



Don't Believe It or Do A compendium of unusual but true facts.

(ISO 9001 certified) By Pat Niesink, Brian Ross, Mike Cramer, Peter Hudyma.







97.3% of all Internet traffic consists of the word "sucks".

The Professor and Mary-Ann were conjoined.

No building taller than 500 feet has ever been made entirely out of pudding. (If you think you see one, just remember that it's NOT A BUILDING.)

The song "Footloose" by Kenny Loggins is the only song ever recorded which cannot be played backwards. If condiments were people, Vinegar and Relish would be feudin'.

Jerry Springer has a pathological fear of lungs.

By far the greatest number of calls received by the police in southern California are requests for tickets to the sitcom "Mad About You".

The most common phrase in the Old Testament is "Depeche Mode". In the New Testament, it is "A Flock of Seagulls".

Contrary to popular belief, the Titanic never hit an iceberg and sank in 1912. Rather, it sailed successfully to New York City many times. It was finally decommissioned in 1978 and converted into a pinball arcade.

The Queen of England is neither a queen, nor is she English. It is a fungus.

In February 1962, Mrs E Ferguson-Bum discovered a potato that looks like Richard Nixon.

Those aren't raisins in Raisin Bran.

98% of people surveyed hated the itching. However, 50% didn't mind the swelling.

A potato chip that looks like Mel Tillis was discovered by an anonymous contributor sometime between 1972-1974.

On August 15, 1462, after a prolonged search, Cardinal Giovanni Petrucchio of Milan succeeded in finding a turnip that looked exactly like Sally Struthers.

World War II mysteriously ended when an American soldier in Belgium uttered the word "Chilliwack" to a German soldier. All fighting in the European theatre abruptly ceased at that exact moment.

Mrs R.T. Necronomicon of Princeton, New Jersey, discovered a potato in her garden that looked totally unlike Kirk Douglas.

Inadvertently locked up in the Silver Spoon Casino after its closing night in 1948, custodian Thomas Tallis proceeded to eat the remaining furniture and effects left in the casino in order to survive. He was discovered alive and well in the casino in 1952, and had gained a healthy 25 pounds.

The human genetic code is an anagram for the recipe to Uncle Ben's Rice Surprise.

If you extract a core sample from a Presbyterian and count the rings, you'll be arrested.

Properly speaking, Mt Everest is only the top 3" of the peak -- the rest is a pile of laundry abandoned by pagan hordes.

When you paint, you are actually removing color from a parallel universe.

In 1987, a Mrs. Wanda Matchik-Powers discovered a clove of garlic that smelled exactly like John Chancellor.

Most books of the New Testament were written to impress girls.

It is now exactly 2:47 P.M.

The three most common elements in the universe are hydrogen, chocolate and pita.

One of WWII's most notorious war criminals served 25 years in Spandau prison after being found guilty during the Nuremberg Trials. He then immigrated to California, and began a successful film career. His name: Bert Convy.

Michelangelo's "David" is actually an oddly-shaped potato.

Economists now can trace the primary cause of the Great Depression of the 1930's to the discovery, in rural Oregon in late 1929, of a potato that looked exactly like Charles Lindbergh.

In 1987, the Swedish government legislated that the verb "bjorden" would have dual meanings: "to spit" and "to vomit." That same year, Swedish dentists bought more than 14 million mops.

Photons tickle.

Counterfeit nipples flooded mainland China in 1876.

The voice of Gumby in the 1960's children's television series was performed by US secretary of state Henry Kissinger.

You don't have to pay money for retail goods in stores. On the contrary, the prices on the tabs are the amounts the store owes to you if you take the items off their hands. This almost never happens, however, due to an historical misunderstanding.

If you examine a blade of grass near the stem, close to the ground, you will see on it two miniature eyes and a mouth.

The following fortune cookie message was found by Mrs T Gilliam on November 30, 1983: " -% A".

Kidney-shaped pool transplants have doubled since the early 90's.

The A&W Root Bear is not a potato. It is a marmoset.

Since WWII, two out of three Presidential candidates have never seen furniture.

Three's Company was based on a Greek tragedy by Xylanthropes. Pythagoras dabbled in the theatre, and was renowned for his portrayal of Mrs Roper.

On June 29 1997, Bobby Flicka and Sam Jessop bicycled on some trails in a park near their home for an hour before dinner.

The Honda Accord is known as the "saltiest" car amongst west African dealerships. It is illegal to call a Honda "salty" in Portugal.

The order of letters in the alphabet is controlled by Mrs G Peterson of Wichita, Kansas. She is also the chairwoman of the North Wichita Methodist Woman's Quilting Club.

Don't bother to enter your feet in a foot beauty pageant if Greg Freddy of Nome, Alaska is involved. For Mr Freddy has won the "Sexiest Feet of a Senior Citizen" title for 6 straight years running.

According to the American Census Bureau, 3 out of every 4 adult males harbors a secret desire to eat their own teeth.

Nostradamus correctly predicted the rise of Henry Winkler, but incorrectly predicted that he would portray either Richie or Potsie.

During the Great Metal Shortage of the 1830s, ceramic jars filled with young fleas were an accepted form of currency in northern Europe.

The entire government of China operates out of a single basement apartment in the suburbs of Beijing.

Of all the elements in the periodic table, Francium is least likely to cause a car accident.

All her life, Cleopatra refused to wear spandex.

Greta Garbo was actually a fire hydrant. She was operated by seven puppeteers, her voice was supplied by the talented Mae Questel, and her almost lifelike exterior was designed by renowned Hollywood inventor Hedy Lamarr. Once, during the filming of Ninotchka, filming had to be temporarily interrupted when Ms. Garbo was used to extinguish a small fire in a wastepaper basket. Also, Marilyn Monroe was a Q-Tip.

On Feb 21, Turkish archeologists claimed that they had unearthed the very first human orgasm. After they cleaned it, however, they discovered that it was just a twig.

On Mar 3 the same Turkish archeologists discovered what may prove to be the world's first 5lb clump of dirt. They refuse to clean it.

Shoe scientist Herb Hanson was the inventor of the original "loafer", which consisted of inserting each foot in a freshly baked loaf of bread.

The numbers 5 and 6 are actually reversed.

Alex Trebek found a potato gardner whose head looks like a potato chip.

Laugh as we may about Rita MacNeil's digestive system, we will all end up in it one day.

Every fifth tourist to Denmark is designated an official "Enemy of the State", and treated accordingly.

Pharmacists in Florida are legally required to grow their fingernails and teeth in order to be able to provide emergency vampire duty, should the need arise.

NASA delayed the television signal of Neil Armstrong's first walk on the moon by 30 seconds, in order to provide a studio voice-over with the famous "One small step for man ...." speech. Armstrong's actual message was, "Well, here I am on the moon."

The official definition of the English word 'piebald' is updated every 2 years to reflect changing political conditions.

In lieu of a designated national flag, the residents of Ecuador proudly massage their feet with gravy.

Urinals were originally designed to dispense urine.

Locked naked in prison cells, Harry Houdini astounded and delighted everyone with his miraculous escapes. His secret? A 14 pound roll of shag carpet cleverly hidden under his left eyelid.

The national sport of Wales is anti-golf, which involves taking an anti-golf ball out of a hole on a green, and then repeatedly wacking the ball with a club in random directions until it's hopelessly lost in the brush.

Ben Kingston of Nashville, Tennessee, has won the state lottery 10 times in succession. His trick was to set his watch ahead by 4 hours exactly 3.5 hours before the numbers were called, record the winning numbers, and then set his watch back 4 hours and play the winning numbers. The Tennessee State Lottery Commission has since banned such forms of cheating.

It doesn't mean much to people if it doesn't have a rhythm which can be construed to have a swinging beat.

The city of Butte, Montana, was carved out of a hardy potato.

The civic pastime of Lourdes, France, is to dress cats in tiny Charlie Chaplin costumes and parade them in the streets every weekend.

Texas is the only landlocked American state to have a salt-water coast.

Other than the Great Wall of China, the only man-made structure visible from low Earth orbit is a small lawnmower owned by Charles Ferguson of Boise, Idaho.

Capitalism was overthrown in Italy in 1955, and briefly replaced with a small piece of wood.

According to his diaries, Louis Pasteur's goal in creating a process to make milk safer to drink was spurred by his secret desire to smear Benjamin Disraeli with a lickably disease-free form of whipped cream.

Long-legged people are able to tapdance at the speed of light. One odd effect is that time dilation can result in feet that are physiologically younger than the dancer's brain. Hans Gabergruden of Germany, for example, has been touring Europe for the last 87 years, although his upper body was pronounced dead in 1952.

Linguists have discovered a new vowel. It's formed by pronouncing the word "trout" while licking the inside of your neck.

The tiny Corsican Green Lizard eats its own weight in insects every day. Not a single milligram more or less, mind you - but precisely its own exact weight.

Officers in the Spanish army converse in a secret code by making clicking sounds with their skin.

The Pyramids are actually the fossilized remains of conveniently-shaped dinosaurs.

The popular singer Alanis Morissette owes her unique vocal style to an allergic reaction to pickled dodo eggs.

"Cabin fever" was responsible for the invention of the phrase "cabin fever".

The so-called Cydonia "face on Mars" is actually nothing more than a giant face carved into the Martian rock by a highly advanced civilisation.

The national dish of British Guyana is hypnosis.

Leather is meat you wear.

The last mighty dinosaur, a Tyrannosaurus Rex, was killed by an errant German bomb during the blitz on London in 1942, rendering the species extinct.

There's a town in France where people wear no pants.

Novelist Stephen King is also reknown as a lovely ballerina.

To "assume" makes an ass out of you and me.

French famous person Napolean Bonaparte was both the oldest surviving participant of the American Civil War, and the youngest professional baseball player, retiring from the LA Dodgers in 1974.

The reason you have never seen Johnny Carson and Bob Saget together in a room is because Carson hates Saget.

The word "parking" is a pronoun.

Human feces is considered a delicacy in Iceland, while Steinway grand pianos are treated as filthy crap.

Step on a crack and break your mother's back.

The first potato chip was invented when Rita MacNeil accidentally sat on a potato in 1960. Although too carbonized to be edible, it gave some entrepreneurs ideas. By the way, the potato looked somewhat like Winston Churchill.

The reason that theatres sell popcorn and candy in the lobbies is because they can sell these foods for far more money than they paid to originally purchase them, thus increasing the profits for the establishment.

If you collected all the lost and discarded pennies in the world, your fingers would stink.

The human bladder can hold 180L of fluid. But not all at once.

It is improper to begin a letter to the Queen Mum with the salutation "Dear Dainty Little Bastard."

Closets are just very small rooms.

The popular 60's singing combo The Mammas And The Papas eventually broke up in 1970 due to internal tension caused by the fact that all four members of the group wanted to have sex with Michelle Phillips.

The video game 'Pac Man', is based on an actual incident.

The word 'hippopotamus' is derived from the Latin phrase, 'No, that is not a hippopotamus'.

The national anthem of the ancient Babylonian civilization was 'Help Me, Rhonda'.

Battleship, the classic strategy game, was inspired by a Mediterranean handpuppet atrocity.

Passing gas in concentric circles is difficult when Phil Hartman is constantly rearranging your livingroom furniture.

If you run westward at the speed of sound, you'll collide with the moon.

In a parallel universe, it is illegal to import images of people avoiding sex.

In yet another parallel universe, U2 is actually Ted Kennedy basting a hanky.

Yawning into a dog's urethra can reduce your blood pressure.

On April 3, 1979, Thomas Gangreline of Wichita discovered a President of the United States that doesn't look like a potato.

Cooking is a complicated way to heat up food.

The average person spends about 12% of their lifetime going to the bathroom, and another 13% of their lifetime talking about it.

You can't buy beer, but you can rent it.

Westminster Abbey tastes "sweet and sour".

The oldest mummified potato is the great Potato of Cheops, dating about 3800 years old. It looks vaguely like Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Real estate is so scarce in Japan that washrooms are illegal. Dutiful citizens wear portable urinals, secured to the midriff with stylish postmodern straps. Cultural icons such as Bimiko (loosely translated as "he's fun but not hasty 3D urinal hero") popularize the practice. The government boldly reports that the time saved by spontaneous urination has increased workplace productivity by 12%. The World Health Organization, however, has expressed some concern: Since the urinals drain onto the ground, most public areas, particularly crowded shopping malls, have become acrid, disease-ridden cesspools.

Contrary to recent new reports, Frank Sinatra did not die. Rather, he is alive and well.

Contrary to popular belief, the 1960's television series "Star Trek" is complete fiction. The characters in the show are played by actors, and the U.S.S. Enterprise does not exist. The crews of Voyager and Deep Space 9 could not be reached for comment.

School buses are actually hollowed-out insects retrofitted with seats.

Contrary to popular belief, the Atlantic Ocean does not exist. Rather, it is really the Pacific Ocean, which stretches down and around South America.

Elvis Costello is the only male recording artist in the UK who can juggle teacups with his armpits.

"K" is the shortest antonym in the English language.

Hiccups are lung orgasms.

The tallest midget is shorter than the fattest thin man.

If you arranged the alphabet chronologically, 'Q' would be the seventh letter.

Defecation is actually caused by a virus. Uninfected people usually explode after about 6 months of age.

God exists. However, he has no supernatural powers, and he did not create the Universe. He was born in 1957, and currently lives in a small one-bedroom apartment in Vienna. His name is Klaus.

Remember the television show "Who's The Boss"? No you don't.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Don Rickles has never been convicted of cannibalism.

When it was first invented, pizza was originally intended to be used as a writing implement.

Watch out for people from Cleveland, Ohio -- they are all vicious killers.

Contrary to popular scientific belief, most mammals do not give milk. It has to be taken from them.

Millions of years ago, the Earth's moon was Ronald G. Hartwell of Manchester, England.

If you could train a monkey to pour maple syrup on pancakes, it would be the best thing ever.

"Miami Vice" is Swedish for "Gravy Injections".

Ducks cannot be photographed, and nobody knows why.

During his entire 20-year conquest of the Americas, Spanish conquistador Cortes' entire vocabulary consisted of the word "despedida", which is Spanish for "bounce". His comrades misinterpreted this to mean, "Exterminate the native population."

The shortest sensible English sentence is, "Please adjust the Agnes Moorehead."

23 times 7 equals 5, on Saturn's moon Triton.

Ink is the sole cause of human aging.

A duck's quack produces fission in granite, and nobody knows why.

Sitting is a capital offense in Austria.

If you ferment a solution of chlorine and pulverized Aspirin, you will produce rubberized platinum.

Witches were commonly burned in medieval England whenever potatos were harvested that reminded people of things.

Guinness Book of World Records recently declared that the world's most dangerous hobby is "biker butt squeezing", or BBS. This exclusive but lethal pastime requires the practitioner to furtively approach a motorcycle gang member from behind, grab his buttocks with both hands, and squeeze firmly for as long as possible. Most BBS enthusiasts have a lifespan of less than 10 minutes after beginning this most deadly of pursuits. The "most dangerous hobby" label was last week confirmed by a nearly unanimous vote by the United Nations, the only dissenting votes being from Iraq and Portugal.

The famous presidential likenesses on Mount Rushmore are entirely the accidental result of wind and water erosion over tens of thousands of years. It was an unbelievably lucky coincidence that the United States happened to have four presidents who looked remarkably similar to these natural erosions. This fortunate accident for the USA so bothered Queen Victoria that she locked herself in her room for a full three hours. Incidentally, ten thousand years ago, Rushmore looked like four delicious potatos.

For years, Hollywood insiders have known that the best way to become lifelong friends with actor Don Knots is to throw handfuls of Bisquick pancake mix into his face. On the other hand, it has been known to piss off Johnny Carson.

Millions of tourists have flocked to Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum in London, England. However, surprisingly few people have visited her cousin's museum, Harvey Tussaud's Museum of Flesh Candles. As his establishment's title suggests, Mr Tussaud gained notoriety by making candles from the flesh and fat of dead celebrities.

If you step on crack, you won't break your mother's back. Rather, the FBI and US Dept of Food and Narcotics may consficate your shoes.

If you are visiting Austria, under no circumstances should you say "thank you" to a native Austrian. For Austrian customs dictate that the individual will be forced to respond with an elaborate "your welcome" ceremony. The lengthy three-day ritual involves wasps, irritable poodles, napalm and stilts, amongst other things.

The Beatles are the most Beatle-like band ever to emerge from England.

In Bulgarian churches, the Virgin Mary has been replaced by Mrs Kravitz from Bewitched.

If hosting a Hollywood dinner party, never serve prunes, or dishes with prunes as a primary ingredient, to Buddy Ebsen. For he already takes medication to help his regularity.

Wayne Gretzsky is called "The Great One" because he manages to touch Janet Jone's bum a few times every year.

By now most people have heard of the famous prediction of Thomas Watson, head of IBM, who said in 1943: "I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." Amusingly shortsighted though his comment was, he is by no means the only great thinker to have missed the mark completely when it came to predicting the future of computers. Nostradamus, for instance, badly misspelled the word "iMac" numerous times in his works. Another notable example was the Greek philosopher Aristotle, who wrote in his "Organon" in 350 BCE that the MicroChannel architecture bus would become the industry standard for PC's by 1997.

???