January 3, 2011 • 24 mins
It's official: Stuff Mom Never Told You has hit the 200-episode mark! To celebrate this momentous occasion, Molly and Cristen give listeners a behind-the-scenes look at the podcast-making process -- from the initial "pitch" to future topics.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to Stump Mom Never Told You?
From House Step Words dot Com. Hello, and welcome to
our two hundred podcast. Oh my god, I'm Molly and
(00:26):
I'm Kristen Kristin. Did you ever think we make it
two dred episodes? I think we're going to make it
to a thousand episodes? Molly A dream big? Right? Just
can you bring it all home fair enough? Dream big
or fall asleep? But think back when we started this
podcast so long ago, so long ago, two hundred episodes
did seem quite far away? It's true, yes, And to
(00:49):
celebrate two hundred we do. I just kind of want
to take a break from the normal, normal kind of conversation.
We have no studies sitting before us, no statistics at hand,
and I think that's what gonna make this what's going
to make this podcast all the more special. Absolutely no studies.
What will we do? Whoa, there's nothing to prove our
facts and we're just going to sort of talk about
(01:10):
how we um came up with the idea what goes
into a typical week of stuff Mom Never Told You?
And what we've learned from our wonderful listeners, and what
we can all look forward to in the next two Yeah,
we sent out messages on Facebook and Twitter asking for
any questions behind scenes questions, questions about Molly and me
(01:32):
and how the podcast has totally revolutionized our live I know,
I've had to hire a bodyguard and is hard to
go out in public without lots of people stopping me. Um,
I'm okay as long as they don't talk, because you know,
as soon as this voice boy starts ringing in people's ears,
it's a game over. I mean, it's just nuts out there.
(01:52):
I am completely kidding. But we got some great questions
from people that we will um definitely answer and hopefully
if you guys on inslid look sulfone never told you
whether you want an inside look or not. Well, I
want to go back to January of two eight, which
is uh the month that Kristen and I both started
(02:13):
at how Stuff Works dot com. We started on the
very same day and then a reroade and I think
that in those first months of two thousand and eight,
I mean, I don't want to speak for you, Christen,
but I feel like we became pretty good friends. Yeah,
we would go out to lunch occasionally with a group
of people. We would go to trivia nights. Yes. Um,
so by the time July and August rolled around, I
(02:33):
feel like we were buds. Yeah, and July and or August,
I'm not sure exactly which month it was was the
month that doing a podcast first came up. Yeah, podcast
became pretty hot here How Stuff Works. Not surprisingly, we
had the success of other podcasts such a Stuff You
should Know that a lot of you folks listen to,
and word troubled down the chain that we were going
(02:56):
to have a lot more podcasts. So Molly and I
got together one day and said, hey, girl, let's do
a podcast. And it didn't take long at all to
come up with the idea of talking about things from
a women's perspective. Yeah, because what better perspective can we
give because the guests hit were women, and uh, you know,
we thought that we would be using a lot of
(03:17):
articles around how self works dot com. Yes, and uh,
that's sort of how we pitched the podcast, was the
female perspective on how selfworks dot com articles. Actually, I
think the way we put it was how stuff works
with boobs. That is how we put it. It It was
we we looked up the original proposal we sent to
higher ups here and uh, the podcast tone I think
(03:40):
has definitely evolved from how we originally perceived it to be.
I'm still amazed that we asked our boss to do something, um,
just based on it being from quote people with boobs. Yeah,
I don't think I've ever used the word boobs. And
since it's probably what it took a little bit of
time for this podcast to get off the ground, that's true.
(04:02):
We thought we sent this email proposing the podcast August six,
two eight. We did not go live until February two
thousand nine. But I think that that time of working
on the podcast is really good for us. And uh,
we have to thank our producer Jerry and a lot
of people who are here for helping us find the
right tone of this podcast. And I think that, you know,
(04:24):
the issue of women can be kind of tricky for
some people to wrap their head around. I think that
there was concerned about whether we'd be either a pregnancy, childbirth,
childcare podcasts, which we have talked a lot about, or
if we'd be like this militant feminist podcast we have
talked a lot about and you know, I think Kirsten,
I originally saw it as being everything in the middle
(04:44):
of those two things, right, because what we wanted to
do is create a podcast that we would want to
listen to, as you know, young women with jobs, hoping
to one day get married and have kids but maybe not.
And that was sort of where we came from. Yeah,
and I would say that our fin tastic, smart, wonderful
listeners have helped us along the way to shape our
(05:05):
voice as well, because you guys are constantly giving us feedback,
offering suggestions and continually just making me and Molly's smile
with kind words of praise and keeping us on our toes.
You know, we um we always want to take sort
of a neutral perspective on some of the more controversial
issues we talked about, and we wanted to say, hey,
we don't have the answer to everything. We have not
(05:27):
experienced everything that is within the spectrum of personhood yet
and we hoped that when we started to do episodes,
people would write in and help us fill in those
blanks of experience. And I feel that that has been
fulfilled within beyond our wildest dreams, absolutely. But sometimes the
interesting thing about all this is that in an attempt
to provide objectivity. But the interesting thing Molly about attempting
(05:52):
to provide an objective perspective is sometimes the neutral stance
can be even more controversial than and highly opinionated stand.
And one episode that does come to mind senal Circumcision.
That's right. Some people were very upset that we did
not take a really strong stand about what was right
and what was wrong. And but you know what, the
(06:14):
way we did that episode was just a presentation of
all the information we had available to us. And it
always goes back I think when I'm thinking about how
we're going to frame an episode to what I would
want to hear, and I just wouldn't want to be
preached to. And that's sort of how we made that decision.
Is you know, we work as journalists and writers during
the day, and we try and be objective in the
(06:34):
articles to present on the site, and it seemed only
fair to bring that same sort of fair mindedness to
what we were doing on the podcast. So, really fast,
why don't we walk through how we actually make a podcast?
Because it's pretty simple to say anyone could do it. Anyone,
anyone of you could do it except for the part
(06:55):
where you get like Jerry or a good producer, because
not not comm not anyone can be a Jerry or Tyler.
We have today Tyler's recording today. And what we do
is a couple of days into the week, after we've
settled into our mondays, all right, uh, Molly and I
will send back and forth some topics. Usually it starts
(07:16):
with an email along the lines of Hey, girl, what
sho you want to talk about today or this week
more like? And we decide on some topics. They might
be trending topics in the news or just topics that
we've been burning to talk about for a while. Yeah.
I mean, look, I don't know about you, Christen, but
I've got this document on my computer that's like seven
(07:36):
pages long, h of things that I've thought of, things
our listeners have suggested, interesting articles I see. And what
I do is when I'm thinking of ideas to propost you,
when I really want to impress you, UM, I pick
like the five best, the five that I'm in the
mood for this week, send him over to you, and
from that the back and forth we kind of figure
out what we're gonna talk about. Right. Once we decide
(07:57):
what usually We record two episodes every week, and so
Molly will take one episode and do the research for it,
and I'll take the other episode and do the research
for that. Then we swap our research so that we
have then read all of the wonderful studies, documents, reports, articles,
et cetera that go into each podcast, and then we
(08:17):
come into this wonderful studio at the house Stuff Works
offices in Atlanta, Georgia, and we chit chat for a
little while, and you know, we try not you know,
one of the mistakes I think we name when we
first started christian As we talked too much. Before the
podcast started. We used to kind of rehearse about um
what we'd say. We never had a script, a fields
and jokes, but it would definitely be like, Okay, we're
(08:39):
gonna start here, then we're gonna go here, and we're
gonna end here. You're gonna laugh here, and uh it's
just like that. Yeah, that was practiced, and now we
try and keep that to a bare minimum. I mean,
it's not like I never see Christen during the week.
Uh you know, we still we still chat, but uh,
you know, we're not going to bring up the topic.
We're discussing because we want to keep most of the
magic right. We go to the microphone, we go to
(09:01):
the brake room, we take two shots of whiskey. Then
we come in and we go for it. And the
whiskey is hard since we do record at ten thirty
in the morning. Yeah, but you know what, no pain,
no game exactly. Um So we may only talked before
we record for about ten or fifteen minutes, and it's
very bare bones, like this is what I think we're
gonna talk about, blah blah blah. But a lot of
(09:22):
times it's just office gossip. It's really when Molly and
I catch up on what's going on with the health stuff,
works offices, because you guys, it's a it's crazy here
where we talked about celebrities a lot. That's true, John
John Hamm so um. So that's how it happens. And
then Jerry takes all of our ramblings and pieces it
together in a wonderful cohesive thing that we like to
call podcast. Right, and then as you know, they come
(09:43):
out Mondays and Wednesdays. There we go. So that't it.
That's the answer to that question. But let's get to
the juicy stuff. Okay, folks had some good questions they
wanted to ask us, and I think that we owe
it to our wonderful listeners to provide some some answer.
All right, christ and here's a question for you. What
is the best advice your mother ever gave you? Okay,
(10:07):
I have the answer to this. And this also deals
someone with other questions that people have asked about how
the podcast might intersect with our dating life or with
relationships with men in general, because we talked so much
about lady lady things. So the best advice my mom
ever gave me, I would say, or at least the
advice that's stuck with me the most is she said
(10:29):
to me. What she said, Kristen, your mom's sassy. She's
a little sassy. Uh. She do accents to She does
not do an accent, but she does have a very
distinct accent. But anyway, my mama told me, Honey, if
you are ever in a relationship with a man, once
(10:51):
you see is what you get. Okay, don't try to
change a man because he's only going to change if
he really wants to. So love him as he is
is and if not, get out. Wow. Yeah, and have
you found that that's that's good advice. I find that
that is incredibly true. And I'm not just saying that.
She wasn't trying to tell me that men are just
(11:13):
hardhearted or hard headed oaths who are completely resistant to change.
But I think it's a good point because a lot
of times women can get caught up in with this
sort of savior complex of wanting to mold their partners
and to some specific ideal, and that is completely unrealistic,
and you need to if you if you love someone,
you should accept them, you know, as as they are,
(11:37):
and hopefully through that if they need to make some
behavioral adjustments, they'll do it on their own. Well, you
alluded to ways the podcast can affect your dating life,
and you've already touched a little bit of romantic relationship,
so I was wondering if you want to say anything
else about how being a prominent lady commentator effects dating relationships.
(11:57):
I think that it's made me more cognizance of maybe
the minor details of relationships with men, whether that's just
interactions with guy friends of mine, or if it is
me um sitting on a date across from a guy,
watching and waiting for body language mirroring that would signal
our inherent attraction to each other. We've talked a lot
(12:21):
about the biology of love and attraction, and sometimes I
have found that, uh, if I get focused too much
in on the science, it can squelsh the magic a
little bit. But at the same time, it's also it's
also comforting away. I just feel like it has given
me a better and more balanced perspective of how men
(12:46):
and women interact, appreciating the differences between us and also
appreciating the similarities. So that's what I would say. Now, Mollie,
you've been You're playing Barbara Walters right now, it's time
to turn the tables on you. All right, let's let's
let's start with your mom's best advice and then get
to the get to the guy stuff. Well, the best
(13:06):
piece of advice. I don't know if this is advice
per se, but it's something my mom always said when
I was upset, and it just always sticks with me.
And she always said that things happen for a reason,
And I know that there are a lot of people
who have trouble with that as an excuse. You know,
when something really heartbreaking or tragic happens. I think it
can be really hard to throw that out to someone
who you know, you know, just lost someone. Um, but
(13:30):
for things like guy stuff or for not getting jobs,
or for just not getting something I want. I always
hear that in my head, my mom saying, you know,
things happen for a reason. And when I look back
on my life and I think about things that, you know,
jobs I didn't get or boyfriends that didn't work out,
it's always because you can see how there are better
(13:50):
things in store for you. So I think that just
that sense of optimism that even though you're crushed at
the moment over something that happened, knowing that you know
there's something ahead and you can't see it yet and uh,
and you just gotta wait for it and move yourself
towards it. That was always just really helpful to hear
my mom's boys saying that. To me, that's a very
(14:10):
healthy perspective. And you know what, that's something that mamma
told me too. Maybe your mom should get together sometime.
And did your mom listen to the podcast my mom is?
I don't think my mom has ever listened to a
single full episode of this podcast. I think she's a
little scared to hear what she didn't tell me? Not lying?
All right? Um, what other questions to be your christal? Wait?
(14:32):
Wait wait wait wait, you just skirted. You just skirted
the entire clost you asked me about about boys. You're
not going to get off the hook? Um. You know.
The biggest I don't know if I notice, Uh, I
guess the biggest difference the way the podcast affects my
personal life is just weird. Factoise I drop in conversation,
and this affects both girlfriends, guy friends, boyfriends. It's just, um,
(14:55):
you know, you just never know what I'm gonna start
talking about menstrual cups, um, which can be off putting
to some people. You know the guy his shock glass
is roughly the same size as a menstrual cup. Did
you know? And I think that when we were talking
about this podcast, the number one thing Chris and I
have learned about as a result of our listeners, mest cups,
menstrul cups, and the long distance relationships can in fact work.
(15:19):
That's true. We got more just beautiful stories of blossoming love,
the transcended oceans, countries, state borders. After that episode, I mean,
it was incredible. You people are a bunch of a
bunch of romantics out there. I will say, you know,
there were days when I'd be kind of grumpy and
(15:40):
it would just be like ten stories of long distance relationships.
That works. You fell in love, okay, and then he
moved he moved from Australia for you. Yeah, but we
still love them. Don't get us wrong, we love Yeah.
There is nothing better than hearing that that that love.
But getting back to dating, um, Chris, and I will
(16:01):
say that, Um, I learned a lot about what I'm
interested in as a person as a result of doing
this podcast, because I did definitely did not start as
um the person I am now when it comes to
women's issues, and I feel that any person that will
sit there and listen to me talk about things that
I'm passionate about, be it not menstrual cups per se,
but just these issues that I think are so interesting relating,
(16:24):
you know women. If people don't even want to listen
to me talk about that on a first meeting, then
they're done. Yeah, And so I think, if anything, it's
helped me winn o out losers. That's pretty helpful. Yeah,
let's say, so, what what else we have? What what
other burning questions people have. Christinvilmore Right, what are your
favorite episodes of stuff mom Ember told you? My favorite
(16:45):
episodes pretty much anything involving Helen Fisher's research the biology
and anthropology of love and attraction. I think it is
endlessly fascinating. One of the most recent ones that we
covered was on the seven year itch slee whether or
not um married couples really do go through that lull
where you want to cheat, you want to end things
(17:06):
and it's over. And research indicates that we have this
four year window of the honeymoon effect that would translate
back to and or gatherer times in the time that
it would take for a couple to get together, make
a baby, and for that baby to grow up enough
that it can not be quite as vulnerable to the elements.
(17:28):
Just things like that, things that explain why we are
the way we are, and especially with those issues such
as love and attraction that are endlessly confounding to me.
I got four words for you, Kristen, Yes, brain on
a breakup. Oh man, that's a good one. That was
one where we also use Helen Fisher's research, and I
(17:50):
have to say, like, I think that might have been
my favorite one to research. It was just a simple
study that Helen Fisher had done about how breakups work
in your brain, as the title implies, and it was.
I think it was one of the It's definitely one
of the top five studies I've ever read in terms
of making me feel not insane, right, And I think
that's always said for the entire podcast, was like, Oh
(18:11):
my gosh, I'm not insane. We're gosh, I'm not insane.
I'm not crazy. You know, it's just your reward or wrong.
It really is like drug addiction withdrawal. So it's um,
like you said, anything with Helen Fisher is always great. Um.
My other favorite I do have to say is poop. Oh,
Lady poop, scoop on Lady poop. Yeah, that was a
good one. Um and uh, when I think when we
(18:31):
recorded that, all we remembered was the goofy saying poop part.
But when you go back and listen, that was another
one where we got to use a lot of really
cool science to explain what goes on inside men and Women.
Any other favorite episodes, Christen, any other favorite episodes? Um,
I thought that episodes that turned out differently than I
(18:55):
thought they would basically when when the research surprised me.
Some stuff like two's tattoos was fun, men's facial hair, Um,
what else? Sex Edition, Sex Addiction was pretty fascinating, Penis
size very fascinating. I really liked Ho mack haul Mac. Yeah,
(19:16):
when you when you basically when the results kind of
surprise you. And the thing that I like the most
about researching these podcasts is finding the studies that you
think that no one would have conducted. You would be
so amazed. Entry um, Kristen, what what sources do you
look at during the week, Like what when you're looking
(19:37):
for ideas? How do they strike you? Well? I have
a folder in my in my bookmarks called lady Stuff
and a lot of my well, my three main four
main hits would be Jezebel Broadsheet, which is on Salon
dot com, and then also the Double X from Slate,
(19:59):
and then the New Times Women's Page. And that's probably
not very surprising to people who listen to the podcast,
because we're constantly calling out uh different writers, different um
articles from all of those sites. But I think that
those those four do a really great job of not
only reporting on women's issues from all all areas, including
(20:19):
more frivolous things such as celebrity gossip and fashion all
of that to more hard hitting issues and providing a
lot of solid analysis. So are there in addition to
those and only are there any other any other sources
that you go to kind of your daily daily hits? UM?
I would say my daily news sources are the ones
(20:41):
you mentioned UM and what else? I like Discover magazine
a lot, live science UM. I always I'm surprised when
I can plug in a lady topic like um bras
and find something come up on a really science e
source like that, But they do UM And then you know,
when we do our deeper research, we have access to
(21:02):
databases that pull up those those studies. And how how
much how many hours would you say you read of
um O our our podcast forces Kristen all right, well,
it depends on the podcast, but I would say I
mean at least at least a few hours every week.
So well, I know that we've covered the podcast in
the past. I got a little question for you to
(21:22):
take it into the future, and old listeners have also
wondered this as well. What kind of topics would you
like to see in the future, Anything that you've been
burning to do, but we just haven't had the chance
to do yet. Oh well, I gues said, we have
really a long list of things that we want to
do in the future. I would say the big ones
that we know we need to do soon our adoption, um, polyamory.
(21:46):
A lot of people request polyamory, yes, and we're starting
to get there. We're trying to talk about monogamy a
little more. A lot of people request podcasts about Playboy. Yeah,
big cultural touchdown on a gray and uh, childbirth. I
would say that a lot of people write in about
childbirth and early childhood issues, but I will say looking
(22:06):
back that that is one of the most controversial things
we can ever talk about. Christen. Whenever we talk about motherhood,
that's when we get a lot of emails like, you
guys aren't mothers. You really shouldn't talk about this. It's
been a tricky That's probably been one of the trickiest
things to get around with this podcast is when we
talk about pregnancy, childbirth, parenting, etcetera. It's all with a
caveat of you and I have no offspring and uh,
(22:29):
and I think that, I mean, we still apply the
same research analysis we do, but there are people out there,
and I would probably one too if I had had
a child, who just believe that we aren't able to
talk about it at this stage in our life. So
I think that that does keep us away from some
of those um motherhood related topics, which is why for
two thousand eleven you and I should both probably just
adopt some kids, you know, just for podcast reasons, kind
(22:53):
of like the whole mech babies that we talked about
on that episode. Maybe we can, maybe we can snag
a couple. I feel like that's be an interesting are
meant to just maybe the whole house stuff works dot
Com office. Maybe I could borrow my niece or a nephew.
You know, we do. We are both aunts now, yes
we are. So see that's something people we have. We
do have children in our lives. We're not just not
(23:14):
just going and completely alone. But as always, I think
that whatever we do, it's always going to be shaped
by what listeners want to hear, because we do. We
read every single thing you guys post on our Facebook,
on our Twitter, every email we get we read, and
we always take what you guys take into account, and
we know that we have the most awesome listeners in
the world we do this podcast would not be fun anymore.
(23:35):
I don't think we would have gotten to two hundred
episodes if we didn't have such awesome listeners. Just completely true.
So with that we want to thank all of you
and as always, keep the ideas coming. Let us know
what you like and just like going forward from two hundred,
how can Molly consider this your virtual suggestion box? Just
send us an email moms at a house stuffworks dot
(23:56):
com for any any tips, any vice, any podcast suggestions
you'd like to send our way. Send listening to my
mom stuff at how stuff works dot com and again,
thank you for two hundred episodes. Christine, thank you episode
some cake. Let's wrap this up the stufp and eat
some cake or an entire pot Well, I don't know,
I try I'd like more. So with that, head over
(24:19):
to our Facebook uh, leave us comment there, follow us
on Twitter at mom Stuff podcast, and check out our blog.
You can leave a comment there as well. Stuff Mom
ever told you at how stuff works dot com for
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(24:41):
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you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to Stump Mom Never Told You?
From House Step Words dot Com. Hello, and welcome to
our two hundred podcast. Oh my god, I'm Molly and
(00:26):
I'm Kristen Kristin. Did you ever think we make it
two dred episodes? I think we're going to make it
to a thousand episodes? Molly A dream big? Right? Just
can you bring it all home fair enough? Dream big
or fall asleep? But think back when we started this
podcast so long ago, so long ago, two hundred episodes
did seem quite far away? It's true, yes, And to
(00:49):
celebrate two hundred we do. I just kind of want
to take a break from the normal, normal kind of conversation.
We have no studies sitting before us, no statistics at hand,
and I think that's what gonna make this what's going
to make this podcast all the more special. Absolutely no studies.
What will we do? Whoa, there's nothing to prove our
facts and we're just going to sort of talk about
(01:10):
how we um came up with the idea what goes
into a typical week of stuff Mom Never Told You?
And what we've learned from our wonderful listeners, and what
we can all look forward to in the next two Yeah,
we sent out messages on Facebook and Twitter asking for
any questions behind scenes questions, questions about Molly and me
(01:32):
and how the podcast has totally revolutionized our live I know,
I've had to hire a bodyguard and is hard to
go out in public without lots of people stopping me. Um,
I'm okay as long as they don't talk, because you know,
as soon as this voice boy starts ringing in people's ears,
it's a game over. I mean, it's just nuts out there.
(01:52):
I am completely kidding. But we got some great questions
from people that we will um definitely answer and hopefully
if you guys on inslid look sulfone never told you
whether you want an inside look or not. Well, I
want to go back to January of two eight, which
is uh the month that Kristen and I both started
(02:13):
at how Stuff Works dot com. We started on the
very same day and then a reroade and I think
that in those first months of two thousand and eight,
I mean, I don't want to speak for you, Christen,
but I feel like we became pretty good friends. Yeah,
we would go out to lunch occasionally with a group
of people. We would go to trivia nights. Yes. Um,
so by the time July and August rolled around, I
(02:33):
feel like we were buds. Yeah, and July and or August,
I'm not sure exactly which month it was was the
month that doing a podcast first came up. Yeah, podcast
became pretty hot here How Stuff Works. Not surprisingly, we
had the success of other podcasts such a Stuff You
should Know that a lot of you folks listen to,
and word troubled down the chain that we were going
(02:56):
to have a lot more podcasts. So Molly and I
got together one day and said, hey, girl, let's do
a podcast. And it didn't take long at all to
come up with the idea of talking about things from
a women's perspective. Yeah, because what better perspective can we
give because the guests hit were women, and uh, you know,
we thought that we would be using a lot of
(03:17):
articles around how self works dot com. Yes, and uh,
that's sort of how we pitched the podcast, was the
female perspective on how selfworks dot com articles. Actually, I
think the way we put it was how stuff works
with boobs. That is how we put it. It It was
we we looked up the original proposal we sent to
higher ups here and uh, the podcast tone I think
(03:40):
has definitely evolved from how we originally perceived it to be.
I'm still amazed that we asked our boss to do something, um,
just based on it being from quote people with boobs. Yeah,
I don't think I've ever used the word boobs. And
since it's probably what it took a little bit of
time for this podcast to get off the ground, that's true.
(04:02):
We thought we sent this email proposing the podcast August six,
two eight. We did not go live until February two
thousand nine. But I think that that time of working
on the podcast is really good for us. And uh,
we have to thank our producer Jerry and a lot
of people who are here for helping us find the
right tone of this podcast. And I think that, you know,
(04:24):
the issue of women can be kind of tricky for
some people to wrap their head around. I think that
there was concerned about whether we'd be either a pregnancy, childbirth,
childcare podcasts, which we have talked a lot about, or
if we'd be like this militant feminist podcast we have
talked a lot about and you know, I think Kirsten,
I originally saw it as being everything in the middle
(04:44):
of those two things, right, because what we wanted to
do is create a podcast that we would want to
listen to, as you know, young women with jobs, hoping
to one day get married and have kids but maybe not.
And that was sort of where we came from. Yeah,
and I would say that our fin tastic, smart, wonderful
listeners have helped us along the way to shape our
(05:05):
voice as well, because you guys are constantly giving us feedback,
offering suggestions and continually just making me and Molly's smile
with kind words of praise and keeping us on our toes.
You know, we um we always want to take sort
of a neutral perspective on some of the more controversial
issues we talked about, and we wanted to say, hey,
we don't have the answer to everything. We have not
(05:27):
experienced everything that is within the spectrum of personhood yet
and we hoped that when we started to do episodes,
people would write in and help us fill in those
blanks of experience. And I feel that that has been
fulfilled within beyond our wildest dreams, absolutely. But sometimes the
interesting thing about all this is that in an attempt
to provide objectivity. But the interesting thing Molly about attempting
(05:52):
to provide an objective perspective is sometimes the neutral stance
can be even more controversial than and highly opinionated stand.
And one episode that does come to mind senal Circumcision.
That's right. Some people were very upset that we did
not take a really strong stand about what was right
and what was wrong. And but you know what, the
(06:14):
way we did that episode was just a presentation of
all the information we had available to us. And it
always goes back I think when I'm thinking about how
we're going to frame an episode to what I would
want to hear, and I just wouldn't want to be
preached to. And that's sort of how we made that decision.
Is you know, we work as journalists and writers during
the day, and we try and be objective in the
(06:34):
articles to present on the site, and it seemed only
fair to bring that same sort of fair mindedness to
what we were doing on the podcast. So, really fast,
why don't we walk through how we actually make a podcast?
Because it's pretty simple to say anyone could do it. Anyone,
anyone of you could do it except for the part
(06:55):
where you get like Jerry or a good producer, because
not not comm not anyone can be a Jerry or Tyler.
We have today Tyler's recording today. And what we do
is a couple of days into the week, after we've
settled into our mondays, all right, uh, Molly and I
will send back and forth some topics. Usually it starts
(07:16):
with an email along the lines of Hey, girl, what
sho you want to talk about today or this week
more like? And we decide on some topics. They might
be trending topics in the news or just topics that
we've been burning to talk about for a while. Yeah.
I mean, look, I don't know about you, Christen, but
I've got this document on my computer that's like seven
(07:36):
pages long, h of things that I've thought of, things
our listeners have suggested, interesting articles I see. And what
I do is when I'm thinking of ideas to propost you,
when I really want to impress you, UM, I pick
like the five best, the five that I'm in the
mood for this week, send him over to you, and
from that the back and forth we kind of figure
out what we're gonna talk about. Right. Once we decide
(07:57):
what usually We record two episodes every week, and so
Molly will take one episode and do the research for it,
and I'll take the other episode and do the research
for that. Then we swap our research so that we
have then read all of the wonderful studies, documents, reports, articles,
et cetera that go into each podcast, and then we
(08:17):
come into this wonderful studio at the house Stuff Works
offices in Atlanta, Georgia, and we chit chat for a
little while, and you know, we try not you know,
one of the mistakes I think we name when we
first started christian As we talked too much. Before the
podcast started. We used to kind of rehearse about um
what we'd say. We never had a script, a fields
and jokes, but it would definitely be like, Okay, we're
(08:39):
gonna start here, then we're gonna go here, and we're
gonna end here. You're gonna laugh here, and uh it's
just like that. Yeah, that was practiced, and now we
try and keep that to a bare minimum. I mean,
it's not like I never see Christen during the week.
Uh you know, we still we still chat, but uh,
you know, we're not going to bring up the topic.
We're discussing because we want to keep most of the
magic right. We go to the microphone, we go to
(09:01):
the brake room, we take two shots of whiskey. Then
we come in and we go for it. And the
whiskey is hard since we do record at ten thirty
in the morning. Yeah, but you know what, no pain,
no game exactly. Um So we may only talked before
we record for about ten or fifteen minutes, and it's
very bare bones, like this is what I think we're
gonna talk about, blah blah blah. But a lot of
(09:22):
times it's just office gossip. It's really when Molly and
I catch up on what's going on with the health stuff,
works offices, because you guys, it's a it's crazy here
where we talked about celebrities a lot. That's true, John
John Hamm so um. So that's how it happens. And
then Jerry takes all of our ramblings and pieces it
together in a wonderful cohesive thing that we like to
call podcast. Right, and then as you know, they come
(09:43):
out Mondays and Wednesdays. There we go. So that't it.
That's the answer to that question. But let's get to
the juicy stuff. Okay, folks had some good questions they
wanted to ask us, and I think that we owe
it to our wonderful listeners to provide some some answer.
All right, christ and here's a question for you. What
is the best advice your mother ever gave you? Okay,
(10:07):
I have the answer to this. And this also deals
someone with other questions that people have asked about how
the podcast might intersect with our dating life or with
relationships with men in general, because we talked so much
about lady lady things. So the best advice my mom
ever gave me, I would say, or at least the
advice that's stuck with me the most is she said
(10:29):
to me. What she said, Kristen, your mom's sassy. She's
a little sassy. Uh. She do accents to She does
not do an accent, but she does have a very
distinct accent. But anyway, my mama told me, Honey, if
you are ever in a relationship with a man, once
(10:51):
you see is what you get. Okay, don't try to
change a man because he's only going to change if
he really wants to. So love him as he is
is and if not, get out. Wow. Yeah, and have
you found that that's that's good advice. I find that
that is incredibly true. And I'm not just saying that.
She wasn't trying to tell me that men are just
(11:13):
hardhearted or hard headed oaths who are completely resistant to change.
But I think it's a good point because a lot
of times women can get caught up in with this
sort of savior complex of wanting to mold their partners
and to some specific ideal, and that is completely unrealistic,
and you need to if you if you love someone,
you should accept them, you know, as as they are,
(11:37):
and hopefully through that if they need to make some
behavioral adjustments, they'll do it on their own. Well, you
alluded to ways the podcast can affect your dating life,
and you've already touched a little bit of romantic relationship,
so I was wondering if you want to say anything
else about how being a prominent lady commentator effects dating relationships.
(11:57):
I think that it's made me more cognizance of maybe
the minor details of relationships with men, whether that's just
interactions with guy friends of mine, or if it is
me um sitting on a date across from a guy,
watching and waiting for body language mirroring that would signal
our inherent attraction to each other. We've talked a lot
(12:21):
about the biology of love and attraction, and sometimes I
have found that, uh, if I get focused too much
in on the science, it can squelsh the magic a
little bit. But at the same time, it's also it's
also comforting away. I just feel like it has given
me a better and more balanced perspective of how men
(12:46):
and women interact, appreciating the differences between us and also
appreciating the similarities. So that's what I would say. Now, Mollie,
you've been You're playing Barbara Walters right now, it's time
to turn the tables on you. All right, let's let's
let's start with your mom's best advice and then get
to the get to the guy stuff. Well, the best
(13:06):
piece of advice. I don't know if this is advice
per se, but it's something my mom always said when
I was upset, and it just always sticks with me.
And she always said that things happen for a reason,
And I know that there are a lot of people
who have trouble with that as an excuse. You know,
when something really heartbreaking or tragic happens. I think it
can be really hard to throw that out to someone
who you know, you know, just lost someone. Um, but
(13:30):
for things like guy stuff or for not getting jobs,
or for just not getting something I want. I always
hear that in my head, my mom saying, you know,
things happen for a reason. And when I look back
on my life and I think about things that, you know,
jobs I didn't get or boyfriends that didn't work out,
it's always because you can see how there are better
(13:50):
things in store for you. So I think that just
that sense of optimism that even though you're crushed at
the moment over something that happened, knowing that you know
there's something ahead and you can't see it yet and uh,
and you just gotta wait for it and move yourself
towards it. That was always just really helpful to hear
my mom's boys saying that. To me, that's a very
(14:10):
healthy perspective. And you know what, that's something that mamma
told me too. Maybe your mom should get together sometime.
And did your mom listen to the podcast my mom is?
I don't think my mom has ever listened to a
single full episode of this podcast. I think she's a
little scared to hear what she didn't tell me? Not lying?
All right? Um, what other questions to be your christal? Wait?
(14:32):
Wait wait wait wait, you just skirted. You just skirted
the entire clost you asked me about about boys. You're
not going to get off the hook? Um. You know.
The biggest I don't know if I notice, Uh, I
guess the biggest difference the way the podcast affects my
personal life is just weird. Factoise I drop in conversation,
and this affects both girlfriends, guy friends, boyfriends. It's just, um,
(14:55):
you know, you just never know what I'm gonna start
talking about menstrual cups, um, which can be off putting
to some people. You know the guy his shock glass
is roughly the same size as a menstrual cup. Did
you know? And I think that when we were talking
about this podcast, the number one thing Chris and I
have learned about as a result of our listeners, mest cups,
menstrul cups, and the long distance relationships can in fact work.
(15:19):
That's true. We got more just beautiful stories of blossoming love,
the transcended oceans, countries, state borders. After that episode, I mean,
it was incredible. You people are a bunch of a
bunch of romantics out there. I will say, you know,
there were days when I'd be kind of grumpy and
(15:40):
it would just be like ten stories of long distance relationships.
That works. You fell in love, okay, and then he
moved he moved from Australia for you. Yeah, but we
still love them. Don't get us wrong, we love Yeah.
There is nothing better than hearing that that that love.
But getting back to dating, um, Chris, and I will
(16:01):
say that, Um, I learned a lot about what I'm
interested in as a person as a result of doing
this podcast, because I did definitely did not start as
um the person I am now when it comes to
women's issues, and I feel that any person that will
sit there and listen to me talk about things that
I'm passionate about, be it not menstrual cups per se,
but just these issues that I think are so interesting relating,
(16:24):
you know women. If people don't even want to listen
to me talk about that on a first meeting, then
they're done. Yeah, And so I think, if anything, it's
helped me winn o out losers. That's pretty helpful. Yeah,
let's say, so, what what else we have? What what
other burning questions people have. Christinvilmore Right, what are your
favorite episodes of stuff mom Ember told you? My favorite
(16:45):
episodes pretty much anything involving Helen Fisher's research the biology
and anthropology of love and attraction. I think it is
endlessly fascinating. One of the most recent ones that we
covered was on the seven year itch slee whether or
not um married couples really do go through that lull
where you want to cheat, you want to end things
(17:06):
and it's over. And research indicates that we have this
four year window of the honeymoon effect that would translate
back to and or gatherer times in the time that
it would take for a couple to get together, make
a baby, and for that baby to grow up enough
that it can not be quite as vulnerable to the elements.
(17:28):
Just things like that, things that explain why we are
the way we are, and especially with those issues such
as love and attraction that are endlessly confounding to me.
I got four words for you, Kristen, Yes, brain on
a breakup. Oh man, that's a good one. That was
one where we also use Helen Fisher's research, and I
(17:50):
have to say, like, I think that might have been
my favorite one to research. It was just a simple
study that Helen Fisher had done about how breakups work
in your brain, as the title implies, and it was.
I think it was one of the It's definitely one
of the top five studies I've ever read in terms
of making me feel not insane, right, And I think
that's always said for the entire podcast, was like, Oh
(18:11):
my gosh, I'm not insane. We're gosh, I'm not insane.
I'm not crazy. You know, it's just your reward or wrong.
It really is like drug addiction withdrawal. So it's um,
like you said, anything with Helen Fisher is always great. Um.
My other favorite I do have to say is poop. Oh,
Lady poop, scoop on Lady poop. Yeah, that was a
good one. Um and uh, when I think when we
(18:31):
recorded that, all we remembered was the goofy saying poop part.
But when you go back and listen, that was another
one where we got to use a lot of really
cool science to explain what goes on inside men and Women.
Any other favorite episodes, Christen, any other favorite episodes? Um,
I thought that episodes that turned out differently than I
(18:55):
thought they would basically when when the research surprised me.
Some stuff like two's tattoos was fun, men's facial hair, Um,
what else? Sex Edition, Sex Addiction was pretty fascinating, Penis
size very fascinating. I really liked Ho mack haul Mac. Yeah,
(19:16):
when you when you basically when the results kind of
surprise you. And the thing that I like the most
about researching these podcasts is finding the studies that you
think that no one would have conducted. You would be
so amazed. Entry um, Kristen, what what sources do you
look at during the week, Like what when you're looking
(19:37):
for ideas? How do they strike you? Well? I have
a folder in my in my bookmarks called lady Stuff
and a lot of my well, my three main four
main hits would be Jezebel Broadsheet, which is on Salon
dot com, and then also the Double X from Slate,
(19:59):
and then the New Times Women's Page. And that's probably
not very surprising to people who listen to the podcast,
because we're constantly calling out uh different writers, different um
articles from all of those sites. But I think that
those those four do a really great job of not
only reporting on women's issues from all all areas, including
(20:19):
more frivolous things such as celebrity gossip and fashion all
of that to more hard hitting issues and providing a
lot of solid analysis. So are there in addition to
those and only are there any other any other sources
that you go to kind of your daily daily hits? UM?
I would say my daily news sources are the ones
(20:41):
you mentioned UM and what else? I like Discover magazine
a lot, live science UM. I always I'm surprised when
I can plug in a lady topic like um bras
and find something come up on a really science e
source like that, But they do UM And then you know,
when we do our deeper research, we have access to
(21:02):
databases that pull up those those studies. And how how
much how many hours would you say you read of
um O our our podcast forces Kristen all right, well,
it depends on the podcast, but I would say I
mean at least at least a few hours every week.
So well, I know that we've covered the podcast in
the past. I got a little question for you to
(21:22):
take it into the future, and old listeners have also
wondered this as well. What kind of topics would you
like to see in the future, Anything that you've been
burning to do, but we just haven't had the chance
to do yet. Oh well, I gues said, we have
really a long list of things that we want to
do in the future. I would say the big ones
that we know we need to do soon our adoption, um, polyamory.
(21:46):
A lot of people request polyamory, yes, and we're starting
to get there. We're trying to talk about monogamy a
little more. A lot of people request podcasts about Playboy. Yeah,
big cultural touchdown on a gray and uh, childbirth. I
would say that a lot of people write in about
childbirth and early childhood issues, but I will say looking
(22:06):
back that that is one of the most controversial things
we can ever talk about. Christen. Whenever we talk about motherhood,
that's when we get a lot of emails like, you
guys aren't mothers. You really shouldn't talk about this. It's
been a tricky That's probably been one of the trickiest
things to get around with this podcast is when we
talk about pregnancy, childbirth, parenting, etcetera. It's all with a
caveat of you and I have no offspring and uh,
(22:29):
and I think that, I mean, we still apply the
same research analysis we do, but there are people out there,
and I would probably one too if I had had
a child, who just believe that we aren't able to
talk about it at this stage in our life. So
I think that that does keep us away from some
of those um motherhood related topics, which is why for
two thousand eleven you and I should both probably just
adopt some kids, you know, just for podcast reasons, kind
(22:53):
of like the whole mech babies that we talked about
on that episode. Maybe we can, maybe we can snag
a couple. I feel like that's be an interesting are
meant to just maybe the whole house stuff works dot
Com office. Maybe I could borrow my niece or a nephew.
You know, we do. We are both aunts now, yes
we are. So see that's something people we have. We
do have children in our lives. We're not just not
(23:14):
just going and completely alone. But as always, I think
that whatever we do, it's always going to be shaped
by what listeners want to hear, because we do. We
read every single thing you guys post on our Facebook,
on our Twitter, every email we get we read, and
we always take what you guys take into account, and
we know that we have the most awesome listeners in
the world we do this podcast would not be fun anymore.
(23:35):
I don't think we would have gotten to two hundred
episodes if we didn't have such awesome listeners. Just completely true.
So with that we want to thank all of you
and as always, keep the ideas coming. Let us know
what you like and just like going forward from two hundred,
how can Molly consider this your virtual suggestion box? Just
send us an email moms at a house stuffworks dot
(23:56):
com for any any tips, any vice, any podcast suggestions
you'd like to send our way. Send listening to my
mom stuff at how stuff works dot com and again,
thank you for two hundred episodes. Christine, thank you episode
some cake. Let's wrap this up the stufp and eat
some cake or an entire pot Well, I don't know,
I try I'd like more. So with that, head over
(24:19):
to our Facebook uh, leave us comment there, follow us
on Twitter at mom Stuff podcast, and check out our blog.
You can leave a comment there as well. Stuff Mom
ever told you at how stuff works dot com for
moralns and thousands of other topics. Is it how stuff
works dot com. To learn more about the podcast, cook
(24:41):
on the podcast icon in the upper right corner of
our homepage. The How Stuff Works I Find app has
a ride. Download it today on iTunes, Brought to you
by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are
you
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