Strange But True: Prayer Pretzels
By Lucie Winborne
An 1898 book predicted the Titanic's sinking 14 years before it happened.
During the 1904 Tour de France, Maurice Gerin jumped on a train and caught a ride between cities to get ahead of the other cyclists.
Antarctica is the world's largest desert, as it is a polar ice desert with very low precipitation.
As a young, poor artist, Pablo Picasso once burned his own paintings to keep warm.
The naked man orchid, aka the hanging man orchid, resembles -- yes, you guessed it -- a nude dude. Native to Mediterranean regions, it's also classified as threatened, possibly due to its popularity as an antidiarrheal, antiflatulent and aphrodisiac.
Pretzels were originally created by monks around 610 A.D. to reward children for learning prayers, with their shape designed to resemble arms crossed in prayer.
Snake wine, a traditional alcoholic beverage found in Vietnam, China and Southeast Asia, is created by infusing whole, often venomous, snakes in rice wine or grain alcohol for months. The high alcohol content denatures the venom, making it safe for consumption, though the drink is banned in some areas.
In 2018, scientists at Caltech played a microscopic game of tic-tac-toe built from DNA.
The dirt on Mars is made up of dust particles just 4% the width of a human hair and contains toxic metals and other harmful compounds that can cause hormonal imbalances and serious disease.
Feeding pigeons in Venice, Italy, is prohibited to protect historical monuments.
Thought for the Day: "You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space." -- Johnny Cash
(c) 2026 King Features Synd., Inc.