October 14, 2010 • 31 mins
Traditionally, house swapping involves temporarily exchanging homes with a stranger for vacation purposes. Tune in to learn more about house swapping, from the traditional version to hospitality exchanges and couchsurfing, in this episode.
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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 Stuff you Should Know
from house Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to
the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as always as
Charles W. Chuck Bryant. This is stuff you should know. Um,
(00:24):
Extreme Home Makeover Edition. Tip of the hat to you
as well. Just gave you a literal tip of my cap. Yeah,
you don't see people do that enough anymore. Tip of
the hat, Tip of the hat to you. Top of
the Day, Top of the Morning, Bluck of the Irish.
Let's let's let's do this, okay, Chuck, Um, this is
going to be one of the worst ones we've ever done. Now,
it's gonna be so great. I don't think you're right.
(00:46):
All right, we'll see. Um well, I guess we'll leave
it to everyone to decide. Well, because then people say
that was great, and people say it sucked. Yeah, whatever,
and we'll be no, no further along than we are now.
We have no idea. Yeah, it's just you and me
and Jerry in a little tiny room and it were
just completely isolated, totally out of touch with reality, complete
(01:06):
so chuck, um, I guess we'll get this stinker started. Huh,
that sounds good to me. Do you remember um? Back
in two thousand and six, there was a twenty six
year old guy from Montreal and named Kyle McDonald. I
don't remember him, you will in a second. He did
one of the coolest Internet undertakings of all time. Facebook, No,
(01:27):
my Space, No, it's not a business. He started he
had a red paper clip and he decided that he
wanted to trade it until he got a house. That
was great, it was awesome. Where did he end up?
He ended up getting a house in a place called Kipling, Winnipeg.
He really got a house. Yeah, in less than a year,
and in fourteen trades, he went from a red paper
(01:49):
clip to a pen that looked like a fish, so
on and so forth until he ended up with He
traded an afternoon with Alice Cooper or a kiss snow globe,
and that's when everything opened up. Uh. Corbin Burnston from
l A Law remember him. He turned out to be
(02:10):
a huge collector of snow globes and he wanted the
snow globe, so he offered trade the snow globe for
a paid part in a movie he was directing, and
the people of Kipling, Winnipeg said, that's it for us.
We've been waiting, this is what we want. We will
trade you a farmhouse in our city for that part
(02:32):
in that Corbyn Burnson movie. Well, who like the mayor
of that town, the town together. I'm sure led by
the mayor, but the town got a part in the movie.
I don't know. I don't know who got a part
in the movie. The question didn't come up. Well, where
it falls apart was the guy went to Kipling, he
accepted the house because he wanted to make the trade,
(02:52):
and he turned around and sold it. He's like, I'm
not living here, you're kidding. I remember the people of
of Kipling, saskatch I wanted, I say Winnipeg, I don't know,
says catch a one. Um. They were not pleased. You
know where it fell apart from me, Corbin Burnson, terrible, Corbin.
If you're listening to this, I apologize for Chuck. I
loved you in Major League. He was he was a
(03:14):
spectacular jerk, but he wasn't over the top. He did
he nailed it. Yeah, Um, Chuck, that guy swapped a
red paper clip for a house but that is in
no way, shape or form related to our topic today.
How swapping that has the word swap in it. That's
a nice lead in, Josh. House swapping is more like um, swinging,
(03:37):
but with houses rather than spouses. Yes, Josh, it has
actually been around since the mid nineteen fifties, and swinging
it's been growing like crazy about travelers do this now
and they say it's growing at about fift a year,
which I mean, you do the math, buddy, In like
(03:57):
six or eight years, looks like we'll I'll be house
swapping okay, I want'll be saying hotels anymore. Um, I
don't think that's true. I mean, yes, mathematically that does
make sense. Um, But the the problem is people like
me are kind of high strong. You wouldn't not be
a good house swapper. No, it's not so much the
(04:18):
person in my house. I generally trust people, you know,
and I trust my instincts. I'm not gonna there's some
some thrill kill colt who loves a good blood orgy
is not going to I'm not gonna lend my house
to some group like that, right, Um, But I wouldn't
feel comfortable in someone else's house. Oh really, see that's
(04:38):
probably the opposite of what most people's redicines has to
do with. I think it goes both ways, man, Yeah,
I like all swapping. Yeah, it goes both ways. And
I can tell you the one that I would really
really not feel comfortable with really is the hospitality exchange. Yeah.
Let's let's go ahead and talk about the three ways
(04:59):
that you can do this. And if you've seen the
movie The Holiday, I have seen house swapping in action.
Was Eva Mendez in there. She was not wait, Queen Latifa,
she was not Oh I'm thinking of last Holiday. Yes,
The Holiday starred Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet. She did
not appear naked in this one. But the movie The
(05:20):
Holiday and Jack Black and the very fetching Jude Law,
Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslett swapped houses for holiday, and um,
romantic high jinks ensued obviously with Cameron of course, with
Jude Law and Kate wins It with Jack Black and
(05:40):
l a to London or I'm sorry English country cottage
type of thing. So that was house swapping in action,
and what they did was called a traditional exchange. Yeah,
and that's when you play your vacation at the same
time and say I'll stay in your place, you stay
in my place. Yes, there's also chuck that I think
the trude was far and away the most common and
(06:02):
frequent type and appealing because, um, you you all you
have to do is own a house. That's it. Well,
you own a house in a place where somebody would
want to go. Yeah, there's there's different ways around that.
If you're in Mobile, Alabama and you want to swap
apartments with someone in New York, you might not get
a lot of action. Maybe not, But what if the
(06:23):
person in New York who's swapping has family and mobile
funeral gotta go down a mobile But by god, I'm
not going to spend a dime while I'm down there,
how swapping it is, Yeah, I'm not gonna pay forty
five dollars for that day's in you know, it's said.
I was reading them one of the articles that this
article on our site was based on, and um they
(06:44):
made that point like, sure, if you live in in
Manhattan or Rio, you're not gonna have any trouble whatsoever.
But um, they said, you can still have a successful
swap if you're able to convince somebody who has a
house where you want to go of the in charms
of Toledo or Tulsa. Then my hometown is an example.
(07:05):
Well at the place you wouldn't want to go. Yeah,
I think all you need to say is Tony Paco's
and people would be all over it exactly clean or yeah. Um.
So the traditional exchange is one. Non simultaneous swap is another.
This is the rich person swap. You take it. Yes,
when you have a like a vacation house and you
don't necessarily have to plan your vacation with air as
(07:26):
you can just say take my place in uh in
Worcester and I'll take your place in Rio. Yes. Rio
is the hot spot right now, is um. You could
also do non non simultaneous swap where you maybe you're
not at home and somebody's using your home but you're
not using there's at the same time, but you're banking
(07:47):
a credit to be able to use their's in the future. Oh,
so I have business in Rio, so you can stay
in my house in Atlanta and I'll take you up
at a future date to stay at your house in Rio,
exactly because my company's for me to go to Rio
this time. So I don't have to worry about it, okay, um.
And then there's the one that I would find extremely uncomfortable.
(08:08):
Do people really do this, Yes they do, and I'll
describe some of them momentarily. But the hospitality exchange, it
doesn't matter whether I'm the host or the guest, I
would feel really uncomfortable. Like my mom was always this
very very generous person, and she always wanted to bring
home like a single friend or something at the hospital
(08:28):
she worked with for Thanksgiving or Christmas, and my sister
where all my sister and I were always like, we
don't know this person. Now our holiday is awkward. Like, yes,
we're helping a stranger, but at what costs? You know?
So I've always been like that. I've just I've never
liked hanging out with people I didn't know on a
really intimate Yeah, but I mean like, guy can hang
(08:53):
out with anybody in a bar or whatever. If someone's
houses in play or is the setting, it changes every thing.
It's just uncomfortable for you. But I'll tell you who
is into that, the two point two million members of
surfing dot com. Oh those people. Yeah, So I don't
even know if you said for sure, what a hospitality
(09:14):
exchange is that's when you live with each other. Yeah,
that's when you say you can come and stay in
my place and while I'm here, be here too, and
then I'll just come visit you someday while you're there
and we'll just be uncomfortable. But what if they it
doesn't go well in the first round and you hate
each other. I don't know. I think it was it
was free, so maybe you could send a friend, uh
(09:37):
remer play like I don't like you, but I have
a friend who would love you well. They do say, though,
to be fair, that it's not necessarily like you're in
a little one room apartment with these people. It works
better if you have a large house with maybe a
private guest house or some area where you don't have
to necessarily be with each other all the time, So
(09:58):
that makes a little more sense. Still, not into it
if you are into sharing your town with strangers, like
let's go see this or let's go to the world
of coke right exactly If you can't possibly get to
the world of coke often enough, hospitality swaps are the
one for you. I love showing people Atlanta that I know. Yeah,
(10:20):
that's one of my favorite things. Is to to delight
people with the charms of my hometown, because there are
many charms in Atlanta, but strangers. I mean, I feel
was a friend of a friend that was a stranger,
I would certainly do that too, but not I would
never log on to a website and just say just
come and visit me. I'll show you around Atlanta. All right.
So we've clearly established now that hospitality exchanges are the
(10:43):
worst idea ever devised by humankind, or that we're just
two big jerks, one of the two. So let's stick
to the traditional exchanges where you don't meet them, they
don't meet you. You just use one another's houses. That's
what how It wasn't that movie. So according to Um
the Time article house swapping as well, written by a Russo,
(11:04):
specifically Francine Russo, Um, most of the people about is
an estimate, have already house swapped. So most people who
are involved in house swapping I've done it before. They're
usually professionals, business people, doctors. It's not a couchsurf situation. No. Again,
there is CouchSurfing dot com, and I would advise people
to go check that out if you're into hospitality exchanges.
(11:27):
Either as a guest or host. Check out CouchSurfing dot com.
It's pretty cool. Um. But with the traditional house swap,
let's talk about the details, Chuck, Like, what are you
going to do? Like, let's say you live in um, yes,
and I live in Mobile, Alabama, and you're you have
a dead relative in Mobile and have to go there. Well,
I'm depressed all of a sudden. But what I would
(11:48):
do is fight through that depression first, and then you
and I would start exchanging emails with one another where
we start to outline specifics of what this is going
to entail. Because on the surface it seems easy, like, hey,
you just swap houses, but there's a lot of you know,
small details. You might have a car that you want
to have use of, so what you know, you can
(12:09):
use my car. You might have house plants or pets.
You might have mail that you want picked up. You
might have your refrigerator only opens if you if you
hike up the left side first and pull the door open.
There might be a little tricks to your house. You
gotta jigger the dead bolt from the inside if you
want to leave the house. So you gotta get all
those little details out in the open, so you know
(12:31):
what you're dealing with. You're also going to be leaving
the keys of your car, the keys to your boat,
the keys to your a t v s. Everything, Like
you're giving these people your life. Um, if you are
a friendly sort or a suspicious sort, and you have neighbors,
friends and relatives that live in the area who will
listen to your commands, you may command them to drop
(12:54):
by and introduce themselves, maybe to act as tour guides,
maybe to just say hi, maybe to just give even
more advice find out if everything's going on, Like you
were switching lives with people for a minute a week. Well,
in the movie The Holiday, the reason that Cameron met
Jude Law was because that was Kate Winslet's brother. Okay,
(13:17):
so you are sort of switching lives. And the reason
Jack Black was there because I think I can't remember,
but it was Jack Black. He was there. He was
the neighbor or something and he knew where somehow. So yeah,
I was reading another article that this article was based on.
I think it was in Budget Travel, um, and the
woman who was talking about house swapping was saying that, Um,
(13:37):
she she and her I think mother were staying in
this Paris flat and they were living Francois life, like
they were eating at his favorite beast rode down the street,
and they were like fixing his leaky sink and talking
to his neighbors outside, you know, his flat, that kind
of stuff. So you can expect, like, if you're if
you kind of keep to yourself, you're probably not gonna
(13:59):
house swap in the first place. But if you if
you're looking to come out of your shell trade houses
with somebody, well, and they say, that's another great reason
to do this, if you're if you want a more immersive,
non touristy experience. I've never even rented an apartment from someone,
but I'm keen to go to a foreign country and
live in a neighborhood apartment rather than a hotel. Like
(14:21):
I like hotels for a minute, but at at the hospitality,
all the fakeness, it's all it's all rings faults to me. Oh,
you're crazy all the way from me. It just is
so fake to me. I I but you know it's fake.
You know that people are paid to be nice too.
It's not like I think that they actually like me
or anything like that. I don't care, right I'm at
(14:43):
the hotel. I don't share, no trust me. I love
hotels a little bit because I didn't get to stay
in them as a child. We didn't what we were
poor teachers and we can't. That's funny that you bring
up teachers, Chuck, because this whole thing, the whole thing
was started in ninety three by a group of teachers
who founded Inner Vack International Vacations so that they could
(15:04):
cheaply swap or make sense rental places or they have
to make ends. Me that that makes total sense. So
that's where house swapping actually came from his teachers. I
didn't know that. Now you do, Uh, what's another good
reason to how swap? Josh? Or what's something you can
do forget good reasons? What's something else you can do
to be a good house swapper? What can you offer? Um?
(15:24):
You would also, well, you want to treat this like
it's you want to treat the other person's house like
you are hoping they're treating your house. Well, yeah, right,
So let's say you break a dish. You would leave
a note and say I broke this dish, I'm very sorry.
Here are all the pieces, but here's also money to
write here's also money to replace it, and if it's more,
let me know and I'll send you the difference or whatever.
(15:46):
Or better yet, just replace something if if you can
replace it. If you can't, sure, um you it's probably
still a good idea to leave a note, unless it's
just something that they're never gonna right exactly. Um. You
will probably also want to restock the fridge when you leave.
You want to clean up. Um, you want to If
(16:07):
the car catches on fire, you're gonna want to pick
up the phone and say your car is on fire. Yeah,
a big, big oops. You should probably let them know. Um,
And it's nice to leave a little parting gift, sure right. Um.
You also uh want to take care of their pets
if they've asked you to take care of their pets,
bringing the mail. These kind of things are usually worked
out ahead of time, though. Yeah, they say it's a
(16:28):
good idea a lot of times to having a letter
of agreement that's not a legal document, but it just
kind of outlines expectations for each other because in the end,
what you want is just a positive experience. You don't
want to come home and say my plants are dead
or my dog is uh dead. Gosh, if I wasn't
gonna say that, I was gonna say hungry, but dead
from hunger. Dead from hunger. Uh. So you want to
(16:50):
have reasonable expectations, and apparently these uh websites who run
these places say that it generally works out pretty well
and the the biggest problems that usually have are differing
expectations that aren't outlined really specifically, right, um, usually a
differing expectation of or differing definition of cleanliness. Yeah, that's
(17:13):
the same. You ever go on Yelp and read hotel recommendations,
It's awful people are I mean, that's something's got to
really be wrong with a hotel for me to to
log into a website and complain. But you should see
the stuff. People complain about the quality of the chocolate
left on their pillow, and their expectations are so ramped
(17:33):
up for some of these folks. It's just it's the
same with hotels. Yeah, I just call those people hard
to please, whether your house swapping or or just vacationing.
But not only that, they like I would consider myself
hard to please. But I don't see ever really going
on to a site and posting a complaint it's more
(17:54):
just like, well, you failed to please me, so I
won't be back. But all that's going on in my
head or I'm saying it to human, she's like, mm hmmm.
I did do one Yelp post about a nameless restaurant
here in Atlanta that served me a raw hamburger, like
purple raw meat inside it was disgusting. Which one I'm
not gonna tell you. I'll tell you after. And I
(18:15):
did write a yelping for you, because all they basically
did was say, oh, I'm really sorry that your burger
would have killed you if you would have eaten it. Well,
we won't charge you for it. And I said, oh, okay,
how about like a three piece of cheese cake or something?
And I complained in the name they they got in
touch with me, though. The restaurant did from the Yelp
(18:36):
review and said, we're so sorry, this is not our policy.
Would like to offer you a gift card for an
under cooked hamber It was only twenty five bucks. I
thought was kind of lame. It was a nice place,
oh was it. Okay you're eating hamburgers and five star
restaurants now, well, but it was one of those you know,
sixteen dollar hamburgers. Yeah, I can see that. Yeah, um, Chuck, Josh.
(19:00):
We talked about some common complaints. We also mentioned the
letter of agreement, right, yes, not a legal contract. Like
you said, there's a couple of points that most people
would make on a letter of agreement. Um, it's where
you're saying you do this, I'll do this, or I'm
gonna do this, and you're not gonna do that, and
you just have it spelled out so that everybody's on
(19:21):
the same page. Right. So what are some of the
points in the letters of agreement? William Sapphire would call them.
Like a hotel, you would want to know like the
phone and internet deal if if all of a sudden
you have a big long distance spill. Um, you want
to get that pre range ahead of time. Now that's covered. Uh.
You want to outline who can stay there, just like
a hotel. Hotels say you can't have twenty of your
(19:43):
friends in a room, and you can say I don't
want twenty of your friends in my house, right, especially
if they're a thrill kill colt into blood orgies that yes. Uh.
You also want to talk about what will happen if
something is damaged or broken down. Do you want to
know immediately? You do not want to know? You have
them called Jack Black, the neighbor what sure? Um? And
(20:05):
uh also that you want to disclose whether or not
you have homeowners or renters or auto insurance. Yeah, because
the cool thing is is you can let somebody take
your car because as far as the um auto insurance
companies concerned, that's your friend and your friends covered by
your insurance. Well maybe not always right, Well, yeah, I
(20:27):
think as long as you're covered, yeah, as long as
you yeah, well, I think one article I read it
didn't spell out car insurance, but it did say that
a lot of insurance companies, if you're gonna do the
house swap, you should check with your homeowners insurance and
just make sure everything because some of them have little caveats.
That is a great point. That is a very very
good point. And you should probably also do that with
(20:47):
your car insurance just to be safe. Right, um chuck gosh.
So we mentioned inter back, right, that was the one
that was that started all this in ninety three. There's
also a place called home Link that's big, and then
there's tons of other sites. I went on inter back today.
They have this place at Table Mountains, South Africa, because
(21:08):
it was one of the most beautiful homes I've ever
seen in my entire life. Pool everything just mod really
sweet house. So they do have cool houses and apparently
they have about ten thousand listings. Are you gonna go there? No?
Did you offer up your place? No? I was just
checking it out, you know, I'm want to do um.
But apparently everywhere from like Craigslist for free to like
(21:30):
these high end sites that charge you about a hundred
bucks to be a member to list your house. Yeah,
you can. Like there's a whole subculture out there that
we weren't aware of. I'm men look into this. Yeah,
I don't think my house is. I guess if you
were a big golf fan the East, like golf tournament
is like right across the street. If you want to
rent my house for the weekend, which is actually this weekend?
(21:51):
Oh is it? Yeah? I got home yesterday in their
cars everywhere and in yep piece from the suburbs, so
in their cores like cans in my yard and talking
about dirt the neighborhood was. I could see you with
the shotgun being like get off a mile along YUPPI here.
It's kind of fun, but it's also kind of annoying.
I'm with you. Are you gonna sell anything? I may
sell some parking spaces. Oh yeah, okay, but nobody marries No. No,
(22:15):
that didn't work out. A couple of last things, real quick, chuck, Uh.
Intuition is huge, huge. Uh. If you start to get
the impression that you don't really feel comfortable with this person,
the more you talk to him, that's that. And since
their house swappers and you're doing this and you're they'll understand. Uh.
If you kind of are on the fence, you can
(22:37):
feel free to ask them for references. Apparently is fine,
although I'd be like, no, that's why another reason you're
not a good housewapper. Uh. And then, um, if somebody
seems a little controlling, like here are exact details of
what you have to do every moment you're at the house,
they're probably not going to be real comfortable. They're being
(22:58):
forced into this, possibly by a thrill kill cult that
they're a member of. I think I'd be okay with it, okay,
except for my animals. I would be a little suspicious
to let the stranger take care of my animals. I
would have to really know that they had dogs and
cats and they knew how to do it. And Emily
gets real specific with the directions for the animals, which
(23:20):
is a good idea. Oh. Another thing you should do
is take the things you're really really love and or
maybe valuable and either put them in a friend's house
or lock them in a room in your house, just
to be safe. It's not necessarily even thievery. Just if
you have a really expensive ose, don't leave it on
your kitchen counter. And that's just dumb, agreed. Mistakes can happen.
(23:42):
So that is the sound that officially ends house swapping
forever for the rest of our lives, will never talk
about it again. Thank you, Thank you for bearing with
us this far. UM. Hats off to you, tip of
the hat, Chuck, just did it. Um. If you want
to learn more about how swapping why, there's nothing else
to know UM, you can type in h O U, S, E, SPACE,
(24:07):
S W, A, P, P I n G in the
search bar at how stuff works dot com and UM
that brings up, of course Facebook questions. How about a
quick announcement, Josh, okay, it kept very quiet here A
silence fell yeah. Uh, the co ED Decoperative for Education. Yes,
(24:31):
our our beautiful friends, um, who took us to Guatemala. Indeed,
they are having a fall fiesta here in Atlanta, and
we want to give that a little pluggage. It is
October twenty one. It is at the Metropolitan Club in Alpharetta, Georgia.
Right and uh to seven, seven to ten pm. That's right.
Twenty bucks to get in. But twenty bucks buys you food, wine,
(24:54):
beer and entertainment. And by entertainment we mean Jerry won't
be there. Jerry is going to be there in the
flesh in her birthday suit. She'll be playing uh, drum solos.
I'm not mistaken. I don't know if a room shot
is a drum solo. Uh. And basically they're raising money
for you know, they're awesome operation with like awesome prizes.
(25:17):
You can win raffles, you can win a week long
African Safari. Yes, sign brave stuff, which I know you
would be into stuff, um and chuck. Just to give
everybody quick rundown if you don't know who COED is,
first of all, go listen to the two part Guatemala podcasts. Right, um.
And they are a nonprofit that basically pulls together money
(25:41):
to buy textbooks for schools in Guatemala, which in turn
rent them and create the self sustaining system where every
five years the schools have have saved enough money through
these rental fees to buy new textbooks and much more. Yeah,
and they do computer lives tune. It's just a really
you and I thoroughly believe in this group, right, agreed,
(26:03):
So we would encourage you, if you're in Atlanta to
go to the fall Fest October twenty one and Alpharetta.
And where can they get more? More information on the
co ed site you think? If so, it's www dot
co ed u see dot org. Right, you should go
there anyway, c O E d U ce dot org concrete. Okay,
so let's get to it. Yes, we're gonna cover a
(26:25):
few of these real quick. Josh, I gave you a
sheet there, right, Will you play along? Sean Ross hyphen
favorite soda? Question Mark, what's your favorite soda? Oh Um,
that's what I've been big on club soda lately, just
playing club soda. They have it in the Brake croom now,
the little Schwepps. I've just been drinking it in there.
(26:49):
Remember we talked about in taste. We have taste buds
for carbon dioxide. Yeah, yeah, yeah, my My carbon dioxide
receptors are in heaven. I love that stuff too. I
am not a big soda drinker, but I do love
sun kissed and root beer, and I love Lacroix, which
is the fizzy water with the natural flavoring. Very good, chuck, yes, excellent.
(27:12):
Eric Sanchez says, would you fight a full three rounds
against George Sampierre for ten thousand dollars? He's a UFC guy, don't.
The question used to be would you get in a
ring with Mike Tyson for ton thousand? Yeah, there's no way.
This face is way too pretty for that. I don't.
I just don't like pain, so no, thank you. Okay,
answers that one. Uh, let's see Victoria Dugger. Their name
(27:36):
sounds familiar if we is that Facebook buddy all the time,
so it's like she might have been a New York person. Okay, Uh, well, hey,
they're Victoria Dugger? Whose voice is that? Who introduces you
on the podcast? Is that Jerry? It is not Jerry,
It is roxand it is our head of the video department,
Rock sand. She does a fine job and she's from
(27:56):
North Carolina. People always say, what is that accent? It's
a non regional dialect. Yes, it is studied in Roxanne.
I went to high school with Zack Galafanakas. Yes, they
know each other. It's small little tidbit there for you.
Shannon Rink says, what do you see as the future
of the podcast? You guys have been doing it for
a couple of years. Now, do you see herself doing
it for a few more years? God willing? Yeah, we
(28:16):
were talking about how the magic has gone, but we're
going to soldier on and make half good podcast. Oh.
I think we both agreed to though that we love
the podcast so much, even if bigger and better things
are in our future, we would like to keep doing
the podcast. Sure, but we'll see. Yeah, um, let's see
we did this Shaun Ross's favorite soda one already? Yes? Uh.
Jan Moffat asks do you use innuendo on purpose or
(28:39):
is it just a consequence of talking about things like
totem poles. I'd say both. Yeah, it depends. Like I
think a lot of our humor is really accidental, but
that just kind of makes it funnier. Don't you think
it's also fairly scatological, and we do a good job
at raining that in. Yeah. For example, you have in
your signature of Pallas Nicolas. Actually his name is Nicolas.
(29:07):
What has been the most difficult podcast to explain? I
had a real hard time with the Sun podcast, as
we all know. Wow, we did have a lot of
trouble with the Sun, didn't we. That was I don't
think that was a good one. It was UM large
Hadron Collider for me. I think the one that I
thought I was going to do well on but really
didn't was UM Butterfly Wings Color Iridescence. That was so maddening.
(29:30):
Do you have another one I do? Um is the
in the Inevitable movie bio on Hippie Rob. Who do
you think should play the lead? I never met the guy,
so you tell me. I can't really envision anybody playing
Hippie Rob, but Hippie Rob. So I think that if
someone approached us to do a movie on Hippy Rob,
we would have to launch like a national search for Rob,
(29:52):
find him and pay him in like Milwaukee's Best Ice.
It's funny that I don't know who he is, but
I still have. You know, you get a mental picture
when you hear about someone who you have who? I
picture the guy in office space, the next door neighbor
that had the big mullet and the big handlebar mustache.
It's you're not too far off. Um. Rob was a
little softer, a little more self aware than that guy.
(30:12):
And with red hair. Oh really yeah, I just blew
my mind. Yeah, reddish strawberry blonde hair and beard. Crazy. Uh.
And I got one more? Um, I have one more.
It's from Scott Fogg and he says American coke or
Mexican coke. Definitely Mexican coke. I don't even drink coke,
but when I see Mexican coke, I buy it because
(30:35):
it's got a sugar. Yeah, the real deal. Yep. Um.
If you want to ask us a question, you have
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to facebook dot com slash stuff you should know. Uh.
You can also follow us on Twitter. It's s y
s K podcast. As always, you can send us an
(30:56):
email at stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com.
Mm hmm. For more on this and thousands of other topics,
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com home page, brought to you by the reinvented two
(31:18):
thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you Should Know
from house Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to
the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as always as
Charles W. Chuck Bryant. This is stuff you should know. Um,
(00:24):
Extreme Home Makeover Edition. Tip of the hat to you
as well. Just gave you a literal tip of my cap. Yeah,
you don't see people do that enough anymore. Tip of
the hat, Tip of the hat to you. Top of
the Day, Top of the Morning, Bluck of the Irish.
Let's let's let's do this, okay, Chuck, Um, this is
going to be one of the worst ones we've ever done. Now,
it's gonna be so great. I don't think you're right.
(00:46):
All right, we'll see. Um well, I guess we'll leave
it to everyone to decide. Well, because then people say
that was great, and people say it sucked. Yeah, whatever,
and we'll be no, no further along than we are now.
We have no idea. Yeah, it's just you and me
and Jerry in a little tiny room and it were
just completely isolated, totally out of touch with reality, complete
(01:06):
so chuck, um, I guess we'll get this stinker started. Huh,
that sounds good to me. Do you remember um? Back
in two thousand and six, there was a twenty six
year old guy from Montreal and named Kyle McDonald. I
don't remember him, you will in a second. He did
one of the coolest Internet undertakings of all time. Facebook, No,
(01:27):
my Space, No, it's not a business. He started he
had a red paper clip and he decided that he
wanted to trade it until he got a house. That
was great, it was awesome. Where did he end up?
He ended up getting a house in a place called Kipling, Winnipeg.
He really got a house. Yeah, in less than a year,
and in fourteen trades, he went from a red paper
(01:49):
clip to a pen that looked like a fish, so
on and so forth until he ended up with He
traded an afternoon with Alice Cooper or a kiss snow globe,
and that's when everything opened up. Uh. Corbin Burnston from
l A Law remember him. He turned out to be
(02:10):
a huge collector of snow globes and he wanted the
snow globe, so he offered trade the snow globe for
a paid part in a movie he was directing, and
the people of Kipling, Winnipeg said, that's it for us.
We've been waiting, this is what we want. We will
trade you a farmhouse in our city for that part
(02:32):
in that Corbyn Burnson movie. Well, who like the mayor
of that town, the town together. I'm sure led by
the mayor, but the town got a part in the movie.
I don't know. I don't know who got a part
in the movie. The question didn't come up. Well, where
it falls apart was the guy went to Kipling, he
accepted the house because he wanted to make the trade,
(02:52):
and he turned around and sold it. He's like, I'm
not living here, you're kidding. I remember the people of
of Kipling, saskatch I wanted, I say Winnipeg, I don't know,
says catch a one. Um. They were not pleased. You
know where it fell apart from me, Corbin Burnson, terrible, Corbin.
If you're listening to this, I apologize for Chuck. I
loved you in Major League. He was he was a
(03:14):
spectacular jerk, but he wasn't over the top. He did
he nailed it. Yeah, Um, Chuck, that guy swapped a
red paper clip for a house but that is in
no way, shape or form related to our topic today.
How swapping that has the word swap in it. That's
a nice lead in, Josh. House swapping is more like um, swinging,
(03:37):
but with houses rather than spouses. Yes, Josh, it has
actually been around since the mid nineteen fifties, and swinging
it's been growing like crazy about travelers do this now
and they say it's growing at about fift a year,
which I mean, you do the math, buddy, In like
(03:57):
six or eight years, looks like we'll I'll be house
swapping okay, I want'll be saying hotels anymore. Um, I
don't think that's true. I mean, yes, mathematically that does
make sense. Um, But the the problem is people like
me are kind of high strong. You wouldn't not be
a good house swapper. No, it's not so much the
(04:18):
person in my house. I generally trust people, you know,
and I trust my instincts. I'm not gonna there's some
some thrill kill colt who loves a good blood orgy
is not going to I'm not gonna lend my house
to some group like that, right, Um, But I wouldn't
feel comfortable in someone else's house. Oh really, see that's
(04:38):
probably the opposite of what most people's redicines has to
do with. I think it goes both ways, man, Yeah,
I like all swapping. Yeah, it goes both ways. And
I can tell you the one that I would really
really not feel comfortable with really is the hospitality exchange. Yeah.
Let's let's go ahead and talk about the three ways
(04:59):
that you can do this. And if you've seen the
movie The Holiday, I have seen house swapping in action.
Was Eva Mendez in there. She was not wait, Queen Latifa,
she was not Oh I'm thinking of last Holiday. Yes,
The Holiday starred Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet. She did
not appear naked in this one. But the movie The
(05:20):
Holiday and Jack Black and the very fetching Jude Law,
Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslett swapped houses for holiday, and um,
romantic high jinks ensued obviously with Cameron of course, with
Jude Law and Kate wins It with Jack Black and
(05:40):
l a to London or I'm sorry English country cottage
type of thing. So that was house swapping in action,
and what they did was called a traditional exchange. Yeah,
and that's when you play your vacation at the same
time and say I'll stay in your place, you stay
in my place. Yes, there's also chuck that I think
the trude was far and away the most common and
(06:02):
frequent type and appealing because, um, you you all you
have to do is own a house. That's it. Well,
you own a house in a place where somebody would
want to go. Yeah, there's there's different ways around that.
If you're in Mobile, Alabama and you want to swap
apartments with someone in New York, you might not get
a lot of action. Maybe not, But what if the
(06:23):
person in New York who's swapping has family and mobile
funeral gotta go down a mobile But by god, I'm
not going to spend a dime while I'm down there,
how swapping it is, Yeah, I'm not gonna pay forty
five dollars for that day's in you know, it's said.
I was reading them one of the articles that this
article on our site was based on, and um they
(06:44):
made that point like, sure, if you live in in
Manhattan or Rio, you're not gonna have any trouble whatsoever.
But um, they said, you can still have a successful
swap if you're able to convince somebody who has a
house where you want to go of the in charms
of Toledo or Tulsa. Then my hometown is an example.
(07:05):
Well at the place you wouldn't want to go. Yeah,
I think all you need to say is Tony Paco's
and people would be all over it exactly clean or yeah. Um.
So the traditional exchange is one. Non simultaneous swap is another.
This is the rich person swap. You take it. Yes,
when you have a like a vacation house and you
don't necessarily have to plan your vacation with air as
(07:26):
you can just say take my place in uh in
Worcester and I'll take your place in Rio. Yes. Rio
is the hot spot right now, is um. You could
also do non non simultaneous swap where you maybe you're
not at home and somebody's using your home but you're
not using there's at the same time, but you're banking
(07:47):
a credit to be able to use their's in the future. Oh,
so I have business in Rio, so you can stay
in my house in Atlanta and I'll take you up
at a future date to stay at your house in Rio,
exactly because my company's for me to go to Rio
this time. So I don't have to worry about it, okay, um.
And then there's the one that I would find extremely uncomfortable.
(08:08):
Do people really do this, Yes they do, and I'll
describe some of them momentarily. But the hospitality exchange, it
doesn't matter whether I'm the host or the guest, I
would feel really uncomfortable. Like my mom was always this
very very generous person, and she always wanted to bring
home like a single friend or something at the hospital
(08:28):
she worked with for Thanksgiving or Christmas, and my sister
where all my sister and I were always like, we
don't know this person. Now our holiday is awkward. Like, yes,
we're helping a stranger, but at what costs? You know?
So I've always been like that. I've just I've never
liked hanging out with people I didn't know on a
really intimate Yeah, but I mean like, guy can hang
(08:53):
out with anybody in a bar or whatever. If someone's
houses in play or is the setting, it changes every thing.
It's just uncomfortable for you. But I'll tell you who
is into that, the two point two million members of
surfing dot com. Oh those people. Yeah, So I don't
even know if you said for sure, what a hospitality
(09:14):
exchange is that's when you live with each other. Yeah,
that's when you say you can come and stay in
my place and while I'm here, be here too, and
then I'll just come visit you someday while you're there
and we'll just be uncomfortable. But what if they it
doesn't go well in the first round and you hate
each other. I don't know. I think it was it
was free, so maybe you could send a friend, uh
(09:37):
remer play like I don't like you, but I have
a friend who would love you well. They do say, though,
to be fair, that it's not necessarily like you're in
a little one room apartment with these people. It works
better if you have a large house with maybe a
private guest house or some area where you don't have
to necessarily be with each other all the time, So
(09:58):
that makes a little more sense. Still, not into it
if you are into sharing your town with strangers, like
let's go see this or let's go to the world
of coke right exactly If you can't possibly get to
the world of coke often enough, hospitality swaps are the
one for you. I love showing people Atlanta that I know. Yeah,
(10:20):
that's one of my favorite things. Is to to delight
people with the charms of my hometown, because there are
many charms in Atlanta, but strangers. I mean, I feel
was a friend of a friend that was a stranger,
I would certainly do that too, but not I would
never log on to a website and just say just
come and visit me. I'll show you around Atlanta. All right.
So we've clearly established now that hospitality exchanges are the
(10:43):
worst idea ever devised by humankind, or that we're just
two big jerks, one of the two. So let's stick
to the traditional exchanges where you don't meet them, they
don't meet you. You just use one another's houses. That's
what how It wasn't that movie. So according to Um
the Time article house swapping as well, written by a Russo,
(11:04):
specifically Francine Russo, Um, most of the people about is
an estimate, have already house swapped. So most people who
are involved in house swapping I've done it before. They're
usually professionals, business people, doctors. It's not a couchsurf situation. No. Again,
there is CouchSurfing dot com, and I would advise people
to go check that out if you're into hospitality exchanges.
(11:27):
Either as a guest or host. Check out CouchSurfing dot com.
It's pretty cool. Um. But with the traditional house swap,
let's talk about the details, Chuck, Like, what are you
going to do? Like, let's say you live in um, yes,
and I live in Mobile, Alabama, and you're you have
a dead relative in Mobile and have to go there. Well,
I'm depressed all of a sudden. But what I would
(11:48):
do is fight through that depression first, and then you
and I would start exchanging emails with one another where
we start to outline specifics of what this is going
to entail. Because on the surface it seems easy, like, hey,
you just swap houses, but there's a lot of you know,
small details. You might have a car that you want
to have use of, so what you know, you can
(12:09):
use my car. You might have house plants or pets.
You might have mail that you want picked up. You
might have your refrigerator only opens if you if you
hike up the left side first and pull the door open.
There might be a little tricks to your house. You
gotta jigger the dead bolt from the inside if you
want to leave the house. So you gotta get all
those little details out in the open, so you know
(12:31):
what you're dealing with. You're also going to be leaving
the keys of your car, the keys to your boat,
the keys to your a t v s. Everything, Like
you're giving these people your life. Um, if you are
a friendly sort or a suspicious sort, and you have neighbors,
friends and relatives that live in the area who will
listen to your commands, you may command them to drop
(12:54):
by and introduce themselves, maybe to act as tour guides,
maybe to just say hi, maybe to just give even
more advice find out if everything's going on, Like you
were switching lives with people for a minute a week. Well,
in the movie The Holiday, the reason that Cameron met
Jude Law was because that was Kate Winslet's brother. Okay,
(13:17):
so you are sort of switching lives. And the reason
Jack Black was there because I think I can't remember,
but it was Jack Black. He was there. He was
the neighbor or something and he knew where somehow. So yeah,
I was reading another article that this article was based on.
I think it was in Budget Travel, um, and the
woman who was talking about house swapping was saying that, Um,
(13:37):
she she and her I think mother were staying in
this Paris flat and they were living Francois life, like
they were eating at his favorite beast rode down the street,
and they were like fixing his leaky sink and talking
to his neighbors outside, you know, his flat, that kind
of stuff. So you can expect, like, if you're if
you kind of keep to yourself, you're probably not gonna
(13:59):
house swap in the first place. But if you if
you're looking to come out of your shell trade houses
with somebody, well, and they say, that's another great reason
to do this, if you're if you want a more immersive,
non touristy experience. I've never even rented an apartment from someone,
but I'm keen to go to a foreign country and
live in a neighborhood apartment rather than a hotel. Like
(14:21):
I like hotels for a minute, but at at the hospitality,
all the fakeness, it's all it's all rings faults to me. Oh,
you're crazy all the way from me. It just is
so fake to me. I I but you know it's fake.
You know that people are paid to be nice too.
It's not like I think that they actually like me
or anything like that. I don't care, right I'm at
(14:43):
the hotel. I don't share, no trust me. I love
hotels a little bit because I didn't get to stay
in them as a child. We didn't what we were
poor teachers and we can't. That's funny that you bring
up teachers, Chuck, because this whole thing, the whole thing
was started in ninety three by a group of teachers
who founded Inner Vack International Vacations so that they could
(15:04):
cheaply swap or make sense rental places or they have
to make ends. Me that that makes total sense. So
that's where house swapping actually came from his teachers. I
didn't know that. Now you do, Uh, what's another good
reason to how swap? Josh? Or what's something you can
do forget good reasons? What's something else you can do
to be a good house swapper? What can you offer? Um?
(15:24):
You would also, well, you want to treat this like
it's you want to treat the other person's house like
you are hoping they're treating your house. Well, yeah, right,
So let's say you break a dish. You would leave
a note and say I broke this dish, I'm very sorry.
Here are all the pieces, but here's also money to
write here's also money to replace it, and if it's more,
let me know and I'll send you the difference or whatever.
(15:46):
Or better yet, just replace something if if you can
replace it. If you can't, sure, um you it's probably
still a good idea to leave a note, unless it's
just something that they're never gonna right exactly. Um. You
will probably also want to restock the fridge when you leave.
You want to clean up. Um, you want to If
(16:07):
the car catches on fire, you're gonna want to pick
up the phone and say your car is on fire. Yeah,
a big, big oops. You should probably let them know. Um,
And it's nice to leave a little parting gift, sure right. Um.
You also uh want to take care of their pets
if they've asked you to take care of their pets,
bringing the mail. These kind of things are usually worked
out ahead of time, though. Yeah, they say it's a
(16:28):
good idea a lot of times to having a letter
of agreement that's not a legal document, but it just
kind of outlines expectations for each other because in the end,
what you want is just a positive experience. You don't
want to come home and say my plants are dead
or my dog is uh dead. Gosh, if I wasn't
gonna say that, I was gonna say hungry, but dead
from hunger. Dead from hunger. Uh. So you want to
(16:50):
have reasonable expectations, and apparently these uh websites who run
these places say that it generally works out pretty well
and the the biggest problems that usually have are differing
expectations that aren't outlined really specifically, right, um, usually a
differing expectation of or differing definition of cleanliness. Yeah, that's
(17:13):
the same. You ever go on Yelp and read hotel recommendations,
It's awful people are I mean, that's something's got to
really be wrong with a hotel for me to to
log into a website and complain. But you should see
the stuff. People complain about the quality of the chocolate
left on their pillow, and their expectations are so ramped
(17:33):
up for some of these folks. It's just it's the
same with hotels. Yeah, I just call those people hard
to please, whether your house swapping or or just vacationing.
But not only that, they like I would consider myself
hard to please. But I don't see ever really going
on to a site and posting a complaint it's more
(17:54):
just like, well, you failed to please me, so I
won't be back. But all that's going on in my
head or I'm saying it to human, she's like, mm hmmm.
I did do one Yelp post about a nameless restaurant
here in Atlanta that served me a raw hamburger, like
purple raw meat inside it was disgusting. Which one I'm
not gonna tell you. I'll tell you after. And I
(18:15):
did write a yelping for you, because all they basically
did was say, oh, I'm really sorry that your burger
would have killed you if you would have eaten it. Well,
we won't charge you for it. And I said, oh, okay,
how about like a three piece of cheese cake or something?
And I complained in the name they they got in
touch with me, though. The restaurant did from the Yelp
(18:36):
review and said, we're so sorry, this is not our policy.
Would like to offer you a gift card for an
under cooked hamber It was only twenty five bucks. I
thought was kind of lame. It was a nice place,
oh was it. Okay you're eating hamburgers and five star
restaurants now, well, but it was one of those you know,
sixteen dollar hamburgers. Yeah, I can see that. Yeah, um, Chuck, Josh.
(19:00):
We talked about some common complaints. We also mentioned the
letter of agreement, right, yes, not a legal contract. Like
you said, there's a couple of points that most people
would make on a letter of agreement. Um, it's where
you're saying you do this, I'll do this, or I'm
gonna do this, and you're not gonna do that, and
you just have it spelled out so that everybody's on
(19:21):
the same page. Right. So what are some of the
points in the letters of agreement? William Sapphire would call them.
Like a hotel, you would want to know like the
phone and internet deal if if all of a sudden
you have a big long distance spill. Um, you want
to get that pre range ahead of time. Now that's covered. Uh.
You want to outline who can stay there, just like
a hotel. Hotels say you can't have twenty of your
(19:43):
friends in a room, and you can say I don't
want twenty of your friends in my house, right, especially
if they're a thrill kill colt into blood orgies that yes. Uh.
You also want to talk about what will happen if
something is damaged or broken down. Do you want to
know immediately? You do not want to know? You have
them called Jack Black, the neighbor what sure? Um? And
(20:05):
uh also that you want to disclose whether or not
you have homeowners or renters or auto insurance. Yeah, because
the cool thing is is you can let somebody take
your car because as far as the um auto insurance
companies concerned, that's your friend and your friends covered by
your insurance. Well maybe not always right, Well, yeah, I
(20:27):
think as long as you're covered, yeah, as long as
you yeah, well, I think one article I read it
didn't spell out car insurance, but it did say that
a lot of insurance companies, if you're gonna do the
house swap, you should check with your homeowners insurance and
just make sure everything because some of them have little caveats.
That is a great point. That is a very very
good point. And you should probably also do that with
(20:47):
your car insurance just to be safe. Right, um chuck gosh.
So we mentioned inter back, right, that was the one
that was that started all this in ninety three. There's
also a place called home Link that's big, and then
there's tons of other sites. I went on inter back today.
They have this place at Table Mountains, South Africa, because
(21:08):
it was one of the most beautiful homes I've ever
seen in my entire life. Pool everything just mod really
sweet house. So they do have cool houses and apparently
they have about ten thousand listings. Are you gonna go there? No?
Did you offer up your place? No? I was just
checking it out, you know, I'm want to do um.
But apparently everywhere from like Craigslist for free to like
(21:30):
these high end sites that charge you about a hundred
bucks to be a member to list your house. Yeah,
you can. Like there's a whole subculture out there that
we weren't aware of. I'm men look into this. Yeah,
I don't think my house is. I guess if you
were a big golf fan the East, like golf tournament
is like right across the street. If you want to
rent my house for the weekend, which is actually this weekend?
(21:51):
Oh is it? Yeah? I got home yesterday in their
cars everywhere and in yep piece from the suburbs, so
in their cores like cans in my yard and talking
about dirt the neighborhood was. I could see you with
the shotgun being like get off a mile along YUPPI here.
It's kind of fun, but it's also kind of annoying.
I'm with you. Are you gonna sell anything? I may
sell some parking spaces. Oh yeah, okay, but nobody marries No. No,
(22:15):
that didn't work out. A couple of last things, real quick, chuck, Uh.
Intuition is huge, huge. Uh. If you start to get
the impression that you don't really feel comfortable with this person,
the more you talk to him, that's that. And since
their house swappers and you're doing this and you're they'll understand. Uh.
If you kind of are on the fence, you can
(22:37):
feel free to ask them for references. Apparently is fine,
although I'd be like, no, that's why another reason you're
not a good housewapper. Uh. And then, um, if somebody
seems a little controlling, like here are exact details of
what you have to do every moment you're at the house,
they're probably not going to be real comfortable. They're being
(22:58):
forced into this, possibly by a thrill kill cult that
they're a member of. I think I'd be okay with it, okay,
except for my animals. I would be a little suspicious
to let the stranger take care of my animals. I
would have to really know that they had dogs and
cats and they knew how to do it. And Emily
gets real specific with the directions for the animals, which
(23:20):
is a good idea. Oh. Another thing you should do
is take the things you're really really love and or
maybe valuable and either put them in a friend's house
or lock them in a room in your house, just
to be safe. It's not necessarily even thievery. Just if
you have a really expensive ose, don't leave it on
your kitchen counter. And that's just dumb, agreed. Mistakes can happen.
(23:42):
So that is the sound that officially ends house swapping
forever for the rest of our lives, will never talk
about it again. Thank you, Thank you for bearing with
us this far. UM. Hats off to you, tip of
the hat, Chuck, just did it. Um. If you want
to learn more about how swapping why, there's nothing else
to know UM, you can type in h O U, S, E, SPACE,
(24:07):
S W, A, P, P I n G in the
search bar at how stuff works dot com and UM
that brings up, of course Facebook questions. How about a
quick announcement, Josh, okay, it kept very quiet here A
silence fell yeah. Uh, the co ED Decoperative for Education. Yes,
(24:31):
our our beautiful friends, um, who took us to Guatemala. Indeed,
they are having a fall fiesta here in Atlanta, and
we want to give that a little pluggage. It is
October twenty one. It is at the Metropolitan Club in Alpharetta, Georgia.
Right and uh to seven, seven to ten pm. That's right.
Twenty bucks to get in. But twenty bucks buys you food, wine,
(24:54):
beer and entertainment. And by entertainment we mean Jerry won't
be there. Jerry is going to be there in the
flesh in her birthday suit. She'll be playing uh, drum solos.
I'm not mistaken. I don't know if a room shot
is a drum solo. Uh. And basically they're raising money
for you know, they're awesome operation with like awesome prizes.
(25:17):
You can win raffles, you can win a week long
African Safari. Yes, sign brave stuff, which I know you
would be into stuff, um and chuck. Just to give
everybody quick rundown if you don't know who COED is,
first of all, go listen to the two part Guatemala podcasts. Right, um.
And they are a nonprofit that basically pulls together money
(25:41):
to buy textbooks for schools in Guatemala, which in turn
rent them and create the self sustaining system where every
five years the schools have have saved enough money through
these rental fees to buy new textbooks and much more. Yeah,
and they do computer lives tune. It's just a really
you and I thoroughly believe in this group, right, agreed,
(26:03):
So we would encourage you, if you're in Atlanta to
go to the fall Fest October twenty one and Alpharetta.
And where can they get more? More information on the
co ed site you think? If so, it's www dot
co ed u see dot org. Right, you should go
there anyway, c O E d U ce dot org concrete. Okay,
so let's get to it. Yes, we're gonna cover a
(26:25):
few of these real quick. Josh, I gave you a
sheet there, right, Will you play along? Sean Ross hyphen
favorite soda? Question Mark, what's your favorite soda? Oh Um,
that's what I've been big on club soda lately, just
playing club soda. They have it in the Brake croom now,
the little Schwepps. I've just been drinking it in there.
(26:49):
Remember we talked about in taste. We have taste buds
for carbon dioxide. Yeah, yeah, yeah, my My carbon dioxide
receptors are in heaven. I love that stuff too. I
am not a big soda drinker, but I do love
sun kissed and root beer, and I love Lacroix, which
is the fizzy water with the natural flavoring. Very good, chuck, yes, excellent.
(27:12):
Eric Sanchez says, would you fight a full three rounds
against George Sampierre for ten thousand dollars? He's a UFC guy, don't.
The question used to be would you get in a
ring with Mike Tyson for ton thousand? Yeah, there's no way.
This face is way too pretty for that. I don't.
I just don't like pain, so no, thank you. Okay,
answers that one. Uh, let's see Victoria Dugger. Their name
(27:36):
sounds familiar if we is that Facebook buddy all the time,
so it's like she might have been a New York person. Okay, Uh, well, hey,
they're Victoria Dugger? Whose voice is that? Who introduces you
on the podcast? Is that Jerry? It is not Jerry,
It is roxand it is our head of the video department,
Rock sand. She does a fine job and she's from
(27:56):
North Carolina. People always say, what is that accent? It's
a non regional dialect. Yes, it is studied in Roxanne.
I went to high school with Zack Galafanakas. Yes, they
know each other. It's small little tidbit there for you.
Shannon Rink says, what do you see as the future
of the podcast? You guys have been doing it for
a couple of years. Now, do you see herself doing
it for a few more years? God willing? Yeah, we
(28:16):
were talking about how the magic has gone, but we're
going to soldier on and make half good podcast. Oh.
I think we both agreed to though that we love
the podcast so much, even if bigger and better things
are in our future, we would like to keep doing
the podcast. Sure, but we'll see. Yeah, um, let's see
we did this Shaun Ross's favorite soda one already? Yes? Uh.
Jan Moffat asks do you use innuendo on purpose or
(28:39):
is it just a consequence of talking about things like
totem poles. I'd say both. Yeah, it depends. Like I
think a lot of our humor is really accidental, but
that just kind of makes it funnier. Don't you think
it's also fairly scatological, and we do a good job
at raining that in. Yeah. For example, you have in
your signature of Pallas Nicolas. Actually his name is Nicolas.
(29:07):
What has been the most difficult podcast to explain? I
had a real hard time with the Sun podcast, as
we all know. Wow, we did have a lot of
trouble with the Sun, didn't we. That was I don't
think that was a good one. It was UM large
Hadron Collider for me. I think the one that I
thought I was going to do well on but really
didn't was UM Butterfly Wings Color Iridescence. That was so maddening.
(29:30):
Do you have another one I do? Um is the
in the Inevitable movie bio on Hippie Rob. Who do
you think should play the lead? I never met the guy,
so you tell me. I can't really envision anybody playing
Hippie Rob, but Hippie Rob. So I think that if
someone approached us to do a movie on Hippy Rob,
we would have to launch like a national search for Rob,
(29:52):
find him and pay him in like Milwaukee's Best Ice.
It's funny that I don't know who he is, but
I still have. You know, you get a mental picture
when you hear about someone who you have who? I
picture the guy in office space, the next door neighbor
that had the big mullet and the big handlebar mustache.
It's you're not too far off. Um. Rob was a
little softer, a little more self aware than that guy.
(30:12):
And with red hair. Oh really yeah, I just blew
my mind. Yeah, reddish strawberry blonde hair and beard. Crazy. Uh.
And I got one more? Um, I have one more.
It's from Scott Fogg and he says American coke or
Mexican coke. Definitely Mexican coke. I don't even drink coke,
but when I see Mexican coke, I buy it because
(30:35):
it's got a sugar. Yeah, the real deal. Yep. Um.
If you want to ask us a question, you have
to be our friend on Facebook. You have to go
to facebook dot com slash stuff you should know. Uh.
You can also follow us on Twitter. It's s y
s K podcast. As always, you can send us an
(30:56):
email at stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com.
Mm hmm. For more on this and thousands of other topics,
visit how stuff works dot com. Want more how stuff works,
check out our blogs on the How Stuff Works dot
com home page, brought to you by the reinvented two
(31:18):
thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you
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