Dear Hank & John - 135: Danger Noodles and Little Boops (w/ Emily Graslie!)

Episode Date: April 9, 2018

How do you throw away a trash can? Which animals have the most awkward adolescent phase? Are humans an invasive species? And more! Email us: [e-mail] patreon.com/dearhankandjohn

Hello and welcome to Dear Hank and John. Or as I like to call it, Dear Emily and Hank. It's a comedy podcast for two brothers and sometimes just one brother and a special guest. Answer your questions, give me a DMZ advice if you want to excuse from both Mars and AFC woman. And today our special guest host, our guest, not John John, is Emily Grassley, the chief curiosity correspondent at the field museum in Chicago and host of the brain scoop and natural history expert

and etc. Emily, how are you doing? I'm doing good, how are you? I'm good, I'm good, I'm angry. Why? I have an angry in my soul because, well, Catherine and I, a year ago, when Orin was four months old, we went to the Netherlands and we went to the Kukenhof Gardens in the Netherlands. Beautiful, like, basically a showcase of all of the best tulip breeders in the world. And it's a beautiful place that sort of makes me marvel at the ability of humans.

And we bought a bunch of tulip bulbs from the tulip breeders there. I don't think the tulip breeder is the right word, but whatever, that's what they do. They breed tulips. Yeah. And then they sent them to us, and then we planted them.

And then after five years of living in this house, suddenly the deer have found us, and they are only eating the Dutch tulips and not any of the normal like home depot things that are all over the yard, but they have selectively chosen to eat. And maybe this is why the home depot tulips are the home depot tulips.

That maybe they're just not as tasty as the good, good, they're basically like Dutch tulips are like hot dogs to deer. Yeah, I think these deer have champagne taste. Like they, they know that you put in all this effort and energy to bring these wonderful tulips back. And they think that it's a gift to them.

The native deer from Montana. Oh, God. Is it a gift to them? Is that how I should think of it? Yeah, they can't get on a plane. They can't go. That's right. Get them themselves. They're not gonna, Is it a gift to them? Is that how I should think of it? I work really hard. They can't go. That's right. Get them themselves.

They're not gonna, they have no land bridge that they can take advantage of. So I mean, I've been fantasizing about like, because we can, I think I know when the deer are showing up, they're showing up at like five o'clock in the morning because occasionally I'm awake at five o'clock in the morning, and I can see that there are no deer prints in the snow, and then there are deer prints in the snow.

And so I'm thinking about just hiding in the bushes and then jumping out, grabbing the deer, and killing it with my bare hands. But you're saying that I should think of this as if I am doing a solid for the deer and this is part of a, it's part of like a cultural exchange program in which deer get to try new kinds of tulips.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's all about framing, man. You know, it's just, just reframe the situation in your mind. And then you can, every morning, just think, oh, the deer are so grateful. They're, look at how grateful they are for what I have done for them.

Yeah, they eat half the tulip and then they move on to the next one because they wanna try every individual tulip. Right, and you can say, you're welcome. Oh, you liked the orange ones. Well, me too. So that makes two of us now. Well, I don't even know what color they are.

Because they haven't even gotten to the tulip part of being tulips yet. It is leaves. I have it. How are of being tulips yet. It is leaves. I have it. How are you getting tulips already? We have snow. Oh, we have snow too. There's snow on our tulips.

Those are some resilient tulips. Well, I mean, they seemed very healthy before the deer ate them. Well, yes. They, a life cut short. Well, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, but you're deer and tulip problems. Yeah, I don't even know. Like, I don't even I'm sorry about your deer and tulip problems. Yeah, I don't even know. I don't even feel like the bulbs can come back from this.

Anyway, you're probably not too much of a tulip expert. You have a number of areas of expertise. But other than my struggles, are things going well in Chicago aside from it not being tulipsies yet? Yeah. Well, I mean, kind of in that vein, I'm a little sad this week. I had to cancel my vacation that I was going to be for tomorrow because I had a plan to take a five and a half hour road trip

to go witness this giant snake migration in southern Illinois. No, why would you? But the highs on the 38. And like, and there will be no snakes in my future. Oh, so they've got to cancel the vacation, not because of anything to do with you, but to do with the snakes. Like the snakes are gonna come out.

No, they'll be too chilly. So I can't, you just wait until it's warm and then go. I can, but you know when you have your heart set on something, it was gonna be March 5th. I was going to go on this intrepid voyage to go find a migration of danger noodles and now it's not happening. Did you mean April 5th just to be clear?

Yeah, what did I say, May? March. I was like, you got a month girl just chill. No, it was gonna be tomorrow. So good. Anyway, we're going in May, so I shouldn't really be that upset about it. I'm just,

so wait, May is a long time from now. Is the, are the danger noodles gonna wait that long before they come out? Well, I don't know. Are they okay? Are they gonna come out at all? Like, you should just have somebody down there like waiting or like a nest cam setup

so that you can be like, oh, there we go, what's going on? No, no, no, no, it's happening. Yeah, yeah, like what they, like kind of what they do with the blossoms, the cherry blossoms in DC, I need like an indicator tree version of that for a snake. Yes. But it should be a person who has my cell phone who can call me at a moment's notice

and be like, Emily, danger noodles. And all. Emily, my clothes are covered in snakes. Emily, they're everywhere. Emily, they're inside of my mouth, I'm dying. Emily, Emily, there's a venomous snake coiled around my legs and I need medical attention. Maybe that's not how that should go.

They're so hungry, they're eating each other. Oh God, it's the humanity. But at least there's no snow, so come on down. Yeah, so that sounds very cool. Yeah, but the snakes are gonna be okay. They're not like in bad shape. No, I think they'll be fine. They're just gonna probably wait to come out.

So they kind of, from what I understand, I've never actually witnessed this great snake migration. There's like a limestone or sandstone shelf in this national park where a bunch of them overwinter. And then it starts to warm up and they're like, hey, it's time for me to make some snake babies. And then they all kind of come out of these cliffs and start to disperse. And they just happen to all cross this one road that they've actually renamed Snake Road.

So we were going to go down to Snake Road and just hang out and just watch the snakes come across the road. And they are venomous, like they're nasty. Well, they're a number of species. So they're a gargoyle snake, they're a green snakes, they're a cotton mouse, they're a rattlesnakes. So it was gonna be a whole shmorgas board of danger noodles and just regular noodles, frankly.

Danger noodles and cuddle noodles. Yeah, and little boobs, you know? Just, and everything. Just everything happy. Just snakes eat snakes? Cause it feels like if you just overwintered and you're like, well, there's a whole lot of snakes around and some of them are quite small.

Yeah, I mean. Just tromp that. I kind of think about that sometimes when snakes eat things with legs, like that creates some, some protrusions. Right, right. Yeah. So if you can, you just eat another snake, Sometimes when snakes eat things with legs, like that creates some protrusion. Right. Yeah. So if you can, you just eat another snake,

it's just like eating a noodle, it just goes down easy, so why not? Well, yeah, yeah, it's like putting a cup into a larger cup, it just fits right in. Yeah, it's like a whole the way down. Like a Russian nesting doll of snakes. Snakes on the way down. Right, because maybe that snake had eaten a snake earlier,

and you ate the snake, and because you're a snake, and it's just, yeah. And then you end up in a museum, and someone's like, oh, we have a boa constrictor, and then they're like, no, we don't. We have a boa constrictor that ate another snake, that ate another snake. Yeah, it's like a turduckin, but it's just snakes.

Yeah. I feel like this is not offering any dubious advice to anybody. No, I mean, you gave me dubious advice rather than the deer and I appreciate that. It's all about my mindset more than how to prevent the deer from meeting the two of us. That's very, very good. Very deer-hank and drawn of you.

Yeah. Do you have a poem for us, Emily? I do. And the funny thing is when I thought about bringing a poem, I realized like, abundantly how not well read I am when it comes to poetry. I was like, oh, yeah, no, I'm there with you. Shell Silverstein, yeah, yeah, yeah, look at that.

But I thought I'd be a little bit more sophisticated. So I asked a friend of mine if they knew of any poems about animals, because I like animals. And so I have one from Lord Tennyson called the Eagle of Fragment. And this is how it goes. It's six lines, it's very short. He clasps the crag with crooked hands,

close to the sun and lonely lands, ringed with the azure world he stands. The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls, he watches from his mountain walls, and like a thunderbolt, he falls. Oh. Isn't that, this kind of neat? I'm in the animal poetry.

That could be, that could be a thing I could get into. Yeah, he did another one called the Kraken, and that's 15 lines, but we can save that for the future, but that one is also very good. You guys could, everyone could just go look it up and tell them, and leave what you think of the Kraken. Yeah, that one's got a little bit more drama, so highly recommended.

All right, well, and now we have entered into the portion of the podcast, that is the podcast part of the podcast, where we answer questions and try to give some dubious advice and the first person that we're gonna do that for is named Karina who asks, dear Hank and Emily, is it selfish to want to be cremated? Since you're not really going back to nature and stuff, would I contribute to the planet somehow

by just being turned into ash, pumpkins and penguins, Karina? I think that, like, okay, Emily, what do you know about burial processes? Well, a little bit more than I knew before I was on YouTube, actually, there's, so there's this great creator named Caitlin Dowdy. She's got a YouTube channel called Ask a Mortician. She is in fact a mortician.

And one of the things that she really advocates for is for green burials. And all sorts of like different ways of sort of disrupting the burial industry. So she's kind of a, she's a disruptor, I would say. And so she's kind of a, she's a disruptor, I would say. And so she's illuminated a lot of new ideas for me about how one can return to the earth. And you can be buried in Joshua tree. So like that's a lot, like that's people, like it's open.

Yeah. I mean, I think there's a permitting process. There's an application process. And I think it's, I mean think there are limited numbers of spaces, but increasingly, there are more and more of these green burial opportunities cropping up with people thinking like, well, why don't you just instead of injecting me with formaldehyde and all these preservatives, just let me decay naturally in like a cardboard box

or like a birch box or something, and then like planted tree. And then when I die, all of my bits can go back to the earth and nurture bugs and stuff. And then I'll just turn into fertilizer. And then there will be a healthy tree. And I think that's absolutely what a wonderful, holistic way of thinking about it.

Yeah, I mean, the thing Karina to note is that the traditional way of being buried, you don't become that useful because you do sort of get preserved. Eventually, you get, you know, like all year, you know, it happens, but like the process is very slow when placed inside of a very processed, lacquered, hardwood box, and inside you yourself have been filled with a lot of things that are designed to make you not decay. And like that's the whole goal is to make you not,

is to make the, the, if you look like you're still alive. Yeah, to make you not be fertilizer. And like I do, I think this is a very personal decision for every person. I think that there is something good about cremation in that you're just not taking a lot of space. You get to go where a place that you like without needing a permitting process.

I don't think that anybody needs a permit to just get scattered somewhere. Also, burial at sea, we did discuss that on a dear Hank and John once, and you do in a lot of places have to get a permit to be buried at sea, but it is a thing that you can do, which I did not realize. It's pretty amazing.

That I think that we have to rigid an idea of what post-life disposal looks like and I'm excited for people who are trying to think about that in different ways. Yeah, I mean it's like there are logistical space problems with everybody, if everybody who has ever lived or ever will live is going to be, in addition to this being pretty unaffordable for most people, going into a coffin and then into a cement block in the ground, we're just going to run out of space. Yeah, listen to 99% invisible about this recently. It was very good in which it is discussed that it is kind

of a uniquely American idea that you get your burial pot forever, that you like, this is where I rest and I will be here until the sun explodes. I guess. In other places, you lease it. And like when you or your family stops paying the lease, they just put somebody else down there. That makes far more sense.

Like, because then like 200 years from now, someone's gonna show up and be like, well, I guess I could have put my grandma here, but there's someone here that we don't really remember. Nobody's, I don't know. So, nobody's coming, nobody's coming by. Yeah. Who do you really need this space right now?

Right. You don't have any, and that's like that, we don't wanna think about that time eventually when people aren't thinking about us anymore. But that doesn't mean that we didn't have an effect on the world and that effect doesn't ripple on through people who don't remember us. And only do you have any other questions for us?

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I agree. I think there are lots of thoughtful ways you can think about what is going to happen with your body. I kind of, you know, people have asked me, would I be taxidermy? I feel like that's... No.

I don't want to go there. No. But maybe an anatomy lab. Not? Yeah, that is. People have done that. I think I can't remember. Some philosopher is taxidermy that some famous school in England and I'm just like, no,

no. And he's like, I don't know if he's on display, but he used to be at least. And I just, no thanks. There's an anthropologist who passed away. I think he was, he's taught at University of Oregon or somewhere in Oregon, somewhere on the West Coast. And he also was a big, big foot believer. And I don't know why that's important to the story.

Anyway, he ended up meeting some anthropologists at the Smithsonian in DC. And he had kept all of his Irish wolfhounds when all of their remains after they had passed away, because he also was a big fan of Irish wall fans. Anyway, long story short, when he died in his will, he wanted to have his skeleton articulated with one of the skeletons of his beloved dog

and now they're still on display and you can go see him with his giant dog with its doggy paws on his skeletal shoulders. And there it is, it's Smithsonian. Well, good. What's his name? I don't remember. If you google Smithsonian Skeleton Greyhound dog, it'll probably come up. It's a Greyhounder, I wish well found. Oh, I wish well found. Cheese, I'm not getting my dog breeds. Anyway. I'm looking, yeah, his name is Grover Krants.

And there he is, that's a big dog. It is a big dog, it's a good boy too. Yeah, he's being a real good boy. Yeah, so. Oh, that's cute. Yeah, I kind of like that, I wouldn't mind that. Okay, yeah, more of it, yeah. You wouldn't mind that. Okay, yeah, more of it. Yeah.

You wouldn't mind being an articulated skeleton. You don't like the idea of being taxidermied. Yeah, I agree with you deeply. I don't know why that feels so very different to me, but it does. Okay, this question's from Emily. Dear Hank and Emily, how do you throw away a trash can? Do you put it into a bigger trash can?

What about the big ones you put by the side of the road? Our trash cans, Justin Mordel, one of many, Emily. I feel like this really goes into the conversation we just had about snake-eating snakes. Well, and also, what do you do when you die? What do you do with your trash can when it dies? Right. I'm sensing a theme.

Yeah, you need to, you need to, respawn like take it to Joshua Tree, bury it, three feet down, not so deep that it won't decompose. Yeah, but put a plant a tree on it, and then put a snake in it, I don't know. I had this problem recently actually. I had like one of the metal garbage cans that rested out the bottom

and I put it into a larger trash can and the trash people took it out and put it next to the trash can basically to say, no, no, no, no, no, you are doing that wrong. And I was like, but I don't know how to do it right. So it's just in my garage. So is it, could it be a recycling? Could you put it out on recycling day maybe?

Would it take it then? Well, maybe, I would assume like it's a hunk of steel. Like it's gotta be useful to somebody, right? Yeah, yeah. Do you, what's wrong with it? I would assume like it's a hunk of steel. Like it's got to be useful to somebody, right? Yeah. Yeah. Do you, what's wrong with it? It's the bottom, the bottom's all rusted out. Oh, you said that.

I was gonna say, I have giant aluminum cancels a bird seed in my backyard. So I was like, you put bird seed in it, but if the bottom doesn't work, then it's not functional. You know, maybe you should put it out like upside down so that they can see that the utility of this particular object has expired. It's it's broke.

That's what I that's what I was about to suggest to Emily is like maybe you need signage there. Right. Yes. In fact, this wiki how article suggests putting the trash can upside down and then if that doesn't work, putting a sign on it that says, discard or please take this or this is broken,

have a nice day. I hope that things are going well with your family. The wiki how article says that? Yeah, and then the final option, if that doesn't work, is to cut the trash can up with a saw and kitchen knife and put it into a bag. I feel like that was more like, that was someone's final attempt.

They're just frustrated and they're like, I can't handle it and then they just angerly go to the garage and get a chainsaw and start hacking it up and then it ends up working. Yeah. Time for the machete. Yeah. And then they also suggest recycling it.

If you can figure out how to do that. So probably that's what I will end up doing is figuring out how to recycle it because it is, I think, a big hunk of good steel. Why not? Someone could use that, melt it down. Yeah, you gotta turn it into something else. Make it into a bird house.

I don't know, metal bird house, sure. Something, put your snakes in it, I don't know. Yeah, protect your tulips with it. Yeah, yeah, make a, you could hammer that real thin and hand make some chicken wire. Maybe I should protect my tulips with it. Maybe I should just like, stake it down onto the ground around my tulips,

and the deer won't be able to get in, and then like some sunlight will get in the rusty bottom, but then the deer will be like, I'm gonna try to get my head in there, and it's like, nope, rusty edges not happening. Oh man, see Hank, you're still thinking about it, like it's not a gift to the deer. Now you're making an obstacle course.

I am, I don't, I mean, I feel like, I don't, yep, that's correct, I want to see my two lips. I want my wife to be happy about the two lips that we have. Yeah. Well, I mean, I also want Catherine to be happy with, with the two lips. So the two situation. The two lips situation. Okay. Okay. Well, if anybody has any suggestions for how I can deal with these deer without murder, please let me know. This next question comes from Nat who asks, dear, Hank and Emily, I recently moved in with my partner. It's both of our first times living with significant others and it's scary and weird and exciting and really amazing. The advice I've

been given pretty much has all been compromise is key, which has proven to be true. However, a situation has presented itself that I don't know how to compromise on. He doesn't organize his books in any particular order on the bookshelf. He says he does not feel a need to do this. Do I organize it for him?

Do I ask him to do it? Do I move out and end our relationship? This message transmitted on 100% recycled electrons, Matt. I feel like this went to a very extreme solution without... Well, without... I mean, it could have... It could have... She could have thought maybe like, let's just burn the whole place down. That's just... Yeah. I think maybe a book shouldn't exist anymore. Let's end it all.

Yeah, humanity isn't worth saving. There's a very simple solution here that isn't real, I mean, it is sort of a compromise. It's not even much of a compromise. Why don't you just have your own bookshelves? So then, I don't know that that will save the worry here. There may be some amount of like, I can't have a not organized bookshelf in my home.

Oh, see. Because it's, well, but she doesn't say the bookshelf. But also it may not be a place that is big enough for more than one bookshelf. But yeah, it says the bookshelf, which I assume, I assume that means you're sharing a bookshelf. And to me, yeah, I think Emily, you're right. Either two bookshelves or just organize the bookshelf.

Or yeah, I'm, or you just have your own shelf on the bookshelf, right? How many books are we talking here? Right, right. I don't know, I don't know. But I also think like, organize your boyfriend's books. That's okay, right? I wouldn't mind if, if to me, my bookshelf is in no particular order, that means I don't care what order they're in.

So if they're in an order that is equal to me as they there being no order. Oh, I just, I feel like just to each it's own, right? I mean, if you, if he's fine with not having books organized, then you just organize your books and just let him have his books be disorganized. So that's part of who he is as a person, someone who does not care

about the organization of their shelf. I mean, I guess, yeah, to your point, if it doesn't matter one way or another, then there's no loss. But this is also coming from, so my partner and I have very, we have our own book, shelves, because we cannot stand the way

that the other one organizes their books. And in fact, yes. You know, he has made his own book plate. So he's so particular about making sure that his books have his name and then that he has his own stamp made. And it's fine because it actually, so then I don't have to stamp my books. I just know that the un-stamped books are mine and the stamped books are his. Also they're all on his bookshelf, his books, because we don't share our books on one of the shelves.

It's very rigid. He's very rigid at yours as less rigid, your systems? I think, yeah, I mean, because I don't, again, I don't really care, my books are all over the place and I don't put my name in them, but. I mean, I do. Like, if you are merging book collections, and it's not, and it is a relatively early relationship,

I would suggest a certain amount of labeling might be good, or some system of knowing whose books are, whose we, Katherine and I for a long time, had a lot of two copies of the same book because our collection's merged and we were like, well, I mean, I don't know. I don't know where this is going. Like, maybe someday we're going to want to have my copy in your copy. It's like like three years into marriage before we were like, you know, we probably don't need two copies of this book. Yeah, you probably,

well, we'll probably add any yet safe to say at this point That we and less ball less need the same book at the exact same time that you could probably probably No, just hit that hit that level If we're gonna have to if we're gonna have to divide the books up There's gonna be bigger things to deal with that won't that won't be the main concern. Right. Yeah. But you're right. I mean, that's kind of a, at an early point of a relationship, what, like, Nat who had just moved in with their partner, you know, that is, that's a big commitment. I don't know if that's a conversation that maybe they're ready to have yet.

Yeah, I, I'm organized by books by sort of kind of book. Like I have a science fiction section and graphic novel session and I like a young adult section and like nonfiction. But it like, within those sections is basically wherever I put the book. I don't feel like I have enough books to need to do it differently than that. Really?

I organized my books by how much I liked them. What? So that's awful. Like what if somebody comes over and that wrote one of the books? Well, if I'd like to go, interesting, my book is at the bottom right. What's your ordering system? Well, it should also go hand in hand sort of like the books that I really like usually are from people that I also know. So I can't imagine a scenario. Like maybe the author of the biology textbook fifth edition that is on the bottom shelf of my bookshelf, maybe at some point they will take offense to the fact that I have put the

textbook on bottom shelf. But I don't see that happening. For instance, you know, John's books are on the top shelf. Because if John came over, I'd be like, look, John, books, they made it. They made it. Here they are. I enjoyed them. Yeah, like my, yeah, that is also my chemistry textbook

is also on the bottom shelf, sitting there being like, you know, maybe someday you might need this. You don't know. Yeah, but you're like, it's probably not gonna be, I mean, the internet exists. Right. Yeah. Well, I mean, when I was writing Crash Course Chemistry here, like working on Crash Course Chemistry, I did open that book a bunch, but it's been a while since I did that.

Yeah, so the utility isn't quite there. But I do it because if someone comes over and they're like, hey, I need a book to read. It's just easy for me to go, I'll pick one on the top shelf. They're all good. Right. The one's on this, the top shelf books. Yeah. Yeah. The hat. That's got to be the name of a bookstore. Top shelf, you know, that's not, that's a, that's a good idea. Top shelf books. Yep, it is. It's a virtual book shop. What?

How does that work? There's not even a physical top shelf. Come on! Well, I mean, if it was an actual bookstore and only the books on the top shelf were any good, or there were only books on the top shelves, that would just be a huge weight of space. Well, maybe there's a cafe, hanging up the other spaces. All the other spaces, yeah. Anyway.

Hey, hit me with another question, Emily. Okay, this one's from Lizabeth with an S. Dear Hank and Emily, my best friend raises pet chickens in Seattle while being a badass woman. Can we say badass? Yeah. Okay, while being a badass woman in computer science,

we skyped yesterday and our chickens are teenagers, ugly teenagers. I know we all have awkward phases, but I was wondering which animals in your esteemed dubious opinions have the worst adolescent awkward phase, any awkward chicken phases in your lives, not your mayor, Elizabeth mayor, with a year. I mean, okay, I wanna see some awkward teenage chicken,

so I've Googled that, awkward teenage chicken. Oh yeah. I think they're actually delightful. Those are cute, they're like almost, well, it's the thing where they're like, they still got their chick fluff, but then they're actually delightful. Those are cute. They're like almost, well, it's the thing where they're like, they still got their chick fluff, but then they're getting feathers. And it's like, oh, you look like, I don't know.

You look not well. Oh, that is weird. You look not well. You look not well. They kind of look like they've been in a wind storm. Mm-hmm. Because the fluff is still there, but there are some other real feathers coming.

I mean, it's exactly what I look like in middle school. Like, you'd been through a wind storm. Yeah, exactly. But it kind of had weird long legs and looked a little frazzled on top. Right. Yeah. Now, I think that that is generally the... Catherine was saying on Delete this, our podcast podcast last week that there's sort of a faith

that you go through when you just turn and do a bunch of doodles. And like your arms end at your knees and it's like, what's happening? Why did this happen? Why? Are you skis? And so you just kind of, you do.

You're like one of those wind dudes outside of car dealerships. Just constantly getting blown around. Like, I don't know what to do with my appendages. Yeah, yeah. And like, and then just breaking things. Both inside and outside of your body. There's a lot of damage happening.

Damage occurs. And which made me think that the most awkward juvenile animal I've seen is maybe a young giraffe, which is just all made in knobby wiggles. Yeah, yeah, there's just like a tiny little nucleus of a body and then the rest is just sticks everywhere. Like so much going on. So many sticks. So cute though.

Yeah, the awkwardness is pretty endearing at that level. I was thinking the worst adolescent awkward face is probably also, I should preface this that it's kind of gross, but it's true. Maggots. Maggots. Oh gosh, Emily. What is the juvenile, aren't the maggots the juvenile phase themselves? Yes.

And they get such a bad rap because they're just baby flies. And if you think of a baby fly, then there's something maybe endearing about that terminology. But there's a double standard here, Hank. And it's because people love caterpillars, which are the- Right, right. The adolescent stages, little wormy bits, butterflies. Just the maggot butterfly. Yeah, but people give fly babies a bad rap, and I'm just thinking of double standards here. That's great.

It's a great point. And I mean, the thing of it is, like, it's not like they grow up and they become beautiful majestic creatures, though. Like, I agree that I'd rather, like, be in the presence of, well, I- Of a butterfly rather than a fly.

Which, no, no, of a maggot, like, what would I prefer to be hanging out with? Like, 20 maggots or 20 flies? I don't know, at least the maggots are staying in the same place, mostly. Yeah, yeah. And what, you know, I think flies are kind of inherently beautiful too, especially if you see some like nice

macro photography, but that also requires that they are still and usually dead. Oh, interesting. So I'm just, you know, personally, I'm also like not a gigantic maggot fan. I think it's because of the quantity of numbers in which they're usually found. Like a little, like, because if you found a bush with like three million caterpillars on it, that's also kind of disturbing. Right. yeah. Well, at least now we get to know that caterpillars are ruined for everyone now that I have the

phrase butterfly maggot in my head. I had very strong opinions about this when I first read that question and I didn't exactly articulate them out loud and now that I've gone down this route, I regretted a little bit. I mean, yeah, well, I think that all larval forms are a pretty awkward adolescent phase. And they're sort of like the quintessential awkward adolescent phase in children's media because it's always like the caterpillars very hungry and he

gets a stomach ache and then he's a beautiful butterflies. The story that I wish that had happened to me. It did! Look at you! You used to be a wind-swept noodle and now you're Emily Grassley, host of the Brain Scoop. But I'm still hungry Hank. I'm always hungry. Right, yeah. You didn't stop being hungry. Yeah. But are there any other animals that have awkward teenage? I feel just like it's a really uniting, it's something that unites all of us. Yeah, teenage rhythm is a really interesting phase of awkwardness. I think that dogs have really great awkward teenage years. Oh, so good.

So good. Do you go on the sub-reddit Blunder Years? No, Blunder Years is good. Oh, hey. That's a good thing. It's so good. So it's just for people who don't know, it's Blunder Years and kind of like Wonder Years.

But it's just pictures of people from their most awkward points of their life ever. It's amazing. The subreddit brings me so much joy. Yeah, I mean, the nice thing about, like when I was that age, I didn't realize how awkward I was. I didn't know it. No, and that's like the beauty of it,

is like you're so blissfully unaware of yourself and context of your surroundings, of, you know, your self-expression isn't quite on point and you just don't even know until 10 years later and you look back and you're like, oh dear, why did my mother let me walk out of the house like that? I mean, yeah, as a father, now I think about like, I will just have to let him walk out of the house like that.

There's nothing else I can do about that. No. You can't control them. No, and you don't even want to, because I think at that point, if they're not even listening to you, right, there's maybe that angsty teenage phase that I think many of you have said been it. You just kinda like, you know what, fine. You can recoil and discuss it yourself 10 years from now

when you see your picture on the top page of Blender Years. And I will just look forward to that moment. And it's all fine. I will just look forward to that moment. And it's all fine. Like the top, the top, the top picture right now is this kid who covered himself in armor made out of connects. I mean, that's a win though. Yeah, yeah, it's truly delightful.

Okay, okay Emily, this next question comes from Anra who asks, dear brothers and also Emily, I took a summer class on ecology and we had a class on invasive species. My question to you is this, are humans invasive species? If humans are, should we have global regulations on our movements?

I know that there's not a way for this to actually happen, but your podcast is pretty nebulous, so I thought you were the best people to talk to Seth so I thought you were the best people to talk to Seth. I thought you were the best people to talk this out. All the best, even in death, Anra. All right, Emily, are humans an invasive species I have lots of thoughts go? Oh, this question makes me so uncomfortable. Um, be good.

I know. Yes. Yeah, yeah I know, yes. Yeah, yeah, no, yes. Yes. It really, yeah, it deeply depends on the definition. What I've learned from living in Montana is that invasive species is an ecological term that is understood mostly in terms of economic impact.

is understood mostly in terms of economic impact. So we talk about invasive species, particularly ones that like cows can't eat. That's a big problem. When you have a species that a cow is like, nope, I'm incapable of digesting that. They become very comfortable on the range land. And then suddenly you have lots of plants that are not nourishing your cattle,

and you have land that is less economically productive than it once was. Same thing with zebra mussels that cling to boat propellers and hydroelectric systems, and you have to scrape them off and turn off the dam for a little while while you do that, and it results in lost money. So in this weird way, it turns out that we, this ecological problem that we understand

and we discuss through an ecological lens, in reality when we talk about it, it's a human economic problem that we actually, when we actually sort of are working and spending money trying to fix it. I never thought of invasive species in that way. Yeah, it's totally like, like living in Montana, you get a real good look at that if you pay close enough attention. Because it's really all about range land

and not about like preserving the ecological diversity of a place. Right, and that's, I mean, that's really interesting. Because when I think about invasive species, I think there are a lot of like ideological, you know, things that we can, these narnias that don't exist, these gardens are eaten that are never going to return

to a pristine habitat. And by wanting to eradicate everything that's quote, invasive about it is really just sort of like a colonial approach to an environment. And so I feel really uncomfortable with the idea that someone could say that humans are an invasive species because then where are we and where are we supposed to go? Right, who are we, who are we displacing? Or who are we advocating for the displacement of?

And I really don't like that way of thinking about it. Right, no, I told, yes, it's a, and it's also, I mean, the entire idea of an invasive species of exotic invasives, like this doesn't happen, I mean, it does, but it almost always happens because of human intervention. And, of course, there is something different about people that is different from nature. But the way that I tend to think of it is not like, okay, you have this box over here that is human,

and you have this box over here that is nature, and you have technology, and you have the biosphere, and they are sort of like opposing but very separate spheres is I have been able to understand it and like keep this like sort of an internalized understanding that I don't have to like refresh in my brain. It just like it's stayed with me that the biology is in us and we have this extra stuff on top of it, but like the biology will never come out of us. And technology is a biological product in the same way that biology is a chemical product. And just like we have, like chemistry inside of us, we have biology inside of us, we have evolution inside of us. That is all part of our story and who we are.

And I think that there can be this weird, like, purity argument that comes out of our feelings about nature that is really kind of fake. And that stuff is always changing and it's always in disruption. And in fact, what we find in ecology is that disruption actually is not just the natural state, but also where a lot of diversity comes from. And that you don't have single, wide swathes of old growth forest, you have mixes and meshes and that mixy bit, where it's not the everywhere, is actually where the most interesting nature happens. Yeah, I think there's a lot of really interesting things, too, that are happening, especially with science communication,

about how certain things have in the past been demonized in a way that isn't necessarily fair. So if you think about like bacteria, right? It's not easy. There's a big proponent that have everything germ-free, which is tear, tear, you do not want to be germ-free. Like, germs are your friend, number one. And two, we did a video about this a couple of months ago,

but the ecological importance of parasites, I think there's a tendency to want to eradicate any idea of anything living and feeding off of you or your livestock or anything, but it turns out that parasites are kind of like theness, they're necessary in a way that a microbiome is necessary. And so I think it's kind of a fun way of looking at the world. If you imagine not that there's anything pristine to aspire to,

but more understanding like what the role of everything is currently playing in the current structure and having a curiosity about that. So I don't know, that doesn't really go back to the question about our humans and invasive species. I guess technically maybe, but also, is it helpful to think about humans as invasive species because I'm not sure that it is.

Right, yeah, I mean, it, it, it, understanding, an accurate understanding of, of the relationship between humans and the biosphere is very hard to, like, I don't think that there is one. I don't think that there is, like, one right way of thinking about it. But yeah, I think that the, the thing that's necessary, that has been necessary for me, is an appreciation of humans and a sort of, like like amazement at them in the same way that I have awe and amazement at the biological systems and to appreciate both of those things and know that like, yes, one of them feeds off of the other, more than the other feeds off of it.

But, you know, we are remarkable. And I want to continue thinking, and I think objectively, that humans are extremely interesting. And it's very cool. And that it's almost like thinking, you know, like the geology of the earth would be more pristine if there weren't so many animals on it. And I'm like, okay. But there weren't so many animals on it.

And I'm like, okay. But you don't want no animals, they're awesome, right? Also, yeah, what about the fossil record? Like the fossil record is just the gifts that keeps on giving when you're like, wait. Yeah, no, totally. What happened to the Cambrian? This is crazy.

This is crazy. All right, I want to do one more question before we get to the news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon. And I would like you to ask this question about salt because I think it feeds into this conversation we're having. Yes, this is from from Tessa, dear Hank and Shrimp and Emily, I guess. I'm a big family. Do you have an adolescent nickname because that was John's adolescent nickname? Oh, oh, my adolescent. Oh, my adolescent nickname was Emily P. And I mean, that's not a good nickname.

But it's the truth, which is what matters. Right, and I hated it. And my sister insisted on calling me Emily P. And I don't know why, but it always bothered me. And so she kept doing it because that's what older sisters do. Perfect. So dear Hank and Emily P. I am a big fan of the pod and a need of your dubious expertise. I recently started thinking about salt, namely sea salt.

And why people always make a big deal about it being sea salt. Doesn't all salt come from the sea. I realize that actually, maybe since salt is a mineral, it's also possible to extract it from the ground. How does that process work? And do we use all kinds of salt in our food? Why is sea salt seen as the best and most luxurious of all salts? Many thanks in advance, Tessa. I like the luxurious, because it is, like, that's, it's a weird thing that like we've created this like, this marketing machine around a type of salt

to be like, it's not just salt. It'll taste salty, yeah, no, it'll taste like salt, but it's, it'll just like, it's more expensive, so it's probably better, right? I mean, this isn't just sea salt. I honestly, Hank and tessa, I kind of think that sea salt is a little 2015. I feel like right now the rage is gray salt

and Himalayan pink salt. Even though I would also say Himalayan pink salt is more 2017 than anything. Oh, now there's gray salt. What the frick is gray salt, Emily? I've never heard of this. Hank, get this. It's with the fric is gray salt, Emily? I've never heard of this. Hank, get this. It's salt that happens to be gray.

Why? It's gray because they put like extra money in it. So it costs more? Or maybe it's just dirty and they're like, you know what? We are going to save a bunch of money by not having to clean this salt. So, but we'll just market it as gray salt and people that eat it up literally. Gray salt.

I'm looking up gray salt right now. Oh God, it's favored by chefs. 100% natural salt. Whatever the fricking taste. I told you. Oh God. It's just rocks. It's just rocks. It's just rocks.

It's just rocks. An article on Livestrong.com. Grace Salt versus Himalayan Pink Salt. Oh, God. I mean, there's an entire, this article is far too long. But it has opinions. It's not like, actually, it's just the same as the normal South. So, I mean, I know the different, like, there's just more minerals in this other stuff.

So, if you just, so there's a lot of salts, is what we call it, any ionic compound in chemistry, we call a salt. And there's a lot of salts in seawater. And the most plentiful one is sodium chloride, which is what is in table salt. And when you make table salt, because you're like, people want the thing that they want,

not a bunch of extra stuff mixed in, because it's the 50s, and we wanna make things that are the things people want the thing that they want, not a bunch of extra stuff mixed in, because it's the 50s, and we wanna make things that are, the things people want rather than like the most weird, natural, we're not even sure what's really in this, which is apparently the craze right now. You make it pure sodium chloride. So they go through some processes

to make it pure sodium chloride, and then they put a touch of iodine in so that people in America don't get goiters anymore. And that's table salt. And it comes from mostly from mining salt, but when you mine salt, that also usually came from sea salt or from inland seas like the Great Salt Lake where there were long periods of time

where water was going to a place and then evaporating, and then that got covered up with rock and then you dug it out. And they actually, interestingly, one of the ways that they do this is instead of digging it out with scoops, they'll pump hot water down, and then they'll pump the hot water out,

and the hot water will come out with a bunch of salt in it, and then they evaporate off the water and you get the salt. And then what's left behind is a giant hole in the earth where there is nothing because you've pumped all the salt out and then sometimes occasionally, and there's a video of this happening, it just collapses and like all the trees on top

are like, zoom and just fall inside. There's a really great video of all the, like an entire swap falling into one of these salt caves that they made pumping salt out of a place. I don't know if you could find it just by googling like salt cave tree falling disaster or something. Salt cave disaster. Salt cave tree fall disaster. What do we get? Video, got to type in video. Yeah, yes, there's a video that comes up. There a video, but it's not the video I'm looking for.

Yeah, buy you corn, sinkhole, swallow stands of trees. It's really good. It's like three minute long video and the whole time you're like, what's happening? Are those trees really gonna fall? It did just like, they're just gonna keep falling? Oh man, everybody look up the Bayou corn sinkhole and there they go, they're just, they're trees and then they're just, where are they going? Where, they're not falling over,

they're just getting, wait, they're just going down and then they're just gone. They get sucked away and the trees are gone now. And the guys with the camera is just sitting there and I'm like, how do you know that's not gonna happen under you right now? Right, Hank, can I just, I am so impressed by how much you know about salt.

I was not at all anticipating all of this. I feel like we really touched on something that you feel personally very invested in. Right, well, I guess I may have a strong opinion about a number of things that I shouldn't have strong opinions on. It may be one of my vices, but I do feel, and then when you make these other kinds of salt

are just the raw salt that hasn't had the other minerals, the other ionic compounds taken out of it. And so it has more stuff than just the salt in it, which I don't, like maybe some experts could taste the difference between those things. I don't think that you can, because salt is a very strong flavor,

and they are, it is definitely not like healthier for you. If you wanna get extra minerals, it makes a lot more sense to just get those minerals rather than like loading it up inside of your food by making it saltier, which has potential negative health effects. Right. I mean, in this article that I'm still amazed

that there are so many words to compare grains and Himalayan pink salt. I mean, they do go into nutritional profiles and differences in texture and use. So I would say, people do have strong opinions about that. I don't know if those are based out of science. You know what I want to, I want the next salt trend that I want to see happen? I want everybody that just go to Salt Licks. Just have a Salt Lick on your table. And just choose a half part of the Salt Lick and sprinkle that on top.

No, no, no, no, no, no. No, you gotta go straight to the source. You eat a bite of your food and then you lick the salt. You have to bite of your food, a lick the salt. Yeah, can we make that happen? And then everybody just passes the salt lick around and you're like, hey, can I get the salt lick? Cause I'm a freaking deer.

I'm like a elk. Yeah, yeah, I really feel it. I mean, why not, right? Which is how weird can we make this? You know, I'm probably guys fended some chefs just now or just people who are really into their special salts, but I, in general, we had a question that we didn't end up asking last week

from someone asking, I was told by my barista that she was gonna make me the best coffee I'd ever had in my life, and I was like, I don't want that, because then like all the other coffee won't be as good forever. And I was like, yeah, kind of. Like, maybe I just don't want to know how much better the expensive salt is.

Maybe I just want to keep using the salt that costs like literally nothing. It's like basically free, because of how much you can get for how low a price. Right. Maybe I don't want to know. Maybe I don't want to know how much you can get for how low a price. Right. Maybe I don't wanna know. Maybe I don't wanna know how much better a thing is, and when honestly, it's probably not that much better.

I just want my coffee that I made in my house. Yeah, I mean, right. We're just feeding into this culture of always needing the bigger, better, more delicious salts. I don't feel like that's sustainable for people today. I think that's too much pressure. I get that. Oh God, it's so much pressure.

How, like, do I have to choose what kind of salt I'm using? Right. I can't just, like, do I have to feel like weirdly bad about using normal salt? Yeah, because then you're gonna have a dinner party and then, and then you will, so it's a scenario where you went to a dinner party and then and then you're you will so you're it's a scenario

Where you went to a dinner party at someone's house and they had Himalayan pink salt on the table and then you invite that person over and then you realize that You you uncultured, you know the plebe only have regular table salt to offer your friend who has much more sophisticated taste than you do. And then what do you do with that? Then you're gonna feel self-conscious and oddly inferior for no reason. Other than this weird precedent that we've said that everybody needs to, if you can afford it, then have fancy table salt. Everything has to be fancy, which reminds me Emily

of our sponsor this week, which is uncultured plebe salt. It's our new product. It's me, Emily, of our sponsor this week, which is uncultured plebsalt. It's our new product. It's just salt. It's like one scent more than the regular salt that you can get from the salt people. But our salt is made by us, so but it's called uncultured plebsalt. And it's just, you could feel okay

about using normal salt. Oh, cheese. I think our other sponsor for today is Turduckin Snakes. For when one snake isn't enough, you need a snake exception. So get your Turduckin Snakes. It snakes all the way down. Yes, we also have a project for Ross of Message

from, we also have a project for awesome message from Rodry Ran, uh, to Natalie, Gnathaly, sorry, Gnathaly, uh, who is her favorite sister? I miss living close. You should come visit. We have two pita pits and a 10 mile radius. I will even let you sleep in a bed that is definitely mine. Whatever that means.

If we have to share it, you can have the edge and I'll take off my socks. We can stay up late playing Skippbo and Buggle. It'll be like old times. Love your favorite sister. That sounds nice and sweet. Yeah, I feel like there were a lot of inside jokes that in there that I didn't understand, but that is,

but I'm for it. I'm for it. With Esquipo, the one with the thing that goes on your foot. Yeah. Okay. Right? Yeah, I think so. It's a Esquipo and Boggle are two very different kinds of games.

I think they like the Esquipits. I like the Esquipits. I like the Esquipits. No, Esquipo is a card game. It's like Uno, but different. Oh, yeah, because Es skippets are the things you put on your foot. What happened to those?

You know what I, they probably got recalled because I remember playing that with my sister. And if that thing flies off your foot, it's going 20 miles an hour right in the face of the second grader in the yard, one over. That's what happened to that. That's right. Oh God.

Or people just started using them as weapons. I'm sorry. All right. Emily, at getting the deer with them to stop them from meeting the tulips, we've got some news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon today. I think that the responsibility for both of those news is followed on my shoulders today.

And I have good Mars news and bad AFC Wimbledon news. Emily, are you like deeply curious about what I'm about to tell you? Yes. Let's start with the AFC Wimbledon news. AFC Wimbledon now, I believe, I think, so they lost their game this week. They lost despite basically having a great opportunity

to not lose in that they had like seven corner kicks to the other teams one, and they had the most of the possession, and they had most of the shots on goal, and yet still in the 22nd minute of the game, the only goal was scored by the other team whoever they were. And that means that AFC Wimmelden is now, I think that it's the bottom five that gets relegated. I tried to Google this, but I wasn't good enough and fast enough to do it.

And if it is the bottom five then they are at the tipi-top of the relegation zone just above the, as John says, franchise currently applying its trade in Milton Keynes, whatever that means. And so it's possible that both AFC and the franchise will both end up getting relegated and will be playing in League Two once more together. And that would be a real bummer,

but at least MK wouldn't stay up while AFC went down. So but there is still time left, AFC women needs to win games by scoring goals. And if they can do that, then they will be able to stay in league two or league, they will stay in league one and continue playing soccer with better teams than are in league two. And I maybe maybe I don't know make more money somehow and that will be that will be good for the team and the fans to you they just they just have to be better they just have to be good then just right I think that what would help is if they would score more goals and have

fewer goals scored against them yeah that's kind of what I took from took away from that. Yeah, better defense and offense. Yes, better at playing the game, good. Better soccer. And we also have our Mars News for today. I don't mean to mock AFC Wimbledon. I just, that's all I can tell you. We have a proposal out of NASA to design robotic bees.

It's what they're calling them, that can fly on Mars. They announced the project, March 30th, so just, you know, last week. And it is in its early stages, but the idea is to replace rovers with a sort of station that stays in the same place. It's like a charging station and communication station, and the bees fly off, do stuff, fly back to the charging station and then they recharge and they can dump data or something and or even samples maybe and then go back off and fly around even more and these things are little so they would be like literally the body part would be the size of a B and

then the wing part would be bigger than a B's wings, because there isn't a lot of atmosphere on Mars. Yeah, they got a fly. And they'd fly around on Mars. Like, yeah, doing weird science, and this is very cool. There are lots of places that like rovers can't get too easily,

and it's dangerous to take a rover into a place where the sand might get it stuck or the grade is too steep, but a flying thing wouldn't have as many of those problems and even if it did land and then fall over, maybe it could figure out how to get itself righted and back into the air again. Sure.

And also there could be lots of them and so if one stops working, you got backups. So this is actually an idea that NASA is floating and working on and trying to engineer around a little bit to see if maybe it's a potentially future Mars mission. I have a question. OK. So why call them bees and not just flies?

Well, so Emily, I don't know if you know this, but people like bees. And because they make honey and they prevent the world from starving to death. And flies are annoying and we kill them and we see them as unsanitary bag-it machines. I know, I was just trying to get back to my point about this ridiculous bias that we have.

We do, we do. And flies, it's a recurring theme, not just in this podcast, but in my life. But Emily, talk to me when a fly makes something that I eat regularly. I, aren't fly, aren't some flies pollinators? I believe they are. No, no, no, no.

I mean, like delicious sweet sugar sauce that I put in my coffee. Cause like, that's magic. That, yeah. I mean, I don't think that flies vomit sweeteners. That is true. But yeah, flies do lots of great work and there are many different types of flies

that, and only some of them are the ones that end up in our homes or bite us. Oh man, a horse fly, I hate a horse fly. I cannot abide. They don't have very many friends, but to get back to the point, that is the Mars news is that's cool. Did you ever think that we'd live in a time where you're talking about

sending tiny little flybots or bebots to Mars? No, I did not. And like the scope of curiosity in the Mars 2020 rover is so outside of the scope of rovers when I was, you know, first, started getting excited about space exploration. That it's kind of easy to be like, oh, a rover is a rover, but it's very different to have like this, like, thing that's the size of a dinner plate basically versus a thing that's the size of a car moving around and doing now over 2000 days of science on the surface of Mars, curiosity is the coolest. And what a great name for it.

I'm surprised that that one was available still. Right, like they had that wasn't on the top five, like back in the 60s. Right, yeah, it's like, well, we're gonna name these one spirit and opportunity, because we're saving curiosity for when we send like basically cars. Right, but what an amazing time to be alive.

Right, and you can also get whatever the frit kind of salt you want. I know. The world really is your oyster. You're salty, salty, pink Himalayan, salty oyster. Gross. Emily, thank you for making a podcast with me today. What did we learn?

Do you remember? I feel like we've been all over the place. I feel like we learned that it's okay to have your ashes spread in the ocean with a permit. I feel like it's okay to be the sort of person who just wants basic salt in your life. And we also learned that butterfly maggots are just caterpillars and also that Emily has a favorite subreddit in which this guy is wearing Kinect's armor and it's real real good and I'm proud of him. Yeah, I am too. He's being the best version of himself and I support it. We support it. Thank you, Emily.

Thank you. And thank you everyone for listening. This podcast is edited by Nicholas Jenkins. It's produced by Rosiana Halsey Rojas and shared in Gibson. Our head of community and communications is Victoria Bonjourner, who also runs our Patreon. She can find it patreon.com slash deer hankin john. It has a number of opportunities, including you can listen to our dumb podcast where we talk about people, this weekend Ryan's and that money goes to support all of our shows that we make like SciShow and Crash Course

and help your triage and sexplanation, so all that cool stuff. And if you like what we do here, you can check that out. You can also find things that we will post on that Patreon that is available to everyone, whether you can support it or not. So thank you all very much. If you want to email us, you can do that at Hank and John

at gmail.com and we are on Twitter at Hank Green and at John Green. And Emily is also on Twitter at MEEHME. Thank you, Emily, for joining us. And as they say in our hometown, don't forget to be awesome.