Tooth & Claw: True Stories of Animal Attacks - The Dancing Bear Attack in Chugach State Park

Episode Date: November 20, 2023

In 1995, Chugach State Park in Alaska turned into the site of a couple of violent bear encounters. Wes details two seperate attacks that happened that year, one with a (kind of) happy ending, and another that ended in tragedy. ~~ To advertise on the show, contact us! ~~ Tooth & Claw is brought to you by QCODE. Support the show and get access to an extensive library of exclusive episodes like this by supporting the show on Patreon or joining the Grizzly Club on Apple Podcasts. For the latest updates on the show and all things wildlife, follow us at toothandclawpod.com and social:  Instagram: @ToothandClawPodcast Twitter: @ToothandClawPod Wes: @GrizKid Jeff: @jefe_larson Mike: @mikey3ds Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, tooth and claw listeners. We got... Toothies. Toothies. Yeah, that's right. I'm glad you finally said it for once on you. We broke you down. We got my favorite podcaster in the world, West Larson, with us.

Oh. And my second favorite podcaster in the world, Mike Smith. And I'm Jeff Larson. Hey, guys. We are Tooth and Claw Podcasts for anyone. joining right now, we talk about animal stories, a lot of attack stories on humans, and we love animals, and we like to give, Wes, Wes gives a scientific approach to why animals like attack, right?

That's the worst description. Yeah. Yeah, it was fine. Yeah, we talk about animal attacks, and we try and, we're trying to tell these stories in a way that doesn't demonize the animal. Like often when you see these stories in media, it talks about how the animal's bloodthirsty or monstrous or something like that.

And we're trying to show that often it's the animal responding to something that the person did wrong. So bringing in the science behind these kind of incidents. So. Yeah. And we're bringing the fun at the same time. Me and Western scientists, Mike's a... That's not true. That's not true.

Well, I am a scientist. Jeff's a co-host and Mike's a co-host slash producer. I did one of those volcanoes in elementary school. I'm a burgeoning scientist. Yeah. With baking. It doesn't count. What are you talking about?

I won that competition. You want to see that ribbon? My teacher thought it counted. You guys want to hear about something really dumb I did this week? Yeah. Yeah. So on Sunday night, I was just eating dinner and I get a text from my bank. It's from U.S. Bank.

And it said there was fraud on my account. account, like someone had charged $900 to some cryptocurrency exchange. And so it said, reply yes, or it said, reply, no, if you made this, if you didn't make this thing and yes, if you did. So I replied, no. And immediately I get a call. And it says that it has the US bank number. I like Googled it to make sure it was the right number. And then this guy starts running me through all this stuff, sending me code saying like, okay, what's the code that you got? And then asking me the last four of my social and everything. And then like, yeah, someone did try to use your card.

We're going to wipe your information off their phone. We're going to have to issue a new card, all this stuff. So what's your pin, you know, and what's all this stuff? Oh, no. And just like running me through it. And at one point I was like, hey, are you actually from US Bank? I just need to know. How do I verify?

And he's just like, oh, yeah, are numbers non-replicatable? You can just look it up. And I was like, all right. And so I give them all my information. And then I get off the phone. I was like, that felt a little weird. And so I called my bank, and they're just like, yeah, that wasn't us. Oh.

And he had already, like, charged a bunch of stuff on Target, and I had to, like, shut down all my accounts and just, like, burn it all to the ground. Yeah, they got you. You know? You got me. They tricked me. Wait, so the number, how did the numbers say it was real? They can replicate it.

Like, they can, the person at my bank was just like, yeah, they can replicate our number. Oh, weird. Yeah. Yeah, but I don't know. So they canceled the charges. I think I'm going to get everything back. I mean, it's going to be a huge hassle for me. But I don't know.

He kind of like, maybe deserves a little bit of what. Yeah. There's a good scam. Yeah. Maybe I should have let him keep like half the stuff he bought it Target. He's like, you got me. Fair play. I felt pretty dumb.

And then it sucks. I'm in Ecuador. So I was like, I was about to lose service for like four days. Yeah, it's like so much harder to figure anything. Yeah. I told the woman's like, you should go into the branch tomorrow and get this all sort out. I'm like, well, I can't really do that for a couple weeks. Yeah.

Yeah, I had that where it wasn't like the same, but it was like this girl. And we actually started dating and I had never met her or seen her. And all of her pictures seemed like pretty Photoshopped. And then she just kept asking me for all these different crowsy. credit card numbers all the time and I'd give them to her, you know. Yeah. She's my girlfriend. And then just disappeared.

And I'm like, maybe that was like not what I thought it was. But it was fun while it lasted. I mean, I had a girlfriend, priest. Otherwise, she was pretty good. She's hot. Yeah. She talked dirty. And maybe after like five years now of podcasting, we can work you out of that debt, bud.

You know, you know I did stupid. is I just forgot to eat today. Just haven't eaten. I forgot. That happens. That happens sometimes. It's like next level dumb. Like I haven't eaten since lunch yesterday.

It's like that's neglecting one of the most primal urges a human can experience. Yeah. Yeah. Well, me, I forgot that we had a meeting at two and I was going to go get some food at like 1.30 and you text me and reminded me. So then after the meeting, I just forgot. What if Jeff just passes out mid-odcast? Yeah, I'm like, you know, that intro, let's just blame it on me not eating. I'll sometimes send text to Jeff's, like, kind of disguised as like, so this is what we want to talk about in this meeting. But it's not really to confirm about the agenda.

It's just to kind of remind Jeff that there is a meeting happening. Yeah. So I'm glad I thought to send that one. Yeah, no, I totally forgot about that meeting. Do we want to talk about that meeting? Yeah, I mean, we're just working on a few more trips. Yeah. I don't know.

Hopefully they're not full by the time this comes out and people just get teased even harder. But we'll see what happens. And I may or may not be coming on some of those trips. We'll see. If I have time, I definitely will. I want to. And hopefully we didn't get scammed because we're with a new contact now. They swapped us over so we could easily be getting scammed by this company.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, what if it's the person who got Wes? Yeah, they're replicating the number. They're just taking it from all our listeners now. It's not scamming us. All right, well, should we go ahead and get to this episode? Yeah, let's do it. You guys got anything else you want to say?

Are you going to get any revenge on this scammer? That kind of leads into my episode, but not really well. Before we get into it, though, let's have a quick ad break. This episode is brought to you by Netflix. Most valuable promotions in Netflix are hosting a blockbuster triple headliner Saturday, May 16th. Rhonda Rousey returns to face fellow woman's MMA pioneer Gina Carrano in the main event. Plus co-main's Nate Diaz versus Mike Perry and the best have you wait in the world, Francesengun-Ganou versus Felipe Lenz. Watch Rhonda Rousey versus Gina Carano, live only on Netflix.

Saturday, May 16th at 9 p.m. Eastern Center time, 6 p.m. Pacific time. All right, guys. So today we are going to be talking about an animal that we've already talked about. And I'm not going to tell you what that animal is just yet. But it's a good story. It's actually two stories. So I want to walk you through my thought process on this a little bit. Actually, I'm about to spoil what animal is. I'm trying really hard to make that a secret. I can't wait. It didn't last long.

but... Grizzly Bear. Yes. It's an exciting 10 seconds. I was reading one of my favorite bear attack books, Mark of the Grizzly by Scott McMillan. Who's Mark? It's not.

It's called Mark of the Grizzly. It's one of the first Bear Attack books I ever read. I remember like drawing the original cover because I liked the cover so much. It's just a great book. So I can't recommend it highly enough. And I was looking for a story that had a particular element to it. And we'll get to that later.

And I found it. But the story that I found in there, I didn't really think was quite enough. And so then I was scanning through some of the other stories. And I found another one that actually had the same element plus an extra element. So we're going to talk about a lot of bonus element. Yeah, two elements. We're going to talk about some interesting bear attack stuff today, stuff that we actually get asked somewhat often by some people.

So it's going to be a good episode. Yeah, I'm excited. I wish you had one more element. I just have two elements. so sorry. All right. Unless you have some element drink. Element drink.

Oh, yeah. Plug it. Which I do. Okay. Both of these attacks that we're going to talk about happened in 1995. Our first one was on May 15th, 1995. And Dan Boccia, I'm just going to, I'm not sure that's how you say his last name. So I'm just going to call him Dan this whole time.

He was in Chugatch State Park near Eagle River, Alaska, on an extraordinary. excursion to hike around and photograph some wildflowers, which seems like a pretty safe thing to do, right? Right. Well, it's not going to be a wildflower attack. It's going to be a bear attack. It was a beautiful spring day in Chugatch State Park, and a long Alaskan winter had finally given way to some greenery and to some warmer temperatures. The days are also starting to get really long, and to Dan, I'm guessing it probably seemed like the world's starting to come alive again. Like, for us, that often happens, like in the United States, we start feeling that way.

April. For Alaska, it's more like May when things start to green up a bit. It's going to be May. Yeah, exactly. Dan was a civil engineer for the Alaskan native tribal health consortium in Anchorage, and he worked in a lot of different isolated tribal villages where he would help design sewer and water systems. So kind of like our dad, Jeff, just heated in much cooler places and for people that actually need it. I don't know, Missoula is pretty cool.

Yeah, Missoula is pretty cool. Yeah, Missoula is pretty cool. Yeah, that's true. Like a lot of Alaskans, Dan had a passion for the outdoors. He was a tall redhead. He was a regular fixture on the mountain biking trails, cliffs, and ski runs in the Anchorage area. And he also spent a lot of time in the backcountry. But being outside that much in doing those kind of activities meant that Dan had his fair share of adventures.

He had fallen from some really high cliffs while he was climbing. He'd been caught in intense winter storms and even avalanches while skiing. What? He fell off cliffs and was in avalanche? Yeah, it seems like he, maybe from what I read about him. No, I think he just like really liked pushing the envelope. I guess you could say that about our cousin Brent. Yeah, kind of.

But he like, the book wasn't my only source. I went and read some articles too about this, both of the attacks we're going to talk about. And all of them described Dan as being like very adventure-loving, very much like in the outdoor scene as much as he possible. possibly could. And he even wrote an essay, and he really seemed to be our kind of person, because he talks about, like, one of the things he loved most about all these adventures was this risk of death, or at least, like, Mike, I don't know if you ever... Yeah, sounds like maybe you guys. An adrenaline chaser, but he, like, these four, these activities that he did, like, forced him to really test his abilities to extreme degree, and, like, having

that risk of death made it all that much more enticing. Like, when, when he, knew there was something that could go wrong, it made it that much more enticing and that much more satisfying when he did what he wanted to do. So lucky for him, that May Day on 1995, he's about to collect one of the most memorable experiences of his lifetime, and one that's going to make him look at fear and adrenaline in a whole different light. So Dan's out there hiking around, he's trying to take photos of wildflowers. He'd just crossed some beaver dams, and he's between two branches of a small stream. When he looks his right and something in the tree catches his eye.

There's a large brown shape moving through the dense trees, and his brain immediately identifies it as a moose about 60 feet away. That does make wild flower photography a little more dangerous, so he's probably having a good time now. Yeah, now he's like, I get to test my abilities. The flowers? I don't know, dude. Flowers, if you eat the wrong one, you could probably die.

True, yeah. Roses have thorns sometimes. No joke. All right. So he's no stranger to moose. He's from Alaska. They're large ungulates. They're common, even near downtown Anchorage.

He knows they can be really defensive, especially this time of year when they might have a new calf that they're protecting. So he immediately begins making an exit plan, not wanting to draw any attention from this moose, which was way too close for comfort. But that's when he notices something strange. The moose's head was moving up and down really quickly, like not in the slow measured way a browsing moose would be doing where it's like grabbing plants and chewing

and kind of doing this slow up and down it's going much quicker and immediately his blood goes cold because he realizes he's not looking at a moose but a very large grizzly bear this bear is bending down and it's ripping chunks of flesh from a carcass and dan knew he was in trouble you don't want to be by that you sure don't dan knew he's in trouble and he really was so i want to talk for a minute about why bears on carcasses is such a big deal and why it's such a big risk. So I dug into some literature for this. I even reached out to my professor, Tom Smith, who I did my master's with. And I read one of his seminal papers. It's called Human Bear Conflict in Alaska, 1880 through 2015. He wrote that book with Stephen Herrero, who's the guy that wrote Bear Attacks,

their causes and avoidances, which is considered like the Bible of bear attacks. Oh, you called him the godfather, right? He's the godfather of bear or whatever. I like that title. Yeah. In this paper, though, they look at over 600 incidents that all happen in Alaska. And while the majority of those incidents are from surprise encounters, bears defending carcasses are shown to be one of the most high probability circumstances that can lead to an attack. So really, like, breaking down that data, surprise encounters where you just see,

surprise a bear in any kind of circumstance are like by far the biggest risk factor. But bears defending a carcass is like one of the top ones. So if you like through a surprise birthday party for a grizzly bear, it would just take you out. It's not going to like it. Depends on how many people are there. Or if you give them like a jack in the box, they won't like that toy very much probably. Probably. So probably spoil it before they go in there.

Just be like, hey, just so you know this is a surprise. Oh, yeah. Spoil the party. Yeah. Can you imagine? What if you gave him a jack in the box for a birthday present at a surprise party? What if you did throw a surprise party for your friend and they just murdered, like, they're so mad at it?

They just have that predator trigger in their brain and they just lose. They're just like, I got to make a decision right now. Fight or flight. All right. Well, anyway, back to carcasses. Like, a bear defending a carcass is one of the most serious things that we dealt with in Yellowstone. When I was working in Yellowstone, it was like, if we knew there was a carcass and we knew there was a good chance there was a bear on it, that was like the high risk scenario where we went in multiple people, multiple deterrence. Like, we took that very, very seriously because it's like such a high danger zone when you're working with a grizzly bear.

And bears are really territorial around carcasses because that protein and fat that they get from ungulates is really beneficial to them. It's much more energetically efficient than food they're going to get from foraging. So when they get this meat meal, they're going to do their best to defend it from other bears or other threats.

So female bears with cubs will go out of their way to avoid carcasses because being around a carcass is like such a danger zone for them that they could run into like a big dominant male that's going to kill the cups. So even other bears that aren't strong enough are going to avoid these carcasses just because they are so risky. There's roughly 30,000 grizzly bears in Alaska. So there's really a lot.

Like if you're walking around Alaska, you have a chance of running into a grizzly bear in most places in Alaska. Some of those bears are the big coastal ones that we see in like the fat bear contest. And then some of them are more inland bears like you would find in Chugatch State Park. Mike won our bet, by the way. We owe him some candy. Yeah, Mike won. The fat bear. That's right.

I know. Yeah. Grazy. I think I sent him $10, but I can't remember. Yeah, no, I remember. What's the big difference, though, if you guys remember, between these coastal bears and, like, an inland bear? Salmon.

Yeah. Salmon. A ton of salmon, they get huge. They have, like, a... Yeah, I think I know what you're saying. So, like, the coastal bears, they are able to... able to eat like a way bigger percentage of meat because they have these salmon runs and like these salmon are a lot easier to catch.

So they get really big that makes them less aggressive. Whereas like me where I haven't eaten in over 24 hours, I'm pretty aggressive right now. And that's kind of how those inland bears get. Yeah. You're on the right line for sure. It's, you know, not just salmon, but everything in those coastal ecosystems, there's just like a higher percentage of food for those bears. So they are really well fed. And because of that, those ecosystems can support a lot more bears and they can support bears on higher densities.

And the direct result of that of the fact that there's like bears and higher densities means they have to be closer to each other. And then they're not nearly as territorial or as aggressive because they don't really have to defend food or defend territory that's the way that other bears do. So because of that, I'm not saying like a coastal bear isn't one that you have to be cautious around, but they do tend to be a lot more lenient towards people than these inland bears, because bears tend to treat us like they treat other bears. So Chugatch, like isn't far from the coast, but it's not necessarily on like a salmon stream that's like a really great kind of food source for these bears. So this is a bear that's going to act more like a bear in Montana or Wyoming. Right? Crinky.

Yeah, a little bit crinkier. Like, Jeff, after not eating for a little bit. Especially to, like, imagine if you got me, like, a burrito or something right now, and then I started eating it and you took it. Or, like, I thought someone might come take it, then I'd be totally aggravated. Probably kill them. Yeah. All right.

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Save up to 40% your first year at lifelock.com slash special offer. Terms apply. All right. So when Dan realizes that he's looking at a grizzly bear that's feeding on a carcass 60 feet away, his heart starts racing and he knows that he has to get out of the area as quickly as possible. So he knows that he's already within a distance that the bear's not going to be happy with. So he decides to back away really slowly and without making any noise in the process. He's doing pretty good until he gets three steps in.

So actually not very good. Almost immediately bad it sounds like. And on the fourth step, on the first step he bumps his stiff. It's taking like 10 minutes for each step. Fair enough. The fourth step, he stepped on one of those squeaky dock toys. Or if each of his steps are like a hundred feet long. He is tall.

He did say that. All right. So on his fourth step, he bumps his stiff new boots against a stump, and it makes a loud noise, loud enough to alert the bear that Dan was there. The bear raises its head and then stands on both legs to get a better view of Dan, and then immediately growls, drops to its feet, and charges at full speed. So Dan only has a split second to react. In a split second, he feels a kind of fear that he had never felt before.

He says it was like a helpless, out-of-control kind of fear that didn't give him the typical rush that he would get, like, or make him feel alive. It just made him feel absolutely terrified. That's surprising, given that he's like falling off of cliff. That's what I was going to say. I was going to say, like, normally that makes sense, but he's, He's like falling off cliffs and being in avalanches. But he felt in control when he was just free falling off a cliff, I'm sure. That's what he said.

Yeah. No, I believe him. It is another entirely different situation, I'm sure. It'd be scared for sure. When the bear's about 30 feet away, Dan knows that it's not going to be a bluff charge. He lays down in a small grove of birch trees and plays dead. And the bear runs right past him. And then he said it started swatting the ground and bouncing and doing what he described as

like a little dance. And during this, Dan calmly said several times, no bear, no bear. And then he looked up and made eye contact with the bear. So just really quickly, like this is pretty classic. Like a grizzly bear when they're really upset and maybe haven't figured out if they do want to attack you yet, they're going to do a display like this. Like this is part of kind of a bluff charge for a grizzly. And I would, I personally would qualify that as a bluff charge.

and then when he decides to finally, like, talk quietly and then look up at the bear, it decides to actually engage. So the bear had had enough. So it's kind of like the hockey, what's it called, that Tonga does before they like play with the hockey match? Haka. Yeah, it's like they do the haka before they. That's cool.

Yeah. The bear looks up, it charges, Dan puts his face on the ground, and he just waits for what he knows is coming. And the bear starts by striking out with a match. massive pot hits Dan and the ribs and he says it felt like getting hit by something absolutely massive like a sledgehammer Like a truck? Not a truck. You didn't say truck. The big swap from the bear sends him skidding across some exposed roots And then the bear jumps on his back and pushes him down with its nose and then it latches its huge jaws around the meat of his back and tears off a large piece of flesh

And Dan gets to have this really singular sensation of feeling muscle and flesh being torn away from his nose body. Oh my God. It's just not something that many people get to feel. No. The bear then jumps over his body and it runs up the trail a short distance, starts swatting the ground and doing the little dance again. And then it growls and starts woofing and grunting.

And he looks up again to see what it's doing. And so it charges him again. So I have a question. This one's not a joke anymore. But so like you said that they treat us like they treat other bears, right? Mm-hmm. So like, I guess what I'm asking is like for another bear, it wouldn't have gotten that injured in this circumstance and it could have ran away after that attack.

So maybe the bear's like, why hasn't it run away yet? I'm going to attack again? Probably maybe. I mean, that's possible. But what I guess like when I say they treat us like they treat other bears, they don't actually see us as other bears. But they don't like necessarily have an evolved response for humans. so they kind of just like default to the other response that they have their most common response which is another bear so like that's kind of why they treat us that way and yeah maybe like the bear

was like I'm just wondering like why didn't you run away yet and now I need to attack you again type exactly you know I well no I think more what it more of what it probably was the bear was like I neutralized this threat you know he like stops struggling and then it runs away and then he starts to move again, it's like, okay, maybe I didn't. Maybe I need to go in and hit it again. Is that a thing for bears when they make eye contact with each other? It kind of triggers something inside of them? Is that?

Not necessarily. I don't think it's so much the eye contact is just like movement and kind of. Personally, I think there's something to eye contact, but as far as I know, there's no research to support that it would trigger an attack. Yeah. So he has this like, seeing. depressive feeling on the second charge, and he thinks for sure that this time the bear is going to finish the job and kill him. And when it makes contact with him, it runs its claws down his side. It rips through his clothes, but it really doesn't do too much damage to his body. But then

the bear bites into his left thigh, start shaking him back and forth on the ground, and then drops the leg and bites into the other one. But it doesn't shake this time. It just bites down. And then just like that, the bear stops. It jumps over him again and tears away into the brush. So he's lying there for a minute, wondering if he had been too injured to stand up. But then he hops up and immediately just begins running the opposite direction for about 200 yards.

Yeah. And he was pretty shocked. Michael Johnson probably just setting a new world record for the 200 yard dash. He was shocked that he was able to do it. But then he starts feeling really lightheaded and hyperventilating. So he calms down and walks the last mile to the visitor center parking lot.

And he's babbling to himself the entire way. And the things he's saying to himself is, oh, I'm lucky, oh, I'm lucky. Oh, he messed me up. Oh, he messed me up. And he's just saying those two phrases over and over and over again. And he's also just terrified. He's saying like every bush, every tree he sees feels like there's a bear behind it. And he keeps thinking about his truck as if,

Like, it's a refuge. Like, as soon as he can get to his truck and touch his truck, he'll be safe. Because he knows he can get away and he can be safe in this little, like, sanctuary. So that's what he's focusing on. And when he gets to the parking lot, he scrambles up a shortcut. He gets to the pavement. And there's a couple in their 30s that are watching. And they just, like, look at him and then walk away, which is kind of a dick move.

That's insane. What? Yeah, because his clothes are, like, tattered and he's, like, just bleeding everywhere and stuff. And then someone else approaches him and they offer him a ride to the hospital in Anchorage, but he declines. And he says he'll drive himself because he still just like wanted to get into his truck, which he still saw as like this safe place. I can kind of understand that. Yeah. It's kind of like in a horror movie where you're just like, you just need to get out of there.

Like don't talk to anyone. Just like go. Right. But when he finally does get to his truck, this fear and adrenaline that was keeping the pain at bay kind of quits. and he just completely stiffens. His entire body stiffens because the pain just shoots and radiates through his body. And he ends up saying like,

you know what? I will take that right after all. Yeah. Oh, so they're still like with him. Yeah. Okay. So they get him into the hospital. Luckily, his wounds really weren't that bad

considering he got attacked by a grizzly bear. He had to pack the hole in his back with some gauze for a few weeks and his leg was in pain for a long time. but he made a complete 100% recovery. He did have some long-term repercussions, didn't like spending time alone in the woods for a long time, was always pretty nervous. But since then, like, he carries sparespray.

He still lives it up. He's still doing all this stuff. And he also kind of sees this as one of the better experiences of his life because it was, like, one that, like, no one can really have, you know? It's just, like, a singular experience. He's got a good story. Yeah. Yeah, a thrill seeker, I guess.

Yeah. After being interviewed by Rangers, they decided not to pursue the bear because it wasn't acting abnormally. It was defending a carcass. And Dan was really happy about that. He didn't think the bear was at fault. So sure. But just a month and a half later, on July 1st,

three other people would be attacked in Chugatch State Park. And they would be nearly as fortunate as Dan. They got that dang bear, I guess. Actually, I'm glad they didn't still. I don't think it's the same bear, but we'll get that. What do you think the truck or like car ride is like after like the first five minutes? Because like he tells him the story like, oh, this bear just bit me, like, bit my back. I had to like run away.

And then like after like it goes quiet, is he just like so. What do you do for work? This weather's been pretty nice today, huh? Yeah, it's a very good question. Hadaday presents in the red corner the undisputed, undefeated weed whacker guys. Champion of hurling grass and pollen everywhere. And in the blue corner, the challenger, extra strength, Hannity! Eye drops and work all day to prevent the release of histamines that cause itchy allergy eyes.

And the winner, by knockout, is Hadiday. Padiday. Bring it on. All right, so let's get into our second story. So Marcy Trent was a 77-year-old Alaskan. She was very Alaskan. At 77, she was still setting records for long-distance running in her age class. She's very well known in the Alaskan running community around Anchorage.

And the white-haired, five-foot-tall woman had spent 45 years in Alaska. So she's no stranger to the trails, the paths, the mountains around the area. Her 45-year-old son, Larry, was also a runner, as well as a woman. popular musician and music teacher. He was so good at saxophone that he played at the governor's inaugural ball, which I guess is like that means you're pretty good at saxophone. Yeah, did you ever do that, Wes? No, I played saxophone for a little bit, but I don't really know what the benchmarks are for being good at it.

He never played at the governor's ball. No, never played at the governor's ball. Any kind of ball? Never played a ball. Were you like the next in line? Like if the one guy called in sick, they'd call you? No, when I quit, I was like 14 or 15, so I don't think that was ever very good. All right, so on July 1st at 10.30 in the morning,

14-year-old Art Abel was lying in bed when his phone rang. His uncle Larry and Grandma Marcy, the two people we just talked about, wanted him to go on a run with them at McHugh Creek Trailhead in Chugatch State Park. He got his stuff together, and not long after Uncle Larry and Grandma Marcy picked him up, and they drove to the beautiful Woody area, near McHugh Creek. As they walked to the trailhead, they joked about what to do

if they see a moose, climb a tree, or a bear, run, which isn't what you're supposed to do. We know that. The trio started running and when they got to this really beautiful part of the trail

that breaks out of the woods and gives you this really beautiful, like gorgeous 360-degree view of the different mountain ranges and the turn again arm. Marcy and Art. You can't survive in that kind of weather. Wait, what do you mean?

360. 60 degree. All right. Marcy and Art at this point decided to stop and admire the view. So the grandma and the 14-year-old. While Larry decides to run ahead, and this is a decision that's going to cost two of them their lives. So really quickly.

They ran away from the bear, but then stopped to look at a view? They were just on a run. They were talking about what to do if they see a bear. I see. Yeah. Yeah, but a bear spray was. still around. And like to their, like a lot of people give the wrong information. So like I'm sure

they thought they knew, you know, not their fault is what I'm saying. Okay. So a little bit about Grizzlies and trail running. So there's a few things that are really high risk about trail running. And one of the main things is that it puts you out of their flight distance and within their fight distance really quickly. So bears, we talked about this. A lot of animals, they have this distance where if they detect a threat, it's just a lot easier to run away. And for some animals, like, that's always going to be their responses to run away, even if you're really close. But with bears, especially grizzly bears, sometimes when you're way too close,

when they determine that you're a threat, they decide to fight rather than flight. And there's actually papers that look at what that distance is. But when you're trail running, you can put yourself within that fight distance a lot quicker without the bear realizing you're there. Runners often aren't making too much noise, and the sound of their footfalls, breaths, and heartbeats will sometimes drown out the noises of their surroundings. And sometimes runners also run with headphones,

which also makes them a little bit less aware of what's going on around them. They often look at the ground in front of them. Like when you're running, you kind of are looking at the trail ahead of you, especially trail runners. So they don't always survey their surroundings the same way that someone who's hiking or maybe just kind of like spending a leisurely time out in the woods might be doing. There's someone I know listening right now trail running with headphones who's just terrified. It's probably my brother.

He does it a lot. He had a running with the bear. I think I told that story. He's in grizzly country too, right? Yeah. I was about to say he's probably not in grizzly country, but he is. Yeah. He's in Boseman.

Also that fast moving motion. can also trigger a predatory attack, which we've talked about. Sometimes a bear sees you coming and is like, oh, I wonder if this is prey, and then you run by and it's like, oh, that's moving like prey moves. So it is a really high-risk activity. It's actually one of the highest risk activity. Like if you, there's some bear's biologists out there that think it's worse than hunting, that it's worse than even like wildlife photography, that it's very high risk.

Like what's number one, just like bear wrestling? It depends on it. Bear hunting, like bear bow hunting. Bear surprise parties. But this is a really high-risk activity. All right. So Marcy and Art watch Larry disappear. He runs out in front of them, the uncle,

the grandma and the grandson are together. And Marcy turns to her grandson and she says, I really hope we don't see a bear. And art assures her that they won't. So the two start running again. And a little bit up the trail, Art's stomach starts hurting a bit, so they slow down,

and Marcy slows down to match his pace. And up ahead and out of sight, Larry was being attacked by a grizzly bear. The bear had been feeding on a moose carcass, and it was likely surprised by Larry approaching quickly and decided to attack rather than flee. And these thick alders around the trail, like there's a lot of brush around the trail,

probably hid the bear until it was really close to Larry, and when his body was found, he was about 30 yards below the trail. His pelvis and rib cage were completely crushed in, and he had deep lacerations all throughout his body. The coroner ultimately ruled that he probably died of blood loss. No one was around when Larry died? Well, I shouldn't say that.

No one was around when Larry got attacked, so it's impossible to know exactly what happened. All right, while Larry was bleeding out 30 yards away, Art and Marcy were approaching, and Art looked up to see the bushes 20 feet in front of him, moving and something big and brown crashing through the dense brush. His first thought was that it was a moose and he immediately dives across the trail and into some underbrush. So he has the same reaction that Dan has, that it's probably a moose and that he just

needs to like dive into the underbrush. If you saw a bush, like you probably would have thought it was like an ant, like a mini ant, right? Yeah. Yeah, it's a good point. All right. So his first thought was moose. He immediately. immediately dives across the trail and in some underbrush. And then he hears his grandma screaming, and the screaming abruptly stops. The bear grabbed the tiny 100-pound woman by the neck and head, and had shaken her so hard that her neck and spinal cord snapped, killing her pretty much instantly.

The bearer then stashes her tiny body and some alders 20 feet off the trail. So Art had slid face-first down a small hill into a ravine in this creek bed, and when he stopped, he didn't know if this moose was still chasing him because he still thinks it's a moose or if it had charged his grandma so he calls out to her and he doesn't get an answer but the bushes start moving again and he fears that this moose is coming after him so he runs away and once he's a good distance away he climbs a tree and he hopes his uncle would come find him and that his grandma's going to be okay about an hour later a hiker passes him so he's been in this tree for an hour now and talks to him from the tree and tells him that he talks to the

hiker and he tells him, Hamos attacked his grandma. So the hiker goes out on the trail, looks around for signs of his grandma, and then hears someone moaning from a little ways away, and it's Larry. The hiker runs up to him, and Larry moans one word. He says bear. So the hiker, his name's Jim Bleeze. He knew he couldn't do him so much for Larry because he just sees Larry's in terrible shape. So he runs down the trail and he meets a group of five hikers. They run back to Larry and Jim keeps going down the trail to look for more help at the trailhead. And when the five hikers find this completely torn up man, Larry, he's breathing shallowly, shallowly, and not responding.

I don't know if you ever got it there. Yeah, I don't either. Shallowly. So he's still alive. He was the guy that got his rib cage was crushed in and stuff, right? Yeah. Yeah. So he's still alive when they get to him, but his breasts are starting to be really shallow.

And one of the women that... But you said that he didn't tell him what happened. He told the other guy at Bear. So... He said Bay. Yeah. He described it. Yeah.

How would you interpret that, Jeff? I'm just kidding. All right. I just, I just mess him with him. He was just goofing. Just goofing. So one of the women that showed up starts praying, and not long after Larry takes his last breath. So Jim had found help at the trailhead, and a helicopter is already on the way.

There wasn't a really good landing spot. So the rescuers rappel down from the helicopter. Not long after, they find art still in the tree and they coax him down. He's still in the tree? I'd been in the tree for three hours. Wow. Like a moose had attacked his grandma. They didn't come and tell him?

Like what happened? No. Like no one came and got him because Jim, the only guy that knew he was there, Jim had like ran for help. Yeah. Oh, I see. Wow. So they find Larry's body right away and Marcy's body not long.

after. They also find a fresh moose carcass with obvious signs of bear feeding. So Art gets a helicopter ride back to the trailhead along the way he pieces together some information just like overhearing the captain of the helicopter or the pilot of the helicopter talking. And he realizes that his grandma and uncle were dead and that they've been killed by a bear. Man, that'd be a rough way to kind of come to your own conclusion that your family had died. Just kind of you had to piece it together like that for yourself. Super awful. Then a police chaplain arrives.

Larry's wife gets there. Marcy's husband gets there. And the chaplain delivers this bad news to them as well. So it takes a few weeks before Art does any interviews to tell the side of the story. And the whole running community and this whole family is really shocked by the attack. And the family really wants a bear killed. Like they say to Alaska fishing game, like we want this bear dead. and they try to catch the bear, but they don't succeed.

And enough time passes to where they're not confident at all. They're going to get the right bear. And so they give up. And this kind of pisses this family off. And they want revenge. Like they want this bear dead. So they actually like even threaten legal action to do it. And one of the family members is like, should there even be bears in Chugatch National,

or Chugatch State Park, it kind of turns into this big thing that dominates some of the Anchorage headlines for a while. And, you know, like, to lose two family members like that has to just be so horrific and painful. It's hard to even imagine. At the same time, you know, this is a place where Grizzlies have existed long before we existed there. So, like, they do belong on the landscape. The air turf.

Yeah. And it's like, if we want to first push them out of our cities and then also, like, not allow them to be in natural areas, like, where do they go, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, that's it for the two stories. The linking factor.

The linking factor to these stories, obviously, is that there's a carcass in both of them. And then the second one, the second element that I talked about was trail running. All right. So let's do our ouchies. So we'll do Dan's story first and then the second story. I'll go first. I'll give Dan six outchies. Like, I do think it sucks that he, like, never was able to enjoy the woods quite the same way.

It sucks to, like, have to pack gauze into an open wound for weeks. That made me cringe when you said that. Yeah. The muscle leaving with the one that got me. Yeah, but as far as a grizzly bear attack, it's pretty mild. So I'm giving him six. And then the two others, I'll give both of them eights because it's like, you're getting killed by grizzly bear. So it's, like, a high, obviously, like, really bad.

but both of them were very, I think, they weren't fortunate in any way, but they at least died quickly. So that's what I'm going with. I think I'll bump, what's the first guy's name, Dan? Dan, yeah. I'll bump him to a five for me because he ran,

he got in a truck, and like he says it's like his favorite thing that ever happened to him. Yeah. So like it couldn't have been too terrible. And then the other two, I like the eight. that's a bad one.

It's very bad. Totally. It's almost worse for their family. Yeah. Dance whole life kind of sounds like one big outchy to me. So on like a relative sliding scale kind of thing, I think I'm going to go with a five for him. For Marcy, I'm going seven because it was almost immediate if what you said,

if what we're speculating is true. And then an eight for Larry, since he kind of had to lay there with a broken rib cage for what seems like at least a while. Yeah. It wasn't quite as instant. Okay. I might go nine, actually.

Nine for Larry. When you're struggling for breath, that's just never a good feeling. Yeah. That's true. I totally agree with you. This episode is brought to you by Redfin. You're listening to a podcast, which means you're probably multitasking. Maybe even scrolling home listings on Redfin, saving homes without expecting to get them.

But Redfin isn't just built for Endlinson. browsing. It's built to help you find and own a home. With agents who close twice as many deals, when you find the one, you've got a real shot at getting it. Get started at redfin.com. Own the dream. All right. Let's get to our categories. Okay. So we've done Grizzlies obviously multiple times. So instead of doing our favorite grizzly, we're going to do our favorite revenge movie because that family really wanted revenge on that pair. So, I will go first, if you guys don't mind. Do you guys are right with that?

Prefer it. So for me, like, the main thing about a good revenge movie is that the villain has to be someone I really want to see get their comeuppance. So, like, my first knee-jerk was to pick Kill Bill because I just think it's a great movie. But I actually kind of like all the villains in that movie. Like, I don't necessarily dislike them. So I decided to go with Django Unchained,

another Tarantino movie. He does great. No one deserves revenge more than like the African American slaves. Yeah. So they, yeah, they deserve to get their revenge. Yeah, I think people gather. I think people know. Yeah, yeah, they did.

But for the 1% out there that needed a little extra help. Anyway, it's just like, it's so satisfying. That's a crazy stance to be like. A really bad take. Yeah. Yeah. It's so satisfying to see, like, these people playing slave owners and KKK members and everything get killed in the way that only Tarantino can really do. So that's the movie I picked.

I picked Django. Yeah, you go, Mike, because I'm just going to list a ton. So I need to explain just very quickly a couple qualifiers for my two picks. So my first is Princess Bride, but it's more the subplot of Enigo. Montoya tracking down the six-fingered man. Okay. I just, I love that movie, and I think that's the fight scene at the end when he finally gets him is just amazing. And, uh...

That's got like the best revenge line, I feel like. Like, yeah, well, he practices it through the whole movie. Yeah, my name is Enigo Montoya. Yeah. My second pick is old boy. Play that clip. Play that clip right here. Diego Montoya, you kill my father. Prepare to die.

Stop. Say that. I will play that clip right there. My second pig is Old Boy, and this one's a little weird too, because it's actually the bad guy of the movie who is getting revenge on the protagonist of the movie. But that doesn't make it any less crazy and awesome and amazing. It's Twisty Turvy. Great movie for Family Film Night.

Throw that one on. Yeah, it's funny you asked us this because me and Mike were honestly just talking about this, And I told him, I think revenge movie is like my number one favorite, like, genre. Is it genre? Yeah. Yeah, sure. Yeah. Like subgenre or genre.

Like, when they're done right. So I was looking at my letter box and like my top 40, I have like 12 of them in there because I listed my top hundred movies. But in my top 20, I had what you said. I had Django is my top. And then Count of Monte Cristo is an awesome. all-timer for me. And that's just like a story purely for revenge. Like that's all that matters in that story, especially the book. But like it's such a good story where he just gets totally screwed over by the people closest to him. And then he becomes like the richest person in the

world. It's just like, okay, I have all these resources. Let's see what I can do. Yeah. Kill Bill was also there. John Wick is like a. really good one that I want to shout out. Yeah, you got to include that. Sikario is like a kind of unexpected one where it's like, oh, I didn't know this was going to be a revenge movie, but it is. Right. Fair enough. Yeah. We were debating Lion King West. Do you think that's a revenge movie? No, I don't think so. I didn't think so really either, but there's definitely elements. Jeff was close to swaying me. Like, the whole thing is like him, his scar kills his dad and then it's like he goes back. to fight scar yeah but it's more like he goes back to like reclaim his birthright not so much

that's what i was saying yeah and like i also was wondering about the departed yeah i don't think so i wouldn't call it a revenge movie yeah you're stretching but yeah i'm not one to talk since i yeah that's why i didn't that's why i didn't bring them up but oh and one other one you did shout out is yeah well you brought it up i did oh you got me the reverse uno reverse card oh oh oh i got I got a shout out Braveheart. Braveheart's like they slit his wife's throat and he just goes and starts a whole war. I'm going to topple your country because you killed my life. Yeah, I like that.

And I'll shout gladiator too. That's a great. But yeah, I could keep going. But those are my favorites. Okay. All right. Well, this episode's coming out right before Thanksgiving. So I wanted to ask you both something you're grateful for.

Revenge movies. I'll come up with something else. I'm thankful for gays. I just, I think they get a hard time, and I think they've done a great job of just showing our culture, like, do what makes you happy. And I just really respect gays a lot,

and I'm thankful that they exist and that they, like, live the life they want to live. All right. I don't know if you can call them gays. What would you say? Like homosexual people, LGBT. LGBT. I think they're fine.

Be called gays. Right. I don't think so. Well, we'll see. We'll see in the comments section. Probably. I can tell already that we won't. No, I think we can probably keep that in.

I'm going to say I'm thankful for air travel because I just, I feel so lucky right now to be traveling and be able to see, like, parts of the world that back on the day. That's a good one. People would have to travel for like months and get like diphtheria and plimidia to like go see the place, you know? Yeah. That's the thing I'm like least sympathetic for is people who complain about their flights. Yeah.

I'm grateful for people who make YouTube tutorials, especially for like complicated tech. Oh yeah. Stuff for free that you can just watch and learn. Just fix your car yourself. really whatever you want. Seriously. I'm grateful for those people.

And like the most helpful ones, it's always like some 10-year-old kid doing like text to speech with like blaring music over it. But it's so helpful. Keep doing it. Put on your terrible music over the video. I'm happy to listen to it for five minutes.

There's like a funny 60-year-old Weber State in Ogden, Utah professor who just does like little four-minute YouTube videos of how to make meals under $5. And he makes all these different, like, meals in the microwave. That's great. Yeah, those are, like, insanely helpful. And there's one for everything, which I love.

There really is now. All right. We're going to go into what would Mike and Jeff do. So let's say you're Dan and you are, you, like, lay down and this bear starts doing a little dance. What are you going to do? It would be so hard not to watch. But that seemed to be his undoing, you know, when he looked at that bear. I think his biggest mistake was kicking the stump.

Okay. So feel free to riff on it. Do whatever you want. I'm just going to walk a lot quieter, you know? All right. Fair enough. The bear starts doing a dance. I think you've got to do a dance off, right?

Okay. So you're dancing off with the bear? Yeah. If it starts dancing, I'm dancing back. I'll do the worm. That's my answer. Okay. You're doing the worm.

Mike, what are you doing? Do the worm so you kind of like leave the scene as you're doing the worm, like gaining distance. Like slowly back away while they do the worm. That's a good idea. For me, I'm keeping my face down on the ground, but I'm pulling out like my phone just very inconspicuously and recording the dance. So I like I can watch it later because it seemed like the movement that he made with his head is what triggered both of those. confrontate like dangerous violent confrontations with the bear so that can be your answer for the next category too the instagram moment i saw you had that oh that's true i forgot we were doing that one yeah

right so what you actually should do uh first and foremost you want to carry a deterrent so bear spray existed in 95 all of these people in these stories should have been carrying some kind of deterrent in grizzly country, especially if you're doing high-risk things like photography or trail running where you're not necessarily paying total attention to all of your surroundings. If you are out and you are unlucky enough to surprise a bear on a carcass, if you see the bear before it sees you, you want to get out of the area as quietly as possible. So I actually talked to Tom about this and kind of what he thought, and we both agree that this is a scenario where letting the bear know you're there isn't good.

Like often that's what you're supposed to do. This isn't one of those. Like you want to get out of there without the bear seeing you because if it sees you, it might react aggressively to protect that carcass. So you want to get your deterrent ready and back out of the area as quietly and as quickly as possible. Because Dan didn't have a deterrent, but he did try to back out quietly. Right. And the bear noticed. And when it attacked him because he didn't have a deterrent, he did what was probably the next best thing,

which was laid down and played dead. The bear still mauled him a little bit, but he got out of this pretty well considering what could have happened. With the runners, the number one thing they should have done differently is stuck together. And again, like this is just a tragic circumstance.

You'd never expect this sort of thing to happen to you. But a group of them would have been much more intimidating to the bear, likely would have scared it off the carcass rather than making it attack them. They should have had a deterrent also, but I do want to, like, point out that there's really not much that Art could have done to, like, stop his grandma for being killed. Like, yeah, he jumped away and, like, got away from this whole situation, but it was so quick and so brutal that, like, it doesn't really matter in this situation.

You know, he couldn't have stopped it. Yeah. Unless they had deterrence, which always bring deterrence. Unless he had deterrents. Especially trail running in Grizzly Country. Yeah. You've cited some statistic or some kind of information before. It was something to the effect of groups of three people have never really had a fatal bear encounter or something like that, right?

Yeah, it's not never, but it's like very, very, very slim chances once you're three or more. Yeah. In Yellowstone, I think it maybe is never, but like in all of Grizzibur range, it's not never. All right, we're going to move on to our next category. And it is an Instagram photo you'd like to have, and you can do it from either story, but just, be sure to be sensitive because there's definitely still surviving members of our second story. No, I'll do the first story too with Dan. And I'm going to do what Mike said, the dance.

But I want to like start the video on my face when I'm laying there and be like, so I was hiking in the woods and this moose came up and just started dancing. And then I'll pan up to the bear. And it would be pretty funny. Okay. Would be funny. I want one final picture of the three of the runners together on the trail. Yeah, like that.

Just one last sentimental photo. Yeah, it would be nice. I would want a picture of the dudes repelling out of the helicopter, because that sounds pretty sweet. That's cool. Oh, what about Dan falling off of a cliff? I kind of want some pictures of that. Yeah, I do too just to know what that meant even.

Yeah. All right, Jeff, let's do your animal fact of the episode. All right. You guys ready for this one? I think it might turn into another episode, honestly. Like another Patreon episode. So AirBud's owner froze his sperm. AirBuds?

The Golden Retriever AirBud, the owner had his sperm frozen for that doc. Okay. That's great. That's the fact. All right. Great. All right, moving on. We're Mike and Jeff paying attention.

So we're going to do four questions. I know one name. What bet do you guys want to do? Billion. Besides a billion dollars. What real bet do you want to do? How about loser has to tell the winner four things they're grateful about the winner in a text? Stupid.

Sure. All right. I can do that. I can come up with four. That's not that many. Who wants the first question? I always pick. Yeah, I want you to pick this time, Jeff.

Yeah, I'll go first. Okay. Roughly how many Grizzlies live in Alaska? 30,000. Correct. Mike, what was Dan doing in Chugach the day he was attacked specifically? Wildflower photography. Correct.

One-one. Jeff, how much did Marcy weigh? 80 pounds? Incorrect. Mike, would you like to steal? 100 pounds. Correct. Two to one.

Mike, what instrument did Larry play? Oh, the sacks. He was so good at it. At the mayor's ball. Hey, Mike, what weight did Wes wrestle at in high school? The first year, freshman year. All right. I think it's 100 pounds, right?

No, my freshman year I was 98 pounds. Good. Jeff. Name three reasons trail running is especially dangerous in grizzly. Three reasons? Because you get into their zone easier of like if they're going to decide to attack you. Great. A lot of times they wear headphones, which makes it so they pay less attention.

listening to tooth and claw and they don't make a lot of noise because they're normally by themselves that should count as a that's a three-pointer that's Steph Curry right there all right two to three that's impressive I mean there's not a billion dollars on the lines and no one cares

how old was Larry Mike oh shoot Larry Larry 55 he's Googling it he Googled I'm not. I just said 55. Jeff, would you like to steal? 50. What? Is it Price is Right?

It was 56. Incorrect. He was 45. All right. Still, it's three to two. Jeff, what is the name of the book that these stories are published in? Attack of the Grizzly. Incorrect.

Mike, do you remember? Mark of the bear. Who's Mark, Wes? Mark of the Grizzly. Mark Wahlberg? All right. Wait, do I get a point for that? No, you didn't get a point for that.

What did I say? Oh, what? That's so close, Wes. Okay, that's fine. Mike, what was the first name of the hiker that found art? Oh, it was a B something. Babby? Incorrect.

Jeff, do you want to steal? Babby? I thought Joe was the first name. Oh, very close. It was Jim. Jam. Wow, I was way off. All, so Mike, you win unless.

That's crazy. Babby was way off. Unless, and you lose, Jeff, you lose a billion dollars and you have to send them for things. Oh, we are doing a billion. Yeah. Unless. I think we're even right now, too. You can quickly answer this last question before Mike gets it.

Oh, cool. And this last question is, this is for 10 points. What was the name of the boy that was killed in Madawan Creek during the shark attacks of 1916. The young boy. Yeah. Lester. No.

Shh. Was his full name? What? Come on. Yeah. Okay, I'll give that to you. I wanted his full name, but Lester, I'll give you credit. That's pretty good.

I can't name. Ten points? That's like a North Korean three-pointer. You have a billion dollars and four grateful things. Yes. Dang. Four things? Yeah.

All right. Let's do a couple of those sort of questions. Let's just do a few because Jesse's trying to sleep and I got this party going on above me. So let's just do a handful if you guys are okay with that. Sure. Subscriber questions. Want to start there? Because I do.

Sure. This one is from subscriber Megan Alana. It's kind of like one word. I don't know if it's two people or if that's first, last name. I'll just say Megan. I live in South Arizona and this week the White Crown Sparrows have returned over winter here. While a very common bird, their lovely songs echo around the neighborhood. Heralding that cooler weather is ahead and the heat is almost over, even if the highs are still in the 90s.

It's really painting the picture there for us. Yeah, it's very nice. Do you have a migratory animal that you get excited to see when they first arrive because they mark the changing of the seasons? Definitely. For me, it's Redwing Blackbirds. Yeah, that's 19. Yeah. Just that call when you start hearing it, it just feels like springs.

right around the corner. So that's my answer. I think if I lived on like the Pacific coasted for sure be the gray whale migration. But I don't. That would be cool. Oh, yeah. I'm going to go with, it's kind of like the reverse of this, but when all the bugs are gone in winter, that's pretty great.

That's a good one. Yeah, it's not exactly like migrational migratory, but. Yeah, it's just they're all dead. Yep. Next question. This is from Turner. You can have an all-examination. Expenses paid vacation wherever you can drive.

But the whole time you're on the road trip there and back, you have to listen to Life is a Highway by Rascal Flats on repeat. Where do you go? How far do you think you could make it? Like Walmart, like 10 minutes away. That'd be tough. I'd probably do Vegas. Like, you can have a pretty sweet Vegas trip and that's five hours.

Yeah. All expenses paid, $200,000 in casino losses. The funny thing is, like, the way my koala brain works, I honestly don't think I would learn the words of the song besides just life as a highway. What if you just pick Wendover? I can do five hours. I don't think I could do that, but if you could do it.

I'd go crazy. Next question. Next question. So this is from Josh. If y'all could choose a person. to enlarge to be big enough to ride like a steed into battle, which bird would y'all choose? I'm picking a gold needle. I know it's a boring answer, but that's, maybe it'd be cooler to pick like a cassowary.

Like a hummingbird. You can pretty much ride one of those already. Yeah, that's a good answer. Hummingbird's great because they can like hover. That'd be a good strategic. But it would just be a so. They could like drain their blood out with their. It would just like need to feed all the time.

Yeah, but if it drink blood, that would work really well. Yeah. Right. All right. Okay, and then a few Instagram questions. So Nick Speaker asks, can you explain why Pippin is a better character than Mary? I can't. Yeah, I can't.

Mike, we can. We could easily, yeah, once a year we do it. I mean, convinces the ends to go see all the disaster and the ants take out Eisengarde for one thing. Yeah. I don't even fight you guys on this anymore because you've kind of convinced me. And Mary didn't want to share his food with the ends after all that work, too, that we... No, he didn't. Pippin steals the Palantir and looks into it and convinces Sauron that he has the ring.

Mary ever do anything like that? Not to my recollection. Mary does help with the witch king or whatever, though, so that's a good point for Mary. This is very movie-centric, too, so... That's what I was going to say, like. I think when you're looking at the movies, Pippin's a better character. In the books, for me, it's Mary. That's just me.

Jesse Raith. Wants to know, if we got attacked and our arm got completely mangled and you couldn't use it anymore, would you chop it off or keep your arm that you can't use? Chop. I'd chop. Chop, me too. I'd chop and hope I get a robot arm. That's the thing.

Yeah. Eventually. Or like ice powers in an ice farm. Or just a hook. Yeah. Or modular so you can like switch it out. You could have a crab claw like we were talking in that one episode or like a gun. I know someone who that happened to with a lion.

Yeah, we got to do that story at some point. Yeah. I could probably have them on. Dana Ugg 30. Would you date a girl who kisses her parents on the mouth? I would think it's pretty weird Like that would be kind of weird for me Yeah I think I've realized that culturally it's like

Kissing is like much bigger deal in America Than a lot of other places So especially help if they're foreign They're just kind of like oh they got different rules If they're from a different culture it wouldn't bother me at all But I've learned to be like you know People are showing affection it's not that big of a deal Totally.

I would do it. But it does seem weird. You would do it. But it would be a little weird. To my mom? No. I would date that person, but it would feel a little weird to me. My rule would be don't do it in front of me.

Actually, you know what? Just go for it. Just Mac. Yeah, I don't think it's a deal breaker. I would be a little weird, though. But like Tom Brady does it, and I love that guy. Would you date him? I would.

I mean, he's got a lot going for him. All right. Two more. Angie Page O2 asks, any advice for solo travelers? I want to travel to a few parks, but I have no friends that like the outdoors. My advice would just be go for it.

Don't be like, you know, go to these parks. You've heard us tell you how to be prepared. So like, just do it. And you'll see some really cool places. Don't be dependent on other people to go to the places you want to see. Totally. Some of my best trips have been solo.

trips and like maybe you'll meet friends while you're there you know you just never know yeah i was asking mike today what his like ideal trip is and he'd be he's like just like being in a house by myself where no one knows to contact me yeah like going up to the fridge to get some lasagna is his ideal trip oh man stop giving me a boner um all right Caleb M. Gillen asked how did Jeff like Cincinnati? I loved it. Really good barbecue. I had a fun time watching the Bengals.

I'm pretty into their football team this year. And I didn't get the full skyline chili experience. They put it on hot dogs. And I guess they put their chili on noodles there. So you get like spaghetti with chili on it. Yeah. And it's just advertised everywhere. in Cincinnati.

Like, every bus has skyline chili on it. The zoo, awesome zoo, skyline chili there. Like, they love that stuff. So I need to go back and get the whole chili experience. Have you had it, Mike? Yeah, yeah, I've been there. It's great. Uh-huh.

It's really good. I like it. I had a really great experience with it. My friend Todd, who came with me, like, took one bite and was just like, that's disgusting and just couldn't even believe I ate any. anymore. Yeah. What the heck? Todd. Yeah, it sounds gross to me, but sorry Cincinnati. I like chili. I'm a chili. All right. Chilly guy. All right. Is that it for questions? Yeah. Okay. Well, I'm not going to really make us go through how much do we like this animal because we already know it's 10 out of 10, 10 out of 10 and 9.

Well, let's make Mike answer. Mike, where are you at on grizzly bears right now? I'm going to say 9. I think you had it. You had me right there. Okay. Yeah. Just my number two overall. Fat Bear Week did a lot to reinforce my enjoyment. Oh, yeah. All right. I appreciate.

Yeah. Well, if you guys can hear this party going, hopefully you've been able to just kind of like have some nice background music to this episode. If not, I'm probably going to go figure out what's going on and see if I can join in, quiet down a little bit or join in. Maybe it's a bunch of bears doing that little dance. Oh, that sounds like it. Yeah. Thanks guys for listening. Again, if you are interested in more content, we have subscription

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Do you feel like subscribing, do it? We'd love to see you on there. And also, we have some new merch, and I really like the quality of this merch. We have Dana, who's been helping us with social media, helping us out with the merch. So check out our store. Buy as much as you have money. Possibly can. Yeah.

Sell your car. No, actually, like, I'm not really even sure how much money will make off of it, but I just want people to, like, be able to have, like, our shirts be, like, one of their favorite shirts. So we, we up it in quality, and we're pretty excited about it. So go check it out. And, yeah. Oh, and also I wanted to say, if you had any, most people had a really good experience with our last store, but if you had any issues, please. DM like my personal account and I can get you taken care of. All right.

That's it for this episode. Thanks, guys. Thanks, Wes. Good job. I like the part about the bear. Yeah, that was my favorite part too. I liked the two elements. All right.

We'll see you guys. See ya. Bye.