392: Kill The Part That Cringes

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You're listening to a Complexly podcast.

Hello, and welcome to Dear Hank and John.

Or as I prefer to think of it, Dear John and Hank.

It's a podcast where two brothers answer your questions, give you DBS advice, and bring you all the week's news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon.

John, I have a friend.

I have a friend.

He's a farmer, and his crop failed.

His crop failed, and now he's going to become a musician.

Do you know why?

Why?

He just had a ton of sick beats.

Yeah, so he's able to make that transition really seamlessly.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Exactly.

How's it going?

How's it going?

You told me,

I hate to do this, but you told me a story that is so wild that I cannot tell anybody else.

Yeah, I feel like we can't tell anybody else, but it was pretty wild.

I was on a, I was on a.

I'll tell it.

I'll tell it without, I mean, I'll obscure the identities.

John's on a Zoom call about a potentially cool thing that might, but probably won't happen.

And on this Zoom call is a person who is so famous that you haven't just heard of them.

You know what they look like.

You know their work.

You could, you, you would be very familiar with the things that they have created.

I should say that this has nothing to do with movies, probably.

Well, it's a, I would say it's a top 10, top 20 American famous person.

Yeah, but certainly

in their creative endeavor.

But a person like who I in particular find cool.

Like I wanted to take the call because I find the person really cool.

And it's not Taylor.

I think we should just say that.

I think we should just say it's not Taylor.

Otherwise, otherwise people are going to be like, oh, you've got video on your podcast now.

You're like dropping vague gossip about Taylor.

Like, are you the Kelsey brothers?

And I get why people get confused about it.

We're both brothers.

We're both extremely handsome.

We're both charming.

We're both, we both have awesome

partners

and muscles.

Great point, Hank.

That's the other kind of defining feature of the Green Brothers.

Yeah.

Musculature.

Yeah.

So, so John's talking to this top, top 20 famous person.

And

they say,

oh, here's the book that you signed for me at the Faultenar Stars tour in 2012.

Yeah.

So like they were in the room.

They went through the signing line.

We signed the thing for them.

And like that, like it was just like a, like every other nerd fighter type interaction.

Well, and that's what, that's what, that's what happens, Hank.

Right.

Like it's just a reminder that like lovely kids grow up to be lovely people a lot of the time.

Yeah.

And

you know, like, of course, of course, I was a little locked into that moment because it was a very famous person, but I have versions of that conversation all the time where someone I admire or someone who's doing cool work will say, oh, I watched Crash Course or, oh, but, but to have them actually have gone to the tour was a little, was a little exceptional.

And like wait in the two-hour long signing line.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So that was very cool and it was a fun moment.

But I, I mean, one of the joys of middle age is getting to have those moments where like you run into somebody.

Like I just had dinner last night with a, with a, with a couple and they talked about um

crash course and stuff so you never can i tell you what is weird about this for me yeah

so uh

in

the the the reality was that when that person went through that line they were them um you know like they had their name that i would never have heard And now they are them and they have their name that everybody in America would recognize.

Yeah.

But they were the same person, but they it feels it feels to me and like i know that this is like dehumanizing but it feels to me like they went through the signing line before they were them

totally because fame is a weird weird drug it's like a hallucinogen

but but instead of just affecting the person who has it it also affects the other people it mostly affects the other people yeah yeah yeah yeah it's like it's like when i'm in in a room with a very famous person I have taken a hallucinogen, but like they have also taken a hallucinogen in the sense that like everyone's looking at them.

And so they have that sixth grade feeling that everyone's looking at me, except everyone is actually looking at them.

Everyone's right.

Yeah.

And so their lines are also very distorted by fame.

Yeah, fame is weird.

And I'll just.

I'll say it since we're in a safe space here.

Only cool people listen to this podcast, so it shouldn't be an issue.

I said something on Instagram and then the Indy Star reported as a news article, and it really got me in my head.

Where I'm like, now do I have to like think about everything I'm going to say?

Because it's going to be in the Indy Star, and my neighbors are going to be like, I didn't know that you didn't like the guy who tried to ban your books, who's now going to be the next lieutenant governor of Indiana.

Anyway,

I'm in a safe space.

Indy Star, this is off the record.

Fame, the fame part of fame, yeah, sucks.

I it's

it is a drug and it's really intoxicating, but like like it sucks.

It's and a lot of but a lot of a lot of people like it's the it's the goal.

It's like a bigger goal It was my goal, man.

You don't think I want to be famous?

I started making YouTube videos.

Like

I, you know, like obviously I wanted people to see my face desperately.

I want to just write stories

to reach them.

Why did we want to be famous?

Well, well,

I think the better question is like, why do why have we stopped wanting to get more famous?

Well, why do we still even want to be a little bit famous, Hank?

Like, what is wrong with us that we want like attention from strangers?

Well, I mean, there's the part where we want attention from strangers.

There's also the part where we want to like do stuff.

Oh, like make a difference in the world, boring, boo, don't believe you.

Don't genuinely don't think that's what it's about.

I don't think that that, I don't think that that's what it's all about, but I think that there is a, there's definitely a, if we just checked out, we would not achieve all of our goals.

That is 100% true.

because I have thought about salingering.

I mean, so much so that Sarah and I have a verb for it.

And every time I think about salingering, I'm like, well, but it would be a catastrophe for my work in tuberculosis that gives me a ton of fulfillment.

And it would be a catastrophe for all the people who work at DFTBA and Complexly.

Like, you know, the truth is, like, the consequences of me salingering would be lots and lots of nice people losing their jobs.

So we can't have that.

I guess that is true but i still think that there is part of us that likes attention from strangers yeah yeah i mean positive attention yeah that like uh

great point

the the

i mean like there was no part of me on 20 in 2015 who who went on tumblr and felt like oh this will be fun i love this so much but i still like there's also like a sensation part of it like we like we are also we're like monkeys you know and like that social status is a thing and it is

a thing that we are designed or that we like we want.

We like it.

Then there are reasons we want it.

There's like evolutionary reasons why we want it.

And like, so I'm like, I'm just a

person.

I'm an animal, a human animal who's inhabiting like a human animal body.

And like when I go on Twitter and I say something and a bunch of people laugh and like heart it and like it and interact with it.

And then they say, oh, well, Hank's so relatable.

I like this guy so much.

I like that.

Especially as a guy who, like, for, you know, a lot of my formative years was punched by high status individuals.

So, like, there's a, there's like a thing there.

I think that's a big part of it.

Yeah.

I used to get really devastated by high, high social status individuals.

And now, interestingly, those same high social status individuals who now identify as like alphas

and spend a lot of time talking about high social status individuals.

Yeah.

They still hate me and I just don't care anymore.

Yeah.

It's like I

found out.

And now I want to be liked by different people than I do.

Yeah, you know what I'm saying, but I actually haven't made any progress since I was 12 with the kinds of kids who used to beat me up.

I'd be interested for you or me to make a video on like the kinds of nerd.

I was talking to Colin and Samir, who are like lacrosse nerds.

And I'm like, oh, yeah.

Yeah, you guys can say you're nerds.

But when I was in high school the lacrosse guys were not like as like the same kind of cool as the football guys but they were super cool like they were way cooler than me they were nerdy about their thing but like they were not nerdy about their thing the way that like i was nerdy about my things that were just

like unacceptably uncool

yeah

yeah maybe it's partly social

structures because if you're into lacrosse lacrosse in a really nerdy, stats-driven way, it's still kind of cool.

Yeah.

Whereas if you're into Pokemon in a really nerdy, stats-driven way, it's seen as nerdier.

Yeah.

And some of that's just social constructs, right?

Like, that's not all.

But it's also

a good idea.

I think you can definitely be a lacrosse nerd.

It's just that if you're a lacrosse nerd, you'll be treated a little bit differently.

Yeah.

If you play a lot of lacrosse, your forearms do look nice.

And if you play a lot of Pokemon,

that is not the case.

Well, I don't know that that's true.

I've seen some pretty handsome forearms on some professional Pokemon players.

but your point is happening from the Pokemon play.

When those lacrosse boys roll up the sleeve, you know, like to the halfway point.

Yeah.

I think all of us are a little bit like, oh,

yeah.

Yeah.

Let's answer some questions from our listeners.

We should probably do that.

I don't think we're going to get to the bottom of all of our issues.

We'll work on it again next week.

Yeah.

Let's try to understand what it is that's driving us at some point, not necessarily today, but like before we die.

Let's understand why we're doing what we're doing and whether or not we should be doing something different.

Anytime you want to figure that out with me, I'm excited for the journey.

All right, Hank, we got a question from Avery, who writes, Dear John and Hank, in movies, when a character is giant, they have a low, booming voice, and tiny characters have squeaky, high-pitched voices.

Is this really how that would work, or is Hollywood lying to us?

Tiny pumpkins and giant penguins, Avery, great question.

This is actually super interesting.

so so you yeah the you could you could imagine like mice obviously have a little high-pitched voices yeah you got that elephants have that low rumble yeah they can make a super low like rumble noise they also make that sort of trumpeting which is a separate thing is going on yeah and so you you can kind of like extend out from that that like this is the case and indeed it is smaller people uh tend to have higher pitched voices larger people tend to have lower pitched voices This is a tendency.

It is not a, it's not like there is a correlation there, but it is not like, it's not super tight.

There are small people who have low voices.

It's just like some people have long arms, you know?

And, but it is about like the, the actual like length.

It's like it's a function of this sort of like size and length of the things going on in your throat.

So

it really does matter.

So there is some biology behind this.

Yeah, yeah.

Like Andre the Giant actually had a super low voice because he was very, very large.

I was a big fan of Andre the Giant.

Can you do an Andre the Giant impression?

No.

No.

I can't do any impressions now because my impression of Danish people was deemed offensive, which is hard to do.

Like it's hard to have an impression of Danish people that Danish people themselves are like, I'm sorry, but that is actually an insult to our culture.

That's fascinating, though, Hank.

Here's another interesting thing, though.

Because

deeper voice, so this is not a human thing, but in some animals, because a deeper voice is a signal that you are a larger organism, they will fake having a deeper voice than they otherwise should have in order to appear more attractive to mates.

So there's like an honest signaling thing where like as you get bigger, your voice gets lower.

And there's a dishonest signaling, this is what they call it in evolutionary biology, where

you make

your voice lower to pretend that you are bigger as to attract mates who then will.

We're going for trying to get a bigger mate who would thus be signaling an honest increase in fitness.

But in fact, you are dishonestly attracting a mate just by pretending and getting a lower vocal tract.

And then you have sort of like an arms race of lower voices without the bodies themselves actually getting bigger.

Wait, it's called dishonest what?

Dishonest signaling.

Yeah.

Dishonest.

I did a lot of dishonest signaling when

we first getting together.

You know who's the biggest dishonest signaler?

Oh, boy, I got some thoughts.

Male peacocks, in my opinion.

There actually is maybe

the feathers of a peacock.

Yeah.

First, you have to have succeeded in a lot of ways.

So in like, like, to have really big, beautiful feather, you have to, you know,

be well fed and getting a lot of food.

But also, also you have to be able to protect yourself to continue having your tail feathers look very good.

So there might be some honesty to the peacock feather.

There's some honesty to that part of the signaling, but the part where they're signaling, I am a super sophisticated animal who is crazy about beauty, who's crazy for beauty, who's like,

you know, basically like a curator of contemporary art.

No.

Turns out, birds.

Just birds.

They're birds.

They're dull as a sack of rocks.

Uh-huh.

They have no idea how beautiful they are.

They don't know they're beautiful.

It's like the

girl in a 90s rom-com.

See how just one day he takes off his glasses and he's like, wait a second.

Am I?

Am I?

Just like walks into school the next day and he's like, look at this.

It was there the whole time.

And we're like, yeah, no, we knew.

we could tell.

We also like glasses, they are kind of cute.

It's yeah, I actually thought you looked better in glasses with your hair back.

It's kind of my, it's just my thing, yeah, yeah.

Makes makes makes me feel like maybe there could actually, this actually might happen.

All right, Abby asks, Dear John and Hank, where do flies sleep?

Since getting pet chickens a couple years ago, the number of flies that hang around our backyard has gotten out of control and they're driving me crazy.

I notice they don't ever seem to be around at night, which makes me wonder where are they sleeping?

I want to find them and destroy them all at once.

Unfortunately, I don't think they all sleep together.

If there was like a big cuddle,

it's like a big flyball somewhere.

Yeah,

that you could just shoot with a hot plasma rifle, that would be great.

But I think that they find their like, they all find sort of like little different places to go chill out.

Some of them, they like crawl under rocks.

So it's not easy to find flies sleeping.

They take up a huge amount of space when they're flying around because

it's volumetric.

They're just like constantly everywhere.

But when they're just chilling out, they take up a tiny amount of space.

They take up the amount of space that a fly, like a fly-sized amount of space.

And that's just up in the corner or under a leaf or under some, under like leaf litter, under rocks.

You're never going to find the flies.

There are other solutions.

Hunting them down while they're sleeping is not the one.

Though I do love the Vendangel element of it.

Yeah.

I'll find you and then I'll put a dead horse head under your bed.

I only kill them at night when they don't see it coming.

All right, I got another question for you.

This one's from Talya, who writes, Dear John and Hank, recently my best friend and I were playing 20 Questions in the car and we landed in quite the argument.

His word in mind was seed.

However, when I asked, is it a plant, his response was no.

He argues that according to the letter of the law, seed is not a plant, and therefore the answer is no.

I'm arguing that in the spirit of the law, claiming that the aim of 20 Questions is to move the guesser closer to a final goal, is it part of a plant should be considered as similar to, is it a plant?

And as such, the answer would be yes.

Your input would be greatly appreciated.

Boo, boo.

No, no, no.

I'm with your friend.

I'm with the friend.

You can't, I mean, I agree.

There's a, there's like a, there's like fuzziness eventually, but it is not at seed.

If you ask me if a leaf is a plant, I'm not saying yes.

If you ask me if...

No, a leaf is not a plant.

A leaf is a plant.

A leaf is not a plant.

A lot of times you can put a leaf in the ground and and get a new dang plant.

This is true.

That does.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, that's also true of a seed.

Like if you put a seed in the ground, that's its whole purpose is to become a whole new dang plant.

But a sperm and an egg are not a human.

Uh-oh.

Okay.

And if we're going to go there, and I guess we are, neither a sperm nor an egg is a human.

Yes.

An egg is not a human.

I mean, a seed is a seed is not a plant.

A seed is not a plant.

A seed is not a plant.

And I think that I would be confused if you said yes.

I would start naming plants.

I wouldn't start naming parts of plants.

Yeah.

I like to play like a 20 questions where you don't have to say yes or no, where you might say,

Right.

Okay.

You make space for like, meh.

Yeah.

I mean, you're in the right, you're in the right universe, but you haven't.

Yeah, where you like make a noise that you're like, oh, that made me think.

I'm not actually sure.

And I, and like, ultimately,

that is the correct noise to make in that situation.

But if you make me say yes or no, a seed is not a plant, it is a potential plant.

Is a fertilized seed a plant?

I am in the

world I am imagining, the seed is fertilized.

Usually, like, seeds usually don't form unless they are fertilized.

When does the plant become a plant?

When the seed germinates.

I know the word for that.

Okay.

Hey, I want to play 20 questions with you after the ad break.

But first, today's podcast is brought to you by the seed germinating, Hank's very specific definition of when a seed becomes a plant.

This podcast is also brought to you by Andre the Giant's voice.

Andre the Giant's voice.

It's big for a reason.

And today's podcast is also brought to you by famous people complaining about being famous.

Famous people complaining about being famous.

Relatable and enjoyable since 1852.

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The Dear Hank and John live stream is the most important thing in my professional life because it is the 45 minutes a month where Hank and I have a deep conversation with our community about the stuff that we actually think about all the time and that actually matters to us.

It's very good.

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And we are always working it out just like we were at the beginning of this episode, but for longer.

It's like that, but it just keeps happening.

We are also going to be making our next monthly patron live stream open to the public so that you can see it for everybody.

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We're just

doing it for clips, but the plan is to eventually do that once we figure out how we might do it.

We just got to get, we got to get on board with those Kelsey brothers, Hank.

We got to get to where they're at.

I know.

Well, it'd be nice if we were in the same physical space.

which those Kelsey brothers are.

The Kelsey brothers aren't.

They're not?

Oh, no.

One of them is in Kansas City and one of them is in Philadelphia.

Okay.

Clearly, you're not familiar with their work.

One of them is married to Kylie Kelsey, who I find to be the funniest and most charming person in the world, other than my wife.

And one of them is dating Taylor Swift, who is literally Taylor Swift.

I did know about that.

I didn't know that part.

You've heard about that one.

Oh, God.

It's good to hear, man.

They're still together.

Well, I haven't heard.

Listen, we're recording this on June 19th.

I don't know what their private life is like.

And by the way, I don't want to know.

It's none of my dang business.

They can share whatever they want to share and not share whatever they don't want to share.

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It's up to you.

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So check it out, patreon.com slash dear hank and john.

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All right, John, this next question comes from Vincent, who asks, when, where, and how were hard-shelled tacos invented?

I think they are perfect.

Also, what should I replace beef with in my tacos since I want to eat less beef crunch?

Vincent.

I'm going to take you.

You're going to replace it with impossible meat, which I've found to be really good.

And we're beyond burger or whatever.

I'm not loyal to it.

The ground beef that's in the, that's in the meat-free section.

Get that plant-based meat.

It's good.

Tastes delicious.

I haven't missed beef at all, by the way.

Like,

there are so many good plant-based alternatives now that it's like about as inconvenient as slowing down for a squirrel as it crosses the road.

Like, I don't even think about the inconvenience of it because it's so minorly inconvenient.

Can I tell you about it?

I've been very happy.

The last day before I started Beef Days.

Yeah, what?

Catherine and I and Oren

had many moons ago booked this exclusive and very difficult-to-get-on-to train ride called the Charlie Russell Choo Choo.

The first choo is spelled C-H-E-W.

It's a dinner train,

and also it is a Wild West

performance event where the training is.

It's like medieval times, but it's set in the West and the train gets held up.

The train gets held up.

It's not medieval times.

I don't know where you got that part.

Did you say that?

No, I mean medieval times, like the restaurants.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Not the historical period.

If it really weren't, it was Wild West, but also there were nights.

They were jousting.

No, I just mean like, it's like dinner theater.

It's like dinner in a show.

It's dinner in a show.

It's a dinner theater, but you're on a train and the scenery is amazing.

It's four hours long.

And here, here is the meal that they give you.

Number one, iceberg lettuce with cheddar cheese grated on top with Newman's own salad packets.

One of my top five all-time starters is good.

It's good.

It was legitimate.

I love iceberg lettuce and cheddar cheese.

Those are, I mean,

I'm an American, baby.

And then the main course arrives, and the main course is potatoes, baby carrots,

steamed baby carrots, and I don't know,

a six-pound prime rib.

Oh, God.

And it's the only option.

You cannot get on the Charlie Russell choo-choo unless you eat steak.

Like, that's, there's not, they don't, they're not like a veg option.

This is in Lewistown, Montana, center of Montana.

It's where the cows come from.

They, uh, it's a very cow-focused culture.

And cows eat people in Montana.

I looked, it's true.

I looked down at this, at this steak, and I was like, well, here's, here's to beef days,

my last beef.

And I was like, this is a good last beef.

It was, I watched the people on the train with me eat the whole thing.

Yeah.

And then have a cheesecake afterward.

I love that.

I love that.

And I like, it was, it was insurmountable to both Catherine and I.

And I was somewhat jealous of Aurin, who got chicken strips.

I could have finished it.

Anyway, what was the question?

I don't know.

What were we talking about?

Oh, yeah, beef.

And I,

you, I, I mean,

a chicken taco was great.

Ground turkey is an amazing taco replacement.

We used to eat ground turkey tacos when we were growing up.

Mom would always make ground turkey tacos because she was.

Yeah, but I've just found it easier to like just if I'm if I'm going to not eat beef, like just not eat any meat.

Yeah.

Meat.

It's easier, especially with ground, ground meat type stuff for sure.

Yeah.

Now, hard-shelled tacos.

Do you know who Glenn Bell is, John?

Yeah, I wrote an entire episode of the Anthropocene Reviewed about Glenn Bell.

Glenn Bell is the reason Taco Bell is named Taco Bell because it's not named after a Bell.

It's named after a man whose name was Glenn Bell.

And Glenn Bell claims that he invented the hard shell taco.

Glenn Bell is a liar.

Well, that's a little bit of an oversimplification for the record.

Glenn Bell did acknowledge at certain times the role that the Mitla Cafe played in the creation of Taco Bell.

So Glenn Bell had gotten out of the Marines, I believe, and he was running this hamburger stand in Southern California that was like literally across the street from this great Mexican restaurant that's still there called the Mitla Cafe, where they have hard shell tacos.

And he basically would eat there and he'd be like, these are great.

And he reverse engineered the hard shell tacos, potentially with some like helpful advice from the family who ran and still run the Mitla Cafe.

They've often been really generous in their interpretation of what happened, the Meatla Cafe family.

Like they've often been like, well, that Glenn, he sure did sell those tacos,

but he definitely stole it from them.

Yes.

He definitely stole it from them.

There are even pre-Glenn Bell patents on devices that help to form and fry.

hard shell tacos.

So

it was a thing.

I think obviously he refined them and there were lots of refinements along the way and turning them into a kind of, you know,

some kind of geographical shaped corn chip.

But I think geographical is the wrong term.

Geometrically shaped corn chip.

I think that, to be fair to Taco Bell, I think they were the first person to make a Doritos taco.

But they weren't the first person to make a hard taco or even close.

I am confident that Taco Bell has held its fair share of innovations over the years.

There's a great article in the New Yorker about the 11-year process to create the Crunch Wrap Supreme.

Wow.

That's a lot of R ⁇ D for what, to me, appears to be not super complicated.

Well, the job was to find something that you could eat with one hand while you were driving.

I mean, that's really a beautiful story.

It's really a beautiful story.

I do really recommend it if you have a chance to read it in the New Yorker.

I'm sure it's online.

And it's such a good story because it brings together high culture and low culture in such an interesting way.

Like, because, you know, it's, it's the New Yorker, so it's inherently pretentious.

But at the same time, it's about the crunch rabbit supreme.

And it's just, there's a deliciousness in that way of connecting.

All right, Hank, I got a question for Max, who writes, Dear John and Hank, I recently found out that there's nicotine naturally found in plants.

Indeed, Max, that's

the main way we get it.

Especially in something called tobacco.

One of these is potatoes.

And first of all, excuse me.

Second of all, how many potatoes would you have to consume in one sitting to ingest a cigarette worth of nicotine?

Like, do I need to be concerned about this?

Do I need to add it to the list of worries that keep me up at night?

Always stress to the max.

Absolutely not.

Absolutely not.

You do not need to worry that you're going to get hooked on nicotine by eating potatoes.

No, no, no.

Look, look, look, look, look.

What about

an alternative way to look at this, which is that the world is extraordinarily stressful?

If you could be focusing on something as unimportant as whether or not you're going to get addicted to potatoes, which by the way, you already are,

then maybe you won't be as focused on some of the worst stuff.

That's going to be.

That's a great point.

Yeah, you should be addicted to eating potatoes because they're basically the perfect food.

Oh, they're so good.

They're better than you think.

What's not great is when you deep-fry them.

Other than that, what a delightful food.

They're great for you.

They have tons of nutrients.

They're delicious.

You can survive for many years on a diet of just potatoes if that interests you.

And it does interest me.

I shouldn't do that, but it is possible.

You shouldn't, but you can.

You could.

I think you might need a couple of other things, but yeah.

I don't know that you would.

Well, I once read that it was only, that you can only do it if you also supplement with

dairy milk, because there are vitamins in milk that make up for all the ones that you can't get from potatoes.

And I read that on the internet.

How long could a human live while only eating potatoes and drinking water?

Now, that's a good damn question.

And would they get a nicotine high?

All right.

I got an actual answer from an actual magazine.

And magazines are not the internet.

They're just on the internet.

All right.

If you ate both potatoes and sweet potatoes, you can do it forever.

There it is.

There it is.

Yeah, I believe that.

Sweet potatoes, they're a whole different thing.

I would love to make a Vlogbrothers video or actually do the math on this because I have not done the math, but I bet I could eat enough potatoes to get a chill nicotine high.

But

I think that I would probably just have to do the skins and I would probably need to swish them around in my mouth a bunch because I think eating tobacco is not going to get you that high.

Okay.

I have some numbers for you.

Here's a little context for you, Max and Hank.

Uh-huh.

The amount of nicotine in a cigarette, and for context, Max, I smoked on average between 30 and 45 cigarettes per day

between the ages of 14 and 25.

One cigarette, one of those,

one of them

contains about 12 milligrams of nicotine.

That's a lot.

Which is around 18,000 times more nicotine than in a potato.

So I don't eat

anything you could get a chill nicotine high unless you're willing to eat at least five or six thousand potatoes in a single setting.

Yeah, I don't think I could eat six thousand potatoes, uh, but maybe

I don't think you can eat six thousand potatoes in your life, but I've never had

nicotine in my life, so my tolerance is extremely low.

First off,

there's no way that's true.

It's not true.

I had a cigar at

that,

I just know you had a certain city.

I had maybe a tenth of a cigar at some cousin's wedding once.

Oh, that's so cringy.

What a cringy way to ingest nicotine.

I've done nicotine in all the major ways except for cigars and pipes because I'm not massively cringe.

I have to say the only way you ever ingested nicotine was via cigar.

That's a thing.

It was a tradition.

There was

a born.

No, I don't know.

It was something.

I felt like a tradition.

All the cousins were smoking cigars.

Yeah.

And so, and John, I'm smoking cigars right with him.

It's not that.

It's just that, like, I would never claim that's the only way I ever

had a cigarette.

I'm saying, even if it were true, it's still the wrong thing to say.

Look, look, I'm not, I'm not,

I have to be me.

I can't let the world inhabit my brain.

I have to kill the part.

I don't, you can't kill the part that's cringy.

You must kill the part that cringes.

John, that's the way forward.

And I did smoke a tenth of a cigar.

And you know how I felt afterward?

I felt like I was on cocaine.

I don't know what being on cocaine feels like, but I was extremely fun.

So much is getting revealed in this episode.

I felt like wild.

It was like drinking like eight cups of coffee.

I was like, oh, this is a drug.

Hank Green, nicotine salesman.

No, like, I don't know.

It's a tough one.

I just kind of assume that, like, since it's everywhere all the time, that like it can't be that impactful on your physiology, but it was intense.

It was like a real high.

It's a pleasure.

Yeah,

it's not actually, it's not actually a pleasant high.

I remember like the first 20 or 30 times I smoked a cigarette being like, this just sucks.

Like, I don't like the way that I feel right now.

I feel different, but not in a positive way.

And then eventually I got to the point that I think I was trying to get to from the beginning where I just had a problem.

And the problem was that I needed a cigarette.

And the solution was to have a cigarette.

And like the joy of resolving that problem was the high rather than whatever little high came with the smoking.

Oh, man.

It would be nice to be able to just solve a problem by grabbing something and turning on it.

Well, I mean, it does, uh, it does create a new problem, but it solves

it.

Creates a number of larger problems.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But there's a reason I smoked so much for so long, which is that's it, you know, yeah.

Yeah.

But now, like my life is in danger because of something stupid I did when I was a kid.

So yeah, you know, there's that side of it.

That is such an interesting way to talk about, because I have this too, but with the things I am addicted to, which is, you know, mostly social media, where like the thing that that I like about it is that it is solving a problem.

Like it's an easy way to solve a problem.

And the problem is that I am bored.

And

like a lot of, like, that's a lot.

That's an interesting way of thinking about the sort of like,

certainly not all of addiction, but kind of maybe a bit of a trigger for it, which is like, it is nice to have a problem that it is easy to solve.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, I don't think that's the only thing going on in addiction, of course, but I do think that that's part of it.

And you're right about boredom.

You're also just and the lack of the lack of intense feeling, right?

Like one thing that I like is intense feeling.

And

I want a really, and I like purity of feeling.

And

if nothing else, the internet still gives me very, very intense feelings.

And I've been thinking about it a lot because, like, listeners may not know this, but you do, which is that I've been quite depressed for the last couple of months.

And it's been interesting to see my behavior on social media be a little more self-destructive and a little less productive

because I'm trying to feel something.

And I just, everything is so grayscale.

Everything is so kind of like empty.

And like the, you know, the, these like intense lies that my brain is telling me are so compelling about meaninglessness and despair and everything that it really does feel like, well, if I go on the internet, like I'll feel something.

And if I post, I'll feel something even more.

Yeah.

And then the indie star will write an article about my post as if it was real instead of just me trying to feel something.

Right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And the

barrier is so low.

Like they designed the barrier to be very low.

Yeah, the barrier is super low.

Like within five seconds of picking up my phone, I can at least be feeling something, starting to feel something.

Yeah.

This is actually what my video on Friday is about because I obviously have not struggled with depression that much, but when I was sick, I did.

And that

feeling of not being interested in anything and not really wanting anything and only feeling like the things that I cared the most about, I didn't even feel like I would, like, if I was going to die, that would just be sort of like a negative.

Like all the things, like just being around would just be like a burden on people.

And it would just be like me sort of like heading into like

making the people who I loved, like making their lives worse by just being so sad right now.

And, and, and like the,

you know, obviously I used social media a lot when I was sick.

Like I was on Twitter a lot.

And

I think that that's part of it.

And then the thing that like really helped me get out of it was like working instead on private projects, working on my like stand-up instead, which was like, oh, I'm like, I'm getting something out of this without it being public.

And

also like, I'm watching all of the stand-up comedy that is like very, it's like very interesting to me to figure out how these comedians are doing the work that they do to try and understand

the art and the craft of it

that became interesting to me?

And it was a lifeline that I just sort of held on to.

And I was like, I can't let go of this thing because I actually am interested in it.

And like, I'm interested in nothing else.

I can't get interested in TV shows or video games.

Like, this is doing it for me for some reason.

And I just like

held on and didn't let go.

So the only thing that was providing me

like that, like any interest at all.

Which

is so hard.

Like, I have never experienced that before.

Yeah, it's really, I agree with you.

It's really hard.

Um, and it is really, I, I, I, I also think you make a good point that a lot of times the way out, like, I feel like the way out is like rest.

I need rest.

Um,

but of course, like, I also need to be doing stuff that brings me fulfillment and makes me feel connected and

doesn't kind of put me further and further into the place of

alone, you know, deep, deep aloneness.

Yeah.

So it's good, it's good advice as well as good sharing.

So thank you.

As usual, I don't remember the question that we were answering.

I think that we're good on it was about depression.

So let's go ahead and move on to the news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon.

John, what's going on in the world of AFC Wimbledon?

Well, Hank, we've just said goodbye

to

our longtime striker,

Josh Davison, who is leaving AFC Wimbledon to play for Tranmere Rovers, which is a great football team name.

But that means that we have one fewer attacking player.

Lots of people are speculating that now we definitely need to sign a striker.

And why not the Montserratian Messi?

Why not bring home the greatest striker of the AFC Wimbledon era, Montserrat national team player,

Lyle Taylor?

And

I think that'd be great.

He's 34 years old.

He's not as young as he used to be, but then neither am I.

You know, and if somebody said to me, like, John, you can't repeat the past.

You can't keep pretending to be young.

You can't stay on YouTube.

It's a young man's game.

I would say, I still got one more year in me, coach.

That's right.

You know?

And I believe that about Lyle.

So we'll see if that actually means that.

We also signed a guy from Sullahul Moores.

I know.

I know.

He played for a team named Sullahul Sullahole Moores.

And his name is

Callum Maycock.

Not Callum Willcock and not Callum won't cock, but Callum Maycock.

Maycock.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He's 26.

He's a midfielder, box-to-box guy.

That's what we refer to as the runners, the ones who can defend from the

defensive penalty box to

the front.

You know, attacking one.

Yeah, he's Maycock box to box.

Maycock box to box.

Maycock, box to box.

That's great, Hank.

He's even got a nickname already.

This is wonderful.

Oh, we also, our women's team signed our first player, and she is also, her name's Leanne Bell, and she is also from the most extraordinary football club.

We're only selling and buying players from hilariously named football teams.

So we sold Josh Davis into Tranmere Rovers.

We signed Callum Maycock from Solho Moors and Lee Ann Bell comes to us from Billericay town.

Okay.

Billrique.

Billericay Town.

Billericay?

I don't know.

It's both ways.

So there you go.

What's the news in Mars?

Well, Mars recently had a big old geomagnetic storm right in the middle of May.

And if that sounds familiar, it's because we also had a big old geomagnetic storm

from the same exact solar flare that caused the auroras here on Earth.

It was also hitting the aurora, hitting Mars.

But on Mars, they do not have a magnetic field, so the aurora happens everywhere on the planet.

It does not get focused into the poles.

It just goes all over the whole planet.

And

so if you missed out on the auroras on Earth, bad news, you also missed out on the auroras on Mars.

Was it a good show?

Was it a good show?

Good question, John.

I have no idea.

The spacecraft that were on Mars, we're able to measure it in various ways,

but I don't know that we got any good pictures of it.

Okay.

Well, I guess we got like, I think some like very

pictures, given that there's so little in the way of atmosphere?

Yeah, I think that that's the big problem is that there's not enough atmosphere to get borealists.

I believe there's enough.

Technically,

something gets borealist, not aurorad.

That's my own position.

I think that actually, in fact, it gets aurora because well, but it's like how

it no, no, I disagree with you because you're going to say, like, oh, because there's also the southern lights, yeah, and those are also borealis, they're just not aurora.

But I would say that the borealis is the light part, so you're getting borealist when you get the lights.

And then I would also say, as a follow-up to that, and this I feel very strongly about, I know that Schaden means pleasure and Freud means friend, and the pleasure you see in your other friends suffering is Schadenfreude, But I still believe instead of saying that of all the Freudas, Schaden is the best, I think we should say of all the Schadens, Freude is the best.

Yeah.

No, look, sometimes we're wrong, and that's, and we just move forward being wrong, and it doesn't matter.

Yeah.

So I'm going to say that it gets borealist.

So did it get borealised?

It did.

It did.

You can actually see grainy images of the barest minimum of barely being able to see that there is a detectable change in the sky.

Borealist.

Borealist.

John, thank you for making a podcast with me.

If you want to send your questions to us, it's at hankandjohn at gmail.com.

Without that, we don't have a podcast.

So please do that.

This podcast is edited by Linus Obenhaus.

It was mixed by Joseph Tunametish.

Our communications coordinator is Brooke Shotwell.

It was produced by Rosiana Haas-Rojas and Hannah West.

Our executive producer is Seth Bradley.

Our editorial assistant is Taboki Troprivarti.

The music you're hearing now and a beginning podcast by the Great Gunarola.

And as they say in our hometown, don't forget to be awesome.