1 Norway’s Publicly Searchable Tax List
Norway publishes searchable tax lists showing people’s net income, net wealth, and tax paid. You must log in to view someone’s information, and that person can see your name in a search history updated hourly. You can view up to 500 people’s records each month.
2. During droughts in Central Europe, people carved “hunger stones” in rivers to mark the low water level and warn future generations of famine-related hardship if the water fell that far again. One stone in the Elbe River at Děčín, Czech Republic, bears the warning, “If you see me, then weep.” Its oldest readable drought date is 1616.
3. A nearsighted boy got into a fistfight that shattered his glasses and sent glass into his eyes. Russian ophthalmologist Svyatoslav Fyodorov removed the fragments and noticed that the boy’s vision improved markedly as the cuts in his cornea healed. Fyodorov tried to reproduce the effect with precise surgical cuts and introduced radial keratotomy, an early predecessor of LASIK, in 1979.
4. In February 2024, Billy Evans, the partner of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, incorporated a blood-testing startup called Haemanthus. He pitched a device that would scan blood, saliva, and urine for signs of disease, starting with pets before moving to humans. Its prototype reportedly resembled Theranos’ machine, although Haemanthus said it used a different approach. NPR reported that Holmes advised Evans from prison, but Haemanthus denied that she had any involvement.
5. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina forced an estimated 1.5 million people from their homes in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, creating a Gulf Coast diaspora. By 2015, approximately 40% of evacuees, especially those from Louisiana, could not return to their previous homes. New Orleans had 484,674 residents in 2000 and only 230,172 in 2006; the Census Bureau’s 2025 estimate of 362,154 was still below its pre-Katrina population.
6 Driving Time Tracked Cognitive Decline
Driving more than two hours a day has been linked to lower intelligence and memory test scores among middle-aged adults in a UK study. Researchers compared driving habits with cognitive tests and checked participants again after an average of 5.3 years. Longer driving time was associated with greater odds of cognitive decline.
7. During filming of the 1966 Star Trek: The Original Series episode “Shore Leave,” actor William Shatner suggested that Captain Kirk wrestle a real Bengal tiger brought onto the set. Associate producer Robert Justman had already warned against working with a full-grown tiger. When the animal got loose and Shatner saw it up close, he dropped the idea, later saying he backed down “for the good of the show.”
8. Germany charges a 25-cent deposit on eligible single-use drink bottles and cans. Shoppers get a refund when they return the empty containers, with about 135,000 return locations across the country. According to recycling equipment company TOMRA, 98% of eligible containers come back, giving Germany the world’s highest return rate for a deposit scheme.
9. In 2001, conservationists began restoring an eastern migration route for endangered whooping cranes by training captive-raised chicks to follow an ultralight plane. The pilot wore a crane costume, while handlers used disguises and crane puppets to keep the chicks from imprinting on humans. The birds followed the plane about 1,200 miles from Wisconsin to Florida, then flew north on their own the following spring.
10. In some U.S. states, “dead red” laws let motorcyclists proceed through a red light when its sensor fails to detect their bikes. A rider can otherwise wait through a signal cycle without ever getting a green light. Washington requires riders to stop, wait one cycle, and proceed with due care; Pennsylvania also lets drivers of other vehicles treat a malfunctioning red signal like a stop sign.
11 Passenger Pigeons Vanished Despite Billions
Passenger pigeons once numbered an estimated 3 to 5 billion across North America. People caught up to 800 at a time in large nets, while shooting contests used the birds as targets; one competition required 30,000 kills to win. Hunting and deforestation drove a rapid decline in the late 1800s. The last known bird, Martha, died at the Cincinnati Zoo on September 1, 1914.
12. Irish actor Pierce Brosnan lost the James Bond role in a 2-minute phone call with producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson after four films as 007. He was filming After the Sunset in the Bahamas when his agents warned him that negotiations had stopped; days later, the producers called with their decision. Brosnan said the news shocked him, and Daniel Craig took over in 2006’s Casino Royale.
13. After starring in 2001’s The Fast and the Furious, American actor Vin Diesel asked Universal Pictures not to make a sequel. He believed the first film could become a classic and feared that turning it into a franchise would ruin that chance. Two decades later, he was playing Dominic Toretto in the series’ ninth film, F9.
14. Under Dutch law, when a motor vehicle hits a cyclist or pedestrian, its owner is generally liable even if the other person helped cause the crash. For someone aged 14 or older, the owner pays at least 50% of the damages unless they can prove an exceptional defense. For a child under 14, the owner generally pays 100%, because drivers must anticipate that children may behave unpredictably.
15. On September 11, 2001, a woman named Beverly Eckert comforted her husband, Sean Rooney, by phone as smoke filled the stairwell near him in the World Trade Center’s South Tower. They talked about the life they had shared until the tower collapsed, and Eckert later became an advocate for families affected by 9/11. Nearly eight years later, she met the president to speak for victims’ families. Six days after that meeting, she died in the crash of Continental Flight 3407 while traveling to Buffalo to mark Rooney’s birthday.
16 Black Hole Disks Form Stars
Under typical conditions, a supermassive black hole that feeds through an accretion disk may only reach roughly 50 billion solar masses. If it grows further, gas in the unstable disk can form stars instead of falling into the black hole. At around that mass, the disk may stop forming, cutting off that route of growth, though the black hole could still grow by swallowing stars or merging with another black hole.
17. In 1964, New Zealand geophysicist Frank Evison commissioned a concrete wall across the Alpine Fault in the South Island’s Maruia valley. Surveying markers in the wall let scientists test whether the fault crept gradually or held still between major earthquakes. The wall has stayed straight without moving a millimeter for about 60 years, supporting the view that the fault shifts several meters at once during earthquakes separated by centuries.
18. In 1939, British major general Bernard Montgomery issued his soldiers in France a circular on preventing sexually transmitted diseases. Senior Church of England and Roman Catholic chaplains objected to its blunt language, and Montgomery nearly lost his command. His superior, British General Alan Brooke, defended him and allowed the circular to stand but warned him against another such mistake.
19. In 4th-century BC Athens, a wealthy Greek courtesan named Phryne stood trial for impiety. According to later accounts, she revealed her body before the jurors while her defender, the orator Hypereides, argued that someone so beautiful could not offend the gods. The jury acquitted her.
20. In 2024, a man named Roger Thiberville died at 91 without heirs and left more than €10 million to Thiberville, a Normandy village of 1,800 people. He had no known connection to the village beyond their shared name, and no one knew of him ever visiting it. He left part of his fortune to his accountant. The village’s share equaled about five times its annual budget. The mayor said the money would pay off debts and could fund projects such as a new fire station.
15 Most Controversial & Costly Blunders in History
21 Khun Sa Offered Australia Heroin
By the 1980s, Burmese drug lord Khun Sa dominated opium production in the Golden Triangle and commanded about 20,000 men. In 1988, he offered to sell his entire heroin crop to the Australian government for A$50 million a year for eight years, a deal that would have taken an estimated half of the world’s heroin supply off the market. Australia rejected the offer. Khun Sa later claimed roughly 31,000 men when he counted troops, reserves, and local militia. He surrendered to Burma’s government in 1996.
22. Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes told investors that the company’s machine could run blood tests using just a few drops from a finger prick. Federal prosecutors alleged that, during investor demonstrations, Holmes and Theranos executive Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani set the machine to a “null protocol” so it appeared to run a test when it was not. A jury later convicted Holmes of conspiracy and three counts of wire fraud involving investors.
23. When British animator David Firth launched Salad Fingers in 2004, he voiced its unusually soft-spoken title character himself. Firth recorded quietly because he did not want to wake his parents, giving Salad Fingers his hushed voice.
24. British film director Guy Ritchie married American singer Madonna in Scotland in 2000. After Madonna filed for divorce in 2008, he got a settlement reportedly worth £50 million to £60 million, including the value of their London pub and Wiltshire estate. The couple then called reports about the settlement “misleading and inaccurate,” leaving the exact payout unconfirmed.
25. Some people say beets taste like dirt, much as others say cilantro tastes like soap. Beets contain geosmin, a compound that produces an earthy smell, and people differ in how strongly they perceive it. Because smell shapes flavor, that sensitivity can make clean beets taste dirt-like to some people.
