January 10, 2022 • 33 mins
Once more, it's time for a weekly dose of Stuff to Blow Your Mind and Weirdhouse Cinema listener mail...
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of
My Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind.
Listener Mail. This is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick,
and it's the first listener mail of the new year.
It's two and the mail bag overflow it We have
a lot of messages to catch up on, so some
(00:24):
of these will go back a little bit into December.
But you know that's what we gotta do. Yeah, yeah,
let's do it. Okay. I think maybe I'm gonna start
with a message from Tom. This was in response to
the couple of episodes we did about the history of
(00:44):
time travel, thought and so a refresher on on what
Tom brings up. In particular. In these episodes, we talked
about how languages generally conceptualized time using metaphors based on space.
So we talked about time like it's a type of space.
You know, you arrive at home, or you can arrive
at four uh, And how for English and many other
(01:08):
modern languages, we picture that time, that spacelike time, with
the future situated in front of us, in the past
behind us. And in part two of that episode, we
discussed one uh one previous piece of listener mail, where
somebody got in touch to say that this spatial orientation
is reversed for Cantonese speakers. That for Cantonese speakers, the
(01:33):
future is behind you and the past is in front.
And so Tom picks up on this by saying, Hi, guys,
I just finished listening to Time Traveler zero part two.
The Cantonese example of a reversed spatial metaphor for time
orientation reminded me of something from an introductory book about
linguistics which I have attached. According to this guide, the
(01:54):
ancient Greeks oriented themselves in time linguistically, just as it
is in Cantonese. The past, being visible and known, is
perceived as in front or ahead, whereas the unknown slash
invisible future is behind. I have no idea if this
is still true of the Greek language of today. The
book is Linguistics, a Graphic Guide by Trask and maybelin
(02:17):
Thanks love the show, Tom. Uh So, I found this
really interesting, and I actually I looked this book up
and uh and found a PDF of it where I
could look at the couple of pages in question here.
And according to these authors, it is indeed as Tom says,
but there was another interesting thing about it, which is that, Uh,
at first I imagined that the distinction here was that
(02:42):
the spatial metaphor for time among future in front people
like like English speakers like us, uh, the future in
front people that their metaphors would be based on travel. So,
for example, if you're walking forward, the place you will
occupy in the future is in front of you, Whereas
whereas I assume sort of the difference was that future
(03:02):
in back people would not be thinking about travel or movement,
but instead would have spatial metaphors for time based on
looking at things in space rather than moving through space,
in which case it totally makes sense that the future
is hidden behind you in the past is visible in front. Yeah,
you know. And I think one of the things that's
(03:23):
interesting about this is if you if you think about
some some of the things we've actually discussed in the
show recently, if you think about the power of nostalgia,
if you you think about the power of um, of myth,
and you think about such concepts as a future shock, um,
it makes sense that the future would be the thing
(03:44):
overtaking us moving from behind, not the thing that we're
we're boldly and accurately moving into Oh well actually yeah,
in stating that, so you've gotten ahead of me here
the uh behind you? Right? Um, So what I was
saying was I initially assumed that the difference was based
on a moving versus looking distinction, but at least according
(04:07):
to the way Trask and Mabelan presented in this book, Actually,
both ways of conceptualizing time as space have some kind
of idea of movement through space. It's just a question
of what is doing the moving. So in this book,
the way they present it is that while modern English
speakers imagine ourselves moving forward through time toward the future,
(04:30):
so the timeline is like a fixed space and we're
traveling through it, the ancient Greeks would have imagined themselves, uh,
standing in place and the timeline itself being the thing
that moved. So you're standing still, looking out over the
past as it recedes away from you, and the future
rushes towards you and overtakes you from the rear. Yeah. Yeah,
(04:53):
I mean, like I said this, this seems like it
would be more in keeping with the way a lot
of us actually experienced change, rather than how we we
think we anticipate change. I agree. I think that there's
a lot that's useful to that kind of metaphor, and
it's clear that many languages apparently still largely look at
it this way today. Uh so, yeah, how does that
(05:14):
change the way you think about, you know, planning in
your life and all kinds of things. If the timeline
is what moves like a river that flows around you
and you are standing there facing downstream, uh yeah, and
it raises all kinds of questions like, for example, if
the ancient Greeks, if some ancient Greek author had come
up with the idea of a time machine, would they
(05:35):
be likely to think of that as a vehicle like
a you know, a chariot that travels through time. Maybe not,
I mean maybe they'd be more likely to I don't
know how they conceptualize it's something that that changes the
flow of the river or something. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I
mean we would have to to think, I guess about
the what sort of of of metaphors they would lean
(05:56):
heavily on and thinking about time And so in action
to this, I started looking around for other examples of
of other languages that think about time like this with
the future in back in the past, in front. And
I did find some other examples. So, for example, I
came across a book chapter by a German, a syriologist
named Stephen M. Mall. I don't know much about him otherwise,
(06:18):
but in this book chapter he at least talks about
how ancient Mesopotamian languages like Acadian and Sumerian did the
same thing. They framed time as the as situated with
the past in front of you and the future behind you.
And in this chapter Mall links this two elements of
ancient Mesopotamian culture, which he claims were strongly focused on
(06:40):
the past and on tradition. And I also came across
a claim where I wasn't able to hunt down the
original source of this, So so I'm not a certain
about it, but at least the claim that some Pacific
island people's also conceptualized the past is in front and
the future behind. Yeah, and come back to you know
what one of them we're talking about in those episodes,
(07:01):
the idea of mythic time, you know Alioti's treatment of
of mythic time. Uh, you know, it would it would
make sense. You have these ancient cultures that are that
are that are more focused on what came before the
important time that birthed what we are today. So one
thing I would be really interested in now, and in fact,
i'd be kind of surprised if somebody hasn't already done
(07:22):
this work and I just haven't come across it yet,
would be sort of establishing a family tree of of
spatial time conceptualizations, because we have pretty good ideas of
what languages are descended from which ancestral languages today just
kind of like we can make family trees for organisms,
you know, And so I would be interested to see
(07:42):
the historical flows of like where different spatial time metaphors
come from and how they trickle down into the different
language groups today. Do any of these, uh, languages or
cultures have more of a crab based idea of time
that you're moving sideways? And yeah, I'm for the president.
What a perfect call back? Yeah, great question. I don't know.
(08:09):
All right, here's when it comes to us from Josh
Josh rides Hi. Guys, first, you three are my pandemic
survival kit. This cannot be overstated, neither can the gratitude
I feel now. It seems to me that the timing
of time travel machines corresponds to the fact that machines
were in fact responsible for time dilation. If your friend
(08:30):
lives a day's horse ride away, and now a train
or car can get you there in a couple of hours,
the machine has essentially transported you back in time. You
leave in the morning and somehow arrive in the morning
instead of that night. One can imagine someone pondering this
at the time to think, what if machines get better
and better at this trick until you were arriving before
(08:52):
you have even left. The speed of travel has decreased
the association between space and time. Imagine what would happen
if someone built a shiny met a box that could
transport you at eight miles per hour. Thanks Josh, Yeah,
I think that's a very plausible idea about where a
lot of these time travel stories come from in like
the late nineteenth century. Now we know that there were
(09:14):
some time travel stories before them, but it really picks
up with time travel via a device or machine in
like the eighteen eighties and nineties. Yes, yeah, so you know,
I have to admit any time I'm on a long
flight that goes across time zones, I can't help but
think about time travel a little bit, you know, you
(09:34):
know the idea that you might get on a multi
hour flight, but due to time zone shenanigans, you're actually
only traveling, you know, like maybe one hour or two
hours through clock time. Then don't get me started about
flying backwards across the International day line or wait, is
it forwards or backwards? That makes I'm not sure, it
(09:55):
depends if you're flying Greek air or not. All right,
let's turn to some messages about music and memory. So
we got a number of messages about different musical mnemonic
devices that people learned in school, since that came up
(10:16):
in the episode, about what whether or not music helps
people memorize verbal information, and if it does do that,
how does it do that? What why, and how does
it work? So I'm not going to read all these,
but I did want to know that long time correspondent
Jim in New Jersey got in touch to say that
when he was in school, he learned a great little
(10:37):
little sing song verse about how to how to learn Latin,
and it included all of like conjugation and declension and stuff.
But I wanted to read another one. This one comes
from John John says, Dear Robert and Joe. Just a
few minutes into your episode on music and memory, a
very particular tune popped into my head. Pop Goes the Weasel,
(10:57):
except the lyrics weren't those of the nursery rhyme, but
the variables of the quadratic formula. If you'd like to
sing along, all over to A is the replacement lyric
for Pop Goes the Weasel? Uh? Can I sing this?
Or is the let's see as Pop Goes the Weasel
under under copyright enforcement. I think you're probably okay. Isn't
(11:18):
this like fair use or educational? We're gonna the big
Pop Goes the Weasel? Lawyers after us. Okay, So I
think it would go something like this, Please don't pillory
me if I if I say something wrong here, Um,
it would be like X equals negative B plus or
minus the square root of B squared minus four A
(11:39):
c all over to A. I think you nailed it.
I think you nailed it. I think it almost fits
the rhythm. It's a little difficult with the minus four
A c Unlet's I misunderstood that somehow. Anyway. John goes
on to say, my only remaining memory from this particular
high school math classes. That is, the teacher singing the
(12:01):
equation to the class, then the class responding with laughter
over its absurdity, and then the teacher's assurance that we'd
never forget the quadratic equation again. Well, nearly two decades later,
the jokes on us. Uh, thanks for being my second
favorite podcast in my Spotify one wrapped, but number one
in my heart. John, Oh, that's nice. Oh, and John
(12:24):
also says, ps, I can also still name all the
American presidents in order thanks to a song we were
taught in elementary school music and memory. It's a thing. Huh. Yeah,
I wonder what the tune was. I vaguely remember something
about that, but I don't think it's stuck with me.
So I've actually thought about this a good bit since
we did the music and Memory episode, like if music
(12:46):
does indeed aid with the formation of memory or the
with cementing verbal memories, Uh, why does it do that?
And I think I've got a pretty tentative take on this,
but obviously I'm still open minded about it. But I
think the two main reasons music probably helps people memorize
verbal information would be, first of all, something we talked
(13:08):
about in the episode, which is that? Uh? Which is
that music? The verbal content in music is structured, meaning
that lyrics have meter and rhyme, and they occur within
a regular structure, usually so like you know, you'll know
that the verse in this song has four lines, and
there this long, and then the chorus has this many
lines in there this long, and that structure is what
(13:29):
helps you complete a half formed thought or find the
next thought. So it might not be so much the
tune or the melody that helps you remember the words,
but the fact that when words are presented in music,
they're organized and structured in a way that helps you
fill in gaps. And then the second thing I think
(13:50):
is that you're probably more likely to spontaneously rehearse verbal
information that's set to music than you are too spontaneously
rehearse verbal information on its own. Uh. And and I
think this would tie into the idea that music is enjoyable,
Like we like music and when we and we want
to repeat it to ourselves. And so the pleasure in
(14:13):
the tune or the melody is like the inherent incentive
to sing it repeatedly to ourselves. And when you sing
it repeatedly to yourself, this has a side effect of
memory reinforcement through repetition and rehearsal. So that's my vibe.
(14:37):
All right. Well here's another one. This thing comes to
us from Matt. Matt says, Hey, Robert and Joe, with
regard to your discussion in your recent episode on music
and memory, I have an experience and some thoughts I
would like to share with you. First the experience one day,
when I was around thirteen or fourteen years old, I
was playing Metroid two on my game Boy while my
older sister was watching her then favorite show Dawson's Creek,
(15:01):
a show I was not particularly interested in by any means. Now,
this may seem like an odd, random fact to just
mention like that, but years later I went back and
decided to play the same game again, and wouldn't you
know it, when the music started playing, it was like
the show Dawson's Creek was playing again in the background.
I would even recall specific lines that I overheard during
(15:21):
that first play through. I thought you might find this
experience interesting, specifically because music seemed to be tied to
recalling information that I wasn't even paying attention to in
the first place. Anyways, onto my other thoughts. I was
thinking about one reason some may more readily recall verbal
information when put to music when compared to without could
(15:44):
be less to do with the music itself and more
to do with the fact that we generally enjoy the
experience of music far more than we do just hearing
words being repeated. I think it's safe to say when
we are engaged in something we enjoy, our brains are
also in turn more engaged than otherwise. More engaged brain
equals or retention. This brought on another thought. When we
try to use music in our studies, we typically have
(16:05):
some hand in the creation of the song we use.
I have heard that one of the best ways to
maintain a memory of something is to modify it in
some way in your mind, even as simply as restating
the information in a different way, such as thinking two thousand,
one thirty seven versus two one three seven. This is
essentially what we are doing when we are putting the
(16:26):
information we are trying to remember to music. It usually
involves some level of changing the phrasing or order of
the information to make it fit the music. At a minimum. Anyways,
love the podcast, keep up the fantastic content flowing into
my ear holes. Thanks Matt, Well, thank you, Matt. Uh yeah.
(16:46):
Regarding your point about modifying information to remember it better,
I've never looked into the empirical research on this, but
it certainly seems true from my first hand experience. Uh So. Obviously,
like you mentioned, the simplest version is just rephrasing something
and putting putting, say a an explanation or a summary
of some events or something into your own words. I
(17:08):
think definitely at least helps me remember it better. But also,
like you say, you know, putting something to a song
that that's doing something similar. You're forming like different levels
of connections with bits of information that seemed to help
but stick more. Another big one I think is making
puns about something like if you're trying to remember names,
if you make jokes about the names while you're trying
(17:31):
to memorize them, I feel like they stick a lot more. Yeah, yeah,
I mean another thing that it comes to mind is
like not Yeah, not can be a pretty complicated thing
to toutt h to to pull off. You know, there's
a lot a lot going on there. You're engaging your
you know, different memory systems here, and what do we
often do well, we end up um taking a little
(17:53):
narrative and applying it to it where we're not so
so much concerned about Okay, where's the left end go?
How do I what do I hold down this? No,
we talked about where does the rabbit go? And and
into what hole and so forth. What's the one Quin
says in Jaws that you comes out of the hole,
goes into the cave, goes around the poll, goes into
the cave again. Oh, that's a good one. I forgot
(18:13):
all about that part. Not too good, is it? Chief?
But as to the first half of your message, I mean, yeah,
clearly it sounds like you're forming um memory associations between
between like a video game or video game music, and
then some other environmental content, in this case Dawson's Creek.
But yeah, I feel like I probably have memories like that.
(18:35):
I can't call a specific one to mind right now.
But if I were to to fire up the game
Boy I played in you know when when I was
a little kid, and hear that, uh, you know, super
Mario Land music, I'm sure I would do well. I
think what I would think of is like being hot
in the backseat of the car. Did they leave you
in there just like a long you know, long car rides.
(18:56):
I think that was the primary Game Boy time. Okay,
but still I'm guessing like stuck to that kind of
um uh like, like like sweaty flesh, just just adhered
to the seat. They have to peel you out at
the end, still playing the game Boy. The Naga Hide,
the Naga Hide was was key. Oh yeah, yeah. Did
(19:16):
you know, by the way, I can't remember if we
were talked about this, did you know that the Nauga
Hide as a brand, had had its own mascot monster,
the Nauga Oh my goodness. I just looked this up
and no, I till this moment, I did not know
they had their own monster. But this is awesome. Look
at him. He's like a like the backside of a
Naga Hide chair. Yeah it's he's made out of Nauga hide.
(19:37):
But he's just all He's just a little toothy gritter
and he's a Naga, or at least that's what the
ad copy I'm I'm reading here is Naga the beast
from which we derive Naga Hyde. I I can only
imagine their extinct. Now, no Naugas were harmed in the
making of this Naga Hide. The company seems to still
be around, but I don't. But you go to their
(19:57):
website and there's no Naga monster aywhere, which seems like
a massive misstep. Well no, wait, there he is. He's
still on the website. I take it all the good God,
Oh my goodness, you can actually this. Maybe we'll have
to cut all this, but now I'm even more excited.
You can buy a Naga. They sell nagas. You're telling
me I can buy a Nauga. I have bought a Nauga.
(20:18):
My wife has bought for her. What color is it?
I think it's sort of teal. Oh nice, nice, good
Naga choice. Oh my goodness. This is one of those
moments where I feel like I've crossed over into another
dimension because this just seems like information I should have had.
I should have been been all about these Naugas. And
look at this, going to Naga hide dot com looking
(20:42):
at Naga Naga's for different seasons for oh my goodness,
that maybe this is what they do. Now you just
look at that cute toothy face and you think it
would not be so bad for my thighs to be
stripped of flesh as I'm peeled off of this creature.
Oh man, Okay, you ready for this next message about
(21:09):
time and crabs? Yeah? Bring it on. Okay, this comes
from Scott. Scott says, Dear Robin, Joe, I've been a
big fan of the podcast for several years and have
been looking for an excuse to write in. After a
recent catchup binge, I now have several first Towards the
beginning of the episode Time Traveler zero, Part one, Joe
seemed to suggest that the metaphor killing time wasn't especially
(21:31):
evocative due to it being an overused cliche. I refute
this stance wholeheartedly. Okay uh. To this day, I cannot
hear this phrase without bringing to mind the scene from
the book The Phantom Tollbooth where the main character Milo
explains to talk a literal watchdog that he is just
(21:51):
killing time, which naturally infuriates the canine chronometer. If you're
unfamiliar with the work, it is a strange, meandering journey
through the achning of a board child's curiosity and wonder.
I highly recommend it to young readers. I've actually never
read it, but I've heard of it many times. Yeah,
I've never read it either, though it's it's been recommended
(22:11):
to name um, and it's been recommended as something for
young readers. But I think my son read a little
of it. I don't. I don't know if he's stuck
with it. But we're about to get to the part
of this email for which we must bring out the
dishes of drawn butter, because Scott says. Secondly, in a
recent Listener Mail episode, another writer suggested that the tarrask
(22:32):
from Dungeons and Dragons was actually a Godzilla sized crab.
A little later, you were lamenting the giant crabs of
Dungeons and Dragons low intelligence score, and you wondered if
somebody had home brewed the crab monsters from Attack of
the Crab Monsters. Yeah, this came up because the crab
monsters in the in the Roger Corman drive in movie
(22:55):
are not low intelligence there, and they are not only brilliant,
they have absorbed the minds of many men. And when
they when they eat your brains, they gain your knowledge.
Scott goes on, this is where I come in. I
am an aspiring D and D five E content producer,
and your show is often a well spring of excellent
monster ideas e g. The leshy Yeti crabs, et cetera.
(23:18):
I even purchased the much lauded Giants, Monsters and Dragons
book for inspiration. So when you mused about the stats
of crabs, I got to work now. Giant crabs are
mostly low level critters that any capable adventuring party should
have little problem dispatching. But if you make them a
bit larger, thicken their carapasts, and add some of the
abilities of an intellectual devour. I am assuming this is
(23:42):
an example of such the mind flare brainhounds. You've got
a pretty solid starting place for the aforementioned crab monsters.
I've included JPEG's of the end result and another of
my giant Yeti crab. I hope you enjoy them. You're
some of the most engaging and amusing science communicator out there,
and I can't wait to see what wonderful weirdness y'all
(24:02):
will bring my mostly mundane workday. Best Scott, Well, Scott,
this is a wonderful email. Thank you for getting in touch,
but you have made a major error. You forgot to
attach the images, so Rob and I are just sitting
here with like bereft. Yeah, I want to see this crap,
But I'm glad that that he's putting in the work
(24:24):
on this. This is something that needs to exist out
there in the at least in the Homebrew universe of
of monsters and also good I'm picking up Giants, Monsters
and Dragons by Carol Rose. I think I heard from
another listener who had recently acquired a copy of this book.
Just a tremendous treasure trove of of fantastic creatures for
anyone out there who, like me, loves loves a good
(24:47):
best fiery. Speaking of monsters, Joe, I do have to mention, Uh,
my wife and I started watching the second season of
The Witcher on Netflix. Okay, or The Witcher as as
our main character would say, which and uh, I have
to say second episode I think it is includes versions
of both the Leshy and Bobby Yaga. So whoa I
(25:09):
have to give give that show credit. Well, that's based
on like Polish monster folklore, isn't it, or at least
the novels are Polish. I believe so. Yes, So it
makes sense that you know that he would draw that
author would draw in these various folkloric concepts. Um, now
I can't I haven't read them, so I can't speak
to them, and I can't speak to how exactly these
(25:32):
episodes have adapted those works. But still, at the end
of the day, you have somebody fighting a variation on
the Leshy And yeah, my excitement was growing as they
started talking about this strange house in the in the
woods that had basilist lags, and I was like, Oh,
that's gonna be Bobba Yaga. Oh boy. So I haven't
read the books and I haven't seen the show. Well,
I think we sort of put on one of the
(25:54):
episodes of the show, just sort of in the background
for laughs. I I don't know. It might be a
great show. I haven't seen it, but I have played
one of the video games and it had a lot
of great monsters in it. Yeah yeah, I mean the
Monster the Monsters game is pretty solid in the show too,
based on on what I've seen, and the lead performance
very gravelly. Wait, it's that. It's the It's the really
(26:16):
buff gamer guy, isn't it. Henry Cavill. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
didn't he like a muscled nerd? He is? Yeah, get
used to him, because I think he's currently attached to
the Highlander reboot. I don't know who he's gonna play.
I hope the Kurgan. I think based on especially what
I've seen in The Witcher. It's like he's got the
gravelly voice, and I would like to see him play
(26:37):
a villain for a for for a change. And he's
a He's a solid actor, so I'm curious to see
what he could do. He was riveting in Hell Razor eight?
Was he was he in that? Or whichever one? The
one where the one where evil goes online? The virtual
reality he's in that? Oh? I was not aware of that. Oh,
(26:58):
it's it's it's great. It's not all right. Well, let's
close things out with a little weird house cinema listener mail.
This one comes to us from Alan. Alan writes, gents,
I recently stumbled upon your podcast and I have really
been enjoying it. The origins of the Chainsaw first caught
(27:20):
my attention. It's all great stuff, but my mind truly
did come bust a little when I saw you did
a weird House episode on Ewok's The Battle for Indoor.
I vaguely recall my sister and I'm watching this and
The Caravan of Courage when they first aired. But what
I remember most was watching and wearing out the VHS
tapes recorded from TV, complete with commercials and about a
(27:41):
second of a football game where I accidentally hit the
record button on the remote while watching. These movies were
a big part of our childhood, so much so that
my sister named her oldest daughter, now in her twenties,
after Sindel or Sindel. I can't remember how the character's
name is pronounced offhand. Yeah, see I in D E
L Yeah. Uh. Anyway, they continue, So uh, we were
(28:05):
all amazed how much she looked like Aubrey Miller through
her early childhood. Every once in a while she still
gets a knowing smile or an outright o MG from
the e walks right when people hear her name. Her
best friend is Wilfred Brimley. Um well, I have to say,
I think that's awesome. My son's first name, in large
(28:26):
part comes from Bastian Baltazar Bucks from The Never Ending Story.
So I think, I think, I think drawing on the
names of our cinematic and literary mythology are are are
totally totally called for inappropriate. Anyway, Alan continues, I don't
know if the tape still exists, possibly in my parents basement,
But I found the DVDs years ago and introduced my
(28:48):
kids to these gems. They are great fun and we
still watch them when we're looking to watch something fun
and not too heavy. My favorite character, of course, was Tick.
He was just awesome and there were a few years
where I thought I could actually make a glider like Wicked.
If he could do it, why couldn't I. Of course,
the answer to that question is because he's a fictional character,
though they're still part of me. The believes I could
(29:10):
if I had access to proper sized animal bones and skin. Well,
thanks again for allowing me to reminisce. Uh. The episode
was great. I really enjoyed it. Keep making great content, Alan.
Oh well, thanks Alan. Uh, Yeah, this is a heartwarming email. Uh.
The one thing, though, that really stuck in my mind
was the part of the much beloved VHS tape where
(29:34):
you accidentally taped over it with the second of something
else that Rob. I assume you had something like that
in your house. Everybody I know did. There's a famous
story in my in my wife's family where they they
I think they borrowed a friend's dearly dearly cherished a
copy of News e s on a VHS tape and
accidentally taped over one second of it with a you know,
(29:57):
personal injury lawyer ad. And they still remember what part
of news eas that where that happens. Oh yeah, I
mean the VHS medium. Uh, you know it had so
many wonderful things about it that at the time we
often took for granted. Um, you know, part of it was,
of course the ads. You know, it's fascinating to think about,
you know, to look back on, like all those times
(30:19):
where if you were really trying to do it right,
you would try and clip out the ads that nowadays.
I mean, that's what I would want to see. I
I don't just want to see that. If I want
to watch this movie that I caught on Sci Fi
Channel in the nineties, I can probably find it. But
what I would really love to do is is watch
all the ads with it is what commercy? Yeah, and
some of that stuff is just lost, I guess. Oh god, well,
(30:40):
I mean like it's the best part of watching the
Star Wars Holiday Special. Actually, yeah, I would never want
to see the Holiday special without the Ladies Garment Workers
Union commercial and tow Bore and all of that great stuff. Yeah, yeah,
it's it's pretty tremendous. Um. I think I still have
a few gyms like that, but there's a lot of
(31:00):
that stuff that I just lost. I do one thing
I remember from VHS some talking about VHS tapes that
were just used to death. We had a copy of
Jim Henson's Labyrinth, which is still of one of my
favorite films, but we just watched the hell out of
it so much that at one point the VHS tape
broke and we had it professionally repaired, which I can't imagine.
(31:23):
I don't even know how that worked, Like where did
my parents take it to get fixed? Who did that?
And why was it more cost effective than just buying
a new copy of Labyrinth. But when Labyrinth came back,
it was slightly warped, So it has this kind of
VHS now we would think of just like a VHS glitch,
kind of a aspect to the entire film, the entire
(31:45):
film plus the trailer to the Name of the Rose
that plays at the very beginning. And so nowadays, if
I watched Labyrinth or I watched that trailer, uh, it
just doesn't sound the same because it should be slightly
warped I'm still reeling from the idea of a VHS
tape repair person. I don't know who did that. That
(32:05):
sounds like the world's best job. Did they take it
to somewhere around town? Do they mail it off? I
don't know. I'll have to ask my mom about Mom.
If you're listening, um, call me. Well, we'll discuss Taneribell.
It's labyrinth spelled backwards. All right, Well, I think we
gotta call it there. But thank you everyone for getting
in touch, and we'll be I'm sure catching up on
(32:26):
more of the emails that came in over the holidays
in the weeks to come. That's right. And in the meantime,
if you want to check out other episodes of Stuff
to Blow Your Mind, we have core episodes on Tuesdays
and Thursdays and the Stuff to Blow your Mind podcast feed,
which you can find anywhere and everywhere you get your podcast.
We do listener Man on Monday, we do an Artifact
or Monster Fact on Wednesdays as a short form episode,
(32:46):
and on Fridays we do Weird How Cinema. That's our
time to put most serious matters aside and just talk
about a strange movie. H Thanks as always to our
excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If you would like
to get in touch with us with feedback on this
episod ode or any other, to suggest a topic for
the future, or just to say hello, you can email
us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.
(33:15):
Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of I Heart Radio.
For more podcasts for My Heart Radio, visit the i
Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows.
Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of
My Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind.
Listener Mail. This is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick,
and it's the first listener mail of the new year.
It's two and the mail bag overflow it We have
a lot of messages to catch up on, so some
(00:24):
of these will go back a little bit into December.
But you know that's what we gotta do. Yeah, yeah,
let's do it. Okay. I think maybe I'm gonna start
with a message from Tom. This was in response to
the couple of episodes we did about the history of
(00:44):
time travel, thought and so a refresher on on what
Tom brings up. In particular. In these episodes, we talked
about how languages generally conceptualized time using metaphors based on space.
So we talked about time like it's a type of space.
You know, you arrive at home, or you can arrive
at four uh, And how for English and many other
(01:08):
modern languages, we picture that time, that spacelike time, with
the future situated in front of us, in the past
behind us. And in part two of that episode, we
discussed one uh one previous piece of listener mail, where
somebody got in touch to say that this spatial orientation
is reversed for Cantonese speakers. That for Cantonese speakers, the
(01:33):
future is behind you and the past is in front.
And so Tom picks up on this by saying, Hi, guys,
I just finished listening to Time Traveler zero part two.
The Cantonese example of a reversed spatial metaphor for time
orientation reminded me of something from an introductory book about
linguistics which I have attached. According to this guide, the
(01:54):
ancient Greeks oriented themselves in time linguistically, just as it
is in Cantonese. The past, being visible and known, is
perceived as in front or ahead, whereas the unknown slash
invisible future is behind. I have no idea if this
is still true of the Greek language of today. The
book is Linguistics, a Graphic Guide by Trask and maybelin
(02:17):
Thanks love the show, Tom. Uh So, I found this
really interesting, and I actually I looked this book up
and uh and found a PDF of it where I
could look at the couple of pages in question here.
And according to these authors, it is indeed as Tom says,
but there was another interesting thing about it, which is that, Uh,
at first I imagined that the distinction here was that
(02:42):
the spatial metaphor for time among future in front people
like like English speakers like us, uh, the future in
front people that their metaphors would be based on travel. So,
for example, if you're walking forward, the place you will
occupy in the future is in front of you, Whereas
whereas I assume sort of the difference was that future
(03:02):
in back people would not be thinking about travel or movement,
but instead would have spatial metaphors for time based on
looking at things in space rather than moving through space,
in which case it totally makes sense that the future
is hidden behind you in the past is visible in front. Yeah,
you know. And I think one of the things that's
(03:23):
interesting about this is if you if you think about
some some of the things we've actually discussed in the
show recently, if you think about the power of nostalgia,
if you you think about the power of um, of myth,
and you think about such concepts as a future shock, um,
it makes sense that the future would be the thing
(03:44):
overtaking us moving from behind, not the thing that we're
we're boldly and accurately moving into Oh well actually yeah,
in stating that, so you've gotten ahead of me here
the uh behind you? Right? Um, So what I was
saying was I initially assumed that the difference was based
on a moving versus looking distinction, but at least according
(04:07):
to the way Trask and Mabelan presented in this book, Actually,
both ways of conceptualizing time as space have some kind
of idea of movement through space. It's just a question
of what is doing the moving. So in this book,
the way they present it is that while modern English
speakers imagine ourselves moving forward through time toward the future,
(04:30):
so the timeline is like a fixed space and we're
traveling through it, the ancient Greeks would have imagined themselves, uh,
standing in place and the timeline itself being the thing
that moved. So you're standing still, looking out over the
past as it recedes away from you, and the future
rushes towards you and overtakes you from the rear. Yeah. Yeah,
(04:53):
I mean, like I said this, this seems like it
would be more in keeping with the way a lot
of us actually experienced change, rather than how we we
think we anticipate change. I agree. I think that there's
a lot that's useful to that kind of metaphor, and
it's clear that many languages apparently still largely look at
it this way today. Uh so, yeah, how does that
(05:14):
change the way you think about, you know, planning in
your life and all kinds of things. If the timeline
is what moves like a river that flows around you
and you are standing there facing downstream, uh yeah, and
it raises all kinds of questions like, for example, if
the ancient Greeks, if some ancient Greek author had come
up with the idea of a time machine, would they
(05:35):
be likely to think of that as a vehicle like
a you know, a chariot that travels through time. Maybe not,
I mean maybe they'd be more likely to I don't
know how they conceptualize it's something that that changes the
flow of the river or something. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I
mean we would have to to think, I guess about
the what sort of of of metaphors they would lean
(05:56):
heavily on and thinking about time And so in action
to this, I started looking around for other examples of
of other languages that think about time like this with
the future in back in the past, in front. And
I did find some other examples. So, for example, I
came across a book chapter by a German, a syriologist
named Stephen M. Mall. I don't know much about him otherwise,
(06:18):
but in this book chapter he at least talks about
how ancient Mesopotamian languages like Acadian and Sumerian did the
same thing. They framed time as the as situated with
the past in front of you and the future behind you.
And in this chapter Mall links this two elements of
ancient Mesopotamian culture, which he claims were strongly focused on
(06:40):
the past and on tradition. And I also came across
a claim where I wasn't able to hunt down the
original source of this, So so I'm not a certain
about it, but at least the claim that some Pacific
island people's also conceptualized the past is in front and
the future behind. Yeah, and come back to you know
what one of them we're talking about in those episodes,
(07:01):
the idea of mythic time, you know Alioti's treatment of
of mythic time. Uh, you know, it would it would
make sense. You have these ancient cultures that are that
are that are more focused on what came before the
important time that birthed what we are today. So one
thing I would be really interested in now, and in fact,
i'd be kind of surprised if somebody hasn't already done
(07:22):
this work and I just haven't come across it yet,
would be sort of establishing a family tree of of
spatial time conceptualizations, because we have pretty good ideas of
what languages are descended from which ancestral languages today just
kind of like we can make family trees for organisms,
you know, And so I would be interested to see
(07:42):
the historical flows of like where different spatial time metaphors
come from and how they trickle down into the different
language groups today. Do any of these, uh, languages or
cultures have more of a crab based idea of time
that you're moving sideways? And yeah, I'm for the president.
What a perfect call back? Yeah, great question. I don't know.
(08:09):
All right, here's when it comes to us from Josh
Josh rides Hi. Guys, first, you three are my pandemic
survival kit. This cannot be overstated, neither can the gratitude
I feel now. It seems to me that the timing
of time travel machines corresponds to the fact that machines
were in fact responsible for time dilation. If your friend
(08:30):
lives a day's horse ride away, and now a train
or car can get you there in a couple of hours,
the machine has essentially transported you back in time. You
leave in the morning and somehow arrive in the morning
instead of that night. One can imagine someone pondering this
at the time to think, what if machines get better
and better at this trick until you were arriving before
(08:52):
you have even left. The speed of travel has decreased
the association between space and time. Imagine what would happen
if someone built a shiny met a box that could
transport you at eight miles per hour. Thanks Josh, Yeah,
I think that's a very plausible idea about where a
lot of these time travel stories come from in like
the late nineteenth century. Now we know that there were
(09:14):
some time travel stories before them, but it really picks
up with time travel via a device or machine in
like the eighteen eighties and nineties. Yes, yeah, so you know,
I have to admit any time I'm on a long
flight that goes across time zones, I can't help but
think about time travel a little bit, you know, you
(09:34):
know the idea that you might get on a multi
hour flight, but due to time zone shenanigans, you're actually
only traveling, you know, like maybe one hour or two
hours through clock time. Then don't get me started about
flying backwards across the International day line or wait, is
it forwards or backwards? That makes I'm not sure, it
(09:55):
depends if you're flying Greek air or not. All right,
let's turn to some messages about music and memory. So
we got a number of messages about different musical mnemonic
devices that people learned in school, since that came up
(10:16):
in the episode, about what whether or not music helps
people memorize verbal information, and if it does do that,
how does it do that? What why, and how does
it work? So I'm not going to read all these,
but I did want to know that long time correspondent
Jim in New Jersey got in touch to say that
when he was in school, he learned a great little
(10:37):
little sing song verse about how to how to learn Latin,
and it included all of like conjugation and declension and stuff.
But I wanted to read another one. This one comes
from John John says, Dear Robert and Joe. Just a
few minutes into your episode on music and memory, a
very particular tune popped into my head. Pop Goes the Weasel,
(10:57):
except the lyrics weren't those of the nursery rhyme, but
the variables of the quadratic formula. If you'd like to
sing along, all over to A is the replacement lyric
for Pop Goes the Weasel? Uh? Can I sing this?
Or is the let's see as Pop Goes the Weasel
under under copyright enforcement. I think you're probably okay. Isn't
(11:18):
this like fair use or educational? We're gonna the big
Pop Goes the Weasel? Lawyers after us. Okay, So I
think it would go something like this, Please don't pillory
me if I if I say something wrong here, Um,
it would be like X equals negative B plus or
minus the square root of B squared minus four A
(11:39):
c all over to A. I think you nailed it.
I think you nailed it. I think it almost fits
the rhythm. It's a little difficult with the minus four
A c Unlet's I misunderstood that somehow. Anyway. John goes
on to say, my only remaining memory from this particular
high school math classes. That is, the teacher singing the
(12:01):
equation to the class, then the class responding with laughter
over its absurdity, and then the teacher's assurance that we'd
never forget the quadratic equation again. Well, nearly two decades later,
the jokes on us. Uh, thanks for being my second
favorite podcast in my Spotify one wrapped, but number one
in my heart. John, Oh, that's nice. Oh, and John
(12:24):
also says, ps, I can also still name all the
American presidents in order thanks to a song we were
taught in elementary school music and memory. It's a thing. Huh. Yeah,
I wonder what the tune was. I vaguely remember something
about that, but I don't think it's stuck with me.
So I've actually thought about this a good bit since
we did the music and Memory episode, like if music
(12:46):
does indeed aid with the formation of memory or the
with cementing verbal memories, Uh, why does it do that?
And I think I've got a pretty tentative take on this,
but obviously I'm still open minded about it. But I
think the two main reasons music probably helps people memorize
verbal information would be, first of all, something we talked
(13:08):
about in the episode, which is that? Uh? Which is
that music? The verbal content in music is structured, meaning
that lyrics have meter and rhyme, and they occur within
a regular structure, usually so like you know, you'll know
that the verse in this song has four lines, and
there this long, and then the chorus has this many
lines in there this long, and that structure is what
(13:29):
helps you complete a half formed thought or find the
next thought. So it might not be so much the
tune or the melody that helps you remember the words,
but the fact that when words are presented in music,
they're organized and structured in a way that helps you
fill in gaps. And then the second thing I think
(13:50):
is that you're probably more likely to spontaneously rehearse verbal
information that's set to music than you are too spontaneously
rehearse verbal information on its own. Uh. And and I
think this would tie into the idea that music is enjoyable,
Like we like music and when we and we want
to repeat it to ourselves. And so the pleasure in
(14:13):
the tune or the melody is like the inherent incentive
to sing it repeatedly to ourselves. And when you sing
it repeatedly to yourself, this has a side effect of
memory reinforcement through repetition and rehearsal. So that's my vibe.
(14:37):
All right. Well here's another one. This thing comes to
us from Matt. Matt says, Hey, Robert and Joe, with
regard to your discussion in your recent episode on music
and memory, I have an experience and some thoughts I
would like to share with you. First the experience one day,
when I was around thirteen or fourteen years old, I
was playing Metroid two on my game Boy while my
older sister was watching her then favorite show Dawson's Creek,
(15:01):
a show I was not particularly interested in by any means. Now,
this may seem like an odd, random fact to just
mention like that, but years later I went back and
decided to play the same game again, and wouldn't you
know it, when the music started playing, it was like
the show Dawson's Creek was playing again in the background.
I would even recall specific lines that I overheard during
(15:21):
that first play through. I thought you might find this
experience interesting, specifically because music seemed to be tied to
recalling information that I wasn't even paying attention to in
the first place. Anyways, onto my other thoughts. I was
thinking about one reason some may more readily recall verbal
information when put to music when compared to without could
(15:44):
be less to do with the music itself and more
to do with the fact that we generally enjoy the
experience of music far more than we do just hearing
words being repeated. I think it's safe to say when
we are engaged in something we enjoy, our brains are
also in turn more engaged than otherwise. More engaged brain
equals or retention. This brought on another thought. When we
try to use music in our studies, we typically have
(16:05):
some hand in the creation of the song we use.
I have heard that one of the best ways to
maintain a memory of something is to modify it in
some way in your mind, even as simply as restating
the information in a different way, such as thinking two thousand,
one thirty seven versus two one three seven. This is
essentially what we are doing when we are putting the
(16:26):
information we are trying to remember to music. It usually
involves some level of changing the phrasing or order of
the information to make it fit the music. At a minimum. Anyways,
love the podcast, keep up the fantastic content flowing into
my ear holes. Thanks Matt, Well, thank you, Matt. Uh yeah.
(16:46):
Regarding your point about modifying information to remember it better,
I've never looked into the empirical research on this, but
it certainly seems true from my first hand experience. Uh So. Obviously,
like you mentioned, the simplest version is just rephrasing something
and putting putting, say a an explanation or a summary
of some events or something into your own words. I
(17:08):
think definitely at least helps me remember it better. But also,
like you say, you know, putting something to a song
that that's doing something similar. You're forming like different levels
of connections with bits of information that seemed to help
but stick more. Another big one I think is making
puns about something like if you're trying to remember names,
if you make jokes about the names while you're trying
(17:31):
to memorize them, I feel like they stick a lot more. Yeah, yeah,
I mean another thing that it comes to mind is
like not Yeah, not can be a pretty complicated thing
to toutt h to to pull off. You know, there's
a lot a lot going on there. You're engaging your
you know, different memory systems here, and what do we
often do well, we end up um taking a little
(17:53):
narrative and applying it to it where we're not so
so much concerned about Okay, where's the left end go?
How do I what do I hold down this? No,
we talked about where does the rabbit go? And and
into what hole and so forth. What's the one Quin
says in Jaws that you comes out of the hole,
goes into the cave, goes around the poll, goes into
the cave again. Oh, that's a good one. I forgot
(18:13):
all about that part. Not too good, is it? Chief?
But as to the first half of your message, I mean, yeah,
clearly it sounds like you're forming um memory associations between
between like a video game or video game music, and
then some other environmental content, in this case Dawson's Creek.
But yeah, I feel like I probably have memories like that.
(18:35):
I can't call a specific one to mind right now.
But if I were to to fire up the game
Boy I played in you know when when I was
a little kid, and hear that, uh, you know, super
Mario Land music, I'm sure I would do well. I
think what I would think of is like being hot
in the backseat of the car. Did they leave you
in there just like a long you know, long car rides.
(18:56):
I think that was the primary Game Boy time. Okay,
but still I'm guessing like stuck to that kind of
um uh like, like like sweaty flesh, just just adhered
to the seat. They have to peel you out at
the end, still playing the game Boy. The Naga Hide,
the Naga Hide was was key. Oh yeah, yeah. Did
(19:16):
you know, by the way, I can't remember if we
were talked about this, did you know that the Nauga
Hide as a brand, had had its own mascot monster,
the Nauga Oh my goodness. I just looked this up
and no, I till this moment, I did not know
they had their own monster. But this is awesome. Look
at him. He's like a like the backside of a
Naga Hide chair. Yeah it's he's made out of Nauga hide.
(19:37):
But he's just all He's just a little toothy gritter
and he's a Naga, or at least that's what the
ad copy I'm I'm reading here is Naga the beast
from which we derive Naga Hyde. I I can only
imagine their extinct. Now, no Naugas were harmed in the
making of this Naga Hide. The company seems to still
be around, but I don't. But you go to their
(19:57):
website and there's no Naga monster aywhere, which seems like
a massive misstep. Well no, wait, there he is. He's
still on the website. I take it all the good God,
Oh my goodness, you can actually this. Maybe we'll have
to cut all this, but now I'm even more excited.
You can buy a Naga. They sell nagas. You're telling
me I can buy a Nauga. I have bought a Nauga.
(20:18):
My wife has bought for her. What color is it?
I think it's sort of teal. Oh nice, nice, good
Naga choice. Oh my goodness. This is one of those
moments where I feel like I've crossed over into another
dimension because this just seems like information I should have had.
I should have been been all about these Naugas. And
look at this, going to Naga hide dot com looking
(20:42):
at Naga Naga's for different seasons for oh my goodness,
that maybe this is what they do. Now you just
look at that cute toothy face and you think it
would not be so bad for my thighs to be
stripped of flesh as I'm peeled off of this creature.
Oh man, Okay, you ready for this next message about
(21:09):
time and crabs? Yeah? Bring it on. Okay, this comes
from Scott. Scott says, Dear Robin, Joe, I've been a
big fan of the podcast for several years and have
been looking for an excuse to write in. After a
recent catchup binge, I now have several first Towards the
beginning of the episode Time Traveler zero, Part one, Joe
seemed to suggest that the metaphor killing time wasn't especially
(21:31):
evocative due to it being an overused cliche. I refute
this stance wholeheartedly. Okay uh. To this day, I cannot
hear this phrase without bringing to mind the scene from
the book The Phantom Tollbooth where the main character Milo
explains to talk a literal watchdog that he is just
(21:51):
killing time, which naturally infuriates the canine chronometer. If you're
unfamiliar with the work, it is a strange, meandering journey
through the achning of a board child's curiosity and wonder.
I highly recommend it to young readers. I've actually never
read it, but I've heard of it many times. Yeah,
I've never read it either, though it's it's been recommended
(22:11):
to name um, and it's been recommended as something for
young readers. But I think my son read a little
of it. I don't. I don't know if he's stuck
with it. But we're about to get to the part
of this email for which we must bring out the
dishes of drawn butter, because Scott says. Secondly, in a
recent Listener Mail episode, another writer suggested that the tarrask
(22:32):
from Dungeons and Dragons was actually a Godzilla sized crab.
A little later, you were lamenting the giant crabs of
Dungeons and Dragons low intelligence score, and you wondered if
somebody had home brewed the crab monsters from Attack of
the Crab Monsters. Yeah, this came up because the crab
monsters in the in the Roger Corman drive in movie
(22:55):
are not low intelligence there, and they are not only brilliant,
they have absorbed the minds of many men. And when
they when they eat your brains, they gain your knowledge.
Scott goes on, this is where I come in. I
am an aspiring D and D five E content producer,
and your show is often a well spring of excellent
monster ideas e g. The leshy Yeti crabs, et cetera.
(23:18):
I even purchased the much lauded Giants, Monsters and Dragons
book for inspiration. So when you mused about the stats
of crabs, I got to work now. Giant crabs are
mostly low level critters that any capable adventuring party should
have little problem dispatching. But if you make them a
bit larger, thicken their carapasts, and add some of the
abilities of an intellectual devour. I am assuming this is
(23:42):
an example of such the mind flare brainhounds. You've got
a pretty solid starting place for the aforementioned crab monsters.
I've included JPEG's of the end result and another of
my giant Yeti crab. I hope you enjoy them. You're
some of the most engaging and amusing science communicator out there,
and I can't wait to see what wonderful weirdness y'all
(24:02):
will bring my mostly mundane workday. Best Scott, Well, Scott,
this is a wonderful email. Thank you for getting in touch,
but you have made a major error. You forgot to
attach the images, so Rob and I are just sitting
here with like bereft. Yeah, I want to see this crap,
But I'm glad that that he's putting in the work
(24:24):
on this. This is something that needs to exist out
there in the at least in the Homebrew universe of
of monsters and also good I'm picking up Giants, Monsters
and Dragons by Carol Rose. I think I heard from
another listener who had recently acquired a copy of this book.
Just a tremendous treasure trove of of fantastic creatures for
anyone out there who, like me, loves loves a good
(24:47):
best fiery. Speaking of monsters, Joe, I do have to mention, Uh,
my wife and I started watching the second season of
The Witcher on Netflix. Okay, or The Witcher as as
our main character would say, which and uh, I have
to say second episode I think it is includes versions
of both the Leshy and Bobby Yaga. So whoa I
(25:09):
have to give give that show credit. Well, that's based
on like Polish monster folklore, isn't it, or at least
the novels are Polish. I believe so. Yes, So it
makes sense that you know that he would draw that
author would draw in these various folkloric concepts. Um, now
I can't I haven't read them, so I can't speak
to them, and I can't speak to how exactly these
(25:32):
episodes have adapted those works. But still, at the end
of the day, you have somebody fighting a variation on
the Leshy And yeah, my excitement was growing as they
started talking about this strange house in the in the
woods that had basilist lags, and I was like, Oh,
that's gonna be Bobba Yaga. Oh boy. So I haven't
read the books and I haven't seen the show. Well,
I think we sort of put on one of the
(25:54):
episodes of the show, just sort of in the background
for laughs. I I don't know. It might be a
great show. I haven't seen it, but I have played
one of the video games and it had a lot
of great monsters in it. Yeah yeah, I mean the
Monster the Monsters game is pretty solid in the show too,
based on on what I've seen, and the lead performance
very gravelly. Wait, it's that. It's the It's the really
(26:16):
buff gamer guy, isn't it. Henry Cavill. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
didn't he like a muscled nerd? He is? Yeah, get
used to him, because I think he's currently attached to
the Highlander reboot. I don't know who he's gonna play.
I hope the Kurgan. I think based on especially what
I've seen in The Witcher. It's like he's got the
gravelly voice, and I would like to see him play
(26:37):
a villain for a for for a change. And he's
a He's a solid actor, so I'm curious to see
what he could do. He was riveting in Hell Razor eight?
Was he was he in that? Or whichever one? The
one where the one where evil goes online? The virtual
reality he's in that? Oh? I was not aware of that. Oh,
(26:58):
it's it's it's great. It's not all right. Well, let's
close things out with a little weird house cinema listener mail.
This one comes to us from Alan. Alan writes, gents,
I recently stumbled upon your podcast and I have really
been enjoying it. The origins of the Chainsaw first caught
(27:20):
my attention. It's all great stuff, but my mind truly
did come bust a little when I saw you did
a weird House episode on Ewok's The Battle for Indoor.
I vaguely recall my sister and I'm watching this and
The Caravan of Courage when they first aired. But what
I remember most was watching and wearing out the VHS
tapes recorded from TV, complete with commercials and about a
(27:41):
second of a football game where I accidentally hit the
record button on the remote while watching. These movies were
a big part of our childhood, so much so that
my sister named her oldest daughter, now in her twenties,
after Sindel or Sindel. I can't remember how the character's
name is pronounced offhand. Yeah, see I in D E
L Yeah. Uh. Anyway, they continue, So uh, we were
(28:05):
all amazed how much she looked like Aubrey Miller through
her early childhood. Every once in a while she still
gets a knowing smile or an outright o MG from
the e walks right when people hear her name. Her
best friend is Wilfred Brimley. Um well, I have to say,
I think that's awesome. My son's first name, in large
(28:26):
part comes from Bastian Baltazar Bucks from The Never Ending Story.
So I think, I think, I think drawing on the
names of our cinematic and literary mythology are are are
totally totally called for inappropriate. Anyway, Alan continues, I don't
know if the tape still exists, possibly in my parents basement,
But I found the DVDs years ago and introduced my
(28:48):
kids to these gems. They are great fun and we
still watch them when we're looking to watch something fun
and not too heavy. My favorite character, of course, was Tick.
He was just awesome and there were a few years
where I thought I could actually make a glider like Wicked.
If he could do it, why couldn't I. Of course,
the answer to that question is because he's a fictional character,
though they're still part of me. The believes I could
(29:10):
if I had access to proper sized animal bones and skin. Well,
thanks again for allowing me to reminisce. Uh. The episode
was great. I really enjoyed it. Keep making great content, Alan.
Oh well, thanks Alan. Uh, Yeah, this is a heartwarming email. Uh.
The one thing, though, that really stuck in my mind
was the part of the much beloved VHS tape where
(29:34):
you accidentally taped over it with the second of something
else that Rob. I assume you had something like that
in your house. Everybody I know did. There's a famous
story in my in my wife's family where they they
I think they borrowed a friend's dearly dearly cherished a
copy of News e s on a VHS tape and
accidentally taped over one second of it with a you know,
(29:57):
personal injury lawyer ad. And they still remember what part
of news eas that where that happens. Oh yeah, I
mean the VHS medium. Uh, you know it had so
many wonderful things about it that at the time we
often took for granted. Um, you know, part of it was,
of course the ads. You know, it's fascinating to think about,
you know, to look back on, like all those times
(30:19):
where if you were really trying to do it right,
you would try and clip out the ads that nowadays.
I mean, that's what I would want to see. I
I don't just want to see that. If I want
to watch this movie that I caught on Sci Fi
Channel in the nineties, I can probably find it. But
what I would really love to do is is watch
all the ads with it is what commercy? Yeah, and
some of that stuff is just lost, I guess. Oh god, well,
(30:40):
I mean like it's the best part of watching the
Star Wars Holiday Special. Actually, yeah, I would never want
to see the Holiday special without the Ladies Garment Workers
Union commercial and tow Bore and all of that great stuff. Yeah, yeah,
it's it's pretty tremendous. Um. I think I still have
a few gyms like that, but there's a lot of
(31:00):
that stuff that I just lost. I do one thing
I remember from VHS some talking about VHS tapes that
were just used to death. We had a copy of
Jim Henson's Labyrinth, which is still of one of my
favorite films, but we just watched the hell out of
it so much that at one point the VHS tape
broke and we had it professionally repaired, which I can't imagine.
(31:23):
I don't even know how that worked, Like where did
my parents take it to get fixed? Who did that?
And why was it more cost effective than just buying
a new copy of Labyrinth. But when Labyrinth came back,
it was slightly warped, So it has this kind of
VHS now we would think of just like a VHS glitch,
kind of a aspect to the entire film, the entire
(31:45):
film plus the trailer to the Name of the Rose
that plays at the very beginning. And so nowadays, if
I watched Labyrinth or I watched that trailer, uh, it
just doesn't sound the same because it should be slightly
warped I'm still reeling from the idea of a VHS
tape repair person. I don't know who did that. That
(32:05):
sounds like the world's best job. Did they take it
to somewhere around town? Do they mail it off? I
don't know. I'll have to ask my mom about Mom.
If you're listening, um, call me. Well, we'll discuss Taneribell.
It's labyrinth spelled backwards. All right, Well, I think we
gotta call it there. But thank you everyone for getting
in touch, and we'll be I'm sure catching up on
(32:26):
more of the emails that came in over the holidays
in the weeks to come. That's right. And in the meantime,
if you want to check out other episodes of Stuff
to Blow Your Mind, we have core episodes on Tuesdays
and Thursdays and the Stuff to Blow your Mind podcast feed,
which you can find anywhere and everywhere you get your podcast.
We do listener Man on Monday, we do an Artifact
or Monster Fact on Wednesdays as a short form episode,
(32:46):
and on Fridays we do Weird How Cinema. That's our
time to put most serious matters aside and just talk
about a strange movie. H Thanks as always to our
excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If you would like
to get in touch with us with feedback on this
episod ode or any other, to suggest a topic for
the future, or just to say hello, you can email
us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.
(33:15):
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