Advertising
- Nike has a television commercial for hiking shoes that was shot in using Samburu tribesmen. The camera closes in on the one tribesman who speaks, in native Maa. As he speaks, the Nike slogan "Just do it" appears on the screen. Lee Cronk, an anthropologist at the University of Cincinnati, says the Kenyan is really saying, "I don't want these. Give me big shoes." Says Nike's Elizabeth Dolan, "We thought nobody in America would know what he said."
- When Gerber baby foods began to sell in parts of Africa, they continued to use their usual packaging, with the cute baby on the front. They didn't realize until later that where they were selling it, it was a common practice to help illiterate people buy things by putting pictures on the wrapper of what was inside....
- Colgate faced a big obstacle marketing toothpaste in Spanish speaking countries. Colgate translates into the command "go hang yourself."
- Pepsi’s “Come alive with the Pepsi generation” slogan, when translated into Chinese means “Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the Grave.”
Animals
- Squid can commit suicide by eating their own tentacles.
- A female lobster is called a hen.
- A Blue Whale's tongue is about the size and weight of a full grown African elephant, and its heart is compared to the size of a Volkswagon beetle.
- A blue whale aorta (the main blood vessel) is large enough for a human to crawl through.
- A female ferret dies if it goes in heat and can't find a mate.
- It was first discovered on a space mission flight that a frog could throw up. First it throws up its stomach, uses it's forearms to dig out the food and then swallows it stomach back down.
- A snail can sleep for 3 years.
- The roaring lion in the MGM logo was named Volney and lived at the Memphis Zoo.
- Most giraffes are bisexual.
- China has trained 700,000 ducks and chickens to attack at the sound of a whistle in order to fight a national plague of locusts.
- A completely severed snake head can still bite you a half hour later.
- The African Rock Python can survive for two years without eating.
- Turkey breeding has caused turkey breasts to grow so large that the turkeys fall over.
- Penguins can jump as high as 6 feet in the air.
- Baby squirrels are called kittens.
Celebrities
- In the movie the wizard of Oz, Judy Garland was the lowest paid of the main actors. Toto the dog made more money for the movie than she did.
- Elvis's cotton underpants are worth an estimated $1300.
- The book Dennis pulls out in the library in Christine is the book Christine by Stephen King.
- The police drama, Miami Vice, stormed the American TV scene in late 1980s and became an instant success. The action scenes and celebrity cast resulted in each weekly episode costing about $1.5 million dollars. The fact that went unnoticed was that the budget of the real Miami Police Vice department was only $1.2 million -- for the whole year.
- At age 14, Tom Cruise enrolled in a seminary to become a priest, but dropped out after one year.
- The characters Bert and Ernie on Sesame Street were named after Bert the cop and Ernie the taxi driver in Frank Capra's "Its A Wonderful Life"
- In every episode of Seinfeld there is a Superman somewhere.
- Ralph Lauren's original name was Ralph Lifshitz.
- The Seven Deadly Sins are represented by the characters in Gilligan's Island: Gilligan, sloth; the Skipper, anger; Mr. Howell, greed; Mrs. Howell, gluttony; Ginger, lust; the Professor, pride; and Mary Ann, envy.
- In high school, Robin Williams was voted "Least Likely to Succeed."
- Photographers on the set of "Scream" had to promise not to reveal what they saw. When Michael Jackson arrived, they were instructed to face their backs towards Michael and place their cameras on the floor. When they turned back around, the photographers where only allowed to photograph Michael off of television monitors.
- One of Michael Jackson's hobbies is observing brain surgery. Said one surgeon after performing a particularly gruesome operation, "Jackson was smiling through the whole thing." In his room, Michael keeps a brain in a jar.
- To develop her signature walk, Marilyn Monroe cut off a slice of the heel of one of her shoes.
- A theater manager in Seoul, Korea felt that The Sound of Music was too long, so he shortened it by cutting out all the songs.
- A person paid $14,000 for the bra Marilyn Monroe wore in “Some Like It Hot.”
- Keanu Reeves turned down 12 million dollars to star in Speed 2 in order to play with his band, Dogstar, and then said no to working with Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro in Heat in order to perform Hamlet in Winnipeg, Canada.
Fear and Phobias
- Hitler was claustrophobic. The large elevator leading to his Eagles nest in the Austrian Alps was mirrored so it would appear larger and more open.
- If you are afraid that you might die laughing--you are suffering from cherophobia.
- Elizabeth I of England suffered from anthophobia, a fear of roses.
- Sigmund Freud had a morbid fear of ferns.
- Tennis star Andre Agassi is said to have a fear of spiders.
- Napoleon Bonaparte, emperor of France, suffered from ailurophobia, which is a fear of cats.
- Frederick the Great was so terrified of water that he could not wash himself with water. Instead his servants had to wash him with dry towels.
- Author Anne Rice, who writes supernatural novels, has a fear of the dark.
- Film director Alfred Hitchcock supposedly had a fear of eggs.
I got these entertaining facts here: Snowy's Silly Facts
