Dear Hank & John - 303: Come Back With A Warrant

Episode Date: September 6, 2021

How much does a rainbow weigh? Where is Voyager headed? What does it mean to 86 something? Am I radioactive? Is it normal to clap at the end of movies? Are brains strings or wrinkle? What does "not unkindly" mean? Who reads books as a job? Hank Green and John Green have answers!If you're in need of dubious advice, email us at [e-mail] 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 John. Doors I prefer to think of it dear John and Hank. It's a podcast where two brothers answer your questions, give you Dubie's advice and bring you all the week's news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon. John, back, do you remember somebody asked us a long time ago? They asked us, you guys, how do you throw away a trash can? Do I just put my trash can inside of my another trash can? Is that how that works? I was like, I was just like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like,

I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like,

I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like,

I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, Can you do the can, can? Can you put the can inside a can? That's the joke. That's the joke. That's brutal. I mean, that was, I was excruciating to live through. I mean, I don't wanna over dramatize it or anything,

but I was one of the worst things I've had to go through in my life. So I'm still workshoppin' it. I'm still workin' on that one. Maybe next week I'll come out of the, like sort of a shinier workshopping it. I'm still working on that one. Maybe next week, I'll come out of the, like sort of a, it's a shinier version of it. When I get to the afterlife, St. Peter's gonna be like,

I mean, you just, you know, you were mixed back and I'll be like, I agree wholeheartedly, but I listened to that whole Hank joke. This is the whole thing. You're not gonna interrupt the can't joke. You know every St. Peter? You remember the-can joke. You did not forget that. Let me in, buddy. I listened to the can-can joke. And indeed, all of our listeners, everybody,

everybody who didn't interrupt in the middle of that joke taboo. This one is a free pass. It's the most good of all the podcasts because it's guaranteed to get you into heaven. Here's a better joke. This question comes from Jess who writes, dear John and Hank, but mostly Hank. Jess, thank you for knowing what I can and cannot do. My fiancee recently told me a joke about how scientists were able to weigh rainbows and they found out after weighing these rainbows that they were pretty light. Now see, that is a good, dead joke.

Pretty light. Very good. Good, doubt it. It got me to thinking, I know that rainbows are like made out of light and that photons have no mass. Well, just your one step ahead of me. But since you have to have water droplets for rainbows to form, how much would a rainbow way if you added up the weight of the water droplets that helped make the rainbow rain drops

and photons? Yes. Well, John, remarkably, Deboki Chalkrovarti decided without telling me or giving me advanced notice or even letting me tell her not to, she did figure this out with real math. So, oh boy. So the size of a raindrop is about, either from 0.5 to 4 millimeters in diameter,

which is a pretty wide range. But you will notice that as you are getting hit by raindrops, sometimes they are smaller than other times. So, it's difficult to know exactly. But the first thing that Deboki has written down, do you technically need more than one raindrop to make a rainbow? But that is all Deboki wrote enough because once that was done, that's just that's that that's we're throwing that out in the universe. Do you, I don't know, probably not, but the question is how much does a rainbow that you're

actually looking at? How much is that rainbow? Right. Right. Way. The average rainbow. Yes. We're looking, we're not looking for like a single, yes, a rainbow within a single drop of water. That's beautiful, but that's not poetry to handle. We're talking about regular, the kind of rainbows that have a pot of gold at the end of them and a box of lucky charms and a leprechaun, those rainbows. So there are probably trillions of those .5 to four millimeter raindrops in a rainbow,

which is a lot of rain. So, John, do you want to know how much a rainbow weighs? I do. We're going to give it to you in elephants because that because it's not going to make any sense otherwise. This is as close as we can get to telling you in a number that makes sense about how much a rainbow weighs in elephants. Seven million. What elephants? million. What? Elephants. What? A rainbow weighs seven million elephants. By the way, I only want to hear weight in elephant measures from now on, period for the rest of my life. When the doctor asks me how much I weigh, I'm going to tell the gods on his truth, which is that I weigh one thirty third of an elephant. We're getting rid of pounds and kilograms. That whole thing is over. It's elephants only for me here on out. It's elephants all

the way down. Seven million elephants. I could not be more surprised. I would have guessed, when you said seven, I was like seven elephants, I buy it. I could, I can see a rainbow weighing seven elephants. I have seven million elephants. Can we go back to light not having masks? Just briefly. That makes more sense than a seven million elephant rainbow. Wow. I mean, I, I, I, you'd, by the way, do not weigh one thirty-third of an elephant.

That is for sure. You may weigh one sixty-sixth of an elephant, but I don't. Well, I definitely don't weigh weigh 166th of an elephant, but I don't know. Well, I definitely don't weigh 133rd of an elephant. I don't want to get too particular here because the last thing I want to do is abandon elephants as a way of measuring mass. But I do strongly believe it depends on the elephant. I've seen a lot of elephants. Some of them are significantly bigger than other ones.

So if we're talking about like adult male elephants, yeah, I have no idea how much they weigh. All I know is that seven million of them weigh a lot. Wow, that's a mind blower for me. Water. Water. Gosh, water. It's heavy.

And it just like goes up into this guy. Do you know why water goes up into this guy, John? It's great. I don't. Because water vapor, the gaseous form of water, is less dense. Yeah, it evaporates. It evaporates into the air. It evaporates into the air.

Yeah. So all these different gases are in the air. It's mostly nitrogen and oxygen. Nitrogen. So water vapor is less dense than nitrogen and oxygen. So it floats until it turns back into water again, and liquid water again, and then it's heavier, and then it falls back down. And that's how the whole world works without that. You know who is one of the... None of it would work. Well, the oceans would. is one of the none of it would work. Well the oceans would, the land stuff, none of it would work.

I've been reading this book by Katie Mack, the astrophysicist called The End of Everything Astrophysically Speaking. And it's full of stuff like rainbows weighing seven million elephants, except even more upsetting and even more weird. Yeah. But weirder and more. The universe is so weird and it's going to end, which is even weirder.

The thing that I've kind of been surprised some 41 now and this wasn't weird to me until now that the universe has a beginning. Like, I don't know why that was never weird to me, now that the universe has a beginning. Like I don't know why that was never weird to me, but now it's very weird. I'm like, oh, so like one day there was suddenly a bunch of hydrogen? It's weirder than that because it wasn't on one day because there really kind of wasn't time before. Right.

But like that, yeah, and yeah, no time is very weird. I don't want to get into it. But the idea, do you know one of the first ways that we figured out that the universe was had a finite age, like how to beginning? I think so, although you can probably correct me if I'm wrong, Hank. I mean, I think there are several ways that we kind of know the Big Bang probably happened, but wasn't the first that we figured out that the universe was expanding at an accelerating rate and that if you run that backwards as you have to because that's how time works that eventually you get to an

unbelievably dense single particle of everything. Yes, and then and then enough, we confirmed that that actually had happened through a number of other experiments. But before that, when we were just sort of thought experimenting about this, people were like, well, if the universe was, so it could be one of two things. Either the universe is infinitely old

or infinitely big. It can't be both infinitely big and infinitely old, because if that were the case, the sky would be white at night. The sky would be white at night because every point would be, and if the universe is infinite, when you look up in any point,

there is something there. You know, it was gonna look black, but there is something there if the universe is infinite, which it may very well be. But the light hasn't had a chance to get to you yet. If it were infinitely big and infinitely old, the light would have had a chance to get to you. So there would be no nighttime, which would be a very weird. I mean, it's very weird to consider the possibility that the universe is infinitely big, because we often think of infinity as being a large number, but it is not. It is,

it is an idea. It is boundlessness. And that is not a large number. It's much weirder than the largest number imaginable. I don't know why, but I think it would be weirder for the universe to have a size. I don't. By the way, I've been reading all these books, Hank, because nine years after you first told me that the universe has no edge. Yeah. I'm trying to write a video about why the universe

has no edge. Oh, I'm concerned. I need to do that. I need to finally understand it. Yeah. I'm really excited to see what gets you there. Because I'm too wide. I have wonderful science communicators who've written brilliant books that are really

helping me get there. But I'll tell you what helps me the most is just the idea that the universe might be infinite because infinite things do not have an edge. That makes things more clear for sure. Yeah, I mean, I just think of it like if the if like everything is a field, like what, why would a field have an end? Why would it why would there be a bound on it? And so like the weird thing is that all these fields interact to form stuff and then all that stuff interacts to form planets and all the stuff on the planets interacts to be like, I'm gonna be a plant. Yeah. That is very weird.

Yeah. It's the it's the hydrogen to Bluetooth that's the weird thing. I think it's trying to understand what the universe is expanding into. That was the biggest problem for me because I was picturing. Well, if it's, does it make it weirder if it's infinite and expanding? Is that still, does that make sense to you? No, no, I mean, of course not. It shouldn't make sense to anyone, right?

That should be weird. Sure. If you're not a little bit weirded out by the idea that you are living in an infinite universe that is expanding at an accelerating rate, then like, I, I don't know what to tell you. Like, you don't get freaked out easily, I guess. Yes, it is weird to me, but at least like, I can, I can grasp it. When people would be like, oh, the universe is like a balloon, it doesn't have an edge.

I would be like, well, first off, balloons have edges. Like, in fact, like, that's kind of what a balloon is. It's just an edge. Yeah. And then, and then secondly, you've got to make that three dimensional. Okay. Anyway, a balloon is three dimensional.

No, you got to make the edge of the balloon three dimensional. But secondly, the balloon, I know what the balloon is expanding into. It's expanding into earth. Like, it's expanding into space. It's expanding into air. And so, I had what I've eventually had to do is put away all of these analogies that people tried to create for me. Because they just start that helpful. Like, it isn't like a balloon. It isn't like a slinky. It isn't, it's an infinite universe that is expanding at an accelerating rate. And we can only see so much of it,

not because there is only so much to see, but because there is only so much to see from where we are. Right. That is what has gotten me there. In so far as I have arrived there. It's so weird. It's so weird. It's so weird. It's so weird. The universe is astonishing. And like we are, but humans on a planet looking at cosmic background radiation to know how all the universe is.

Yeah. Very weird. It's so good. It's so encouraging. It's so good. It's so good. Speaking of the universe, John, we have a question from Nick who asks dear Hank and John, where is Voyager heading? Is it still out there? Is it going any place

in specific or is it just going? Mattis Vincere, Nick, I don't know what that one is. I don't either. Can I tell you what I think the answer is and then you tell me what the actual answer is? Sure. I think the answer is that the Voyager space capsule is going away. That is correct. You've hit on it. Do you have anything more than away? Yeah, like further and further away from us.

Yeah. It's not actually going, because I don't think it's actually going toward anything. I think the think it's actually going toward anything. I think the main thing it's going is away. It's like when I move to Alaska, a waitress. I was at a breakfast place and a waitress said to me, there's only two kinds of people who come to Alaska, people who are running to something and people who are running from something, which kind are you? And I was like, I think I'm like the Voyager Space Capsule, I'm running away. Yes. Well, that's, that is correct. It is especially correct in as much as like, so we didn't intend for the Voyager Space craft to

have like a trajectory really. The point was, we got to get it, we got to like study a bunch of the solar system and then once it's done, it's not, it's not coming back. Like it's gonna be headed quickly outward because outward was where all of the planets were. So it went quickly outward and so the Voyager spacecrafts continue to go quickly outward. And so they're both going in different directions,

they're going different directions in space. The weird thing is that they are both going to arrive kind of ish somewhere in about 40,000 years, but different places, which is weird. So Voyager 2 will be a little less than two light years away from a star in 40,000 years. That will not be helpful to anyone. I was going to say that it's like it's really headed to anything.

It's like a very close, three far away from a star, which is not close. But here's the really weird one. In about 40,000 years, Voyager one will be 1.7 light years away from a star. It doesn't matter what star. You can look this up. But the weird thing is that at that point, 40,000 years from now, the star that Voyager will be two light years away from will be the closest star to Earth. Oh.

But isn't currently. Because it's currently Alpha Centauri, which will have moved away. But that star will be, despite the fact that it's going to be the closest star to Earth, we won't be able to see it with a naked eye because it's a very dim star. It's a main sequence star that just has, just is not very, does not have a bright magnitude. And so even if you were sitting on Voyager at 1.7 light years away from that star, you could barely see it. What?

That's where Voyager's heading. That's how much space there is that like they've calculated the closest thing they're gonna get to in the next 40,000 years. And it's a star that basically won't be able to see. I have to disagree with your premise that in 40,000 years, the Voyager space capsules will be somewhere because what you

just told me is that they will both be over a light year away from the nearest meaningful thing. And like, yeah, which is, but that's a lot closer than they are right now. I understand, but it isn't close, right? Like the sun is seven light minutes away from me right now, and I sometimes get cold. Like, it's not close to be a light year away from something. Not at all. The sun is very close. Interestingly, and looking at this, I discovered that the closest star that we have been to

or that we will be to in the lab, that we will be to, is gonna happen in 1200 years or 1300 years, and we will be quite close to that star. We will be point one six light years away. That's pretty close. So closer than Voyager. And Voyager will not be that close to that star. Voyager will be farther away than we are.

Because it's not going to anything. It's just going from. It's like me moving to Alaska. If only we threw Voyager at that star, but no, we didn't. Okay. So, I feel like, if we want to plan an interstellar mission, though, that's the candidate. It's not going to be that far away. It's just that the mission's going to take 2,000 years, which like, okay, let's think long term, okay? I'm okay. I'm okay with thinking medium term

on this one. Let's wait until we've got some speedier spaceships. The next question comes from Jason. I just want to confirm by the way that I was 100% right. Yes. And you with all of your fancy calculations were 100% wrong. Voyager is going nowhere fast. It is going from not to next quiet this next question comes from Jason who writes, Dear John and Hank, what does it mean to 86 something? And where does that come from? Jason, by the way, Rosiana, our producer left a note that said she's British, and you have to note that said, I always thought Americans were saying the letter A, the letter D, the number six, like AD6, like C3PO or something.

It's a Star Wars joke. But no, it's the number 86. And have you heard this before? Like if you say you're going to 86 someone, it's a way of saying you're going to murder that. Or if you say like something got 86, it means that we got rid of it or we just, it's been canceled. So the short answer to your question, Jason, is that nobody knows where 86 came from.

There are a number of series in the 1920s when the term first emerged. There was a lot of rhyming in English, a lot of slang rhymes that were especially popular in the UK, but you also saw them in the US. It may have been rhyming slang for the term nix, which means get rid of. It also, this is my favorite potential version. It may have been that when you were a bartender, because it was largely used in the hospitality business in the beginning, it may have been that when you were a bartender, and because it was largely used in the hospitality business in the beginning, it may have been that when you were a bartender and you 86 someone, it basically meant you were like, you can't have any real liquor anymore,

you're too drunk, we're cutting you down to 86 proof alcohol, which by the way is still 43% alcohol. So plenty, which is also, I think, the major vote against that. Like if you're really trying to cut someone off, I'm not sure that you like head to the 86 proof stuff. But there is also the possibility that it was soda jerkslang. So like there were all these in the 1920s, there were all these drug stores that had soda fountains where you could get ice cold soda drinks.

And there were lots of codes, like code 13 meant that your boss was nearby. Code 81 meant a glass of water and code 86 supposedly meant like we're all out of it. We don't have any of that. So those are the kind of leading leading votes. I guess so far as I know, but none of them are confirmed because even slang that emerged just a hundred years ago is already shrouded in mystery. Well that continued to happen or have we written stuff down too much? Well, I think like there's actually to me like a huge purpose in, for example, know your meme, which is sort of like

a meme history source. Yeah. I do think, but even then, like a lot of this stuff is somewhat shrouded in mystery. Like if you read the know your meme articles about even means from like 15 years ago, there's a lot of ambiguity already. So no, I think it'll continue. I think it'll always be part of the human story. Yeah.

I think you're right. Like even today, there are lots of things that people say that I have no idea where it's come from and I, she. Oh gosh. Yeah, sheesh. Oh, Lord. The other day, the other day, the other day, the other day, the field,

as much as like this stuff continuing to happen. I know. And it's always like, you never see it coming. You know? We're done. We're done with the new slang, right? We must be. We've come up with all the words we need. And then, no, we haven't, because we did not have a word for,

shhh. Oh, God. All right. word for shiiiish. Kiiiish. Oh, Lord. Oh, God. All right. Hank, what's the answer to the science question? This one comes from Emmy who writes, dear John and Hank, since Potassium is radioactive and I have potassium inside of my body.

Could I say that I am technically radioactive and are there other decaying elements inside of me as well, sincerely, Emmy? Uh, you know, I'm not entirely sure if there are other decaying elements inside of me as well? Sincerely, Emmy. You know, I'm not entirely sure if there are other decaying elements. I mean, I bet that there are, but potassium is, I think, the big one. And, and yes, you are radioactive, not worryingly. So if you sleep next to someone for eight hours, scientists have calculated this, you will receive 1.5 bananas of radiation. Hold on, Hank, before we go any further, how many elephants is that?

I don't know, like six elephants? Probably like, it's probably like a hundred. I'm just guessing. Okay. It was like, you get a hundred elephants of radiation, if you sleep. What happens if you sleep next to an elephant? K.

K. How close are you? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know how much potassium elephants have. I feel like we might be at the very outer edge of even dubious conjecture at this point. Nah, elephants got plenty of potassium. It's necessary for so much of our neurology.

So elephants got potassium. If you sleep in the arms of an elephant, you will get 100 bananas of radiation. I've said it now and I will not take it back. It's true. Cause I feel like it is. It might not be true. Just, just, just to be clear, Hank is guessing and he is probably guessing wrongly. And I cannot wait for someone to write in with some highly skilled calculation of how many bananas of elephants of radiation come from sleeping next to an elephant. But anyway, Hank, mostly I'm reminded that today's podcast is brought to you by radioactive elephants, radioactive elephants burning bright. Fuck us, it's also brought to you by Pretty Light.

It's what rainbows are. Actually, they're not. They're not light at all. They're incredibly heavy. They're pretty light. They're nice to their light that's nice to look at, though. It kills the joke because they're so heavy. You do what die.

Today's podcast is also brought to you by the universe, the universe, no edge since 16 billion years ago. And also this podcast is brought to you by Gleesa 445. Gleesa 445, it's the star that Voyager and also our son will be close to when about 40,000 years. Not very close, just to be. No, I agree. Not very close. Okay. Just running from something, not running to anything.

Yeah. Voyager. Be just to just grow up and learn that in life, you need to make positive choices as well as negative ones. You need to decide what you're going to as well as what you're running from Voyager And that's a lesson that I learned on the keyniponence level asca the hardest way Good luck Voyager. We also have a lovely project for awesome message from Kate Kuman from Detroit to Matt Kuman. My husband Matt was a nerd fighter to his core. He watched every video, read every book, listened to every podcast, even to the point that it was annoying. Matt died of cancer in September of 2020, so this message is in honor of him. Be grateful for every second you have, fight for what you believe in, and if you love someone, tell and of course DFTBA.

Kate, that is so lovely and such a wonderful way to honor your husband's memory and thank you for sharing that with us. And also, I know how annoying it can be when somebody won't shut up about how much they love something. So thanks for loving him anyway. And thank you for sharing that. He told me to stop and said, people don't do that, which brought me to the question, is it normal to clap at the end of movies? I hope it says, normal is sneezing, Jade. Yeah. I, there's been, I've been in movie theaters where there has been clapping at the end, but it has definitely been the exception in my experience.

The movie has to be good, which most movies aren't, you know? No, I don't know about that. To me, like, the clapping I tend to experience in movie theaters is for movies that people have been waiting a long time for and that are like part, like, you know, at the end of like phantom menace, everyone clapped because it was like, ah, the star wars is back.

It's very exciting and they're like, you know, sometimes you hear clapping when like a big bad gets gotten, not at the end of the movie, but people are like, woo, and that's always I'm like, you know, sometimes you hear clapping when like a big bad gets gotten right at the end of the movie, but people are like, woo, and that's always I'm like, wow, that's you're really into it. Okay, you're going for it. I think it's nice. I think it's a nice communal moment. And I'm a big fan of nonverbal communal moments like where we make sounds together, but we don't have to spit all over each other.

And that's one of the reasons I like applause. I think it's great. I'm 100% in favor of it. I, because to me, not clapping is just a form of not being enthusiastic. And usually you're not clapping for precisely the reason that Jade's cousin cited, which is like, it's so embarrassing. It's like, yeah, it's not done. It's not. It's not a bad thing. I also, I also clap when there's a rough landing on an airplane,

though, I'm one of those people who like, you got this thing down in this thunderstorm, and you are going to hear it from me. If there's anybody going to hear from it's going to be John Green. God, I can't. I remember, remember flying. That was a vaguely. Yeah. Yeah.

That was a strange thing that I did for years and years and years that it turned out. I didn't, I didn't have to do. I would, I would like to. I mean, I have to say, I don't see any upsides to the pandemic, but I don't miss, I don't miss flying. I think I flew enough. I a little bit, I don't, I don't miss flying at all. And I almost feel like a spell has been broken because I was so obsessed with getting, you know, like platinum or diamond medallion status every year. Oh, really? I never, I did never think about that at least. Oh, I,

I mean, I, I had to obsess about it because like, it was the way that I gamified the fact that I had to fly 60 times a year. Yeah. And then like the spell broke and now they email me and they're like, we're going to extend your medallions that. So I'm like, I'm not interested. Like, whatever hold you had on me is gone. That thing that I cared about now seems very silly. I don't want your literal or your figurative peanuts. Like I'm good. I like being sort of a ground-based phenomenon

most of the time. So Jade, I think you should just tell your cousin, listen, I'm being unironically enthusiastic, which is a resource in short supply in this world. And I will thank you not to judge me. Haha. John, this reminds me, I would really like some tea berry ice cream or checker berry ice cream.

This is a flavor of ice cream that we only have in America and that we don't have anywhere near me. So if anybody knows where I could get checker berry ice cream delivered to me in Mizzula, Montana, please let me know. Hard to get frozen stuff. Hank, we have another question. It's from Catherine and it's a very interesting question that I do not know the answer to. Okay. She writes, Dear John and Hank, are human brains like a blob that wrinkled into folds that look like thick strings? Or are they strings that eventually formed into a blob?

Oh God. Like, could you unravel a brain by pulling one end of the brain's dream? Okay. Not an abundance of just one, Catherine. I think, and there may be some developmental biologists who will correct me on this, but I'm pretty sure that the brain originally forms as a solid blob, and then the wrinkles fold into that blob over the course of the fetal development. And that it is not, well, I know it is not, it's not like a string of brain that then

gets bigger and then like runs up against itself, which I understand how you think that. But that is not. It'd be cool. It'd be very cool if the brain was like sort of like a head intestine. Exactly. You know. And that's how thoughts work. They start at the thought place and then they sort of get shout out into your mouth.

Yeah. Right. First you eat some sort of input and then at the end of it like you poop out of thought. If only every thought were a poop I think we would be appropriately humbled. Yeah, right. Just be like, oh gosh, I just had a thought. Usually don't have it until like nine in the morning, but yeah, today I had a thought of 830. They don't have it until like nine in the morning, but yeah, today I had a lot of eight 30. Yeah, I do. I just in general, I want my own mind to know that they are not all bangers.

That's right. Yeah. That's a great question, though. I mean, it's a fast, it's a fast, a thought experiment, but yeah, it's more blobby than it is in testimony, unfortunately. We have another question from Vi who writes, dear John and Hank, in John's book, The Anthropocene Reviewed, available now wherever you buy books, he uses the phrase not unkindly, saying,

and Hank, this is about, there's a moment in the book where I write about, like, when I sign my name 250,000 times, there would be the occasional signature, like one out of every 10 or 12,000 that I would feel like really captured the essence of my signature and looked really good. Yeah. And I was really proud of. And I write about this in the book and I say that Sarah will nod politely and look carefully at this near perfect signature for a while before saying not unkindly,

it looks exactly like all the others. Which is true. For some reason, my brain completely stumbled that the phrase not unkindly. What does that mean? I assume he doesn't mean kindly, because then he would have used that word. Does it mean somewhere between kindly and unkindly, but isn't that just saying something normally? What is the English language have such ambiguous phrases? Just some guy, Vi. I, well, okay, let me see, you wrote it. So you know the answer, but I, as a reader, here's how I interpret that.

If you, if you just said, she said, it looks exactly like all the others, I would probably assume a certain amount of like snark in that sentence because like it is a dumb thing that you're doing. But Sarah is being empathetic toward your, you know, over analysis here because you're doing a thing a lot. And so it's when you're doing a thing a lot. And so when you're doing a thing a lot, you can't help but think a lot about it. And so Sarah is being thoughtful in her comments and attempting to say a thing that could easily sound unkind in a not unkind way.

Yeah, I think that's very close to it. I mean, so this is a double negative and double negatives are supposed to not happen in English, but in fact, we use them all the time. And we use them in a lot of different ways. Sometimes we use them to emphasize a positive. There's all kinds of different double negatives. But in this case, you sometimes use a double negative because you're trying to cut something a little bit. You're trying to find a place between kindly that isn't quite kindly, that's a little funny, that's got a little bit of snorke, but that still has some generosity about it. And that is not unkindly. And so, and the other thing that a phrase like that does that I like, the reason that I chose it there and why I like it sometimes is that it can also cause that pause.

You know, you read it and it doesn't feel as smooth as a river rock, right? Like, it's a little bit of a jagged edge. And that that pauses you when you're reading. And and they're in that little like section between two commas, you pause enough that the joke that comes after it is funnier, hopefully. So like if you can if you can stop someone right before the joke, the joke is often reads to me in a way better. So that's the other reason for it. But double negatives have so many purposes in English and like triple negatives also

have multiple purposes a lot of times that it can be, it's definitely a dangerous game to play. And I thought about it a lot when I was writing that sentence. I remember thinking about it because I was like, you know, this is, I know what I'm trying to do here, but you never know like if it's going to be communicated perfectly. So yeah, it's not an uncommon, I just did it actually. But it's not an uncommon, it's not an uncommon, I just did it actually. I'm biased. But it's not an uncommon trick in English. I certainly didn't invent it, but I've always been pretty fond of it. John, let's do one more question before we get to the all-important news from Mars and

AFC Wimbledon. It's from Rachel who asks, dear Hank and John, I'm trying to figure out what career I want in the future. My dream job would be one where I could read fiction novels all day. Since both of you all have written books, I was wondering, out of all of the people who help in making your books, who reads the book as part of their job? Slaying dragons and saving princes, Rachel. Oh, that's an interesting question. Who reads? Who's like, I mean, people, the wild thing is that the reading of the book almost doesn't seem like it counts toward the work.

Like they almost always do that, like not during working hours. Yeah. Yeah, so I think like the obvious people, the first people are your editor who reads a book a lot of drafts, after draft, after draft. And then there's the copy editor who and copy editors will be unafraid to correct me if I'm wrong here. I believe usually read the book a couple times. And that's when I don't I don't know what it's like to read as a copy editor. I would think that it would, you know, you just, you have to be paying such close attention to grammar.

Yeah. Like, you have to think about the phrase not unkindly a lot and different things like it all the time. And so I don't know if it's as enjoyable as like reading for pleasure is. I'd be interested to hear that because I can't imagine.

Because copy editors also do continuity work and they do fact-checking work. So like, you know, they will check to see, so different, so for example, Grammar C. Theater, the last word in Grammar C. Theater and the official name of the Grammar C. Theater is spelled like it is in British English, but like I didn't know that. And so my copy editor like looked up how grammar c theater, the business name is spelled because in that situation, it would be so like stuff like that where you don't even think of it as it's not grammar.

It's just like that is the name of a business of a business and Mary Beth was making sure that that was like correct, you know, there's like timeline stuff. They do a ton of different things, but all of that makes me feel like you would have to be thinking so much about the sort of structure of the book, the process of the book that it would be hard to enjoy the book as a story. Yeah, it's very detailed oriented work, but also super important work.

And yeah, so you could do that. Also, the publicist often, not always, but usually reads the book, certainly my publicist, always reads the book, at least Marshall. Yeah, I think publicists read a lot of books for sure. Yeah, and then librarians and booksellers read a lot of books and I think you're right, Hank, it often isn't treated as part of their job. But it is certainly a profession where I mean the best read people I've ever known are almost all

Librarians or booksellers. Yeah, there's certainly a profession that attracts people who love to read love to talk about books Love to think critically about books. Yeah. Is there anybody else who reads every book? I can't think of anybody I mean, I guess like said at publishers like sales reps read books and you know, generally books like pretty much everybody who works in publishing has to like books on some level. Yeah. Because if they didn't there are other there are better businesses, you know, like if you if all you want is to be a publicist, you're going to go work for Nike. Yeah. And I mean, editor is also like the other thing is that that in that world, you have friends who are working in that world. And so like my editor reads a lot of the books of other editors.

So while Maya has read my books 10, 20 times and probably is pretty done with them, she reads other editors work and she, you know, like to learn from their process and just to support them and to be excited about their work. And so that's also in the world of publishing, like your friends are working on books. And you, it's part of how you support your friends and feel connected to them is by reading whatever they're working on.

Right, very true. So, agents, also agents, agents. There's probably a lot of people who are not thinking of Rachel. Agent, a lot of people were not thinking of Rachel. I'm agent. I've got a lot of books. I'll agents read a lot of books. They read a lot of like first 10 pages of books, but they also read a lot of books. So yeah, there are lots of jobs out there that involve reading books and we hope you find

one, Rachel. Woo, woo. Hank, before we get to the news from Mars and AFC Women, then I just want to read a couple response emails we got one from Ali who wrote, dear John and Hank in a recent episode of the podcast, you just got to how pulling out a book in public is like asking to have a meat cute in real life. That's not what I said. That's not what I said.

It is, it is, it is a little bit what we said. We said that that happening the first day of home room, right, is not, is a, is a, is definitely people are trying to express something with the book that they have chosen. Let me get to the point of the email. When I was in college, I wanted to get a cute guy to join the book study I was in. So I walked by his dorm room reading the book. He saw me. He noticed the book. He joined the book study. And now we're married with an adorable toddler and we watch every one of those video, cuddled up on our couch together, DFTBA, Allian Tommy. So it sometimes works, Hank. Wow. Wow. It has. Well, some other people wrote in to say,

when I'm reading a book in public, I am demonstrably asking to not be talked to, thank you. That's very true. You're right. You're right. It was. We got we yes, but hey, there is a look. Look, it's human interaction is complicated. And sometimes it's going to go one way and sometimes it's going to go another way. And that that is. Love, love, John. Sarah also wrote in to say that they just listened to episode 51, which is like seven years ago, in which we have a discussion about what to say when someone knocks on the bathroom door while you are inside. And then Sarah's suggestion of what Sarah says, when people knock on the bathroom door is so good that even five years later, I have to share it with you. I wanted to share my go-to response, which is to yell, come back with a warrant. That's very good.

That's great. Oh, God. Come back with a warrant. Oh, my God, it's very good. That's great. Oh, God. Come back with a little one. Oh, my God, it's so good. Especially in a public bathroom. The more public, the better. You're going to have to walk fast that person when you come out. Yeah, when you walk out after saying come out with a warrant, you do the thing where you point at your eyes and then you point at their eyes

and then you point at your eyes again. Then you just walk right back to the your table at the restaurant and you're like, I, you heard me. Yeah. That's, that's right. It's not in you. It's not in you. If somebody yelled, if I knocked on the bathroom door, you want to talk about a meat cute that results in Marychek.

If I knock on a bathroom door and somebody says, come back with a warrant when they leave that bathroom, I'm going to like hand them a business card and say, can we be friends? Oh, God, I don't have a business card, but that's what I would do if I did have a business card. Hank, let's talk about the news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon. Okay. How's AFC Wimbledon doing Okay. How's AFC Wimbledon, John? Oh my God, so good.

Two amazing things happened this week. First and most importantly, we on my birthday, August 24th, thanks for my gift, by the way, Hank. You didn't get me anything on my birthday, August 24th. I think that's enough. AFC Wimbledon played horribly. I mean, awful, terribly, yeah, in a second round, Carabao Cup tie. You'll remember there are all these knockout competitions like Carabao Cup, the FA Cup. And yet despite playing horribly, we won the game in the last,

with essentially the last kick of the game, Anthony Hart again, who's been with AFC Wimbledon since he was 10 years old or 12 or something, scored the, scored the winning goal. And that meant that we got to be in the third round of the caribouc cup. And we could have drawn any of the teams anywhere in England, but we didn't draw just any team. We drew Arsenal away with an A play in like a 60,000 seat stadium and it is going to be so much money and it is I mean, it's a dream. It's a dream come true It's like it's like winning an actual lottery. They pick a ball out of yeah a machine and you get paired with Arsenal away from home at a stadium that seats all these people.

It's very expensive to go there. All Arsenal fans, please go to the third round FA Cup, Carabao Cup tie against ANC, Wimbledon, please pay full price for your ticket. I'm very excited. It's a huge deal for Wimbledon. It's really, really good. It does not matter if we win the game. It just matters that we got that lucky draw.

Well, I mean, if we won the game, that's a big if. I mean, you're not going to win that game. We're not going to win that game. Arsenal are terrible this year, but we're not going to win that game. Yeah. Maybe. No, no. No. I can't, you know me. I can't give up hope. And then

over the weekend, AFC Wimbledon went to if switch town, if switch town, most notable for having signed the very same Joe Piggitt who just left us. And they were expected to be one of the best teams this year. They certainly have one of the highest budgets and they're kind of like picked by everybody to be promotion favorites. But not so much on that day, they did score two goals very quickly at the beginning of the second half. And I was very frustrated and upset. And I was like, I can't believe it.

But then we came back and we drew two, two. This is the second time that we've come from two goals down to tie a game and the tying goal was scored again on the last kick of the game in the last second stoppage time by Jack Rudoni, who is also Ben with Wimbledon since he was a little kid. His mom is a huge Wimbledon fan and it's just awesome. It was, it was great. We do need to stop tying games and start winning a couple, but even so, it was a joy to watch AFC Wimbledon 5 games into the league one season are in 15th place and stop the count. I would be very happy to end it right there. Well, 15th would be awesome.

That's cool. I love tying good teams. Oh, yeah. It's great. Now we just need to beat some bad teams. Yeah. This weekend Mars news, so perseverance is of course attempting to persevere after it lost its sample. So I drilled that hole. Right. And then it looked up the picked up the sample and there was nothing in the sample tube. So it is headed on over to a different area that's going to have softer grass. Better rocks, actually harder rocks. So what they think happened with this other rock is that it just turned into dust. Yeah. Right. So they are headed to an area of some rocks that have withstanded some like a lot of erosion over the years, and they'll be able to hold up

to the drilling a little bit better. And they're going for a rock that they've named Roshette. Sure. Why not? Because it's just like a nice looking rock. And they're going to drill and take that sample. They're adding another step to the sampling procedure

where they actually take a picture of the tube to make sure there's something in there before they stow it away. Yeah, good call. And the, yeah. So, and they're adding another extra step where they're going to take a picture of the tube so that we'll actually know if there's something in there. And I have every confidence that it's going to work.

I'm excited. We're gonna get a rock into a tube. We're gonna have two rocks. And then we're gonna shake them up, see what they're made out of, see what's in there. See what's in that tube rock. It's gonna be cool. I hope we can do it.

I feel like it's pretty hard to get a rock into a test tube on Earth. You know what I mean? Like, if you have one of those sandbox and dynamics robots to do that, they would be like, oh, this is going to be this is going to take a while. So I thank you for making a podcast with me. It's been a pleasure. If you want to send us your questions, we're at hankanjanagemail.com. We don't have a podcast if you don't have questions.

So thank you very much for having them. This podcast is edited by Joseph Tuna Metis. It's produced by Rosiana Halls-Rohas. Our communications coordinator is Julia Bloom. Our editorial assistant is Deboki Trucker-Vardy. 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. And as they say in our hometown, don't forget to be awesome.

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