In what would be his final professional baseball game, catcher Dave Bresnahan threw a potato to confuse a runner before tagging him out with the actual baseball.

The very first recorded baseball game dates back to June 19, 1846. In an all-New York matchup (played at Elysian Fields in Hoboken, NJ), the New York Nine beat the New York Knickerbockers. The final score was 23-1 and the game lasted four innings. How competitive!

From that very first game to the playoffs of today, teams have always looked for ways to win. Sometimes, those ways bend the legality of rules.

There’s an excellent book called Intentional Balk: Baseball’s Thin Line Between Innovation and Cheating that dissects some of the more creative ways teams and players have sought to gain advantages over the years.

We’re talking things like elaborate underground wiring systems that drew from the ol’ “two tin cans and a string” foundation or intentionally kicking dirt onto the plate to make it harder for pitchers to see during twilight games.

One of the most clever moments, however, comes from an August night in 1987. Dave Bresnahan was a catcher on the Double-A Williamsport Bills. The season had been a disappointing one, and heading into the final weekend, Bresnahan put an idea into motion that he and his teammates had been talking about for weeks.

"I was the backup catcher, and when you're sitting in the bullpen, you have to do something to break the boredom," he said. "So we had a lot of discussions from baseball to politics. We talked about all kinds of tricks people had done, whether they were in college or high school. We talked about bringing a potato or a roll of tape onto the field.

"And my teammates challenged me. They said why don't you do it. It took me about two weeks to get the nerve, but I finally decided to do it. I'm not really a class clown type but I have a great sense of humor, and I was just trying to break the monotony of a poor season for me and the team."

With his teammates supportive of the prank, Bresnahan brought several potatoes to the ballpark for the final weekend of the season, which included a doubleheader against Reading.

Still, he needed the right scenario to make this potato caper happen. And in the fifth inning, the perfect setup unfolded.

Reading’s Rick Lundblade got onto third base with two outs. Bresnahan told the home plate umpire, Scott Potter, that there was an issue with his glove and he needed to replace it.

The second glove had a potato in it, peeled and shaped to look similar to a baseball, that quite literally would change Bresnahan’s life.

Bresnahan returned to his place behind home plate and called for a pitch low and away. As the ball was coming to him, Bresnahan transferred the potato to his throwing hand, then leapt up and chucked the potato well over third baseman Rob Swain’s head.

Lundblade, the runner on third, saw what he thought was the ball rolling around in the outfield, so he sprinted for home. He found Bresnahan standing there with the ball and was tagged out.

It’s straight out of the Little Big League playbook!

“I started to run to the dugout and I hear the third-base umpire yelling that it’s a ‘bleeping’ potato,” Bresnahan said. “My roommate had a close friend who had an umpire for a close friend and we had called him about a week before to see how he would rule. He said he felt they’d just send the runner back to third and kick me out of the game.”

Bresnahan was fine with that outcome, only it didn’t happen. Potter, the home plate umpire, was being graded by his supervisor, who was sitting in the stands. And suddenly, he had to make a decision on something that is not in any baseball rulebook. Potter allowed the run to count.

Williamsport manager Orlando Gomez, like Potter, was not pleased by the antics. Gomez pulled Bresnahan from the game and later fined him $50. The following day, Bresnahan was released from the team.

That wound up being his final professional baseball game. He had offers from other clubs, but they all wanted him to start at High-A ball, which was a step down from the league he had just been playing in. It became clear that any team that wanted his services was more interested in the stunt side of things, so Bresnahan retired.

Within the next year, he met his wife and eventually had three children before moving into a successful real estate career. None of that would have happened if not for one fateful potato.

As for that potato? It got thrown into a trash can during the game. However, thanks to some collector sleuthing, it now sits in a specimen jar at the Baseball Reilquary in Southern California, preserved by denatured alcohol. Now that’s a tasty piece of baseball history.

Thomas Jefferson, the third U.S. President, is the first known American to create an ice cream recipe and helped popularize it throughout the country.

Back when I started Fun Fact Friyay, this newsletter had very few subscribers. Thanks to you charming readers, it’s continued to grow. Now, many people have their days improved (or ruined, if you hate fun facts) with a little whimsy.

Some of the earlier facts I’ve shared never got their proper place in the sun, so with this week including National Ice Cream Cone Day (September 22), I wanted to revisit a fact. Coincidentally, if it had its place in the sun, it would melt quite quickly.

Incidentally, I celebrated National Ice Cream Cone Day at OMG Squee, a place with a name that’s just as much fun to say as the ice cream is to eat.

Look at this cute taiyaki cone!

Ice cream has evolved over centuries and across cultures. This cone above being a swirl of cereal milk and ube flavor, topped with Oreo dust and filled with sweet red bean, is a testament to that. And I am always up for giving a unique flavor a try.

Turns out my fondness for this treat makes me aligned with Thomas Jefferson, America’s third President, who was QUITE the fan of ice cream.

He likely discovered it while in France in the 1780s, and he’s credited as the first American to write a recipe down. His recipe is for a much more classic flavor (vanilla), and it’s on display at the Library of Congress.

Jefferson’s Monticello home featured multiple molds of ice, an ice cream freezer, and an ice cream ladle.

While in the White House, Jefferson served ice cream on at least half a dozen documented occasions. He often paired it with a pastry or crust, because every good ice cream dish could use a little extra crunch.

His guests offered positive reviews of the experience. Let’s see a few highlights:

“Ice cream very good, crust wholly dried, crumbled into thin flakes.” -Mannaseh Cutler, Massachusetts Senator

“Balls of the frozen material enclosed in covers of warm pastry, exhibiting a curious contrast, as if the ice had just been taken from the oven.” -Samuel Latham Mitchill, New York Representative

“[I’m going to serve] ice creams on Sunday next, and afterwards, every Wednesday and Sunday, during the season.” -Honoré Julien, Jefferson’s cook in the White House

Word spread fast at the start of the 19th century. Mary Rudolph, who was related to Jefferson through marriage, included more than 20 ice cream recipes in her cookbook, The Virginia Housewife; Or, Methodical Cook.

Rudolph’s book is quite the goldmine. It features over 500 recipes, including the first curry recipes in America. You’ll also learn how to make household items, such as soap and cologne, and it’s an interesting look at early American cooking.

Of course, you came here for ice cream, so if you don’t have time to make 500 things, we’ll start with one: Here’s Jefferson’s ice cream recipe.

The term “rock and roll” was popularized by Cleveland DJ Alan Freed, who started using it in 1951 to promote the music he played on the radio.

I recently visited Cleveland, with one of my goals being to check out the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Notably, I wanted to experience the temporary exhibit on 50 years of Saturday Night Live music, which was even better than I could have imagined.

It was delightful to see costumes, props, and facial molds from years of hit SNL bits, such as The Lonely Island digital shorts, Fred Armisen as Prince, and Will Ferrell and Ana Gasteyer as Marty and Bobby Culp.

Beyond specific SNL characters, the collection also includes just about every musical performance from the show’s lengthy history.

I helped a man scroll through a screen to put on James Brown, and then we bopped along to his song and dance moves. I watched Shakira do an impressive back-bridge while singing “She Wolf.” I saw Fall Out Boy dress exactly like my friends and I did in 2005, complete with Pete Wentz having an extremely popped collar on his polo shirt. What a treat!

The Rock Hall also has a “Jamroom,” where you can play with studio musicians. I happened to be walking by as the room opened, so I was the first one up onstage! I said I’d play guitar, and another guy who was interested was told to wait, but I said, nah, he could be the vocalist if he wanted.

Since we were doing Green Day, he was the Billie Joe Armstrong to my…uh…Billie Joe Armstrong. (Billie plays guitar and sings for the band.)

In any case, we did great. I mostly remembered how “American Idiot” goes on guitar, and I nailed the end of the solo, truly the most important part for any rock legend. We even drew a crowd of about 25 people. I think that’s pretty good, considering all the other entertaining exhibits to check out.

Without one Cleveland disc jockey, however, rock and roll could perhaps be known by some other name. Or maybe it would have continued on as an existing genre like rhythm and blues.

Alan Freed wasn’t the first person to ever put rock and roll together; in 1923, Trixie Smith used the term in her song “My Man Rocks Me,” though it meant something different in that case.

However, it was Freed who popularized “rock and roll” as a musical genre. He said that rock and roll is “a river of music that has absorbed many streams: rhythm and blues, jazz, rag time, cowboy songs, country songs, folks songs. All have contributed to the big beat.”

Freed was working at WAKR in Akron in the late 1940s when he met Leo Mintz, a local record store owner. Mintz had started selling R&B records and noted more people were becoming interested in them, so he said Freed should play those records on the radio.

In 1951, Freed was hired by WJW radio in Cleveland. He hosted a midnight radio program where he used cool, hipster language to communicate with his listeners. Mintz bought AM radio airtime to devote an entire show to R&B, with Freed taking control of hosting duties.

On July 11, 1951, Freed played R&B on WJW, believed to be the first time that genuine R&B tunes were heard on a major radio station broadcast to mass audiences. Freed dubbed his show “The Moondog House,” referring to himself as “The King of the Moondoggers.”

Freed likely came up with “rock and roll” as a way to avoid referring to “rhythm and blues,” because segregation was still commonplace in the 1950s. White artists and bands had long been covering songs from Black musicians. Unlike other mainstream radio DJs, Freed played the originals, not the covers, helping introduce a wider (and primarily younger) audience to the music.

The musical trend continued, and Freed eventually hosted TV shows like The Big Beat and was in some of the earliest rock and roll movies, including Don’t Knock the Rock and Go, Johnny, Go!

Though Freed died at just 43 years old, his legacy continues to live on. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, among numerous other honors.

And as the poet laureates Reel Big Fish say in the opening of their song “Good Thing”: “You and I are mortal, but rock and roll will never die.”

I hope you put on a song today that rocks your socks off. Happy listening!

During the September 11 attacks, a guide dog named Roselle led her blind owner down 78 flights of stairs to safety.

It’s been 25 years since the September 11 terrorist attacks, when 19 al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four U.S. passenger planes. Two planes struck the World Trade Center towers in New York City. Another plane hit the Pentagon in Arlington, Va. The fourth plane was headed toward the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C., but its passengers revolted against the terrorists, and the plane crashed into a field in Pennsylvania.

There are countless stories of tragedy, grief, and sorrow from September 11. If you were alive then, you almost certainly vividly remember where you were and what you were doing.

Will Jimeno, then a rookie Port Authority police officer, was trapped under rubble for 13 hours. He recalled the situation as “literally hell” and said he was buried, crushed, and “just wanted to die.”

Yet he and one other colleague made it out alive. And he shares not only his story, but the stories of those who weren’t as fortunate. He says he gets asked all the time what he saw the most on that day. His response?

“Love. In all that darkness, there was love. I want people to understand that on September 11, the darkest day in U.S. history, there was a lot of good that day. There was a lot of light that day.”

Those stories are what give us hope. People banding together to help each other. And in some cases, we saw animals offering a hand (or paw).

Roselle the Guide Dog

Michael Hingson was born blind. In 2001, he was working as a regional sales manager for a computer-storage company. He and his coworker, David Frank, were on the 78th floor of the north tower of the World Trade Center. They were preparing to lead a seminar, when they heard a muffled explosion.

Frank noticed fire and smoke billowing above them. The building also plunged several feet. “We got to get out of here—right now.”

Frank, Hingson, and Roselle, Hingson’s yellow Labrador retriever guide dog, did a quick sweep of the room to make sure no one else was there, then headed to the stairwell.

Descending 78 flights of stairs is exhausting and difficult on a calm day. In the midst of panic and chaos, while navigating fire, smoke, loud sounds, uneven footing, and people running by you in all directions? That’s a whole other story.

Yet Roselle was determined to guide her group out of the building and into safety. She sometimes walked beside Hingson, but since the stairwell was narrow and space was tight, she often walked at his heel, helping guide him down while he held onto the railing.

“Good dog, Roselle. You’re doing a great job,” Hingson kept telling his companion. He explained later: “I knew she was going to sense the fear in everyone else, so I needed to let her know I was okay.”

Along the way, Roselle offered kisses to comfort other people who were in the stairwell. And despite unnerving moments as they traversed down, Hingson, Frank, and Roselle made it to the lobby. The trio crossed Broadway, and then a police officer yelled that the south tower was coming down.

Everyone turn and ran. Roselle led Hingson to shelter in a subway station.

“Roselle had done her job perfectly,” he said.

When they were told it was safe to leave, Hingson, Roselle, and Frank emerged back at street level, and Frank reported that the towers were no longer standing.

Hingson returned home to New Jersey that night. Roselle, just being a wonderful dog, began playing with her favorite toy.

Shortly after the attacks, Hingson moved to California and worked for Guide Dogs for the Blind. He’s become a public speaker and has published several books, including his 2011 best-selling memoir, Thunder Dog, Live Like a Guide Dog, and Running with Roselle, a children’s book.

Roselle received the service dog Award for Canine Excellence in 2002. She lived a good, happy life of 14 years. Hingson now lives with his guide dog Alamo (who also attends events).

One of the outcomes of the attacks is that it stopped people from traveling, or made them more afraid to see other parts of the world.

That makes me sad, because the world is incredible. I’ve continued to travel and encourage other people to do the same when they can (and I still very much love a good deal). Some things have irrevocably changed since 9/11, and it will always be a day that lives with us.

Hingson has a good reminder about that, too.

“If we allow ourselves to be blinded by fear, all we’re going to do is make it harder for ourselves to live.”

A year after the attacks, Roselle (alongside Hingson) made an appearance on Larry King Live. King called her ACE award “a big doggie deal,” but she remained cool as a cucumber throughout. Truly a natural.

The first cellphone call was made by Martin Cooper in New York on April 3, 1973. Cooper, who worked at Motorola, called his rival at Bell Labs to tell him he had invented the cellphone.

I love a bit of good-natured trash talking. If you pull off something cool, it’s fun to celebrate it!

Steph Curry uses a “night-night” celebration when he hits a particularly devastating shot at the end of the game. The entire world got to see it during the 2024 Olympics, after he made four threes in a row in the closing minutes of the gold medal game against France.

John Carpenter, the first million-dollar champion on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, famously only used one lifeline during his run, and it was to call his dad to tell him he was going to win a million dollars.

Rosa Parks had some of the most impressive “trash talk” ever by standing her ground and refusing to give up her seat, leading to the passing of a law preventing racial segregation on buses.

Martin Cooper, the head of the communications division at Motorola, couldn’t help himself when he and his team invented the first cellular phone.

You just created this cool new technology that you believe will change the world forever. Who would you call? A parent, sibling, or partner, so you can celebrate together?

Perhaps you would, but Cooper had a different idea.

While standing next to the Hilton Hotel on 6th Avenue in New York City on April 3, 1973, Cooper pulled out his new invention.

“New Yorkers were passing by,” Cooper said in 2023. “You know how blase they normally are, but they were startled because there were no cordless phones at the time.”

In 1973, the only type of portable phones were in the car. Bell Labs, Motorola’s competitor, believed car phones were the wave of the future. Cooper thought differently; cellphones should be an “extension of the person” and with them at all times.

Okay, Mr. Prognosticator. We see you!

Of course, the OG cell was a bit larger than the ones that easily fit into pockets and purses. It was 10 inches tall, 1.5 inches wide, and 3 inches deep, weighing 2.5 pounds. Still, you didn’t need to be attached to a cord or wall to use it.

With that first phone call, Cooper dialed up his fellow counterpart at Bell Labs to deliver a bit of a good-natured ribbing.

“I said, ‘I’m calling you from a cellphone but a real cellphone. The personal, handheld, portable cellphone.’ You notice I was not averse to rubbing his nose in our achievement.”

And you know what? I fully support Cooper’s move. He built something that has changed the world. Sure, in some ways, having a phone nearby 24/7 is a bad thing and perhaps a key component of the gradual deterioration of society? On the other hand, I sure do appreciate having directions on my phone when I visit a new place, like Alaska!

So, kudos to you, Martin. I hope this inspires you to pick up your phone and actually call someone this weekend. Even better if you tell the person on the other end that you’re calling from a real cellphone, since it will almost certainly confuse them.

Ranch dressing was created by a plumbing contractor and his wife in Alaska.

I just spent a week in Alaska, and my goodness, what an incredible place.

It’s pretty wild to feel your jaw drop as you turn every corner. The state’s nickname is “The Last Frontier,” and it’s clear why. There’s a vastness you simply don’t get in any other state.

At any given moment, you could come face-to-face with a bear.

Or a moose could decide the road directly in front of you is now a pedestrian crossing.

Or you can realize you’re the only person within shouting distance, even amongst an echo-y mountain range. That’s a very calming feeling.

In most of these situations, you likely won’t have ranch dressing on your person. But in all of those settings, you’d be in the home of the versatile condiment.

Back in the 1950s, a plumber named Steve Henson and his wife Gayle were living in Anchorage, Alaska. When Steve wasn’t plumbing, the duo liked coming up with concoctions to feed the work crews.

They experimented with a nameless dressing mixed with buttermilk and mayonnaise. It soon became a go-to for many meals, pairing nicely with lots of different foods.

The Hensons moved a few years later, eventually purchasing a 120-acre ranch outside of Santa Barbara, California. He retired by age 35 (a dream) and named his new ranch Hidden Valley Ranch. Steve and Gayle brought their dressing with them to serve at the ranch’s steakhouse.

A Los Angeles Times story from 1987 includes a letter from Alan Barker, who lived and worked at the Hidden Valley Guest Ranch in Santa Barbara from 1959 to 1963. Barker adds more detail about the Hensons’ creation.

“We ate it on everything from steaks to, in a comical moment, ice cream. The guests at the ranch first began asking for jars of it to take home for themselves, and then wanted larger quantities for their friends. They took it in liquid form in mayonnaise jars. The impracticality of this led to packaging the mix as a powder,” Barker wrote.

Corroborating Barker’s story, by 1957, Henson was selling packages of his dressing mix in stores. He later offered the dry ingredients via mail for a modest price of 75 cents per package.

The guest ranch was closed by the 1960s, but the “ranch dressing” mail order business was better than ever.

In October of 1972, Clorox purchased the Hidden Valley Ranch brand for $8 million, or nearly $64 million in today’s money. Henson once again got to retire.

Today, you’ll find ranch incorporated in just about everything. Clorox developed a bottled version in 1983 that didn’t need to be refrigerated. One of my friends enjoyed drinking straight from the bottle in high school.

I believe he has since kicked this habit, though maybe he still savors a sip or two. I prefer using ranch more as a dip, but to each their own.

In any case, whether you’re indulging in a bit of ranch dressing, eating some Cool Ranch Doritos, heading to a ranch for a weekend getaway, or listening to the Blink-182 album Dude Ranch, I hope you have a splendid time.

Pine cones can “predict” when it’s going to rain.

In the movie “Mean Girls,” the character of Karen Smith (played excellently by Amanda Seyfried) has a “fifth sense”: she can tell when it’s going to rain.

“It’s like I have ESPN, or something,” she claims.

Of course, her psychic abilities are more “in the moment.” She can tell you when it’s currently raining.

Still not a bad talent, considering some of those quick showers that douse areas in California and Florida and end before you’ve had a chance to say, “We really needed it.”

Karen’s predictive skills have nothing on pine trees, though. Despite having no living cells, muscles, or nerves, pine trees (and more specifically, pine cones) can indicate when rain is around the corner.

Pine cones release their seeds when weather conditions are optimal, and wet weather ain’t that time. The seeds require dry air with nice gusts of winds to spread them across the land.

When the environment is dry, pine cones on the ground appear more open, with their scales moving down, similar to the motion of uncurling a fist. When the air is humid, which often indicates rain is on the way, the pine cone’s scales clamp up to seal the cone into a tightly-wound ball.

Pine cone scales have multiple layers. The outermost layer consists of stretchable cells, while the inner layer is full of stiff fibers.

In dry weather, when the cone is open, the cone’s stiff fibers and stretchable cells are the same length and sit parallel to each other.

When there’s more moisture hanging around, the stiff fibers maintain the same length. However, the stretchable cells absorb water drops, causing them to expand and sending the scales curling upwards toward the rest of the cone.

This process usually occurs when humidity levels hit around 20 percent. The water moves toward the cone’s central stalk and then flows toward those interior parts of the scales. As the water fills up the empty spaces between cells, it causes the cone to curl until conditions become drier once again.

Some folks also believe oak and ash trees can let you know what kind of weather is on the way, though there’s not nearly as much evidence of that. They’ll just have to keep pining for pine cones.

Now, let’s dance!

Montell Jordan, singer of “This Is How We Do It,” is taller than Michael Jordan, NBA Hall of Famer.

Growing up in Chicago in the 90s, I received a steady dose of Michael Jordan.

Of course, I’m not unique. During that time, MJ was perhaps the most popular athlete in the world.

I mean, can YOU think of anyone else who had such a catchy song for a massively successful ad campaign?

However, people outside of Chicago likely didn’t get into the multiple Chicago Bulls “Greatest Hits” CDs. These compilations were found in local department stores like Montgomery Ward and featured an incredible collection of bops and broadcast calls of memorable Bulls moments.

These CDs are perhaps the greatest compilation albums ever made. (This statement has not been verified by Fun Fact Friyay.)

It’s where I first heard the full version of “Be Like Mike” (a step up above the commercial tune, in my book). There are also variants of the “12 Days of Christmas” with Bulls lyrics, as well as a “YMCA” parody that spells out “B-U-L-L-S.”

Let’s all spell it together!

A few years before these CDs were dropped, Montell Jordan came onto the scene.

You may be familiar with his songs “Get It On Tonite” and “Let’s Ride.” You are most definitely familiar with “This Is How We Do It.”

Even to this day, the song gets played at sporting events, bars, clubs, and just about anywhere containing a number of people that can be classified as at least a gaggle, if not a crowd.

We don’t have scientific data to back it up, but I’d guess this song also gets more spins on Friday than any other day of the week, due to the first verse opening up with the line, “This is how we do it, it’s Friday night.”

Coincidentally, Montell released “This Is How We Do It” in 1995, one of the few years of the 1990s the Bulls did not win a championship. I doubt the song was playing very often in the locker room.

Admittedly, it took me many listens to notice any words beyond that first line and the chorus. Had I been paying attention, I would have noticed this little number later on in the song:

Once upon a time in '94
Montell made no money and life sure was slow
And all they said was 6'8" he stood
And people thought the music that he made was good

Now, we know people lie about their height sometimes, but this is other people saying it. So it must be true. IMDb confirms Montell’s height, as well.

IMDb also randomly knows my height. They’ve got a crack squad over there.

Okay, we’ve got Montell Jordan at 6’8”. How about the other MJ, Michael Jordan?

There are ample avenues to figure out his height. But I’m going to once again be a Chicago homer and point us to the Chicago Bulls starting lineup, roared by PA announcer Ray Clay over the song “Sirius” by The Alan Parsons Project.

Tell me this doesn’t get you immediately hyped:

In case you’re feeling too energetic already and didn’t watch, the video reveals Michael Jordan is 6’6”.

I’m no mathematician, but 6’8” (80 inches, 2.03 meters) is taller than 6’6” (78 inches, 1.98 meters). And thus, Montell Jordan is taller than Michael Jordan.

Meanwhile, Montel Williams and Michael B. Jordan have both had heights reported in the 5’11” to 6’ range, though the Internet seems skeptical.

I’ve never stood next to either of them, so I can’t confirm. If I do, I’ll try to report back.

In the meantime, may you stand proudly, however tall you are.

Leslie Nielsen’s gravesite reads “Let ‘er rip” because he enjoyed fart machines so much.

I like to think I have a pretty expansive sense of humor.

I appreciate a delicious one-liner, such as the many clever musings from Mitch Hedberg or Steven Wright.

I giggle at fast-paced jokes where the words bounce off each other effortlessly, like basically the entire Bridesmaids movie.

I enjoy a nice meandering story, a la the ones Norm MacDonald liked to tell on talk shows, or these silly animal jokes from Madison Sinclair.

But one thing I never really got into were fart jokes. Is it mildly amusing when you ask Alexa to make a fart sound, then ask her what time it is, and she says, “It’s fart o’clock” and farts again?

Sure, but I still don’t know what time it is.

While I’d prefer not to smell these kinds of jokes, the actor Leslie Nielsen was legendary for loving a good fart prank.

Bill Hader recently-ish appeared on an episode of “Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend” and recounted how Nielsen would use a fart machine during meetings with SNL’s Lorne Michaels.

Conan should not be surprised by this story, because his very own talk show once welcomed Nielsen (and his fart machine) as a guest.

In fact, Nielsen would regularly bring a fart machine with him to prank people. He enjoyed everything fart-related so much that he put a reference to it on his headstone.

If you head to Nielsen’s gravesite at Evergreen Cemetery in Fort Lauderdale, you’ll notice a simple inscription: “Let ‘er rip.”

People also sometimes put mini airplanes or other mementos in honor of his films and TV shows. He was in about 250 movies and shows, so there’s lots to pull from.

And should you walk around enough, you might notice a bench with another Nielsen quote: “Sit down whenever you can.”

Nielsen would tell actors and comedians that phrase when they asked for advice. I would argue that even if you’re not an actor or a comedian, it’s very practical. I’m sitting down right now, and I’m loving it.

Here’s a three-minute compilation of Nielsen’s best “work” with his fart machine. And you know what? After watching it, I think I might get why he found it so funny.

The ‘o’opu ‘alamo’o, a fish in Hawaii, can climb vertical waterfalls.

I visited the island of Maui last month, and it is very hard to believe that Hawaii is the same planet that you and I live (unless you live in Hawaii, in which case, it’s quite easy to comprehend).

Seemingly everywhere I turned, I would find myself marveling at how gorgeous the nature was around me. How clear the ocean water is. How cool the eucalyptus rainbow trees are. How lush the greenery gets.

Plus, you get to see things like the Nakalele Blowhole, which instantly locked in a spot as one of my favorite natural wonders. The waves from the ocean crash against the rocks alongside a cliff on the northwest coast of Maui, and some of that water gets forced through a large hole on the surface of the rocks.

When the tide is high, you get super cool sights like this:

Have you ever seen a rainbow traveling across the sky like that? What a spectacular view.

It turns out that rainbows are not the only thing that soar to impressive heights in Hawaii. The ‘o’opu ‘alamo’o (Lentipes concolor), a native fish, can climb up waterfalls.

There are four types of fish, including Stimpson’s goby, that can also scale waterfalls, though the ‘o’opu ‘alamo’o is the most impressive of the bunch.

When the fish return to their spawning beds and swim upstream, they sometimes come across waterfalls. It rains quite often on Hawaii, after all.

By using a combination of their mouths and suction disks on their pelvic fins, the fish can propel their way up the wet rocks behind and to the side of waterfalls.

Sometimes, these waterfalls can run hundreds of meters tall. That’s a whole lotta climbing! But it doesn’t deter the ‘o’opu one bit.

Surprisingly, the biggest threat to these fish when they’re climbing the waterfall isn’t that they’re breathing out of water. That’s mostly okay, as long as their gills and skin are wet.

Rather, the fish also need to be able to “pee across their gills” to properly remove nitrogenous waste. Without that, they’re at risk of ammonia toxicity.

Yet the ‘o’opu continue to persist, their endeavors to scale waterfalls serving them well. Scientists have noted that because the fish have been spotted on all six of Hawaii’s largest islands, properly tracking them can be tough. They also believe the population could be dwindling due to a number of factors, human intervention being among the list.

It’s a great reminder for anywhere you travel, especially in places with natural beauty or native wildlife. Leave everything as you found it, and admire from a distance. The views are still just as breathtaking.

R.L. Stine, the author of the Goosebumps book series, types all his books with only one finger.

In last week’s issue, I made a passing reference to Goosebumps. This series was a massive influence on my childhood. R.L. Stine has been cranking out his series since July 1992, when Welcome to Dead House and Stay Out of the Basement hit bookshelves.

The original run of Goosebumps books consists of 62 titles. But there are plenty of other spinoffs, including Goosebumps Most Wanted, Goosebumps SlappyWorld, and Goosebumps Series 2000. Remember when the year 2000 seemed like a future that was way off in the distance? Ha!

My favorite collection was Give Yourself Goosebumps, otherwise known as the choose your own ending books. If you’ve never read one, the first few pages progress as normal, and then you’re offered some kind of decision. “To walk through the door, head to page 43. Prefer to take the window? Turn to page 62.”

I have vivid memories of reading through these horror tales, putting a bookmark on the page I didn’t choose. Then, when the route I did take came to an end, I could easily hop back and see if the other decision would have been better.

Did that result in the book sometimes having a dozen bookmarks? You bet it did. It was a work of art.

Stine would also be Run DMC levels of tricky in that sometimes both of your decisions would lead to your character’s demise. Typically, the book only had one or two “good” endings, and it was a treat to pull it off on the first read-through.

To date, Goosebumps has sold over 400 million copies across the catalog. It’s been turned into a TV series and also received the silver-screen treatment via two film adaptations starring Jack Black. I only just watched the first movie a few years back, and it was delightful!

I’m typing this edition of Fun Fact Friyay using all ten of my fingers. I grew up in the Mavis Beacon era, and we took typing classes in middle school. Plus, you know, I very much enjoy writing, and a lot of that is done digitally.

Quick sidebar to encourage you to journal or write in an actual notebook or real piece of paper from time to time, too.

R.L. Stine, though? He never learned how to type properly. He began his authoring career by using only his left index finger, and…well, he just never stopped typing that way.

Back in 2015, Stine responded to a now-deleted tweet on Twitter (hey, it was still Twitter back then) and acknowledged that he only uses one finger to type his books.

“That finger has written over 300 books. Hope it holds up,” he added.

Stine has continued writing books—the next Goosebumps release is coming out on August 4. And in an interview earlier this year, he confirmed that he does, in fact, still type with just his lone index finger.

“I never learned how to type, and I’m totally left-handed,” he said. He then held up his index finger. “Look, it’s totally bent. This is what I sacrificed for my art. The finger’s ruined.”

As someone who has a permanently bent pinky finger thanks to a basketball injury, I can empathize with Stine. I haven’t sold 400 million books (yet…though you’re welcome to add to that tally here!), though I hope I’ve entertained some people along the way.

Whether or not you enjoy a good scare, we can all appreciate working toward something we love, even if it’s not the conventional way of doing it.

And I’ll be darned if that doesn’t give me goosebumps.

The black rat, also known as a roof rat, ship rat, or house rat, has a scientific name of Rattus rattus rattus.

Lately, I’ve been listening to the podcast Keanan and Lakin Give You Déjà Vu. As the name suggests, it’s hosted by Staci Keanan and Christine Lakin, who played Dana Foster and Al Lambert, respectively, on the 90s sitcom Step By Step.

(Side note: I’ve met Christine Lakin, who was a judge on an Internet reality show I was on back in the early-ish days of YouTube, but that’s a story for a different time.)

I don’t typically enjoy rewatch podcasts, yet this show offers enough tangentially related sidebars that it doesn’t just feel like I’m rehashing old episodes of a show I remember bits and pieces of. And in the most recent episode I listened to—which is about a year and a half old, since I've only recently discovered the show—they noted how one of the characters says, “Oh, rats!” when faced with an unfortunate situation.

Both hosts agree that “rats!” should make a comeback as a turn of phrase, and I wholeheartedly co-sign. It worked for Step By Step, it worked for Calvin and Hobbes, and by golly, it can work again in the 2020s.

If you saw a black rat in the house (which would then also make its “house rat” moniker more accurate), you might address it by one of its nicknames.

“Yo, ship rat, what’s good?” you might say. Or, “Roof rat, who’s your favorite jazz musician?”

Of course, if you’re afraid of rats, you might simply say, “EEEEEEEEEK!” and run out of the room screaming.

However, if you wanted to scientifically label the same creature, you’d be a little more formal: Rattus rattus rattus.

This trifecta is known as a triple tautonym. That’s when zoological names of species consist of three identical words: the genus (or generic name), the species (or subspecific name), and the subspecies (or subspecific name).

Should rats give you goosebumps—after all, they’re the main villains in the classic Goosebumps book, “Attack of the Beastly Babysitter”—you’ve got plenty of other options.

Want to point out the Canada striped skunk to a friend? Just shout, “Mephitis mephitis mephitis!”

Prefer names with quite a few syllables in them, at the risk of suffering from Hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia? Holler for a particular type of shore clingfish with a “Lepadogaster lepadogaster lepadogaster.”

Curious about a herd of plains bison? You’d just have to say, “Bison bison bison,” and several may appear. Okay, that name is not nearly as fun, since it’s largely just a repeat of the animal’s common name.

By the way, what did the papa buffalo say before sending his child off to school? “Bison!”

Anyway, rats are often unfairly credited with spreading plagues, especially during the Black Death, which killed over a third of Europe’s population between 1347 and 1351.

Turns out, as with many of the world’s problems, humans were to blame, instead.

And much like me, rats tend to be generalists in their diet. They’re omnivores, and they’re not picky. Fruit, fungi, cereals, oranges, coffee beans, sugar cane—they’re all fair game when a rat’s in town.

Perhaps rats and humans aren’t so different, after all. Though if you still want to say, “Oh, rats!” should you ever see one nearby, I fully support you.

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