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1:23

Hello

1:23

and welcome to Dear Hank and John, or as

1:25

I prefer to think of it, Dear John and Roman

1:28

Mars? That's right. It's a podcast

1:31

where John, your second

1:33

favorite green brother, is joined by

1:36

your very favorite podcast

1:38

host, Roman Mars, to answer

1:41

your questions, give you dubious advice, and bring you all the week's news

1:43

from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon.

1:45

Roman, you're the host of 99% Invisible. I

1:48

am. One of my favorite podcasts of all time.

1:50

Oh, thank you. How come you keep coming on Dear

1:52

Hank and John? Because

1:55

this is one of my favorite podcasts of all time. This

1:58

is my family's podcast.

1:59

like so the twins when

2:02

I have them in the car, we pull

2:05

up to Dear Hank and John. And when

2:07

the question comes up,

2:09

they know, I

2:11

hate it when people talk over the podcast. So

2:15

they reach forward, because I can't listen to two things

2:17

at once. I've gotten old, you know, like I, and

2:19

they reach forward. I can't relate. They reach forward

2:21

and they hit pause on the little

2:24

console and they'll answer

2:26

the question before you have a chance to

2:28

answer it. And they go, I think I know this. And then,

2:30

and then, and this is just a part of our

2:33

life. So, so Dear Hank and John

2:35

is very important to me. So I'm really honored to be

2:37

here.

2:38

Well, we are thrilled that you're here. The

2:40

last time you were here, and

2:42

we don't usually bring this kind of thing up at

2:44

the beginning of the podcast, but something extraordinary

2:47

has happened that I need to inform you about. The

2:49

last time you were here, you and Hank

2:52

were chatting about,

2:55

remind me exactly what it was. How

2:57

many chickens would need to be in space

3:00

before humans would notice?

3:02

Is that correct? I

3:04

think it was something like that. Like I

3:06

don't recall it.

3:07

Perfectly. Great, great. So we

3:09

have received the following email from Rachel

3:11

that I simply cannot wait to tell you about. Dear

3:14

John and Hank, here in the astronomy community, we take

3:16

two things very seriously. Knowing

3:18

everything that is in space and April Fool's

3:20

Day. For this April Fool's Day, I

3:23

roped a postdoc friend of mine into doing

3:25

some math in order to answer the question

3:28

that Hank and Roman Mars recently

3:30

examined. How many chickens

3:33

would there need to be in space

3:36

before we would notice?

3:37

This resulted

3:39

in a scientific paper, Roman, called

3:42

Nuggets of Wisdom, which is a good

3:44

pun. There's a lot of good

3:46

puns in this paper, but I would just

3:48

like to read you one sentence from

3:51

the abstract and one sentence from the introduction.

3:53

The abstract begins, the lower limit

3:55

on the chicken density function, CDF

3:58

of the observable universe, was recently... determined

4:00

to be approximately 10 to the 21 chickens

4:03

per parsec. For over a year, however,

4:05

the scientific community has struggled to determine

4:07

the upper limit to the CDF.

4:10

So we know the lower limit to the CDF,

4:12

but what is the upper limit to the CDF?

4:14

And then the introduction begins as follows. The

4:16

chicken density function, CDF, entered

4:19

the scientific spotlight in a March 2022 episode

4:22

when a listener of the podcast, dear Hank and John, wrote

4:24

in with a question. Oh my God. The rest of the

4:26

paper is epic.

4:29

There's so much math. I

4:32

can't read it. I don't know what any of this

4:34

stuff means, but the conclusion

4:36

is that there would need to be about 10

4:39

to the 18th power chickens inside the orbit

4:44

of the Earth for us to start noticing.

4:47

Wow.

4:47

That's a lot of chickens, very close to the Earth.

4:50

I know. That's a lot of chickens. I

4:53

was also surprised.

4:56

Goodness gracious. I thought it would

4:59

be maybe in the hundreds of thousands, but then no,

5:01

you could put a lot of chickens in orbit

5:03

before it would start to block our view.

5:08

Oh, that is amazing. Oh,

5:11

what a great way to start this episode.

5:15

We're never going to reach

5:17

those heights, unfortunately. So I hope

5:19

you enjoyed listening to Dear John

5:21

and Roman.

5:23

Everything after this is going to be a disappointment.

5:27

Oh, I love it. All right. So good. You're an

5:29

expert in architecture and

5:32

the built world. Okay. Yeah, maybe.

5:34

So I wanted to ask you this question about

5:37

an apartment.

5:38

Dear John and Roman, is it a moral

5:41

failing to find a living roach in my

5:43

apartment? Does a cockroach show

5:45

up because I haven't cleaned thoroughly enough

5:47

as if to lecture me before I kill it, or

5:49

do they just wander in because they happen to be

5:51

in the neighborhood? Do I have to vacuum and

5:53

scrub every surface now that I have seen this roach

5:56

not trapped in the metamorphosis? Rebecca.

5:59

Hmm. I

6:02

would say it is not a

6:04

moral failing at all. Agree.

6:08

But, oh, maybe

6:10

you haven't cleaned thoroughly enough. Oh,

6:14

I think that's victim blaming. No,

6:17

I just know that it isn't the fault,

6:20

like,

6:21

it isn't because you haven't cleaned enough. But if

6:23

you want to never have a roach again, you

6:26

should clean, like, all

6:28

the time and get rid of, like, all the crumbs

6:30

and all the, like, don't leave dog food

6:33

out and things like that. You know, like,

6:35

there's a, it's a way, it's part of the,

6:37

you know, sort of, like, tactical warfare when

6:39

it comes to cockroaches. But they

6:41

will get there, they're everywhere.

6:44

They're everywhere. They'll

6:46

be at the very end, you know,

6:48

like, right before the heat death of the

6:50

universe, they'll be there.

6:53

I think they come in, and I

6:56

take this quite personally because it's

6:58

an ongoing argument in our family

7:01

whether the primary

7:03

reason why we might have

7:05

bugs

7:08

or other non-human

7:10

animals inside of our home is

7:12

because of a failure in the architecture,

7:15

which is what I maintain. Like, that

7:17

there are little gaps that

7:19

allow the roaches to come in. I

7:21

see. I don't know, I don't know where they are. I

7:23

don't think the roaches are born inside the house,

7:26

you know?

7:26

And so I think that there's, I

7:29

think that's the failing. And

7:31

Sarah maintains the failing

7:34

is that I am filthy. And so I was really

7:36

asking Rebecca's question

7:41

as a kind of proxy question to you. And

7:44

I don't like your answer. I

7:47

do not think that you could

7:49

construct a house so tight

7:52

as to not have a cockroach be able to wind

7:54

its way through it. But

7:57

you could just pick up after yourself,

7:59

John. really

8:00

good.

8:06

Yeah, no, I mean, I don't want to disagree

8:09

with you, God, I just respect you a lot. I think of

8:11

you as a friend, but

8:13

you definitely could construct a house

8:15

tight enough that it does. I know

8:18

you could because like you can make

8:20

a box, like you could make a box that a

8:22

roach can get into and

8:24

a house is essentially a

8:26

very large box. It is a very large box. But

8:29

if you wanted sort of a hermetically sealed,

8:31

you know, like white room in which you,

8:33

you know, do your viral research or whatever

8:36

it is, yeah, you could probably

8:38

avoid any roaches. That's

8:40

what I want so

8:42

that I could be as

8:43

dirty as I want. I don't want to do it

8:45

for like viral research. I want to do it.

8:48

I don't want to like keep smallpox inside

8:50

the room or whatever. I just want to be able to

8:52

be the person I want to be in, the space

8:55

I want to be in without risking

8:57

a roach. Yeah. I mean, have you considered putting

8:59

a box inside the box? Like your own

9:01

space? Great idea. Oh,

9:04

wow. If we pitch that idea to Sarah, she'll

9:06

be like, amazing. I love it.

9:10

Give him a little box in the corner where he can go

9:12

and eat, drop all of his grooms. Let

9:17

him just sneak into his little box whenever

9:19

he wants to eat and then he can come out

9:21

when he's done. He can pile

9:23

all the dishes in there that he wants to file. That's

9:25

fine because that's his box. That's right.

9:28

It's the only answer. All right. I

9:30

think we've come to a conclusion, Rebecca. You just

9:32

need to build a hermetically

9:34

sealed box inside of your apartment. Dear

9:37

Roman and John, I know a species is

9:39

considered native if it is in a certain region due

9:41

only to natural evolution. But

9:43

is there a specific amount of time after which a

9:45

species can be considered native? Is

9:48

the definition of native species exclusively related

9:50

to human interference or could animals or

9:52

other causes such as natural

9:54

disaster displaced in a species also

9:56

make a species non-native?

9:58

Also, is there such a thing as a... being considered

10:01

culturally native. For example, orange trees

10:03

being a significant part of Spanish culture

10:05

despite not being native to Spain.

10:07

Curious to know Mordecai. That's

10:09

a really good name specific sign off Mordecai. It

10:11

is. It's very good. What do you

10:13

think?

10:14

Well, I have a strong opinion about this because

10:16

I live in Indianapolis,

10:20

which

10:21

depending on your definition of native species,

10:24

how far back does it go is

10:27

the first question. Because if it goes back over 12,000 years,

10:30

there's no native species to Indiana

10:32

other than ice because all

10:35

of this was covered by a glacier that was like 4,000

10:37

feet thick.

10:39

And maybe there was some moss and stuff, but

10:41

there weren't any like big, big parties. But

10:45

I am particularly fascinated by this tree called

10:47

the ginkgo tree, the ginkgo biloba.

10:50

And

10:51

there were no ginkgo trees in

10:54

Indianapolis until about 120 years

10:56

ago. In fact, not to brag, but

10:59

the first ginkgo tree in Indianapolis

11:02

was planted by Kurt Vonnegut's great,

11:04

great grandfather. And I get to

11:07

walk past it sometimes. So

11:09

the ginkgo is an invasive species in the sense

11:11

that it's not native to Indianapolis

11:14

except until 2 million years ago,

11:17

there were ginkgo trees right here

11:19

along the banks of the White River. Interesting.

11:22

So it's not a native

11:25

tree, but it also is a native

11:27

tree. I think,

11:30

and I'm interested to get your perspective,

11:33

but I think that

11:35

when we think of, like

11:38

I've been talking to a lot of horticulturalist

11:40

people lately because we're planting a bunch of trees

11:42

around here to try

11:45

to even the score. You

11:47

have too. You've caused a lot of trees

11:50

to be cut down. Fair enough. And

11:52

I don't

11:54

like to get too much into my religious beliefs, but I think

11:56

that's a significant impediment to getting into heaven.

11:59

And And

12:01

so I'm trying to plant some trees to

12:03

even the score a little bit. So the

12:05

St. Peter won't be so pissed off with me when I get

12:07

up there. And

12:10

one of the things that I've learned, at least

12:12

in talking to these

12:15

landscaping people, is that

12:18

I tend to think of native or non-native as

12:20

being, in terms of plants, as being

12:22

a dichotomy, like a light switch that's either

12:24

on or off. But they think of it

12:27

much more as a spectrum, which

12:29

I tend to find is the case with a lot of experts,

12:31

like things that I think of as

12:34

a layperson, as dichotomous.

12:37

People who are experts in the field tend to think of as

12:40

spectral. Yeah. Yeah. That

12:43

makes sense. Especially with this idea that

12:45

the ginkgo could be kind of grandfathered in, or Kurt found

12:48

it gets grandfathered into our

12:52

understanding since it

12:54

existed well before humans

12:56

and then was introduced later. I mean, the

13:00

simple explanation of what non-native is,

13:02

is

13:03

if humans weren't involved, it's native. And if humans

13:06

were, it's non-native. But

13:08

I can see how that would be.

13:11

It is sort

13:13

of a little bit of a false dichotomy

13:16

when it comes to how we operate in the

13:18

world. And definitely

13:20

sort of

13:21

chance events with sort

13:23

of animal distribution and whatever,

13:27

when distribution

13:30

could

13:31

introduce something to an area, which is

13:34

kind of a stunning achievement. And just because it's not

13:36

a human doesn't mean it's not

13:39

sort of remarkable and sort of unique in

13:41

the way that it would invade would be exactly the same.

13:45

So I think this is fascinating. I'm

13:48

not sure. We're not the only weird species and

13:51

activity moving things around. For

13:53

sure. Like when, when... Oh

13:55

my God, this is like a

13:57

deep pull, so it might be completely wrong.

13:59

But I love that. That's

14:02

hey, that's what this podcast is all about,

14:04

Roman. Deep cuts that might

14:06

be wrong, but we're not going to research. But

14:10

basically, like up until the point that people

14:12

realized that plate

14:14

tectonics, that the continents moved around,

14:17

there was a great amount

14:19

of study to sort of justify

14:22

the

14:23

movement of plant

14:25

and animal species across these very,

14:27

you know, like far-flung continents.

14:30

And it was so advanced, like the, you know, like I

14:32

recall this story very distant

14:35

from my education, like

14:38

a large book just came out at the very moment

14:40

right before plate tectonics that was like describing,

14:43

you know, like in great detail how

14:45

all the animals and plants made it. It was like the unified

14:48

theory of movement.

14:51

And then, and then like a year later,

14:54

geologists were like, okay, so here's the

14:56

thing. There

14:58

may be a simpler explanation than this

15:00

like 1400 page theory

15:02

of everything. And, you know,

15:05

and then all of a sudden the distribution made more

15:07

sense because the things were on

15:09

the land and as it moved along and, you know,

15:11

and glaciers came and all that sort of stuff. And

15:13

so the

15:16

point being is like,

15:18

you can get very far, I mean, islands

15:21

are obviously populated by things that, you know,

15:23

that feel just as like extreme

15:25

interventionist as a human that

15:27

land on a place and it is not natural

15:30

that it lands there, but it is natural that it lands

15:32

there. And I like to think of ourselves as

15:34

not so much separate from nature as

15:36

a part of nature. Yeah,

15:39

right, right. Like we think of ourselves

15:41

as being artificial even though we are made

15:43

out of earth and everything inside

15:45

of us is earth. That's right.

15:47

We're not that artificial of an intelligence

15:50

as artificiality goes. You

15:53

know what your story, and I don't

15:55

know if you know this about me lately, but

15:57

I like to relate everything to the history.

15:59

of human responses to tuberculosis. I do. And

16:03

your story about

16:07

plate tectonics reminds me of the story about

16:09

tuberculosis, which means that I have to tell

16:11

it and I'm extremely sorry. So

16:14

this guy, Robert Koch, is the guy who

16:16

finally proved to, at

16:19

least to the, lots

16:21

of people already knew that tuberculosis was

16:23

a contagious disease, like

16:26

lots of people in the Americas

16:28

and in

16:29

parts of Asia. But in

16:32

Northern Europe especially, it was really seen

16:34

as having had to be inherited

16:37

because it went with all these personality traits,

16:40

these sort of like personality traits we associate

16:42

with or we associated with civilization,

16:45

like intelligence and emotional sensitivity

16:47

and just sort of being like a John Keatsy

16:49

type of character.

16:51

And so in 1881, this

16:54

medical textbook was published that had

16:56

a whole chapter on the so-called

16:59

consumptive personality, like what

17:01

kinds of people were inevitably going

17:03

to get consumption. And it was the same thing where

17:05

it was like this kind of theory of everything

17:08

that explained every case of consumption

17:11

that anybody could possibly get as associated

17:13

with this personality trait or else that

17:15

thing happening in childhood or your parents did

17:17

this or whatever. And then

17:20

literally the next year, Robert Koch

17:22

was like, no, I'm pretty sure it's this bacteria.

17:26

I found it. Here's a picture

17:28

of it. I

17:31

think it's that, which yeah, like rendered

17:34

like the biggest medical textbook in Northern

17:36

Europe

17:37

totally out of date in six months.

17:39

Love it. Love it. It's

17:41

not even that good of a tuberculosis story. It's

17:43

just that I know it and I want you

17:45

to know it. I'm one of the people who

17:48

maybe I'm the one person who cheers

17:51

when a tuberculosis story like

17:55

starts to come up on a Dear Hank and John. I'm like

17:57

more. I just can't believe it.

17:59

I still cannot believe

18:04

that tuberculosis is at the center of human history

18:06

in such dramatic, obvious ways from

18:09

the stethoscope to the cowboy hat to the existence

18:11

of the state of New Mexico. But

18:13

I also, on a

18:16

more serious, less funny haha

18:19

note, I cannot believe that 40 million

18:21

people have died of tuberculosis in this century,

18:24

and I didn't know any of that. I

18:26

thought that like tuberculosis was a disease

18:28

of the past. So I think like my obsession with tuberculosis

18:31

is really about like

18:32

my confoundedness of thinking

18:34

of myself as a reasonably engaged

18:37

person and certainly an engaged person

18:40

when it comes to potential health problems. And

18:43

yet, I just had no idea.

18:46

So it's so like, it really

18:48

has reoriented my understanding of the world.

18:51

I love that stuff. All right, let's move on to

18:53

another question. I will do my best to not relate

18:56

it to tuberculosis. This is about an old

18:58

Instagram account, which Robert Koch

19:00

did. No, he didn't. All right, Missy asks, Dear

19:03

John and Roman, I have an old Instagram account

19:05

that I forgot the password to a couple of years ago

19:07

that has quite a few followers and a

19:09

couple thousand posts in parentheses.

19:11

It was a Finsta. Now we should stop

19:14

here. What is a Finsta? Do you know?

19:16

I have no idea. Okay. What

19:19

could it be? Could

19:22

it be a financial Instagram? Like

19:24

that you used to raise money like a GoFundMe?

19:27

A Finsta. A Finsta. I mean, that

19:29

sounds like that to me because

19:31

like FinTech is like financial tech

19:33

and stuff like that. Right. Yeah, that's what I was thinking.

19:35

Yeah. All right. We'll just assume that. It was

19:37

a Finsta. There are some things that I've said on that

19:40

account that totally are not reflective of who I

19:42

am today and that I'm not proud of. Like,

19:44

did you raise money via a lie? It doesn't

19:46

matter. That's the point is

19:48

that Missy said things that they're

19:51

not proud of. I don't know the email it's

19:53

linked to. It was probably a fake one, nor

19:55

the phone number. So basically it's up forever. What

19:57

do I do if I get famous and successful in these

19:59

old-

19:59

from when I was 14 to 18 and stupid, get surfaced.

20:04

Definitely going to be canceled, missing. Wow.

20:07

Oh, God. I mean, I really, I would

20:10

like to say like, I'm so grateful I don't have

20:12

this problem, but I might. I

20:15

think everyone is going to have it soon.

20:19

I'm terrified. I mean, I'm really

20:21

scared of it. Like, I also

20:23

said a lot of things, Missy, when I was younger

20:25

and not just 18 that I

20:28

like, that do not reflect who I

20:30

am today, right? Like, I think that's

20:32

the hope, right? Is that you're not the

20:35

same person at 45 that you were at 25 or 15. Absolutely.

20:39

But there is a way that the internet sort of like, turns

20:42

things into a,

20:43

well, first off, like, you know, like, I guess it makes

20:45

sense to be held accountable for like, being that

20:47

person on some level. But like, the

20:50

internet kind of turns things into a,

20:53

I feel this with publishing too a little bit. It turns

20:55

things into like, time stops.

20:56

I get

20:58

older, but those books

21:00

don't. I grow up

21:03

and my books don't. And that's part

21:05

of why people like my books, because now if I

21:07

wrote some of those older books, I would be, they

21:09

would be way less good, but way more mature.

21:14

You would have thought through the problems and then, and

21:17

like, totally cut them off in the past.

21:21

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally 50 pages long. Right,

21:25

it would be like a 60 page book. Go

21:28

like, fuck up kid. Where like, the whole, the whole,

21:30

the whole thing, it'd be more

21:32

like, hey, don't make these

21:35

bad choices. Okay. Why are

21:37

you romanticizing this girl? Just

21:39

don't do it. Symmature,

21:43

man.

21:44

Yeah, so I would be much preachier and much

21:46

more like a dad, which would probably make the

21:48

books worse. But that's who I am

21:50

now. And I'm much more proud of this person.

21:53

Anyway, the point is like, I don't know,

21:55

how do you deal with this? Because you've been a

21:57

public person for a long time.

21:59

How do you deal with it? Oh. The

22:02

one story that comes to mind is I did

22:05

a tweet during sort of the height

22:08

of

22:08

the sort of democratic

22:11

nomination when it was Barack Obama

22:13

versus Hillary Clinton. And my tweet

22:16

was- My

22:18

tweet was something like, I met

22:21

like a die-hard Hillary person

22:23

and it was kind of weird. And at

22:25

that point I had, I was always surrounded by Barack

22:28

Obama people. And

22:31

then there was some

22:32

Twitter meme eight

22:35

years later that was kind

22:37

of like, hey, go find an eight-year-old

22:40

tweet and repost it. And

22:43

it just so happens that eight years later, Hillary

22:46

Clinton was running against Donald Trump.

22:50

And this tweet

22:52

resurfaced and people were like, Roman. What

22:55

the hell? Oh no. Oh no.

22:58

Oh no. And I was so, and

23:00

it was like the thing was just so innocent because

23:02

at the time it was just like, it was really

23:04

like this cool, it was actually kind of

23:06

a cool anomaly. Like I met like an organizer

23:09

for Hillary. It was kind of weird,

23:11

you know, like because- Right. You

23:13

didn't, yeah, you didn't mean it as an insult. It's

23:16

just like, it was kind of surprising to you coming

23:18

from the world that you came from that there were like,

23:20

cause like, I think like my

23:22

parents were like this in 2008. They were

23:24

like Hillary Clinton supporters, but not

23:27

like aggressive about it. Right, right,

23:29

right. They weren't like knocking on doors. And

23:32

at the time, there was so much energy for Barack

23:34

Obama. I was just like, that was what

23:36

I, that was the sea I was swimming in. And

23:39

so anyway, so this is like my mild version of

23:41

this and it was extremely uncomfortable

23:43

to try to explain that with some

23:46

kind of nuance when it seemed like

23:48

a choice was about to be made that was going to destroy

23:50

the world. And so mostly

23:53

what I do, and since then I think over

23:55

time I have removed more

23:58

of my personality and my- takes on

24:00

things just in general

24:02

as a protective measure. Yeah,

24:05

I should do that, but I can't stop. I

24:08

can't stop. I need to stop, but I

24:10

can't stop. And I really do focus on

24:13

positive things, you know? Like, and

24:16

I just hope that, you know,

24:19

that that doesn't get taken

24:21

poorly. I don't know. It's just sort

24:23

of like, I don't know. Because

24:25

you don't want to seem like a Pollyanna, like everything's

24:28

golden. But I

24:30

think what the internet is missing is hope.

24:34

And like, a kind of, like

24:36

I think the most punk rock thing in the world right now

24:39

is earnest,

24:41

earnestness and optimism. Yeah, I agree.

24:43

Is there so radically counter-cultural?

24:46

Totally, totally.

24:47

And so I think that is what the internet

24:50

needs, but then sometimes when I'm doing that, I

24:52

think, am I going to come across

24:54

as somebody who's oblivious to the world's problems?

24:57

Like even when I was writing the Anthropocene Reviewed, I

24:59

was super conscious of that because I was like, I

25:02

remember I was writing the intro and I was like, I want this

25:04

to be about this desire to fall in love with

25:06

the world, but then I was like, oh, but that's going to seem

25:08

like I don't care about injustice. And

25:11

I think like everything's like

25:14

beautiful and amazing on earth and,

25:16

you know, and that's not how I feel of

25:19

course. Like I think it's a complicated story. And

25:21

then, but then you're, yeah, so

25:23

I really struggled with finding the way

25:25

through that. How do you be

25:27

earnestly hopeful while still acknowledging

25:31

the reality, not just of suffering, but also

25:33

of the unjust distribution

25:36

of suffering? Absolutely. It is so

25:38

hard to represent yourself thoroughly

25:42

and completely. And it's just your hope

25:45

is that,

25:46

you know, if this finsta, whatever

25:49

that is, is discovered, it's sort of taken

25:51

totality with everything else that you've

25:53

produced and made. And, you

25:56

know, there is a habit.

25:57

of

26:02

when people get into arguments, it's

26:05

easier to land a blow on

26:08

someone who is more like you who

26:10

would feel

26:11

your admonishment than someone

26:13

who is so different from you. They do not

26:16

care that they

26:18

hate you or whatever, or you hate

26:20

them. And so it creates a kind of,

26:25

I'm thinking of like an EO Wilson Valley where

26:27

the evolution is very hard to sort of like

26:30

skip over because it's so painful to change.

26:33

You get hurt by the people you like

26:35

the most during that period of time or whatever. And

26:39

so I'm sympathetic

26:41

to this

26:41

and hopefully, well

26:43

I mean now

26:44

everyone's going to be trying to find Missy's Finsta.

26:48

But like, I mean it sounds like

26:50

it's going to be pretty hard since Missy

26:53

doesn't know the name of

26:55

the email address with the Finsta

26:58

or the password.

27:01

But don't we have to kind of forgive

27:04

ourselves? Don't we have to kind of forgive 14 year

27:06

olds? Absolutely. Because they're 14? Absolutely. And

27:10

to some extent, I know

27:12

that that's not a blanket statement, but

27:14

we have to acknowledge that these

27:17

people's brains are getting formed

27:20

and they are capable of change and in fact,

27:22

will and need to change. Totally.

27:24

And it should be celebrated when it does

27:27

happen and not

27:29

sort of taking the task.

27:32

But I'm sensitive to the idea

27:35

of this sort of like reaction to cancel culture,

27:37

which I think I don't fundamentally believe

27:40

exists in the way that it's presented a lot of the

27:42

time. Right. And

27:44

so it's just one of those really, really tricky

27:47

things. And what I would recommend is just

27:49

like, be out there, be good,

27:51

be a good person in the world.

27:52

And this type of

27:54

stuff will hopefully never be discovered.

27:57

And if it ever is, part of the

27:59

story is...

27:59

that

28:00

you become this new person, which is super

28:02

important. Yeah. And

28:05

in a way, I think the argument

28:07

that becoming that new person doesn't

28:10

erase the hurt that you may have caused

28:13

or the hurt that you did cause is important

28:15

to acknowledge as well.

28:17

And that's part of the way that

28:19

the kind of conversation around so-called cancel

28:22

culture, I think, gets really

28:24

off

28:25

track is that

28:28

it needs to allow for both of these

28:30

realities, both the reality that people

28:32

grow and change and the reality that

28:34

people can cause harm

28:36

and then grow and change and that harm is

28:38

still real. Totally. It's such a mess.

28:41

I just don't... I feel sorry

28:43

for anyone who had to navigate it very,

28:46

very young. Yeah.

28:47

I mean, exactly.

28:50

Like to be... Yeah. I

28:52

don't even... When I was 18 years old,

28:54

I don't remember. I don't

28:56

remember what I was like. I

29:00

wasn't great. I smoked a lot

29:02

of cigarettes. Sarah's only... Sarah

29:05

went to the same high school I did, so she sort of remembers

29:07

me from high school and she's like, the only thing I really remember

29:09

about you is that you kind of smelled

29:12

really stale smoke and you

29:15

were sort of cute, but mostly

29:17

because you seemed like trouble.

29:21

And that's so

29:23

different from my personality now.

29:25

Nobody would see me today and be

29:27

like, he's sort of hot, but only because he seems

29:29

like trouble. Yeah,

29:34

that's a real 180 right there. Yeah,

29:37

nobody on Earth seems less trouble.

29:42

About as intimidating as

29:44

a goldfish that's left its bowl. Like

29:46

I'm clearly not in the environment

29:50

in which I thrive if there even is such a thing.

29:54

Totally. All right. I like that we're answering

29:56

questions very slowly

29:58

and not that many of them.

29:59

That's my, it's Hank's least favorite

30:02

kind of, and dear Hank and John, but it's

30:04

my favorite. Oh, good, good. Well, I'm here

30:06

to serve. I think it's gonna be okay about

30:08

this Finsta, but to be fair,

30:10

we don't really know what a Finsta is, so it

30:12

might not be okay. I wish I could give you like

30:14

a blanket reassurance. Maybe

30:17

if it's a fascist Finsta account, maybe

30:19

then you would have some problems, you know? Yeah.

30:23

But, you

30:23

know. I hope there's not a whole genre of

30:26

Finsta, like I've heard the word Finsta before,

30:28

and if it was all about fascism, I think,

30:31

I think I would know that. Yeah, okay.

30:33

I think it's about fundraising. All right, and

30:35

if you fundraised under like a false pretense,

30:37

man, that's not great, but I don't know,

30:39

you were 14, you should apologize, try to make

30:41

back the money and give it back. Agreed.

30:44

Kiawa asks, dear

30:46

John and Roman, someone I love very much

30:48

is going through a tough grieving process.

30:51

His girlfriend, the love of his life, suddenly

30:53

had to move for work, and no one knows

30:56

when she'll come back. He's having a very

30:58

hard time with her absence, and

31:00

no one knows when she'll come back. Okay.

31:03

Can you call her? Yeah, yeah. He's having

31:05

a very hard time, did she go to space? He's

31:08

having a very hard time with her absence and can't

31:10

understand why she has left or where she has, why

31:12

does he call her? Or that she will be back

31:14

eventually, how can I help him in this trying time?

31:17

Important context, he is a horse. Okay,

31:20

well, there we go. There we go. He's

31:22

a horse. Of course, of course. He's a horse. Okay.

31:26

His girlfriend is another horse

31:28

who went away to training for a while.

31:31

He doesn't understand English other than his name

31:34

and the words no and good boy. Doesn't

31:36

he understand like, what's the, what do you say? Giddy

31:39

up. Does he understand giddy

31:41

up? Yeah. What's the other one you

31:43

say?

31:44

Halt. Ho, whoa. Ho.

31:47

Whoa. Or something like that. Whoa, whoa, it's whoa.

31:49

You say whoa. Yeah. Kiwa,

31:52

you've come to the right place. In addition to being fenced

31:54

to experts, Roman and I are clearly

31:56

equestrians. Cowboys.

31:58

Throwing through.

31:59

Dangerous, dangerous,

32:02

dangerous boys. All

32:06

I remember about you is the stale

32:10

smell of cigarette smoke, a little

32:12

bit of danger in how you rode that

32:14

horse.

32:18

If there's anybody on Earth

32:20

who looks less comfortable on a horse than I do,

32:22

I haven't met them. All

32:25

right, Kia, we've got a horse problem. This

32:28

is a bummer. I remember this happened when

32:31

there was a period in my life where I had two dogs,

32:34

but one of the dogs died

32:37

and it was awful

32:40

because the other dog

32:42

was just confused and heartbroken.

32:45

And I felt like, I mean, maybe this

32:48

is anthropomorphizing, but I felt like the other

32:50

dog was like,

32:51

why did you take away my best

32:54

friend? Yeah. Yeah. They

32:57

didn't get to go through the grieving. They didn't see

32:59

the death. They weren't like...

33:02

So, they were just, I think they were just confused

33:05

and super sad. I

33:08

don't have a solution for this. I just thought it was sad.

33:11

Yeah. Or alternatively, maybe they view all

33:13

absences as death, like a kind of like

33:16

a fundamental object

33:19

impermanence type of thing that they just like... But

33:21

then sometimes death is followed

33:23

by rebirth and then the other times it isn't.

33:26

I

33:29

mean, the thing is when it comes to this stuff

33:31

is like you can never address

33:34

the true problem, but addressing

33:38

the symptoms is pretty

33:40

good, which is touch

33:42

your horse, be with

33:45

your horse, do things with your horse.

33:48

And there will be fleeting moments in which they

33:51

will not feel this pain.

33:52

And

33:55

if that's the best you can do and it probably is the best

33:57

anyone can do, then that's what you should

33:59

do.

33:59

also probably the best that we can usually do

34:02

for each other. Agreed. You know, is

34:04

accompaniment. Yeah. Like,

34:06

can't solve this problem for you because

34:08

it's not solvable. Yeah. And also,

34:11

you don't need me to solve it

34:13

because you already know that it's unsolvable. And

34:15

so, my attempts to like solve

34:17

it or minimize it are not actually

34:19

what you need. What you actually need is just

34:23

accompaniment. Yeah. Yeah. Just

34:25

to not be so alone. Yeah.

34:27

Agreed. Yeah. I know this chaplain,

34:30

Vanessa Zoltan, who's also a great podcast host,

34:32

and she told me a story once about

34:35

being with somebody in the

34:37

midst of like terrible, terrible crisis

34:39

and loss. And this

34:41

person saying something like,

34:44

like, my life will never be the same. And instead

34:46

of saying like, well, you know, in time it'll

34:48

get better, Vanessa said, I know.

34:51

And like just

34:53

the acknowledgement of

34:55

the hugeness of what was happening is

34:58

more of a gift than trying to minimize

35:00

somebody's experience. Absolutely.

35:03

Or some horse's experience. And

35:05

the good news is you get to spend a lot of

35:08

time with a horse. And this seems like a nice horse.

35:10

Yeah. Yeah. It seems like a good

35:13

horse with big feelings, which

35:15

my kind of horse. I like an emotionally

35:18

engaged horse.

35:19

Before

35:22

this, Roman and I were talking and

35:24

we were talking about how some people hosting

35:27

this podcast have

35:29

a bit ruminative.

35:32

Spent a lot of time thinking,

35:34

spent a lot of time analyzing. And

35:36

Roman

35:39

said the most beautiful thing I've ever heard.

35:41

And I promised him I was going to give him

35:43

a year to use it, but I can't

35:45

even 30 minutes. I didn't even give him 40 minutes. What

35:51

he said was, you know, it's really is

35:53

true that the unexamined life isn't worth living,

35:56

but the over-examined life isn't much better.

36:02

It's so true.

36:03

Why do I over-examine

36:05

life? Why does that horse over-examine

36:08

life? It's gonna be fine. Your girlfriend's coming back,

36:10

man. Why do I over-examine

36:13

life? The over-examined

36:15

life also isn't that

36:17

great.

36:19

Where's all the attention

36:21

for the over-examined life? That reminds me. That

36:24

reminds me that today's podcast is brought to you

36:26

by The Over-Examined Life. The

36:29

over-examined life.

36:31

It's a Roman Mars original that I stole 40

36:33

minutes after he said it.

36:35

This podcast is also brought to you by 10

36:37

to the 18 chickens. That's

36:40

a lot of chickens. That's a lot of chickens.

36:46

I don't know if that accounts for their spacesuits,

36:48

you know? But maybe they don't

36:50

need to have spacesuits. It doesn't say living

36:53

chickens. It's

36:55

chickens. Today's podcast

36:57

is additionally brought to you by Finsta. Finsta?

37:01

Is it financial? I'm

37:04

not looking it up. I'm never gonna look it up.

37:06

This podcast is also brought to you by Boxes Inside

37:08

of Boxes, a place where you can be messy and

37:10

eat and free of cockroaches

37:13

or maybe just live in harmony with cockroaches.

37:17

It's all up to you.

37:19

This episode of Dear Hanging John is brought to you by Thrive

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39:59

IV

39:59

This next question comes from

40:02

Max.

40:08

He writes, Dear John and Roman,

40:10

recently I was in an ice cream store that has an arcade machine

40:13

in the corner and I went over to play there and I found

40:15

six quarters resting on the machine. Can

40:17

I use those quarters? No one else was around who looked

40:19

like the quarters were theirs. Was someone

40:22

coming back for them? Did they just leave them there

40:24

for someone to use? I've had this happen

40:26

a couple times before and I can't decide if it's

40:28

morally right to use them only a little mad,

40:31

Max.

40:32

Yeah, use them. I think you got to. Yeah.

40:35

I think they're there on purpose.

40:37

I think they're there left for you. Right.

40:40

And then maybe if you feel a little weird about

40:42

using them, like after you have that like

40:45

four to five minutes of gaming joy

40:47

that six quarters can buy you these

40:50

days, you go to

40:52

the ice cream store and you're like, hey, can

40:54

I get six quarters? And you just leave the six quarters

40:56

there for the next person. But I think that I think

40:58

it's just for you. I was

41:00

recently at a arcade,

41:03

a pinball thing

41:04

and there was a, I'm

41:06

a big pinball fan. Yeah. Martine

41:08

on our show is a huge pinball fan and

41:11

I'm a big admirer. I'm just so not

41:14

good at it that I have

41:16

not to, you know, like I haven't

41:18

grabbed onto it as a hobby, but I love

41:20

it. Right. I'm not good either. It's

41:22

very much like my relationship with skateboarding.

41:25

You know, like I admire the people who are very

41:27

good at it and I think that it's very beautiful. But

41:29

then when I play, it's a pretty fast game, but

41:32

I just love the machines. I love the noises. It's

41:34

like all the, it's like everything that a casino

41:36

can give you, but it's way less

41:39

expensive. And so

41:41

anyway, I was at this pinball arcade and there

41:43

was a

41:44

pinball machine with four plays

41:46

on it. And I think it had four plays on it

41:48

because the person before me had scored, you know,

41:51

like 700 billion points or whatever

41:53

and then just walked away.

41:56

But I did, I went to the, I went to the

41:58

pinball wizard guy.

41:59

who runs the pinball arcade and I was

42:02

like, hey, this machine has four

42:04

free plays on it. And he just looked at

42:06

me like, what's wrong with you? I was

42:09

like, do you think I can

42:11

use them? And he was like, yeah,

42:14

you can use them. Otherwise,

42:16

you're going to put

42:17

a dollar in the machine and then it's going to have five

42:19

free plays. So

42:22

I think you should just use them. Yeah, you should just

42:24

use them. Live like that guy. But I love the idea of

42:26

like leaving six

42:29

other quarters, but you definitely use the

42:31

ones that are there and put new quarters

42:33

on. Totally. 100% critical.

42:38

Yeah. Do

42:41

you have a favorite quarter?

42:44

Oh, you mean like in the state varieties

42:46

of quarters? Or like maybe it's the original,

42:48

maybe you like that eagle. Or

42:51

maybe like the bicentennial. I loved the bicentennial

42:53

one when I was a kid. I was like, because it was

42:55

so special.

42:56

Yeah. But now all the quarters

42:59

look weird. They do. And it's sort of, I

43:02

would say I don't at this

43:05

point, although I, we, you

43:07

know, someone pitched us a story once about all the

43:09

quarters. And that is the

43:11

type of story I would love to know.

43:14

You know, like, I would

43:16

follow that thread. But it, you know, I

43:18

don't know if it jazzed like everyone else on staff,

43:20

which is why Fry White didn't sort of make it. But

43:23

like, the, I do think there's

43:25

a little bit of a problem with all the special

43:27

quarters is like, if they're all special, like, like,

43:31

no one is special. None of them. Yeah. Right. And

43:33

so you don't get an affinity for that, like,

43:35

like, like that bicentennial quarter, which showed up

43:37

every once in a while. Right. That

43:40

you could, you know, like, attach some

43:42

meaning to. But I have to admit,

43:44

I'm really, in generally,

43:46

I'm just pretty delighted by each one because

43:48

I love that type of,

43:50

you know, sort of

43:53

that federal civic symbolism when

43:55

I love finding out

43:57

what people choose to represent themselves.

43:59

is super interesting to me. But

44:03

I don't know if I can't name my favorite. I can barely

44:05

even picture one of them, but I spend

44:07

time looking at them for sure.

44:09

I know that you're a flag enthusiast. And

44:11

one of the things that I like most

44:14

about Indianapolis, maybe the

44:16

thing that I like most about Indianapolis

44:18

is our city flag. Good flag. Good

44:20

flag. Really good flag. Doesn't say

44:23

Indianapolis on it, which makes

44:25

it rare and valuable on its own, but

44:28

it's also a really good flag. And then the state of

44:30

Indiana, and this is a huge surprise because

44:32

you would think that it would have a terrible flag

44:35

and it has a bad one, but it's not nearly

44:37

as bad as most state flags. I

44:39

think it's a good state flag.

44:42

Yeah, they could take the word Indiana

44:45

off of it and then it would be great.

44:46

But

44:48

if I'm picturing it right, it's the one with

44:50

the torch and the thing. Yeah,

44:53

they could sort of a totally dark blue background,

44:56

golden torch, and then some stars

44:58

around it. It's beautiful. I totally agree.

45:00

It would improve greatly, just

45:03

take the word Indiana off of it. But

45:05

the bones of it, if you did

45:07

that, are real solid in my opinion.

45:10

Yeah, no, I agree. But Indianapolis is

45:12

a great city flag and

45:14

it has, I don't know, it's basically

45:16

a cross that's centered

45:18

and then it has that white

45:20

star with a round red circle. Yeah.

45:23

And

45:25

it's lovely. I just

45:27

was talking about the Indianapolis flag

45:29

yesterday. Oh, wow. With

45:32

Michael Green, who runs a thing

45:34

called Flags for Good. And he

45:36

was telling me about the original version of that.

45:39

This is about a 70 year

45:41

old flag, I think, roughly. And

45:44

the original version of it had

45:47

the cross off center, like

45:50

more like a Nordic cross. And it

45:53

won a contest or someone designed it, it won a

45:55

contest. The designer left

45:57

the state and it was adopted. And

45:59

he came. back to Indianapolis at some point and

46:01

then the flag was flying and he was like, oh,

46:04

they like re-centered

46:05

my flag.

46:08

Well, but

46:11

it should be in the center because as

46:13

I've understood it is that Indianapolis

46:16

is a city built on a grid, but

46:18

the very center of the grid is

46:20

a circle. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It makes a ton

46:23

of sense.

46:23

And so you can actually, not

46:26

to be too nerdy, but like you, wherever

46:28

you live in Indianapolis, which is a huge physical

46:30

city. It's like one of the physically largest

46:32

cities in America. You can point to

46:34

the part of the flag where you live.

46:36

Like if you live in the northwest side, you can point

46:39

there. If you live southeast, you can point there and you can

46:41

sort of use the flag as like, I live approximately

46:44

here as long as you're inside of the city, like

46:46

inside of the Beltway. Yeah, yeah. I

46:48

love flags that are stylized

46:51

maps. Like St. Louis has a good one like that.

46:54

Yes, yes. I know that

46:56

shows the rivers converging into the sort

46:58

of fleur-de-lis that represents the city.

47:01

Yeah. I like it. They

47:03

need to be pretty stylized for them to work in

47:05

my opinion. Like Indianapolis

47:06

is a really good example of that. But when they

47:09

work, they work great.

47:10

I love them. Yeah. And

47:13

I love the dark blue. I love the light blue

47:15

of a Chicago style flag, but

47:17

I love the dark blue works

47:19

for Indianapolis. I think so

47:22

too. That's great to hear. We're

47:24

just happy to know that Indianapolis was in your

47:26

mind in any way. That's

47:29

like, we're just happy to be included and

47:31

have it not be about something horrific.

47:33

Like one time I met with the

47:36

governor

47:37

and he was like, what

47:41

do you need to be able to do your business effectively?

47:44

And I was like, I mean, I need you to shut

47:47

up is the main thing I need, honestly.

47:49

Like I need you to like stop ruining

47:52

it for me. But what I said was like,

47:54

you know what, governor, like every

47:57

time Indianapolis is in the national

47:59

news, I don't

47:59

if you've noticed this, it's bad.

48:02

Like, Indiana

48:05

never makes news for being

48:07

awesome. And so what I would love

48:09

is for you to stop making news.

48:15

That is good advice.

48:17

That's good advice in general. Stop

48:22

pumping the brakes on everyone

48:25

else's attempt to make this a normal, nice

48:27

place to hang out and recruit and

48:29

work and live.

48:31

And let us have a soccer team.

48:35

Dear Roman and John, I was driving with

48:37

my sister the other day when we spotted a car

48:39

wrapped to look like a clownfish. The back of

48:41

the car said it was for

48:44

a mobile fish veterinarian, which

48:46

got us thinking,

48:48

how do they do surgery on a fish? Do

48:50

they do it underwater? Is there a water

48:52

mask for the gills, like an oxygen mask for

48:54

people? Do people even get surgeries

48:57

on their fish? They didn't teach us this

48:59

in school. Anna.

49:00

Oh, there you go. I get it. Now,

49:05

I would assume that a mobile fish veterinarian

49:09

is not performing surgeries,

49:11

but is instead being like, your

49:13

fish

49:14

is good or your fish is not good.

49:17

And here's some fish medicine. Exactly.

49:19

But

49:20

is there fish surgery? And so

49:23

surely there can't be. I was very

49:26

intrigued by this because I saw this one.

49:28

I didn't do tons of research today,

49:30

but I saw the first I did. We didn't do anything

49:32

about finstals. That's for sure. But I did.

49:34

I saw this one and I was like, I'm

49:37

very curious about this myself and there's no way I

49:39

can make a guess. It turns out, yes,

49:41

there is fish surgery. In fact,

49:43

no. Yes. I mean, I would say that most

49:46

of the time that a veterinarian is called

49:48

in for a fish, it is like to add chemicals

49:50

or antibiotics to deal with some

49:52

kind of ick or

49:53

something like that. But

49:55

for very expensive fish or fish

49:58

that you're very attached to, probably.

49:59

larger. Like I watched

50:03

or I saw pictures of a fish surgery

50:06

and it was something to behold

50:08

because you are right. Like it is

50:10

not what, well, Anna is right.

50:12

There's kind of a water mask

50:15

for their gills. So... Oh,

50:19

so they take them out of the water, but they sort

50:21

of keep the water on them? Yeah,

50:24

they take them out of the water. I mean, at least the one

50:26

I saw, they take them out of the water. They

50:29

have a tube that goes in their mouth that pumps

50:31

water over their gills so that

50:34

they can breathe. They

50:37

are anesthetized and

50:39

they cut them open, they remove their little

50:42

lump or something, they sew them back up and

50:44

then you have fish surgery.

50:47

Wow. I know.

50:49

Humans are remarkable. It's

50:51

amazing. Amazing. I mean, the

50:54

things that we can do when we care, it's incredible.

51:01

Yeah. We can perform surgery on

51:03

fish. We can. Yeah. Yeah. Love

51:06

it. That's pretty mind blowing. I'm

51:09

sure somebody is going to send us an email

51:12

a year from now that's like, actually

51:14

we did a study and we found out that fish

51:16

performed surgery on fish too.

51:20

And here's our paper full

51:22

of puns that we published on April 1st, but

51:24

it's pretty remarkable that humans

51:27

could do fish surgery. Yeah, I love it. Incredible.

51:29

All right, I also wanted to ask you this question about cheese. Okay.

51:32

From Evan who writes, Dear John

51:34

and Roman, I come to you with a question. I work at a cafe

51:37

that specializes in wine and cheese

51:39

and we have two cheese platters, one for bland

51:42

tastes and one stinky

51:44

cheese platter. We're talking

51:47

moldy cheeses. Why do

51:49

only

51:50

old people enjoy

51:52

stinky cheese? Do younger

51:54

people have more sensitive taste buds? People under 35 always

51:57

go for the bland cheeses. Gouda, bem.

51:59

etc. Smell you later,

52:02

Evan. Yeah, actually. Really?

52:06

Yeah, our taste buds get older

52:09

and they get less

52:11

sensitive and you

52:13

are more likely in general to enjoy

52:16

stronger flavors as you get older because

52:19

those taste buds just aren't firing like

52:21

they used to. Mmm,

52:22

that's so interesting. That

52:24

explains why, if you told

52:26

me 15 years ago that

52:29

a significant portion of my free time would

52:31

be spent with my mother growing

52:34

peppers from seed and

52:36

then taking care of them in the garden

52:38

for six months and then over the next six

52:40

months processing them into hot sauce, I would

52:42

have been like, what?

52:45

My mom lives next door to me? That would have

52:48

been my first surprise. For your first surprise.

52:51

Then my second, I would have been like, and I love

52:54

it? Wow. My second

52:56

surprise would have been that I make hot sauce

52:58

with my mom, but it's so fun. And

53:00

also I love hot sauce, which

53:03

I didn't 15 years ago. Hot sauce

53:05

is the best. I love hot sauce too. Oh,

53:08

I'll send you some. Yeah, I need some green family

53:12

hot sauce. I don't know if you like our family hot sauce, but

53:14

you won't complain that it's not spicy enough.

53:18

Yeah. So

53:18

I think the two things working

53:20

here are just

53:22

the ravages of time and also

53:25

exposure. I think that over

53:28

time you try more things, you start to like

53:31

more things. I think you can

53:34

refine your palate through exposure and

53:38

like stinkier cheeses and stronger,

53:40

all kinds of stronger smells

53:42

and tastes and stuff like that. It's one of the great things

53:44

about growing older actually, in my opinion.

53:47

I agree. I went to

53:48

a blue cheese, like educational

53:51

evening, several years ago,

53:53

you know, like one of those things where... Sure are weird things you

53:56

do. Yeah, I don't know. Like Sarah

53:58

was like, Oh, I got us tickets too.

55:46

And

56:00

anyway, I went skiing. I don't know if you've ever

56:03

been skiing. Are you a skier? No, I mean, I,

56:05

no, it wasn't part of my life in central

56:08

Ohio. Not me. Yeah. Same,

56:10

exactly, right? Thank. Very

56:12

far away from anything that I, and

56:15

I didn't just never had any interest in it, but anyway,

56:17

I went and I

56:20

didn't, I was, it was fine. I

56:22

liked it, it was great. I, you know, whatever,

56:24

it was good time outside, all that mountains

56:26

are beautiful, et cetera. But the thing that I loved

56:29

was my ski instructor, Haley,

56:32

who loved skiing

56:35

and like understood it deeply and

56:37

was passionate about it and needed to like, and

56:39

needed to share things with me about it that weren't necessarily

56:42

about like my skiing. It was just

56:44

about like what makes skiing awesome

56:46

and interesting and the things that you're able to

56:48

do on skis that you can't do without

56:51

them. And I was like, that's

56:54

the best part of this vacation for me.

56:57

Totally,

56:58

totally. Getting to like learn from Haley

57:00

about skiing. Yeah, yeah.

57:03

That's, I think that stuff's beautiful. And

57:05

it is one of the great joys of listening to 99% Invisible. By

57:09

the way, if you haven't listened to 99% Invisible,

57:12

I'm extremely

57:13

jealous of you because you're about to have the

57:15

best experience. You're about to find out that there

57:17

are actually, there are actually really good podcasts

57:20

out there. It's so

57:22

good. And, but that's one of the

57:24

joys of listening to it is that so often you

57:27

introduced those stories

57:30

of people's deep

57:33

love of things, their

57:35

deep fascinations,

57:37

and you kind

57:39

of model how that happens in a way

57:41

in some episodes. Like you allow the listener

57:44

to experience some of the same

57:46

magic

57:47

of falling in love

57:50

with something. Yeah. What

57:52

I like most about the show and the

57:54

way it changed me in the past like 13 or 14

57:56

years that I've been

57:58

doing it. And I have to. like, really

58:00

stress. Over the years, my role

58:03

in what makes the show great has

58:06

diminished significantly because

58:08

I have this team of people who make it and are so,

58:10

so good. And I always say that I'm

58:12

like the third or fourth or maybe the fifth

58:15

most important person on any

58:17

story. Right. But I'm

58:19

there for every story, you know? Right.

58:23

And so, but what I love

58:25

the most in the terms of that sort

58:27

of like, awareness of the world is

58:30

these designers

58:32

of our built world and makers

58:34

of things are solving

58:36

problems before you even

58:38

have them. They're, they're, they,

58:41

in a way, when you operate in the world,

58:43

you are in the warm embrace of

58:45

people thinking about things that

58:47

you don't even need to bother thinking about.

58:50

They've, they've handled it for you. And

58:52

it's changed my outlook of, it makes

58:54

the world feel so much more caring

58:57

in general just by thinking about

58:59

curb cuts and streetlights and,

59:02

you know, things like that. It just, it really,

59:04

really changes my mood

59:08

when I work on a story,

59:09

you know, or, or like, where does someone else

59:11

work on a story and say, oh, you should

59:14

move this here. You start to see all the systems

59:17

that people participate in

59:19

and strengthen for each

59:21

other, you know, like from whether

59:23

that's

59:24

manhole covers or

59:26

sewer systems that, you

59:29

know, we are all working together on

59:31

some level to make things easier for

59:34

each other. Yeah.

59:35

And that's so lovely. I know. It's

59:37

such a, it's such a much better way of thinking

59:40

about what we're up to as a species. Agreed.

59:43

It, it, it totally reoriented my

59:45

brain doing the show. And

59:47

so hopefully, you know, you get some of that effect when you

59:49

listen to it too. I certainly do. All

59:52

right, Roman, it's time for the all important news from Mars

59:54

and AFC Wimbledon. I'll go first. There

59:56

is no team in professional football

59:58

anywhere as far can tell on

1:00:01

Earth right now that

1:00:03

has lost

1:00:05

more games from winning positions

1:00:07

than AFC Wimbledon.

1:00:09

And today, as

1:00:11

we're recording this, Good Friday,

1:00:13

or should I say Bad Friday,

1:00:17

AFC Wimbledon played Harrogate Town, one

1:00:19

of the worst teams in League Two, favorite

1:00:21

to go down, not even be a professional

1:00:23

team anymore, won't be able to play them in FIFA as

1:00:26

them in FIFA next season, maybe. We

1:00:29

were winning two nil, two goals from Ethan Chislett

1:00:31

in the 85th minute, five minutes to go. And

1:00:34

I thought to myself,

1:00:36

maybe we're going to win a football game. But

1:00:39

no, no, we

1:00:41

gave up a goal, stupid goal, really annoying.

1:00:44

And then in the last second

1:00:46

of added time, there was a corner kick for

1:00:49

Harrogate and everybody,

1:00:51

everybody, everybody on

1:00:53

the field, everybody on Earth knew

1:00:56

what was going to happen. You could see

1:00:58

it in the eyes of all 11 Wimbledon players.

1:01:00

You could see it in the eyes of the 600 fans

1:01:02

who'd traveled to Harrogate. You could see

1:01:04

it in my eyes and we gave up a

1:01:06

goal in the last kick of the game and

1:01:09

tied 2-2 and I can't

1:01:11

do this anymore. I can't,

1:01:13

why am

1:01:14

I letting the quality of my

1:01:19

life be deeply affected by the exploits

1:01:22

of 26 year olds who live far away from

1:01:24

me? Why? And then

1:01:26

I was like, I went to Sarah and I was like,

1:01:29

we need to invest real

1:01:31

money

1:01:32

in AFC Wimbledon. And she was like, no,

1:01:36

no, no, that's a non-starter. And I was

1:01:38

like, they need

1:01:40

help

1:01:43

in their minds. They need mind

1:01:45

help because there's nothing wrong

1:01:47

with their feet. The problem,

1:01:50

and I know what this is like because the problem

1:01:52

with me is also inside of my mind. So

1:01:54

it's not a criticism, it's just an acknowledgement.

1:01:57

And like, I need help inside my mind.

1:01:59

mind. And,

1:02:02

you know, and Sarah was like, I don't know,

1:02:04

I think we should probably focus on partners in health, buddy.

1:02:07

And that's a good point. That's a good point.

1:02:10

God, it's so frustrating.

1:02:12

Yeah. Oh, goodness gracious. Mars

1:02:14

would never do this to somebody, you know?

1:02:18

Mars doesn't have a problem in its head. No,

1:02:21

it doesn't.

1:02:22

It's

1:02:24

so difficult. It's so difficult

1:02:26

right now. Yeah.

1:02:28

So anyway, hopefully we won't get relegated.

1:02:31

Even though we haven't won an

1:02:34

away game in six months.

1:02:36

Hopefully we won't get relegated.

1:02:38

So that's the job at this point.

1:02:40

There's only six games left in the season. And

1:02:43

hopefully

1:02:45

that's,

1:02:47

hopefully we'll be all right. Do you have any news

1:02:49

from Mars? Yes. Is

1:02:52

this a personal question? I guess,

1:02:54

I don't know anything about the planet Mars. I would

1:02:57

say that things are going good

1:02:59

in the Mars household though. So

1:03:02

we're going strong. That's

1:03:04

it. Yeah, that's great. That's great. That's

1:03:06

the news from Mars I wanted, like what's the news

1:03:09

from Mars? And the news from Mars

1:03:11

is that things are all right, you know? Yeah. Things

1:03:14

are okay. Yeah. We're doing- You didn't like throw away

1:03:16

a 2-0 lead in four

1:03:17

minutes to the worst

1:03:19

team in professional football? No, we

1:03:21

avoided that fate. But there

1:03:24

are many other things, obstacles along the way.

1:03:27

Yes, no, it's not to say that there are

1:03:29

no challenges. The great thing about

1:03:31

caring a lot about football is

1:03:33

that

1:03:35

it's so simple. Like life

1:03:37

is so complicated and

1:03:39

so difficult. And that's the problem with

1:03:41

getting too involved in football is that it just becomes,

1:03:44

then it's like, oh, it's really complicated.

1:03:46

But if you just watch the games,

1:03:50

then it's so simple.

1:03:53

It's a flat field, the ball

1:03:55

rolls around. Sometimes it goes over the

1:03:58

line, sometimes it doesn't. It's

1:04:00

unimportant and in the best

1:04:02

possible way.

1:04:07

I've

1:04:09

been watching a lot more soccer because one of my

1:04:13

step kids is a really fanatic

1:04:15

about soccer, loves, loves, loves soccer, goes

1:04:18

to the park by himself for

1:04:20

like three or four hours a day to

1:04:23

go practice footwork and stuff like that.

1:04:25

Wow, that's beautiful. And it's really

1:04:27

watching him. Is he

1:04:30

interested in a trip to South London? I

1:04:33

think he would be, yeah, he would be.

1:04:37

We need somebody

1:04:40

who will spend three or four hours a day at

1:04:42

the park working on footwork. If

1:04:44

you open it up to 14 year olds, I think you would

1:04:47

have someone, you'd have a taker. But

1:04:49

I've been amazed.