Mental Floss

Last Christmas, my Uncle Tim drew my name in the annual Christmas drawing of names for presents. Since we share a love of all things trivial, he gave me a subscription to a magazine called Mental Floss. I have loved this magazine- partly because it has nothing to do with food or parenting- and I wanted to share with you 10 things I learned in my last edition of Mental Floss (Sept-Oct 08).
1. The longest jellyfish on record measured 160 feet- more than half the length of a football field.
2. I already knew that our longtime Senator Strom Thurmond set the record for the longest individual filibuster but I learned that a speaker isn't allowed to walk away from the podium- not even to go to the bathroom- so Strom hit the steam room beforehand to sweat out all his excess fluid. He lasted 24 hours 18 min before asking for the bathroom key!
3. Adidas and Puma were founded by competing brothers.
4. One of my favorite campaign slogans is "We Polked you in '44, we shall Pierce you in '52." Pierce won.
5. Walter Mondale's 1984 slogan was "America Needs a Change." Unfortunately for Mondale, Reagan won 49 of the 50 states.
6. Ukraine has a 99.4% literacy rate.
7. KFC's slogan in China is translated as "Eat your fingers off!" (Michelle, Sb- is this true?)
8. Actress Robin Givens married tennis coach Svetozar Marinkovic in 1997, but they separated later the same day.
9. There was a Bible printed in 1631 dubbed "Wicked Bible" b/c the printers forgot a not and printed "Thou shalt commit adultery."
10. The printers of that Bible were executed.