Uncle John’s Did You Know? Read online

  Uncle John’s Did You Know?

  Bathroom Readers’ Institute

  * * *

  * * *

  by the

  Bathroom Readers’

  Institute

  Bathroom Readers’Press

  Ashland, Oregon

  UNCLE JOHN’S

  DID YOU KNOW…?

  BATHROOM READER®

  FOR KIDS ONLY

  © 2006 by the Bathroom Readers’ Press (a division of Portable Press). All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. “Bathroom Reader,” “Bathroom Readers’ Institute,” and “Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader for Kids Only” are registered trademarks of Baker & Taylor. All rights reserved.

  For information, write:

  Bathroom Readers’ Institute

  P.O. Box 1117, Ashland, OR 97520

  www.bathroomreader.com

  Interior design/illustration and cover illustration:

  Patrick Merrell

  (www.Patrick.merrell.org)

  Cover design:

  Michael Brunsfeld

  ([email protected])

  Uncle John’s Did You Know…?

  Bathroom Reader For Kids Only

  by the Bathroom Readers’ Institute

  ISBN-13: 978-1-60710-687-6

  E-book Edition: October 2012

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  READERS’ RAVES

  Here’s what our faithful fans have to say about Uncle John’s Bathroom Readers.

  “I love Bathroom Readers! They’re interesting and funny. I can’t stop reading them.”

  —Kevin

  “I’m a teacher, and every morning I put a factoid from your books on the board. I have kids who can’t wait to get to class to see what weird thing is on the board that day. You are a never-ending source of information and enjoyment. Thank you.”

  —Elly

  “I have been a fan of the Bathroom Reader for over a decade now. Maybe one day there will be a whole course on bathroom reading, and quoting your text will not only be expected and encouraged, but required!!!”

  —Jessica

  “Your books are awesome!! (‘Meow,’ my cat agrees.) I have two books, Uncle John’s Top Secret Bathroom Reader For Kids Only and Uncle John’s Puzzle Book. Both of them have helped improve my grades by 20%!”

  —Veronica

  “I really love your Bathroom Reader For Kids Only. I’m 12, and I read it everywhere (not just in the bathroom!). I like it so much.”

  —Beka

  THANK YOU!

  The Bathroom Readers’ Institute thanks those people whose help has made this book possible.

  Gordon Javna

  Amy Miller

  Patrick Merrell

  Stephanie Spadaccini

  Angie Kern

  Maggie McLaughlin

  Brian Boone

  Thom Little

  Jay Newman

  Julia Papps

  Lorraine Bodger

  Zackery Weimer

  David Battino

  Claudia Bauer

  Michael Brunsfeld

  Connie Vazquez

  Dan Schmitz

  Judy Hadlock

  John Dollison

  Jennifer Thornton

  Raincoast Books

  Banta Book Group

  Terri Dunkley

  Sydney Stanley

  JoAnn Padgett

  Scarab Media

  Steven Style Group

  Jennifer Payne

  Melinda Allman

  Laurel, Mana, Dylan, and Chandra

  Matthew Furber

  Shobha Grace

  Gideon and Sam

  Porter the Wonder Dog

  Thomas Crapper

  * * *

  While at sea, the crews of United States nuclear-powered submarines wear blue coveralls called “poopie-suits.”

  TABLE OF

  CONTENTS

  CREATURES GREAT

  On Safari

  Here, Doggie

  Big Cats

  Elephant-itis

  Gorillas

  Horsing Around

  House Pets

  Penguins

  On Safari

  Planet of the Apes

  Here, Doggie

  The Poop on Pigs

  Shark Attack!

  BODY WISE

  Everybody’s Body

  Healthy Living

  Hair All Over

  Remarkable Bodies

  Everybody’s Body

  The Better to Bite You With

  EEEWWW!

  That’s Disgusting!

  Odorama

  That’s More Disgusting!

  That’s the Most Disgusting

  AROUND THE HOUSE

  The Clothes Closet

  Pencil Us In

  Bathroom News

  WORLDLY MATTERS

  Around the World

  Geographical Records

  Flags

  All Over the Map

  Official Languages

  Post It

  Name Power

  Education

  Geography

  DESTINATION: EARTH

  All About Earth

  Volcanoes

  The Himalayas

  Landmarks

  Precious!

  Trees

  Earthquake!

  Extreme World

  Ecology

  The Seven Natural Wonders of the World

  Plant You Now, Dig You Later

  More About Earth

  JUST WEIRD

  Freaks of Nature

  Loony Lawsuits

  Lost & Found

  Strange Museums

  Loony Laws

  The End

  Silly World Records

  WORDPLAY

  English

  Alphabet Soup

  Word-ology

  Tongue Twisters

  IMAS

  Palindromes

  Foreign Tongue Twisters

  Winning Words

  Tongue Twisters

  Don’t Be a Dafty!

  Word Origins

  Pangrams

  Smart Remarks

  BELIEVE IT

  World Religions

  Strange Superstitions

  Mythology

  Bible Stories

  Mythical Creatures

  Superstitions

  BUILDING BIG

  Man-Made Milestones

  The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World

  Amazing Engineering

  Big Cities

  The Seven Wonders of the Modern World

  The Plane Truth

  FILM, SCREEN & PAGES

  Once Upon a Time

  Sound Effects

  Secret Lives of Fictional Characters

  What’s on TV

  The Written Word

  At the Movies

  Commercial Characters

  Books

  IT’S HISTORY

  It’s Ancient History

  Knights in Shining Armor

  The Warriors

  Kids at Work

  Milestones in History

  The Royals

  Old-Time Occupations

  Words of War

  History Quiz

  FOOD FOR THOUGHT

  Sweet Dreams

  Sugary Stuff

  Food & Drink

  Dear Dairy

  Oh, Honey!

  Cooking Good

  Fast Food

  (Have Some) Candy

  I’ll Drink to That

  It’s a Corny World

  C
ondiments

  Junk Food

  Food, Glorious Food

  Got Milk?

  ANIMAL ACTS

  Amazing Animals

  It’s a Wild World

  Animal Defenses

  Animal Records

  Endangered Species

  Animal Quiz

  Animals in Captivity

  Animals by the Numbers

  It’s a Wild World

  Knots & Skulks

  Fishy Stories

  Hey, Daddy-O!

  Beastly Appetites

  Animal Odds & Ends

  Animal Geography

  It’s a Wild World

  GOOD SPORTS

  The Ancient Olympics

  Baseball Team Names

  Sports by the Numbers

  Hockey Team Names

  Sports Nicknames

  Basketball Team Names

  The Modern Olympics

  Football Team Names

  CUSTOMS AND FADS

  Games

  Happy Holidaze

  Make a Wish

  Rockology

  Amusement Parks

  The Calendar

  Scrabble

  Weird World Holidays

  I Do! I Do!

  FARAWAY FRIENDS

  Japanese Sayings

  Oh, Canada

  Whadaya Say?

  Travel Tips

  Places of Interest

  If You Say So

  Down Under

  You Name It

  Antarctica

  Japanese Language

  Animal Sounds Quiz

  Going Places

  Life in Japan

  Souvenir Shop

  TAKE A NUMBER

  Every 24 Hours

  Studies Show

  Handy Numbers

  Number Ones

  Survey Says

  The Average

  Weights and Measures

  America Numerical

  ART & MUSIC

  Artsy-Fartsy

  Instrumental

  Sing a Song

  Musical Miscellany

  RANDOM FACTS

  Cars by the Numbers

  Crime and Punishment

  Open for Business

  In Living Color

  It’s About Time

  Money Matters

  Odds & Ends

  Helpful Hints

  In Living Color

  Makes Cents

  CREATURES SMALL

  Creepy Quiz

  Reptiles

  A Visit to Microbia

  The Deadliest Snakes

  Antz

  Watch the Birdies

  Spiders

  More Reptiles

  You Bug Me

  Another Visit to Microbia

  SCIENCE MADE FUN

  Adventures in Bubble-Land

  Glug Glug

  We’ve Got Chemistry

  Lots of Energy

  Re-Use It or Lose It

  Evolutionary, Watson!

  Robots

  Space Travelers

  Temperatures

  Outer Space

  The Moon

  Building Blocks

  AMERICANA

  Whatchamacallit, USA

  Las Vegas!

  Average Americans

  On the Map

  American History

  More Wacky Town Names

  THE PEOPLE PAGES

  Last Names

  Not-So-Famous People

  Southpaws Only

  Oh, Baby!

  Ladies & Gentlemen

  Family Ties

  Acting Human

  HOW’S THE WEATHER?

  The Cold Truth

  Weird Weather

  Stormy Weather

  Lightning

  GREETINGS FROM UNCLE

  KNOW-IT-ALL

  Okay, nobody can know everything—not even Uncle John. But it’s fun to know a little about a lot of different subjects. That’s where your faithful friends at the Bathroom Readers’ Institute come in. We love to collect fascinating facts and tantalizing trivia. Then we quiz each other: “Hey, Brian, did you know that you can hear an elephant’s stomach rumble from 200 yards away?” Or, “Hey, Patrick, did you know that only 1% of the water on Earth is drinkable?” Or, “Hey, Stephanie, did you know that spiders sometimes get trapped in their own webs?” We could go on all day (and night) doing that, couldn’t you?

  Hey, what a great idea for a book!

  So here it is: our kooky compendium of weird and wonderful facts—just like the encyclopedia…only fun. Use it to test your teachers, freak out your friends, mesmerize your mom, dazzle your dad, and baffle your brothers and sisters. (You may even feel yourself getting smarter.)

  Happy reading and as always, Go with the Flow!

  Uncle John and the Bathroom Reader Staff

  MAN-MADE

  MILESTONES

  • Hard hats were invented and first used in the building of the Hoover Dam in 1933.

  • The sandals that the Statue of Liberty is wearing are size 879. (They’re about 25 feet long.)

  • The Great Wall of China stretches 1,500 miles and contains almost a billion bricks.

  • On a clear day, you can see four states from the top of Chicago’s Sears Tower: Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Michigan.

  • The Eiffel Tower is repainted every seven years. It takes 60 tons of brown paint to do the job.

  • There’s evidence that after the Pilgrim ship Mayflower sailed from England to America (and back), it was taken apart and made into a barn in England.

  • What kind of stone is Mount Rushmore made of? Granite. It was “carved” mostly with dynamite.

  • Egypt’s Great Sphinx is 260 feet long, 20 feet wide, and 65 feet tall, making it the largest stone statue in the world.

  • While the rest of the world had wheels, the Aztecs had no knowledge of them.

  ENGLISH

  Even if you speak it, there’s still plenty to learn about it.

  • Very few words in English use “en” to pluralize them. Some are: ox (oxen), brother (brethren), child (children), man (men), and woman (women).

  • While many Western languages, such as Spanish, Italian, and French, are Latin-based, English isn’t—it’s mostly derived from German.

  • There are 812 three-letter words in current usage in the English language, and 857 fifteen-letter words.

  • The Brooklyn accent—saying “dese, dem, and dose” for “these, them, and those”—came from the Dutch accent of the original settlers. Want to hear a Brooklyn accent? Just listen to Bugs Bunny.

  • In 1737 Benjamin Franklin made a list of American slang terms for drunkenness—and came up with 228 of them.

  • “Pants” was a dirty word in England in the 1880s.

  • “Dreamt” is the only English word that ends in the letters “mt.”

  • The North American National Scrabble Association recognizes five words worth 392 points—the most anyone can score in a single turn: OXAZEPAM, BEZIQUES, CAZIQUES, MEZQUITS, and MEZQUITE.

  ALL ABOUT

  EARTH

  Some of the things you could tell a visiting Martian about your home planet.

  • Lake Baikal in Russia is the world’s deepest lake—it’s deep enough for five Empire State Buildings to stand in it on top of each other.

  • Millions of years ago, the Earth consisted of one land mass surrounded by a vast ocean. Geologists call the land Pangaea (Greek for “all land”); they call the ocean Panthalassa (“all sea”).

  • Sometime between 180 and 200 million years ago, Pangaea broke into two parts: Laurasia, which consisted of what is now North America, Europe, and part of Asia; and Gondwanaland—what’s now South America, Africa, Australia, India, and Antarctica.

  • Where’s the Earth’s core? Directly under your feet, 4,000 miles down.

  • Tallest mountain on Earth: Not Mt. Everest—it’s Hawaii’s Mauna Kea, which rises 33,476 feet from the floor of the Pa
cific Ocean.

  • Want to travel as fast as a jet plane while standing still? Stand on the equator. The Earth’s spin is greatest there, moving you at more than 1,000 miles per hour.

  • What do you call the tip of a glacier? The snout.

  • The way at which the Earth is tipped on its axis—at an angle of 23 ½°—is what causes the seasons.

  • Scientists think the Earth’s core is hotter than the surface of the Sun.

  • Take a deep breath: If air were liquid, it would form a layer over the Earth about 33 feet deep.

  • Wind blowing against a mountain range can actually speed up or slow down the Earth’s rotation.

  • California’s San Andreas fault is slipping about two inches a year, causing Los Angeles to move closer to San Francisco. At this rate, L.A. will be a San Francisco suburb in about 15 million years.

  • 95% of all life on Earth lives in the range between 300 feet below sea level and 9,000 feet above sea level.

  • It hardly moves, but it accounts for 85% of all life on Earth: It’s plankton, which consists of microscopic plants and animals that float around in the water.

  • About 100 million tons of sand particles travel around the Earth every year, carried by breezes.

  • Here comes the tide: The Atlantic Ocean is getting wider by an inch or more every year.

  • In the last 10,000 years, Niagara Falls has moved about 10 miles upstream. That means that the falls are eroding at the rate of five feet a year.

  • What’s the most abundant element in the Earth’s crust? Oxygen. (Second most abundant: silicon.)

  EVERY 24

  HOURS…

  …without fail, here’s what happens…

  • The Earth travels more than 1.5 million miles in its orbit around the Sun.

  • 2.5 billion adults go to work; 1 billion kids go to school.

  • Lightning strikes 8 million times.

  • The bees of the world make 3,300 tons of honey.

  • Crayola makes 5 million crayons.

  • The world’s humans produce 2.2 billion tons of poop.

  • 200,000 Americans have surgery.

  • Two people in Sri Lanka die from poisonous snakebites.

  • Birthdays are celebrated by 16.5 million people.

  • Americans eat 15 million hamburgers.

  • The chickens of the world lay 2 billion eggs.

  • The Amazon River gushes 8 trillion gallons of water into the Atlantic Ocean.

  • 380,000 babies are born; 145,000 people die.

  IT’S ANCIENT

  HISTORY

  • Ancient Celtic warriors were known to fight naked. From head to toe, their skin was dyed blue.

  • The Arabs didn’t invent Arabic numerals—the Hindus of India did. The numerals were introduced to Europe by way of Arab traders around the 11th century.