Dear Hank & John - 29: Barbershop Genghis

Episode Date: December 22, 2015

Do you need to be a Patreon supporter to get your question answered? How do I make my partner comfortable at his first Christmas with my family? Why are mini-M&Ms better than the regular kind? Why do we always assume life needs water? And an important update from Sweden!

Hello and welcome to Dear Hank and John. More as I prefer to think of it Dear John and Hank. It's a comedy podcast in which me and my brother John answer your questions. We'll give you some dubious advice and bring you all the weeks news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon. Hank, we've got a very special guest today. My daughter Alice is here in the studio with me.

Hi, I'm GoHank. Oh, hi Alice. And now she's off to go watch Elmo. How are you, Hank? I'm good. How are you doing? I'm doing well. We raised $1.5 million in the 2015 project for awesome

for organizations including Save the Children and the United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees, and that is very exciting to me. It is very exciting. for organizations including Save the Children and the United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees, and that is very exciting to me. It is very exciting, and somewhat unexpectedly, I think that I did not know what was going to happen. We have been able to keep some of the perks up, thanks to Indiegogo, and if you would like

to get that exclusive episode of Dear Hank and John that is only available through the Project for Awesome, you can still do that at projectforawesome.com slash donate. Mmm, great. Mmm, delicious bonus episode. So go ahead and do that projectforawesome.com slash donate. It's gonna taste like ice cream. What flavor, justice?

What's gonna taste like ice cream donating to charity? Yeah, or just the podcast, the exclusive podcast you're gonna get? Oh, sure. It's gonna be a flavorful podcast. Is there any way we could move on to the short poem of the day? That's fine with me. I mean, there's a bunch of short poems today that I'm thinking about, Hank,

but I think I'm gonna go with, he tells her by Wendy Cope. Are you familiar with this poem? No, I don't think so. It's the world's best poem about mansplaining. Are you familiar with mansplaining? Hi, sure I am. Okay.

This is called, He Tells Her by Wendy Cope. He tells her that the earth is flat. He knows the facts, and that is that. In altercations, fears, and long, she tries her best to prove him wrong. But he has learned to argue well. He calls her arguments unsound and often asks her not to yell. She cannot win. He stands his ground. The planet goes on being round.

Boom! Drop the mic. It is indeed a boom-worthy poem, Hank. I think boom is the only response to that great poem He tells her by Wendy Copp. Oh, yeah. What else do we do in the beginning of the podcast? I feel like we got through the beginning real fast. Usually we talk about some of our drama, some of our difficulties in life, but I'm not really feeling that. I'm feeling so good after the project for awesome. I got a bunch of shirts I'm gonna send to people

of an painting hankler fish art. I'm a little overwhelmed, a little bit behind with work, but you know, so am I always? So that's, yeah, maybe we should just go on with the questions. Yeah, you sound wound up pretty tight, but I like tightly wound hank. Let's start. Well, I also downloaded, I downloaded Dub Smash this morning,

so I'm just very excited about Dub Smash. You know, my friend, Cara DeLavine, was huge into Dub Smash when we were promoting the Paper Towns movie, and she showed it to me, and we did a bunch of them together, and she kept asking if she could put them on Instagram and I kept saying no. So somewhere on Cara's phone are some very, very damaging dub smashes of Cara and me singing to various songs.

That is a beautiful potential project for Awesome Perk that I wish I had known about before now. No, no, no, never. Let's answer some questions from readers, Hank. All right, let's do that. Let's begin with this question from Sloan, no, no, no, never. Let's answer some questions from readers Hank. All right, let's do that. Let's begin with this question from Sloan, Hank, who writes, dear John and Hank, my boyfriend is not able to get home

to spend the holidays with his family this year. My parents decided to invite him to spend Christmas even Christmas day with my family. I'm very excited about this, but I'm also nervous about it being awkward for him because my family is very close and we have lots of traditions. Do you have any advice for how my family and I can make him feel comfortable? Oh well I think you guys should get matching sweaters.

Oh all of yes. It's basically one step away from an engagement, so it's quite a commitment to make, but if you all got matching sweaters I think you'd feel like part of the family. I would argue that getting matching sweaters is in fact far more of a commitment than an engagement. It's easy to walk away from an engagement would argue that getting matching sweaters is in fact far more of a commitment than an engagement. It's easy to walk away from an engagement, walking away from matching sweaters as almost impossible. Well, I mean, just being part of somebody's Christmas photos, too.

Like, that might be a thing that happens. You're going to wear matching sweaters. You're going to be in front of the Christmas tree. You're going to set the timer for 10 seconds, and you're going to stand there awkwardly smiling, being like, how could this possibly be 10 seconds? It's gone on forever. And then finally, it clicks. And I mean, basically, you're married.

Yeah. Well, I mean, I have two different former partners, as you know, Hank, who were invited to Christmas's over the years and who ended up not becoming spouses. And indeed, my main conclusion from having been on both sides of this coin, both the person who welcomes in a non-married partner to a, or like a non-committed long-term committed partner to a Christmas and the person who like goes to someone else's Christmas.

My main conclusion is that you don't really need to welcome them because if they are going to be a good fit, they will just be a good fit. Like it'll just work because, you know, I suspect that your boyfriend will treat this as a sort of anthropological experiment. You know, he's mostly going to be bearing witness to these weird holiday traditions that you and your family have put together over the years. And there's something really fun about doing that. Like, there's something fun about seeing someone you love in a completely new context. Indeed. It may be awkward, but I think that it depends on

obviously how he approaches the situation, but I think it's gonna be fun. I think it's gonna be a fun time. And the fact that you're concerned about it and you're thinking about it means you probably are gonna be well prepared for it. We've got another question. This one is from Kelly, who asks,

with Lynn Manuel Miranda being a 2015 MacArthur Fellow and the success of Hamilton, I was curious as to what historical figure you think might make a great musical. Hip hop has made an impact with Hamilton. Is there any genre of music you would like to see brought to this stage? Yes.

So I'm gonna say, I'm gonna say like, what's the historical figure and the genre of music you wanna see them paired with, John? Sure, no, for me it's definitely the barbershop quartet take on the life of Genghis Khan. Yes, yes, yes! So, I'm actually not even gonna try to trademark or copyright that idea. Broadway producers who also listen to Dear Hank and John, you are more than welcome to go ahead and make that. The Barbershop quartet, Genghis Khan. Well, John, I was gonna tell you mine,

but it seems so pathetic and pale in comparison that it will just seem like I'm trying too hard. So we're gonna move on and just stick with Barbershop quartet of Genghis Khan because that's way better than my art. Alright, I will, I will, I will, I will bask in the glory of my victory and ask you this question, which comes from Matt. Dear John and Hank, in your last podcast you mentioned that dear Hank and John is now sponsored by its listeners via Patreon.

Will the questions asked on the normal podcast be from patrons only or from non-supporting listeners as well? I.E. do I have to pay to get my question answered? Great question, Matt, that you didn't pay to get answered. Um, ha ha ha ha. Indeed, no, I don't really like, I mean, I guess I can see the benefit of that, but,

you know, from my perspective, this podcast is supposed to be sort of open to, equally open to all. And anything that we do on the Patreon is just kind of a bonus that isn't really related to the core product. That's also how we treat the SciShow and Crash Course patrons. You know, the idea is more of an NPR-style model where some listeners support it so that all listeners can enjoy it. Indeed. Indeed. And I want to say you are not the only person who has had that question, but it's possible

that we will subconsciously, accidentally do this and we will do our best not to. But we will be looking at the questions from the Patreon and the questions from the email, just as we also look at questions from Facebook and Twitter and I think also maybe even occasionally Tumblr. And there are some other people who have general feedback from previous episodes. For example, Liam says in a recent podcast,

you talked about how your drink is on the right when you are seated formally. If you make a circle with your thumb and index finger, it forms a D on the right hand and a B on the left hand for drink your drink being on the right and your bagel, your bagel being on the left or bread or any type of bread. Whatever type of bread it is. Usually when I go to a fancy dinner though, it's my drink on the left and my bagel or my drink on the right and my bagel on the left. How often do you go to fancy dinners with bagels? All the fanciest best fancy dinners have bagels instead of like just like what?

Just like bread, like a roll, that's just, come on. You get a whole bagel if it's a fancy dinner. I don't usually like to criticize your lack of understanding of proper luxury Hank because in general, I think that it is a character asset rather than a character flaw. But if I may ask you a personal question, how many total Michelin stars have the restaurants that

you've eaten in your life accrued? Well, I do know that a lot of my favorite restaurants have Michelin tires. You have heard my feelings as someone who values proper luxury. You have made me call into question my entire worldview. Let's move on to a question from Caitlin who asks, dear John and Hank, why are many M&Ms so much more delicious than regular M&Ms?

That's actually, well, for a math question. Yeah, it's just wrong. It is a math question. It's also false. It is deeply false. And you are, and like I do not understand, your ridiculous perspective, however, the reason why they are worse is that they have a higher surface area to volume ratio.

A sphere's volume, and I know, and the M&M is not a sphere, but we're approximating. This is actually the case for any volume, is it is a cubed factor. So you've, it's pi, I think it's pi times 4 thirds times the radius cubed. Yeah. Pretty sure.

Whereas the surface area of a sphere, the surface area of it. Whereas the surface area of a sphere, the surface area of it, whereas the surface area of a speed, whereas the surface area of a sphere is pi r squared. So as r goes up, as the radius of the sphere goes up, the volume increases much faster as it is the cube, rather than the surface area, which is just a square. So bigger M&Ms have less candy shell per unit of chocolate than smaller M&Ms.

They actually try to make up for this by making the candy coating thinner on mini M&Ms, which to me is like that also makes it worse because you get less crunch and also you get more like food coloring per unit of candy, which can't be good. I don't know if that actually affects the taste, but it seems like it would. But in a bigger M&M,

there is much more chocolate per unit of candy, which I think is better. It obviously changes the taste substantially. If, apparently, you, Caitlin, like more candy in your M&M, which is just a ridiculous position to have. To summarize, sorry. Caitlin, the order is many M&Ms are the worst. Regular M&Ms are the second to worst. And peanut M&Ms are the single greatest achievement

in the history of human beings. You know the great thing about peanut M&Ms, John, is that in addition to being a fantastic candy, they are also a really great food. I'd eat a bowl of those for dinner. is that in addition to being a fantastic candy, they are also a really great food. I need a bowl of those for dinner. With my big ol' lats. Yeah, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no You know, probably a pretty long time. I bet there's some essential fatty acids you're not getting. Maybe some vitamins and minerals, you're not quite squeezed in there.

I probably not a lot of vitamin C in an M&M, but maybe. Yeah, you might get scurvy eventually. You could fortify one. I'd like to see a bowl of fortified with some iodine and maybe a little bit of vitamin C, vitamin D, just in my bowl of peanut M&Ms that I have at dinner with, you know, with my drink on the right and my bagel on the left. Oh, you sound like very, very enthusiastic

about the world, Hank, like you might be on speed. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha who asks, dear Hank and John! While preparing dinner tonight, I removed a previously opened jar of pizza sauce from the refrigerator and noticed a single spot of mold. No, gone. The interior side of the jar. The sauce remaining at the bottom of the jar appeared to have no mold on it at all. Can I still put the sauce on my pizza or does that spot of mold on the side of the jar render all of its contents unusable? Um, what a great question.

Let me answer your question with a question. Are you f*** kidding me? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Of course it renders the entire jar of pizza sauce unusable. I've just, I can't even recycle that jar of pizza sauce. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. You have to throw it away immediately, take the trash bag that you have thrown it away in,

put that trash bag in your exterior trash receptacle, and then just try to forget that the whole thing ever happened. Well, I'm glad to know that this is the occasion, which required the very first bleeping on a deer hankin' John. I will agree with John though. I will say it is probably not a good idea. So, molds are fungi and they work in mysterious ways.

The mold that you can see is not 100% or even the majority of the mold that's in there. Molds, by the time you can see them are are producing tons of spores, which are flying all over the place, and have probably started colonies that are currently invisible elsewhere. The mold actually has to penetrate into the food a little bit before it starts producing visible like the spore bodies that are the fuzzy things that you actually see. And usually, like, this is fine. And small quantities mold is not a big deal,

but there are certain molds that can be more dangerous. They produce toxins that can make you sick. So the safe thing is the garbage. You probably only have to just close the jar though and put it in the garbage and not worry about, or you could even wash it out. You don't have to worry about touching the mold. It's just the eating it.

But if you're John though, I suggest doing exactly what makes you feel safe. Hey, this seems like a good time to bring up the fact that in answer to several people's requests, I have compiled my top 10 causes of eschatological anxiety that is anxiety about the end of the world. Okay. Are you ready? And tell me if you think that this order, I mean, this is a genuine order. Tell me if you think this order makes sense to you. Okay.

Number one, apocalyptic bird flu and or flu caused by a different animal. Number two, solar flare. Number three, nuclear war that dramatically reduces the population of humans. Number four, disappearance of Earth's magnetic fields. Number five, number five, weaponized hemragic virus, like Ebola, but weaponized. Number six, volcanic super eruption. Number seven, unexpected asteroid. Number eight, artificial intelligence, Runnamuck, which I call the Terminator scenario. Number nine nanotechnology run a muck, which I call the gray goo scenario. And number ten, my personal death. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Well, of all of those, I'll say, if we're talking about the lightliness,

it's definitely should start with your personal death, which I think is more likely than any of those things, which is a great, which is great news for the whole rest of the world, but bad news for you. No, it's the worst possible news for me. Well, well, except that maybe you would die in all of those other scenarios, so maybe it's basically like your personal death would occur in any of those scenarios, so of course it would be the most likely of all of them. Okay. Alright, so I'm moving 10 to one.

Is there anything else that you would change? You know, I might move some of those things around, but they're all pretty good scenarios. In general, I tend to fear human things more than I fear natural things because natural things happen on very long time scales and there's very little you can do about them though there are some things, certainly certainly that we're starting to prepare for certain of these eventualities.

But yeah, I feel like humans are really unpredictable and I feel especially like with the advanced thing, like the rapid advance in science, you start to see potentials for people who don't have a ton of training being able to, as you say, weaponize something like hemorrhagic fever, which would be real bad. And maybe even to the point of like intentionally designing a flu that would be very dangerous and then intentionally releasing that flu. That's the kind of thing that we have done. We've intentionally designed extraordinarily dangerous

flus, basically so that we can study how to treat them if they were to happen naturally. But the fact that now we know that we can intentionally design very dangerous flus, it seems like how far are we away from a point where that can be done at a laboratory that is not regulated and is owned or run by a small group of crazy people?

Well, to be fair, I think that is inclusive of my number one concern, apocalyptic bird flu. Yeah, I mean, I think that apocalyptic bird flu and intentionally weaponized bird, intentionally weaponized artificial flu are kind of two separate things. Just like weaponized hemorrhagic fever is different. All right. I mean, I'm going to go with one in one A then. I'm not going to mess around my whole. Just for that one little observation you make.

Well, in general, that's something that scares me a lot. And so I wanna make sure that it's also scaring you because if it's scaring me and it's not scaring you, then there's definitely something wrong. That's great to hear. Thank you for that feedback about me as a person. I have another question for you Hank. It comes from Chrissy who asks,

dear John and Hank, I've just listened to one of your podcasts where you were talking about how they have discovered water on Mars and how that means there is a possibility of life there. My question is how do we know that if there is life on Mars, it would be dependent upon water like we are. Wouldn't it be possible that they would be completely different from any other life form we know of? Yeah, this is, so this is a question that I've,

I've, you know, it's spent the fair amount of time talking about. It's also another science question. I feel like we've had a lot of questions that could be answered with science this podcast. So I appreciate that because it means that I will talk more and John will talk less unless you John want to take this one.

No, thank you, though. Chemistry works best, first of all, in a liquid. Liquids are, they have a lot of different interactions between all of the particles in the liquid, so all of the molecules and atoms in the liquids will interact more frequently. And so liquid chemistry just a lot more gets done than in a gas where particles run into each other less often or in a solid where they don't move around. They all stay in the same place in the same order. So liquid chemistry is just good chemistry and we think that in order for life to happen

at the moment, like we think that in order for life to happen, there has to be good chemistry happening. So if we're saying that the life is based on chemistry and not on something else weird like plasma physics or something like that, then we're gonna we're focused on liquids. And water is a particularly good liquid for this kind of chemistry to happen because it is polar and thus many different things can dissolve in it. many different things can dissolve in it. So stuff's really good at dissolving in water, particularly various carbon compounds that we think that are sort of the basis

of how our life works. But in general, there's just lots of stuff that can dissolve in water. And like certainly all of life on earth is based on water chemistry. But we think that water chemistry is just sort of the kind of chemistry that can have the most interesting products. You can just get a lot out of water chemistry. Now, there's also the possibility that much different pressures

and temperatures, then you have liquid methane, which you can have maybe some kind of interesting chemistry going on there, but methane is nonpolar, so less stuff can dissolve in it, but still some stuff can dissolve in it, so maybe there would be chemistry based on liquid methane that could result in life. But liquid water is not just a personal bias. It's not just us saying, well, all the life we've ever seen is based on liquid water, so it must be. It's also that we know how chemistry works. We do a lot of chemistry based on a lot of different things in our world. And liquid water chemistry remains

the like where a huge like vast variety of interesting chemistry gets done. Hey, guys, I have to tell you that of all the sentences you've ever said that aren't dirty, liquid chemistry is just good chemistry is the one that sounds the dirtiest. I don't even know why exactly, but when you said it, you said it like four different times and each time you said it, it sounded dirtier and dirtier.

I apologize. Hank, I have breaking news from the world of Dear Hank and John, or as I prefer to think of it, Dear John and Hank, it comes from Linus in Sweden who writes, Dear John and Hank, I am currently listening to the latest episode of your podcast. And in the discussion about how to equally distribute arm chairs among, for example, movie goers, I felt I had to point out that here in Sweden, we have already solved this problem, at least in movie theaters. It is based on the same principle that John has. Everyone, starting from the far right side of each row,

is given control of the armrest to their right. Well, how to make sure that everyone follows this? On every armrest, there is a white arrow pointing to the chair on its left side. This simple use of an international and translinguistic symbol allows everyone in the movie theater, no matter age or spoken language, to know clearly which armrest is theirs to use. Hank, Sweden has solved the armrest crisis. I mean, I just need to ask Linus if you walk into the movie theater, is there there always people lined up on the left hand side because they get both armrests. So you walk in it like at the beginning, you're like, everybody's like, I gotta get this.

So I get both armrests. And I also have to ask Linus, if Sweden is as dreamy and beautiful as it sounds, and also if possibly Swedish people went into the future and listened to our podcast and then brought that back as a policy or maybe they just went into the future where that is a common thing because of our podcast. I just wanna be sure that we can definitely take credit for this and I also wanna say in regards to just generally discussing previous podcasts. I like this trend, we've done it credit for this. And I also wanna say in regards to just generally discussing previous podcasts, I like this trend,

we've done it several times this episode, and I have to say, oh my God, it's burning! That's funny because I am gonna charizard this mofo. That's why it's burning due to my charizard. That is fantastic news about Sweden. This podcast is brought to you by Swedes. Time-traveling, left-hander-hating, uh, efficiency-loving Swedes.

Oh, Sweden, I do know it's true, Hank, that if anybody has a time machine, it's almost definitely Sweden. And of course, this podcast is also brought to you by Liquid Chemistry. Liquid Chemistry. It's a good chemistry. This podcast is brought to you by matching sweaters. Basically marriage. And of course this podcast is also brought to you by the new hit Broadway play, Barbara Shopgengus. All right, let's do one more question, John. Do you have one ready? I don't. Hank, if you notice that I'm trying exceptionally hard

to make sure that I speak less than you during this podcast. I feel like I'm just in a mood to speak more than you anyway, so I don't think you haven't have to try. This question, I have people call it a mood. Some people call it emphatomines. I have another question. This one's from Josh, who asks,

Dear Hank and John, I'm reading two- a Mockingbird in my freshman English class, and my teacher has used the character Kalpernia to explain a concept called code switching. My teacher defines code switching as talking differently, different dialects or personal filters, depending on your listener or environment. My question is, when do you feel the need to code switch? What kind of personal filter do you use

when you were talking to each other, your friends? What is the benefit of acknowledging when you are code switching? I have to say that this is something that I did not realize until well into my 30s and because of the ability that the internet has given me to talk to people, lots of people who are not like me,

that I code switch all the time. And it is one of the really unthought about privileges of being a white male, that I can code switch constantly. And then in the circumstances where I feel like I can't, I am so deeply uncomfortable. And I feel like, and understanding that I am uncomfortable when I can't deeply uncomfortable. And I feel like, and understanding that,

I am uncomfortable when I can't code switch, despite the fact that there are many people who cannot code switch nearly as much as I can, and that understanding my discomfort in those situations is really sort of has allowed me to understand how difficult it is to not be a white male. Yeah, I mean, I think when people talk about not understanding what is meant by the phrase white privilege or not seeing it in our social order or whatever, I think reading up on

code switching is actually really helpful because I completely agree with you that for me at least it is a tremendous example of the privileges that are sort of built in to my identities. And being aware of that is tremendously important because when you aren't aware of it, you just sort of, you just sort of think that the universe is tilted in a particular way and it's your way. And that seems like the honest or real or fair way of the world because it's the current way of the world. And yeah, so I think that's, I actually think that's really interesting.

The character of Calpernia into Kilomockingbird is one of the most fascinating characters to me. Although Atticus Finch is often hailed as like the greatest hero in the history of American literature, and I certainly think that Atticus Finch is a great and fascinating hero. You know, the truth about the civil rights movement in the South is that the heroes of it were not white men. In fact, there were very, very, very few southern white men who, looking back on the civil rights movement, can be considered to have acted heroically. Almost all of the heroes of the civil rights movement almost all of the heroes of the civil rights movement in the South were the African-American people who were resisting in various ways and establishing rights that had not been given them by the state, which is an extremely difficult thing to do. And Calperney is a fascinating character in that context.

Yeah. And in sort of deeper answer to your question, your actual question, yeah, I find myself code switching like just like moment to moment, I kind of am disturbed occasionally by how chameleony I can be. And just sort of like if I'm like suddenly at a fancy dinner or if I'm like one moment I'm the boss and the next moment I'm a friend and the linguistic ways that I do that and then I make that clear to other people around me when I'm trying to be, because I'm friends with a lot of my employees.

And so there are, you know, there's certainly like physical contexts, like if we're at work versus at a bar, but there are also linguistic contexts and it's very subconscious. And I don't really know that I'm doing it, but I can identify it when I do. And it's a really nice thing to be able to do so easily. And sometimes it disturbs me. I have a great southern accent when I go back to the south.

That my wife will look at me and be like, what? What? What? And I'll just be like, oh no, this is normal. This is how I talk. I talk like this a lot of time. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you don't. All right, let's move on to the news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, hours watching an internet live stream of a town council meeting occurring in

South London. I watched as local government representatives asked questions about how the garbage would be taken out. How many parking spots there would be? How many of these parking spots would be reserved for people with disabilities? And I heard them ask questions about how the garbage would be taken out and how many parking spots there would be and how many housing units and whether those housing units would have built-in air conditioning. Hey, I watched as these members of the Merton Council

asked hundreds of questions. I formed opinions about the local government representation in South London that are far firmer than the opinions I have about my local representatives here in Indianapolis, whomever they may be, I have no idea. of AFC Wimbledon fans sitting there, um, waited to find out if the town council was going to approve their plan to build a new stadium in their historic home, bringing League football back to Wimbledon after the great injustice of 2001. And I watched and wept as the town council voted unanimously to agree that they can build a stadium. It is a huge moment in the history of AFC Wimbledon Hank. This is the end of a vital part of the journey.

This is the moment when they get to come home. Wimbledon fans sing a song, show me the way to Plow Lane. They've been singing it since they were forced from their stadium more than 30 years ago. And, you know, through reforming this club, starting out in a public park, working their way up through the non-league ranks

into League football, They have shown the world the way to Plow Lane and I'm so proud to be a fan and sponsor of AFC Wimbledon right now. They're going to get to build a stadium. It's going to be a beautiful stadium. It's going to be so fancy. There's no way I'll ever get to sponsor it when they move into the new stadium. And I am so excited. I am so excited for the day when I cannot afford to be a sponsor of this great football club. So it was a huge moment in the club's history, and the unanimous vote was really just a moving moment. I mean, many, many AFC Wimbledon fans compared it to the moment they won the playoff to go back into the football league. That's how important it was to win,

well, in fans and to the future of the club. And I'm just thrilled for them. There's a lot of work ahead. Obviously they've got to raise a ton of money to build the stadium, but they're going to be able to do it. I know it and I'm just so, so happy. Congratulations, John.

And congratulations, AFC Wimbledon. I have similarly exciting news that I am similarly bubbling and like deep in my heart have butterflies about with regards to Mars, John. Would you like to hear about it? Yeah, but just tell me first, did you weep when you heard it? Just maybe a tiny, tiny bit. I don't even believe you. Well, you will believe me when you hear the news, which is that the first book in Kim Stanley

Robinson's Mars trilogy is going to be made into a TV series that is going to be written by none other than Jay Michael Strzyski, whose credits include Babylon 5 and Thor. Oh! Yeah, so basically it is really, it is a dream coming true for me. So that Red Mars is the first book in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. It is the book that got me into Mars,

that not only that, but got me into chemistry, got me into science, got me into just, you know, basically my entire life path. Kim Stanley Robinson has remained a hero of mine. He has continued to write remarkable books. Though in recent years he has become a, you know, he's always been an environmental advocate but has become a lot less bullish on the idea of having Mars as a backup planet because he wants to be very clear that this is the one We've gotten we better do it right, but Yeah, so red Mars is going to be a TV show and it's gonna have 10 episodes and they may do the rest But it's it's not a hundred percent sure, but yeah, it's got it's almost 100% gonna happen unless like something very, very bad happens.

So, I'm extremely excited. I'm extremely excited. Somewhere 14 year old Hank is just having his biggest possible dream come true. Yeah. Yeah. That's very exciting. I mean, I remember you reading those books and I had never seen you read like that before. And indeed, like you've since told me

that you never had read like that before. But I mean, I'd never seen you care about something that way. And it was really, really cool to watch. It really, it truly was transformative in your life, even from the outside. And so I am genuinely really excited for you. I thought that you were gonna come at me

with some boring news about now we can drill a mile into the Mars surface or whatever, but that is actually cool. What channel is it gonna be on? It's gonna be on Spike TV, which I've left out because I'm just not a big fan of Spike TV. Yeah, what the hell? Whatever. As long as they do a good job, it doesn't matter. My DVR doesn't know a channel. I'm recording. Well, that's exciting. Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. Hank, before we talk about what we learned today,

we need to talk about something else, which is that this is the last podcast of 2015. Oh, right, yes. And we're even taking the first week of 2016 off. We're going on a two week hiatus so that we can spend some time with our families, enjoy the holidays, and also let our listeners enjoy the holidays. Yes.

Yes. We don't want to distract you from all of the holidays. And if you want, and if you want a need distraction, there are lots of other podcasts. Would you like to suggest an alternate podcast, John? I would like to suggest an alternate podcast, serial. Well, I've actually, I don't know if you guys have heard of it. It's like Dear Hank and John, but better in every way. I would suggest you must remember this,

which is a history of Hollywood podcast and also Lime Town, which you should not listen to at night. It is a kind of horrifying, fictional, but pretending to be nonfiction podcast. So Hank, what did we learn today? We learned, I don't know. It's good. It's good end of the podcast. It's strong. You delivered that.

I appreciate it. We learned that red bars has got to be a TV show. And we learned that supporting Dear Hank and John on Patreon, while it is certainly welcome Patreon.com slash Dear Hank and John, does not help you get your questions on the podcast. Indeed, indeed it does not. We learned that tiny M&Ms are not as good as big M&Ms

because of math. And we also learned that big M&Ms because of math and also because of peanuts are not as good as peanut Mm&m's. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha- continues to live in a glorious future. Glorious, glorious future. They need to share that time-travel technology with the rest of the world. It does seem a little odd- a little odd fair. The rest of us are stuck in this miserable present, but Sweden has it all figured out.

Except for sunshine. They didn't figure that out yet. I don't know a lot about Sweden's weather, John. Well, it's pretty far up there, Hank, so in the winter, awfully dark. Ah, see, well, we've got that going on here in Montana as well. John, thank you for having a podcast with me. No, it's been my distinct pleasure.

It's been a very enjoyable 2015 for Dear Hank and John, or is that for the thing of a Dear John and Hank? We're looking forward to continuing more in 2016. If you have a question for us, you can use Dear Hank and John hashtag on Twitter, where I'm John Green and Hank is Hank Green. You can also email us, Hank and John at hashtag on Twitter, where I'm John Green and Hank is Hank Green. You can also email us hankandjohnatgmail.com. And I'll also, you can find us on our Patreon at patreon.com slash dearhankandjohn.

This podcast is edited by Nicholas Jenkins. The theme music is from Gunnarola, and as they say in our hometown, don't forget to be all. Don't forget to be all of them. Don't forget to be awesome.