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These are the shownotes for Season 7, Ep 22 first published May 29, 2026.
6 Doorbell ringing bears are back
4 (tie) A) We are not having fun. B) if this is true there's inexpensive pain management on the horizon!
I would also add to this list: looking for treasure (buried or unburied), playing charades in an elevator, and pretending to solve complicated math equations.
2 Why hamsters hit the wheel so hard
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00:00:00,000 --> 00:05:05,279 What's that Rover? There's a very creepy puppet and a dog translator in this episode? Hi friends, I am Scott and this is What A Weird Week. It's a show where we look at the weird news of the week. We go back through 10 of the weird news stories and we catch you up on the weirdness. You can get all our show notes on the show notes page, which is shownotes.page. Here we go, Friday, May 29, 2026.
Number 10 is serial inspired by this TV show? Wait, wait, wait, wait. We'll get a copyright strike for sure. Let's do our own version. The folks from General Mills are introducing Saved by the Bell cereal. Not a new cereal, it's rethemed packaging for like Cinnamon Toast Crunch or some of the other General Mills cereals, Cheerios. And the packaging is themed to the TV show Saved by the Bell, which if you're on familiar, it was a TV program that was on the air in 1989. And this is nice. They're teaming up with an education charity. So making the world a better place through nostalgia and cereal. The packaging will feature Zack and A.C. Slater. Kelly, I don't know. These are people on the show? Okay. I never, I'm sorry. I never really watched the show. I will put a link to more info and some photos. As far as availability, it's a limited run thing. So your luck may vary on obtaining the Saved by the Bell cereal. But if wherever you go to buy your favorite cereals, if they carry General Mills, have a look there and you may be able to find some Saved by the Bell themed General Mills product. Oh, I should say this portion of the program not sponsored by General Mills. What 1980s TV show would you like to see come back as a cereal? Here in Canada, living on the East coast of Canada, we had the Littlest Hobo program, Canadian content television show whereby a dog would solve crimes. Some sort of super intelligent dog. I would like to see that made into a breakfast cereal.
Number nine is a scary one and we have footage. Hours after this harrowing collision with a small plane over the Alps, the paraglider who posted this heart-stopping video is speaking out, writing on Instagram today, which we've translated from German, the biggest thanks to my lifesaver, my reserve parachute. So what's happening in that video, we have the footage because the paraglider, the lady from Austria is wearing a camera. So we see what she recorded. An airplane runs into the parachute. So then the lady is descending rapidly, spiraling, but able to deploy her reserve parachute and ended up landing safely. Absolutely bonkers. If you have a chance to click the video, we will link to that in the show notes or click shownotes.page.
Number eight. Number eight is that pet translator that's been in the headlines boasting a 95% accuracy rate. It's all powered by AI. I mean, of course. Now the smart caller uses built-in microphones, motion sensors, and accelerometers to analyze a pet's vocal sounds, body movements, and behavioral patterns. If it works, it would be a wonderful invention, I imagine. And then I would like to see all the animals at the, first pets, yes, but then all the animals at the zoo should have this technology too. So we can better communicate with the zoo animals and learn what they're trying to tell us. Some of them probably want to eat us.
Number seven. Number seven is the very large and creepy puppet that has been in the headlines. So somebody turned in a puppet, somebody found a puppet and they turned it into the police. And now police in Massachusetts are trying to reconnect the puppet with its owner. The puppet looks like some kind of zombie clown. Like it's a puppet show that you would leave everybody, grownups, children, everyone would leave the puppet show crying and terrified, I'm pretty sure. And I'm just going to say right now, the article doesn't get into how haunted the puppet is, but I'm going to say 95% haunted. I'll link to the article from Ben Hoops Hooper at United Press International. Ben Hoops Hooper has the weird news beat and some good reporting. It looks as though perhaps this haunted puppet is a spirit Halloween decoration, like seven foot tall puppet.
00:05:05,279 --> 00:10:00,320 And again, they don't say it's haunted, but one look into the puppet eyes and you know that thing will haunt your dreams. If you want to have a look, click the show notes.
Number six. Number six is a continuation of a story that we've followed on this program where bears are, my theory, organizing and they figured out if they ring a doorbell, a tasty human being will answer the door. It keeps happening. This time around, it was New Jersey. Some New Jersey bears made headlines because they rang a doorbell. Well, take a look at this. Don't open the door for this ding dong ditcher. A viewer is sharing video of a really nosy bear just walking right up to her home. You see, look at that. We'll link to that video in the show notes.
Number five. Number five is a new octopus that's been discovered. It's small, it's blue, and it seems to me as though researchers are freaking out about it. I don't know. Are they freaking out? Here's the headline from study finds. It seems kind of intense. Blue octopus found near the Galapagos may have just changed deep sea science forever. They only have this one octopus to go by. It's sort of like when they run DNA through CODIS on your favorite crime solving show. They didn't get a hit. That's how I would describe it. Paraphrase. They ran the octopus through CODIS and they didn't get a hit. I'll stop there. It's more complicated. Obviously, I'm dumb, but I'll link to the article and you can read the whole thing. I love it when they find new stuff. I always say this. For some reason, it gives me joy when they find new things. Just when you think we found all the things, they find new things. And I like that. More information if you click the show notes or you can go to shownotes.page. The photo is pretty great.
Number four is a tie for fourth place because a couple of different surveys came out. One was bad news. One was good news. I thought I'd put them together and maybe they'd balance each other out. The first one, the bad news, you friends in the United States of America, according to a study, almost half of American adults are not having fun. No fun in your life right now. And you can probably guess the reasons. Everybody's burned out or working too hard or too busy or ain't nobody got no money. I will link to the article in the show notes, but also I'll put a link to cheap ways to have fun. Maybe that'll help. The other thing, I would categorize this as good news, but I do have to say something first. It's about religion. And when you have a show that goes out over the internet and you talk about religion, there are different opinions. I'm not getting into the religious aspect of this, just what was in the peer-reviewed journal. And it was just a small study, 180 patients. But the headline is this. Five minutes of in-person prayer linked to less pain and anxiety. So what they did was after a clinic visit, they had in-person Christian prayer for five minutes. People reported a reduction in pain and a reduction in anxiety. One of the things they point out, this was believers and non-believers. Both had the same effect. But again, 180 patients, so more research needed. If you want to read the thing, we will link to it in the show notes.
Number three is some juice news, which that would be a good name for a podcast. Juice news. The article from study finds about some juice research. The headline is a daily glass of fruit juice may help improve diet and mood. That seems promising. One of the quotes from the article, people in the juice group scored notably lower on a depression symptom questionnaire than those who changed nothing about their diet. Another thing in the article is how people in the juice group kept pouring more juice than they were supposed to have. People like juice. The article kind of points out maybe we don't know portion size. We're not so great at portion size, but also it could be that we just love juice. People in the juice group poured twice as much juice than they were supposed to. I'll stop there. You can get more details on it, though. I'll link to everything in the show notes or click show notes dot page.
Number two is from Popular Science, an article they wrote this week about hamster wheels, the science and the joy of hamster wheels. I learned that for a long time, they thought hamsters ran on hamster wheels because they were in captivity. Maybe it was some sort of neurosis. Maybe they were super bored or kind of got squirrely. Sorry, squirrely hamsters, but got squirrely. That's why they ran on hamster wheels. Then they discovered that if you had a hamster wheel in the wild, wild mice would get on that hamster wheel and run. They're not in captivity, so they ruled out boredom and they ruled out neurosis. One researcher they talk about spent 30 years trying to figure out the hamster wheel enigma. Mice did the experimental hamster wheel, shrews,
00:10:00,320 --> 00:12:27,559 frogs, and even slugs, the article says. Can you imagine a slug wheel? That's a slow-moving wheel, I imagine. So why do hamsters run on hamster wheels? well you'll have to read the article no I'm just kidding it's for fun here's the quote it's hard to ignore the idea that they're getting some sort of pleasure or enjoyment out of running on the hamster wheel it's for fun
Honorable mention this week the honorable mention to the fellow in Canada my home country of Canada who fought a traffic ticket received in 2007 received a fine a traffic ticket for running a red light but fought it didn't think the fellow's name is Neville he didn't think he deserved a fine he appealed his ticket and he's been waiting and waiting since 2007 he would check in and request updates on the status of his appeal you know the wheels of justice move slowly a judge finally decided to hear the appeal and Neville won his appeal his traffic violation has been struck down fight the power this happened in Toronto Ontario Canada North America planet earth and we link to the article in the show notes
Number one is a new way to fight fires through mighty bass tones there's a company developing a firefighting technique based on sound waves low-frequency bass sounds which they say can put out flames I had no idea any of this was possible but we link to an article that gets into how the low-frequency bass sounds if there's sufficient volume can do something to oxygen and potentially put out a fire cause a fire to stop being fire go back to whatever it is before it's fire I do like the idea of some sort of fire prevention system that involves Funkadelic that would be pretty great alright we're gonna stop there
Thanks for checking out what a weird week if you're new here we have all the show notes on our show notes page which is show notes dot page and also there are links to smash the subscribe or demolish the like button or all of that is at show notes dot page we're back next Friday with 10 more weird news stories on what a weird week
https://people.com/general-mills-debuts-saved-by-the-bell-themed-cereal-boxes-exclusive-11982080
9 Scary Paragliding/ Airplane Mishap
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DYu0zLyvZIs/
8 Dog Translator
https://www.odditycentral.com/animals/controversial-ai-powered-pet-translator-boasts-a-95-accurracy-rate.html
7 Police seek owner of very creepy puppet
https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2026/05/27/Stoneham-Massachusetts-creepy-puppet/7051779883178/
6 Doorbell ringing bears are back
https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2026/05/21/bear-doorbell-Sparta-New-Jersey/5501779382850/
https://studyfinds.com/blue-octopus-changed-deep-sea-science/
4 (tie) We are not having fun, but here's something you might want to try
https://studyfinds.com/five-minutes-of-in-person-prayer-linked-to-less-pain-anxiety/ and also https://studyfinds.com/half-americans-say-no-fun-in-life/
https://studyfinds.com/daily-glass-juice-improve-diet-mood/
2 why hamsters hit the wheel so hard
https://www.popsci.com/environment/why-hamsters-run-on-wheels/
Bonus traffic fine fought and successfully beat. and it only took twenty years in court to do it. #fightthepower
https://www.oddee.com/canadian-man-wins-nearly-two-decade-battle-against-a-traffic-fine-78831/
1 Utilizing mighty mighty bass tones as a fire extinguisher? More info please.
https://www.oddee.com/unusual-new-tech-blows-fires-out-with-bass-sounds-78856/