Random knowledge seems kind of stupid. Unless I plan to star on Jeopardy, there is no real benefit to knowing that a fungi with a 3-mile long footprint resides in Oregon if I can’t even remember judicial branch concepts for my AP Government quizzes. But, fun facts are exactly how they sound: fun. My bookshelf is lined with dozens of (rather dusty) Snapple lids, each of which has its own quirky factoid. Here are 10 of my favorites:

1. The only Michelangelo painting in the Western Hemisphere is on display in Fort Worth, Texas.

Michelangelo is believed to have made over 600 paintings, and yet all but one lie on a single half of the world. As if that isn’t shocking enough, Fort Worth, Texas somehow transitioned from a cowboy’s trading post to one of the fastest growing cities in the United States, home to multiple international art institutions.

2. Dairy cows drink up to 50 gallons of water a day.

Fifty gallons is about the capacity of an average bathtub, roughly equal to three kegs. As if that isn’t enough, they eat approximately 100 pounds of feed each day. Despite this large intake of water, most dairy cows only produce about seven gallons of milk each day.

3. The square dance is the official dance of the state of Washington.

A dance called the “quadrille”, or “square” in French”, was adopted in 1979. Their state vegetable is a Walla Walla sweet onion, a very simplistic, grass-looking plant. Pretty boring, Washington.  

4. You blink over 10,000,000 times a year

Do you understand how much 10,000,000 is? If you added up 10,000,000 seconds, they would accumulate to over three months. That’s insane! Plus, reading this makes you aware of your blinking, which is just really annoying.

5. If you doubled a penny every day for 30 days, you would have $5,368,709.12.

Again, do you realize how big that number is? For most of us, just having $5 in our bank account is a win, so $5 million is crazy to think about.

6. Mint has been found in Egyptian tombs from as far back as 1000 B.C.

I wouldn’t be surprised if you thought aliens built the pyramids, because the Egyptians were pretty advanced. They had a complex calendar, crazy cosmetics, cryptic calligraphy and even comprehensive condoms.

7. The fear of vegetables is called lachanophobia.

Lachno is Greek for vegetable, and surprisingly enough some people are truly terrified of them. Your brain’s amygdala is what causes fear, and many phobias arise as a result of traumatic events, which must have involved veggies of some sort for people with lachanophobia. Other random phobias include xanthophobia (fear of the color yellow), turophobia (fear of cheese), and omphalophobia (fear of belly buttons).

8. A neutron star is as dense as stuffing 50 million elephants into a thimble.

There’s that million word again. An average elephant weighs 12 thousand pounds. Fifty million of those would weigh about 6 trillion pounds. And all of that is going into a thimble, which is as big as the tip of your finger.

9. A male ostrich can roar just like a lion.

Just look up a video. It’s weird.

10. The East Antarctic Ice Sheet is as thick as the Alps Mountains are high.

The East Antarctic Ice Sheet is thicc as heck, but it won’t stay that way for long if climate change keeps going at a rate like this thanks to the greenhouse effect. Get your sheet together, people.