Interesting Facts

According to a study by the Department for Education, British teens are going out less and shunning cigarettes and alcohol to stay at home on their computers. (The so called 'Laptop generation' of teenagers are now more likely to be surfing the web and playing games than hanging out in the park. 13-year-olds today are more 'sober and responsible' than 10 years ago. Only 32 per cent had tried alcohol compared with 52 per cent in 2004, and it's the rise of social media sites such as Facebook that is thought to be behind the change. They are probably more sober and responsible than I am too.)

Brazilian surfer Carlos Burle is believed to have surfed a 100ft wave. (He took on the monster wave - created by the St Jude storm - at Praia do Norte in Portugal. The current Guinness World Record holder, Garret McNamara from Hawaii surfed a 78ft wave at the very same spot in Nazare in Nov. 1 2011.  Footage of Mr Burle's amazing ride will be analyzed by the Guinness World Records team, you can view it on YouTube: Mad!)

According to research from mobile network O2, smartphones are hardly ever used to make a phone call. (Most people use their smartphone for surfing the web, checking social networks or playing games. The research found that the average smartphone owner spends more than two hours each day using the device. Here's a breakdown of what they use it for. Browsing the internet - 25 minutes  Social networking - 17 minutes Playing games - 13 minutes  Listening to music - 16 minutes Making phone calls - 11 minutes Text messaging - 10 minutes Taking photographs - 3 minutes Even though people only spend three minutes a day taking photographs, photography was the most popular thing to use a smartphone for, 74 per cent said that they had taken photos with their handset. For me all the above is true apart from playing games and texting. I have never played a game on my Motorola Droid, and I send about 10 texts a year. In fact my smartphone gets about 30 minutes use a day, I prefer...

No, not surfing the internet, proper surfing. The Guinness World Records organisation has awarded professional surfer Garrett McNamara from Hawaiia the world record record for the biggest wave ridden. (Back in November Mr McNamara rode a 78ft wave off Portugal. The wave formed above an undersea canyon known as one of the biggest wave-generators in the world. That seems like a reason to avoid the area, but there's no accounting for surf mentality.)

On 2.5cm2 of your office desk there are 20,961 germs compared with 49 on the same area of a typical toilet seat. (The joy of WiFi is that I can ask you whether you are sitting at your desk now, or if are you surfing on the loo?)