Flightless Bird

This week on Flightless Bird, David Farrier discovers that Rhode Island is not in fact an island. If not an island - what is it? Farrier talks to linguist Kate who has a true love for Rhode Island - and she educates David about the vampire buried there, the food Rhode Island loves, and its place in pop culture. Along the way Farrier discovers Rhode Island has a lot in common with his favourite place, New Zealand - which, arguable, is an island.

This week on Flightless Bird, David Farrier investigates why American opossums are so different to New Zealand possums. Speaking of which - why does one have an “O” in front of them? To find answers, David meets up with a possum called Horace, and learns that contrary to popular opinion possums are not related to rats. In fact possums have many amazing traits including being pretty much immune to rabies, being living fossils, and masters at playing dead. While New Zealand possums are terrible for the environment, the possums Farrier discovers in LA are very different beasts.

This week on Flightless Bird, David Farrier investigates why American chocolate tastes so different to New Zealand chocolate - and more specifically, why Hershey’s chocolate allegedly smells a little bit like vomit. Farrier talks to a former Hershey’s worker to try and get to the truth, learning about various theories and stumbling on an old rivalry between Hershey’s and Mars. David finds himself talking to flavour expert Barb Stuckey, author of TASTE: Surprising Stories & Science About Why Food Tastes Good. Does he find the answer? Perhaps you need to let your tastebuds decide.

In this week’s Flightless Bird, David Farrier goes to his first Monster Truck Jam to try and understand why Americans love big vehicles so much. There he meets Krysten Anderson, who drives Grave Digger - and tells David what it’s like to be a female driver in a male-dominated sport. David then joins Dax Shepard who explains why Americans like big wheels and big power, before the two of them watch the Monster Jam World Finals go down. Slowly Farrier begins to understand these oversized vehicles, realizing that to become truly American he must love a 12 thousand pound truck.

In this week’s Flightless Bird, David Farrier sets off to understand America's frozen food obsession. Each year Over 80% of American households will eat frozen dinners this year - making the frozen food market worth over $65 billion dollars. Monica Padman takes Farrier frozen food shopping, introducing him to her favorite frozen foods. They then put on a fancy dinner for their friends featuring nothing but frozen foods.

"In this week’s Flightless Bird, Monica, David and Rob discuss their favourite (mostly American) TV shows. Because occasionally on Flightless Bird, we break from the usual format and do something a little bit different. You saw that with Flights of Fancy about a month ago, where we got your expert insights into very American things - and also with American Gods, where we focus on an American legend.

And today, we’re doing another new thing that we’ll do from time to time: a Top 10 List. David, Rob and Monica each bring their 3 favourite shows to the table - as well as a runner up (.33). Combined - a magical top 10 list!"

In this week’s Flightless Bird, Farrier sets out to understand why Americans call “Snakes and Ladders” something completely different: “Chutes and Ladders”. Farrier meets with Hasbro’s Brian Baker, senior vice president for board games. Farrier learns the surprising origins of Chutes and Ladders - as well as other popular American board games like Candyland and Monopoly.

In this week’s Flightless Bird, David Farrier goes to eat at iconic American restaurant chain the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. Back in 1994, Forest Gump was box office gold - the highest grossing film in America that year. Forrest Gump also did something not many films have ever done - something truly magical - it leapt out into real life. Because on any day of the week in America, you can stroll directly into a restaurant that wouldn't exist without Forrest Gump: The Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. To learn about all things Gump, Farrier talks with David Chen from decodingeverything.com who breaks down the significance of the film. He then takes producer Rob to dine in style at Bubba Gumps, before talking to the Vice President & COO of the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., Jenny Scharbrough. That's right, Jenny!

In this week’s Flightless Bird, David Farrier throws himself back to the reign of Queen Elizabeth during the 1500s. Why? Because Americans love Renaissance Fairs. The whole idea of the Renaissance Fair started back in 1963 - when teacher Phyllis Patterson held an event for her students in her backyard. A few months later her and her husband Ron put on a bigger one - hosting about 8000 people. It kept growing - and in 1966 the official “Renaissance Pleasure Faire of Southern California” was launched. Farrier decides to head along to that very fair see what all the fuss is about.

We’re trying something a little different today - something we’re calling “Flights of Fancy.” Now awhile back, if you follow David Farrier on Instagram, you would have seen a prompt where he wanted you to pitch a deeply American topic YOU could speak on. Maybe it was a job you had, or some other personal insight you could give into something AMERICAN. Maybe you worked at Buckees, or in the depths of the White House. We heard from so many of you - like hundreds - with so many ideas. Rob made a fancy spreadsheet to collate all your responses, and we picked a bunch we liked. Then we zoomed with those people - getting them to explain their area of expertise. We met a true cross section of America - and some of the topics you’re about to learn about - some of them we’re gonna dive deeper later in the year. But for now, this is Flights of Fancy - where we talk Flightless Bird listeners about the what they want to see on Flightless Bird.