my second most favorite random restaurant fact: the full name of Macaroni Grill is Romano's Macaroni Grill, after Phil Romano, founder of... Fuddruckers.

He founded Fuddruckers in '79 and moved on to Macaroni Grill in '88.

my most favorite random restaurant fact is that Colonel Sanders cursed a Japanese baseball team in 1985, causing them to not win for 18 years.

The Hanshin Tigers won the 1985 Japan Championship Series, and in their celebrations the fans threw a statue of Colonel Sanders into Dōtonbori River.

why they did this is even weirder: So the fans were celebrating on Ebisu Bridge, and they started yelling out the names of the players of the Hanshin Tigers. Each time they yelled out a name, someone who looked like that player would jump into the river.

The only problem is that one of the players on the Tigers was Randy Bass. There aren't a lot of white guys in Japan so none of the fans really looked like him... but Colonel Sanders kinda does! if you squint, a lot.

so they tossed his statue (from a nearby KFC) into the river.
And then they didn't win for 18 years. In fact, they came last or second-to-last for most of those years.

Finally in 2003, The Tigers won the Central League! This qualified them for the Japan Series, and fans were so happy that the curse was broken that over 5000 of them jumped into the river. One man drowned. Colonel Sanders statues were put inside or bolted down in fear.

They found the statue, finally, in 2009. It now stands in front of a KFC near Hanshin Koshien Stadium. (Not the original KFC it was stolen from, as that one has shut down)

the only problem: They couldn't find the glasses or the left hand. Those are replicas. Some fans speculate the curse will not truly end until those parts are finally found and returned to the statue.

and if you're wondering "huh, is KFC a thing in Japan?" yep. It's a big thing.
It's actually part of the Christmas tradition in Japan to have KFC. You have to pre-order your dinner months in advance, because KFC is so busy around Christmas.

Another fun fact about Colonel Sanders: He is a Colonel and he was in the military. He drove wagons in Cuba for the US Army from 1906-1907.
But he's not a Colonel from his time in the military. He's a Kentucky Colonel.

which isn't a military rank, it's more like a title. Kentucky's Governor and Secretary of State can grant people the commission of Kentucky Colonel in recognition of outstanding service to Kentucky.

He also founded KFC (as a franchise, at least) in 1952, and then sold it in 1964. But until he died he'd randomly drop in on KFC locations to test their chicken, and he'd yell at them if they didn't do it to his standard. The KFC company apparently put up with this.

he really, really hated KFC's food. he called their gravy "wallpaper paste" in a newspaper interview. He actually opened his own chicken restaurant after selling KFC, and got sued by the KFC company over it.

as part of the settlement, he sold off the restaurant. They still operate, and still use his recipe. They're the only non-KFC restaurant that is allowed to!

http://claudiasanders.com 

KFC started, btw, as a service station operated by Shell. He served chicken from a restaurant he operated next to the gas station.
He was also involved in a shootout with his competition.

apparently a sign to the gas station was repainted to direct customers to the other station, so naturally they solved it with a shootout. A Shell employee who was with Sanders was shot and killed by the other gas station owner.

so Sanders had no more competition, thanks to the other guy getting convicted of murder.

Sanders was an interesting guy. He became a lawyer through correspondence courses, and practiced for 3 years, before ending his career by getting into a brawl, in the courtroom. with his own client.

BTW, the last silly thing about the hanshin tigers curse? The curse started in 1985, and he died in 1980.

He cursed them FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE!

oh I forgot to mention. In 2003, when the curse was "broken", by the Hanshin Tigers winning the Central League?
They did qualify for the Japan Championship Series, but they lost.

And Osaka rebuilt the bridge so that it's harder to jump off of, to prevent any more of this silliness.

I promise this is the end, but one more thing. Randy Bass, the player who started all this madness?
He's currently a state senator in Oklahoma. Has been since 2004.