Whales are textbook beauty and grace—and they’re a helluva lot of work to clean up when they die. Today, we’re diving into one of the most bizarre, smelly, and heartbreaking jobs in the world: working on a marine animal stranding response team.

Thanks to Dr. Susan Barco and Dr. Alex Costidis at The Virginia Aquarium & Marine Science Center Stranding Response Program, here are a few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• The equipment you need to dismember and move a 50-ton whale
• How many calories a whale eats in a day
• The smelliest whale to dissect

Did You Know?

For every foot in length, a whale weighs about two thousand pounds.

To learn more about the stranding response team and how you can support them (as well as how to take a whale watching tour), please visit these links:
https://www.virginiaaquarium.com/research-and-conservation/stranding-response

https://www.virginiaaquarium.com/support/give-to-stranding

https://www.virginiaaquarium.com/things-to-do/boat-tours

https://www.virginiaaquarium.com/blog/whale-watching-boat-tours

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Digital Operations Specialist - Holly Hutchings
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

A special thanks to Brennan Tapp for assisting in this episode's field recordings, and Mackenzie DiNardo (PR Manager at the VA Aquarium) for helping make all this happen.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].

Under the right conditions, hobbies and physical activities become deep play, taking on additional layers of meaning and personal significance. Historical figures, like Winston Churchill, relished his deep play. Which, for him, was painting. “I know of nothing which, without exhausting the body,” he said, “more entirely absorbs the mind.”

Ol’ Churchill knew that his deep play was important not just for the fun of it, but for the positive impacts on his work. Something Alex Pang knows all about.

Alex is the author of Rest: Why You Get More Done When You Work Less. He’s made it his life’s work to show that success doesn’t demand longer hours. It demands more rest. And deep play is a central part of it.

But what exactly is it? How can you find the deep play that’s right for you? And can it revolutionize your work?

A few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• The 4 elements of deep play

• Why Winston Churchill likened painting to battle

• The often-misunderstood relationship between work and rest

Did You Know?

“It is not enough merely to switch off the lights which play upon the main and ordinary field of interest. A new field of interest must be illuminated. The tired parts of the mind can be rested and strengthened, not merely by rest, but by using other parts.” – Winston Churchill

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Digital Operations Specialist - Holly Hutchings
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].

Did know that—scientifically speaking—there’s no difference between a dove and a pigeon? Yet a dove’s more colorful counterpart has been dragged through the cultural mud. In doing so, we’ve missed out on the rich history and amazing features of this incredible creature. Andrew Blechman (author of Pigeons: The Fascinating Saga of the World’s Most Revered and Reviled Bird) is here to share the jaw-dropping details.

A few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• The world event that led to the cultural downfall of pigeons in America
• The loving history between pigeons and humans
• How a pigeon can find its way home from hundreds of miles away

Did You Know?

Genghis Khan and his grandson created a pigeon post that spanned—get this—one-sixth of the entire world.

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Digital Operations Specialist - Holly Hutchings
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].

Over the next year, 56 million people around the world will die. That’s 106.6 per minute, 1.8 people every second, every day. That’s a lot of deaths. And it’s someone’s job to pick those people up and take them where they need to go. But who picks you up when you die?

A few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• Why’s there such a high divorce rate among morticians?
• Why does the person who picks you up wear a suit and tie?
• How did the Civil War change funeral services?

Did You Know?

Want to hear a joke? This one’s from Jake: What do you call a mortician with a bad back? Unemployed. (With physical labor like that, if you don’t get those day-to-day movements right you can destroy your body.)

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Digital Operations Specialist - Holly Hutchings
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].

Sully. Miguel. Mr. Incredible. Nemo. Pixar has an extensive roster of characters who instantly capture our imaginations. But getting an impactful story to fall into place comes with big challenges—ones Pixar writers have to creatively spar with every day. And sometimes, those challenges hit back. 20-year Pixar storytelling veteran Matthew Luhn takes us on his journey into the writers’ room. 

A few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• Why did Toy Story (and Pixar) almost get shut down?
• How did Matthew go from The Simpsons to Pixar?
• How’d the writers figure out the ending to Finding Nemo?

Did You Know?

Since 1995, Pixar has made $14.7 billion at the global box office.

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Digital Operations Specialist - Holly Hutchings
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].

The First World War saw the dawn of fighting in the skies and advanced, savage warfare on the ground. Maimed soldiers lucky enough to survive were unlucky enough to live in a time when medical tech was vastly outpaced by war tech. That struggle to keep up meant uncertain futures for wounded soldiers—especially when it came to facial injuries. Medical historian Dr. Lindsey Fitzharris takes us behind the scenes of a medical revolution: the birth of plastic surgery.

A few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• Why did soldiers with facial injuries sit on blue benches?
• How do you reconstruct a face?
• Were injured men called back to the front lines?

Get a copy of Dr. Fitzharris' book, The Facemaker: A Visionary Surgeon's Battle to Mend the Disfigured Soldiers of World War I, at Amazon, Audible, or Bookshop.org.

Did You Know?

8-10 million people died in WWI, with twice as many injured—often seriously.

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Digital Operations Specialist - Holly Hutchings
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].

In an age when eels were sometimes used as currency and castles pierced the sky, “thou” was all the rage. But over time, it disappeared from use. Where’d it go? And will it ever make a comeback? Grammar Girl (aka Mignon Fogarty) helps us parse through the grammatical treasures of yore and solve the “thou” mystery once and for all.

A few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• The searing insults “thou” provided
• The societal shift that ended “thou”
• What dead word Grammar Girl would love to resurrect

Did You Know?

“Thou” was used longest in areas farthest from London. It’s still used in a few regional dialects, including those in Yorkshire and Cumbria.

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].

Is sleep giving you the cold shoulder? What if you had a bedtime buddy? A platonic pal who could slow the thoughts running through your head and lull you to sleep every night? Enter Drew Ackerman (aka Dearest Scooter).

His Sleep With Me podcast gets 3 million+ downloads every month. That’s over a hundred thousand people, every night, falling to sleep to Drew’s hypnotic voice and meandering tales. How does he do it? What’s the secret sauce to lulling a football stadium’s worth people nightly?

A few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• When it comes to putting strangers to sleep, what topics are off-limits?
• Are giant fighting monsters good for a snoozy narrative?
• What role does meandering play in a sleepy story?

Did You Know?

A lack of sleep is detrimental to our mood, creative output, and even self-control. Brain scans have shown the frontal lobe—which is responsible for self-control and gatekeeping emotional impulses—is switched off by a lack of sleep.

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin

Digital Operations Specialist - Holly Hutchings
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].

Science is all around us. It's in our smartphones, the contours our of eyelids, the hidden rabbit nest in the backyard. But what if everything we’ve come to know about the world (and that the natural world knows about itself) disappeared? Could science itself go extinct? 

Alie Ward of Ologies stops by to set the scientific record straight, and share why science is more than a path to answers—it's a gift of questions.

A few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• What animal species Alie discovered as a child
• Why we’re not the only species who experiences science
• Can you make music from spider mating dances?

Did You Know?

If human knowledge is a janky old car, science is the friend who’s happy to push us to the repair shop.

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].

Cemeteries are a rather new invention in human history, created only 10-15,000 years ago. We’ve come a long way from stopping to smell the proverbial roses… instead of rotting flesh. But how do these resting grounds for the deceased become tourist destinations for the living? Cemetery historian and author Loren Rhoads helps us dig up the truth.

A few curiosities you’ll uncover in this episode:

• Why a famous Paris cemetery “brought in” celebrities
• The world event that led Loren to fall in love with cemeteries
• Ways humans have rid of their dead through the years

Did You Know?

Humans didn’t start burying their dead until around 120,000 years ago.

Credits

Curious State is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast hosted and produced by Doug Fraser.

Find Curious State on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, or subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.

Podcast Manager - Adam Cecil 
Podcast and Advertising Operations Specialist - Morgan Christianson
Marketing and Publicity Assistant - Davina Tomlin
Intern - Brendan Picha 

The Quick and Dirty Tips network is a division of Macmillan Publishers in partnership with Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Have a question? Or a topic you’d like covered on the show? Maybe you just love sending emails? Whichever shoe fits, tie it on and send me a message at [email protected].