Things I've learned recently, and from whom I learned them.

The name of the Norwegian band Royksopp means "smoke mushroom" or what we called a puffball when I was a kid. (Ingrid, Arild's Norwegian friend)

Hyenas are more closely related to mongooses than dogs, and both are evolutionary connected to the same proto-organism as cats. (Animal Planet)

The Monroe Doctrine, delivered by President James Monroe on December 2, 1823, was the formal notice by the US government to the colonial powers of Europe that the Americas were no longer open to European colonization and that any attempt to influence the fates of the newly born nations in Central and South America would be considered "as dangerous to our peace and safety." It is one of the first official declarations by the US government that all of the Americas fell under its political domain. However, it should rightly be called the Adams doctrine, as it was drafted and persuasively argued by John Quincy Adams in response to Spain's struggles with rebellious colonies throughout the region, which threatened to drag in France, Austria, England, Russia, and other colonial powers. (usinfo.state.gov)

"Manifest Destiny," unlike the Monroe Doctrine, was not a formally declared US administrative policy, but in fact a term created in 1845 by politician and journalist John L. O'Sullivan as a means of identifying a cultural ideology that had been forming in the US since its origins. (From Revolution to Reconstruction)

The average person farts fourteen times per day. (Sara, though her sources are unknown)

I fart less than fourteen times per day on average, though I believe they are longer than most other people's farts. (Personal, subjective observation)