In 1983, an engineer and his family fled to Austria from Communist Czechoslovakia in a homemade hot air balloon made from old raincoats and propelled by domestic propane.Guards shot flares at them but missed.
The placebo effect can help with weight loss. In one experiment, people told a milkshake was high in calories were far less hungry than people told it was a low-cal shake.
In 2002, a Chinese peasant uncorked a liquor bottle and was bitten by the snake inside, which had been trapped for about a year. The porous stopper had allowed enough air into the bottle for the snake's survival.
In 2020, a 74-year-old Florida man saw a gator grab his puppy, Gunner, in a backyard pond. He jumped in, pulled both animals to the surface, pried open the gator's jaws, and freed his dog.
Thanks to "Finding Your Roots," Anderson Cooper learned that an ancestor had been blugeoned to death by a slave. Cooper's response? "He had 12 slaves. I don't feel bad for him."1>
A biology teacher had students design a diet following federal nutrition guidelines with nothing but McDonald's food, including Double Cheeseburgers. After 3 months, he'd lost 37 pounds.