SPEAKER_03 0:00

So the first thing that happens is your muscles go, I don't think we're gonna do anything anymore. And then the next thing that happens is your brain says, You're dead. That's it. Welcome to another episode of Smells Like Humans. This is the podcast where we explore the curious things that people do, the very human things that grab our attention and cause us to wonder, what and why? I'm Ross, your host. My guest today is Not Afraid of Attack Dogs, is almost never surprised, and can order ice cream in at least three different languages. It's Joan.

SPEAKER_00 0:38

Hello.

SPEAKER_03 0:39

Welcome to the show and welcome everyone, friends. Please share our show. If you like it, chances are you know someone who also will like it, and that is the best thing you can do. We're small, we're shrunken, we're completely independent, we're organic, we're homegrown, and we need your assistance. If you like what we're doing, encourage us, send us notes. We love us some love, and we love to hear from you, and we will respond. We're very, very responsive. Let's get started. We know that humans are always up for the next thing. Whatever thing is supposed to improve our lives somehow. I don't know if you know this, Joan, but the wellness industry is a four trillion dollar a year operation. Trillion. That is wild. Trillion. That is hu it's much bigger than I thought. And this industry, the so-called wellness industry, tries very hard every moment of every day to convince us humans that just because we're not sick, it doesn't mean we're well. There's something missing. And let me just tell you where I'm going with this.

SPEAKER_00 1:55

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:55

Because I know you're thinking now, where are you going with this? We'll come back to this. But the bottom line for me is I'm not wanting really to quibble with one technique versus another and what whether you should do or shouldn't do. If you're out there and you're doing something, or you're buying something, or you're participating in something that helps you get through your day and you can comfortably afford to do it, you just do it. We're all about doing the things that we like to do. I just don't think people should feel bad or guilty if they're not doing all of these things that the wellness industry is trying to persuade us to do. Or if you can't afford to do it, um, you shouldn't necessarily feel bad, you know, that you're not doing the latest thing. Especially things that celebrities are doing, like Gwynneth Paltrow, man, she's made a fortune with this goop. You know about the goop?

SPEAKER_00 2:59

I sure do.

SPEAKER_03 3:00

She's telling people that there's a benefit to inserting a jade egg into your vagina and keeping it there overnight.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

I mean, maybe.

SPEAKER_03 3:11

It's uh it's an egg-shaped gemstone that you stick in the vagina to improve sexual health, strengthen the pelvic floor, and increase sexual satisfaction. I could use some help with my pelvic floor, I can tell you that right now. How about Demi Moore swearing by the benefits of leech therapy? I mean, that's pretty old-fashioned. Very old-fashioned, but it's supposed to improve circulation. And if you ever watch this old movie with Humphrey Bogart and Catherine Hepburn called The African Queen, there is a leech scene. Oh, yeah. It's one of the best parts of that movie, seeing Humphrey Bogart without a shirt with leeches all over him. I mean, who wouldn't want that? They've changed the way they make movies. Anyway, and then Kim Kardashian, she has her own blood injected back into her face. The so-called vampire facial. And there's evidence that suggests this does something. They even say you can wipe your own blood on your face and it helps your skin. There's things that celebrities are doing that we hear about, and it sounds like, wow, if they're doing it, maybe it's something I should be doing. Now, what are the major wellness areas that we are constantly being asked to invest our hard-earned scratch on? Well, let me just tell you fitness gear, skin care, that's a big one, right? Relaxation and recovery, sleep aids, health monitors, nutrition and motivational tools. There are such things called wellness festivals, goddess gatherings, or cannabis retreats. You can go and try out vaginal steaming. I don't I'd rather do the egg, actually, before I get steamed. I'm just saying, some people go to make a big deal of going to these um cycle clubs like Soul Cycle, they go on juice cleanses, they don't eat anything that isn't quote unquote clean. People do yoga, charge crystals, download mindfulness apps, they try to stay away from so-called toxins, or they're detoxing all the time, or they're eating superfoods, they're drinking natural wine, they're prioritizing self-care, they're investing in all these supplements or digital detoxes, intermittent fasting. So many things, right? And now, now, now bring in the ice plunge. What do you mean? Why are you saying no so soon? You haven't even heard about the benefits of ice plunging.

SPEAKER_00 5:53

Okay, tell me the benefits.

SPEAKER_03 5:55

Well, people who soak in an ice tub or jump into freezing water say, Well, you're still saying no. You haven't heard the what the benefits. Okay. This is what they say the benefits include. All right. Mental clarity. And I think that would happen as soon as you hit the ice, because then you're like, wow, it's really clear to me right now that this is no good. Like, would you ever have a clearer moment in your life? Like, this is too cold. Pain management, that's a thing. I think that's a thing because there's a sense that it reduces inflammation, and and a lot of times you put ice on things, you know, when you twist your ankle. Ever twist an ankle?

SPEAKER_00 6:37

Sure.

SPEAKER_03 6:38

That's not a very personal question. That's not that's one of the least personal questions we ask on the show. Did you ever twist an ankle and you're like, I'm not telling you? I gotta consult my lawyer first. Weight loss, stress tolerance. Apparently, they say it helps with anxiety, depression, and anger management. See, I would be more angry hitting the ice, I think. So, uh, as usual, with a lot of the wellness things that we do, the evidence is equivocal at best about whether these benefits are real, consistent, reliable, or are they imagined? Is it a placebo effect? And again, if you're doing stuff and it's working for you, I'm good with it. But if you're not doing stuff and you're wondering whether you should, you should know that the jury on ice bathing is still out. But I will tell you that Lizzo says it's good. And if Lizzo says it's good, do we really need science to tell us anything? I mean, if Lizzo's doing it. I watched her take an ice bath.

SPEAKER_00 7:45

I mean, I wonder if, depending on how you feel about a celebrity, if they're then you feel better about their recommendation or something they're doing. Because when you tell me some of the other names you mentioned, then I don't care what they're doing. But then when you say Lizzo, I'm like, hmm, what's Lizzo doing? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 8:02

What is Lizzo doing? Right now, I mean, she's got a pretty high profile. She's super positive, and she's taken ice baths, and you can watch it on TikTok. I did. She says it's uh she gets so cold she's numb, but it helps my inflammation. She got an ice bath for her own home, and you can watch her ice bathing. So have you ever done this, Joan?

SPEAKER_00 8:27

Um, no, but you have. I have watched you do it.

SPEAKER_03 8:30

Yes, I did do an ice tank swim. I signed up for this thing called a tough mutter. And if you don't know what that is, it's one of these obstacle courses that you can run. This one was 10 miles long, and some of the obstacles are legitimate, like climbing walls and stuff like that, but some are just gimmicks. For example, you have to run through an electrified shock jungle. You're running. There's a picture of me that you took of me running through wires hang dangling down. You're soaking wet, and about 40% of the wires are electrified. So you're getting shocks as you run through the like, what is that? That has nothing to do with fitness.

SPEAKER_00 9:11

No, I have never been so glad to transition from participant to spectator.

SPEAKER_03 9:16

Yeah, it was just a lot of dumb stuff. I would never do another tough mutter. I would do another obstacle course thing, but one that was more serious. This has just way too many gimmicks. And one of the gimmicks was this thing called this ice tank swim where you you plunge into one side of this tank and it is freaking titanic cold. It is really, it was so cold when you hit the water, you can feel your muscles stopping to work. Like you can feel you wonder like, how do people freeze to death so fast in the ocean in the cold water? It's because what happens is your muscles. So the first thing that happens is your muscles go, I don't think we're gonna do anything anymore. And then the next thing that happens is your brain says, You're dead. That's it. And even though I was only in there for a handful of seconds, because you have to dive under the water and swim under this closed part of the tank and pop out the other side, even though it was not a long time that I was under the water, I could feel those things happening. So by the time I got to the other side and popped out, I was there was a moment where I'm like, so I could just be dead now. Because your brain, I think, you know, people talk about how badly people want to live and how yeah, uh, yeah, maybe. But why does my brain immediately, as soon as it gets cold, say, you know what? Being dead's okay. Why are you don't just give up. Give up. I don't want to do it. And the muscles, too. Muscles are 86, they're doing nothing anyway. So uh, yes, it is intense. It was the most intense thing I did besides the shock jungle.

SPEAKER_00 10:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 10:51

And probably the most unnecessary thing.

SPEAKER_00 10:53

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 10:55

Manufacturers, and this is the one thing about everything. As soon as anyone notices humans doing anything, the manufacturers rush in and try to commercialize it so they can make a ton of dough. Of course. Did I mention it was a four trillion dollar industry? So now people say, Oh, you like cold water? You like jumping in the ocean? Okay, well, let's start selling you things so you can do it right. This happened, and we were talking a few shows ago. Madeline and I were talking about pickleball. Pickleball was this backyard sport that was made up. And now I just saw an ad for pickleball clothes that are super expensive. And it's like, okay, now we have to have outfits to play this stupid game.

SPEAKER_00 11:42

Otherwise, can't play it.

SPEAKER_03 11:44

It's like, no, yeah, because now you get out there, and if you're just wearing like jeans and hiking boots, people are like, oh, you can't play pickleball.

SPEAKER_02 11:52

This is you're at the pickleball court. Don't you have any sense of uh decorum and etiquette? Where's your tea? Where's your crumpet? Where's your jaunty chapeau?

SPEAKER_03 12:02

Like, come on, this is pickleball. There shouldn't be outfits for it. There shouldn't be outfits. The only reason we're all now doing this is because the people selling us junk are telling us if you can't even play a stupid game without spending $500 on some kind of outfit. Come on, that's always happening, and that's what's happened to ice plunging. $5,000 will get you a plug-in tub for cold plunging at home.

SPEAKER_00 12:31

Where wow, you can where do you put that?

SPEAKER_03 12:33

Well, you put it at home somewhere.

SPEAKER_00 12:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:36

Maybe in the kitchen. So you can so you can heat up some warm towels to get into uh boil up some. I don't know. I don't know where it would go. Uh there's something called Blue Cube, makes a mini me cold plunge for home use for 16 grand. 16,000 bucks. It's like you got sixteen thousand bucks lying around, you're buying an ice tub. What? And that's it doesn't stop there. There's a twenty-seven thousand dollar model called the Malibu 56, and that can accommodate multiple plungers at the same time. So now you're inviting people over this family activity. It's a hot tub or a cold plunge. What? No, it's not a hot tub.

SPEAKER_00 13:25

That's the options. You have a hot tub for people andor a cold plunge.

SPEAKER_03 13:30

Well, I don't want to do a cold plunge at somebody's house. Like, why would I want to go over to your house and do a cold plunge? No, I don't want to. I'd rather play pickleball and not wear any kind of outfit. You could also, by the way, since we're just talking about cold water.

SPEAKER_00 13:45

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 13:46

You can just, if you have a bathtub, fill it up, get a couple of sacks of ice and get go to town, get busy, get your lizzo on for like four dollars and eight cents. Or if you don't have a bathtub, you can just run cold water in your shower. You can take cold water showers. A lot of the benefits they say will confer at the temperature of 59 degrees, which feels very cold, but it's not freezing cold, which that ice tank that I swam in was.

SPEAKER_00 14:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:17

That was actual ice cubes. Like it was frozen cold. It was there were like icebergs floating in there. I was like Leonardo DiCaprio hanging on to a wood plank, looking bad. My face was pale, just like I was exactly like him in every way, except without the career or the looks. But I was dying just the same as Leo did, and that's the great equalizer is cold water. That's the only difference. What? Okay, so you can if you don't have a bathtub, you can buy a rubber-made tub, fill that with ice water, sit in it. Apparently, you can take classes and ice bathing, you can go on retreats where they do this. You can get ice rollers for your face and roll ice on your face to help your skin. Some people say when you start with an ice bath, it makes the rest of the day seem a lot easier because it's the hardest thing you'll do all day.

SPEAKER_00 15:21

Yeah, it just sounds still I'm saying no to that.

SPEAKER_03 15:24

Still, nothing is convincing you?

SPEAKER_00 15:26

Nope, not convinced.

SPEAKER_03 15:27

Do you remember Gwyneth Paltrow with the jade egg? Yes. She says her husband takes a is an obsessive cold plunger. And you figure if you're married to Gwyneth Paltrow, you you need to do something. You gotta be into some kind of wellness activity. Because what if that guy was like a just a couch potato Cheeto stained finger? Yeah, McDonald's wrappers, like all up. Yeah, he's DoorDash. Can you order McDonald's from DoorDash?

SPEAKER_00 15:59

I don't know. That's a I don't know if you can even do that. The other Uber Eats, maybe.

SPEAKER_03 16:03

So you're Uber eating your McDonald's, he's got wrappers all over the place. He's got French fries stuck to his like stomach because he's been sleeping on his fries. And like it's a lot of tension in their marriage because she's like, people are expecting, I don't even know if they're married, but the husband, it was described in the article. So so yeah, so there's a lot of tension there because she's selling this goop and she's got this wellness empire, and her husband like never shaves and his hair is always sticking out crazy.

SPEAKER_00 16:32

Right, he's a slug.

SPEAKER_03 16:33

And he's a slug and he's smoking cigars all the time.

SPEAKER_00 16:36

Ideally. Do you know or Paul Malls? Paul Malls would be good.

SPEAKER_03 16:41

So when uh so you I had should have mentioned that you are actually related to me. And when I don't know if you remember this, but when we were kids, I would say I was probably like 11 or 12, I got fascinated with I guess smoking, I'm not sure how it came up. But our mother said, Okay, how would you like to smoke a pipe? And I'm like, I don't know. I never thought about that. So she takes me to a tobacco store and buys me a pipe, not a crack pipe. That came later. No, she bought me a pipe and tobacco, and for a while, I'm like a 12-year-old kid with a pipe smoking, smoking in our house.

SPEAKER_00 17:30

I had totally forgotten about that. I just wonder it was that when she was smoking too, because she was smoking for uh on and off for all through those years.

SPEAKER_03 17:39

Well, she might have been secretly smoking, but she wasn't she wasn't she wasn't outwardly smoking. I have I always I have a theory about why she did it, but do you remember me smoking a pipe?

SPEAKER_00 17:52

I absolutely remember that.

SPEAKER_03 17:53

It's weird seeing a kid smoke a pipe. That's gotta be weird, right? And anyone who wasn't born, I mean that's not that old that probably thinks about like what kind of responsible parent is doing that. Well, I'm not saying they were responsible, but I am saying I was smoking a pipe. And now it would have been nice if it was one of those Sherlock Holmes pipes, because that's even I'm 12 years old, I'm watching cartoons, and I'm smoking a pipe. So I had this pipe, and I my theory was she was saying once he gets understands what smoking is, he'll get over it. And she was right. There was only so long I could smoke a pipe, and also my friends just like, What? What do you why? You're a kid, you have a pipe. Pipes are for old guys with slippers and smoking jackets and beards. What do you think about someone who smokes a pipe? Could you be with a pipe smoker? Could you be like, could you date a pipe smoker?

SPEAKER_00 18:59

I don't know. That's a hard one.

SPEAKER_03 19:03

You always have to keep relighting it.

SPEAKER_00 19:05

I dated a cigar smoker, and I can tell you that was a mistake. That was a huge mistake.

SPEAKER_01 19:13

Hey, honey. I gotta take you for a ride in my car. We'll put the top down, put on a scarf or something. Flicking the ashes on you.

SPEAKER_03 19:25

Everything's blowing around, everything smells like cigars. Now, personally, because our grandfather, you didn't know as well as I did, we used to go to his house and that dude smoked cigars. Sure did. And um, so the smell of cigars to me is one of the great smells. I like it, but I don't like cigars. I've tried smoking cigars and they're not fun to smoke. Yeah, it's a lot of work. But dating a cigar smoker, that's interesting.

SPEAKER_00 19:53

Yeah, you gotta try that out sometime.

SPEAKER_03 19:54

Yeah, I'll date a cigar smoker. I'll put that in my dating profile because I need something, I need something different to attract the kind of people I want. And the kind of people I want would pull out a big stogie and light it up and maybe have a pipe going at the same time. Yeah, bite off, bite the end off, spit it out at me. That's that's in my wheelhouse. That's the kind of people I need to date. And I also need to date people with a gravelly voice.

SPEAKER_01 20:21

Come here, hon. Come here, hon. Yeah, that's better. Put your head on my shoulder. No, no, I've got ashes in your ear. I'm sorry. Pass me that apple pie, the McDonald's apple pie. You remember the apple pie, McDonald's?

SPEAKER_03 20:38

What was that? That was good. We can't get that stuff anymore. I mean, you can go down there. Did they even make the apple pie?

SPEAKER_00 20:45

I actually don't know. I haven't been there.

SPEAKER_03 20:47

I think they got off the pies. They got out of the pie business. None of that food was real, it was delicious, though. Anyway, beach plunging. That's a thing. So, right now, we've known about this. The polar bear people, the ones that jump in the water. They there are people now. I was reading this article, it's called the New York Dippers Club. So these are people around the New York area, and they jump in the cold ocean every day of the year. A group of them get together, jump into freezing water, and jump out. Every day. They don't have they don't skip any days, so it's dead of winter, there's ice and snow out, and they're going out there and they're jumping in cold water, not wearing like protective gear, they just jump in. So you might be thinking to yourself, what are the risks? It's always good to think about that.

SPEAKER_00 21:44

Yeah, I don't know. I always thought heart stopping.

SPEAKER_03 21:48

That's that's number one. Your heart can just say nope.

SPEAKER_00 21:54

Along with your brain.

SPEAKER_03 21:55

Well, your brain is definitely gonna say nope. That's the thing I learned from that ice plunge is that your brain just Gives up immediately. There's no like encouraging words. All these shows, these movies you watch where the person's underwater for like three minutes holding their breath and they have this will to live to get out of the sunken car or whatever. No, the brain doesn't do that. The brain's like, in the lottery of life, you are a loser, sir. Just give up now. Welcome and embrace the drown, because that's what's happening. Hypothermia is another thing. That happens. Uh drowning. People just drown for the reasons I just mentioned. Frostbite. So some people in this New York Dippers Club, like, you know, they their toes are frozen off.

SPEAKER_00 22:37

Lose a toe or a finger. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 22:39

And then then you just snap them off like saltines or pretzel sticks. Big toe gone. So the decrease in core temperature and the immersion in ice constricts blood vessels and slows the flow of blood in the body. So that can be dangerous. Especially if you're at risk for cardiac arrest, stroke. People who have diabetes are especially at risk for being plunged into cold water. So uh don't just do it because Lizzo's doing it. Talk to your doctor and say, Hey, can I jump into really freezing cold water? And is that going to be okay for me? Because you know how they always say, is your heart safe enough for sex? Is that what they say? You have your heart safe enough for sex? Ask your doctor. Also ask your doctor if your heart is safe enough to get into free a frozen tub of ice. Okay, so now you're wondering what's a good how what's my strategy? What should I be doing to do this the right way? Don't spend too much time. Don't spend too much time in the ice bath.

SPEAKER_00 23:46

Yes, get in, get out.

SPEAKER_03 23:49

Yeah, they say uh no longer than 10 or 15 minutes, which to me seems too long. Way too long, maybe a minute, but they say you can kind of work up to it. But people who like just get used to it and sit in there, if you're getting used to it, you're probably having that brain thing. Don't get used to it. Because if there's like a there's just one tick from I'm used to it to I'm dead, body exposure. So they're saying that you get the best result if you immerse your entire body all at once in the ice bath, that gets the best effect of blood vessel constriction. However, you might want to ease into it so you get used to it. So you're put your feet in, then your lower legs, and then as you can, you go in the rest of you. This is like how any I think most people I get into a cold swimming pool. They don't jump in all at once.

SPEAKER_00 24:42

I mean, I don't actually get it, would take me months to get used to something that's actually like that cold. Like I can't even get into an 85 degree pool. Wow, 85 without easing in.

SPEAKER_03 24:56

That's so warm. 85 degrees is so warm you you like need to get out to cool off. The water, like being in that pool at 85 makes you sweat. So if you decide to take an ice bath at home and you do it the old-fashioned way, like just loading up your tub with ice cubes and water, you can do that, but you shouldn't the temperature shouldn't be below 59. If it's below 59, it's too intense. Don't do it. If you're doing it to reduce inflammation after a workout, the sooner you do it the better. If you are paying to be in a cryotherapy chamber, which is basically cold therapy in an office, these sessions aren't cheap. They can cost up to a hundred bucks. Ostensibly, you're doing it under the watchful eye of somebody who knows what they're doing. But these cryotherapy things, I mean, you turn that down a couple of clicks, and what are you, Walt Disney's head? Isn't his head like frozen somewhere?

SPEAKER_00 25:56

I don't know. I've never heard that.

SPEAKER_03 25:59

So don't some people though like get their parts freeze for later?

SPEAKER_00 26:04

Well, they yeah, they can get their everything frozen.

SPEAKER_03 26:07

Because they want to be reanimated? Yeah. Like, I don't see how that's gonna go well for them.

SPEAKER_00 26:11

I mean, they made movies about it.

SPEAKER_03 26:14

I know, but that doesn't make it right. And Walt Disney, okay, so 200 years from now, old Walt gets reanimated, or at least his head, and then what's he what's he up to? What's he gonna do? Play golf? He's gonna like what? Go to a concert? What's he gonna do with his time? He's not gonna know what's going on. Imagine someone living 200 years ago would have been what 1822? Did I do my math right? 1823. I almost did it right. 1823, they come alive now. How are they gonna be? They're gonna get they're gonna die in a bus accident five minutes after they're reanimated. They leave the office, okay, take care uh Count of Monte Cristo, and walks outside, immediately gets run over by a bus because doesn't know about buses. That buses will not stop for you, even if you're out of stop waiting. They just drive by. They will not stop. So if you walk out in front of a bus, they will run you over. And it'd be like, wow, you waited 200 years for this. Seems bad. Seems like a bad thing to do. Short-term use. So that's what I said before. Don't use, but it's not how long you're in the tub, but also don't do it all the time. That's the other thing. Like, people get addicted to these things, so they're always injecting their own blood interface. Don't do it all the time. You should do it once in a while. If you're doing ice baths as part of a daily routine, it's probably a mistake. So people who are doing these new this people in this New York Dippers Club, you people need to like have some days off. They're saying you shouldn't do it every day. Maybe if you're a super, like if you're an athlete or you do a lot of intense exercise, maybe ice baths can be a thing for you, used in a clinical setting, used you know, strategically, but the idea of doing this all the time for some of these benefits which have really not ever been shown to be true, maybe is not the best thing you can do. But my feeling is if you want to try it, start with the tub and the ice cubes. Don't spend twenty-seven thousand dollars on a multi-body plunger. Get your friends over there, like for party mode, and then everybody spends the rest of the night like just shivering. You ever been really cold and you can't get warm again?

SPEAKER_00 28:39

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 28:40

I once was uh on a swim team. Did you know that?

SPEAKER_00 28:44

No.

SPEAKER_03 28:45

So what's going on? On the one hand, my mother's having me smoke a pipe, but then she's also put me on a swim team when she knows I'm not gonna succeed because I've been smoking the pipe. So I got no lung no lung capacity. I got no lung capacity because of the pipe smoking.

SPEAKER_00 29:02

I've been thinking about why people have to go to such extremes because all of these things that you've been talking about, the benefits of cold, those make sense. But like I was kept thinking about Finland and the Finnish who take hot saunas and then go roll around in the snow and then get back in the hot sauna. And that's or take a little walk in the snow. Um and that's just that they've been doing that for for a long, long time. And that's that's how and it is considered healthy, right?

SPEAKER_03 29:34

Right.

SPEAKER_00 29:35

But it's um so why do we have to take it to this crazy extreme?

SPEAKER_03 29:40

Well, yeah, I think part of it is what I was suggesting is that the wellness industry is constantly on the lookout, and when they see something that people have been doing or are doing, or you know, they notice it or or a celebrity does something, they want to capitalize on it and make it a bigger thing so they can make money. There's that force is always in the world, they're always watching us. Uh, that sounds very conspiratorial, and I don't mean it that way, but that that people who are in the business to sell us stuff, to convince us that we need something else, that we're not enough the way we are, are constantly watching for the next thing and they will sell us whatever that next thing is. And they go so hard, it's not just a they never go halfway. It's always like, no, you need to do this. If you really want to have the best skin, if you really want to feel good, if you want to lower your anxiety or you have an anger problem, you need to jump into a $5,000 ice tub. And it's like, maybe not. Like, and that's what that's uh uh last year, sometime during last season, I was talking to Amy and I told her I think I was wigging out because I was really having it was having really hard for me to watch commercials anymore because I just felt like they're just so demanding not of just your attention, but they're constantly telling you that there's something the matter with you. Yeah. Unless you have this, right? Whatever the thing is that they're selling, if you just have this, you'll be happier, you'll feel more successful, you'll feel better about yourself, your relationship will be better. It's constant.

SPEAKER_00 31:21

People will think you're better. Right.

SPEAKER_02 31:24

And I don't mind that.

SPEAKER_03 31:26

If I don't have to pay for it, they can think whatever they want. I want them to think things, but so I just I feel like there's a lot of pressure. And and the most obvious example maybe is just the phone. It's like you always feel insecure about your phone because they're always telling you you don't have the right phone. Like you have but you got this new phone, and this new phone will give you will scratch your back. This new phone will make you a pancake. You know, why you don't have that, you don't have a pancake phone, you don't have pancake making phone. Oh, well, how do you even live and I think yeah, it does.

SPEAKER_00 32:02

It's uh it feels like a lot of pressure. You know, it's kind of the sadness of seeing two people in a restaurant at a table, both looking at their phones and not talking. It's it it's a deep sadness.

SPEAKER_03 32:16

And they don't like their meal because to me that's the real crime. If you get a bad like meatball sandwich. I gotta tell you, it's you think that it would be easy to get a decent meatball sandwich. You know, in Manhattan there's a meatball bar you can go to. I hope it's still open. I haven't been there since the pandemic, but you go up and they're just it's all meatballs all the time. They have all kinds of meatballs. You don't even have to get a sandwich, they'll put it in a freaking cone, they'll slap it in your palm, they'll have you can have it any way you want it. You put it in a sack, take it home, feed it to your dog. I've known a lot of dogs and never have I seen a dog turn down a meatball.

SPEAKER_00 33:04

Ever. That's true.

SPEAKER_03 33:06

What's your take on the wellness industry? You're in the middle of it. You get products, I'm sure. You buy things to make your life more well.

SPEAKER_00 33:16

I I mean I think we all do because we we all want to feel better. Well the thing that I thought when you were first um introducing the topic and um reading that um introduction and talking about a four trillion dollar industry is um I'm wondering if something that m motors that besides the avid marketing is people feel bad. People feel bad all the time now. And there's a lot of reasons like in our country and other countries, right? Where people are not they don't feel good and they want to feel good because that's that's how we that's that's normal, right? It's normal to want to feel good about things and feel good about yourself. And I and I feel like there's a lot more pressures on people, and people are told that, like you said, they're not good enough, but also they don't feel good because um their lives are difficult, or things are too hard, there's the whole pandemic, all of the political um stress and all of the just social stressors that we have created.

SPEAKER_03 34:23

I should have mentioned that you're the roller derby therapist. So you actually deal with people and um their difficulties all the time, but I think you're right, and that's why I said at the beginning like I'm not against if you can afford it and it makes you feel better, you should do it. It as long as it's not hurting you or hurting somebody else, like who cares? Like, and you can afford a $5,000 soap tub and that makes you feel happy every day, then you know that's good. But I also feel that because people don't feel good a lot of the time, that they're told, we're constantly given these messages that if you just do these things, you will fix your life. And those things don't fix anything, and they take our money. And then you're buying like a $500 jar of face cream. Can you do that? Can you buy a $500?

SPEAKER_00 35:14

Oh, yeah, easy. That's supposed to like rejuvenate your yeah, it's supposed to be really much better than the you know, $15 one.

SPEAKER_03 35:21

And it's made with like frogs' legs and and porcupine quills or whatever, and it's like zebra tooth, and then you like try it, and then it's like it's just the same as the like the thing I buy is I just get a can of Crisco out of out of uh Costco because they sell the big cans of Crisco and you just do a dip in there, and you are you are lubricated. Did you know that when I was in high school, I worked at a gas station, and I used to so I was one of the younger guys, but I was constantly uh I was constantly teasing the older guys who worked there. Like I would just all day long be sticking it to them and needling them and pranking them, and one day they had enough of it, and it's a long story, but they eventually caught me, just like at 11 o'clock at night. They caught me, so I couldn't go home. They blocked in my car, I couldn't leave. They grabbed me, they took me into the uh what we used to call the lube bay where they do the oil changes, and they filled my pants with 90 weight, and that's like a very viscous uh grease that they used to use to lubricate cars, and they filled my pants with it. That stuff does not come off very easily.

SPEAKER_00 36:38

Yeah, but you are moisturized forever.

SPEAKER_03 36:41

Forever. Below the waist, I'm butter. The other thing I that's also in my dating profile.

SPEAKER_00 36:51

Oh.

SPEAKER_03 36:52

Which apparently is not a good thing to say. It's not what people want to hear. But it's it is true.

SPEAKER_00 36:58

Um, the other thing that I was thinking about is there's um the wellness industry has been exported to countries that are poorer than the United States, for example. And I'm thinking of particularly there's a town in Mexico called Tulum that is the wellness destination. And lots of you know, their Westerners have moved there to practice their different wellness therapies.

SPEAKER_03 37:28

Well, you mean to sell it to other people?

SPEAKER_00 37:30

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 37:30

So you get people to come there, yes, and yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:33

And then, like I recently heard about in another city in Mexico that's a pretty um desirable location where Americans like to go visit and they like to go live there, and it's um San Miguel del Allende. And there you can go and do these uh retreats for couples where you're in a retreat for like three weeks with a person who's gonna help fix your marriage. And it's really bizarre. Like, why are you have to go to Mexico to do that?

SPEAKER_03 38:06

By the way, if you show up at one of these couples' retreats and you're single, how does that work? Can you say, uh I I don't have any problems, but that's my problem. So can I just hang out with y'all? They probably have like a singles dunk tank. Thank you, Joan, for joining me for this episode and talking about ice plunges. And thank you to everyone for listening. We hope you like what we're doing. And if you do, please share the show. We know that that is the number one way that you can help us grow our status in the kingdom of podcasts. It's a giant kingdom with millions of people doing podcasts. And if you want to help us climb our way up this rung so we can get to the very top of the podcast kingdom, and then when you do that, then you're immediately killed. But on the way, it's a very thrilling ascendance. And if you're willing to help us with that by sharing the show, we appreciate it. We also like hearing from you. You'll also find us on Patreon if you want to support us financially. This costs money to do, and as you notice, we have no advertising, so we are making nothing doing this. We're just here for you, and we do enjoy talking to you each week. And when you reach out to us, that's the best form of payment. So share the show, number one. Number two, if you want to send us some positive words, that is appreciated very much. And we hope you will tune in to another episode because whether you are ice plunging with Lizzo or just someone getting a little kid hooked on pipe smoking, it's important to remember that we all smell like humans. Goodbye, everybody. Pass me that apple pie, the McDonald's apple pie.