Dear Hank & John - 165: We're Gonna Make It

Episode Date: November 26, 2018

What would it feel like to be microwaved? How do I get my dad to chill on Facebook? How do I confront my roommate about the ferret oatmeal baths? And more! If you're in need of dubious advice, email us at [e-mail]! Check out our other podcasts in the WNYC Studios network, SciShow Tangents and The Anthropocene Reviewed. Join us for monthly livestreams and an exclusive weekly podcast at patreon.com/dearhankandjohn.

Hello and welcome to Dear Hank and John. Where's our first figure of Dear John and Hank? It's a comedy podcast where two brothers answer your questions, give you a debies advice and bring you all the week's news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon John. Yes. Have you noticed that the bees haven't been out flying around? Why haven't the bees been out flying around Hank? Because they're in the hive for the winter. Do you know why? Because they're in the hive for the winter.

Do you know why they like to stay in the hive for the winter? I don't. Swarm. That's not a joke. That was a little bad. I feel bad about it. Do you want another one? No.

Do you not have any bones there are in a human hand? How many? A handful. That was better. That was better. But just for future reference, like the last thing that you should do when somebody tells you I did not enjoy that joke is double down. You want another one? I just told you my best joke, but hold on, I've got a less good one lined up. Oh yeah, well, I didn't feel like either of those were too good, but I felt like if you do two of them, if you like add up to one good joke.

All right, John, do you have any good news for me? I do have some good news, Hank. In the United States, the turnout for the midterm elections was excellent, which is good news because democracy works when people vote. And here in the United States, voting is not as common as it is in many countries, partly because of voter suppression, partly because of historical attitudes toward voting. So it's great to see a little bit of a change on that front. Yeah.

I mean, especially in a midterm election, where people are usually not super engaged, it seems like people are more engaged. The reasons for that might not be good news, but that is good news. That's right, Hank. If we are looking for the reasons behind the good news, we will almost always find bad news,

so we don't do that anymore. That's not what that part of the podcast is about. Exactly. Let's answer some questions from our listeners. This first one comes from Amanda who writes, dear John and Hank, I am walking home from the subway in 30 degree weather. And my bladder is so full. Before my fingers get paralyzed from the cold, I wanted to ask, what will happen if I freeze to death before I get to a bathroom? Will my pee freeze inside of my body trying to prepare for all contingencies, Amanda. Amanda, I have bad news for you,

but before we get to the bad news, I am gonna need to ask John a question as a person who lives in Montana. How do you pee in big cities? Well, I mean, when you're in town, do you just pee on the sidewalk? No, and I'm in Missoula. I go to one of the many places where I am allowed to pee

like the public restroom or the restaurant where I know the people who work there. That's definitely the number one way. The other ways are not as desirable. The number one way is to find a public restroom. The number, if it's, if it's a true P emergency, I think most people will understand if you go to an alley or you just kind of turn away, but that is technically in a lot of places a crime called public urination.

I just want to, I just want to know if there are public restrooms and I'm just not seeing them. Well, there are. Yeah, of course. It's just like- it's, I mean, the answer is that it's just like Mizzoula, except there are more buildings and air go more bathrooms. Okay, I just feel like I can never find a place to pee. Right, but it's because you don't know the city. Ohhhh. It's not because it's- so there are places to pee, I just haven't noticed them. Yeah, I mean, usually there are occasions

where you have to be like, listen, I need to use the bathroom and you're gonna have one kind of problem or another kind of problem and I think you're gonna prefer if you let me use the restroom. Right, right, sure. And like, and when I get out, I'll buy a USB charger or a piece of pizza or whatever they sell there. Right. Yeah. Like I know the rest room is for customers only and I will be a customer, but first.

Okay. All right. So Amanda, that's number one. We'll go pee because apparently there are places to pee in your city. No, Amanda, you're going to make it. It's fine. You're going to make it. You're going to make it to your apartment. And it's, I mean, is there anything more enjoyable than making it to your apartment and just being like, oh, peeing. Peeing this nice comfortable place. John, do you know the answer to Amanda's question though? Of course, your black,

of course your pee is not going to freeze inside of your bladder after dye unless it is incredibly cold, like near absolute zero. Well, first of all, it's 30 degrees, so your body isn't gonna freeze for a long time. But the main thing is that by the time you are dead from cold, your body isn't frozen yet, and so your muscles will relax

and you'll pee all over your dead body. All right. And then that will freeze on the outside. Good party. That will probably happen before you die, by the way, which is bad because then you're cold because you have pee on you. Well, I mean, I kind of knew that,

but I'm glad to have it laid out for me in that manner, Hank. So thank you. The next time that I need to pee and I'm walking in the cold, I will know exactly what's going to happen if I don't find my way to warmth. All right, well speaking of which, John, this question is from Lauren, and she's got a solution for you. Dear Hank and John, what would it feel like to be microwave?

Microwaving goodbye, Lauren. Very good, very good. It would definitely warm your pee up. That's for sure. Don't do that. Don't do not get into microwave. No matter how big it is, no matter how comfortable it looks,

no matter how cold you are, do not get into microwave. So I have heard a story that during the Korean War, men would actually stand in front of the microwave antennas to warm up, which is basically, like these are antenna that are broadcasting information and they stood in front of them to get warm.

So those people know, and apparently it warms you up. Does it also like mutate the DNA in your cells? Probably a little bit. Don't do that. Yeah, I just as a rule, like putting everything else aside, I think I feel like it would be very difficult to get inside of most microwaves. That's true.

That's a very good point. And in fact, if you have ever watched the YouTube show, is it a good idea to microwave this, which I did in the 2000s? Classic of the genre. Classic of the genre. You will note that it is hard to get a microwave to turn on with the door open even. For lots of good reasons, but I, in college, had a microwave that did turn on when the door

was not open and we threw it away because that seemed bad. Yeah, definitely. Right, I mean, there was a time when microwaves were far less safe than they are now. We feel like we're in this like horrible moment in human history, and in many ways we are, but at least we're not like huddling by the microwave radios for warmth. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's in the future, John. Oh, God, let's hope not.

I do think sometimes that we need to like pause and to be grateful. Yes. For the fact that the 21st century is so far at least on pace to be the least violent century in human history. Yeah. In fact, that by most objective measures, life is getting better.

The main way that life is getting worse is Twitter. Like, it's those big things, John, but it's also the small things. Like, everybody's got a fridge and like, I can get avocado toast and coffee is really good now. Hank and I are so into the fact that most, most people own refrigerators. Like, it's an incredible human accomplishment, not just to have invented the refrigerator, but to have made the refrigerator affordable enough that like lots of people have two of them,

and you can go on Craigslist and someone will be like, hey, I'll give you my refrigerator for five bucks if you pick it up. Yeah, it's free to, free to a good home. I've been playing a video game called Tropico lately John Yeah, and Tropico is a game where you are are less sort of running a Like a community on a small island in the Caribbean and trying to make everybody happy and or Suppressing them through your dictatorship depends on how you want to play sure and

and on how you want to play. And I've noticed a thing where, and they've designed this well, where when you first introduce something, people are like, yes, this is excellent and I like it. And so, like, I have a bunch of houses that I built, like in the early 1900s, and then into the 1950s, they're like, I hate these houses, they're terrible. And I'm like, you loved them 50 years ago. And they're like, yeah, but things have gotten better. And I don't want to continue living the old bad way when there are other people in other places living in the new good way.

And I think that is important. And also, it's great. It's like, I, as a dictator, I'm frustrated by that, but I as a human, love that. It's so wonderful that we, what we see as a normal amount of comfort changes and that we can continue making the world a better place for people and their children. Hank, I think we should get back to answering questions

shortly, but I just wanna tell you that I met an astronaut over the weekend. Context is an important, but I just wanna tell you that I met an astronaut over the weekend. Context is an important, but I was hanging out with an astronaut, not to brag, but this is a person who spent like a year in space. And- Well, now you've limited, it's not just an astronaut, it's one of like two astronauts that you've now.

Well, it's also possible that they didn't spend a year in space and I miss her when I'm talking. I'm not a very listener. Or that you're exaggerating, but I've seen happen before. But I'm about to retell the story that they told Never Batom with no exaggerations. All right. Okay. They were making the point to me, which I found very interesting that like Velociraptors

were maybe like two to five million years away from getting really smart. That they were pretty smart. They had opposable thumbs. Some good stuff was happening on the velociraptor sentience front. And then there's this catastrophic event that results in the catastrophic event that results in the, you know, extinction of velociraptors and many other species. Okay. We are in a weird time in human history where there's a little bit of like a potential bottleneck. Like there's a lot of ways that we could kill

all the humans on the planet right now. And there's like a higher than ever number of people who have that power. Okay. Yep. But if we can just become a species that lives in like a few places, like not just Earth, but maybe, for instance, Mars, maybe even the Moon,

then if there is a catastrophe on one of those places, it's not the end of the velociraptors. And I found that the most compelling argument I have ever heard for why we should focus about half of our available resources on reducing poverty and disease burden and improving life expectancy and lifespan and the other half of our resources on Mars, which was a huge shift in my thinking, but I am now strongly, as of like three days ago, pro Mars. Man, I gotta tell you, that is not, that argument doesn't even do it for me.

That's not the one that works for me, because I feel like if we're on Mars, I mean, maybe 300, 500 years from now, you can have a system of colony on Mars. But yeah, that's what I want. All right. Okay. Good. Good. I'm on board with you now. I'm thinking in a 500-year time horizon. 500 years from now, they're the number of people who can end human life on Earth will be greater than it is today. And I don't like the greater that number gets, the more certain it becomes that human life will end on Earth. But Mars is gonna survive it and it's gonna be great, Hank.

Everything is gonna be fine. Good. We're gonna make it. We're gonna make it. We're gonna make it through this millennium if it kills us to quote the mountain goats. Hahaha. All right, this next one comes from Susanna who asked, do you John and Hank, my dad recently got a Facebook account?

Oh, my condolences. That's too bad. He's very, very into it. Yeah, I bet he is. I mean, everybody who's new to Facebook is like, look at this thing. I'm away for university, so I don't see this first hand, but whenever I open chat, I see that he's active, and my mom and sister complain about him spending too much time on Facebook,

even during dinner, which was strictly forbidden for me and my sister, and I realize that he's scrolling and reading comments even when I'm Skyping with him and my mom. Also he's posting a lot of political posts posts and although well-intentioned. Oh boy, they always are, aren't they? They often are worded in a conflict initiating way. And my dad, as a newcomer to Facebook, hasn't yet learned that this is definitely not a good place for political discussions. Oh, Susanna, if only. If only. If only that was a problem. Yeah. For newcomers. Yeah, there seems to be a fan of only. I like that. If only that was a problem. Yeah. For newcomers.

Yeah, there seems to be a perspective here that this is something that only happens and then like you get over it. But in my experience that, I mean maybe eventually, but that's Zuzana. Yeah. Zuzana is a much better person than I am. It's the long and short of it. I'm a lot more like Zuzana's dad. Yeah.

Zuzana is my hope for the future. Anyway, I tried telling him how unhealthy this can be and that it seems like he's pulling away from real social life, but it's tricky. Who listens to their daughter for life advice? Do you have any ideas on how to approach this Facebook and father, Zuzana? Oh god, I'm so sorry. I don't know how to fix this problem, but it's not just you, it's the whole species. Yeah, the... There was a really interesting article I read once that said the internet didn't have the giant impact on the 2016 election that we thought it had.

And it said, it was like in 2014, all of these people, and that was the most recent data we had, didn't have Facebooks. And so it couldn't be affecting these people and so there was some like talk of like maybe there's some kind of Effect where like one person is influencing like one person on Facebook is influencing a bunch of other people on Facebook But actually it turned out that a lot of people got Facebook between 2014 and 2016 and a lot of people Particularly got Facebook during the election cycle, like while the campaigns were happening because they were really Jones and for news, because in America when elections are happening, we get pretty obsessed with it, especially if we're somebody who maybe

thinks that like the opposition party might be like a catastrophe for the country. And so those people all came on Facebook very quickly. And just like Zuzana's dad didn't know like all like, you know, like had that initial spurt of being like super obsessed and also not super healthy about how they were using it and also seeing it as this way to influence the world that it was almost like being on this platform, doing this work, that is the good that I am doing. This is how I am making the world better

by engaging in these conflicts, by coming at people, by creating, and oftentimes creating conflicts. And I know that from personal experience too. And I still do it a little bit. I've gotten much better at it, especially since starting, starting to delete this, though not everyone can start a, you know, year-long podcast with their wife in which they get criticized on how they're using social media. But I think that we are building some tools

and I think we are getting better at it. And I do think that to some extent, Susanna is right, that like you get, you like the moment you get into it is the moment that it's the worst and that realizing that bad behavior pattern takes a little while and it also does take feedback from people who love you and who you can trust.

And hopefully your dad can trust you and the rest of your family to help them rain it in. Yeah, Hank is a lot more optimistic about this stuff than I am. I read Hank's novel and came to a very different conclusion based on the text of the novel, then Hank came to as the author. I do not see the number of minutes that people spend on these social media platforms

decreasing much over time. Like I don't really. It is right now. And Facebook actually has a huge problem. And like they're getting scared about it. And well then that's great. I mean, I guess I can only speak to my personal experience. I don't know that much about the metadata,

but in my personal experience, the amount of time I spend on these platforms, even as I do learn to create content in a more careful way to respond, you know, when baiteded less often, et cetera, I don't really find myself able to turn off in the way that I used to be able to. You know, we got into the internet in the first place. The reason that this podcast is happening, the reason that there is vlog brothers is that

before Twitter or even like Facebook was that big of a deal, at least in my life, Hank and I were really into a couple of YouTube shows that in a lot of ways mimicked the contemporary social internet just on a much smaller scale, like that allowed us to feel connected to people that allowed us to feel like being part of that community was really productive and important and interesting and in some ways like the most interesting thing that we could be doing in that moment. And I still I agree with Hank I still believe that there are wonderful things about the internet and that these are mostly tools that we just don't know how to use well yet. And the fact that Zuzanna for instance is able to see her father's use of the internet very differently from how she uses the internet tells me that me that like, I suspect the next generation,

the kids who grow up with this will treat it differently and more cautiously than we've treated it. But I am still really concerned about it, and that's why I'm taking a year away from the social internet to see what I feel like on the other side of that. A year. It's not that long.

I mean, it's true. As you get older, a year becomes less of a big deal. Yeah, and it's going to be a very busy year, to be honest with you. So got other stuff to do. Yeah, there's a ton of stuff going on. Yeah. And it'll probably be useful to me, to go to twitter.com and find that there is an app that says, no, no, you can't. Yeah, I have actually, so I spend a lot of this, this weekend playing that video game that I've now talked about two times,

because obviously it's a little stuck in my brain because of how much fun it is and how compelling it is. I love strategy games. And I hadn't played a lot of video games recently, but what I found is like it gave me an outlet for problem solving and for exercising and flexing some problem solving muscles and was very distracting and felt very good

and I enjoyed doing it, it's very pretty. And it was time that I otherwise would have just been engaging on Twitter. And then when I was like, let's look at Twitter, I didn't have the same dopamine response. And that was, that's very interesting to me. That, that, that, you know, a solitary video game can kind of be just a reboot, like a, like a switch to hit and be like, oh yeah, no, like that's, this isn't the end of everything. There,

there are other things that are fun. And that I can do in my free time. That are maybe a little healthier. Yeah, no, I agree. I feel the same way about video games. My issue is that I am suffering from what you think called technology-induced loneliness. Mm-hmm. And I do not wanna have technology-induced loneliness anymore. And my brain says that the treatment

for technology-induced loneliness is to spend more time on the internet. and I think that my brain might be wrong. Yeah, I think that is correct. I think that is correct. Catherine and I went to a party last night and we were like, oh gosh. Oh my. Look at all these human beings. Yeah, I spent like an hour of it playing with a two-year-old because that's that's where I'm at, John. Yeah, it's fun. No. It was fun though.

He was a great little two-year-old. This next question comes from Hannah who asks, Dear Hank and John, I am the head librarian in a school and I'm currently reading the Fulton or Stars for the first time. Everyone thinks that, of course, I've read it before, so I'm distracting lots of spoilers. How can I stop this without telling everyone I haven't read it before? Not a spamer or a banana, Hannah.

Well, Hannah, one thing that I think we forget about books is that even very popular books are read by basically nobody. Okay. Including many of the people who have strong opinions about those very popular books, right? Like, we all know that the number of people with an opinion about Twilight is massively lower than the number of people who actually read Twilight. The Faulkner's Stars is a much more successful novel than I ever imagined could be possible in my life. And yet, like 95 to 96% of people over the age of 14 have not read it.

So you're in very good company, Hannah, like you're with the vast majority of people. But Hannah's the head librarian. Even so, there are lots of books. And why would you read one instead of another? Even a very ambitious reader can read maybe 50 to 100 books per year. That means that every year there are lots and lots and lots of great books that you don't read. So I just think in general, the way to deal with this is not to spoil stuff. Yeah. I mean, you're solving the problem for all the people listening who might spoil something,

but there's not that many of them. How do we solve the problem for Hannah, who has this problem now, and we're not going to shift all of society overnight? Well, I mean, a good news. Well, I mean, a good news. No, it on the book that says, I've not read this book. This is my first time. Do you put a good note on the book that says, I've not read this book, this is my first time. Do you read it on a Kindle and no one knows what you're reading?

No, you definitely don't do that. You buy it from your local and a Kindle bookstore. Do you only read it at home and have another book for work? I've been here for a while. I've been here for a while. You clearly get it out of your local library. Yeah. It's free and the hand is there. myself, you clearly get it out of your local library.

Yeah. It's free. And Hannah's there. Yeah. Hannah, who I assume is in the United Kingdom, because wrote not a spanner or a banana Hannah. And so I assume that's supposed to rhyme. Right. Spana. Spana or a bananette should I reread the the question in a British accent? John would that be good if you reread the question in a British accent? I will quit the pod I Can never go back to the time when you think to British accent for six months It's like one of my worst memories

Do you want to read thinking? Oh, I got almost called you Catherine. Do you want to know a great thing John? What? Sometimes I do accents when I'm reading or in books. And I so I'll start reading a book that clearly is from the, like, from the word usage, it's a British book or it's like American South book. And I'll start to do an accent and he will go, no, no, no, no, no, no. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha I've always done something similar with Alice where I insert Alice into the story.

Yeah. You know, so I'll have like the main character of whatever book be Alice and she just hates it. She's always hated it and I've always thought it was hilarious. And she'll be like, no, dad, go back and read it the regular way Yeah, we're we're dads Yeah, you can't it's it's just irresistible anyway Hannah what you should say is look 95% of people haven't read this book and I am one of them

But I'm about to not be one of them so stop spoiling me but spoiler alert about I'm about to not be one of them, so stop spoiling me. But spoiler alert about spoilers for the fall in their stars. You can't spoil the book. Like, it's not true. I mean, it's like spoiling the Titanic. You know where it is? No, it's not. Because it would be like,

spoiler Titanic if it- BEEP. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Oh, we can't put that in the pod, Nick. That's a spoiler. Hank just said something very funny that we can't put in the pod because it's a spoiler. It's very, very funny. All right. Hannah, okay. All right. Here, I right. I guess upon further reflection, you can spoil the fault in our stars. I convinced him everyone. He did, he did. But I'm just gonna say,

no, I'm just gonna say what you said. I think it's so funny that I think it's worth the spoiler. So hit that like skip ahead 30 seconds button. All of you who haven't read the fault in their stars, also it's available wherever books are sold. What Hank said was, it's just like the Titanic, but it's a different ship sank. Okay.

So yeah, I think yeah, all right Hannah if you were listening maybe you just want to listen to the spoiler and be just just accept it All right, if you're coming back From not listening welcome Well again my book the fault in their stars has not been read by 95% of people. Right. And I want you to not be one of them anymore. Hit it. Or you can get an absolutely remarkable thing as well. All right, Hank, this next question comes from Christina who writes, dear John and Hank, I've always known this, but recently I've given more thought to the fact that when we breathe air out of a kissy face position, it is cold.

But when we breathe air out of a more open mouth, it is hot. Why is this? Do we cool our own air before blowing it out, not an Aguilera, Christina? Is that right? Is that true? Oh wow, it is totally true. Yeah, it's dramatic. Okay, so now we are discovering that this is the first time

John has ever done kissy face hair. It's the first time I've ever done a kissy face while like, expelling air out of my mouth in the fastest way possible. I don't know how you kiss, but that cold, it's like colder than the air. It's almost definitely not colder than the air conditioning. It's like air conditioning. It's the difference between turning on the heat

and turning on the air conditioning in your car. So my guess is when you got big open math in your blowing air, that it's not incorporating a lot of air from like ambient air. Whereas when you blow the little tube, you're getting a lot of mixing of ambient air through like, you know, fluid dynamics burnouly stuff that you don't want to know about. And that's like grabbing a bunch of other air, sucking it in and mixing it so that by the time it hits whatever year, like, measuring the temperature at, that, um, and actually I'm going to do a test, John. I'm going to do a test right now.

I don't agree. I think it's different. I think it's something else. I think it's that when you push air out at a high rate of speed, it picks up air in the atmosphere. And that's what I was saying. Okay, I thought you meant like, because you're breathing differently. No, no, no, it's like sucking an atmosphere. Yeah, it's sucking an ambient air, so air from the room. Right.

And I just did an experiment, John, to confirm this because science is great. I hollowed out a pen on my desk, and I blew fast air through the pen, right when it comes out it's still warm. Oh Wow, I mean we are here to solve people's problems Big ones small ones, but especially small ones What you're asking, today's podcast is brought to you by Hank's science experiments. Hank's science experiments look for them soon in a retail store maybe.

And this podcast is also brought to you by the first six months on Facebook. You think it's so important, but really you're just being attacked from the inside. You have an autoimmune disease called Facebook. Today's podcast is also sponsored by huge microwave rays that you can stand next to to get warm. Not recommended. Not recommended. And finally, this podcast is brought to you by Ferret Oatmeal Bath. That's a question we haven't answered yet. We didn't get through very many questions, John.

Well, we still have time. Let's get right to that Ferret Oatmeal Bath question. This one comes from Vicki, right? Dear John and Hank, I have a roommate who I absolutely adore. That sentence makes the rest of the question kind of make sense, but only a little bit. So let's just bear in mind throughout the rest of the question kind of makes sense, but only a little bit. So let's just bear in mind throughout the rest of the question that Vicki, for whatever reason, completely adores this roommate.

We share a bathroom, and she's a moderately clean person. I don't have any complaints, aside from the fact that she has two ferrets, and she bathes them in our bathtub. This wouldn't be a problem, but fairs have to have oatmeal baths. And she doesn't always clean. Do they have to have oatmeal baths? Like do they have oatmeal baths in the wild? Yeah, is that like on the instruction manual? Can you imagine like the fairs spa that they go to

like in the wild where they're like, oh god, this oatmeal bath is so nice. I'm sure there's a reason why ferrets need oatmeal baths. Anyway, she doesn't always clean the tub out after their baths. That is a crisis. It needs oatmeal dust in the bottom of the tub. And if I don't check before I shower, it makes the bottom of the tub slimy

and I end up smelling like a retirement home. I'm a non-confrontational person. Yeah, no, Vicki, we gathered that. So how do I broach this? Do I obsessively clean the tub every time I shower? Do I request a schedule of her ferret bathing? Any dubious advice is welcome, Vicki. Oh, you gotta, this is a great time to take a person you adore and have a good relationship

with an experiment with a little bit of conflict. Just a tiny bit where you say, hey, Rumi, couple things. First off, do ferrets have to take oatmeal best? No, no, no, no. First off, I love your ferrets and I love them and I love them and I love them. And I want you to take it.

I don't think I could go that far. First off, I want you to take great care of them. First off, I tolerate your ferrets, and I know that you love them. There's no reason to be dishonest. I know that you love your ferrets. I want them to be healthy. I want you to take great care of them. But when I shower after the ferrets have bathed in our only tub,

I often feel really gross for a variety of reasons that I would imagine you can imagine. It's dangerous. It's dangerous. You got a slippery tub. People die. Absolutely, it's dangerous. I think that's why I believe that if you've got a tub,

you should take a bath, but not Vicky. But only, but there's one exception to that statement. There's not a lot of bathtubs that I wouldn't take a bath in, but I have to say that if I was living in Vicky's house, I would probably be a shower person. Yeah, you're just going to have to have a small confrontation because really what you're looking for here is not a huge shift in behavior. You're looking for, hey, after the ferrets get out of the tub, can you wipe it down really carefully because you just put two ferrets inside of our only shower container. And if they react negatively to that, then I can't imagine that they will, Vicki. I think you're gonna be fine.

You've gotta have the confrontation though, because A, this is a health issue and a safety issue, and B, it is a big, big problem. I usually try to minimize how big a problem these things are, but this seems to me like a proper crisis. All right, John, this next question comes from Sage, who asks, dear Hank and John. Last week I was doing my homework

and this person came up to me and started talking and it was a bit annoying, but I tried to be friendly. He ended up asking for my Snapchat and I gave it to him. I asked if I, he asked if I wanted to be his friend and I said, okay, because what else was I gonna say? He has been talking to me on Snapchat and wants to hang out sometime. He called me one of his best friends. He is a pretty cool person, but I really don't want to be friends with him partially because he's a lot older than me and I don't think he knows how old I am.

I'm 16. How do I stop being friends with him? I've considered not answering his text, but that seems mean and I don't want to hurt his feelings, pumpkins, and penguin sage. Oh, sage. Oh sage. Don't be a little sage. I'm just going to say this really quickly. People who are going to treat you poorly and are going to abuse your trust, that is what they do. They make you feel obligated.

They make you feel like, oh, I mean, in the normal course of human events, I would be friends with this person. It doesn't seem totally unreasonable to say no to any of their individual requests, but you're getting a vibe and the vibe is correct and you should ghost this person. Yeah. Give me another one, John.

All right, Hank, let's stay serious for a minute. This one comes from Abby, who writes, dear John and Hank, my dad passed away unexpectedly last week. I'm a junior in college and everyone I know keeps asking, how are you and offering condolences I'm a junior in college and everyone I know keeps asking, how are you and offering condolences, which is very sweet of them and I appreciate it.

But the problem is I keep saying it's okay. And then they say, no, it's not okay. And you know, it isn't okay. But it leaves me in an awkward position in which there is no easy way to end these conversations. Is there a good response to these questions that lets them know that they don't need to worry about me without oversharing or lying?

Can I just walk around telling people my dad died and it's not okay by now see you later? Should I just crack a joke? How many morbid jokes can I get away with before causing alarm? Abby. Oh, this is actually, she has a great name, specific sign off.

I forgot it, I'm sorry. Doing appropriately shabby. Abbey. That's good. You should just put that on a t-shirt. Yeah, I mean, it's so hard because people are trying to be nice, but in a lot of cases, Abbey, I'm imagining that it's in a situation where you don't have like 15 minutes or it's not someone you're particularly close to. You might be like in a hallway or right before the beginning of class or something and they're like how are you how are you doing

and you're like I don't really have time to discuss it and I'm also not sure how much you want to discuss it. One thing Cheryl Sandberg recommended in her book about the grief she experienced after her husband's death was saying to people, how are you doing today as a way of not making it this big overwhelming question, but about what's going on today? And it allows the Abby of the situation to share whatever part of their day they want to, as opposed to only having to talk over and over again about this huge overwhelming loss in their lives. And maybe that's like just to turn that question into that because how are you doing could

mean a lot of things. And if you turn it into, here's how I'm doing today or here's how I'm doing this afternoon, or that might be an easier question to get your head around and to have a satisfying answer to. Yeah, the other thing I'd say, and Abby, we're not grief counselors or experts in grief to be clear. We are two brothers who just figured out via blowing through a pen how air gets cold. But I do think that it's really important to have conversations with people you trust about how you're feeling and what you're going through to process that grief and to learn

to live with it. And I think reaching out to people who are asking, how are you at a time when it's good for you and when you have time and when the situation is appropriate is almost always gonna be welcome by those people. And so I would encourage you to reach out to people when you need to, as you need to, but not feel obligated to say anything in response to how are you other than I'm okay or I'm doing all right today

or whatever feels right for you. I have another question that's from Tuiscu who asks, dear Hank and John, help. I use public transport almost daily and I don't know when to wear my mittens. Am I supposed to wear my gloves all the time and never take them off or am I supposed to take them off while I'm inside of the bus? I'm confused as to how I can stop my hands from getting cold. Rhymes with lizard, rhymes with lizard, Tuiscu. Wait.

Wait. Is that... Are you messing? I feel like you're messing with us. Twiskoo. Twisk, who's Zard? Lizard, Twisk's Zard. Oh, huh.

Twisks. I can't think of any word that runs with Lizard other than kind of Charzard. And even that, like, isn't a complete rhyme. Blizzard, she's all strong with me. Blizzard obviously runs with Blizzard, so their name is clearly Blizzard. I think Treesco has done an amazing job

of recognizing that we are almost definitely going to mispronounce their name and made us okay about it. I think was the goal. Yeah, and it worked, thank you. and made us okay about it. I think was the goal. Yeah, and it worked, thank you. John, I, so it depends on how warm it is on the bus. Slash, whether you wanna touch anything that's on the bus.

Right, to me, wearing mittens is an excellent excuse not to have my hands touch bus surfaces, which are widely known to be among the West clean surfaces available to humans. John, do you know that metal objects actually disinfect themselves, so like copper railings, copper donor knobs, steel poles, not like in real time, but over time they are able to, like the metal particles get into bacteria and actually disrupt their functions. Yeah, I do know that. That's great.

That's why I try very hard when I'm on public transportation never to touch plastic. Yeah, like, I almost feel like the plastic would be the cleaner surface, but it's not, in fact, because even though, like, the metal is what people are touching all the time. But anyway, yeah, where are those mittens, man? If you're comfortable, where are mittens?

Even if it's a little too warm on the bust for mittens, I would still wear the mittens because in my experience, there is very little that is less pleasant than like emergency, panicked, fast, putting on mittens. You know, so like you get to your stop, and you're like, oh my God, it's my stop, and you got your bag, and you got a bunch of things happening. And then you're like, oh, I've got to put on my mittens, you know, so like you get to your stop and you're like, oh my God, it's my stop and you got your bag and you got a bunch of things happening and then you're like, oh, I've got to put on my mittens and trying to put on mittens quickly is a recipe for disaster.

Yeah, agree, especially when you're trying to put them on a two-year-old. Oh my God. Yeah, well then I'm like, even now, like my kids won't be like be like oh the fingers aren't in the right Glovespots or whatever I'll be like it's fine Who cares? It's a six step walk to the car we can do it Just ball your fists up and put them into little Hand socks. It's fine exactly. All right, I think we got to get to some comments before we get to the all important news from Mars and AFC. When will then this email came in from Ian, who wrote, dear John and Hank, you've stated repeatedly

that this new partnership with WNYC would not change the pod, but now only one episode in, John states that Reese's peanut butter cups are the quote best Halloween candy and the first thing he steals from his children. I thought this was a strictly pro-mars pro-snickers podcast. Does W and Y see have a brand deal with Hershey that has forced John to repeal his stance on sneakers? And if this is the case, I can come to accept it. I just need the truth. Ian. Ian, it's true.

Ian, no, we can't discuss this matter. What do you mean? We can't discuss this matter. The state of our brand deal with Hershey. Slashmars. We're pitting them against each other, Ian. Exactly, Ian. There's nothing you do with WNYC.

It has to do with my desire to have a personal candy sponsor and not really caring who I sell out to. Yeah, because Snickers was like, here's a bunch of Snickers bars, and you're like, okay, that's good. But like, they only last me a month. Yeah, I gave them so much promo for those 478 Snickers bars

and did another 478 Snickers bars arrive at my office? No. So what that told me is that maybe it's time to reach out to my friends over at the Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. Place factory. Yeah, I mean, the, like, so little Snickers are fine. They're good.

They're one of the best Halloween candies. But little Reese's Peanut Butter Cups are better than big Reese Reese's peanut butter cups. And I'm standing by that statement. Yeah. No, I completely agree with you. A little snickers taste like a slightly off snickers. A little Reese's peanut butter cup tastes like a condensed and superior Reese's peanut butter cup. Yeah. Which is the kind of thing that I will say over and over and over again. If those folks just send me 478 Reese's peanut butter cups, minis or fools, I don't care.

Oh geez, minis, that's something that's like, that's like a $40 bag. That's so true. Why am I so willing to sell out for like goods and services, but not for cash? Like if Reese's was like, hey, I'll give you 80 bucks to talk about us on the pod. I would be like, of course not. You've offended me, but if they send me 80 bucks worth of candy, I'm like, hey guys, you know, it's great Reese's. I just took a bath and peanut butter in chocolate.

And I had my parents have never smelled better, has been spoken because I want, I want to relive each of those moments. Like I want to be a fly, if heaven exists, it's me as a fly on the wall, every single time any human has ever said my parents have never smelled better. It's just a great compilation video and it's just John's heaven. It's just like an infinite

video. Yeah, it's the infinite just like I would be so happy for eternity if it was just that and then like I would get occasional breaks to be with my family but like my job would be watching every time that's ever happened. Okay. Okay. Alright, I'm in actual tears. Also, Sean and a bunch of other people wrote into say to your Hank and John on your recent podcast you discussed some specifics regarding the terms of Will a person visit

Mars before 2028 and while I agree with your assessment views of the alien dogs, I think you missed a crucial aspect of your bet and your discussion and your understanding thereof. Citizens United established the precedent that corporations are in fact people. So should a corporation, i.e. SpaceX visit Mars by 2028, I would argue that Hank per the specific terms of the bet has one regards Sean. Thank you, Sean, and everyone else who responded similarly excellent point. Completely disagree on every level, Sean. First off, if SpaceX gets to Mars by 2028, I will eat my hat. Secondly, corporations are not people. No matter what the Supreme Court says. Like, if a corporation does something, nobody ever says like, oh, the first person has made it to the top of Mount Everest.

It was Google. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think John has legitimate points, but I'm gonna go with the Supreme Court just because I want the podcast to remain named the dear Hank and John, although probably it still won't be. Yeah, I still like my odds by the way. Hank, it's time for the news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon. I'll go first.

I have decided to be relentlessly positive about AFC Wimbledon through the end of the year. I think that the negativity is not helping. Yes, we are at the very bottom of the table. Yes, we lost another game, the first game without Neal Ardley, two to one after being up one nil. But we're not going to talk about that stuff anymore. We're going to talk about good things, great news, and the best news, the really exciting,

is that the Don's Trust, which owns AFC Wimbledon, Wimbledon is owned by its fans, the Don's Trust is having elections right now. So if you are a member of the Don's Trust, if you own AFC Wimbledon, I own like one six thousandth of the club, you can also own one six thousandth of the club. You can vote for your preferred candidates right now, which I have done. It is democracy in action and it's a very special thing. Most people don't get to vote for the people who are going to lead their club. They just have to deal with whatever rich person owns it. And in that respect, Wimbledon fans are very fortunate. And so I'm really excited that there are 11 people running

for the four spots in the Don's Trust that are up for election this year. And I love the way the club is run. And I love that forever 75% of AFC Wimbledon will be owned by the Don's trust and no matter what rich person comes in and tries to steal it, it can't. It is an asset of its community, which is the way that all sports teams should be. So good news, what's going on in Mars? So the day that this podcast comes out, Mars Insight Lander will be landing on the surface of Mars

one way or another, John, unless it misses. In which case it's a terrible news. So I guess that's a possibility, but a really big is this Landr. Give me, uh, give me some specs. Uh, I don't know what it weighs. That would be an interesting fact for me to have access to and yet I don't. Am I talking about like a hot wheel landing on Mars? Or am I talking about like a desk landing on Mars?

A bigger than a desk. Wow. Yeah. And also it will get bigger once it lands because it will unfold, which is quite cool. That is cool. I'm so excited for this Hank. I have bookmarked the NASA website

and set a calendar reminder so I don't excited for this Hank. I have bookmarked the NASA website and set a calendar reminder so I don't miss the live stream. I need this moment. Yeah, I agree. I'm right there with you, John. So last week, I talked about this size thermometer that insight will place on the surface of Mars. And now, I will tell you about the two other main experiments that are on the insight lander. One is a heat probe that will hammer itself down into the surface of Mars, and here's what it does. It will go down a little bit, and then it will release some heat, and then measure

how fast that heat dissipates, and this will tell us about the composition at that level, and then it will go 50 centimeters deeper, and it will release some heat and do it again. And then 50 centimeters at a time until it's five meters, ideally, if everything goes to plan, below the surface of Mars, at which point it will sit there, and it will have learned its active experiment part of how much, how good Mars is at dissipating heat, which will tell us about the composition of the crust. So basically, Hank, what you're saying is that this contraption will be kind of like hot breathing onto the surface of Mars. Yeah, there's a portion of it that will be hot breathing onto the surface of Mars, correct? It's great. And then there's another experiment that is designed to tell whether or not Mars has a solid core,

which is a question that's up in the air. We literally have no idea, and it does that by basically measuring exactly where it is on the surface of Mars, and that will allow us to tell how much Mars wobbles in its orbit, and that wobble, and how that wobble works, will tell us whether there's a core of the planet, which is amazing, that you can do that with just a couple antennas on the surface of the lander. That is pretty amazing. That you can do that with just a couple antennas on the surface of the, the, the lander.

That is pretty amazing. Science. Science! All right, Hank, thank you for product with me. Thanks to everybody for listening. We're off to make our patron only podcast over at patreon.com slash deerhank and John called this week in Ryan's.

But first, I think Hank has the credits. I do. deerhank and John is a co-production of Complexly and WNYC Studios. It's produced by Rosie on a Halsey Rojas and shared in Gibson. Our editor is Nicholas Jenkins, Victoria Bonjourno, as our head of community and communications. The music you're hearing now and at the beginning of the podcast is by the great Gunnarola, and as they say in our hometown, don't forget to be awesome.

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