Products tagged with Fun Facts

Book of Animal Ignorance [Hardcover]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

The authors of The New York Times bestseller The Book of General Ignorance bring us a book packed with wit, wisdom and little-known facts about the animal kingdom. Arranged alphabetically from aardvark to worm, The Book of Animal Ignorance is sure to impress both animal lovers and trivia nuts alike. One of our favorites: Boeing used to “employ” ferrets to run cables through hard-to-reach parts of airplanes. That one had you scratching your head, didn’t it? We’re fairly sure that means your brain is fast at work filing that little tidbit away for future use as witty dinner party banter.

Book of General Ignorance [Hardcover]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

Camels store water in their humps and Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, right? Wrong and wrong, according to the authors of The Book of General Ignorance, a witty and humorous tome that gives common misconceptions, misunderstandings and flawed facts the heave-ho. The Book of General Ignorance will activate the memory centers of your brain as you try to recall the information you learned. After all, you’ll need to remember these fascinating tidbits to in order to impress everyone at dinner parties. Makes a great gift for trivia buffs, know-it-alls and aspiring game show contestants.

Brain Box: All Around the USA

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

This is the kind of game that reminds you of summers spent with your kid sister stuck in the backseat of a wood-paneled station wagon on your way to Yellowstone. Or wait, was it Yosemite? Brain Box: All Around the USA gives players 10 seconds to study an illustrated card and memorize as many details as possible. Then, players roll the dice to determine which question they’ll be asked about the card. This clever memory game teaches players little-known facts about the 50 states while boosting visual perception and recall skills.

Eats, Shoots & Leaves [Paperback]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

We have to confess that we’ve been known to engage in hour-long debates about the merits (or lack thereof) of the serial comma, the proper usage of the colon versus the semicolon and the all-too-common and egregious misuse of the apostrophe. So naturally, we’re suckers for Eats, Shoots & Leaves, an impassioned manifesto on punctuation by British journalist Lynne Truss. This witty, humorous and at times snotty book makes a case for the value of punctuation in preserving the nuances of language. Whether you’re a stickler for quotation marks or don’t know the difference between a dash and a hyphen, this smart book will have you thinking about punctuation like never before.

Things That Make Us [Sic]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

For the record, we gladly break grammar rules for effect (not to be confused with “affect.”) What can we say? Sometimes a properly placed “ain’t” sounds much better than a grammatically proper “isn’t.” But we’re downright grammar curmudgeons when it comes to the erroneous use of words like “irregardless,” “expresso” and “disorientated.” In Things That Make Us (Sic), author Martha Brockenbrough gives us a snarky, irreverent guide packed with common grammar gaffes and tips for avoiding them. This helpful and hilarious book also contains letters to some infamous language offenders, including George W. Bush, David Hasselhoff and the Queen of England.

Intellectual Devotional: Biography [Hardcover]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

The fifth installment of this best-selling series features 365 captivating entries about the most celebrated personalities in history. Like its compulsively readable predecessors, The Intellectual Devotional Biographies is organized into seven categories, one for each day of the week. With their trademark wit and style, authors David Kidder and Noah Oppenheim offer an array of fascinating facts about major figures from Atilla the Hun to Desmond Tutu.

Intellectual Devotional [Hardcover]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

From important literary passages to basic physics principles, this New York Times bestseller boasts 365 short daily lessons that will help you refresh your memory, learn new things and become a bigger hit at cocktail parties than the crab puffs. The Intellectual Devotional is the first in a series of books by David S. Kidder and Noah Oppenheimer designed to arouse curiosity and keep your brain sharp. This fascinating book offers a daily dose of information from one of seven fields of knowledge: history, literature, philosophy, mathematics and science, religion, fine arts and music.

Intellectual Devotional: Modern Culture [Hardcover]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

From the Slinky to Star Wars, Beatlemania to Babe Ruth, and flappers to fascism, The Intellectual Devotional: Modern Culture walks you through 365 days of the films, music, literature, personalities, trends, sports and pop references that have defined contemporary culture. Whether you’re a pop-culture maven or trivia buff, this installment of the New York Times best-selling Intellectual Devotional series will test your memory and keep your brain sharp as you try to remember 365 fascinating tidbits that’ll impress even the most cultured of the culturati.

Intellectual Devotional: American History [Hardcover]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

The last time you thought about American history was back in Mrs. What’s-Her-Name’s class. And, come to think of it, you weren’t really paying much attention. The Intellectual Devotional: American History offers 365 days of history lessons and the chance to refresh your knowledge, revitalize your mind and make Mrs. What’s-Her-Name proud. From Thomas Jefferson and Martin Luther King Jr., to the Federalist Papers and Watergate, these daily digests cover the pivotal events, major figures and cultural milestones that helped shape our nation. After a year of historical wisdom and cerebral nourishment, you’ll be extolling the virtues of life, liberty and the pursuit of brain health.

Intellectual Devotional: Health [Hardcover]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

This fourth installment of the New York Times best-selling Intellectual Devotional series gives you everything you ever wanted to know about health and the human body in small daily doses. The Intellectual Devotional: Health covers topics in lifestyle and preventive medicine; the mind; medical milestones; drugs and alternative treatments; sexuality and reproduction; diseases and ailments; and children and adolescents. Packed with 365 days of medical knowledge and wellness wisdom, this fascinating book is positively infectious—but in a good, healthy, no-hazmat-suit-required kind of way.

Kwizniac

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

This take-anywhere trivia countdown game tests your knowledge under pressure as you learn fun tidbits of information related to each question. The object of Kwizniac is to accumulate the most points by answering as many trivia questions as possible. Unlike most trivia games that give just one piece of information about a subject, Kwizniac offers a more in-depth trivia experience with a set of 10 clues in decreasing order of difficulty. The more clues it takes to answer the question, the less points you receive. Kwizniac activates the brain’s hippocampus, which basically means it’ll turbo-charge your natural RAM while having fun.

Brain Box: All Around the World

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

Put your memory and visual perception skills to the test while doing your world geography teacher proud with Brain Box: All Around the World. This clever memory game teaches players facts about different countries while boosting visual perception and recall skills.

If Ignorance is Bliss [Hardcover]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

John Lloyd and John Mitchinson have proven themselves to be masters at digging up obscure facts, abstruse information, and amusing anecdotes and presenting them effortlessly, somewhat slyly, with either great wit or at least a little bit of tongue in cheek. If Ignorance is Bliss... contains hundreds of quotes you probably have never heard before, arranged thematically from A to Z. From laugh-out-loud-funny bon mots to some real headscratchers, Lloyd and Mitchinson have gathered a universe of star-studded blurbs like: “The Beatles are dying in the wrong order.” —Victor Lewis Smith “When you forget to eat, you know you’re alive.” —Henry James “You know ‘that look’ women get when they want sex? Me neither.” —Steve Martin

Mindstein

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

If you get invited to one more run-of-the-mill trivia game night, your know-it-all mind is going to blow a neuron. Let that Einstein-like mind of yours really shine with Mindstein. Rather than answering one measly little question to earn a point like some trivia games, Mindstein asks players to answer five successive multiple-choice questions in their heads and then unscramble a five-letter word based on the letters associated with each correct answer. Shout out the right word, get a smart card. Get it wrong, lose one. The first player to collect five cards that spell S-M-A-R-T wins the game.

Mind Your Marbles

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

The adult human brain contains between one hundred and five hundred trillion synapses—give or take a few. For the purposes of this game, let’s call ‘em Marbles. Put those trillions of brainy bad boys to use and collect twelve more… play Mind Your Marbles! On your turn, listen to three trivia questions, but don’t go blurting out answers until all three questions have been read… you have to answer the questions correctly and in order to score up to three Marbles per turn. Steal Marbles you need from other players, and be first to collect one for each of the twelve question categories to win. Stretch your memory… Mind Your Marbles!

Mental Floss History of USA [Paperback]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

Smarter than your old history teacher, funnier than the Founding Fathers and more American than Betty Crocker cradling an apple pie

Do you still think of Honest Abe as a heroic defender of liberty? That the late ’60s were a groovy time of peace and love? That the United States has always been dependent on foreign oil? Well, you shouldn’t! In this delightful tour through America’s knotty past, mental_floss offers something new: a refreshingly honest history that’s guaranteed to set things straight.

Peppered with trivia, charts, timelines, and, yes, plenty of history, The mental_floss History of the United States includes the juiciest tales of political intrigue, serial killers, mobsters, Puritans, rum, witches, potato chips, and more. Here at last is the true American Dream: an insightful, accurate, and wholly entertaining history that’s 100 percent made in the U. S. of A.

Splickety Lit

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

This game will wip your flig (flip your wig)! Sometimes known as a spoonerism, we’ve renamed this clever wordplay exercise Splickety Lit. Each question has words or phrases that have their beginning fonsonants clipped (consonants flipped…you pet the gicture). The challenge is to answer the Splickety Lit question correctly in the mame sanner. So, if asked who Skuke Lywalker’s father was, you can confidently shout out (spoiler alert) "Varth Dader!” Engaging your memory, word skills, and comprehension speed, Splickety Lit is a winner that’ll keep everyone guessing, from fart to stinish!

Second Book of General Ignorance [Hardcover]

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:32:19 +0000

The original Book of General Ignorance was published in 2006. It has since been translated into twenty-six languages and sold over 1.2 million copies. Now, just when you thought that it was safe to start showing off again, John Lloyd and John Mitchinson are back with another busload of mistakes and misunderstandings. Perfectly obvious questions you'll be quite certain you know the answers to. Whether it's history, science, sports, geography, literature, language, medicine, the classics, or common wisdom, you'll be astonished to discover that everything you thought you knew is still hopelessly wrong. For example, do you know who made the first airplane flight? How many legs does an octopus have? What is the chance of tossing a coin and it landing on heads? What is house dust mostly made from? What color are oranges? Who in the world is most likely to kill you? Whatever your answers to the questions above, you can be sure that everything you think you know is wrong. The Second Book of General Ignorance is the essential text for everyone who knows they don't know everything, and an ideal stick with which to beat people who think they do. Hardcover with full color dust jacket.