80 Fun Facts About Random

Which planet is nicknamed the Red Planet?

The colour comes from iron oxide, essentially rust, in the dust that covers its plains.

How many points is a touchdown worth in American football?

It has been six since 1912; the extra point or two-point conversion is what pushes a score to seven or eight.

What is the main ingredient of hummus?

The word itself is simply Arabic for chickpeas; tahini, lemon juice and garlic do the rest.

Which fictional paper company employs the staff of the US version of The Office?

The Scranton, Pennsylvania branch is watched by a documentary crew that seems to film around the clock.

Which superhero's secret identity is Peter Parker?

Parker got his powers from a radioactive spider bite in 1962, though the comic panel mistakenly called the spider an insect.

Who wrote The Hobbit?

He later made retrospective tweaks to the book so it would sit comfortably alongside The Lord of the Rings.

What is the name of Batman's butler?

He first appeared in Batman #16 in 1943 and has since served as legal guardian, medic and surrogate father to Bruce Wayne.

Which capital city is the coldest in the world by average yearly temperature?

Mongolia's capital sits at about 1,350 metres in a valley that traps bitterly cold winter air.

On which planet are the strongest sustained winds in the Solar System, reaching around 2,100 km/h?

It receives only about 40 percent of the sunlight Uranus gets, yet its internal heat still powers the fastest planetary winds known.

What is the only Spanish-speaking country in Africa?

The former colony of Spanish Guinea sits on the Gulf of Guinea; its name refers to its position near the Equator.

Which was the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature?

The 2001 DreamWorks film was also the first animated film ever placed on the American Film Institute's top-ten list for a year.

Which element has the symbol W, taken from its German name Wolfram?

Its ores scheelite and wolframite give it the highest melting point of any metal, which is why it worked in incandescent bulb filaments.

In which city were Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie assassinated in June 1914?

The shooter, Gavrilo Princip, was a Bosnian Serb student; the killings set off the July Crisis and the First World War.

Which sauce takes its name from a coastal town in Thailand where it was first produced in 1932?

La-Orr Suwanprasop, a native of Si Racha who had moved to Bangkok, began selling her chilli sauce that year.

What is the term for a group of owls?

The name comes from the language of English venery, the medieval hunting vocabulary that gave animals their collective nouns.

Which programming language is named after a British comedy troupe?

Its documentation carries on the joke, using 'spam' and 'eggs' as placeholder names instead of the usual 'foo' and 'bar'.

Which Italian island is the largest in the Mediterranean Sea?

It is also the most populous island in the Mediterranean, with over 4.7 million people and Europe's largest active volcano, Etna.

Who was the first person to lead a party to the South Pole, arriving on 14 December 1911?

He had picked up polar survival skills years earlier from the Netsilik Inuit while navigating the Northwest Passage.

Which Grand Slam tournament is played on clay courts?

It is the only major on clay, and its long rallies make it widely regarded as the most physically demanding tournament in tennis.

What is the best-selling album of all time, with an estimated 70 million copies sold?

Sales took off after Michael Jackson debuted the moonwalk on the Motown 25 TV special in 1983.

How many chromosomes does a typical human body cell contain?

That is 22 pairs of autosomes plus one pair of sex chromosomes; egg and sperm cells carry just one set of 23.

Which explosive, patented in 1867, made the founder of the Nobel Prizes his fortune?

Nobel's invention tamed nitroglycerin into a form that was easier and safer to handle, making him hugely rich.

Which team became the first to win 18 NBA championships, in 2024?

Boston's 2024 title took them to 18, one clear of the Lakers; eight of those came in a row between 1959 and 1966, the longest streak in league history.

Which post-impressionist painter severed part of his own left ear with a razor in December 1888?

The episode followed a confrontation with Paul Gauguin; in the decade that followed he produced around 2,100 artworks.

Besides Vienna, Bratislava and Budapest, which fourth national capital does the Danube flow through?

After leaving the Serbian capital the river forms much of the Romania-Bulgaria border before reaching the Black Sea.

Which Levantine or Turkish dessert is made from layers of filo pastry, chopped nuts and syrup or honey?

Melted butter brushed between the paper-thin sheets is what gives it its distinctive crisp, layered texture.

What is the highest possible break in a normal frame of snooker?

It means potting all 15 reds with 15 blacks, then all the colours; a free ball can push a break to 155, which has happened only twice in professional play.

Which is the tallest and heaviest of all living penguin species?

It lives only in Antarctica, where males incubate a single egg on their feet through the polar winter.

Which Canadian author wrote the 1985 dystopian novel The Handmaid's Tale?

She has said nothing in Gilead was invented from scratch: every practice in the book had a real historical precedent somewhere.

Which sultan's 46-year reign, from 1520 to 1566, was the longest of any Ottoman ruler?

Under him the empire's population reached at least 25 million and its fleet dominated from the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf.

Which company did Paul Allen co-found with his childhood friend Bill Gates in 1975?

Allen stepped back from day-to-day work in 1983 after a Hodgkin lymphoma diagnosis but stayed on the board as vice-chairman.

Which is the oldest tennis tournament in the world, played on outdoor grass since 1877?

It was billed as the World Grass Court Championships from 1912 to 1924 and is the only major still played on grass.

What is the sole official language of Suriname?

The South American country was a Dutch plantation colony until independence in 1975 and has around 14 local languages besides.

Which hormone, produced by beta cells in the pancreas, lowers blood glucose?

Its neighbouring alpha cells release glucagon, which does the opposite job when blood sugar dips.

Which Fleetwood Mac album, released in February 1977, is widely considered the band's magnum opus?

It was recorded while the band members' relationships were falling apart, which is exactly what most of its songs are about.

What is the least populous state capital in the United States?

Vermont's seat of government is so hilly that it has been called a city on seven hills, like Rome, only much smaller.

Which unit is the SI base unit of electric current?

Since 2019 it has been defined by fixing the value of the elementary charge, rather than by the force between two parallel wires.

Whose tomb was discovered in the Valley of the Kings in 1922 by a team led by Howard Carter?

Carter's patron was George Herbert, the 5th Earl of Carnarvon, who had funded the digs since 1907.

Which sparkling wine may only carry its name if made in one designated region of north-east France?

The Romans were the first to plant vines there; the still wines of the region were known long before the bubbles.

Which board game's weapons include a candlestick, a rope and a lead pipe?

North American editions call it Clue and swap the dagger for a knife and the spanner for a wrench.

Which chess piece moves only along diagonals?

Because of that, each one stays on the same colour of square for the entire game.

Which nearest star to Earth after the Sun lies about 4.25 light-years away in Centaurus?

It has held the title of closest star for around 32,000 years and will keep it for roughly 25,000 more.

Salvador Dali's 1931 painting of melting clocks is called what?

Dali said it grew out of his theory of 'softness' and 'hardness', though critics have long linked it to Einstein's relativity.

Which Charles Dickens novel opens with the line 'It was the best of times, it was the worst of times'?

The two cities are London and Paris in the years around the French Revolution.

Which Japanese drink is made by a process closer to brewing beer than making wine?

The rice is polished to remove the bran before fermentation, and the more it is polished, the more premium the grade.

Which mammal has the longest gestation period, carrying its calves for about 22 months?

A newborn calf already weighs around 100 kilograms and can stand within an hour of birth.

Which Irish rock band formed in Dublin in 1976 and cut its first demo at Keystone Studios in 1978?

That first demo session was largely unsuccessful; the band later became one of the biggest touring acts on Earth.

The city of Marrakesh is one of the four imperial cities of which country?

It is the country's fourth-largest city and the capital of the Marrakesh-Safi region.

Which sprinter set the 100 m world record of 9.58 seconds at the 2009 World Championships in Berlin?

It was the biggest single improvement on the record since electronic timing began, and it still stands.

Which Paris museum has normally displayed the Mona Lisa since 1797?

The sitter is most likely Lisa del Giocondo, a Florentine merchant's wife, though Isabella d'Este remains a plausible alternative.

The Great Fire of London in 1666 started in a bakery on which street?

It broke out shortly after midnight on Sunday 2 September and burned the medieval city inside the old Roman wall.

What Latin-derived initialism on an invitation comes from the French for 'please respond'?

Literally it means 'respond if it pleases you', which is politer than most hosts feel about no-shows.

The Super Bowl winners receive a piece of silverware named after which coach?

It honours the Green Bay Packers coach who won the first two Super Bowls and five NFL championships before the merger.

Who became the first woman to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic, in 1932?

She was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for it, five years before her disappearance over the Pacific.

Which fermented Korean side dish is most often made from salted napa cabbage or radish?

It is seasoned with gochugaru chilli powder, garlic, ginger and salted seafood and appears with almost every Korean meal.

Which nickname for Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14 did poet Ludwig Rellstab coin in 1832?

Beethoven himself headed the score 'Sonata quasi una fantasia' and wrote it around the age of 30.

On which planet would you find the largest and most visible ring system in the Solar System?

All four giant planets have rings; Saturn's moon Rhea may even have a faint ring system of its own.

Which conflict on 18 June 1815, fought in what is now Belgium, was Napoleon's last battle?

The French were beaten by two armies of the Seventh Coalition, ending the Hundred Days of Napoleon's return.

Which martial art, meaning 'gentle way', became an Olympic sport in 1964?

Its philosophy became the model for other modern Japanese martial arts that grew out of the older ko-ryu schools.

In George Orwell's Animal Farm, what kind of animal is Napoleon?

He and Snowball are the two young boars who take command after Old Major dies, until Napoleon's dogs chase Snowball away.

Which river carved the Grand Canyon?

The canyon lies in Arizona, on land the Southern Paiute and other peoples have lived on for centuries.

Which Bogart and Bergman film of 1942 is set in a Vichy-controlled North African city?

Warner Bros bought the rights to the unproduced stage play it was based on in January 1942 and had it in cinemas by November.

Which crime film of 1994 is regarded as Quentin Tarantino's magnum opus?

Some of its scenes were originally written by Roger Avary for True Romance and reworked into the script in 1992 and 1993.

Which Adele album, released in 2011, topped the Billboard 200 for 24 weeks?

It went on to become the best-selling album of the whole 21st century so far.

Roughly what is the speed of light in a vacuum?

The metre is now defined from it: the distance light travels in 1/299,792,458 of a second.

Which dish, eaten in Hungary itself as a soup, is one of that country's national dishes?

In Hungary today it is eaten as a soup rather than the thick stew most of the world knows.

Which bird lays the largest eggs of any living land animal?

Adults are the heaviest and largest living birds, weighing up to about 145 kilograms.

At which racecourse is the Kentucky Derby run each May?

The race for three-year-olds is the first leg of the Triple Crown and is held on the first Saturday in May.

The Wright brothers made the first controlled, sustained powered flight in 1903 near which North Carolina town?

The spot is now known as Kill Devil Hills; their 1903 patent claimed a system of aerodynamic control, not a flying machine.

Which Australian natural wonder is the world's largest coral reef system?

It is made up of over 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands stretching for more than 2,300 kilometres.

Which 1918 Holst orchestral suite has seven movements each named after a heavenly body?

Earth is not included and Pluto had not been discovered; the premiere was a private performance for about 250 invited guests.

Which Italian dessert is built from coffee-soaked ladyfingers and mascarpone cream?

The Veneto region sought EU protected status for it in 2013 so that versions with strawberries could not use the name.

Who was the country's first Black head of state when he became President of South Africa in 1994?

He had negotiated the end of apartheid with F. W. de Klerk, and the two shared the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize.

The Bengal and Siberian subspecies of which cat are the largest living felids?

India holds the largest extent of its habitat, over 300,000 square kilometres, followed by Russia.

The papermaking process is traditionally credited to Cai Lun, a court eunuch of which Chinese dynasty?

Archaeological finds show paper-like material in China from the 2nd century BCE, two centuries before Cai Lun.

How many hearts does an octopus have?

One systemic heart drives blood around the body while two branchial hearts pump it through the gills; the main heart actually stops when the animal swims.

Which planet has a day that lasts about half of its own year?

Its slow retrograde spin gives a solar day of 116.75 Earth days against a year of only 224.7 Earth days.

The Bluetooth wireless standard is named after a 10th-century king of which country?

Intel's Jim Kardach proposed the codename in 1997 after reading about Harald Bluetooth; the logo merges the runes for Harald's initials.

The unicorn is the heraldic symbol of which country?

Two unicorns supported the arms of the King of Scots, and since the 1707 union the UK royal arms pair a unicorn with an English lion.

Which food, when properly stored, does not spoil thanks to its high sugar and acidic pH?

Archaeological samples have remained edible after millennia, though claims of edible jars in Egyptian tombs have all turned out to be other substances.