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How Sword Swallowing Works · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you Should Know?
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Speaker 1: From house Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant,
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Speaker 1: which makes this stuff you should know? Like you didn't know,
0:24
Speaker 1: and if this is your first time, if you really
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Speaker 1: didn't know, Welcome to the dark Side. Your life has
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Speaker 1: just fever changed. You are officially addicted. That's right. Um, yeah,
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Speaker 1: that's that's what I got. I'll take shoulders for five
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Speaker 1: hundred back. Okay, yeah, yeah, and that way you said
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Speaker 1: when I suggested this one, I typed it. Yeah, and
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Speaker 1: I think you thought it was funnier when I typed it.
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Speaker 1: I heard it, Okay, I heard I heard it in
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Speaker 1: my head founded, much like that. Darrell Hammond, Sean Connery, Yeah, um, Chuck, Yes,
0:59
Speaker 1: have you ever seen in the movie Days Being Confused? Uh? Yeah,
1:03
Speaker 1: In fact, I remember the first time I saw that movie.
1:05
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, let's here in Athens at the Georgia Theater.
1:09
Speaker 1: That was a great place to see that movie. That
1:12
Speaker 1: was wonderful. Remember when whenever they showed I think his
1:16
Speaker 1: name was Washington. That no, which character the black guy.
1:23
Speaker 1: I think you're thinking of the sweat Hogs. That was Washington, right,
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Speaker 1: But I think his name was Washington Took. I think
1:29
Speaker 1: I'm not sure, but yes, clearly I could just be
1:32
Speaker 1: thinking of that guy because they both have frozen. They
1:34
Speaker 1: were set in the seventies. But um, he has that paddle,
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Speaker 1: it says soul poll on it. Do you remember like
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Speaker 1: the whole theater just erupting the first time that showed
1:43
Speaker 1: that that was awesome. I remember I thought Matthew McConaughey
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Speaker 1: was not an actor. Oh, like, he was really Waterson.
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Speaker 1: I thought he was a real dude. They just dug
1:52
Speaker 1: up in Texas. Oh yeah, because that was like the
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Speaker 1: beginning of his career, the first thing I ever saw
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Speaker 1: him and Ben Affleck and that's It's a great movie.
2:00
Speaker 1: Parker Posey. Yeah, well that brings me to my point.
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Speaker 1: Parker Posey, you remember the part during the Beer Bust
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Speaker 1: where Parker Posey's funneling beer through a beer bong and
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Speaker 1: like she's got it for like a half a second,
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Speaker 1: maybe a second and a half, and then but it
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Speaker 1: just like pours out her mouth and all over her face.
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Speaker 1: At that moment. The first thing I thought of is
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Speaker 1: I'm sure everybody thought as well when they saw that
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Speaker 1: very suggestive part was Parker Posey would be terrible at
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Speaker 1: sword swallowing. That's what I thought, because it takes a
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Speaker 1: certain amount of relaxation to swallow a sword, and after research,
2:43
Speaker 1: I found that a sword swallow will make an excellent
2:45
Speaker 1: beer funneler. I haven't funnel the beer in a long
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Speaker 1: Time's been a while for me. It's probably good when
2:50
Speaker 1: you're forty to be able to say that I lost
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Speaker 1: access to beer funnels, and I think that's kind of
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Speaker 1: what happens. Like you just don't go to places where
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Speaker 1: there's a beer final not anymore. But you can always
3:02
Speaker 1: shock in a beer as long as you have a
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Speaker 1: pen and a beer can. I never got into any
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Speaker 1: of that, to be honest, kig stands all that silliness.
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Speaker 1: I was just like, just have a drink it. I
3:11
Speaker 1: don't prefer being upside down. I've never done a kigstand
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Speaker 1: really never. It's really um. You're like, you know what
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Speaker 1: it feels like to be torn apart by a gang
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Speaker 1: of angry toughs because there's like a couple of guys
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Speaker 1: like you're Yeah, you're it's really kind of scary. You're
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Speaker 1: on the edge there. We don't recommend any of those
3:30
Speaker 1: things now. And while we're at it, this is the
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Speaker 1: ultimate c o A. Please anyone out there, never ever,
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Speaker 1: ever try to swallow a sword or anything except food,
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Speaker 1: obviously in beverage, right, but no food larger than the
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Speaker 1: end of a football. Yeah, do not do not do
3:48
Speaker 1: not try this at home ever ever ever. Okay, Yeah,
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Speaker 1: Josh and Chuck officially think you're stupid if you try
3:55
Speaker 1: to swallow anything after listening to this, or if you
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Speaker 1: participate in backyard wrestling. Yes, equally dangerous. All right, so Chuck, um,
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Speaker 1: let's talk about swords swallowing. I'm excited about this one.
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Speaker 1: Kind of cool. Yeah. Um, this is part of our
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Speaker 1: ongoing circus arts collection. Have we already done one human cannonball? Okay,
4:15
Speaker 1: we've gotta get tight rope in there and then we're
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Speaker 1: all set. Well, we need to do like freaks too.
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Speaker 1: Uh yeah, just sideshow freaks, or maybe even like a
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Speaker 1: history of the sideshow. That would be pretty awesome, I agreed. Alright, So, um,
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Speaker 1: what other kind of freaks would I've just been talking about?
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Speaker 1: I don't know, um, you know the kind of meat
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Speaker 1: on the Friday night have you seen have you seen
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Speaker 1: that movie Freaks? Oh yeah, we've talked about that one,
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Speaker 1: all right. Um, yes, so Chuck, let's talk about the
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Speaker 1: history of sword swallowing, shall we. Yeah. I was kind
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Speaker 1: of surprised to learn that it started out with sort
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Speaker 1: of religious undertones or are they overtones? I think sword
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Speaker 1: swallowing is so that, um, it would be an overtone
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Speaker 1: and overtone. It's not very subtle. Early on in India
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Speaker 1: about four thousand years ago, they kind of the same
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Speaker 1: folks who are doing the firewalking and snake handling to
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Speaker 1: sort of show their oneness with God would swallow swords. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: like they were protected and they will be like look
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Speaker 1: what I can do. Yeah, I'm boastful. Yeah, funk here
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Speaker 1: this is what they're called. F A k I r
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Speaker 1: okay um and uh. Yeah, sword swallowing has been around
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Speaker 1: for four thousand years. Uh. And there's apparently still a tribe,
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Speaker 1: although I couldn't find, um the name of the tribe,
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Speaker 1: but it's in the Indian state of andrew Pradesh. And
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Speaker 1: um they apparently still passed down sword swallowing skills from
5:40
Speaker 1: father to son. Yeah. Yeah, so we know where it
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Speaker 1: came from and we know it's ancient. Started in India,
5:46
Speaker 1: started to move around the Far East, the Mid East. Um.
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Speaker 1: Typical path things will follow China, Japan, Mid East language civilization.
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Speaker 1: It all just followed the same path as sword swallowing
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Speaker 1: hit Japan, UM and China. In the eighth century, a
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Speaker 1: d in Japan and became part of Sanu Sangaku Sangaku
6:09
Speaker 1: one of those two, which is basically like street performance, right. Um.
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Speaker 1: And then apparently it got picked up again later on
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Speaker 1: in India again and it's the cradle of it. Um
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Speaker 1: by the whirling dervishes, the rebirth of swords swallowing, Yes,
6:28
Speaker 1: the first one by the dervishes, right. The whirling dervish.
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Speaker 1: Dervish is a beggar of the Sufi mystic order of
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Speaker 1: monks and um, they would kind of whip themselves into
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Speaker 1: a frenzy, hence the term whirling dervish. Uh. And there's
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Speaker 1: a specific order of dervishes um called the Order of
6:47
Speaker 1: Refis refights. My Indians getting rusty and they eat glass,
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Speaker 1: walk on coals, swallow swords basically the original it's like
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Speaker 1: a revival of the original the original reason people would
7:03
Speaker 1: swallow swords. And then it comes to Europe, and as
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Speaker 1: with all things that came to Europe from the outside,
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Speaker 1: the Catholic Church persecuted anyone who could swallow a sword
7:16
Speaker 1: man fun killers back in the day, but that was
7:19
Speaker 1: not enough to kill it. It was basically just a
7:21
Speaker 1: loss of enthusiasm by the public. Um by the nineteenth
7:26
Speaker 1: century in in Europe, everybody's like, we've seen this before,
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Speaker 1: we know what's going on. It's all an illusion, a trick,
7:34
Speaker 1: which we'll get to in a minute. Um. But then
7:37
Speaker 1: it hits America and there's a guy um from Madras,
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Speaker 1: an Indian man named Senna Sama. And on November seventeen,
7:46
Speaker 1: which will henceforth in the s Y s K Pantheon
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Speaker 1: of dates be referred to as sword Swallowing Day, Yeah uh,
7:54
Speaker 1: in New York City at St. John's Hall, for one dollar,
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Speaker 1: adults could see the first person to ever swallow us
8:00
Speaker 1: order in the United States and for a dollars a
8:03
Speaker 1: lot of money back then, I agreed, but this is
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Speaker 1: a big deal, and you would think it would have
8:07
Speaker 1: taken off right then, but no, it wasn't until eighteen
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Speaker 1: nine at the Chicago World's Fair that it became very
8:13
Speaker 1: popular in the US. Yeah, I wonder what else was
8:15
Speaker 1: big that year that wasn't the ice cream here wasn't now, No,
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Speaker 1: that was St. Louis in nineteen o three. Okay, so
8:22
Speaker 1: pretty ice cream of course, Swords wallow Horse. You know,
8:25
Speaker 1: if ice cream had been around, people be back. I'd
8:28
Speaker 1: rather to see ice cream, right. This was the year
8:30
Speaker 1: that electricity was a big one. Yeah, that was the
8:33
Speaker 1: one that The Devil in the White City is said. Okay,
8:38
Speaker 1: it's pretty good, but you can wait for the movie. Now,
8:41
Speaker 1: that was it coming out. Apparently Leo DiCaprio is playing
8:45
Speaker 1: the bad guy. Of course he is. I don't know
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Speaker 1: why I said that he rarely plays bad guys. Yeah
8:52
Speaker 1: that's true. Yeah, although he wasn't that good of a
8:55
Speaker 1: guy in Shutter Island. Uh, well, we don't want to
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Speaker 1: ruin that. It doesn't at her okay. Uh. It died
9:03
Speaker 1: out again in the nineteen fifties because of you know,
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Speaker 1: it's on the carnival circuit and I guess all these
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Speaker 1: new fangled rides sort of took away from the whole
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Speaker 1: side show aspect. And then I love how this points
9:15
Speaker 1: out that the you know, The Internet and video games
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Speaker 1: also helped kill swords swallowing, Like, really, yeah, I didn't
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Speaker 1: know that one had anything to do with the other.
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Speaker 1: It did. The Internet and video games pretty much killed
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Speaker 1: everything but the Internet and video games and TV. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: but now you can research and watch sort swallowing on
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Speaker 1: the internet. Now that is gorgeous thinking. I'm very impressive
9:39
Speaker 1: that one. Alright, So that's pretty much the history of
9:42
Speaker 1: swords swallowing. There's I guess towards the beginning of the
9:47
Speaker 1: twentieth century when it became very popular in the US.
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Speaker 1: There is also a lot of controversy over whether it
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Speaker 1: was a trick or an illusion, and Harry Houdini himself
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Speaker 1: said it's a trick. There's a trick to it, and
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Speaker 1: he wrote in um, his very famous book The Miracle Mongers,
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Speaker 1: and expose right um that people who swallow swords first
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Speaker 1: backstage swallow a metal sheath that they slide the sword into.
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Speaker 1: All Right, I gotta stop you here. How it's you're
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Speaker 1: still swallowing the thing that's just as long and it's
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Speaker 1: made of metal, and you're pretending like it's not in there.
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Speaker 1: You're walking around talking a lot. I don't know it
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Speaker 1: seems easier just to learn to swallow this. I mean,
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Speaker 1: it's not like and we'll cover this. Actually, might as
10:35
Speaker 1: well go ahead and say it. The swords that they
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Speaker 1: swallow aren't sharp edged. No, they are still pointyes, but
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Speaker 1: it's not like they're swallowing razor blades. I get the
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Speaker 1: impression that they're pointy ish. Well, yeah, a dull point
10:48
Speaker 1: I would say, yes, But I mean that can't be
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Speaker 1: much worse than the sheath. So I think the sheath
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Speaker 1: is Maybe Houdini was being funny and Tracy Wilson missed that. Maybe.
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Speaker 1: So she goes on to point out that the Encyclopedia
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Speaker 1: Britannica says that it's a magic trick as well, and
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Speaker 1: that it's not a that it is some sort of
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Speaker 1: illusion or hoax or fraud. But really, apparently the the
11:17
Speaker 1: basis of um sword swallowing is quite real. Like the
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Speaker 1: person is swallowing a sword, right, So let's how how
11:26
Speaker 1: do you do that? Well, Josh, if you're gonna talk
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Speaker 1: about swallowing a sword, then we need to talk about swallowing.
11:33
Speaker 1: And if you're gonna talk about swallowing, you got to
11:35
Speaker 1: talk about the g I tract. Yes, not the g
11:38
Speaker 1: I bill, the g I gastro intestinal tract. It's got
11:42
Speaker 1: a couple of types of muscle. It's got a skeletal
11:45
Speaker 1: muscle tissue and smooth muscle tissue, little lubrication layer called mucosa.
11:51
Speaker 1: And then skeletal muscle is involunteery, I'm sorry, voluntary, And
11:56
Speaker 1: if you're talking about your upper g I, you're talking
11:58
Speaker 1: about your mouth, you're farring in your upper esophagus. The
12:02
Speaker 1: smooth muscle is involuntary, and they work in concert to
12:07
Speaker 1: help you swallow junk. Right, So the top stuff is
12:11
Speaker 1: all voluntary, Like you can move your tongue, you can,
12:14
Speaker 1: you can. Yeah, you start off doing it on purpose
12:16
Speaker 1: when you chew and swallow, right, But then it gets
12:18
Speaker 1: to a certain point past the what is it, the
12:21
Speaker 1: upper esophageal um sphincter. Yeah, that just cracts me out.
12:25
Speaker 1: Once it gets past that, which is kind of high
12:28
Speaker 1: up towards the top of the esophagus. Yes, then it's
12:32
Speaker 1: like you said, it becomes all involuntary. It's automatic, which
12:35
Speaker 1: makes it very difficult to control anything that happens after that. Yeah, specifically,
12:40
Speaker 1: the you know, your epic epiglotis goes into action because
12:43
Speaker 1: that keeps stuff from going down into your lungs, which
12:45
Speaker 1: you don't want. Bullus is food is chewed food and saliva.
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Speaker 1: That's the best word ever in bullus b O, l u,
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Speaker 1: s and um. Once you've done all the voluntary action,
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Speaker 1: it does a pretty cool thing. It gets down to
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Speaker 1: the part of your esophagus as the smooth muscle, the
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Speaker 1: involuntary muscle and paristalsis takes over and that's basically you're
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Speaker 1: It just squeezes it down like an inch at a time. Yeah,
13:14
Speaker 1: you know how your esophagus is ringed, Yeah, right, Um,
13:18
Speaker 1: those rings are little bands of muscle, and then they
13:21
Speaker 1: squeeze just above the bullus and just shut it down there.
13:25
Speaker 1: Finally it gets to the lower esophageals fixter and that opens.
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Speaker 1: You have to laugh every time that that opens, and
13:35
Speaker 1: the bullus drops into the stomach to be digested and
13:39
Speaker 1: then eventually pooped out. So that's what happens. That's that's
13:44
Speaker 1: life that we just described life. The trick here, not trick,
13:50
Speaker 1: but on the way down it passes by things like
13:53
Speaker 1: your trachea, your heart, your a order which I thought
13:58
Speaker 1: was part of the heart. Well it's a it's the artery,
14:03
Speaker 1: the main artery that connects to the heart, and I
14:05
Speaker 1: saw the vena cava was also separate. That's the main vein. Yeah,
14:13
Speaker 1: And the diaphragm is the the muscle that moves up
14:19
Speaker 1: and down which allows us to breathe. And and we
14:22
Speaker 1: say all this because the sword is passing right through there. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: I mean it takes the same path as your food does. Yeah,
14:28
Speaker 1: pretty much, yeah, pretty much exactly. We have our ribs
14:31
Speaker 1: because we've got so many vital organs right there, they
14:34
Speaker 1: need extra protecting um. And so we circumvent the ribs
14:39
Speaker 1: when we swallow swords and just go directly past all
14:41
Speaker 1: that stuff, all that soft tissue, right. Yeah. But there's
14:44
Speaker 1: a difference, a big difference here. Swallowing food requires a
14:49
Speaker 1: lot of contraction of muscles, and which you want to
14:52
Speaker 1: do when you swallow a sword, is you want to
14:54
Speaker 1: relax all those muscles, even the involuntary ones, which is
14:57
Speaker 1: we'll get in into how to do that in a
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Speaker 1: minute here. But it's sort of the opposite of even
15:03
Speaker 1: though it follows the same path, the muscles are doing
15:05
Speaker 1: things they shouldn't do, aren't trained to do, at least, well,
15:11
Speaker 1: that's kind of the point of sworce swallowing. Like if
15:13
Speaker 1: you one of the reasons we warned you against sword
15:16
Speaker 1: swallowing is because you can't just swallow a sword the
15:19
Speaker 1: first time you try it. No, you you could, but
15:23
Speaker 1: you would kill yourself. Um. Sword swallowing actually takes a
15:27
Speaker 1: lot of practice, and a lot of horrible, horrible practice too. Um.
15:32
Speaker 1: You have to train. You have to train your involuntary
15:36
Speaker 1: muscle to work voluntarily, right, Yeah, or to not volunteer
15:43
Speaker 1: at all. That's a great point by by um relaxing.
15:48
Speaker 1: So the voluntary stuff, and let's talk about this. This
15:51
Speaker 1: is I guess now we've reached sword swallowing one on one.
15:55
Speaker 1: The first part is easy because it's all voluntary muscle.
15:58
Speaker 1: You move your tongue out of the Yeah, you open
16:01
Speaker 1: your throat. Um, you tell your head back. You always
16:04
Speaker 1: see a sword swallower tilts his head back. It's intuitive.
16:07
Speaker 1: But at the same time, the reason why is because
16:09
Speaker 1: they're lining up the pharynx, the throat with the esophagus
16:14
Speaker 1: so that it's a straight shot as straight as possible
16:16
Speaker 1: from the from the mouth all the way down right.
16:19
Speaker 1: That's right, um. And then after that, chuck, well, you
16:25
Speaker 1: slip the sword down in there, and it passes through
16:29
Speaker 1: the mouth and pharynx and upper esophagal sphincter into the
16:33
Speaker 1: esophagus itself. And the esophagus has got a little curve
16:37
Speaker 1: to it, so the sword is actually gonna straighten it out.
16:40
Speaker 1: And Tracy even points out that sometimes it's nudging organs
16:43
Speaker 1: out of the way as well on the way down.
16:45
Speaker 1: That's why you usually swallow a swords slowly and and
16:48
Speaker 1: the lube sword as well. Yeah uh. And then um
16:52
Speaker 1: loose either by saliva or artificially, right, some people use
16:55
Speaker 1: um uh petroleum jelly or vegetable or something, whatever your
16:59
Speaker 1: flavor is. So that's how it's done. Pretty cool, that's right.
17:03
Speaker 1: That's pretty much all there is too. It's but again
17:06
Speaker 1: it takes some tremendous practice. Um. And also depending on
17:13
Speaker 1: the type of the story of the length of the sword.
17:15
Speaker 1: You said it was blunted, it's not sharp, still kind
17:19
Speaker 1: of pointy, but it's as dull as possible. Um. But
17:24
Speaker 1: the length of the sword is also very important as well. Um.
17:28
Speaker 1: Usually from your teeth to the cardia, which is uh
17:33
Speaker 1: where basically where the stomach connects to the esophagus, where
17:37
Speaker 1: your lower esophageal sphincter is. Um, it's about forty centimes
17:43
Speaker 1: in the average person. Yeah, okay, so right, so if
17:47
Speaker 1: you swallow a sword that's longer than forty centimeters, um,
17:52
Speaker 1: you are going to it's gonna have to go into
17:54
Speaker 1: your stomach. That's that's a big deal. Yeah. And what
17:58
Speaker 1: I've gotten is most sword allowers don't do that. Um,
18:02
Speaker 1: it's not by accident that the Sword Swallowers Swallowers Association
18:06
Speaker 1: International UH defines that length at thirty eight centimeters. That
18:13
Speaker 1: you know, to qualify. So if it's forty centimeters, they said,
18:16
Speaker 1: let's make it get a couple of centimeters short, right,
18:19
Speaker 1: But this is just the typical person. It could be
18:21
Speaker 1: much shorter. That's just to qualify. I don't know, I
18:23
Speaker 1: thought it had to be that long. No, No, I'm
18:26
Speaker 1: saying you're the distance cardia could be shorter. So even
18:30
Speaker 1: with that shorter sword, you still may be in your stomach.
18:33
Speaker 1: But yes, if you just if you get it all
18:36
Speaker 1: the way down to a couple of centimeters above your cardia,
18:39
Speaker 1: the s s AI, it still considers you a sword swallower,
18:43
Speaker 1: which I think is nice. That is nice, but chuck, Um,
18:46
Speaker 1: if you if you are taking a sword all the
18:49
Speaker 1: way down to your cardia into your stomach, the sword
18:52
Speaker 1: is literally in your stomach. That's crazy. Not only have
18:55
Speaker 1: you relaxed, like all the voluntary muscles in your mouth,
18:59
Speaker 1: you've relaxed all of voluntary muscles on your on your
19:02
Speaker 1: larynx and in your esophagus right, all the involuntary muscles.
19:07
Speaker 1: But you've also managed to figure out how to relax
19:11
Speaker 1: both of your esophageal sphincters, the top one and the
19:14
Speaker 1: one above your stomach, so that you can pass a
19:16
Speaker 1: sword through without damaging it. And is nuts. And they
19:22
Speaker 1: do recommend, by the way, um, nothing over twenty four
19:27
Speaker 1: sixty one because at that point you were well into
19:30
Speaker 1: your stomach. Yeah, that's the s s ai again. Yeah,
19:32
Speaker 1: And I guess anything over that you might go hit
19:35
Speaker 1: the bottom of the stomach, but you don't want to do. Also,
19:39
Speaker 1: I want to point out that there is also a
19:42
Speaker 1: long tradition of sword swallowers who juggle, and often do
19:47
Speaker 1: this on horseback while juggling dude, unicycles, cartwheels, They do
19:52
Speaker 1: all sorts of crazy things. So really, to me, just
19:55
Speaker 1: standing stock still and swallowing a sword, that's impressive. Have
19:59
Speaker 1: you ever seen drop? There's this. I don't know if
20:02
Speaker 1: it's a new move, but it's a move where you
20:05
Speaker 1: put it down like halfway and then you move your
20:08
Speaker 1: hands and you let it drop by itself and you
20:13
Speaker 1: actually tighten your catch it with your esophageal muscles. That
20:18
Speaker 1: is control, pretty good control. Yeah, yeah, And they always
20:21
Speaker 1: take it out really quick to if you notice, because
20:24
Speaker 1: you're we'll talk about the gag reflex, but you're suspending
20:27
Speaker 1: that and you can only do that for so long.
20:29
Speaker 1: That's why they you know, you see him do it
20:32
Speaker 1: and then it's like tada, and they yank it back
20:34
Speaker 1: out really quickly because they want to live. That's right. Yeah. Um, well,
20:39
Speaker 1: speaking of the gag reflex, that's one of the things
20:42
Speaker 1: that has to be overcome and training, you know. Let's
20:45
Speaker 1: let's get into the reflexing. Okay, Well, reflexes exist outside
20:48
Speaker 1: of the brain. They're actually regulated by the brain stem.
20:51
Speaker 1: I didn't know that. Actually, Well, that's how how somebody
20:54
Speaker 1: can still be considered alive even though their higher faculties
20:57
Speaker 1: are gone, because they still have reflexes. It makes sense.
20:59
Speaker 1: I just never really out about it that way. But well,
21:01
Speaker 1: may I describe how it reflects works. So basically, you
21:04
Speaker 1: have a receptor nerve ending that detects, in this case,
21:09
Speaker 1: in your throat detects some sort of object or intrusion
21:12
Speaker 1: that shouldn't be there. Basically, the only stuff that should
21:15
Speaker 1: be there is fluid and chewed food as far as
21:18
Speaker 1: your receptors are concerned. But yes, if a sword or
21:21
Speaker 1: any other metal object um makes its way into your throat,
21:25
Speaker 1: the receptors are going to figure this out and they're
21:27
Speaker 1: gonna send an electrical impulse to your central nervous system
21:31
Speaker 1: in the brain stem. The in the integration center is
21:37
Speaker 1: what it's called. Yeah, that's kind of like it's kind
21:39
Speaker 1: of sounded to me like a call center. Like literally,
21:41
Speaker 1: I mean, it happens so quick, but it's like, what's
21:43
Speaker 1: the nature of your emergency, sir? Exactly, Like I've got
21:45
Speaker 1: a sword in my throat, but this is the brain stem.
21:48
Speaker 1: So it's all done on like um punch cards like
21:51
Speaker 1: they used to play Tic tac toe in the hanging chads. Um.
21:55
Speaker 1: So your your brain stem says, Okay, well there shouldn't
21:58
Speaker 1: be a metal object there. Just go ahead and direct
22:01
Speaker 1: the muscles of the throat to gag and that produces
22:05
Speaker 1: what's called a wretch, and that's meant to expel the
22:09
Speaker 1: foreign object. What swords followers do is mute or dull
22:15
Speaker 1: this reflex so that it doesn't happen at all, and
22:17
Speaker 1: they do it by setting it off time after time
22:20
Speaker 1: after time, unbelievable. They make themselves gag as much as
22:26
Speaker 1: they can until it doesn't work, which is dangerous. It's
22:31
Speaker 1: very dangerous. And if you didn't get the idea before
22:34
Speaker 1: from the initial c O, a sword swallowing is a
22:37
Speaker 1: very very dangerous pastime, profession, whatever you're using it for,
22:42
Speaker 1: I would imagine there at a higher risk for choking. Choking, Um, yeah,
22:47
Speaker 1: because the point of the gag reflexes to get that
22:49
Speaker 1: stuff out. That piece of steak comes flying out when
22:51
Speaker 1: you wretch it up. Uh. And ideally, if you don't
22:55
Speaker 1: have a gag reflex, then yeah, that's bad news because
22:58
Speaker 1: that steak just stays in there and die. You know.
23:01
Speaker 1: I had a friend um who when I was in
23:03
Speaker 1: elementary school, his mom got an emergency tracking out of
23:06
Speaker 1: me with a steak knife. Oh yeah, Dad, you always
23:09
Speaker 1: hear about the stories she had the little scar and
23:11
Speaker 1: everything cheese. Someone in a restaurant door. Oh wow, yeah,
23:17
Speaker 1: I mean a steak knife, no anesthesia, know nothing, steak
23:20
Speaker 1: knife and then a straw or pent cheese. I've never
23:24
Speaker 1: seen anything good like that happen. I didn't see it happen. Yeah,
23:28
Speaker 1: but I mean I've never I'm just saying I've never
23:29
Speaker 1: seen any like awesome life saving situation. I want to
23:33
Speaker 1: be a part of one one day, just not on
23:35
Speaker 1: the side. Uh so what what other dangers? They actually
23:41
Speaker 1: did a study um of and they want to ignoble
23:45
Speaker 1: prize for the study. I found out in two thousand
23:48
Speaker 1: seven and they studied a hundred and ten um English
23:52
Speaker 1: speaking sword swallowers and basically just ask him a bunch
23:56
Speaker 1: of questions about their health. And they called it sword
24:00
Speaker 1: throat when they get a sore throat. Yeah, I thought
24:03
Speaker 1: that was kind of clever. Clever. So throat pain, um
24:07
Speaker 1: lower chest pain, persistent lower chest pain, internal bleeding occasionally.
24:12
Speaker 1: I saw this one lady who was coughing up blood
24:15
Speaker 1: and they found out that she had like nicked part
24:17
Speaker 1: of her esophagus way down, which imagine it's common um
24:22
Speaker 1: esophical perforations like we just talked about. Uh, how do
24:26
Speaker 1: you say that pleurisy, inflammation of the lungs, and paracarditis,
24:32
Speaker 1: which is inflammation of the sack that protects the heart.
24:36
Speaker 1: And that's in descending order of how often those things happened.
24:40
Speaker 1: So everyone gets the sword throat, it seems like, but
24:42
Speaker 1: probably very few actually got inflammation of the the paricardium, right.
24:47
Speaker 1: They also figured out that, um, there was a trend
24:52
Speaker 1: among sword swallowers where if they had a particularly rough performance, um,
24:58
Speaker 1: the inflammation that would result resulted in further injury. So
25:02
Speaker 1: like they would be okay during the performance, but you know,
25:05
Speaker 1: they had a little trouble getting it down, but then
25:08
Speaker 1: a day later or something they broke their esophagus or
25:11
Speaker 1: something like that. And then also apparently sinus infections are
25:16
Speaker 1: common because you're you're passing the sword with petroleum jelly
25:21
Speaker 1: and whatever hair and gun get picked up in between
25:23
Speaker 1: the time you put the petroleum jelly on and the
25:25
Speaker 1: time you swallowed it right past the sinuses, which can
25:28
Speaker 1: be sensitive. I can attest, and I imagine the circus
25:31
Speaker 1: side show isn't the cleanest area on the planet, you,
25:36
Speaker 1: I think, imagine correctly, you know what I'm saying. Um,
25:40
Speaker 1: there's also death is a side effect of sword swallowing
25:44
Speaker 1: from time to time. Um. Another British medical journal study
25:48
Speaker 1: cited the death of a man who um swallowed an
25:52
Speaker 1: umbrella or tried to and died. My first question was,
25:56
Speaker 1: did he accidentally try and open it? You hit the button.
25:59
Speaker 1: It's like Tom and Jerry totally. His body flares out
26:03
Speaker 1: like an umbrella. It's like Tom and Jerry, except real life.
26:06
Speaker 1: And said, that's right. Um. World sword Swallowers Day, two
26:14
Speaker 1: thousand ten. What it sounds like is that they gathered
26:17
Speaker 1: sword swallowers at Ripley's believe it or not, all over
26:20
Speaker 1: the country to do this all at once to perform
26:24
Speaker 1: um and Red Stewart, your buddy Red. He swallowed a
26:27
Speaker 1: world record fifty two swords at a time. Oh man,
26:30
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's official or unofficial Guinness certified.
26:34
Speaker 1: But George the Giant swallowed a thirty seven inch sword
26:39
Speaker 1: at the Hollywood believe it or not. Jeez, So that's
26:42
Speaker 1: they recommend twenty four inches max. Because you're in the
26:44
Speaker 1: stomach thirty seven inches. That's longer than three ft. That's crazy. Uh.
26:50
Speaker 1: Dan Meyer swallowed a giant straight razor and hedge clippers
26:54
Speaker 1: in Dallas at the belief that they're not there. Travis
26:57
Speaker 1: Festler swallowed a sword with cockroaches crawling around it, um,
27:02
Speaker 1: crawling on the sword. And guess where this one happened Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Um.
27:10
Speaker 1: What else a hundred and twenty degree curve sword at
27:13
Speaker 1: the Ripley's Believe It or Not in Ocean City, Maryland,
27:17
Speaker 1: and I'm just amazed over, you know. And finally, Mike
27:20
Speaker 1: Harrison at the Orlando Believe it or Not, swallowed a
27:23
Speaker 1: sword that was driven down his throat by the discharge
27:26
Speaker 1: of a gun. I don't know how that happened, but
27:30
Speaker 1: wait what happened? Apparently it was shot into his mouth
27:33
Speaker 1: from a gun. I don't know. I'd like to see
27:37
Speaker 1: that one. Yeah, that's kind at the at the Internet,
27:41
Speaker 1: which is first killed and then now supports sword swallowing.
27:47
Speaker 1: And also Red Stewart, who you mentioned, who swallowed fifty
27:50
Speaker 1: two swords at once. I guess his former record was
27:52
Speaker 1: twenty five. Um. But before that, this impresses me the most.
27:57
Speaker 1: He in V seven he swallowed a our axel. Well
28:03
Speaker 1: they do. Tracy pointed out people swallowed dipsticks and other
28:06
Speaker 1: straight metal things. Yeah, that's pretty amazing. Stuff. Yeah, that's
28:11
Speaker 1: got to be pretty big around too. Yeah, and people
28:15
Speaker 1: have swallowed snakes. I found this guy, Oh that sucks
28:19
Speaker 1: for the snake. Yeah, I think the snake lives. Yeah,
28:22
Speaker 1: but still he's like, well, sure, what are you doing? Well,
28:25
Speaker 1: the snake is probably like I'm getting eaten by another snake,
28:28
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, okay, so it's just desserts then. But
28:31
Speaker 1: this dude in the eighteen forties sal Uh salam intro
28:34
Speaker 1: the snake swallower. He uh have a couple of good
28:38
Speaker 1: quotes from him. They fancy that it hurts you, but
28:41
Speaker 1: it don't, or what a fool I should be to
28:43
Speaker 1: do it. I don't mean to say it don't hurt
28:46
Speaker 1: you at first, because it do. For my swallow was
28:49
Speaker 1: very bad and I couldn't eat anything but liquids for
28:51
Speaker 1: two months whilst I was learning. I cured my swallow
28:55
Speaker 1: whilst I was stretching it with lemon and sugar. And
28:58
Speaker 1: then he learned this that was sore, doesn't He learned
29:00
Speaker 1: to swallow a snake and said, the snakes are about
29:04
Speaker 1: eighteen inches long, and you must first cut the stingers
29:08
Speaker 1: out because it might hurt you. When I first began
29:10
Speaker 1: swallowing snakes. They tasted queer, like they draw the roof
29:14
Speaker 1: of your mouth a bit. It's a roughish taste. Apparently,
29:19
Speaker 1: the scales like it's easier going down than it is
29:22
Speaker 1: coming back up. I could see that, the way the
29:24
Speaker 1: scales are laying, I could totally see that. So we
29:26
Speaker 1: don't recommend swallowing snakes either, and I don't know if
29:29
Speaker 1: anyone still does that. That might be a nineteenth century
29:33
Speaker 1: swallowing steaks. Snakes swallow steaks a lot. Yeah, it's not tough. Um, Well,
29:41
Speaker 1: I guess that's it. You've got anything else, Well, if
29:44
Speaker 1: you want to see some pretty cool images about um,
29:47
Speaker 1: sword swallowing with a strange like kind of um superhero
29:52
Speaker 1: worship ee um man, he was buff too. Yeah, there's
29:58
Speaker 1: a there's a period around how S works where like
30:01
Speaker 1: comic book geeks like kind of ruled the place, right,
30:04
Speaker 1: and so this is acceptable in some way. Yeah, it's
30:06
Speaker 1: definitely look different than our other illustrations. Right, So if
30:09
Speaker 1: you want to, um, if you want to see those
30:11
Speaker 1: weird illustrations and learn as much as you possibly can
30:15
Speaker 1: about sword swallowing, uh and the circus arts in general,
30:18
Speaker 1: we have a whole circus arts section. Did you know
30:20
Speaker 1: that I just let you say circus arts. Um, it's uh.
30:25
Speaker 1: Any of that stuff can be typed into the search
30:27
Speaker 1: bar how stuff works dot com and that means, now, Chuck,
30:31
Speaker 1: it's time for listen to mail. I'm gonna call this
30:37
Speaker 1: blood type follow up. Guys are just googled good podcast
30:41
Speaker 1: and found your name, and I think you're serious. Although
30:45
Speaker 1: I google good podcast and I didn't see anything. What
30:49
Speaker 1: comes up? Uh? There was one article about how to
30:52
Speaker 1: do a good podcast and it was like, enunciate very clearly,
30:56
Speaker 1: stick to the point, and keep it short. We're away
30:59
Speaker 1: of breaking rules. Uh. So I just enjoyed your latest
31:04
Speaker 1: podcasts and have a contribution on the subject of blood type.
31:08
Speaker 1: To put it simply, the transfusion rate is sixty to
31:10
Speaker 1: ninety million eaters per hour for the first fifteen minutes,
31:13
Speaker 1: although each hospital has its own policy in an exact rate,
31:17
Speaker 1: but it UH on average it is sixty to ninety
31:22
Speaker 1: After about fifteen minutes, the rate can be advanced to
31:25
Speaker 1: one hundred to one hundred and twenty million eaters per hour.
31:28
Speaker 1: The rationale is that if an acute hemolytic reaction is
31:32
Speaker 1: going to occur at will happened in the first fifteen
31:34
Speaker 1: minutes of a transfusion, and the slow rate keeps the
31:37
Speaker 1: infused volume low. So, using a little advanced math to
31:40
Speaker 1: answer your question, it takes as little as sixteen to
31:44
Speaker 1: twenty two point five million leads of incompatible blood to
31:47
Speaker 1: cause a reaction. Of course, these are rough estimates, that
31:50
Speaker 1: they do give you a hint of how a little
31:52
Speaker 1: bad blood can cause a big problem. Thanks for doing
31:55
Speaker 1: the show. I look forward to going back and listening
31:57
Speaker 1: to old shows as well as the current new ones.
32:00
Speaker 1: I hope I didn't just make myself look like an idiot.
32:04
Speaker 1: Far from it, Dan, you sounded pretty dang smart, I
32:07
Speaker 1: would say so. Um. Yeah. Also, it's really weird to
32:11
Speaker 1: U two get feedback that quickly, like we recorded that
32:16
Speaker 1: two days ago and bam, we've got an answer. I
32:20
Speaker 1: really enjoyed that. We I kind of wish we could
32:22
Speaker 1: do this alive, but that wouldn't work. We've tried that before.
32:27
Speaker 1: It never does work. Um, well, I guess it's it.
32:31
Speaker 1: Do you have anything Do you want to call for anything? Uh? Okay, um,
32:37
Speaker 1: if you have any kind of circus arts background or
32:42
Speaker 1: your family, does we want to hear about it? Because
32:44
Speaker 1: we find that kind of stuff fascinating. Um. Also, by
32:48
Speaker 1: the way, the black guy in Dason confused his named
32:51
Speaker 1: Melvin Spivey. Really it was way off, so sorry about that. UM.
32:56
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Speaker 1: com slash stuff you Should Know, and you can also
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33:20
Speaker 1: Stuff Work staff as we explore the most promising and
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