Secretly Incredibly Fascinating - Spoons

Episode Date: November 22, 2021

Alex Schmidt is joined by comedians/podcasters Cody Johnston and Katy Stoll ('Some More News' YouTube channel, 'Even More News' podcast) for a look at why spoons are secretly incredibly fascinating. Visit http://sifpod.fun/ for research sources, handy links, and this week's bonus episode.

Hey folks, it's Alex, like always, and as you know, I am a man of business, right? I'm a master of business and deals and stocks, business, finance, business, in particular business. And so I'm very excited to tell you about a new party game that is from clickhole.com, an incredibly funny website, and the party game is called Business Walrus. If there's one thing I love more than business, it's walruses. They're amazing. They should be an episode. Point is, Business Walrus is an incredible new party game that

you're going to have a lot of fun playing. I have it and I've enjoyed it myself. I think you will too. And Business Walrus was created and written by the writers of ClickHole.com. If you don't know what ClickHole.com is, I am very excited for you to spend all day reading that. It's incredibly funny and creative satire. They did one article where the animatronic fox on the Splash Mountain ride at Disney marries your dad, and you just experience that as you ride the ride more. It's that kind of fun. I really, really love it. And this game distills that sight into a wonderful little package with a walrus on it. He's wearing a suit.

He's nice to look at, too. It's on sale at Target. It's on sale a bunch of other places. We'll have a link for you to buy it in the links for this episode. And again, that is Business Walrus. And then last, last thing I say, even when an ad is as fun as the Business Walrus, if you're a patron of this podcast, you hear these episodes with no ads whatsoever. If you would prefer that experience, please go to sifpod.fun, sign up, back the show, get a bunch of other stuff beyond that. But otherwise,

please get business walrus and please enjoy this episode. Spoons. Known for scooping. Famous for spooning. Nobody thinks much about them, so let's have some fun. Let's find out why spoons are secretly incredibly fascinating. Hey there, folks. Welcome to a whole new podcast episode. A podcast all about why being alive is more interesting than people think it is. My name is Alex Schmidt, and I'm not alone. people think it is, my name is Alex Schmidt, and I'm not alone. My two guests are wonderful returning guests Cody Johnston and Katie Stoll are on the show today. Between them, Cody and Katie are the host and producer of the Some More News YouTube channel, the co-hosts of the Even More News podcast, and they are making wonderful, political, hilarious stuff all of the time.

We also go a ways back knowing each other and working together, partly at the former workplace crack.com. Cody also wrote a sci-fi series called Galactic War Room, where I got to be a, you know, like, like nerdy flunky kind of guy in the spaceship, which was very fun. Anyway, today, Cody and Katie are making some more news and even more news, and I think really making a legitimate difference in politics on the internet. I think it's awesome. Also, I've gathered all of our zip codes and used internet resources like native-land.ca to acknowledge that I recorded this on the traditional land of the Canarsie and Lenape peoples. Acknowledge Cody and Katie each recorded this on the traditional land of the Canarsie and Lenape peoples.

Acknowledge Cody and Katie each recorded this on the traditional land of the Gabrielino-Ortongva and Keech and Chumash peoples. And acknowledge that in all of our locations, native people are very much still here. That feels worth doing on each episode. And today's episode is about spoons. A self-explanatory topic, also a fun origin there. Cody and Katie were on this show once before, and as we were talking, Katie said, hey, spoons would probably be a good topic for the show, right? And I think this is the first time that just conversational process has led to something like this. Because the previous time they were on was about the painting The Scream by Edvard Munch. You've probably seen it or heard the episode, then you know about it.

But that talk about a corner of art history and Norwegian history led to this podcast episode about spoons. I think this podcast is magical in that way. I just think it's really cool that we can get from there to here. And I'm thrilled for you to hear this episode where that happens. So please sit back or continue using your spoon to divide stuff because you are allowed to do that. It's not weird. Either way, here's this episode of Secretly Incredibly Fascinating with Cody Johnston and Katie Stoll. I'll be back after we wrap up.

Talk to you then. Cody, Katie, it is so good to have you back. And, of course, I always start by asking guests their relationship to the topic or opinion of it. Also, there's a topic that Katie, you suggested long ago, which is very fun. But either way, how do you guys feel about spoons? Alex, I've been waiting months for you to ask. And the answer is I love spoons. I love spoons.

They are my favorite utensil. I think they're incredibly underrated. They... And I'll be even more specific. I prefer a tiny spoon. I like a small spoon more than the big spoons. But that's just me.

Tiny like the smaller of the two spoons that you use at a table? Sure, there's that. But I have been known to get miniature spoons as well oh yeah okay one time i stayed at a airbnb in iceland and there was a whole drawer like they clearly had children and there was like all these tiny spoons and i took i took one with me as a souvenir awesome um hope they're not listening. I'm a petty thief! This is all... It's been a long sting by the Icelandic authorities,

and I'm glad we can bring you in now. Justice is finally served. There's no extradition, right? Like, I can't... I'm good. Served with a spoon. Right? I made it through customs.

I will say, I'm pro-spoon. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find somebody who's anti-spoon. I will say I'm pro spoon. Um, I think you'd be hard pressed to find somebody who's anti spoon. Um, I wouldn't say I have as many specific, uh, wants from a spoon as Katie. Um,

I also don't necessarily have, uh, I wouldn't say it's my favorite utensil. I think that, uh, it's a wonderful innovation and a compliment to the fork. If one were to say, like, if you were to eat food and you didn't know a fork or a spoon and you put people in a room for a week, they'd come out with something similar to, oh, you need something for scooping and you need something for poking. Yeah, like a spork.

And then you're settled. Or the humble spork and then you're settled uh or or the the humble spork um but they just come out with one huge spork like we've done it this is all you need yeah we finally did it yeah and i'll want some miniature ones um i'll just say that i find a spoon to be very useful not that it's ideal for cutting through things but in a pinch you can um a lot of times with salad i'm gonna go i like a nice like grain filled salad with lots of things on it um you're gonna need a spoon i'll oftentimes get a fork and a spoon um and mostly use the spoon because you gotta get that like that good stuff absolutely that's the thing about spoons. If you had to choose, if you had to only use one utensil, I think

most people would eventually land on spoon. You can eat something that maybe should be a fork with a spoon. The same does not go the other way. You cannot eat a spooner with a fork very easily. No. And I like what you said, Cody, about you think it'd be hard to find somebody who's anti-spoon. I think you're right. I think like if any of us sit down for more than a second to think about it, like I have in prep, it's like, oh, spoons are the number one utensil.

Great. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They can do everything. They can't do everything amazingly, but they can do everything they can't do everything amazingly but they can do everything if you need to yeah even like you could you could eat a steak with a spoon if you had to you well really cut it up with a spoon and then i mean worst case scenario with a steak you can

pick it up and eat it with your fingers and also true also true i mean obviously nature's utensil the human fingers yeah true or just bobbing your head you know but even then i guess that's true for anything but not soup although you would just drink the soup anyway but also like i feel like and i'm maybe i you know we'll learn much today but if you were to like okay we need a utensil you're a human being and you don't know utensils all you know is your your hands and what is a hand if not a fork and a spoon you cup your hand you got a spoon you got your four little prongs um you got everything you need right there and your your teeth is the knife yeah it's true it is it all comes down to spoons ultimately i think

i like in thinking about spoons with me, I remembered past roommate living situations where spoons were kind of the dish we ran out of first, especially because I would eat cereal every morning. And then if anybody else did, that was just it. Like we have a sink full of spoons and like two bowls. And that's all that we're out of. My spoon thing is the highest filled and it runs out first. That's when I run the dishwasher when the spoons are out. That's right, when the spoons are out. Good song too, When the Spoons Are Out. When the Spoons Are Out, love, classic. Classic.

Is that a song? Hold on. No. I mean, maybe. Cody, go ahead. Sing it for us. When the spoons are out tonight. That was not the right chord.

Whoa. You've got prop instruments going next level. That's great. Hey, it's an instrument. It's not a prop instrument. It works. It does what it needs to do. Yeah.

Also, spoons go to a musical instrument if you need to. You clap them together. Anyway, it's endless. That's absolutely true. And a great band. Wow. You know what? If we're on that subject.

Wowee. The band Spoon. Wowee, indeed. The band Spoon. True thing. Researching this got me in the mood to hear the band Spoon again. I've listened to them a lot for like a couple days. I'll bet.

It turns out they had like five good albums. I forgot. They're great. They do. They're great. And some good like work music they've got. Yeah. I don't know.

I can zone out to Spoon and get into the zone. I will say, I still think, I would say like Wineglass or Glass is a better instrument than Spoons. It's more of a utility. Like the, you know, you put water and you get the tones and stuff. I mean, that's a great percussive sound, for sure. Like when you raise your

glass and tap it with a spoon. Also true. Well, but then you require the spoon. And I think we can get into the first chunk of the show about spoons because on every episode, our first fascinating thing is a quick set of fascinating numbers and statistics. This week, that's in a segment called, Cause I'm leaving on a SIF plane. I don't know when I'll be stats again.

I swear to God also please swear to Paul Garaventa that's his suggestion thank you Paul thank you Paul we have a new name for this every week

please make it as silly and wacky and bad as possible submit to SipPod or to SipPod at gmail.com and the first number here is the 1300s that century the 1300s

AD that's the approximate time when the European like general population got access to spoons until then a regular like a spoon we think of today was mostly for richer people that's right classic would they make their own though like I feel like spoon we think of today was mostly for richer people that's right classic uh would um would

they make their own though like i feel like yeah so i was gonna if they were aware of like oh the richies got the spoons we'll make our own spoons or yeah was it their decision that let's release the we now you know like you know like you know they're not gonna have necessarily materials for the for the nice spoons but like you know carving like, you know, they're not going to have necessarily materials for the for the nice spoons, but like, you know, carving a wooden spoon or something. Right. Exactly. Yeah, they would like work out something like that. And the source here is the California Academy of Sciences, which is a big museum in San Francisco that happens to have a huge collection of historical cutlery and people studying like cutlery across time. Good for them. My God, I grew up there and I never once went and checked out the cutlery exhibit all this time.

Well, now you don't have to. Also, from my Googling, I think they also have like dinosaurs and stuff. It's probably a hard sell. That's probably where we went. Cody, I think we went there once. But I don't recall the spoons. No, no, no. We just went to the dinosaur section.

We missed out. Like I was like, why don't I Google this museum? And I saw really cool dinosaurs were the first images. I was like, oh, OK. There was a really cool dinosaur exhibit. Yeah, they get you in with the dinosaurs. And then they really like now we're going to wow you. And then you take it to the next level.

Scoop you up. Yeah, they have a whole set of this and also study it, and they say that people would have something to scoop with that they'd make themselves or get. But in Europe in the Middle Ages, royalties started getting fancy spoons made out of gold and out of silver. And then around the 1300s, craftsmen started making spoons out of pewter, which is an alloy that's mostly tin and is incredibly cheap and easy to use. And so then suddenly it became more common for everybody to have like a metal spoon they bought.

It was something that was easier to do. Good for them. That makes sense. Yeah. they bought, it was something that was easier to do. Good for them. That makes sense. Yeah.

Once it's cheaper, then the poor is going to have them. Yeah. For their slop. Yeah. For their peasant gruel and for other gruels. You know, all the gruels. Other kinds of gruel, of course. Yeah.

Yeah. You know, maybe they're middle class gruel. And also this California Academy of Sciences, they say that we have to go further back to find the origin of the word spoon or also the word four spoons in a lot of European languages because the first first spoons, there's kind of no date for it. You're looking like a couple million years back into the Paleolithic, into the Stone Age. Back then, people would use shells for that kind of function to scoop stuff,

and they would also use chips of wood. And then the upshot from them, quote, the Greek and Latin words for spoons are derived from cochlea, meaning a spiral shell. And then the Anglo-Saxon word spawn means a chip of wood, end quote. So the English word spoon is coming from Anglo-Saxon for a chip of wood that you're using to scoop stuff. Okay. That's interesting. That makes sense. So they had just random scoopy things before they had like a spoon from Ikea, you know? Yeah, I mean, I'm looking around my room and there's plenty of things I could scoop things if I had to.

Well, that's most, you know, that's the most and there's plenty of things I could scoop things if I had to. Yeah. Well, that's most, you know, that's the most tool-y kind of things, right? Where it's like, okay, nature did this over millions and millions and millions of years. And we recognize that we can use that shape to do a thing. And then we're like, well, let's make our own and try to perfect it with our amazing human brains. That was a smart comment. It sounds sarcastic, but it's true. It did sound sarcastic.

I was like, I made a joke and you made an interesting point. That's why we're here. A little bit of both. It's for both things. Yeah, both things are celebrating. For both things, yeah. Both things. Exactly.

The listener can't see I'm raising my arms in embrace of both things. He is. You know, like a saw, right? You got a saw and you get your little saw and you saw a thing. Well, you got different kinds of teeth in nature that are reminiscent of saws. And you take that and I'm going to make that out of metal and I'm going to cut down trees and do keep doing that until there are no more until there are no more until we've got a real problem on our hands yeah and then they're the the california

nope nope i was gonna say something stupid what is your stupid thing mine's stupid too i'm just the cal the California Academy of Sciences is really hiding the fact that they have any information on spoons. Like, Kate, you're right, we have been here. And, like, it must be in the basement or something. It's such a surprise that they would also have that exhibit. Yeah. It's like, but what about the rainforest inside? Yeah.

Which is very cool i'm definitely imagining a hans molman type figure asking people to please look at his spoons while children are observing pterodactyls above them and and the one he's got his little stand and like the size a spoon and like crayon on a piece of cardboard yeah here's my spoon it's not even like information about spoons or like an ancient spoon it's just a spoon that he has when the the next number here is very elemental the spoons it is two this may be obvious but it's the kinds of things a spoon can hold, solid foods and liquid foods all at once. And there's a really interesting book called Consider the Fork, A History of How We Cook and Eat by British food writer Bea Wilson. And I read the section on spoons, which is very interesting because she says that we don't really think about it, but it's the utensil that does both things. but it's the utensil that does both things.

And she also points out that spoon design varies a lot across cultures depending on what the most common liquids and common little solids are in their culture. Her favorite example is an Afghan spoon called a kafgeer, K-A-F-G-E-E-R, because it's very wide and spatula-like because it's mostly for rice. And then they're also a culture that lacks chopsticks. And so they just use this huge spoon to pick it up. Chopsticks just elude me. That makes sense. They're the coolest utensil, but the least useful for me personally because I s*** at them.

I spear things with my chopsticks. You can do that. Judge me. I am bad. I have to go practice with my chopsticks. You can do that? Judge me. I am bad. I have to go practice. It's not acceptable. And also I'll link stuff in particular from Q. Edward Wong, who's a professor of history and East Asian studies at Rowan University. He says that chopsticks only started to become very common in countries like Korea and Japan and Vietnam in the past 2000 years,

which I know is a long time, but it's not that long. And he says that... In the grand scheme of things. In terms of utensils and stuff, yeah. Right, yeah, because people had to eat before that. Right. And he says that chopsticks really kind of blew up and became popular because of more rice cultivation and wheat cultivation.

So then you've got like grains of rice and noodles to pick up with that. But before that, they were eating like porridges and millets and other softer grains where you need a spoon. And so that's why you see spoons across a lot of East Asian cuisines, like along with chopsticks. Fascinating. Yeah, it really is. Yeah, it's cool, right? They're pretty universal across foods, unless it's a highly eating with hands cuisine. It's kind of the main utensil we all get to. That's interesting, though.

I like chopsticks because it's not a challenge, because it's chopsticks, but I like it. It's part of it. There's no skill required uh with any other utensil i just feel bad about myself when i use it i get frustrated because i'm bad at it and then i don't use it which is the problem i understand that don't keep trying don't pick up the fork just keep trying yeah mindfulness with your food too it makes you slow down i would think i mean for me it does i do i definitely have the experience with spoons of

doing like now i'm thinking of homer simpson like homer simpson shoveling with my spoon if i if i don't think about it or yeah or try to be polite just Just like, just going like a harvester. Yeah. Yeah, just go for it. What's stopping you? Not the spoon, that's for sure. Big scoop, yeah. Not the spoon.

When the next number here about spoons is 10 to 12 months. 10 to 12 months, that is an age range for people. And according to the CDC's child development stuff, that's when they say most babies can use a spoon independently, the age of 10 to 12 months. Cute. Good for them. Little dummies can't hold it. Can't grip. Yeah, they think it's an airplane or a train of some kind. Idiots. Stupid. They think it's an airplane or a train of some kind. Idiots.

Stupid. God. Get out of the world, kids. Jeez. And yeah, the CDC says most babies can swallow a spoonful of pureed foods without choking when they're around six months old. And then another child development step is 10 to 12 months old, they can handle the spoon themselves and feed themselves something with it. I'm sure there are other numbers, other depending on you know their study of babies but but that seems to be a yardstick for kids um because it is like just yeah the simple sort of

like oh you hold once like once your your digits can like actually grab stuff and hold on to them then it's just a matter of like aiming. I'm kidding. I know this is not a visual medium, but I am miming. I'm using a spoon poorly and like missing his mouth. Yeah. Which is what a baby will do at first.

Folks, Cody has some prop mashed peas. He's really committed. I did not think he would do that. It's pretty gross, but you know. I carrot top as your guest but uh here we are nothing but props and the the last number here about spoons it's it's kind of metaphorical but it's the year 2003. Because in 2003, a writer named Christine Miserandino published a blog post titled The Spoon Theory. And I don't know if people have heard of this idea, but Miserandino has lupus. And so her blog post laid out an exploit, like a metaphor she would use with friends to explain like the experience of living with lupus. She gave the friend 12 spoons. She

said each spoon represents a unit of energy. And so with a chronic disease like that, you only have so many spoons to do the things in your day. And since it's been picked up by people to talk about mental energy, emotional energy, everything. But like within the last 20 years, spoons became, you know, a metaphor for getting through stuff and having only so much ability to do it i hadn't heard that before but i like that yeah okay yeah yeah like you get one spoon to like get out of bed get dressed you know spoon that makes sense yeah and like everybody spends spoons on stuff but in her metaphor she was like it takes me more spoons to do these particular things because of bloopers.

And you only get so many spoons as more people have a larger amount of spoons and so on. I mean, she probably chose that metaphor because everybody likes spoons the most. Those are always this utensil that runs out first. Yeah, it fits, huh? I don't know if she did, but that just came to my mind now. Yeah. But it does fit. It goes with what we were talking about before.

I never run out of forks, really. I always have forks, actual literal forks, not some kind of metaphor. We just have a lot of them. Oh, yeah. So many forks. Someone take these forks off my hands. I actually run out of forks a lot because I have fewer forks than spoons because I use spoons most.

So I have fewer forks, but then I'm using them still because I'm a human. Well, you're coming over here tomorrow, so I'll send you home with some forks. Do you want me to take some forks? Sure. Oh. I mean, you can have them if you don't have very many. All right. And forks? Sure. I mean, you can have them if you don't have very many. Alright! And forks!

But yeah, and if people want to read this blog, Christine Miserandino continues to blog, and her website URL is butyoudontlooksick.com which I think is a really cool thing for chronic stuff. But yeah, so that's a nice thing that's come around. Like, it's the first

new spoon thing, I feel like, in centuries. Oh, yeah. Otherwise, it's just Spoon. I was like, wait, what could possibly have happened in 2003 about Spoon? Except for, again, the band Spoon. Right, sure. And new album February 2022. I checked.

Nice. Did not know that. All right. Next thing here is a big trumpet sound for a big takeaway. Before that, we're going to take a little break. We'll be right back. I'm Jesse Thorne. I just don't want to leave a mess. This week on Bullseye, Dan Aykroyd talks to me about the Blues Brothers,

Ghostbusters, and his very detailed plans about how he'll spend his afterlife. I think I'm going to roam in a few places. Yes, I'm going to manifest and roam. All that and more on the next Bullseye from MaximumFun.org and NPR. and NPR. Hello, teachers and faculty. This is Janet Varney. I'm here to remind you that listening to my podcast, The JV Club with Janet Varney,

is part of the curriculum for the school year. Learning about the teenage years of such guests as Alison Brie, Vicki Peterson, John Hodgman, and so many more is a valuable and enriching experience, one you have no choice but to embrace, because yes, listening is mandatory. The JV Club with Janet Varney is available every Thursday on Maximum Fun or wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you. And remember, no running in the halls. But speaking of modern spoon stuff, got a couple takeaways for the main episode. Let's get into takeaway number one. Spoon use was at the center of a recent Canadian civil rights case. I'll say that one more time because there were a few parts. Spoon use was at the center of a recent Canadian civil rights case. I'll say that one more time because there were a few parts.

Spoon use was at the center of a recent Canadian civil rights case. This was in the 2000s, and it was actually very, very interesting, but I'd never heard of it in the U.S. or just in general. Yeah. Yeah. I have no idea what you're talking about. I'm curious if Canadian listeners know in advance, let me know at ZipBot.com. But sources here are the CBC News and also CTV News, and then the YouTube channel of a TV network called Balitang America, which is based in the Philippines.

Because the story starts in 2006, there was a young boy named Luke Kagadok, and his family had immigrated to Canada from the Philippines. They lived on the West Island of Montreal, and he went to a grade school called École de la Lande. And when he was seven years old, this kid, Luke, got reprimanded at school repeatedly for how he ate his lunches. And all of the reprimands and punishments were based on how he was his lunches. And all of the reprimands and punishments were based on how he was using his spoon. And we were talking earlier about how you can use a spoon to cut food. That's the traditional use of a spoon,

apparently, for many Filipino people. They'll use a spoon and fork, sort of like how I was taught to use a knife and fork. You can just use a sharp enough spoon to divide stuff. Yeah. It's not weird. Even, even if it's not your culture,

it's like, makes sense. It's not that strange. Yeah. That's completely reasonable. Like you don't, if you don't have a third utensil or that's wait. So we got in trouble for the,

for like cutting food with a spoon? Yeah, I know. And so what happened is... In the 2000s. Yeah, in 2006 in Montreal. That's so unreasonable. Like, I understand, like, if it's like, oh, actually, so, like, you don't have to do that. We have, if you want, you can use a knife and here you go and show the kid, you know, here we do it this way. But to like,

demand that he does it that way or to like, get him in trouble. That's just so weird. Yeah, exactly. Like, like if the school had said, why don't you do it this other way? And maybe his folks were upset they were changing him or something. You know, that's one thing. But maybe it's just a couple of weird staff members or something they got really really out of line uh according to the family luke was told that he quote ate like a pig end quote like fully i know um pigs don't use utensils although they could be very smart i don't know how they could cody how could they use a spoon how could a pig use a spoon tape it on there so actually that's there's not a world where he was eating like a pig because he was using a spoon yeah um aside from aside from the fact that who cares spoons uh gross what what

the hell like incredibly yeah and then it also this went all the way up to the school's principal apparently the principal like called his family to talk about it and according to the family the principal said quote this is not the way canadians eat you have to adapt to quebec society end quote and then also the school like increasingly reprimanded him. Then they separated him from his classmates at lunchtime and forced him to eat by himself. This makes me really sad. And also Luke's mother, like, went to the school to meet with, like, sit down with the school staff and just explain, hey, this is our thing. And it's from our culture. And they refused to change the punishment and just kept him by himself at lunch.

Like, it's a really, really out of line school. That's so cruel and weird. Yeah. So they sued the school. They did, and they sued and they won. So that's great. Good. And also the school claims that they were punishing Luke

for some kind of disruptive behavior and not for how he ate. They were disrupting. Right. But I can't find anything like denying the verbal statement quotes or anything. And then Luke apparently also started getting like excluded from games at recess by the other kids as a as in the fallout of this like he couldn't play basketball with kids or tag they also said that he had trouble sleeping and he would like wake up from nightmares kind of screaming about it and then his parents would have to kind of calm them down transferred to a different school got out of there but then the

the family got legal help their case was initially turned down in 2006. But then when they appealed, you know, four years later in 2010, they won a judgment of 17,000 Canadian dollars in damages from the school board and a couple staff members who were particularly awful about it. Yeah. Good Lord. That's so sad. Like, of course, he was like ostracized by the rest of the kids kids are cruel and they go by like what happens around them so if you're just like singling out this kid and having him eat alone like that's gonna transfer over to the rest of their behavior like you're piling up yeah you're piling up on him and making it worse and drawing attention to him and making him another over a

spoon for a spoon which is a good utensil good utensil there's nothing wrong with using it to cut your food and eat it too yeah like i had not heard of this cultural practice and i feel like we all sort of independently invent it from time to time you know it's truly straightforward you can just use the the edge of it to divide things yeah that's it that's how edges work yeah I really don't touch my knives I don't you don't need to I mostly don't I've been known to spread like mustard on a piece of bread with a spoon. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Well, why would you need a knife? What are you, Canadian? Nope. Bunch of jerks. I also don't eat meat, so I'm not cutting things. That makes sense too, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, knives are kind of meat centric, huh?

That's often the situation. I mean, I really don't every so often, you know, if I want to slice something, I don't even I literally just bought myself one knife for cutting vegetables because I didn't even have that. But yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I like cooking. Yeah. Cooking and stuff. That makes sense. about knives like cooking yeah cooking and stuff that makes sense but yeah for the most part like in terms of like sitting down and eating a meal it's really just for meat um yeah for the most part um yeah and i it's not it's not quite a spoon thing but in the research i found a lot of sources basically say that spoons and knives are both like ancient, ancient, like millions of years old. And then forks are relatively recent because they're kind of hard to make. Like you'd have like the equivalent of a huge grilling fork for cooking,

but otherwise not personal ones. But yeah, people would use knives kind of like forks back in the day. Cause that was easier to make, even though it's dangerous. Do you know if, uh, what came first the

pitchfork or the fork oh like were they like oh we could use that smaller for food probably the pitchfork for farming before the like fork at a table yeah that makes sense um because it's just it's just larger like it's easier to make that as a blacksmith or whatever yeah yeah and like yeah like uh like agriculturally if you're you figure you'd have like those it's earlier than like than the consumption of it and and a guy in your town builds a frankenstein monster you know exactly before you're sitting down at a fancy meal with your little pronged utensil right you can't even have dinner there's a frankenstein monster exactly exactly what do you get what are you wasting your time have dinner there's a frankenstein monster exactly exactly

what do you get what are you wasting your time here for there's a frankenstein monster to take care of yeah can you gonna poke them with your fork no you need something bigger than that just people with huge spoons chasing the doctor out of town like this is what we got sorry i don't know this would be a shovel right oh yeah just just a shovel i forgot shovels exist yeah what i was talking about i guess i mean a shovel is just a giant spoon yeah exactly or a spoon's a giant uh small shovel tiny shovel tomato tomato you know you could cut it with a tomato spoon. Or cut a tomato with. You can't cut a spoon with a tomato. I don't think.

Probably, right? No. It would be a really bad spoon. Depends on the... Really poorly made, bad material, and very, very hard tomato. Yeah, well, a tomato doesn't have an edge. Also, once you put the guy who made the Frankenstein monster in

the medieval stocks, where his head and arms are sticking out, then the tomatoes, that's when you throw them. That's when the tomatoes come out, exactly. Now they're useful. Yeah. Not for cutting stuff. Or eating. Yeah. But yeah, and so the family won this judgment against the school and the staff.

And still a terrible experience for Luke. And also the courts in Quebec at least did the right thing in the end. So that is good. Yeah, that's good in the long run. I hope Luke's okay. Because that's good. I know, what's he up to these days? He got 16 grand or something, I think you said. 17,000 Canadian, yeah. 17,000. What did you know it's good like okay they got what was it 16 grand or something

i think you said and so like that's good canadian yeah 17 000 what did you use it for oh and his like his mom said it would go straight into his college fund in an interview good which makes sense because he was yeah because like that's good and like that you know goes towards uh hopefully a better education than he got at that school um but that like that is damaging to that kid like he waking up with like nightmares and stuff and like all that that whole experience like money's not gonna fix that um it's sad that it happened yeah and it and it hopefully made people more aware of cultural differences with the same utensils like you can use a spoon for this and and people in the philippines do yeah you totally can right or you can just come up like we all do it we just don't do it exclusively yeah i mean just judging other cultures judging other people

for how they are raised and how they consume stuff is just so white. Yeah. It's just so North American and, you know, well, not North American, it's white. But, you know, like around the world, people, you know, we can't even fathom, so many people can't even fathom that there are different ways to consume your food, but it's all the narrative that we've been taught of, like, this is the way to do it.

And if you're not, you're a savage. Yeah. So that's the crux of it. It's racist. Yeah, truly. Yeah.

Even there's another thing, the same school, apparently when the court handed down the judgment against them, part of their reason was that the school had recently lost another case where they discriminated against another kid. And it was a kid who was Sikh and who wanted to carry a ceremonial sword item that's part of that culture and belief system,

and they wouldn't let him. And the court kind of said, you guys just lost another case like this. You need to get it together and stop telling people what activities they can do yeah like yeah uh that's a little well i don't know the details of it that's a little more understandable understandable because it's a sword but once you sit down and have a conversation with why this might be permissible for this individual or you know yeah exactly

it's a ceremonial sort yeah you, you have to talk and be thoughtful, which this school does not do. Right, clearly they're not capable of doing that. Calling the kid a pig for using a spoon. Right, which again, on several layers does not work. Yeah. Bad school. Bad school all around.

Never met a pig. Don't understand spoons. Come on. But yeah, there's one more takeaway for the main episode here. Let's get into it. Takeaway number two. Europeans used to carry a personal

spoon and a knife. And that's probably something we should bring back. 100% Absolutely. Portable spoons! I don't need a knife. I don't need to f*** with a knife. But what have we learned this episode?

No knives, only spoons. Yeah, we're so wasteful. I hate how I always make sure to check, especially during COVID, all the takeaway. Like, no utensils, but they always do. There's a wastefulness to that. I mean, I don't know. I've got plenty of spoons for a guest to come over and borrow but i like that i like that idea i'm prepared that makes sense uh you're prepared uh less wasteful uh it's nice to have your little thing a little case you know uh i imagine there's like you know there's like who doesn't like things

who doesn't have like having things they have to carry with them? I bet it's probably like, you know, there's like man boxes. You know, here's your like weekly like leather thing. I bet that exists. Like here's your like leather case and like here's your personal fork and spoon. I'm sure there is a manly lunchbox. Absolutely. Or like just like a pocket knife. I'm sure there are some that have

like those as extensions right like here's your like you can get those for like camping i was like oh this is like a fork and a spoon and a thing but i'm being visual again for all for all you listeners out there uh miming what a pocket knife looks like you all know what that looks like yeah but those are also like probably like are very tiny um and not uh probably not what you're talking about i'm just like well that's what i'm talking about let me just remind you all about the tiny spoon that's true that's right that is true pocket spoon yeah because katie like you said there is it's it's a i think a relatively new thing

but there's a modern thing of people saying hey I can bring my own cutlery so I don't throw out a bunch of plastic spoons and forks and knives I can just do that and it never crossed my mind until my partner started and then I was like oh yeah you can you're just allowed

I know we're just so cavalier with our trash you know there's also like reusable paper towels and stuff that I want to buy. Anyway, that's a whole different episode. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Found a good one. And we can link it.

Cody just put something in the chat that is a six and one multifunction camping utensil flatware set. Detachable spoon fork knife combo mess kit with carrying pouch. Mess kit especially. Sounds like a great Christmas gift. Oh, man. Wow. Pretty compact. Amazon, though.

And like the right size. The standard, like that's the size of a spoon. Not like a Katie-sized spoon, but... A normal-sized spoon. Yeah, get me the baby one. The one that's made for babies. These are cute. I like the yellow. Baby's first pocket spoon. Yeah, get me the baby one. The one that's made for babies. These are cute. I like the yellow.

Baby's first pocket spoon. This is super cute. Does it have a bottle opener? It sure does, doesn't it? It sure does. Can do it all. Yeah. Brilliant.

I've seen like sets of Bring Your Own Cutlery where there's chopsticks built into or other items that are just handy. You know? It's easy to do. Yeah.

Here's another one a little fancier we don't need to keep sending you links of pocket cutlery but i'm doing it they're fun yeah this is i i would like put sets of links of this to help people but i think people can just find it it's like almost hard not to find it it takes a second i did it by googling the words that we were saying as we were saying them and i clicked i think the third image that i saw so yeah you guys you guys you guys got it linda and then there's also a like a historical element here main sources are national geographic and also sarin, who's a curator at the Cooper Hewitt Design Museum. The like, bring your own cutlery movement and practice that's big today. It has

roots in Europe in particular in the 1500s, 1600s, 1700s, because it was considered like, polite to bring your own spoon and knife when you went places, because then you weren't forcing the people hosting you to provide that stuff. Because like we were saying, Europeans could get pewter spoons and stuff then, but it was still pretty expensive. Before the Industrial Revolution,

when they were stamping them out, it was like not the cheapest, easiest thing to have a huge drawer of spoons ready to go. Right. Yeah, they're still like being crafted. It's not, yeah, this mass produced sort of thing. And Sarah Coffin says, quote, you would come with a little carry case and it would be your own personal knife and spoon, end quote.

She also says that personal cutlery was a status symbol for a lot of people, like they would get an extra nice one to show off how wealthy they were. Classic. And also, and I know this isn't relatable, but back in the day, they considered personal spoons especially a great way to prevent the spread of diseases. I was about to say, I bet

that at the time, you know, you're not sharing utensils, you bring your own stuff, you keep it to yourself. Yeah, like it's a great way to not spread the plague or whatever they were worried about at the time it makes perfect sense yeah i mean although if you're eating in the same area you know you're probably sharing air and um you know sure well you can't

you know can't do everything but um but you know it mitigates risk and we know all about that yeah what no yeah we think about it like all the time yeah and so that was like before the past few centuries when we had factories stamping things out uh in europe it was very common and then and then in their colonies and in north america it was very common to like carry your own knife and spoon not a fork because that was still a little advanced at the time. But like you have your own knife and spoon ready to go. And who needs it? Yeah. And who needs it? And dead weight.

Don't bring one. Dead weight. You got enough change for an extra fork? Save yourself the trouble and get a second spoon. Right? Yeah. That's what I think. Two spoons, one fork.

Why bother? Two spoons, no fork. No ever i'm saying it's me middle ages i've got my kit i've saved up i've bought a knife i've got a spoon and i'm thinking what do i want do i want a fork no i think i think i'm gonna get another spoon in case i lose this spoon because it's more useful. Okay. Yeah. That's just me, though. Takes all kinds. It's fine.

I'm like, I'm actually trying to think if I've ever eaten with two spoons at once. And it's probably fun. I don't think I've ever done it. But like, I mean, like holding two spoons, you know, not that there's like a second one on the table. Well, I'm going to try that later. Yeah. Is it like, would you assign each spoon to a specific food you're eating? Or is it just sort of a free-for-all?

We're like, okay, right hand a bite, left hand a bite. And just sort of... It's not Canada. There are no rules here. That's true. We can eat like pigs if we want and have two spoons that we use like pigs do. Yeah, none of us is a Montreal school principal. Right.

We understand how pigs work and we can do whatever we want. That's us. That's us understanding how pigs work. That's us. That's us understanding how pigs work. But yeah, and National Geographic says that as far as plastic utensils, it's hard to find a number for like the global output, but they say that the one company, Sodexo, buys 44 million plastic utensils per month in the United States.

So that's like one company, one big country per month. They're buying 44 million. We're so f***ed. We're so f***ed. I'm sorry, this is a clean show. Bleep it. We're so screwed. It's a good time to go for it.

We're so in trouble. But it is. The silver lining is this is one of the easiest, like kind of big things you can do is just switching to not using disposable cutlery. Yeah. Like you don't have to stop driving or whatever. You know, you can just carry a spoon. Yeah. It's not like, yeah, get rid of your car and uh yeah start biking it's like no

just like get a little get a little personal spin yeah we googled so many sorry i had to turn my camera off you guys that's not always the case no it's not and i might be lying to you right now it might have been positions but oh you'll never know either oh man when the pictures come out i'm gonna be so embarrassed if you release those pictures, we're going to turn you in for stealing that spoon from Ireland. Iceland. No, I shouldn't have given you leverage over me.

That's right. Folks, that is the main episode for this week. My thanks to Cody Johnston and to Katie Stoll for opening their drawers with me. You know, spoons, we all have them. Anyway, I said that's the main episode because there is more secretly incredibly fascinating stuff available to you right now. If you support this show on Patreon.com, patrons get a bonus show every week where we explore one obviously incredibly fascinating story related to the main episode. This week's bonus topic is the bizarre history of the McSpoon. The McSpoon is the strangest McDonald's restaurants item of all time, period. Visit SIFpod.fun for that bonus show, for a library of almost six dozen other bonus shows,

and to back this entire podcast operation. And thank you for exploring spoons with us. Here's one more run through the big takeaways. Takeaway number one, spoon use was at the center of a recent Canadian civil rights case. And takeaway number two, Europeans used to carry a personal spoon and knife, and that's probably something we should bring back. Those are the takeaways. Also, please follow my guests. They're great. Cody Johnston and Katie Stoll and their collaborators make up the Some More News YouTube channel, which also has a Patreon page, and it's its own podcast now.

Then there's the Even More News podcast as well. That is the place to go for smart, funny, correctly critical analysis of everything going on, because things continue going on in politics. That's their nature. And please check it out. It's awesome. Many research sources this week. Here are some key ones. A fantastic book, it's called Consider the Fork, A History of How We Cook and Eat, that is by food writer B. Wilson. A lot of amazing online resources from the California Academy of Sciences, which is that museum in San Francisco that has many dinosaurs, but also has a lot of cutlery. Plus tons more articles from there, in particular a piece from National Geographic about the, you know, increasing phenomenon of disposable cutlery and how we can work around that.

Find those and many more sources in this episode's links at sifpod.fun. And beyond all that, our theme music is Unbroken Unshaven by The Budos Band. Our show logo is by artist Burton Durand. Special thanks to Chris Souza for audio mastering on this episode. Extra, extra special thanks go to our patrons. I hope you love this week's bonus show. And thank you to all our listeners. I'm thrilled to say we will be back next week with more secretly incredibly fascinating.

So how about that? Talk to you then.