Useless facts

[Markus]

Hey folks,

let's gather some useless knowledge here, just for fun. I'll start with this fact:

Some flower fragrances contain traces of Indole, and the substance is used in perfumes.

I had a weird experience this summer: Between fields I thought I was smelling flowers, only to learn later that in fact it was strongly diluted dung odour. Now I stumbled across the fact that traces of Indole, one of the substances responsible for the odour of faeces, are common in flower fragrances and that the substance is perceived as flowery in very low concentrations. Noone really needs to know, but I think it's a fun fact.

Cheers!

Markus

[Loke]

My humble contribution.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpEnFwiqdx8

  yo yo yo

[Markus]

That's a good one, Loke - thanks!

[The One]

An extremely interesting, but ultimately useless fact:
At the start of World War I, none of the participating forces issued metal helmets to their troops. The first helmets were designed and issued after it was noticed that there was a significant number of head wounds inflicted on the soldiers in the trenches that were caused by exploding shrapnel overhead.

And another:
1 Googol is an actual number. It's value is expressed as 1.0 × 10^100 in scientific notation.

[Markus]

Computer keyboards are more contaminated by germs than toilet seats, but even keyboards are nothing compared to dish-sponges.

[The One]

About 665 million people in India have no access to toilets and do their business in the open.

[Lady Sa'iltu]

In Oymyakom winters are extrime cold with average temperatures dropping below -40*C, but the record is -67.7*C. The highest temperature took its place in Libya in 1922 andit was +58*C.