TIL that the sheet of ice that covers most of Antarctica is, on average, a mile thick or more (1.6 km), comprising 90% of the world's ice and more than 70% of its fresh water.
TIL a married couple was hired by the MLB from 1981-2004 to draw up each season's baseball schedule. They were responsible for scheduling 2,430 games played by 30 teams.
TIL That smiling in public is frowned upon in Russian culture. Excessive smiling is seen as a sign of dishonesty, insincerity, or even stupidity. Russians also tend to not smile in photographs for this reason.
TIL that Bernie Madoff's office was a hub for cocaine and wild sex parties, dubbed the "North Pole" in honor of the drug-infused fest
TIL that pigeons don't have external sexual organs, so mating is accomplished by pressing their anal tracts ("cloacas") together.
TIL of four interwoven studies of smokers, found that sadness increases cravings, frequency of smoking, and volume of puffs, and also predicts smoking relapses, even decades later.
TIL Wataru Misaka the first non-white NBA player described his first game as "It wasn't a big thing" and "Nobody cared." the same year Jackie Robinson broke the baseball color barrier