Every year on the last Monday in May, Americans gather together at parades, festivals, and family parties to honor our fallen military heroes who selflessly gave their lives in the line of duty.

The tradition of Memorial Day remembrance is one that is near and dear to our hearts and roots as a country, but we’re willing to bet that there are some interesting things you may not know about this special occasion.

In light of that, here are six cool Memorial Day facts you may not know.

Traditions of remembering fallen heroes date back to the days of ancient Greeks and Romans. Each year, graves of loved ones were adorned with flowers, and festivals were held to show honor to the dead. Similar events were also done in Athens with one of the first known celebrations held to honor Pericles, a strong Athenian general. The first Memorial Day in America began in the 19th century.

One of the earliest and documented ceremonies were held by over 1,000 freed slaves on May 1st, 1865. Groups of colored troops, such as the 54th Infantry, joined the newly freed men and sang hymns while distributing flowers among the tombstones in the cemetery. This event occurred near the end of the Civil War.

Before Memorial Day was actually called Memorial Day, General John A. Logan first issued a decree that today would be dubbed “Decoration Day”. Early American received this notion well, and ceremonies took place in more than 27 states within the first year.

Even though the term Memorial Day started gaining traction in 1880, it wasn’t until the Uniform Monday Holiday Act of 1968 finalized the new celebration date and name. There was a ton of controversy that surrounded the changes for quite a few years from many groups, but as we can see, that settled.

Believe it or not, there is a lot of rivalry surrounding the topic of who celebrated Memorial Day first:

Only one town has federal recognition to back up their birthplace claim, and that is Waterloo, New York. They have the official U.S. Government seal of approval for their 1966 celebration.

Although more and more people celebrate Memorial’s Day as an annual summer holiday, there are many traditions that have remained strong through time:

Prospective homebuyers list hardwood flooring as one of their most-sought-after features when they begin shopping for a new home.

Hardwood is timeless, beautiful, and resilient. If properly cared for, a hardwood floor can last upwards of 100 years. But have you ever wondered how your home’s indoor environment affects hardwood flooring?

Incontinent pets, children’s toys, high-heeled shoes, spills, and a busy family can all cause damage to a hardwood floor, but the greatest threat your floor faces may be the environmental factors that you can’t see.

As a natural product (it is wood, after all), hardwood flooring is extremely susceptible to changes in temperature and humidity. Installing a hardwood floor in a geographic region where temperatures and humidity fluctuate wildly from one season to the next can be a tricky endeavor.

If your flooring contractor installs the planks too closely to the walls without allowing room for the wood to expand and contract, there is a strong probability that your flooring may begin to peak during humid months. Alternatively, when the humidity drops, you may notice unsightly gaps between the planks.

Let’s face it; having hardwood floors installed in your home costs a pretty penny. If you choose the wrong contractor or you pick a wood species that doesn’t react well to fluctuations in temperature and humidity, thousands of your hard-earned dollars might end up in the nearest landfill.

It’s in your best interest as a homeowner and a consumer to do your homework on individual wood species, the Janka scale (the Janka scale measures how much pressure a wood species can handle before denting occurs), and how the geographic region you live in may affect the longevity and beauty of your hardwood floors. Hardwood flooring in a home in Michigan won’t react the same way to seasonal changes as a home in south Florida will.

Anyone who has renovated a home before can attest to the fact that making significant upgrades can turn into a very costly endeavor in no more time than it takes to blink your eyes. Many homeowners try to save money by going the do-it-yourself route only to realize that they bit off more than they could chew.

Some homeowners cut corners by purchasing entry-level materials that end up disappointing them when the product fails after six months. Consumers often ask if it is possible to buy cheap flooring that looks expensive. Unfortunately, the answer to that question is a definite no.

When you purchase new flooring, think of it as purchasing a new car; the good ones aren’t cheap, the cheap ones aren’t good, and you can’t buy a new Maserati for the same price as a used Mazda.

If you’re looking to make a quick aesthetic fix on a rental property or a flip house, it may not make sense to pour thousands of dollars into a home improvement project. But if you plan to stay in your current home for any length of time, you’re better off seeking financing options or saving your money until you can afford a reputable product and have it installed by a professional flooring company.

If you’re unsure of how to differentiate between a good flooring product and a cheap product, your best bet is to do your homework on the manufacturer and the warranties that company uses to back their materials.

Say you’re planning to change the flooring in your bathroom or your kitchen and you’d like a luxury vinyl product, but it isn’t in your budget right now. Cutting corners by installing a cheap peel-and-stick tile from your local big-box store isn’t going to give you the kind of results you’re looking for, and you could wind up with a big mess on your hand if the adhesive on those tiles begins to fail.

Another way to be sure you’re buying a good product is to explore options with a shop-at-home flooring retailer based in your community. One of the benefits of using a shop-at-home company’s services is that you’ll be able to look at flooring samples in the comfort of your own home, at a time that’s most convenient for you. Look for a company in good standing with the Better Business Bureau, and be sure that they back their work with a written lifetime installation warranty.

Have you ever wondered what all the chemicals listed on the back of soda cans do to your innards? Chances are you probably have.

The folks at Harvard University wondered what those chemicals do, too. Findings from a 2012 study conducted at Harvard showed that participants who consumed the most soda had a twenty percent higher chance of developing heart disease than their less soda-addicted counterparts and participants who drank the most soda had a twenty percent higher chance of having a massive heart attack.

Soda’s Negative Effects on the Brain

A study conducted by the Department of Neurological Science at UCLA found that test subjects who consumed a diet high in sugar and fat had decreased spatial learning abilities and a greater instance of plaque buildup in the brain.

Scientists have linked increased plaque buildup in the brain to the onset of Alzheimer’s disease and other memory-related illnesses that dramatically decrease people’s quality of life.

Soda’s Negative Effects on Teeth

It’s no secret that soda is terrible for your teeth. In fact, soda is so bad for your teeth that the Department of Restorative Dentistry at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, found that people who drank excessive quantities of soda pop over an extended period experienced the same degree of dental erosion as people addicted to meth and crack cocaine.

If you’ve never seen a chronic meth abuser’s grin, trust us when we tell you that you don’t want your smile to resemble the mouth of a chronic drug abuser; nobody looks good with a mouth full of rotten teeth.

Soda’s Negative Effects on Your Weight

If increased plaque buildup in your brain and your teeth falling out of your head isn’t enough to make you stop drinking soda pop, consider the negative effects soda has your waistline; research shows that removing one Coca-Cola from your diet each day would decrease your annual caloric intake by upwards of 200,000 calories—the equivalent of sixty pounds of weight loss.

Soda’s Negative Effects on Your Overall Health

A 2014 study published in the American Journal of Public Health found that soda drinkers’ immune cells have shorter telomeres than the immune cells of non-soda drinkers. For those of you who are unfamiliar with telomeres and what they do, telomeres are protective units situated at the end of your chromosomes. The shorter your telomeres, the faster you age, increasing your risk of sicknesses.

Another major pitfall associated with drinking sugary sodas is the increased chance of developing Type-2 diabetes and other chronic health issues such as obesity and cancer. Plain and simple, giving up soda is one of the simplest lifestyle changes you can make to improve your health and wellness.

Unless you drink only from Sippy cups similar to the ones toddlers use, anyone that ever picked up a glass filled with liquid probably has spilled a drink on his or her carpet at some point or another.

If you spilled water on your carpet, no harm no foul. But if you spill soda pop, wine, dark liquor, or Kool-Aid, well, you may have a serious problem on your hands. So, what should you do if you spill a drink on your carpet?

Before we answer that question, let’s start with what you shouldn’t do if you spill a drink on your carpet. Most people’s first instinct when they spill a drink on their carpet is to grab the closest towel, rag, or t-shirt in the vicinity to try to soak up the liquid; this is a mistake.

The correct approach to cleaning a spilled drink on your carpet is to find a clean, white towel, or a roll of paper towel that doesn’t have any sort of design printed on the absorbent material. Place the towel directly over the spilled drink, and gently blot (don’t rub; rubbing is bad) the spill until all the liquid is absorbed. (Depending on the amount of liquid on your carpet, you may need to repeat the blotting process multiple times and use multiple clean towels.)

Another thing you shouldn’t do when attempting to clean a spilled drink from your carpet is to soak it with a cleaning agent. Some of the chemicals in carpet fibers may cause permanent damage to your carpet’s delicate yarns.

If blotting the spill doesn’t remove the stain out of the carpet, contact a professional carpet cleaner. If having your carpet professionally cleaned doesn’t do the trick, you could try to use an area rug, a piece of furniture, or a houseplant to hide the stain from view.

In some instances, placing something over the stain to obscure it from view may not be practical. When all else fails, you will need to have your carpet replaced by a professional flooring company.