As you pay your taxes, just think about all the neat things they’ll help pay for.

• In 1789 the total U.S. federal government debt was $190,000.

• The IRS estimates that $20 to $40 billion are lost to tax fraud every year.

• In 1952 Albert Einstein called income taxes “the most difficult thing to understand.”

• There are 284 bathrooms in the Pentagon.

• There are 412 doors in the White House.

• Sixty-five percent of all paper bought by the federal government is used by the Defense Department.

• Taxpayers spent $57,000 on gold-embossed playing cards for Air Force One in 1992.

• The U.S. government spent $277,000 on “pickle research” in 1993.

• The United States spends $40 billion a year collecting “intelligence” from around the world.

• The Pentagon spends $8,612 every second.

• The Pentagon spent $50 million on Viagra for American troops and retirees in 1999.

• George W. Bush’s 2001 tax cut added 14,368 pages to the U.S. Tax Code.

• NASA spent $200,000 on a “sanitary napkin disposal unit” for female astronauts in 1992.

For hundreds more fun facts, check out Uncle John’s Extraordinary Book of Facts and Bizarre Information.