Dear Hank & John - 174: The Mysterious "Stolen" Car

Episode Date: January 28, 2019

Am I too old to race down hotel hallways? Is there a stranger in my attic? How do you make plans with a subgroup of friends? And more! If you're in need of dubious advice, email us at [e-mail]! Join us for monthly livestreams and an exclusive weekly podcast at patreon.com/dearhankandjohn.

Hello and welcome to Dear Egg and John. George, I prefer to think that you're John and Hank. It's a comedy podcast where two brothers answer your questions, give you to be a advice and bring you all the weeks news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon John. Have you ever noticed that Marxists always write only in lowercase? No, why is that hang? It's because they hate capitalism. That's a pretty good joke

That's a pretty good joke, but thanks John Hank I'd like to propose a new opening bit for me in the podcast this whole thing where I try to share good news It's not working because I don't feel it in my heart, and I think I think our listeners can tell Yeah, I think so too. I was thinking maybe we could institute a new thing where I share something every week that I would have tweeted if only I had Twitter. Golden Retriever leads ambulance through Maves of Alleyways

to save his owner. I mean, that news story sounds faked. It sounds like probably an oversimplification of a complicated story to try to make people feel good about a world where I don't think that you should feel unambiguous, we good. Anyway. What would you have tweeted, John?

This week Hank, I would have tweeted a link to the op-ed I wrote in the Washington Post about why I'm not on Twitter. You wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post? Yeah, and I can't even read it because that's got a paywall. Well pay for journalism, Hank. Hilariously, the editor of this op-ed very, very kindly and gently asked me to tweet about the op-ed in question. Really? Yeah.

Yeah, he made a good argument, but like, I can't get on Twitter. Yeah, I mean, there are a lot of things I need you to be tweeting, John. This is not the only thing. There are many things that you have not tweeted that I wish you had. I have even thought about tweeting it myself. What have you thought about tweeting that you wished I was tweeting about? Just like life's library stuff or let it snow news, turtles all the way down news, all this stuff I feel I'm like I expect to be seeing and I'm like I didn't find out about this because John isn't tweeting.

Well I mean you could always call me. I'm here. That sounds very time consuming. I need to just show up in the feed, John. A little bit of the four hours a day he spent on Twitter could be spent calling your dear old brother. Oh, God. But if I call you, we'd talk for like an hour. Yeah, and then you'd still have three spare hours. Yeah, but I'd have less time to be on Twitter.

Alright, let's answer some questions from our listeners. This first one comes from Jacqueline, who asks, dear Hank and John, hello, my name is Jacqueline, pronounced like Jacqueline, and my question is, why has there been no Ryan's in either of your books? Why were the Carl's called Curls and not Ryan's?

I'm a huge fan of your work from an Apple Juice Lover Jacqueline. Let's do now we know that about Jacqueline. Yeah, like if you have a chance to tell people one thing about yourself, it's Apple juice lover. I think that's great. Yeah, I mean, people are using their sign-offs to not tell us information about themselves.

I wanna know more about you. Sure. I have a collection of antique swords, Jacqueline. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, giant. Why do people collect giant knives, John? Well, that's not air. That's not invite, that's not invite correspondence from the giant knife community. I don't know. I don't want to hear from them.

Ha, ha, ha, ha. We should really all use our name specific synops to do more at the same time. Here's the answer, Jacqueline. I have never written a character named Ryan because I have a friend in real life whose name is Ryan and I try to avoid real life friend names in my books. Now you may be saying Jacqueline, what about an abundance of Catherine's, a book that is entirely about people named Catherine, which is also the name of your sister-in-law, and also

contains a character named Hassan, which is the name of one sister-in-law, and also contains a character named Hassan, which is the name of one of your real-life friends. I'll answer your question, Jacqueline, by saying that that was the last time I did it, because people were like, oh, is Hassan Hassan, is Catherine Catherine? But I was like, oh, enough. I don't feel like I have any control over what my characters are named. Really? I thought I did. I created it several times I have any control over what my characters are named. Really? I thought I did. I created it several times, I was just writing and I was like, oh this is a character, boom,

here's a name, and then I went to thinking that I would just replace it with something better down the road and then found it was completely impossible for me to imagine that person being named something else. Wow. Wow. Yeah, that is not a problem I have. I'm able to change character names all the time. I just, I feel like they're real people.

I can't, you can't just like start calling somebody, somebody something else. Well, once I settle into the name, and I know why they're named that, they stay named that. But I need to get to a place where I know why they have that name. Like right now, well, I was about to talk about something that I'm working on, but I've decided not to.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Your John and Hank, when one of my friends is having a hard day and texts me about it, how do I respond? Like the other day my friend was really upset about a recent breakup and I was like, sorry? Because what do I say? Catherine. Sorry. Sorry. Not that. No, not sorry with three question marks.

You don't say sorry with three question marks. Sorry with three question marks. You don't say sorry with three question marks. Man, you probably say sorry, but yeah, this is one of the things that fascinates me about like textual communication. Yeah, it's so hard to, I also never know quite how to deal with bad news delivered via text message.

Well, that's because that's why we have all of these tools that are not texts inside of our texting apps now. We can send, we can draw people a heart with our finger and that's like, oh, that's like you've made something for me. You can, you can create, I don't know how it works. I'm waving my hands around, create with your texting app. I assume you're not using built-in text messaging. I assume that this is like snap zap or whatever. And then, or you can send a gif, gif, hif. Did you just say snap zap?

Snap zap. Oh yeah. Like it was mixing together, snapchat and WhatsApp was what I was trying to go for. Oh, I thought it was like, I was thinking like snap sap was like the snapchat for trees. Snap snaps sounds like a good candy mostly.

You should see the filters that like my oak tree uses on snap sap. I mean, it makes my oak tree look exactly like a maple. Yeah, I mean, it's something else, but I tell you what, they, I text my trees and it's days, possibly weeks before I hear back. It is true. Well, I think it's because they're busy

snapsaping each other. Maybe, maybe that's happening. It could be Hank that your trees are just happening. Just aren't that into you. I've never had a problem getting any snapsaps back from my sycamores. They're immediate responders. That's great.

I'm wonderful to hear. Maybe my trees have more of a social life than yours do. I mean, this is the dead, jokiest bit we've ever done. It's not great. It's not great. Not going down the industry. No one's making an animatic about this one. John, yeah, I, so first of all, I don't, I would never text someone

with like a bad thing that happened to me. It would never occur to me to be like, I'm having a bad day and I'll just like pick a friend and be like, I just wanted to let you know that I'm having a bad day. I just, it's not in my like, on the, like, drop down menu of possible things I could do when something bad happens. Right, but that's because you're much older and just like from a totally different generation. Catherine, I think when somebody texts you bad news, you have a choice, you can either call them and say,

Hey, I know you were having a bad day, so I wanted to give you a call, so you could actually hear like a supportive voice and I want you to know that I care about you, I hope that you're doing well. Or you can text back something a little bit longer than sorry with three question marks. Along the lines of, I think you're a really wonderful person

and I think you're amazing and it's a bummer that that dude broke up with you, but, you know, a b****** him. Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. I'm thinking you find a gif with the words BEEP HIM. Uh-huh. And you're beautiful and then you send him that. You're, uh, or some kind of words of encouragement

delivered via Neopatric Harris or Markiplier or somebody from the Lord of the Rings. Sure. And my axe. You're better off without him is what you should say. Yeah, you should be supportive, but you should never, ever, ever in response to bad news, right? Sorry, with three question marks.

What do you want a meat ado about it? Exactly. A Catherine, a different one. My house was in my house, unfortunately, was destroyed in a wildfire. Sorry. They're looking for a message of support. So if you can deliver that via gimmily, the dwarf, do it.

This next question comes from Sarah, who asks, dear Hank and John, I have a group of about nine-ish friends that hang out a lot. And as you can imagine, or may have experienced, this makes it difficult to plan things like dinners or group outings. What's the etiquette for planning something fun for a subgroup of friends without making other friends feel left out?

I've been doing this unskilledfully for years, and it never seems to work out the way I hope it will, trying to be considerate but also hang out with small groups of people sometimes, Sarah. Sarah, I can solve this problem, and I can solve it with three question marks. Every Monday or Tuesday, my buddy Alex sends a text message to all of our friends, like we have a group of friends,

and the text message says, trivia with three question marks, and then in parentheses, Thursday with three question marks, and the people who say yes, hang out with Alex on Thursday at trivia, and the people who say no don't. So the key is you invite everyone, but some percentage of people will say no. Right, so you have to start picking things

that some people are gonna say no to. Yeah. Like, fried cheese at my house, everybody's gonna come over. Right, you can't, yeah, you start to have to be like, bowling Thursday, but like specific times, during which some people probably can't make it, and also people are like, bowling isn't that fun. Cariochi, on Tuesday evening?

No. See, you'll never get John to carry Okia on Tuesday. Also, build a spreadsheet. You wanna make sure nobody's getting left out, mark everybody who's you've seen, and keep track of it, and then you have, have you haven't seen Dolores for a little while, you gotta highlight her and Red,

and make sure that you and Dolores get some good quality time. I know what my friends do when they wanna see each other and they don't want to see me. They go rock climbing. Like a couple times a year, all of my friends except for me go rock climbing. And I know that they don't like rock climbing. They just need a weekend without me.

Yeah, you got to build like a Vin diagram of all your friends and their various interests. Yeah, man the only way we can get rid of John is literally to climb up this sheer face of granite. John's not coming out to this one. This is similar. My friends will be, my friends have stopped asking me at this point if I would like to go fishing. I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no, that sounds like it's very early in the morning.

Oh, I love fishing. I also love fishing. It's just, I do not have the time to even invest in the acquisition of the gear, let alone to go fishing. Sure, sure. No, you are a very busy person. One of the benefits of my demotion at work

so that I now report to my little brother is that I have far more time for fishing. Yeah, and also, I know pretty much what you'd say in any given situation. Yeah. Oftentimes people will be like, would it be okay if John gave this up? And I'm like, oh, it would be okay for John to give.

He's perfectly happy to not sit on that panel. I think he'll be okay. Yeah, yeah, it's true. Take your friends fishing. Not everybody's going to want to go Sarah, so it's perfect. It's good. I like that. That is not the answer I would have given John, and I'm 30 something year old man. I forgot. Seven, eight, something like that. something year old man, I forgot. Seven, eight, something like that. And I wouldn't have had that because that's the extra three years of life experience you have.

Thank you for giving me that job. All right, Hank, this next question comes from Carly who writes, dear John and Hank, help. I'm a 21 year old college student and like most people my age, I have friends. I knew from high school on Facebook. These people are getting married and starting to have children on purpose.

Yeah. Uh huh. I am in a relationship, but nowhere near getting engaged or having an actual child. No more am I interested in doing that in the near future. How do you interact with peers who are doing different adult things than you? I come a carly. I get that done. The first time I had a friend who had a child on purpose was when I was still in high school and I was like, oh, and I realized that we were going to have very different lives and we stopped being friends. Yeah, I think that happens a lot because you end up with different leisure activities and just different schedules and a very different feeling life.

Being a parent is, at least in my experience, very different from life when you don't have kids, at whatever age you become a parent. That said, I think the way that you continue to bridge that gap is by being conscious of it and being aware of it and working To bridge it so get you know hang out with their kids. You don't have to have a kid to hang out with kids in fact It in my experience. It's the most effective birth control But John I'm getting a sense from Carly. Yeah, these aren't people These are people I knew from high school on Facebook.

They're people, Carly's age. But the question is, how do you interact with peers who are doing different adult things than you? And I think you just have to understand that they're doing different adult things. Sure. You can still like their picture

and be like, oh my God, cuties question mark question mark question mark. Do you ever feel like, because Facebook exists now, we hold on to friendships that maybe we don't need? Is this a bad one? I feel bad to be like hey sometimes like it's okay to have friends and then in the future you won't be friends with a person anymore but it's a thing that happens.

You know that New Year's Eve song, Old Lengzain, Should Old acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind? Is that what that's all about? Oh yeah, that's literally those are the first words of the song. That part's in English. I mean, I knew the words. I just didn't know what an Old acquaintance was. I thought I might be like a Scottish word for memories.

No, it's not. It's a Scottish word for people memories. No, it's not. It's a Scottish word for people you know, but not well. So like the English also, I'm aware of the point and the point and the point and the point. Anyway, sometimes I listen to that song, which I think might be the most beautiful song and I've ever heard in my life, but sometimes I listen to that song.

And of course, the rhetorical answer should old acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind is well of course they shouldn't be forgot and in fact we have to toast them right now to days of old Langzai. But sometimes I think to myself, man maybe sometimes old acquaintance should be forgot and never brought to mind.

So John in this song, all Lang's Zined, he says, for all Lang's Zined, my Joe. Use Joe. Dear. Joe is a dear, a female dear? No, no, no. Okay, can we just, can we spend a little more time laughing at that one?

This guy's glad you liked it. Now my best work, but I was glad you liked it. Now my best work, but I'm glad you liked it. It's so stupid. To return to your question, Carly, I think if you wanna be friends with these people, then you've gotta be conscious of the ways in which your life are different and do a good job of listening to each other.

And if you don't wanna be friends with them, that's fine, just like the occasional photo no big whoop. Yeah, sometimes old acquaintances should be forgot. This next question comes from Callie who asks, dear Hank and John, I'm going to turn 18 soon, and I have many questions about what it's like to be a legal adult. However, a very important one occurred to me over my family's past vacation. Would I become an adult?

Am I still allowed to race down empty hotel hallways like a hyper-energetic child? Do other people even do this? As two people who seem to spend a decent amount of time in hotels, do I either view ever do this? I am in dire need of advice on this matter. Going back to...cally. I have thoughts, John, but hit me with yours first. I do remember doing this in high school. Like, I loved running up and down a hallway,

and I still don't totally understand why. It's not something I do much anymore, unless I'm like leaving the hotel bar, and then the elevator takes a long time, and I really have to pee. Ha-ha-ha-ha. I think the last time I did the full first, Kali, I will say other people do do this because I have had many a hotel room in which I have heard children slash young adults running

up and down the hallways giggling, making noise. It is an audible noise in the hotel room. And so yes, I have experienced it. I've also done it. I think probably the last time I did it was well after my 18th birthday. I was solidly probably, I'd say, in the mid late 20s was the last time

I ran full speed down a hotel hallway. And what changed from then to now that I haven't done it in probably a decade? I don't know, John, something inside of me, possibly my moniscus. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Yeah, it is weird how I don't miss being young. I really don't, and I love adulthood.

I think adulthood is tremendously underrated by young people, or certainly was, it was underrated by me when I was a young person. But at the same time, there is something sort of tragic about the fact that I no longer run up and down hotel hallways. And I know that, like I get why people would look at a middle aged person, you know, walking at an amiable pace down a hotel hallway and think like, oh, you know,

there's a person who's no longer sucking the marrow out of life or whatever. I just don't want to anymore. Question mark, question mark, question mark. Yeah, I mean, there's something about like that when you sort of get off the elevator and it's like this long expense and you're like, wow, look at how, usually can't run far and straight

inside of a hall, like I'm never in a hallway this long. And so there's something backens to you about it to be like, okay, bust it out, push hard, go, go, go. And maybe I've been in hotels so much that that thought doesn't occur to me anymore or maybe I just don't have a playful enough mind anymore. I will say when I'm at my house wearing socks, there's a long hallway with wooden floors in my house.

And sometimes I will get a running start and then do the sock slide, like risky business sock slide. I'll still do that, but every time I do it, I think this could be the last time I sock slide and the first time I tear my ACL. Okay. Yeah, I mean, it's, we're solidly in the winter here in Mizzoula, Montana, and I definitely spend a fair amount

of time skating across icy sidewalks and enjoying myself, but also thinking someday I will have to stop doing this. Functionally, or my hair not, I don't know, will you? Well, I mean, eventually I'll be dead All right, well, let's move on this next question comes from anonymous who writes dear John and Hank I was out to a midnight dinner with my friends when I realized I lost my car keys I quickly ran outside ran back panic to express how bad the situation was Ran back outside they paid my tab and came out to help. So here we all are shivering and panicked,

and tired, and about to call a toe service. When my hands slowly graze over my pocket and low and behold, there are my keys. Oh, wow, oh, God. This sounds like me. It sounds like something I do. I've been in a Nalega situation many times. I suddenly had the idea to check the table one more time.

Went back in and came out with my large glob of keys in my hands saying I had found them on the table. They actually believed me and we all made up a story that the waiter had deceptively done it. What do I do? Do I come clean days later and laugh off that I'm a liar as if I didn't just lower myself to the level of the worst politicians? Do I continue to let them believe that the waiter is a shady person? In case they listen to Dear Hank and John, I am anonymous. Well, first of all, your lie was so bad. Oh, so bad. You could have found that.

You could have been like, oh, I went to the bathroom. Yes. I forgot I went to the bathroom. Yes, that is exactly what I would have done. I would have been like, wait, oh, did I leave them in the bathroom? And then I would have faked that I left them in the bathroom. I forgot I went to the bathroom. Yes, that is exactly what I would have done. I would have been like, wait, oh, did I leave them in the bathroom? And then I would have faked that I left them in the bathroom. Don't give me wrong anonymous. I definitely would have lied in your situation. And also, I would definitely continue lying in your situation.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's a bummer that everybody blamed the waiter. Like, feels like a cliche person to blame, although I kind of get it, I mean, it's a bummer that everybody blame the waiter. Like, feels like a cliche person to blame, although I kind of get it, I guess, because like, who else could possibly be responsible for this? Of course, the answer is anonymous. But I think you just gotta continue with the lie. Hank, this reminds me of something that happened to me,

but I'm not lying when I tell you this story. So I was living in Chicago one morning, I walked outside to get in my car to drive downtown and my car was not where I had parked at the night before. I walked like a two-block radius around my apartment and I was like, well, I guess someone stole my car. So I called the police and the police came and they said, your car is probably like two and a half blocks away

and you forgot where you parked it. And I said indignantly, there is a reason that I have lived in Chicago for five years and never called the police about my car being stolen, which is that this is the first time it has been stolen. Flash forward about two hours, I get a phone call from the police that says that they've located my car two and a half blocks away. I walk to the location

where they found my car and I get in my car and the car, it was a stick shift car, the car had been left in reverse, which is something that a lot of people do in stick shifts to I don't know, keep the car from rolling away or something, but you don't really have to do it with contemporary stick shift cars. I have never done this in my life. This is not a lie. Somebody stole my car, drove it for an indefinite period of time, parked two and a half blocks away. And the reason I know this is because I would never have left my car stuck in reverse when turning it off.

And no one will believe me, which is why I am still telling the story. Like if just one person had believed me in the last 15 years, I would have been able to just stop worrying about this. But I did not like enter a fugue state, drive my car two and a half blocks away, park it in reverse, and then walk away. That did not happen. Someone stole my car.

Okay, someone stole your car and drove it a half a block. But John, by bringing this up to two and a half blocks. Zephanationally, more people will disbelieve you now than they did one minute ago, because more people know about the story. I know, and every time I tell someone this story, they're like, don't you think it's possible? And no, it's not possible.

Someone stole my car without keys. I don't know how they did it, but I have a very similar story to this one, except it's my bike and I got married. I got married. I went on my honeymoon, came home, my bike was gone and I was like my bike got stolen. And then about three months later, I found my bike chained up outside of the Florence Hotel

in Missoula, Montana. And I was like, here's my bike. I need to call the cops so they can cut the lock off and give me my bike back. And then I was like, here's my bike, I need to call the cops so they can cut the lock off and give me my bike back. And then I was like, that's my lock. They're still using my lock, how do they know my combination? And then I was like, oh, I biked to the Florence Hotel to go to my like morning rehearsal breakfast thing,

then just left it there for the last four months. But see, that is a story that makes sense. Like, I was at that breakfast, and I remember that immediately after that breakfast, we went back to your house to play like Tony Hawk Pro Skater so you could try to chill out a little bit before you're wedding. Because I was not doing great.

It was the only time I've ever seen you, like close to what I would describe as John Green anxious. So that makes sense. I understand that narrative. I do not understand how my car got 2.5 blocks away from my apartment, but we can move on. Okay. This next question comes from Elissa who asks, dear Hank, a John.

My default browser window when I open a new tab is to tab for a cause. It's a web page search engine that shows me ads, and then I can donate part of the revenue they make from the ads to a charity as hearts. I donated 300 hearts for the Foundation to Decrease World Suck. Do you know if this is real? Where do my hearts go? What are they used for? Am I getting straight up duped? Thanks, Elissa. What are they used for? Am I getting straight up duped? Thanks, Alyssa.

You're not getting duped, and I know that because we get a large donation to the Foundation to Decrease World Suck, which is our charity from Tab for a Cause every year. It is true. It works, it's a real thing. Yeah, so you can go to Tab for a Cause and basically adds happen in the background

of your web browsing, and it doesn't significantly slow down my browser and it generates money for charities. You can pick which charities you want it to go to. It's got lots of different charities that they work with. They've worked with the Foundation to decrease world suck for a long time. In fact, I think the founders of it are nerdfighters.

And yeah, it's actually, it's a pretty cool thing. Yeah, in fact, that reminds me, Hank, that today's podcast is brought to you by Tab for a Cause. Tab for a Cause, you can raise money for charity. I feel bad about taking sponsorship revenue from them, but okay, this podcast is also brought to you by Joe, a deer, a female deer. Not your bro, your Joe, your deer.

Today's podcast is also brought to you by being off social media, being off social media. I had to mention it because it's been six minutes. And finally this podcast is brought to you by rock climbing without jaw. It's the only way to rock climb. You cannot rock climb with him. It's weird that for all of my friends,

that would be their favorite hobby. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Yeah. What should I do? Like Oscar and Tony, Emma, Emmy. Sorry, that makes more sense. Hahaha. Hahaha. Hahaha. Hahaha. Hahaha. Alright, Emmy.

So there might be someone in your attic. It sounds like, like, so for complete clarity, I once worked in an office building that was not very nice and sometimes like, there would be like noises above, above like the bathroom. And I assume that it was rats or raccoons or something. And like, and even like at one point, I saw like a bunch of stuff had fallen through the vent.

Like so I thought maybe like somebody was building a nest up there. And we found out that it was actually a human being living between the floors of the building. Right, there was a person who lived like between the second and third floor of Hanks Old Office Building. I don't think that's the situation here,

but I want to emphasize that you can't rule it out. I've looked at YouTube videos on this topic and it does seem to occasionally happen. Or I don't know why I've looked at YouTube videos on this topic, but it's like seven times people were found to be living in someone else's attic. That's an example title. So Emmy, here's what you're gonna do.

That sounds like one, a YouTube video that the algorithm has correctly identified as one that John would click on, and also one that John would click on. Like, the YouTube knows so much about you. It's like, you know, I know that this video isn't going to be good for you, but you are going to watch it. So we have decided to show you this thumbnail. Exactly. Yeah. It's like, Hey, I believe that this guy once Googled, is there someone in my attic? And so nine years later, I'm going to show him this video that says, yes, yes, there is someone in your attic. I mean, you're gonna call an exterminator

and the exterminator is going to come and go into your attic and one of two things is going to happen. One, there's gonna be a raccoon, which I think is like overwhelmingly the most likely scenario and that raccoon is gonna get dealt with one way or another. Two, the exterminator is going to encounter

the person who's living in your attic, and then that's their problem. Because that's their house now. Right, yeah, the exterminator has inherited your home, and they have to deal with this. I mean, I'm laughing, but this really is one of my great terrors. It's terrifying, it is terrifying,

and I don't like it. And now I need to check my attic. Yeah, there's a big difference between hearing noises and hearing people, right? If you're hearing human voices talking to each other, then I would get, get. I would do, yeah, that's out of that. That sounds like a police time.

That sounds like a time for a police and that's why the police are there. I assume that you haven't heard human voices, but also raccoons are very advanced. Oh my God, yeah. They have human hands. Just like people, they have human hands and frequently invade strangers addicts.

No, no, no. It's not a thing that people frequently do. It is like humans. It's a very common problem. They have human hands and they eat exactly the same food as people. There's nothing that people eat that raccoon's don't eat. Hank, I'd like to show you a website called... Oh God, no.

What siteite. What siteite. What video call and man finds woman living in addict. I'd also like to show you a website called someone is living in my attic, three exclamation points, creeper in my apartment, question mark, someone has been living in our attic, two exclamation points. This is a genre.

This article is titled, it's just weird Seattle man finds stranger living in his attic. Six, I actually found the YouTube video I watched. It has two million views, so I'm not going to leave. Oh my God. And it's called Six Sick Strangers Caught Living in Other People's House. Oh my God.

Oh, this, Dave says, I don't immediately freak out, but I'm like, this is not ordinary. Yeah. Yeah. I do immediately freak out. That's exactly what I do. Like, that's the perfect person to experience someone else. Right, like an unexpected stranger living in the attic

is the person who doesn't usually freak out. Yeah, like I wanna call Davis and be like, do you wanna job? Like you sound like you're good at high stress circumstances. Sounds like you can really handle handle some curveballs life throws at you. I think you might be good for the conference planning industry. That's my new question for all of our applicants to jobs.

How would you feel if you found someone living in your attic? Would you think that that's just weird? And something you could handle? Or would you freak out, run out of the house, call, run into your neighbor's home Hide in their attic while calling That's of course how it's all happened, you know Spreads from person to person it's yeah, oh god

Man, I am I mean the very first thing I'm going to do when I get off this call is going to my attic and make an Extremely thorough accounting. I feel like we have to have a warning at this point in the podcast to be like when when not if because like Of course, this is what's gonna happen. You check your attic for strangers. Be very careful. It's difficult to go up those little Ladder stairs sometimes. Oh, I thought you meant be very careful. There is likely a stranger in the back. No, I just don't want you to fall over. That's by far the most dangerous part of this podcast. It's people falling on their way up to their attic. Now people are like, do I even have an attic?

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. There's a big possibility we have not considered, which is that it's a ghost. What if it's a ghost raccoon? Oh my ghost. What if it's a ghost raccoon? Oh my god, what if it's a ghost raccoon, then you really have to move. That's, can we move on now? Yeah. This next question comes from Liam, who asks, dear Hank, a job.

I'm starting to apply for colleges and I feel like there's pressure to be good at one specific subject. It seems like most of my friends have their thing that they're really good at, like painting or math. But I just kind of have basic knowledge about a lot of things. How do I find my thing? Wondering if lip balm can be my thing, Liam. Liam, there are so many jobs. Like there are so many different kinds of careers and different kinds of life that you can have and in many not all certainly but in many of those careers and lives it is more helpful to have several things than it is to have one thing. Like it's more helpful to be someone who knows how to learn and

someone who knows how to write a sentence be someone who knows how to learn and someone who knows how to write a sentence and somebody who knows how to deal with people than it is to be, you know, a PhD in mathematics. I think the part of this is going in self-aware and like understanding that like, maybe you're not a one thing kind of person. It certainly is a society where we have a lot of jobs with extreme specificity in mind,

but I also find that that specificity isn't really found until you get out of school. So you have sort of like that basic background and then you get more specific as you get into the workplace. But also there are lots of jobs that require, as John says, a broad base of knowledge and also a really good ability to learn and problem solve and figure stuff out. And I think that that can be very well taught through an education that doesn't necessarily have one thing.

Yeah, Hank, that's good advice. I mean, you're such a good CEO. Well, thank you very much, John. Here I am. I also have no idea what the frick I am doing. I was not trained for this job. Oh, God. Yeah, every time I look at a spreadsheet, I'm like, I can't believe that, like,

they've allowed me to get away with looking like somebody who knows how to look at a spreadsheet. And Julie opens the budget, and I'm like, I mean, it looks good, right? No, I had to call Julie the other day and ask her, like, the most basic question about a spreadsheet, which was, how do I make all of, how do I show what adding all of these numbers together

equals? Oh, you don't know how to do a sum function. I love it. Wow. I do now, not to brag. But until I learned how to do a sum function, what I used to do was I would copy all of the numbers from the spreadsheet and I would paste them

into the Google search bar and then I would put a plus sign between each of them. Oh wow. Which also works but is not as quick. Yeah, yeah, I guess that works. You could also just like write them down with a pencil and do a bunch of addition. Well, the other thing I would sometimes do

is I would just look at the numbers and try to get it like an approximate sense of the sum. Oh, yeah, I do do that all the time. Yeah, so I'll be like, that's around 80. Could be 90 or 70. Could be 62. I'm not not great At addition, yeah, but if I do it enough times it'll all come out of the

I mean that is too real That is too real for me where I'm like, okay, so now I've estimated it wants to be 90 Let's try estimating it again from scratch That's too real. Oh, so glad I devoted you. I really feel a lot of ability. I feel super exposed on the spreadsheet front. Yeah, no, I mean, for the record, I would like to just say that one cannot be demoted

by someone who isn't yet their boss. I demoted myself, and then you accepted my demotion. I love spreadsheet so much. I built a really good spreadsheet recently for a potential business partner that we wanna work with and oh, it's such a thing of beauty. You change one number over here and one number over here and it's just like, boom, boom, boom,

whole thing changes itself. I love it. You can build them from scratch? Yeah, I mean, essentially someone has to build the spreadsheet from scratch. Like it's a, I didn't, oh, I can can build them from scratch? Yeah, I mean, essentially, someone has to build this spreadsheet from scratch. Like, it's a, I didn't, oh, I can't build one from scratch. I can't build one from scratch like that. I have to wait until someone sends me a spreadsheet.

One time I tried to make a spreadsheet for my accountant, for my taxes, and I sent it to her, and she wrote back, I don't understand what you've done here. Can you send a word doc? Hahaha. Hahaha. Like my spreadsheet building is so bad. My accountant was just like, why don't you write all of this out?

Yeah. Alright Hank, before we get to the all important news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon, I want to ask this question from Celia. It's a big one. She asks, dear John and Hank, why does cold water taste so good and hot water taste so bad? I'm concerned penguins, Celia. It's interesting because you put some stuff in some hot water and then you got a good thing.

You got hot chocolate, tea, coffee, that's the thing. We're all down with that. We're just like, especially warm water. Mm-hmm. I'm like, ooh, something seems bad, like I shouldn't be doing this. And I think that that goes down to like, if you're gonna be drinking water without like modern infrastructure,

you're gonna wanna find the coldest water possible, cause the warmer the water is, the more life there is in it. So you think it's like an evolutionary adaptation that when we drink plain water that's the exact temperature of our mouths were grossed out. Like you think that is built in hardwired into the human brain? I think that it is hardwired to prefer cold over hot water because cold water is less likely to have pathogens in it.

I definitely see that and I have to say that even now I kind of believe when hot water is coming out of the tap that it is more gross. Yeah, interesting. And I know that's probably irrational, but I still believe that. So, well, I mean, probably, I'm gonna stick with my probably. I'm not here to attempt microscopic fate. That's not the business I'm in. Okay. But yeah, I think, yeah, there you go, Celia. It's for, that's my guess anyway.

I'm not gonna be like, 100 P. That's the funny thing, I say, 100 P now. I'm not gonna be 100 P on that, because look, evolution is complicated. How you doing, Johnny, okay? No. This is my new trick. I can give Johnny an immediate fever

by just saying hundo pee. That's, I don't like it. It doesn't feel good in my heart. I'm feeling very sad now. It's the thing people say. I didn't make it up. I's the thing people say. I have never heard anyone say hundo pee other than you and maybe Logan Paul. Do you hear Logan Paul say very much?

I mean, I think that you are to blame for the reason that Logan Paul shows up on the vlog brother's YouTube homepage. I know and know I am not. I never watch the app. It's not my fault. It's not my fault. I'm busy watching six strangers caught living in other people's houses. Good, high quality YouTube content.

And I'm watching like machines get made by other machines. All right, I'm just gonna take a gander at the old watch history here. If you're gonna look at the watch history, I'm gonna look at the watch history and I'm gonna see what embarrassing things you watched recently. You got me, and it's all classic Tetris and Rocket League.

I can't stop watching, I can't stop watching high quality classic Tetris. That's why I'm getting all these Rocket League videos. I know, I'm sorry, I'm trying to stop. It is an addiction. I'm really into Rocket League videos right now. I've never even played Rocket League. What's the deal?

I know. I did watch a few like, not just people playing Rocket League, but people giving me tips on how to play it well. And I'm like, why am I watching this? I also, um, yeah, I also like watched an hour and a half of the Rocket League World Championships. And by the end of it, I had like a team that I was rooting for and a favorite member of that team. And when

the crowd would chant MVP, I would be like, yeah, MVP, MVP. I got to I got to stop watching Rocket League. That's okay. I don't mind. I don't mind that particular suggestion. So there you go. Hank Theorizes, that warm water just is grosser. I think it's just grosser. John, do you have news from AFC Wimbledon that you want to share,

or would you just like to skip it? I mean, I don't have any news that I'm that excited to share. It's been a difficult, it's just been a hard year. And AFC Wimbledon are not just in last place, but they are distantly in last place. So if you want to see a third tier English soccer team in the form of AFC Wimbledon, the time to do that is definitely now, because I don't think it's looking like they're going to be a third tier English soccer team next year. They lost three nil to Fleetwood Town goals in the 1930th and 83rd minute after losing four one in their previous league one matchup. So two consecutive

three gold defeats, not good. Next league one game is against Sunderland, High Flying Sunderland, High Flying Super Rich Sunderland. So it's looking like we are going to be more to the bottom for the remainder of the season. What's the news from Mars? How's things, how's things on Mars? John, we, we, the news from Mars is that Donald, President Donald Trump offered a NASA official unlimited funding if they could get to Mars before 2020. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,

wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,

wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait Does Donald Trump know about the Mars sometimes being much further away from Earth than other times thing? Because to be fair to the president, I did not know that until the podcast. No, yeah, I don't think most people do. Yeah, I think most people are like, once you say it, I'll be like, oh yeah, I guess that makes sense. But yeah, no, I don't think that he's probably super aware of that.

I don't know, the headline is Trump offered NASA unlimited funding to go to Mars in his first term in New York magazine. And yeah, I mean, perhaps it was unclear. So it was like as they were sitting down to do a live thing, there was this NASA official and astronaut with him. Ivanka was there. They were going to congratulate Peggy Wittsen, direct to the International Space Station, Peggy was an astronaut on the ISS at that time. And they were sitting

down, and I guess he was doing a small talk maybe, but basically said, can we get this done? Can we get this thing done? I'd like to get a big accomplishment under my belt. Maybe we could get there by 2020. And I think that everybody was like, no, that's not a thing that can physically occur. And he was seemed a little bit disappointed about it. Well, so they did have to explain

some orbital mechanics stuff to him. And also that they couldn't push back the conversation that they were having with astronaut Peggy Watson because the ISS has to be above them while they're having that conversation, not behind the earth from their perspective. And that is a pretty short window. It's fair that's also something I probably wouldn't have known. But I'm sorry Hank that we're not going to Mars in 2020 despite an offer of unlimited funds. Yeah, I mean, I think ultimately I don't want us to rush things. I don't want to make

a mistake. I think that if you're trying to do it into two-year window, it seems like you're gonna move fast break things. You don't wanna do that when you're dealing with very big rockets with people on top of them. Right. So, probably for the best, I'm still optimistic for 2028. Seems like SpaceX is doing just fine laying off 10% of its staff. We're all good, no bigs.

I'm, we're gonna be fine. So really neither AFC Wimbledon nor Mars are crushing it at the moment. Mars is great. Lots of good stuff is happening on Mars. I mean a lot of stuff is happening at AFC Wimbledon. Mission to Mars is not going great. That, right.

That's like saying there's a lot of great things happening with AFC Wimbledon. They're building a new stadium. The youth teams are strong, the women's team is strong. There is just the one problem. Right, well, what I will say is not doing great is my bet. My bet is not looking strong. And we should say for new listeners that this podcast

will be renamed Dear John and Hank, if there are no humans on Mars by the end of 2027. All right. No, by the end of 2028. I believe it's 2027. We can look it up later. The point is, Hank, it's been a pleasure to pod with you. It's been a pleasure to pod with you too, John.

Thank you. Thank you to everybody who sent us questions. You can send us questions via email at HankandJohn at gmail.com. You can also send us questions via email at hankandjohnatgmail.com. You can also send us questions via Twitter, but John won't see those, so don't do that. Sorry, now I'm mentioning it. I'm not so sure.

Yeah, I don't know how I'm doing it. This podcast is edited by Nicholas Jenkins. It's produced by Rosie on a Halsey Rollhassen shared in Gibson. Our head of community and communication is Victoria Bon Giorno. The music that 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.