Joe Kittinger made the highest intentional skydive in history when in 1960 he jumped out of a balloon at 103,000 ft., and is the only person to have broken the sound barrier with his body alone.
They still swab the subject's arm with alcohol during an execution by lethal injection. Regardless of any risk of infection, the alcohol causes the blood vessels to rise making it easier to insert the needle.
According to American Programmer, 31.1% of computer software projects get canceled before they are completed, and 52.7% will overrun their initial cost estimates by 189%. 94% of project start-ups are restarts of previously failed projects.
A 1991 government study indicated that 60% of software projects were behind schedule, 50% were over cost, and 45% of delivered projects weren't usable.
Last year people spent more than $32 billion on lottery games - more than they spent on the theater, movies, and recorded music combined.
For every single death due to firearms for whatever reason, there are 67 lives saved by them.
Joseph Heller's famous novel was originally titled Catch-18, but his publisher had another "18" book that year so they changed it to Catch-22.
The earth is getting bigger. Over 10,000 tons of meteorite dust are added to the mass of the planet each year.
There are more bacteria living on the surface of a typical human than there are humans living on the surface of the Earth.
On average, a woman will speak 7000 words over the course of a day while a man will only speak 2000 words in the same period of time.
Every bird and mammal except the spiny anteater experiences REM (rapid eye movement) sleep.