Les Perras's podcast

Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 388. This podcast is for listening practice. I have over 50 words and expressions highlighted in today's story for you to get practice listening to. In particular, the expressions 'keep going' and 'once or twice' are repeated. I will put the full list of highlighted words in the description below. 'Today's episode is about Anna and her discovery in New Zealand. Anna was sweating. She had just arrived in New Zealand for the first time and she was alone. She had to prove to her father that she was strong enough to take over the family business. She could not go home until she had proof. ## The beach She did not know what to do in New Zealand, or how to prove she was strong. She had nothing better to do so she went for a walk on the beach. After twenty minutes or so, she saw something unusual up ahead. She walked over to it and picked it up. It was a bottle with something inside. She took it out and discovered that it was a map of some sort. She went back into town and went to a cafe to sit down and look at it. After about ten minutes she thought maybe it was a treasure map. She took it to the library and searched many maps of New Zealand. She found the place the map was showing. She still had to find a way to prove she was strong, but until she got an idea, she decided to investigate the map further. ## the forest and first discovery She got off the bus near the place on the map. The map said to go into the forest. She did not like forests. They were full of insect and wild animals. But her curiosity drove her. She wondered what kind of treasure she might find. Walking through the forest was very difficult. There were many plants and the things she hated most: insects. But she kept going. She got lost once or twice, but with her compass, she could find the way. She thought maybe this forest adventure could help her prove her strength. As she was walking through the forest she found a box. It was very old. There was a key inside it. She took the key and kept going. ## mountains and second discovery The forest opened up and in front of her was a large mountain range. The map said she had to go into the mountains. She started to climb. It was easy at first, but soon it became difficult. But she kept going. If she fell, it would be the end of the story. In fact, she slipped once or twice but she caught herself and did not fall. Finally, shegot to the top of the mountain. She saw a funny spot on the mountain on the other side. The map said she should go there. ## cave and third discovery She went down the mountain and up the other side. It took her hours to get there. Finally she got to the funny spot on the mountain and discovered that it was a cave. She went inside the cave. There were many twists and turns. But she kept going. She finally found a large room in the cave. On the other side was a great big chest. She went to the chest. She tried to open it, but it was locked. Then she remembered that she had a key. She took the key out and tried it on the lock. It worked! The chest sprang open and there was a treasure inside. There was too much to carry out all at once so she took just a small portion of the treasure and put it in her pockets. Then she started the long trip back to the road. ## final discovery When she finally got back to her hotel room in the city, she was exhausted. But at the same time, she felt great. She had overcome her fears. She had faced the unknown. She had kept going even though it was hard. And she had found the treasure. The problem was, on her way back she had lost the map in the forest. She could not go back to the treasure. But it did not matter. She discovered a new treasure inside herself: The power to keep going and not give up. Plus, she could prove she was strong to her father because she had some of the treasure in her pockets. Anna decided it was time to go home.

Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 387. This podcast is for listening practice. I have over 25 words and expressions highlighted in today's story for you to get practice listening to. In particular, the expression 'never forget' is repeated. I will put the full list of highlighted words in the description below. 'Today's episode is about Julia and her promise to climb Mt Everest. Julia had to climb Mt Everest. Her father had climbed it. Her mother had ==encouraged== her. Then her job ==got in the way==. Now she had put it == on the back burner==s too long...Now she could feel her power going down. And then she thought of her father. She would ==never forget== his smile. She HAD to climb Mt Everest before the ==window closed forever==. ## Twenty years Ago Julie was climbing with her father. She loved climbing with him. He had a ==mind for business==. Business climbs, he used to call them. When you climbed with him, you==didn't waste time==. She thought she had all the time in the world with her father. She would ==never forget== his smile. She didn't know what was coming. ## Bad news One day, her father came back from climbing Mt Everest. He told her all about the climb. She was so excited. But now he was sick. the doctors said that there was ==nothing they could do==. There was nothing SHE could do. Well, ==there was one thing== she could do. She ==promised== her father that she would climb Mt Everest. He smiled at that. She would ==never forget== his smile. But before she could climb Mt Everest ==another story happened== in her life. ## Work She got a job. She loved her work. Her work ==was everything to her==. She put her whole life into it. The problem was that it was ==eating up her life==. She could feel her power going into her work as the years went by. She was very successful, but there was ==_something Missing_==. Her promise to her father. She had to find a way to ==solve her problem==. ## The Offer Then the way found her. Her work was her company. She started the company ==all by herself==. Now it was big and successful. Other people noticed it. One day, a man came to her office. He ==offered== to buy her company. She said no. Then she thought about it. Then she spoke to the man. She ==got to know him==. Then she ==got to trust him==. Then she said yes. She tought of her father. She would ==never forget== his smile. Finally she could ==move on== to her Promise. ## And Now After selling her company she had money. She started climbing a lot. Now after twenty years, ==her climber's mind returned==. She did the business climbs. Now she was ==applying for== the permit to climb the tallest mountain in the world! This was going to ==seal her promise==. She had already begun training. and the team was getting put together too. Julia knew she would fulfil her promise to her father.

Jerry had to write a report. He had to choose a famous person, and write about them from a different angle. If he got a good mark, he could pass this course, but if he got an average mark, he might fail. He had to write very good. That meant he had to write something original. He was very bad at being original. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras Podcast episode number 386. This episode is about Einstein. ## Einstein was Great Jerry thought that Einstein was great. Not writing about his greatness would miss the point. Jerry did NOT want to miss the point. So he started off his essay saying that Einstein was the man of the century according to Time magazine. But why was Einstein great? Jerry read and read. but the more he read, the more confused he got. He could not explain why Einstein was so great without explaining Einstein's ideas. And Jerry could NOT understand his ideas! He began to panic! He started sweating and breathing fast. He worried that he was going to fail this course. Then he got an idea. ## Einstein's Shortcomings Jerry decided to write about why Einstein was NOT that great. Then he could say something that made sense. And then it hit him: this was ORIGINAL! Jerry was almost crazy with happiness. He could pass the course. so then he started to look for reasons why Einstein was not that great. And he looked. And he looked. Then the nervousness began to creep up. They proved Einstein was right with this experiment. then they proved he was right again with that experiment. And then another. Jerry began to feel fear again. Einstein was a great thinker and they just kept proving he was right. How could Jerry find a shortcoming? Just as he was starting to feel down, he noticed a small comment in one of the articles. This might save his life! ## Personal life Jerry read that Einstein's personal life was not very good. SO, Jerry decided to search more. AND He found that Einstein got married two times. AND THEN he discovered that the FBI watched Einstein for years and years. Did the FBI think Einstein was **BAD**? On TOP of all this, Jerry found things saying that Einstein was a bad father. He wrote once that he wished his son had never been born! What kind of father was that? Einstein was not very good with personal relationships, it seemed. Then Jerry read that Einstein might have had Asperger's syndrome. This could explain why Einstein had more personal problems than many people. ## Weak Points So Einstein had weak points after all! He did not make much money even though he was famous. He lost money in investments. He got divorced, and in fact he had lots of girlfriends through his life. Jerry's essay was getting more and more interesting. ## Result Jerry wrote his essay. He did not write any explanation of Einstein's ideas. He wrote that despite being famous for his scientific ideas, the private side of his life was not very good. In a sense, Jerry wrote in his essay, Einstein's life was kind of balanced. He had a wonderful public life and not so wonderful private life. The result was a very good score on his essay. Jerry felt so relieved! Now he could pass his course, and he would not have to take it over again. What's more, Jerry got a sense of confidence that he could write and he could be original!

Monica was devastated. The people from her party left five minutes earlier. But her party was a flop. They said her cooking tasted like it was made from a recipe. She wanted to go to bed and cry all night. The worst thing was: She HAD cooked from recipes. That was the moment she decided to become a good cook. On her way to becoming a good cook, she had four turning points and made a surprising decision at the end. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast, episode number 385. Today’s episode is centred on recipes. ## Bad Food Monica’s food wasn’t bad per se. It just wasn’t GOOD. It was uninspired. It was insipid. But that was just the beginning. She thought, if cooking from recipes was a bad thing, then she would learn to cook without a recipe. She started right the next day. She opened the fridge and got out some things to cook. The first thing was chicken. Then some vegetables. After that she looked around her kitchen for some seasonings. Thirty minutes later, she sat down to eat it. THIS was bad food. Now Monica had her second realisation: she needed a PLAN. ## Amazing Food The second time she started cooking, she had a plan. She thought about the flavours that she liked. She got all her seasonings out. She cooked with a vigour. She was inspired. She added a little this and a little that. These seasonings were her favourites. This time she would make a masterpiece. When she finally sat down to eat it, she couldn’t believe it. This time it was amazingly bad. It was so bad, in fact, that she could not eat it. She had to waste the food. She felt just as bad as the day of her party. In fact, for a while, Monica thought about quitting. But she couldn’t bring herself to do it. She thought, “”I’m being a drama queen. I’ve only cooked twice without a recipe.” She took a short walk and decided the best thing was to take cooking lessons. ## Cooking Lessons Monica felt so nervous going to the cooking class. She thought cooking class was for other people but not for her. But she pushed herself into the class and started learning. She was in for a surprise. They taught some really good things in that class. She didn’t learn just how to cut vegetables. She learned how to use eggs. She learned how to combine flavours. She learned different ways to mix, layer and present food. She was very impressed. But the thing that surprised her the most, shocked her, in fact, was this: She could see patterns. The food that she was cooking was very similar to the recipes that she remembered using. She started to rethink the cooking school idea, and cooking in general. ## Hello Recipes! Monica thought quite a bit about the cooking school. She thought “I’m learning all these cooking principles and I am cooking things that are just like my recipes. Why not just use the recipes?” That was when she decided a few things. The first thing she decided was that she did not need cooking school. And the second thing she decided was that she did not need to listen to other people’s opinions about what makes a good cook. She decided to keep her life simple and just use recipes.

This Extensive English Listening story is about a watermelon crime, and Jonathan. Listen to the story as Jonathon has misadventures with watermelons and discovers the watermelon crime. At the end, you’ll find out how watermelons can be dangerous. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras Podcast episode number 384. This episode is about watermelons and the watermelon crime. ## Carved Watermelon Project Jonathon wanted to make a carved watermelon like he saw on youtube and facebook. You know, the kind where they make a cute animal or maybe a completely red watermelon ball. He didn’t know how watermelons could be dangerous. So Jonathon went online to find a good guide to buying watermelons. The online guides said to check the colour of the watermelon, tap it, and look for a yellow spot. ## The First Watermelon He went to the store and found one just like they said online. It was big, and green and looked ripe. It had a nice yellow spot on the bottom. He knew the yellow spot meant that it had been sitting getting ripe for a long time and was probably gonna be really sweet. You won’t believe what he found with this watermelon. He took it home and invited a friend to come over and carve it up with him. His idea was to also take videos and photos while they were making it. They cut it open and to his surprise there was a great big hollow spot inside it. His friend said that it was not good for doing the watermelon carving. He took a photo of it and sent it to his mom. She responded quickly, telling him to not eat it. It was probably contaminated and could be dangerous. He was disheartened but decided to listen to his mother. After all, she had years of knowledge, especially about food. She safely cooked for him all his life. But he was in for a surprise with the next watermelon. ## The second Watermelon The second watermelon was super red. He cut it open and he thought, wow! I bet it’s really sweet. He was lucky this time too. His friend was with him, and said he read that super red watermelons were dangerous. He got a tissue and touched the watermelon. The tissue turned red. His friend said, “Yup! It’s no good. I read that if the tissue turns red it’s bad for you, it’s got some chemicals in it.” By the time he got to the third watermelon he had learned a few signs to look for. He found one that looked good. But he knew what to do with the watermelon before eating it. ## The Third Watermelon In the store the melon looked fine. He took it home and his friend said, “Let’s cut it open to check it right now!” But Jonathon decided to wait a few days after he brought it home. That was because he read that if something bad happened to the watermelon, you might not know it right after buying it but if you waited a few days, you could tell if it was safe. On the third day there was some foam on part of the watermelon. He looked really carefully at it and found a small hole in the centre of the foam, and the foam was coming out of the hole. Indeed when he cut the melon open the inside was no good. It had been injected with a chemical that was causing the watermelon to ferment after a few days. That was causing the foam. He was lucky he did not eat it. Jerry had learned that some people put the chemicals into the watermelon with a needle, and it can be difficult to find when you buy it. Jonathan decided to wait until next year and then grow his own watermelons so he could be sure they were good.

Watch this video to learn how one kind of scam system is working. Don’t be scammed, and don’t spend your money on scams. Learn how by watching now. I’ll teach about this scam using a story about a guy named Jerry. I’m gonna tell you about a bootcamp scam that he got mixed up with. I’ll tell you about three steps in the scam: the initial Fear, the FOMO, and the offer. Finally, I’ll tell the close of the story where Jerry finds a better way. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 383. Today’s topic is data science. Jerry decided to change careers. He heard that the job prospects were pretty good and the salaries were great, so he decided to become a data scientist. But he didn’t know where to start. He was a bit nervous but not nearly as nervous as he would become later. So he did some basic research. ## Decisions The first thing he found was there were several branches of data science to choose from. There was data analytics, data mining, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. He couldn’t decide right at the start, but he heard that the basics were all the same anyway. Then he realised he didn’t know where to study the basics. So he searched online and he found a webinar. It sounded great. One good thing was they had the webinar at a good time so he could join it easily. But even better was that the webinar was free. He thought this was very tempting but it was not as tempting as the offer he would hear later. He put his name on the list and soon he got the invitation link in the mail so he could join the webinar. ## Initial Fear In the first twenty minutes Jerry began to feel quite nervous. The webinar host talked about what you had to learn to become a data scientist. The host made him worry that if he didn’t learn the things they said, he would not get a good job, and maybe not even get a job. But that was not all. ## FOMO Then in the next twenty minutes he became even more nervous. The host made it sound like he would be lucky if he could get the right training. He worried that he might miss his opportunity to enrol in the course that they said he needed. He felt that if he did not get in that course, he couldn’t get a job. He had a fear of missing out. ## The Offer Near the end of the webinar, he began to feel excited. They said that although the course was super expensive and high quality, he could get in. What was even better, he could join the course for a very cheap price if he signed up right away. He thought this was a great offer but his friend was going to tell him something different. ## The Warning Just before the course ended, he got a text message from a friend. Jerry told him about this great course, and the friend warned him… it’s a scam! Jerry did not believe it at first, but the friend asked him three questions. He asked Jerry if he felt fear, if he felt FOMO, and if the offer sounded really really good. When Jerry thought about the answers, he realised he was getting sucked into the scam. Then he backed out at the last moment. ## The Better Way He talked with his friend that night. They did a bit more research and found a way better way to become a data scientist. He decided to pick up programming first and get a simple programming job. While he did the programming job, he could take online courses about statistics and business analysis. After those courses he could start to study Machine Learning. That would be a safer and cheaper way to get into the data science career. He felt he just dodged a bullet.

Let me tell you a story about Tyler, his search for the perfect supplement and his relieving discovery. But first we need to know a bit more about Tyler. You see Tyler had a lot of problems. He had mood swings. He was not very happy at his work. He had trouble with his weight. And he was a bit suspicious of authority. Because of these problems, Tyler decided to find supplements that could help him. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode 382. This episode is about a fictional character called Tyler and his search for supplements. ## Mood Swings Tyler felt great most of the time. His friends and colleagues thought he was a bit intense. He had a lot of energy and enthusiasm. But then there were times when he slowed down. He had a heavy spirit, and low motivation. Tyler noticed this himself and it worried him. Yet he distrusted authorities and did not ask for advice. Instead he started to research supplements. He thought there might be a supplement that could help him. He tried one for a month but nothing changed. Then he tried another for a few months. He found a change in his moods, but there was another change that concerned him. ## Weight After two months on his second supplement, Tyler noticed that he had really put on weight. In fact, he had put on 5 kilograms in about a month! This was very concerning. He thought about diets, but his eating habits had not changed that much. Instead, he began to look for new supplements. Indeed, there were supplements to help almost anything, including losing weight. He found a few supplements and decided to try them. He wasn’t worried about using supplements yet. It wasn’t long before he felt he had jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire. ## Sleepless Tyler had brought his mood swings down a little bit. Then after gaining weight, he took a supplement to help lose weight. Indeed, his weight gain stopped but after two weeks, he realised that his quality of sleep was pretty low. He woke up tired and irritable almost everyday. It was amazing how it correlated so well with the weight loss supplements. Although he was getting nervous about supplements, which I’ll get to in a few moments, he was still convinced by many of the marketing claims that he had read. ## Yet More He found a new supplement that promoted good restful sleep. He started taking the new supplement right away. Once again, the promise of the supplement was fulfilled and he got better sleep. He also was drowsy during the day. He was talking about it with one of his colleagues. The colleague asked him where he did his research. Then he and his colleague made the connection. Many of the research sites he used were getting financial support from the supplement companies! He was shocked and dismayed. After a few weeks of soul searching and deep thinking, he made a decision. ## The Reason for Supplements Tyler did not trust authorities. He did not want to go to doctors and get medicine which he felt was unnatural. The whole reason he was using supplements was because he felt they were ‘natural’. Now, he decided to continue searching for natural solutions but without supplements. He quit using all the supplements right away. He adopted a simple balanced diet and regular exercise. ## Relieving Discovery This is where Tyler made his relieving discovery. By eating a simple balanced diet and doing moderate regular exercise, he was able to achieve all the goals he wanted using supplements. His mood swings were moderate and natural. His body weight stabilised at an appropriate level, and he got good sleep every night.

I’m going to tell you the story of George and his quirky and suspicious search for the best earphones. Along the way, I want you to pick up some new vocabulary that I used in this story. Hi, and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 381. Today’s episode is about earphones, told as a story about George. ## Gain and Loss A couple of weeks ago, George got himself a new smartphone. He was pretty happy with it but about a day after getting it, he lost his earphones. Now, George likes to think he is a very intelligent consumer but he overlooks one thing: he is a bit neurotic but I’ll tell you more about that later. Anyway, he noticed that earphones were becoming pretty stylish. He wanted to get earphones with great style to complement his personality. ## Styles He looked at some of the wireless earphones first. He thought they would be great because they looked so convenient. He did a bit of research on them and then found one of his fears was true: they were easy to lose. He had already lost one pair of earphones. As I said, he was a bit neurotic, and he thought if he got wireless earphones he would lose them too. So he started looking at wired bud earphones. ## Buds He soon found a problem with the bud earphones. It wasn’t that they were too small to be stylish. In fact, he rather liked the minimalist style of the bud earphones. The problem wasn’t that they didn’t fit well. His last earphones were bud earphones and he knew they fit well. And it wasn’t the cost. Most of the bud earphones he was looking at were pretty reasonable. The problem was infection. The bud earphones fit right inside the ear canal. He read that as the popularity of bud earphones increased, so did the incidence of ear infections. There was no hard proof that the bud earphones caused infection. But in fact, some hearing aids that fit in the ear canal have been proven to change the ear canal flora and increase the risk of infections. Like I said, George was a bit neurotic. This was enough to provoke his anxieties, and George stopped shopping for bud earphones. He confirmed his fears when he read about hearing loss. ## Hearing Loss George read that sounds of 80 decibels or higher can cause hearing loss. The higher the volume the faster you lose your hearing, he read. And earbud earphones are like fire hoses pumping the sound directly into your ear. So he looked for a solution to prevent hearing loss. One of the better ideas he found was the bone conduction earphones. They don’t even put the sound in your ear. They conduct the sound into your hearing centre through the bones in your skull. George also realised they were safer because of this: if he had bone conduction earphones,he could still hear things in his environment like cars or signal sounds or other people talking. This safety feature was a big plus for George. ## Big Style But George didn’t buy the bone conduction earphones. He thought there had to be some drawback, some problem. Then he found it. Hi fi sound aficionados did not like them because the quality of sound was lower. George discovered that these high quality sound fans only used headphones to listen to their favourite music. George’s neurotic thinking made him feel if he got bone conduction earphones, he would suffer from poor quality sound. The headphones were not quite as safe as the bone conduction earphones, but they were safer than bud earphones. And almost like a bonus for George, headphones were making a stylish comeback. That was it. George found the answer to his problems and bought the headphones. He felt good.

What’s the Best Drink? What's the best drink you can have for just about any occasion you can think of? I'm going to tell you the story of my search for the best drink, my experiences along the way and my surprising discovery at the end. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 380. This podcast is actually about a kind of tea but we'll talk about lots of drinks. ## My Childhood When I was a child there were a lot of drinks that I liked. Coke was good but I also like ginger ale quite a bit and 7UP as well. you'll notice that they're all fizzy sweet drinks. I also really enjoyed Kool-Aid. In fact I might even say Kool-Aid topped the list when I was a child except that my mom almost never made it. When I went into my tweens I got hooked on juices. I had started to become aware that fizzy drinks weren't really healthy. I wanted healthy drinks and juices were being touted as very healthy back then. The problem with juices was that after you drank them, ironically you started to get more thirsty. Also, they were quite expensive. My mom didn't want to buy as much juice as I wanted to drink. It was limited to one glass in the morning. And I was about to take up a new hobby. ## Climbing In my late teens I took up rock climbing and Mountaineering. I always wanted to carry a drink with me, naturally and I went hunting for a good drink. There was a new kind of Kool-Aid on the market that didn't have sugar. It was cheap, very light, and really tasty. At least, it was tasty for a while. I only drank it on the weekends when I was climbing but after a while I got tired of the taste. It was too strong. I wanted something simpler. My favourite drink now is very simple but before I tell you what it is, I have to explain why I had to find it. ## Simpler It wasn’t long before I found powdered iced tea. This was wonderful. Since it was a powder I could add a little or a lot and make the taste just the way I like it. The flavour was much simpler, too, and there was no choice of flavour. Just iced tea. The problem was that it had a lot of sugar in it. Then after a few years, I couldn’t find it in the stores anymore. But by then I have moved on to a very surprising simple drink. ## Moving On I was climbing in the high mountains regularly. Sometimes I did not have the iced tea mix with me, so I began to drink the fresh water running off the snowfields and glaciers. I discovered this was truly the best drink there was. Soon I stopped using the iced tea mix. I only drank the water I found in the mountains. It was truly delicious. But after I moved to Japan, I discovered a problem with the fresh mountain water. ## The Problem with Fresh Mountain Water I had moved to Japan, and I wanted to get a refreshing drink. I went with some friends to the convenience store. There were drinks in Japan of course. They were pretty good, too and they were very interesting. There was Calpis water (a milk derivative drink) and Pocari Sweat. Then ilohas drinks came out with several flavours. I enjoyed them… they were better than green tea, which is okay but not that great in my books. But my search for a drink in Japan showed me the problem with Fresh mountain water. You could only get it in the high mountains in Canada! I had to make due with artificial flavours for a few years but… Do I still drink them? ## Do I still Drink Them? I was drinking these bottled drinks to quench my thirst. Then I noticed something. One bottle is not that much but two or three a day began to look expensive to me. My wonderful wife came to the rescue one day, introducing me to Barley tea. Barley tea is perhaps the best drink there is outside of the fresh mountain water from Canada. You can make it strong or weak. You can buy it ready-made. You can drink it hot or cold. And the best part? You never get sick of it. It is basically calorie free and rich in antioxidants which are associated with good health.

What’s the common point between pianos and motorcycles? Today I’m gonna talk about their similar point and it might surprise you, but first I have to introduce a guy called Alpheus Babcock because his invention is the link to motorcycles. Hi, and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 379. Today’s episode is about pianos, motorcycles and Alpheus Babcock. ## The problem Pianos were invented around 1700 and they took the music world by storm. Except there was a problem with them: they were difficult to hear. If you played in a small room with a small audience it was fine. But you could not use them to accompany an orchestra. The other instruments would drown out the piano. The problem was the strings. To make the larger sounds, you needed to pull the strings tighter and tighter. Eventually, you had to pull them so much that they broke the frame of the piano. This brings us to our main character. ## The Inventor Alpheus Babcock enjoyed making pianos and organs. He and his brother formed a company to make organs right from the start. He wanted to make better pianos for the musicians. It was the start of the industrial revolution and new materials were coming on hand. He noticed that some other piano makers were using iron braces in the frames of the pianos; This improved the sound, but not enough for him. Then inspiration struck. He decided to make his frames completely from iron. This had two main benefits. Before I say what they are, we have to take a quick look at motorcycles. ## Motorcycle Engines The engine of a motorcycle is a finely tuned thing. It may just look like a big piece of iron but there's a lot of science in the engine. You see, the pistons are stroking back and forth several thousand times per minute. The engine has to be very very hard to withstand that for years. This is one of the qualities of the cast iron engine: It is very hard. Yet, interestingly, it has another quality at the same time: it is flexible. The cast iron can expand and contract with the range of temperatures to prevent warping and changing size or shape. So what about the piano frame? I said that it has two main benefits. # The Two Virtues Coming back to the cast iron frame of the piano, Babcock was lucky to discover that it had two virtues. First, it was strong. He could pull the strings far, far tighter than on a wooden frame. In fact, he could even use steel strings and pull them even tighter. This was the first sound boost. The sound coming off the strings was much more robust. But in addition to the strength, the cast iron frame had a second, more subtle quality. The core of the cast iron frame was slightly flexible. This meant that the vibrations from the string were passed into the frame. Then the frame itself began to vibrate and make the sound even larger. Now the modern performance piano was born. ## The Common Points So what do motorcycle Engines and pianos have in common? It is the cast iron that is used in them. It is the same industrial quality cast iron in each one. That's because the qualities that make grey cast iron good for motorcycle engines are the same qualities that make it good for pianos. The hard strength and the subtle flexibility.

Why are Chameleons Tricky Pets? I love chameleons. But even if you love them, they are still tricky pets. I'm going to tell you why chameleons are so tricky to keep. First we have to look at the cages. I'll tell you two features of cages that are necessary and if you don’t have them, Your chameleon could be in trouble. Then we'll talk about chameleon friends and why you want to have only one chameleon. Then I’m gonna talk about some of their behaviours that make them tricky to keep. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 378. Today I’m talking about why chameleons are so tricky to keep. ## The Problem with Fresh Air The first trick is getting the fresh air just right for your pet chameleon. Keeping a cage well ventilated for just about any pet that needs a cage is a really good idea - except for chameleons. What's the big deal? Well, you need the ventilation because these animals need to get fresh air. You and your chameleon will feel nothing but grief If you put them inside an unventilated cage, they could die from that. They need a high humidity and high moisture environment. And it has to be constant. It can't be changing, or you're gonna stress your chameleon. Stress is very bad for chameleons. That spells grief for you and your chameleon So you need to get a special cage with special ventilation techniques to keep it warm and moist for your buddy. Otherwise it’s gonna feel stress. And speaking of stress, let's take a look at another stressor for these tricky animals. ## Special Cage Size Once you get it warm and moist, you have to make it safe for your chameleon buddy. They love to climb trees. It makes them feel safe. If they're not up high in the tree, they're gonna feel a lot of stress. If you want to keep a chameleon as a pet, you need to make a special cage that's tall so that it can have branches and leaves up high to crawl on. And you shouldn't put the cage on the floor, because, even though it's up on a branch, it’s still kind of low down. Now before I talk about some quirky behaviour of Chameleons, Let’s talk about their social life a bit. ## Social Life To introduce chameleon social life, let me tell you a story. I found a guy who got a chameleon as a pet. Then somebody in his family gave him another chameleon pet as a gift. At first he was really happy. He thought this was cool. He put them in the cage. He checked the cage: Warm: check Humid: check High: check But his chameleons were definitely very unhappy. They were greyish. There were a few times when he even saw them fighting with each other. These guys were just bad neighbours, and they felt stress being in the same cage together. That's how chameleons are. They're like lone wolves. They don't want friends, and they don't want close neighbours. Don't put them together in the same cage. It's a bad idea. ## Don’t Force it There was another guy on the Internet who wrote about some of his experiences with keeping a chameleon as a pet. He said that when he picked up the chameleon it didn't move. He said at the beginning he thought that was a happy chameleon. In his mind, it was just content to sit on his hand. Finally he discovered that if chameleons don't move at all, It's a bad sign. It means they are feeling stressed. That's one way chameleons respond to stress. They stay really still. If you pick up your chameleon and it stays really still, then you know that it's not happy, it's feeling stressed. So pick it for just a little bit of time each day, until it gets used to you.

Who Discovered the Americas First? This is an old question, and everyone thinks they know the answer, but today I want to give you a different answer. Along the way, we’ll take a look at the mystery of the Polynesians, a sideways view of sweetpotatoes, and one of my childhood heroes, Thor Heyerdahl, along with some DNA studies. ## The Polynesian Mystery Before we get into the sweet potatoes, let me tell you a short story. A few years ago, I flew to Guam. As I looked out the window on the vast open sea below me, I wondered, how did the first people get to the remote Pacific islands? Polynesians are remarkably similar in their genetics, language and culture despite being separated by thousands of kilometres of open ocean. Also, they didn’t have compasses or sextants to navigate with. The polynesians didn’t have a written language. So, how could we find the answer to these mysteries? The answer to the Polynesian mystery of navigation starts with the guy I’m gonna tell you about next. ## Thor Heyerdahl My mind wandered and then I remembered as a kid hearing about a guy called Thor Heyerdahl. He was an explorer who thought the Polynesians got to the islands just by floating there on big rafts. He proved this was possible by making a big raft which he called Kon-Tiki and floating from South America to an atoll called Raroia in French Polynesia in the middle of the Pacific ocean. They did it in 101 days, so they proved it was possible. At this point, you might ask, what does this have to do with sweet potatoes or discovering the Americas? On the way to answering that question, first we have to see the big problem with Thor’s idea. ## The Genetic Problem The problem with Thor’s idea was that he thought the Polynesians came from South America. Today, modern genetic evidence points overwhelmingly to southeast Asia as the origin of the Polynesian people. But we can’t simply say they started there and that’s that. You see, there is some genetic evidence of American people’s genes in the Polynesian people. They carry partly indigenous American genes. Then there’s the whole question of the sweet potatoes. ## Sweet Potatoes Sweet potatoes are an ancient crop that was first domesticated by humans 5000 years ago in Central and South America. But at the same time, sweet potatoes are a staple food among many polynesian people. They have been eating sweet potatoes for at least 700 years. There’s archeological evidence to prove this. So how did they get the sweet potatoes? And further, the quechua word for sweet potato is Kumar. The word for sweet potato across Polynesia is uncannily similar. So this brings us to the BIG Question. ## Who Discovered the Americas first? Well, this is a great question, but it’s also a silly one. It’s silly because, obviously, the Indigenous people first discovered the Americas. But it is still interesting because that was a long long time ago, and we like to know who has re-discovered the Americas since then. Of course, there is Christopher Columnbus. Then there are the slightly controversial voyages made by some Norse peoples, including Leif Ericson. But It seems likely that polynesian peoples arrived on the western shores of South America quite a bit earlier than those two explorers. We can’t say conclusively when or where they made contact but that they made contact seems almost certain, and it’s extremely likely they did so before any Europeans.

In this video we are going to explore the history of El Dorado and I'm going to tell you where it is, along with some of the stories about it. Along the way I'll tell some stories about the Conquistadors, a very special Conquistador called Quesada and the mysterious Muisca tribe and their secret gold ceremony. Hi, my name is Les Perras and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 376. This episode, naturally, is about El Dorado. ## The Conquistadors When Spanish conquistadors arrived in South America naturally, they came in contact with lots of the indigenous people of South America. They were quite impressed with these people because they had gold. Of course the conquistadors loved gold. That was one of the targets that they were travelling for. When they talked to the people, they asked where they got the gold from and of course, lots of stories came out of that. Usually the people did not find the gold themselves. Rather, they traded for the gold with other tribes. This is perhaps the origin of the El Dorado myth. The myth said there was some place out there that is full of gold, and the streets are made of gold and the people wear gold. ## The Conquistador who found El Dorado There were many conquistadors, but there is one main conquistador associated with El Dorado. He was searching for El Dorado, because he wanted to get rich just like the rest of them. On the other hand, he was one of the best educated conquistadors in South America at the time. He wasn't a very good fighter, but he was a great explorer. In fact, due to his explorations, he was able to found the capital city of Colombia, which is modern day, Bogotá. Along the course of his adventures, he was able to track down some of the rumours of mysterious tribes that had vast amounts of gold… So much gold, in fact that they could cover their leader in gold. This conquistador was called Quesada. Not only did he found Bogota, but he was also responsible for discovering the Muisca tribe of people and the famous lake, where they held their secret ceremony. ## Muisca and the Secret Ceremony The people of the Muisca tribe thought gold was special. Not special in the let's get rich and get lots of gold sense. They felt gold had the power to bring balance and harmony back to the tribe and the world. Gold was essential to their secret ceremony to initiate a new leader of the tribe. When the old leader of the tribe died, they needed to find a new leader, but they couldn't just call him the leader. They needed the blessing of the people in the tribe and the blessing of the gods. They had a secret ceremony to initiate their new leader. This was a long ceremony, but the ending was out on a lake. That lake was Lake Guatavita. The Muisca would cover their leader in flakes of gold which they could get by trading with many different tribes around them. They would float the leader out onto the lake on a barge with torches in each corner. The supporters would offer gold statues to the gods by throwing them into the lake, and then the people of the tribe would shout their approval and they had a new leader. ## Where is El Dorado? Guatavita is the best candidate for the actual location of any place that could be called El Dorado. Of course the myths and rumours of El Dorado were so exaggerated that no place on earth could be El Dorado. But if any place could be El Dorado this was it because this was the origin of many of those stories. However, the conquistadors spent their lives searching for this place. As a result of that the meaning of El Dorado has come to change. El Dorado is a quest. It's a quest for happiness, material, success, and for some love.

Are you worried about hackers? I’ve studied computers. I’ve studied programming. I run my own server. I thought I knew about computers. I felt secure. I was wrong. Hi welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 375. Today's episode is about hackers and online safety. Listen to some common sense advice about physical security with computers, and, more importantly, mental security. Then hear about the close call that I had on the internet. ## Your Connection Maybe the simplest and first thing you should do is make sure that you have a safe connection to the Internet. If you go to a coffee shop, it's best not to use their Wi-Fi. If you have to use their Wi-Fi first do a bit of research and learn about VPN. Then go out and purchase a subscription to a VPN. I won't tell you about VPN here but they can save you a lot of problems if you're browsing outside your home. ## Your Passwords Almost everybody says to make good passwords. I have to agree here. The problem is everybody tells me they can't remember their passwords. Probably the simplest solution to that is to make your password. A short sentence. The sentence should have unusual words in it, make a picture in your mind, and have a number. An example would be "I like three chocolate hotdogs". The sentence is not too long, it has a number in it, and a strange combination of words which most people would not think of. At the same time it's easy to remember. ## Save Your Data If you're using your computer for just browsing, then you probably don't have much to worry about. But if you are creating files on your computer, make sure you save your data and back it up regularly. A great place to back it up is on some kind of storage that is separate from your computer. Maybe it's a hard disk or a USB or even cloud storage but the USB is probably the best. Leaving files on your computer should be safe but you never know. So back them up and then erase them from your computer from time to time. ## Suspicious Emails Be very very careful and wary of suspicious emails. If you don't know the person who sent you this email, why do you need to read it? Personally, I treat unsolicited emails as junk mail. And the junk mail I get in my real mailbox goes straight into the garbage. The unsolicited emails go straight into the garbage or spam. ## I was Almost HACKED! This is where I had a problem. I got an email from a friend. At least I thought I got an email from a friend. I use Google mail and when I saw the mail it had my friend's name on it. Furthermore, it had my friend's photo attached as a little icon beside the email. I thought I was safe. My friend is kind of a strange person. I read the email and I thought this is a bit strange, but then again, my friend is a bit strange. Perhaps owing to my friend's eccentric personality I wasn't surprised when he was asking for help in terms of money. I did a little bit of checking in my email correspondence with him, and he was quite quick to reply. This is the second point that should've set off a red flag. He was asking for money and second he was responding very quickly. My problem was I wanted to please my friend. That's my weakness. I don't like saying no to a friend who needs a bit of help or assistance. Plus I saw his photo and his name on the email so it should be OK, right? Well after about six or seven email exchanges the red flag finally started flapping in my face. I then looked at the exact precise email address that he was sending the email from. This was a new and different address from my friend's regular email address. I sent an email to my friend on his regular email address rather than just responding. My friend indicated that he had not sent me any emails that day or that week. That was the instant I knew that I was dealing with a hacker. I simply stopped communicating. I am very happy to say I did not part with my money, and I did not get ripped off. But on the other hand, it was a very close call. Hackers might not hack into...

The Incredible Story of Melvin (He Survived!) Scissors are Dangerous! Regardless of the age, you should always be careful when you have scissors. Melvin learned this the hard way. You can learn from Melvin’s experience, too. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 374. This episode is about a young boy named Melvin Jones, and safety with scissors. ## An Innocent Afternoon One afternoon in 1925, Melvin Jones was having fun playing with his sister and brother. They were in their kitchen and their mother was preparing dinner. They were thinking of things to do. They decided to make paper dolls. Melvin got some scissors and his brother and sister got the paper. Then they decided to go upstairs because it was cleaner than the kitchen. ## Going Upstairs However, as they were going upstairs, Melvin stumbled on the stairs. Melvin was quite surprised when the scissors punctured his side. Obviously, they didn't think much of it right away. He did not have any obvious complaints of acute pain. ## Sleepy They washed the wound, and then Melvin said he felt sleepy. He had barely finished saying that he felt sleepy when his lips turned blue and his face darkened. This was an ominous sign. His parents immediately called for an ambulance and Melvin was taken to the children's hospital. ## The X-ray At the hospital, they rushed him into the x-ray room and they did an x-ray. The x-ray examination disclosed a puncture of the heart. This was clearly a drastic downturn of condition. The doctor stepped in and pronounced the need for surgery. ## Surgery In the surgery room, the doctor needed to get access to the heart, and it was necessary to force the ribs back to gain access. The doctor used forceps to lift up the heart and discovered a gash a quarter of an inch long. The doctor stitched two stitches in the heart and placed it back into its natural position. Then he put the ribs back into place. Meanwhile outside the operating room Melvin’s father was having blood taken. The purpose was to give a transfusion to Melvin. ## The Doctor The surgery was a success. Melvin was on his road to recovery in no time at all. The doctor was somewhat reluctant to take credit for his performance in the operating room. It's reported that he didn't say very much about the event at all other than it was unusual. ## The moral of the story We all know that Sharp objects are dangerous. At the same time we often take unnecessary risks in our daily lives. Mothers tend to warn us to be careful but it's difficult to believe that anything bad will happen to us. Melvin’s Story is an acute reminder that accidents can happen, and some of them are very serious. Such ordinary objects can be a lethal threat to us. Please exercise caution when you're walking around with scissors and certainly don't run with them. Our mothers tell us all sorts of stories, but in this case, running around with scissors IS dangerous, and we should listen to our mothers. On the other hand, if you would like to listen to not too serious stories, about what mothers tell us you can listen to the podcast about old wives tales.

Imagine a world, where, all of a sudden, out of the blue all the hairpins instantly disappear. You can just begin to imagine the chaos that would ensue in such a disastrous event. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 373. This episode is about hairpins or rather how much we rely on hairpins, and what would happen if they all disappeared. ## Sarah Take Sarah for instance. She's at work, and she feels confident about her appearance because she has her hair up in a bun, and the bun is being held in place with hair pins. Then to her shock and chagrin suddenly her bun, which took her time and effort to arrange in the morning, falls to pieces and her hair tumbles down wildly across her shoulders. She feels nervous and embarrassed, because she never goes out with her hair down or loose or not nicely styled. Her confidence in the day is shot and she can no longer function effectively. ## Sandra Sandra is a famous actress, and she's at the Grammy awards show. She's just been announced the winner of the Grammy award for best actress, and she's in front of the podium, making her speech when wham! Her beautiful hair, all held in place by hairpins, tumbles down across her shoulders in a very sprawled, messy fashion, and the crowd begins to laugh. Sandra feels shock and embarrassment and has trouble making the rest of her speech and she's helped off the stage by assistants. ## Tom Tom uses hairpins to keep his toothpaste neat and tidy. He puts the hairpin on the end of the tube of toothpaste, and as he uses toothpaste, he gradually pushes the hairpin down the tube. This makes him feel confident and organized and clean until bang! The hairpin disappears, and his freshly squeezed tube of toothpaste remains, squeezed, rumpled, and untidy. His wife walks into the room and says “finally, you've decided to relax about this!” Which brings on a new argument between them about how to use the toothpaste. ## Joey Joey has been instructed by his mother to get a piece of tape. There was a convenient hairpin tucked under the end of the tape to make it easy to find the end of the tape. But since that has mysteriously evaporated, the end of the tape is now almost impossible for Joey to find, he looks and tries and scratches but he can't find the end of the tape and his mother is getting impatient and angry. Joey begins to cry. ## Victor Victor was out skiing in the mountains. Unfortunately for Victor, he just fell over into a pile of deep snow. His jacket was open for ventilation. He reached down to do up the zipper, but he couldn't find it. The zipper tab had broken off two weeks earlier and he had a hairpin fastened onto the zipper, in place of the tab. Sadly, the hairpin is now also missing, and Victor cannot do up his jacket despite the increasing cold and his sad predicament in the snow. Victor is in trouble. ## As you can See As you can see, hairpins are intrinsically important to our life in general. We would be at a loss if we did not have hairpins. Please take your hairpins seriously and be sure to preserve and maintain them! If losing hair pins makes you feel fear, then go and listen to this podcast about fear so you can understand your fear in English better.

Does the moon affect us in ways that we don't fully understand? Are prisons more dangerous at the full moon and are our hospital emergency rooms more full at the full moon? These observations have been largely dispelled as myths. But recently scientific research is showing a slightly different connection between humans and the moon. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 371. Today I want to talk about the moon or more specifically our connection to the moon or the moon's connection to us. ## David Avery In 2005, David Avery was working in a psychiatric ward. A patient came in with a problem with mood swings. They were quite extreme swings from one mood to another. But the patient was an engineer, and a problem solver. Because of this, he had been taking meticulous records of his moods, so that he could better understand it. He shared his records with Avery, and Avery was surprised and impressed with the rhythmicity of his mood swings. Avery finally thought there might be a connection with the moon but in the end he dismissed it because he couldn't find any mechanism to connect the moon cycles to the man. The man was given medicine and discharged. ## 12 Years Later… 12 years later, a famous psychiatrist called Thomas Wehr wrote a paper about some patients with rapid cycling bipolar disorder. This is where people switch between depression and mania faster than normal. The surprising thing about all these patients was the crazy regularity of their episodes. Wehr said that he was impressed, because these rhythms seemed unlike biological rhythms, and more similar to a physical rhythm, because they were so precise. ## 2 cycles Wehr tracked the rhythms of this patient for years and years and collected a large amount of data. By looking at each individual patient’s data he was able to find a pattern. In fact he found two patterns. There was a 14.8 day cycle and a 13.7 day cycle. ## Avery’s patient Avery read Wehr’s paper and then called him because he recalled the situation with his patient 12 years earlier. After some discussion they looked at the data and discovered a 14.8 day pattern in Avery's patient. This is shocking because the pattern once again was very rhythmic. Perhaps more rhythmic than normal biological processes might suggest. And the rhythm is surprisingly similar to the rhythm of the moon. ## Mechanism The problem was explaining it. Finding the pattern was one thing, but how could we explain what kind of mechanism was working between the moon and these patients? People have long speculated on a variety of mechanisms for how the moon could affect us. One of the most common mechanisms suggested was the moonlight itself. But this has been largely dismissed because in modern life, there are all sorts of artificial light sources that we are subject to. If light was the stimulus or the mechanism, then it wouldn't be working anymore because of electric light. On the other hand, there might be something connecting us with the magnetic field of the moon. There is a molecule in animals called cryptochrome that may be functioning as a magnetic sensor. We don't know for certain that it functions as a magnetic sensor but we do know that it has a connection with circadian rhythms in our bodies. Science has not yet found a conclusive explanation, but this is one of the possible mechanisms ## Correlation Whether the mechanism is found or not, the correlation has been found. There is a distinct correlation, and it seems higher than random chance. It's too early to say that the moon would affect all humans, but it's not too early to say that the moon may affect some humans. ## What does it mean? This means that our earth's nearest neighbour, the moon, could have an influence on us after all. There are lots of artists who claimed that they are more creative during different phases of the moon. The scientific correlation that has been found might support some of those claims. It's too early to say the moon doesn't...

You wake up in the morning and instantly you know that you have a problem because your throat has a funny tickle to it. This is going to be OK today but by tonight it's gonna be worse and the next day you're gonna have a sore throat and then the cold is gonna come on full throttle. Should you take a cold medicine? Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 371. Today I want to talk about cold medicines, what's in them, what they do, and should you use them? What are the main ingredients? Depending on the medicine, there's different ingredients, but three big ones that I found in my research were acetaminophen, dextromethorphan, and Phenylephrine. A lot of the cold medicines that are on the market contain 2 or even all three of these ingredients and they all have slightly different uses. Let's take a look. ## Acetaminophen Acetaminophen is in almost all the cold medicines. This one is gonna reduce your fever. It won't get rid of your fever, but it will make it a little bit better. Additionally, it's going to give you some relief from mild pain, and maybe even moderate pain. When you catch a cold often you have pain in your joints or even in your muscles. This is going to help with that. ## Dextromethorphan dextromethorphan is meant to relieve a cough. Be careful here because you might get the wrong idea about it. This medicine does not make your cough better. It works by acting on the part of the brain that makes you cough. It suppresses the part of the brain that makes you cough. So you don't cough as much. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't cough, and it doesn't mean you're better. As an analogy, it's a Band-Aid. It means you can't see the problem anymore, but the problem is still there. ## Phenylephrine Phenylephrine is a drug that can help relieve nasal discomfort. It works on different kinds of nasal discomfort. If you have problems from colds, allergies, or hayfever, this one is going to help you feel a little bit better. But pay attention to those words: make you feel better. It doesn't make you better. It makes you feel better. So it's just like the two medicines above. It works on your feelings not on your illness. If you take these medicines you're not getting better. ## Not a Cure These medicines don't cure you. They make you feel better. On the other hand if you feel better, your body is more relaxed and feeling less stress. If there's less stress, then your body can put more of its energy into fighting the cold. If you're feeling a lot of physical stress from the pain and the discomfort of the cold, your body might be wasting energy and resources on stress hormones, and steroids like cortizone. This could be more counterproductive and cause more problems than it helps. So taking the cold medicine could help you get better. It's just removing some roadblocks. But the medicine itself doesn't make you better, and it doesn't make you get better faster. My grandma said those medicines were a waste of money. The reason she said that was she said you don't know if you're better or not better. You don't know if you're sick or not. I'm inclined to agree with her. Don't take medicine so you can know exactly how sick you are. Not bad advice considering these medicines don't make you better. If you’re interested in listening to podcasts about health, try listening to my podcast about sugar detox after this. Thanks for listening.

Handspray use literally exploded in consumption with the advent of the coronavirus pandemic. Almost overnight it seemed sales went up and there were all sorts of things that happened in connection with that. Hi and welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 370. Today I want to talk about hand sprays in the context of the corona virus pandemic. ## Contagious At the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, people were worried about how this virus was being transmitted. Of course the first thing we thought was dirty hands because that's how the common cold is transmitted, and there are certain limited similarities between the coronavirus and the common cold. ## So stop the spread So people decided that we've got to keep our hands clean in order to stop spreading this disease. Of course, we can wash our hands, but there are problems with using soap and water. One of the problems is that your skin dries out. Another problem is that you need access to a sink and towels. Then there's the thought of the environment, because now you have to provide a lot more clean water and you also have to launder the towels. ## BUT How do you do it So another way to clean your hands is to use hand sanitizers. These have been around for a long time. They've been used in hospitals and car garages. The car garage type usually is more of a hand cleaner than a sanitizer, but some of the ingredients are similar. The next thing is, are you going to use a gel or a spray? And a lot of people started using sprays. That brings us to the next point. . ## Then Everyone Bought them When everybody started using spray, they needed to get them so they all ran out to the stores and bought them. When the stores ran out, they went online and they started buying them online. And then the online stores ran out of stock too. ## So demand soared Prices soared now with demand soaring and supply not keeping up, So we had a problem. The problem is that people are more willing to pay higher prices. Then other people are willing to charge higher prices. This cycle continues until we end up with price gouging. At one point a bottle of hand sanitizer that normally cost $2.50 was selling for $90 during the pandemic. ## So They stopped it Then the authorities stepped in. They recognized the price gouging and stopped it. They made exorbitant prices for these products illegal and prevented people from selling them at those crazy prices. ## Then production increased After a while, production started to kick in, and they were able to make more of the alcohols that we use in these hand sanitizers. It took quite a while in fact. I remember that I needed alcohol for cleaning my classroom and in fact I had to look around for about three weeks before I could find a supply. Even after that, the supply was irregular. ## Now Now people are used to hand sanitizers. Many people still carry a portable supply in a small bottle with them. Others see the hand sanitizer when they walk into a business establishment and use it regularly. Most people prefer the hand sanitizers to soap and water because it's easier on your skin. Myself, I am relieved at the use of hand sanitizers because they're safer on the environment than using soap and water many times a day. If you're interested in learning more about going soapless, check out my video about going soapless down below.

Tissues are great for all sorts of things. Blow your nose, wipe your face, wipe other parts of your body… But be careful here. Welcome to the Les Perras podcast episode number 369. Today I want to talk about tissues and what you can and can't do with them. ## Can The sky’s the limit here. You can do just about anything you want with tissues… almost. You can blow your nose with them or wipe out your mouth with them. You can use them for wiping off makeup. In fact they were first invented to take cold cream off your face. I don't really know what cold cream is. I've heard the name a lot, but I've never used it and I don't want to use it. Anyway you can take it off with tissues. You can use tissues for making fake flowers. You can use tissues for other decorations. I know people who use tissues as bookmarks and some people use tissues to wipe up messes or wipe the grease off their pot before they wash it. ## Can’t I shouldn't say can't so much as I should say, shouldn't. The big deal here with tissues is flushing them down the toilet. That's a big no-no. In the coronavirus pandemic, there was a run on toilet papers and people bought too much toilet paper and some people were stuck without. What do you do when you go to the toilet and you don't have toilet paper? Well, of course you can use tissues… Sort of. What I mean is you can use tissues for wiping, and cleaning up the mess, but you shouldn't put them down the toilet. If you put the tissue down the toilet, you're gonna have troubles, or somebody's gonna have troubles. You see, toilet paper is designed to disintegrate in water. It's really weak and it's weak for a purpose. It has to break down quickly so that it flows effortlessly through the pipes. Tissues are much stronger. When you put them in the water, they do become weaker. But not weak enough to break down and flow with the water. They can clog up the pipes and create a blockage. When this happens, somebody has to go in and clean out the blockage. I don't know about you, but we got our pipes blocked once here in Japan and it cost a small fortune to have somebody come and clean it out. Trust me, you don't want a blockage in your pipes. Don't put the tissue down the toilet, put it in the garbage. That's the safest, easiest way to dispose of tissues. I have a related podcast about plumbing that you can listen to next.