Ed Sheeran bought a ticket to LA with no contacts. He was spotted by Jamie Foxx, who offered him the use of his recording studio and a bed in his Hollywood home for six weeks.
100 Mind-Blowing Home Facts
The longest Cricket Test match lasted over 12 days between England and South Africa. It only ended because the English team would have missed their boat home.
Whenever Charles Dickens was away from home, he would always realign the bed he was sleeping in to face Northwards, as he felt that this fostered and unlocked his creativity.
Hugh Jackman often will tell the paparazzi where he is when he goes home to Australia so they can get their photos, then leave him alone for the rest of his visit.
Part of the Falklands Islands is littered with leftover landmines from the Falklands War. This stretch of beach has become home to over 1 million penguins as they are too light to trigger the mines when walking on them.
Bob Ross’s hair was naturally straight, but he chose to get a perm so he could save money on haircuts when touring the US penniless in his mobile home. Bob hated his curly hair but kept it as it was iconic.
All of the suits worn by Neil Patrick Harris in How I Met Your Mother were tailored especially for the actor. After the series finale, he took some of them home.
Football teams wearing red kits play better. The colour of your clothes can affect how you’re perceived by others and change how you feel. A review of football matches in the last 55 years, for example, showed that teams wearing a red kit consistently played better in home matches than teams in any other colour.
Finland is the happiest country on Earth. According to the World Happiness Report, it has been for six years in a row. It’s not surprising, given that Finland is the home of Santa Claus, reindeer and one sauna for every 1.59 people.
Massachusetts is the home of basketball and volleyball.
Australia is home to the Great Barrier Reef.
The building One Times Square was built in 1904 as the headquarters for the New York Times. It’s been home to the New Year’s Eve Ball Drop Celebration since 1907, when the first New Year’s Eve ball was made of iron and wood, one hundred 25-watt bulbs and weighed 700 pounds. Today’s ball is 12 feet in diameter and weighs almost six tons with 2,688 Waterford Crystal triangles bolted to 672 LED modules attached to the aluminium frame.
The children’s fictional book Heidi is inspired by the village of Maienfeld in the Bündner Herrschaft of Graubünden, Switzerland. Published in the early 1880s by author Johanna Spyri, you can now visit the Heidi Village above Maienfeld to tour a replica of the protagonist character Heidi’s home, cottage and school.
In the 1932 World Series, Babe Ruth famously gestured toward centre field before hitting a home run in that precise direction.
According to a OnePoll study commissioned by IHG in 2023, 71% of travellers said they’d likely need a separate vacation after their trip home from the holidays to unwind and relax.
The circulatory system is more than 60,000 miles long. If a child’s entire circulatory system—we’re talking veins, arteries, and capillaries—were laid out flat, it would stretch for more than 60,000 miles, according to the Franklin Institute. By the time we reach adulthood, our bodies have become home to approximately 100,000 miles of blood vessels.
An espresso maker was sent into space in 2015. Coffee lovers will appreciate this interesting space fact: Samantha Cristoforetti was the first astronaut to get a warm and cosy piece of home sent to her while in orbit. The Italian Space Agency worked with Italian coffee manufacturer Lavazza to get the coffee capsules into space.
An employee at Pixar accidentally deleted a sequence of Toy Story 2 during production. Ed Catmull, the co-founder of Pixar, wrote in his book, Creativity Inc., that the year before the movie came out, someone entered the command ‘/bin/rm -r -f *’ on the drive where the files were saved, and scenes started deleting. It would have taken a year to recreate what was deleted, but luckily another employee had a backup of the entire film on her laptop at home.
Baseball umpires used to sit in rocking chairs. People have been playing baseball since the mid-19th century. In the early days, umpires would officiate the games while reclining in a rocking chair located 20 feet behind home plate. By 1878, the National League also declared that home teams must pay umpires $5 per game.
Nikola Tesla hated pearls. The electrical engineer paved the way for current system generators and motors; the way electricity gets transmitted and converted to mechanical power is thanks to his inventions. But despite his patience with scientific experimentation, he had no tolerance for pearls. When his secretary wore pearl jewellery one day, he made her go home.
The Empire State Building has its own ZIP code. It’s home to 10118.
Yes, bleach expires. Did you know that household bleach expires? It’s news to us, too! This home cleaning product lasts about six months.
Australia has the most number of venomous snakes worldwide. Australia is home to almost a hundred species of venomous snakes. However, only one fatal snake bite incident is recorded per year.
Squeaky floors were the best home security in 17th-century Japan. You’d expect Japanese feudal lords to live in pristine houses with the sturdiest materials – and that is mostly true, save for their squeaky, creaky floors. Nightingale floors were flooring systems that “chirped” when somebody walked on it. They were installed in temples and palaces to alert of intruders. The floors were built in a way that the flooring nails rub against jackets or clamps, causing squeaking noises.
A seaman once set a ship on fire to get out of work early. One of the “don’t-try-this-at-home” fun facts: A civil employee once started a fire that ravaged the nuclear submarine USS Miami which was docked at a Naval Shipyard. Though the cause of the fire was unclear at first, civilian employee Casey J. Fury soon admitted to starting the fire for an early dismissal from work. Fury was sentenced to 17 years in federal prison and ordered to pay $400 million in damages.
Toilets usually flush in E flat. Another weird bathroom fun fact: most toilets flush in a certain key. Try listening for the key of E flat in your toilet at home.
The Netherlands has the tallest population. At an average height of 72.36” (6.03 ft), the Netherlands is home to the tallest population on Earth.
At the Humane Society of Missouri, kid volunteers comfort anxious shelter dogs by reading to them. Shelter dogs have usually lived through significant trauma. This makes it difficult for some dogs to be adopted due to their changed behaviour. To solve this, the Humane Society of Missouri created the Shelter Buddies Reading Program. It pairs kids aged 6 to 15 with anxious, mistrustful dogs to socialize them for home life.
Baseball umpires used to sit in rocking chairs. Baseball has been around since the 19th century. However, in the early games, umpires would sit in a rocking chair 20 feet behind the home plate.
Nikola Tesla did not like pearls. One of the fathers of mechanical electricity, Nikola Tesla’s love for groundbreaking discoveries let us harness electricity the way we do now. However, he did not love pearls. He once sent an assistant home for showing up wearing pearls.
There are more than 200 flavours of Kit Kat in Japan. You can find Japan-exclusive flavoured Kit Kats such as Adzuki (Red bean), Tamaruya Honten Wasabi (Japanese horseradish), Shinshu Apple and more. Don’t forget to bring these exotic flavours home to share with your loved ones on your next trip to Japan!
Sailors consider black cats good luck. Some sailors use black cats as the ship’s cat in hopes of a safe voyage. Some fishermen’s wives would even keep a black cat at home as well in hopes of their husband’s safe return.
The average male will become bored after 26 minutes of shopping. However, a study found that most women will not get bored until two hours later. Maybe next time you should just leave your boyfriend or husband at home.
The Goodyear blimp is the official bird of Redondo Beach. While it may not be a bird per se, the coastal city still named it as such. Redondo Beach is situated near the Goodyear Blimp’s home airport in California.
The winning lottery combination was once foretold in a fortune cookie. This resulted in over a hundred winners for the 2005 lottery. All of these winners took home around $100,000-$500,000 depending on their original bet.
The inventor of the television banned TV from his home. When Philo Farnsworth invented the television in 1927, he intended for it to be a learning instrument that could end wars. However, once TV was commercialized, he came to regret his invention. As a result, he did not allow his household to watch television. One of the ironic yet interesting facts.
Grapes explode in the microwave. Funny facts disclaimer: don’t try this at home.
The tallest dog ever was a 7-foot Great Dane. Zeus holds the record for the tallest dog in the world at 7 ft tall. He was an unusually large Great Dane from Otsego, Michigan who took home the record in October 2011.
The biggest tooth ever recovered from a human is 1.4” long. The Guinness World Record for the biggest human tooth goes to Indian cricketer, Urvil Patel. He had his large canine extracted and came home from the procedure to find that his 3.67cm long tooth was a record breaker. His tooth was nearly double the size of an average human tooth.
Uganda is home to the endangered mountain gorilla, particularly in the Ruwenzori Mountains.
On November 9, 1971, John List murdered his wife, mother, and three children in their home in Westfield, New Jersey.
The List family home, known as Breeze Knoll, was destroyed by arson in 1972, a year after the murders.
The newspaper serving Frostbite Falls, Minnesota, the home of Rocky and Bullwinkle, is the Picayune Intellegence.
More than 86% of U.S. households have at least one car for every driver in the home. And 28% report having more cars than drivers!
Argentina is where the world’s first animated feature film was created. Before Disney’s Snow White was made in 1937, Argentina was home to the first full-length animated feature film called El Apóstol. It was a political satire consisting of 58,000 drawings and running for 70 minutes.
Soccer teams that wear red tend to play better. The colour of your clothes affects how others see you and how you feel. Studies have shown that soccer teams played better in red in home matches.
Mars is home to Olympus Mons, a dormant volcano and the largest volcano and highest mountain in our solar system. It is 16 miles high and 600 km across the base, making it 3x the height of Mount Everest.
In the early days of baseball, umpires sat in rocking chairs behind home plate.
Planets can wander through space without a parent star. Not all planets form and stay around stars: astronomers estimate that there could be more than 200 billion of them floating free and drifting through our Galaxy. These ‘rogue’ planets were thought to have been kicked out of their home systems. While this is true for some, other planets may have formed completely independently of an accretion disk (as was the case for our Solar System) instead of forming from the collapse of tiny, cold clouds known as globulettes.
Babe Ruth was the first baseball player to hit a home run in the All-Star game, at Chicago’s Comiskey Park in 1933.
Antarctica is home to the largest ice sheet on Earth. More than six times as large as Greenland, Antarctica is the southernmost continent and is the coldest and windiest place on Earth – with temperatures that can drop as low as -89.2°C and winds that can exceed 320 km per hour. Antarctica is home to the largest ice sheet on Earth, containing a staggering 30 million cubic kilometres of ice. This represents an incredible 70% of Earth’s freshwater and 90% of its ice. As a result, changes to the Antarctic ice sheet can have significant implications for global sea levels and ocean currents. Monitoring the Antarctic ice sheet is therefore of paramount importance and satellite data plays a crucial role in this effort. Data from satellites such as CryoSat, ESA’s ice mission, allow scientists to track changes in the thickness and movement of the ice sheet over time, providing insights into how it is responding to a changing climate. ESA has recently teamed up with NASA and the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) to carry out an ambitious campaign in Antarctica which involved taking simultaneous measurements of sea ice from ESA’s CryoSat and NASA’s ICESat-2 satellites. This research is essential for informing policy decisions on issues such as climate change and sea level rise, and for developing strategies to mitigate their impact on coastal communities around the world.
Atacama is the driest place on Earth. The Atacama Desert, located in South America, is widely considered to be the driest place on Earth, outside of the Antarctic dry valleys. This vast expanse of land spans over 100,000 sq km and receives an average of less than 1 mm of rainfall per year. The harsh climate of the Atacama is due to a combination of factors including its location in a rain shadow caused by the Andes mountains, the presence of the cold Humboldt Current offshore and a lack of moisture-bearing winds. Despite its arid conditions, the Atacama is home to several unique species of plants and animals that have adapted to survive in this harsh environment. The desert is also known for its stunning landscapes, including salt flats, geysers and towering volcanoes – making it a popular destination for adventurous travellers.
Europe is the second smallest continent in size but the third largest in population. Europe is known for its diverse cultures, rich history and stunning landmarks. Despite being the second smallest continent in size (after Australia), Europe is home to a staggering population of over 746 million people, making it the third largest continent in terms of population (after Asia and Africa). Europe has one of the highest levels of urbanisation in the world, with over 75% of its population living in urban areas. With the world’s population expected to reach 9.7 billion in 2050, we must increase efforts to understand and mitigate the challenges brought by rapid and unplanned urbanisation, air pollution, as well as issues related to the management of water and energy. ESA and the German Aerospace Centre (DLR), in collaboration with the Google Earth Engine team, have developed the World Settlement Footprint – the world’s most comprehensive dataset on human settlement. Featuring data from the Copernicus Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 missions, this unprecedented collection of data on human settlement will advance our understanding of urbanisation on a global scale.
Trees are breathers. Trees are one of the most effective tools we have to combat climate change. Forests are home to around 80% of biodiversity on land and tropical forests alone produce over 40% of the oxygen we breathe. Covering around 30% of Earth’s land surface, we depend on forests for our survival. Forests absorb around 8 Gigatonnes a year of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and play a crucial role in the carbon cycle and climate system. However, climate change, forest degradation and deforestation are causing much of this stored carbon to be released back into the atmosphere. Recent research found that recovering tropical forests was only successfully combating a quarter of the current carbon emissions which indicates the importance of preserving and restoring our tropical forests. To better understand the role of trees in regulating our planet’s carbon cycle, ESA’s upcoming mission called Biomass will use advanced radar technology to measure the amount of carbon stored in Earth’s forests and other biomass, providing a more accurate assessment of carbon storage and uptake than ever before. By monitoring changes in biomass over time, scientists will be able to assess the effectiveness of forest conservation efforts and better understand the impact of deforestation on our climate.
One Japanese man, Tsutomu Yamaguchi, was in Hiroshima for a business trip on August 6, 1945. This just happens to be the day the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the city. He somehow survived with burn injuries and went back home to Nagasaki. Then, on August 9, 1945, another atomic bomb hit that city. Yamaguchi and his family survived this attack, as well.
Working from home often involves balancing official duties with kids. Studies have found that kids can ask 300 questions a day on average. That is one question every 2.5 minutes!
FORESTS ARE HOME TO OVER 80% OF THE WORLD’S LAND-BASED SPECIES OF ANIMALS, PLANTS AND INSECTS. These animals help to keep the forest healthy. For example, elephants distribute seeds from fruits they have eaten. When the seeds pass through their gut, they come out undigested in their dung, and germinate in the ground.
You can see axolotls right here at Deep Sea World! That’s right, Deep Sea World’s Temple of Frogs is home to a small group of axolotls, so you can enjoy an up-close view of these cute and curious critters.
Fraser Island is the biggest sand island! The biggest sand island in the world is called Fraser Island! It is off the East Coast of Australia. The island is home to forests which, amazingly, grow through the sand!
The word “oysterhood” means “reclusiveness” or “an overwhelming desire to stay at home.”
When the University of Nebraska Cornhuskers play football at home, the stadium becomes the state’s third-largest city.
The first rap song to win an Academy Award for Best Original Song was Eminem’s “Lose Yourself.” It rapidly became one of Eminem’s most successful singles, staying at the top of the charts for 23 weeks running (that in itself won the song a Guinness World Record!). Eminem didn’t attend the Academy Awards as he thought he wouldn’t win, so instead spent the evening at home sleeping and watching cartoons with his daughter. One of his producers ended up accepting the award on Eminem’s behalf.
Samsung’s various business activities account for more than 15% of Korea’s entire economy. While Samsung is known worldwide as a technology giant, it has its fingers in many pies in its home country. Being the world’s largest manufacturer of phones is not enough, as in Korea, there are hospitals, apartments, universities, and even funeral parlours owned by Samsung.
There’s a mountain in Greece that women are prohibited from visiting. It’s not just the mountain, but an entire peninsula called Mount Athos. You see, Mount Athos has been home to a collection of monasteries since at least the 4th Century AD. For more than a thousand years, if not longer, the presence of women has been banned not just from the monasteries but from the whole peninsula. Mount Athos is an autonomous region of Greece controlled by the Greek Orthodox Church. According to the Church, the Virgin Mary blessed the peninsula and made it her holy garden, so no other women were allowed to be there. Other than wild animals and a few cats, the animals there are also all male.
Macaulay Culkin from Home Alone let his fans vote on what he should change his middle name to. The famous Home Alone child star has faded away a little into obscurity these days, but he’s still manageing to stay relevant. In November 2018, he asked the world to give him a new middle name, as his name was “something dumb.” Out of a wide range of ridiculous finalists, he ended up changing his middle to his full name and is now officially known as Macaulay Macaulay Culkin Culkin!
The world’s first Guinness world record for push-ups was 6,006. Charles Linster took home the first Guinness World Record in this category when he completed all 6,006 push-ups non-stop back in 1965. There are plenty of different record categories for push-ups these days, ranging from the most completed in one hour (2,806) to the most consecutive one-finger push-ups (124).
One of President John Tyler’s grandsons is still alive today—and he was born in 1790. How is this possible? President Tyler, the 10th US president, was 63 when his son Lyon Tyler was born in 1853; Lyon’s son was born when he was 75. President Tyler’s living grandson, Harrison Tyler is 94. Lyon’s other son Lyon Jr. passed away in 2020 at the age of 95. The Tyler family still maintains the President’s home, Sherwood Forest Plantation in Virginia.
This Is The World’s Largest Hard Disk Drive (HDD). Seagate launched the Exos 20+ hard disk drive (HDD) in December 2020. The HDD utilises HAMR and MACH2 technologies to offer 20 terabytes (TB) of storage. Typically, home computers utilise hard drives ranging from 1TB to 4 TB. Businesses and data centres may use significantly larger hard drives. It’s an impressive development from Seagate. The company recently launched 18TB hard drives to the market as well. Lately, companies have released larger and larger hard drives with improved performance. Solid state drives (SSDs) continue to grow in popularity, but the HDD remains a competitive alternative, especially for larger capacities.
The original Xbox had sound snippets of real space missions. The original Xbox contained edited sound bites from actual transmissions from the Apollo missions. If you left the Xbox on the home screen, eventually, you’ll hear whispers of conversation – actual chatter from the Apollo mission.
More than 90% of Americans have Internet access, with 77% reporting broadband access at home.
Most toilet paper sold for home use in France is pink.
Warner Bros cancelled “Home Alone” because they didn’t want to spend $14 million on it. 21st Century Fox continued the production, and the film grossed $476 million worldwide.
There are twice as many pyramids in Sudan then there are in Egypt. When most people think of pyramids, they instantly think of Egypt, but this couldn’t be more wrong! Sudan has somewhere between 200 to 255 pyramids, while Egypt is home to just 118 to 138 of them. So how did so many pyramids end up down in Sudan? From 3,000 BC, Egypt’s armies were sent south to conquer whoever they found, reaching as far as modern-day Sudan. There they lorded over the locals until the Egyptian empire collapsed in 1,070 BC, but their influence remained for much longer. Less than three hundred years later, the new rulers of this region, the Kush, still believed in the Egyptian Gods and started constructing pyramids en masse.
Surrender? Never! Lt Hiroo Onoda served with Japan’s army in the Philippines during World War Two. He was ordered not to surrender, so he didn’t, until 1974. His wartime boss was sent to get him. He returned home a hero.
Linux’s overall market share among home users has risen to 1.69% but that percentage is much higher in certain countries.
The average smart home could be at risk of more than 12,000 hacker attacks in one week. (Purplesec)
47 per cent of employees cited distraction as the reason for falling for a phishing scam while working from home. (Tessian)
The largest county in England is… Yorkshire: We’re continuing this guide on facts about England with a dive into the country’s geography. Taking up 11% of England’s land mass at 14,859 km², Yorkshire hails the title of being England’s largest county! Due to its large size, it’s no surprise that Yorkshire boasts a large variety of landscapes. From the stunning North Yorkshire Coast and Moors to the flat greenery of the Vale of York; there’s so much to explore here. The county is also home to a wealth of history, including two UNESCO World Heritage sites, Saltair & Salts Mill and Fountains Abbey & Studley Royal.
London has the world’s longest-running show: At St. Martins Theatre in the West End in London, the world’s longest-running show is being played. Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap has been running since 1952, which means that the show has been running for more than 70 years now. The show started as a radio play, called Three Blind Mice, and follows the story of seven strangers snowed in at a home in the countryside.
The UK is the home to world-renowned scientists like Charles Darwin, Isaac Newton, Alan Turing and Stephen Hawking.
The UK is home to the rock band The Beatles, considered to be the most influential band of all time.
New Jersey is known to be home to the world’s highest roller coaster.
The US is home to the most iconic musical artists of all time i.e. Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, Madonna, Whitney Houston, Michael Jackson, and Beyonce.
Billions of funds are transferred each year: In 2021, money transfers to low and middle-income countries reached US $605 billion according to the latest World Bank data. It’s estimated that around one billion people worldwide (or 1 in 7 people) are involved in international money transfers, with around 200 million migrant workers sending money back home and 800 million people receiving it.
Remember “Charlie bit my finger?” The video racked up so many views that the family was able to purchase a new home with over $1.3 million in royalties and ads as of 2017.