Psst, hey, Wowser fams, Mindy here.
And before we start the show, I've got a question for you.
Are you ready to make It WOW?
Okay, here's the deal.
My buddy, Carly Que and I are hitting the road to make It WOW with you in the D .C.
area. That's right.
We'll be making It WOW in Bethesda, Maryland on Saturday, March 29th.
Make It Wow is a live bonker balls competition game show where real kids are the star of the show.
Two teams of Wowsers will turn their wildest, and wierdest ideas, into jaw -dropping inventions live on stage.
Tickets are on sale now.
Grown -ups visit Tinkercast .com slash events to get your ticket today.
That's Tinkercast .com slash events.
We can't wait to make it wow with you this spring, but until then, let's get on with the show!
And then we - Oh wait, no I said laughing twice.
Ah... whatever. We Wow On the Weekend.
We Wow On the Weekend.
We Wow On the Weekend.
Because this is what we do on the weekend.
Hello and welcome to We Wow On the Weekend.
I'm your host, Dennis.
And that's my co -host, Reggie the Giant Pigeon.
Brrrr. This is the show where we hang out and chit chat and listen to episodes of Tinkercast Podcasts.
Brr. Hey, Reggie, want to play a game real quick?
Brrrm. Oh come on. Just real quick.
Brrr. I want to play I Spy.
Brr. Brr. Brr. What?
I do not cheat at I Spy.
That's a lie. Brrr.
Reggie! I'll play fair, promise, promise.
Brrrr. Yes. Okay, here we go.
I spy with my little eye something blue.
No, it's not your feathers.
Guess again. No, it's not the rug.
No, not my jar of blue raspberry jellybeans.
Give up! It was this tiny piece of blue lint in my pocket.
See? I win. OK, your turn.
You spy with your little eye.
Someone who's cheating and I spy.
Well, I have no idea to whom or what you could be referring.
Let's just move on to the Q &A segment.
Uh, uh, uh, the Q &A segment.
All right, let's just get the old answering machine pulled up here.
OK, here we go. Hi.
You've reached Dennis from We WoW!
on the weekend. That's me.
Do you have a question?
Well, I do, too. Lots of them.
And who's going to answer all my questions?
You? Probably not. But I guess I can answer yours.
Leave me a message!
Hello, my name is Domino, I live in Uchawaya, Argentina.
Hi Domino. Dennis, why are strawberries red?
Why are strawberries red?
Oh, I know this one.
Yeah, it's because they're embarrassed.
Well, strawberries don't have the riz of a raspberry or the cool mysterious vibes of a blueberry, so they're kind of blushing about it.
Which is actually pretty cute.
But, embarrassed strawberries is not the important question here.
I think the more important question is...
What's the deal with gooseberries?
Because, Reggie, they don't look anything like a goose!
Oh, wait... Do gooseberries turn you into a goose when you eat them?
They don't. See? I think this just proves my point.
Gooseberries, I'm onto you.
Next question... Hi, I'm a lion.
and I'm from Maplewood, New Jersey.
Hi, Elijah. Brrr! My question is how do you understand Reggie?
How do I understand Reggie?
Good question, Elijah.
Brrr! It's actually quite simple.
I just listen to him and understand what he says.
You know what? Reggie's much better at explaining it than I am.
Uh, Reggie, you wanna take this one?
Brrr! Brrr! Uh -huh.
Brrr! Uh -huh. Social cognition, right.
Wow, I couldn't have put it better myself!
Thanks Reggie, next question.
Hi Dennis! Scared of live butterflies or colored butterflies, even though they are not made out of butter.
Wow, Greg, question.
Do I know why butterflies are called butterflies, even though they are not made out of butter?
Hmm, maybe butterflies smell like butter?
Reggie, do butterflies smell like butter?
No, okay. Well, maybe they make butter then?
Reggie, do butterflies churn butter and that's where butter comes from?
No, right. Well maybe butterflies eat butter?
Reggie, do butterflies...
Okay, they don't eat butter.
They eat nectar. Well...
maybe it was a typo?
Like, maybe butterflies were supposed to be named Flutterby's because they Flutter -on -by -you but someone wasn't paying attention and wrote down butterfly instead.
Yeah, like a happy little accident!
It was a happy accident, a happy accident.
Someone messed up! But that's okay.
Welp, that's enough voicemails for now.
Listeners, if you've got a question for me, call and leave me a message.
The number is 1 -888 -7 -wowwow That's 1 -888 -7 -wowwow I just might answer your question on wee wow on the weekend That takes care of that Okay, up next is a little segment I like to call Inside Dinkercast Studios Inside Dinkercast Studios This is the part where we listen to an episode of one of my favorite Tinkercast podcasts, and today we're listening to season 3, episode 21 of Wow in the World, called, getting nosey about the science of smell.
Hey, I'm in this one.
Yeah, I yell a bunch of helpful information over the fence.
I know. Guy Roz and Mindy are so lucky to have me listening in on their every word.
Mm. OK. Here we go.
And bye. Brrr. Wee Wow will be right back.
Grown -ups, this message is for you.
That's it. Now back to the show.
Rockin' the world. Smells.
Get your free smells.
Buy one sniff and get a whip free.
I'm chucking Dios here, people.
Who wants to buy me?
What are you doing?
The sun's not even up.
You're gonna wake up the whole neighborhood.
And it's about time.
Wake up, Stable! Good morning, Guy Ross.
Can I interest you in a jar of freshly ground coffee?
Well, as long as I'm up, I might as well take you up on that offer.
Just stay right there.
I've got to grab my robe and I'll be down in a minute.
Who wants some fresh odors?
I've got bacon frying, freshly cut crafts, blown out birthday candles, cool mountain air.
Okay, Mindy, I'm up and at them.
How about that jar of freshly ground coffee?
Oh, sure, Reggie? One jar of freshly ground coffee?
Woo -woo -woo! Coming right up!
Here you go, Guy -Ras.
That will be $3 .99 plus tax.
Rrrr. Mindy? Yeah? This is just an empty jar.
Where's the coffee?
Uh, it's in the jar.
Mindy, I know what coffee looks like.
And I can assure you that there is nothing in this jar.
Well, that's because smells are invisible, Guy -Ras.
Smells? Yeah. If you want your freshly ground coffee smell, You're going to have to open that jar.
You woke me up and got me out of bed for nothing?
Open the jar, Geiras.
OK. Invisible coffee, what's next?
Mindy, this jar won't open.
That's because I put a child proof lid on it.
Here, let me take a crack at it.
There. Your freshly ground coffee smell.
Ahh. You weren't kidding, Mindy.
This coffee smell is almost as good as the real thing.
Now, where is the real thing?
Oh, I don't know. Maybe Dennis' house or something?
Dennis? What? You have coffee?
Oh boy, do I ever. I have fresh, single -origin beans imported from Peru's Cajamarca region.
hand -picked and sorted, fully washed and sun -dried, roasted to perfection, and here we have a ...
Aw, my carafe. Nevermind, I don't have coffee.
Mindy, are all of these empty jars filled with odors?
Well, yeah. I mean, look here.
We've got the smell of wet clothes left in the washing machine for three days, and this This one is that super specific convenience store smell.
And this one over here is rotten eggs.
Ooh, that one smells like Uranus.
What? Uranus, the planet.
It's made up of gas called hydrogen sulfide, bears an uncanny resemblance to rotten eggs.
Surprised you didn't know that.
Okay. Well, scientifically speaking, he's not wrong.
Thanks, Dennis. You're welcome.
Um, Fomindi, do you have any good odors in these jars?
Yeah. Let me see here.
Ooh, try this one. Oh!
Oh! What is that? The smell of a pile of dirt?
Dirt? No! You're smelling beets.
You know, that purple root vegetable that you roast in the oven and eat on salads, turns your poop pink?
Well, you know, for some reason, beets have always smelled like dirt to me.
What else you got? Ha.
Let me... hmm. Ooh, I know.
Here, try this one.
Ewww! Ahhhh. What do you think?
I think that one might be completely empty, Mindy.
Actually, Guy. I can smell it from here.
Ssssst. It's Lily of the Valley.
Yeah, you're right, Dennis.
This one is Lily of the Valley.
Lily of the Valley.
As in the highly poisonous woodland flowering plant?
Exactly. My mother would wear the scent every fall as I left home for boarding school.
She said it signified the return of happiness.
How my mother loved boarding school.
What is he talking about, Mindy?
Okay, so the scent of Lily of the Valley is one of those smells that skincare and beauty product companies are always trying to recreate.
Do you mean for, like, perfumes and soaps and lotions?
Yeah, it contains this chemical called borjunol.
And for a lot of people, like Dennis, even a tiny droplet of this stuff can smell super intense.
But what about for people like me who can't smell it at all?
Well, you're not alone, Gyroz.
You see, this geneticist named K .C.
Trimmer, she got together with a team of researchers at the Monel Chemical Censes Center in Philadelphia and Rockefeller University in New York City.
And she and her team set out to find out why different people smell different things differently.
And just to be clear, a geneticist is the type of scientist who studies how certain features are passed down from different generations of people.
Right? Right. Like how I inherited my mother's sense of smell and my great grandfather's sense of entitlement.
Ugh! So I'm wondering, did Dr. Trimmer and her team suspect that genes or what makes you you and me me have some kind of role to play in the way different people experience different smells?
You know it. So she and her fellow researchers decided to conduct a little scientific experiment.
Ooh, I love a little scientific experiment.
What do they do? Well, I could tell you.
Yeah. But I'd rather show you.
Come on, help me lug all these smells to the old factory in my backyard.
Old factory? Mindy, isn't the old factory system literally your sense of smell?
Yeah, but while you were sleeping, I built a literal old factory in my backyard.
I wanted to have a place where I could bottle up and reproduce all my smells.
How long was I sleeping?
Oh boy, finally something I can help with.
Let me consult my eavesdropper almanac.
Huh, okay, let's see.
Says here, 10 pm, Guy begins snoring loudly.
Then, 2 .05 am, Guy mumbles incoherently in his sleep, 3 .31 am, Guy wakes up and reads a text message I sent him.
Did it! 3 .34, Guy texts back, new phone.
Who dis? 3 .35, I text.
Wait, wait, wait, wait, just a minute.
Before we dive into any stinky experiments, Can we just talk about our olfactory sense or how we humans are able to smell in the first place?
Sure. Let me see your nose here, Gyros.
What? Oh, maybe! OK.
So inside your nose, way up there through your nostrils, are about 400 different odor -detecting receptors.
Now let's count them.
One, two, three, four.
Mom, maybe get your fingers out of my nose.
Ah. Uh. You know the old saying, you can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, and you can pick your best friend's nose in a pinch.
That is not how that saying goes.
Well, as I was saying, our noses are full of these little teeny, tiny smell receptors, just waiting to catch the tiny molecules that we come in through the air that we breathe.
And then what happens?
OK. So when we breathe in those molecules through our noses, depending on the molecule, different receptors will activate or wake up and then work together to send that odor message to our brains.
Our brains then process that smell and let us know whether it's good or bad.
like freshly baked cookies or a sweaty sock.
Yeah, these receptors can also tell you whether the smell is recognizable or unrecognizable.
Like the smell of your own house or a food you've never tried before.
And of course they can also tell you whether what you're smelling is safe or unsafe.
Safe, like newborn babies, or unsafe, like the smell of harmful chemicals.
You got it! Our ability to smell is how our noses help us to make sense of the world around us.
And how many smells or scents or odors can our body's olfactory system actually detect?
Guy Raz, the human nose, just like this one hanging off your face here.
Stop grabbing my nose, Mindy!
Kairoz, your nose has the power to tell the difference between at least one trillion different smells, and I'm working on getting one of each of them bottled up in my new backyard olfactory.
Aah! Ooh! Mindy, you made a life -size model of a human nose?
Wait, is that supposed to be my nose?
Surprise! Haha. I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about this.
Come on. Let's go inside.
Is there a door? A door?
And a nose? Uh... What the nostrils are for?
We're gonna climb in like the giant odor molecules that we are.
What?! I'll climb in first, and then I'll pull you up, okay?
Uh... You, rub onto my hand!
Ugh... Mindy! Why is it so sticky in here?!
Ah, sorry, I guess I forgot to tell you that we would be welcomed by a thick layer of mucus.
But it'll all be worth it when we get to the factory part.
Just walk, walk, walk, walk, walk...
Gross! Gross! Ah, made it!
Stepping through the smell -receptor laser gauge?!
Analyzing odor. Beef dog.
Ha? Beef dog? Yeah, I installed a bunch of smell receptor sensors in the old factory.
And for some reason, every time I enter it, it recognizes me as the smell of a beef dog.
Do I smell like a beef dog?
Ok. Mindy, this is surprisingly high tech.
Thank you very much.
Well, what is it gonna think that I smell like?
Well, why don't you pass through the smell receptor and see for yourself?
Okay. Passing through.
Analyzing owner. Italian White Ruffles and fresh uni.
What? I think I need a do -over.
No time for do -overs, Mr. Truffle Pants Uneface!
Don't you want to see the rest of the old factory?
Hurry! Grrrrrrr! Now this is where the magic happens.
Whoa! All of the machines you see here are bottling up millions of different smells from dirty hot dog water to newborn puppy smell.
And you built all of this while I was sleeping last night?
Well, yeah, with a little help from Reggie.
Brrr! Brrr! Brrr! OK, a lot of help from Reggie.
Brrr! Brrr! OK, fine.
Reggie basically built the whole thing while I ate corn chips and watched TV.
Brrr! So Mindy, you were saying earlier that those researchers at Rockefeller University conducted a little scientific experiment to see why some people might experience smells differently.
Oh, yeah, that's right, and I wanted to recreate that experiment here in the old factory.
Great! So do we have everything we need?
Let's see here. We've got 150 jars of different smells ready to go.
OK, so assorted odors.
And that's pretty much all we need.
Oh, right. Oh, how can I forget?
Thanks, Reg. Um, we're also going to need 300 people.
300 people? How are we going to get 300 people in your backyard nose factory?
Easy. We're going to get them to participate by giving them something for free.
People love free stuff.
Brrr. Free smells, of course!
You're whiffing up what I put down, guy -roz.
Brr. Be right back.
Brr. Brr. Attention neighbors.
Today only, we're giving away free smells, so get them all to last.
Brrr. Brr. Brr. OK, I'm back.
No luck getting 300 people to take you up on your offer of free smells, huh?
Well, you know... Vwaaaa!
Everyone, please come in one at a time.
Be civilized. Okay, have a seat.
Yep, just have a seat right there.
Free smells, can you believe it?
I hope my free smell is sea breeze.
I want lemon tarts.
I need everyone to just be patient.
The free smells are coming.
Mindy. What is happening?
I told you guy Ross.
I'm just recreating the experiment that was conducted by the researchers in this study Excuse me Will these free smells be good smells like cool mountain air and freshly baked bread or will they be bad smells like?
Toots farts and flatulence They seem pretty restless for the free smells you promised him Indian.
I think we'd better get started.
Okay Um, good morning, everyone.
And welcome to Mindy's Old Factory and Oder Emporium.
Now, before I give each of you the free smells that I promised, I'm going to need you to participate in a little scientific experiment.
I knew it. There's a catch.
There's always a catch.
I'd like to introduce you to my lab assistants, guy roars, and Reggie.
Say hi. Hi. Now, throughout the course of this experiment, Reggie and Gyroz here will be bringing out 150 jars of different odors, or as I like to call them, smells.
I will instruct you on what smells to try, and then on a sheet of paper, you will rate the intensity of each odor on a scale of one to seven, one being that you find the odor extremely weak and seven being that you find the odor extremely strong.
And I'm assuming three or four if it's somewhere in the middle.
You got it, Guy Razzi.
Next, on a scale of 1 to 7, you will rate how pleasant you found the odor to be, one, if you found it to be extremely unpleasant, and seven, if you found it to be extremely pleasant.
Let's do this! Woo -hoo!
Reggie, bring on the smells.
Wow, wow, that's a lot of odor, Mindy!
Friends and neighbors, what you're looking at here are 150 different odors collected, bottled, and in some cases, produced by yours truly.
Thank you, thank you, thank you very much.
And now, let the experiment begin!
Ah, Legend. Legend, is this really happening right now?
First odor of business is cilantro.
Kyra, please open the jar and release the odor.
OK. And now, I need everyone to take a thorough sniff and rate its intensity and pleasantness on a scale of one to seven.
Oh, are you sure that cilantro, Mindy?
It smells like soap.
I think Reggie begs to disagree, Guy -Raws.
Next up, opening the jar of pea odor from a person who's been eating asparagus.
Indeed. Everybody sniff!
Oh, oh, gross. Smells like normal pee to me.
Now please rate your findings and feel free to include any notes you'd like to add.
Reggie, please pass the next odor to Guy Ross.
Guy Ross, go ahead and open the odor.
OK. Please be something pleasant.
Please be something pleasant!
The next odor of business is dad sweating after losing a game of racquetball smell.
Ugh. Oh wait, there's actually a scientific name for this odor, I think it's called Androstenone.
And while some people find it pungent and gross, other people think it smells like vanilla or they can't smell it at all.
And last but not least, drum roll please, guy rozz, please open the jar of human toot.
The toot? Not just any old toot, guy rozz.
This is a certified and licensed grade A gluten -free USDA approved organic mini -tute.
You bottled your own toot?
Sure did, and there's more where that came from.
Oh no don't tell me you...
Kairos, like most humans, I average about 15 toots a day, and for the last 30 days I have bottled every single one of these things.
them. Which means...
Which means that every single person in this old factory is going to take home their own jar of certified organic Mindy Toots!
Wow, humans really will take anything that's free.
But there's a catch...
Before any of you leave here today, and before I give each one of you your free jar of toots, I'm going to need a small jar of your blood.
Oh. Oh. What? No. Anything for science, Guy Roz.
There are limits to that, Mindy.
What are limits? Mindy, you can invite people to your giant backyard nose factory and take their blood.
Well, if I don't take everyone's blood, then how am I supposed to reenact and show you the rest of the experiment?
You know what? why don't you just give these people their free smells and let them go and Then you can just tell me what happened after the researchers took the blood samples fine Everyone, please line up single file and get your free smells One for you one for you.
Thank you very much for participating in our study one for you one for you Reggie, you want to come over here and take over?
My arm is getting tired from lifting all these jars of toots.
Brrr. Brrr. Brrr. Brrr.
Okay, so once these trained and professional scientists working in an actual laboratory took the blood samples from the people who participated in the study, what did they do with them?
Oh so Dr. Trimmer and her team took the blood samples back to another lab And then they studied the DNA of each person.
And by DNA, you mean the instruction manual for our bodies.
Right. And those DNA instructions are what make you you and me me.
And in this experiment, the scientists wanted to get a good look into each person's blood so that they could study that instruction manual.
And what were they looking for?
Well, they were looking for and comparing different genes in each person's olfactory system.
The system of the body that helps us to smell.
Right, and what they found was pretty well.
Oh yeah? What did they discover?
They discovered that even the tiniest change in even one of the 400 olfactory receptors… Meaning those little smell sensors that send messages to our brains after catching odor molecules… Yeah, they found that even the teeniest tiniest change could completely change the way one person experienced a certain smell compared to another person.
So that would explain why Dennis could smell that lily of the valley plant and I could smell nothing at all.
Or why I might be smelling beets and you think you're sniffing dirt.
Or why some people might smell sweat, while other people think they're smelling vanilla.
Or why I might smell Parmesan cheese and you might smell...
Uh, hang on. Gotta get the jar open.
You've gotta smell this, Gyros.
Ah! Uh! OK, here we go.
Smell this. Oh, that smells like vomit.
Thanks to your DNA it does, but I can assure you that this is Parmesan cheese smell.
I wonder if it works the other way around.
Mindy, now that we know that even the tiniest changes to our smell sensing olfactory receptors can change the way a person experiences smell, what can we do with this discovery?
Well, according to Dr. Trimmer, just knowing this is going to help us to better understand how smell might affect our overall health.
Yeah, I imagine our sense of smell actually plays a pretty big role in why we choose the foods that we do.
Yeah, but don't go around thinking you can just blame your DNA on why you like or don't like every smell.
Believe me, I tried it.
Yeah, there can be lots of different things that can affect the way we perceive or experience smell.
Yeah, for example, the way we interpret smell is related to the same part of our brain that holds memories and that plays a big role in how we're able to taste or smell different foods.
Speaking of which, are you catching a whiff of that smell coming from outside?
Yeah, but who would be grilling at this hour of the morning?
Probably someone who was woken up before the sun, and whose body clock now thinks it's lunchtime.
Well, there's only one way to find out.
Through the snotty nasal cavity!
The what? Come on! Follow me, Guy Ros.
Ahh, made it out of the old factory alive!
Midney, you weren't covered in slime!
What did you use to make this stuff?
Oh, I've been bottling up my runny noses for years.
Finally found a good use for them.
Ugh! Morning, Indy!
Morning, guys! Hey, you two bookers want to come over for some burgers?
Ha ha! Get it? Bookers?
Burgers? Eh, you don't get it.
Ah ha ha! Wow! That was so...
awole! And now I want burgers.
Oh yeah and Lily of the Valley.
I love reliving my fond memories of boarding school.
The perfume mother used to wear as she drove me 12 hours to Count Montague's school for nosy little children.
Anyway let's wrap up the show and go fire up the grill!
For burgers Reggie!
Thanks to all you listeners out there for tuning into We Wow on the weekend.
If you have a question for me Call and leave me a message at 1 -888 -7.
Wow, wow. That's 1 -888 -7.
Wow, wow. I just might answer your question on weewo on the weekend.
OK, let's go. So what do you want on your burger, Reggie?
Barbecue earthworms!
Reggie! Ew. Well, I just thought you were more of a honey mustard earthworm kind of pigeon.
What about ranch, ketchup, tzatziki?
Wait. Is it pronounced tzatziki or zat -ziki?
Grown -ups, if you like Wow in the World, you can listen early and ad -free right now on Wondery Plus.
Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Wondery Kids Plus on Apple Podcasts.
Prime members can listen ad -free on Amazon Music.
And before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery .com slash survey.
Thanks for joining us for this edition of WeWow!
Our show is written by Ruth Morrison and Jed Anderson.
The role of baby Dennis is played by Jed Anderson.
Who plays the role of big Dennis?
Never your mind, tee hee!
Original sound design and production is done by Henry Moscow with contributions from Jed Anderson and Tyler Thole.
Original music for WeWow!
is composed and performed by Tyler Thole.
Special thanks to Jessica Bodi, Rebecca Caban, Dr. Natasha Crandall, Kenny Curtis, Kristin Yang, Meredith Halpern Ranzer, Twi Mack, Jodi Nussbaum, Ali Paxima, Guy Roz, Linda Raffenberg, Steph Sosa, Mindy Thomas, Anna Zygorsky, and all of the other tinkerers at Tinkercast HQ.
Be sure to visit Tinkercast .com where you can become an official member of the World Organization of Wowsers.
learn about upcoming events, shop our WoW Shop, find our best -selling books, and learn about all the other amazing podcasts from Tinkercast.
Thanks again for thinking, tinkering, experimenting and exploring with me this week.
Be sure to check out episodes of WoW and the World on Mondays to What's in a WoW on Fridays and We WoW on the Weekend with Dennis on the Weekends.
And remember, Who Wows?
I wow, oh baby Denis, we wow.
Oh, right, we wow! I'm in the world, I'm in the world.
I'm in the world, I'm in the world.
I'm in the world. Wow, in the World is made by Tinkercast and set to you by Wundery.
