Mental Floss

ALL STORIES

Is disaster about to strike?

From a profane parrot to an exploding corpse to swapped (and dropped) bodies, the funerals on this list went terribly awry.

Stacy Conradt
















From smart speakers to fitness trackers, give mom the splurge gifts she really wants this year.

Stressed about what to give to mom this year? From fitness trackers to DNA testing kits, the best gifts for moms run the gamut, but they can help make her holiday season even more meaningful.

Hannah McDonald
Where the ‘nog’ came from is a bit of a mystery.

The ‘egg’ part of ‘eggnog’ is obvious. The ‘nog’ is a little more mysterious—possibly involving noggins and/or grog.

Ellen Gutoskey








Charles Dickens.

Dickens’s unprecedented celebrity made him the most popular novelist of his century—but the author of Great Expectations, Bleak House, A Christmas Carol, and dozens of other works was more than just a writer.

Sean Hutchinson