Things I learned this week 2 Sep

• Dubai has more buildings over 700 feet tall than New York City.
• The Swiss may be a neutral country, but their military is ready for an invasion. They have engineered their nation to collapse. To prevent the invader from using bridges, tunnels, highways and railroads, there are at least 3000 points of demolition, with hidden artillery to prevent repair to the destroyed infrastructure. Some mountains are so porous that whole army divisions can fit inside them.
• U.S. corn crop acreage, put together, would cover all of Germany. In the U.S., it takes 91 gallons of water to produce one pound of corn. Annually, the industry uses 3.5 Long Island Sounds to grow crops.
• Nocebos: When we tell people about the possible negative side-effects of a real drug, that often makes them more likely to experience those side-effects.
• The Beatles' "Yesterday" has been covered 2200 times by different artists.
• Banks don't want people taking pictures inside.
• Countries where prostitution is legal, (R) if it's also regulated: Belgium; Germany (R); Israel; Italy; Netherlands (R); Turkey (R).
• People who own little dogs often think any ban against dogs doesn't apply to them.
• Saturn has 62 moons, 53 of which have been named. One of them is named Prometheus.
• In the first half of 2011, high temperature records were set in cities across the US 13582 times. In the same period this year, there were 23283 records set.