What a Weird Week gets you caught up on the odd, interesting,
strange, fun, and weird news that happened this week. Ten stories in 15
minutes!
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Hi friends, I'm Scott and this is What a Weird Week, a look at the
odd, interesting, strange, fun and weird stories that made news this
week. See bottom of shownotes page for a transcript of the podcast
episode. To Subscribe/ get in touch/ other/ see www.shownotes.page.
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These are the shownotes for Season 6, Ep 29 first published Fri July 18, 2025
Thanks for rating and reviewing and also subscribing!
These are the shownotes for Season 6, Ep 29 first published Fri July 18, 2025
Casino for the rest of us! UNO at the casino https://www.newsweek.com/new-uno-social-club-casino-las-vegas-2098544
Mysterious ship goo is baffling the sciencers https://www.popsci.com/science/ship-goo-great-lakes-mystery/
Really old movie prop sells for record amount https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2025/07/17/Heritage-Auctions-Rosebud-Citizen-Kane/6941752775517/ *SPOILER ALERT* If you haven't seen the 1941 film Citizen Kane, do not look.
How to sleep better but you might not like it https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/07/250716000856.htm
Impossible egg record has finally been cracked! https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2025/07/16/Guinness-World-Records-largest-scotch-egg/1951752684454/
Sloths and more specifically sloth gas makes science headlines https://www.livescience.com/animals/scientists-thought-sloths-dont-fart-then-one-was-caught-tooting-on-camera
Pooch TV preferences may surprise you #study https://studyfinds.org/dogs-watching-tv-habits/
Has the Green Pigeon shown up in your feeds yet? Earlier this summer it started to gain momentum. I thought it was fake. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cg5zdyy4lrgo
The science of delicious campfire food https://www.popsci.com/science/why-food-around-campfire-tastes-better/
Why do we feel guilty about using our vacation days? (If you don't, you're winning). https://studyfinds.org/why-do-so-many-american-workers-feel-guilty-about-taking-vacation-days/
The million dollar relationship question that you should NOT bring up with your partner https://studyfinds.org/would-you-leave-your-partner-for-million-dollars/
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These are the shownotes for Season 6, Ep 29 first published Fri July 18, 2025
00:00
sloths and giant eggs and mysterious goo. What a weird week. Hi friends, I'm Scott and this show is called What a Weird Week. We go back through the news of the week and we pick out the weird, the odd, the fun, the interesting, the not too serious stories.
00:26
do 10 stories in about 15 minutes and you can get everything we talk about in more detail if you click show notes dot page. All the stuff about our podcast lives there too. The website is show notes dot page. Here we go. Season six, episode 29 first published Friday, July 18, 2025. 10 is casino games for the rest of us. I don't know roulette. I can't do blackjack, but uno at the casino.
00:57
What? So this made headlines. The card game Uno, the colorful card game made by Mattel, is coming to casinos. First, just the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas, but they expect there'll be some sort of nationwide or widespread Uno situation at casinos in the United States of America. At time of recording, we don't know if you'll be able to gamble on Uno or if it's just for fun, but I can't.
01:22
I'm having a hard time. don't understand how the world works so much. I'm not that sharp, but I can't imagine a situation where you would go to a casino to play a card game just for fun. But I could be wrong on that. We linked to the Newsweek article about the Uno games coming to casinos. They mentioned that Uno is owned by 80 % of American households and they say Uno is America's favorite game. I didn't know that. I thought America's favorite game was that game where you hate watch the new Sex and the City show.
01:52
and you say terrible things about it, but then also you can't not watch it. This has been an educational journey. Click the link to learn more. Show notes that page. Number nine is a heck of a mystery. I'm going to say, and I don't think this is an exaggeration. This is going to be the greatest goo mystery that you encounter this week. The mysterious goo that was discovered on a research vessel conducting research in the great lakes.
02:20
It contains new life forms and no one knows how the substance got on the research vessel. I'm going to pause it right now. If you're some kind of new life form and you want to be discovered, why not attach yourself to a research vessel? That seems to make sense to me and that is my hypothesis. Anyway, here's what happened. The research vessel called the Blue Heron goes in for some maintenance and there's this weird substance, kind of oily, greasy, tar-like substance.
02:49
And at first they think it's, you know, the usual, what happened? We spilled the oil, something like that. It's not that. They took a sample and they got DNA from the sample and it's some mysterious life form. That's kind of, um, it's very quick summation of the long article from popular science. If you want to read the lengthy article from popular science, it is very interesting. If you're into goo, right? And who among us is not? The photo of the
03:15
One of the researchers got a sample of the goo in a paper coffee cup and labeled it ship goo.
03:25
And they still, mean, investigation continues. What the heck is the goo? That's where we are right now. So hopefully we can circle back one day and have an answer to the goo mystery. eight is a record breaking movie prop, but also a very expensive movie spoiler, I would argue. So this is the sled from the Orson Welles movie Citizen Kane. It sold at auction for 14 million and something. That's the second most a piece of movie merch or movie memorabilia has fetched.
03:54
So it's second place. First place, the Ruby Slippers from The Wizard of Oz. They sold for 32 million and something. So 14 million dollars. Interesting how this came to be. The Rosebud sled was discovered when Joe Dante, an acclaimed director in his own right, doing some iconic films like Gremlins and that. Joe Dante is working at the studio. He discovers this sled and he figures out this is, wait, this is the Citizen Kane sled. So he owned it. He put it on auction.
04:24
$14 million and something. But I've not seen the Orson Welles film. I've been waiting until all the reviews ran to make, you know, 1941 film. Anyway, you don't want to hastily watch a movie till you get all the reviews. So I haven't seen it. And now I know Rosebud is the sled from the Citizen Kane film that gives away the ending. Movie spoiled. If you want to read the whole article, have a look at the movie memorabilia. We put a link in the show notes.
04:54
Number seven is some valuable research about how to get better sleep. Do you need more sleep? Are you tired? Are you asleep right now? I'm sorry. I am sorry about that. Should I do the rest of the episode as an ASMR? No, I should not. The research published on the Science Daily website, we linked to this in the show notes. It's things you can do to get better sleep that don't involve taking drugs because, know, drugs do sometimes have side effects. So they were looking at drug free ways to better sleep.
05:24
Tai Chi is one doing yoga and walking and jogging some of the best ways to get better sleep and improve that time it takes for you to fall asleep at night like make make it so it happens faster. That's kind of it. I guess I'll stop there. Wait, first I'll show you a couple of my Tai Chi moves.
05:45
That was me doing Tai Chi. Oh, I really do need to get some sleep. six. This one is a triumph of the human spirit. A world record involving an egg. A world record that seemed impossible to crack, but they did it. Ollie and Phoenix, a couple of social media famous chefs have the world record for the heaviest scotch egg ever created in all of time on planet Earth. A scotch egg is not readily available where I am. East Coast, Canada. So.
06:15
I'm vaguely familiar that it's some sort of delicious thing I want to try, but the scotch egg, in case you're like me and you're like, what is that? It's a hard boiled egg. You wrap it in pork or some sort of delicious salted meat, I think. And then it's breaded and then you deep fry it. That's a scotch egg. So how did they get a 17 pound scotch egg going? Well, it was an ostrich egg. And the first go, they went to take it out of the fryer and it came apart. So that seems like heartbreak, but somehow...
06:43
They were able to access another delicious ostrich egg and they made the world record scotch egg, 17 pounds and change. Number five is a science story involving sloths and sloth gas. So if you're someone who finds sloths interesting, boom, you got that. If you're someone who finds passing gas interesting, hilarious, this story is the best of both worlds. The Hannah Montana of stories about sloths and gas.
07:12
Science wasn't exactly sure if slots did pass gas. One of the mysteries, the scientific mysteries, you know, not at the top of the list, but it was on the list of scientific mysteries that one day science would get around to solving. And now I have to credit the author of the article, Pandora Duan. This is for Live Science. Here's part of what Pandora wrote. For years, it's been assumed that slots don't fart, but new footage of a baby...
07:41
baby sloth letting rip in a water bath has shown that contrary to popular belief these tree dwellers are actually incredibly gassy. I mean there's no way I can add anything of value to this story that hasn't already been said. The link is in the show notes if you want to check it out. Show notes dot page. Number four. This one is about the television viewing habits of dogs. New research. So maybe you have a dog. Perhaps your dog watches television.
08:09
According to this article, 90 % of people who own a dog report that their dog watches some TV. Pooches are watching the tube. And one of the things I learned, pooches have preferences, not unlike people. Some dogs, if you have an excitable dog, they want to see a lot of movement. If you have an anxious dog, they'd rather watch, you know, something, human voices coming from the TV would be better for the anxious dog. That's part of what's in the article. One of the surprising things is that
08:39
Dogs experience television a lot like we do. are immersed in, like they are experiencing something. It's not just about flashing images. They are experiencing that as they watch TV. They are immersed in that world. Not unlike how we get when we watch TV. Human being people, earthlings and dogs, similar in that regard. There's more to it. I'll link to the whole thing. Click show notes that page. Number three, has the green pigeon showed up in your feeds yet?
09:08
There is a green pigeon that lives in Northampton, United Kingdom. The BBC did a report. We linked to that in the show notes. People thought it was AI or, you know, a fake photo, fake footage. It's not. The BBC has confirmed there is an actual green pigeon. Lime green. Just imagine a pigeon if you don't have a chance to click the photo. Imagine a pigeon and now imagine that pigeon is completely lime green. That's what's going on. Neon, neon green.
09:33
So they think somebody died the pigeon. It's not as though the pigeon could eat too much lime jello and then turn green or something like that. The experts in the article say, no, pretty sure somebody died this pigeon. And it's not great for the pigeon when that happens. Bit of a mystery. If you have any information the authorities would like to know, because what if it catches on? And pretty soon we have the entire rainbow, pigeons of every color of the rainbow. It seems lovely. And a nice multicultural message, perhaps.
10:02
but it's not good for the pigeons. Honorable Mention. This honorable mention is about how we find food delicious when we prepare it over a campfire. This according to popular science, if you're in that boat, if you find that a campfire like making a s'more over a campfire, roasting a marshmallow so much better than doing it over a candle in your apartment. Well, you're not alone if you find the campfire food better. Popular science says we'd
10:31
Can't we don't stand a chance basically with all the factors coming together when we consume food prepared over a campfire. Some of it is very little. It has to do with the actual food. Some of it is chemistry, different things happening with the campfire and our senses. Some of it is nostalgia. Some of it is psychology. There's a little bit of everything going on there and we don't stand a chance. Campfire food has us. They ought to have some sort of
10:58
food delivery service instead of like a box of fresh vegetables every day, it should be campfire food. We're going to be millionaires. Hey, partner. Number two is that study about vacation guilt whereby you go on vacation and you feel guilty about it and you can't stop. It ruins your vacation because you can't stop thinking about work and how guilty you are being on vacation. And maybe you've never experienced this because it really depends on where you're at. Our show goes out over the information super highway.
11:28
So, you know, where you're at, you're part of the world. Maybe you go on vacation guilt free. The United States of America, you friends in America seem to be hit the worst with vacation guilt, where some people cut their vacation short. Some people, almost 50 percent of people don't use all their vacation time. And why is it that the United States of America is hit with so much vacation guilt? The article gets into it and thinks maybe it has something to do. Well, here's what they say.
11:57
The US is the only advanced economy that doesn't legally mandate a minimum number of vacation days. So where I live, East Coast Canada, it's the law that after I work at my company for so long, I have to take so many vacation days. So I don't feel guilty about it because I'm just obeying the law. That's kind of me breaking it down. And I'm not a scientist, but you can read the whole thing. Maybe if you're dealing with a lot of vacation guilt, you want to read the article and forward this to your boss.
12:27
show notes dot page. one story this week is the study that says, well, okay, let me just say my personal relationship advice. Now I've been married a long time. I don't understand the new ways of love. I would say avoid bringing this up in conversation with your partner. There is a study recently published. 43 % of Americans say they would leave their partner for a million dollars. Maybe that's not you. Maybe you're in it for the long haul. I applaud that. And I believe in love.
12:56
But that's almost half of people surveyed said they would leave their partner for a million dollars. Their love, although strong, does have a price tag. Nobody's going to give you a million dollars to leave your partner. So this is a stupid hypothetical question that should never be brought up. Relationships are going to be ruined now because of the study and the publication coming out and people saying, oh, isn't that funny? You'd never do that. babe.
13:31
There's other stuff in the study, but I'm going to stop there. is depressing. Or maybe I should look at it another way that, you know, people being practical in a tough economic time, people are being practical. That's ending on a bright note.
13:57
We're going to stop there this week. you for listening to What a Weird Week, available wherever you get podcasts. If you need links to stuff, go to shownotes.page. That's where the show notes are and all the other things. Shownotes.page. We're back next Friday with more weird stuff and fun stuff. It's not all depressing like leaving your spouse for a million dollars. Catch you next Friday on What a Weird Week.
14:24
Babe, I'm leaving, must be on my way Somebody gave me a million damn dollars
14:38
I'ma head out now I decided I'd take a private jet Because I'm a millionaire
15:01
without you And I would be poor if I stuck around in this scenario, so Please believe me, we're better off this way Well, at least I'm better off this way
