Mental Floss

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Not all Manx cats are tailless like this one.

Manx cats can have tails of varying lengths, but only “rumpies” or “rumpy risers” are eligible to compete in the championship classes in CFA cat shows.

Kirstin Fawcett


These books altered history in ways big and small.

Here, in no particular order, are just a few of history’s most influential tomes—and how they made humanity look at things in a new light.

April Snellings, mentalfloss .com






There's a multitude of pencil types out there.

Almost every syllabus, teacher, and standardized test requires a No. 2 pencil. Are there other choices out there?

Bryan Dugan


Sophisticated and fool-proof.

No, spies aren't all focused on national security. Yes, the CIA did deploy a mission called Operation Acoustic Kitty.

Justin Dodd




These linguistic illusions will hurt your brain.

Linguistic illusions—a phenomenon in which your judgment or understanding of a sentence or phrase conflicts with its actual meaning or structure—reveal how we process the world, and remind us that things aren’t always as they seem.

Brett Reynolds


Be careful out there!

Poison ivy can take many different shapes and sizes. It can appear in small patches, take the form of creeping vines or a bush, and can even mimic the appearance of a tree it has wrapped itself around.

Emily Petsko