So when Wikipedia did the black out thing to protest SOPA, I realized something. I am unconditionally and irrevocably in love with Wikipedia. I reference Twilight, because Wikipedia seems to thirst after my productivity like Edward thirsts for Bella’s blood. However, in an effort to justify my time wasting, I present you with some interesting tidbits I have learned on Wikipedia. This is only a sampling of the random but interesting crap I have learned from the site.

1. Some pranksters enjoy stealing lawn gnomes from people’s gardens and “releasing them into the wild.” There are even garden gnome liberation fronts.
2. Austin, Minnesota holds an annual Spam Jam, a festival celebrating the food product SPAM.
3. When Count Rugen hits Wesley in the Princess Bride. Cary Elwes (Wesley’s actor) told Christopher Guest (Rugen’s actor) to really hit him. The result was production being shut down for a day while Elwes was in the hospital.
4. Mattel produced an Oreo Fun Barbie Doll that was criticized because Oreo is used as a derogatory term for somebody who is black on the outside and white on the inside.
5. Sadie Hawkins was a comic book character. Girls choice dances are often named after her because in the comic her father organizes a sort of foot race in which the unmarried women of the town have the chance to chase men and potentially legally bind them to matrimony.
6. The phrase “Elementary, my dear Watson” does not appear in any of the 60 works by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
7. The word meme was coined in 1976, as a shortened form of the Greek word mimeme, which means to imitate.
8. Platypuses (there’s no agreed upon plural) not only lay-eggs, they also produce venom.
9. Kryptonite was not introduced in the Superman comics, but rather in the radio series. It was created to allow the voice actor time off, and was not used in comics until 1949, six years after being introduced in the radio series.
10. The prince’s name in Beauty and the Beast is never revealed in the movie, but a CD-ROM tie in game refers to him as Prince Adam.

Wikipedia is often frowned on as an unreliable source. However, it is wonderful for random knowledge that doesn’t need to be accurate. Oh, and while I was perusing the Princess Bride  pages, I found this picture of Mandy Patinkin, the guy who played Inigo. He looks so different now!