The Weirdest Thing I Learned This Week - Q&A: Cubed Poops, Forked Penises, Murderous Squirrels

Episode Date: April 14, 2021

Producer Jess Boddy joins Rachel for a listener voicemail Q&A episode! The weirdest things we learned this week range from wombat poop to possum penises. The Weirdest Thing I Learned This Week is a podcast by Popular Science. Share 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!  Click here to follow our sibling podcast, Ask Us Anything!  -- Follow our team on Twitter! Rachel Feltman: www.twitter.com/RachelFeltman Produced by Jess Boddy: www.twitter.com/JessicaBoddy Theme music by Billy Cadden: https://open.spotify.com/artist/6LqT4DCuAXlBzX8XlNy4Wq?si=5VF2r2XiQoGepRsMTBsDAQ Popular Science: www.twitter.com/PopSci --- 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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That's code weirdest for 20% off. You said this place was steps from the water. We just haven't found the steps yet. How much did we save? Enough. Enough to get lost. Or you could book a stay with Hilton. Welcome to your ocean front room.

Just steps from the water. The Hilton sale is on now. Book on Hilton.com or The Hilton.com. Hilton app and save up to 20% to get the stay you expected. When you want savings, not surprises. It matters where you stay. Hilton for the stay. Hello, weirdos. Today's episode is going to be a little different from our usual. So we have a very special episode coming into your feed on Wednesday, April 21st, and we are really excited to share it. I'm not going to spoil any details, but we know you will love it so much.

It's going to really be a balm to soothe your troubled soul in these terrible times. But because that was going to mess up our episode release schedule a little bit, we didn't want to leave you hanging with no episode as you refreshed your feed fortnightly, looking for your weirdest thing fix. So Jess and I thought it had been a while since we did kind of a listener Q&A audio message. episode, so we're doing one of those. Yay! Yay, indeed. And for listeners who aren't familiar, Anchor, which is the app that we use to distribute our podcast, has this really cool feature where whether you're listening to Weirdest Thing in the Anchor app or you go to Anchor.fm and find

the weirdest thing profile page, you can click a button to send us a voice message. And you can just, you know, tell us all your thoughts and feel. about the show. Try to be nice ones. There was one mean message in here. Just one, though, so it was pretty good. What? I also, I think I know who it was from. I think it was from a child who tried to explain correlation does not equal causation to me when I spoke to a classroom on Zoom. Oh, my God. I heard his voice, and I thought, this is a little scamp who has been rude to me Before. The audacity.

But anyway, you know, if you have a young child sending voice messages to podcast hosts, you know, maybe check it with them. There are some, we'll show us some great examples of youngsters weighing in on weirdest thing. Oh, yeah? Yeah, we will. We have a really good one. Yeah. But yeah, so we have a pretty good rate in terms of positivity. but again, we do ask that you remember that we're human people who put a lot of work into making this show for you.

Anyway, you can leave us messages with questions about the show, about us, about popular science, or you can share facts that you found, and I will verify them to make sure that you and I are not embarrassed when they air, and then we'll share them on an episode like this. We also have some questions that came in from our Facebook group. Just a plug. I know a lot of listeners have been coming into the Facebook group lately, but if you haven't joined yet, you can find it by searching Weirdest Thing on Facebook. And it's just a great place for weirdos to congregate, chat, share weird facts they've found, et cetera. So with that, I guess, Jess, I'm going to share the first of several voice messages that we're going to talk about today. Let's do it. I'm excited. Hey, guys.

I just wanted to tell you that you're amazing and thanks for everything that you do. Okay, love you guys. Have a good weekend. Wow, that's so nice. We love you too. Also, no name was given. Whoever that was, thank you very much. I listened to that one right after the one

that was a small child being mean to me and it really made me feel a lot better. We love all of you guys so much. And just to side note, do not hesitate to just leave us nice mess We love it because we love hearing from you. And also, remember to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts because it helps other weirdos find the show. But whoever you are, thank you so much. Really nice. All right. And then next we have a message from Laurel, who I think submitted a couple voice

messages. We had quite a backlog because it's been a while since we have done an episode with these. So apologies if you sent one in and it doesn't get played. We might play it at a later date. But as always, we encourage you to send as many messages as come to mind. I was thrilled to see some people, you know, showing up in this inbox more than once. Hey, guys, it's Laurel in Seattle. First of all, is it true that giraffes only sleep two hours per night? I get the need to be alert and flee from lions.

Hashtag no tigers in Africa. But seriously, how do they cope? Second, while we're on the topic of giraffes, did you know that the Arthurian legend about the questing beast, a barking monster with the head of a snake, body of a leopard, and feet of a stag, is medieval Britain's way of making sense of these sleepless freaks? They also thought narwhal tusks proved the existence of unicorns, so I guess it's all relative. Anyway, thanks for making the show. What? Yeah, so I did research this one. This was the first I had heard of giraffes, you know, being insomniacs.

Yeah. And apparently there was a time when researchers actually thought they didn't sleep at all. Because if a white male scientist hasn't seen it happen, it can't be real. Of course. Sorry, white male scientists. We love you too. But, you know, it's just a history of science and just tone it like it is. But there was this big study in 1996 that suggested that,

suggested that they average about four hours in each 24-hour period. So a bit more than two hours a night, but still quite little. And also, the adults tend to get that sleep in really short bursts. So it's unlikely that you would see an adult giraffe sleeping for more than a couple hours at a time. And they're also often standing or with one eye open. And if they're not standing. They tend to sit down and like fully twist and rotate their necks around so they can nuzzle their faces into their butts. It's really cute. It sounds like how a flamingo sleeps. Yeah. I guess if you have a long dending neck, like you got to put it somewhere. For sure. It takes a lot of energy to hold that thing up, I guess. Yeah. And also, when my husband Oliver found out

we were doing a user-submitted fact episode today. He said, you have to share my fact about how the first thing a giraffe does is fall six feet. Oh, my God. Like when it's boring? Yeah, yeah. They just plop. And then they have to, like, get up and be ready to run away from a lion. What a way to enter the world. Exactly. And he didn't even know that there was a giraffe fact in the mix. So I promised him that I would share that today. But yeah, I highly recommend people Google sleeping giraffe. It's very cute. Also, there was a study a few years ago that I remember covering about –

because, like, if you think about, like, what sound a giraffe makes, like, we don't think of giraffes as making noise, but they hum at night. Right. And there's recording of that. So, again, I recommend giving that a little Google. Duranx were turning out to be way cuter than I thought they were already, and that was already pretty cute. Yeah, yeah, the thing about the Arthurian questing beast also seems true to the extent that we can know what they were talking about when they wrote Arthurian Legends Down. But it does seem to be like a common belief among historians that that mishmash of characteristics, head of a snake, body of a leopard, like legs of a deer.

which does kind of make sense when you think about a giraffe. Like head of a snake sounds wild, but you're like, they do kind of have snake necks. Yeah. It's less head of a snake and like neck is a snake attached to a whole body. Okay. Speaking of animals, we have this next one from Olivia. Hi, I'm Olivia. I'm a high school student in Minnesota, and I love your podcast. I don't know what the average adult knows or doesn't know, but something that I find really interesting are brains, especially strange brains. One of my favorite books about strange brains is called Unthinkable, an extraordinary journey through the world's strangest brains by Helen Thompson. While I was reading it, I came upon lycanthropy, which is basically where people with schizophrenia sometimes and some people, where they're prompted by odd things, I guess.

They sort of turn into an animal or they think that they are an animal. I guess that's a basic quick summary that I can give. Yeah. Thank you for continuing to record in these times and staying home to help flatten the curve. Yeah. So I looked this up because I'm familiar with lecanthropy as in like literally being a werewolf. Sure. Sure.

And it turns out this is called. clinical lecanthropy to distinguish, you know, from literally being a werewolf. Yeah. And it is really interesting. A few years ago, a psychiatrist dug through the literature and found 56 case reports of this since 1850. But only 13 of them were wolf-specific. It's often clinical lecanthropy is because this is such a rare thing in the medical literature that clinical lecanthropy is often used as just like a blanket phrase for any belief that you

are turning into an animal or that you might morph into an animal sometimes, even though the word is wolf-specific. But so clearly very rare since 1850, only 56 case reports have been written down. And again, only 13 are wolf-specific. Yeah. But looking through the whole set, he found that. A quarter of those case studies were in people diagnosed with schizophrenia, 23% had psychotic depression, and 20% had bipolar disorder. And so, you know, on the one hand, this is probably

on some level just an unusual presentation of psychosis, which of course can lead to all manner of delusions. But it's also, like there's some thought that maybe it involves parts of the brain involved in proprioception, which is one of my favorite words and means like your sense of where your body is in space, which factors into some other conditions that we've talked about on weirdest thing before, including like Phantom Lim or, you know, people who develop a great sense of dysphoria with parts of their bodies and have an urge to amputate parts of their bodies. there is this sense that may be parts of the brain that help us, like, remember where our body is in space, which is something we take for granted, but it's hugely important in being able to, like, move your body.

Every time you, like, touch your nose, it is a huge, you know, coordination effort, and it's pretty much unconscious for most people. So, yeah, and another lit review on this condition actually found that hyenas, cats, horses, birds, and tigers had all been reported as... Oh yeah, I was going to ask. Yeah, as clinical, you know, animorphs, if you will. Yes. Including some snakes. And in Japan, apparently, foxes were quite common. Oh, cool. So, yeah, the only criteria for this is that, you know, the patient either reports during a period of lucidity or relative lucidity that they had believed that they had turned into an animal at some point, or they're just exhibiting behavior that indicates that at that moment,

they think they are a non-human animal. But again, it seems to be a pretty rare presentation of psychosis. And to me, it's kind of surprising that it's not more common, since, again, you know, delusions can take all sorts of forms. But, yeah, I love that we just stuck with clinical lecanthropy and ran with it. Yeah, me too. Okay. Now we're just. Now we're just stuck. We're have a question from the Facebook group where Ashley asks, what are your favorite sci-fi movies or TV shows? And then other than Armageddon, what movies have really bad science? Oh, that's a great question. It is a great question.

And it's, I mean, I could really, I love lots of sci-fi. I'm a big Star Trek fan, both TNG and to a lesser extent, TOS. and the newer shows all have a special place in my heart. But I rewatched The Matrix recently and I actually like cried. I was like, this was a radically subversive film, but I'm so glad it was part of my cultural upbringing. Oh, man, I've never watched that. I've been thinking a lot about The Matrix lately too.

I don't know. I'm glad to hear that maybe it holds up. Yeah, it holds up quite well. And it's also, it's just like, I think we, with more distance and also, like, as an adult, which I definitely was not when I watched it on VHS with my parents. Yeah. It's, like, actually, you know, a quite, like, poignant story about, you know, the outliers of society and, you know, breaking free from societal expectations. So, hell yeah.

Definitely, hi, my list. I also love the movie Equilibrium, starring Christian Bail, even though I understand it is objectively. quite bad. Oh, I've never seen that one. It's just like a classic dystopian, like, it's a true pastiche dystopian film. It, it harkens to so many movies and makes no original points of its own. But I think it's fun. Yeah, that's totally fair. Yeah. I have to say that I love the alien movies. Like the original alien especially is like maybe my favorite, well, you know, saying my favorite piece of sci-fi is like a huge thing to say. I know, right.

It's up there. Yeah. And then as far as like good science in movies, I always go back to Interstellar. It's like, you know, they took the time. So I recently watched the bonus features on Interstellar and it's like the science behind interstellar, which is just like so nerdy, but like I love it so much. And they talk to all the physicists and stuff that they worked with on the movie and that's really cool.

And I appreciate that in all of like the really wild. action-heavy scenes in space that they don't actually put sound effects in space because in space there's no sound. And that bums me out to think about Star Wars, which I love because there are so many good Star Wars sound effects that we love. Like the Thai Fighter, which we've talked about on this show before how they make the tie fighter sound. But it shouldn't exist, which is so sad. One of my favorite Star Wars sequel trilogy facts is that Laura Dern. in every shot that she's using a phaser said, Pugh, Pugh!

Well, using an icon. And yeah, in terms of, like, bad science in movies, the one I thought of right away was that movie Lucy that Scarlett Johansson started, which I definitely saw in theaters. I don't remember why, but I did. And it's the concept is that she, like, accidentally gets dosed with these like neutropic drugs. And that over the course of the movie,

she gradually uses more and more of her brain because, of course, humans only use 10% of their brain. So as she gets up to 100%, she literally, sorry for spoilers, but this movie came out like a decade ago and wasn't very good. So I'm just going to spoil it. She hits like 100% brain use and literally like dissolves into the like cyberspace or space time. unclear. She basically like becomes her character in the movie her by getting to 100% brain capacity, which first of all, I still don't understand the physics of how that was supposed to work. But second of all, it is long been known that the people only use 10% of their brain thing isn't just not true, but it like came from nowhere. Like it's not something that scientists used to think that they debunked. It just, it was, it's completely made up. Yeah. But 65% of people believed it in a 2013 survey. Oh, my goodness. Listen, you probably use all of your brain. Like most people use all of their brains. And obviously, everyone is different. But like you certainly use more than 10% of it. I promise. It seems like such an evolutionary disadvantage that you would only use 10% of your brain at a time. Like, then why do you have the extra 90%? Like, what is it even doing?

Exactly. Our brain. Brains are so energy hungry. It's really inconvenient that they're so big. Like, it makes childbirth a huge pain. Our whole life cycles are dictated by how inconvenient it is that our brains are so big. Right. So, like, why it just makes no sense. And also, it kind of, like, I think the reason it bothers me so much that it's pervasive is

that it's not totally unconnected from, like, some very eugenicist ideas. about like what makes people intelligent, brain size does not make you more intelligent. Right. So, you know, neither does the shape of your head. So it just, I feel like it's a really slippery slope when people throw this around. It like hints that there are some people who have unlocked their evolutionary potential. And you know what? There are just some people who have studied harder or are better at stupid standardized tests or

whatever. Yeah, I was just going to say, what even is intelligence then? Whoa. Right? Yes. Absolutely true. So that's my, Lucy is my, I will rage against this movie, even though Morgan Freeman's in it. Oh, Morgan. I hope he got to like buy a boat because of that movie. That's all I have to say. Yeah. Now we have a message from, I believe it's Tulene, but if I have to record pickup after they say their name, I will. Hi, guys. It's Teline from Florida. Once again, I'm sending a message because I'm waiting to clock in at work and what else are you going to do at before 6 I am. So I just wanted to say you guys are all fantastic. I think my favorite episode was probably the one where Claire talked about the world's first marathon and the disaster it was. And just in general, her facts are fantastic. And like you guys are all pretty great. But fun fact, cats. can only get, well, they only ovulate once they've been mated.

So unless they're, it's called induced ovulation, and it's actually pretty cool. And then possums actually have a two-pronged penis because they have, female possums sort of have like a divided uterus. So there's like two sections. Cool. Bye. Oh, man. I love possums.

Do you? Yes. Yes. I'm not judging you. I'm just like, I needed to make sure it was not in jest. Oh, no, I'm being fully earnest. I have a really, I have very mixed feelings about possums. It kind of like, I can see them as very cute and then suddenly see them as very horrifying. Totally. Well, they're just like very cool. And I think, you know, we've done so many episodes. I think that I was the one that gave a possum fact once.

Yeah. That sounds like. right. And how they like eat bones and they're largely immune to like snake venom because they can eat snakes and their bones. Like I don't know. They're just very metal and also cute, but like scary. I don't know. I'm a fan. Yeah. So I looked up these facts because I always promised to verify them. And yes, this is true. Cats are one of many animals that have this thing called induced ovulation. But cats can spontaneously ovulate sometimes too. so they don't always have to have sex to trigger ovulation. In contrast, koalas only ovulate if a male has physically ejaculated into them.

And there's a big spectrum of induced versus spontaneous ovulation in terms of like there are some animals where it's just like a physical trigger. So stimulation other than the actual penetrative sex act can trigger the ovulation as well. And then there are some where it's, again, really specifically ejaculation. There are some where it's just like the presence of the other sex and the animal. So yeah, I think there's like a lot we still don't know about it actually, which is pretty cool. Yeah. And then, of course, we have to talk about the two-pronged penises, naturally. And yeah, that is indeed to match the forked vagina and twin uteri, which I did not realize all marsupials have.

Oh. I don't know if I knew that and forgot or just never knew it, but today I learned. And yeah, so the possums are marsupials, and there are many species that we call possums, but we're just going to talk about them all. They're marsupials, which means they don't have very robust placentas. So the babies are basically still embryos when they're born. And one thing I didn't realize is that many possums don't have well-formed pouches. like kangaroos do. So their young have to literally, like, cling onto their teats for dear life

while being, like, loosely tucked into a skinfold. Oh, my goodness. It's not a very secure situation. Yeah, and so, like I said, most male marsupials have two-pronged penises to match the fact that most female marsupials have two-pronged vaginas, though they actually have three vaginas. Oh, for God's sake. It's, oh, my gosh.

The diagram, I really. I encourage people to look it up because it is truly just a series of tubes. It's really needlessly complicated. But they have a third. They basically have like two like loops that are the two vaginas that are used for conception. And then there's a third vagina down the middle that's only used for giving birth. Oh my goodness. I could not find any great theories on why this is, but I'll dive deeper into it hopefully and share it on a future episode.

Of course, human people who have uteruses can have two of them. It happens at about one in 2,000 people with uteruses. But only like one in 25,000 of those people will have twins where they have one fetus in each uterus. And also not all people who have two uteruses have two vaginas. But for like kangaroos and possums, the system is basically so that they can just be perpetually pregnant, which is horrifying. So it's like, you know, there's like one egg that gets fertilized in justates, and then by the time it finishes, they already have another one going in the other uterus. Oh, boy.

And that one isn't born until the, you know, Joey or baby possum that went in the pouches out. What an existence. Yeah, it's a real factory assembly line thing. Yeah, I've heard that a human with two uterus. can also not be fun because you could get like two periods per month. Yes, I have also heard that. That would also suck. Yeah.

Yeah, you know, I think there are many ways in which it can be not a fun time. But in contrast, there are a lot of, a lot of the people who have two uteruses don't find out until they get pregnant. Right, right. Because it tends to not cause any trouble. and not take up a bunch of extra room. You know, a uterus that doesn't have a fetus growing in it is quite small. It's like a softball at most. So, yeah, you may, in fact, if you're listening, be in possession of two uteri.

Let us know. How is that? All right. Here's our next one from Michaela. Hi, my name is Michaela. I'm from Toronto, Canada. And the weirdest thing I learned this week is that if you give a sea urchin a hat, it will wear it. Anyway, I thought that was pretty cool.

Love your show. And happy quarantining. Bye. I love the way this is phrased. But yeah, if you give a sea urchin a hat, it will wear it, which is a children's book I would read. So this turns out to actually be pretty simple. Seargeons apparently, like, naturally will choose to wear shells as little hats. Possibly for protection against UV rays or maybe to even, like, give them some weight.

that when currents get strong, they won't get washed away. And some people who keep sea urchins have found that if you 3D print a stylish, sturdy little hat, the sea urchins will just accept it. Stop it. You can find pictures of them wearing like little like Stetsons and top hats. It's very cute. This is amazing because I just learned that in the game, Stardy Valley, where you play as like, It's kind of like a farming sim, I guess, but it's so much more than that.

But anyway, you can have a fish tank in your house and you can put seertons in there. And people are just finding out now that you can make them wear hats. Like you can get hats to put on your character in the game. But then if you put them on your seachetron, you can have your seretian wear a hat. So apparently it's all rooted in science. I love that. Me too. I would love it if that was just a thing that accidentally happened.

But they probably read it online and then thought it would be cute. Yeah. Either way, I accept. Yes. Okay. Now we have a question from the Facebook group. Angela asks, are any topics totally off limits? Or are there weird things we found that have been vetoed? Yeah, it's a really interesting question. I wouldn't say there are any topics that are off limits. We do a lot of work and just does a lot of note taking to make sure we don't repeat facts. Yeah. Other than that, I mean, I think we just try to be really careful to make sure that our definition of weird is, like, maintaining fun, inclusive vibes and not, like, othering folks. Totally. Yeah. So they're like, I'm sure there are, there are topics that are harder for us to cover well than others.

But I can't think of anything where we've ever been like, nope. But yeah, I guess it's mostly like does it pass the vibe check of being like we can talk about this being weird in a way that's like positive and interesting and not gross. For sure. And I think when it comes to like the quote unquote hard topics, like if you're thinking about like politics wise or, you know, like I think it's a good opportunity for us to like talk about why those topics are hard. Like we talk about Nazis all the time on this show and it's like. There are Nazis everywhere. They're everywhere. You know, you can't, you know. you can't, you know, I don't know. It's a good chance to, like, put things in perspective. Yeah. No, it's true. If we chose to never cover a story that might have Nazis in it,

I honestly don't even know what we would be able to cover. Yes, half our story's gone. But, yeah, I can't think of anything we've ever vetoed. I think, you know, it's, it comes down to how much, like, credible information you can find about it, too. There have definitely been things I've wanted to cover where it's not that the fact is not factual, but it's like there's just not enough, there aren't enough good, like, primary or trustworthy secondary resources for me to talk about it for more than like 30 seconds. For sure. You know, there has to be, you have to be able to build out, you know, a little more robust

narrative. And that means that someone somewhere has to have done the digging at some point. You know, we're not an investigative podcast, so we aren't shaking down, like, archives looking for hitherto unknown information. So that's the other thing, is that, like, it can't be so weird that no one is talking about it. Right. Now we have a message from Pat. Hi, I was listening to your episode about the carrots in World War II. and carrot pie is amazing. It tastes just like sweet potato pie or pumpkin pie. I served it to my family

and they had no idea they were eating carrots. My name is Pat Gray and I live in Valparaiso, Indiana and I love your show. It's amazing. Thank you. Oh, I love that. Thank you, Pat. Yeah, that was a really fun episode. I think that was Claire talking about the World War II propaganda around carrots. That kind of of led people to think they improve eyesight, even though it was just something the government made up for war. So definitely go back and listen to that. I'm also so happy to hear that the wartime pro-carat movement's carrot pie taste good because I love sweet potato pie. And I'm really excited to find other ways to trick myself into eating vegetables by blending them with like sugar and heavy cream.

Hell yeah. I'm absolutely going to try it. Thank you, Pat. Okay, now we have one from Tina. Hi, guys. This is Tina from Wilmington, Delaware. I love you, and I have to say, again, it made my day when you played all of my messages. Anyway, the weirdest thing I learned this week is I was out in my yard, and there was this little squirrel hopping around, and instead of attacking my bird feeders, he was just kind of hopping around in the yard and sort of digging in the grass and then looked like he was munching on something, and then he'd hop and he'd munching and hop. And then he stood up and I swear it looked like he had an earthworm in his mouth. So I looked it up and yes, squirrels eat earthworms.

Like how weird is that? I thought they just ate like nuts and stuff. Anyway, that's the weirdest thing. I hope you're staying safe and sane in all of this crazy mess. Love you. We're meeting squirrels. I can see the headlines now. Thank you so much, Tina.

our biggest fan in Wilmington, Delaware, which is saying something, because I have people there, so you've managed to beat them all. So, yeah, I also was under the impression that squirrels just ate mutts and stuff. It turns out they're just very opportunistic foragers. They lean toward vegetarianism, like me, really. They lean toward vegetarianism,

but they'll eat larger animals even than worms, including birds if they find them dead because it's just like food is food. What? The one thing I came across while researching this that really disturbed you was that apparently they will eat nestlings in a pinch. I don't know what the circumstances are. Wait, nestling? Yeah, like a baby bird that's not dead. I don't know what the circumstances are.

Like how hungry does the squirrel need to be? How weak does the bird need to be? But that really disturbed me. That really, like, rocked my understanding of what squirrels do. Am I afraid of squirrels now? Yeah, so they definitely are, like, they're still much more prey than predator. They just forage. But, again, I'm really going to need to find more intel on the baby bird thing.

Because, again, that just really, I don't know if I know squirrels anymore, you know? Yeah. I do like the idea of leaning vegetarian, because I, too, eat an all-vegetarian diet except for like a Chicago hot dog or a chicken nugget. Right. That's basically squirrels. Yeah. You know, I think I can understand squirrel. We're meeting squirrels. Yeah. Not going to say no to a hot dog. That's the squirrel diet. Okay, now we have one from Julie.

Hi, my name is Julie. I'm calling from Denver. I'm so excited to submit this fact to you. I love this podcast. It's my favorite ever and you all rock. My fact today, is from Dr. Jen Gunter's book, The Vagina Bible, and is for anyone who has ever pooped and felt like no matter how much they wiped, there was still poop on the toilet paper. Essentially, when you poop, you may not get everything out. And even if you do, your poop that's higher up, your digestive tract moves down and sits at the rectum. You can think of your rectum as your little poop personal storage bag. Your poop storage bag is kept sealed by your anal sphincter. And you can think of this sphincter as kind of like one of those doors you push to open. Any rubbing or stimulating, such as aggressive, wiping will open the sphincter and release a little bit of poop. In Dr. Gunter's words, you may see that on the toilet paper and mistakenly believe that it was because you have not wiped enough. So you get more toilet paper or a wipe and dig around again and again. I love this. This is just like that scene in Parks and Rec where Andy is like talking to April. And I think also Ron Swanson, he's like, I should keep wiping and wipe and it's like a marker.

Yeah, I also, this got me wondering, like, whether, you know, you hear a lot of, like, debate from, from countries that are more into be days about, like, oh, how can Americans be satisfied with using toilet paper is so gross, it doesn't actually get you clean. And I'm like, is that, do we think that? Just because toilet paper opens your poop purse? Maybe. A lot of questions raised here. And few answers. But we, of course, love Dr. Jed Gunter. Anyone who hasn't listened to the episode which he guest hosted should definitely check it out.

She did not talk about poop. So there's plenty more to learn there. Okay. Now from our Facebook group, Jenna asks, is it true that the Akron-Goodier Tire Blimp Warehouse is so large it can create its own weather? Oh, I've heard about this. I'm not sure of the answer, though. I looked it up and I honestly like I wanted more information but I seem to have a tentative yes sort of. So this giant building was actually like when they were building it, because it was so big,

they were like, it's going to expand and contract so much when the temperature changes because there's just like so much structure that they actually put it on rollers so that it wouldn't cause structural damage as it moved. And then because they knew that the temperature inside and outside would be so different, that they were worried it would create kind of an indoor weather system. And so that's why it has these giant windows on either side because the idea is that they can open them up to equalize those temperatures. But apparently in certain conditions, the differential in temperature can cause enough condensation to accumulate in the upper air of the hanging. that it will miss down on people who are in science. So it's not quite, I mean, like, I have heard before people talking about, like, warehouse is so big that, like, clouds form in them. And, like, that's, it's true from, like, a physics standpoint, but it's not like you

would stand in there and, like, see a fluffy cloud and, like, get caught in a hurricane. It's, like, technically true, but also I don't think it's what most people are thinking when they say it. Yeah, that makes sense. And Jenna had a second question, which is, why did her sister put peanut butter in her hair when she got gum stuck in it? And I cannot speak to that specific sisterly relationship, but I did look up whether peanut butter actually helps get gum out of hair. So gum is obviously very sticky, but it's also often hydrophobic, which means it repels water at, like, the molecular level instead of being washed away by water. So what you want to do is introduce another hydrophobic substance because then the gum

will have an easier time sticking to that than to your hair. So peanut butter doesn't have any like magic gum dissolving properties, but it's very oily. And so I think it might be popular, first of all, because most American households have peanut butter on hand all the time. Right. But also because since it's so thick, I think it's kind of like it's easier to glob into your hair and like work it around with your fingers than a pure oil. But you can use any like food safe oil to do the same trick. I just add that because I don't want you put in no like toxic super flammable oil in your kid's hair. But like, you know, avocado oil, olive oil, canola oil, they will all work. Vaseline is probably a good sub in for peanut butter.

if you're allergic to peanuts or you just don't want to smell like a sandwich, because, again, it's not that, like, gooey texture that I think, I imagine might be helpful in kind of, like, getting it to work through the hair. So, yeah, there's everything you need to know about peanut butter, gum, hair. Okay, and another one from our Facebook group. Hannah asks, how do you find so many amazing weird things? Is it just through research for other Popsite articles, or do you have a go-to-go-to? sources for all things weird.

And if we had to pick the ultimate weirdest thing we learned, what would it be? Oh, my gosh. I know I don't have an answer for that last question. I'm so sorry, but I do not. But listeners, please let us know your thoughts on what the ultimate weirdest thing was on Facebook or via White's message. I would love to know. We should have done a March Madness bracket for...

Oh, yes, we should have. I can't believe it. It's April. We can't. We missed it. Next year. Next year. 2022.

So how do you find so many amazing weird things? Well, I got the idea for the podcast because I just like, I seem to just collect a lot of weird information. I think the same is true. For most people at Popside, there's just like a certain level of curiosity and weirdness you need to get into science journalism. For me, I would say that like, I, you know, I read a lot of nonfiction. books, relatively speaking, a lot of science books. So I come across some weird things that way. You know, there are a lot of great, like, Reddit threads of people asking historians for their favorite, like weird things from history. Oftentimes, I'll, like, look at kind of, like, silly, really

poorly sourced roundups of bizarre facts and, like, see if I can find actual information to back any of them up because like usually nine out of ten of them are pretty made up but the one that isn't is usually even weirder than that list thought it was. The diamond and the rough. Exactly. But yeah, there's certainly stuff we do come across while reporting our articles as the intro says. Yeah, Jess, do you have anything to add to this? Yeah, I would say I feel the same way.

Like I think you and I and a lot of people at Pops are very similar in that like we just love to learn stuff and like read about stuff we're interested in. And I find that like a lot of my friendships are that way as well, like outside of work. Like I just gravitate towards people who like stuff a lot. I'm very enthusiastic about things and learning stuff and, you know, that sort of thing. So I think that that is a great breeding ground for learning weird facts. Totally. Yeah. Relatedly, my husband has an email thread with the subject lied weird stuff. Amazing. He just sends me whatever he comes across. And he listens to so many podcasts that are like similar to weirdest thing that I always have to be like,

are you sure you didn't hear this on No Such Thing as a Fish one week ago? Because if so, I do not want to use it on weirdest thing. Totally. And then also like, you know, sometimes the things he sends me are not true and I have to let him down. Yeah. But it is a great, Oliver does really help me out, I would say. he has been responsible for at this point a good dozen facts. Yeah.

I love when you come on the show and you're like, okay, I had to do this fact because Oliver won't stop talking about it. He gets really hurt when I know what he uses is. All right. Now we have one more very special voice message, the most special. Hi, weirdos. It's Liam in Australia. we're so glad you're back. Did you know that Wombat Pooh is shaped like a cube

because they use it to mark their territory. If it was round, it would roll off the hill and rocky places that they live in. Bye. Liam! For listeners who don't know, well, catch up because Liam is our favorite fan, our number one fan. Yes.

And we are so grateful for his support and for the support of his mom, who is also one of our favorite listeners. So yes, Liam, Wombat poop is cubed. And researchers do think it's probably because they use it. They put it in like, I read one article that referred to it as like tactical locations around their own. They're like super spies. Yeah. Well, and they use it to like communicate.

I think there's a lot we have left to learn about the specific use of the wombat poop. But it was pretty recently, researchers did kind of like narrow in on how they make their poop cubed, which partially is that they spend a really long time digesting their poop, like more than humans. They extract way more nutrients than water. It's much more efficient. But that also means that they're left. with a dryer end product. More moldable, perhaps.

Yes, indeed. And so they then use contractions in just the very last portion of their lower intestines to press them into hard cubes. So they don't have like a cubed shape butt. They use their regular like tube intestines to just squeeze. And yeah, they make these hard cubes that, to Liam's point, do not roll away. And so they're able to use them for communication.

And isn't that just great for them? I'm so happy for them. Now I'm imagining wombats with like, you know, the ability to make different cookie cutter shapes of poop like a star or like a heart. Oh my gosh. I feel like one day in the distant future people will have like genetically engineered Wamba pets that make little star poops. Oh my God,

that's genius. Absolutely. I want that. We're going to be rich, Jess. All right. That is everything for this week's bonus episode. Thank you so much to everybody who submitted questions and facts.

Like I said, we didn't have time to get to everyone and we definitely will want to do another one of these shows in sooner rather than later. So send us voice messages through the Anchor app or the Anchor website or just join our Facebook group and you can always ask us questions there, share your weird facts there.

We will definitely give you a shout out if we end up using them on the show. And like I said, we will be in your feed again in one week, which is just so exciting. And it's going to be a really special episode. So please keep an eye out for it. If you have any friends, you haven't told about weirdest thing yet, now is a great time

to get them hooked. I can't wait to talk to you again. And super soon. Thanks for listening, Weirdos. The Weirdest Thing I Learn this week is a popular science podcast. We're available on all major podcast platforms. So subscribe wherever you're listening now. And if you like what you hear, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. It helps other weirdos find the show.

For more information on the stories you heard in this episode, come find us at popsai.com slash weird. You can buy our merch, including weirdest thing, t-shirts, totebags, and mugs at popsai.threadless.com. The show is produced by all of our hosts, including me, Rachel Fultman, with editing and audio engineering by Jess Bodey. Our theme music is by Billy Cadden. If you have questions, suggestions, or weird stories to share, tweet us at Weirdest underscore thing. Thanks for listening, Weirdos.

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