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Fun Planet Facts Did you know… Venus rotates backwards, so the Sun rises in the west and sets in the east. Its day (243 Earth days) is longer than its year (225 Earth days). It is also the hottest planet overall, with surface temperatures around 850–900°F (460–482°C) Uranus rotates on its side, which causes extreme seasons, with each pole getting 42 years of continuous daylight followed by 42 years of darkness. It also records the coldest temperatures in the solar system (down to -224°C / -372°F). And what about Neptune. It has the fastest winds in the solar system, reaching supersonic speeds up to ~1,300–1,500 mph (2,100+ km/h)

On this date… In 1962 NASA launched Telstar 1, the world’s first active communications satellite. It enabled the first live transatlantic television broadcasts and telephone calls, revolutionizing global communications. On July 10, 1856 Nikola Tesla, the famous inventor and electrical engineer, was born. In 1553 Lady Jane Grey was proclaimed Queen of England at age 15, following the death of Edward VI. Jane is remembered today as the “Nine Days’ Queen,” a tragic and highly educated young woman caught in the violent religious and political conflicts of mid-Tudor England. Her story has inspired countless books, plays, and paintings

Fun Color Facts Tyrian purple (royal purple) was one of the most expensive dyes in history. It came from the mucus of sea snails. Producing just 1 gram required crushing around 12,000 snails, and the process smelled terrible. It was so prized that only emperors and royalty could wear it. Indian yellow pigment was made from the urine of cows fed nothing but mango leaves. The urine crystals were collected, dried, and turned into paint that was used by famous artists like Van Gogh. Mummy brown was a real paint color made by grinding up actual Egyptian mummies into pigment. It was popular among artists for centuries and only stopped being produced in the 1960s when mummies became hard to source. Another cool color fact. A small percentage of women have tetrachromacy, four types of color-sensing cone cells in their eyes instead of the usual three. They can potentially distinguish around 100 million colors, compared to the average person’s roughly 1 million.

Did you know… Birds are some of the most bizarre creatures on the planet. Poisonous birds! The Hooded Pitohui (and a few related species) are among the only known poisonous birds. Their skin and feathers contain batrachotoxin-like compounds that cause numbness, burning, and a foul taste. Birds that set their world on fire! Australian “Firehawks”, like black kites, whistling kites, and brown falcons in northern Australia have been observed picking up smoldering sticks or grass from existing fires and dropping them into dry vegetation to start new fires. This flushes out prey like insects, lizards, and small mammals. A bird the plays dead! The Kakapo, a flightless nocturnal parrot from New Zealand is the world’s heaviest parrot (up to ~4 kg / 9 lbs) and instead of flying from threats, it freezes in place and relies on excellent camouflage— a strategy that worked for millions of years until humans and introduced predators arrived. A bird that hibernates! The only bird known to truly hibernate is the Common Poorwill (a nightjar from North America). In winter, it can slash its oxygen use by ~90%, drop its body temperature to around 5°C (41°F), and enter a torpid state for weeks or months while hidden in rock crevices or on the ground.

Did you know… One of the oldest and heaviest organisms in the world is a clonal colony of quaking aspens called Pando (“I spread” in Latin). Located in Utah U.S.A, Pando consists of ~47,000 genetically identical trunks connected by a single massive root system. It covers over 100 acres with a total estimated biomass of around 6,000 metric tons (about 13 million pounds), making it one of the heaviest known living organisms. Pando’s age is estimated to be roughly 12,000–37,000 years old, making it one of the oldest organisms alive today.

Is it true, the foods we eat may be radioactive? Brazilian nuts are often ranked #1 for everyday foods with elevated levels of radiation, as the trees in the Amazon absorb radium from soil. Many other fruits, nuts, leafy plants (macadamia, pecans, tea, coffee, spices, leafy greens, mushrooms) and bivalve shellfish (mussels, oysters, clams) can have modest accumulation of natural radionuclides. And my favorite, Bananas, are also naturally radioactive because of potassium-40, a naturally occurring isotope. But you’d need to eat about 100 million bananas in a short time for a lethal dose. So it’s true, but don’t go bananas! The radiation exposure from eating these are tiny in comparison to background radiation levels or medical procedures.

Fun Facts about Argentina Did you know, in 1892 Argentine police pioneered the use of fingerprinting for criminal investigations. Or in 1917 the world’s first animated feature, El Apóstol, a 70-minute political satire featuring around 58,000 hand-drawn frames, was created by Italian-Argentine Quirino Cristiani (sadly it was lost in a fire in 1926). Argentina invented the first ballpoint pen, had the first baby born in Antarctica, has the world’s highest concentration of psychologists and psychiatrists per capita, and much more! Amazing country!

On this date… In 1456 Joan of Arc is posthumously acquitted of heresy, 25 years after she was burned at the stake. This cleared her name and boosted her legacy as a French national heroine. In 1928 the first commercially sliced bread is sold by the Chillicothe Baking Company in Missouri U.S.A. It was the origin of “the greatest thing since sliced bread”. Oh and my favorite, July 7 is also observed as World Chocolate Day

U.S. stocks continue to hit all time highs, but did you know Wall Street is riddled with bizarre obscurities The name? The wooden wall that gave the street its name was built in 1653. The wall was roughly 2,340 feet long, stood 9–12 feet high and was intended to protect the small colony from English colonists, Native American tribes, Pirates or other threats. There is literally tons of money under the street. The New York Fed has a vault 80 feet below street level (on Liberty Street) that holds roughly 6,190 tons of gold belonging to foreign central banks and governments. It’s one of the largest gold repositories in the world. That’s a bunch of bull. The famous icon of Wall Street, a 7,100 pound bronze bull, was secretly installed in front of the NYSE in the middle of the night on December 15, 1989. It was briefly removed by police but became an icon after public outcry.

Fun Number Facts 👇 😱 Fear of the number 13 is so prevalent it has a name: triskaidekaphobia. 🤯 If you could fold a standard piece of paper in half 103 times, the stack would be as thick as the observable universe (~107 billion light-years thick) ♠️ When you thoroughly shuffle a standard 52-card deck, there are roughly 8 × 10⁶⁷ possible combinations, meaning the resulting sequence of cards has almost certainly never been seen before. ⏱️ A ‘jiffy’ is an actual unit of time. It means 1/100th of a second. Speaking of which, I’ll be back in a jiffy – got to go research some more fun facts!