Season 6 Episode 15: Slippery Science and Storm Chasing with Meteorologist Katie Nickolaou

Ever wondered why stepping on ice can send you skating off like a cartoon character? Special guest Katie Nicolaou, a seasoned meteorologist, storms in with her personal journey through tornado alley to the broadcast screen, debunking weather myths and recounting a dramatic dance with an EF4 tornado.

Imagine mastering the "Animaniacs" song for a talent show or donning costumes to connect with fellow pop culture aficionados. It's all in a day's work on our podcast, where we blend a passion for meteorology with the universal icebreaker – weather chat. Whether it's rubbing shoulders with celebrities like Will Wheaton and Greg Baldwin, who surprise us with their weather wisdom, or diving into the affectionate world of our pets Doppler and Radar, we're sharing the quirky and the profound from our lives to yours.

Circle up with us for a whirlwind of fascinating super facts, from the explosive danger lurking in your bathroom during a thunderstorm to the wartime origins of hurricane hunting. And let's not forget the puppy news – from the anticipation of Bernoulli's arrival to the touching mentorship between our older dog Bunsen and his furry protégé. It's an episode packed with stories that will warm your heart, tickle your funny bone, and satisfy your curious mind.

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Transcript

Speaker 2: 0:08

Hello science enthusiasts. My name is Jason Zukowski. I'm a high school chemistry teacher and a science communicator, but I'm also the dog dad of Bunsen and Beaker, the science dogs on social media. If you love science and you love pets, you've come to the right place. Put on your lab coat, put on your safety glasses and hold on to your tail. This is the Science Podcast. Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Science Podcast. We hope you're happy and healthy out there. This is episode 15 of season 6.

Speaker 2: 0:39

We've kept some unbelievably exciting news under wraps for a little while, and it goes a little like this we're getting a puppy. That's right. We drove to up to Grand Prairie, which is like six and a bit hours north of Red Deer, on Sunday last week. Chris had this all lined up and we saw some Bernese Mountain Dog puppies and one of them is coming home with us on June 1st and the puppy's name is Bernoulli. So our hearts are so full. There's lots of reasons why. We'll explain, probably in the family section, but that's the big news for our family Big, huge, somewhat life-changing news getting a puppy again. It's been a while while, but we're all really, really excited, okay.

Speaker 2: 1:27

Well, what's happening on the science podcast this week in science news. Why is ice so darn slippery? Well, turns out it has to do with hexagons. In pet science, we look at a dog named da Daisy who can find some rare fungus, and our guests in Ask an Expert is meteorologist Katie Nicolaou. Katie is a gem and her interview is just amazing. The bad jokes are back. All right, we got to. Why didn't the truffle invite people to his house? Well, there wasn't mushroom. Okay, and always be careful when you're eating a fungus. If you eat the wrong one, you could be in truffle. Okay, on with the show, because there's no time like science time. This weekend Science news, let's chat about why ice is so slippery. Chris, have you ever slept on ice?

Speaker 3: 2:28

really bad I have very badly actually this past winter. You have it on video. Yeah, that's right when I went down the. When I went down the hill quickly and I was, everything was going great until you put the Mario sound on there.

Speaker 2: 2:46

Yeah, the Mario dead sound. You wound up being okay. I think your pride was more bruised than your body, but I think you did get a pretty nasty bruise on your elbow from that fall.

Speaker 3: 2:56

Yeah, I did.

Speaker 2: 2:58

Yeah, and ice is everywhere in Canada. When it snows it gets a little warm and it melts and then it freezes. And we shouldn't make too light of people falling on ice, because there are countless people in Alberta that are seriously injured every winter by slipping on ice. A teacher at our school actually slipped and got a concussion from falling on ice.

Speaker 3: 3:20

Hey Jay, did you realize that ice isn't limited only to Earth?

Speaker 2: 3:26

I think I've heard of ice in space before.

Speaker 3: 3:29

Yeah, it can be found on other planets and moons in our solar system, such as the ice caps on Mars.

Speaker 2: 3:35

Ooh, an ice cap-chino, an ice a Mars, ice cappuccino A Mars-a-chino.

Speaker 1: 3:47

Wouldn't it be great if it was like a McFlurry with a Mars bar cappuccino, a marzachino.

Speaker 3: 3:50

Wouldn't it be great if it was like a mcflurry with a mars bar cappuccino? Okay, yeah. Or from dq mars bar blizzard, um. And there's ice covered oceans of europa, which is one of jupiter's moons, and of course, the icy surface of pluto, its little heart. So these extraterrestrial aces can be composed of water, methane, ammonia and other substances.

Speaker 2: 4:10

So, like a lot of the ice on other planets, I think, if I'm remembering it correctly, you don't necessarily want to take an ice cube from Europa and put it in your drink. It's probably got a bunch of other stuff in it that would not necessarily be great to enjoy your cold beverage with. But speaking of cold beverages, one other fun fact about ice is icebergs. Icebergs despite being made of salt water, they float on the ocean, and that's because ice is less dense than water. That's something you learn when you're quite young, right? That ice, solid water is less dense than liquid water, and about 90% of an iceberg's volume is below the waterline, which is why only the tip of the iceberg is visible at the surface. The last 160 years, scientists have debated about what makes ice so slippery. Because when water is frozen, it's coated with a layer of molecules the outside layer, which actually act like a liquid. This quasi-liquid layer makes ice so slippery it gives it a lubricating feature.

Speaker 3: 5:18

Do you have a funny name for it? I thought you would call it melty melty layer.

Speaker 2: 5:22

Yeah, If I was a scientist I would call it the melty-melty layer.

Speaker 3: 5:27

But it's actually known as pre-melting.

Speaker 2: 5:29

Yeah, it's known as pre-melting. All right, so let's get into the study. The scientists used atomic force microscopy to measure the location of atoms on the surface of ice At around minus 150 degrees Celsius. The surface is made up of two types of ices. One type of ice forms a layer of hexagons and the other layer is shifted relative to the layer below it. So there's two layers One is a hexagonal layer and the other layer is shifted, not unlike how carbon bonds in diamonds.

Speaker 3: 6:05

Yeah, but it is hexagons too.

Speaker 2: 6:08

That's right.

Speaker 3: 6:09

Yeah, so it's shifty. All right, one of the layers basically they're both hexagons, but one is shifted. But interestingly, at the borders between these two types of ice, researchers found defects due to the misalignment of the patterns, and so, when the temperature was raised slightly, researchers found defects due to the misalignment of the patterns, and so, when the temperature was raised slightly, the disordered regions expanded which marked the initial stages of pre-melting.

Speaker 2: 6:36

Oh interesting, when the temperature gets a little harder, the shifty layer gets bigger because it starts to melt.

Speaker 3: 6:46

So at higher temperatures the disorder would cover the entire surface, giving ice its liquid-like patina. Figuring out the structure of ice's surface required pinpointing the locations of individual hydrogen atoms. So the researchers added a carbon monoxide molecule to the tip of the atomic force microscope probe, and that was to measure the force between the tip and the surface, deducing the locations of the protons I think the carbon monoxide was like poking it and it found out where all the protons were yeah, and the study was performed at very low temperature to avoid water molecules escaping from the ice.

Speaker 2: 7:24

Oh, like vaporization, they didn't want to lose anything to the outside environment.

Speaker 3: 7:29

So the researchers hope to use short laser pulses to briefly heat the ice for measurements under warmer conditions.

Speaker 2: 7:38

So I guess if you were ever wondering why ice is so slippery, or you've fallen and you can't get up from slipping on ice, you can curse the two layers of ice that were found in the study a hexagonal layer and a slightly shifty, slightly melty other layer. That's science news for this week. This week in pet science we're going to look at a study that found out that dogs can smell not just truffles. They can actually smell out other rare mushrooms and funguses. So I know truffles are worth a lot of money, but our dogs seem to not be able to find things like that. They find other things quite easily with their powerful nose. What are some things that they found, chris, quite easily with their powerful nose. What are some things?

Speaker 3: 8:25

that they found. Chris Bunsen can smell out moose legs from kilometers away.

Speaker 2: 8:30

I know it is kilometers, he knows where they are, so far away.

Speaker 3: 8:36

And his behavior changes. He becomes a dog that doesn't listen very well. And he's shifty, like the hexagonal layers in the previous study, the hex shifty and mysterious.

Speaker 2: 8:51

Yeah, and he doesn't listen and he bounds off to go get his moose leg. Really, he can smell anything that's died.

Speaker 2: 8:58

He is so good at smelling dead things yeah now I don't know if beaker has the same kind of like interest in those type of smells, but what beaker's really good at smelling out is stuff that's buried under the ground. Either she hears it or she smells it, but she is constantly hunting for critters that are in the ground and also roots. She really likes digging up roots and ripping them out of the ground, so I don't know if she knows that they're there, but she always finds them, so maybe they have a smell and dogs can smell.

Speaker 3: 9:28

Yeah, so, interestingly enough, we're going to talk about this study's focus, which investigates the ability of dogs to detect critically endangered native fungi in Australia the tea tree fingers fungus.

Speaker 2: 9:43

Ooh, I like that. I like that name Tea tree fingers fungus.

Speaker 3: 9:46

Oh, I like that. I like that name Tea tree fingers fungus and it's significant because this fungus is extremely rare, with fewer than 100 known specimens, which makes detection crucial for conservation efforts.

Speaker 2: 10:06

Yeah, you might have heard previous podcast episodes where we've had expert guests who run detective dog services or detection dog services and they look for bat poop or endangered bumblebees. So it's no stretch of the imagination that a dog could be trained to look for a tea tree, fingers, fungus, the.

Speaker 3: 10:22

But in this study they used a very special dog daisy yeah, daisy daisy was trained to find fungal delicacies such as those truffles, and she was able to detect the endangered tea tree fungus more efficiently than the human surveyors I love when the dogs beat humans.

Speaker 2: 10:41

the humans are out there like looking for hours for this fungus and the dog's like right over here bro.

Speaker 3: 10:47

Utilizing dogs for detecting rare fungi can significantly enhance conservation efforts by locating these fungi more quickly and accurately than the traditional human methods.

Speaker 2: 10:57

Ooh time is money.

Speaker 3: 10:59

Time is money, so the study highlights the potential for training more dogs to assist in ecological conservation, leveraging their acute sense of smell to find rare species that are otherwise difficult to locate. So we have cute dogs using their acute sense of smell to find rare species. I think that is a match made in nature.

Speaker 2: 11:24

Yeah, daisy is an Italian water dog and apparently the Italian water dog breed is typically used for truffle hunting. If you're I don't know anything about. Do you know anything about truffles, chris? I thought for the longest time when I was growing up truffles were chocolates.

Speaker 3: 11:42

I did too. I thought they were chocolate. I did that. Sounds like the name truffle sounds like oh, this is a fancy chocolate. But you know what? On the game Stardew Valley, your animals would dig up truffles and you would sell them for a lot of money.

Speaker 2: 11:55

It's actually the pigs.

Speaker 3: 11:57

It's actually the pigs.

Speaker 2: 11:59

Yeah, and I love that game. I should play Stardew Valley again. That was such a gentle game Just farm, just grow things.

Speaker 3: 12:07

And sell truffles that the pigs don't get.

Speaker 2: 12:09

Yeah, that's a game. Actually. You like to watch me play because it was so relaxing.

Speaker 3: 12:14

It is. It's so relaxing and the music is great. But back to the study. So there's future applications expanding the use of dogs and detecting other rare and endangered species, and that will aid biodiversity preservation.

Speaker 2: 12:29

So, again, this is yet another study that shows that, using the dog's powerful olfactory abilities, their thousands to tens of thousands of times better smelling ability than humans, to find stuff that we would never normally be able to find endangered species or tea tree fungus, tea tree finger fungus there we go. That's like triple word score and scrabble you just win I think you would just win that's pet science for this week.

Speaker 2: 13:01

Hello everybody. Here's some ways you can keep the science podcast free. Number one in our show notes sign up to be a member of our Paw Pack Plus community. It's an amazing community of folks who love pets and folks who love science. We have tons of bonus Bunsen and Beaker content there and we have live streams every Sunday with our community. It's tons of fun. Also, think about checking out our merch store. We've got the Bunsen stuffy, the beaker stuffy and now the ginger stuffy. That's right, ginger, the science cat has a little replica. It's adorable. It's so soft, with the giant fluffy tail, safety glasses and a lab coat. And number three if you're listening to the podcast on any place that rates podcasts, give us a great rating and tell your family and friends to listen too. Okay, on with the show. Back to the interviews. It's time for Ask an Expert on the Science Podcast, and I have meteorologist Katie Nicolaou with me today. Katie, how are you doing?

Speaker 5: 14:02

I am doing great, Actually. Props to you for getting the last name right too. That one is a tricky one with Nicolau.

Speaker 2: 14:09

My last name has also been said wrong many times. Luckily it's phonetically sounded out and it sounds like Mike Wazowski from Monsters Incorporated.

Speaker 5: 14:21

Oh cool, See mine. I just say if someone throws a nickel at your head, you're going to say, ow, so yours is way cooler.

Speaker 2: 14:28

I do like Mike Wazowski. He is my favorite character in Monsters Incorporated, by far.

Speaker 5: 14:34

He's so relatable he is relatable he is.

Speaker 2: 14:40

I always ask guests like where are you in the world? Where are you calling into the show from?

Speaker 5: 14:45

I'm calling in from Battle Creek, Michigan, home of cereal.

Speaker 2: 14:50

Cereal, all of the cereal in the world, all the cereal.

Speaker 5: 14:55

We have Kellogg's, we have Post. I'm pretty sure there's a dog food factory thrown in town somewhere. It's great.

Speaker 2: 15:01

Do they allow people to come for tours and then they give little samples of the cereal? Is it like that?

Speaker 5: 15:07

No, they used to they actually used to do that. They had a museum and everything, and then the museum got turned into a school I went to. So it still smells like Froot Loops, like a vague memory in the distance, but no more cereal.

Speaker 2: 15:19

So the walls of the school are like scratch and sniff. Scratch them and you get the just fall on my nose.

Speaker 5: 15:29

I introduced you as a meteorologist? What's the training required to be a meteorologist? Katie, absolutely. There are a lot of different paths you can take, but for me, I went to college and got a bachelor of science degree in meteorology itself and a minor in digital media. Sometimes people go into the armed forces and they get training on the job and then that can translate over to being a meteorologist via the American Meteorological Society. Sometimes you can get certifications. There's a lot of different pathways to it.

Speaker 2: 15:54

Were you a weather kid when you were young? Were you charting temperatures and measuring precipitation?

Speaker 5: 16:00

Oh, definitely yes. When I was like five, I want to say I was in a tornado and it was at night and it was really cool to see all the lightning flashing and my parents didn't think that was weird, so they let me go to the library and get all these books on weather. I started just loving Jim Cantore and storm stories on the Weather Channel. I still love that show, love that show. And then another tornado hit me in 11, at my grandparents' house in 2010. And this is, mind you all, in Battle Creek, michigan. So I took that as a sign to either stop or go. And boy, I hit the gas on that and just went.

Speaker 2: 16:33

That is not something that kids who have been through a tornado think. That's something I'm going to study, so that's unique, I would imagine.

Speaker 5: 16:42

Oh, definitely, and you'll find if you talk to any other meteorologists. We all have our storm story.

Speaker 2: 16:46

You have an origin story.

Speaker 5: 16:50

Exactly Every single one of us. I swear no one just stumbles into this field, we're usually violently thrown into it.

Speaker 2: 16:59

See where I am in the world is Alberta, canada, and I grew up on the prairie, so I'm I am no stranger to tornadoes. They were not something that I was fascinated by. They were something I was terrified of. It was not something I as a kid I was like I'm time to go learn more about that.

Speaker 5: 17:17

Let me try and see how close I can get.

Speaker 2: 17:19

Kudos to you. You were younger than me, but was the movie Twister a thing that you, like, became enamored with, because I've talked to other meteorologists who just they watch that movie on repeat.

Speaker 5: 17:32

Oh yeah, it's funny Cause I think that Twister was a premonition of me being born, cause we were both from 1996. So it was just like an obvious Easter egg as to how my life would go. But yeah, I love watching it. I've been on a lot of summer convective field studies with my college where we would just go out and chase storms in the summer and we would always have a twister movie night. And you have not lived until you've sat in a room full of 20 meteorologists all quoting the exact same movie. It's amazing.

Speaker 2: 17:58

I do In my heart of hearts. I'm a giant nerd and I go to Comic-Cons with my family In my heart of hearts. I'm a giant nerd and I go to. Comic-cons with my family. So I get the quoting whole movies kind of thing Drives my wife a little bonkers. When I'm around other people who like love Lord of the Rings or Firefly, I can just meet a random person and just start quoting things with them. So I get that.

Speaker 5: 18:21

I had the exact same experience this past weekend them, so I get that. I had the exact same experience this past weekend. I was at Indiana Comic-Con and we were standing in line next to Steve Burns, who played Steve on Blue's Clues for anyone who's familiar with the show.

Speaker 5: 18:32

And so someone in line just started going we just got a letter. And then you hear three other people join in and go we just got a letter. We just got a letter, I wonder who it's from. And you just have all these grown adults singing this ditty next to Steve Burns. I can relate.

Speaker 2: 18:47

I bet you he had a great big smile to be something that he created to have people still connect with that.

Speaker 5: 18:54

That or he was rolling his eyes. We couldn't point. The guy contacts.

Speaker 2: 18:59

Oh, my goodness. Hey Katie, so you're a weather communicator, you're on TV, you're a meteorologist on the TVs. What channel are you on? Where are you there?

Speaker 5: 19:11

Yes, I am on channel 6 WLNS in Lansing, michigan. It's a really decent-sized market. We're in the capital city of Michigan, so it's been nice to be able to reach people through all of Michigan through that Sorry what's the capital of Michigan again?

Speaker 2: 19:26

I'm sorry.

Speaker 5: 19:27

Oh, it's Lansing Michigan.

Speaker 2: 19:28

Lansing. Okay, that's not. Something I studied in school was American geography and capitals.

Speaker 5: 19:34

Basically, take your right hand, put it in front of your face, go to the middle of the palm and boom, that's where I am.

Speaker 2: 19:41

Okay, what does the job entail? To be a weather communicator on TV? What does that look like?

Speaker 5: 19:48

if you don't mind explaining, Charisma and caffeine, I think, are the two good ways to sum that up, although I can't have the second. I get migraines, so I run on sugar alone. But basically for me I chose the morning shift. It really just fits my lifestyle very well. I go to work, start working around midnight, I do our morning show from 4.30 in the morning to seven and then after that I finish up what I need to come home and, like today, take about a six hour nap.

Speaker 2: 20:16

So why do you have to? Did you say midnight?

Speaker 5: 20:20

Oh, I did indeed Midnight.

Speaker 2: 20:24

Do you have to? What do you? What time does the news start? Is there a whole bunch of prep work that goes into that? Sorry, I'm just like a little, okay, no totally Most people.

Speaker 5: 20:34

They think the news. You show up, you put it in and get the hair and makeup people and they put you in an outfit and stuff. So no, we do all of that ourselves. So when I start up at midnight, I power up the computer models, I take a look at the previous day's weather, the reports, and I work my way from past to present to future, and it takes quite a bit of time to be able to look through 10, 20 different model runs and simulations of what'll happen and then use what you know of the region and previous history to figure out.

Speaker 5: 21:01

Okay, is it going to be sunny today? Is it mostly sunny? Are we splitting hairs? Am I going crazy? And all of that's within the first few hours, because following that I have to go into a broom closet and record radio hits for all the local radio stations giving you a little forecast. There I go in, I have to put on my hair, put on my makeup, comb my hair, make it look good as much as I can, and pop on a address, and then we get to edit graphics too. It's a lot of stuff all happening before the sun even thinks of coming up.

Speaker 2: 21:30

When you do a five-day forecast, that's your five-day forecast. That is that's not coming from, like some weather government thing.

Speaker 5: 21:40

Nope, a lot of times the forecast gets pulled directly from the national weather service or something like that, but it is a part of our forecasting. I look at what the National Weather Service has forecasted for the area and think I'm seeing some sunshine. Later on I might bump up that temperature a few degrees, and that's why you'll look and you'll see all the different stations have different forecasts. It's because every one of us is adding our own little flavor and meteorological know-how to it. Oh, my goodness, I had no idea.

Speaker 2: 22:09

It makes it super competitive. I'd imagine Does it stress you out. You might get it wrong. This is like people plan their lives around weather. Sorry, I didn't mean to stress you out with this question.

Speaker 5: 22:22

No, because it's honestly. It's so funny sometimes, like with severe weather especially. I don't know if you're familiar with the show the Bachelor. It's just this dating show and everything for anyone who doesn't know about it, and it's on during prime time, which also is lining up with prime severe weather time, and so in the summer and in the spring we joke oh, it's going to be a bachelor night where we have to cut in and we get so many angry messages because we're cutting in to cover the tornado stuff.

Speaker 5: 22:48

That's about as stressful as it gets. As you have a tornado on the ground and someone on the phone saying how dare you interrupt Brad giving this rose to someone, it's like, oh please, no, I need to focus. But otherwise it's fine because usually with the forecasting nowadays we get it right to a very decent degree most of the time.

Speaker 2: 23:05

Occasionally one of those stray showers will pop up, but it's not as stressful to say it was 40 years ago without much of the internet's help they're just like throwing like a clump of grass in the air and like checking to see what the goats are doing exactly like the leaves are blowing a little bit faster here I. That's good that you're accurate. I feel like the Canadian weather, the governmental weather body in Canada. There's this joke that all Canadians have it's called the plus one. Have you ever heard of the plus one?

Speaker 5: 23:36

I have not Enlighten me.

Speaker 2: 23:38

So what happens in a winter forecast? Always on the news it's minus 35, minus 40, minus 30, plus one. And I think that's just the government's way of giving us hope so we can plan in the future to have showers and decide to go to the grocery store just to get out of our depression. But then the plus one never comes. But then they just move the plus one ahead a couple days to keep us going and give us hope in our dark winters in canada see it's a, it's a social science.

Speaker 2: 24:15

You gotta make sure you give people something to look forward to am I right to say that you, like you're out in the field looking doing stuff with extreme weather, sometimes too?

Speaker 5: 24:26

Oh, totally yeah. I actually yesterday put my parents in the car and said we're going to go storm chasing and see what we can see, and I took my parents along on a storm chase. We didn't really see much, just had some lightning, some heavy rain and some really pretty clouds. But one of these days I'm going to get them an actual tornado and I'm going to scare their pants off.

Speaker 2: 24:46

Big question, but do you have some memorable storm chasing stories?

Speaker 5: 24:51

Oh, absolutely. There was the time we found a snake in the car, the time we were almost blown up. The other time we were almost blown up let's see, sifting through the files, one from dynamite, one from lightning, I'll add that. But yeah, one of the biggest stories I have is the EF4 tornado in Lawrence, kansas, which was in 2019. It was my senior year storm chase and that storm just blew up out of nowhere. And, funny enough, we were watching Twister on our DVD player, sitting in the Sonic drive-thru eating our tater tots when the warning came up and we're like, oh, it's go time, guys, and it just. It was so fast and it's just one of the strongest tornadoes I've seen, widest too, and that was amazing to just be launched into that scene. And then, oh golly, that same chase we had or no, the chase before we had three tornadoes on the ground at once, followed by a positive bolt of lightning that almost struck our car. It exploded the road and the next day we found a snake in the car. That was a curse chase.

Speaker 2: 25:50

This is in Michigan.

Speaker 5: 25:52

Oh, this was out in Kansas and Oklahoma, if that happened in. Michigan. I would have already moved by now, because that was a little too crazy for me.

Speaker 2: 25:59

I was like I didn't know there were snakes in Michigan.

Speaker 5: 26:02

They must have some snakes, but that sounds more like we had nice snakes, this one was mean.

Speaker 2: 26:07

Oh no, wow. Is there some things people do people get things wrong with the weather that you don't mind correcting? Are there some common misconceptions you're constantly having to educate people on?

Speaker 5: 26:20

Oh, yes, so many. A lot of times it has to do with geography and just old school myths that have existed for hundreds of years. One of them is tornadoes can't cross hills or mountains or rivers or lakes, and they cross all of those. The tornadoes can happen in the mountains. They can happen right on top of a lake. It turns into a water spout. At that point they can still do damage. They can still do damage. That's one Another one. It's just a little goofy and I like to correct people on it. They think that the cow in the movie Twister died. It didn't. Cows have been lifted up by tornadoes and deposited and feel safe and sound, and I like to give people hope that the tornadoes will not kill every cow that they encounter wow, a relatively morbid story, uh, from a farmer near us.

Speaker 2: 27:05

He was working in his field and a cow landed right beside him. Um what? Yeah, it was ejected from a tornado kilometers away and whoa, yeah, it's a bit morbid, I know. So, yeah, the sadly the cow did not survive.

Speaker 5: 27:22

I'd say, at that point it becomes ground beef. Right, that was a long distance travel.

Speaker 2: 27:26

That's the joke, that's the very morbid punchline.

Speaker 5: 27:30

Oh man.

Speaker 2: 27:31

But yeah, it was a whole thing, and if it hit him he would have been probably killed as well. Yeah, Tornadoes have just wild power.

Speaker 5: 27:40

They do, and such erratic power too. No-transcript.

Speaker 2: 28:11

Yeah, instead of ejecting them, maybe it just like gently sets them down. That's possible. Exactly. Hey, can I ask a couple of tornado questions? I was thinking-.

Speaker 5: 28:21

That's a great way to start a conversation.

Speaker 2: 28:22

By the way, Love it, oh no that's a great way to start a conversation. By the way, Love it.

Speaker 5: 28:26

Sorry, oh no, that's a great way to start a conversation with a meteorologist. Can I ask you a couple of questions about tornadoes? Yes, please do.

Speaker 2: 28:33

Okay, I've seen in, for example, twister and other movies. The center of a tornado, like a giant tornado, is relatively calm. Is that true?

Speaker 5: 28:43

It's likely not going to be that case. Some tornadoes, they can have that center of low pressure in the air in the middle of it and you think of it like flushing a toilet where you have it draining in the middle. But most of the time the wind field is so large, it just it continues to envelop the zone. You aren't going to have it be completely clear Hurricanes. They're such a large scale and you still have such a small eye. So with a tornado it's a much smaller scale, so it would have a much smaller core and it just gets enveloped in that wind.

Speaker 2: 29:14

But inside, like the eye of a hurricane is relatively calm. Is that true?

Speaker 5: 29:19

Oh yeah, definitely true. Yeah, because it's on such a large scale, it can have an area where it's nice and quiet, but then it's surrounded by the most violent part of the storm being the storm wall.

Speaker 2: 29:30

And then this one's not necessarily I guess it is weather related we've had maybe you've seen the smoke that's come from canada like terrible forest fires yeah for a couple years and there have been fire tornadoes like that's legit a thing, right. How do they form? Is it just from the intense difference in temperatures? I don't know.

Speaker 5: 29:52

Exactly, it's the temperature difference driven by the fire. So the way I like to do it is for our viewers listening at home. If you take each of your index fingers, you have the warm air pointed up that rises, then you have the cold air. You point the left finger down, that sinks. You put the two together and you can't really push through your fingers, so you have to spin around them and so instead of having a storm system like a large low pressure system bringing that warm air in, bringing the cold air in, you have a very intense hot air sector with that fire. That fire and then everything else around it is relatively colder. So you create the same motion and same dynamic, just with different prompts I love it.

Speaker 2: 30:33

That's a great. I'm gonna use that and when I teach kids. I love that oh absolutely.

Speaker 5: 30:38

The fingers start to flail a little bit when they're under second grade and then you get a poked out eye, but otherwise it's great, it's all good.

Speaker 2: 30:44

I teach high school kids. I don't know. They're under second grade and then you get a poked out eye, but otherwise it's great, it's all good. I teach high school kids. They're going to poke each other sometimes too. So there's, that Is. Is our tornadoes your favorite type of extreme weather? Is that a thing you love the most, or is there some other type of extreme weather that's your jam?

Speaker 5: 31:02

Yeah, I've been thinking about that since college, because in meteorology a lot of times you find a specialty or like an area that you really are passionate about, like hurricanes or tornadoes, and for me it's a mix of tornadoes and lake effect snow. Being from Michigan, we get this special phenomenon called lake effect snow, where Lake Michigan, being as large as it is, if it stays warm enough through the winter, the cold air blows over it and we can create our own environment for snow. You don't actually have to have a system, because it provides the moisture and the warm air that you need. So it's very similar to what you have with the firenadoes, where you just have an environment that's very localized. It gets really unique weather.

Speaker 2: 31:39

Okay, so it wouldn't snow anywhere to the west east north, it would just be around the lake. Is it anywhere to the west east north? It would just be around the lake. Is it close? To the lake.

Speaker 5: 31:48

That also depends. It's a very strange phenomenon to study and very touchy too, because it has a lot to do with the wind. If the wind is coming in from the north and it has that bitterly cold air with it, we're going to end up with snow directly south of the lake. If it moves northwest, then the snow will be southeast, directly south of the lake. If it moves northwest, then the snow will be southeast and, depending on how strong the wind is, that dictates how far inland it can get being towards the central portion of Michigan, we still get lake effect snow, and that's about 100 miles away from the lakeshore.

Speaker 2: 32:15

We just get snow where I live, like all the snow pockets.

Speaker 5: 32:19

Ah, the purest form.

Speaker 2: 32:20

There's probably something to do with the Rocky Mountains. They're just two hours west of us. Oh, there you go.

Speaker 5: 32:30

Yeah, I think some kind of chinook gets screwed up and then it just gives us snow. Yep, oh, isn't that the best okay, that's really I.

Speaker 2: 32:37

Until we chatted I I had maybe I've heard of lake effect snow, but now I've got a better. I've got a better picture of it that's what I aim to do maybe moving towards social media. Katie, you have this brilliant tiktok account and I've watched probably like 60 videos on it in prep for our chat oh my gosh.

Speaker 5: 32:58

Thank you for watching they're so good.

Speaker 2: 33:00

They're so good. Could you tell everybody a little bit about it in your own words? It'd be better than me just trying to explain it, I think.

Speaker 5: 33:06

Totally yeah. I started it funny enough because I saw someone on TikTok eating an icicle like a carrot just this big icicle and I thought don't do that, there's so much on your roof you don't want to eat. And so I made a TikTok video basically saying if you're eating the ice cream, you're eating poop, and it got 18 million views. I was on TMZ, I went viral because of that and I found accidentally this market of people wanting to know weird weather stuff and so I started making more and more explainer videos and I talk about ball lightning, comparing potatoes to tacos and I talk about ball lightning, comparing potatoes to tacos, like all this weird fun stuff that also tells you what you need to know and you learn something in the end.

Speaker 5: 33:50

So it's like Bill Nye meets the magic school bus and somehow meets Steve Irwin, because I incorporate a lot of animals into my forecasting.

Speaker 2: 33:57

That's what I noticed. There's these clips of you doing the meteorology reports with pets. What's going on there?

Speaker 5: 34:05

Yes, yes, so that is my Friday fur cast. It's a passion project I started when I was at my last station and I just team up with the local humane societies and they bring in an adoptable pet once a week and I do the weather while holding them and they go nuts.

Speaker 2: 34:20

The ones I've seen, it seems like it's a bit of a it's. Some days it can be somewhat distracting for you. Is that putting it lightly?

Speaker 5: 34:30

Very much so this past week, I think. Uh, well, we had um a puppy and she would not stop licking my face. It was like the best kiss attack from a dog you could ever see. Uh, and then I also had this one kitten named Bert, and I will never forget Bert because he stuck his claw directly through my nose on live TV and I just had to smile and here's the forecast. Everyone, I'm not in pain at all. He got adopted, still Totally adoptable, but that created some blooper reel material.

Speaker 2: 35:07

You have. It looks like the sound was taken away from it because of Tik Tok. They had a big fight with some kind of music thing, but it's the forecast of the world, Could you? I know what's going on with that, but I would love for you to explain that video, Cause it's brilliant.

Speaker 5: 35:23

Oh, thank you. Yes, it's a fandom forecast. It's something I created and I basically combined my passion for TV, new TV movies and stuff with meteorology, and I enjoy the Animaniacs Nations of the World song and thought I could forecast for every nation of the world. Why not? I have nothing to do. It's the middle of COVID in South Dakota. This is fine. I decided to make all the graphics and then I get on screen and I'm just like United States, Canada, Mexico, Panama, Haiti, Jamaica, Peru and I won't do the whole song because I will take up like a minute and a half of the show, but you get the gist of it and it was a very fun one. Take experience I don't think I could survive a second take. I was so out of breath.

Speaker 2: 36:01

Did you have to practice that song quite a bit to get it down pat? Or from watching the Animaniacs when you're younger, did you already have that memorized?

Speaker 5: 36:10

Oh, I learned it because I wanted to be able to impress people at my college's talent show and I just heard the song, I think at some point Because I hadn't seen Animaniacs at that point and I went back and I saw the clip. I was like, oh, I'm doing this, I am so doing this. It took me a couple of weeks but I got it down.

Speaker 2: 36:28

If you were born in 1996, wouldn't you have been a small child when Animaniacs came out?

Speaker 5: 36:35

Oh yes, but see, I'm more of a Arthur Magic School Cyberchase generation. I should watch Animaniacs more. I I actually rob polson, who uh voices yakko warner. Absolutely love him as a voice actor. He's so sweet. I should take him on a storm chase you should.

Speaker 2: 36:53

He'd be like hello nurse or whatever it is exactly.

Speaker 5: 36:57

But what's crazy is I mentioned comic-con earlier. I met will wheaton from star trek at this past weekend at the con. He plays Wesley Crusher in the Next Generation and he has a passion for meteorology. He has a weather sensor on his house, apparently, and we were talking about that. And then I met Greg Baldwin, who is the second voice actor for Iroh in Avatar, the Last Airbender, and apparently when acting wasn't working out for him, he went back to school to become a broadcast meteorologist and I tell you I almost flipped the table when I was like you. What it was so crazy. So Hollywood is full of meteorology people.

Speaker 2: 37:32

I think weather just connects us. It's the thing that is a safe conversation starter.

Speaker 5: 37:38

Exactly it's. You say it's sunny outside, and then that just knocks off a conversation that just it keeps going and going and it's sunny outside, and then that just knocks off a conversation that just it keeps going and going. And it's one of those things in life that everyone has to deal with, no matter who you are, your walk of life, everyone's stuck with the weather. I love that.

Speaker 2: 37:58

That's a funny just as a quick aside. People know that I occasionally talk about our experiences at comic-con this. When we went, they asked bunsen and beaker to be special guests at our the one that we went to so we dress them up as pokemon and, oh my gosh, yeah, it was very sweet. And what we didn't know was sarah natachini, who does the voice of ash, is a huge dog person, so we got to meet her and, yeah, bunsen and beaker got to meet her. So that was very cool. But you just that's the thing is, she's a lot of these people are just, they are very famous for a thing that they do, but they're just normal folk outside outside of the fandoms yeah, it's amazing the interest that people have outside of what you know them for it it's so cool.

Speaker 2: 38:45

So we have some standard questions that we ask guests every time on the Ask an Expert section, and the first one is we ask our guests to share a pet story with us, something, yeah, like a pet story, a memorable story with a pet from their life. And, katie, I was hoping you could do that for us.

Speaker 5: 39:04

Oh, absolutely. I think probably the best pet story that I have has to do with finding a kitten. Last summer we were driving to this turkey farm because they have really good sandwiches Turkey sandwiches, of course, but very good sandwiches and we were on this back country road and I'm driving and I just see this cat in the road. It's a fluffy little kitten and I'm with my uncle and my brother and we all just scream our own variation of cat kitten. And when I tell you, I pulled over the car, the first driveway I saw my brakes probably hated me, but I pulled in and I'm going running and this little kitten's bobbing up the road towards me. I was like get out of the road and I scoop her up and take her to the car and oh my goodness, she was a mess. She would have been squished in a second. So we are very lucky we found her when we did and took her home and helped her out.

Speaker 2: 40:03

So did she become part of your family, or did you like find another place for her to go with?

Speaker 5: 40:09

some. Yes, my brother adopted her.

Speaker 2: 40:11

Oh, my goodness.

Speaker 5: 40:12

What was the cat's name? Oh, she was Sophia. Sophia, immediately the second we saw her. We're like Sophia.

Speaker 2: 40:21

Oh, that's sweet. Do you have any pets yourself, or is that something coming in the future? Or, like you're a busy person, that's maybe not right now for you.

Speaker 5: 40:31

Oh, yes, no, I immediately when I got out of college, I told my parents I was going to get a cat and it was from this local farm, and, bless her soul, this 16 year old cat gave birth to kittens on the farm and I got to get two of them. So I have Doppler and radar.

Speaker 2: 40:46

Doppler and radar. Oh my goodness.

Speaker 5: 40:48

I live the brand.

Speaker 2: 40:51

Does Doppler meow Like when Doppler's moving like?

Speaker 5: 40:57

she moves fast enough that she could. Honestly, she is an insane little cat. Oh, and her brother, radar. He is so clingy. I got him first, she was followed two years, doppler followed two years later. I swear that little guy. He loves watching storms at anything weather with me. It's the sweetest cat ever so is he cuddly.

Speaker 2: 41:18

He'll snuggle in for cuddles. What or do you have? Only with me oh well, everyone else is very jealous. Sucks to be everybody else. That's what happens with cats, right.

Speaker 5: 41:30

Yep, they have a very select group of people they let into their inner circle. So count yourself lucky if you're accepted.

Speaker 2: 41:38

Our cat, ginger, came unexpectedly. I'm super allergic to cats. Unexpectedly. I'm super allergic to cats and my, my wife and my son used my podcast against me because I did a story about this food you can feed your cats called live clear from I forget which brand it is, but it binds the fel d1 protein that causes the the histamine response in people who are allergic and they're like now we can get a cat and I'm like oh my god, why did I do that story? And because I'm not a cat person, I'm a dog person because if I ever pet a cat, my face blew up and we got this cat and this cat is the super cool creature, love this thing to death and she's picked me as her person, which is the irony of the whole thing you're the one who, who can't have me, so naturally I will want you?

Speaker 2: 42:26

Yeah, like I'm talking to you in my little podcast room and the cat is like sleeping right beside me. She follows me around and sleeps right next to me when I'm working there you go, go cats. Yeah, all right.

Speaker 5: 42:40

As long as it's a cute animal, even if it's an ugly animal, I love them all.

Speaker 2: 42:46

Some ugly animals are so ugly they're cute, though. I've heard that before. Yes.

Speaker 5: 42:50

You've been on TikTok, so I'm assuming, have you seen Wisp the cat?

Speaker 2: 42:54

Yes, I have seen.

Speaker 5: 42:55

Wisp. I love that cat Like a used napkin.

Speaker 2: 43:02

Oh my goodness, Just let you know those hairless Mr Bigglesworth Dr Evil's cats. Yes, absolutely, they're so ugly, they're cute kind of things.

Speaker 5: 43:14

Apparently they're very oily and in the summer they leave butt imprints on anything they sit on.

Speaker 2: 43:20

Oh, ew, I don't know about that, ew, I know that's another layer to this. But I guess Bun, and like beat bunsen, our burner, he drools when he's hungry and you step in that and you don't think second of it. So that'd be, gross to other people like ew, that's dog drool and we're just like no, it's just part of our house, it's on everything, so just deal with it exactly.

Speaker 5: 43:40

Occasionally you step in cat puke.

Speaker 2: 43:41

You're like part of life yep, katie, thanks for sharing your pet story with us. I love it.

Speaker 5: 43:50

Absolutely.

Speaker 2: 43:51

The other question that we challenge our guests with is a super fact. It's something that you know, that you tell people, and it blows their mind a bit. I would hazard a guess that when you're up at midnight, you are thinking of super facts every day. Do you have one in your pocket?

Speaker 5: 44:07

for us, are thinking up super facts every day. Do you have one in your pocket for us? I actually have just pulled out my book of super facts that I keep next to my computer because that's the kind of nerd I am. There are two of them One's a shorty and one's a fast one. But the short, fast version is you can be exploded by lightning on the toilet. What that's? Yeah, if you have a vent over the top of your toilet and it's not properly attached, the lightning can travel through the vent and explode the toilet, because it's happened multiple times.

Speaker 2: 44:32

You don't explode. The toilet explodes, or both of you.

Speaker 5: 44:35

Oh yeah, Depends on if you're on the toilet or not.

Speaker 2: 44:38

Oh, my God Okay.

Speaker 5: 44:49

But that one's an interesting one. The other one is the reason we fly planes into hurricanes with the hurricane hunters and do research and everything is because a man made a bet with the British that he could do it. I believe it was back in World War II. Let me flip to this lovely page. There it is. Yes, world War II, the Air Force and Navy meteorologists wanted and needed to find a better way to get information on these storms. And so you have Colonel Joseph Duckworth who, over a bed at breakfast I think it was told the British that he could fly into a hurricane and survive. And they didn't believe him. And he did it twice with the same storm and that new field of meteorology was born.

Speaker 2: 45:19

What kind of weirdo breakfast would that have to have been for that thing to come up?

Speaker 5: 45:24

I know he was in the breakfast.

Speaker 2: 45:27

Your tea and crumpets or whatever people had back then. If you were british and somebody slighted you and that was the end of that, you gotta fly into a hurricane now yeah, forget duels. That's so, hamilton, let's fly into hurricanes I demand satisfaction slapped right, but instead of that you gotta fly into a hurricane and the fact that he did that with his co-pilot.

Speaker 5: 45:48

They landed and then the meteorologist at the base said I'm going to grab some instruments, take me back up. And he said, sure. Oh, it's just in time. Exactly, and the man who did that, duckworth. He's actually buried about 30 minutes from my house and this past summer I went and I cleaned his grave and got the hurricane hunters to send a little medallion and it's placed right next to his headstone.

Speaker 2: 46:10

Oh, oh, my goodness.

Speaker 5: 46:13

So fun facts.

Speaker 2: 46:14

Those are super facts I'm just trying to. Would the guy have known? Did he do it before? Maybe I missed that part, or did he just assume he could do it?

Speaker 5: 46:25

He just assumed he could do it. He trusted that plane.

Speaker 2: 46:29

That is some yeah that is some overconfidence. That is bordering on stupidity right there you're like.

Speaker 5: 46:37

I was so lucky that hurricane wasn't much stronger because we didn't have ways of getting the drops on readings or any information from these hurricanes. It could have been a katrina, it could have been a thunderstorm, the in-between trying to get the strength of it. That was a gamble.

Speaker 2: 46:52

I feel like that would be a great cutaway in the Simpsons or the Family Guy. There goes Duxworth and it's like the enormous hurricane and that's the end of him.

Speaker 5: 47:03

You get the Doppler effect of just Okay, that is a super fact.

Speaker 2: 47:09

I have one more question. You are so busy with what you do, with being on TV and your TikTok page. I sometimes ask guests what do you? What do you do that outside of all of your science, that you do for fun? Do you that you might say you're passionate about hobbies or sports or causes, or is your life involved in what you're doing right now?

Speaker 5: 47:32

Yeah, I tend to incorporate my life as much as I can into my work because I feel like that gets people more invested in it and it's nice to be able to go home from work and still be like chatting with people. I have a. I have an elderly gentleman who messages me every week, just checks in, he feeds stray cats and tells me how they're doing, and I'm like this is so nice because he knows I like cats. But my main thing that really is my passion outside of meteorology is cosplay. I love the concept of cosplay and being able to do it, which, if anyone isn't familiar, cosplay is a mixture of costuming and role play.

Speaker 5: 48:04

And it happens at Comic-Cons a lot and you just dress up as your favorite characters and you get to interact and Adam Savage from Mythbusters has the best explainer on it. It's a TED Talk and it's very difficult to explain if you haven't experienced it yourself. But it is one of the most true forms of fun that you can have Because, say, for example, I'm dressed up as Beverly Crusher from Star Trek, then a Captain Picard walks into the same convention. The sounds that come out of us like, oh my gosh, we got to take a picture. It's just, it's so pure and I love it.

Speaker 2: 48:38

You may not know this about our family, but our whole family does cosplay together. I build replica costumes and our whole family goes as groups. Yeah, I've talked about this before. It's a big passion of mine. We had a guardians of the galaxy group. I built a nine foot tall groot suit. And then there's yeah, that's the role playing. Is I get to be groot?

Speaker 5: 49:01

I get to say I am groot a million times exactly one of my big cosplays that I do is doodle Bob from SpongeBob and he just runs around going and I wrecked my voice Doodle, bob, what Do you have photos of this, katie?

Speaker 5: 49:15

I totally have pictures of this. I will have to email it to you because I built the whole pencil and everything. It is a full body costume. Actually it lines up perfectly. His original character design has a black dot on one of the portions of his face and I made that into the eye hole and you can't even tell. It's so perfect. But I'm glad I went to that con on a Saturday because I needed all of Sunday to get my voice back from just screaming.

Speaker 2: 49:43

That's hilarious.

Speaker 5: 49:44

Oh, but that one I do, doctor who, it's just, it's so fun to just embody these characters.

Speaker 2: 49:50

I'm in crunch time. Right now I'm building a Baldur's Gate 3 cosplay group, yeah, so I don't know if you're familiar with that game.

Speaker 2: 49:58

Oh yes, yeah. So I played it when it came out. Baldur's Gate 1 and 2. And my wife and I played it. So there are characters from Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 that make a reappearance, and 3 and my son and his girlfriend play 3. So they're going as two of the newer characters and my wife and I are going as two of the older characters. I just got to work on my Rashomir accent to be a mince Go for the eyes. I can't, I gotta keep going. You'll point I punch.

Speaker 5: 50:28

I can't. I got to keep going. Your point I punch. Oh man, that has got to be elaborate. I think the most elaborate cosplay I've worked on is I've made a replica of Lego man.

Speaker 4: 50:36

Oh, you're good. Based on a original patent.

Speaker 5: 50:38

It's oh gosh. I've been working on it for almost a year now because it's about eight feet tall and I can actually climb inside of it and function it.

Speaker 2: 50:47

Is it cardboard?

Speaker 5: 50:49

It's corrugated plastic, so it's one step up, but they make yard signs out of.

Speaker 2: 50:54

Oh, yeah, yeah, you can cut that up, yeah.

Speaker 5: 50:56

Yeah, I. Just I had to do all the math calculations and really made those math classes pay off. I have blueprints and everything.

Speaker 2: 51:04

I have, literally right before we started talking, put another file on my 3d printer. This is very cool we get to talk about. It's not every guest I get to talk about cosplay with, so thank you for indulging in your passion anytime. Katie, we're at the end of the chat. I thank you so much for being a guest today. Where can people find you on social media? What's your handle if folks want to check out more about you?

Speaker 5: 51:30

Totally. You can find me at weather underscore Katie, that's W-E-A-T-H-E-R, that little underscore thingy, and then K-A-T-I-E. Or just look up icicle poop, that's also a thing.

Speaker 2: 51:42

If we search icicle poop, you'll come up.

Speaker 5: 51:45

That's my face, yep. It's ruined any political career I could possibly have you never want to have poop pop up next to your name in the google bar, but it happens it's all.

Speaker 2: 51:59

It's about science. I think you're fine, that's all. Yes, it's for the science uh, doctor, one of our first guests that we ever booked was Dr Danny Rabioti. She is a she studies painted painted dogs and she wrote does it fart? That was her book. That she wrote because she became the expert of if, if this Adam, does this animal fart?

Speaker 5: 52:25

So I think you're okay with the whole thing. Writes this down. Adds it to my reading list. There we go.

Speaker 2: 52:31

Yeah, so does. She wrote three books Does it fart? And there's another one about slime. I forget, I forget actually, but oh yeah, there you go.

Speaker 5: 52:41

Looking this up now, you've just completed the rest of my night.

Speaker 2: 52:47

I was going to say we'll make sure some of your links are in the show notes people, so just take a look in the little thing under the podcast. Wherever you're listening in, the show notes will be. They'll be hyperlinked. Sweet yeah technology yeah, go technology. Thank you so much for being a guest, katie. I'll let you go. I appreciate you being such a wealth of knowledge with the weather and just such a fun personality for everybody to listen, to, appreciate it.

Speaker 5: 53:13

Oh, thank you so much for having me. This is like my favorite thing now is talking like this, because I get to meet people that I never would have met, and this science brings you together.

Speaker 2: 53:23

It does Science and weather.

Speaker 5: 53:25

Perfect.

Speaker 2: 53:28

Before we go, what do meteorologists say to other meteorologists? You know how, when one actor sees another actor going to do a play and they say, break a leg, do meteorologists have some kind of colloquialism like that?

Speaker 5: 53:43

Yeah, but it's blunt, don't die.

Speaker 1: 53:45

Oh really oh okay, yeah, that's all. Don't die, uh, really.

Speaker 5: 53:48

Oh, okay, yeah, that's about it, that's all.

Speaker 2: 53:51

I've interacted with.

Speaker 5: 53:54

I don't know if I can sign off with don't die, but yeah either that or sunny skies ahead, but I prefer the stormy ones.

Speaker 2: 54:03

That's what keeps you in business, right.

Speaker 5: 54:05

Exactly.

Speaker 2: 54:08

All right, Take care of yourself. Katie Best wishes.

Speaker 4: 54:10

Thanks, bye. Okay, it is time for story time with me, adam. If you don't know what story time is, story time is when we talk about stories that have happened within the past one or two weeks. Dad, do you have a story?

Speaker 2: 54:23

I think I have a pretty big story, kind of out of the blueris said um, so I have a line on some puppies and I was like what? And within five days of her saying that we were driving up to grand prairie, grand prairie is like six and a half hours north of us. We went up on sunday and the big news is and the big news is what Chris?

Speaker 3: 54:53

We are getting a new Bernie's Mountain Dog puppy.

Speaker 2: 54:56

We are, we are. I'm still, I'm excited, but I'm still like in a state of shock, like it hasn't hit me yet.

Speaker 3: 55:05

I know, I know it's. It's kind of shocking, like opportunity knocked and we opened the door. It's kind of unexpected because we have a perfect family, the way we are with our two dogs and Ginger, but and our family will forever change when we bring in the new one in to our fold.

Speaker 2: 55:28

But summer's coming, we have lots of time to spend with a dog, yeah, and so there's that, and bunsen is um, he's getting older. We never want to think of a life without bunsen, but we also want to think of a life where bunsen can mentor another dog, because he did such a good job with beaker, um, we don't want to wait, and we don't want to wait until he's a very, very old dog, and that's not possible anymore. He's the best older brother he's a good boy.

Speaker 2: 55:57

He's perfect, uh like. I think adam was even a little weirded out about the puppy news yeah, it was.

Speaker 4: 56:05

It was surprising, for sure, because you guys were gone for the day and then came back and you're like, oh yeah, we're getting a puppy. So, yeah, that's that was.

Speaker 2: 56:14

That was some pretty surprising news oh, it's gonna be so fun, though, adam, you'll get to play with the puppy before you're off to calgary yeah, I'm excited.

Speaker 4: 56:21

I'm excited because bunsen was fun as a puppy.

Speaker 2: 56:24

Yeah, yeah yeah, he was a good little puppy. So that's the big news. And, um, on the six and a half hour drive back, chris and I had a lot of time to debate the name for the new puppy. It had to be a b word. There were five contenders, but we settled on the best of the five, which was on the best of the five, which was Bernoulli. Bernoulli, yeah, it's as soon as you. Actually you came up with it, chris.

Speaker 3: 56:57

Yeah, I was looking up science B words and I was looking at images and lists and there was some very common ones like bond and burette, and then I said some crazy ones like Beta and Beta Hydroxy, and you're like no, no, no, no, um Brimstone. You were like meh, no, uh, most of them you vetoed right away. And then I went to a totally separate list and Bernoulli was on there and when I said it you were like and I knew that was the one, I knew that you were going to be okay with. Bernoulli was on there and when I said it you were like and I knew that was the one, I knew that you were going to be okay with Bernoulli.

Speaker 2: 57:35

Bernoulli's principle is as the speed of a moving fluid increases, the pressure decreases. Bernoulli's principles explains why planes fly and what causes lift and, if anything, we try to make our social media accounts uplifting. So I think having a dog named Bernoulli is perfect, and that's my story. I don't think I got a bigger one than that.

Speaker 4: 58:02

Well, I have a little story. I don't know if we talked about it last week, we might have, but on Tuesday Bunsen was acting a little weird. In the morning he was a bit of a drama queen. Bunsen always is a bit of a drama queen. He's always princess and the pea and his tummy is always well, not always, but if his tummy is hurting him, he's always a little drama queen and needs to eat his food. He needs to have his rice and chicken, Like when he was younger, Papa would come over and he would for the raw food. He would make it warm and he would put it on the pan and warm it up.

Speaker 1: 58:43

That's right. When he was a puppy, he only ate warm food, yeah.

Speaker 4: 58:48

And he wouldn't eat the frozen stuff unless we pan seared it for him. So that was funny.

Speaker 2: 58:53

Okay, but to in Bunsen's defense, he was coming from a Swiss family and they cooked him fried eggs every morning, like they hand cooked the dogs, like delicious, human quality breakfasts every morning. So he was coming from like a Swiss family breakfast to us to frozen, frozen food. He's probably like no, what yeah?

Speaker 4: 59:21

So Bunsen princess on the P. Anyway, he, we think he hurt his neck on.

Speaker 2: 59:28

No, it was it was an ear infection. Adam, oh was, it was an ear infection adam oh it was an ear infection yeah, he had a very serious ear infection, probably earlier in the week, which is now receded a bit oh okay, well, that's weird.

Speaker 4: 59:40

Anyway, he then less princess and the pea. Now I guess I didn't know about that, but um, he had his neck cocked to the side and was walking super weird. And it was a little freaky because, like, why is your neck cocked to the side, bunsen? Do you smell burning toast? But yeah, like you, like, mom and dad texted me to make sure he was doing good and I was like calling his name and he was sleeping. So I thought something was wrong with him and so I woke him up, like Bunsen you, okay, he got mad at me because I woke him up and I tried to give him like his toy as like a peace offering, but he just had a mad look on his face. He was, it was a little upset with me. It's like when he falls in the water and gets upset with dad oh no, you don't want to be on that side of it no, he holds, he definitely holds small grudges, but but yeah, that's my story, is Bunsen Bunsen being Bunsen, bunsen being a grudgy against me?

Speaker 3: 1:00:34

But yeah, mom, do you have a story? We were very concerned about Bunsen earlier this week because Jason saw him wake up and have his head cocked to the side and walking very, very strangely and seeming a bit listless and not our usual Bunsen. So we were thinking, hmm, maybe did he pull a muscle in his shoulder with his neck, because Jason felt underneath his chin and he yelped and we're like, oh, no, he cried.

Speaker 2: 1:01:10

I felt terrible.

Speaker 3: 1:01:12

Yeah, um, but you didn't know, you were trying just to um, feel him all over, just to see if there was anything awry. Anyway, um, and even like I tilted his head to the left and to the right and on one side he definitely didn't want to tilt or turn his head as far as the other, so his range of motion was impacted. Anyway, we went to um anyway, we went to the vet today and uh explained all of our concerns and what we had seen and she did an exam and she uh looked in his ears, went, uh, so Jason, both Jason and I were there to begin with, and then Jason had an appointment so he had to go. So, right, right at the beginning, jason was there for the first once over and then so she was looking in his ears and she's like, oh yeah, that looks a little bit red and and usually when she said, sometimes when they're walking with her head to the side, it could be an ear infection, but I still want to do a sample and I want to just do a whole once over and check them over. And so that happened and Jason, you left and the cutest thing happened so she was doing his cranial nerve check because Jason said you know, we're not sure, maybe he had a stroke, we're we're not sure, we're not vets, so please do a thorough exam.

Speaker 3: 1:02:35

And so she was doing his cranial nerve test, so checking his reflexes, checking his eyes, and I was sitting behind him kind of rubbing his back, just so he was more calm he's pretty calm there, but he does get stressed out at the vet. But he was pretty calm and she was, um checking his reflexes and um doing all these things like boop, boop, boop on his nose, on his, on his cheeks, and. And then she stopped and she must've been done. But she looked at him in the face and she said you are so cute, oh, and my heart melted because Bunsen is so cute and he is such a good boy and he was just sitting there getting beep, bop booped and his reflexes are great, his cranial nerve is great, his eyes are great, his ear has an ear infection in it.

Speaker 3: 1:03:33

Um, she brought back the sample, uh, on the microscope slide to show me the culture, growth of bacteria and yeast and she says wow, it's kind of surprising, um, that he has both in there. When based on, like um, a visual scan, it didn't look that bad. But we have eardrops now for him. Bunsen, it's not his favorite, the eardrops, not his favorite. But you know whose favorite it is.

Speaker 3: 1:04:01

Beaker's. So what I have to do is, Bunsen, I have to kind of corral him and get the eardrop in. And then Beaker comes over and I pretend I'm like oh yes, Beaker, and I go boop, boop in her ears. And then I rub her ears and she's like, oh yes, so we trick her that she's getting ear drops.

Speaker 2: 1:04:22

She wants what Bunsen's getting.

Speaker 3: 1:04:24

She wants what Bunsen's getting, but you know what?

Speaker 1: 1:04:29

She likes it, bunsen doesn't like it. Beaker's like. Please give me more eardrops. Thank you, I need more eardrops, thank you, yeah.

Speaker 3: 1:04:36

With your cute little face. She has a cute little face too. But that's my story, hi Bunsen.

Speaker 4: 1:04:46

All these vet stories are actually. I'm going to, I'm going to give a little bonus story. All of these vet stories are actually reminding me of, of like two, two or three weeks ago, my cat Finn. He went to the vet just cause he he has, like he's been having some weird like issues with peeing, like he doesn't pee in the, in the um litter box, uh, which I think for right now is is is a little bit better. Um, maybe, maybe we just need a, a new litter box. But they didn't find anything wrong with him, which is good.

Speaker 4: 1:05:22

So, um, but finn, excuse, went to the vet and the vet was so surprised about how well Finn was acting, because Finn let the vet just touch him, move him around, give him pets, like, take his temperature and everything, and Finn was super chill. And then, when the vet was done with him, finn walked up on my grandpa's lap and just laid there and started purring and he purrs very loudly, so the vet very much heard the purrs. I was like I've never seen a cat this chill with being at the vet. But that all changed because Finn really doesn't like the cat box, like to be transported. So, like the cat crate, he really doesn't like it. So he was a lot less chill when they were trying to put him in the cat crate. I know, yeah, yeah, anyway, that's, that's a bonus story, but yeah, that's story time. Thank you so much for listening to my section of the podcast and thank you for listening through all the way to my section. So, yeah, I'll see you next week. Bye-bye.

Speaker 2: 1:06:24

That's it for this week's show. Thanks for coming back week after week to listen to the science podcast. Special thanks to the effervescent Katie Nicolau. Please follow her on TikTok she's a gem or on social media what a wonderful guest. We'd also like to thank the Paw Pack. That's a support group that we have a Patreon-like account with. If you would like to support us, that's the best way and that's to become a member of the Paw Pack. The top members get their names read.

Speaker 3: 1:07:00

Chris, let's hear those names Jennifer Smathers, laura Stephenson, holly Burge, brenda Clark, ann Uchida, peggy McKeel, terry Adam, debbie Anderson, sandy Brimer, tracy Leinbaugh, marianne McNally Fun Lisa, shelley Smith, julie Smith, diane Allen, brianne Haas, linda Sherry, carol McDonald, catherine Jordan. For science, empathy and cuteness.