Dear Hank & John - 386: Play Me Some More Fiddle

Episode Date: April 3, 2024

Why does my cat put her mice in the water bowl? How do you quit Twitter? How much would it cost to build a real Lego house? What happens to dirt displaced by coffins? Why do batteries bounce when they're dead? How do I balance socialization and personal time? Hank and John Green have answers! If you're in need of dubious advice, email us at [e-mail] us for monthly livestreams at patreon.com/dearhankandjohn.Follow us on Twitter! twitter.com/dearhankandjohn

INTRO Hello and welcome to Dear Hank and John. Or as I prefer to think of it, Dear John and Hank. It's a podcast where two brothers enter your questions and give you dubious advice and bring you all the week's news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon. John, do you know how, like, what the mass of TikTok is? This is an interesting question. I've always been curious.

Oh. Well, it must weigh something. At this point, I'd say that it probably weighs about one Instagram. Hmm. And falling, from falling. Yeah. I would say it's losing mass. I would say it weighed two Instagrams just a year ago.

It did, I think it probably weighed about two Instagrams and now it weighs one Instagram. I mean, in my own life, I gotta tell you, it weighs like 0.7 to 0.8 Instagrams. Yeah, it's starting to feel that way. I think a lot of the massive TikTok went into TikTok shop and that just makes it, the massive TikTok shop is like 89 Instagrams

and I don't want any of them. Yeah, fair enough. How are you, Hank? How are things? How's life? You good? Yeah, I'm hungry. Well, that's not for now. Again, we don't have bodies when we record this podcast. We are made out of spirit stuff. Yeah, nearby me, I have two things I can eat. I can eat either Ricola cough drops or this chapstick. Please don't eat either of them because again, you don't have a body. We don't want people imagining some physical reality. We want them living in the third space that connects the three of us, you, me and the

listener. Okay, no, we're going to change that up. This is it. We're doing a new thing. It's a mobile intensive podcast with real body movement. I'm standing up now. You can tell just by listening, can't you? I'm standing up and I'm doing a stretch. Hands up, hands down.

I'm waving my arms. Hands up. I'm waving my arms. Hands down. I'm waving my hands in the air, Hank. I'm waving my hands. Yeah, I'm waving. Like I just don't care. I'm going left, I'm going right. I'm waving my hands in the air, Hank. I'm waving my hands. Yeah, I'm moving. Like I just don't care. I'm going left, I'm going right.

Now I've, there you go. You feeling that? Yeah, I'm moving. Well, I don't want you to be moving so much that you're losing your breath. I just want to be able to picture your body in space. How's the hair? Is it still curly?

It's still curly. And spin. All right, that's the last spin. Okay, I'm pretty dizzy. All right, let's answer some questions from our listeners. I don't have the questions doc open, John. You go first. F***. I wish that I could, I wish that I,

I wish that you could all relive with me five minutes ago when Hank said, I'm already ready to make the podcast. I can't wait for you to finish this email. I'm going to hang up and you can call me back in a few minutes when you're ready. This question comes from Emma who asks, dear Hank and John, why does my cat put her mice

in the water bowl? Is she drowning them or giving them a bath? Does she do it because she knows it annoys me? Pumpkins and penguins, Emma. She's drowning them. That's what cats do. They're killers. They're murderers.

Look at their teeth. Have you spent any time with your cat? Your cat is a stone cold killer. It's wild. I'm reading the Warriors books, which are about cats in the wild, house cats that have become wild with Orrin. And it is an absolute delight. And it is like, wow, look at what my cats could be, but are not. They want to be that. That's who they are on the inside.

We're actually not sure. The cats that domesticated cats come from don't seem to drown prey, and they don't seem to cache their prey in water, they just bury them. So there's also some thought that your cat is just sort of like, this is a me space, which is my bowl, that's for me, and this is a me toy, and I'm gonna put my me things in my me places. So maybe it is that also could potentially. We don't know though, we can't get into the brains of the kitty pets. I mean, I can't even get into the brains of the people I love the most.

I can't even get into your brain. I can't even get- I wrote a cat brain. John, I can't get into my own brain. Sometimes. I'm here. This is me and I'm like, why do I feel that way? No idea. It's interesting you say that

because I would more characterize my situation as being unable to get out of my brain. Hmm, it's both, huh? All right, we've got another question. This one's from Emma. We're trying to answer more questions, by the way. We've made a commitment to each other. This is a dead one from Emma.

Is there another Emma? There's a second. Not that surprising. Remember that time there was an Emma with three Ms, but this Emma only has two Ms. Dear Mostly John, but also Hank, how do you quit Twitter? Oh, Emma, you could ask me or Hank, because neither of us knows the answer.

You did it for a while. Unsurprisingly, this microblogging social media platform is really bad for my mental health, but no matter what I try, I can't seem to quit it for longer than a week or so. I feel addicted to the teeny tiny rush of attention I get from the app. I tried deleting the app off my phone, but I still find myself logging on through the desktop site. Not Lizzie Bennett or Anne Elliot, Emma. Yeah, I hear you. I hear you, Jane Austen super fan. I hear you. I think about this all the time. So there's the times when I'm on Twitter and I understand. So this is, again, I don't understand myself, but when I'm on Twitter, I kind of understand why I'm there. I'm like reading stuff and I like see that, and then I make stuff and then I'm like seeing

how people are interacting with it. And the tiny bit of attention that Emma gets for me does not feel tiny. But what I don't really understand is when I am not on Twitter and then I am, what happened? Right, I mean, that's the thing. I took 18 months off of Twitter and I missed nothing. I don't mean that I didn't miss much.

I mean that I missed nothing. I missed a couple opportunities. I missed the opportunity to promote the Looking for Alaska Hulu show. I missed the opportunity to share some stuff that I cared about, but I missed nothing in terms of the capital D discourse. Nothing, literally nothing.

Yeah, yeah. So I'm thinking about this a lot because I'm trying to figure out how- Well, the truth is you're trying to get off Twitter. You're just not ready. I would, I just don't want to and so I fail at it. You're not ready to say you're trying to get off Twitter, but that's what you're trying to do.

Privately, you'll acknowledge that you're trying to get off Twitter. Yeah that's what you're trying to do. Like, privately, you'll acknowledge that you're trying to get off Twitter. Yeah. And, but like, I think that like making a big like, I'm getting off Twitter is, I mean, that's one way to kind of make it happen is to be like, I'm getting off Twitter. And then, like, Doesn't last. If I tweet, people are like, hey, look at you off Twitter, huh? Right, right, right.

So, so at least then I would have a reason to not tweet. But I will say there's no evidence that you're like spending less time on Twitter. Ray, I could still be there, just not tweeting. Which is probably better. There's no evidence that you're tweeting less. Oh, for me right now? Yeah.

Oh, for sure. Oh yeah. Well, my point is that like, you can't say like, oh, I'm not gonna tell people I'm trying to get off Twitter. I'm just doing it quietly and not make any progress. It's like when somebody's like, hey, I'm not announcing that I'm quitting smoking. I'm just cutting down,

but I am smoking the same number of cigarettes per day. Yeah, well, no. It's a new kind of cutting down that you haven't heard about yet. For sure. So what I'm trying to do is to figure out other ways to satisfy the impulses that Twitter, like a nicotine patch for Twitter.

Yeah. And which my hope, my dream, is that an email newsletter could be that. I think I'm wrong. You're wrong. But I, but maybe I'm right. It's a, it's gonna be a great email newsletter. It's called, We're Here. I'm wrong. You're wrong. But maybe I'm right. It's gonna be a great email newsletter. It's called, We're Here, I'm very excited for it,

but I do not think it will replace your addiction to Twitter. I've recently tried to replace my addiction to TikTok with really trying hard to get addicted to Instagram. So Emma, I'm having this really interesting experience right now where I'm using Instagram Reels and Instagram Reels is pretty sure about two things about me as a person. And one of them is that I'm an evangelical Christian.

I had this on TikTok for a while. Because Instagram knows that I'm a Christian. They know that I'm Episcopalian. They know that I've made Reels about being Episcopalian. They know that I've talked about Jesus and that I've talked about the gospels and Instagram has therefore concluded that since there is only one kind of Christian, or there's kind of like two positions on Christianity, pro and anti, and I'm clearly pro. And so given that I'm pro, I'm going to get a lot of pro content. And I'm like, no, no, no, not like that. Uh-uh, no, yikes. Some of that stuff makes me really uncomfortable actually.

But then I stitch that stuff because I'm like, no, this is wrong. This does not reflect the gospel. And so I stitched that stuff and then Instagram is like, oh, he really likes it. That's the biggest mistake. Hank, can I ask you a serious question? And I want you to be 100% swear to God honest to me.

Uh-huh. Do you swear to God? I swear to God, I will be honest with you, or not answer the question. So sometimes there's like a half second pause between when I say something and when you laugh. And that usually means that you're on Twitter. Were you just on Twitter?

No, I did just type into Google, how much would it cost to build a whole house out of Lego? That is exactly... Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha But yes. This is what it's like having Hank Green as your brother. You're curious. But it wasn't Twitter. Would it be cheaper than a house or would it be more expensive than a house? Well, that's the question that was sent in by Grace. Dear Hank and John, I'm a millennial who may never own a house. How much would it cost to build a whole house out of Lego considering all my options, Grace? Emma, we have no idea how to get off Twitter.

Grace, I've got good news. Well, first off, I need to know a couple of things about you, Grace. Are you by any chance tiny? Yeah, because then not a lot. If you're Lego sized, we're talking a couple hundred bucks. But if you're human sized, I've got bad news according to a Reddit comment from five years ago, which says that the cost- Oh, you can actually-

The cost? You're glad that you went to the best possible source right away. There's a lot of math in it. There's a lot of math. It's just doing based on like the sort of grams of material you would need. You would need between $327 and $655 million. What? No.

Yeah, Legos are cheap, dude. I understand that, but there's no way that you can't, there's no way that if I went to the Lego corporation in Denmark or wherever they're headquartered and said, wait, let me try. Hello. What? It's me.

I'm doing my Danish accent. Okay, I like it. Yeah, I'm, yep. I feel like you're- Hello. Uh-huh. Hello. Greetings. Okay, I'm Hank.

How are you? Yeah, John. Oh, you're John? Nice to be your acquaintance. You're John, you work at the Lego company? No, no, no, I'm me. I'm me. I'm just trying to speak in a way that helps the Danish Lego people feel at home. No, that's not working.

You have to be John who works at the Lego factory and I'll be me. I want to buy a lot of Legos. Yeah, yeah, yeah. OK. So, John, here's the situation. Houses have gotten really expensive in America. Yes, I hear. Prices of timber through the roof. Yeah.

I'm thinking about buying a house or some land and just building a house out of Lego. Okay. Does anybody do this? Is this the thing that happens sometimes? My first worry is insulation. That was a little German. My first, first, first I worry about insulation.

That makes sense. There is, you may know a lot of space between Legos and maybe that is gonna capture the air and that will provide good insulation. Or maybe I'll build an outer and inner wall and then just fill the inside with insulation. I say we could do it for two million. Kronach.

Two million Kroner, okay. Kroner, two dollar. I think we might be on the Euro. That's $188,000, John. Yeah. That's not so bad. I mean, the land is gonna cost me something. Yeah.

Will you build the house for me? No. Will you? No. Have you, you want Lego master to come to your land and build you Lego house? This is crazy. But you will give me a discount on the blocks.

No discount, just two million Kroner. Well, that seems like less than I would spend if I was going to just like buy a bunch of Lego sets and build it with. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, of course. Yeah, we're not going to make you go to Target by six million Lego Ninjago sets and build house from Lego Ninjago. Yeah, of course. OK, great.

Well, I mean, honestly, I'm a little worried about leaks. I think that that's my biggest concern rather than insulation, just water getting in. But you said it would work and so we're gonna do it. Did not say it was gonna work. I said I would sell it to you for 2 million Kroner and I stand by that.

I can't do my bad fake Danish accent anymore. It was hurting my own feelings, let alone the feelings of our Danish listeners. I hope that they will appreciate- Take that in the spirit it was intended? I hope that they will just be laughing at you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. To be clear, that wasn't a laugh with me, that was a laugh at me. I hope that everybody got that one.

I definitely felt that. Tuna, tight as possible. Just make, just, just- Disagree, Tuna. Zip, zip. You can make it, you can use all the words that we had, but have all the words take up as little space as possible. $133 million.

I'll just say this right now, Hank. If you're telling me that it costs $500 million to build a Lego house, I know this is a bold thing and that this could lead to my literal bankruptcy. I will build you a Lego house for $100 billion and you will be happy with it. I am convinced that for $100 million, I could build a fine, acceptable Lego house. I agree. I agree.

I think that they were doing it by weight, so they were like, a house weighs this much and Lego's weigh this much. Oh, no, no. But like, it would think that they were doing it by weight. So they were like a house weighs this much and Legos weigh this much. Oh no, no, no. But like it would be lighter than a normal house. Yeah, you'd be able to move it around. That'd be one of the great benefits of it. Now, as you say, it wouldn't be watertight, which would be a significant disadvantage.

I actually did tour a company that makes 3D printed houses. Yeah, I remember. And super cool. And I was like, so is this like, will it ever be cheaper than a normal house? And he was like, ah! It's the wall system.

If you wanted to make this shape of a house with normal materials, this would be cheaper. And I was like, yeah, because it's got a bunch of curves in it and it's hard to make curves. He's like, yeah. And I was like, what if it was's got a bunch of curves in it and it's hard to make curves. He's like, yeah. And I was like, what if it was just a normal house? He was like, this is still more expensive.

I was like forever. And he was like, of course not. In the future, we will find lots of ways to make it cheaper. And I was like, call me when it happens because that is of course what you're going to say. But I do like, honestly, I think it could be a thing. I think it could be a thing something. Do we live in 3D printed houses?

I think it could be a thing. Yeah. Absolutely. And by the way, if 3D printed houses be a thing. I think it could be a thing someday. Do we live in 3D printed houses? I think it could be a thing. Yeah. Absolutely. And by the way, if 3D printed houses become a thing, what if you could 3D print the blocks that the house is made from? You got a Lego house. Yeah. You just pour Legos into a machine and it goes... Yeah. Yeah. All right, Hank, we got another question from Leo who writes, Dear John and Hank, what happens to the dirt displaced by the coffin when they bury you? and it goes up. Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr on top of every grave, right? Leo, me-o, my Leo. AC Actually, even more dirt than that, because the dirt that they dug out is all nice and compacted, but when they dug it out, it all got loosened up. CB Yeah, that's true.

AC But also, they know that in the future, that if they leave it leveled off, that you will get a dip as it all compacts. As it compacts. And even eventually as like the coffin itself potentially compacts, you're gonna get a dip. So you're gonna have a very bumpy ride. Not that you should ride your golf cart through a cemetery, but it would be a bumpy ride. And so what they do is they do actually leave a pile of dirt on top.

Yeah, there's a mound. It remains. There's a mound. And then it sort of settles in over time. Sort of levels off over time. And that's how they do it, Leo. And sometimes they have to come back and put more on top later. They do.

And they do have a little bit of extra dirt leftover and they just, you know, I assume, keep that around, do stuff with it. So you know how like when guys hang out, you like, I assume keep that around, do stuff with it. So you know how like when guys hang out, you like say things that aren't true? I don't know why this is. We use like, you just like say stuff and they're like, I gotcha that one, you know,

herpes comes from oranges. Sarah and I do that all the time to each other. It's not just when guys hang out. Okay, well I was hanging out with some guy friends for the first time I met a guy and he was like a real like fun, funny guy. And I was like, what do you do for a living? And he was like, I'm a gravedigger.

And I was like, ha, nice one. And he was like, no, I work at the cemetery. I dig graves, groundskeeper also. And I was like, but what do you really do? And he was like, actually a gravedigger. And he was a gravedigger and we're still friends to this day and he's still a gravedigger. He works actually, he like manages the cemetery

and it's a real job. So I, because of my friend, know more than I feel like I should about how cemeteries work. I know more than I should about how cemeteries work because I visit one most days. You are a little bit obsessed with one, yeah. I'm a bit of a Victorian gentleman

in terms of cemetery visiting, but like they want you to visit the cemetery. The people who work at the cemetery want visitors and they want you to walk through and look at the graves. And there's nothing wrong with that. It's nothing, it's not weird. It's normal. Oh, we got a question from Kayla who asks,

Dear Hank and John, my roommate told me that you can tell if a battery is dead, if it bounces more when you drop it. I did not believe her, but then she showed me, and sure enough, the dead battery bounced, and the charged one hit the table with a definite thud. I just wanna know why. What could possibly cause this?

It hurts to not know what's going on here. Caleb, wow. Wow, that made it all worth it. Yeah, hurts and what's, it's impressive. Yeah. First time I heard about this. You know, James Watt. James Watt?

The tinkerer behind the efficiencies in the steam engine that made it so much more efficient that it made it worthwhile to dig up all the coal in the world to completely transform both human history and the atmosphere. Did he die of tuberculosis? Probably, but that's not what this is about. Let me finish. James Watt had two kids with tuberculosis. The first one died quite young and then in the middle of his big success,

when he was living high on the hog and very, very famous and everything, he basically stopped researching into steam engines and for years was trying to discover a mechanical gas-based solution to tuberculosis. So like pumping nitrous oxide, for instance, into the lungs so as to give them a chance to rest. Now there was actually something to that in the sense that TB is a highly anaerobic bacteria. So denying it oxygen does kill it, but of course, it's also really bad for humans to be denied oxygen. And anyway, he totally left behind his other

work to focus on this obsession to try to save his son, Jesse. And then his son tragically died at the age of like 27. And then James Watt went back to doing a lot of the work that we know him today for. But he had this big interruption in his life that was related to TB that kind of could have changed world history. But then he went back and kept making the steam engine better. That's your little tuberculosis fact for today, Hank. What's the answer to this question? Why do dead batteries bounce? Well, you can't really tell if a battery is dead if it bounces. Like if it bounces, it doesn't mean it's dead.

It means that it's been used some at least. Whereas if it doesn't bounce, then you can say, ah, that one has full charge. So that's wild that you can tell that. But it turns like batteries, alkaline batteries, when they get used, are physically changing on the inside. So that like when... Right. There's something getting used up, right? Nothing's, I mean, yeah, not really.

A chemical reaction is occurring. So all the same atoms are there afterward, but they are in different molecules. So you have zinc metal beforehand, and that's a metal and it's like a rod. And so it doesn't have a lot of flex in it. And then afterward you have zinc oxide, which apparently is just bouncier.

Like it will compress when you drop it and then spring back into a normal, into its original shape. And that will transfer some of the momentum from the bounce, from the hitting the table back into upward motion. So it like the material inside of a used battery is bouncier than the material inside of an unused battery.

And I don't know who discovered this, but I saw a TikTok about it once and I was like, oh my God, I can't believe that's real. It sounds like a prank that you would play on someone. Like you would drop it on a different material or something, but it's real. Wow, that's mind blowing. I always used to think that I could kind of feel

the difference between the weight of a used battery, but that's not a thing. So there's no difference in weight, there's just a difference in bounciness, which is almost more interesting. Yeah, well there is, I mean, there probably is a very slightly different mass. Right, but like you're not gonna be able to feel it

in terms of like when you're doing bicep curls. No, no. Now, how many- I don't know if anybody knows, but John loves to do bicep curls with a battery. Just a single AA battery. That's all you need a lot of times. People talk about wanting to sort of maximize, but if you go to failure, it doesn't matter

whether you're lifting with 50 pounds or two ounces. Just go as long as you can go. Which reminds me that today's podcast is brought to you by John Green's Workout Tips. John Green's Workout Tips, AA bicep curls for the win. Today's podcast is also brought to you by Kitty Pets. Kitty Pets, they're the cute little cats that live in your house that have murder faces and hands. And today's podcast is brought to you by the $100 million Lego house that John built for

you at a significant profit to himself. And this podcast is brought to you by We Are Here, our new newsletter that launched last week. You could get it by looking for that in various... Yeah. There's got to be a way. Just Google it. Just Google it.

Yeah. We've also got two Project for Awesome messages to read, one from Miranda to Malia or possibly Melia. I often struggle with what to write in your birthday cards, but maybe I can manage a podcast message. Here it goes. I'm so lucky, grateful and proud to have you as my sister and pal for life. We've made lots of awesome memories together so far and I look forward to more laughter and fun times in the future. Your duck is now a bird. That sounds like an inside joke, but it's also very kind of sweet.

now a bird. That sounds like an inside joke, but it's also very kind of sweet. Like all ducks are birds, but not all birds are ducks. And now maybe your duck will be a duck again someday. We also have a project for awesome message from Rachel, the Hank and John, who says, I've been a nerd fighter since 2010 when I was 14. And now you're 18. Nope. Now you're 12. Oh, no. That was half your life ago, Rachel. I wanna say thanks for always modeling thoughtfulness, compassion and unironic enthusiasm. I also wanna shout out my husband Joe, who listens to the pod with me because he's always eager to participate in anything I love,

which is one of the things I love most about him. Also, what's your favorite Midnight's track? Mine is Karma. I like Karma a lot. It's my daughter's favorite track on Midnights, but mine is the one with a curse word in it. So I don't feel like I can repeat it. It's called Vigilante Stuff. I like the line, I don't dress for women, I don't dress for men. Lately, I've been dressing for revenge.

As I took on, as I made a video yesterday about my long time nemesis, the profiteering from about my longtime nemesis, the profiteering from tests to the poor corporation, Danaher, as I was making that video, I was playing that song in my mind, just thinking like, you have the courage to do this. This is fine. This is not even that difficult. I find that stuff so stressful, Hank. I think the CEO of Danaher thinks that I really relish it, you know? And that I enjoy this, but I don't. I really hate it. It makes me want to throw up. But I also feel like other people who would fight that fight don't have the megaphone that I have. And so I have an obligation to them. So anyway, Danaher, if you're listening, or anybody who works at Danaher, if you're listening,

Danahur, if you're listening, or anybody who works at Danahur, if you're listening, you got to stop charging 300% markup for these tests in poor countries. It's just not, it's really slowing down human progress. And I know that's not what you want to do. So like, just go to the negotiating table so I don't have to keep making these videos because it's very stressful. Really, I've been dressing for revenge. All right, Hank, let's answer one more question before we get to the all important news from is very stressful. Really, I've been dressing for revenge. All right, Hank, let's answer one more question

before we get to the all important news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon. John, this next question comes from Nicole, who asks, Dear Hank and John, I recently started my first full-time job after graduating from college. I've also moved into a house by myself. Recently, I've been finding myself very busy

keeping up with all my relationships with like old school friends and new work friends and family, I've managed to assemble a large group of people that I care about. Between these various groups, I have a lot of weekly activities. Board game nights, TV nights, etc. I often have four to six activities a week, and I've been struggling to keep up with my chores and personal hobbies. How do I make more time for myself without sacrificing my relationships?

Adult woman Nicole. I? Adult woman, Nicole. I mean, first off, Nicole. Applause, just applause. Way to battle the disease of loneliness in the most aggressive way possible. Yes, you're doing it. We should all have board game nights. We should all have trivia nights.

We should all have TV nights. I need all of that stuff in my life. And right now I don't have any of it. So you're doing a great job where I'm falling short. I think that the way to make more time for yourself is probably to make some you nights, some Nicole nights, some adult woman Nicole nights where it's like this time for adult woman Nicole to have adult woman Nicole time and watch, I'm going to imagine like 1970s crime movies? Sure. Like Three Days of the Condor.

That's what I was thinking of. Oh yeah, Three Days of the Condor. I've never heard of that. It's really Robert Redford. Could be just watching old Murder, She Wrote's or maybe- Oh yeah, Angela Lansbury. Maybe you do Tiny Lego. Maybe, you know what I've been doing lately

is I'm watching this show, Foyle's War, was recommended to me by my mentor, Bill Ott, just before he died. And they got like 500 seasons of it. It's like Murder She Wrote. Like this was an institution in Britain for like 70 years or something. Foil has been, it's the 100 years Foil's War.

I mean, here's how long Foil is at war for. Foil goes to war. He's like a detective who doesn't go to war actually, cause he's too old when World War II starts, but he's still trying to solve crimes in Britain because there's still crimes happening. And his son goes to war. But yeah, so here's how long Foyle's war lasts.

Foyle's war starts in 1939 or whatever when Foyle's war starts. Man, Foyle's war is still still going on like on 9-11. Oh no, I think they stopped it. I think the guy died. It's the same guy the whole time? Yeah, Foyle. But it's not the same character. It's not like the doctor where he comes back.

No, no, no, it's Michael Kitchen the whole time. Michael Kitchen. I guess now that I'm looking, it's not as quite as dramatic as I thought. It ends in 1947, but still, I mean, that's- Wow. That's well after Foyle's War. So you're saying it started in 1939 and went to 1947.

Started in 1940 and went to 1947 now that I'm looking at it. Which is like a pretty long time for a TV show. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They started filming it in 2002 and they made it until 2015. That's a long run for a TV show in the 21st century. Also, every episode is like a movie. They're like two hours long, each one. And they're, I mean, considering that there's a war on and there's murder in every episode, the stakes are so low, so deliciously low. You could be watching Foil's War, Nicole, but you could also in these free moments where you sit like instead of doing it like a game night

once a week, maybe you'll do a game night once every two weeks. And in these moments that you have free, you can secretly learn to play the Fiddle. And then, two years from now, you'll just be like, have a week where every game night you go to, you're like, oh, why did you bring that weird case? Oh, that's my fiddle.

You play fiddle? Da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da I love playing some more fiddle. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da

boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom. Deek dook blook blook dook dook dook dook dook dook dook dook That's the plucking parts. And then... Man, when you hear a trumpet for the first time, your mind is going to be blown. Look, okay? That was my first try. No, you did great.

You did great. I'm not criticizing it at all. Listen, it's way better was my first try. You did great. No, you did great. You did great. I'm not criticizing it at all. Listen, it's way better than my Danish accent. That's for damn sure. All right, Dane. Lego headquarters, fingers crossed. For a moment, I was going to be like...

Denmark, nailed it. Isn't it weird? Nailed it. Yeah. Isn't it weird that there are some people named Dane? It'd be like if someone was named German, but like lots of people are in fact named German. People are named German.

Yeah. People named all kinds of place names. Yeah. Hey, so let me tell you the news from AFC Wimbledon. Okay. There's six games left in the season and we're definitely not going to get relegated. If you told me that at the beginning of the season, I would have taken it in a second. The whole joy of not having to worry about the collapse, the crisis, the destruction, all that stuff that would happen if we got relegated, that is

a massive relief every year. But we're on the edge of the playoffs. We're one point out of the playoffs right now with six games to go. Now there are a lot of other teams that are sort of in the hunt with us. I would say that there's one playoff spot realistically available and there's four or five teams who could get that spot.

According to the bookies, we have about a 30% chance of having a 25% chance of getting promoted. We have a 30% chance of making the playoffs and then you have a 25% chance of winning the playoffs. We got six games to go. Five of those games are quite winnable. There's just the problem that we don't know how to score goals without Ali El Hamidi. Mm-hmm. Sometimes it happens, but- problem that we don't know how to score goals without Ali El Hamidi. But we got- Sometimes it happens, but- It does, it happens, but it almost happens like you're like, oh, right, yeah. And we have no chance of doing that again. We're just like, even when it happens, you're like, well, we're

not going to be able to repeat that one. That one was weird. That's not a thing that we did on purpose. We got into a situation and we capitalized on the situation. Like when we beat the franchise, like one of our center backs was inexplicably playing left wing. And when asked after the game, why were you there? He was like, I don't know. I don't know how that happened, but I'm glad that I was.

That's why I love hockey. Hockey like maybe 50% of goals are like that, where like it was really. Yeah, the defenseman is just like, well, I guess I'm still moving. Like some puck did something and it was like, oh, I have the puck here? Okay, goal. Yeah, so shoot, got a goal. Yeah. Well, all of our, if you like that, you'd love AFC Wimbledon in the second half of the 2023-2024 season because all our goals are like that. So up next, we've got separated by just three days, we play Harrogate Town, very winnable game. And then we play Stockport, which is our least winnable game out of the last six. If we can get four points from those games, like one draw, one win, I feel really good about

our chances of making the playoffs. And if we make the playoffs, Hank, you're coming. Oh, boy. Oh, I know you don't. I don't live in a situation where I'm rooting against AFC Wimbledon. You think you're busy. I have a movie coming out and I'm going. I've got a newsletter coming out. Oh, I know. And you hired somebody to work on it. Listen, I'm not. I've got a newsletter coming out. Oh, I know. And you hired somebody to work on it. Listen, I'm not saying that we're not busy.

I'm just saying that you're going. It's a difference. You're going to love it. You know what? We're going to be there and you're going to say to yourself, I cannot believe that for so like, like as you will, when we go to racks next week, you're going to say, I cannot believe I denied myself this joy for so long. Yeah, there was supposed to be like a cool government person

to come to my office and do an interview for Vlogbrothers this week. Sure, a member of the cabinet who got distracted by, I think it's safe to say, a bigger issue. A significantly bigger deal. And so like, it is always good to have these quick interfaces with people for whom the pressures are indeed much higher. Much higher.

So look, you're right, I could do whatever. Yeah. You know? You can. And in fact, you will. And you will bring Orin and I will bring one or both of my children. And when we win, you will take the children back to the hotel so that daddy can party. What I don't like is that the franchise, as you call them, is definitely going to be in

the playoffs, probably. Anyway. Well, I think at this point, it would be a victory for them to make the playoffs because it would mean they didn't get automatically promoted. And it's Ryan Reynolds team, Rek'sim, that's keeping them out of automatic promotion right now. So Ryan Reynolds and I are closely aligned on this issue. Yeah. Well, good-

Exciting times in League Two. Rek'sim is not number one in the league though. So finally they are meeting some resistance. Yeah, they have a lot of the same players they had last year. Oh, interesting. John, in Mars news, there's a crater on Mars, which is not a surprise.

It's called Clorinto and it is in the Elysium Planitia. And it's about 8.7 miles in diameter. Now, none of that stuff's interesting, but would you believe that this crater has created, the impact that created it, created also two billion secondary craters. Two billion with a B? With a B. How? Because the thing hit the planet and then it tossed up all these rocks and then those rocks went very high up

and they all came down and made more craters. Wow. Yeah. That is- So they were able to actually catalog the secondary craters that radiated out and- I mean, they didn't count them by hand, did they? No, no, no.

Oh, good. They use some AI or some math or something? Yeah. Great. That's good news. I mean, that's just a reminder that space is, and this speaks to another project that I'm working on. We are way over committed right now. But it's just a reminder to me that space is freaking weird and fascinating and happens on scales that blow my mind both big and small. The other weird thing about this crater, John, is that it is only 2.3 million years old. So it's like, I don't know if you can compare it to the one that took out the dinosaurs, but like thanks Mars for grabbing that one so that we didn't have to have it.

Yeah, gosh. That's recent. That's like very recent. Yeah, that's like our territory. Yeah. Well, yeah. Like there were like back at that, if that had hit earth,

it would have changed how humans happened probably. And potentially weather. Yeah. I'm just glad I'm here. It does feel like a tremendous coincidence, but then according to the astrophysicists, it's also the only thing that could have happened. That's fine. Yeah, it's fine.

That's fine. It's fine that there's no free will. It's fine. It's no big deal. Yeah, there's this book that just came out that everybody's telling me to read about how to live a good life while also recognizing that there is no free will. And I'm like, fine. I don't have to look at that. I'm good. I feel like I'm already up to that. Yeah. I can't even look at a partial solar eclipse without glasses. I can't, I can't, I definitely can't look at like the reality that I don't have free will.

I'm just gonna burn my corneas right off. Oh, I love that we got there, Hank. Thank you for potting with me. Thanks to everybody for listening. You can email us your questions at hankandjohnatgmail.com. This podcast is edited by Joseph Tunamettish. It's produced by Rosianna Hals-Rojas. Our communications coordinator is Brooke Shotwell. Our editorial assistant is Deboki Chakravarti, the music you're hearing now at the beginning of the podcast is by The Great Gunnarolla, and as they say in our hometown, don't forget to be awesome.