Today is the first Friday the 13th of the year, and it's got the inter web thingy in a spin, but not everyone thinks the number 13 is unlucky. Triskaidekaphobia, is the phobia of the number 13, and there are a number of theories behind the cause of this association between thirteen and bad luck, […]

A lot of people believe that the number 13 is unlucky, but research by online insurance comparison company confused.com has shown that in Britain 21.9 per cent of insurance policy holders living at a house number 166 have made a claim in the last five years. (The unluckiest house numbers in England for 2012 are:- House […]

If you want to do something that no human has ever done before, shuffle a pack of cards. (When you shuffle a normal pack of 52 playing cards, the number of possible permutations is ‘52 factorial’ otherwise known as 52! or 52 shriek. This works out as 52 times 51 times 50 ... all the […]

The 2014 to 2020 budget for the EU will be between 143 billion euros and 151 billion euros ($182.5 billion to $192.8 billion) per year. (It sounds like a lot, but it's only about 1 percent of the CEO (common economic output).  Over seven years this adds up to over 1 trillion euros, but according to German […]

There are 12 net contributors and 15 net recipients within the EU.(Net contributors receive less money from EU funds than they pay into the joint coffers. Net recipients receive more grants and benefits than they pay. The largest net contributors include Germany (at 9 billion euros), France (6.4 billion), Italy (5.9 billion), Great Britain (5.6 billion) and […]

Before you go off in a huff, love is a number - in tennis. (In France, where tennis became popular, the round nought on the scoreboard looked like an egg and was called 'l'oeuf,' which is French for 'the egg.'  Legend has it that when tennis was introduced in the US, Americans (mis)pronounced it 'love.') More about numbers […]