19 Facts You Can Use to Fill an Awkward Silence

In the airport, they usually ask you to take your laptop out of your backpack and put it in a separate bin while going through the security check. Laptops are dense, and the x-ray can’t see through them, so you could be hiding something dangerous there. If it’s out and is on its own in a separate bin, it’s easier for the scanners to capture a prospective hazard.

Normally, the messages you send using iMessage are blue. But look, this time, it turned green. No need to panic — it’s not like the user has blocked you or anything. It’s just that you sent a regular SMS and not an iMessage.

iMessages can only be sent to people who own an Apple device, so if the recipient doesn’t have one, they’re all gonna be green. Another reason your phone might opt for an SMS is that your iPhone isn’t connected to the Internet. iMessages go through the web, and SMS uses a cellular signal.

The jacks you put in your devices have little plastic rings on them that separate different sections. These sections are called pins, and each of them serves a different purpose. Each plug will have at least one plastic ring because any plug must be separated into at least two pins. One of them is there to cancel out any interference, and the other — to carry the signal.

If, for example, your headphones have one ring and two sections, they have mono playback. They deliver the same sound to both your right and your left ear. If there are two rings and three sections, then there is the basic one to cancel out interference and the other two — for either ear. Three rings and four sections mean that you have a set: one basic, one for either of the ears, and the last one is the microphone pin.

I bet you’ve never even noticed, but all credit cards, no matter what bank or country they come from, are the exact same size. The first ever credit card was issued in 1958 by the Bank of America, and later the international standard was established for every issuer around the world to follow. The standard dictates both the proportions and the thickness.

Whistles can work perfectly fine even if they don’t have that ball inside. Yet, they have it. That’s because, even though there’s sound without the ball, the noise it creates is very flat and not distinguishable enough. When you blow, the ball starts moving around inside, creating different pitches and making the noise more noticeable.

Jeans have had those metal rivets ever since they were invented. Jacob Davis, the man who made the first pair of jeans, added copper rivets to those spots where pants are more likely to rip to make them stronger. Today, they have more of a decorative purpose because they are distinctive and traditional for jeans.

A basketball has little dots all over its surface, and they serve as friction points. It’s important for that ball not to slip out of hands. There were times when they played basketball with a soccer ball. The floor was very slippery, and it was impossible to play because you’d have to be very careful just to keep the ball in place.

So, they had to redesign it. The more points of contact any object has with some surface, the more friction there is, and the less likely it is to slip through the surface. So, that’s how the ball got its dots.

Those holes at the ends of the handles aren’t just there just for you to hang your pans easily. You can also place your cooking spoon in there while making a meal. It’ll hang right above the pan, and the sauce won’t spill around. Make sure to tap off the sauce or food beforehand, though, so that it doesn’t go down the spoon’s handle.

You unload the dishwasher, and while everything is dry, your plastic containers get all wet once again. Seems like they never get dry, and that’s actually true. The reason for it is the material. The dishes heat up and cool down slowly, and so the remaining water evaporates and dries out easily. When you take out those plastic containers, they cool down way too fast. So the water doesn’t dry out of the surface and just stays there.

Another water source is those upside-down cups that collect water on top. But have you noticed that cups have chips on the bottom? They serve as a water drain in the dishwasher. So yeah, these cups don’t accumulate water in the dishwasher.

Take a look at aluminum foil. One side of it is always shiny, and the other one is dull. When producing the foil, they flatten it with rollers. It’s so thin that the rollers tear it, so they take two layers at a time. So, the sides facing the roller remain shiny, and those in the middle stay dull.

We say it all the time: 2 a.m. and 2 p.m. without thinking, why such a choice of letters? It’s just Latin, which is still used for many other abbreviations. A.m. stands for “ante meridiem,” which means “before noon.” P.m. stands for “post meridiem,” meaning “after noon.” Same with pounds, which are noted as “lb” from the Latin phrase “libra pondo.”

Most movie theater seats are red. And the reason isn’t better visibility, but quite the opposite. In low-light conditions, red is the first color that fades away in our eyes. And that’s what we want in a movie theater — to see nothing but the screen. Also, movie theaters were inspired by fancy Italian opera houses, so that’s another reason, too.

Ever wondered why so many Disney characters wear white gloves? Well, back when animated movies were black-and-white, putting white gloves on characters was a way to make the hands stand out from the rest of the body. Then animation evolved, but the gloves stayed a Disney tradition. But there are other reasons, too: human hands make animal characters more humanized and relatable. Also, those gloves are way easier to animate, which speeds up the process.

Cats often rub their bodies against your legs, but do you know why they do it? This way, they transfer their scent to you, marking you as their territory and as their human. It’s also a sign of affection — by doing this, they show that you’re part of their inner circle.

Wonder why it’s so hard to swat a fly? Well, to a fly, we’re sloths. That’s because they see things in slow motion compared to us. Species have different perceptions of speed.

The speed we see will be twice faster for a turtle. And it will be four times slower for a fly. Turn a video on 0.25x speed and imagine someone approaching you at this pace. Well, that’s how a fly sees you. So yes, it has enough time to escape.

Road signs have different shapes and colors to send different signals to your brain. Oval shapes are more friendly, and squared ones are very familiar and secure, so they are usually regulatory. Triangles reflect instability, so they are usually warning signs.

And finally, the STOP sign has a special octagon shape, the most unusual and unsettling. It’s supposed to draw your attention to it. Together with the red color, this sign stands out the most, just like it’s supposed to.

Some sidewalks have little plates with bumps on them. We don’t pay much attention to them, but they’re very important for visually impaired people. They signal a slope that then leads to a crosswalk. Also, there are several patterns that signal different things.

Name the school grades. A, B, C, D ... and F. No E, but why? The modern grading system dates back to 1897.

In the beginning, it was all the letters from A to E. A meant “excellent,” B was “good,” C was “fair,” and D was “passed.” Below that was an E, or “fail,” which was often confused with the opposite — “excellent.” So, soon enough, it was changed. F for “fail” is way more intuitive.