The Weirdest Thing I Learned This Week - A special Q&A with Rachel and Jess

Episode Date: November 6, 2019

In lieu of a regular episode this week—which we were too swamped with live show prep to record!—enjoy this chatty Q&A with Jess and Rachel. They talk about getting into science journalism and podcasting, the show's origins, antics that ensued at the live show, and more. And don't worry, we'll be back next week with a regular episode. Thanks for listening, weirdos! The Weirdest Thing I Learned This Week is a podcast by Popular Science. Share more of your weirdest facts and stories with us in our Facebook group or tweet at us! Click here to learn more about all of our stories!  Follow our team on Twitter Rachel Feltman: www.twitter.com/RachelFeltman Jess Boddy: www.twitter.com/JessicaBoddy Popular Science: www.twitter.com/PopSci Theme music by Billy Cadden: https://open.spotify.com/artist/6LqT4DCuAXlBzX8XlNy4Wq?si=5VF2r2XiQoGepRsMTBsDAQ --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/popular-science/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/popular-science/support Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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So unfortunately, bad news first, we do not have a regular episode for you this Wednesday. But Jess is here with me. Hello. And we are going to do a special little Q&A and short voice message review just to give you something fresh in your feeds. And don't worry, we'll be back next week with part one of our live. show, which is our excuse for being too busy to record another full episode this week. Oops.

Live entertainment. It takes a lot of efforts. It really does. A lot of people. But it was so much fun. It was amazing. We should start by just talking about how much fun the live show was. It was great.

So many people dressed up. Like the costumes were impeccable. It's true. I was Mary Toft. I wore like a vaguely reminiscent of a medieval peasant gown. Yeah. And bunny slippers because she was. She was a scam artist who pretended that she was giving birth to rabbits.

Our winning costumes were they dressed up as the mushroom death suits, but they also, it was a couple. And one had a falcon sex hat. It was, you know, a falcon on her hat. And then her partner had a Millennium Falcon sex hat. Yeah, iconic. Yeah, really iconic. Also my fiancé Oliver. I was just going to bring that up.

I loved his costume. He like walked into the green room and he was like, can you tell what I am? And I was like, it took me a second because it was so complex. It was. There were layers. Layers indeed. I was talking to somebody who came to the show.

We met a lot of awesome fans, by the way. But she was like, he clearly took so much care, like sitting at home, cutting out those little shapes of maggots and cheese. He went as the entire first episode of our first live show. So there was the great dairy fire. Yeah. There was the fistula cow. slash man and there was the jumping maggot cheese. Yeah.

So he wore a flaming polyester shirt. Okay. When he walked in, I literally thought he was, I asked him if he was Guy Fierry. Well, so Jason Letterman, he had floated the idea of somebody dressing in a Guy Fierry shirt with a just a cheesehead on to be the dairy fire. But Oliver decided that wasn't complicated enough. Definitely. When he is doing a vision.

pun. He's, he, he, he loves groaners. Yeah. He likes making me, like, upset at how bad his jokes are. Totally. And this one, it was pretty bad joke. But, uh, yeah, somebody was like, oh, he's sitting there, like, cutting up the little maggots at home. And I was like, no, he didn't do any of this at home, because he wanted me to be surprised. Seriously? Like, sitting at work cutting out those little maggots. Wow. So. I respect it. Yeah. And yeah, we even, we, for the first time ever, planned an after party, which was ambitious of us, given that it was Halloween. But the thing is that caveat always has a really tight turnaround for the next show. And so we can never stick around and chat. So I was supposed to have gotten us guaranteed space at a bar. And it turns out they did not hold up

their end of the bargain. Oh my God. So it was quite packed there. And I think many people immediately fled the scene. If you attempted to come to the after party, I apologize. I immediately tried to talk to management and the bouncer, both of whom were extremely nice to me, but then were toothless. Wait, seriously? Oh, my God. Well, because they, like, they were super nice because, you know, I was nice because I knew it wasn't, like, the fault of these men that I was talking to. But I was like, look, here's the situation. I know we don't have an exclusive agreement. Like, I know this is a free thing. Yeah. But I was insured that the way the party room works here is that, like, we would share it with maybe one other party and that you would know that there was capacity for all those people down there.

And clearly what was happening was like it was Halloween and people were just packing in down there and there was like a drunk dance party happening. And I was like, oh no. And so they were like, okay, yeah, we totally understand like this is not what you were told to expect. You brought all these people here. We'll tell the bouncer that anyone who's not in one of the two parties that's supposed to be there has to leave. And then the bouncer went down and mumbled some stuff at some people and nobody left. So there was a lot of traction. traffic noise in our studio sometimes, and we often just have to pause and wait for it to pass. We're on 34th? 30 seconds? Yeah. We're in the middle of K-town on a Friday afternoon, so we're really

beholden to the whims of midtown traffic. And we've gotten really good at hearing the beginning of a hunk. It feels like a superpower at this point. Sometimes we'll look over and Jess is just, we'll have to put a photo on the insta of the, of the, please, pause for traffic noise space. Totally. So yeah, to the like 10 people who stuck around until we decided to give up and migrate upstairs because there were few enough of us that that was fine. I had a great couple of hours hanging out with you. It was super fun.

I think some of us are going to Burning Man, which is a thing I never thought I wanted. But I was convinced. Jesus. So come to the next live show. Yeah. TBA soon. Yeah, definitely. But yeah, I had to tell you, I spent my whole life being like, Burning Man, don't need it.

And it took Benjamin and Lauren like 30 seconds to have me on board. What did they say? They're just big weirdos. And they had compelling arguments. Yeah. Yeah. That's like a whole experience, Burning Man. Yeah.

Well, who knows? Maybe I'll be there. Maybe we'll all be there. There you go. Next live show. Cool. So there are a few fun things that we are going to share with you right now. So we are always asking people to send us questions and very few people ever send them, which in my darker days, I think is because we have no fans and people are interested in us. Yeah. But last night proved that is not the case. Yeah. Sometimes it just feels like we're in here and we're like doing our thing and it's like just for us. But then like you go to that live show and you see all those people who like are fans. Yeah, people had come from San Diego, from Puerto Rico.

Puerto Rico. Oh, my gosh. Somebody at the live show said that she had come from Puerto Rico just for the live show, and then she had to leave to catch her flight before the show ended. Yeah, back to Puerto Rico. And she came up to me and Eleanor. Eleanor and I were just, like, so shocked, like, frozen and crying because she was so nice. Please send us a message, whoever you are, because we would love to, you know, send you something.

Yeah. Just say thanks for. Being such a good fan. Totally. We love it. We love to see it. Thank you so much for making the trip. I don't know.

Maybe we'll do a live show in Puerto Rico. Who knows? We can just get on a cruise ship. Oh my God. What if in like 20 years podcast hosts are the new like cruise ship entertainment. Honestly? I dig it. Yeah.

I do it. Like Broadway stars being put out to pasture on cruise ship. Yeah. That's where we're. we'll all be when we're over the hill. Catch us in the Bahamas. Okay, cool. So anyway, we always ask for questions. Please send

us questions anytime, anywhere, in a five-star review on Apple, in an anchor voice message, in a tweet to weirdest nander-score thing, in our Facebook group, weirdest thing. That's it, I guess. Instagram. Yeah, Instagram. So, after much, pleading and

soliciting and badgering, I did manage to get some Q&A questions. And we also have some fun voice messages to go through. Amazing. And then next week, you'll have part one in the live show and it'll be spooky and great. Tell your friends. Okay. So these are from my Insta. Username at Crimody asks, what fact do you absolutely want to talk about but can't find enough info on? Do you have any that come to mind, Jess? Not immediately. For a while, my live show fact that you'll hear next week. I really needed to find some depth with and I did find some in the nick of time about the witch's teat. Catch it in about seven days in your feed. So that one was, you know, it was a white whale that I really achieved there.

Who you caught? Yeah. Yeah. You did it. What about you? I mean, I feel like I'm constantly coming across interesting historical figures that like there may be a scientific or medical angle to what they did, but it's really hard to get enough info. I think the thing is that I usually kind of just go with it anyway. The thing I'm thinking of is when we did a live show and my fact was about a lady art scammer. Yeah.

She was trying to like, she told people that she could teach them how to like mimic the secrets of the Renaissance painters, Renaissance masters. And I had gone into this like super excited. And it was a cool story, but it just didn't end up having. the science angle I expected to wrap it up with. Yeah. And I just made the decision that it was an interesting enough story and that the takeaway that, you know, I kind of thought I was going to be able to say something about the way paint had changed or the way use of color had changed.

Like, I thought I was going to be able to find some answer to what the Renaissance Masters had done differently. And the answer is just that they'd been better painters than the guys who were famous for painting at the time this lady art scammer was doing her scams. Yeah. Which I was like, that's an important resolution. Yeah. It's just not the thing that I kept digging around looking for. So I'm sure there are facts that I'm not thinking of that I did the same thing. But then like, I was like, this isn't a good enough story on its own.

Haven't you wanted to do a roller derby fact for a long time? That's an answer to another question. Oh, okay. We'll put a pin in that. Okay. Thank you for that question. Lovely. Another one from Insta is from Margo.

And the question is, how do you smash the patriarchy from inside the science lab? That's the best place to smash the patriarchy from. But seriously, the systemic biases of all sorts in science are as baked in as the systemic biases everywhere in society. You know, the fact that for basically all of history until the last 50 years, most science in the mainststance, in the mainstrand, scientific literature was being done by relatively wealthy white dudes. Like, that means something. Not having a diversity of perspectives and backgrounds affects the things you think are worth asking and the way you interpret the data that you collect and the kinds of things that become dogmatic

and that we continue to hold on to, you know, from textbook to textbook. So, like, of course, science is not a white Western thing, you know, it was pretty much. which invented in like the Middle East and Asia, not pretty much, literally. Yeah. But, you know, in the last few hundred years, the scientific establishment has shifted to being, you know, extremely Western and European and white and male and rich. And that's beginning to change over the last few decades. And it's finally like really changing in a meaningful way.

And that's important. We're learning things that. people didn't even think to ask about before were reevaluating things that people didn't bother re-evaluating. I mean, the reason I keep talking about the American eugenics movement on this podcast is because I want listeners to think about what they take for granted as being like reasonable. Because for years, most Americans and definitely most American scientists and doctors thought eugenics and even for sterilization was reasonable. Oh, and then there's the fact that, like, for most of scientific history, we just didn't study people who weren't men of European

descent. Yeah. And that leaves huge holes in our data. But, yeah, you can break down all of the systems of oppression from inside the science lab and everywhere. Yeah. Go Margo. I assume you're saying this as someone in a science lab. We're not in a science lab. No. Because that's the other way I could interpret that. And I must clarify. Yeah, no.

We're in a room lined with foam. From Jesse on Insta, what drives your curiosity? Would you have Hank Green or Siri Riley as on as a guest? You are amazing. Well, thank you, Jessie. We are. I mean, you know what? Hank, call me. Whatever. Yeah.

We love it. assume Hank Green is an obsessive fan, and that's why I've never met him. We do have one writer who's a big fan. I hope. She put us on her book. Oh, yeah. Jody Pekle. Yeah, Jody.

Yeah, she wrote my sister's keeper. She's a big deal. She is a big deal. And she was like, I literally just put this podcast into the manuscript for my new book. I hope we don't get cut. Oh, my God. I hope we're not bad in the book. Oh, my God.

What does she turn to us evil? I assume it's a, like, very brief reference. I hope it's not someone being like, ugh, the vocal fry on this podcast. My friend likes, side note, and then there was a murder. If we do play a major role, I insist on being played by Aquafina in the film adaptation. Oh, I hadn't thought about who I wanted to be played by. Also Aquafina.

Yes. It's now a one-woman show. We are all Aquafina. I'm here for this. Now I need this. Or just the cast of hustlers. Yes. Oh, my God.

What drives our curiosity test? Oh, right. I don't know. natural state of being as extremely curious? I've always been extremely curious. My dad's a mechanical engineer and my mom is an OBJN. And so we always just talked about a lot of very complicated stuff. One time when I was seven, I had just learned about circumference and diameter and I needed to know which was which. And I couldn't remember and I asked my dad and he spent half an hour explaining the concept of pie to me instead. that was not what I needed to know.

Right. I love my dad. Thanks for that. But yeah, I just always, I've always loved telling stories. I love making people laugh and I love helping people learn things and trying to make people enjoy learning things as much as I do. So I guess that drives my curiosity. Yeah, I think I have a similar answer. Like, I agree.

I always, like, love teaching people stuff and, like, telling stories and all that jazz. And I also just have, like, have a ton of pet interests. Like, I like, getting into stuff. Whether that's like video games or like skin care or like some book. I don't know. There's a lot of stuff to get into. My hobbies, books. Books.

I read. My favorite movies. Books. Yeah, we just like weird stuff. We're bizarre people. That drives my curiosity. I just want to be more bizarre. Someone named Jason, some loser.

Interesting. He asked whether there has ever been a fact that we absolutely. loved but couldn't use on the show. So this is the answer that's roller derby. So as long-time listeners might know, I have been very passionate about getting less mediocre at roller derby for a couple years now. I've broken a limb. I've gotten a lot of weird bruises and made a lot of great friends. Oh. Good sport. It's the best sport. And I'm very bad at it. But you know what? I've improved thanks to the help of New York's finest roller derby players who are the best in the world. I mean, you know, among the best.

Yeah. They're the best. And a couple years ago, I read a book by a friend from Derby who's at Margo M. Dash Atwell. And it's called Derby Life. Really recommend it for anybody at all interested in the sport. And, yeah, Roller Derby has a super fascinating history that's related to walking marathons, like the one that Claire talked about. episode. The whole time I was like, oh my God, I want to talk about it. I can't believe it didn't spring out of you.

Yeah. Well, it's just like there's no good like 20 second version of the connection. Totally. And I didn't want to take the wheel. Yeah. Yeah. I get it. But yeah, that's something that I'm like one of these days. I'm just going to say, fuck it. And do my fact about the history of roller derby, even though there is absolutely no science angle. Yeah. I've thought about covering it similarly to the way I'm just going to the way I'm going to I covered the history of bikes where, like, there was a really interesting medical angle there, right? Where in our episode with Bill Nye, I talked about how physicians worried that women were going to, like, get a permanent condition called bicycle face.

Yeah. That was basically the result of liberation. Yeah. But, yeah, they'd be like, it's going to make you scow. It's going to make you ugly. And they also really didn't like that women were, like, putting on pants to ride bikes. And there was kind of a similar panic over roller skating where they were like, these youths. are going out and doing it in mixed company.

They're using it as an excuse to hold hands. Their chaperones can't keep up. The horror. And then also they were like, women fall and their skirts go up. Embarrassing. Yeah. So it was like an inherently like slutty sport, which is true. I love that though.

I'm into that. There isn't, I couldn't find as perfect a like medical angle as with as with biking. So yeah, one of these. days. So then a couple of these questions actually come from Ruth Hunger, who's a Northeastern student, who is writing a story about us for Storybench, their publication. What? Yeah. I didn't know that. Surprise. Oh, my God. I love that. So that should be out shortly after this episode goes up if it's not up already. And I asked her if like any of the questions she asked me hadn't made the cut. And she

graciously shared those with me. So one of her questions was how do you go about choosing your Yes. Oh. My answer to her was like literally anyone I can think of who might say yes. Totally. But like, you know, we're always trying to get like a diverse set of perspectives. Right. People who have slightly different areas of expertise than we do.

Different sense of humor. Different levels of vocal fry. I don't know. Different audiences. You know, obviously when we have guests on, we always hope that when we expose our listeners to the guests, they will like, find new, exciting media to enjoy. And vice versa. You know, we're always thinking about who are guests that maybe have audiences that have

not heard weirdest thing before and would maybe listen to an episode. So that's a like pragmatic angle. But honestly, just like I just have brought on people that are fun to talk to and who I've met before. The exception is Jen Gunter, who I had wanted to meet and had never, that had never happened. We were like mutuals on Twitter, but had never had any reason to meet. but because of her book publicity efforts. Her PR person reached out to me, and I was like, yes.

Yeah, I'm so glad we got here. That was a great episode. Yeah, so fun. But yeah, mostly it's people I'm friends with or people who I'm just like, oh, you know, I'll give it a shot. And yeah, you know, we get mixed reviews on having guests on. Sometimes people are really into it. Last night, a fan told me at the show, they were like, I hope you don't keep having so many guests on, because I love it when it's just the gals, the usual gals.

It is, yeah. And they weren't saying like they were bad episodes at all. Right. But just the chemistry and when our usual cast is so good. Yeah, which is really, really flattering. Totally. That our listeners aren't looking for us to like jazz it up. It's very jazzy already. I did get one voice message that was just shout out to Bill Nye.

He's a great dude. Oh, yeah. And I was like, he doesn't run this account. Yeah, he will never hear this. No, he will not. Next time I see him, that will not be at the top of my list. Yeah, really. Okay, and Ruth's other question had been,

do we ever feel a poll to cover big issues when important news breaks and, like, abandon the usual format of the show? And I don't because we cover all the important news online. Yeah. Like, we obviously get into some, like, dark and intense and timely topics. But on the whole, it's, like, a fun comforting. Yeah. It's entertainment.

It's an escape. Yes. Yeah. It's where we talk about what we want to talk about. Whereas, like, online we might be, like, forced to cover what we need to cover. Right. I mean, people need to know things. Of course. And it's our job. Yeah.

But that's not what weirdest thing is for. It's not the most important thing I learned this week. And I think that's what makes this difference from so many, like, science news podcasts, which of course are also great and important. But yeah, somebody actually the same fan who I'm trying to remember who it was I talked to because I talked to a few people. But I think this was Matt. And he had said that he likes it better when there aren't guests because we're his faves. And that was very nice. But he also, he described this show as like a comfort, like a weekly, like it's very soothing.

And I thought that was so nice because I don't feel like I'd be comforting when I make this show. I feel like I'm just being a weird butt head. Yeah, right. I'm glad that people consider this a nice escape. Yeah. So yeah, I mean, I'm happy to say that this is like the one area of my career where I do not care about what the big news was. Yeah. So if you want some news, check out our sister podcast, Tuckathlon.

From our Facebook group, Spencer asks, what's a weird fact that you found to be the most useful or has helped you at some point? Was there the time that we were talking about vitamin C and scurvy? Yes. And we talked about skincare. Yes, but I cut it for time. Oh, okay. But that did come up. Yeah.

And I think it was. It was Helen. Well, with Helen and Saltsman was amazing. But Sarah, I think, was like, I've learned so much about vitamin C and skincare now. Totally, because I had to go on a vitamin C skincare rant. Yes. You raised your finger and turned on your mic. I have something to add.

I love when that happens. So that was some news that Sarah is probably using on her already glowing skin. Yeah, her skin is good. She doesn't even need vitamin C. We miss Sarah. I know. I miss her. And I'm kind of like if there's anything that, like, I've come away from the show being like,

Well, thank goodness. I know that. I will say Claire's 10,000 steps fact. That's true. Like, I used to really look at my steps all the time and, like, base, I don't know. There is some kind of, like, internal, like, I have not successfully completed the day. Totally. And that fact made me stop caring. Yeah, it was very freeing.

Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, other than that, I'm not really sure. It's true that most of our facts are, like, pretty out there. I have heard from a few people who found my episode about face blindness super validating. Really? And, like, helpful in realizing that their brains are also weird.

So, yay. Yeah, that's great. Kate on our Facebook group asks, what's your background? How did you end up writing for Popsie? And on The Weirdest I went this week. My background says, I was born in the Delaware Valley. The farmlands of Violent, New Jersey. Yeah.

So, I mean, you know, I was once Adams in other places. and I'm a human lady. And somewhere along the way, I kind of always assumed it would be a scientist. And then I got really into writing, but I didn't think I could ever, like, make a living as a writer. And then I went to college. I was a wee baby at the time. I went when I was 16. I went to Simons Rock, Gola.

Fellow alums include Ronan Farrow, Roman Mars, the Cohen brothers. Though I don't think they liked it there. Oh. And that's it. End of list. It was a small class. And we were many different ages. No, it is a really tiny school, and I spent most of my time waiting around in ponds. I thought I was going to do environmental science, mostly because it was, like, really interdisciplinary, and I didn't want to specialize on anything because that sounded boring, and I didn't want to teach, because that just wasn't

my style, and I really liked my ecology and a lot of very weird, esoteric things. And then I ended up going to grad school for science journalism, where you get to just learn. weird esoteric things all the time. And it turned out that was a really good fit for me. I was briefly at Quartz. Then I launched a blog for the Washington Post that was their irreverent, silly science. Not always silly, but I did read a whole lot about poop. There's still people who will tweet me being like, this big poop story and Rachel Thelkman isn't covering it. And I'm like, I have been mostly editing for three years. Yeah. I'm sorry I've let you down. I'm not, I'm not churning the constant content mill on the poop beat anymore.

That's true. I'm just not in the daily poop smith grind. It seems like the people miss it. One day I shall return to the shit. No, I still write about poop sometimes. Obviously, I went to Ohio to tour the secret Charmin Poop Labs. Yeah. But, yeah, and then I ended up at popular science because I thought it would be cool to work on a magazine in, you know, the year of our Lord 2017.

Yeah. Yeah. And, yeah, it really does. It's my three-year work anniversary. It is. Oh my God, congrats. Thank you. It's been a great three years.

In digital media, that makes me, I'm like, you know, they're like ready to send me my retirement watch, you know? Yeah. Put me on a cruise. Yeah. In the Bahamas. I was going to say, the Bahamas. Yeah. I mean, we started talking about audio.

I love listening to podcasts. I mean, especially fictional podcasts because I stare at screens and words all day. And so reading fiction and watching TV is enjoyable for me, but not. something I want to be doing constantly. So I found that, you know, the recent resurgence of audio drama was really up my alley. I love shows like Archive 81, the Magnus Archives, a lot of great shows with Archive in the title. The Big Loop. Anything Paul Bay touches is gold. Love you, Paul. Caravan, really fun show. Ours Paradoxica. So, yeah, I wanted to make a podcast, and our editor-in-chief was like, Science Podcast. Give me an idea.

And the first idea I had was weirdest thing I learned this week. Wow, one and done. And here we are. You laid the nail on the head with that. I was some Adams in other places and now we have this podcast. Yeah. What about you, Jess? Jess went to the same grad school as me.

Yeah, I did. I don't know. Let's see. Where did it all begin? I studied biology in undergrad at University of Pittsburgh. Go Panthers. They would butcher the llamas in more ways than one. Simon's Rock is not known for our sports teams.

Yeah, I played volleyball in college, which was very fun, a fun time. But I was always willing to science. I thought I maybe would be a scientist, maybe be a teacher. And I just took writing classes because I enjoyed them. And it was like a GPA booster, honestly, because it just came very naturally to me. And kind of not even until like my junior, senior year, I was like, oh, like science writing is a thing. And I did a few internships right out of undergrad at Science Magazine and PR. and then I ended up going to NYU, like Rachel.

And, yeah, my first job out of graduating grad school was here at Pop-Sye. We were so happy to have you. Oh, I'm so, I just, yeah, I feel so hashtag blessed. I mean, I loved interning here, too, in grad school, so it felt like a natural fit. Well, and, like, tell folks how you came to become the all-important caregiver of audio at the weirdest thing. Yeah, I mean, it's just always. something that I've enjoyed doing like production in general. And I, you know, that was something I did learn a little bit in grad school and I learned a little bit as an internet pop sci like a year and a half

ago. But yeah, I've just, I've been the producer, I guess, for, I don't even know how long. Probably close to a year. Yeah, definitely. And it's like one of my most favorite things about my whole job. Yay, me too. I love doing this show. Yeah, it's an amazing, yeah. Like it is. It feels like an escape from all the scary things. Yeah. So I love being part of it. It would not exist without you. Nor you. It would be just a pile of broken twigs. So, okay, there are just a couple voice messages that I'm going to share that just delighted me.

So they will also delight you. I'll play just these two. Hi, we're this thing teen. My name is Fosia. I live and was born in Nigeria. And I'm so excited to finally get around to sending you. this. Yay, you have fans in Nigeria. I can't definitely be the first because I've shared your podcast with everybody I know. And it's usually after my worrying them with certain bits of

information that I've learned from you. And I was like, you can learn it too. And so I was just gone ahead and shared it with a bunch of my friends and family who were initially worried about my well-being and where I was getting all the information from. But thanks so much for educating me about a lot of the things that I sort of used to take for granted. And I appreciate it. And you all keep doing what you do. Wow. Yeah, I just loved it.

Me too. That's a really lovely message. Thank you so much for sending it. And thank you for sharing the show. I don't think we're going to make it to Nigeria soon. You never know. A cruise. A cruise.

Cruise the world. But yeah, and, you know, listeners, if you, you know, we also had that message from a listener in Mexico. Yeah. That similarly was like, yeah, I don't know if you know you have listeners down here. And like we do have some, we have like a dashboard we can look at, but we only really see the countries that have like many, many people listening. And it's so much better to just hear from you guys directly. Yeah. So if you live in a place where you think we would be surprised to know we have fans, please let us know.

We love to hear from you. And thank you so much for listening. Okay. Now, this message is in a leak of its own, though. Oh. Because it's from a celebrity. Hi, I'm Liam from Australia. And this is the weirdest thing I learned this week.

There is an Australian turtle that can breathe through its bum. Because of this, the Bittroy River Turtle can stay under. Watcher for 21 days. I love weird things and turtles. Oh my God. It's Liam. I also love weird things and turtles. Liam is our favorite fan. Oh, my God. For people who don't know a while back, Liam's mom and the only woman I will ever refer to by her relationship with a man, because I feel that being Liam's mom is a high honor. It is. She posted while we were on hiatus saying we unfortunately have caught all the way up, which means, you know, and we listen. in the car all the time. And today I tried a different podcast. And Liam said, no, mum, where are the girls we listened to? Yes. And I know we've shouted out Liam on the show before. Thank you for

calling in. It's really lovely to hear from you. And you are absolutely right. There is a turtle that breathes through its bum. Turtles have cloacas, which, you know, it's like one hole for all the stuff that all the holes in people's pants do. One stop shop. Yeah. Yeah. All of the things that are urethras, vaginas, butts, on humans on a lot of reptiles and birds, it's just one hole. Yeah. Which can simplify things and complicate things, you know, depending on the situation.

And for some turtles, they basically, it's the same kind of respiration that, like, salamanders do or frogs, like, through their skin. So it's not like the butt is like inhaling air. our episode on the Fartiste, you know, gets into how a butt can inhale air after a fashion or our smoke enemas episode. We really, we talk about butts so much. But yeah, the skin that is doing the oxygen absorption and letting out carbon dioxide is in the cloaca. Right. A.K.A. the super butt. The all-purpose butt.

Oh, my God. I love that. The one butt to rule them all. And yeah, I think they primarily use it, you know, while they're hybridating because otherwise turtles will go up and breathe through their mouths. Oh, right. Yeah. I think I read something about that too. Like when it's, like you said, like when it's when it's the winter and they can't reach the surface. Yeah. And there's an, God, what's the word for it? It's not hibernation. We wrote about that crocodile that was frozen with the snout out of the water. Yeah. And that was also not hibernation, but something that reptiles do that is similar. Oh, in reptiles and amphibians, it's called brumation. Yeah.

And it's just, you know, slightly different process. Same, like, end goal that you're, like, using less energy and just kind of chilling out during a time when you would otherwise have to expend a lot of energy just to be alive, right and around. And, yeah, they'll be, like, down in the mud, staying toasty relatively. Right. Or in some cases, frozen with their snouts being out of the ice. But, yeah, so some turtles who do this while they're snoozing, their butts take care of breathing for them. Love that for them.

Yeah. I did not know that before you sent him that fact, Liam. So thank you so much for teaching me about that. Go Liam. Was there a rooster crowing in the background of his? I think either a rooster crowing or a baby crying. Oh, did you think it was a baby? I couldn't quite tell.

Okay. Maybe it was a baby rooster. A plot twist. Anyway, yeah, Liam, keep being curious and investigating weird facts and sending them our way. Yeah. Maybe one day we'll have an episode that's just Liam's facts. I would love that. If you, you know, if you send us like one fact a week, we'll be there in no time.

So thanks for listening, but you're the best. Say hi to your mom. Yeah, that's it. That's all I've got. I don't have any messages better than that. Yeah, nothing can beat that. So on that wonderful and heartwarming note, thank you weirdos for continuing to support our show. Remember that the best thing you can do to show us your love is to leave a five-star review on Apple, even if that's not where you listen, even if you feel like you don't have anything super in-depth or substantial to say. It helps. helps other people find the show because of algorithms. And also because, you know, every once in a while we get one-star reviews from people that are just like, these girls have vocal fry, or they disrespected the founding fathers. Or they said that science has systemic biases in support of Caucasian men. And that's sexist and racist. Or IQ tests actually aren't dumb. I won't explain what you got wrong about them.

I'll just leave a one-star review. For example. So what can you do about that? You can leave us five-star reviews, even if they just say things like, great. I love to hear it. It means the world to us. But even if for some reason you can't leave our review, we still love you. Thank you for listening.

We will be back next week with part one of our super spooky live show. Catch you then. Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes. At First Citizens Bank, we roll with your goals because we're built for what you're building. Fit for your ambition for Citizens Bank. Thank you.