Where the English might say 'It's the bee's knees', the French say 'C'est le petit Jésus en culotte de velours' (It's the baby Jesus in velvet shorts).

Word of the Day: CUÑADISMO (Spanish slang) — literally: ‘brother-in-law-ism’; speaking on topics you know little about as if you were an expert and smarter than everyone else.

12 + 3 – 4 + 5 + 67 + 8 + 9 = 100

In 1959, the first commercially successful document copier, the Xerox 914, went on sale. It came with a small fire extinguisher as the machine had a tendency to catch fire.

In 1952, a bus driver managed to propel his bus over an opening Tower Bridge after a watchman forgot to ring the warning bell. The driver was given £10 and a day off work as a reward for bravery.

Sea otters have underarm pockets that they keep food and their favourite stones in.

Salt Lake City has the widest roads of any major US city. They were originally built to such a width so that farmers could turn their cattle without “resorting to profanity”.

In 1899, G.E. Dudley patented an electrical anti-masturbation device for men that consisted of a tube connected to a bell that would ring if the penis, inserted in the tube, became erect.

Word of the Day: ANTIMETABOLE - a rhetorical device when words are repeated in successive clauses, but swapped. For instance JFK's "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country", or Snoop Dogg's "With my mind on my money and my money on my mind."

According to a medieval Irish legal text on cats called Catslechtae (Cat-Sections), if a cat is able to purr and to catch mice, it’s worth three cows and if it’s only able to purr, it’s worth one cow and a half.

If every zombie bit one new person a day, starting with one zombie, the whole world would be zombified in 34 days.

Elephants in sub-Saharan Africa are being more aggressive towards people and experts believe they might be seeking revenge against humanity.

In 2015, two Americans were injured in separate events where a man shot at an armadillo and the bullet ricocheted off its shell.

In 2018 a Polish environmental charity put a SIM card in a GPS tracker to follow the migratory pattern of a white stork. They lost track with the stork and later received a phone bill for $2,700: someone in Sudan had taken the SIM from the tracker and made over 20 hours of calls.

The first paperback vending machine was installed at Charing Cross Station in 1937 by Penguin books. They called it the ‘Penguincubator’. (📷: STML)

Hebocon is a Japanese contest to find the worst fighting robot, a sort of anti-Robot Wars. Entrants of the first Hebocon in 2013 included a pole dancing Barbie doll, a robot that banged a packet of ramen flavouring on the ground and a tissue box with vibrating dildos for legs.

Tonight at 9pm on BBC Two we'll be looking at WINGS AND WHEELS in a brand new episode with Sandi, Alan, Aisling Bea, Desiree Burch and Hank Green.

When the U.S. military tested their AI human-movement recognition robot on a group of Marines, all of them managed to approach it undetected. One was disguised as a fir tree; another somersaulted for 300 metres; two hid under a cardboard box and giggled the whole distance.

For a pilot study in 2022, scientists fitted 5 Australian magpies with tiny trackers that could only be removed with a magnet or scissors. Within 10 minutes, a female had successfully removed the tracker from a younger bird, and 3 days later, all of them had been removed.

Fun Fact: If Stephen is murdered or banished he will be immediately replaced by Sandi Toksvig #CelebrityTraitors

Your strongest music-related memories are formed around age 14.

Instead of requesting a traditional wake-up call in a hotel, the French writer Alphonse Allais would have the concierge call the room on either side of his one in order ‘to be gently woken by the sound of your neighbours’ protests’.

Archaeologists have found records of Ancient Egyptian excuses for missing work. They include ‘the scorpion bit him’, ‘brewing beer’, ‘drinking with Khonsu’ and ‘embalming his brother’.

Baby blue whales put on 4kgs an hour until they’re 8 months old. 🐋 Tonight at 9pm we'll be looking at lots more whale facts in 'Wales, Whales and Wails', a BRAND NEW QI episode with Sandi, Alan, Elis James, Griff Rhys Jones and Kiri Pritchard-McLean!

Word of the Day: ULTRACREPIDATE – to critisise beyond your scope of knowledge.

QI Fans! Brand new QI Series W launches TOMORROW NIGHT at 9pm on BBC Two and iPlayer.

Word of the Day: PSITHURISM - the sound of leaves rustling in the wind.

In the late 1920s, Louis Armstrong came across some buskers playing his music and told them they were going too slowly. The next time he saw them they were playing faster and had a sign which read ‘PUPILS OF LOUIS ARMSTRONG’.

Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns. GEORGE ELIOT

From 1264 to 1827, anyone who received a Master of Arts degree from Oxford had to swear that they would never forgive Henry Symeonis. By 1608, no one knew who he was or what he had done.

The vertebrate with the smallest brain-to-body weight ratio is the bony-eared assfish.

A pumpkin is a berry.

According to the Malleus Maleficarum, a 15th century guide for witchhunters, witches could steal men’s penises and keep them as pets.

In the mid-1970s, Sweden sold North Korea 1000 Volvos. North Korea has never paid for them, making this "the biggest car theft in human history". The Swedish government continues to send twice-yearly invoices to Pyongyang for £200,000,000.

Richard Norris Williams was advised to have his legs amputated after he survived the sinking of the Titanic, but he instead walked it off and won the Men’s Doubles Championships at Wimbledon in 1920.

Tchaikovsky was able to quit his day job with the support of a wealthy patron. Her only condition for her support was that they never meet in person.

One of the highest per capita consumers of Worcestershire sauce is El Salvador, where it is known as salsa inglesa ('English sauce') or salsa Perrins.

When asked if Abraham Lincoln had any hobbies, his wife responded only ‘cats’.

Male bees, or drones, don’t do any work in the hive. They make up roughly ten percent of the colony’s population, and they spend their whole lives eating honey and waiting for the opportunity to mate.

The world record for the longest time handcuffed to another human is 123 days, achieved by a couple who kept breaking up and then getting back together and wanted to save their relationship. After the handcuffing, they swore never to get back together.

Documented Viking nicknames include Eystein Foul-Fart, Herjólfr Shriveled Testicle, and Skagi the Ruler of Shit.

Vallvidrera, near Barcelona, has a curling club. Each season, the members of the club go to the local reservoir and toss a stone in to see if the ice is strong enough to play. Since the water never freezes, they go for brunch instead and raise the toast, ‘We shall play one day’.

In 1982, 43% of fathers in the UK had never changed a nappy. By 2000, this had dropped to 3%.

In 2008 there was a federal court case called 'United States v. Approximately 64,695 Pounds of Shark Fins'. The United States lost.

On the first night sleeping in an unfamiliar location, one side of your brain remains alert the entire night in order to “watch out” for potential threats.

September, October and November are the only months not mentioned by Shakespeare in any of his works.

Charles Earl Boles was an 1870s American stagecoach robber who left poems at his crime scenes, signing them “Black Bart”. One verse was: I’ve labored long and hard for bread, For honor, and for riches, But on my corns too long you’ve tread, You fine-haired sons of bitches.

In Basel, Switzerland in 1474 a chicken mistaken for a rooster was accused of witchcraft after laying an egg. The chicken was found guilty and burned to death.

Ponyhenge is a collection of rocking horses in an open field in Lincoln, Massachusetts. No one knows where the ponies come from, or who is donating them - but the herd continues to grow. (Image: Jenn Forman Orth)

Word of the Day: BLOBBERY - a garden made of shrubs and bushes shorn to look like blobs. (📷: Paolo)