Buddha would not play Jenga
Many Buddhist scriptures include a list of games that Buddha would not play. It is the first list of games in history.
Category: Society
One hundred quintillion banknote
In late 1940s Hungary, the highest inflation rate ever recorded led to the creation of a banknote valued at one hundred quintillion pengő.
Lincoln’s beard
One month before the 1860 election, Abraham Lincoln was clean shaven. By inauguration day, he had a full beard, and wore it until the day he died. He grew it because a twelve-year-old girl told him to.
Final speakers
Around the world today, several languages have just one native speaker left. When they die, their language dies with them.
Tiniest car
The Peel P50, manufactured in the Isle of Man, is the smallest car ever to go into mass production. It’s really, really small.
Placebo surgery
When trialling a new medicine, it’s standard practice to test it against a placebo medicine. But what do you do if you’re trialling a new surgery instead?
All-Joking, All-Drunken Synod of Fools and Jesters
Peter the Great founded a drinking club when he was a young man. Because he was tsar, he took it too far.
The queen’s duck
Have you ever had a boss who just had to contribute to your project in order to prove their worth? There’s an easy way to counteract that: just add a duck.
Ghost murder
If you kill someone because you think they’re a ghost, is it murder or manslaughter? Or self-defence?
Strip-mined country
Eighty percent of the surface area of the Pacific country Nauru has been strip-mined; most of its land has been shipped to Australia, New Zealand, and Britain.
Ghost marriage
In France, China, and Sudan you can marry a ghost.
Lonely words
Flother is another word for a snowflake. It appears only once, in a 1275 CE book. The poison that killed Hamlet’s father in Shakespeare’s play, hebenon, is mentioned nowhere else. These are the hapax legomena, the lonely words.
Jazz on bones
In the 1950s and 60s, foreign music was censored in the Soviet Union. So bootleggers made illegal records out of old X-ray film: the jazz on bones.
Glass hammer
“Hey kid, go to the store and get me a glass hammer, will ya?” Many professions prank newcomers by giving them an impossible task: find a left-handed screwdriver, striped paint, elbow grease, a lobster gun…
Bishop of the moon
According to 1917 Roman Catholic canon law, any newly discovered territory fell under the jurisdiction of the bishop of the “port of departure.” So, after the 1969 moon landing, was the Bishop of Orlando also the Bishop of the Moon?
Food for a day
The humanitarian daily ration (HDR) is a small non-perishable package designed to provide one day’s food supply to anyone, regardless of religious dietary restrictions. Just don’t make it the same colour as a bomb when you airdrop it.
The Generalist Academy 