Dear Hank & John - 31: Breakin' the Law (and Being Good.)

Episode Date: January 19, 2016

Should I give up on my dreams of changing the world? Is mayonnaise an instrument? Why are DVD cases not squares? Can you burn a cucumber? Does the moon have Earth eclipses? Do you have anonymous social profiles?

Hello and welcome to Dear Hank and John. Or as I prefer to think of it dear John and Hank. It's a comedy podcast about death in which me and my brother John, Anciet, questions give you dubious advice and bring you all the weeks news from both Mars and A.O.C. Wimbledon. Hey John, how you doing? I'm doing well. It's been a good week so far.

I've just been playing FIFA as A.O.C. Wimbledon. I've been writing a lot. What else is going on this week? Not much. It's cold here in Indianapolis. We've had our first real good solid snowfall, and it's real icy and intimidating. I've been running a lot.

I don't know. Things are good. Things are really good. How are you? Well, the day that we are recording this podcast, it is a week ago, as you people listening to it, or maybe more than that. But is the day that we found out that David Bowie died? And I'm very sad. And having, I'm dealing with that.

Indeed, we must, we must pause to give thanks for the life of David Bowie, who is such a astonishing revelation in so many worlds, not just music, but in the way that he presented himself in the way that he shifted between identities truly a man ahead of his time. Yes. Yes, very helpful for me to have David Bowie as a sort of role model, not in all things, of course, but in many. And I am sad. So the local radio station is playing only David Bowie on vinyl this day, and I was just sitting in my car. Very hard to leave that.

But here I am for dear Hank and John, a comedy podcast about death, so appropriate today. It couldn't be a better day to do a comedy podcast about death. Would you like a short poem for the day? I should have done something, David Bowie-centric, but I didn't think I wasn't properly prepared. That's fine, I accept your apology. Instead, I've got a Sonya Sanchez poem for you today.

Do you know Sonya Sanchez? She was born in Birmingham, Alabama, my hometown, not yours, even though we're brothers. And great, just a brilliant poet. And one of the best love poets we have in the world today, I think, although she also writes blisteringly and beautifully about race and sex and feminism and lots of other things. But this is a very short poem called Black Magic by Sonia Sanchez. by Sonia Sanchez. Magic, my man, is you turning my body into a thousand smiles.

Black magic is your touch making me breathe. Black magic by Sonia Sanchez. Short poem. Very short poem for the day, Hank. I thought I feel like I've been lengthening the definition of short poems. Yes. Lately on Dear John and Hank.

And I feel like I might be losing some listeners in the process. So go check out Sonya Sanchez. If you're not familiar with her work, it is full of richness. And it's just, she's just a wonderful, wonderful poet. Yeah, I don't know. Next week, Hank, I'll have a poem for you about grief. How's that? We'll remember David Bowie a week after his death,

which as listeners are listening will be like six months after his death. Okay. All right. And I think that with that, it is already time to start answering questions. It's only taken us like three minutes. It's unheard of, John.

Well, I don't know what to do. I would like to extend the intro to the podcast, but I have no other short poems for the day. No, and I, as sad as I am, don't want to harp on it, especially because everyone else is further along in their process of grief than I am. So we've got a question from Henry who asks, dear Hank and John, why are DVD covers not square?

Mm, that's a great question. Mm. I think I know the answer. You know, I think I can send up the answer in two words actually. Two words that you might disagree with, but in that the world might disagree with. Okay. But my two words are blockbuster video. Okay. I think that you're wrong

Respectfully, but I think you're on the right track. I think blockbuster video is part of why DVDs are not square But I think the actual deep down answer is V H The actual deep down answer is VHR. I think that because video, I said. I think you've used the wrong, John used the wrong three letters there. I apologize for interrupting.

Really? But did you say VHR? VCR. Oh, I thought you said VHR. I don't think so. Did I? Did I say VHR? I think you may have completed VHR apparently.

Confided it. Let's just back it all. No, no, do not back it up. You are not allowed to back it up just because you said something wrong. Everybody's gonna enjoy that. There's no way we're gonna get out of there. There's no, I'm gonna force Nick to edit this.

No, it's saying in. It's good in. All right, so tell me about VAR. VCR. VCR. Video cassette recorders. My theory about why DVDs are shaped the way they are is so they can look more like VHS tapes.

That's where I got the A-Trend because of VHS tapes. They can look more like VHS tapes, be similarly shaped so that when DVDs first came out and I remember this vividly, I remember thinking, but why would you wanna watch something on a CD? It had the advantage of being rectangularly shaped so that I could say to myself, well,

I don't like this business of giving up video cassettes, but I suppose at least the shape is the same. Right, and I mean, if you look, if they had made them the same form factor as CDs, everybody would have felt like I was watching a movie on a CD, whereas they made it more the sort of size of, yeah, more the height of a VHS tape. And also there's just something pleasing

about that aspect ratio. It's the same aspect ratio as book. And the reason the books are that shape is, you know, it's kind of a good shape for reading, but also it's just very pleasing to us that, like, golden ratio shape. So I, yeah, I think it has to do entirely with product marketing and I would love to know the number of gallons of oil that were necessary to make DVD cases that shape, rather than the shape they need, they could have been, which is much smaller than they were.

But someone do that calculation for me, and then we can all go, ugh, and then move on. Well, but it's over, Hank. I mean, the nice thing is that every time we don't buy a DVD today, we save all of that oil that would have gone into that plastic. Instead, we just download it from iTunes.

It's true, it's true. I mean, the number one question I have for Henry is, what are DVDs? Right. A lot of people listening to this are like, this is a fascinating discussion about two ancient pieces of technology. I have no relationship with. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, John couldn't even remember what a VHS tape was called. So that's going to be DVDs in 10 years. I'm your 10 years. All right, we've got another question, Hank. This one is from Avery, who writes,

dear John and Hank, can you set a cucumber on fire or is it's water content too high and therefore not flammable? That's a great question. And it's an important question because I can't tell you how often I've looked at a cucumber and thought, I'm going to charge our this mofo, but then thought, you know what, I'm not sure if that's scientifically possible. Well, you can definitely set a cucumber on fire, but you're going to have to bake the water out of it first.

Yeah, I mean, a lot of like that, even when you're burning wood, sometimes the wood is wet and so you throw it on there and then it steams through a little while before it catches. But yeah, there is combustible material inside of a cucumber, but if you dehydrated a cucumber, you could totally light it on fire.

And I don't know how well it would burn. I've never tried, but I bet you a dehydrated cucumber would burn very much like a piece of wood. Now, hey, let me ask you a related question. Have you ever had a coolade pickle? That is a cucumber that has been pickled in coolade. No, I, well, I have great news.

Your life is about to get better, because there is nothing on God's green earth as delicious as a Kool-Aid pickle. Well, I have, how is my life about to get better though? Because who's going to give me this Kool-Aid pickle? Well, now that you've asked for one, lots of people, I bet every time we go on tour for the next 10 years, you'll get a cool-aid pickle.

Ha-ha-ha-ha. I want to say to all those people who are considering giving me a cool-aid pickle whenever I might show up in your town, please do not. Please bring me a cookie. I want cookies. That's not. I do not want cool-aid pickles.

I don't like pickles. I'm not a pickle guy. I can have some sweet relish on a hot dog, but really that's the extent of my pickle interest. I just, vinegar is very strong. It's a very strong flavor. And I am not into it, John. So, of course, I assume that there's no vinegar in a cool-aid pickle, which makes me think that it's probably going to spoil pretty quickly.

No, I don't know. I think there is vinegar in it, actually. But I'm not a scientific expert in how cool eight pickles come to be. All I know is that they taste better than regular pickles. But yeah, I've been thinking a lot about that, about recently, just because today, or yesterday actually, as we're recording this, was the four year anniversary of the publication

of my book, The Fault in Our Stars Hank. And I was thinking back to that tour in 2012, which was so fun, but also so stressful that for years, I could remember when I thought about it was the anxiety that it provoked, because we would sign for several hours after the events, and that was pretty overwhelming for me. But one of my central memories from that is that very kind, lovely, generous people at every city that we went to, they would bring us peeps because one time in 2007,

for those who don't know peeps are these marshmallow-like, preservative-filled Easter candies shaped like yellow, usually like yellow chicks, but people would bring us peeps because we made some peeps jokes back in 2007. And we could never think of a polite way to say the truth, which is that we both hate peeps. That's the whole point.

That's why we had to do the peep things because it was a punishment. It wasn't a punishment, but it was like a challenge. Like, ha ha ha, look at this person doing a thing. He doesn't want to do it. Exactly. And then people were like, yeah, they must love peeps so much. But people were, you know, latching onto being a part of the inside of this thing, and I

appreciate that. But yeah, we had a lot of peeps that we would take them to the next place, and then we would throw them into the audience. Be like, peep-died. Yeah, we're standing out well. Which is fine. Some people like peeps, and those take them to the next place and then we would throw them in the audience. Be like, peep-time. Yeah, we're straight out well, because some people like peeps and those people got to enjoy them. Yes. Anyway, the short version of this very, very long answer is that yes, you can light a

cucumber on fire and yes, please bring Hank Kuhle pickles when he's on tour cookies. By which he means cookies. But I do feel like next time we go on tour, we should bring a bunch of peeps and we can throw them out in the audience every single time. That would be fun. I feel like that's sort of like a cheap, safe thing to throw into an audience.

You're not going to get hurt getting and hitting the head with peeps. No. I've got another question. This one is from Sidney who asks, dear Hank and John, if you're standing on the moon, does the earth ever eclipse the sun? How often does this happen? And does it look as remarkable as a lunar eclipse does

from earth? More importantly, what, uh, uh, what, what, what, most importantly, what does John think happens? Thank you for the question, Sidney. So if you're standing on the moon, does the earth ever eclipse the sun? The answer is, of course, yes.

And in fact, the earth eclipses the sun more often than the moon eclipses the sun for those of us standing on earth. You know, John, I actually don't know the answer to this question. I would have to look it up. Well, my answer was so confident that even if it is incorrect, people will believe me.

Well, I think you're right. Like, based on just base, like, I don't 100% know, but based on the fact that the earth is bigger than the moon, it probably would eclipse the sun more than the moon does. But I don't know. I don't know. I don't know why I asked this question without having looked it up by a bot. Alright, let's move on to another question then, Hank, so that you don't have to continue

to be embarrassed. This one is from Catrice, who asks, dear John and Hank, I know that both of you have your own social feeds, but have you ever considered creating anonymous social profiles to be able to experience a social network without the burden of relative fame? In other words, are you hiding as faceless social network users among us? This is a very interesting question, and I know a lot of people who do.

I have a lot of sort of famous-ish friends or acquaintances who have lives on social networks that are private because of the way that the way that they structure them and because they've never sort of been outed as being affiliated with that channel. I have one Reddit account that I use just to enjoy soccer anonymously without having people, you know, jump in and talk about other stuff that I do. That's the only sort of non-public facing

social identity that I have, I guess. I mean, my Reddit account is people know who I am, but most people don't. And so I just feel like Reddit is a sort of demographically different place from most of the places that I spend time on and my username is not my name. So usually I think that people don't, I feel like just a normal person when I'm using my Reddit account unless I'm doing an AMA or something. So I like spend time on the personal finance, subreddit, and the ulcerative colitis subreddit, and those people, I'm just another person. And so I sort of get that experience that way.

But yeah, I mean, honestly, I spend so much time doing social media as part of, like, sort of, you know, it's part of my job, but it's a part that I enjoy. But, like, beyond that, I don't wanna do a bunch of it, It's part of my job, but it's a part that I enjoy, but beyond that, I don't wanna do a bunch of it because I do it all the time all day anyway. So I sort of get all of my social fix

with my public social media-ing and I don't want any more of it after that. Yeah, I just wouldn't know how to do it very well. I don't know. I never had a Twitter without an audience. I've had a website without an audience. I feel like I know how to write for a website as a person who doesn't have much of a public life, but I don't know how to do it. And I don't really want to learn. Like, I admire people who do it. Like, there

are some Twitter accounts that I follow that I just follow because they're extremely thoughtful and funny and engaging, but not because of whoever the person is who runs it. And in a way, like, that to me is sort of the purest and most interesting form of social media, but it's not the way that I've ever used it. So I don't think I'd even know where to begin. Aiden, I've got another question, John. It's from Aiden who asks,

dear Hengen John, is it always wrong to break the law? Oh, boy. Are certain laws meant to be broken? Oh, boy. Can you still be a good person who breaks the law? Are certain laws meant to be broken? Oh boy. Can you still be a good person who breaks the law? No, boy. What, I don't have any, this is not a hard question for me at all.

I'm surprised that you are struggling with it. Well, I think the rule of law is actually really important to the maintenance of a social order, but I do. Right, let me give you an example of, of, of times when it is, okay, to break the law. Okay. When the law, when the law breaks like fundamental human justice things, like for a very long time, it was illegal to be gay. Right. And like, and so that, in that case, it is, it is okay to break that law. Now, that law was not made to be broken, but I think it was important that people broke that law.

I think it's important that people break the prohibition of marijuana laws, because I don't think that we'd be having a conversation about the legalization of marijuana and about the huge problem we have with mass incarceration and people going to jail for doing this thing that is not dangerous to themselves or other people. And so I think that we need to have that conversation

and we wouldn't be having it if people weren't breaking that law. Right, I agree with that. And certainly, I mean, obviously you're gonna, first off, we have to just draw a line between civil disobedience and other kinds of law breaking. Like obviously, you know, the civil disobedience is often right and often the only correct or moral path of action in the face of injustice.

Like obviously, you know, sit-ins during the civil rights movement, for instance, were important. But that's a different kind of breaking the law, because that's a kind of a breaking the law where you understand that you are breaking a law, you are choosing to break the law, and then you are, you know, suffering the legal consequences. So you're basically sort of using the rule of law to bring attention to the injustice of a law. That's different from smoking pot, which is against the law, but usually you smoke pot in the privacy of your own home or whatever, hoping not to get caught. But that said, I agree with you that it is not wrong to break the law and that you are still a good person

if you break the law. However, we have to understand that we're coming at that conversation from a tremendous place of privilege. If you smoke pot, you're 11 times more likely to be imprisoned if you're African-American than if you're white. So it's relatively easy for me to say that it's okay or even that there's nothing wrong with breaking the law when I am very unlikely to receive the kind of harsh punishments that have been this like great disgrace of mass incarceration in the United States. I think it's a lot more complicated to tell someone

who's in a position where they could go to jail for 25 years that they should smoke pot if they want to. Like I think that you don't want to lose, you don't want to lose in the conversation, the real risks that people run when they break laws and they aren't in privileged positions. Right, and that is entirely the reason why I was anti, like when I was growing up, I was anti-drugs almost exclusively because I knew that it could mess up my future, which, but that is not a reason

to not break the law. I mean, it is, but that is not the question that Aiden is asking. Aiden is asking, is it always wrong to break the law? And the answer is, no, it is not always wrong to break the law. And it is not, it is probably not a good idea, but that does not change the fact that it is not wrong. Right, I just want people, yeah, but I just want to be conscious of the fact that there are, you know are potentially catastrophic consequences to some people and that those consequences are unfairly distributed among the population.

Yes. I agree with you. The only other thing I would say about that is that I actually don't think it's always wrong to break just laws. It's just that they have to be exceptionally minor ones and the circumstances have to dictate it. For instance, I think that speed limit laws are good that we should have more of them, in fact, but occasionally it's okay to speed. Like, you know, if you're a... One time I got food stuck in my esophagus, and so I couldn't swallow any water,

couldn't swallow any liquid. I decided to drive myself to the hospital, and I would throw up every like five or 10 seconds, because you were just producing so much saliva, trying to get this piece of food down my esophagus, but then my esophagus couldn't handle it, so I would just come back up. And I thought it was okay to speed in that situation,

just because I really did kind of need to get to the hospital. And it worked out for me. So, Aiden, if the question is, John and Hank, there is food in my esophagus. I cannot get it down or up. Is it okay to speed? I'm gonna say a cautious yes.

Yeah, and I do think that this is a problem with laws. Like we want to have a system, and we need to have a system where there are, like, there are rules. And sometimes the rules get broken in ways where everybody is like, well, I understand why that happened, but we have to enforce the law. And that can cause big, big problems, you know? Especially when like the letter of the law is different from the intent of the law. And that does happen sometimes where you have a law that was built for one situation being applied to a new situation

that it clearly does apply to, but that it was not intended to address. And that's why one of the many reasons why legal systems are complicated and why you have to go to school for a real long time to be a lawyer. Yeah, I mean, it's also just another example of how, to me, the whole legal system, at least in the US, like, is just a great example of how power sort of conserves and preserves itself very efficiently and effectively.

Because once you're inside of the legal system, like if you're on parole, for instance, like everything just becomes much more complicated and challenging, it's just so much easier to go back to jail. But if you're never inside of the system, then it seems that the system is quite effective. Because you can point to lower crime rates over the last 30 years and lots of other stuff. But then once you're inside of the system,

it's tremendously dehumanizing. And also, it's one of the places where class and race and sex are just most obviously, the data is just overwhelming that they play huge roles in what happens to people who commit offenses that are deemed to be illegal. Sorry, I'll get off my soapbox now and answer another question. commit offenses that are deemed to be illegal. Sorry, I'll get off my soapbox now and answer another question. Dear John, this question is from Sophie who writes, dear John and Hank, I'm a high school senior in the midst of the college application turmoil.

My parents think I have a delusion of grandeur about being able to make a lasting impact in the world. Should I be realistic? And why does being realistic mean I have to give up on my dreams of doing something amazing? Don't do it. Just believe in yourself. Everybody can, everybody makes big changes on the people around them at the very least, and also maybe on the whole world. And I think that having dreams is fantastic,

and I think that, but I also think that refining those dreams as you go on is absolutely okay too. So having something that drives you forward is not something that you should not engage with. Like, have that thing drive you forward. And if suddenly, if it becomes clear that that thing isn't necessarily gonna happen, that's okay.

Don't move, go in a different direction, have a new thing that drives you forward. But, I think, being able to make a lasting impact on the world, that's not, that's not delusional, right, John? No, quite the opposite. I'm reading this book about ancient Rome, actually. And the writer keeps saying, you know, like something will happen in ancient Rome

and then the writer will say, and the world would never be the same. And I just keep thinking, but like after everything that happens, the world is never the same. You know what I mean? Like, after I finished playing a game of Wimbley Wombley's on FIFA 16, the world will never be the same. The world will never be the same after you have kids. The world will never be the same after you get married. The world will never be the same

after every event in human history. So I guess for me, it's a false choice between being realistic and being able to make a difference because there are so many ways to make a difference. I do believe in being realistic about your dreams, but I also believe in having those dreams. I believe in finding ways to make them realistic, rather than just agreeing when you're told that things like that don't happen to people like you.

They do. Whatever it is, whatever the dream is, things like that do happen to people like you, unless the dream is becoming a banana and floating in space all the way to Mars. Because we've already learned that it takes way too much energy to get out of the Earth's atmosphere in the first place. Why do you always bring up the atmosphere? Because it just infuriates you. It does.

It does. Yeah, I mean, we've got a very thick atmosphere, Hank. It's hard to swim through. Doing big things, it, I think that the number one thing is to not tie yourself worth up in this, in a quest, to make some magnificent impact. And yeah, like, maybe that's what your parents are trying to protect you from, the potential that you'll get.

So you will believe that you are not a worthwhile person unless you have this kind of impact. And I think a lot of us are kind of our taught that, the people that we hear about in the media, the people that are idealized, whether that's a business person or a celebrity, are people that seem to have outsized impact on the world, like greater than average impacts. And so we sort of can, like we tie that to what makes a person worthwhile.

So it is possible that don't think that that is the only way to be a worthwhile person. That is absolutely not the case. But yes, do want to have impacts on the world. Do want to make the world a better place and do make decisions based on that. Based on the change that you want to make in the world. Have that be a guiding force in the decisions that you make, whether that's what school

you go to or what you do on a Friday night. Yeah, that's absolutely okay to do. It's always been, seems so weird to me that people put so much emphasis on celebrity, and I know that I know that I'm coming at this from a particular perspective and everything, but that said, I just don't believe that celebrities have some massive impact on the social order that, quote unquote, regular people

don't have. If you wanna have a lasting big impact on the social order, be a teacher. Because when you're 75 years old and you're still teaching 15 year olds, those 15 year olds are going to remember you for another 60 years. You know those 15 year olds are going to remember you

when you would have been 135 or whatever. No one is going to remember the vast majority of like so-called celebrities when they would be 175 years old. Hank, who was the guy who was on that show, Charles and Charge? Mm. Scott Bayo. When we were kids, Scott Bayo was phenomenally famous.

I wanted to be Scott Bayo was phenomenally famous. I wanted to be Scott Beo worse than I've ever wanted to be anything in my life. And I just even though it's only been 20 years, nearly forgot his name. Yep. Yeah, I sing this song about Helen Hunt, who is the biggest, biggest star on TV when I was a young person.

And I will sing this song about Helen Hunt and the majority of the people in the room will not know who Helen Hunt is, which is just a tragedy. She's wonderful. It is a tragedy, but I have to say, because both Helen Hunt and Scott Bayo are just phenomenally important people in human history, but I have to say, and they're also old friends of the podcast. So, hi, Helen,'re also old friends of the podcast. So, hi, Helen, hi, Scott. Thanks for listening.

We appreciate your support. Keep sending in your questions. We'll answer one someday. I have to say that, like, I think that, in some ways, you make a choice between having a, having a sort of a deep impact on people's lives and having a broad impact. And celebrities are always celebrated in part for and having a broad impact. And celebrities are always celebrated

in part for having such a broad impact. But a lot of times I feel like it isn't a deep impact. And we've talked before Hank about how the only following worth having is a cult following. And I deeply, deeply believe that because, you know, the sort of cult, cult like institutions that I've followed over the years, whether it's they might be giants or the mountain goats or,

or the Mr. T experience or Zay Frank when he was making this show, you know, those are the things that have had the biggest impact on the way that I think about life and the things that I've found most helpful in, in the darkest times to kind of get me through. And nothing against Scott Bay or Helen Hunt, but like I haven't turned to them in my darkest hour, the way I've turned, for instance, to John Darniel of the Mountain Goats.

Agreed, agreed. I have another question, John. It's from Alex who asks, dear Hank and John, I'm Alex from Maryland. My friend Chase recently told me how great the podcast is. So far, I'm loving it. Welcome to the podcast is so far I'm loving it, welcome to the podcast Alex.

My question is, is mayonnaise an instrument? I think that this might have something to do with SpongeBob. I googled it. But SpongeBob seems to think that mayonnaise is not an instrument. Now I don't know any of the context of this argument, but I will say that I think anything can be an instrument, and if you want proof of that, you can go to watch songs to wear pants to the YouTube channel, where Andrew Wong does play music with just about anything. He recently played a symphony, I think something by one of the classical composers with songs, you know, on the underpants.

And I think that if you can play a classical piece of music with songs, then you can play something with mayonnaise. My answer to this question would be that mayonnaise is certainly an instrument. It's an instrument of horror and destruction and sadness. I see what you mean. I love it, mayonnaise, and I don't know what's wrong with you. What do you mean you love mayonnaise? I mean that I think that mayonnaise is a condiment

that I enjoy putting on various salty type foods. Are you kidding? You put mayonnaise on a sandwich? Sure. Oh God, really? That's what mayonnaise is. That's what mayonnaise was created for. That's what humans do with mayonnaise.

That is literally the thing that is done with man, and I mean like potato salad, egg salad, all of these salad dressings are often made with mayonnaise. How is this a surprise to you? I can't believe you like mayonnaise. It's mayonnaise. It's like if you told me, if you just suddenly announced that you believe deep down that the greatest football club

in the world was Manchester United. Like I just cannot believe that someone I've counted on for so many years and been so close to all this time has been liking mayonnaise. I mean, were you not around for my childhood? That's what I ate. I ate ham and mayonnaise sandwiches. I would not eat anything else.

Oh God, ham and mayonnaise sandwiches. I, first off, I wasn't around for your child that I went to boarding school when you were 10. But that just sounds awful. Why would you eat ham and mayonnaise sandwich when you could put mustard on that sandwich and get the same? Ugh.

Ugh. What? Mustard? What? Oh my God, I don't know how people do mustard. It's just like, it's just like just dirt mixed up in vinegar. I mean, mustard is one of the great tastes on earth and mayonnaise is one of the worst.

Manays is something like, I, sometimes I open my refrigerator and I'll see that we have a jar of mayonnaise in there and I'll be like, why do we own this? This is reprehensible. It probably went out of date in like 2011. We just haven't gotten it out of the fridge. Well, mayonnaise lasts a real long time.

It's one of the remarkable things about mayonnaise. Yeah, I wonder why. Maybe it's because it's made of preservatives. But it just lasts forever. I would actually like to know why mayonnaise lasts so long. Someone should ask that to the podcast and we can answer it sometime after I do some research. All right. Well, in the meantime, Hank, we have to move on from this horrifying discussion to the

news of Mars and to AFC Wimbledon. I want to say, the only time mustard is good is when it's mixed with mayonnaise. Oh God, it's just, that's the fastest way to ruin mustard. I think that that's most salad dressings. It's just mayonnaise and mustard mixed together. Right, that's why I don't eat creamy salad dressings, nor does anyone who has any kind of sophisticated palette. Do you think that it's already time for the news from Mars? Because I don't think it is. I think it's time to talk about our sponsors, John, because this episode of Dear Hank and

John is brought to you by mayonnaise. Manays! Creamy, delicious Made With Whole Eggs! Nope, nope, nope. This podcast is not brought to you by Manays. It's brought to you! Manays! Bye! Mustard. Mustard. Delicious. Nutritious. And... No! No!

No! Mustard has no food eggs in it. Zero... Zero calories and mustard. It is the opposite, literal opposite of nutritious. This podcast is also brought to you by Breaking the Law. Breaking the Law, it does not make you a bad person. Some time, I mean, first off, nothing makes you bad person.

Not necessarily. It does not necessarily make you a bad person. And of course, this podcast is brought to you by DVDs, DVDs. A technology that most of you are not familiar with. That's not true. Everybody knows what a DVD is still. The other day I asked Siri a question because I was curious if my Wii would play DVDs. So I asked Siri,

does my Wii play Netflix? And then I said, oh, I mean, no, DVDs. And Siri understood all of those words. Wow. But I was at the point where I accidentally called DVDs Netflix. Yeah, well, I don't blame you. That is so. Yeah, well, I don't blame you. That is so.

Wow, okay. And remarkably, Siri gave me the correct answer to that question. Siri is a good answer. Which is no. My week and not play DVDs. Yeah, it doesn't surprise me. Yeah.

Why would it be able to play DVDs? Nick, if you could just cut all of this boring crap out of the podcast, that would be great. What are you talking about? I think that you, what you just did, John, is I made, I told a story that I thought was funny. And then you said, Nick, can you cut that boring crap out of the podcast? Yeah. I didn't hurt my feelings. All right. Well, to be fair, I think I've talked for 85% of this episode of Dear Hank and John, so you should probably be allowed to ramble on a bit. and you should probably be allowed to ramble on a bit. All right, John, I guess it is now time for the news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon.

I got a little bit of Mars news. Do you got a little bit of AFC Wimbledon news? I do, but only a little bit. It's been a quiet week for AFC Wimbledon as the senior team has not played this week. In fact, they haven't played since January 2nd. They have a game against Carlisle. That was postponed because the FA Cup, however, Hank. The AFC Wimbledon under 18 team played

primarily side new castle last week. New castle are like, they're one of the biggest teams in England. And AFC Wimbledon won two won thanks to two goals from a ginger, a 17 year old gingerhank whose name is Alfie, Alfie Egan, 17 year old Alfie Egan scored two goals against Newcastle's under 18 team to send the under 18 AFC Wimbledon team all the way through to the sixth round of the FA Youth Cup where they will face either Chelsea

or Manchester United. Is that not unbelievable? I cannot believe it. I can't believe that we have a ginger on our book's name to Alfie Egan. The future could not be brighter. I'm so pleased. I don't know what it means, but I have news for you, John.

All right. About Mars kind of, the Martian won a Golden Globe for Best Pick for Best Comedy. It was so hilarious. It ended up being a comedy. There are funny parts. Uh, uh,

but it did win a Golden Globe, so that's good. So that's the news for bars is that this movie about Mars won a Golden Globe. In his, uh, yay. In his acceptance speech, Ridley Scott talked at length about the importance of Mars exploration and how there was no future for humans where we did not continue to reach

for further life of field and how we needed to go to Mars and there was widespread agreement among all the Hollywood people. All right, well, that to be sounds like a comedy movie to me. I made all of that up, Ridley Scott, didn't talk about any of that.

Oh, I don't watch TV, so I wouldn't know. But if we can call this a comedy podcast though, the Martian can win a Golden Globe for Best Comedy. I will say, I didn't think the Martian was the best comedy of the year, but I did think it was one of the best movies I've seen this year. In fact, I have to say, I thought it was much better

than the Revenant, which won a lot of awards last night, which is a very, like just an unfathomably violent movie about a bear, which usually you would think that I would like because I love violence and I love bears, but I just, I didn't find the combination that appealing in this particular instance. Mm, interesting, interesting. I thought that the Revenant was about Leonardo DiCaprio.

Does Leo play the bear? Leo does not play the bear. He plays a man who gets mulled by a bear. The issue with the Revenant really is that it's not about anything except for survival and a pure desire for revenge. Which is, I don't find these revenge fantasy movies to be compelling in and of themselves. It's beautiful cinema and everything and the cinematography is amazing. Leonardo DiCaprio is brilliant in it, of course, he's a very good actor.

But I just felt that there was no there there if you get my drift. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I went to see Star Wars again this weekend and the people that I saw Star Wars with a number of them stayed to then watch the Revenant immediately afterward and I found that to be a questionable decision. Also, it's a questionable legality

unless they paid for both movies. They did have to move to a different theater, yes. Oh, good, good. That is one of those cases where probably you shouldn't break the law if you're just stealing. And I don't do that. And as they say, in the previews every single time with that guy in the hoodie who's filming the movie on his iPhone,

that is illegal. Dush. So don't do that. Hank, what are we learning today? We learned that John, if you try hard enough, you can set anything on fire. It's not actually true. You can set a lot of things on fire.

Not anything though. You cannot set helium on fire or any of the noble gases. That's why I live in a world full of helium. You must have a real deep voice if this is your helium voice. We also learned that DVDs are shaped like VHRs or DCSs we can't remember. Neither can we remember Scott Beo very much anymore, but I'm sure that both he and Helen Hunter having a lovely go of it. And of course, I don't even know what to say after that. What does that even mean having a lovely go of it? Having a lovely go of what?

Just life. You know, Helen's working on movies and stuff. She's always doing interesting things. No, Helen was nominated for an Oscar a few years ago. She's great. She's... That was a great career. And of course, we learned that if you're on the moon, the Earth may eclipse the sun, but don't trust John. He got a C-minus in both physics and chemistry and biology.

And that question is probably one of those. Hahaha. Hahaha. Not really. It must be. Because it seems like a science question. And those were the only science classes. Those are all the science.

Well, okay. I see how you see the world. Thank you for podcasting with me, John. I hope the people enjoyed this as much as I did. Yeah, thanks for listening everybody You can email us your questions at Hank and John at gmail.com or you can use the hashtag on Twitter hashtag dear Hank and John I'm John green on Twitter Hank is Hank green You can also follow us on other social media most notably for Hank his snapchat Hank gr E and most notably for Hank, his Snapchat, Hank-gr-e, and most notably for me, my Reddit. I'm not giving you the username, I'm sorry.

This podcast is edited by Nicholas Jeggidze, the theme music is from Vanerola, and as they say in our hometown, don't forget to be awesome. Don't forget to be awesome.