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What has the world's deadliest venom? · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
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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: Snowpocalypse eleven. Yeah, this is the first day we've been
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Speaker 1: in the office this weekend. It Thursday afternoon. Yeah. And
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Speaker 1: I know all you northern folks like to make fun
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Speaker 1: of us here in the South, but it's just ya.
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Speaker 1: You know what, next time it snows and ices seven
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Speaker 1: inches in your city wherever you are up north, Like,
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Speaker 1: don't salt any roads, don't get out any snow chains,
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Speaker 1: don't get out any snowplows, and see how you do.
0:45
Speaker 1: Saw And that guy was like, uh, I'm sorry now
0:48
Speaker 1: he was. He was fine, he was a nice guy.
0:50
Speaker 1: I wasn't trying to be a jerk. I'm just saying
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Speaker 1: we don't have the stuff to deal with it. No,
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Speaker 1: apparently we have ten snowplows. Ten snowplows for the city
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Speaker 1: of Atlanta. That's about what we don't think we should
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Speaker 1: go out and buy fifty snowplows. Now though I didn't
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Speaker 1: even know we had ten. Yeah, I thought that was
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Speaker 1: pretty decent. It's a southern city, so yeah, um, it's
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Speaker 1: the weather's fault, not Atlanta's fault, and that's right. So yeah,
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Speaker 1: we had to come in to make sure that we
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Speaker 1: still continue getting everybody stuff. You should knows. I can't
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Speaker 1: imagine that publishing it will never happen, Chuck, Are you
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Speaker 1: gonna it will never happen? Dude, Chuck sory. Okay, my
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Speaker 1: knuckles are starting to you ready, yeah, warm enough to
1:36
Speaker 1: do this. Before we start this, can I say something
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Speaker 1: to Australia because we're gonna be talking about Australia. They're
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Speaker 1: suffering through some flooding there in Brisbane. It's like a
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Speaker 1: five year flood, right, It's it's a big flood and
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Speaker 1: it's um killed so far about thirty four people, and so, uh,
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Speaker 1: we just want to say that, you know, we're thinking
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Speaker 1: about your Australia. That's an awful thing and we're gonna
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Speaker 1: be poking fun at you later on with all the
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Speaker 1: deadly creatures there and your outback steakhouses, but um, we're
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Speaker 1: thinking about you on a serious note. So having said that,
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Speaker 1: let the jokes fly. Uh, Well, that's tough you just
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Speaker 1: shut me down, all right, You ready, Yeah, let's do this, Okay. So, Chuck,
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Speaker 1: there is a couple of different guys out there in
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Speaker 1: the world who are in stiff competition right now to
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Speaker 1: come up with a cure for cancer based on scorpion venom.
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Speaker 1: There are two dudes and they are scrambling for their
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Speaker 1: lives right now. Um. There's a guy at the St.
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Speaker 1: Louis University School of Medicine and there's another guy who
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Speaker 1: is at the Henry Ford Health System in Michigan. Okay, right,
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Speaker 1: and both of them have found or are working upon
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Speaker 1: the idea that scorpion and him something in it attacks glioma's,
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Speaker 1: which are a very very deadly type of cancer cell
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Speaker 1: brain cancer tumor. Right. Um, they go after glioma's first
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Speaker 1: for some reason. So if these guys can figure out
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Speaker 1: the treatments really weird, you inject the scorpion venom, it
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Speaker 1: goes and attaches itself to the glioma, and then you
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Speaker 1: radiate it and it just destroys everything. So if they
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Speaker 1: can figure out how to get this to work reliably,
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Speaker 1: they would have basically come up with a cure for
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Speaker 1: brain cancer. I knew a guy undergoing that treatment. You're joking. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: this was at the very beginning stages of it, like
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Speaker 1: probably seven or eight years ago. Yeah, this is from
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Speaker 1: two thousand six. Yeah, this guy was um. I worked
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Speaker 1: for a company that produced documentaries, like medical documentaries, and
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Speaker 1: they were documenting this guy's fight with cancer. And one
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Speaker 1: of the things I remember at the time hearing was
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Speaker 1: that he was undergoing a very experimental thing with scorpion venom.
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Speaker 1: And we're all like what, But it wasn't about that,
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Speaker 1: so I didn't learn much about it. Yeah. Interesting, it
4:02
Speaker 1: is very interesting, And scorpions, of course are extremely poisonous. Right, No, Josh,
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Speaker 1: oh really, here's your here's your cocktail party. Fact of
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Speaker 1: the day. There is a difference between venomous and poisonous.
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Speaker 1: And the difference is not in the toxin, but in
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Speaker 1: the way the toxin is transferred from the animal to
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Speaker 1: the whatever. I never knew that I suspected as much.
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Speaker 1: So poison is transmitted passively, Uh so you have to
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Speaker 1: ingest it or absorb it somehow, and venom is injected, right,
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Speaker 1: and usually poison like say a poison tree frog, where
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Speaker 1: the dart frog. Yeah, the poison tree dark frog, poison
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Speaker 1: dark frog, poison dart frog. Where am I getting tree from?
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Speaker 1: I think they're they're in trees, right, the poison dart frog.
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Speaker 1: It creates this poison passively, like you said, usually through
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Speaker 1: a diet. That's how poison is created. And it's not
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Speaker 1: out to hurt you unless you eat it or handle
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Speaker 1: it in a way. It doesn't like you get the
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Speaker 1: toxin absorbed through your skin. Boom, you're dead, right, or
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Speaker 1: if you're a human being, you're on one heck of
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Speaker 1: a trip, I would imagine. So, uh, you said something
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Speaker 1: very important though. That's another difference. Poison is um created
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Speaker 1: through the diet, whereas venom is inherent in the animal itself. Well,
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Speaker 1: the animal creates it. Yeah, the animal creates it without
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Speaker 1: the help of diet, right right, There's like some sort
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Speaker 1: of mechanism in their metabolism that creates venom, and poison
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Speaker 1: is generally a defensive um as a defensive role in
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Speaker 1: venom is usually for the offense for predators. You want
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Speaker 1: to get your prey bite, Yeah, like with a fang
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Speaker 1: or a stinger, release some venom. Boom, you're fine, got dinner.
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Speaker 1: Those are the differences. Yeah, So a scorpion isn't poisonous.
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Speaker 1: It is venomous. It produces its own venom on purpose,
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Speaker 1: uses it on purpose. Venomous, right, poison tree, dark frog,
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Speaker 1: that's poisonous. It even says it in the name poison
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Speaker 1: through the skin. All right, So, Chuck, this is something
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Speaker 1: I've always wondered, Right, what is the most venomous animal
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Speaker 1: on the planet. I would imagine that it's something along
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Speaker 1: the lines of a cobra. Maybe maybe they have them
6:25
Speaker 1: in Florida. Those things are extremely poisonous, right, are they
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Speaker 1: the most poisonous? I'm sorry, venomous animal? How many times
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Speaker 1: do you think we'll do that this time after we
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Speaker 1: explained that we're gonna screw it up, We'll get a
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Speaker 1: very accurate number from Aaron Cooper. I'm sure, Um, what
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Speaker 1: the the most venomous animal? I would think is either
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Speaker 1: a coral snake I should say before I read this article,
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Speaker 1: the black mamba maybe I've always heard those are pretty.
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Speaker 1: That's another one to the um black widow spider, or
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Speaker 1: possibly the brown recluse. Like you always hear black widows
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Speaker 1: gonna kill you. That's what my dad always said to
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Speaker 1: me before I went to eap every night. But um,
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Speaker 1: the brown recluse. Apparently it is way way worse. It's
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Speaker 1: because they Yeah, sure, I've heard that black widows. Man,
7:09
Speaker 1: I see those all the time. They always scare me. Yeah,
7:11
Speaker 1: well they look really scared that that shiny black body
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Speaker 1: with the red hourglass and that look like we are
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Speaker 1: you looking at I'll kill you? Uh, those are not, Josh,
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Speaker 1: but I would have guessed placed my guesses on some
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Speaker 1: of those things as well before this article. Apparently the
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Speaker 1: deadliest most venomous animal being on the planet is found
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Speaker 1: in the ocean right off of the coast of Australia. Yep,
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Speaker 1: the box jellyfish a k a. The sea wasp right
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Speaker 1: a k a. The marine stinger. Yeah, I think that's
7:47
Speaker 1: a stupid name, like sea wasp. Sea wasp is bad.
7:50
Speaker 1: I think they have these at the Georgia Aquarium, although
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Speaker 1: I may be wrong. They have those little little translucent,
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Speaker 1: sort of fluorescent almost jellyfish. I think a lot out
8:00
Speaker 1: of them are like that, though, are they. Well, now
8:02
Speaker 1: I know that they're not like solid orange, You're like
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Speaker 1: they have tentacles. They sort of look like jelly. Uh.
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Speaker 1: These are pale blue, almost transparent um and they are
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Speaker 1: of the most deadly creatures in the world because they
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Speaker 1: can kill a human in five minutes or less. That's
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Speaker 1: pretty quick they can. So if you're out of see,
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Speaker 1: you will likely die before you reach help. Yeah, you're
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Speaker 1: going too shock. The venom of the box jellyfish or
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Speaker 1: sea wasp um. It paralyzes your central nervous system, right,
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Speaker 1: so you can't breathe, your heart stop speeding, your muscles,
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Speaker 1: stop working. You probably do all sorts of unpleasant things
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Speaker 1: in your pants. Yeah much, you have this control yourself,
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Speaker 1: and that's probably the least of your worries at that point,
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Speaker 1: because you are dying and you're swimming back to shore.
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Speaker 1: The problem is when you encounter one of these things,
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Speaker 1: if it does indeed sting you, when if you pull
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Speaker 1: your arm away, that actually tends to cause more of
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Speaker 1: the stingers to latch onto you and deliver even more venom. Right. So,
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Speaker 1: so if this happens to you, just just still play
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Speaker 1: still and let it sting the crap out of you.
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Speaker 1: How does this happen? Though, Josh, what are these little
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Speaker 1: deal he's called? Uh? They are called nematicists, right. Nematicists
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Speaker 1: are these little cells that how something called snido blasts
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Speaker 1: and this is real. Yeah, and it was a lovely
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Speaker 1: British one. She went canolst Kanto blast. It's Kate Middleton,
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Speaker 1: it was. This is the only British one we know
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Speaker 1: right now. So each tentacle has five thousand of the
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Speaker 1: nematosists that are housed in the blast. Okay, so, and
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Speaker 1: the Knido blasts are basically like the little charge of
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Speaker 1: venom that shoot out, right, And there's a trigger protruding
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Speaker 1: from the nematosist, which basically is like a little it
9:59
Speaker 1: looks like a little claw. The trigger is and when
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Speaker 1: this thing is triggered, the knido blast shoots out, deposits
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Speaker 1: the venom in you, and you're in big trouble. Now
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Speaker 1: that's just one Knido blast, right, There's apparently a ton
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Speaker 1: of these on any given tentacle. Correct, you have five
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Speaker 1: thousand stingers, uh, seventy five thousand total. If you have
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Speaker 1: fifteen tentacles nematicists, that's a lot. Oh yeah. And all
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Speaker 1: it takes is probably a few to do some major damage.
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Speaker 1: I wondered if one of the reasons it was so
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Speaker 1: deadly was because there's just so many. I would definitely
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Speaker 1: think so. I think it's very powerful venom. Yeah, right,
10:42
Speaker 1: so that the pairing of the two is deadly. Uh,
10:45
Speaker 1: and the the reaction of the um nematicist trigger the
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Speaker 1: knido blast. Now, the neumatosis is triggered releasing the knido
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Speaker 1: blast um by chemicals in our skin pheromones I would egine. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: that's key. And some Australians have very cleverly figured out
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Speaker 1: that for some reason, nylon, as in pantyhose, keeps this
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Speaker 1: chemical from seeping out and being detected by the kinnado blast.
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Speaker 1: So you can just walk right up to a box
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Speaker 1: jellyfish with pantyhose on your arm or your head and
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Speaker 1: rub the jellyfish and it won't do anything. Do not
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Speaker 1: do that, But I'm just saying theoretically you could. So
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Speaker 1: if you see some AUSS surfers wearing pantyhose, then uh,
11:32
Speaker 1: don't want, don't don't hate. That's probably the reason why.
11:35
Speaker 1: That's the reason why, Well, you never know, you don't do.
11:38
Speaker 1: You might just be into that kind of thing. Luckily,
11:42
Speaker 1: there are some cures for this there, things like vinegar
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Speaker 1: um acetic acid can render it harmless. Yeah. And the
11:50
Speaker 1: funny it's like one of the deadliest animals on the planet.
11:52
Speaker 1: But then vinegar like that's fine, it's crazy. And there's
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Speaker 1: an anti venom And notice I did not say anti venom,
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Speaker 1: which people usually say anti venom. That is not correct.
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Speaker 1: Although it's sort of accepted now, it's still not proper.
12:04
Speaker 1: It's at anti venn V and I n one of
12:07
Speaker 1: my personal little gripes jib yeah, jibe, people say jive,
12:12
Speaker 1: yes they do. Um chuck. Apparently it takes about two
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Speaker 1: to three minutes to die from a box jellyfish injection, right,
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Speaker 1: it's fast. Um. There's been over hundred people who have
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Speaker 1: died since ninety four in Australia alone. How many. Yeah,
12:33
Speaker 1: that's a lot of dead people just from this jellyfish,
12:35
Speaker 1: just from the box jellyfish, just in Australia. And apparently
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Speaker 1: from November to May they come into the North Shore
12:43
Speaker 1: and a lot of times they're just like, well the
12:45
Speaker 1: beaches closed until May, until these things leave because they
12:48
Speaker 1: will kill you write. But also in Australia they believe
12:53
Speaker 1: that there is pound for pound another jellyfish, which, by
12:57
Speaker 1: the way, the box jellyfish is not a tree jellyfish.
13:00
Speaker 1: It's in the family. It's not a true jellyfish. And
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Speaker 1: neither is. I'm gonna try this, but I'm pretty sure
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Speaker 1: I'm gonna butcher the eruke Engi. Eruk Engi I heard of?
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Speaker 1: That is that in here. No, it's the the eruk
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Speaker 1: and Gi jellyfish. It's like the size of a fingernail,
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Speaker 1: but it can kill people. It can kill you, just
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Speaker 1: this little thing right, so pound for pound, it's definitely
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Speaker 1: more venomous than the box jellyfish. But there was this
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Speaker 1: guy who there there's this thing called eruk and Gi syndrome,
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Speaker 1: and the Erukanji are a tribe of Australian Aborigines and
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Speaker 1: they live near the water, and every once in a
13:35
Speaker 1: while one of them would go out into the water
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Speaker 1: and just mysteriously die right there swimming. So there's a
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Speaker 1: doctor who suspected that there was a jellyfish involved, and
13:45
Speaker 1: he started looking for it and he found it that
13:47
Speaker 1: what it's now called the eruk and Gi jellyfish. Um
13:51
Speaker 1: But to prove his point, he took this one little
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Speaker 1: tiny jellyfish stung himself, his son, and the lifeguard on duty,
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Speaker 1: and all three of them ended up in the hospital,
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Speaker 1: like at the edge of death because of this one
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Speaker 1: little jelly fish and he's like I found it, So
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Speaker 1: that one is probably the deadliest jellyfish pound for pound, definitely. Well,
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Speaker 1: the box jellyfish we should mention too. Even if it
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Speaker 1: doesn't kill you, it is a how do you pronounce that? Dermonic?
14:20
Speaker 1: It's dermonocratic? Is that right? So that means that it
14:23
Speaker 1: kills your skin cells and tissue underneath. So even if
14:26
Speaker 1: it like wraps around your arm and you manage to
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Speaker 1: get it off and live, it can like turn your
14:30
Speaker 1: skin black and dead, and you'll be scarred for life
14:33
Speaker 1: and no one will love you. No one will ever
14:35
Speaker 1: love you. Can but I think you'd be so happy
14:38
Speaker 1: to be alive. You could live without love, sure for
14:40
Speaker 1: a little while, and then you'd be like, why didn't
14:43
Speaker 1: the jellyfish just take me? Why didn't I wear a pantyhose?
14:47
Speaker 1: So there it is, right, the the box jellyfish, or
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Speaker 1: at least the eric and gi un gi jellyfish, or
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Speaker 1: the deadliest most venomous animals on the planet. Right, So
14:58
Speaker 1: are we done? No, you know as well as I
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Speaker 1: do that we're not done. Let's teasing. Let's talk about
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Speaker 1: venom in general, and uh, the reason why it's hard
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Speaker 1: to test its potency is because it's you know, like you.
15:12
Speaker 1: So the answer to the question is, no, they're not
15:14
Speaker 1: necessarily not necessarily what the most venomous animals on the planet. No,
15:19
Speaker 1: no, no no, they are. Okay, I'm just talking about difficulties
15:22
Speaker 1: and testing venom potency. It's tough because when you let's say,
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Speaker 1: you get this deadly venom and you inject it into
15:27
Speaker 1: a lab rat, it's not necessarily gonna even if you
15:30
Speaker 1: do the pound uh, the equation to equate it to
15:33
Speaker 1: a human, like a full sized human. What are you
15:36
Speaker 1: laughing at? Uh? A rat doesn't necessarily react in the
15:41
Speaker 1: same way that a human would. Right, And what are
15:43
Speaker 1: you talking about is the UM what's called the lethal
15:46
Speaker 1: dosage dosage standard LD fifty, Right, you explain that it's
15:49
Speaker 1: kind of cruel. It's very cruel. Basically, they figure out, um,
15:53
Speaker 1: how much of a venom uh it takes to kill
15:57
Speaker 1: fifty of a lab population. And we're not talking about
16:02
Speaker 1: like the grad students were a bunch of mice or
16:05
Speaker 1: rats or whatever. So let's say you have you know,
16:08
Speaker 1: twenty UM twenty mice and you inject them all with
16:13
Speaker 1: a venom. However much venom it takes to kill half
16:17
Speaker 1: of them is what's considered the l D fifty measurement, right,
16:21
Speaker 1: which you'd express in terms of like um, with a mouse,
16:25
Speaker 1: you'd be like, uh, it's five milligrams of box jellyfish
16:30
Speaker 1: venom to every ten grams of mouse weight. Yeah, it's
16:35
Speaker 1: it's for every one hundred grams of the animals body
16:38
Speaker 1: weight the amount of venom, right or large animals. So
16:44
Speaker 1: so a low number is deadly. For instance, the coral
16:47
Speaker 1: snake has an l D fifty of one point three.
16:51
Speaker 1: In the box jellyfishes is point oh four, So it's
16:55
Speaker 1: the corals because the LD fifty of one point three
16:58
Speaker 1: on I guess a mouse because it's specific to the animal,
17:02
Speaker 1: and like a proper LD fifty measurement will say the
17:07
Speaker 1: way that it's injected, like orally skin injected, right, um,
17:12
Speaker 1: and then the animal, so it'll be like h zero
17:16
Speaker 1: point for LD fifty rat comma skin transdormal um you know,
17:22
Speaker 1: one k dash So sorry, so sorry, risk, and you
17:27
Speaker 1: bring up an excellent point. That's it is a very
17:30
Speaker 1: cruel way of figuring out how deadly a venom is. Right,
17:35
Speaker 1: So in large part it's been discontinued or abandoned. Um. Well,
17:39
Speaker 1: at least there's been calls for it. I don't think
17:41
Speaker 1: the research is quite as fast and loose as it
17:43
Speaker 1: once was. Right, Yeah, there was a crazy time for
17:50
Speaker 1: l D fifty ratings. Yeah, they're trying to figure out
17:51
Speaker 1: better ways to do this, But the whole point is
17:54
Speaker 1: to create a scale of comparison. Like you don't want
17:57
Speaker 1: coral snake to bite you, but you really really don't
18:00
Speaker 1: want to box jellyfish to brite you. I don't really
18:03
Speaker 1: want either one to bite me away from both of them,
18:07
Speaker 1: that'd be my my call. Uh. I wonder what some
18:09
Speaker 1: of those methods are. They didn't They didn't mention this
18:11
Speaker 1: in the article curious what well to to measure the
18:15
Speaker 1: potency of a venom? If they're getting away from l
18:17
Speaker 1: D fifty, how is she gonna tell unless you kill something?
18:21
Speaker 1: I wonder if it's one of those things where you
18:23
Speaker 1: know how it says like not tested on animals. One
18:25
Speaker 1: of the reasons why there's so many products that say
18:28
Speaker 1: that now is because they already did all the animal testing.
18:31
Speaker 1: They're not using a lot. There's not a lot of
18:33
Speaker 1: new stuff that they're introducing that need animal testing, So
18:37
Speaker 1: these people didn't test it on animals, but somebody thirty
18:40
Speaker 1: years ago didn't. It's fine that that's what the label
18:42
Speaker 1: should say. No longer necessary to test on it, right,
18:46
Speaker 1: Like we specifically didn't test on animals. Right. Uh, let's
18:50
Speaker 1: you wanna talk about some other deadly venomous creatures and
18:53
Speaker 1: they're in Australia. Yeah, dangerous with really dangerous stuff. Yes.
18:58
Speaker 1: The geographic snail Josh is found along the coral reefs
19:03
Speaker 1: of the Indo Pacific and it is uh little brown
19:06
Speaker 1: and white gastropod and it has the ability to paralyze
19:11
Speaker 1: you almost instantly with a little mini spear. It's like
19:15
Speaker 1: extends a tube, black organ with a spear on the
19:17
Speaker 1: end of it and just boom, you swim by and
19:21
Speaker 1: you paralyzed. And some little smaller creatures die before they
19:24
Speaker 1: even realize they've been bitten. In't that awesome? Yeah? They're
19:26
Speaker 1: like what the or not even what the? Yeah, just
19:30
Speaker 1: they're like I wonder why I'm going to have for
19:32
Speaker 1: lunch and then nothing, Yeah, then you aren't lunch. And
19:36
Speaker 1: apparently this little spear that this protrusion um can reach
19:39
Speaker 1: anywhere on it shells, so you can't pick it up anywhere. Yeah,
19:44
Speaker 1: or you're in big trouble. You go at it from
19:45
Speaker 1: like the very rear and you think I'm safe here,
19:47
Speaker 1: and I think you'd probably use like long tongue or
19:51
Speaker 1: something like that. That's how you handle a cone snail. Uh.
19:54
Speaker 1: The inland taipe An, I've never heard of the snake.
19:58
Speaker 1: It's a snake. It's an Australian. And let's talk about
20:02
Speaker 1: its venom. Okay, the taipe hand has a venomous bite
20:07
Speaker 1: powerful enough. This is this sign a T shirt to
20:10
Speaker 1: kill fifteen thousand mice. It's a lot of mice death.
20:14
Speaker 1: I don't know how many humans that is, but that's
20:16
Speaker 1: certainly more than one. Yeah, I would think. Ah, they
20:20
Speaker 1: created an anti vennin luckily, but before that you were
20:23
Speaker 1: pretty much toast if you got bitten by one of these. Yeah.
20:26
Speaker 1: And do you want to talk about any even real
20:28
Speaker 1: quick anti what antie vennin? Yeah? Go ahead. So you
20:32
Speaker 1: know how it's made, right? Uh? No, I didn't until today,
20:36
Speaker 1: but it's pretty awesome. Let's hear. Basically, they milk, right,
20:40
Speaker 1: And there's actually a guy in Kentucky whose job it is,
20:44
Speaker 1: and he's one of several I imagine he milks venomous snakes.
20:49
Speaker 1: It makes some pretty pretty good money doing it, but
20:51
Speaker 1: it's a lot of repetitive work. Like a graham of
20:55
Speaker 1: oh what is it, I think, um, rattlesnake. Maybe, no,
20:59
Speaker 1: coral snake. A gram of coral snake. Venom to be
21:03
Speaker 1: used to make any venom um is like a grand
21:07
Speaker 1: thousand dollars, Like you can sell it for a thousand
21:09
Speaker 1: dollars of pop. But it takes like three folks to
21:12
Speaker 1: create a graham of this venom. Right, so the guys
21:15
Speaker 1: working hard, but he's being paid well for his anyway.
21:19
Speaker 1: They milk whatever animal it is, whether it's black widow box, jellyfish, uh,
21:25
Speaker 1: a rattlesnake exactly, um, and they take the venom. They
21:32
Speaker 1: slowly introduce it into a horse's system. I think I
21:37
Speaker 1: didn't know this. The horse becomes immunized through to this
21:43
Speaker 1: venom whatever it is right over. Yeah, And then this
21:47
Speaker 1: this immunization is expressed in its hemoglobin. So they take
21:50
Speaker 1: the horse's hemoglobin. That's so it's immunized horse hemoglobin. That's
21:55
Speaker 1: an a venom. That's what they're injecting into you. And
21:59
Speaker 1: I was reading how they do it. If you come
22:01
Speaker 1: in you're like I got bit by a black widow,
22:04
Speaker 1: just like Dad said, right, Um, they they apparently if
22:09
Speaker 1: you're age sixteen to sixty, black widows are not quite
22:12
Speaker 1: so bad like they're They're like, you can treat this
22:14
Speaker 1: with muscle relaxers and it should go away in a
22:16
Speaker 1: couple of days. Yeah, I've heard you feel pretty bad, Yes,
22:19
Speaker 1: very anxious and well you have trouble brilli. But after
22:24
Speaker 1: a couple of days it should pass and muscle relaxers
22:26
Speaker 1: will work. And barbiturous if you're real anxious. But um,
22:30
Speaker 1: if it's if you suspect it maybe a fatal bite,
22:33
Speaker 1: you use this anti venom, you vandon. I'm sorry, Chuck.
22:37
Speaker 1: You take a little bit and you, um, you mix
22:39
Speaker 1: it in with sodium solution, saltwater, and um, you start
22:44
Speaker 1: out with a point zero one solution and you go
22:49
Speaker 1: up to I think all the way up to a
22:50
Speaker 1: one to ten solution. Uh. And then that you give
22:54
Speaker 1: them the full dose of anti venom, which is horsteam
22:56
Speaker 1: with globin and that crazy extuff that never happens. That's
23:00
Speaker 1: how we treat snake bites in the century. Here's some
23:03
Speaker 1: horse blood. You mentioned pain killer. I did want to
23:08
Speaker 1: mention quickly that the the cone, not the cone snail,
23:12
Speaker 1: but the cone shell. I wonder if that's the same thing. Apparently,
23:16
Speaker 1: the cone shell's venom has been developed by drug companies
23:20
Speaker 1: for chronic pain because the venom is said to be
23:23
Speaker 1: ten thousand times stronger than morphine. That's a pain killer
23:28
Speaker 1: right there. I got anything else? Oh wait? The funnel
23:32
Speaker 1: web spider, also in Australia, also can kill you very quickly,
23:37
Speaker 1: under fifteen minutes. And uh it's known for being very aggressive.
23:42
Speaker 1: So you put two two words together, aggressive spider, and
23:46
Speaker 1: you'll see the back of my head walking out the
23:49
Speaker 1: door for the airport. I don't like spiders. I'm not
23:52
Speaker 1: big on spiders either, nor aggressive ones. Well, those are
23:56
Speaker 1: the worst kind of spiders really, because you know you're
23:58
Speaker 1: raised like well, if you leave them alone, they'll leave
24:00
Speaker 1: you alone. Except for that one. Yeah, he'll come after
24:02
Speaker 1: you in your sleep and crawl up your nose and
24:04
Speaker 1: kill you. I wonder if LD fifty research has been
24:07
Speaker 1: replaced with cancer fighting venom research. I hope so. I
24:11
Speaker 1: hope so too. Except anothery're developing cancer in mice to
24:14
Speaker 1: see if they can treat it with Yeah, well that's
24:18
Speaker 1: it for um bidliest venom. If you want to learn
24:21
Speaker 1: more about venom and see a very cool drawing of
24:25
Speaker 1: the knido blasts of a box jellyfish type in Deadliest
24:30
Speaker 1: Venom in the handy search bart how stuffwards dot com,
24:32
Speaker 1: which brings us now to listener mail. No, No, that's right.
24:39
Speaker 1: Do we have a jingle for this Facebook questions? Yeahs
24:45
Speaker 1: there we got Facebook questions. Are laugh not because she
24:49
Speaker 1: thought it was funny, because she's like, sweet, I don't
24:51
Speaker 1: have to go find some special He just made my
24:52
Speaker 1: job easier. Yeah, we asked for some Facebook questions the
24:55
Speaker 1: other day on the Facebook, and which we are want
24:59
Speaker 1: to do from time to time, and we're gonna go
25:01
Speaker 1: through a few of those now and then on the
25:03
Speaker 1: next one we record. So let's just fire some of
25:06
Speaker 1: these out, all right. Here's one from Peppie Brown, Marianne
25:11
Speaker 1: or Ginger law. I don't know what that means you
25:15
Speaker 1: l O L means laugh out loud, and Marianner Ginger
25:18
Speaker 1: is asking the angel question from Gilligan's Island, which style
25:23
Speaker 1: of lady do you prefer? Like? The little farm? This
25:27
Speaker 1: one already we have. I think I said both. Go ahead,
25:32
Speaker 1: Uh let me see um. Amber Lee Stewart says, when
25:37
Speaker 1: was the last time Chuck had no facial hair at all. Um,
25:40
Speaker 1: last Halloween, I did the mustache. That's facial hair, and
25:44
Speaker 1: then I shaved the mustache after Halloween to grow out
25:48
Speaker 1: just an even goatee. And um, I don't think I
25:52
Speaker 1: saw you. That was oh nine, I still at nine.
25:55
Speaker 1: I still I was around. I think I saw you.
25:58
Speaker 1: I have a scar on my upper lip that's covered
26:00
Speaker 1: by my stash. Is that from your handsome molder brother?
26:03
Speaker 1: The scar? No? No, no, it's from a Latmore accident.
26:06
Speaker 1: So yeah, that was the last time I had no
26:07
Speaker 1: facial here and this rivoning stuff here. Uh well, here's
26:12
Speaker 1: one from Jennifer Lugar. Um, what do your families think
26:15
Speaker 1: of your s y s K fame and fortune? My
26:18
Speaker 1: family is largely unaware of it, and the stuff that
26:21
Speaker 1: they are aware of their like, don't get a big head.
26:24
Speaker 1: And the word fortune is not quite applicable at this point.
26:29
Speaker 1: Modest fame. My family thinks it's neat. My my nephew Noah,
26:33
Speaker 1: thinks it's pretty cool. My brother thinks it's cool. That's
26:36
Speaker 1: a lot, right, man. My dad remember he finally bought
26:38
Speaker 1: an iPod. Yeah, I still don't think he's listened to one. Yeah,
26:42
Speaker 1: I don't think my dad is either. Uh. Andrea Steele?
26:45
Speaker 1: What are you afraid of? Josh? Chuck and Jerry? I'm
26:47
Speaker 1: not really afraid of anything as far as phobias go. Um,
26:51
Speaker 1: not crazy about spiders and snakes, but who is? What
26:56
Speaker 1: are you afraid of? Josh? What am I afraid of? Mine?
27:00
Speaker 1: Are more emotional like I'm I'm afraid of being left
27:02
Speaker 1: out of of like not getting invited to things. That's
27:08
Speaker 1: a good one. Chuck, you did still didn't say anything,
27:11
Speaker 1: Jerry anything? What are you afraid of? Lightning? Really did
27:15
Speaker 1: do that? I used to be afraid of dying in
27:18
Speaker 1: a plane crash or falling off of a building. He's
27:20
Speaker 1: done pretty good with that, all right? What you got? Um,
27:24
Speaker 1: let's see what's your deserted island food? As in, if
27:27
Speaker 1: you were stuck in an island and could only have
27:29
Speaker 1: one food to eat forever, really really really good mild
27:35
Speaker 1: buffalo wings with ranch and blue cheese. Okay, that's pretty good.
27:43
Speaker 1: I'll I'll say same thing. Okay, I can eat buffalo
27:46
Speaker 1: wings for the rest of my life. What do you have?
27:49
Speaker 1: That was by the way, Mary, Margaret Shepherd, thanks for
27:51
Speaker 1: that one. Devin Stone Chuck, what was inspiration for your
27:54
Speaker 1: band name El cheap Oh? That was given to us
27:56
Speaker 1: by our friend Justin and my parents actually to say
28:00
Speaker 1: that it was sort of a saying in the seventies,
28:02
Speaker 1: like yeah, this L Cheapo car dealership or this L
28:04
Speaker 1: Cheapo pizza place or no way, Jose. That was a
28:08
Speaker 1: big one. It was a big and then guy's name
28:11
Speaker 1: Jose stood up and we're like shut up. We say
28:14
Speaker 1: yes way. Uh so, yeah, that's where it came from.
28:18
Speaker 1: Here's one from Dannette at Aitkin's Koski Koskey. What did
28:24
Speaker 1: you do during our snow days? I worked? I even
28:29
Speaker 1: wrote a blog post about working during snow days. Yea,
28:31
Speaker 1: we may have been in Jamie's, but we were working. Yes,
28:35
Speaker 1: how many more? Josh? One to let's do one more guys.
28:39
Speaker 1: This is from Colleen Sweeney. If you were a baseball player,
28:41
Speaker 1: what would you have them play when he came up
28:42
Speaker 1: to bat? You know how players always pick out like
28:46
Speaker 1: some tough song? Yeah, what would you play? You're the
28:50
Speaker 1: best around Joe's posito pretty good. Um, I should have
28:55
Speaker 1: thought about this. I didn't even think about it. I've
28:58
Speaker 1: got that answer at the ready. I would play something
29:01
Speaker 1: tough like classic rock. Maybe like um, when the levy
29:04
Speaker 1: breaks by led Zeppelin, that'd be a good one. That's intimidating. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
29:08
Speaker 1: that's what I do. Okay, Well that's it, huh for now? Yeah?
29:13
Speaker 1: Well you you do one more, I'll say my next
29:16
Speaker 1: one for the next time. Okay, okay. If you want
29:19
Speaker 1: to join in the fun on Facebook, we strongly encourage
29:23
Speaker 1: you to go hang out there on our page, and
29:24
Speaker 1: while you're there, feel free to like us if you
29:26
Speaker 1: want to. It makes us look cool, not to my
29:29
Speaker 1: family necessarily, but Chuck's family at least. Um. That's Facebook
29:33
Speaker 1: dot com slash stuff you should know. We also tweet
29:36
Speaker 1: that's s y s K podcast, and of course you
29:40
Speaker 1: can always drop us a line via email if you're
29:42
Speaker 1: old at stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com
29:52
Speaker 1: For more on this and thousands of other topics. Is
29:54
Speaker 1: it how stuff works dot com. To learn more about
29:56
Speaker 1: the podcast, click on the podcast icon in the upper
29:59
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30:02
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30:12
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