[Dear Hank and John intro music plays]

Hank: Hello and welcome to Dear Hank and John! 

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

Hank: It's a comedy podcast where two brothers answer your questions, give you dubious advice, and bring you all the week's news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon. John, how are you doing today? 

John: Well, Hank, I've just returned from a four hour trip to IKEA, so I'm not-

Hank: It was like a four hour drive to get there?

John: Oh no, no, i's only about thirty minutes away, but we spent a long time at IKEA. There was many things that needed to be purchased. Oh, it was a lot. It was a big endeavor. 

Hank: What- I've never been to one. What I imagine, having heard about them, is that it's basically like you go in and then you have to, like, walk a predetermined path. Like, there's no, like, aisles like at a grocery store. I don't know if this is how IKEA is but this is how I imagine it.

John: Yeah.

Hank: There's no aisles, there's like a maze, like a labyrinth that you have to walk through and you just- then at the end of the labyrinth is the cashier.

John: You know, that is astonishingly accurate. That is more or less exactly what IKEA is like. The only difference from your imagination and reality is that at the end before you get to the cashiers there's this huge warehouse where you have to pick out everything that you want, and none of it is, of course, made, so it's all in flat boxes.

Hank: [laughs] So you have to go home -

John: Right.

Hank: - and put in fifty hours of labor with you and your very small Allen wrench. Do they have hot dogs at IKEA? 

John: I don't know because the last thing I wanted to do was spend another hour there eating. I will say this, though. It is a wonderful, wonderful test of where you're at with your marriage to make IKEA furniture together. 

Hank: Mmhmm.

John: It's just a great way to check in on, "am I able to cooperate with this person in extremely difficult circumstances?" 

Hank: I feel the same way about building furniture and checking in with yourself. Like, if you can build an item of furniture without a single time screaming or throwing something across the room, you basically are like six steps down the path to enlightenment.

John: Yeah, I've never gotten anywhere close to that. I've never finished an IKEA project without crying. And that includes just a few minutes ago when all I had to do was screw four screws into the back of a chair. Still couldn't do it. Alright, let's get to some questions from our listeners. 

Hank: That was a very good poem to start us out with, John. It was really touching. 

John: [laughs] Ok let's get to some questions from our listeners. This first one comes from Tyler, who writes, "Dear John and Hank, I recently came into the possession of a very significant amount of LaCroix."

Hank: [snorts, then laughs]

John: "I won the grand prize at their holiday giveaway - " 

Hank: What!?

John: "- which is a year's supply of LaCroix. However, I don't know how much of a grasp LaCroix has on how much of their product even an enthusiast such as myself consumes in a year, as I will be receiving one hundred cases of 24 cans apiece, which of course comes out to 24 hundred cans of LaCroix. My question to you is this. What does one do with 24 hundred cans of LaCroix? I could, of course, throw a LaCroix themed party, but what activities could there be besides enjoying the delicious natural essence of LaCroix? Any dubious advice is appreciated. Tyler."

Hank: [laughs] Okay. Wow! Ok, so I guess this is like a year's supply of LaCroix for a family of four maybe? 

John: No!

Hank: I like LaCroix, but - and I almost came at Tyler for being like, are you a true enthusiast if you don't drink, like - and then I did the math - six and a half cans of LaCroix a day. That seems like a lot!

John: I think I could drink six and a half cans of - actually, if LaCroix wants to send me 24 hundred cans of LaCroix, I will right now guarantee you that I will drink all 24 hundred cans myself over the course of one year. 

Hank: And then you'll just build an airplane with the leftover aluminum. 

John: Well I suppose- I suppose there is the environment to consider. But maybe- maybe I'll just use the aluminum to build a new addition onto my house to hold all of my new IKEA furniture. 

Hank: [laughing] So, additional question. I didn't realize that when you got a year's supply of something, you got it all upfront. Like if you get a year's supply of Snickers, do you have like an area of your house that is now Snickers? 

John: Totally. 

Hank: Because I buy like a week or two's worth of food at a time. If I have a year's supply of anything it's going to take up more space than all the rest of the food in my house. Especially, apparently, 24 hundred cans of LaCroix.

John: Not only that, but, I mean, I'm not an expert in food safety. Everyone knows that. But it seems to me that drinking a year old LaCroix has to be not quite as good as drinking, like, a freshly canned LaCroix. 

Hank: I feel deeply that that is not the case. I bet there is not a significant chemical difference between those two LaCroixs. 

John: Tyler, you have to have a series of LaCroix parties. You have to have one every month for the entire year. And you'll become known in your community as the LaCroix Boy, and it'll be great. It'll be great for you and then the craziest thing about it, Tyler, is that when all these parties are over, and when you're having the last LaCroix party from your year's supply of LaCroix, you're gonna find yourself thinking, "I want this to continue," just like I did at the end of the Brotherhood 2.0 project I did with my brother and you're going to go out and you're going to buy your own 24 hundred cans of LaCroix so that you can continue to be the LaCroix Boy for the rest of your life, and I for one, celebrate that, Tyler. I hope that you have a LaCroix party once a month every month for the rest of your life. 

Hank: Um, and it's not that expensive. I'm looking at bulk LaCroixs and you can get 24 for just ten bucks. 

John: So it's a thousand dollars a year. 

Hank: Yeah, you know. You could be spending that, like you probably spend more than that on coffee. The question- no, probably not. That would be a lot to spend on coffee.

John: Where's he getting his coffee? 

Hank: [laughing] He gets his coffee at the very expensivest coffee place. It's called shmoosh-me coffee. It's got all the best and there's meatballs too. Um, I lost the podcast notes, John. 

John: I'll say. 

Hank: Okay, I'm back. Question. Can you turn your LaCroix into profit? I don't mean resell the LaCroix, but I mean like maybe it'd be like "Free LaCroix" at the thing that you do where you also provide a service or sell items. 

John: Hmmm. That is such a Hank Green way to get rid of 24 hundred cans of LaCroix. Is there any way that you can skirt the rules in order to accidentally make money? 

Hank: You could also just save money by saying, okay, everybody, I'm having a potluck once a week. For you, my friends, free LaCroix, and I'll also have a bag of chips. You bring food. 

John: That's good. 

Hank: And then you're getting - you won't have to buy the food as much. 

John: That's a great idea. Do you think you'd get tired of LaCroix if you drank six and a half cans of it a day every day for a year because it - because I don't think I would. 

Hank: Well I assume that they also provided a variety of flavors. It's not just pamplemousse, it's a bunch. And I think in that case, no I would not. I'd be like oh- but I would discover that I had a favorite and I would regret the fact that I had soooo much tangeriiiine and I don't really like it that much. 

John: You know, I used to not like tangerine, Hank. I find myself - whenever I find a LaCroix flavor I don't like I get it more often as a way of trying to train my palate into understanding why -

Hank: [laughing] The complexities?

John: - the geniuses at LaCroix chose to release this flavor. Like, obviously they know. more about sparkling water than I do. They make the greatest sparkling water in the world, so if they say that tangerine tastes good, I need to keep drinking it until I understand that they are right.

Hank: Right.

John: And in the case of tangerine that did actually happen. Now there have been a few LaCroix flavors that I just have not been able to bring myself around to but I haven't quit.

Hank: I'm very impressed by your efforts John. We have talked a lot about LaCroix and I have several other things to say but I'm going to move on instead. Does that seem like a good plan? 

John: Yeah, sure, if you don't want to get a LaCroix sponsorship. But yeah, go ahead and move on. 

Hank: This question's from Sarah, who asks, "Dear Hank and John, I've been watching Eons on Youtube recently and I'm absolutely loving it." It's our show at youtube.com/eons. "In the episode 'The Search for Earlier Life,' Blake mentions a, quote, 'team of Japanese scientists found some rocks' and the article of their work published showed on screen. What I'm wondering is in the mention of the scientists being Japanese, is that necessary? Is there something about their study or published work that makes it necessary to inform that the scientists were from Japan. I wonder if this is also similar in the literature world to saying, like, a Japanese writer. Is there inherent racism when mentioning these details? DFTBA, Sarah." In general, when we talk about scientific publications, we usually will say - on SciShow anyway - we'll say like, "A team of scientists from the University of blank," because you want to give credit to the people from that University. What I suspect is the situation here, the actual situation, is that it was from multiple different Japanese universities and so we shortened it to a team of Japanese scientists.

John: Yeah, that's possible. I also- you hear this a lot with artists, like when artists are identified in wall labels and when they're identified in episodes of The Art Assignment or whatever, their nationality is usually stated. 

Hank: Mmhmm.

John: And I've heard a few reasons for that in talking to curators about this. One of the reasons I've heard is that it helps people to understand that people are doing work all over the world, that people are making art all over the world.

Hank: Mmhmm.

John: Another reason is that it helps people to understand where there might be more support for the arts, so one reason you might say "a team of Japanese researchers" is if they were working across multiple universities in Japan, partly with government funding from the Japanese government. So yeah, I'm definitely not an expert about this, but I think it's pretty common across disciplines. And when it comes to authors, I usually assume that people state nationality as a way of stating the language in which the text was originally written. But I don't know. It's always felt very weird to me when I am travelling and people introduce me as an American author. [Hank laughs] I always feel really uncomfortable with that, because there's the idea of, like, the American Writer, it's just a little problematic to me for a few reasons. But yeah, let's move on. 

Hank: Yeah, I do like that - you know, I think that it's good to say, to introduce that there is other work going on in other places in the world, because if you just say "a team of researchers" our brains sort of default to the default, and our brain is, if you're an American, your brain will default to it being American. And that might even be the case for a lot of places. A lot of people might assume "a team of researchers" means a team of American researchers just because there's an awful lot of research that gets done in America and it's good to spread that love and let people know that interesting things are happening all over the world. 

John: Alright, Hank, we've got a great, great question from Patrick. Usually I don't enjoy it when people email Dear Hank and John and ask us to do their homework for them [Hank laughs] but in this particular case I did enjoy it, because I liked the homework assignment. Patrick writes "Dear John and Hank, in English class we are learning about fake news and propaganda, and as an assessment we have to write a fake new story among other things. The only problem is I have no idea what to write it on. Can you give me some ideas? Patrick." He also had a very long Latin signoff but I'm not going to even try to read it because it doesn't lend itself to my talents. But the good news here, Patrick, is that I am an expert in fake news. I have retweeted so much of it. 

Hank: [laughing] I mean, in the science world it's so easy to create fake news, and people do it all the time. All you have to do is say that something that's bad for you is actually good for you. 

John: Right.

Hank: And people will take that up, like - it's like, "Ah, chocolate's good now? Excellent. We're going to write a lot of stories about that. That's an excellent headline." 

John: Here's the thing, Tyler. A good fake news story does exactly one thing. It confirms a belief that someone already has with a fake fact. So if you are trying to convince me to retweet fake news, tell me that somebody wearing a "make America great again" hat did something terrible. 

Hank: Yes. Yes, or, or - 

John: If you are trying to get somebody who disagrees with me to retweet fake news, tell them that, you know, somebody who committed a heinous crime did so because they were such huge fans of Hillary Clinton.

Hank: Or if you want to get John to retweet some fake news, you've got to talk about, like write a story in which all of the players of AFC Wimbledon did something really great to support gun control. It's just all of his favorite things all in one.

John: Well, okay that's actually a good example though, Hank, because one of the keys to fake news is that it has to be in an area where the person who's reading it and sharing it doesn't actually know that much about it. Because if it were that, if it were that AFC Wimbledon story, I would immediately be suspicious, right? Because I know a lot about AFC Wimbledon. There are no AFC Wimbledon press releases I don't read. There are no, like, AFC Wimbledon news stories with which I am unfamiliar. So like, you don't play to someone's expertise. You play to their biases. 

Hank: That's true, that's true. You've got to come in from an area of ignorance. And in general it's just about, in a kind of way, helping people feel more comfortable in their perspective on the world. And that is the nicest way to say it. 

John: Yeah. Fake news tells you, "you were right all along, even when the data said you were wrong, you were right." Also-

Hank: And that's why you've been eating so much chocolate for your whole life. 

John: Also, Patrick, I would like to apologize for having just repeatedly called you Tyler. 

Hank: [laughing] Tyler was the LaCroix Boy.

John: Sorry, it's a fake news podcast today. I'm only calling people by wrong names. 

Hank: Is LaCroix Boix spelled with an o-i-x , John? 

John: [sing-songy] Of course.

Hank: Oh I hadn't realized that. That's exciting. 

Hank: This next question comes from Mrs. Robinson, who asks, "Dear Hank and John, how does one finance baby? [laughing] My husband and I really want a third member of our family to love and cuddle but we have no idea how to pay for all the things it will need. I can't imagine both of us working full time with a baby in the house, and doesn't it kind of defeat the purpose of having a baby if you hire someone else to do all the day to day loving and kissing and changing of poopy diapers? Will we have to come up with a budget?" I mean, yes. "I can't imagine our current strategy of just 'don't spend money' will be applicable to having a needy baby depending on us. I haven't read any of the baby books. Do any of them cover budgets? How did you guys and your families decide you could afford this timeless, very tiring, very expensive adventure? Your dubious advice is much appreciated. God bless you please, Mrs. Robinson." 

John: Great name-specific signoff. 

Hank: Mmhmm. Mmhmm.

John: Really good. 

Hank: Babies are expensive and forever. Like, they don't stop being expensive unless and until they get a job. And also probably even a time after that. 

John: Yeah, I would say five years after baby gets its first job is maybe when you can begin to think that the money that you make is yours again. 

Hank: [long laugh] I don't - so there are books about this but I did find that they were separate kinds of books. There was the baby books about babies and then there was the parenting books about parenting and money. Which, like, are not- and I kind of wish, like when I had my childbirth classes, the conversations about money were very infrequent and uncomfortable with all the people in the room. And of course, people are in different situations and so that is kind of bound to happen to some extent. But it is extremely important to be thinking about it now and also to be thinking that like, yes, your current strategy of just not spending money will not be applicable anymore. Though there are lots of ways to save money and to not spend money and to avoid falling into the "oh this thing is so cute, I need to buy it" or you know, just having the things that people give you are fine. Having a baby shower, people are going to give you a bunch of stuff. That will get you set off on the right foot. But yes, when your family gets more complicated, you should be thinking about money in a more serious way.

John: Yeah. I do think that budgeting is key. I also want to say, for the record, I remember when we were going through this, because this was in 2009. I think, Hank, by the time you made the decision to have a baby, you and Katherine were in a pretty secure financial place. 

Hank: Yeah, not- yeah. Yeah. 

John: But when Sarah and I were thinking about having Henry in 2009, we did feel like, oh, maybe we should wait a few years until, you know, hopefully things are a little steadier financially. And we got some advice from people who said, "you're never going to feel ready." And I think that's true, but I think you need to feel ready enough. Like, you aren't ever going to be ready to have a child because it's such an all at once change. It's one of the very few proper event changes in a human life. It's really intense and it actually does happen all at once, unlike most things that are sort of processes that we try to ritualize with events. I found it very helpful to have a budget but it was still stressful and we were in the scheme of things extremely lucky, and so- but it was still very stressful. 

Hank: Mmhmm.

John: My main advice to you is to lean into the baby shower if you can, because most of the expensive stuff is up front cost, except for diapers which are unbelievably expensive. And I also just want to say that I don't buy the argument that there's no point in having a baby if you have to have childcare. 

Hank: [laughing] Yeah, I agree. I almost cut that line out just because - yeah. 

John: There's plenty of poopy diapers. There are plenty of opportunities to love and hug on your child even if you have to work. And Sarah and I both worked- we went back to work when Henry was 12 weeks old and I don't think that Henry feels any sense of loss from that. In fact I think it was good for him in some ways to be exposed to different kinds of people and to feel loved and supported by a variety of people instead of just two. So, obviously every family's different. I don't think there's one right way to parent. But I don't think that you should feel like it's inherently a tragedy if a kid goes to daycare. 

Hank: Yeah, of course not. And also, absolutely feel comfortable relying on friends and family if you have those opportunities, both for childcare but also for just financial support if you need that. And to some extent, if grandparents are around to help, they might very well like that.

John: Yeah. They might not. I mean it depends on the grandparent.

Hank: They might not. It depends on the grandparent.

John: You've got to live with the family you get. We've been very lucky, I have to say, with lots and lots of - our kids get lots and lots of love from lots of places and that's been a real blessing for us.

John: This next question comes from April, who writes, "Dear John and Hank, almost every time I get in my car I worry that I'll be pulled over for speeding." April. I know exactly what this is like. I spend so much time worrying about being pulled over for speeding. "I don't speed that much and have never been pulled over for speeding, but I've seen it in the movies and I know that the police officer asks 'do you know how fast you were going' and what frightens me is not the speeding ticket, but how in the world am I going to answer that question. If I say yes, does it make it better because I knew I was speeding and take accountability, or is it better to say no and feign ignorance? Please help me so I can be prepared if this day ever comes. Not February, April." 

Hank: So this is a- like, I have gotten the question, instead of "do you know how fast you were going," it's, "do you know why I pulled you over?" 

John: That's what I get. 

Hank: And I'm like, [shouting] No! Not that! Oh god! It could be so many different things!

John: Yeah.

Hank: I don't! Are you a singing telegram? Is it a good thing? 

John: [laughs] My - I always have this impulse to confess every crime I've ever committed when confronted with a police officer, for him to be like, "hey, do you know why I pulled you over," and me to be like, "is it because I smoked cigarettes when I was 16?" [Hank laughs] I did. I bought them. I bought them at Kusa [spelling?] liquors where they catered to your spiritual needs. 

Hank: Is it because I kissed Cheryl when I was still kind of going steady with Miranda? Like is that why? 

John: No, that's not why.

Hank: We were super separated! I promise!

John: I think - Ok, when you get that question you answer it by saying, "I don't know why you pulled me over." 

Hank: That is the correct answer. I do not know why you pulled me over. A police officer once asked me "is there any reason why you're not wearing your seatbelt?" And I was wearing my seatbelt! It was just that my shirt was the same color as the seatbelt and I was like, "I don't know, this thing? That I'm wearing? Help!"

John: My assumption has always been that they ask you "do you know why I'm pulling me over" on the off-chance that you might say "is it because of the 800 pounds of heroin in my trunk?" 

Hank: [laughs] Is it because I'm the murderer? I've murdered so many people and I've just been waiting to be caught. 

John: Or you just like, sigh and say yes and get out of the car and put your hands behind your back. Um, no, April, I have not gotten a speeding ticket. This is a point of tremendous pride for me. I have not gotten a speeding ticket since I was 22 years old. However, when I got that speeding ticket when I was 22, the moment I began to roll down the window- first off, I was in tears. Secondly, I immediately said to the police officer, "I am so sorry. This is entirely my fault. I did not know what the speed limit was and I am sorry." And I thought, you know, maybe that will get me a warning- it didn't. It got me a 242 dollar speeding ticket. 

Hank: Yeah, no.

John: But that's my recommendation, April. Just listen. Make no sudden movements. And everything is going to probably be ok. But I can't completely - I share this worry so I feel like I can't completely calm you down. 

Hank: Yeah. My last time I got a speeding ticket was September 22, two thousand- what was it- seven? I think? 

John: Okay.

Hank: And I know that because it's the day before I got married. 

John: Oh man. You were in a right state. [Hank laughs] It was 2006 by the way. 

Hank: Oh! Shoot!

John: It was 2006.

Hank: It was 2006. Yeah you're right.

John: I recently got into a car accident, Hank. My first car accident -

Hank: Oh no! Yeah, yeah- 

John: - in almost 15 years. And it is so true that when you're in an emotionally overwhelmed place, you become a much worse driver. I ran into a postal service vehicle, which was tremendously embarrassing, but also annoying, because even though the damage was quite minor, of course that car is owned by the United States federal government. And so there were layers involved in getting, you know, to the point where I could drive away. And it would never have happened except that my poor dog is dying and it's been a very stressful couple of months, and then also there are a bunch of professional stresses going on at the same time and I - the moment I backed into this postal vehicle, I was just like, "ohh, this never would have happened if I'd been not stressed out!" And that is exactly what it was like before your wedding. You were in a state.

Hank: I was in a state. I even know that that's like the place where the cops pull people over. You should always - it's like, the speed limit goes from like 35 to 25 for this, like, four block stretch. 

John: Yeah.

Hank: And the road doesn't change at all! It's 'cause it's by the hospital and, yeah. I did the thing, John. But it's- yeah. It turned out okay. Thank you for being with me during that stressful time. I don't know why. That's like the most freaked out I've been in my whole life. Like, I was super happy about it - it was just - 

John: Yeah, well it's an intense thing - right. Well it's not about whether you're happy about it, it's just a really intense thing. And I remember my wedding as mostly being very, very intense. I often say that the first 12 hours of my marriage were the most difficult 12 hours so far. [Hank laughs] My wedding really, really stressed me out. So I can relate. 

Hank: Yeah, I mean, once it happened I was super down. It was the 24, 48 hours beforehand that was not - just events, man! They're hard! It's hard to run an event. Then I did it for a living! For ten years. 

John: [laughs] You were like, I'm so good at this, I think I should make it my job. 

Hank: This next question comes from Katya, who asks "Dear Hank and John, I just listened to your podcast in which you give advice on how to befriend a crow. It just so happens that I have the opposite of that problem. For some reason, my roommate decided to become friends with the many crows that live in our neighborhood every time she goes out." 

John: Oh, boy. 

Hank: Oh, boy! "Every time she goes out she feeds them some walnuts in the hope that they will recognize her face and see her as an ally."

John: Oh, God.

Hank: I guess that'll come in handy when the apocalypse rolls around and you've got a bunch of bird friends. "I told her from the start that I thought this was a bad idea. Crows creep me out. Why would you want to befriend them? Well a few weeks ago I woke up and got a heart attack when I saw four crows perched in a row on the balcony railing. They were watching me sleep!" [laughs] "They won't go away? How do I unfriend the murder?"

John: Oh god, I forgot that a group of crows - what's a group of crows called, Henry? Do you remember? 

Henry: [softly from background] Uh-

John: A murder! A murder of crows! Henry's here by the way. Henry, do you want to say hi to the podcast?

Henry:  Hiiii.

Hank: Hi, Henry. 

John: Um. Hey, Henry, do you think it's a good idea or a bad idea to become friends with crows? 

Henry: Good. 

John: A good idea? Why!?

Henry: You can make them- you could fly on their backs?

Hank: Hm!

John: I could fly on their backs? 

Henry: Yeah.

John: You mean like, a group of crows could like, hold me up and take me places?

Henry: Yeah.

John: I guess, but they're crows! I mean, couldn't I do the same thing with, like, golden eagles? 

Henry: Yeah.

John: Wouldn't that be cooler? Alright.

Henry: But it'd hurt more. 

John: It would hurt more because of their beaks? Why? 

Henry: Talons.

Hank: Ah. Mmhmm.

John: Their talons. I guess that's true. Henry's thought this through, he think that you should befriend crows so that you can fly places. 

Hank: Yeah! Well maybe that's what your roommate is thinking of, Katya. 

John: Yeah.

Hank: I don't - the thing is, the difference between unfriending a crow and making a crow enemy seems very fraught. 

John: I agree. That's a very fine line. And as much as you don't want to be friends with these crows who are watching you sleep, the thing you really don't want, Katya, is to have a bunch of enemies. Have crow enemies. 

Hank: Yeah.

John: That sounds very scary. Because then they- 

Hank: This is the exact same problem I have with Facebook, is like, maybe I don't- 

Henry: [quietly from background] You could just get a bat and hit them. 

John: [laughing] No!

Hank: You can what?

John: He said you can just get a bat and hit them. 

Hank: Oh! [laughing] No, you can't do that, Henry! 

John: It's a solution! But I think it's a crime. 

Hank: Uh, yeah. It's also- they're very fast, crows. This is the, I feel like, the exact problem that I have with Facebook, which is I can't - I feel like, not being friends with someone on Facebook, once you are friends with them, is like a very active decision.

John: Right.

Hank: And I do not want - I just want to be like, I just don't- like, you're just not part of my life anymore, but I don't want to say, like, unfriended! Like I'm hitting them off my Facebook stream with a bat. Just be like, Bfft! You're out!

John: Yeah.

Hank: And I have- and thus the crow situation also must be dealt with similarly, which is just ghost them. 

John: Yeah, Katya, you're going to have to ghost, not just the crows, but definitely your roommate. I would argue that the underlying issue here is the roommate. And like, I'm not telling you to be terrified of your roommate and her crow befriending activities, but I mean, do move. 

Hank: [laughs] Uh, are the crows on Facebook? Can you unfriend them that way? 

John: Oh that's a good idea. Try to be as passive aggressive about it as possible. I would definitely -

Hank: Or just be like, look, crows, I'm just not doing this any more, I'm moving to Vero, Vero is this social network and it's totally cool 'cause it's not like Facebook 'cause it's different from Facebook in ways. And so if you're not going to move over to Vero we just can't be friends. 

John: And the most important way it's different from Facebook is that crows aren't allowed to join?

Hank: Yeah, crows can't join Vero. I know that that's weird, but it's just like for now until the network get's bigger they can't have crows on. 

John: [sighs] So much of my life I didn't have a Facebook, and I think on average, I don't know. I don't want to talk about it, let's move on to a different question. 

Hank: This podcast is brought to you by Vero, that new social network that everyone's talking about that is different from Facebook somehow. 

John: Today's podcast is also brought to you by singing policeman telegrams. Singing policeman telegrams! The best reason for getting pulled over. 

Hank: [singing] Do you know how fast you're going? It's 37, your birthday! [both laugh] This podcast is also brought to you by Tyler the LaCroix Boix. Tyler the LaCroix Boix! Go to his potlucks, there's free LaCroix. 

John: And lastly, today's podcast is brought to you by IKEA furniture. IKEA furniture! Testing the well being of marriages and individuals since 1971. 

Hank: And also we have a Project for Awesome message from Jackie in Colorado. This message is for Maggie. It was a donation to the Project for Awesome, thank you very much for that, Jackie! It says, "Happy 25th birthday, Mags! As it turns out, sending 25 puppies to you in Scotland is a little bit impractical but I figured a podcast announcement would be an entertaining alternative gift. Plus, it's for charity! Have a fantastic day celebrating and take a well deserved study break. The Green Brothers said it so you have to follow through. Ta-ta-la-dee-da-dee-day, don't forget to be awesome."

John: Hank completely messed that up, but I'm gonna crush it. Are you ready Maggie?

Hank: Okay.

John: Here it is. [somewhat sing-songy] Ta-ta-la-dee-dee-da-day! And don't forget to be awesome. 

Hank: What is - is that a thing that I should know about? 

John: No, I just read it correctly. And you read it wrong. [both laugh] 

Hank: Ta-ta-la-dee-dee-da-day. 

John: Nah, still doesn't sound right.

Hank: [speaking more quickly] Ta-ta-la-dee-dee-da-day. Tata - tataladee dee daday. Ta-taladee-dee-da-day. Ta-ta-ladee-deeda-day. 

John: It's like when -

Hank: Yeah, I don't know, I feel like that's gotta be from something, right?

John: Nah. It's like when I - it probably is from Avatar the Last Airbender and we're about to get 250,000 correction notes. [Hank laughs] Whenever I try to say something in Spanish Henry just looks at me blankly for the longest time, and then eventually he'll say it back to me but correctly. And then I'll try to say it correctly and he'll just- it's the first time I've seen him roll his eyes. He's begun to just roll his eyes and say, "no, Dad, you can't do it."

Hank: So stop trying. 

John: It's an embarrassment. 

John: This next question comes from Amy, who writes, "Dear John and Hank, I often hear life advice saying things along the lines of, 'Follow your passion and dreams!' But is it wrong to want a 9 to 5 job and have your passions be side gigs? Why do so many songs have lines bragging about not having a 9 to 5 job? I'm about to finish an undergrad in music, and while I love playing instruments, I'm extremely exhausted from the lack of a daily routine in my class and rehearsal schedules, and from what I can tell from talking to my teachers, that's what a career in music is. Am I a quitter or letting down myself or my teachers if I get a nice 9 to 5 job in the best place on earth, a library, and be a part time musician? Not wanting to disappoint, Amy." 

Hank: Man, Amy, it seems like you've got your stuff together! 

John: Yeah! 

Hank: It seems like you know exactly what you want!

John: Amy, you're crushing it! Don't let anybody tell you that you're not crushing it. You know what you want to do for a job. You want to work in a library, which is awesome. And you know what you want to do as a side gig, which is awesome as well! I think this is great, and it's also really wonderful if you understand about yourself that you're someone who benefits from routine and structure and that's where you thrive. Like, I - that took me a long time to understand about myself, and when I stopped having a job, I had always had day jobs and sort of wrote at night and on the weekends, and I was very comfortable with that. But then when we had enough money for me to stop doing that and I was able to write full time, I was like, "Oh, this is great! I'm going to be living the dream! That's the dream, to write all day!" And within, like, two weeks of living the dream, I was like, this is terrible. Like, I understand that this is the dream, but it turns out it's not my dream. Like, my dream involves a certain amount of routine and seeing other adults during the day and lots of other things that weren't possible for me when I was ostensibly writing full time. And so, slowly, I built more and more day jobs so that I could come to an office, work 9 to 5, and write at night and on the weekends because that's where I'm productive and happy. 

Hank: Yeah, I've been thinking a lot about the ways we imagine success and how insidious that can be, when we create definitions of success that require things - it's almost sort of a requirement that any definition of success that really resonates with us is something that only a few people can have. 

John: Yeah.

Hank: And like, otherwise if everybody can have it, that can't be that great! Right?

John: Right. 

Hank: And that is such a destructive, terrible thing. Not just for individuals but for society as a whole, 'cause we need to like, have a society where the most people possible can be experiencing their lives as a worthwhile, exciting success. And I've become very, sort of like, apprehensive about the things that I do for a living and people seeing that as a goal that they want to have, because this is definitionally - like my job is definitionally something that can only be had by not very many people. Because you need a large audience to support, like a YouTube show or a podcast, and so not everybody can have a large audience unless more time of the day gets manufactured. So I worry about that and having gone through and watched the first season of the new Queer Eye on Netflix - you know, seeing those people moving to a place where they are more happy with and accepting of their life as it exists is really exciting, though I worry that in the examples given in that show, like, it requires a bunch of money to be spent on your clothes and your hair and your house, and like, it worries me- and like, I love the show, don't get me wrong. I'm like, a super fan of this and I wish there were more episodes. I got really sad when I found out that it was over. But I just want there to be ways for us to feel like successful people without having to have that be based on other people and sort of, like maybe unrealistic expectations for what a life can be. 

John: Yeah, I mean, the other thing about that, Hank, and you know, I obviously come to this question from an extraordinarily privileged and specific- 

Hank: Mmhmm? 

John: - perspective, but my experience has been both in having a measure of public renown and in knowing lots of people with much more public renown, it is tremendously overrated. Like it is overrated on a scale that baffles me. Because the truth is, and it's a hard truth to talk about, I think, but the truth is that for lots- for most people, I think, it's very disorienting, it's very scary, it's not particularly fun, and there's a feeling- at least I felt this after the success of The Fault In Our Stars - and again, I want to acknowledge how grateful I am for that success and how wonderful it was - but I also think that to be fair, I should acknowledge that I was not having a good time. I was deeply, deeply unhappy and I was sick and I was scared all the time and I was completely overwhelmed. And I realized that - it was another time that I realized that just because something is the dream, just because something is the thing that you're told to try to accomplish by the social order doesn't mean it's necessarily the thing you actually want to accomplish. But it's so, so hard to disentangle your interests and your passions and who you are from what the social order wants you to be or what the social order values. And so one of the things I loved about this question is that, you know, this is someone who seems to have a pretty good handle on who she is and what she wants, and I think, Amy, you should celebrate that. I think you should be excited about that and I think you should pursue the life that you want to have, especially because you're lucky to understand what that is. 

Hank: Agree. I think it's a thing that we all would do well to think more about, that stuff. Not just for our own sakes but for everybody's. 'Cause we're maybe headed into a world where it gets harder and harder to lead the kind of life that people can imagine as a success and that leads to a much less happy society which has a lot of negative impacts. 

Hank: I've got another question, John. It's from Anna, and it's about sand. "Dear Hank and John, how much sand is there?"

[both laugh]

John: This is a great question! I know the answer! 

Hank: You know the answer to how much sand there is?!

John: Yeah. I do.

Hank: How much sand is there? 

John: Who asked the question again? Is her name Anna? 

Hank: Yeah.

John: Anna, I'm about to blow your mind. 

Hank: Mmkay. 

John: You probably already know this, Anna, but I still think it's amazing. There are more stars in the universe-  [Hank laughs] - than there are grains of sand on Earth. 

Hank: Or something like that. 

John: No! It's not even close!

Hank: Okay, I believe you. 

John: That's it. 

Hank: I believe - there's a Carl Sagan quote that's - there are more stars - I think in the galaxy than there are grains of sand in every beach in the world. The thing to be really specific about though, John, is we don't know how many grains of sand there are in the universe. And that's what Anna asked about. 

John: Oh -

Hank: How much sand is there? 

John: Oh, yeah. Like, in the universe, there's a lot of sand, Anna. I mean, there's a ton. Like- well, actually way more than a ton. There's a lot of sand in the universe. 

Hank: [laughing] Just-  there's a lot. The question of whether - my guess is that there is more sand in the universe than there are stars in the universe, but I don't know that for certain. But that's my guess. 'Cause I bet there's a lot of good rocky planets with water running around making sand. 

John: Yeah, it's very, very, very probable. 

Hank: And Mars seems to be, like, mostly sand. There's a lot of sand on Mars. 

John: Yeah.

Hank: Or dust, I guess. Whatever the difference is between those things. So yeah, I think there's probably a lot of - there's a lot of sand. 

John: You want to know something else weird that I learned from the same thing where I learned this about the sand? 

Hank: Yep.

John: If you took ten drops of water, regular drops of water, and you counted the number of molecules of H2O in those ten drops of water- 

Hank: Mmhmm.

John: You would get a number approximately equal to all the stars in the universe. 

Hank: [strained] Ahhhhhhhhhh Okay. But what about sand though, John? 

John: I mean isn't that- well I already told you there are more stars in the universe than there are grains of sand on Earth. So how about- so this is the answer. So, if you assume a grain of sand has an average size and you calculate how many grains are in a teaspoon and multiply it by all the beaches and deserts in the world, the Earth has roughly, and we're speaking very roughly here, 7.5 times ten to the eighteenth grains of sand, or 7 quintillion 500 quadrillion grains of sand. Whereas the universe has just an absolute crap-ton of stars. 

Hank: [laughs] The number is non specific, but it's more than 10 to the 18. It's bigger than that. Which I believe! 

John: No, I'm pretty sure that - isn't that the current - wait, hold on. Isn't that the current thought about how many stars there are in the universe?

Hank: An absolute crap-ton? 

John: Yeah!

Hank: Oh, yeah. No, absolutely.

John: Like, not a relative crap-ton. But an absolute. 

Hank: Absolute crap-ton. Anna's question actually goes on to say, "since sand is made from rocks getting crumbled up into pieces, there's more and more sand being made all the time, right? Is that balanced out by the creation of sedimentary rock? Is the amount of sand increasing or decreasing? If it's increasing, does that mean that there's infinite sand? Bun, Anna." Banana. Banana.

John: Mmm, that's a great name-specific signoff. So -

Hank: It is! 

John: It's important to understand something here, Anna, which is that even if the amount of grains of sand is increasing, there's a finite amount of matter on Earth, so the number of grains of sand will never be infinite.

Hank: Correct.

John: So that's good. [Hank laughs] Because it means that, even -

Hank: But in the universe, there might be infinite sand in the universe, unfortunately. 

John: Possibly?

Hank: Just to confuse matters further. 

John: That's true. It could - it's possible. But it's hard to know for sure. There are seven times 10 to the 22nd stars in the known universe according -

Hank: Oh that's way more than we've got sand. 

John: - to this website. So that is actually the scientific definition of an absolute crap-ton is seven times 10 to the 22nd. 

Hank: Yeah, like the systems, the plate tectonics that is currently sort of - the geological processes generally that is converting sand into sedimentary rock is going on and will continue going on. Whether or not those things are in balance at the moment I don't know. I don't know if there's like, more sand being made by crumbling than there is sedimentary rock being made, but you are quite correct and intelligent to identify the fact that sand eventually becomes rock again, which is pretty cool! 

John: Alright, Hank! So we know that there is a finite amount of sand on Earth, and that that situation will continue. 

Hank: [laughing] Yeah. Do you want to give me the news from AFC Wimbledon, John? 

John: Eh, I mean, part of me does, part of me doesn't. Okay, here's the news from AFC Wimbledon, Hank. We played Peterborough in the League 1, the third tier of English football. Uh, it was a good game. Lyle Taylor scored a fantastic goal, and it looked like AFC Wimbledon were going to get three points, which would have been very very useful. But then Peterborough scored an equalizer, which is extremely frustrating and disheartening, and so it was a one - one draw. AFC Wimbledon got one point which moved them from 37 points to 38 points. They remain in 18th place but they are only two points away right now from a relegation spot. 36 points is what the team in 21st have. 21st, 22nd, 23rd and 24th will all spend next season in the fourth tier of English football. So Wimbledon are two points clear of the drop zone right now.

Hank: Oof, oof!

John: With 12 games to play. From those 12 games, we need about 14 points to guarantee our place in League - or close to guarantee our place in League 1 next season. Hank, how many points per game is that?

Hank: I don't know. 

John: While you're thinking about it, I'm going to go on and give you an update. But in all likelihood we actually need 14 points from 11 games because our next game is against Blackburn and they are at the top of League 1 and are just amazing this year, I mean, as third tier English football teams go, and will very likely beat AFC Wimbledon. I think even - yeah. So, then we need 14 points from 11 games. Basically, we still need to win 5 games, but now we only have 11 games in which to do it. 

Hank: Yeah.

John: So I'm officially very nervous.

Hank: Yeah. Well, you need 1.27 points per game to get in a -

John: [sighs] That's a lot of points! 

Hank: Yeah to get the 14 points out of the 11 games.

John: It's nerve wracking, so -

Hank: Ooh, gosh, that is scary. 

John: There's nothing obviously that I can do about it from the United States, but it is- ah, God, it's a worry. I just really hope the Dons find a way to stay up. I think that they've got some great young talent. I think things could look really good next year and then hopefully the year after that we'll be in the new stadium, and that will be a huge, huge deal for the future and the security of the club. So, [short sigh] yeah if we could stay in League 1 for another two seasons it would be great, but obviously it's going to be tough this year. I will say, Simon Bassey who's been with the club since they were formed - he participated in the tryouts on Wimbledon Common back in 2002 and was part of the team for a few years before joining the coaching staff- Simon Bassey had a great series of kind of "Come to Jesus" moments with the fans where he was like, look, we used to have the smallest stadium in League 2. Now we have the smallest stadium in League 1. The odds have always been stacked against us and I know that it's really frustrating to watch your team go out and struggle week after week but we need to be in this together. You know, the great thing about having a fan owned club is that we really are in it together, all of us who are members of the Dons Trust own the club just as much as Simon Bassey or any other fan does, and so that was really heartening and inspiring to me the way he talked about all of us being in this together and how the team was going to need the fans, just as the fans were going to need the team, so I am worried but I am also feeling that resolve that he has instilled in me. 

Hank: Great! Great. And it's not- and you'll go back and have the biggest stadium - or the smallest stadium in the fourth tier, until that stadium gets finished, and you know, that'll still be impressive that you've come so far. 

John: Ehhh. I'd really rather not suffer Wimbledon's first relegation since being reformed in 2002. But obviously- 

Hank: Yeah, the universe that - time is infinite, John. It will have to happen eventually. 

John: Mmm- that is not true. 

Hank: [laughs] Oh!

John: That is not true. It is very possible that the world will end before Wimbledon ever get relegated. And may that be the case!

Hank: [laughs] I mean, no! 

John: Yes! Yes!

Hank: Okay. 

John: What's the news from Mars?

Hank: In news from Mars, the Trace Gas Orbiter, which is part of the Exomars exploration program, which is two missions, one of which crashed into Mars, but this one did not. It's a European led mission, it just finished its very long term aerobraking maneuver to get into the orbit that it needs to be in to do its science. So when you go to Mars, you are going very fast, 'cause you have to get there, you have to get out of the Earth's gravity, you have to be accelerating out of, you know, away from the Sun to get further away from the Sun, and then you get there, you're going very fast, you have to slow down. There's two ways to do that, really. One is you have rockets that have fuel and you use those rockets to slow down and go into orbit around the planet. And then you have to carry all that fuel with you, which is bad. But sometimes, missions will just crash into the atmosphere, going like crazy fast, burn off some ablative plates that have parachutes to slow down and rockets to slow down, mostly though they use the atmosphere to slow down. But when you're an orbiter, you can't just crash into the planet and slam into the atmosphere like that. So instead, like they have this very long period of time where I think over 900 times the orbiter went around the planet and on one of the orbits, it skims the back - or on one side of the orbit it skims the back of the planet's atmosphere and then it goes way out in this long, looping orbit and then it comes again, it skims the atmosphere again, and then each time it slows down a little bit 'cause it crashes into the atoms at the very very top layer of the very thin Martian atmosphere. And that's what Exomars has been doing for over a year! It's been slamming into those atoms, slowing down, and now it's in its final orbit, and that means it can start soon doing its actual science mission which will be mostly figuring out this mystery that we've got on Mars right now, or at least part of this mystery, which is methane. We have detected methane on the surface of Mars several times. There's debate about whether that methane was actually on Mars or whether it was somehow trapped on the lander that landed on Mars. We've seen methane several times but we need a more sensitive instrument and this trace gas orbiter is going to be- it has those instruments. It'll be able to tell how much methane there is in the Martian atmosphere or where that methane maybe is coming from and that's very important, not just because it's interesting, but because methane on Earth is mostly produced by life. And if there was some tiny trace amount of weird life on Mars, it might be producing methane. It might also be consuming methane, and so understanding the methane cycle on Mars could be a really important part of understanding what weird trace life might actually be happening on the surface of that planet. Or beneath the surface. 

John: Wow. That's pretty cool. You know what else is news from Mars this week? 

Hank: What?

John: Noted Mars fanatic Elon Musk revealed [Hank laughs] that his global broadband Starlink network, this constellation that he is building to try to bring global broadband to people, especially people who are left behind by so much of the technological revolution- that the name for it was inspired by The Fault in Our Stars! My book! Or more likely the movie. 

Hank: [laughs] You don't think - I mean, who knows? So apparently Elon's a John Green fan. Does Leon Muss have any feelings about this sitch? 

John: No, Leon Muss has gone quiet recently. I'm not sure what's going on with him. I know you said that that was only going to be like a thing that lasted for a few weeks, but I'm committed to making sure it lasts for the entire twelve years of this stupid Mars bet. However, right now I'm - I don't enjoy Twitter enough at the moment, to be completely honest with you, to have a novelty account. 

Hank: [laughs] It's the only fun way to be on Twitter.

John: I just barely enjoy it enough to tweet my new Vlogbrothers video every week. But yeah, I was really excited about that. I thought that was pretty cool, so thank you Elon Musk for including me, making me a footnote in the incredible story of global broadband, Mars, Falcon Heavy rockets, et cetera. And thank you, Hank for being the reason that I care enough about this stuff to follow Elon Musk on Twitter in the first place. 

Hank: Alright John, what did we learn today? 

[outro music plays]

John: Well, we learned that IKEA furniture is just waiting at my house to be made. 

Hank: Oh, god can't you get, like a taskrabbit to come help you out with that sitch?

John: No, I'm going to do it by myself.

Hank: Alright.

John: Well, with Sarah. 

Hank: And we learned that 7 times 10 to the 22 is the technical definition of an absolute crap-ton. 

John: We learned that working 9 to 5 is just fine if you like working 9 to 5.

Hank: And finally, we learned that there is no such thing as too much LaCroix. 

John: Or at least I'd like to find out if there's such a thing as too much LaCroix. 

Hank: [long laugh] Alright, John. Thank you for podcasting with me. It's been a joy. And thank you everybody for listening, and if you leave ratings on iTunes that's really great too! Or whatever podcast machine you use to get podcasts into your podcast. Ears. This podcast is edited by Nicholas Jenkins. It's produced by Rosianna Halse Rojas and Sheridan Gibson. Our head of community and communications is Victoria Bongiorno. The music you're hearing now and at the beginning of the podcast is by the great Gunnarolla. And as they say in our hometown -

John and Hank together: Don't forget to be awesome. 

[outro music ends]