TRIVIA

• How long does it take to hard-boil a three-pound ostrich egg? (1 hour and 45 minutes)
• A pound of ground coffee yields 50 cups. How many cups does a pound of tea yield? (200)
• What popular fruit was named after a papal estate outside Rome? (The cantaloupe, which was named after the Pope's summer residence of Cantalupo)
• What was Charles Elmer Hires originally going to call the drink we now know as root beer? (Root tea--but a friend convinced him the name would discourage sales)
• What is the most widely eaten fish in the world? (The herring)
• How long does it take a ginseng root to reach marketable size? (Seven years)
• What snack food commercial was pulled off the air in 1970 because of complaints from an outraged ethnic group? (The Frito Bandito commercial for Frito corn chips. The complaints came from Mexican-Americans)
• What fruit did the Visigoths demand in ransom when they laid siege to Rome in 408? (Peppercorns--3,000 pounds of them. Pepper was a highly valued spice at the time)
• What ethnic food did Jeno Paulucci make available in supermarkets nationwide for the very first time in 1947? (Paulucci gave us Chinese food--under the Chun King label. He later brought us Jeno's pizza)
• What recipe -- first published 50 years ago -- has been requested most frequently through the years by the readers of "Better Homes and Garden"? (The recipe for hamburger pie, which has been updated and republished a number of times over the years)
• How long -- in feet -- is the trunk of the average full-grown elephant? (8 feet)
• How many pounds of fish can a pelican hold in its pouch? (About 25 pounds)
• An average human has 46 chromosomes. How many does a cabbage have? (18)
• On an average day how many hours does an elephant spend sleeping? How about a giraffe? (Four hours for both)
• What breed of dog is particularly distinctive because of a genetic condition called achondroplasia? (The dachshund. Achondroplasia causes dwarfism--in the dachshund's case, abnormally short legs)
• What bird has been spotted flying at 27,000 feet - higher than any other bird on record? (The whooper swan. A flock of 30 was spotted by a pilot and picked up on radar at that altitude in 1967)
• What percentage of the world's food crops are pollinated by insects? (80 percent)
• What is the difference between a crawfish and a crayfish? (Nothing)
• How many eyes do most spiders have? (Eight)
• Berkshire, Cheshire, Victoria and Poland China are breeds of what animal? (The pig)
• What percentage of its body weight does the average bear lose during hibernation? (Up to 25 percent)