Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! - WWDTM: 25th Year Spectacular Part VIII!

Episode Date: November 25, 2023

Our deep dive into our 25-year history continues with appearances from Jane Curtin, Adam Savage, Hannah Kearney, Muffet McGraw, and more!Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

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I'm the guy who makes a black hat with a buckle look sexy. I'm your pilgrim, Bill Curtis. And here's your host at the Sudomaker Theater in downtown Chicago, Peter Sagal. Thank you, Bill. Thank you, everybody. So even though it's Thanksgiving week, we are still focused on celebrating our 25th anniversary year. As it says in the book of Leviticus, every 25th year, a radio show shall lay down its burdens and review its past segments. You wouldn't believe the crazy stuff in Leviticus. Did you know it's a sin to have a voice this sultry? If it isn't, it should be.

So let's begin this jubilee with a trip back to 2009 when we went to Hartford, Connecticut to interview one of the original stars of Saturday Night Live, Jane Kirk. Do you realize that Saturday Night Live is as old as Jesus? That's terrifying. That also doesn't bode well for its immediate future I did want to ask though 33 years ago just like you said it wasn't just a TV show it was this huge cultural moment and when you look back on it I don't know if you look back on it

I can't see that far when you think about it you're like wow, wow, that was a great thing, and we were just lucky it was just a TV show, and we went on, or is it like, wow, that was like a moment. That was an amazing thing that I was a part of. I, you know, I get carried away by what other people say about it. I didn't really think beyond what I was doing about what the effect was. I felt the effect, but I didn't understand it, because I wasn't watching it. I was doing about what the effect was. I felt the effect, but I didn't understand it because I wasn't watching it. I was doing it.

Wow. You were telling us earlier that when the show first began, it was panned by the critics. Nobody thought it would succeed at all. Oh, no, no. As a matter of fact, one reviewer said, I had no right to be on television. Really?

Yeah. Were you guys aware of that? Did you think, oh, we know... We didn't care. You didn we know... We didn't care. You didn't care? We didn't care. We were getting paid $750 a week. Whoa.

And that back in the 70s... Come on, we're talking scratch here. And that would buy you a lot of cocaine back in the 70s. And apparently it did. Apparently, from what I've read. Although, we've also read that the parties and the whole sort of scene there was crazy every Saturday night,

but you were not a part of it. Is that true, that you were like, no, not what you were going to do? Well, no. You know what? I hated missing a day. I hated missing Sunday. You mean that day that you just sort of... That day that when you arrive back at your apartment at 5 o'clock in the morning, I didn't want to

miss the day. And actually, I sat next to Mick Jagger and he had his fist up his nose, and I thought, I don't want to see that ever again. You know, I was about to say, you can't do that. Then I was like, Mick Jagger probably could. He did. Was there something up there he wanted? I didn't wait around to find out.

No, no, no, no, no. Because Lord knows what he was going I didn't wait around to find out. No, no, no, no, no. Because Lord knows what he was going to have when he got his hand out, you know. We also once, we read somewhere that you actually haven't watched Saturday Night Live since you left the show. Is that true? Pretty, yeah, probably. Was that a conscious decision or are you just busy now on Saturday night? Part of it was a conscious decision and the other part was I can't stay up that late.

Yeah, you know. Those crazy kids. Oh, jeez. I don't know how they do it. Do you ever go back and watch yourself from the very early days? Do you know what I did? They came out with the DVDs and they gave us two sets

and so I sent one to my daughter and she had the DVDs and I said, have you looked at any? And she said, no, and so I sent one to my daughter, and she had the DVDs, and I said, have you looked at any? And she said, no, let's look at one. So they pick a disc, and they put it in, and we're just going through the thing, and they stop. And it was a show from the first year.

It might have been early on. And we watched it. It was so not funny. It was 90 minutes of sheer boredom. People sort of standing around going, what do I do now? It was awful. It was just awful.

So I like the myth. Right. That's So I like the myth. Right. That's what I like. Mrs. Loopner was funny. I like Mrs. Loopner. We love Mrs. Loopner. Well, Jane Curtin, we are so delighted to have you with us. We have asked you here this week to play a game that we're calling... Something About You.

I don't know what it is, but it's driving me wild. Never mind the clothing, the gym, the hair, the witty badinage. One theory of sexual attraction, at least, says that it all comes down to pheromones, those invisible, undetectable to the conscious mind scents, which for some animals are the biochemical equivalent of hay sailor. So we're going to ask you three questions about pheromones taken from Mary Roach's new book about the science of sex called Bunk.

Answer two questions correctly, you'll win our prize, Carl Castle's voice on their home answering machine. Carl, who is Jane Curtin playing for? Jane is playing for Karen Wolfe of Manchester, Connecticut. All right, here we go. Here's your first question. Back in the 1970s, scientists tried to find out if pheromones worked on humans by doing what? A, finding men who had lost their sense of smell and measuring their responses to an attractive actress hired for this purpose. B, asking 65 women to smear supposed monkey pheromones onto their chests before bed to see if their husbands noticed.

Or C, observing the behavior of rhesus monkeys who were wearing lingerie recently worn by humans. I think it's the first one. I think it's the first one. You think it's the first one? They found men who had lost their sense of smell. They were anosmic, is the term. They introduced them to an actress and they measured how excited they got.

That's what you think they did? I think it's A. You think it's A? I'm afraid it was actually B. No. They hired 65 women. They paid them a dollar a day to do this. They thought they had discovered this chemical in rhesus monkeys

that caused sexual interest in males in rhesus monkeys. So they synthesized the chemical. They gave it to these women. They asked them to smear it on their chests and go to bed with their husbands and not mention it and see if their husbands reacted in any way. And the answer was, no, they didn't. Excuse me.

went? And the answer was, no, they didn't. They all kept having flashbacks to their time in Borneo. I'm presuming the husbands were holding a remote at the time. Honey, did you want something? No. No, but they started chewing on their toenails.

Because all of a sudden they could reach them. They're picking bugs out of her hair. Okay. You have two more chances. Some years after that, scientists wanted to test the effect on human females of a compound called androstenone

that is found in male sweat. They wanted to see if women were attracted to it. So, in order to find out, they did which of these? A, they sprayed it on a particular seat in a dentist's waiting room, and they watched via hidden camera to see if women sat in that chair more often. B, they asked test subjects to sniff it and then look at pictures of a homely man to see if that made the man more attractive. Or C, the scientists simply put it on like cologne and they went out to bars around campus to see how lucky they could get. I think it's C.

You think it's C, that they just put it on their pulse points. I do. Went out to the bars. Yeah. And were like, hello. Yeah, I think it's C. No, it was actually A, the dentist's chair. The dentist's chair. They went to a dentist's office

and they sprayed one chair with it and they hid and they watched to see if that increased the frequency of women sitting in the chair. They hid? Where did they hide? Under the chair. Behind the ficus tree. No, they had a little camera,

and they said that after they sprayed it, more women sat in that chair for reasons that the woman couldn't explain. Well, why did you sit in that chair? I don't know. I just sat in the chair. So that was actually one of the few experiments showing that pheromones might have an effect, although... If you want a woman to sit in a chair.

Exactly. You have one more chance, Jane. Let's see what you can do. The Smell and Taste Treatment and Research Foundation in Chicago did a test. They used special equipment to see what scents women found the most arousing. Surprisingly, the most arousing scent for their test subjects was what? A. Hormel brand canned corned beef hash. B. Freshly cut

linoleum tiles. Or C. A mixture of cucumbers and good and plenty candy. Oh, it's got to be C. You're going to go for the good and plenty? Yeah. You're right. Let's talk about this a minute. Why were you so certain? Well, when you think about it, I mean, cucumbers smell great.

Yeah. And good and plenty? Good and plenty smells great. Have you smelled a good and plenty lately? Well, I'm going to go buy a few boxes as soon as we leave this theater. Kids have been huffing good and plenty. Really? Well, you're right. Why not a box? as soon as we leave this theater. Kids have been huffing Good & Plenty. Really? Right out of the box.

It turns out that it was the mixture of cucumbers and Good & Plenty. Some researchers guessed that the candy brought back pleasant memories of childhood. By the way, among the very least arousing scents, men's cologne. Cologne. So if they added cucumbers to the snack stands at movie theaters, those teenage date nights could get a little more interesting.

I'll have a cucumber and a good and plenty of... What if you sweat on a cucumber? And then rub it on a chair. Put it on the dentist's chair. What if you give... Like if there was a sweaty cucumber on a cucumber. And then rub it on a chair. Put it on the dentist's chair. Like if there was a sweaty cucumber on a dentist's chair. Wait a minute. What if you rubbed good and plenty

on your chest? I do. What do you do with it, Roxanne? Where do you rub it? How about a rhesus monkey eating good and plenty? Is that exciting? A rhesus piece of monkey. a rhesus monkey eating good and plenty? Is that exciting? A rhesus piece is monkey. A rhesus piece is monkey.

Carl, how did Jane Curtin do in our quiz? Well, Jane needed at least two correct answers to win for Karen Wolfe, but she had just one correct answer. So, I'm humiliated. Jane Curtin was the star of Saturday Night Live and the hit TV shows Kate and Allie And Third Rock from the Sun You can see her in TNT's presentation

Of The Librarian, Quest for the Spear And The Librarian, Return to King Solomon's Minds Jane Curtin, thank you so much for being here Thank you When we come back, we talk to both a tech mogul and a mogul skier. You can try to guess who's who. That's when we return with more Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me from NPR. These days, it can feel like the news is fighting for your attention wherever you turn. But staying informed shouldn't be a battle.

Everything you need to navigate the stories that matter to you is at your fingertips. The NPR app cuts through the noise, bringing you local, national, and global coverage. No paywalls, no profits, no nonsense. Download the NPR app in your app store today, or you can go to npr.org slash app. your app store today. Ores got addicted to fossil fuel. That is Planet Money from NPR. The biggest presidential primary day in this campaign cycle, Super Tuesday. Will the Republican nominee be settled after these votes?

Check out the NPR Politics podcast for all the news you need about what happens when voters have their say. From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, the NPR News Quiz. I'm Bill Curtis, and here's your host at the Studebaker Theater in the Fine Arts Building in downtown Chicago, Peter Segal. Thank you, Bill. So we're looking back at some of the highlights from our 25 years on the air to distract from the fact we're definitely getting some wrinkles in our T-zone. In 2011, we spoke to Eric Schmidt, now a well-known philanthropist, but then the CEO of Google. He had been hired to bring some maturity to a company founded by two very young grad students. And Peter asked him how he imposed discipline. We had to have two rules. The first rule, these are both rules I enacted. The first is that you had to wear clothes to work.

First rule, you have to wear clothes. What's the second rule? Well, the second rule is that you have to have fun. You can be serious about wearing a suit, and we wanted to invent the future. Right. And you did, and here it is, and it's nice. So speaking of the future, everybody's excited about Google Glass. Yes. And I don't know what it is exactly. What would you use it for? Tell me what you'd use this amazing invention for. We don't quite know yet.

We have made 2,000 of these. We've shipped them out to developers, and we're seeing what they develop. There's obviously issues, shall we say, of appropriateness

of how people are going to use these things. There's a right time to have Google Glass on, and there's a right time to have it off if you take my drift. Right.

So we're going to watch and see what people do with it and then decide what to do. It is a technical achievement of extraordinary scale. I've been to the Googleplex, your headquarters in California, and it is amazing. There's volleyball pits and there's an amazing cafeteria that has everything but a cash register. And there are classes all day. There's yoga. There's a ball pit. There's a ball pit for grownups. How does any work ever get done?

Free breakfast, lunch, and dinner, massages, you name it. Bring your dog to work, bring your other pets. We had one employee decide that the policy allowed him to bring his boa constrictor to work. How'd that work out? We have revised the policy that you have to work for them if you cannot bring your boa constrictor to work. Really'd that work out? We have revised the policy that you have to work with if you cannot bring your boa constrictor to work. Really? That's in the rules now? On the other hand, it made the ball pit interesting.

I just imagine this was your job. I mean, it was like you're sitting there in your suit trying to do the business and it's like, Mr. Schmidt, there's a boa constrictor. Could you come down and tell him not to do it? I'm like, alright. They did catch the boa constrictor. There is a person trick you could you come down and tell them not to do it alright they did catch the book instructor yeah you can hire uh... in new york city

who will in fact catch book instructors that you lose you you mentioned that you you've invented this thing google glass and you don't know how exactly people are going to use it you do that a lot of the stingers but it's been a twenty percent of your time at the other another another one of our ideas is that engineers should spend 20% of their time working on whatever they find interesting. And before you get too excited, remember, engineers are not that interesting. Right. But they understand very well.

And a lot of the Google inventions came from engineers just screwing around with ideas. And then management would see them and would say, boy, that's interesting, let's add some more engineers. So give me an example of something that came out of that. A simple one would be Google Maps. Google Maps came out of that process. I have a question on Internet etiquette. How do you feel, or have you ever gotten someone's email

and they had an AOL extension at the end? Do you feel sorry for them? Well, AOL is one of our largest partners, so we're very happy if you're using AOL. Eric Schmidt, we're delighted to have you with us. We've invited you here to play a game we're calling Try Googling That

Big Shot. I am skeptical. Google, as we know, seems to find everything. So we're going to ask you about three things that cannot that big shot. I am skeptical. Google, as we know... I'm skeptical of this. Yeah, seems to find everything. So we're going to ask you about three things that cannot be found,

at least as far as we know. Answer two questions correctly, you'll win our prize for one of our listeners, Carl's voice on their home answering machine. There's nothing that cannot be found

through some search engine or on the Internet somewhere. Oh, so you say, sir. So you say. Bill, who is Google chairman Eric Schmidt playing for? Ashley Burden of Columbia, Missouri. All right, here's your first question, Eric. For more than a century, people have been looking for what in the deserts of Southern California?

A, a fungus that can cure baldness, B, a treasure ship from the 19th century, or C, the real killers? The fungus. The fungus. The fungus. Oh, from your mouth to God's ears. But actually, it's the treasure ship. For more than a century, there have been legends of a wooden ship filled with treasure somewhere in the desert south of the Salton Sea. How did it get there? They say a big wave somewhere.

By the way, am I supposed to be using Google during this thing or not? Well, you've got it hardwired into your brain. I've got a browser up here. I'm running Chrome. If I could just type your questions in, I'll get the answers right. I don't know. Sometimes Chrome, you just end up with some strange site that doesn't help. I'm not saying, I don't mean that.

I don't mean that. Don't turn it off. This is a test of your knowledge. I'm just saying, not the world's knowledge. You're not. Next question. The town of Rennes-la-Chateau, France, because of an adorning mystery,

is regularly overrun by whom? A, people looking for Amelia Earhart, B, fans of the Da Vinci Code, or C, mongooses? The first one. The first one. People looking for Amelia Earhart are going to Rennes-la-Chateau, France? No, the third one. The third one. The first one. People looking for Amelia Earhart are going to Rennes-la-Chateau, France? No, the third one.

The third one. Mongooses? Yes. I'd go to that chrome. Yeah. I'm trying to type a question in. You're asking me to say, I need to use Google voice search here. Go do it.

Actually, at this point, I think we'd best better let you use the crutch, so go on. I'm trying to type a question in. You're asking me to say, I need to use Google voice search here. Go do it. Actually, at this point, I think we'd best better let you use the crutch, so go on. I'm trying to type a question in. You're asking me to say, I need to use Google voice search here. Go do it.

Actually, at this point, I think we'd best better let you use the crutch, so go on. I'm trying to type a question in. You're asking me to say, I need to use Google voice search here. Go do it. Actually, at this point, I think we'd better let you use the crotch, so go on. Grand Le Chateau. Grand Le Chateau. I want you to... We've never tried this.

You're the chairman of Google. You get to use Google. Go ahead. See if you can answer the question. The serious societies, the Freemasons, the Priory of Zion. I mean, you know, there's lots of information here.

I know. Meanwhile, we got Bill Gates on the other line. He used Bing and he got it. He's waiting to win. I'm kidding, I'm kidding. So, all right. So, what do you think? And the answer, of course, is the Da Vinci Code,

according to Wikipedia. So there. So there. Yes. Yes. So there. It is. Back in the 50s, a restaurant owner

started spreading stories about hidden treasures at the Priory. It launched all these other stories, many of which Dan Brown used in his book, which is why these people are coming to Rennes-la-Chateau and really annoying the natives. All right, so you have one more chance, and you have the vast power of the internet via your own company. So let's see if you can answer this one. Another great mystery is the lost Dutchman mine, a valuable gold mine somewhere in the Superstition Mountain area of Arizona. Many men have died searching for the mine.

One prospector, James Cravey, was found dead in the mountains. And a coroner ruled that there was no foul play despite what? A, he was found with a dented cook pot near his broken skull. B, there was a guy next to him who told the searchers, yep, I shot him just a little while ago. That was me. Or C, his head was found 30 feet from his body. His name was

James Cravey. That's C-R-A-V-E-Y. Lost Dutchman wine. You just go ahead. I'll play Angry Birds on my iPad. Go. Let me know when you're ready. We're searching. We're searching. We're reading. I find this hilarious.

It's amazing the amount of information that's on the internet. That's true. His head was 30 feet from his body. Did you just find that on the internet? No, I'm just guessing. I'm still reading about all the other deaths. Well, you're right. His head was found 30 feet from his body.

It's a car assess. This is according to one lost Duckman website we found. No foul play. How his head got 30 feet from his body on its own, we don't know. Bill, how did Google chairman Eric Schmidt do on our show? Eric got two right. Playing for Ashley Burton. Eric Schmidt is the executive chairman of Google and author, along with Jared Cohen, of the book The New Digital Age.

Eric Schmidt, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, I've been searching Oh, I've been searching So long for you Mr. Schmidt was a tech mogul, so why not pair him right now with a mogul skier, in fact, one of the greatest of all time, Olympic gold medalist Hannah Kearney,

who we spoke to while in her hometown, Salt Lake City, in 2017. But as Hannah told Peter, she didn't actually grow up there. I did not. I grew up skiing on ice in Vermont. Right. And is that why you became a mogul skier? Because you couldn't find a decent, squirmed run anywhere in Vermont? It certainly built character,

and it honed my turns. It made skiing in Utah much easier. Wow, yeah. I should probably explain, because not everybody knows what mogul skiing is. So you're basically, you're skiing, you're going around these many, many, many bumps in the course, and then every now and then you hit a jump, you go flying in the air, you do a somersault or something impressive, you land, you keep going. Yep. And then it's also timed. Right. So how did

you, well, first of all, how old were you when you started skiing? I was two years old when my parents put my two-year-old body inside of a horse halter and let me go down the slopes, and I don't remember learning how to ski. Really? So, like, you have no memory of yourself before you knew how to ski? Correct. Wow. You were in the horse halter? Were they riding you?

The whip. That's why I became a good skier. Just kidding, Mom and Dad. So, when you get in a car, do love the streets with a lot of potholes when you're driving it's sort of the same thing right yeah those you'd be dodging moguls you're going straight over them but similar yeah yeah now no backflips this is this is this is a relatively new competitive sport right because ski racing classically was just downhill and slalom and giant slalom. And when did they start adding these sort of crazy new types of skiing to the international circuit?

At the Olympic level, it was 1992 for our sport. And they've been, as you've seen, adding more crazier sports year after year. In my sport alone, I was, I think, 16 years old when I had to just start learning backflips because someone, his name was Johnny Mosley, decided he was going to push the sport and make it so that all future generations were going to have to learn crazy flips and maneuvers. They're not as dangerous as they sound, but I don't think that's what my parents thought when they first heard. And certainly nothing I was interested in doing when I signed up for mogul skiing, meeting my dad at Tower 8 and skiing bumps. I wanted to keep my feet on the ground.

Can I ask you something? You keep talking about you didn't want to do the acrobatics and so on. Was there a point when you realized like, wow, I'm really good at this? I mean, you were the best in the world and you didn't want to do it. What if you had focused? good at this. I mean, you were the best in the world and you didn't want to do it. What if you had focused? We might never know. We might never know. I tricked myself into thinking

I liked them. I put little post-its in my room at the Olympic Training Center that said I love jumping. Really? And it's only now that I would admit that I didn't really like it. That was your self-motivation program? It worked I thought you guys had like, you know, multi-thousand dollar sports psychologists

Nothing's better than a post-it Post-it, okay World's shortest TED talk Exactly Now, you've skied in two Olympics 2010 and... Excuse me But the first one was so unsuccessful

that it would be better off if we just where was that Torino Italy in 2006 yeah and then you came back in 2010 and you won gold

yeah that was where exactly that was Vancouver Vancouver that was a final I have heard we have all heard that the Olympic Village

is like an absolute decadent Roman orgy all the time. That is what they tell us. And they say, well, you know, young athletes, they're away from home. No, they're going at it like sled dogs. Exactly. What comment can you make about that, shall we say, stereotype of Olympic Villages? I can make a couple comments.

All right. I will start with the rumor, which was there's a bowl of condoms at the health center. That's what we hear about. In the athlete village. And they disappear quickly. So I was like, oh my goodness, these are being put to use.

But let me ask you this. If you were at the Olympics and there were Olympic condoms Say so Olympic Olympic branded a little five rings on the condoms? I never opened it, so I'm not positive. All right. They come in all the colors of the Olympic rings. Of course they do.

And they work so well, there's a flame at the tip. I know. You might be onto something. Hannah Carney, it is a pleasure to talk to you. We have asked you here to play a game we're calling... I am the master of all I survey. You ski moguls. So we thought we would ask you about the other kind of moguls, business moguls.

Answer two out of these three questions correctly. You'll win a prize for one of our listeners. Bill, who is Hannah playing for? Kyle Trotter of Salt Lake City, Utah. All right. First question. Ready to do this? Ready.

Samuel Goldwyn was one of the great movie moguls, and he was famous for his odd turns of phrase known around Hollywood as Goldwynisms, including, at least allegedly, which of these? A. When told he couldn't make a movie from a book because it was about lesbians, he said, it's okay, we'll make them Hungarians instead. Or, B's okay, we'll make them Hungarians instead. Or, B, quote, my own personal theory is that the pyramids were built

to store grain. Or, C, quote, people are not as stupid as the media think they are. Many of them are stupid, but I'm talking about overall. C. You're going to go for C? Yep. No, that was actually said by Ben Carson,

the Department of Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. The real answer was A, the one about the lesbians. Oh, second choice. So what was it? No, so the first one about the Hungarians, that was Samuel Goldman. The other two about the pyramids storing grain and people are, in fact, stupid.

That's Ben Carson, the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. He would recognize stupid. Okay, Hannah, you've got two more chances. Here is your next question. Working for a mogul can be pretty dangerous, as in which of these cases? A, cosmetics mogul Vidal Sassoon required that his employees never wear bike helmets,

which might cover their silky, lustrous hair. B, in the early days at Ben & Jerry's, ice cream mogul Ben Cohen used to make employees eat new flavors as fast as possible to test brain freeze. Or C, in order to test the quality of his wares, bulletproof clothing mogul Miguel Caballero shoots all of his employees in the chest. C.

C it is. Very good. Did you know that? Thanks, guys. All right Alright Last question You get this right, you win One of the most famous moguls we have today Is of course Rupert Murdoch He made his first fortune in Australia And then he moved to the UK in the 1960s

Buying the then struggling tabloid The Sun He turned its fortunes around By telling its editor what A, quote Focus on, footballers, girlfriends, and things that look like footballs. B, if you use a word longer than three syllables, you're fired. Or C, I want a paper with lots of boobs in it. How could you prove he didn't say any of those things?

Well... She's going to be right whatever she answers. I like that. I like your thinking. They all sound possible. They do. I mean, is there a transcript of everything he's ever said? According to his biography, he said one of those things.

Oh, had I read his biography? Has anyone read his biography? Really? That would be absolutely not my choice. It's funny. You don't have to read his biography. You just have to read an issue of The Sun. Okay.

The audience in my ear is saying C. And it is C. Thank you. Well done. Bill, how did Hannah Carney do in our quiz? Well, of course she won. Two out of three. Thanks for that.

Here we go again. Hannah Carney is an Olympic gold medal winning skier who just finished her junior year at Westminster College here in Salt Lake City. Hannah, thank you so much for joining us. And what are you going to tell me? Give it up for Hannah Carney. When we come back, one of the greatest basketball coaches of all time and one of the greatest myth busters, which, let's face it, is a little easier to be because how many myth busters are

there? That's when we come back with more Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me from NPO. What does it mean that Trump's mugshot recalls Paris Hilton's? What does the fake resume of George Santos tell us about American myths? What if I told you that the Kardashians are the new Kennedys? On It's Been a Minute, I give you fresh ways of thinking about what's going on. Listen every week to It's Been a Minute from NPR. Hi, I'm Jen White from 1A, the home of good conversation. But what makes it great are the ideas and insights you bring to the show every day. It seems only fair that when you make room for us, we make room for you. Listen to the 1A podcast from WAMU and NPR.

From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, the NPR News Quiz. I'm Bill Curtis, and here is your host at the Studebaker Theater and the Fine Arts Building in downtown Chicago, Peter Sagal. Thank you, Bill. Thanks, everybody. So we keep wanting, we really do, to move on from our 25th anniversary, but we keep finding such amazing stuff in the vault. Imagine Scrooge McDuck diving into his big pile of gold coins, but instead of gold coins, it's reels and reels of tape. For example, one of the greatest college basketball coaches ever was Muffet McGraw, who for 33 years was the head coach of the Notre Dame women's team, leading them to two championships and a 77% win-loss record. We visited

with her near South Bend in 2013, and Peter began with the most important question for such an accomplished person. College sports is a cutthroat business, especially at Notre Dame, and they expect excellence and they expect toughness. Has having the name Muffet been a little bit of a hindrance? I mean... Well, you know, when I came there, Digger was the men's coach. So, I thought I fit right in. Now, did you grow up playing basketball? I did.

Right. I played professionally for the California Dreams. I played in college for St. Joe's in Philadelphia. You played professionally for the California Dreams? This was a pre-WNBA women's professional league? It was the first women's league, so I got my husband a t-shirt that said, My wife is a dream. Did you get tired of the wild lifestyle

of a professional basketball player? The entourage, the hangers-on, the money? All the kids you didn't know you had? Yeah, for example. I have to say, you don't seem like you have, like, shall we say, the enormous height of a professional basketball player. I was a point guard.

Now, imagine that I don't know anything about basketball. That's your next point. That's so funny. Honestly, I... Hold on, Peter. I'm getting the image here now. Okay. Just pretend.

All right, go ahead. Let me stand in for people who are so ignorant of basketball that they don't exactly know what that means. Would you explain what that means? Well, the point guard is generally smaller than the other players on the team and bossier. Really? Yeah. They run the show.

She's like the Magic Johnson, even though he was big, Peter. He's a big guy. He's a big part, but she's like the John Stockton. How's that? There you go. There you go. Yeah. She passes the ball.

Yeah. She shoots from the outside. Of course, John Stockton was How's that? There you go. There you go. Yeah. She passes the ball. She shoots from the outside. Of course, John Stockton was one of the dirtiest players in the history of the NBA. Were you dropping the elbow as the people came around the pick? A little bit. I thought so. Really? You got to.

I could see it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've always wanted to know, because I watch basketball on TV, and there are moments when the coach calls on the players, and he or she is just yelling at them. And you can't tell, because, of course, you can just see it on TV. What are you saying at that moment? I mean, are you trying to motivate the players? I mean, don't they have motivation enough?

They do. They do. We're talking about practice the next day and how hard it's going to be if we don't win this game. Really? You're sort of threatening them? A little bit. But let me try to, because I want to get a sense of this, because it's not a world I

know anything about. Let's assume that you are coaching, say, me. And you're watching the sidelines, and I'm not doing a good job. I know that's hard to imagine, but let's assume. And you call me over and give me the full-on Muffet of the sidelines. What would that be like? Why did I give you a scholarship? That's the point! I'm gonna get back out there and play, coach.

Everybody knows that the women's game is just as hard, just as demanding, just as competitive as the men's game is just as hard, just as demanding, just as competitive as the men's game, but is the style different? Is like trash talk different in the women's game? No, it really, it's an art form. Trash talk? Yeah. Yeah.

So... We don't start it, we finish it. Well, Muffet McGraw, we're delighted to talk to you here. And we've invited you here to play a game we're calling... So, what exactly is a toughet anyway? Right. So, you're the first Muffet we've met other than Little Miss herself. So, we thought we'd ask you about her world, nursery rhymes and children's songs.

Answer two out of these three questions about Mother Goose and her offshoots. If you do, you'll win our prize. One of our listeners, Carl's voice in their voicemail. Carl, who is Muffet McGraw playing for? Muffet is playing for Barbara Twitchell of Elkhart, Indiana. All right. Okay, here is your first question. The nursery rhyme Goosey Goosey Gander

is, according to some experts, really about what? A, consorting with prostitutes. B. An incident in the late 18th century British-Dutch naval war. Or C. Goosey Goosey Ganders. I'm going to go with C. You're going to go with C? It's actually about Goosey Ganders? Yes. No, it's actually about consorting with prostitutes.

According to some scholars, Go goosey was a slang term for ladies of the evening, if you will. All right. So you're down a little bit. If you were your own player, what would you say? I can do it.

You can do it. You can do it. You can go out there. Just box out. We all know Georgie Porgy pudding and Pie, Kiss the Girls and Made Him Cry. Okay.

According to some scholars, that nursery rhyme is really full of veiled references to what? A, the discovery of the element oxygen, B, a gay sex scandal in the court of King Charles II, or C, Pudding and Pie. Could I get a hint?

No. Do your players get a little step ladder to dunk? No. Then you get a hint. Number two sounds terrible. The gay sex scandal in the Court of King Charles II. You are correct. Georgie, or George, was a courtier

who was appointed a gentleman of the bedchamber to the king, and rumors flew. All right, that's very good. You have one right with one to go, so it's coming down to the final minutes. The French kid song, Alouette, you know, Alouette, gente alouette, that one, very popular, kids all around the world.

It may not be as popular if the kids knew what they were really singing about. Are they singing about, A, a gay sex scandal in the court of King Charles II? B, how much they love a certain hair product? Or C, are they singing about plucking birds so they can eat them? Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Well.

Why are you hissing at her? See? See. See. We're going to go with see. We're going to go with see. When the crowds call out plays, we follow the players.

No, you're right. It's C. Thank you. Alouette. An alouette is a lark. French Canadians love to eat larks, and it's all about plucking all its little parts so they can eat it.

Carl, how did Muffet McGraw do in our quiz? Muffet had two correct answers, Peter, so she wins for Barbara Twitchell. Well done. Muffet McGraw is the head coach of the Notre Dame women's basketball team. Muffet McGraw, thank you so much for being here. What a pleasure.

Instead of scrolling mindlessly, engage mindfully with the NPR app. With a mix of on-demand news, stories from this station, and your favorite podcast, you can relax without shutting off your brain. Download the NPR app today. The economy can sometimes feel like a big, scary wilderness, filled with jargon and unreadable charts. The Planet Money Podcast is here to help.

We love spreadsheets. Yeah, let us be your guide to the global economy. We brought snacks. Is that trail mix? It's actually gorp. That's Planet Money from NPR. Hi, I'm Jen White from 1A. I host a news show for those who need to know what's happening and why it matters. But we get it. The news can weigh you down. It's why we also make time for stories, guests, and surprises that'll lift you up. Listen to the 1A podcast from WAMU and NPR. my favorite people in all media, myth buster Adam Savage, who got to live out every nerd's dream, blowing stuff up for a living in the name of science. Adam and his partner, J.B. Heinemann, would go to any lengths to test if something was a myth. For example, whether or not elephants were afraid of mice. That's correct. We were actually in South Africa filming with some great white sharks, and the weather prohibited us from going out on the boat, and we had a few days to kill, so we decided to just head inland and get a mouse and see if the elephants were actually afraid of it.

Honestly, we thought we were just producing some extra kind of funny filler for the show. We had no idea that the elephant would be absolutely kind of visibly freaked out by seeing this tiny little mouse. Do you think it was just that one elephant? Maybe it had issues from childhood? Faux-bex. Going way back? That was a really big mouse.

How did it express fear? Well, see, we wanted to introduce the mouse to its environment kind of abruptly, so we took a piece of elephant dung and we hollowed it out, and we put what was then a very unhappy mouse inside this piece of elephant dung with a piece of monofilament tied to it so we could puppet the dung. I'm sorry, did you say you could puppet the dung? I did indeed. All right.

And then as the elephant came wandering along, we moved the dung out of the way, and there was this very surprised little mouse. And the elephant absolutely stopped in his tracks, and the best way I can describe it is he tiptoed around the mouse. Really? Well, wait a minute, wait a minute. Put yourself in the elephant's place.

I mean, forgive me, but if a mouse emerged from your dung, I mean, don't you think... I mean, forgive me, but if a mouse emerged from your dung, I mean, don't you think... I would be... I mean, I would freak out. I'd say, what did I eat? I'm not going back to that restaurant again, is what I'd say. You did the famous one, I love this, about whether or not a plane could or could not take off if it was on a conveyor belt. Oh my God.

I saw that. And you actually put a plane on a conveyor belt. We did. We did. You wouldn't believe the amount of discussion there is on the internet about this question. If you have a plane trying to take off and it's on a conveyor belt matching its speed in reverse, can it take off? What's the answer?

Well, hold on. Well, explain the problem and then tell us what happened. Well, the problem is that the question has a trick in it. It leads you to believe, just by the phrasing of the question, that the plane will not move forward. And thus, the question is, can it take off if it's not moving forward? But that's actually not so true.

The fact is, no matter how fast the conveyor belt is moving, the plane will move forward because the plane doesn't push along the ground. It pushes through the air. And the only reason the wheels are there is to keep the propeller from hitting the ground. How did you get a conveyor belt big enough to hold a plane up or a plane small enough to go in a conveyor belt? We did both. We actually got an ultralight plane that was in exactly, you know, a real plane shape that weighed about 500 pounds and a willing pilot.

And we got a quarter mile drunk. Yeah, go ahead. I'm so disappointed in American Airlines. So you were saying, so you put this guy in an ultralight plane. We got the ultralight plane and we put it on a runway on top of a quarter mile long piece of tarpaulin that we were dragging with a pickup truck in the opposite direction. Okay. And it

actually turned out we had to do it at exactly dawn because at any other time of day, even the slightest wind would turn this thing into just a big twisting ribbon. So we only had one chance to get it right, and we actually did it. The truck took off in the opposite direction, 25 miles an hour, which is the takeoff speed of the plane, and the plane absolutely lifted off, something the pilot of the plane didn't think it would do, in fact. Wow. So all the Internet discussions have ended.

No, absolutely not. They all… The primary argument that remains on the Internet is, well, they did it wrong because the plane took off. Yeah. Adam Savage, we're delighted to have you with us. We've invited you here to play a game that today we are calling… Without you, George Hamilton would never have been able to star in Love at First Bite. In other words, you're Bram Stoker, the mostly mediocre 19th century Irish novelist who did happen to write Dracula. Using Eric Newsom's new popular history of vampires, The Dead Travel Fast,

we're going to ask you three questions about Bram Stoker. Get two right, you'll win our prize for one of our listeners. Carl's voice in the home answering machine. So, Carl, who is Adam Savage playing for? Adam is playing for Cherie Morgan of Rensselaer, New York. Ready to play? I'm ready. All right. Your first question. The authorship of Dracula may not have been the most impressive achievement of Bram Stoker's life, because he also managed to do what? Did he A, star in the first cigarette advertisement, B, invent the idea of the author's book tour,

or C, steal Oscar Wilde's girlfriend? Couldn't have been hard. I'm going to have to go with C, steal Oscar Wilde's girlfriend. That couldn't have been hard. I'm going to have to go with C, steal Oscar Wilde's girlfriend. Stealing Oscar Wilde's girlfriend. You're right, sir. He stole Oscar Wilde's girlfriend. His girlfriend, Ned. Stoker became friendly with Oscar Wilde while at college,

and there he met Florence Balcombe, who was attached to Wilde. Eventually, Florence got tired of waiting around for Wilde while at college, and there he met Florence Balcombe, who was attached to Wilde. Eventually, Florence got tired of waiting around for Wilde to make the first move, so she went off with Stoker instead. Next question, very good. Next question. Stoker's first book was not, to put it mildly, as much of a success as his later work. What was it? Was it A, a romance between a Dublin ferryboat captain and a lost mermaid, or B, a non-fiction guide to the duties and procedures of the lower-level Irish bureaucracy, or C, a catalogue of the different kinds of potatoes grown in County Kilkenny? I'm going to go with B. You're going to go with B, The Nonfiction Guide to the Duties and Procedures of the Lower Level Irish Bureaucracy. That page, Turner.

You're right. You are right. The book was called The Duties of Clarks of Petty Sessions in Ireland. It did not inspire any movie adaptations. Well, this is impressive. Let's see if you can go for perfect. On whom, according to a widely accepted theory

held by Stoker biographers, did Bram Stoker model the character of Dracula? Was it A, the great American poet Walt Whitman, B, his own mother-in-law, or C, Santa Claus? Wow. That is an awesome question.

Thank you, sir. Very interesting. I'm going to go with A. I'm going to go with Walt Whitman. You think he based Dracula on Walt Whitman? You're right. He did. Amazing. Although... I sing.

I sing the body electric. Although according to the biographers, it wasn't an act of jealousy. It was an act of appreciation. Stoker was a huge fan of Whitman's. He corresponded with him for years from across the Atlantic. You see, in addition to being a very powerful, sexually liberated character, much like Whitman,

Stoker's Dracula is also described in the book as looking just like Walt Whitman in real life. Wow. Something you didn't know. I had no idea. Carl, how did Adam Savage do on our quiz? Adam aced it, Peter. Three correct answers, so he wins for Cherie Morgan. There you go.

We should have known better than to go up against a guy with his own lab and acetylene torches. You did well. You seem to have a gift for this ferreting out truth. Maybe you should make something of it. You know what? I think you're right. I think I will.

Well, you did good here, Adam Savage. Thank you so much for being with us. Adam Savage is one of the Discovery Channel's Mythbusters. Adam Savage, thank you so much.

Thanks, Peter. Take care. You're welcome. That's it for our Giving Thanks for 25 Years edition. Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me is a production of

NPR and WBEZ Chicago in association with Urgent Haircar Productions, Doug Berman, Benevolent Overlord. Philip Godeka writes our limericks. Our public address announcer is Paul Friedman. Our tour manager is Shana Donnell. Thanks to the staff and crew at the Studio Baker Theatre.

BJ Lederman composed our theme. Our program was produced by Jennifer Mills, Miles Drombos, and Lillian King. Special thanks to Monica Hickey. Special spanks to Peter Gwynn. Our vibe curator is Emma Choi. Our technical director is Lorna White. Our CFO is Colin Miller.

Our production manager is Robert Newhouse. Our senior producer, that's Ian Chilog. And the executive producer of Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me is Mike Danforth. Thanks to Bill Curtis, to all of the guests and panelists you heard this week, including, of course, our founding judge and scorekeeper, the much-missed Carl Castle. And thanks to all of you for listening, and thanks to our fabulous audience here at the Studebaker Theatre. You guys are the greatest. I love you being here for this.

I'm Peter Sagal. We'll see you next week. Thank you. This is NPR. mental illness, which loses patients to an endless loop between the streets, jail, and hospitals. Does it have to be this way? For the history, the reality, and hopefully some solutions, listen to Lost Patients from KUOW and The Seattle Times, part of the NPR Network. Big news stories don't always break on your schedule. But with the NPR app, news, culture, and podcasts are ready when you want them.

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