Solutions From The Multiverse
Hosts Adam Braus (@ajbraus) and Scot Maupin (@scotmaupin) meet up each week where Adam brings a new idea to help the world and Scot picks and prods at it with jokes and questions. The result is an informative and entertaining podcast that always gets you thinking.
Solutions From The Multiverse
Solving Calendars: The Norse Calendar System | SFM E72
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
A few clarifications : 1) our current calendar is the Gregorian calendar. The Julian was similar but came before that. 2) the solar year is roughly 365 days long and the lunar year is roughly 354 days so the month of Yule is always 11 days long. 3) Braus weighs 13.5 stone.
Ready to shake up your golf game and shake off an outdated calendar system? We're plunging headfirst into the exciting world of Park Golf on today's episode, a simplified version of the classic sport that's winning hearts worldwide. We'll pop open a surprise package from the USA Park Golf Association and share our personal experiences with this emerging sport.
We're also taking a deep dive into timekeeping, from the Julian and Roman calendars, right up to a revolutionary concept of an intergalactic calendar. Uncover the historical roots of these systems and the vital role of Julius Caesar in shaping our modern calendar. We'll explore the framework of a solar lunar calendar and how it could bring us more in tune with nature's rhythms. Venture with us into discussions on adopting the Norse calendar, featuring its unique naming system, and the radical idea of changing the metric system for a more inclusive holiday season.
We'll then transport you to Germany and Japan, sharing our first-hand experiences - from martial arts lessons in an 'Ikea dojo' to the cultural norms of communal changing and showering. We'll take a look at the Germanic and Norse calendars and the dissimilarities with the Julian calendar. Finally, we'll explore the prospects of an intergalactic calendar and its implications for future space travel. So join us for this exhilarating journey into sports, culture, and timekeeping!
Help these new solutions spread by ...
- Subscribing wherever you listen to podcasts
- Leaving a 5-star review
- Sharing your favorite solution with your friends and network (this makes a BIG difference)
Comments? Feedback? Questions? Solutions? Message us! We will do a mailbag episode.
Email: solutionsfromthemultiverse@gmail.com
Adam: @ajbraus - braus@hey.com
Scot: @scotmaupin
adambraus.com (Link to Adam's projects and books)
The Perfect Show (Scot's solo podcast)
Thanks to Jonah Burns for the SFM music.
All right, I have something I want to show you and see if I can get you a little cross stuff.
Speaker 2Okay, so my other podcast the perfect show that I haven't done in a while but I'm working on every episode. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1Yeah, awesome. I did an episode on something called Park Golf and what happened was someone contacted me and then they distribute Park Golf stuff here in the United States and said can I send you? We have new clubs coming in, can I send you one? And so I just got I haven't even looked for free.
Speaker 2I just got this was sent to me, sent to the podcast, yeah.
Speaker 1Whoa A new Park Golf Club.
Speaker 2Two balls. It looks beautiful and it has a beautiful like and a little bit of other gear, but it's from the.
Speaker 1What is? It's from the USA Park Golf Association.
Speaker 2Whoa USA Park Golf.
Speaker 1So I haven't opened it. I wanted to wait and do this on Mike because I was like I'm going to probably have a reaction really looks good. I mean.
Speaker 2I can see through the plastic, I should say it's it's covered in bubble plastic. Oh wow, it's like they sent you the hardest of core Park Golf Clubs that is cool. It's like a Park Golf Club with wood on the top, Big like so so say, if people wanted to play, to experiment with Park Golf, what would be the exact step by step?
Speaker 1I mean you would need to get some sort of a club situation. I'm lucky I have. I brought the other ones that I have. These are my old clubs. I've never had a new club in my life. This is really fantastic. But, like you, I just take these out to a regular golf. Okay, so you?
Speaker 2go to a regular golf course A nine hole.
Speaker 1Nine hole like par three.
Speaker 2And you bring the right kind of club hey can I use this on?
Speaker 1You know I explain. I have to explain what it is. Yeah, and they've always been fascinated.
Speaker 2I've been like, oh OK, the two times I've done it so, but you just hit the balls in the holes just like. Just hit the ball in the hole, just like golf is just a much larger ball.
Speaker 1This is what.
Speaker 2Oh it's like a big wicker. You know what this is? Oh they're heavy.
Speaker 1They're kind of like croquet type lacrosse balls, I mean they're. You know what this is.
Speaker 2This is the pickleball of golf.
Speaker 1That's how it should be marketed because it's one.
Speaker 2You only need like one, one club, right? You don't need like 20 clubs.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2And then the balls way bigger and it's easier to do Right. It's easier than golf, I think it.
Speaker 1I mean, it has challenges too, but probably Sure Well pickleball has challenges too, but pickleball is easier than tennis.
Speaker 2Sure, yeah, I bet. So I think this is the pickleball of golf. This could become a really big thing.
Speaker 1It's really you hear that everybody.
Speaker 2Do you hear that that clock? It's such a satisfying thing, okay.
Speaker 1So sometime I'll take you out and we'll.
Speaker 2Yes, I am totally. I never played regular golf, so this would be.
Speaker 1I had never played regular golf either before and I played much part golf and it's it's super fun. Have you played mini golf? Yeah, of course, then you're good.
Speaker 2So this is like somewhere between mini golf. So the same way that like there's table tennis and tennis, and then there's pickleball there's like there's like mini golf and golf and then park golf. Okay, dude, I think you've seen the speed at which pickleball has exploded. It's nuts, it's crazy. There's an entire pickleball area of Golden Gate Park now with like 20 or 16 courts.
Speaker 1I got an email that they changed this whole a Bladium indoor soccer space to like Like indoor pickleball. Yeah, exactly, pickleball space. It's amazing yeah.
Speaker 2It's crazy. I think it's partly the aging of the population, right? People love pickleball too. Well, I was just going to.
Speaker 1I just wanted to record this for this, because also I'm going to reuse this for the perfect show later when I do an update on what.
Speaker 2Yes, I love this. We have to. We should go play pickleball. We definitely need to go play some park golf. I feel like some edibles might be involved too, that'd be fun.
Speaker 1I'm not. I'm not opposed.
Speaker 2San Francisco.
Speaker 1It's all form of eating things free, it's legal.
Speaker 2Ok, should I do a solution? You should do a? Ok, do you know? You know we're coming up on Yuletide, the.
Speaker 1Christmas time, yes, no, is that different? Yuletide is different than Christmas.
Speaker 2No, that's a, it's a word for Christmas.
Speaker 1OK.
Speaker 2OK, but but do you know? It's heritage Yuletide Yul logs right, yul Brenner, all all related from the king and I yes, I didn't think of the.
Speaker 1That's, that's it. That's the end of my you.
Speaker 2That's you, you'll, I'm tapped out Yul you'll.
Speaker 1you'll regret. No no, you said you got to do that in the crypt.
Speaker 2You regret not knowing my you'll references.
Speaker 1Well, where does Yuletide come from?
Speaker 2Yeah, ok so the solution for today is we should abandon the Julian calendar. Ok we should adopt the Norse calendar.
Speaker 1Julian calendar is our current calendar, 12. Months.
Speaker 2Julius Caesar invented it. All right, it's based on Egyptian calendars. And that's why we have like June, which is for or sorry, July is Julius and August is Augustus, like October is October is October is October is October octopus. It's doctor octopus. Yeah, it's doctor octopus month, yeah, but yeah, so it's. It's a good calendar. There's there's great things about it. It's a solar calendar. Ok key feature OK, key feature of the Julian calendar solar.
Speaker 1OK, so it's the solar. So in January we have to fix it twice a year with the daylight savings? No, that's a different thing. It's not fixing the calendar.
Speaker 2That's just making it so you have more sunlight at certain times of day that people have decided is optimal or socially optimal. Tricking it.
Speaker 1Our brain doesn't do anything to the calendar, but we do have to fix it with leap year but.
Speaker 2but you have to have some kind of leap year built into any calendar because the Earth's rotation around the sun is a quarter, it's 356 and a quarter days. Yeah, you have to do something. If you're going to do a solar calendar, you have to do something for leap year. So the Egyptians figured that out? Yeah, they were sun. They were the sun, god people.
Speaker 1They figured that people already also figure out the quarter day.
Speaker 2Well, let's, let's, let's, let's talk about lunar calendar, let's talk about lunar calendars first let's talk about lunar calendar, so the other major calendars are lunar Chinese, jewish, muslim, all lunar calendar Based around the phases of the moon.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2So they're like what month are we in? It's just like the month is the moon. It's each month is 28 days. Ok. And they go. It goes around and around around like a spiral, and then and then, when you get to the whatever you know the month, you get to the end of the lunar year, then you start a new lunar year and it's a different time every. Like a bear compared to the solar calendar. It's a different day every year, right?
Speaker 1Because every month is the same number of days. But every month is the same number of days sold Exactly.
Speaker 2And and every day it is corresponds directly to the lunar cycle. So if it's the 14th day of the month you look up, it's going to be half moon or whatever new moon. It's going to be one of the direct quarter phases of the moon.
Speaker 1OK.
Speaker 2And then when you get to the new new month, it's black, it's a new moon or whatever, yeah, or whatever you put, I mean, I don't know. Maybe you do full moon on the first, I don't know, depend yeah.
Speaker 1But it'll be on the cycle. You can know what the moon is going to be that night based on what day of the month it is, without coveted check.
Speaker 2But you have. Your new year is like a different day, based on the Julian calendar, every month, every year. Right, it's kind of weird. Ok, here comes the Norse calendar. It is both a lunar and a solar calendar.
Speaker 1That once.
Speaker 2How Yule? Okay, Yule is an extra month that is a different length every year. A little bit Okay. And it is the difference between the solar and lunar new year. Oh and so every year the lunar new year ends and then you have this extra month called Yule, and then when Yule ends, it's the beginning of the next year. So there's this time where it's like between, it's almost as if you know, when you're at New York, you're in New York and it's like 10, 9, 8, that time, is like 12 days 10, 9, 10.
Speaker 1No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's slow wave, slow wave. We got to. We'll be here tomorrow, tomorrow. Okay, let's say 8.
Speaker 2Yeah, and then the next day's say that.
Speaker 1And then don't get ahead of us.
Speaker 2So it syncs up the solar and the lunar new year.
Speaker 1Okay, so, and it works by being a different length every year, but it just kind of it fills in whatever that gap is.
Speaker 2It fills in whatever the gap is.
Speaker 1Does it have a maximum number of length? I think it's like 8 to 14 days. It's like less than a short month, but within that amount of time it's going to cover every scenario.
Speaker 2Yeah, Okay, and then during that time in the Norse so the Norse people figured this out. They like recognize, they understood that the sun was going around and they understood that the moon was going around and they were like we have to reconcile these two. So they did it. Okay, it's pretty cool.
Speaker 1Smart Vikings.
Speaker 2Smart Vikings you know, Okay. So so here's the cool thing, though I think. I think it has two benefits that I think make it so that we should totally adopt it Okay.
Speaker 1What's this?
Speaker 2Like you said, every month has the same number of days, except for Yule, which is just Yule is like, but crazy time yeah.
Speaker 1There's just going to be everyone.
Speaker 2So Yule is yeah, yule is all parties. No work Yule. And it's just like a everyone's like it's Yule.
Speaker 1We're not doing anything and the Yule Tide is that time. Yeah, the Yule Tide, beginning Yule to end Yule. Yeah, okay.
Speaker 2And during that time you burn the Yule Log if you want which is just a regular.
Speaker 1Okay, it's not.
Speaker 2It doesn't have any special you cut down a huge tree and you put the front end of it into a bonfire and then you just feed you feed the bonfire? Sedimentar yeah, some sprinkles Marshmallows.
Speaker 1Yeah yeah, he'd some chocolate over it.
Speaker 2Make some s'mores over the Yule Log.
Speaker 1You don't have to. I mean Yule Log, is I mean?
Speaker 2that was the Norse people. You know they like their bonfires. Yeah, Of course, so we don't have to do. It's cold out there.
Speaker 1Yeah, you got to stay warm.
Speaker 2Put up some big bonfires, but but yeah, so Yule Log is not necessary. It's a Yule, you know Yule Tide, so that's one benefit is, as months are all the same thing, the other benefit is the months are lined up with the moon. I think that our society is pretty, like you know, we're pretty like alienated from nature, and the more we do in terms of development seems to alienate us further from nature. Right, I think we need to bring our culture, we need to make big moves, like we need to make big decisive changes to bring our culture more in sync with nature.
Speaker 1You're saying base our calendar on like nature, not on some dude who just got stabbed in the back when he was yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2Unpopular. Oh, he's very yeah.
Speaker 1A2 Brutain, that's it, that's it, that's it.
Speaker 2On the Ides of March. Which Ides? I don't even know what Ides are. I think my favorite quote from from Julius Caesar, the Shakespeare play is surround me with fat men I want. That's what Julius Caesar says he's like. I like fat men because skinny men are ambitious, like they're hungry.
Speaker 1Oh, I thought he meant as like a shield, a physical shield in case he was going to get stabbed. He's like that gives me more, like physically more protection.
Speaker 2That's right, that's right.
Speaker 1So it's around me with that man and they're like, oh, we're going to leave this back part open. He's like, no, no, no, no, no, no. Then Brutain Okay.
Julius Caesar and the Roman Calendar
Speaker 2So this is this is important the Ides, okay. So there were four or sorry, three ancient markers for dates in relation to lunar phases. Dates is the middle of the month, but that's not a lunar month. So Calends, nones, nones and Ides were the ancient markers used for reference dates in relation to lunar phases. The Ides simply refers to the first full moon of a given month, which usually fell between the 13th and the 15th. So they were, so they did have somewhat lunar style going on. I mean, julie, by the time he was killed he might not have already implemented the calendar.
Speaker 1Oh, that's true, he probably named after him. He certainly wouldn't have had months named after him Before he died, right.
Speaker 2Yeah, and then he was killed. Probably probably wasn't super popular.
Speaker 1So what kind of calendar was he using? Was Julius Caesar using a lunar calendar then? I don't know.
Speaker 2Yeah, what is this Roman calendar before?
Speaker 1Is this a big? Is this a big? Do as I say, not as I do. Is that what we're dealing with here? We have to deal with leap year and remembering. Is this 31 days or 30 days? Are we the 28 day?
Speaker 2This makes no sense. The calendar consisted of 10 months in a year of 304 days Is the metric system, the Romans, the metric calendar gets crazier. The Romans seem to have ignored the remaining 61 days, which fell in the middle of winter.
Speaker 1There's like this the start hat. They're like they just were like I'll see you tomorrow. They're like there's no tomorrow.
Speaker 2They're like wait 61 days it's so cold. Nothing happens until it gets warm again. It's not even a thing.
Speaker 1It's like when you get caught and you freeze and you just hope you don't get seen. It's like we're going to stop now and hope that the sun comes back around and makes things warm again. We figured we did something to make it cold. We're sorry, but we're not going to move. When you make it warm again, then we'll start moving again.
Speaker 2There were different months Aprilus, mayus was already there Junius, frijuno, the goddess Quintillus, sextillus, september, october, november, december. Those were all there from way before. I think Julius Caesar was like hey guys, we're going to get those 60 days back, we're going to cut big two more months in. Yeah, he's like why are we doing Augustus?
Speaker 1Why are we doing a bunch of 30-ish day months, then we run out of months, but we still have a bunch of days left. Maybe that was his big contributor. He was just like, hey guys, maybe we can redo that math one time.
Speaker 1Just add two months, we're moving 61 days it seems to me like we have a simple solution here. They're like whoa, oh man, look at Junius over here, mr Goodwill, he Goodwill, hunting on their chalkboard. One night, all the really smart people went to bed and Julius Caesar just couldn't sleep, so he's wandering around his big bed. He goes oh, what's this over here? He runs it off. They're like hey boy, get out of there.
Speaker 2Get out of there, run away. He's like this looks. Oh my God, it's correct. He's done it.
Speaker 1He's just scrambled to all their scrolls.
Speaker 2But yeah, so anyways our calendar is synced up with nature to some extent with the sun, but I think it's really like have you ever been happy? Some witch warlock type person is like happy equinox. And you're like, oh sure, you're like I sort of, in a very liminal way, understand that the days are getting longer, the days are getting shorter. So you kind of understand. We're sort of like, oh, it's fall.
Speaker 1so the days are getting longer. That's also the solstice situation.
Speaker 2Yeah, exactly Celebrating solstice is, but if every day you looked up at night, and the moon was like the phase that lined up with the day it was. I think that just brings us, like, like clock, closer to nature. Yeah, and then you would be a blast. It would just be a total blast. It would just be like everybody takes off like whatever. This year it's eight days, next year it's 12 days, you know what, who knows, and it's just fun.
Speaker 1We'd find out what you was going to be and then people would like book cruises Caribbean, Caribbean.
Speaker 2you'll cruises, you old cruises because everything shuts down. Before you have to get your log. There'd be a huge line for logs.
Speaker 1Now, what countries would participate? Would this just be like America?
Speaker 2So now you're talking about, now you're talking about. So I don't want to talk about end state, I want to talk about implementation. Yeah, I was going to say how do you?
Speaker 1even start a new cap. It's not like Rome, where you're like we are one third plus of the world, or whatever. How do you even start a new calendar and you would have to get a lot of people to adopt it. First you build an app.
Speaker 2First, you build an app, of course. Right, you can call it a Norse calendar app, you can just call it. I would just call it the modern calendar, because I think it's a more sophisticated calendar than the existing one. The better calendar, the better calendar, right, the superior calendar.
Speaker 1The not lame calendar. And then it just kind of implies we're like oh, we didn't say anything. We didn't say I'm just saying we're the not lame calendar, no, but the Norse calendar.
Speaker 2If you conclude that your calendar is lame, that is on you.
Speaker 1I mean, infer whatever you need to infer. I said what I said.
Speaker 2I kind of dropped into a Ron Burgundy there, if you do that.
Speaker 1It's on you. Is Norse calendar the marketing that you would get people hooked with? No, I wouldn't do Norse calendar.
Speaker 2I would call it like the better calendar, the modern calendar. Or I'd call it like the solar lunar calendar or something To get like. I think it would be good to get like kind of woo woo people on board, you know new age people? Because, yeah, moon like New moon, like menstruation Women's menstruation goes in cycle with the moon. Wouldn't it be great if we got rid of our patriarchal calendar?
Speaker 1We have an entire society of people aware of when to be most fearful werewolves.
Speaker 2Absolutely you better 14th of the month. You better get the hell out of there.
Speaker 1Yeah, but they're like it's the 27th, I'm not even worried, bro, there's no worries. Yeah, there's no Wolverine.
Speaker 2Not Wolverine, sorry, werewolves, yeah. So I think you could get like new agey people on board and stuff, because it'd be like in cycle with the moon, and then you could also get I think it'd be easy to get both sides you could get solar calendar people on board and you could get lunar calendar people on board, because it kind of is both.
Speaker 1Right If you, if you put a science bent on the lunar, the lunar calendar gets the woo woo people right.
Speaker 2Right.
Speaker 1Already, and if you can put a science bent on it, like how you could sell the metric system, you're like it just makes more sense. You know what I mean. Like it's a. I would never do that.
Speaker 2I'm pro imperial system. What I'm anti, anti metric system. I well, I think it's filing the American the way. The American studio is the best where you have science done in metric. Are you? Are you? Is this a bit? I'm 100% certain. Wait, I'm 100% honest. Do you like the English system better than the?
Speaker 1metric Absolutely 12 of these into one of this three of those into four of these. Yes, perfect Instead of just base 10.
Speaker 2Mm, hmm, what I had. A German man explain why.
Speaker 1Why One?
Speaker 2reason why there's many reasons. Why Do you measure your weight in stone? Yeah, I'm about 18 stone, that's cool Kilograms.
Speaker 1That's cool. No, I hate that. No, all that's bad. Okay, so there's sidebar, there's multi sidebar.
Speaker 2There's multiple reasons. One reason is fractions.
Speaker 1How's one?
Speaker 2third of 10,. Scott, what's one third of 10? 3.3 repeating yeah it's an irrational number. That's not my fault, I know, but the point is, guess what's one third of 12. Four, yeah, a rational number.
Speaker 1I have to guess that was an irrational number. That wasn't a guess, by the way I know it. That's good Sometimes, I think 3. I just want to establish. I wasn't a guess. You said guess, but I knew that, did I say?
Speaker 2guess what is that? Now, guess what 2 plus 2 is.
Speaker 1Okay, I already know this one as well as 4.
Speaker 2Yeah, so that's so you get. So this is what a German guy who was a PhD.
Speaker 1So that's why we use 12. We use it so that we can split things Goes and get things better. Get another friend who needs to stop splitting things in 3.
Speaker 2This was a PhD in engineering from Germany and he said absolutely, the British system is better because you can do fractions better, so you can do like a wrench that's a quarter, a third. Your wrenches can be like perfect.
Speaker 1But we have machines that can store irrational numbers. Now we don't have to worry about this. No bad news bears, so it's just for a third Fractions, divisions of things, yeah.
Speaker 2Okay. The other reason is so this is the reason he said that one I don't. Okay. I'll trust him. He has a PhD, but I have so what's a third of an inch? One third of an inch. One third. How do you measure that?
Speaker 1on a normal ruler One third, they give you a quarter. They give you eighths and sixteenths. Where do you get to third?
Speaker 2You got to do a quarter of it. That's you got to do it, just bump it up to a quarter. Yeah, you got to bump it up to a quarter. Okay, anyways you can fight with this German man. I have no dog in that fight.
Speaker 1I would love to fight with this German man. He's probably older than I am by far, now I'll just punch him. You probably just like pull the rug, take him out, trick him into standing on a rug and then like, pretend, like I'm going to tie my shoe.
Speaker 2Should we whoop, yeah, pull it out from under him. Or maybe you just like do the pull and he would just wouldn't move. It'd be like when you pull out a tablecloth and everything stays on the table. That's probably what happened.
Speaker 1He's like I've got these slick European shoes.
Speaker 2Exactly for that reason. Just whoop, he's like oh, naughty, naughty, nice work Right to pull the rug. Everyone applause.
Speaker 1Yeah, now it's Russian. You tried to pull the rug. You tried to pull the rug from me.
Speaker 2You tried to pull the rug from me From Moskowicz. My shoe is very slick, it's not possible. Yes. So the other reason this is the reason I'm convinced to use the British system is it's human scale. This is the other thing we need to do with our society is make it more human scale.
Speaker 1Yeah, that's why it's so stupid. It was like an inches based on the king's thumb or whatever.
Speaker 2Right, I just like it, especially for fluids. Like a cup is like how much you want to hold in your hand and drink.
Speaker 1You don't know how much I want to hold in my hand and drink.
Speaker 2If you go make a cylinder with your hand. That's one cup, that's good, that's how much, that's what nature wants you to be able to drink. Is one hand full of anything? And so a cup is a very reasonable amount for humans. It's human scaled, and then the same thing for a pint, that's 400 ml.
Speaker 1400 ml liters.
Speaker 2A pint is what you want to drink For, like, if you're going to sit down and have any kind of like a beer or like a cup of water, a pint is what you want Two cups. And if you're like, oh, I want 357 ml, I'm like that's just, that's exactly Like that's not right, you want one.
Speaker 1You do have a point with the liquid stuff, but it's just because metric hasn't invent Like there's no kilo liter, right, that's not a common thing.
Speaker 2There's a kilo liter, it would be a thousand liters. Oh wait, A liter is a thousand oh so no, we didn't.
Speaker 1And then you do use two liter bottles. We use liters all the time. Gallon's better, though, a gallon of milk versus a two liter of soda, because a gallon is like as much as you want to carry in one hand.
Speaker 2You would never want to carry more than a gallon, or unless you could be like I, can carry more. What about it's 22 pounds? What a weird.
Speaker 1I can't even attack that statement because it's so impervious to you Like it's so amorphous.
Speaker 2It's human scaled.
Speaker 1You're like a gallon is the exact amount you would want to carry, unless you want to carry more, or if you don't want to carry less. I'm like, well, what a puzzle box you bet.
Speaker 2I can't find my way in. I'm trying.
Speaker 1I know there's something wrong with your reasoning, but I cannot find a way in.
Speaker 2That's right. That's right. Anyways, maybe it's just crazy. Okay, you tell me that's interesting. I didn't even think about it for the third. I'd always been like the metric.
Speaker 1We should all be on the metric system because it's better.
Speaker 2Metric system works for some things. Great Tens. It's. Good for science, it's good for distance. I mean for distance no a kilometer. How far is a kilometer?
Speaker 1How many inches? Who wants to go one kilometer? Nobody. How many feet or a?
Speaker 2mile. Also, a kilometer is totally irrational. They just thought that the earth was 40,000. They thought the entire circumference of the earth was 40,000 kilometers.
Speaker 1They just thought that's what it was. They were like let's take how do we pick the distance?
Speaker 2They were like oh well, how about 40,000 chunks of the circumference of the earth? That's what the French revolutionaries, who came up with the metric system said Split it into radians.
Speaker 1Okay.
Speaker 2Why didn't they just do like 50,000, or why didn't they do 30,000?
Speaker 1They just picked 40,000. A kilometer being a thousand meters makes so much more sense than a mile being 5,280 feet. That is true, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2You have found the absolute weakest point of the British system.
Speaker 1But people still say mileage and they still use miles per hour in a lot of places, even when they're using colombus.
Speaker 2I think we should readjust the mile to be a little smaller. We could do the mile.
Speaker 1We could do the mile. I think the mile should be 1,000 yards, 12 inches in a foot, but keep, but start switching, because it's called the mile which is the melee, the thousand steps, that's supposed to be the thousand legionnaires. A thousand yards would be 3,000 feet, so mile becomes roughly a little bit over half what it is Like a kilometer. It would become a kilometer and you can split 3,000 by 3, so you have your whole third situation that you love.
Speaker 2Oh, you do 3,000 feet. Yeah yeah, yeah, these are great points, also a different solution. But yeah so we are talking about weights and measures. I mean, we're talking about the calendar.
Speaker 1I just wanted to know about your metric systems.
Speaker 2I do like the liquids, though I will stand by the liquids forever. I want a pint of beer, I want a cup of flour, I want a gallon of milk. But the Yule stuff, I think, is a win Brings us closer to nature, gives us all 10 days off during Christmas time, like everybody, and it's a secular holiday because it's based on the sun and the moon. It's not like, oh, it's Christmas or Hanukkah.
Speaker 1Yeah, but no, just gets us away from all of that. Some people see the idea of promoting a secular holiday as an attack on Christmas. Have you heard of this? Yeah, yeah, happy holidays Are you attacking Christmas with your calendar.
Speaker 2I mean, I don't even know if the 25th of June on a solar calendar would always fall on Yule. Actually Wait would June?
Speaker 1be the middle of Yule, I don't know.
Speaker 2No, it would be around like the New Year's time, but I don't know the exact. You said 25th of June. I was like what? Oh sorry, january is what I meant, so let's see what Yule time. Okay, so Yule for the 23.
Speaker 1no-transcript. Oh wait, I did 23,.
Speaker 2I need 22 for this year right.
Speaker 1This year is 23.
Speaker 2Okay, so this year, Yule is from December 21st to January 1st. Perfect, Perfect. So that's what I'm saying it's perfect.
Speaker 1Places are mostly shut down that time anyway, except if you need to do some emergency getting in, I know.
Speaker 2So this would formalize that that time for everyone is holiday. Cool, I think I'm gonna sync up all the moon and the sun and it would be fun. I'm in favor. I know, I know, I know. It's a great thing.
Speaker 1I don't like the somebody, just okay. Just in my 30s somebody taught me the trick. Have you seen the? Trick of the knuckles thing to know the long month, short month, long month, short month. It's like goes up and down. You're like your knuckles. I can't even remember how it goes now, but it was in my 30s and I was like, oh okay, cause I always kind of struggle with some of them.
Speaker 2You can just do it on one hand One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, nine, nine, nine, nine, nine, nine, nine, nine, nine, nine. You don't have to do two. Yeah, cause two is the same as one.
Speaker 1I mean it's just some of the middle months you're like. This is 30, 31.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, I know you like doubt yourself in the middle. I always count my knuckles.
Speaker 1It's like how some words that I've been spelling forever. I'll be writing it. I'll be like I don't have two L's in it.
Speaker 2I don't have one on it Like I wanna double up the letters in the middle. You know yeah, I never know how many days are in a month. That's why this would be better. This would be better.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2Put their knuckles away, exactly. Except for when they're in non-violence Unless they're in a fight in Boston. Definitely have to bring their knuckles out, but only in that fight in Irish style where it's like underhand you want both knuckles pointing up and one arm extended out significantly farther than me? Yeah, that's a good way to do it. I've seen that, so it looks like. Actually, when I'm looking at like a Yule calendar thing, it's actually always December 1st to January 1st.
Speaker 1Okay. Which I don't really think that it falls within that time.
Speaker 2I don't think that's actually true from like a purely I would wanna follow exactly.
Speaker 1Obviously, you would want it to stop at the beginning of the new year, so that it Maybe it would always be the same, because you're resetting it exactly. They wanna restart on January 1st, yeah.
Speaker 2January 1 isn't always a lunar year, but I guess it is always, if you're resetting it to be man we would hire a calendar scientist.
Speaker 1Yeah, some kind of calendar scientist we would get the top people in the calendar science of Harvard division of Harvard. We'd recruit them, we'd hire them out the PhDs in calendar and we would let them tell it.
Speaker 2I love this idea. I would just be so happy if we switched our. We could keep the month names the same as the Julian calendar, cause everyone's used to that, but we just shift it and then we add the month.
Speaker 1I mean, if you just change the phones, I mean everyone will go with what their phones is anyway. Right, right, so we make an app. That's the first thing. Okay, make an app.
Speaker 2So first make an app and then you people here this episode, they download the app and then they can be like looking at it and it can tell them what day it is, and then people can just start to celebrate Yule. Yeah, so they can say to people oh, that's Yule, so like I'm going to be off, you know, and people can be like oh instead of saying like oh, it's the holiday and you know, tiptoeing around like oh it's.
Speaker 1Hanukkah oh, it's Yule, I'm going to be off. They're like what you just say, it's Yule. I just how do I ask? What are you? The president in the States could be like take Yule off, cause it's secular, it's always secular idea.
Speaker 2It's just like the sun and the moon are out of joint for 10 days every year, so I don't work. Sorry, you know like that's a fun secular way to make that time of year special you get the tweens.
Speaker 1You make an ad campaign saying Yule rules, yule rules. And you like you make it like a really like a cool. You have somebody with a backwards hat and sunglasses saying it and then, or it's the Criptkeeper and it says you'll be sorry.
Speaker 2Oh, you know.
Speaker 1I wish the Criptkeeper had a more soothing voice, Like if you was just like oh no, there is the Yulekeeper headspace episodes.
Speaker 2Have you heard those? No, I'm breathing.
Speaker 1I'm just gonna have to the Criptkeeper pops up, he looks the same way, right. He's just like hey, everybody.
Speaker 2I'm bird by the bird, how you doing.
Speaker 1How's everybody doing tonight?
Speaker 2Yeah, I have some jokes for you.
Speaker 1Don't worry about that, just chill. But I'm not gonna like freak anyone out or get anyone's ears like her?
Speaker 2Why would I do that Weird stuff that I always did before?
Speaker 1Hey there, big boy, nice to see you. Good things were dropping by my Cript.
Speaker 2That's right, Be fine. Hey, do what he do, pun still. But just he would deliver them in a smooth voice. I can't think of any like right off.
Speaker 1The feel so forced. I mean that's what puns are, but you know they had the benefit of writers writing them.
Speaker 2I can have multiple voices because you know there's more ways to skin a cat. It doesn't really work without the good voice. You might say he lost his head.
Speaker 1Yeah, that's what he always says, because William Shad here.
Speaker 2He lost his head.
Speaker 1Yeah, criptkeeper's not a great character really, he's a very I have a friend who really loves him.
Speaker 2Well, ironically, everyone loves him.
Speaker 1I don't know he is heck. He's got a very specific energy. I didn't watch a lot. I wasn't allowed to watch a lot of those tales from the Cript, that's because they were HBO, I didn't have cable and it was like they had they might, would they show?
Speaker 2nudity. I think they'd show a boob every now and then.
Speaker 1Okay, yeah, a boob, my parents would have been, or cleavage, at least Would have tried to throw themselves in front of the screen Like no, no, no, no, yeah, don't.
Speaker 2Get rad 6 seconds the Americans.
Speaker 1so prude, it's true. When I went to Japan, there was like they didn't care after well they did. It was an after. There was like a Certain channels or after a certain hours Would have certain restrictions that were not, but like top, top was not a situation. Yeah, yeah although no, I'm admitting, maybe too, too much After hours in Japan.
Speaker 2I mean that I think it's culturally relevant to point out that a place that has zero, a murder rate of almost zero percent, allows people to look at naked their versions of other human beings. And our country has how many tens of thousands of people killed by gun violence and murders every year, and we're like oh my god don't show a nipple.
Speaker 1The Puritan origins of our country yeah, and then it's hilarious to me, having lived in other places where, like people here are just like you know how every country is like this and you're like oh, no, no, no.
Speaker 2No, no, no, no. This one has a weird like. This is yeah.
Speaker 1When you go to other countries, you're like hey, you know you how you guys should be ashamed of this.
Speaker 2Or like Right feel bad about yourselves.
Speaker 1Because of that. They're like what, what are you talking about? What are you talking about?
Speaker 2That's what really struck me in Germany because, because they're like you know, you meet someone who's like a super uptight, like banker, you know who, like you know, it's just like perfectly groomed like sure and so then in America you assume this person has enormous bodily Shame and, like you know, extreme Puritanism that goes along. You think of that as going along.
Speaker 1There's like a whole package right, a high conscientiousness.
Speaker 2Kind of person, but then, this same person in Germany just like drops trowel and just like walks around a park in a city, like, and then they're just like what this is totally sounds like a specific person. No, this is totally normal. In Germany it's called fire copacota.
Speaker 1I mean free body culture. Wait, it's totally normal for all the uptight dudes to then just drop drown, walk around in a certain no big deal.
Speaker 2It's just like totally normal. They're like does like this would just be a nice thing to do. This is what I'm doing. I'm just standing around naked in a park.
Speaker 1Maybe I'm too pure to whatever sounds like some sort of a sex crime. I know right, but in Germany it's totally normal. They just do this like once a month or is it?
Speaker 2Did I tell you this one? I think I told this.
Speaker 1I.
Speaker 2Was an. I was at an Ikea dojo and I tell you this story you've told me about being an Ikea before.
Speaker 1Okay, but not in Germany. I went in with anyone.
Speaker 2Good story. So this exactly, I think, illustrates the way Germany works. So I was at this. I key to sign. I like Ikea. Oh my dad kind of introduced it to me when I was a kid and did you flip someone out of their pants?
Speaker 1And I just flipped them and those hot pants? Just give me those pants.
Speaker 2And they were like, yeah, this is the tree my head.
Speaker 1Yeah, you like see everyone in Germany. Does this all the time? Take that Germany we're in Sacramento.
Speaker 2So, I was in. So in Germany, when I was an exchange student, I was 19 years old and I was like, oh, I wanted like things to do, because I just a young person. So I was like, oh, I found an Ikea dojo and I was like sweet, I'll go do Ikea lessons.
Speaker 2So I only went one time, maybe because I got a little. It was pretty far away from my house too. But it was also kind of weird because you know, I got there and I got there a little late, which is like not a good idea to do an Ikea.
Speaker 2Oh, you're not supposed to be disrespecting the, so I I ran in, I run to the end of the thing and I just and I just swap into my gi and I run out and I stand in line. I just got in just in time to bow and and and be ready for class. It's like, oh, thank God, we do the whole little class a little lesson. You know we're throwing people around doing, you know grabbing people's wrists, redirecting momentum, yes, and then and key and you know everyone gets, you know, sweaty and hot and our geese are all like you know and you know.
Speaker 2So then we go back and everyone starts. You know we split men, women, men on the right, men, women on the left. Okay, so we go in and the men go in the right and the women go in the left, and then we're like Just describing normal locker room culture. And then we're like you know, all the guys like are undressing and like they're like put a towel around their waist and like Are walking back to I hear showers are in the back of the locker.
Speaker 1Sure.
Speaker 2Yeah, so I hear that and I hear that. I see them putting like towels around their waist and walking to the back and I think this is the same. Okay, the showers connect in the back between the women in the locker room one showers.
Speaker 1Interesting, so they're there's.
Speaker 2Germany yeah, interesting. So they're like ashamed to dress in front of each other and undress, but they're totally fine, just being like wet seals together covered in soap with no walls. I mean it was like if you totally mental.
Speaker 1Sometimes the taking off clothes process is the least, at least sexy part of like, like you can sort your body into some of the it's least attractive shapes. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2I had felt real, installed on all my, discovered that rip them off.
Speaker 1The problem, the offensive part, is like when you're bending over to remove your sock or whatever, right, and they're like we'll just let everyone do that on their own right, and then when you're walking around normal style, you can show what you're right.
Speaker 2Right.
Speaker 1It was Japan had some unisex Onsens where you would, you would go in, but usually like you're covered up to your, I mean You're covered up to your neck and you can't really see the water stuff.
Speaker 2You just come on wandering around. But this was I didn't really go to a lot of those. This wasn't a little bit of a progressive part of the city, like it was in the western side of Hamburg, which I can't wait with this event.
Speaker 1I 2004.
Speaker 2Wow.
Speaker 1So this was? I mean, this was not like like a recent, like we're trying a new thing, no, no, this is just like German culture.
Speaker 2They just don't. But. But the interesting thing is, like you know, it's not just like I don't know. In America you might see like oh, I'm in this environment, that's all hyper progressive sort of low conscientiousness people like you know, hippies sort of people, and then they're like we're free about our bodies and they're naked and whatever. But in Germany it would just be anyone it would be like a nation would be like a total conservative banker guy would just be like, yeah, naked, or a tall woman of whatever age would just that's the part that concerns me.
Speaker 1You're just like. You come back to like. The ultimate expression of freedom is like walking pantsless through the park. That sounds neither pleasant nor appropriate.
Speaker 2Oh, it sounds so polite. I love being naked. Maybe it's my German heritage Wearing like imagine.
Speaker 1I'm imagining it because you've given me the shirt still like a suit, like the button up shirt, the tie and the blazer, but just like pants off and then like dress dress shoes, like oh, with the dress shoes.
Speaker 2Uh huh, just why, you know, I like Seinfeld's idea of belt with pockets when you're naked, because the only thing naked nudity is lacking is pockets, yeah it's true, you can't carry a lot of stuff, but here we are talking about Germanic culture with the Germanic calendar, and look at me, you're promoting the Germanic calendar.
Speaker 1We're trying to move away from that. We're moving to North. No, no, no, no, that's the same. The Germans did use the North one. You could call it Germanic.
Speaker 2Norse, you know, the Northern Germany Norse. That was all one people you know.
Speaker 1Now I see where the Northern I thought you were spreading out. You were like pulling from the cruel things to the people of Iceland. No, you're still.
Speaker 2Northern, you're still Homer for.
Speaker 1Germany, Dutch.
Speaker 2German, yeah, like Northern German, Dutch, Danish, Scandinavian.
Speaker 1Did the Scandinavian cultures have this as well?
Speaker 2No, they really kind of adopted the Julian calendar and I think yeah. I mean I think it makes sense because it's just even and smooth throughout the whole thing, but I think there's something too, having like an unevenness at that key time when I was in Japan they were clinging.
Speaker 1So the calendar was the same months, you know 12 months of the year, and they just have them. They name them by number, they just number them one through 12. Oh boring, January is just one month, you know.
Speaker 2That's so boring.
Speaker 1February is two months all the way to 12.
Speaker 2They have an opportunity there.
Speaker 1Well, they can they give them like fancy names, because they give everything fancy names, but like just everyone uses one month or seven months or whatever. Yeah, but what's interesting is they don't they have they will also say the year, but then they also have what you use as your more official year, which is the year of the emperor. They let you you need to know your birth date, not just in like, I was born in this year with the four the 19 such and such, but your or 2000,.
Speaker 1I was born 2000, such and such.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1No but. And then you need to know oh, it's also Showa this year, or Hese?
Speaker 2this year or whatever, the whatever the reign of this emperor.
Speaker 1We need to know Cool. That it's, it's Hese 18. It's not just 2004 or whatever. So what would you do with Yule? Where would you go?
Speaker 2Well, I mean, I think, I think it's just would simplify everything for society. But if everyone Christmas falls during Yule the 25th, yeah, it's actually like the height of.
Speaker 1Yule. It's like the peak of Yule Every year, for sure.
Speaker 2Solar New Year's.
Speaker 1So I'm saying you, if Yule is a thing, if Yule becomes a thing, where are you going to go and?
Speaker 2spend your Yule. Oh, I mean, I just would probably do like a staycation.
Speaker 1I'm pretty, I'm like a whole right, because everywhere would be shut down, right I?
Speaker 2mean people could decide it's a free country. People could decide to like run during Yule and use our high use our high, our high, our high season. We take a month off in this or we take a week off in the, in the, in the summer, to counter balance it or something Gotcha. But all schools could be off, all you know, office jobs, banks could close, you know, you could really shut down society and have it be focused on family.
Speaker 1That's what I'm saying. Like you wouldn't necessarily want to go somewhere if they're shut down and there's nothing to do there.
Speaker 2Well, if you say, as a society, we're going to focus on family there probably would still be restaurants who serve that there'd be services that served families that would still stay open, like travel, trampoline parks. Trampoline parks, you know, normal family outing goat.
Speaker 1But I mean, I'm I personally am.
Speaker 2I'm personally, I'm somewhat, you know, I'm a bit of a homebody, so I would just be like, wow, 10 days where no one will bother me, this is great.
Speaker 1I'm going to stay uninterrupted fortnight yeah.
Speaker 2Well, writing too. I've been writing a lot, so I'd write more writing reading right, catching up on stuff. I'm probably doing a logic paper.
Speaker 1I would want to do cooking experiments during Yule.
Speaker 2Of course, because good idea you can.
Speaker 1if it doesn't quite turn out right, you can always just kind of package it and give it to other people.
Speaker 2Yeah, Throw it in the fire and be like you log, you'll burn it. Burn it. Well, you can package up and give it to people. Yeah, that's what I was going to say. I mean you'd be like, here's some bird cookies.
Speaker 1Depending on how good the person like, how good it turns out, you give it to that level of your. You save the better versions for your better friends.
Speaker 2So if this comes out in mid December, everyone should get prepared for Yule, december 21st to the first We've got to make this app for everybody, I mean somebody does.
Speaker 1This is how we are.
Speaker 2Our podcast is becoming our podcast is becoming a great source for new ideas for people to do it always has been. It's great, of course. Yeah, I guess you're right. That's the premise of the podcast New ideas.
Speaker 1But you can't always do them.
Speaker 2Can't always do them, but this one you could totally make it happen. It would be so easy. The Norris calendar app and it could show the phase of the moon and it could show the pathway of the sun. I'll be honest you could see it sync up the moon, the sun all in one screen. It'd be beautiful.
Speaker 1I'll be honest, I'll probably be a late adopter. I'll have to wait until like 93% of the world has switched over.
Speaker 2You're the only person in the world besides me who knows this, and you would be a late adopter.
Speaker 1I feel like, because I've just it takes me so long. It takes me so long to memorize a bunch of different new months and where they started.
Speaker 2It won't be the same months. I'm terrible at scheduling. You. Just look at your calendar. Oh, you know what we could make as a calendar like a Google calendar for it too, so people could start moving everything. I'm just barely getting the Julian calendar now. Just barely, just barely now I feel like I'm starting to get it.
Speaker 1Just starting to get it. Yeah Well, you just learned that it's called the.
Speaker 2Julian calendar. I mean, did you know that?
Speaker 1it was called that. No, I've been throwing that around like it's been something I use all the time, but you know oh yeah, it used to be the Gregorian calendar.
Speaker 2That was what the Julian calendar, part of what the Julian calendar was Well how is it different?
Speaker 1The Roman calendar is called the Republic calendar.
Speaker 2No, that was called the Republic calendar. The Gorgian People love their characters. The Gregorian calendar is the calendar used in most parts of the world. It went into effect in October 1582. Oh, as a modification of, oh, a replacement for, the Julian calendar. Okay, it includes leapures. So sorry, we are in the Gregorian calendar, okay, but it's very similar to the Julian calendar, except for leapures.
Speaker 1Gregorian doesn't even get credit for it usually.
Speaker 2So there's been improvements. So here's the whole point. Over time, there are improvements to the calendar. We have become an advanced technological civilization and we haven't made an improvement. I think this is the improvement.
Speaker 1The Gregorian calendar almost had us all doomed to Y2K. I mean we need to switch up the calendar.
Speaker 2You're blaming Y2K on the Gregorian calendar. Okay, I'll do that. I'm with you. I mean it's not true, but I'm with you in spirit.
Speaker 1Well, if we counted years different, we'd be different, we'd start over. We got another 2000 years before we have to worry again.
The Concept of an Intergalactic Calendar
Speaker 2Why would we not do that? So the idea, though, is this puts us as a space faring civilization calendar. That's what this is Okay, because Yule is based on Terra's specific relationship to Luna and Sol in our system. Meaning if you go to a different planet, your calendar would be different Because it'd be based on that calendar, the calendar of that planet.
Speaker 1Interesting. Well then we'd have to have some sort of a calendar translation. There would be some galactic calendar.
Speaker 2Yeah, there'd be some integral.
Speaker 1We've got to figure out intergalactic travel first, but then the calendar problem is number two right. Yeah, number two on our priority list, you're right.
Speaker 2Intergalactic calendar's future episode yes, thanks everybody for listening up to this Wackadoo holiday season episode.
Speaker 1Enjoy your Yule wherever you may be and come back next week for another episode from us.
Speaker 2Yeah, take care, merry Christmas.
Speaker 1Oh, I said it A bad don't happy holidays Big. Yule, Big Yule everybody.
Speaker 2Big Yule, oh, that's good. Have a big Yule. Big Yule everyone.
Speaker 1Have a big Yule. Bye.
Podcasts we love
Check out these other fine podcasts recommended by us, not an algorithm.
The Perfect Show
Scot Maupin