12 Oddly Articulate Bits of Trivia We Found Spelled Out in Spiderwebs Above Our Now-Beloved Pet Hog
Okay, first of all, we want to get out ahead of the rumors — yes, our wicked uncle was raising this adorable and precocious pig for slaughter. But we had nothing to do with that — in fact, we saved its life! It was the runt of the litter, and papa said it was going to die anyway, so we took it in and cared for it until it grew big and strong.
Anyway, a few weeks go by and we start seeing these really long, insightful, honestly very funny bits of trivia intricately woven all around the pigsty. Stuff about Bob Barker and Betty White beefing for half a decade… Italy secretly feeding everyone microchips… Coolio’s final appearance on Futurama. Some truly mind-blowing stuff, written in a way that’s informative, yet accessible. Not too verbose at all.
Naturally, we attributed these tidbits to said pig, fumigated the sty (overrun with spiders), and compiled them into this handy list for you all to enjoy!
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Rip Torn Once Broke Into a Bank and Confronted Cops With a Loaded Gun
In 2010, Torn got so drunk that he broke into a bank, having mistook it for his apartment (which was over a mile away). He fell asleep there, with a pistol, and started yelling at cops to get out of his house when they inevitably showed up. (Source)
The Man Who Requested a Year-Long Moratorium on Sex
Botanist John Hill had a beef with The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge. Specifically, over its acceptance of the theory that sperm weren’t cells, but fully formed, tiny li’l guys that just needed to hang out in a vagina for nine months. He wrote letters to the Society, under the pseudonym of a fake physician, describing a rash of immaculate conceptions caused by tiny sperm-sized men. He begged the king to declare a temporary ban on sex until they could figure out what was going on. (Source)
A Child’s Skeleton Was Found in an Ancient Eagle’s Graveyard
The skull of a young Australopithecus africanus (a human ancestor) was found among a bunch of other animal bones. They were thought to have all been the prey of some big cat, until they noticed talon marks on the skulls, likely left by some ancient gigantic eagle that we have yet to find the remains of. (Source)
Italy Is Microchipping Fancy Folks
Like expensive cheese? You may swallow a microchip without knowing it. Italian cheesemongers are putting “edible” microchips in their cheese in order to verify authenticity and combat the insidious practice of fancy parmesan counterfeiting. Now, what does “edible” mean, exactly? The chips are about the size of a grain of sand, so they’re just kinda hoping you don’t notice as they enter or exit you. (Source)
Tuskegee: One City, Two Racist Opuses
People often get two distinct embarrassing chapters in American history confused: the Tuskegee Airmen and the Tuskegee Experiment. The former were a group of all-Black fighter and bomber pilots that were held to near-impossible standards in the hopes of disqualifying them from service — but they instead became an elite badass supergroup who left racists with no argument for keeping the U.S. military segregated. The latter was a 40-year study in which the CDC refused to treat Black people who had syphilis with penicillin, in order to study the long-term effects of the disease. (Source)
The Bald Eagle Doesn’t Sound Like That
The classic SKREEE you hear accompanying a bald eagle on TV and in movies is a far cry from the desperate seagull chirp they actually make. But Americans demand a more dignified yawp from their emblematic scavenger, so audio engineers have settled on that badass screech. It’s like a patriotic Wilhelm scream. (Source)
The ‘Malleus Maleficarum’ Is an Ancient, Evil Erectile Dysfunction Commercial
A big part of this 1486 manual on the detection and management of witches was dedicated to reassuring dudes that if their dong didn’t work — or somehow went missing — a witch had either cursed it, or stashed it in a bird’s nest. The cure usually involved the brutal murder of innocent women. (Source)
Bob Barker and Betty White Beefed Over an Elephant
In 2009, an elephant at the L.A. Zoo was given the okay to be transferred to an elephant sanctuary. Barker was in favor of the move, but White thought the zoo was the best home for him. Barker called White his “sworn enemy,” but they found common ground a few years later when a rich dentist murdered Cecil the Lion. (Source)
Coolio’s Final Episode of ‘Futurama’ Is Out
When Coolio passed away suddenly in 2022, fans felt a tiny bit of solace when they found out he had recorded his parts for the revival of Kwanzaa-Bot shortly before he died. His Season 11 episode, “I Know What You Did Next X-Mas,” is out now on Hulu. (Source)
Solar Eclipses Are a Literal Miracle
The odds that the moon should take up almost exactly as much space in our sky as the sun does, despite their near-unfathomable difference in size, are astronomically low. The fact that their sizes and distances from the Earth are just the right ratio is an incredible, unexplained coincidence. (Source)
The Caribbean Wormhole
The Caribbean Sea has been found to emit a mysterious hum that’s detectable from space. It’s a subaquatic vibration too low for humans to hear, but scientists have decided our best chance of understanding this thing is to call it a “whistle.” It happens when westward-moving waves cause a vibration at the bottom of the basin that forms the sea. What’s especially odd is that the whistling will stop when the current hits the western boundary of the sea — but start back up again 120 days later on the eastern boundary, as if it were looping through a huge set of portals. (Source)
Outdoor Cats Are Decimating Ecosystems
One study found that cats kill over two billion birds in the U.S. every year — statistically speaking, pet cats are a lot worse for birds than oil spills. Even in places where feral cats are well-fed by people, those cats will keep murdering native wildlife for fun. (Source)
