Posts by Adan Mathews

Who doesn’t remember that f’n awesome opening ceremony from Beijing in 2008? Fireworks both real and fake. A giant, rolling and eventually floating LED screen… And the drums…. We’ll never forget the drums… Or that water cube. But, what happened after the games ended? Well, when it comes to the water cube, a lot of things...

I crushed this one. I never actually owned Alanis Morrisette’s 1995 album, “Jagged Little Pill.” But I absolutely dominated the quiz. Even though I never had the album, a whole lot of other people did. The era-defining album ranks just behind this one: And just ahead of this one: Maybe you don’t recall the time when Celine Dion...

The folks over at the YouTube channel WonderWhy have stumbled upon some 50-year old research that still packs a powerful punch today when it comes to determining one’s ability to use deductive reasoning. It’s a super-simple test invented in 1966 by cognitive psychologist Peter Cathcart Wason. And, this dude dedicated his life to the psychology of...

There are several reasons I’ve been hesitant to re-name any of my Pokémon in the game so far. Practically speaking, I like using the “A-Z” function to organize them by type, but I think the main reason is that I have enough stuff to do – when the servers let me on – that re-naming Pokémon...

Pokémon GO is bringing people together in amazing ways, and one of the most incredible stories to come out in the short time since the ARevolution began is the story of NYC’s own Ralph Koppelman. Six-year-old Ralphie loves to draw, and he’s well on his way to becoming a Pokémon master. Ralphie found this thing just...

Actually, that’s not very new anymore. Nowadays a lot of phones have a time-lapse option in the camera app. I mean, if it’s new to you, go for it! It really is pretty damn cool. Or… You could just check out these time-lapses I pulled from our archive of Fact Snacks: #9. Here are the...

If you were around for the premiere of South Park – or, like me, you caught it on VHS because your cable company didn’t carry Comedy Central back in 1997 – then you’re probably feeling kind of old right about now. But don’t go sticking that fork in the electric socket just yet… All those...

I don’t know if money is actually the root of all evil. That feels a little hyperbolic. One time, I found $20 in my coat at the beginning of winter, and that was pretty awesome. Money brings you facts and buys me food – but it can also totally make things weird. Here are 8 crazy facts related...

It might not get much credit these days… But, Mortal Kombat was the OG when it came to turning a video game into a franchise, which is still a pretty dicey enterprise by the way… Of course, even though Warcraft only made $47 million in the US, they managed to bring in over $385 million in foreign...

Is there a cooler job than being an astronaut? I don’t know that there is. Astronauts not only get to look down on the Earth from orbit, but they also experience a host of other things that most of us never do. Things like GOING TO FREAKING SPACE! Here are 11 awesome facts about US astronauts: #11....

Do you like art? That’s accidental art, which is totally cool, but not really what I was getting at. That is actual art made to look like an accident. Definitely closer, but still not really what I was going for. I thought we could stick to some of the more classical stuff. Again, closer, but…...

So, how much do you know about plants? I bet you wonder that a lot. I know I do. No, not like Nancy Botwin… Like, botany and shit. Can you name the plant if I show you its picture? That one’s Audrey II. But she’s a puppet, not an actual plant – so it doesn’t count....

Unfortunately, have not evolved as fast as cars, and this is the result in the US alone: Source The human body just isn’t built to cope with the kind of high-speed impacts that cars inevitably cause. In an effort to remind people of how fragile we are, Australia’s government commissioned a road-safety engineer, an artist, and...

Since I’m always digging up crazy facts for you, I thought it might be a good time to round up a few of the weirdest ones from the last few months for you to take in, shake your head in disbelief, contemplate for a minute, and then realize you have to believe it, because all the information we...

Artists in general can come off as a bit weird to the general population, but thanks to social media, many of them have found a way to use that to their advantage. But, writers can be a different story. Many often live or lived solitary or sheltered lives away from the media, so their secrets often...