Tooth & Claw: True Stories of Animal Attacks

The Two Brothers and the Biscuit Basin Brown Bear Attack + Other Animal News Stories

88 min
Jun 1, 2026about 2 months ago
Listen to Episode
Summary

This news episode covers recent animal attack incidents including a trophy hunter killed by elephants in Gabon, two conservationists fatally attacked while protecting wildlife in South Africa, two grizzly bear maulings near Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks, and various other animal encounters. The hosts discuss bear spray effectiveness, grizzly delisting debates, and broader wildlife safety considerations.

Insights
  • Bear spray remains highly effective despite recent attack incidents; empty cans don't prove ineffectiveness without context of proper deployment
  • Grizzly bear attacks are statistically rare (first Glacier fatality in 30 years) but generate disproportionate media coverage and political pressure for delisting
  • Wildlife professionals who dedicate lives to animal protection sometimes die protecting those same animals, creating poetic but tragic ironies
  • Early season warm weather in California correlates with increased snake activity and human outdoor activity, creating higher bite incident rates
  • Political polarization around wildlife management (delisting debates) obscures nuanced conservation economics where trophy hunting funds anti-poaching efforts
Trends
Increased politicization of wildlife management decisions, particularly around grizzly bear delisting in Montana and WyomingMedia frenzy effect: animal attack reporting creates perception of epidemic (shark summer, snake summer) despite stable or declining incident ratesGrowing recognition of class consciousness around data center development across political spectrum in rural communitiesEarly season wildlife activity driven by climate volatility creating mismatches between human recreation timing and animal behaviorLiability-driven removal of problem wildlife due to lawsuit risk rather than ecological necessityConservation funding models dependent on trophy hunting creating ethical tensions for wildlife professionalsBox jellyfish and marine animal incidents in tropical recreation areas despite known risks and available treatments
Topics
Grizzly Bear Management and Delisting DebatesBear Spray Effectiveness and Wildlife DeterrentsTrophy Hunting Ethics and Conservation FundingWildlife Ranger Safety and Anti-Poaching OperationsRattlesnake Bite Incidents and Seasonal Activity PatternsBox Jellyfish Stings and Marine Animal EncountersMountain Lion Attacks on Domestic AnimalsElephant Behavior and Human-Wildlife ConflictBlack Rhino Protection and Poaching PreventionNational Park Wildlife Management PolicyClimate-Driven Early Season Wildlife ActivityMedia Coverage Bias in Animal Attack ReportingLiability and Legal Risk in Wildlife ManagementWilderness Recreation Risk AssessmentConservation Economics in Africa
Companies
Ollie
Pet food subscription service featured in mid-roll advertisement with fresh recipes developed by chefs and vet nutrit...
Quince
Sustainable fashion and home goods retailer offering high-quality essentials at 50-80% less than luxury brands
Hims
Telehealth platform providing online access to licensed healthcare providers for ED treatment and other health condit...
Smalls
Fresh, human-grade cat food subscription service with 80% animal protein and no fillers or artificial ingredients
People
Wes Larson
Co-host and bear biology expert who provides scientific context for grizzly bear incidents and wildlife management po...
Jeff Larson
Co-host and younger brother of Wes who covers trophy hunting incident and provides wildlife safety perspectives
Mike Smith
Co-host who covers wildlife ranger deaths in South Africa and box jellyfish incident in Fiji
Tom Smith
Wes's mentor cited for research on bear spray effectiveness and candid perspectives on wildlife deterrents
Casey Anderson
Quoted extensively on wilderness philosophy and grizzly bear coexistence; spent more time around grizzlies than most
Ernie Docio
75-year-old millionaire big game hunter killed by female elephants with calves in Gabon while hunting yellow-backed d...
Gary Freeman
65-year-old South African safari guide dedicated to elephant protection, killed by charging elephant while protecting...
Schumann von Yarzfeld
58-year-old South African conservationist tracking black rhino to protect from poachers, gored and killed by the rhino
Anthony Polio
33-year-old from Fort Lauderdale killed by grizzly bear on Mount Brown Overlook Trail in Glacier National Park; first...
Kevin Deal
Homeowner who successfully fought off mountain lion attacking his 95-pound Akita dog Sasha by kicking and yelling
Guy Rowles
30-year-old Australian surfer stung by box jellyfish in Fiji, survived despite severe systemic reactions and returned...
Kyle Rittenhouse
Recently bitten by brown recluse spider; made public statement comparing spider to communists
Angelina Jolie
Purchased 60-acre hunting ground in Cambodia and converted it to wildlife preserve for elephants and tigers
Quotes
"Every one of these situations is tragic, but we also need to ask an honest question. Why were those people here in the first place? Because they wanted to experience something wild."
Casey Anderson~1:45:00
"There's plenty of beautiful mountain places with elk, trails, rivers and scenery that don't have grizzlies. But when you step in a true grizzly country, you feel something different deep in your bones."
Casey Anderson~1:46:00
"If you're using AI for anything, be real careful. Just use it only if you have to, but I would say maybe don't use it at all."
Wes Larson~0:08:00
"This is what he loved to do. So he at least died doing what he loved to do."
Ernie Docio's family~0:25:00
"Bear spray will always work? He's going to be the first to tell you no. But then he's going to say for the vast majority of people, it's by far the best deterrent."
Wes Larson~1:30:00
Full Transcript
Hello everyone, welcome to Tooth and Claw podcast. We have a time magazine named him The Bad Boy of Bear Biology, Wes Larson. I'm his younger brother, Jeff Larson, and then we have Mike Smith with us. He likes us some. Yeah, he's a good boy. Beautiful floral background today, Mike. Thanks. Yeah. In another life I was a floral, what do they call them? Floral ranger? Yeah. A designer, sure. A florist or floral designer, yeah. My aptitude test that I took in college, that was my, I was a hairdresser or floral ranger or really top two career options, yeah. Huh, one of mine said I was supposed to be a cop. Whoa. And I was like, nope, that's actually not true. His questionnaire, it's like, do you like using your power over people unless it's like, yes. Of course. Who doesn't? I follow some floral designers and sometimes like our friend Yesmine, sometimes they make things where it's like breathtaking. Like I'll see someone's, especially when they have the video of them putting it together and it's like, oh, that's so pretty, you know? Stunning. Yeah. So. They need like a British bake off competition show, but for floral rangers I think. They have that. What? That exists. Oh really? Yeah. I follow this account. It's this AI florist design where it's all AI. The flowers are AI. The thing making the AI flowers is AI and it's more breathtaking than even what Wes was talking about. I don't want to follow the hat at all. Yeah. That sounds awesome. That was hard to listen to. There's flowers that don't even exist in real life on there. If you're using AI to arrange flowers, stop. Get help. Like that one Michael Jordan meme. Stop. Get some help. Stop it. Get some help. Yeah. I just say, you know, if you're using AI for anything, be real careful. Just use it only if you have to, but I would say maybe don't use it at all. Even what else is going on? Not much for me. I'm about, I'm going to Yellowstone tomorrow to do a little bit of guidance. I think a couple of listeners on that trip is going to be fine. Watch out for that super volcano. Oh man, Mike. That's my fantasy that it blows up while I'm there. Let's give it a vaporized. Watch out for that super pack of wolves. I love those wolves. Yeah. I will though. That's also a dream to see a super pack of wolves. But yeah, I would love to be there when it blows up. I think that's the best place in the world to be if that thing goes up. It's the super pack of wolves. What are they lobbying the government for at this point? More elk. It's looking awful. Yeah. It's going to be the Yellowstone. Well, this is our news episode. So if you're a news, a new listener, this is an episode where we go over kind of the stuff that's happened in the news for the past five or six weeks, things that maybe weren't big enough to merit a whole episode devoted to them, but that were, you know, interesting and newsworthy and that were sent to us by listeners. So each of us is going to go over a few of those stories. It's going to be fun, guys. Yeah. Are you having it? I'm going to have some categories. All right. Well, do you, do one of you guys want to go first? Mine are kind of, I have, I have like really just one big story this time so I can go whenever. Maybe I'll go in like the middle, but, and then I have a few headlines that I think are fun. Why don't one of you guys go first? I'll go first. Why not? Did you guys hear about this millionaire big game hunter who got killed by elephants in Africa? Yeah. Yeah. So Ernie Docio, he's 75 and he was in a place that I actually had to Google called Gabon or I'm saying that with the weird emphasis, I feel it. Gabon. That's how you say it. Yeah. In Central Africa, right? So I hadn't heard of Gabon before, but it's this country in Africa where he, he's like a trophy hunter. So he was looking for something called yellow backed Duke years. Yeah. Species of antelope. Is it like a blue sheep situation where their backs aren't yellow enough? I'm not totally sure. Let's look it up. Let's look it up. No, it's got a pretty, a pretty yellow back. Cool. Well, something about Gabon is it's pretty heavily forested area of Africa, right? Like there's a lot of brush, there's a lot of trees. It's denser than most Africa, what you like, imagine seeing African wildlife in. And they're walking through this and they come up on a herd of female elephants with calves. So this calves. Yeah. That's what the article said, but that sounds weird to me. Elephant calves. That's right. Elephant babies. Cabs is right. And I was kind of thinking, you know, the newest Jurassic Park movie with like Scarlett Johansson. Yeah. You know where they like are walking through a field and then all of a sudden there's like 15 brontosaurus that just come out of nowhere. Yeah. Like how did you not see those? Like the biggest dinosaur that's ever exist. Right. The biggest giant. Yeah. I was kind of thinking like it almost feel like that's like elephants seem like the hardest animal just to like sneak up on and like not. Yeah, exactly. But like I said, it's dense forest. Humans aren't super tall, you know, so they probably just didn't have a good eye line. Once they came up on this herd, like they were still like fairly far distance away. It was about 150 yards, which you don't want to be that close to a herd of elephants, but it's also not like, oh my God, I'm about to die. This on foot, on foot though, I would definitely kind of be concerned. Right. If I surprise to her develop. So they start backing away as they should. And these elephants are like, no, you're on our turf now. You can't just, you can't step up on us and back off. So they, they charge, they stop, they charge again, they stop, and then they charge all the way, make contact with these hunters and they injure Ernie and another hunter with him, like a brave hunter, drags them out of the way. But then this elephant sees him and she is still enraged, you know, and she gores his her tusk into him killing him. Geez. Yeah. So elephants, like especially like, I don't think these elephants, they're forest elephants, which is more uncommon. And like, I just don't think they come in contact with humans as often and they're just, can be really aggressive animals. Like they know how big they are. They had calves. So these elephants really want to send a message and they ended, they ended up killing Ernie, which is really sad. It's unfortunate. But his family was quoted saying like, this is what he loved to do. So he at least died doing what he loved to do. You know, we've talked about this before, but there's this myth out there that hippos are like the most dangerous animal in Africa outside of crocodiles and snakes, but it's probably elephants. Elephants are probably the mammal in Africa that kills the most people because like you were just saying, Jeff, they're so big that they don't really have much they have to worry about. So they're pretty unafraid and pretty willing to try and, you know, get rid of a threat. And so that's what that's what happened here. And yeah. And I think even worse is like they do still have to be protective because of lions in a lot of these areas, you know. So even though they're so big and unafraid, they still are like defensive because they like do still need to especially protect calves, you know, and people like they have a fear of people now because they are hunted and they, you know, they get into a lot of conflict. And like I was saying, Ernie, this is what he liked to do. You know, he has he's gone out there. He's killed lions. He has like really big elk that he's killed where he's from in California. And he's just kind of like later in life started collecting more and more different types of species of animal in Africa is a really good location for that. And I think it's kind of like what mom says to me and Wes with tattoos. You don't actually like your tattoos because you keep wanting to get more, right? And eventually you're just bragging about how many tattoos you have of all different types rather than just getting local tattoos and appreciating the beauty of your local tattoos. You're needing tattoos from all over the world. So I think that's kind of similar to what happened here. Yeah. I it's interesting. I think that's not a terrible good person. Good theory. I when this happened, there was a lot of people online again that were just like, oh, we got what he deserved. Yada, yada, yada. And I don't I think it's a lot more nuanced than that. And I have a colleague that recently put out a full film on trophy hunting in Africa and how it actually is in a lot of ways in a lot of the countries that it's done. It's a big boon to the economy. It funds a lot of the conservation work. Often, you know, some of the meat is given to local communities. So it is more complicated than just kind of good and evil. I my personal feeling is just like, I think you have to look at your motivations and how you feel when you're hunting. And if you are like killing something out of bloodlust or like collection or whatever, then maybe you're not doing it for the right reasons. But I do think it's kind of wrong to just jump in and say this guy was a bad guy and he's a millionaire, not a billionaire. So we can't say that he's bad just by how much money he has. Yeah, you're a millionaire right, Wes? I am not a millionaire. No. Yeah, I know. And I think where I've changed with that is just like, I just don't want people to be impressed by it anymore. Like I think it shouldn't be impressive that someone has like so many different taxidermied animals from all over the world in their home. Yeah. But that's just a personal opinion. Some people think it's impressive and you know, that's just how I feel about it now. And I do think it's impressive. I think on the flip side too, when people are upset about this kind of thing, it's also like, you know what, this is part of the deal with hunting. Like there's some danger associated with it, especially if you're big game hunting and Africa. That's part of the reason these guys like this is it feels like an adventure and there's danger and that's just kind of something you have to accept. Mike, what are you doing with the spatula? This is my mic set up for today. Sorry. I should have slept with that maybe. I just realized this. Yeah. Okay. Interesting. Mike is holding a spatula with a tiny microphone connected to the end of it. Well, right after this, he's going on a cooking podcast. Yeah. Yeah. What's your best dish if you got invited on one of those? No, I make a mean bacon. No, hold on. Wait, give me a second here. I made a lemon velvet cake. That was real good. Oh my gosh, you guys, everyone's invited over. Come on over. I got something for you. Yeah. Okay. Mike, you want to go next? I do. So this is maybe a pretty good follow up to Jeff's story and I'm going to do a little bit of a double header here for a couple of different reasons just because I wanted to shout out a group of people who are doing some really awesome, albeit dangerous work and also just as a bit of a warning in general, I guess. But I wanted to start with a stat if you'll allow me. Yeah. Allowed. According to the Game Ranger Association of Africa, at least 384 wildlife rangers were killed between 2012 and 2020. And I wanted to talk about a couple that happened just within this past month that are kind of interesting and tragic to me all at once. So this was reported on April 19th. I got most of this information from a People Magazine article. They're doing good work sometimes. They're corroborated by many other sources, but I thought this one just gave the most insight into this person's personal life, which I thought was the most interesting angle of this article. So this is about 65 year old Gary Freeman. I got it mixed up earlier. People magazine's the one that called you bad boy of bear biology. Time was the sexiest bear biologist. Oh no, he was top 10 hottest bear biologist in people magazine. Bear biologist. He was like us. And they had photos of me like drinking a coffee and stuff. Yeah. Do you know what my favorite sexiest man of the year photo is? Is when Harrison Ford won it in like 1999 or something and he was wearing all denim. And he had kind of a goofy little haircut and then earring in. It's just iconic. I love that picture. Man, I love Harrison Ford so much. Not even that. Like even then I was still like, yeah, he's still the sexiest man. I think that's maybe what they were trying to do is prove that even through the doesn't matter. Yeah, the all denim. Yeah, he had like a flat top. Just incredible work. Okay. Anyway, we're talking about 65 year old Gary Freeman. So he was leading a small group of tourists at a Clisiri private nature reserve. I believe that's how you say that Clisiri. And this is in South Africa. And an elephant actually charged out of the bush towards him and his group too. So much like maybe not all the way similar to what Jeff's story was like, but pretty similar here. So he's a very experienced safari tour guide and he dedicated his whole life. Like he spent every waking moment, it seemed, to the protection of elephants. He loved elephants. It was just doing everything he could to make sure that the poachers weren't getting at them, that they were being respected and still had their land to operate in and all that. And he would connect with these tour groups that he led just to the point where like everybody loved him. They were inviting him to weddings, future family gatherings and stuff. They're like, we've known you for a day, but you want, we want you at all these things. Yeah. And he was actually quoted once ominously quoted as saying he would rather be killed by an elephant than ever shoot one. Oh, foreshadowing. The six ton elephant is what the size of this elephant was. Started charging at his group and he stepped in front of it to try to break this charge. He actually, he stayed true to his word. The elephant covered the ground quickly. He never fired a shot and it basically trampled him unimpeded at that point. That's amazing. I like, I don't think I could do that. Even if it was an animal, I loved that much. I think I'd shoot it, you know? I know. Yeah. I was wondering maybe even just like a shot in the air or over the elephant's back or something, but the people in his group said in the investigators afterwards, we're just like, yeah, never the, all the bullets were still in the gun, like nothing, no discharge or anything. So the other people in his group, they tried to usher him to a safe spot so medical assistants could arrive. But by the time they did, he was just pronounced dead on the spot. So there's no real shot at surviving the encounter. So that's part one of what I wanted to talk about. The next one, pretty eerily similar involving a different animal, also reported late April, this time by Outdoor Life. And this one's about 58 year old conservationist Schumann von Yarzfeld. And he was out this in the Samara Karoo Reserve in South Africa. So again, South Africa. And he was tracking a black rhino that he and his private security firm were trying to protect from poachers. And the team knew that they were closing in on it. They had an ankle monitor, a GPS tracker on it. So they knew they were close. So when the black rhino. Show it off, dude. The ankle monitor. How many days do you have left? Joey Chestnut, he's competing this year with the ankle monitor. Is he really? What did he do? He slapped someone at a buck. It's like the most American thing ever. He's wearing an ankle monitor at a hot dog eating contest on 4th of July. Anyway, they knew they were getting close because of this monitor it was wearing. But when it suddenly burst out from the brush, Schumann didn't even have time to react and it actually gored him. Impaled him with one of its horns before retreating back into the reserve. And again, I don't want to have happened with them. Either one. That's the dangerous part, you know. They have two horns, neither of them, of which you want to go through your body. Unless you're trying to get your ear pierced and it goes through your ear lobe. Just perfectly through your ear lobe. Just the very tip. Sure. Just the tip. So again, no shots were fired. The rhino is left unharmed and it just retreated back into the safety of the reserve. And tributes came pouring in from friends and coworkers. And everyone was just like, this dude was awesome. He was such a good guy. He worked tirelessly to protect these animals from poachers. And he was really, really good at doing it. So it's just one of those really tragic ironies where two men who lived their lives in service of these animals were killed by the animals. And I think I don't want to put words in the mouths of the dead, but maybe in some kind of way there's a beauty in that. Kind of like. It's kind of poetic. A little bit. But I just thought that these articles said something very, one of them said something poignant by the end where it was like, this is largely thankless and often dangerous work that these anti poachers and security firms are doing down there. It's like not the most financially rewarding job. And it's dangerous on both sides, the animals and honestly like armed poachers, you know, they get in shootouts and armed conflicts with these people. So it's just a scary situation to be in, but doing it for a good cause. So I thought it was worth a moment to shout out the good work that they're doing. For sure. Yeah, that sucks. I hope that rhino gets poached now. Don't say that. I do not. My dog, Shanks is the cutest dog in the entire world. Also he's a better bear biologist than Wes and he's a better producer than Mike. But really at this point he feels like family to me and that's why I try to give him the best food possible. All these fresh recipes are developed by real chefs and backed by vet nutritionists. They're obsessed with making the best meals with the highest quality ingredients. From the moment you start your subscription, everything is tailored to your pup. The meals are perfectly portioned and you get a pup tainer and scoop for easy storing and serving, which I use every time. And let me tell you, their customer service has really helped me figure out exactly what to get Shanks. On his old non-Auli food, he would get diarrhea a lot. He doesn't get diarrhea anymore and that makes my life a lot easier. They also have health check-ins, which has been really nice. They recommended some hip and joint bites for Shanks because he is a tripod. But anyways, I love that Ollie is obsessed like I am with making Shanks the healthiest dog possible. Get ready for both you and your pup to be obsessed. Head to auli.com slash tooth. Tell them all about your dog and use code TOOTH to get 70% off your welcome kit when you subscribe today. Plus, they offer an obsession guarantee. If you're not completely obsessed, you'll get your money back. That's O-L-L-I-E dot com slash tooth and enter code TOOTH to get 70% off your first box. Ollie, feed the obsession. Alright, are we ready for mine? I guess. So, yeah, they are kind of both a little heavy and a little bit of this is going to be a little repetitive, but we're going to have to talk about it. So there's been a lot of news about Grizzlies in the recent news and a lot of kind of fear mongering too, which is something that hasn't really happened in a bit for Grizzlies. It's a little discouraging to see, but I want to talk first about the two incidents that have led to this fear mongering and then we're going to go into it a little bit. We're going to go into bear spray a little bit because there's been a lot of chatter about bear spray as well. But first, let's talk about the incidents. So on May 4th, two brothers were hiking near the Mystic Fall trails by Biscuit Basin in Yellowstone National Park. They were attacked by what was most likely a female grizzly bear with cubs. I saw in some places one of the brothers was reported as 14 and other places he was reported as 15 and the other one was 26. Where did this happen? This was near Biscuit Basin on the Mystic Falls trail. That sounds so much like a candy land, like you know when you're playing the board game. It's like the starting zone is Biscuit Bay. Yellowstone has some great names for their different like, uh, so the river. Yeah, the different like geyser basins and stuff. Okay. Anyway, these two victims were found by a tourist from Maryland. This tourist was hiking on the same trail and they'd seen grizzly tracks on the trail. Then they stumbled on a bloody hat and a bloody watch and then they heard one of the brothers calling for help. Even a watch like on the ground is kind of like watches are really fastened to you. Yeah, like if you know that's a watch got torn off. Yeah, something bad happened. Yeah, a hat could just be like, oh, someone dropped a hat. A hat can fall off pretty easy. Yeah, but if it's covered in blood, you kind of are like, this probably didn't just fall off. Anyway, at first he thought it was a prank. This person calling for help, but when he got a better look at the victim, he knew that it was really serious. He called for help and then he stayed with this victim, put a t-shirt over him and an effort to help keep him warm. A helicopter arrived and it took both of the brothers to a hospital in Idaho where they, at last I could see they're both still listed as being critical and serious condition. The park has been really tight lipped about this encounter, this attack. For me, that makes me think that it was very serious, that these two got torn up really badly. I've heard some things that have kind of trickled out and it does sound like a very intense, serious mauling. The entire area was closed to hikers and visitors until recently those restrictions were lifted. Jeff, our family was hiking right in that area a couple days ago when they sent photos as like, oh you were right by where those guys got mauled. I think the park probably has a pretty good idea of which bear was responsible, but I also think they probably aren't going to try and remove her or take her cubs or anything because this feels like cub defense and something that's well within her natural behavior. It's definitely like an elevated response to a threat. This isn't usually what you expect, especially of Yellowstone bears that are somewhat habituated to people, but still within her natural behavior. I don't think they'll be killing her, but you know, TBD on that. They haven't released yet whether or not bear spray was used, but speaking of that, a day earlier that same week, a hiker disappeared while hiking the Mount Brown Overlook Trail in the Lake McDonald area of Glacier National Park. Mike Mount Brown, that's like your favorite mountain ever. McDonald's too. On May 6th, a few days later, search and rescue found human remains about 50 feet from the trail in a densely forested patch of timber. The body was identified as that of missing hiker Anthony Polio, who was 33 and lived in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Again it's thought that it was most likely a female with cubs that was involved in this attack, and on this one they did find a fully emptied can of bear spray near the victim. Once again the entire area was closed to visitors. I'm guessing it's been reopened by now, but I'm not totally sure. This is actually the first fatality in Glacier National Park since 1998, so the first one in about 30 years. Even though people are getting pretty up in arms about this stuff, just put that in context. It has been a while since something like this has happened. So we're going to have a little discussion. Apart from the obvious tragedy to these victims and their families, a big downside to these incidents happening so close to each other in the same week is that it's led to a lot of wind in the sails of people that think Grizzlies both need to be delisted in the lower 48, and then people that think bear spray doesn't work. So let's talk about that second one first, and then we'll talk about the first one. I think we do here on Tooth and Claw need to do a slightly better job about how we talk about bear spray. And the main thing I think we need to correct just a little bit is to make sure that people understand that this is not a perfect deterrent. There are situations where it doesn't work. It should make you feel a lot more confident when you're in Grizzly Country, but ultimately you're still taking a risk if you recreate around Grizzlies. If you have bear spray, if you have a machine gun, if you have grenades, it doesn't matter what your deterrent is. You're still taking a risk. There's always the chance that your deterrent won't work. You know Jake Jilin Hall in the movie Bubble Boy? Yeah, a big old bubble. That suit he makes where he can go outside? We've talked about the guy that made the bear suit. Troy, it didn't work for you. The risk would be lower in a bear suit or with a good deterrent like bear spray, but there's still a risk. That's just part of recreating around Grizzly Bears. But since these attacks, there's been people that have written these big essays that have gotten a lot of attention, unfortunately, because I think they're irresponsible about how bear spray doesn't actually work. They do a lot of cherry picking when it comes to science and quotes. They say it doesn't work. Just like blanket statement. Or they say that it works like a third of the time, which is grossly wrong. And they're picking a lot of this stuff from Tom Smith, my mentor, because Tom is very candid about how he feels and sometimes his quotes get misrepresented. If you were to ask Tom today, if bear spray will always work, he's going to be the first to tell you no. But then he's going to say for the vast majority of people, it's by far the best deterrent due to its ease of use and the margin for error that it allows. This is a product that you don't have to be perfect with for it to still work effectively. And then the best part about it, and the thing that Tom for sure would say, is that you're not killing the bear. This bear is probably just acting naturally, responding to a threat, and it gets to leave the encounter as well. So the thing about this glacier one is people are saying that this can of spray was empty, and that means that it didn't work. But no one was with this guy. We don't know what happened. There's so many things that could have happened that we don't know. He could have been attacked and sprayed the can wildly up in the air or something. We just don't know. So an empty can and a dead body doesn't tell us if it was used properly, and it's wrong to assume that it just didn't work. A little disclaimer, if you were going into grizzly country, you should use the deterrent that you feel most comfortable with. If you think that's a gun, I would do a bit of soul searching and make sure that's not just like a power trip or an ego thing, because guns do give you that feeling. When you pick up a gun, it makes you feel powerful. And I understand that. And I have pretty good with guns. That's why I didn't want to be a cop. Yeah. Jeff, you're our gun guy. You're pretty good with guns. I'm pretty good with guns. What would you go to in a bear encounter first? If you had a gun on your hip. Probably bazooka. Yeah. Okay. If you had a gun on your hip and a can of bear spray, which one are you grabbing first? No, I don't honestly think it would even be a decision. I think I would just grab the bear spray. I think I'd forget about the gun. Gun would be more of a last gas type thing where in the movies, the bear forgets that I have a gun and right before he gives us like speech before he kills me, I pulled out from Hunter me. Yeah. Yeah. That's exactly what I was thinking too. No, but I was thinking similarly when I carried a gun in Yellowstone to like kind of high pressure situations, it was for if I was being mauled, I would use that gun, but not just like in my first line of defense. That being said, the most important thing if you're recreating a grizzly bear country is to have a plan. Get in a group whenever possible, make noise, carry deterrent, know how to use it and just be smart. Pay attention to your surroundings. Don't take any chances that you need to take that you don't need to take. Like we talked about this last week with Ravens. If you're walking and you see a carcass and there's a bunch of Ravens around, don't go explore it. You know, just be smart in grizzly bear country. That's the most important thing. Grizzlies would be having a good deterrent. That's the thing I have the hardest time with. Intelligence. Yeah. Being smart. Yeah. All right. So quickly I want to talk about the people, including the governor of Montana, who are saying that these attacks just go to show that grizzlies need to be delisted and that there's too many bears. And I'm not surprised our governor thinks that. He's a multimillionaire from New Jersey. No, it's Gianforte. He's not from Montana. Personally, I think having a healthy population of grizzly bears on the landscape is what makes Montana special. That feeling of wilderness is what brings people to Western Montana to begin with. And a big part of that feeling comes from having grizzly bears around. If that doesn't appeal to you, maybe Montana isn't for you. You know, maybe there's plenty of beautiful places that kind of look like Montana, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico that don't have grizzly bears. They don't have big predators that you really need to worry about. But you know, lions make places in Africa feel wild. Tigers make India feel special. Great whites give the ocean this kind of beautiful sacred feeling. And grizzly bears are important to the overall spirit of places like Montana. Now I want to read a quote from a colleague of mine, Casey Anderson, who has spent probably. Wait, Mike, are you raising your hand on purpose? Oh, yeah. I was just waiting for Wes to call on me. No, no. Mike, go first before I read this quote. Yeah, I'll lower my hand real quick. Yeah, OK. Sorry. So what does it behoove people like the governor or whoever this guy is? Like, why do people want them delisted? What does that what benefit does that serve people in their position? Just like everything, it's been highly politicized now. And they want to be able to hunt grizzly bears. Like it's part of it's a hunting thing, then it's a hunting thing. And it's like a predator control thing. It's part like ranchers and stuff that don't want to have to deal with grizzly bears. And it's part hunters that want to be able to kill them. And it is politicized, unfortunately. And I think that's the reason why so many bear biologists, including myself, are really hesitant to push for delisting, even though we have these really now healthy populations of grizzly bears in the Greater Yellowstone and the Northern Continental Divide. It's so politicized right now that if they're delisted, we're worried that it's going to be the same kind of view toward wolves, where they're just going to like allow people to kill 20 grizzly bears or, you know, whatever they they decide to do. So that's why there's so much hesitance among the scientific community to push for delisting right now is the political environment. Gotcha. OK, so Casey Anderson is he's not a bear biologist, but he has probably spent more time around grizzly bears than anyone I know. And he recently had a really good quote about the pushback on these attacks. And I did just want to read a verbatim because I think it's really beautiful and it really sums up how I feel. You can find him on Instagram at grizzly guy. Anyway, this is what he says. He had their name first, Grizz kid or grizzly guy? I had mine first. Yeah. Yeah. The prophecy for being the bigger man. He's a good guy. All right. So he's talking about these recent attacks. He says every one of these situations is tragic, but we also need to ask an honest question. Why were those people here in the first place? Because they wanted to experience something wild, Montana, Yellowstone, Glacier, these places still hold something rare in the modern world. And part of the reason they feel different is because grizzly bears still exist here. They remind us that this land is not fully tamed, that nature still has teeth, that we are visitors, not controllers. There are plenty of beautiful mountain places with elk, trails, rivers and scenery that don't have grizzlies. But when you step in a true grizzly country, you feel something different deep in your bones. You feel alert, humble, alive. And there are a lot of people right now trying to dilute that wilderness. Let's stop trying to tame the West. Let's honor it for what it is, including its danger, because that danger, that uncertainty, that ruggedness, that is part of what makes these places special. It's part of what regulates them to. Not every place is supposed to feel like a city park with a parking lot every hundred yards and zero risk. And the truth is, if grizzly bears disappeared tomorrow, the next complaint wouldn't stop. It'd become too many people at trailheads. Wildness itself is what limits saturation. Some people choose easier places, some choose wilder ones. That balances natural too. Not every landscape is supposed to be comfortable. Some places are supposed to remain truly wild. And I agree with that. Like full, you know, I put my full support behind that. We live in a world where you get to pick your poison when it comes to how you recreate outside. If you decide to share space with grizzly bears, you need to like prepare for the eventualities that come with that, the risks that come with that, and you need to have a plan and be properly prepared. So just one last thought before we go to our next one. This push for delisting is so the states can hunt and manage grizzly bear population numbers. Both of these attacks happened in national parks. So even if delisting happened, there would still be like parks aren't managed by hunting and stuff. So these incidents still would have happened. It makes that whole argument counterintuitive. National parks. Yeah, exactly. Maybe that's the real problem. Start allowing hunting in national parks. It's just counterintuitive. It's sad. It's sad. It's always sad. All of our stories so far. But you know, it's just too bad, but like. You know, that's what's part of what makes having wild things beautiful. The world more exciting to have wildlife that can be dangerous, you know. Yeah. All right. Who wants to go next? Other. I think Jeff better. Is the name grizzly boy you taking? Grizz boy? Probably. I feel like everything's taken at this point. Grizz baby. Yeah. Grizz dude. I'm the grizzly dude. Boy. Yeah. Grizz boys taken shoot. Yeah. I'll go. I'll go with this one. Let's get out of the death for a second. Yeah. OK. Grizz baby might be might be available if anyone wants. Jeff, it's all yours. Wes. Yeah. You remember. So you're a bear expert, but you're also a bit of a celebrity expert. Like, you know, a lot of pop culture facts and yeah, I have trivia. I like two things stick in my brain really well, and that's animal facts and like movie facts. So sure. Yeah. So hopefully you remember. You remember Will Smith when he slapped Chris Rock at the Oscars. I watched that live. Yeah. What what would have happened if no one stopped him and he is allowed to continue slapping? I don't think anyone did stop him, but I think he would have just kept slapping him based on what you're trying to to get. And Chris would have eventually died. Died. Yeah. Yeah. If he got slapped for too long without sure, like a few hours of slaps. Yeah. Right. Well, Wes, similarly, there was someone named Kevin Deal and had he not stopped an attack by a mountain lion on his seven year old Akita dog named Sasha, Sasha would have died. Yeah, I think that is that's exactly the analogy I would have made too. So deal was upstairs and I can only assume he was watching the game show. Let's make a deal because of his name. And he says he heard a scream that could have only been a dog that was under attack. Right. Mm hmm. It is a piercing scream. Yeah, that's what you said. It's his quote. Not mine. Oh, interesting. You don't think dogs can scream just bark? I would have used just, yeah, that word, bark, but no. Yeah. Howl. Sure. That's fine. I don't want to. Yeah, this is his story to tell. Yeah, I think if a dog's getting attacked by a mountain lion, I don't know what noise that is, but it's not a bark. Just the mountain lion could scream. Is that more of a screamer? Yeah, they scream. Kevin runs downstairs. He runs outside and he opens the door and he's face to face with a large mountain lion that's pinning his 95 pound dog to the ground. The dog has like zero control. It's like one of the what read what am I trying to say? It's like one of the UFC fighters who just like tries to get someone on the ground and hold them there for all five minutes, you know? Submission, right? Yeah. Yeah, the dog just can't move at all. OK. And Kevin says its arms are wrapped around the dog's waist, a rounder belly and Sausers head was in the mouth of the mountain lion when he walked out. Oh, check engine. Right. So he starts yelling and kicking the mountain lion, saying, like, get the F out of here is what he said to it. You know, verbatim. I think you can go ahead and use the full F word there. I'm in his shoes, but I don't want to nitpick. He successfully gets rid of this mountain lion with a really hard kick and saying, get the F out of here. Yeah. Well, now, real interesting part of this is there's a picture of Sasha's head after the attack. Sasha got pretty, you know, beat up. And one of the mountain lion's teeth was like stuck in the skull of the dog. What? Yeah, it's like a pretty big tooth. It's a cool little souvenir, though. Right. So I saw pictures. You know, it looks like Sasha is going to be just fine. Good. And probably have some battle scars now, but. Yeah, kind of crazy. Yeah. Got to admit, that's kind of crazy. Why is that? It's kind of crazy. Yeah. You all have heard me sing praises about my cat on the show a lot. I think Toad is the perfect pet. I just absolutely love having a cat. And that's something I never would have expected. I'm allergic to him. I just never thought I would like a cat so much, but I really, really love having a cat. And for that reason, it's important to me that I give him the best possible food. And Smalls is fresh, human grade cat food that does so much more than just feed your cat. It helps them live a full, healthy life. Most cat food out there is made with meat by products, cheap fillers and artificial ingredients. Basically stuff that isn't great for your cat. Smalls is different. Their fresh recipes are made with at least 80% animal protein, and they're gently cooked to retain all their nutrients and flavor. They never had fillers or artificial ingredients and their food is so healthy. The 88% of cat parents say that after feeding Smalls, their cats have better digestion, a softer and shinier coat and more energy to play because it's actually good for cats. Your cat's health and longevity starts with what they eat. Try Smalls and get 60% off your cat's first order plus free shipping and free treats for life when you go to Smalls.com. One last time that's 60% off your first order plus free shipping and free treats for life when you head to Smalls.com. Slash tooth. Mike. Yeah, I got you, Wes. So this is a real interesting one. I thought this was pretty fun. Spoiler alert, no one dies. I wouldn't say it's fun if someone died, I promise. Yeah, I'm done with ones where people died too. Yeah, unless it's someone I knew and hated. And there's only one of those people in the world. Nolan, if you ever die by an animal, I'm going to call it fun. I hope he listens. OK, so this was reported on April 22nd by Surfer Magazine. And this concerns one 30 year old Sydney native Guy Rowles. His name is Guy. Love that name. It's a great name for a guy. Or a gal. Sure, that's confusing. Right. It's a great name for a guy. It is his name. Yeah, it's quite literally. Right. Guy was out on a surf trip with his dad down in Fiji. They went to a famous surf spot called Cloudbreak. Maybe the surfers out there will be familiar with that. I've heard of that one, actually. It's like one of the ones that's like way out in the ocean, but it's like a perfect. Yeah, there's just perfect sets and beautiful waves out there. That's actually a pretty important factor in the story, Wes. So good job. Thanks. He's contributing with good things like that. Good interjections. Jeff, he can try. OK, so 30 minutes into their first day out in the water, he suddenly feels this zap on his arm like an electric shock almost. I mean, look down. He saw several long tentacles wrapped around his arm. You would you might think with the way that was worded. That was one of those unhelpful interjections, Jeff, but keep trying. It's lightning. He looked really fast. And then he heard the thunder immediately since it was so close. OK. So instinctively, you know, you just try to rub, brush whatever's on your arm if it's causing you harm. And that's what he did, just instinctively try to brush it off. And he said as soon as it did, it felt like he had poured hot boiling oil all over his whole body. Wes, you probably know, Jeff, you could probably even guess what we're talking about here. I know what it is. Yeah. So he paddled over to his guide who immediately identified it as box jellyfish, box jelly, box jellyfish sting. And he rushed guy back to the boat and they set out for the nearest hospital as quick as they could. And West, like you said, they're pretty good ways away from land at this point. So 40 minutes at the very fastest just to reach land. And then probably another 20 minutes there from there to get to any meaningful care. So we know from box jellyfish stings, we've done stories on this before. Things are looking pretty grim for a guy here. Yeah, it sucks, too, because I don't I think it stays like intense, that entire boat ride, right? Like even like if a shark bites your leg off, I feel like you get waves of pain and stuff. And this one, I feel like you just stay on. It gets worse and worse. And that that's like the the baseline for these are like terrible pain, like you're going to get that almost no matter what. But then you can also have like systemic reactions where organs and stuff start shutting down and breathing is difficult. So yeah, there's a lot that can happen. Usually when stings have this much coverage area on even just an extremity like an arm, it can be a death sentence, like pretty quickly it can lead within minutes to death. And sure enough, his guy was riding back on the boat. He started he said he felt like he was breathing through a straw at first. He started convulsing and sweating profusely. His heart was beating out of control. All the while his arm just felt like it was on fire, you know. So once they reached land and got connection, guy called his mom, told her that he loved her and then was admitted to the hospital. And the doctors just went pale when they had heard what had happened. Probably were shocked that he was even still alive with like how bad a shape his arm was in, like sting marks all coiled around his whole arm. And he was actually Googling while he was being admitted to the hospital, like what is the prognosis here? What should I do? What do we do? And it's like you should probably be dead is what he learned. And he was just like freaking out. And he was like, dad, am I going to die? Dad, like what's happening? And the dad just was so clutched. The whole experience stayed right by his side, kept him calm. It was like, you'll be all right. You'll get through this. You'll be all right. You'll get through this kind of just repeating a mantra almost just to keep him calm and give him hope, you know. This was an interesting part of the story. So guys, dad was just like pleading with the doctors to administer anti venom. And the doctor at this point said it's too late for that to even be effective. So all we can really do is douse his arm in vinegar and load him up with some morphine and just hope for the best. I was under the impression that like no matter when anti-venom would probably be helpful, but I guess these doctors, I mean, obviously they know better than me, but. Yeah, I, you know, with snakes, I think that might be the case. But with with box jellies, I do think it has to be like pretty quick because I think it affects like the tissue. And if it's already like entered into like the lymphatic system or the blood or whatever box jellies do, I don't think it really works that well anymore, but I'm not sure. Yeah. Well, that's what that's what Guy was quoted to saying in the article that the doctors told him. So apparently that's just what they thought was best was just to get him all loaded up on morphine. His dad again, right by his side. It was kind of like a trip sitter when you're having a bad trip. You're like, this is going to pass. You'll be OK. It's just really nice to have someone there to like keep you anchored to reality kind of. Yeah. And that's that's what he'd said. His dad was for him. He wouldn't have made it without both the doctors. And he just he said the people of Fiji were so amazing. And the doctors, of course, were life saving and that he's going to keep going back there for the rest of his life. But where are the doctors life saving? They sound like they just give him morphine. Yeah. But if they I mean, I think the thing with these two is if you get to the hospital in time, that's the biggest thing because then the doctors can treat any like systems that are failing, you know, so if like he suddenly has like trouble respirating, they can put him on a respirator. If you know, if whatever happens, they can treat that thing. So I think it's fair to say the doctors help save his life. Yeah, I'm not trying to be funny, even. I'm just like they couldn't even give him the anti venom anymore. So it's like, yeah, I was wondering like you might be technically right. But I do also think the vinegar that they put on his arm, that's that'll get the rest of the whatever the stingers, the barbs will come out and release anything that's remaining from the jellyfish will be shed off because of the vinegar. So maybe there was a life saving component there. Either way, he was just incredibly grateful. And shockingly, he was actually back in the water the next day. That's right back out there. And he's like a little anxious, but he was like, this is my happy place. This is where I feel safe, like even despite what just happened, nothing will ever keep me out of the water. So the very next day he was back out surfing with his dad, which I thought was pretty incredible. That's always so admirable. Like I can't just loving something that much and having it be that important to you where that trauma doesn't ruin it. That's pretty impressive. Cool. All right, I got a couple short ones. I have a question with that real quick. So like in a perfect, perfect scenario, once the jellyfish was on his arm, should he have done anything differently? Because I know you're not supposed to swipe it off. That's where you got all the pain. Yeah. But would the jellyfish like detach itself eventually? Like what do you even do? Yeah, I think I think you want to like get the jellyfish off as carefully as possible. Like you could just grab it and pull it off. You don't want to like you were just saying you don't want to rub where it stung you because often those those barbs are still attached and they can continue to inject venom when you rub. And so that is hard as it might be. You don't want to do that. Like it's almost like when you get stabbed with a knife, like you don't pull the knife out type of thing. Like just you do want to take the jellyfish off, but you don't want to like rub it off necessarily, you know. But isn't it kind of hard to take it jellyfish off your arm? So if you in the unlikely scenario, or maybe likely if you take the moral of the story to heart, if you do have vinegar close at hand that for whatever reason, there's an agent in vinegar that makes jellyfish release along with their barbs that just cleans them off, I guess. So yeah, that's I guess best case scenario. You just have some in your swim trunks, a bottle of vinegar or you're surfing in the spring for surfers. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Vinegar surf spot. And then some guy would write an article. It's like, no, it doesn't work. Doesn't work. Not effective. For jellyfish. To get them off your arm. Here's why I use my gun when I surf. All right, I got a pretty annoying one, a Punch the Monkey update. So two two US nationals were arrested after one of them jumped into the enclosure, a punch, punch the monkey at the Japanese Zoo while the other one filmed. One of the men was a 24 year old college student. He was the one that actually jumped into the enclosure. The other was a 27 year old singer. They denied the allegations, even though they were like filming it. They jumped in 4K. Yeah, other people filmed it as well. And the person that jumped in was wearing a costume, carrying a stuffed toy, jumping over the fence. And the costume was promoting a cryptocurrency. So they're being held by police. I think they should be executed. I am all for that. This sounds like, you know, I just think these are people that probably should be removed, kind of like how we remove bears that give all the other bears a bad name. We probably should just remove these two people that are giving all other Americans a really bad name. So. Yeah, it's interesting because it's honestly, like at the heart of it, it's pretty harmless. Like I even saw the video and like all the monkeys just kind of moved away from them. And then the workers took them out of the enclosure. But then it's just like. I don't care what happened. Like, I don't care if they get life in prison. And I know just once I once I heard it was to promote a cryptocurrency. I was like, OK, whatever, throw the book at him. Yeah. All right. I had another punch doing, by the way. I think punches doing OK. There wasn't much info in this about punch himself. But that's what always happens with bullies like Wes, Mike. What? You get you hear about it once and you're like, oh, this that's so sad. He's getting bullied. And then you never you just assume they stop bullying. Wait, am I a bully now? I can't. I have. I don't. Yeah, I raised this. So it's OK. OK, but I would assume he's still getting bullied. Yeah. Well, I'm just going to do it. I'm going to hit West with a do better, I guess. And I'll do better. Better. OK. All right. So another quick one here in Bremerton, Washington, where MXPX is from, if you're a pop punk fan. There's a family that's going to get a three hundred and fifty thousand dollar settlement. And can you guys guess why it's animal related? I doubt you can. Oh, I'll tell you why, because you're not going to get it. Their child was attacked by an otter at a marina and pulled underwater by this river otter, bitten up pretty badly, and they ended up suing this marina and the state because they didn't put up the proper warnings and whatnot. And they knew this otter was there and was being pretty aggressive. So they're going to win a three hundred and fifty thousand dollar settlement. The reason I want to include this one is because we talk about this sometimes on the podcast, like why problem bears and stuff have to be removed sometimes. And part of it is because we are in such a country where you can sue for just about anything. And there's a liability with leaving those animals. And this is a good example of that. So. Had they done a better job with signage and stuff, they probably wouldn't have lost this court case. But yeah, that's that's kind of the world that we live in, unfortunately. But this kid did get pretty bit not, but apparently. All right. So as we said, last news episode, I think Wes said this, but. The year twenty twenty six is the summer of the snake. Right. I didn't say that. But yeah, there were some. We did talk about rattlesnake bites. Yeah. So another death happened. It's the third death in California this year. This one happened a little bit more north. There was in a rural area in Redwood Valley out in California. And this was a 70 year old or 78 year old lady who was just hiking in the Redwoods, you know, beautiful day, such a beautiful part of the country. And she's bitten three times by rattlesnake on her hike, which, you know, normally I feel like it's just one bite and this one got her three times. Which is three different times or was it all one snake? It was all one snake. It was all one snake, three bites from one snake. Yeah. Right. That would have been crazy. So she was taken by family to the hospital. And according to their sheriff's office out there, she says come to her injury after two days in the hospital. And, you know, I don't want to make any assumptions, but I hope they gave her enough anti-venom because we have seen and had even someone on who's like, is like, I really had to fight to get more anti-venom. But yeah, third person killed by a rattlesnake in California this year. And if you guys listeners, I'm going to have some euphoria spoilers. So skip ahead if you don't want that spoiled. But honestly, might even have a fourth death by rattlesnake in California this year because Nate Jacobs was killed by one in the show before. In a pretty bad way, too. And really bad way. But also, like, I thought it was like really egregious. The they had like a rattlesnake up on top. And then in the coffin, they just have a gigantic python on top of the actor, Jacob Alorty. And then they just like CGI to rattlesnake tail onto this python. So I went to Twitter, like, looking for people to be like, look at this and not a single peep. So then I felt responsible to make a tweet about it. And I was like, this is going to pop off. And then I was like, actually, it probably won't. And I never tweeted about it. Yeah. No. But it was disappointing to me because it kind of took me out of what I think would have been like just so much scary or had I like not been so focused on there. Just. Yeah. It's a shame to my world. That this is how I felt pretty much my whole life watching movies and stuff. There are there's a lot of articles now that are saying, you know, what's going on in California, what's happening with our snakes? Kind of like Jeff just said, like some are the snake. And there's the one reason that I've been seeing over and over again is just a really early season warm up might be responsible for these bites. And we talked about this last news episode that things got real warm, real quick in California this year, and that might have caused first, you know, snakes to be active a little bit earlier than normal. But I think the other part of that, the other side of that equation is it caused people to be active, normal or earlier than normal to like it was really warm and nice out early in the year. So you had more people out and more snakes out. So I think that's part of the reason, but I also think it might just be just kind of a fluke that this many people are being bitten. And because of it, they're reporting on it. You know, it's become kind of like that whole thing with the sharks, where once those stories kind of start getting some traction, then other news agencies are going to report on them too. And it becomes a bit of a frenzy. I also saw the heavy rains and then it dried up. So like the rain kind of drove them out of the grounds a bit more. But I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Stay safe out there, hike around California. Or wherever. Yeah. That's true. Is that all you got, Jeff? Yes. I got one more. Apparently, I thought this was pretty important to bring up since we just did an episode about them. But Kyle Rittenhouse got bit by a brown recluse. Yeah. Recently. No way. You see that? Yeah. And he said the Communist didn't get me, neither will this spider. So comparing the brown recluse to Communist and the article. Well, the article was unclear, but he didn't. It didn't say whether he shot the spider or not. Yeah. He probably tried to. So Communist couldn't get him, dude. All right. I have a quick correction. I kept saying Brodis instead of Brodis for the town in Montana last week. And I really should have gotten that one right because we have family that lives in Brodis. But I just kind of got in my own head about it. So sorry. All right. Should we move on to our categories? Bro, this is a bear. Brodis. Bra. Yeah, that works either way. Brodis. Brodis bear is a mall in me. This episode is brought to you by Quince. Summer always changes how I get dressed. I want pieces that feel lighter and more breathable. Things that are easy, but still put together. That's why I keep coming back to Quince. They focus on high quality essentials that feel and look amazing. Think breathable linen and soft, organic cotton. Well made basics, but without the luxury markup. It's that rare balance where everything feels elevated, but still effortless. Let me tell you, I've been wearing these pants. 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You know, I think Chet Hanks did the white boy summer. Yeah. And then there's always like a summer of the shark. Charlie X. Brat summer. Brat summer. Yeah. Yeah. There's summer of the snake, but we're each going to do our own summer of the what? I'm going to say French summer. This is French summer. I think they got a chance of having Winby win NBA championship and they have a really good chance of winning the FIFA World Cup, which is kind of like the two most universal sports is basketball and soccer. And like if France wins at both of those, it's kind of like that's saying something, you know? Yeah. And then French fries never been bigger than right now. Yeah. Yeah. I just had a French dip. Yeah. Oh, my God. I had a French dip sub for the first time in a while. Wes, you got it. And that was so good. So some of the French. I like it. I kissing is probably the best kind of kissing. I mean, hmm, it depends, I think, on how good. Yeah, I'll rethink that. Yeah. I picked the summer of class consciousness because I've been really encouraged all these data center projects that are being announced. It's been really encouraging seeing people on kind of in every political spectrum in the US. Say no, like we don't want this. This isn't something we want in our communities. It's happening in Utah. It's happening here in Missoula. People are uniting to to say no to billionaires. And even if they push through, even like people I know from college who were completely different politically, they're like this. Bull honky. Yeah, exactly. And for me, that's been really encouraging. I think it's a step toward people realizing that our neighbors aren't our enemies regardless of their political affiliation. That our enemies are the people that are trying to make life worse for us to profit off of us. Was the person you knew in college Joe Biden by any chance, Jeff? Yeah. This is bull honky. Bull honky. Malarkey. So yeah, summer of class consciousness is what I'm deeming it. I'm going with summer of the Psyop because it turns out everything you don't like, apparently, is just a Psyop, it turns out. If you don't like the ban geese, they're a Psyop. If you don't like Dubai chocolate, Psyop. It's starting to get under my skin a little bit, but I just keep hearing it. I keep seeing it. And that's what I'm deeming this the summer of. Yeah. OK, next one is what's some good news that you've seen? I can go first. I read recently that Texas's solar grid now outpaces its coal power grid. And I think a kind of silver lining to the weird energy struggle that we're seeing going on in the world right now with the Iran war and whatnot is that people are realizing this reliance on fossil fuel is a dead end. And it's it's too easily controlled by these global powers and whatnot. And alternative sources of energy are burgeoning and becoming much more popular because of that. And I think that is some really good news. I think it's something that needed to happen and we're seeing it happen, which is great. Don't forget about nuclear power, two guys. It's a good one. Check it out. I only paid attention to a little of that, but you said the Iran war. Yeah, I said Iran war. Yeah. Yeah. I can go Angelina Jolie. She purchased a huge 60 acre span of hunting ground in Cambodia and made it like wildlife preserve and is just like making this huge section like sanctuary for wild elephants and tigers and different animals. And it's pretty cool. That is cool. That's great. I like her. Good job. Good job, Angelina. I've always wanted to go to Cambodia. Me too. Bill cut lessen that he likes her so that Jesse doesn't get mad. Oh, yeah. Well, I'm editing this one. So ask me. Do I have to raise my hand again? OK. I picked a different tack. I just saw a Naoki or a Salwa's manga Billy Batt finally getting officially licensed English translation. And that's exciting since he's the goat. He's the goat. That's why he's the goat. Oh, man, I'm so excited. I mean, unofficial translations for everyone's work exist out there. But I like supporting my artists officially when I can. So Billy Batt. Good job, Naoki. Naoki or a saw. He's one of those guys who make stuff that I don't really have to give too many caveats about. It's like. No, he's just a great storyteller. Really distinct art style. That's why he's the goat. Great. All right. My last one was what's the quickest what's the quickest you've ever given up on something? Mike, why don't you start this time since you keep going last? Yeah, so my job at State Farm, I gave up before I even went in the first day. I got one of the best days of my life was when I quit and I felt just the weight of the world lifted off my shoulders and I ran away to Texas for a summer. My boss is just like, so Mike's not coming now. I'm like, what? Yeah, he just called me and said he's quitting. I love that. So awesome. Mine's also a job and I couldn't think of some. I'm sure there's things I've quit faster than this, but this was something I think about how quickly I left for. For a minute, I did this job that was you talk to people that are in debt and you try to sell them a debt relief program and you could. You could sell it to them for as much as they're like willing to pay. So it was really predatory and terrible, and you're supposed to try and get them to pay like up to ten thousand dollars, but you could give it to them for like two thousand. And I never sold a single plan because when people would start asking about it, I'd just try and give them the cheapest one and then my boss would get mad at me. Never made a single dime. And I quit after two office days because I realized that it was the most soulless, awful thing that I could possibly be doing. And so I'm glad I didn't make any money from it because I would feel like I'd have to give it back or put it into something good. And I quit. Yeah. Yeah. God forbid you put your money into something good. Yeah. Mine was a job, too. I got a job that I think I kind of almost lied to get the job even. I said I had like experience serving and I got a job as a server at a Marriott. And oh, yeah, they made it so like you had to stand at this like little whatever they're called a kiosk thing. You had to stand and you couldn't look at your phone and one lady came in the entire shift. So it's the most bored I've ever been. And then the next day that I like just didn't go in and they're like, hey, where are you? I love the Irish goodbye to a job. Yeah, that's pretty tough. Good. Yeah. And Mike, you want to go? I'll go. I'll do mine. Yeah, sure. So a time when your dad helped you through something tough and bonus points. I'm giving you bonus points. We're keeping track of points all of a sudden if he was there physically with you in person to help you through it. There's one night where he just did my homework for me. It took a while, but I was on like Adderall and it wasn't like the long lasting stuff either. And then like I would have to get up like super early for family scriptures reading and all this stuff. So then by the time school was over, I was just like mentally exhausted, you know, and there's this one day where I literally just could not think at all. And I just sat there looking at my math homework for maybe an hour and a half without solving one single problem. And my dad just ended up doing it. That's nice. Our our dad like shout out, dads. We got Father's Day coming up, which we never do a Father's Day episode. But shout out, dads. And I feel really, really lucky. Not all dads, not all dads are good. But I was about to say, I feel really, really lucky that we did get a really good dad. And the thing about my dad that I think makes him special. Among other things is that he is one of the most willing people I've ever met to help someone that like needs help. And he's really capable of doing most things and just really generous with his time and whatnot. And a thing that I thought of was in college, my freshman year, I was getting a ride from my friend to Montana. And then he continued up to Canada for Thanksgiving. And then he was going to pick me up on the way back down and we're going to drive back to Utah. And he flipped his car in the middle of nowhere, Montana on some ice. And my dad drove me out there. We helped get his car like pulled out of this ditch. He took us to the auto shop where they fix things. They put like snow tires on the car, which my dad helped pay for. He put us up in a hotel and then he helped us like on our way out the next day. And it was just him going above and beyond for someone that he'd never met and to help me out too. And it was just one of those things where I just realized, you know, I'm very lucky to have such a generous dad. Dads are pretty great when they're good. Yeah. Sometimes they can be real bad. You guys freaking love Nick Cannon. Oh, he's got a lot of kids. He's got a lot of it. Yeah. Um, no, my dad also, just the best person I know, he's, um, the best I could ever hope for. It's actually his birthday yesterday. So happy birthday, dad. Shout out, dad. Happy birthday, Chris. Chris, uh, the best. He's the best. He's so emotionally supportive and just so encouraging whenever I have an idea, no matter like how dumb or in any of its sounds, he always just was so encouraging to pursue all of my interests and dreams and stuff. So just wanted to say that, but there was a time when I was really little. I was, I think I was like four years old and I hit my head. I was playing on the monkey bars with my, just me and my mom at a little play place and I hit my head really hard on a metal bar and I started crying. And I don't like, this wasn't really a thing. I never like asked for my mom or my dad when I was in trouble or in pain. I just kind of like silently suffered through it. But this time for some reason, I just like needed my dad to be there and it was in the middle of a work day. So my mom called him at his job and he immediately left the office and came over to like this stupid little playground place at the school I was at and just like hung out with me for a little bit. And like for a kid that just like made sense that he would do that. But as I grow into adulthood, I'm like, I don't know how many, I don't know. Maybe that's a thing all dads would do, but it was just a normal every day occurrence that my dad would do something like that that maybe I'm realizing he's a pretty special guy after all. Tall, tall as shit. Pretty tall guy. Yeah. I know. Why didn't you give me some of that? It all went to Nate. What the heck? Nate's like 14 feet tall. You're pretty tall, Mike. You, yeah, you can't. I lie about my height and say I'm your height because you're tall. Yeah. I think if I were to be taller, I think the tallest I'd want to be is your height. So, so I'm the, I'm the sweet spot for you. I think so. Yeah. I love how tall I am, but I, but if I were taller, I think I'd want to be like six, two, six, one. Come on now. Hold on. Sure. Six, one. Yeah. I'm not, I know stolen valor for me. Unlike Jeff. What's your other category, Mike? I don't know. It was probably some stupid one. Hold on. Oh, if you were to die right now, unexpectedly from a score of zero to ten, what do you think your associates and friends would score you? Just on average. What do you think they'd give you? Score. Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to go quick, but I'll go through it. Shanks, I think is giving me a 10. That's nice. I think we West would give me an eight. And I think Mike would give me an eight. I think my mom and dad would give me like a six because I got tattoos. Uh, it's troubling. Cyrus would give me a seven. What's Danielle giving you? Oh, business partner. Yeah. Um, probably eight. Okay. Wow. That's good. That's really good. Yeah. Nothing to sneeze at. I'm trying to think anyone under five. I don't think anyone's giving me under a five. Okay. There's probably no, I liked how you did that. Yeah. I thought you were just going to give one average number from everybody, but I liked that you did everyone individually like that. Yeah. I, I just came up with an average number and I settled on like 7.5, but honestly, I think it'd probably be higher than that. I just didn't want to seem like that was kind of some false humility. I think I'd probably get an eight from my friends and family. Well, Tom, you're his favorite student ever. Yeah. I think Tom would give me a nine or a 10. I think, uh, I think Jesse would give me a nine or a 10. I think you guys would be a little bit more, uh, complicated in your answers, but what do you think the lowest number someone would give you would be? Like think of the person that hates you the most. Yeah. I think that, that person's given me like a two or three, but I don't even know that person. What's crazy with you, Mike. I just think it's like some unknown hater out there that would probably give me that. With Mike, like he would give Nolan like a two. Yeah. And then Nolan would probably give Mike like a seven. Yeah. Yeah. He'd be a lot more generous towards me than the other way around. That person that said I have the personality of a cardboard box would probably give me like a two or three. I feel like, okay. I have a lot of boxes. Yeah. Great. Sure. So neutral five. Yeah. Um, I'm going to go with, uh, I, you know, not baiting me into that West. I'm going with a six overall for me. And listen, this isn't, I'm not trying to be humble. I'm taking like true honest inventory of myself. I spend a lot of my time trying to like not be available for people. That's true. You know, I'm a pretty solitary creature and it's not like I'm, I, I'm useless or like a net negative, but I could be a lot better, I think. And I'm talking about like all associates, all coworkers, not like friends and family, of course, are going to raise the average pretty well. But like, I don't know. I just think about all the people I've ever worked with and like, yeah, it was fine to have around the office, but man, I think, I think your score that you get given while you're alive is different than your score you are given while you're dead too. Yeah. Cause I think there's a certain glossiness that comes over after someone dies where you really just remember most of the good stuff. So yeah. Like if I'm being honest and I'm getting a nine or 10 from like family and associates, they all love me. Yeah. Right. Give you guys a nine or 10. I'm not going to doc you very much. Right. You know, I could maybe doc you for something small, but that's how we should be heroes from now on. Just at the end, everyone, you get a score. Yeah, right. And then they carve it into your, you get to get intense. Tombstone. All right. My two categories, the first one was a pop culture one. And it was pop culture or a media that makes you feel the most peaceful and relaxed. I don't remember why I picked this. I think it had something to do with one of my stories. But yeah, pop culture that makes you feel the most peaceful or relaxed. There's it's hard times out there. People need to know some things that are going to make them feel good. Anya. Hmm. For me. Interesting. In winter came is the album of choice, but like honestly put on any song by Anya, and I'm in a great place emotionally. Yeah, I just I unironically unabashedly am her biggest fan. I love anya so so so much. Lover. This one doesn't apply as much right now in my life because I have a great job. I love I work with my best friends and our listeners are awesome. But office space back in the day when I would have to work like a nine to five was just like at least someone gets how I feel. Yeah. No. Yeah. That movie really tapped into some feelings. The best. Yeah. Yeah. That is a great movie. I also picked a visual media. I picked the show Great British Baking Show. I think that one for me just puts me in a good mood no matter how I was feeling before turning it on. It just makes me feel cozy and happy. And my favorite moment in that show is after the finale when they show how everyone is friends still and they're all hanging out with each other. It's like the only show that makes me cry real tears not just get like choked up like I fully cry when I see that because it's just so affirming to see these people that are in a competition show become like lifelong friends and have this deep love for each other. So nice. That's great. All right. And my second category is a pretty serious one. It's a would you rather would you rather all of your farts for the rest of your life are going to be completely odorless but incredibly loud like very loud picture the loudest fart you've ever had in your life or they're going to smell terrible like the worst smelling fart you've ever had but be totally silent. This one's actually pretty easy for me. I want to hear you guys answer. I'm picking the smelly ones. Wrong. Wrong. Loud. You got to go loud. Because loud farts are funny and then they don't smell too. So it's like win win. Yeah. I I think that's I don't think that's wrong. And I just feel like the smelly ones you could get away with people not knowing it's you which I know is sneaky and not the answer is very. We're going to be in a car and you'll do one and then everyone's like who farted. Wouldn't me. The other thing is if I don't mean that guy. If I knew that I they were that bad I would just hold them until I'm not around other people but yeah. Here's the problem. I think you guys make a good good argument. We're going to eventually figure out that you're like people have brands of fart. Yeah. And it will figure you out. Yeah. Well and sometimes you fart in your sleep like Jeff on in America that first night you had the worst parts ever and I literally couldn't sleep because our room was so toxic from your farts. So but if they're so loud you're not sleeping either. Yeah. Either way I'm picking loud. I think you guys are right. I think I might switch to loud and you can do that trick where like Jeff did in school that one time where you like pinned the blame on someone else. That's not easy with a loud fart. That's easy with the smelly one. So funny. At least you have the chance. Just like it was like a four seconds fart and then I was like you farted. The whole I sat by myself in one half of the class for the rest of the class and then tired rest of the class was on the other half. And I wasn't a confident kid. Like it started funny to me and I was traumatized by the. But like it's still really fun. Like I did it on purpose. Yeah. To be fun. All right. That's all I got. Me too. Okay. Me too. I'm done. Thanks everyone for sending us stories. We appreciate it. Stay safe out there. You know stay safe out there. Be smart. Have a plan. And we'll talk to you soon. Love you. Love you. See you. Bye.