Some useful tidbits..

1 billion - the total number of online pledges to celebrate Earth Day (April 22) that the Earth Day Network hopes to collect for its A Billion Acts of Green initiative. Think green acts, not greenbacks, for this pledge drive: You can vow to plant a garden, switch to LED lightbulbs, or walk more and drive less. Head to earthday.org/2012 to join the cause. Your one good deed could help make the environment a billion times better.

4.74 - the average number of people linking any two strangers, according to strangers from Facebook and University of Milan, who studied 721 million Facebook users. That's quite a status update to the six-degrees-of-separation theory of psychologist Stanley Milgram. In 1967 the professor asked a group of volunteers to send a document to a random Massachusetts resident via people they know thought might know him. Milgram found that the process required about six jumps for the documents to reach its intended recipient. The population may be expanding, but the world is getting smaller.

1.65 - the average number of lies told per day, as reported by a Michigan State University study sampling, 1,000 Americans. Among out-of-the-box thinkers, dishonesty could be even more prevalent, says a new report in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Researchers tested the creative abilities of hundreds of people, then asked the participants to take exams and grade them themselves. Those with "creative personalities" were more likely to fudge their results or overstate their abilties than were their less imaginative counterparts. The study's authors posit that it's easier for this inventive group to conjure up tall tales on short notice.

77,000 - the approximate age of of the world's oldest mattress, recently uncovered in a South African cave by a team of archeologists. Composed of about 15 layers of compacted stems and leaves, the specimen is an impressive 50,000 years older than the one previously considered the planet's oldest. Have a sinking feeling that your mattress could take third place? If you are frequently disrupted by your sleep partner's movements, or if your mattress is rounding its first decade, it might be time to spring for a replacement.

28x - about how much more monely companies with three or more women on the board of directors donate to charity, as compared with corporations with no female directors. In a study released last year by Harvard University and Catalyst, a research nonprofit devoted to women's advancement in the workplace, the former group gave an average of $27.1 million to philanthropic endeavors in 2007, while the latter forked over only $969,000.

9/10 - the fraction of U.S. households that always stock eggs, according to the NPD Group, a market-research firm in Port Washington, New York. Other top kitchen staples are milk and bread, kept on hand by 94.4 percent of the households. (French toast, anyone?) For tips on saving on groceries--buy milk at the pharmacy, where it can be up to 20 percent.

SMILE, SMILE & TAKE YOUR BOSS TO LUNCH TODAY :)