Beantown Podcast - 50 States Power Rankings Part Two (072022022 Beantown Podcast)

Episode Date: July 23, 2022

Quinn comes to you LIVE with Part Two of his 50 States Power Rankings to dig into the Great Plains as well as some real LOSERS like Kentucky and Indiana. Don't forget to bitch us out at [e-mail]

Hey, what's going on? It's Quinn David Furnace. Welcome to my show. Quinn David Furnace presents the bean town podcast for Friday, July 22nd, 2022, 222-0222. What's going on? What's happening? It's nice to be back with you on a Friday. We've been kind of all over the place with our recording schedule lately. And that's really a good problem to have. It means I've been busy. I've been out doing stuff. We've been at Summerfest. We've been out for the weekend, you know, swimming with, you know, future in-laws. That sort of thing, just like out and about, doing stuff. And that's totally fine. And I think I mentioned this last week on the show,

where it's like, yes, summer feels like it's coming to an end. Partially, the temperature is sure dawn. It's hot as balls out there. But that's totally okay with me, because I feel like I'm doing stuff. I'm going on vacation this upcoming week, going to a hot bearable cabin with the immediate family. It'll be the first time the immediate family's been together in almost a year. That should be exciting. And got Hawaii coming up and literally I'll be there in a month, let's see, one, two, three, four leaving,

four weeks and one day from now, four Hawaii. So that's 29 days for those you who didn't pass third grade math back when you were a kid. That's what we're leading up to with our US State Power Rankings which we're going to dig into pretty shortly here. I don't have much much of a prologue. If you will, the last time you use the word prologue in a sentence and then just read it in a book prologue, p-r-o-l-o-g-u-e. Before we dive into those power rankings, oh yeah, but what we're getting there and then you know we got Gosh my end of August is crazy. I have a week of orientation a week of Hawaii and then a week of what's affectionately known on campus as immersion week which has to do with the class I teach and

The next thing you know it I mean literally like end of immersion week we're gonna be back in Wisconsin going up there for a wedding and all of a sudden it's post-labor dates. Football season, it's getting into fall, although September tends to stay warm. And you know, it's traveling for work and stuff. So it's exciting. I'm busy, I'm occupied working, working three jobs still, and going strong. Some days are easy. Some days are draining. Today was very draining. It's about 620 in the afternoon and the evening blaze it.

On Friday afternoon, and I just finished work. Right as I was starting to hit record, it's been one of those days. Came all the way back from the suburbs. This morning walked in about two minutes before my first meeting started. It's been a hectic week. And it's not quite done yet, but I think the majority of it is done. Thanks everyone who sent flowers, trees, thoughts, prayers, text messages, all that stuff to Rachel, to her family, death in the family this past week.

So we've been out in the suburbs since Tuesday night dealing with some of that stuff. It's a lot of family events, church things, all that stuff, and just got back this morning. So it's been a lot, but these things are bitter sweets and not the right word, but sad, but also good opportunity to remember, reflect, celebrate life and then a good chance to be with family and friends as well and a couple of Rachel's friends made out to the visitation and I am very thankful

for for them for doing that because we were out in the burbs not necessarily close to the city of Chicago so it's that. And then Rachel, and a slightly lighter, but still kind of stressful. No, Rachel's doing her full fledged move in tomorrow. July 23rd, she's moved a couple of things in and we've got some replacement furniture coming in. We've got a new coffee table. I had to take some clear off the coffee table, clear off the dining room table, take some picks, posted to Facebook Marketplace,

that with like five scammers this morning, it was great. So no actual real person leads yet. But hey, if you're looking for an IKEA coffee table or a dining room table donated when I was 22 courtesy of Hannah Johnson H. what is Hannah Johnson? No that my H's are only Haley's. That was the second Hannah Johnson that I was with and there's been a lot of Haley's. But the vlog story short if you're looking for any of those either of those, let me know

they're all yours 15, 20, 25 bucks or best offer whatever you want to do. But we got that stuff coming in and Rachel's making her big move tomorrow which means today is my My last day living the the solo life at home since I was in graduate school since the day I left Chicago for Baltimore and this podcast was conceived about gosh about six seven months or so after I arrived in Baltimore that's when we started the show so that means for all of you who are the OGs, the day ones, if you will, I heard that in a

song yesterday on the radio, sounded pretty hip, pretty fresh. So I wanted to include that on the show. I'll also mention I'm the producer and best boy and, you know, key grip of the show. And hello to my friends in Pakistan. Kiberpast, Hyderabad, Islamabad. Thank you for tuning in today, really appreciate it. But if you were a day one, that means you've been with us, you know, four and a half years,

we're in season five here. I think this is show like two 30, two 40, we're kind of in that range somewhere. And that means, you know, the whole time you've been listening all the way back to January 2018. I've never had a roommate, which was a new thing for me when it first started. It feels very kind of weird now to be going back

to living with someone, but up until I was 22 and three months or so. I had had a roommate or in most cases multiple roommates. And so it feels kind of strange, but in a fun, exciting way to be coming back into the roommate life this time, a roommate that, excuse me, will be a great roommate. It's someone I care deeply about, which has been the case for some roommates,

but for the most part, that's not the case with your roommates. So, yeah, that's happening tomorrow, and then Sunday morning, leave for kind of a brief, like four, five five day family vacation sort of thing. So there's a lot going on, but I'm excited for that and just relaxing. Busy times for work for sure. So this upcoming week is not the ideal week to take off, but it's happening. Gosh, so I'm taking, I don't want to go down too deep in here. I want to get to our states and we're going to very quickly because I don't have that much else going on.

And I'm tired. I had what, four hour long synchronous meetings today on Zoom and then just a whole bunch of other stuff happening. It was just one of those days where it just meant just kept going and going. I mean, I didn't finish my meetings till five and then I was doing actual, they're work until like six, 10, 6, 15. Just one of those days where, man, I just don't feel like talking, I don't really feel like doing anything. But you know what, that's the thing about the Bean Tom podcast. We never stop. We come at you. You got new content every week, okay? It's been that

way for 230 some weeks or something. I completely lost my train of thought, which is a damn shame. Oh, I forgot to mention listener's questions advised. Here comes the FCC finds when you are listening to being time podcast number one, we're locationing some language number two's podcast subjectively terrible. What was I going to talk about? I said I didn't want to get too deep into it. And then I completely botched it. Where I don't usually do this, I'm going to listen back to the table, be right back. Okay, it was definitely not worth rewinding.

It was basically me going on a tangent about wanting to relax this week and then recapping all the vacation I still have yet to take Which is not who like who who gives a shit, but I'll tell you anyways That's kind of that's if you want to you know sum up this program and not show it's basically like Quain who gives a shit about this stuff, but you're gonna talk about it anyway, so I guess I'll listen. That's essentially our thesis.

I have five days this week, this upcoming week, in July, and then Hawaii later on in August, and then I just randomly took the week before Christmas off. If I can find a reason we'll flight, I'll head out to the Pacific Northwest and see my parents' house. I haven't been there for a handful of years. I never met their dog, that would be kind of fun. But if that doesn't work out, if it's like $700, which is what it looks like right now, then I don't know if that will happen. And then after all of that, and I'm doing a little bit of traveling this fall for work, getting back into that, it's been three years. Really, since I was able to do much of that.

On top of all that, I still have seven more days I have to use, like half to use, things that won't roll over. The crazy things I could use a full 12, another two and a half weeks of vacation, which there's just there's just no time. So it's it's not going to, I got seven more days minimum I got to use. You know, I've done, I've done the road trip. Angle the last two falls last year was end of August. The year before was like right for Halloween. And I love the idea of the road trip angle. It would have to be another solo trip this year.

But man, between rental cars and gas prices, it's just, it used to be like, okay, road trip, that's sort of the cheap option, right? But now it's much more like, I mean, I could literally just like fly to, not that I'm a Florida person, but just for example, say fly to, you know, Fort Myers or something, stay in a shitty motel with a pool and just like hang out there for five days. That would be so much cheaper than the road trip.

And usually it's like flipped, right? You think of road trip as being the more affordable option. So I'm going to have to decide what I want to do. Because it's common, you know, we were just talked about this on the show like I'm completely like schedule is set. Not that I'm doing something every day or every week, but like I know theoretically what I want to be doing, where I want to be doing where I want to be all the way until Labor Day. And next thing you know, I mean December, I'm done, I'm done with work for the year like the 20th or so of December. And so next thing you know, we're looking at from Labor Day to like December 20th, which is gosh, only what, like, three months where I gotta take some time and Thanksgiving is sprinkled in there.

It's not like it's impossible. I'll make something work. Likely, I don't know. Really November, something like that. Well, we're kind of gonna have to wait and see what happens. But anyways, guys, this is part two. I think we covered everything else I wanted to say.

My name's Quinn, this is my show, listen to discretion, packy stan. Oh, one other thing I wanted to mention. We haven't done a, we haven't premiered or teased a new cut by Q, excuse me, right on Q, there's a lot of Q's floating around episode in a couple of weeks now, and that's just a product of investing a lot of time

into the power rankings and just straight up other things and then also just completely forgetting today because I was thinking I was gonna do it today. There's a lot of stuff we could have commented on. Steve Bannon, USA Women's Soccer, the all-star game, millions of other monkey pox. I still haven't gotten to the bottom of the whole monkey pox. And is it more of an LGBTQ disease? Is it not?

Because there's a lot of talk going on with that right now, and I don't really know what the answer is. And I just haven't looked into it that much. The whole little miss thing on Instagram making a comeback, all those memes from the children's books from the 70s. Long story short, we've taken a couple of weeks off and there's a vast amount of content that we could have dug sunk our teeth into, really really and that's just on me. So maybe next week we'll try to get into it. Next week could be exciting. I mean, we got Friday here. It's technically a

vacation day. I'm gonna work a little bit, but maybe Jane and Steve want to come on the podcast and join the sort of third tier of our states. I don't know, I'll propose it. We'll see what they say. And then we got just two more after that. And then I'm going to Hawaii. So I think I covered everything I want to cover. Before we jump in, I just wanted to say thanks to our sponsors, our good friends at Home Pride Oregon.

If you need your home inspector in Central Oregon, you got to know whom to trust. You want someone who's safe and certified an expert in this business, but doing it for years at this point. His name is Steve. He's my dad. You can reach him at 541-410-0316. If you don't get in the first time, just keep trying.

Phone lines will will remain open like American Idol circa 2004. Phone lines remain open. Keep trying. They'll stay open with the 10 PM. Remember that? I had that kind of floating passing thought last night at some point. I don't really remember what we were talking about.

But it was just, you know, just the vision or the memory of like, sea crest on stage with some random 22 random 22 year old, you know, and on the screen you got like the singular wireless. Remember singular wireless with a C? That was a thing. And then it was like 18T for a while. I don't know if you as cellular was ever like the official sponsor for American Idol. But you know, you had the little graphic on the screen to be like 1, 888 4245 and then the last two digits would be like whichever order they were in that night. So if they were first would be a one if they were 11th would be 1 1 and it be like, you know data charges may apply or whatever. I don't think that I don't know if they were I don't think they were ever a toll number.

It's the other thing is crazy remember toll numbers I don't think they're ever a toll number. See other things, okay, do you remember toll numbers? I never actually called one because I would have been grounded to hell if I did that. But that was, I remember being at a friend's house and they were voting for American Idol live as it was on and their mom was like, oh God, no, we can't afford this.

Like hold on, it's not a toll number and there was a whole kerfuffle about whether or not it was a toll number or not. Just that early 2000s, nostalgia man, voting for American Idol by phone. I love it, I don't think I ever, maybe I did it once or twice. Always rude for the black guys on that show.

I don't really know what that says about my personality. But to this day, I pretty much exclusively root for African Americans on Jeopardy. The few and far in between that pop-up, I don't really know what it is. It's not like an affinity thing. It's just, and it's not, I don't want to say anything weird here, but I just feel like You know what let's let's get some fresh blood in here

Especially on a show like jeopardy. So I don't know I also completely backed up on jeopardy missed it Wednesday missed it Thursday Haven't seen yet today got I got literally an hours worth of jeopardy to watch when we hop off here Which is fine. I'm probably going to like get some talk about and try to go to sleep at like 9 p.m. It's just been that kind of week. But call Steve or go to his website homeprydorgan.com and he'll get you to

take care of. So that's homeprydorgan. That's one. Number two are good friends at Samson. The Samson Q2U series. If you're listening to this, you're probably thinking, hmm, wow, okay, that's some crisp clean audio quality. Well, it's not an accident.

It's the Samsung Q2U series developed and cultivated over years in their signature audio lab. We're going off script here. The SAMHson Q2U series delivers consistent, reliable, quality audio quality. I like that because you can use quality as an adjective and then as a noun. Quality audio quality. It's a palindromic phrase, really. We are inventing, introducing the world to new methods of wordplay here in the show, which you come here, you learn something new, you get exposed to something new, you don't need NPR, all I'm a big NPR fan, especially the time when Jane was on,

that was awesome. Maybe we'll ask her next week. Maybe we'll get Jane on the show next week, ask her to do an ad read in our NPR voice. I think that could be good. But here's a, you know, end of the story. Do an ad read in our NPR voice. I think that could be good But here's a you know end to end of the story We were talking about this Samson in the Bible actually on the recant stream with Ryan English Ryan Ligin and Christian English the other day

Talk telling the story of Samson and his hair and how Delilah was definitely a babe like yeah, she was pretty slutty, and she was a prostitute, but she was clearly a babe, 10 out of 10, a Babylon babe. Although, I can't keep any of those ancient cities straight. You know, you got... Ugh. You got Babylon.

You got Judah, Judea. I don't know what the whole deal of Judah is. What I really get confused is the 12 tribes of Israel thing, which is what? Jacob's 12 sons, is that right? It goes, because I think it's Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are like the, you know, the trio, the patriarch, grandpa, dad, and son. And then I think from Jacob comes the 12

tribes of Israel. And that's where there's like Joseph and the technical dream coat. They leave them in a well. It's pretty badass. And then he becomes like a match of straight in Egypt or something. There's a whole story with that. He's got a brother Benji and apparently 10 other brothers who were total dicks. And that's the Samson Q2U series. From Genesis Exodus, Livedic, his number is Deuteronomy, and then First Kings, which

I think is the story of Samson. And God speaks, he uses a Samson. And they're good friends, cuts by Q. Just cuts by Q, I can always make that mistake. It's an antique, nope, it's a fresh take on barber shops. Let's put it that way. Here, located right here in the city of Chicago, if you need your haircut or your mutton chop shaved or your neck plucked or even Brazilian butt wax, whatever it might be, I don't think there's a Brazilian butt wax. I think there's just a Brazilian wax and a Brazilian butt lift. I don't know if there's a Brazilian butt wax.

Another thing that we'll invent here, right, here live on the bean-tongued podcast. Regardless, you're regardless, when you need to fresh do something snappy and new, guys just call the experts at cuts by Q. Okay, I promised you I was gonna get into these power rankings ASAP and 22 minutes in. That's pretty much what happened last week.

I will say this. So we're getting into it now. Last week, bottom of the barrel, and I'll give my recap of those rankings in a second here. But last week, I was so passionate, right? Those were pretty much states that I abhorred ABHORRED. Robert Horry, I think he was a power forward for the hawks or something like that.

Last sidebar I promised before we do our recap of last week. Robert Horry, let's see. It was an American and professional basketball player born 1970, so it was already 52 as of next month, from Hartford County, Maryland, Hartford County is what I was trying to say. He played 16 seasons, that's pretty significant. The most of, oh, here's an interesting one. Okay, this is literally the second sentence of his Wikipedia. He played 16 seasons in the NBA, winning seven championships.

The most of any player not to have played for the Boston Celtics. What a bizarre kind of record. He's the only four players do have one, an NBA championship with three teams. That's pretty cool. One, two of the rockets. I think the rockets won the two in between the Jordan

three beats, right? Three with the Lakers won two of the rockets. I think the rockets won the two in between the Jordan three beats, right? Three with the Lakers and two with the Spurs. With no defeats in the NBA finals, that's badass. Can you imagine a career? You play 16 years, you win seven titles and you never lose, Jordan only won six. So that's gotta be close to the record for most titles that are ever losing.

I don't know, like, did Bill Russell, you know, never lose or something like that? He probably has the record. But he earned the nickname Big Shot Bob because of his clutch shooting and important games. So anyways, he played for the, you know, primarily the rockets must have been early in his career. I guess he would have been like 25, the Celtics

and the Lakers, or excuse me, not the Celtics, the Rockets, the Lakers and the Spurs. So 16 years, that's a bigger name than I was kind of prepared for when I just casually like said that name. So that's pretty cool. Okay, to recap last week, to finish my thought, this crop that we're getting into today has been assembled in such a way that they represent the states I really don't give a shit about.

Whereas last week is lower in the rankings, spraying up the kaboos, but the reason that there is because there are states that I'm like, God, I can't, I hate you for one reason or another. And it's mostly deep south states. So the states that I'm like, God, I can't, I hate you. For one reason or another. And it's mostly deep South states. So the states that we're getting into this week

are much more like, yeah, I don't particularly care for you, but I don't have any sort of vendetta against you. What do you think the origins of vendetta are? I promised the last one was the last sidetrack, but we have to know, vendetta is such a weird word. Latin meaning vengeance. Okay, that's what Vendetta is. It makes sense.

V-E-N-D-E-T-T-A. Cool word, right? People know V-E-Fur Vendetta, but it's just like, it's a cool word, okay? But this week is just kind of states that I don't really care about. So I think there's I don't really care about. So I think there's going to be less to talk about. Also, important note, I didn't take any notes on these states.

I gave you the recap of what this week's been like already. And one of the unfortunate side effects was that I really just like did not think about this at all until I started recording. But tomorrow is going to be like wake up early, go for a run, try to relax a little bit, maybe spend a little bit time outside, then Rachel's movie again, and then got shout out to friend the podcast, Abby Whitsack, for getting engaged this morning. You know Abby, not because she's been on the show yet,

but because we've teased that we want to get her on Talk Subway, because she's a big subway fan, or a polygist, if you will. Maybe that's a better word than fan. She got engaged this morning. Congratulations to Abby and her fiance Jake, who's also one of my friends. I don't remember where we were going, but that's okay. I'm just gonna give you a recap of our rankings from last week. Oh, I didn't take any notes on this week's crop. I also didn't double check before I started the episode.

Oh, what I was going to say tomorrow night probably hanging out with those guys, celebrating their love and then Sunday morning leave for vacation. I'm not bringing this stuff with me. It's a vacation from everything, okay? Here's last week's rankings, and then we'll jump into this week's with a pause in between, because I really got a pee. Okay, coming in, our honorable mentions

who weren't ranked, Washington, DC, Puerto Rico, and Guam. Number 50 Alabama, number 49 Mississippi, 48 Louisiana, 47 Arkansas, 46 South Carolina, 45 Florida, 44 Texas, and 43, Missouri. And when I returned from the bathroom, we're jumping in, had first. All right, so coming in at 42 and 41, the most stereotypical thing you're gonna find on this entire list is a coupling of sorts that I really, I'm not gonna just completely package them.

I will talk about them separately, but the first one there's just not much to talk about. So 42 and 41, North Dakota, South Dakota, I don't feel any shame about putting them back to back. I'll say this, there's a lot more to discuss about South Dakota, the North Dakota, and not that I'm going to really dig deep into all the details, because no one really wants to hit Minute 28 of the show and get an in-depth look

at Quinn's top 10 things to see in South Dakota. That's not what these power rankings are about, but I could tell you five things going on in South Dakota and North Dakota, it's crickets, literally and figuratively. I'm also drinking a great white cloth surge flavor, natural lime. Easily beats the artificial flavors. Okay, so North Dakota is number 42. Jack here, I'm a cis number. North Dakota is just wide open, nothing. I was thinking about this in the shower before I got going today. And I really think North Dakota out of all the 50 states might be the state where it's just kind of like,

I got nothing, I don't know. Put it, you know, in the same level of like I got nothing here as, I would say Nebraska. Idaho to a certain extent. And I guess you could throw like Kansas and parts of Oklahoma in there. But it's just kind of a state where it's like, I can tell you about Fargo,

which is more or less Minnesota. And I think most people who don't really like, who didn't really pay much attention when they saw the movie Fargo or, you know, have watched television show and they hear the just ridiculous, you know, stereotypical accents and stuff, they're probably like, oh yeah, Fargo, I love that, you know,

Minnesota, it's cool. And actually, I think a lot of the movie Fargo does take place in Minnesota, like where the story is set. I think it's just like the original murder happens in Fargo. I think that's kind of how it goes. But granted, I have not seen the movie in a while. Rachel and I watched the first season of Fargo, you know, with Chet Hanks and Joey King King and I don't know the actresses name

the lead actress oh and of course our good friend Martin Freeman who Rachel absolutely hated his character which to be fair he's kind of he's kind of terrible in that show. We watched the first season of that back I think I feel like it was pretty not like right when we started dating but definitely like a couple months into when we started dating and we've never returned to it. We watched the whole season we liked it and I think they have what four seasons of Fargo now maybe five. I think I definitely want to come back to it at some point. The second season was where the like old retired cop

who in season one owns the diner and he's the dad of the kind of main cop. I think it's like a flashback or like a prequel basically where he's the main character. And then season three is the whole UN McGregor, one where he plays twins, which I've seen pretty much everything UN McGregor's done. That's one thing I've never touched.

And I don't know any friends who are like, oh yeah, fargo, I love that. We just like don't talk about it. And then I think Seeks and Four of those when they just made the film a bunch for Naradras Park and Chris Rock was in that one. So I mean it's a definitely the type of thing I think I would like. We've just never really talked about coming back to it. That's the problem with North Dakota. We can talk and talk about Fargo and it's like what else is there? It's Trump it. That's the problem with North Dakota. We can talk and talk and talk about Fargo, and it's like, what else is there? It's Trump country, it's agriculture, the one, you know, the one thing about North Dakota, oh, I did not mention this. This category is called they stink and they know

it, and that's a little bit harsh, but I just didn't have time to revisit and change names. So that's just kind of what we stuck with. The one thing about North Dakota is that there are wide sweeping portions of land that are really beautiful. Portions not a great word. Areas of land. Like Theodore Roosevelt National Park near Montana, are really beautiful. Portions not a great word. Areas of land. Theodore Roosevelt National Park near Montana, it's beautiful.

It's kind of like bad lands start to meet the like foothills of the Rockies or just kind of like the Great Plains. But it's not like, oh yeah, like you got to see this. You got to check this out. Like, oh that's neat. It's just kind of like, it's really shouldn't be its own state. Because there's not much going on there.

The capital of North Dakota for the majority of you listening who probably don't know is Bismarck with a C. And it's 73,000 people as of the 2020 census, which granted is not tiny. That's probably more than I was going to guess before I looked it up, but it's just kind of like not much there. So, that's North Dakota at number 42, number 41 South Dakota. Pretty much everything you want to see in South Dakota, you can see along I 90, which I think that's how it goes. Right, 90 runs to South Dakota, 94 runs to North Dakota,

like the one east-west interstate going through the entire state, which let's be fair, I'm spoiled, I live in Illinois. We've got everything from like 94 all the way down to, I don't know what the southernmost one is, we're probably somewhere in like the 40s or something like that, it's crazy. You look at Illinois and it runs all the way from the great lakes like Michigan down to Memphis basically the south.

It just is a long state. South Dakota is a lot of kitschy things. Okay, you got wall drug, 5 cent coffee, free ice water. It's a crazy place. You got the corn palace in Mitchell. South Dakota, I think, is what they call that town, Mitchell. And then you, of course, have Mount Rushmore. We, and Crazy Horse. We talked about Crazy Horse like a month ago on the show,

we did an entire episode dedicated to that stain on our democracy. Mount Rushmore is not much better. They did like 10% of the monument and they just gave up and quit and that's a promise out the code and they don't finish what they start. Badlands are neat, black hills are neat. Like, it's really picture-esque

and some, you know, very interesting hikes and stuff. But it's not like, oh yeah, there's a cool mountain or an awesome resort. It's just kind of like, blah. I've never been a rapid city, South Dakota, or let's say this. I've probably driven through there before, but I can't tell you anything about rapid city. I just imagine it as being like Napoleon Dynamite, but more kitschy. I've spent a little bit time in Sioux Falls and it just feels like we're all, you know, Midwest basically nothing very interesting. And so South Dakota number 41, honestly, it would have maybe

been even more appropriate to switch them and put South Dakota at 42 in North Dakota at 41 solely because Mount Rushmore is such an idiotic thing where we did like again like literally one tenth of it was finished and wasn't there a is it the end of national treasure two where they like pop out and they're actually at Mount Rushmore. Is that how that one ends? I don't remember. That's one where spoiler alert at at Harris dies. It's tragic. Is that yeah? Because number one is Sean B. Number two is at Harris. National Treasure Book of Secrets. I think that's how it goes. I distinctly recall the plot of National Treasure One in many of the twists and turns and just all that stuff. National Treasure II drawn a blank.

I remember the scene where Adheris dies because someone has to stay behind the whole the wheel open. I think he be smurches. There's a word for you. B-E-S-M-I-R-C-H-E-S-B smurches the name of Nick Cage's dad, John Boyd or his grandfather perhaps, played by probably a devilishly handsome Henry Cavill or something like that. I don't know. I think I saw that one once on VHS.

And he has like clear his name and then here's like, sorry for besmirching your old man's name. And they're all gonna be Nick Cage's voice. And Nick Cage is like, dude, you don't have to stay behind the whole wheel. We can figure a way out. And that Harris is like, no, this is ill in the way. You gotta go. And Nick Cage is like, I won't forget you.

And that Harris is like, tell the world my story. Okay, I don't take any pride or credit in my ad Harris impression. But he kind of has a little bit, he's not like a southern guy, but there's a little bit of a 7 and twang to his voice. And after half of a white cluster, I just couldn't pull through. All this is to say, that's South Dakota number 41. Coming in at number 40, I gotta start numbering these because right now they're just in a big list without numbers. And I'm gonna forget where I'm at.

And we also got a, we a periare buns here at 40% and we got like a lot more states to get through. Again, the category today is they stink and they know it. I actually wrote they suck and they know it, but that just seemed harsh. Okay, number 40, something a state we've already mentioned today in one of our ad rates, Indiana. Indiana is just corn and suburbia developments, but you go to the, you know, their Lake Michigan shore and it's just like a great opportunity and they f'ded all up with just Gary and shipping and they have like two beaches and a dune and that's about it. And people say Indianapolis is cool Indianapolis is trendy and it's not bad. Like I don't I don't hate on Indianapolis, but I don't think that there's anything about Indianapolis that's amazing

either. And then you get down south you get down to like Evansville. I spent a night there one night went to a Mexican restaurant really depressing a lot of college kids from The Evansville acers. So if they are the racers, I can't remember like sneaking alcohol and pouring it into their, you know, diet coke It's just like man. This is kind of a depressing place down there in the Ohio River. It's just I Don't have any specific hatred for it. It's just cornfields and mostly lower class white people which don't tend to be my favorite crop of people, although that's who I was born into.

Indiana does have, it is home to poppas, mini donuts and cheese curds, which has prompted me to open up a new tab and check in on poppas. They were silent for a long time over the winter dormant, if you will. And then they kind of, they came back with a couple of posts, and then I haven't seen much from them. However, okay, good news. I think I'm just like either, well, it's both. I'm not going to Facebook very much these days and they're just not showing up in my news feed because this definitely should have showed up. This

is from 12 hours ago, so about 7 a.m. and Will County Illinois, Manhattan, Illinois, to be specific. Happy Friday, where at the County Thresherman Association, antique tractor and steam engine show. This is all real. This weekend, Thursday through Sunday from 9 to 5, cash only come out for a good time in great food. Please be understanding that our normal products, oh this is interesting. Please be understanding that our normal products are unavailable at this time.

Oh, okay, same great food, just different packaging. So it's not their products, they're packaging. Pop has got to work on a social media game. There are a lot of posts by the will county. I don't know, I'm not seeing any of this on my Facebook feed for whatever reason, but they're still going. They were at the Crown Point antique mall last weekend. So that's the one thing Indiana's got going for it and shout out to Hashtag Girlfriend of the podcast Rachel Ray-Mose for her brilliant find. I don't even, we were coming back from someplace, Michigan, I guess. I don't remember exactly what we were doing, but she found it and

Michigan, I guess, I don't remember exactly what we were doing, but she found it and we haven't been in gosh is it Is it two summers already or just last summer? I don't remember last time we went to poppas But we need to we need to get out there soon It's tougher to just make a trip. It's easier when you got something on the way That's number 40. Okay, we're into the 30s now. Coming to number 39, we're kind of starting to get into the list of states here where it's

like, yeah, these aren't A-listers, but they're not the worst states. And yeah, I mean, we've made it through a leaven so far, so that kind of makes sense. Okay, number 39, a state where I've spent a decent amount of time in my adult life, Kentucky. I have both good things and bad things to say about Kentucky. Good things, Louisville is a really neat place. It's kind of blue collar. The Ohio River Valley is just, I think, really beautiful.

Obviously, Churchill Downs is a really neat place. And there's some great eats in Louisville, some interesting hipster, local music kind of stuff. And then Lexington isn't bad either. Lexington is kind of got that old South feel without feeling as racist, if you will. That's an oversimplification, but that's just where we're at on these power

rankings. But the rest of Kentucky is just kind of like, hey man, if you've seen justified, you pretty much understand what Kentucky is. And that's just a crop of folks that I don't really understand. I don't really, you know, empathize with all that much. It's just kind of some weirdos with guns, potent combinations. So that's Kentucky number 39. It's not all bad, but Kentucky is just one of those places

where I just don't think I could ever live there. You know, it's just, I don't know. Nothing about it, nothing specifically about it that I really have disdain for, but there's also nothing about it where I'm like, oh yeah, I would live there. Harlan County, no thanks. Number 38. We're jumping across the country for much of the rest of these rankings here. Although we started in the Dakotas, we went east a little bit and now we're coming back west. This one my ruffles and feathers, but I had to put it somewhere guys. Montana is number 37. Here's the name of Montana. Amazing spectacular natural beauty. Like nothing else I've ever seen.

The only thing that could rival it for me personally is Alaska. Outside of that, it's Montana. And look, Colorado, it gets the headlines. Colorado is nice. But Montana is like Colorado, in my perspective, just like bigger, grander, and fewer people, which I'm all about. At the same time, Montana suffers from the same thing that like North and South Dakota suffer from,

there's just like not much going on there. So look, hey, if you're the type of person who wants to just like live someplace with 10 out of 10 natural beauty and not be bothered by anyone, go to Montana. It's gonna be fantastic. And that going to be the theme for the for the following state as well But it's just like I don't I don't know if I could ever live there until I was like retired You know Montana's not a place where I'm like, oh, yeah, I would never ever live there

No, I I would retire at 60 and go hang out there, like great hiking, beautiful views, people are kind, but I just, I can't imagine like being this age and being like, oh yeah, I'm going to live in Montana. It just doesn't really work. Shout out to Glacier National Park and surrounding regions, spectacular, gorgeous, nothing bad to say. Even, you know, we spent a, we spent a day, the last time we were in Montana in Calispell, Lake Flathead, really fun. Like I had a great time there. It's a cool town, but man, just wide open land

and not much action. And so that's why we put Montana 37. Yeah, it could have been higher, but I don't think I could have gotten it out of this tier. 36 is Wyoming. Similar, also large, but even fewer people. Okay, our bean town podcast, trivia poll, question of the week.

What's the population of Wyoming? If you get it within 100, do I want to do that much? If you get it within 50,000, I will give you a bean-town button. And I'm going to guess, too, I haven't actually searched it yet. But email is bean-town podcast, Yahoo.com, and get this bean-town podcast at Yahoo.com. And we'll give you a shout out if you get a right shout out to Walt Furnitz, brother of podcast. Got our last poll question, right? I think we're doing population of, I don't know. We do a lot of population questions on this show.

OK, Wyoming population, if you get it within 50,000, you're a winner. Which mostly just carries prestige. Excuse me. Okay, Wyoming. So to let you know, it's the least popular state in the union for a month, being number two. So the least popular state, I'm gonna guess Wyoming

is something like, feels like a lot of pressure. I feel like as the host, I should be getting this. The population of Wyoming is, let's just say 250,000. Okay, drum world time. I low-balled, but I wasn't, you know, I was on the right track. It's 581,000 people. So number two, or number 49 is Vermont. What do we think Vermont is 624? So it's Vermont's got about 40,000 people more. Anyways, that's Wyoming. It's just kind of a lot of space. I haven't really gotten out of the car much in Wyoming. The last time I did, it was driving from Chicago to Oregon

with my parents, at least spent the night in Laramie. Actually, no, it wasn't Laramie, it was Delette Wyoming. And we went to a kind of a bar and grill kind of place for supper and a good spot, except man, our service was slow. And, but I got a beautiful picture of the Rockies. And then another time I was driving through Wyoming with my brother, brother of the podcast, well, for any of you just got mentioned,

and we cut it way too close with gas. And the thing about Wyoming is there's not really gas stations or exits on the highway every 10 miles. It's more like 40 or 50 miles, so you got a really plan ahead. We didn't do a great job with that. But we made it. We did not run out of gas.

I think the worst part about that specific memory was we got off the highway. This was like eight or nine at night. It's dark out because it was like November, but not super late. Anyway, still unsettling. And we've, we've, you know, pulled into a gas station. We always was like an abandoned gas station. And so you got to like get back on the highway with, you know, the needles below the slash. And you're like, hopefully this works out. And it did. I got lucky. That was the closest I've ever come to run out of gas. But we didn't.

works out and it did. I got lucky. That was the closest I've ever come to run out into gas, but we didn't. Wyoming has doubles tower fans of close encounters of the third kind. We'll recognize it. I've never actually been there. It's like 30 miles off the interstate or something. So it's just one of those things where it's like, who was going to see it? They should have drove the interstate around it, you know, built it around it.

It would have been smart because there's not much else going on. So that's why you owe me number 36. We have four left in this list. Number 35, something I don't have much to say about Nebraska. Kind of like North Dakota, you got the one city that people know it for, Fargo for North Dakota, Omaha for Nebraska. Omaha is not terrible. It's kind of like Kansas City. They're both on the Missouri River.

And, uh, but I'm a big fan of Kansas City than Omaha. Nebraska's classic drive-through country. If you're already driving there, you're probably going to Colorado. Or if you're coming from Colorado, you're probably going to Colorado. Or if you're coming from Colorado, you're probably going to Chicago or some poppas, you know, I would drive from Colorado to poppas. Let's make one thing clear. But you do have to go through Nebraska, which is a long, a sneakily long state. What does it take? Probably like, I don't know, six hours to get from one end of Nebraska to the other, six and a half, seven, depends on who's driving, I guess. But you get past Omaha,

you get past the Missouri River to the east and it's just kind of a lot of corn, a lot of soy, and then weirdly enough sand, like where did that come from? I don't know, it's there. But if there's one thing you need to know about me, and this is not just an Anakin Skywalker rip off, I don't like sand, I really don't. It gets in your, been between your toes, it gets in your socks.

Like, it's hot. It's just little rocks. I don't really care for big rocks, so why would I want even smaller rocks? Nebraska's weird, man. You get to the far west and it's kind of like the foothills of the Rockies, but you're not to the Rockies yet.

Most people don't realize that Nebraska borders Wyoming. I think in a lot of people's minds, Nebraska is like, oh yeah, Midwest. And Wyoming is like, ooh, that's, you know, big sky country out West, but they're like literally next to each other. Nebraska could have been lower on this list, honestly. Could have been like 42. I don't have really anything to say about.

I don't, I think the reason it ended up here at 35 is because I think people are fairly kind. It's like half mid west half great planes. And I don't really have anything specifically to hate on it for, but it's just kind of there. So that's Nebraska. Coming in at number 34, a close partner in crime, Kansas. Kansas is mostly fields. It's super flat. It's when I think of like Kansas, I think of West Texas. I think of just flat, cows, steers, STERR, sunflowers, tornadoes,

which let's throw Oklahoma in here too. Okay, I don't have the manpower to do separate conversations about Kansas and Oklahoma. So, Kansas is 34, Oklahoma is 33. I'm a fan of Kansas City. And actually, I've spent the majority of my time in my life in Kansas City, Kansas, rather than Missouri. Although the border is kind of like, you know, for a while, the Missouri River is the,

this is interesting actually. For a while, the Missouri River is the border between Kansas and Missouri, but then it is weird. You get to Kansas City and it's the border for like the Northwest portion of the city out by the airport. But then there comes a point when the border just like leaves the river and goes straight south. And there's it's really it's not like, oh yeah, you're walking down the street. Oh yeah, there's the sign for Kansas, we're in Kansas now, or there's a sign from Missouri. It's just like this building could be in Kansas,

it could be even in Missouri, I don't really know, or we're just in Kansas City. So it's kind of weird, because it is two separate cities, but it doesn't really feel that way. But outside of Kansas City, that's the theme of a lot of these states, they got one interesting city, and there's only not much else going on. The, you know, Kansas has the whole Kansas City metro area overland park, whatever. I got to go there in a month here, two months. But otherwise, there's

just not much going on. I had never been to Topeka. I never been a man hat and I never been a Lawrence. I just I've never been to Lawrence. I just don't imagine that they're that interesting other than just like your traditional kind of Midwest great planes, you know, cities with 30,000, 40,000 people. And that's not to hate on them. I think I can enjoy living in a place like that and like working at a college, but I don't know, just, I'd rather be in a place like Chicago

where you get a lot of cool things. And then Oklahoma 33, Trelleteers, we talked about Andrew Jackson last week on the show, but Oklahoma City I think is neat, but it's also a state that is like very racist. And I don't really have much to say about Oklahoma. This is Oklahoma's kind of the embodiment of this group of states where I was just like I really have much to say. I don't have any specific hate for them. I don't have any specific love or affinity for them.

It's just Oklahoma, right? I'm not gonna go there. I don't care to be there. What do you think is going on in that panhandle of theirs? I don't know. It probably just feels like Kansas or Texas. Cows, corn, and God. Really, that's what life is all about for those folks. And good on them, but that's not for me. Coming in, our final state of this group here at 32, it's Delaware.

It's a state that everyone forgets about. It's kind of sneaky. Most people in the world know Delaware for the like northern 5% portion of it. like northern 5% portion of it that 95 passes through Wilmington. You're literally in Delaware for all of half an hour when you drive on I-95. And Wilmington in and of itself has got a lot of interesting problems. Huge crime, huge like trafficking because of its location. And you go north of there into the half circle and it's just like Amish Dutch country. You go south of there. It's like a really bizarre kind of Del Marva south kind of feel. It's not the deep south. You know we'll get to Maryland and Virginia in a little bit here next week, perhaps, without

looking at my notes. But that's sort of what the rest of it, what the other 95% of Delaware is like, there's not very many people, they have a little bit of beach, but it's not sexy, we're whole with beach. And kudos to Delaware, I don't think there's any sales tax in Delaware. Like, that's pretty neat. But the rest of it is just like weird. It basically goes Philadelphia suburbs and weird Amish farm country and then Wilmington, which is like not a great place, Tbh. which is like not a great place, TBH. And then the rest of it is like weird, rural farming.

I don't know how to describe it other than it's just Delaware. But I figure most people have never been to Delaware. That's kind of what it's like. Shout out to Anne to the podcast, Anne Tiana. She's been on the podcast before. There's a great picture on my phone of her wearing a bean-tum podcast trucker hat. She lives in Delaware.

That's what I got for ya. That's the list. We'll recap it from 42 on down. So 42 North Dakota, 41 South Dakota Indiana 39 Kentucky 38 Idaho 37 Montana 36 Wyoming 35 Nebraska 34 Kansas 33 Oklahoma 32 Delaware That's where we're at. We are On to 31 starting next week. We have 31 states left Next week will be group three of five

next week is going to be similar in that I have like not a ton that I want to say, but it's much less like not a ton I want to say and it kind of sucks and more like not a ton I want to say for a lot of the states, but there's a lot of things I like about it. That's where we're going to pick it up next week. That's what I got for you. We're gonna, it's gonna go over an hour with our outro music, but I'm not gonna talk for more than an hour, but I want to thank everyone for listening again. Thanks everyone for your support, not only the show, but for me and my family, been a long week. And I appreciate, you know, text calls that sort of thing. It is 7.30 p.m. I'm done. I am way over talking for today. I'm going to go find some supper, probably pour myself some whiskey,

and catch up on jeopardy. And that's my Friday. It's just a weird day and I'm really tired and I'm not gonna feel bad about falling asleep at 9.30 pm on the couch. So, sometimes you need those days, right guys? Everyone, thanks for listening so much. Thank you to our sponsors. Thank you for sticking it out with our US State Power Ranking. So let us know how we did. Beantown Podcast Yahoo.com.

Again, this beantown podcast Yahoo.com. You can tweet at me. I'm at White Buns with the Z. This shows at Beantown Cast Instagram. I'm at Q.Queen D. Would love to hear your thoughts on our rankings so far. Two fifths of the way done, basically 20 states down, 30 to go, more or less. Let's queue up our outro music here. I want everyone to stay cool. We got a heat wave in

Chicago. Stay safe and stay sane. Everyone, I will check in on you next time. Have a good one. Bye. M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M-M- nd nd nd nd nd nd nd nd nd

nd nd Thank you.