Dear Hank & John - 184: Lady with the Time Piece (w/ Helen Zaltzman!)

Episode Date: April 8, 2019

How do you deal with saying something wrong publicly? How far does a squirrel's social sphere extend? Can I ask my friend questions about her surgery? And more! Thanks to Helen Zaltzman for being a temporary Green brother this week! Find more of Helen's work at helenzaltzman.com. Follow us on Twitter! twitter.com/dearhankandjohn 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 Hank and John! Or as I like to think of it, Dear Helen and Hank. It's a comedy podcast where two brothers and sometimes those special guests answer your questions, give you a debuse advice and bring you all the week's news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon. Helen! Do you know when you first move into a house, sometimes the house doesn't have numbers on it. That's concerning.

What, what, what the blazes is this nightmare? Yeah, I think it's okay as long as you address the situation. Oh, Jesus, dad. How are you doing, Helen? Everybody, this is Helen Salzman. Hi. She is from the podcast, The Illusionist and also several other enterprises of great quality. I'm a big fan and got to hang out with Helen at PodCon and she graciously agreed to take over for John as he is traveling with Partners in Health right now, which is really cool.

And I just got an update from him that says things are going very well. No, wait a minute. So it's turned out well for him and for me because I'm delighted to be here. That's great. And also I've made a question answering podcast for 12 years. So I feel like I've been training for this moment. Yeah, I mean, it's a, there's a number of questions that came in that Helen was like, yeah, no, don't, I don't talk about roommate stuff anymore.

It's just broke me. We've been doing a question firecast for 12 years, you've done all the roommate questions. You know how there's that often repeated quotation. I think from a Russian author saying, all happy families are happy in the same way, all unhappy families are unhappy in a unique way. Unhappy roommates, I think, are unhappy in the same way.

Pretty much. It's like, do the dishes. Do the dishes. Never have a dish that isn't done is the main thing. It really is though. And it's amazingly creepy in one's contentment that can be created by undone dish. Yeah.

Yeah, we have the same situation in our office. We had an institute in no dish policy. If there's a dish have the same situation in our office. We had to institute a no-dish policy. If there's a dish in the sink, then like, it's like all hands on deck time for a meeting. That seems like a bit more effort than just cleaning the dish or smashing it into pieces. Yeah. That's exactly right. Well, or that's what we should do. We should be like, if there's a dish in the sink, we're taking it outside and shooting it. It's Montana. This is how we solve problems.

Desperate times. Tell me about your question answer podcast. It's called Answer Me This. And we answer questions. That's it from the listeners. And you know how that goes. And then tell me about the illusionists. The illusionists is an entertainment show about language.

And how and why we use it the way we do it. Ooh, I like it so much. It's wonderful. I really appreciate the hard work that goes into your work, making my life more enjoyable. Yes, well that's the whole point. Okay, well let's get to some questions from our listeners. This first one comes from Becca, who asks, dear Hank and Helen,

my dad recently purchased a new car. And first one comes from Becca, who asks, Dear Hank and Helen, my dad recently purchased a new car, and it's great. However, on the side of the passenger, yeah, on the side of the passenger seat, there's a sort of cup holder, except it's long and skinny. I have attached an image for reference.

We'll put it up on the Patreon. The only logical explanation that I have is that it is a banana holder. How is that the only logical explanation for anything? Well, it does look to be the shape of a banana. Marchinal. It's kind of like banana shaped. I could put a banana in there.

I don't know. I like bananas. Maybe it's a good, it's good. Okay, what else do you have though? What could it be? Well, I'm looking at it and it looks like it's sort of the size of say a slim paperback book. Or for a British sandwich, not an American one,

because those have a lot more filling. Or. It's just a chill, normal sandwich. You know, a meager sandwich, a slice of toast. Or a paper map. Yeah, sometimes a paper map, who has those? Sometimes I'm in England and someone gives me a sandwich and it's just two pieces of bread

with like mustard between them. I'm like, this is not, this is just bread. Well, you're giving me flavored bread. Brex, it took the fillings away. Yeah, you guys don't, you only have so many things left. Just more bread. Yeah, plenty of bread, that's good. And that's right out of mud, so it's very sad.

I feel like, well, I mean, we need a place to put our phones these days. Maybe there's, are there any charging ports in it? It's hard to tell from the picture what's in it. I'd imagine there's gonna be quite a lot of detritus gathering in it. Yeah, it's definitely. What you do need to make sure is that this

pocket is big enough to get that hose in at the car wash to suck out the stuff because otherwise you know. It's going to be a super nastiness. 20, 25 rolls around and that's just a bacterial culture. There could be some very

important bacteria in there. I mean look how penicillin was discovered. Do you think it could be some kind of device for gripping your seat nervously whilst the driver takes a turn recklessly? Well, I can't tell if this is an American or British car. So is this the driver's seat or is it the passenger seat? If it's America, this is the passenger seat.

Yeah, it looks because the photo is approaching from the right-hand side of the car and therefore it suggests to me an American passenger and S-Backer has flipped this photo. And why would you do that? Just to be confusing for us. Okay, so it's a passenger seat. I mean, I think it get like an iPad mini in there. A book of puzzles. It does. A Bible. Yeah, a Bible. Maybe it's the Bible holder. Yeah, for car, Bibles. For your car Bible.

Where else are you supposed to keep it? In the car altar, who's got room for that? I'm glad that we answered this one so well, Helen. I feel our duty has been done. Can we, can you answer a question for me that is about words? Jamie says, dear Hank and Helen, why are honey moons called honey moons? They have nothing to do with honey or the moon.

So I assume that we are honey's. Like I call Catherine honey sometimes, so there's that. And then there's, you know, it's like going to the moon. We all alone with just the two of you, right? There's no one else in the whole world. Yeah, there's no gravity. You see a floating around. Honey's on the...

But that's a very sweet romantic explanation. It's very, very sexy too. I've apparently the moon. I don't know, the moon's actually pretty abrasive. I'm really into it. From what I've heard from astronauts. The moon is pretty abrasive. Yeah, I guess there hasn't been a lot of moon-based romance

so far in the history of humanity. Not that we know of, though, they did go in two person teams. So there's only two people who, on each of those missions, know what actually happened down there. Yeah, but I suppose if you're wearing those all-incasing spacesuits, and if you try to get any body part out of it. It's blunt. That's what you're on the surface. When you're in the capsule, you're still on the moon.

And then they take their clothes off and they have sleeping bags. And all the best fun gets had in sleeping bags. Yeah, okay, that's after a not business. These are a little less interesting, I think, Jamie might have hoped. Honey is to represent the marriage's sweetness because it's new and then the moon is probably saying that sweetness will only last one lunar month. Maybe even just until the moon wakes. Okay. Okay, And when did this become like a broad usage sometime recently? No, I think it's I think it's about 500 years old. But then I'm just I'm just trying to reflect on how long has the concept of marrying for love been around. That feels like a more recent concept.

So maybe this is a quite optimistic thing to give to marriage. You're supposed to enjoy this, but for only up to 28 days. So it's just, yes, it's the sweetness of the first lunar cycle. Yeah. Is the honeymoon. That makes a lot of sense. And I do actually find that quite interesting. Don't show yourself.

All right, all right. I know that there's so many interesting things that you come across all the time. And so, so all of this, all of this, what is it called? Edomological stuff? Probably all see like all the boring explanations that are boring to you are exciting to all of us lay people. I found something that I did think was exciting, which because a lot of languages, they just have a similar expression

to Honeymoon, but German, it's tinsel week. So in Germany, it only lasts so week. But it's so shiny while it lasts. It's very, I guess. Like I think of tinsel and I think of trash. Like this is bad trash that I have to clean up that makes it more difficult to recycle my Christmas tree. Right, well I suppose then that's feeding

into my earlier observation that Married wasn't supposed to be enjoyable until recently. It's your bad trash week. Things will get better after the first week, we promise. It's tinsel week. Or maybe they won't get better, but at least they won't be tinsel on the floor. That's right. Be less to clean up. This next question comes from Boyd, who asks,

Steer Hanken Hellen, how do you write a poem in another language that you can't speak, especially when you can barely write one in your own language? This poem is due tomorrow and I need something that rhymes with faseal, boyd. Wow. Well, my immediate answer would be, you don't write a poem in a language you can't speak. It seems like being at least somewhat competent in a language is an essential requirement for successful poetry writing, unless you're just going to do like jazz poetry. Wait, just like this word looks like another word, put them together, whatever. Yeah, that's good. Okay, first of all, do jazz poetry, boyd. I know that we're. Okay, first of all, do jazz poetry, boy.

I know that we're too late to actually help you because I assume that this question came in not in the future. Podcast is going to be released in some days. But first of all, I did find that Rime Zone has a Spanish language, Rime Zone, called remar.io, that I pronounced very well. And so you can find things that rhyme with faseal, like pra seal, for example, even though that isn't a Spanish-speaking

country, that is how they say it. So there's that. You've got remar.io on your side. And then secondarily, you should say to your teacher, why are you making us do a thing that basically is impossible because we are new to this language. And poetry definitionally requires a mastery of language. And maybe they would appreciate the eloquence of you rejecting the assignment. Right, you could do it in Spanish. Maybe you could do it rhyming in Spanish. That would be very good. Well, if you did that rhyming in Spanish, then you might have inadvertently completed this assignment.

So that would be a great result. Well, and maybe in the future other people wouldn't have to do it. That's what it's all about. It's about, it's about like like one, getting a good grade, but two, saving all of the people who were will in the future, becoming through this class. Right, so you're just creating a legacy void of conscientious objection to the foreign language poetry class.

This is a question from Tim who says, dear Hank and Helen, I know in job interviews, you're not supposed to talk badly about your current or most recent job when you're asked why you're wanting to leave or have left that position. But how do you address it if you're leaving supposed to talk badly about your current or most recent job when you're asked why you're wanting to leave or have left that position. But how do you address it if you're leaving, say, because the management is ineffective and unreliable without coming across as a complainer? Mmm.

Are we the best people to ask this? Because I don't know about you, Hank, but I have not been in a conventional working environment since basically forever. I'm not a bad person to ask about it because I do, I am on the side of the job interview fairly frequently where I'm the one listening, not the one talking. And so when I'm listening to somebody, I am worried about them being a complainer. I am and and so there this is something to be treated with delicacy. Of course, there are situations absolutely where the management is bad and that is why you are leaving. And in a town like mine that is quite small, I'm actually aware of some places where management is quite bad. And so it can be like, yes, I agree with you.

And you don't even, like, I might not even have to ask that question, which is why it's nice to work in a small town, but also why it can be bad. But I think it is a thing to be treated with care, because you want to seem not like somebody who's saying, I am better than the people who are my bosses. Because nobody wants that part, like nobody wants that relationship,

because it makes the work environment inefficient. When there is somebody who's constantly questioning everything that's happening. Also, presumably, you don't want to employ someone with the suspicion that down the line they're going to be complaining about you to someone else in another interview. That is definitely true. So the way to maybe phrase it is to turn it on yourself and say, I want more opportunity. I really, like, compared to what we're doing at that workplace, what you were doing

at this workplace is more exciting to me and then say why? Say like, say the things about this new workplace that are exciting to you and changing the frame from, I didn't like this, to I am very excited about this. Because that's oftentimes something that perspective higherers want to hear

is sort of like how much you understand the potential work that you're gonna be doing and why you're going to be excited to do it. Even if it's not like 100% percent true because obviously like we're all doing work and some of it's going to be some of it's going to be boring and hard and and trudgery but but finding the things that you're going to love about it and actually once you start actually loving those things and taking the time to appreciate you know the value that you get to be adding to the world. Yeah it's really good isn't the catch all appreciate the value that you get to be adding to the world.

It's really good. Isn't the catch all thing to say that you're ready for new challenges? I'm ready for some new challenges. Why not? Because you're not saying, oh, you're better than the old job, which I think is think still has an implicit,

you might be a bit of a sneak to it. I mean, when this question comes up, Hank, when you're interviewing someone, what are you hoping to find out from that question? Is it just a trap to see whether or not they're a complainer? No, not it. I hope very much that none of the questions I ever ask in a job interview are traps. What I am worried about, and like this isn't a disqualification, but what I want to know is when I call that person for a reference, are those stories going to line up?

Am I going to hear that they didn't like working with them and that they were fired? And in fact, in the interview, they said that they decided to leave on their own, and I'm going to find out that like I was lied to which is a problem. And I'm looking for just greater insight into the person's understanding of their career path and of their relationship with other workplaces. Well that seems reasonable. You've convinced me. You're hired. I'm so excited to be working with you. There are no benefits.

I get to learn something new every day, I'm sure. Like, for example, this next question from Ava, who asks, why is refrigerator spelled without a D while fridge has a D pumpkins and penguins Ava? Fair point. Do you know the answer? I do. Well, sort of.

I mean, none of the answers are, you know, absolutely slam dunk, but it's probably because when they abbreviated refrigerator to fridge, if you just took the FRIG, firstly that's a little bit of a rude word in Britain, don't know if it is in the States. If you saw FRIG written down, you might not know how it's pronounced, you might think. Oh, I would definitely say Frig. Oh, right. Okay. And another people might say Frig, depending on which vowel system and consonant they were subscribing to. But if you put that D in,

I think most people who are accustomed to English would know that it's supposed to be pronounced frid. So it's a short i and a j sound rather than a guss sound. Yeah, because we have that in a bunch of other words. Like, like, judge is how you make that noise. Bridge. Fudge. Yeah, so make it all's how you make that noise. Or fudge. Or fudge. Fudge. Yeah. So make it-

Oh, wonderful words. Make it like bridge and fudge, and people will get the gist. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Uh, yeah, and so, like, someone just decided that, I guess, like, I'm not used to the idea of people just deciding how words are spelled, but I guess that's- I guess we do that with every word. Yeah. Every word weed somebody picks.

Well, it just happens incrementally, because this did start off as frig, and I've definitely seen it in books as an abbreviation, but I think the more the device was common, the more the abbreviation would become relevant to people's lives. Because say, a hundred years ago, how many people had caused to say, frayed your frig as it all right it down. Right. And then I think it just, yeah, once it catches on, people do kind of what's easiest. That's what a lot of quirks of language are, just people making things easy, because we're

lazy. Right. So people were saying this word a bunch before it started getting written down. And then somebody was like, now we have to write this word down. We had this problem in a very early episode of Dear Hank and John, where somebody wanted to figure out how to spell the word use, like as per use, because people were shortening the word usual,

and there's just not, like we don't have a good way of making that sound. And I've seen it, people trying to abbreviate it, particularly in subtitles of like Netflix shows or whatever, they're watching with the subtitles and they're like, oh, the person subtitling and how to figure out

how to spell use. Yeah, that's rough. And they spit, yeah. You know a stuff about language, how would you spell use? Well, I'm thinking how easy it would be to spell it in Russian because they have a letter that is definitely you and the letter that is just and English has really let itself down with this flexible spellings. I think I've

seen it spell you ZH, I'm translating Z to Z because I'm on an American show right now. Thank you. Thank you very much. But would you, if you saw that, would you, would you just be baffled or would you infer from the context that it was used? I think it would be, I think I would know that it was used, especially if there was an unlaught. I don't know why I feel like that would help, but I feel like it would help. Would that mean it was more like ooosh? I think that's what unlauts make something too syllables. Do they? Is that what they do?

You've created extra problems. I don't really speak any of the Umla using languages, but that's what I gathered. Okay, I have no idea. It's a mess. I thought it was made it more umi. This next question comes from Sarah, who asks, dear Hank and Helen,

I saw an article that kids can't read analog clocks anymore. Just to be clear, I was born in 1980 and I can't read analog clocks. Everyone Just to be clear, I was born in 1980 and I can't read analog clocks. Everyone's all mad about it, but really, we haven't just gone all digital by now. Is there some reason why analog clocks are better or more practical than digital? Is it just because they look better on a wall?

Sarah, reason for this? That's a very good name-specific sign off Sarah. She thinks I reused is that often? Possibly. If not, she should. So is Sarah reason for this, how much? I can think of some reasons why analog clocks still exist. One, it's much easier to see them from across the room.

When I'm trying to sneak a look at the time from someone else's wristwatch, because I don't wear one, if it's digital, no chance. If it's an Apple watch, absolutely no chance. Oh yeah, well, because it's not even, sometimes it's not even on until they look at it. I used to wear a watch around my neck, and it was useful. A lot of people were like, that's so handy, I can see the time just by looking at you. And there was a cafe I used to frequent, and they called me Lady with the Timepiece. To me?

Did they call you that in English? In English. In English. That sounds like a translation from another language. Lady with the Timepiece or that just the title of a... Very undramatic comic book hero. Yeah. Yeah, so I'd say that would be one reason I would say that there's

less to go wrong in the Ananol clock. There's just the engine that drives the hands around where it's digital. You've got to have the display that doesn't break because as soon as one of the lines is out, then the time is always wrong. You're like, is it six? Is it eight? Oh, right. Well, that, that kind of digital clock. Now are you talking about digital from the previous errors of digital, but yes. Sure. And then the third reason I think is that it provides more of a visual conception of the passage of time and the way the day is divided up. And I think maybe there's a value to a lot of people of that. Yeah, I have a problem where the difference between three, like 52 and 401 is so dramatic for me. And I'm just like, I go from being like,

oh, I have plenty of time to get all of my work done. And in the course of like nine minutes, I go from that to being like, oh God, oh no, everything is ending and there's no way I'm going to be able to get my work done. I should just give up and not do anything. Do you have some kind of blood sugar crash right before 4pm every day? I don't think that's it. It might be. I think that I just have a really bad time, like with, you know, all of the cognitive bias toward, like,

not having that number turnover in the same way that I find at $0.99 sandwich much cheaper than $1.05 sandwich, which is amazing that we can have a $0.99 sandwich anyway. What a world. But I don't have that experience as much with an analog clock because, like, you see the continuity of the whole thing. And oftentimes, when there's an analog clock because like you see the continuity of the whole thing. And oftentimes when there's an analog clock on the wall, what I'm looking for isn't like, I know what hour it is, I'm just watching the hand to be like, how much more time do I have in this particular hour? I had to quite use the thing, I was staying with a friend last month and they have a cookie clock and every half hour it makes a cuckoo noise and I'd

been reading about the Pomodoro technique of dividing your day up into was it. I was curious. Yeah. And I was like, well I haven't consciously done that but when the cuckoo, cuckoo's, I think oh that's another half hour gone. Did I achieve things in that half hour block? Get a cookie clock for optimizing your day. Yeah, instead of a tomato, which is the guess why that's called the Pomodoro technique,

because that means tomato, right? It does, yeah. Is it named after someone like Alex Pomodoro? No, actually, it's named because the guy who started it had a little like a timer that looked like a tomato. I'm pretty sure that that is where it came from. Rubbish. What if you're talking about a timer?

No, I'm not saying your explanation's rubbish. I'm just saying if you name something after that, that makes me sad. What if your timer just looks like a timer? You got free from the gas station or something? I mean, you call it something else, but because you had a tomato, you could have called it the tomato system, but that sounded really bad.

So you were like the Pomodoro technique, and then all the people who are like into time management into efficiency were like, that sounds very official. And it sounds good. That's why it's the whole reason why everything is everything because it sounds good. All right, I'll buy into that. It does sound good.

Would you like a question from Elliot? Yes, please. Great. Elliot says, Dehankin Helen, I recently gave a presentation at my job in which I cited a bunch of statistics about the global trends for poverty and health access. While I managed to check most of

the statistics, one that surprised everyone was the assertion that there are a third as many people living in poverty today as in the year 2000. It's understandable that it surprised them because it's wrong. The number is actually half as many. The rate of poverty is one third, not the number, afraid I don many the rate of poverty is one third not the number Freed I don't understand that sorry. I even had conversations about it with my boss afterwards and now I feel guilty and awkward that I told them all incorrect Information how do you deal with saying something wrong in front of people dubious advice is preferred. I have not met ET Elliot Elliot I was in does Eliot get that?

This happens to me all the time, both in, because I make informational content on the internet and because I speak with authority in spaces where I am the boss and so people don't question me. And so I worry about it, a fair amount, and Elliot, you were doing the right thing by worrying about it. And in this particular case, I think you are totally in the clear to send an email to clarify and say, I said something wrong, and I want to clear it up.

The difference between, you know, the poverty rate being one-third and the number of people in poverty being one-half because the number of people has increased. So there are still more people in poverty than there would have been like if there had been no population increase. So the rate of poverty has gone down more than the number of people has, sorry if I did a bad job of explaining that, but you can write an email in which you explain that

and be like, hey, everybody, I got this wrong and I wanted to make sure that this false stat didn't get shared. And it's a quick email and it shows two things. One, that you are an efficient communicator and two, that you care about getting stuff right. And I think that like both of those things ultimately actually make you look better than if you hadn't gotten the thing wrong in the first place.

Yeah, I liked how you said to frame it as you're not wanting them to spread incorrect information on it as a result of Eliot's mistake. Right, right, because you definitely don't want that to sort of come back on them. Throw that in there. Classy move. Which reminds me actually that this podcast is brought to you by accurate global health statistics, accurate global health statistics compiled by experts to be disseminated by all of us accurately even when we get something wrong a little bit. This episode is also sponsored by Kanana, the bananas cultivated to fit perfectly in your

car by a cup holder, a glove compartment, or just that weird little niche behind the gear stick if you have a manual transmission. Kanana, get 10% off your first bush-love Kananas at Kananaana.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na.na. for some bulls**t. This podcast is also brought to you by the new combination Pomodoro Kuku clocks, where instead of a bird that pops out once every half hour, it's a tomato. It's just a live, it's just a real tomato that slowly rocks, showing you that all life is fleeing and that you should get some work done. The time marches on. How very yoko-ono. And this podcast is also brought to you by Frig.

If you sick, if you're Frig having a DNA, not anymore, with Frig, available in mini-bar, Frig Frieza, and lock your enemy in it and throw them into a quarry size. I wanted to mention, as part of this, in this period of Eliot's question about being right about stuff that in the last episode of this podcast, I believe I said that the atomic number of nitrogen was six. It is seven. I'm not sure anybody took that one and started like shouting it around to people. But if you did, go apologize and make a correction and say that it was Hank Green's fault. It's too late now.

It's too late for some people. It's too late for all the people who listen to that episode and not this one. And I really do deeply apologize. That is the definition of nitrogen, seven protons. Well, that's so bring stuff. that is the definition of nitrogen, seven protons. Well, that's so bring stuff. All right, I got another question. Is it an important one?

That is a little bit sad. It's from Amanda who asks, dear Hank and Helen. My family considers the squirrels who live in our backyard to be like our outdoor pets. We have names for them and we pretend that we can tell them apart. I actually have a met people who

can tell the squirrels in their yard apart, which I find to be remarkable. And I don't know if I trust them, but they really seem like they can do it. Anyway, I was recently driving through a nearby neighborhood and I accidentally hit a squirrel with my car. I felt very bad, but to be fair, the squirrel made several poor life choices at the end there, and my alternative was swirving and possibly hitting another car. Well, a trolley problem.

The squirrel problem. Yeah, you've solved it. Wow, yeah, they do sometimes make several poor life choices at the end there. But then I wondered, did my squirrels know this squirrel? Are you gonna mean so much trouble if they did? Was it a cousin? A childhood friend? How far does a squirrel's social sphere extend?

Maybe it was one of my squirrels on vacation. Please help! XOXO, gossip squirrel. Well, if you're observing these squirrels so closely, maybe you'll be able to see if they enter into a period of mourning. Right. What does a mourning squirrel look like, Helen? Like a black squirrel like they have in Toronto? So they're all just very sad there.

Is that what you're saying? Well, they're just very goth. Could be that as well. Yeah, or if there's just a period of dower-ness, they're leaving piles of acorns untouched, sort of a symbolic gesture, I guess. But like a squirrel shiver happening. Yeah, exactly.

My guess is that a squirrel's social sphere is pretty localized. Though, I would imagine that it's a number of overlapping circles. So different squirrel groups probably overlap. And there's probably a group. There is some overlap that leads all the way out to that squirrel that you got accidentally. And I do wonder, like this relationship that we have with squirrels,

this like very, like we've created an environment that's kind of perfect for them in the city. Good food options, like we like to plant nut bearing trees that are a great habitat for them. We keep all of their predators away We like to plant nut-bearing trees that are great habitat for them. We keep all of their predators away because it's harder to be a coyote in the, or a fox in the city now. And we don't actually study them very much in the way that we might study an animal in

a natural ecosystem, which I think maybe we should do more of. I want to understand a lot more about squirrels and how they work, how a new squirrel... I keep trying to think of the word harvest, but I mean, I guess they're littering. So like the new... Yeah, the new, like the new... The new bees, the new ones, like how many of them stay in the same place? Do they travel? Do they go on like walk up out and try and find other squirrel groups to become a member of how many of them survive at all

What are the leading causes of squirrel fatality? Is it like a lot of starving or is it mostly cars? World age Yeah, maybe my guess is not so much irresponsible hoarding for winter Right. Yeah, just or yeah, not not preparing. I imagine there's a lot of squirrel death in the winter time, especially here in Montana and I didn't look into a squirrel population and breeding and and breeding and interbreeding, because I thought no good can come of it. It will probably only make Amanda feel worse.

So in interest in making her feel less bad, I'll just say, I've lived in some pretty squirrel-heavy places, Britain has many squirrels, and I rarely see them being convivial with each other. They usually seem to be chasing each other or ignoring each other. I think that the squirrel chasing might, that might be fun, right? Isn't that squirrel fun? I don't know.

That's like fun to me. Well, yeah, but I mean, you're applying your human experience on to it. Maybe the squirrel, it's like, it's like having a commute that it hates. Who knows what's going on in the squirrel's mind? The other thing that I believe we have also said on this podcast before is that there are no nice ways for squirrels to die.

So keep that in mind. Are there any nice ways for anything to die? Certainly in nature, I think it's painful 100% of the time. Well, at least being a manned out of this life would be swift. Yeah, we're hoping. Here's a question from Chloe. She says, dear Hank and Helen, my friend has a deviated septum, and she's getting it surgically repaired in a few days.

I'm very excited for her to be able to breathe and smell things, but I'm also very excited for me because I think that type of stuff is interesting. Am I allowed to pepper her with questions about the procedure and how everything works? Would that be inappropriate? Surgery and snot? Chloe. Oh boy. I mean, I think this of course comes down to the individual person, but if it's me, I want to tell you everything about it. I think that's a pretty common thing, and then I can relate to this now

because I had a major medical experience last year. And people love asking me about it. And then they love talking about their own surgery and fluids that spurred out of surgical orifices in their bodies and other gore. It's just not good over a meal. But I would say people are very excited to say this. Were you excited to tell them about it?

Um, really depends on the person. I think if they were taking a kind of slightly salacious interest then yes. And if they were just doing the whole, oh poor you must have been awful. I'm like, well it's really, it's really for me to determine that. Right. Yeah. But mine was easier because like I have a scar on my neck, so it's very visible. And so people are also looking at it. Yeah, exactly. Whereas I don't know if it would be not my bum, maybe I wouldn't want to talk about it.

Yeah, I've had a number of surgeries over the years. And I like talking about it. I think it's fascinating and weird. And sometimes people get a little squirmy. Katherine doesn't like to hear about my tendon reattachment because that was a process. But I just got a colonoscopy recently and I was like, I'm gonna make a video about this.

And I did and it was great. And Katherine trooper that she is, like as I was coming out of the anesthesia, she turns the camera right on and she filmed the whole thing of me being really on drugs and it was very funny to watch after the fact. What a team, what a team. And if it also took a lot of people,

this is a useful service because they're thinking, okay, if I have to go through that, doesn't seem as fun. Yeah, well, I've had so many colonoscopies now that it's like, Oh, I know need to break. Ha ha ha ha ha. Do you need to, do you have any questions

about colonoscopies? I can give you answers. So how long do they take? Oh, well, anywhere, like when they're in there, is like 15 to 30 minutes. It's very quick. They go in, they look around, and so like for the doctor, it is not a long time

which when you see how much it costs, you start to question that, although I imagine that when you see how much it costs, you don't, so that's great. And yeah, but how long it takes for you is a different experience because, like, one, the day beforehand is kind of part of the procedure because there's a lot of preparation that goes into it. You can't eat food. You have to take this stuff that makes you poop a lot, and that is a bad day, and is by far

the most time that gets invested into the process. Right, so colonoscopy is a bad day. Yes, colonoscopy. But colonoscopy, my- Did you say colonoscopy? I didn't, but you just did. So that's the thing. And then do they give you a video afterwards?

They filmed? They didn't offer me a video and I didn't ask. So I've heard that some people have gotten video of their colonoscopy. So apparently it's a service that is available at some hospitals or maybe all and I just didn't ask. I also know that you can ask to be awake during the colonoscopy.

That is an option that's available. They don't present that option to you because almost no one takes it. Hmm. I met up with a friend the other day who's actually a bowel doctor and she had a colonoscopy herself last year and said she had it with that anesthesia

because she wanted as a professional as well as a patient to know what it was like. And she said that didn't hurt, but she had the throat and doscape, and that was pretty gross. She had some sedation for that, but the Column one, no problem.

The technology has come so far. Right up into your Column. This next question comes from Dermott, who asks, dear Hank and John, my name is Dermott, and I'm 17 years old, and I'm currently looking into colleges and work, and I'm currently looking into colleges and work, and a lot of places talk about coffee breaks

for getting to know professors and other students, et cetera. But I strongly dislike the taste of coffee. What should I do during these coffee breaks? Get a hot chocolate and risk not looking adulty enough? Do I suck it up in order a drink I hate? Is this whole thing a metaphor? Not a puppet frog? Dermit.

Oh, thanks you for explaining to me how your name was pronounced. I'm glad that we got it all out of the way at the end there. I was wondering what the puppet frog thing was referring to. Right. It's a pronunciation guide. It was helpful. No, I get that now. Yeah, it was helpful. So I think coffee break is a...

It's kind of a figure of speech, because I don't really drink coffee either, but I've rarely had a problem at something described as a coffee break, because usually tea or water at the very least are available. And then you mention hot chocolate. If you're out of place, we can order your own drinks. Then just get whatever you like. I don't think anyone's thinking this. available and then you mentioned hot chocolate. If you're out of place, we can order your own drinks. Then just get whatever you like. I don't think anyone's thinking this, the test and dermat felt because he did not literally drink coffee at the thing called a coffee break. So he's disobedient and must be stopped. Then he needs an excuse. Basically, I have excuses ready to go for pretty much any situation. So I'd say with this, you could tell people you're giving up caffeine. You could bring your own drink in a reusable flask or bottle. So if you want to drink milk, you can and no one would know. I would say that when I went

to college, there was a far bigger problem beverage related and that was that I was not interested in drinking alcohol, which is legal in Britain from the age of 18. So in college, everyone's at it. But because I was indifferent, I was regarded with great suspicion. And also it just made a lot of social occasions very boring being the sober person in a room of drunk people. So I just stopped going to quite a lot of things. But what I would say Dermott is that right now, the question you're asking is whether you should conform by doing

something you don't want to do. And this question is not going to be just relevant to coffee. This is just the beginning of that question in your life. Oh, I think probably it is the continuation of that question. Even at 17, there, I assume that there have been a number of opportunities to do something to conform or to do the thing that feels right. Oh, no, you're correct. I think that I would avoid hot chocolate. My set, I think that somebody might make, like, have an opinion about somebody who got

hot chocolate at a coffee break. And maybe, so there's two, there's two opinions that somebody could have. One, they could be like, oh, come on, grow up, dermat, or two, they could be like, wow, that is a person who doesn't mind doing something a little bit different. And so you're sort of rolling the dice on like you could go the neutral route

and just be like, yes, I will also get a coffee, even though I'm going to have to put a lot of sugar and milk in it until it basically tastes like hot chocolate anyway. Or you can be like, look, I'm going to, people are going to be thinking something about this decision. And in general, we, like, in all circumstances, we try to do the thing that people aren't going to think about. Like, we do that all day every day, where we're sort of making the default choice because otherwise we have to deal with it. And I think it's great to sometimes not do that.

And especially if it's allowing us to be a little bit more true to ourselves, also hot chocolate is delicious. I have a friend who doesn't drink any hot drinks, doesn't like them. Imagine the nightmare he's had through life. Hahaha. I often will get a, do you get the iced coffee? They have so many choices now.

There are so many things. Things do. That are available. You can have a green juice, even a gas station. Hahaha. I wasn't a gas station the other day. And there was a section in the refrigerator that said,

healthy choice. And there was banana milk milk and I looked at the banana milk and it had like 36 grams of sugar in it. I was like what's happening? What world is this? It's America that world Because you can use the word healthy without having to back it up with the reality We're not good at we're not good this. Or you're too good at it. It's true. We're just trying to live our lives in the best way we know how, which is sweetened.

And optimistically. We've got a one response that comes from China who says to the brother's green, there's a fabulous device that is like a mesh screen door where the two sides come together with magnets. It easily opens as you walk through and then automatically closes behind you with the magnet closure. It's very inexpensive and the perfect solution

to the chicken burglar problem that Andrea was facing in episode 182. We're gonna put a link to it on the Patreon. Thank you, China, for your help. Oh, also, China says, I'm just China help, China. So I had to include that as well. One hell of, do you have news from AFC Wimbledon for us? Oh, I sure do.

AFC Wimbledon has come out victorious against last place Scumfulp, which is not great news in that it was the expected outcome, but it is good news in that if they had lost that game, the season would definitely have been over. They're now in third to last place and have won four of their last five games, which is wild. The only other team in all of League 1 that has won four of the last five games is number three, Portsmouth. So if the entire season were just these last five games, AFC Wimbledon would be fighting to go up a league, not down a league.

Unfortunately, they're still in the relegation zone and need to win more games in order to stay up. How many do they need to win? I don't know. I'm not John. We couldn't figure it out. And I can't see the future That's it. That's the whole thing. Good job. You did it. Thank you

You was talking about Well, I did my best to write some aFC Wimbledon news for Helen to read. I hope that John is proud of me I'm brother. Are you are you excited about the possibility? So this is the situation. We thought almost 100% that AFC woman was going down a league. But now they actually have a chance to stay up and it's making me extra stressed out, which is not what I need.

But this is why sports are bad. Right. They make you stressed they make Brits violent It's not like not like you guys have anything else to worry about right now I do think people still prioritize Misery about sports right well honestly You need something to worry about that doesn't matter when things that do matter are miserable and that doesn't matter when things that do matter are miserable. And yeah, I can't believe they've won four of their last five games.

That's like, it's very good, it's very exciting and I'm very happy. And they are actually like, they're like basically one point away from out of the right relegation zone because the two teams that are ahead of them in the relegation zone both lost their last games. So, who knows? Anything is possible. Those teams need to keep losing and FC Wimbledon needs to win. Do you want to hear some news from Mars? Love to. Especially if there's no football on Mars. There isn't. Yet, though we're working toward that goal. No. Or just sports.

I'm sure the moment that there are people on Mars, there will be sports. In fact, it wasn't long we were on the moon before people were golfing there. So we did the think of meteor impacts or meteorite impacts as pretty bad for life. You get all that dramatic climate change, you get tsunamis, you get massive shockwaves, you get dust clouds that lead to not having any light, which is important

for life. So that is usually bad, but also maybe early on, at least on Mars, they could be good for life. The Mars Curiosity Rover made some surprise findings a while back where they found both nitrites and nitrates, which are nitrogen-containing ionic compounds, that are vital to the chemistry that forms the basis of life on Earth as we know it. But scientists were like, that does not make any sense. There's very little nitrogen on the surface of Mars. Where could that have come from? And they did an experiment recently back on Earth

where they simulated the conditions kind of with lasers of a meteorite smacking into the atmosphere of Mars. And they did a number of different atmospheric concentrations. So like how thick the atmosphere was, a number of different atmospheric compositions, so like what molecules are in the atmosphere. And they found that in certain, certain atmospheres, which were fairly thick and contained both carbon dioxide or all, like these things, carbon dioxide, nitrogen and hydrogen, that these nitrites would form. And so they are thinking that this may be how these nitrites formed, and it indicates

that there was a period of time where, in billions of years ago, when Mars had a pretty thick atmosphere that had those things in it, which is really cool, that you can maybe infer a previous atmosphere from chemicals now found on the surface of Mars by the Mars Curiosity rover. Whereas we can also infer things about the geology of Mars, about the rocks, and about whether there was water on the surface, but figuring out what the atmosphere was like is a really tricky question. This is a pretty good way of actually teasing out some data about that, which is really

neat. Nice. And the atomic number of nitrogen is still seven. It's seven, hundred percent, pretty sure. Gonna Google it right now just to make sure. Maybe seven, hundred percent prematurely. Yeah, it's seven, you guys. It's seven. Carbon is six, obviously, because that is very, like the most important thing to know in chemistry, not that I'm ashamed, but I am. Helen, is there a joy to make a podcast with you?

Thank you for doing this today. Hank, thank you so much for letting me be a temporary green brother. Oh gosh, if only it could be permanent. I would love to ever guest host on any of your podcasts. It's if the opportunity presents itself. Cool. I might rope you in.

All right. I killed my cohosts. Yeah, I mean, you don't need them. No. If you want to send us questions, you can do that. Please do. Thank you to everybody who does it at hankinjohnatgmail.com. There would be no podcast without you. You can follow me. I'm at Hank Green on Twitter.

Helen, what is your Twitter? Helen Zoltsman. The map is with a Z and then another Z later. Oh good. Are you of German ancestry? No, it's a Lithuanian name by South Africa and people go a little bit awry with the consonants. Sure. Yeah, as we do, like humans, spellings. They go all over the place.

They see Z's and they think they can't be that and they correct them to another letter. It's insane. This podcast is edited by Nicholas Jenkins. It's produced by Rosy Anna Halsey-Rohas and Sher shared in Gibson our head of community communications. It's Victoria Bonjorno. The music that you're hearing now and at the beginning of the podcast is by the great Gunnar Roa and as they say in our hometown don't think it's awesome. Hey update I got something wrong. Skuntpe isn't the last place team in League 1. That's Bradford City,

which is actually a game still to come. Skunthorpe is actually ranked above AFC Wimbledon, though not dramatically, so that actually is a really good outcome because Skunthorpe went down, Wimbledon went up. Eventually, maybe, there are only two points ahead of Wimbledon now. Wimbledon can be a head of Skunthorpe, in which case they would definitely be out of the relegation zone. So Wimbledon is from what I can tell three points from being out of the relegation zone. I think that's yep I think so. Sorry, all use Skunthorpe fans didn't mean to say you're last place. That honor goes to Bradford City, which is the final game of the season.

So that would be very scary if we get to that point and then we're planning it's the worst team in the league and then they win even though they're not going anywhere. They should just let Wimbledon win, right? Okay, bye. They should just let Wimbledon win, right? Okay, bye.