Most of the time, we think of famous people as larger than life. They become idols that we look up to as something beyond human, and we forget what they really are.

However, sometimes, you hear about the silliest little personality quirks of famous people. It brings you back down to Earth, reminding you that they are really just people like you in the end.

These notable individuals may have incredible wealth, reputations, or similar traits. But they also have very funny things about them that will make you laugh and forget for a moment that you think of them as above you.

10 Mark Zuckerberg Will Only Eat Meat From Animals That He Kills Himself

Mark Zuckerberg is well-known for being a strange guy in general. He was privileged enough to go to Harvard but dropped out to pursue Facebook. Of course, this worked out well for him.

He is now worth a staggering amount of money, but that hasn’t changed the fact that he is weird. During recent Congressional hearings, people often joked that his behavior seemed strange and compared him to an android or an alien in disguise who was trying to mimic human behavior.

While these jokes are amusing, some of Zuckerberg’s real habits are even stranger. Every year, he likes to challenge himself to do new things. In 2011, his new commitment was to only eat animals that he killed. With his riches, he believes that he shouldn’t take healthy eating for granted and should have to participate in the process up close.^[1]

Zuckerberg has his own livestock that he slaughters, and then he has a butcher friend prepare it for him. Yes, he obsessively uses every last part of the animal, even if it means making a stock out of chicken feet.

9 Ronald Reagan Liked To Touch The Earlobes Of His Friends And Relatives

Ronald Reagan was the first major celebrity to become an elected politician and then president. He had a certain charisma that really struck a chord with a large portion of the American people, securing himself a second term and remaining fairly popular throughout that time. Also a bit of a joker, he was a very affectionate man with his friends and family.

Although most people think about him as a politician and president, his friends and family knew him as a warmhearted man who really had a thing for earlobes. He grabbed the ears of immediate family members, friends, and even actors (during Screen Actors Guild negotiations while he was president of that group).^[2]

There is no reason to believe that it was at all sexual in nature or at least not overtly so. As far as anyone ever knew, Reagan had just grown up to feel natural showing affection and closeness to others by grabbing a bit of their ears.

8 Kanye West Falls Asleep All Over The Place And Always Blames It On Jet Lag

Kim Kardashian is famously married to Kanye West. During a recent appearance on The Late Late Show with James Corden, Kim took part in a game called “Spill Your Guts Or Fill Your Guts.”

Essentially, the host and a celebrity guest ask each other questions prepared by the show’s writers. The individual who is asked the embarrassing question gets to choose whether to answer or eat something disgusting that the other person picked out—such as a 1,000-year-old egg, pickled pig’s feet, clam juice, or something similarly repulsive.

When asked to dish on Kanye’s weirdest habit, Kim immediately explained that Kanye tends to fall asleep everywhere—in inappropriate places or situations—and doesn’t understand why his behavior might be a bit of a problem.

She has had situations where he took her to see designers whom she had never met. Then he fell asleep during the meeting, leaving her feeling rather awkward as she faced the new people on her own. According to Kim, anytime she gets a little annoyed with him about it, he blames it on jet lag—even if he hasn’t flown anywhere in months.^[3]

7 Jeff Bezos Dismantled His Own Crib As A Child Because He Wanted To Sleep In A Bed

Jeff Bezos has been in the news a lot recently, mainly because he is now neck and neck with Bill Gates and had beaten him for the top spot on Forbes’ 2019 list of richest people in the world. Also, as Amazon becomes more and more of a household name, it is no surprise that the founder and leader would increasingly become known to everyone in America and in most of the world as well.

While most people only know Bezos as the bald, wannabe supervillain who is running the largest e-store in the world, he was a precocious genius even at a young age. Back then, he surprised everyone around him with his desire to change his surroundings and move up in the world—before he even knew how to properly read and write.

The stories claim that when Jeff Bezos was a toddler, he dismantled his crib with a screwdriver when the adults were not watching. He no longer wanted to sleep in a crib. Instead, he wanted to move up to a real bed like a big boy.^[4]

This precocious youngster was so obsessed with moving to greater heights even at such a young age that he took apart his entire cot to prove a point. Even then, his parents likely realized that he was destined for great things. They certainly did everything they could to foster and nurture his intellectual growth.

6 Donald Trump Is Convinced An Exercise Regimen Will Do Him More Harm Than Good

When US President Donald Trump was first given a serious presidential physical by White House physician Dr. Ronny Jackson, he stated that the president was mostly okay except that he was close to the line of obesity. Jackson recommended that Trump eat less in terms of portion size, cut down a bit on unhealthy foods, and add some regular exercise to his routine.

The president took to the diet advice fairly well. He has reportedly cut his portions and removed a bit of fat from his meals. But he’s struggling with the exercise routine.^[5]

He is convinced that exercise mostly does more harm than good. As a slightly younger man, he once was quoted as believing that humans overall have a finite amount of energy, like a battery, and may die younger if they regularly exercise.

Actually, we are more like rechargeable batteries. Nevertheless, working out too much or in the wrong way can hurt you, so there is a certain level of truth to how he came to believe what he does.

5 President John Quincy Adams Took A Naked Bath In The Potomac at 5:00 AM Every Day

John Quincy Adams was known for being an incredibly stern man. He was the sixth president of the United States and a no-nonsense leader who had almost no sense of humor. As a leader, he was especially known for being a great negotiator, having spent much of his earlier career helping to craft treaties with various foreign powers. This included the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the war of 1812.

However, like all men, he had his silly quirk and it once got him into a bind. Adams liked to go for a naked bath in the Potomac River every morning around 5:00 AM. He was a creature of habit, so he could be relied upon to do this.

Now presidents did not answer questions from female reporters during that time period, and Adams was no exception. For a while, female reporter Anne Royall had been trying to get an interview with the president. When she learned about his quirky, publicly nude bathing habit, she came up with a devious but effective plan to secure her interview once and for all.

She waited until he had gone into the water for his morning swim and had been moving around for some time. Then she asked him for the interview again. When he refused to answer her questions, she explained that she had his clothes and he could have them back after he talked to her. And that’s how Royall became the first woman to get an interview with a sitting president.^[6]

4 Eminem Refused To Star In Elysium Because He Won’t Leave Detroit For That Long

The movie Elysium was a sci-fi thriller set in a dystopian future where the rich lived in space with a magic heal box that could keep them healthy and alive almost forever. Meanwhile, the vast majority of the remaining people were living in squalor and with horrible diseases on the surface of the planet.

Eventually, the hero manages to bring a bunch of heal boxes down to Earth, as if this will somehow solve things like hunger, dehydration, or the desire of most humans to take the best land for themselves. Nevertheless, it was a fairly popular movie at the time, but it could have been very different.

The movie starred Matt Damon, and most people would say that he fit the role well. However, the part had originally been written and planned out with Eminem in mind. They asked him to do the film, and he wasn’t entirely uninterested. But he wanted the movie shot in Detroit because he did not want to leave home for that long. He is really just a huge homebody.

Eminem was willing to star in 8 Mile because it was about his life and could be filmed at home. However, with the producers unwilling to meet his demand to film Elysium in Detroit, he backed out of any role in the project.^[7]

3 Lady Gaga Is A Traditionally Minded Catholic Who Doesn’t Believe In Premarital Sex

Lady Gaga is one of the most famous pop stars in the world mostly because she shocked the living daylights out of almost everyone when her type of act was far beyond what anyone would expect from a pop idol. Her garish displays, ridiculous dance numbers, and provocative outfits and lyrics kept everyone talking about her.

Most extremely religious people considered her a bad influence. They imagined her to be quite the promiscuous individual who promoted such a lifestyle to others.

However, this couldn’t be further from the truth. Lady Gaga is a devout Catholic who went to a Catholic school as a youth and still believes strongly in her faith. While she isn’t one to push it on others to an evangelical degree, she does not believe in premarital sex for herself as it is against her faith.^[8]

Now we aren’t saying that being against premarital sex is itself a weird quirk as this is a belief held by many who adhere to various religions around the world. Rather, it is strange that a woman known for being so provocative and using the trappings of a sex symbol to her advantage could not imagine using her body in the way that so many people would accuse her of doing.

2 Bill Gates Used To Keep Track Of Employee License Plate Numbers In His Head

Bill Gates is known for being one of the most philanthropic rich people of all time. Despite being the richest man in the world for many years, he pledged a huge portion of his billions to charity, fought tirelessly for charitable causes, and convinced many other rich people to do the same.

Since actively leaving the management of Microsoft, Gates has done incredible good in the world. However, while he is now a billionaire who has apparently seen the light, he was once a man who was trying to create a thriving business.

Back when Microsoft was a small start-up, Gates would mentally keep track of all employee license plate numbers to better know their comings and goings. This gave him a better idea of who was staying late, showing up late, or coming in early and helped him keep an eye on productivity.^[9]

Some people would find this behavior rather weird, and it certainly does have a bit of a stalker vibe to it. But it didn’t hurt overmuch as Microsoft continued to grow to the point that he simply couldn’t keep track of all the license plate numbers anymore.

1 Ulysses S. Grant Was Extremely Sensitive And Would Not Let Others See Him Naked

Ulysses S. Grant was one of the most important men in the early days of America, but he was also a really strange guy. Although he was the brilliant leader who led the Union troops to victory over the South, he wasn’t much of a politician. He only managed to make his way into the presidency because of his fame as a war hero.

Once Grant became president, he mostly just put many of his friends into office and failed to do the job properly at all. A lot of people say that he regretted taking the position once he fully understood what it entailed.

However, Grant strangest trait was perhaps his inability psychologically to allow others to see him naked. Today, Grant’s position on being seen naked may not seem that weird, but for the time, it was really rather odd.

Even if you were of a high rank, soldiers tended to get naked rather publicly and servants would douse them with water. It was also common for servants to dress higher-status people and see them naked all the time.

While Grant showed no aversion to seeing others showering around him, he was a very private man and preferred to bathe by himself in his own tent. He did not even want servants to see him. As far as anyone knows, only his wife and perhaps his physicians ever saw Grant naked during his adult life.^[10]

The natural world has a few hiccups; from stacked trees to square seas, the results can be weird. However, sometimes, the quirks in nature evolved due to survival.

It is the reason why America has a goldfish plague and an extinct bird made a comeback. Some oddities remain mysterious, like sea life trapped in amber and the night a weather team tracked something huge until it vanished.

SEE ALSO: 10 Recent Stories That Prove Mother Nature Is Screwing With Us

10 Beluga-Narwhal Hybrids

During the 1980s, an Inuit hunter shot three whales in Greenland. One sank from his reach. The other’s remains were left on the beach and eventually washed away. The man kept the skull of the third.

He was confused by the creatures. They were unfamiliar—with gray bodies, strangely sideways teeth, fins like belugas, and tails like narwhals. The confusion spread to the scientific world when a visiting researcher brought the skull back to a museum in Denmark. Nobody had seen anything like it, and although a beluga-narwhal hybrid was suspected, it could not be proven.

Recently, scientists relied on modern research techniques to find the answer. They extracted DNA from the teeth and found that their predecessors were correct. The genes revealed that the creature was male with a narwhal mother and a beluga father.

It lacked the unicorn-like tusk of male narwhals, its head was bigger than both its parents, and chemical analysis showed that it had a different diet. Perhaps due to its unusual teeth, this creature foraged at the bottom of the sea while belugas and narwhals never do.^[1]

9 Blue-Eyed Coyotes

Coyotes look at the world with golden brown eyes. For this reason, it came as a shock when five coyotes in California turned up with piercing blue eyes. When the photographic evidence was shown to experts of eye color in wildlife, nobody had seen anything like it. Two of the animals trotted around in Point Reyes while the rest lived in Santa Cruz and Sacramento.

In wild animals, eye color remains consistent. This drastic change is still unsolved, but at least researchers have ruled out interbreeding with dogs. Domestic dogs sometimes have blue eyes, and they do have puppies with coyotes. However, these crossbreeds have distinctive faces and coat colors but never blue eyes.^[2]

A genetic mutation is more likely. The suspicion is that a single coyote was born with blue eyes a few generations ago and the California five could be this animal’s descendants.

8 Goldfish Invasion

In 2019, a goldfish was pulled from the Niagara River in New York. At 36 centimeters (14 in) long, it was enormous. The creature, which could have been an abandoned pet, was not the biggest to be captured in the US wild.

In 2013, California’s Lake Tahoe produced a 61-centimeter-long (24 in) goldfish weighing 2 kilograms (4 lb). It’s not clear how this member of the carp family got into the waterways as they are native to Asia.^[3]

However, fish that were flushed down the toilet or illegally released as well as goldfish escaping from bait buckets must all have contributed to the growing problem. They are hardy, breed prolifically, and often outcompete native species.

As far as anyone can tell, this popular aquarium fish is now a serious invasive species that was first noticed in New York’s waterways in 1842. The orange plague spread, and today, the Great Lakes ripple with tens of millions of goldfish.

7 Three-Eyed Snake

The rangers suspected that he had two heads which had fused together during development. However, the images clearly showed that this was not the case. Instead, Monty had one skull with three eye sockets. Even more astoundingly, the eyeball seemed to work. For this to happen, the python had to grow an extra optic nerve and undergo major changes to the brain, likely while Monty was still an embryo.

Although he eventually died at two months old, it was still longer than most snakes born with bone deformities. They usually perish within days. In Monty’s case, his abnormal skull made eating difficult and that could have contributed to his death.^[4]

6 The Bug Blob

One night in 2019, a meteorologist in California noticed a blip on the radar. It indicated that something enormous was moving over San Bernardino County, which was confusing. The air was supposed to be clear and free of radar blobs like rain and thunderstorms. Whatever it was, it measured 130 kilometers (80 mi) by 130 kilometers (80 mi).

The team dispatched people on the ground to have a look the old-fashioned way—with their eyes. They found no rain despite the radar showing that the mass consisted of raindrop-sized objects. Instead, there was a swarm of ladybugs.

Although it was in the right place, the cloud of beetles did not match the mysterious blob’s size. Even though the main mass of the swarm occupied an area of just 16 kilometers (10 mi) across, the ground spotters concluded that the insects were responsible.

Several ecologists and insect experts did not agree, but they were surprised that so many ladybugs had gathered when their numbers were supposed to be low. The reason for the mass migration remains unsolved. The blob also vanished from the radar, taking any explanations with it.^[5]

SEE ALSO: 10 Weird And Wonderful Oddities Of Nature

5 A Blonde Zebra

In 2019, Sergio Pitamitz waited near a watering hole in Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park. The wildlife photographer wanted pictures of migrating zebras. When he noticed a pale zebra arrive with its herd, Pitamitz thought the animal was just dusty. However, when it entered the water and the “dust” stayed, he knew he was looking at something special.

So-called “blonde” zebras remain a mystery. While they exist in captivity, these suspected albinos were a rumor in the wild until the Pitamitz photographs. The extremely rare condition is thought to be partial albinism, resulting in pale yellow stripes and manes.

Captive zebras are skittish, making genetic tests difficult. But thus far, the blonde animals behave like normal black-and-white zebras. They are fully accepted by their herds, with whom they bond and even reproduce.^[6]

As the specimen in Tanzania proved, they can also survive into adulthood in the wild. As researchers cannot agree about the reason for zebra stripes, they do not yet know if yellow zebras face any special challenges because of their condition.

4 A Tree On A Tree

Nestled between the towns of Casorzo and Grana in the Piemonte region of Italy stands a natural oddity. Locals call it the Bialbero de Casorzo. It is a cherry tree standing on a mulberry tree. The latter is an old, gnarly customer, and the cherry’s growth had somewhat flattened the mulberry’s crown.

This phenomenon calls the top tree an “epiphyte.” Such passengers are not parasitic and do not feed on the tree below. Instead, they get their energy from the sun, the rain, and the debris surrounding their roots.

What makes the cherry tree so unusual is its good looks. Normally, epiphytes are short-lived and stunted because they struggle to get the nutrients they need.

The cherry tree is fully grown and handsome with health, resembling its brethren that grow on land. Its roots likely snaked down the mulberry’s hollow trunk and grew into the soil below. It remains a mystery as to how the two trees merged. The most plausible theory suggests that a bird dropped a cherry pip onto the mulberry.^[7]

3 Sea Life In Amber

Myanmar amber from Asia is the Rolls Royce of amber. It often produces rare fossils from 100 million years ago that look like they died a few seconds ago. In 2019, a piece of Myanmar amber outperformed every expectation.

Until then, all the fossils had been land creatures. However, this one contained sea life. Barely as long as somebody’s thumb, the chunk was packed with 36 land species. They included mites, spiders, and insects. This was already an astonishing concentration of organisms. From the ocean, there were four snails, a marine ammonite, and up to seven tidal isopods. There were also grains of beach sand.

Amber forms from tree resin, something that will never solidify underwater. Somehow, the sea creatures got trapped with the other species on land. Some of the shells were eroded, and none had soft tissues.

This suggested that the ocean bits had long since died by the time they ended up in the pine forest. Although a tsunami could have carried them into the forest, it was more likely that the trees were close to the beach and dropped resin onto the sand, capturing both land creatures and the old shells.^[8]

2 A Bird That Evolved Twice

Nobody knows why the birds left Madagascar. This ancient migration ended when the white-throated rails (Dryolimnas cuvieri) found a new home among the Seychelle Islands. They landed on a reef called the Aldabra atoll, a circular haven free of predators.

As time went by, the peaceful existence caused the birds to lose their ability to fly. Around 136,000 years ago, floods engulfed the atoll and the flightless rails became extinct. For 36,000 years, the reef remained submerged. But as an ice age arrived and water levels dropped, the atoll resurfaced.

Incredibly, sometime later, the same thing happened. White-throated rails left Madagascar, landed on Aldabra, and evolved to be flightless—thousands of years after the first clutch. For a single species to evolve in an identical manner twice and independently is known as “iterative evolution.” The phenomenon is rare, and the fossils from the reef remain unique.^[9]

1 Square Waves

A “cross sea” is an unforgettable sight. This rare phenomenon seems to break the rules on how waves work. Instead of rolling in one direction or toward the shore, a cross sea looks like somebody took a pen and drew squares on the water. The “squares” are formed by waves coming from different directions.

For instance, one set of waves follows the normal pull toward the shore but a strong wind creates an extra set of waves going against them. This forms the perfectly square pattern.

As spellbinding as it appears, a cross sea is hazardous. Two opposing swells hitting a swimmer or boat can be dangerously destabilizing. Another factor making the waves deadly is that they can appear within minutes.^[10]

Worse, they often coincide with rip tides. The latter are powerful currents that few swimmers are able to escape. To top it off, a cross sea is more likely to develop near shallow coastal areas where people swim, surf, and enjoy the day in small boats.