Dear Hank & John - 109: The Catastrophizing Kindergarten Teacher

Episode Date: September 25, 2017

How do I stop whistling? How do you not get burned out? How do I get rid of a death zit? And more! Email us: [e-mail] patreon.com/dearhankdandjohn

Hello and welcome to Dear Hank and John. Or is I prefer to think of it dear John and Hank. It's a comedy podcast where two brothers will answer your questions, give you a new advice and bring you all the weeks news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon. Hi John, how are you? I'm doing well. My new book, Tordel's All the Way Down, comes out in about two weeks and I'm sort of freaking out But it occurs to me that you will know the pleasure of this particular freak out sometime next year when your novel comes out

Yeah, there's a number of times in the past a little while where you've been like Talking about something that I'm not I can't talk about I hate doing, and I never want to do. And so I didn't for the most part, and then now it's happening. The thing that I've been working on, and not able to talk about is a real thing now, and I have a book that I wrote, and now have to revise.

John, this process is time-consuming. Yeah, no, I mean, that's why it takes me years between books, but I have absolute faith in you. You're gonna be okay. But it is, it's time consuming and it's intimidating, but you're a really good writer and it's gonna be great. I'm not worried, I'm not worried.

I am a little worried that you're not going to put all of your energy into the tour because you're gonna have to revise during tour. And I want to spend the entire tour playing on the super Nintendo classic mini thing that I just bought. Well, I'm definitely going to be revising on tour because the deadline I have been given is quite aggressive.

Well, that's fine, but you and I have to play a lot of Super Mario Kart. Well, you can take that up with my editor who I have now. I have an editor. It's weird I'm so excited for you. So for those of you know, no, it's not that good itself promo His new book is it's gonna be called his first book. It's gonna be called an Absolutely remarkable thing. It's coming out in the fall of twenty eighteen and i am and i thrilled it is an absolutely remarkable thing

you haven't read it yet so you don't know it could be terrible that that one thing i will say about an absolutely remarkable thing is that it does not pass the mom test in that she cannot remember the title uh... well on the other hand the thing that is the best about it is way back in 2007, my friend, Maureen Johnson, observed that many book titles would get better when you add in your pants

to the end of them. An absolutely remarkable thing in your pants is one of the greatest in your pants book titles of all time. It was considered. It was really the only thing I needed for it to be a good... That's all I was hoping for. I kind of wanted it to spell out fart, but I gave up on that goal. And so just got a art instead.

Oh man. Well, I am really thrilled for you and really proud of you. And I guess it remains to be seen which green brother will rule the roost of publishing, but I am really excited for you. I really now regret not finding a way to make the acronym fart. Do you think I could have stood that one under the radar and Penguin wouldn't have noticed? And you know, everybody just be like, seat on the shelves and then when it comes to talking about the book because it's a rather long title, you just have to say, well, when I was imagining the main character in fart, it would be so good. Also, something that happens in your pants. Go ahead and give me a short poem, John.

All right, this poem we sent in by Michelle. It's called Splinter by Carl Sandberg. It's very short and it's about fall, so it's seasonally appropriate. The voice of the last cricket across the first frost is one kind of goodbye. It is so thin, a splinter of singing. Just a little early fall poem for you Hank, can I share with you a question from our listeners? Yeah, please do. Alright, this question comes from Colleen, who writes,

Dear Brothers Green, I love listening to the pod, and I'm excited to see you in Saint from our listeners. Yeah, please do. All right, this question comes from Colleen, who writes, Dear Brothers Green, I love listening to the pod, and I'm excited to see you in St. Paul next month. I'm also excited to be visiting Minnesota, Colleen. I am a kindergarten teacher who is slowly burning out. My kids and coworkers are amazing, but the demands placed on all of us are becoming increasingly impossible. And to add to it,

I have a particularly large and difficult class this year. I'm John's age, and wondering if it's too late to change careers. My husband and I have two kids. We cannot support ourselves on his salary alone. So taking a few years for the family or more schooling is not an option. What could my next career be?

Keeping it, Colleen, what a great, amazing specific sign off. That's good, that's good. There may be sort of the same careers in other places that you could be looking at. Like often times, I will hire video editors who are currently video editors at other video editing companies, but they will like the job better. We're working for me because it will be more pay or it will be less pressure or a cooler thing. So maybe

there are kindergarten's out there that aren't so hard. Maybe, but I would say that there's also opportunity to do lots of other jobs. I mean, I always recommend talking to your friends and networking is a horrible word, but it is by far, I think, the most effective way to find jobs. So go talk to your friends, talk to other parents at soccer games, say, I am a kindergarten teacher, but I'm looking for interesting new opportunities. If you hear of anything, please let me know. I think that tends to be the way that most people actually get jobs.

LinkedIn and everything is great, but I think there's no replacement for networking. The other thing that I'd say, Colleen, is that in my opinion, your skill set is incredibly useful in a lot of different careers, like a lot of project management careers, because if you can handle a classroom full of five and six-year-old children, as far as I'm concerned, you can do almost anything in terms of organization and six-year-old children. As far as I'm concerned, you can do almost anything in terms of like organization and administration. Yeah, I mean, managing, for the most part, is just controlling people who are letting their base instincts drive them, which is definitely kindergarten teaching. That's a great

point, John. Yeah, I remember the other thing is that you'll probably be calm under pressure, which is useful. I remember when I started working at Bookless Magazine, I'm not generally, this is gonna surprise you Hank, but I'm not generally known for being a calm person. But when I first started working at Bookless Magazine,

my previous job had been at a children's hospital, and everyone would be so upset about the deadlines at Booklist and is the magazine gonna come out on time. And I would just be like, you know what guys? The magazine's come out on time like every two weeks for the last 104 years. I think it's gonna be fine. Nobody's gonna die today. That's good.

Yeah, de-escalation because you really can't be somebody who escalates if you're a kindergarten teacher. No, you cannot be a catastrophizer if you're a kindergarten teacher. If a five-year-old is like, I cannot believe that Jimmy stole my crayons. You can't be like, oh my god Jimmy, that really is a deal. Oh man, we need to call the principal immediately. In fact deal. Oh man, we need to call the principal immediately. In fact, you know what, we need to call the president. Yeah, because he can de-escalate a crisis.

Oh man, I'm glad that I have gotten a fair amount of de-escalation training before having a child. Hopefully, that will be a positive thing for both of us. This next question is from Tyler, who asks, Dear Hank and John, how long slash well do you have to know someone before you should or it makes sense to go to their wedding? I have two friends whom I have acted with in a play that are getting married.

I've only known them for about four months, but in that time we grew pretty close as theater makes you do. The young lady posted on Facebook saying, if you would like a wedding invite, please send me your address. This is the worst thing! Big! Why is she putting the burden of choosing who goes and who does it on us Tyler? Yeah, no, this isn't how weddings work!

Well, also, like, this isn't how weddings work. Well, also, like, I mean, is there a, can I look up her Facebook and ask for an invite to the wedding? Like, because I don't mind as long as there's an open bar, I don't mind spending a Saturday afternoon with strangers. What, what in the sweet name of hell is this? I mean, just when I thought that I understood the brave new world of internet discourse, suddenly, what? I don't know, don't Tyler. No, Tyler, back away. Just walk slowly away from this situation, delete your Facebook, and just try to reset your

life. Yeah, yeah, spend a little time in the woods. This, oh man, I like, that's just way too much. Like what, does this person like everyone who follows the month Facebook enough for them to come to their wedding? Because that is not how I feel about everyone who follows me on my Facebook.

Maybe it is a strategy for dealing with really difficult or annoying parents. Like if the parents are like, we need you to invite these 72 people you don't know. Maybe they can be like, you know what? Fine, but the solution to pollution is dilution and I'm inviting everyone from my Facebook. There's going to be 4,000 people at this wedding. We're serving nothing but Papsu Ribbon Beer, and you can bring all of your friends.

There is no food. Yeah, the cake is big enough for two people. Thank you. Yeah, Tyler, don't go to this wedding. That is my full stop recommendation. This next question comes from Hayley, who writes, dear John and Hank, I'm 20 years old and I only recently learned how to whistle.

And can we pause for a second so I can just tell you something? Yeah, sure. I don't know if I've told you this before, but to get Willie inside when he's outside, Sarah and I whistle, we say, whistling, to get him inside. That's the whistle, to get Willie inside. And Henry and Alice don't know how to whistle

but they also like to get Willie inside. So what they say when they want to get Willie inside is this errrrp! That's cute. It's so cute it melts me. Every time it melts me. Oh, it's like when Alice says I'm upside down when she's right side up and says I'm right side up when she's upside down. Like it's so frickin cute.

All of this is in front of you. I can't wait. Anyway, Haley has just learned how to whistle. Congratulations, Haley. I'm happy that I can finally whistle but now I find myself with a serious problem. I can't stop whistling. This is a serious problem.

Oh, it's a crisis for everyone around you. Maybe it's because I feel like I have 20 whistleless years to make up for, or maybe I'm just practicing now that I'm addicted to it. This wouldn't be a big deal, but I live with a roommate in a studio apartment. Oh my, oh wow. And I think I'm driving her crazy with all the whistling.

Oh, you don't need to think, Hayley. You need to stop the whistling. How can I stop whistling and move on my life? Best whistles, Hayley. That's a fantastic sign off. That's the best whistles I've ever got. It all got worth it at the end there. It all, I mean, it paid off big time.

So Hank, in addition to being, as you know, a really great singer, I am also an off-key whistler. I also can't whistle correctly. Yeah, I'm not great at whistling either. I have a couple of friends who are like super high quality, like you should be a professional whistler whistlers. Yeah. That is not me.

You want to play a game real quick where we whistle tunes back and forth to each other and I try to guess what you're whistling. Okay. Alright, here's me, you ready? Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay you bring me one. It's gotta be something I recognize. Remember, I only know about seven songs. Okay.

Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee!

Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee!

Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! Whee! an all star by Smashmouth? Yes. It was literally one of the seven songs I know. I know. I figured it was gonna be one of them. Hank, what did you say to Haley? What is Haley doing in the situation? I mean, stop whistling. I mean, maybe, with anything that becomes compulsive, it can be very hard to stop doing things, but maybe there's some kind of noise activated shock color

that you can acquire. No, that's a terrible idea. To some mega-different enforcement. My first ever therapist, when I described the experience of these obsessive thought spirals that I would fall into, I remember my first ever therapist said, and I'm quoting directly, you need to stop thinking like that.

That's really good. And I was like, oh yeah, no, that's thanks for that helpful advice. Obviously, Haley wishes that she lived in a world in which she wasn't whistling so much. Here's my advice, Haley. I wonder if you can whistle to yourself, like whistle silently the way that you like, talk to yourself. I wonder if you can whistle to yourself, like whistle silently the way that you like talk to yourself.

I wonder if you could practice some self-wistling. I do that with talking a lot and Catherine will sometimes be like, what are you doing? And I will just, my mouth will be moving very smallly. And just... Oh yeah, I do that a lot. It's weird. I do that especially when I'm writing a vlog brother's video

in my head. Yeah. And Sarah will be like, are you talking? And I'll be like, not exactly. I'm just being real weird. I'm just, I'm just, oh man. I mean, it's part of the process. Speaking of real weird, we've got a question from Jethro who writes,

dear John and Hank, when I open my mouth, photons get in. Now the photons have no mass, so they don't cause me to gain weight or anything. My question is, what happens to the photons when I close my mouth? Do they all get out in the last moment before it shuts or do some get trapped in there and bounce around

until I next open my mouth? What's some, and Jethro? Oh man, I love it so much, Jethro. This is super good. That's, well, I mean, I can tell you actually what happens to them. That's what I want to know. Okay, I feel like, I feel like that magic

of feeling as if they're just bouncing around and they're waiting to fly out when you open your mouth again. That's too beautiful, I don't want to ruin it. But Foton, when it hits something will either be absorbed or it will reflect. And so a very small amount of them will reflect, but then they will reflect and hit something else very soon afterward. They're moving at the speed of light. So it's going gonna happen very quickly.

And within, you know, an imperceptible amount of time after you close your mouth, they will have all been absorbed by the tissues in your mouth. And your mouth will be slightly warmer. So there's that probably. But yeah, they won't be there when you open your mouth again, unless you could open your mouth really fast, really fast.

Really, like, wait, way faster. Which is why when you close a door, all the photons, they just, like, they get absorbed by the room and stop bouncing around. Even if you're in, like, a room made of mirrors that happens, because the mirrors aren't perfect. Basically, we're all made out of light. We're all made out of energy if you want to be beautiful about it.

Yeah, I don't know. It feels like a reach. It feels like one of those early John Green novel science reaches. It would definitely not all made of light. I can tell you. This next question comes from Nicole who writes Dear John and Hank. During this year's Project for Awesome, I purchased the Nerdfighter Penpal perk to make a long story short.

The two pen pals I was placed with never responded after the initial message. The fantastic team at Project for Awesome worked very kind to me, but said that no one else has had this situation occur, so they were placing me on a list in case this happens to anyone else but it's been several months and I'm beginning to lose hope. I'm hoping if you read this email someone will reach out to be my nerd fighter penpal best wishes Nicole. Alright Nicole here's the deal. We're gonna we're gonna have applications to be your penpal. No wait we're not doing that. We're not doing that. That sounds like great.

All right, Nicole, here's the deal. You know, Colleen from earlier, who the kindergarten teacher who's looking to find a new career, she doesn't know this, but she is your new pen pal. Oh, and how the good news is that you, Nicole, now it is your job to get Colleen a new job. So we're close in the loop on this. We're going to hook you up with Haley as well, Now it is your job to get Colleen a new job. Right.

We're closing the loop on this. We're going to hook you up with Hayley as well, and you can talk with her, and you will not be able to hear her whistle, which is excellent news for you, because it's a pen pal situation. Hopefully, Hayley won't write out her whistleings. Colleen and Hayley, if you don't want to be Nicole's pen pal, don't worry. Her previous two pen pal pals also rejected her, so I'm sure her heart won't be broken or anything. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

All right, John, this next question comes from Dalia, who asks, what is the proper etiquette for handing change to a cashier? Do you place it on the counter, which forces them to pick up the coins, which can be difficult and irritating? Or do you try to hand it to them directly, which can result in your hands awkwardly touching, or dropping the coins by accident.

Am I the only one who thinks about this? An answer would be much appreciated. You are curiously dolly. Hey dolly, I got great update for you. Just we're use credit cards now. We don't. No, not always. I mean, so when I worked at stake and shake,, it was a cash-only business astonishingly. Wow.

And this came up in my life all the time. When I, I don't know if you know this, Hank, but the takeout side of Stake and Shake is called Take Home a Sack, because you are taking home a sack of burgers. And so when someone would come up to the Take Home a Sack line, this would happen all the time. In fact, it would almost every time. And in my experience, I would rather, much rather, personally, someone just tried to sort of drop,

hand the change off in some way or drop the change into my hand, because it is very difficult to pick up change off of a counter. And in the end, I think it's actually, from the perspective of someone who's somewhat germophobic, actually like, grosser to have to like touch every part of the penny as you try to like rip it from the counter and then just to like risk the slight touch of another human hand.

So that is my personal vote, but I'm sure that everybody's experience is different. And really, I would think that most of the time we can solve this problem with credit cards now. This is a problem that my son, Orin, has. He is 10 and a half months old, particularly with avocado. Uh-huh. Sure. Man, it, like, getting him to pick a piece of avocado

up off the counter is it's so frustrating to watch. And he's just, like, he's concentrating and he's got his fingers on it and he's pulling it and it sticks and he just slides off and it's still there on the frickin' thing in front of his high chair and he's just like, why can't I get this avocado into my hand? Oh, there's so sticky, the surface tension.

It's hard to figure out how old I was when I first ate an avocado because I was definitely older than orange is now. Oh man, yeah, like when did avocados happen? I feel like we didn't, like I did not encounter an avocado until college and all of these young people these days, don't know what life was like. They don't understand, like steak and shake

didn't take credit cards and avocados didn't exist. It was a hard life for us. We walked up hill to school both ways. It was very difficult. Did I ever tell you by the way that Sarah's grandfather was an avocado farmer in California? No, it's true. It's true.

Not the kind of avocados that we most commonly eat these days here in the United States, but he was an avocado farmer, and you still occasionally see his name on avocados. Excuse me, avocado again for me, John? Well, now I can't, because now I've become suddenly tremendously self-conscious. Do I say avocado weird?

You say avocado, like you are very American. Well, I didn't British people say avocado. Rosy on how do you say avocado? Avocado. Avocado. That is my, that's my invitation of rosy and I'm saying avocado. Avocado.

I mean, what is it like to treat words so generously as English people treat them? It's like every word they say, it's like they're trying to like give them a hug and make sure that it's feelings don't get hurt. Do you know avocados in America used to be called avocado pairs? Which is just because they're pear shaped, but like what? But they don't say that because people are going to be very confused when they crack open

this. Right, let's call the way they catch on for decades. Be polite. Take a bite out of it. They're like this. They crack open an avocado pair and be like, this doesn't taste like a pair at all. Something very bad has happened to this pair. Ha ha ha ha ha ha.

All right, Hank, let's get to another question for Barbara Whistler. This one comes from Allison, who writes, hi, John and Hank, I find myself in year three of graduate school working a full-time low-paying internship, writing a thesis and working on a grant. I haven't made it in my career yet, and I already feel burned out. The two of you seem to do it all,

even while maintaining relationships and time with your families. How do you keep yourself from burning out? How do you keep going when you're just tired, overworked and underpaid, Allison? I think that much more important question, Allison, should be asking, is how do John and Hank make it appear that they don't get burned out?

Yeah, I mean, so the fact that you don't think that we do is a, as a widen, as far as I can tell. But yeah, there are definitely times when I feel like, like I'm failing at one or the other of those things that I'm concentrating too much on one and it's hurting the other or that, or that I'm just really done. I'm just done with one of the things that I'm working on

and I have to keep doing it because it's a responsibility that I have and that I've signed up for and people are relying on me. I cannot tell you in our real lives how often Hank says to me, or I say to him that we feel like we're doing all of our jobs badly. It's one of my biggest worries and frustrations is feeling like I do too many things and end up doing them all poorly.

But I also have just a tremendous amount of support that you probably don't have working in graduate school and working at your full-time job and trying to write a thesis and also trying to get grant money so that you can continue to do the work that you want to do. Like that is a lot to take on in a life. And I think it's I find it helpful to sometimes just to say like, okay, well the reason I feel overworked and stressed out and like I'm pressed past the limit is that I am. Like that's real. It's not that, that, you know, I'm some tremendous failure because I can't do stuff. It's because it's real. And I also, the other thing I'd say is that honestly because Hank is my brother and Hank is the most productive, relentless person I have ever met and I am in complete awe of his ability to just do thing after thing after thing and do them all well.

Like, I also know the feeling of like looking at other people and just feeling like, I don't, I can't do that. And sometimes that's also okay. I think it's okay to just be like, I can't do all this other stuff, even if other people can do it. I can't, and accepting your own limitations and being able to kind of work within your own strengths and weaknesses, I think is kind of the key to long-term sustainable workloads. Yeah, Yeah.

And the only reason I feel like I've been able to do like an abnormally large amount of sort of individual activities is because one, I find them all very enjoyable. And I kind of often don't have to do them when I stop finding them enjoyable because I can find people who will help me keep those things working and alive after I have gotten burned out on them or I will sort of catch my burnout early and find ways to have people who support me and support those things after I feel like I can't do them. And so that's an amazing place of privilege to be able to, like, when something is getting to be too much for when I'm just, like, over it, I can find people who have that passion

that I don't have at the moment and then come back to it when my passion is back. Yeah, I know that is a huge privilege, for sure. I got another question. It's from Kate, dear brothers Green, I currently have a pimple located right at the base of my nostril and even brushing a finger against it causes instant pain and death. Why does this particular zit hurt so much?

And how do I get rid of it? I would appreciate any dubious advice as I would like to be able to watch my face again like a normal person, acne and artichokes, Kate. John. Oh. Noes, no stuff. Man, I tell you what, I looked this up, John.

Noes pain is some of the worst pain that you can have on your body weirdly. There was a man in recently who decided he wanted to know where it hurt the most on his body to get stung by a B. And so he stung himself with a B every day for a month on different parts of his body. In fact, twice a day because he did a test sting on his forearm so he could be like,

okay, this is how much the base level of pain is. And then I will sting myself on another part of my body to know how much worse than forearm be sting that is. And do you want to know where on his whole body because he stung himself everywhere? It hurt the worst. Was it the nose? It was the nose.

And yes, he did sting himself on his penis, and it hurt less than getting stung on the nose. In fact, it was not even really like, it was close to the top, but penis sting was like, just as bad as like armpit sting or like palm of the hand sting. It was like a seven, The nose was a nine. Like the nostril and like around the lip area was the worst area to get stung by a B. And I feel this, I feel the so hard

because I get noses it's on the inside of my nose sometimes and they hurt so bad, it hurt so bad. So bad. So I completely agree, but I just, if you don't mind, I would like to ask you to just roll back the tape a little bit. What?

Why? Hey, well, what did you know? Well, science. You can't give me like one of, you can't give me like one fifth of this news story and not fill in the blanks. Who is this person? Why did they choose to do this? Don't tell me for science. Because for science you need a much larger

sample size. Well, I mean, I don't think you're going to get a much larger sample size is the thing. First off, in my experience, what you need in this situation above all, because there is no solution that I know of to the nose it is empathy You need people in your life who care about you and understand how terrible a nose it is and that is why Kate I am going to be introducing you to Nicole C That's right Kate you're gonna be pen pals with Nicole C Whether you like it or not and remember she has been dumped by two pen pals, so don't dump her. Okay, what Hank, what is going on?

Who did this? His name is Michael Smith. He is. No, it isn't. It is, it is. No, it isn't. That is a completely fake name. As anybody who intentionally stung themselves

on the penis with a B would do, he has created a fake name. I mean, no, I'm at the Cornell graduate students page right now. I've just clicked on a picture of Michael Smith research. I'm interested in how honey B workers sense the size of their colony and how they make the switch from investing in survival, slash growth to reproduction. I spend lots of time counting B's and looking at drone comb.

It is not mention the fact that he stung himself on the Venus with a bee, and apparently stung himself a total of 190 times over 38 days and calibrated his experiments with a single sting on the forearm every time. I mean, it's one of those Batman things, you know, like it's the hero we need. Yeah, so the nose was a nine out of 10. The lips was an 8.7 out of 10. Interesting that he got that granular with it, that there was a .7 going on. Venus came in at 7.3 testicles a mere seven tying, tying for fourth with the cheek, the palm and the armpit. I mean, I am grateful to know this information so that if I ever get a stung in the nose by a B,

I will at least be able to comfort myself by saying, well, Michael Smith did say this was the worst. Michael Smith did say this was the worst. And he knows. He says at the end of this article and national geographic, I didn't see a lot of merit in repeating this with more subjects. So he just stopped going to, it's not gonna go any deeper with the research it looked like.

But it's not up. He addressed my concern about sample size head on, which I appreciate. Thank you, Michael. What the, in fact, take that reminds me that today's podcast is brought to you by Michael Smith. Michael Smith, the surprisingly generous soul who agreed to be a stung by a B190 times. The podcast is also additionally brought to you by the Solution to Pollution, which is a dilution.

A delusion. Just invite everyone to your wedding so you don't have to hang out with your parents' weird friends. And today's podcast is brought to you by the photons in your mouth. The photons in your mouth, they're gonna stay there. And finally, well, not technically, but whatever.

And finally this podcast is brought to you by avocado pairs. Just take a big ol' bite. Don't even think about what might be inside of there or whether that skin is definitely not to be eaten. Just yum yum yum. This next question comes to you. I don't even know what the next question is. This next question comes to you.

Oh my goodness, interesting. Go ahead, fine. No, you go, no you go. All right, it comes from Joey who asked dear Hank and John. I just wanted to compliment the phrase, the week game this week, episode 108, it was a large improvement on that bit

and definitely made it more exciting for us listeners. So I wanted to give you positive feedback, not a kangaroo, Joey. Thank you for that, Joey, and for the wonderful name specific sign off. I want to say that when we create bits here at Dear Hank and John, we try to set the bar so low that we cannot help but jump over it in the future.

Yeah, working hard at that. I also liked it last week, it made me really excited. But I have not heard one yet from you. So I don't know. Well, maybe I haven't said it. Maybe I haven't. Maybe it's audible.com slash Dear John and you're really throwing me for a loop.

Rosiana would have been throwing you a pretty easy softball if she made it audible.com slash dear John, you're home for a free month of audible. We've also got a note here from Emmyn Berkeley I wanted to read who writes, I'm a female tech executive in my 50s and I love all the many things you guys do. I'll be at your San Francisco show,

no doubt the oldest attendee. No way, I bet you will not be the oldest attendee. Oh, no, no. But I really do appreciate you being there in San Francisco and spending your Halloween with us. That is going to be our Halloween spectacular and we're very excited. You have no idea how Halloweeny Hank is going to get.

Anyway, I'm very much looking forward to it. When I was in high school college, I relied on my own 1970s nerd fighter-esque tribe, sci-fi lit star trek, the original recipe comic-ons, when they were still in a hotel ballroom, Bob Dylan, Jam Bans, and I still love all these things. In the last episode, you recommended wearing personal fandom garb, thus I will be in Tidei, which brings me back to Jam Bans. Thinking it's funny to not care about Tray's name. It's like saying the person who wrote Harry Potter is JK what's her name.

I share this with you only to point out that there are many fandoms throughout space and time that provide community for us nerds. Diagon and Deadheads, M in Berkeley. What a great email and what a generous correction. Thank you. And I have to say, full disclosure, I have been to a fish concert quite recently actually and I had a great time. Alright, Hank, let's go back to questions for a second.

This one comes from Jordan who writes, Dear John and Hank, I'm a 20 year old girl who's a few months off finishing her university degree and I've recently been working for quite a large tech company. I've had the opportunity to purchase stock in this company and now I on the proud, question mark owner of some shares in a global organization. Everybody's told me that stocks are good, and I should have them. I'm also under the impression that selling them within the first year of having them incurs a bit of a tax where I am from Australia. The reason I'm writing now is that I remember listening to an early dear Hank and John, regarding stocks, and all I remember is that I need to have more than one.

First off, I just want to pause Jordan and say that coming to dear Hank and John for market advice is a great decision. But like, what do you do with them? Do you have to check their existence daily? Do they need food and water? They're not neopets, Jordan, come on. When do I need to sell them? Should I sell them? What's the point of having them if you don't sell them? I'm 20 and I don't know how to share Jordan. Great sign off. Great high quality.

Excellent. Jordan, honestly, and this has been proven by cats choosing picking stocks versus high-paid analysts picking stocks. The best thing you could do is nothing. It's just like have stocks and keep them, and it is a way to save money in a way that that money will become more money as you get older. Being the age of 20 is a great time to put some money

into investments because while year to year, you never really know how much money you're gonna make over the last hundred years of the stock market existing. There has been a fairly steady increase in stock prices, as more value has been added to the economy and more cool things have been done with money. The goal is that if you have a hundred dollars that goes into the stock market when you're 20 years old, by the time you retire, that will be $500. That's not a huge deal when it's $100, but if you're putting in $1,000 and it's $5,000, if you're putting in $10,000 and it's $50,000, that can really help create stability for

you when you are done with working. That's the whole thing. So I'm going to disagree with everything that Hank just said. All right, let's fight about it. First off, neither Hank nor I knows that much about investing money. As evidence for this, I would point to the fact that Hank and I had an extensive conversation last night

where we were both trying to understand how stock options were and how vesting works and how shares it was. I didn't figure it out either. No, and the other thing that I was gonna say is that we ended the conversation by being like, this seems complicated and that was the end. So I can't think of a less financially savvy

podcast to visit, but I will say, I don't think that doing nothing in Jordan's particular case is the right thing to do necessarily. So Jordan, you're gonna get these shares at some kind of a discount, ostensibly to what they would cost on the open market. And then they will like vest over time

while you work at the company, hopefully for a while. That's what the company wants, certainly. And then you will have the option to sell them. And you're right that short-term capital gains are taxed differently in Australia than long-term capital gains. I think I'm not positive. But at some point, I actually think that you should sell the stock in that company because I

don't think that it is always a good thing to own. If you're going to own stocks, which I agree is good, I don't think that you should own stock in only one company. Now, Joe, it's possible that the corporate behemoth you work for is so big that it cannot fail. But even very large banks in America that were deemed too big to fail, and indeed were not allowed to fail by the government, still saw their share prices reduced by like 80-90 percent in the stock market crash of 2008. So at some point, I would recommend selling that stock and just buying what's called an index fund or some

vehicle through which you can own a lot of stocks at the same time. So an index fund is basically just, you would own all the companies in Australia or all the companies that do business in Australia instead of just one. And your $100 would be kind of split among all of those companies instead of just at the one I'm gonna assume it's Google Yes, John is right you do not want to put all of your eggs in one basket obviously the but It's great that you have an opportunity to have this stock now and it's maybe have a piece of the Organization that you're working for but you know once there is a good time for you to sell that or invest in other stocks

so that you can have them word-diverse portfolio or just buy an index fund, which has been proven for the most part to be much better than trying to pick individual stocks. The index fund is just like if you're in America, you just buy the whole S&P 500 and when that goes up, your stocks go up, when that goes down, your investment goes down. And over time, the S&P tends to go up. And there is a global catastrophe. And then it happened, and money doesn't matter anyway.

Right. Then we're just going to be burning our dollars to stay warm. But Jordan, the only thing that I would ask in exchange for this high-quality financial advice is that you write us and you explain to us how like, vesting and all that and stock options work because we're a little confused. All right, Hank, before we get to the news from Mars and A.C. Willemden, I want to share this email from Colleen who read it and to say, dear John and Hank, on your most recent episode, John mentioned that hot springs Arkansas was the best town name in the state. Personally, I'm from Yerika Springs, no hard feelings.

Interstate rivalries aside, John, allow me to introduce you to Greasy Corner, Arkansas, Weiner, Arkansas, Monkey Run, Arkansas, and Toad Suck, Arkansas. So I officially rescind my position that Hot Springs, Arkansas is the best town name. Obviously Toad S Suck Arkansas takes. Oh man. I mean, I need a shirt from Toad Suck Arkansas.

So bad. Get it to me. We had a lot of really good names just with X-Signoffs that came in. America, whose name is America, names just with X-Signoff. God bless America. Also maybe my favorite that I have seen, maybe ever, is from Ruth, who signs off, you can't handle the Ruth. My favorite is actually from Tori, which is the best one I've ever seen. She signs off,

who lives, who dies, who tells yours, Tori. Oh, I didn't get it until you set it out loud. Oh God, it's a winner. It's a winner. Oh, man, what a time to be alive. Hank, what's the news from Mars this week? Well, a bunch of people, eight of them, I think, spent eight months hanging out on the side of a volcano in Hawaii, never venturing

outside of their habitat without space suits on, living only with each other, and doing their best to get along and to make that relationship work for science, so that NASA can better understand how people will get along on long missions with a small number of people, ideally going to Mars. And this is a big deal because there have been times when astronauts in space have been like, this is terrible, and we're gonna basically mutiny. It only happened one time.

And they said to NASA, we're gonna stop working until you change our work hours. And it was like a space strike, which is either a labor movement or it's illegally taking over a space station which depending on your perspective. So getting people, young people to spend a bunch of time together without any contact with anyone else.

If they wanted to communicate with the outside world, they had to have about a 20 minute lag, which would be like the sort of average amount of time that the light takes to get from Mars to Earth. So you, so they couldn't browse the internet like normal people, they had to hang out with just the same people over and over again and spend eight months doing that on the side of a volcano in Hawaii, which is not the worst place to hang out, I don't think, but maybe nicer than Mars in a

lot of ways. But how did it go? It went fine, they all did well, I'm sure that there will be research papers published about it, but in general these things, when they're done explicitly but in general, these things, when they're done explicitly for the science, you don't really know that much about it until all the papers have time to get written and peer reviewed and stuff. But they're home now and get to be on the internet like normal people and I'm sure regretting it. Well, I'm sure the first thing that they did

upon leaving their fake Mars was tune in to Dear Hank and John. So hello, former Martians. Thank you for your service. Yes. Well, Hank, the news from AFC Wimbledon is, wait for it. Good? Ooh.

AFC Wimbledon went to Blackburn Rovers, an away game against one of the better teams in League 1. In fact, Blackburn rovers once won the Premier League. And everyone felt very strongly that AFC Wimbledon would lose that game because that has sort of been a bit of the trend line for the first six games at the season. But no, Blackburn rovers lost the game. AFC Wimbledon won the game. Check it out. Can you imagine that?

AFC Wimbledon won 1-0, bringing their total goal scoring for the season up to, if I'm not mistaken, four. Yeah, so a 1-0 victory. And then in the past, as you are listening to this, but in the future, as I am reporting it. AFC Wimbledon on September 22nd play the franchise currently applying its trade in Milton Keynes is obviously a huge game. No getting around it.

It's the rivalry that shouldn't be but is and we'll see. I mean I will be watching the game live on the I follow AFC Wimbledon app. Now, it is cool. Now, there's some problems with the app. It's not perfect, but it is really cool that you can watch live streaming video of Wimbledon playing.

And this game, I am glad that I will not be there in real life because I'm sure it will be tense and upsetting, but hopefully it will be tense and upsetting, but hopefully it will be tense and upsetting and also thrilling and we will win. That is kind of my big hope. I really, really want to win that game. I also have that same hope for you, John. Are things going better for a particular reason, or is it just the luck of the dice? Well, I mean, defensively, Wimbledon have been very solid this season. They've scored fewer goals than almost any other team. Actually, they've scored the fewest goals in League One.

But they also have one of the best defensive records in League One. They've only given up eight goals, which I think would put them like seventh or eighth in the table if games were only calculated by how many goals are scored on you. So I think the struggle for Wimbledon is gonna be where the goals are going to come from without, you know, without Tom Elliott and without autobioloc and Fenwa and we're starting to see a little more energy. The game before that AFC Wimbledon drew, but they were creating a lot of offensive chances. So the dons are currently 16th in the table, which means that

they are four spots north of the relegation zone right where we like it. All right. Good job, AFC Wimbledon. John, is it now the time where we guess each other's phrases of the week? It is. It is the time where we guess each other's phrases of the week? It is. It is the time where we guess each other's phrases of the week. All right. Do you want to try and guess mine? I do, but I have no idea what it is. Oh no. I have, I don't even know if I have a guess. Let me, let me, let me, let me think if I have a guess. Um, Hank, was your phrase of the week the front door? Yes, let me let me let me think if I guess

Hank was your phrase of the week the front door No, no it was not that it was even say the front door I mean I feel like this is what was your phrase of the week? It was exceptionally easy to hide and and also we had a great moment for it It was don't put all your eggs in one basket. Oh wow. Yeah, you did like that very effective. We got a stock market question. Yeah. You did have that very effective.

What was my phrase of the week? I'm gonna guess the solution to pollution is dilutioned. I mean, it would have been a great phrase of the week, but my phrase of the week was, No. You know the roost. Rule the roost. Which I snuck in very, very early, because I sensed that I couldn't put it in any later

So I snuck in that thing about how we're gonna have some kind of like fake rivalry as writers and to find out who's gonna rule the roost, but of course we won't really have because One person's success does not it impact someone else's success, except positively in the case of brothers. The rest of the week makes it so you cannot get distracted. You gotta be paying attention to all the time. So we're gonna go record this week in Ryan's, our weekly Patreon-only podcast about Ryan's increasingly focused on non-Ryan's. And, but thank you for listening, and thanks to everybody for sending in their questions. We're sorry about all the questions we don't answer,

and thank you for pauding with me. And it was absolute pleasure. This podcast is edited by Nicholas Jenkins, produced by Rosiana Halsey-Rohas and Sheridan Gibson, our head of community and communication, is Victoria von Giorno. The theme music that you're hearing is by the great Gunnarola. If you want to email us your questions,

you can do that at Hank and John at gmail.com. We're also Hank Green on Twitter and John Green on Twitter. You can find us that place and also other places on the Internet. Thank you so much for listening. Thanks for partying with me and as they say in our hometown. Don't forget to be awesome.