Dear Hank & John - 186: The Morlon Wiley Way In

Episode Date: April 22, 2019

How do you open an envelope? How do companies turn attention into money? What's the deal with the itsy bitsy spider? And more! Get your signed desk sword!!! https://store.dftba.com/products/john-green-signed-desk-swords 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. Follow us on Twitter! twitter.com/dearhankandjohn

Hello and welcome to Dear Hank and Jon. Gorsair for Think of a Dear Jon and Hank. It's a comedy podcast where two brothers answer your questions, give you a dubious advice, and bring you all the week's news from both Mars and AF's to Wimbledon. Jon, you know, I just, I really, I really love how the sun comes up, and then it goes down. I really mix my day. Oh God. No. Not that one. It really makes my day. Oh God. No.

Not that one. It just makes my day. I just, I don't know what else to say. It's, I think it's really great. I'm not, I'm not not laughing because I don't get it. I'm not laughing because it's not funny. Hank, you know what I would have tweeted this week? What?

I would have tweeted about the fact that I'm about to be a guest at a live show recording of my favorite podcast, not distributed by WNYC Harry Potter and the Sacred Text. You're gonna go to a live show. I'm gonna be part of the live show with Casper and Vanessa. I'm so excited and nervous. It's the last chapter of the fifth book, Hank, it's an intense chapter.

Oh, wow, you got a finale. A lot of discussion about life after death. So if you're reading a book like Harry Potter as a sacred text, this is a meaty chapter. John, I also have things that I can't tweet about. For example, this email I just got from my editor, ha, I love this. Not sure it's the title, but I love it.

It is so hard to title a book job. Let me tell you what that email means. Ha, no. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, if you don't like my ideas, send me some good ones. I had so many bad titles, I mean for all of my books, but especially for the Fault in Our Stars and Turtles all the way down, but I had so many bad titles for the Fault in Our Stars, and if it hadn't been for Rosiana saying that I should just call it the Fault in Our Stars, God only knows what would have happened. I really wanted to call it the sequel with the idea being that it was a sequel to a book

that didn't exist. That's very confusing. Yeah. Yeah. Not a great idea. No one would buy that book, they'd be like, where's the first one? I know. I know.

Well, I mean hindsight's 2020 obviously, but think of how that book might have sold if it had been called the sequel, it could have just lit the world on fire Could have done really well it could have I mean imagine a movie called the sequel about two kids with chronic illness God Hollywood gold written all over. I writing books is hard and I mean, I'm doing the best. It is hard, but every time I complained about writing books, my dad, also your dad always said, well, it ain't coal mining and it ain't. Yeah, it ain't coal mining.

Speaking of things that aren't coal mining, how about our career as professional givers of dubious advice? This first question comes from Julia who writes Dear John and Hank, I graduated from College Glass Spring and I'm currently working at my first real-world job at a law firm. I like it so far. Why do people say I'm working at my first real-world job? Like, what are the other jobs, exactly? Yeah, well, they mostly take place inside of role-playing games. Yeah, right. I used to like, professionally mine coins for World of Warcraft players,

but now I'm working out a law firm. Every job is real. Yeah, unless you are blacksmithing for your D&D crew. Even that I would argue is a real job. Anyway, Julia writes, I like it so far and everything, but the one thing that keeps tripping me up is envelopes. We receive a lot of letters. I know that your law firm receives a lot of letters, Julia writes, I like it so far and everything, but the one thing that keeps tripping me up is envelopes. We receive a lot of letters. I know that your law firm receives a lot of letters,

Julia, because I have lawyers, and I have to send them envelopes full of money every month. We receive a lot of letters, and it is my job to open them, but I can never seem to get the darn things open. If I try to open them by peeling back the glued flap, the envelope tears, and it looks like a wild animal attack it. If I tear open the side, I tend to accidentally rip the contents as well. How does one open an envelope? This is such a young person problem.

Like, this is such a thing for people between the ages of like four and 30, and then people older than that. Like, that was all we had, Julia, okay? We didn't have emails. We had to open envelopes. It was the only way we could communicate with each other. Yeah, also the great thing about having envelopes all the time is you get to have a small sword on your desk. Yes.

Specifically, the purpose of opening envelopes. That's right. There's a thing, that's what it's for. It's a desk sword. It's literally called the desk sword envelope opener. What are they called? Letter openers. That's what they call letter openers.

Letter openers. It's a tiny sword, Julia. And as it happens, I have an extra one, and I'm sending it to you. So, you're getting a sword. I don't usually solve problems when I answer questions, but I just so happen to have an extra desk sword and it's headed your way.

It's really, really cool looking. Is it possible that all people under the age of 30 don't yet have a letter opener, but they will all need to get one? And so we should start selling them a DFTBA.com. Slow down, cowboy. You've just had a million dollar idea. Stop everything, cancel the pod.

Rain in that horse, Hank Green. That is such a good idea. Oh my God. Branded letter openers, maybe they should, what should, what's in with our brand, but also sword shaped though. Like I have this as a prop. No, actually the newest letter openers, Hank,

they no longer look like little swords they now are very ergonomic and the sword part of the letter opener is like hidden so you can't access it. It's like a safety razor letter opener. Oh I see that I don't like it at all. I hate it. I want it to look like a sword. Yeah but I think we're gonna have a hard time selling millions of dollars worth of swords and we need to suddenly Hank and I have been thinking a lot about making money because we have to raise a lot of money for partners in health, for the projects that we want to do, or help fund in Sierra Leone. And so Hank and I have been having a series of conversations, which at one point Hank said, this must be how regular business people talk all the time.

Where the only thing we care about is making money. Like the only thing that matters is, can we maximize revenue from this product? Right. Yeah, which is, I guess that's how all business is usually done. I don't know, John, I like it when they look like sorts. All right, here's the deal, Hank. I am buying 400 of these letter openers on Amazon right now. I know that might not be the most efficient way,

but they're crazy cheap. They're like 30 cents a piece, but I probably should reveal this. Then I'm going to sign each of them and I'm gonna to sell them for $19.95 at dftba.com and they will be available by Monday. And all proceeds, Departners and Health. All proceeds, Departners and Health, dftba.com, letter opener, signed by me, and I'll probably

like put a spiral on some of them. They'll be great. Believe me, this will be the best $19 you ever spent. And all proceeds go to partners in health Okay, problem solved is 20 times 2400 not for what is 20 times 2400 20 times 20 is 400 and what's 400 times 19? It's $7,600 They're 22 bucks a piece. Okay, John has changed the price to $2200 bucks a piece. He wants $8,800 for partners and help. Yeah.

It feels like we're doing the project for awesome right now, which is not a bad feeling, like I like that feeling. It's all by the way, it's gonna be all the time now. It's just always the project for awesome for the rest of all time. That's the deal now. Okay, all right. Well, now you can get your envelopes open.

Everybody except for Julie, I need to get these things. Julie, however, cannot, does not need to because you're going to send her your desk sort. That just bought them. God, that was easy. Don't chop an Amazon. John has too much power. Do as I do as I say, not as I do as I say not as I do The next question that we've got comes from Shireen who asks dear Hank and John How does YouTube make money not the creators kind of them to though? But the actual site any site really I get that when you click on a thing you spend time in a certain website The time is money, but like how? Who sees overall of this? What does the hierarchy look like? Is there a hierarchy?

Where's the bank? Is it like stocks? Oh gosh. You know what though? Like when I read this question initially, I was like, no, it's nothing like stocks. And then the more I thought about it, I was like, it is kind of stocks,

but essentially YouTube is buying and selling instead of like pieces of a company. they're selling pieces of your attention. Right, and there's a market. And the market depends on who you are and what kind of content you're watching and how much money you have and when you were born and where you live and all that stuff, which is really upsetting and crazy. Like you are being you are being auctioned off by a computer program, Shereen. Well, not you, but your attention, which does over time shape the person that you become, of course, because what you watch becomes a, I mean, like a kind of like an infection in

your brain, right? Like it shapes your worldview, what you pay attention to shapes your worldview. And we feel like we're choosing what we pay attention to shapes your worldview. And we feel like we're choosing what we pay attention to, but in many cases, at least when I'm on the internet, I'm not really actively choosing what to pay attention to. I'm sort of like in a state of empty ingestion, I would say. It's not dissimilar to when it's like 10 o'clock at night and I remember that there's 1400 calories of graham crackers in the pantry. I don't know how to deep to go with all this YouTube is owned by Google Google is owned by How shareholders I guess no Google is owned by alphabet alphabet is owned by shareholders and those shareholders

This is crazy are owned by Google. Wait, what? That's how they get you. I'll run you through it again, Hank. YouTube is owned by Google. Google is owned by a company called Alphabet. Alphabet is owned by shareholders. And those shareholders have their world view and values

shaped by Google. If I could just, I'll draw you a diagram. Imagine a snake that's eating its own tail. That's... Everything will be fine. Hahaha. Everything's fine. This will work. Shereen, basically, YouTube and every other social media company is in the business of

capturing and then monetizing your attention. They want as much of your attention as possible and they turn it into money via advertising. Even Netflix, which doesn't rely on advertising, is in the business of trying to capture and hold your attention because when they're shareholders, the people who own their company, when they look at how valuable Netflix is, one of the main things they look at is how much attention does Netflix capture. Because that translates to how much people are willing to pay Netflix. So as you spend more time on Netflix, Netflix says, oh, we can raise the price now. And if people are spending less time on Netflix, then the shareholders get very worried that Netflix will not be able to raise the price. And price raises are what the valuation

of Netflix relies on. Like the idea that the price of Netflix will increase in the future is why the stock price of Netflix is high. So much of the contemporary US economy and in many countries actually is built around holding people's attention. And I think that we will look back on this time

as being very weird for that reason. If indeed we are lucky enough to hang around long enough to look back at this time. This next question comes from Brenda who writes, dear John and Hank, my friend is invited me to her art exhibition at school. My other friends and I are very excited and we want to bring her something to congratulate her, but she's allergic to almost everything. We were thinking about flowers or potentially baking her something, but those seem like high risk because of pollen and gluten. Do you have any suggestions for gifts to someone who's super allergic to many things? I'm allergic to grass Brenda. A letter opener. Yeah, Brenda, do you have to be a dot com right now?

There are only 400 of these letter openers and I cannot imagine anyone being allergic to the incredibly high quality plastic that these letter openers are famous for. I mean, these things, just for a little bit of context, these things, the average rating, star rating is three, three stars. You have a reason to have to review right now. That's three with a THR, three stars. Not two. Not one. Not four or five. Not four or five.

Not four or five. Not four or five. Not four or five. Oh God, what a, what a, God, if this idea backfires and I end up with a lot of letter-opener, so I'm gonna be so mad. Which one did you get? None of your business.

They're multicolored. They're actually, actually the average review is four stars. But the most recent review from Siu Chang is three stars, three stars. Okay, does the job, but the opening to the knife is too wide. So you got to be careful with your finger. Good lord. How what are you doing? They used to be just knives. That used to be the whole thing. Was that just knife? Yeah. Five stars. Very sharp. Perfect for opening envelopes. Well, I mean, that is its job.

And then the only one star of you is dangerous. This product is terrible. There is not enough of a safety guard on these, and I open two letters with it and deeply cut my finger. So just heads up there. Oh my god. All right, well, we are not responsible for any harm and courage. Oh my God, we're gonna get sued.

We're gonna end up losing $8,000 because we're gonna get sued by somebody who deeply cuts their finger on our hand signed letter openers available now at tftba.com. We're in 2D. By the way, this is a bit, but this is also very real. I need 400 of you to buy these letter openers. Care and use them with caution. Again, all our profits go to partners and health. We don't keep any of this money. This next question comes from anonymous.

Who asks, dear Hank and John. Did we answer that question, John? Yeah, no, she's getting a letter opener. Congratulations on your art exhibition. My sports team started the recent season with one win followed by a pile of losses. Previously, it was a team that brought me a lot of joy. But now, I feel as though their losses are coordinating with a more generalized depression that I'm experiencing, and I'm struggling to find positive silver linings while they keep losing so badly. Sports are supposed to be fun!

So I've kind of detached with the intent to get back in when they start being fun again. You seem to always find positives with AFC Wimbledon even when they aren't playing to their top potential. How do you do that? Thank you, feeling the baseball blues. Well, so the good news about baseball, right, is that no matter how bad your team does, they still get to be in the same league. You know, like if you finish the bottom of the major leagues, nobody says like you're not a major league team anymore. So that's a silver lining right there. I do want to say here, anonymous, that if you are concerned about your mental health,

that is something to pursue and it's probably not being caused directly by sports, but it's super real. And I do think that like when we are in difficult places, the things that used to bring us joy, stop bringing us joy, and that's not only about the results that the team is having. It is really difficult, though, just on a human level when the team that you care about sucks. It's really miserable, not least because all of the opposing fans take a certain amount of glee in your team's sucking, and that's always a bad feeling. They're quiet about it. No, no, and to be fair, you don't see me having a tremendous amount of sympathy when things go south in Milton Keynes. So this is why one of my very favorite things in soccer is the songs sung by bad teams like, uh, right.

You some some way of reveling in how bad you are like just like we understand the situation. Yeah, I think it was Ashton Villa who were playing once and they were down like 5'0 and the fans started singing, let's pretend, let's pretend, let's pretend we scored a goal and then they all went like completely crazy. And then there's the classic football chant. We lose every week, we lose every week, you're nothing special, we lose every week, we lose every week, you're nothing special, we lose every week. Right. Right.

And I think that like if you come in thinking that the point is to win and there's no other point than that, then that is just very disheartening. So the thing that like the true fans, the people who can stick with it through the bad times, what they find are things to follow and things to celebrate that aren't the win. They might be an individual goal or a save or, like, a player doing very well or, you know, like, your pitcher making a better, having a better game than their last game, even if they still lost. Like, you find the things to enjoy. Yeah, Hank, when we were kids, Orlando got an expansion MBA team called the Orlando Magic. You might remember them.

I do. Yes, they still exist, by the way. I literally don't know if they're still a professional basketball team, but they were when we were kids. Yes. Yeah. So they're thing. They were bad.

They're first couple of years. Then eventually they got Shaquilla Neal and they got pretty good. But they were really, really bad. They're first few years. And do you remember Hank, the guy who was the last guy on the bench of the early Orlando magic? Uh, no, definitely not. His name was Morlin Wiley.

Okay, yeah. Now, I don't remember that. Morlin Wiley would get into like a game once the magic were down by like 20 points and people would get so excited when Morlin Wiley entered the game. Like, people would just go crazy. Every time the ball would get past

a Morlin Wiley, everyone would be screaming, shoot, shoot, shoot. When Mor than Wiley everyone would be screaming shoot shoot shoot. When more than Wiley scored a free throw you would have thought that the Orlando magic had just won the NBA finals. It was a beautiful thing to behold. And to me like that you've got to find that thing. You've got to find your more than Wiley way in not only when it comes to sports when it comes to everything in life.

Yeah, and I mean the guy played a 11 years, oh, I was gonna say you played 11 years in the NBA, but no, he played three years in the NBA and then he had a very long career playing for lesser. Yeah, I mean, I you know, he bounced around a little bit. He played for the Rapid City thrillers. John, I agree and I didn't expect to get such insight from this question. So well done. What do we have? Getting at actual insight ever. That's not what this podcast is for. Sorry, it's not what we're about. Not what we're about at all. All right, I think we have another question. This one comes from Adam who writes, dear John and Hank, what's the deal with the song The Itsy Bitsy Spider? Nursery rhymes and children songs generally

have morals of some sort or like teachable elements to them. So what's going on in The Itsy Bitsy Spider? Is it supposed to be a lesson in perseverance? Yes, Adam. That's exactly what it is supposed to do. Please help me understand, when it comes to good times, I don't subtract them. I, Adam. It's good. It's good, Adam. I have listened to a lot of nursery rhymes

in the last period of time. And I find that they don't have morals. Do they? Well, I think one of a lot of the wheels on the bus, they go round and round. That's all, that's what they do. The people on the bus, they go up and down. Like, I'm not learning anything here. Kids are like, it's even too spider, and it is like part of it is that it's like a hand game, and so there's hand gestures to go with it, and so you like, you get the kids doing the hand gestures.

I completely agree with you that wheels on the bus, or Old McDonald had a farm, as far as I can tell, no that wheels on the bus or Old McDonald had a farm. Yeah. As far as I can tell, no moral aside from the fact that life, especially when you are a child, is best-lived on repeat. But I do think the Itsy Bitsy Spider song has a moral, which is precisely perseverance.

I mean, the Itsy Bitsy Spider walks up the water spout, gets washed down, and then walks up the water spout again. There's two ways of looking at this, right? There's the sycifus is rolling a rock to the top of the hill, and then it rolls back down, and then he has to roll it back up for all of eternity. But as as Camufamously said, one must imagine sycifus as happy. Like you keep going. That is the glory of the human story

is we get washed down the water spout and we're like, no, no, I'm going back up to the top of this roof. I only after having a child realized that the water spout was what the water comes off of the roof in. I thought that it was the sink when I was a kid, but it was like climbing up into the faucet.

So this is a revelation for me when I picked up a book about its ebotsie spider and it showed the water spout. And I was like, oh, there's bound to be bugs up there. That's a fine place for a spider. Right, that's much more terrifying. So you thought it was a story about like spiders coming out of drains. Yeah, hiding in the drains, because that's in Florida.

Of course, things are always coming out of the drains. It's so true. I mean, every time I went to the bathroom as a child, I would look in the toilet and like 40% of the time, there'd be something. Snake. I don't know. A spider. What are they doing in there? How do. Snake. I don't know. A spider.

What are they doing in there? How are they flying? How are they flying? How are they flying? How are they flying? It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider.

A spider. How are they flying? How are they flying? It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider.

It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider. It's a spider. including places that it was socially acceptable to poop. He was like, try in here. Oh, they didn't actually get mad about that. I'll try somewhere else next time. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha like literally not credible. Red green just had no quit in him at all. That's right, and he actually just celebrated his 35th birthday, Red Green.

I would not be surprised if Red Green were still alive somewhere. I don't think he's in a dog body anymore, but I think he might have made the transition. You know, he figured it out. He found a path. All right, I agree with another question. This one comes from Kuzama who writes, dear John and Hank, I hope you're both doing great. My name is Kuzama, yes, you pronounced it out. He found a path. Alright, we don't know the question. This one comes from Kuzama, who writes,

Dear John and Hank, I hope you're both doing great. My name is Kuzama. Yes, you pronounced it right. Hmm. Don't bet on me, Kuzama. And I love M&Ms. But a few days ago, I found out that I can't eat them anymore, because the official Twitter account of M&Ms tweeted out in response to a certain question that M&Ms are not whole all, rendering them unfit for consumption. By me, I've loved them ever since I was a kid. I have fond memories of enjoying them whenever. I got them as a gift from my uncle who brought them from Kuwait because I live in rural India and they're not available here. What do I do now? Any dubious advice is appreciated, not eating Eminem's, Kuzema.

So a few things, Hank. First off, M&Ms really botched the announcement that M&Ms were not whole all, surprisingly enough. This is how you do this on Twitter? You don't with Twitter? No, you would think that M&Ms would be like tremendously culturally sensitive, but it turns out that no.

That's the first thing. Secondly, because of the way they answered the question, all of the vegans were like, wait, what? What? What? What? What? What?

Okay, yeah. And thirdly, those of us who just enjoy M&Ms, but are neither Muslim nor vegan, were also like, hold on a minute, wait, wait, wait. How many animals are in my Emaneuvers? Yeah, exactly. What if I have a belief system that requires me when eating Emaneuvers to believe

that I'm not eating meat? Yeah, I'm not vegan here, but I do. I just like, but I like to know if it's bacon or not. I wanna know what animal parts I am eating when I'm eating animal parts. It's this part of it. And that's my belief system. So then they were like, oh, when we release M&Ms

in certain countries, there's sometimes HALAL, it's marked on the package. So Kizema, the M&Ms that your uncle is getting might actually be Hulal. It'll be marked on the package, apparently, according to M&Ms Twitter. And then secondly, it seems, it's not totally clear from their answer what the issue is,

but people have long kind of believed in certain parts of the Islamic world that red M&Ms are not halal. Because, and I did not know this, the red dye, it like comes from beetles. Oh. It's like beetle parts. Like they just have to do like M&Ms with no reds. And right, but then like when

it would be the factory when they're made, you know, they haven't had an mom with the expertise necessary come in and take a look at the factory obviously. And so that's why they're just like, oh, it's not a whole, but then everybody's like, well, but what isn't a lot about it? And the answer to that is maybe just the red M&Ms or maybe more because like they haven't, they just haven't dealt with it well. And I frankly am disturbed on every level. And I'm sorry that you can't eat M&Ms. I do think though Hank, that there are other chocolate candies

that are just as good as M&Ms. If not, there I say it better. Oh my goodness. Well, look at John with the outlandish statements here. Do they have peanuts in them? Because peanut m&Ms are all I care about. Peanut m&Ms are very, very good. I can't.

I want to be able to minimize this loss for Kuzama, but peanut m&Ms are pretty great. Hahaha. This next question comes from Sarah. I think it's for me who says, dear Hank and John, though I mean this is somewhat applicable to you as well. I have ulcerative colitis, so normally I poop a lot, but I almost never poop on the weekends.

Why is this? It's my cold lunch. Taking a well-deserved break from a long hard work in a week of excessive pooping. Sincerely Sarah. Wow. Somebody tell Sarah's colon that the rules of employment in America do not apply to our colons. Everybody's working for the weekend, Hank. Even Sarah's colon.

Yeah. This is the whole problem. It's working very hard so it can take a couple of days off. Yeah, working too hard. There's a thing called the gut brain information access Sarah that I spend a lot of time thinking about. And the relationship between our brains and our intestinal systems, our gut system in general,

is very complicated and weird. And that is probably what's driving this on some level, I would guess. Yeah, I also, in general, I have many times when I have no choice, but then I'll go on vacation and it'll be like two, three days, and I'm like, I am worried about what's gonna happen when what happens eventually happens. Right. And usually rightfully.

I don't know, I'm like, just do it. Like, whatever it is, I find, and this is different for everybody, but I find I need certain triggers. Like, apparently, my brain needs some subconscious something, and here they are, my office, which is really annoying because I walk out my office and I immediately have to go back into the house.

To any bookstore, anywhere, honestly, where there are lots of books, I don't know what it is, but if I need it, then like it's better than X-Lax. Wow. Yep. And I'm like, hey, you got the key to the bathroom? I just walked into your store.

I promise. I made my self-pain. Yeah, when the sign says for customers only and you want to be like, listen, I will be a customer. However. Yeah. Like, I will be a dedicated customer. I will be so loyal to your brand.

All I need is that key with a very big key chain on it. Which reminds me that today's podcast is brought to you by bathrooms at your local independent bookstore. The bathrooms at your local independent bookstore. You can't get that on Amazon. That's not available on Amazon. This podcast is also brought to you by your losing sports team.

They're not doing great, but find somebody to root for and just be happy that they're getting a chance to play a sport with people watching. What a great job. Morgan Wiley, today's podcast also brought to you by the Attention Economy, the Attention Economy, you're the product. And finally, this podcast is brought to you by Red Eminem's.

What's in them? They're beatily. Ha ha ha's yeah. I mean, oh. All right, Hank, before we get to the all important news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon, we have an important email that came in from Libby. You might remember Libby Hank. She asked a few months ago for some Mizzula recommendations because she was applying to college in Mizzula

at the University of Montana. She was coming to visit and she wrote in to say, dear John and Hank, I got that scholarship at the University of Montana, she was coming to visit, and she wrote in to say, dear John and Hank, I got that scholarship at the University of Montana. It's been a wonderful day in Missoula. I ate at Bigapizza, and now I'm gonna spend the next four years of my life here in Missoula, not at Bigapizza, although it was very good,

so I guess we'll see. When they told me I got the scholarship, they said that the fact that I'd heard about the university from a podcast really stuck out to them So I guess I have you guys to think and the pod for the $18,000. You're welcome to be and I do take full credit If you would like to buy a letter opener To thank us available at dftba.com That's right. You there's never been a better time to buy a signed letter opener.

And that will ship it to you from Missoula. And it'll go to Salt Lake City first, but it will come back. So that's how it works. Hank, you made someone move to Missoula. It's beautiful. Yeah, it's a lovely place. I hope that you have found it

finding the housing situation affordable. Unlike, I'm sure you have place. I hope that you have found it finding the housing situation affordable, unlike I'm sure you have not. I'm sorry. Is the housing situation expensive in Missoula? It's getting that way. I mean, it's just increased a lot. It's still obviously much cheaper than a lot of places. Are the beers at the VFW still like 30 cents?

The beer has not gotten more expensive, John. In fact, if anything, it's gotten cheaper because there are so many breweries competing with each other. I mean, I tried to give the person at the VFW a dollar for a PBR, and then they proceeded to give me like nine beers. Hank. Yes. AFC Wimbledon are down to their last few games in League One, but the question now is, are AFC Wimbledon are down to their last few games in league one But the question now is are aFC Wimbledon down to their last few games in league one? Oh boy is it tight and difficult and scary Wimbledon played Oxford United over the weekend It was nil nil and that was a

It was nil nil and that was a generous result, I would say. Well, first of all, because Oxford United is middle of the table, they've won their last four games before this one. They have. They're doing really well, so it's good to beat a team that's doing well. We didn't beat them just to clarify. So to tie a team that's doing, it's good to not lose to a team that's doing well. It was a borderline miraculous draw. They had 14 shots to AFC Wimbledon's four.

Wimbledon had no shots on target. Aaron Ramstale, our 21 year old goalkeeper on loan from Bournemouth, just played like an absolute madman. I mean, he was incredible. He made so many world class saves. I am so grateful to him. As a result of that point, AFC Wimbledon now have 44 points after 42 games.

It looks like this season, 50 points might be enough to stay up, maybe 51. So Wimbledon have to win at least two of their last four games. One of those four games is against Lutentown who are running away at the top of the league. Yeah, that's exactly unlikely to beat them. We have three winnable games.

One is against Bradford City, who have lost like seven games in a row. One is against Wickham, who have lost like seven games in a row. One is against Wickham who have lost four out of their last five. And one is against Bristol Rovers who sort of middleing like us. So we really need points in all three of those games and at least two of them have to be wins. It is tense. That's coming down to the wire, John. When when it shows up on my screen and the game is

ongoing and there's no scores and it's happening and it keeps happening for so many minutes. Oh, really? I mean, I watched the whole Oxford United game and I was just sweating. I was just drinking and sweating by the end of it. Yeah. Yeah, you got to find a way to not care about the winning, but it's very hard when there's this very, like if you were in the middle of the pack, who cares?

Who cares? Yes, then I would be able to just enjoy the whatever, but as it is, all I can think about, oh, just desperately, desperately, desperately, I think as you have a lower goal differential than the two teams that have 45 points. I know. So if you just had 45 points,

you wouldn't just be in 20th, you'd be in 19th. I know, we'd be out of the relegation zone if we'd be acting it's Stanley, but we didn't tank, so it doesn't do any good to focus on that. Thank you. I'm just saying, they have to, all that has to happen. So you're saying you need 51 points. I'm saying all that has to happen. So you're saying you need 51 points.

I'm saying all that has to happen is Roachdale or Scunthorpe have to lose every game that they have coming and you have to win one of them. Well, that is technically true. Yes, if Roachdale and Scunthorpe, I think it's Roachdale, but nobody knows for sure. It's something for the scientists to figure out. If they both lose all four of their remaining games,

we only need one point. However, that's probably not gonna happen, but maybe it will, I don't know. All I know is that I do not like being in the bottom four. On the other hand, two months ago, Wimbledon were dead in the water, not just in last place, but seven points away from being not in last place. And now we are up to 21st.

So there is hope. There is a possibility here. But boy, is it scary? All right. Well, the news from Mars, John, we have a mystery. So as we know now, four billion years ago, when Mars was very young and the solar system was also quite young. Mars was a warm place with lakes and it had rivers and it had probably big old oceans.

And as time has gone on, the atmosphere that was hold it, that was had enough pressure to keep that water in a liquid state has gone away. So there was a lot of atmosphere around Mars, and then it went away. And the leading theory for how it went away, and it's always been told is solar-way, like the Mars's magnetic field shut down. It couldn't block these high energy particles from the Sun. They hit the particles in the atmosphere and one at a time they they get bumped out until there isn't much atmosphere at all left.

Yeah. I'm so interested in solar winds that now whenever my kids are like, is human life going to end when you know the earth collides into the sun? I'm always like, no, no, no. First off, it'll be way way before that. Secondly, whatever replaces no, no, first off, it'll be way, way before that. Secondly, whatever replaces us and renders us extinct will go extinct when the solar winds come. Right. Yes. Before the sun touches us, there will be many, many bad consequences. So there's a new study out based on data from the Mars Express spacecraft that basically went through and said like how would this process work based on the solar radiation that Mars is getting

now. And solar wind would account for according to this study less than 1% of the surface pressure that has been lost over the last four billion years. Wow. Now, what this means is one of two things. They're both big things. One, we're misunderstanding how, like maybe the early state of the sun, like maybe the sun was different billions of years ago

than it is now, or how the solar wind interacts with the atmosphere of Mars. Two, these sort of like other big category of things that this might be is like a number of other things that could account for it, which aren't clear and basically are like, if it isn't one of those first things, it's just like, I don't know, man, there's a lot of work to do if it turns out that this

is actually the case that the solar wind is not responsible. We're just not sure. Was it some kind of catastrophic effect of a meteorite impact? Was it surface level chemistry that bound up all of the atmosphere at compounds? Like what's happening? Nobody knows. So in the billion or so years that Mars was a warm place with oceans and rivers, is it possible that accentient species rose and fell and it is responsible for the end of life on Mars. It did something to make the atmosphere go away. Do you think that is in their hubris? Is that within the realm of possibility or are they like chemical reasons why that is impossible?

Well, there's sort of like entropic reasons, just that it takes a very long time in our one experiment for any amount of complex life to evolve. So as an example, in the same time scale on Earth, we did not exit the realm of single-celled organisms. Right, that's true. That's not a bad point. But I would argue that the reason we didn't exit single-celled organisms is just because we hadn't made like one leap. And then once we made that one leap, the rest of it actually went quite quickly. Maybe if the leap happened to happen super early. Maybe exactly. Or, or, or.

Maybe if the leap happened on like day four on Mars, there were like little people on Mars. I assume that they were little because that's what I've seen in the movies. And then, you know, they are the reason why Mars collapsed. Like us, whether... Mars collapsed is a good name for a book. Can I use that? I mean, you can use it for A-book, you can't use it for the sequel

to an absolutely remarkable thing. Brutus will make a ton of sense, no? I remember I started to do that, though. I started like any phrase I would hear. I would be like, hmm, that is an interesting title. I could be reading Shakespeare or the Bible or something and like every other word in a song I'd be like, hmm, the value of the shadow of death, eh?

It's very good. Black popcorn. Oat milk. Oat milk. Oat milk is a really bad, but yeah, you aren't there yet, my friend. I'll keep working on it. Just stay on the path. Hey, we've also got a product for awesome message today, John. It's from Ben Ratner, who says, quote,

I'm Hank Green, and I'm saying this by my own personal choice. I have changed my mind, and as of this very moment, this podcast is now called Dear John and Hank. That isn't real though, just for clarity. That's what Ben wanted us to say. It's not real. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha to go now to record our Patreon Only podcast this week in Ryan's, which you can get at patreon.com slash deerhankinjohn. But Hank, thank you for potting with me and thanks to everybody for listening. Absolutely. This podcast is edited by Niko with Stjinkins.

It's produced by Rosiana Halsey Rojas and shared in Gibson our head of community and communications is Victoria Bonjourno, the music you're hearing now, and at the beginning of the podcast is by the great Gunnarola and as they say in our hometown, don't forget to be awesome. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ OUT