Fun Facts That Are

After being traded to the Phoenix Suns, Shaquille O'Neal went to Walmart at 2 AM to furnish his new apartment. He spent $70,000 on TVs, laptops, and appliances in a single trip. His credit card was declined because the bank flagged it as fraud — they couldn't believe someone was spending that much at Walmart.

In 1998, Google's founders offered to sell their search engine to Yahoo for $1 million. Yahoo said no. In 2002, Yahoo had another chance to buy Google for $5 billion. They negotiated it down to $3 billion, and Google walked away. Google is now worth over $2 trillion.

In 1324, Mansa Musa — ruler of the Mali Empire — made a pilgrimage to Mecca with a caravan of 60,000 men and thousands of pounds of gold. When he stopped in Cairo, he gave away so much gold that he crashed the local economy. The price of gold didn't recover for twelve years. He is widely considered the wealthiest person who ever lived.

Arnold Schwarzenegger agreed to star in the comedy Twins for a $0 salary. Instead, he negotiated for 20% of the film's backend profits. The studio agreed, convinced the movie would flop. It grossed $216 million worldwide. Arnold's cut came to roughly $35 million — more than he'd ever made for a Terminator film.

Donald Miller Jr. of Ohio disappeared in 1986 and was declared legally dead in 1994. In 2005, he showed up very much alive and asked the court to reverse his death certificate. The judge denied it — Ohio's 3-year statute of limitations to reverse a death ruling had expired. The judge told him: "I don't know where that leaves you, but you're still dead as far as the law is concerned."

On May 22, 2010, programmer Laszlo Hanyecz paid 10,000 Bitcoin for two Papa John's pizzas — the first real-world Bitcoin purchase. At the time, those coins were worth about $41. At Bitcoin's peak, they would have been worth over $700 million.

In 1925, con man Victor Lustig forged government documents, posed as a ministry official, and convinced six scrap metal dealers that the French government was secretly selling the Eiffel Tower for scrap. He "sold" it to the highest bidder. The victim was so humiliated he never went to police. So Lustig went back to Paris and sold it a second time.

Hospitals across the US have volunteer "baby cuddler" programs where grandparents come in to hold and cuddle premature babies in the NICU when parents can't be there. Skin-to-skin contact helps the babies gain weight faster, sleep better, and leave the hospital sooner. Some hospitals have waitlists of over 500 people wanting to volunteer.

Steve Jobs' biological father, Abdulfattah "John" Jandali, managed a popular Mediterranean restaurant near San Jose. Jobs ate there a couple of times without knowing the owner was his father. Jandali didn't know either. Years later, when Jobs' biological sister Mona Simpson tracked Jandali down, he casually boasted: "Even Steve Jobs used to eat there. He was a great tipper." That's how Jobs found out.

Sylvester Stallone was so broke he sold his bull mastiff Butkus outside a liquor store for $40. After selling the Rocky script, he went back to buy the dog. The new owner refused. Stallone kept raising the offer until the man finally agreed — for $15,000. Butkus went on to appear in Rocky.

In November 2017, the Tsukuba Express line in Japan issued a formal public apology after a train departed Minami-Nagareyama station 20 seconds ahead of schedule. Not 20 minutes. Twenty seconds. The statement read: "We sincerely apologize for the great inconvenience." Not a single passenger had complained.

In 2005, graffiti artist David Choe was hired by Sean Parker to paint murals inside Facebook's first office in Palo Alto. He was offered $60,000 in cash. He took stock options instead. When Facebook went public in 2012, his shares were worth approximately $200 million.