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TIL there is a copy of the Qur'an written in Saddam Hussein's blood which he had commissioned for his 60th birthday. Over the course of 2 years he provided up to 57 pints of his blood to complete the 336,000+ words that make up the text

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awmr9 TIL Of all the planets in the solar system, Venus is the most similar in size to Earth - its diameter is 0.95 and its mass is 0.82 in relation to the Earth’s size - gravity on the surface is 0.9 G. The problem is in the surface temperature which is about 470 C, the pressure is around 93 bar.
69yZJ TIL At the 1932 DNC: after Roosevelt's favorite song "Anchors Aweigh" had been repeatedly played, someone reportedly shouted: "For God's sake, have them play something else", which caused the band to play “Happy Days are Here Again”. This cemented the song as an unofficial Democratic theme song.
7rZLZ TIL "Phil McNamara was able to capture something not a lot of people get to see: the exact moment an active volcano blows its top, and the attendant shockwave. Filming off the coast of Papa New Guinea, McNamara filmed the start of the eruption of Mount Tavurvur volcano on August 29th, 2014." [Video]
8VnP TIL in the 1940’s Stetson Kennedy went undercover as a Klansman, gave Klan passwords to the writers of the popular “Superman” radio show, who used them in a story line in which Superman fights the KKK. Kennedy has been dubbed “the greatest single contributor to the weakening of the Ku Klux Klan”
vOND TIL there is a bird that can imitate the sounds of chainsaws and car alarms.