Page 60 - Other Facts

If you recycle a water bottle with the cap on, the recycling company will just throw it away!

Most people have been instructed not to recycle plastic caps yet throw them in anyway because they think, “What’s the harm?” In fact, there is much more harm than commonly thought. Recycling companies do not accept plastic lids because they are made from a different type of plastic.

Bottles are usually made of Type 1 plastic, while caps are made of Type 5 plastic. If the two materials are mixed together, they melt unevenly and are contaminated. This is why recycling companies usually won’t let you contribute caps. Also, the plastic from caps is much thicker and usually jams processing equipment, which is another reason they’re not allowed.

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A technique called 'circular breathing' allowed a saxophone player to hold an E-flat for over 45 minutes!

Now at last you can understand how the “epic saxaphone guy” can play that song for 10 hours in those YouTube videos. In all seriousness, there’s a technique called circular breathing that’s used by players of some wind and brass instruments to produce a continuous tone without interruption for breathing time.

Basically, it involves breathing in through the nose while still pushing air out of the mouth. This is accomplished by storing air in the cheeks. It’s used frequently for didgeridoo players as well as oboe and flute players. In 1997, someone made the world record for using circular breathing to hold a note for 45 minutes.

It was Kenny G (who today is often associated with Foster the People) who accomplished the feat. To this day, 15 years later, the Guinness Book of World Records acknowledges him as the record holder for longest musical note.

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People believe that Lucky Strikes are called so because you'll find a pot joint every once in a while!

It's claimed that every so often you'll get a Lucky Strike cigarette with marijuana hidden in it. Yes, people believed that the brand would hide a joint once in a while in their cigarette cartons. Although there's no clear origin for this myth, popular urban legend site snopes says that it's been around for a while.

This is, of course, not true. However, the brand didn't help themselves with their slogan "It's toasted." This referred to the tobacco being toasted instead of sundried, which supposedly made for better products.  

The marihuana rumor is often used to explain why people "flip" a lucky upside down in the pack. They were were saving the "lucky strike" they got for last.

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Lost your wallet at New York City? There is an 82 % chance of getting it back!

If you lose your wallet in a big city such as New York City, do you expect to ever see it again? Do you expect to recover your money and keep the party on? Well, New Yorkers surely know how to make your hopes stay high!

Students in an urban studies class at Barnard College recently dropped wallets on the street as part of an experiment to see whether or not New Yorkers returned them. The outcome surprised them all: In 132 drops from the Bronx to Brooklyn, the wallet was stolen a mere two percent of the time! 3% of the time, the person tried but failed to give it back, and 13% of the time, no one picked it up.

Ironically, the riskiest place to lose your wallet is in the Upper East Side of the city. Students attempted to drop it in a neighborhood where the median income is $126,000, and expected a higher than average drop rate. In fact it was worse there than in other places!

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North Koreans must dust their pictures of their dear leader or else!

If a North Korean doesn’t keep their picture of Kim Il-Sung properly dusted, they’re sentenced to hard labor and treated as political prisoners! It's common knowledge that the North Korean people are very repressed and under strict dictatorial rules. Their fearless leader, Kim Il-Sung, is very serious about how reverent they are to him, his statues, and his photos. He even has an official list of ten principles. Within each principle there are articles, it’s not just a simple sentence per principle. Every home in North Korea must have a picture hanging of Kim Il-Sung.

Article six of the third principle states “Su Ryong Comrade Kim Il-sung’s portraits, busts, statues, badges containing his portrait, publications containing his portrait, art paintings containing his portrait, signs displaying his teachings, and the Party’s basic motto must be treated with reverence and protected with utmost care.” Il-Sung’s portraits must be dusted daily with a clean cloth, not with a household rag.

If not properly and respectfully taken care of, a family can be incarcerated as political prisoners and punished with hard labor.

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