Fancy That!

Facts to make you go“WOW!”

◆ Sleeping through the night only became common during the last 200 years. Before then people had “first” and “second” sleeps, often working or reading in between.

◆ A CANDLE FLAME IN SPACE WILL APPEAR BLUE AND ROUND, DUE TO LACK OF GRAVITY.

◆ The may tree now blossoms in the middle of the month, rather than at the beginning, due to changes made to the Gregorian calendar in 1752.

◆ ACCORDING TO OLD SUPERSTITIONS, YOU SHOULD NOT BUY A BROOM, WASH BLANKETS OR GET MARRIED IN MAY: “MARRY IN MAY AND YOU’LL RUE THE DAY”.

WOW! One tablespoon of soil has more microorganisms than there are people on earth.

◆ In the nursery rhyme Here we go gathering nuts in May, the word nuts was probably a corruption of knots, meaning bunches of flowers.

WOW! A GROUP OF PORCUPINES IS KNOWN AS A PRICKLE OF PORCUPINES!

◆ The may tree or hawthorn is the origin of the Maypole as well as the phrase “Ne’er cast a clout till May be out” – referring not to the end of the month, but to the opening of the flowers.

◆ May, from the Latin Maius, is named after Maia, a Roman goddess of growth. ◆ LEFT-HANDED PEOPLE TEND TO CHEW THEIR FOOD ON THE RIGHT SIDE, WHILE RIGHT HANDERS CHEW ON THE LEFT SIDE.

◆ NO ONE KNOWS WHO INVENTED THE FIRE HYDRANT, BECAUSE IN 1836 THE US PATENT OFFICE WAS DESTROYED IN A FIRE!

◆ In the UK, May is National Asparagus Month, National Share-a-Story Month, and National Burger Month.

◆ A STUDY OF 40,000 PEOPLE SHOWED THAT PEOPLE BORN IN MAY THINK THEMSELVES LUCKIER THAN THOSE BORN IN ANY OTHER MONTH.

◆ The average person spends 6 months of their life waiting for a red traffic light to turn to green.

Sharks kill fewer than 10 people per year. Humans kill about 100 million sharks per year

A human brain operates on about 15 watts of electricity

New York drifts about an inch further away from London every year, because of the movement of tectonic plates

The sun moves at 220km per second and is 4.6 billion years old