10 things we didn't know last week
Snippets from the week's news, sliced, diced and processed for your convenience.
1. Being born without an ear is called microtia.
2. Zsa Zsa Gabor is related to Paris Hilton.
3. In Iceland, 96% of women go to university.
4. Gordon Brown has broken prime ministerial convention by getting a mobile phone, but it does not take incoming calls.
5. It costs 100 euros to hire one of the prostitutes' windows in Amsterdam for part of the day.
6. About 16,000 hyphens have been dropped from the latest edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary.
7. The Belgian army had to be called in recently to deal with an infestation of moths.
8. Dinosaurs had creches.
9. 'Conservative haircut' is economists' jargon for a form of loan collateral.
10. Meteorites do not let off dangerous fumes - but on landing can expose rotting organic matter, filling the air with methane, hydrogen sulphide and carbon dioxide.
(Sources, where item not linked: 4. Sunday Times, 16 September.)
Seen 10 things? . Thanks to Patrick McGarry for this week's picture of 10 scraps from the paper shredder).