Stranger than fiction

“ Juneau, Alaska, is the only state capital on an island (with the obvious exception of Honolulu, which doesn’t really count because Hawaii is an island state). It’s also the only state capital that’s inaccessible by car. The city itself, of course, has roads, but they all dead-end a few miles outside town. The only way to get to Juneau is to take a boat or a plane.

“ By the time of his death in 1931, famed inventor Thomas Alva Edison had been awarded a total of 1,093 patents.

“ Most people would be more frightened of a cobra than of a tree frog — it’s a no-brainer. You might be surprised to learn, then, that the golden poison arrow frog is actually 66 times deadlier than a cobra. Although at any one time the cobra carries enough venom to kill 15 people, the golden poison arrow frog carries enough to kill 1,000 people. Of course, that probably won’t be much consolation for the first 15 people bitten by the hypothetical cobra.

“ It was author and noted wit James Thurber who made the following observation: “The wit makes fun of other persons; the satirist makes fun of the world; the humorist makes fun of himself.”