Mark and Toddcast

It was sort of the Segway before the Segway: a commuter monorail system balanced by a series of gyroscopes. While this innovation never took off, there are still modern-day companies working to revive the concept. Find out more this week, along with an apocalypse of cicadas, ungrateful fans sue Madonna, cold Tesla batteries, video proof that plants communicate with each other, Portland's biggest eyesore buildings being sold, and controversy around Bobi, the Guinness Record holder of "world's oldest dog."

Everyone has heard of the famous Stanford Prison Experiment, which purported to show that anyone could become a monster warden or beaten-down prisoner in the matter of a week. But what if that whole experiment was kind of bullshit? This week we take apart the experiment, and discuss news including the end of the beloved Fruit Stripe gum, federally rescheduling marijuana, the rich owning 90% of stocks, and the feel-good story of the week: Bill O'Reilly's books being removed from Florida schools.

This week we blow up a story about one of the most famous non-famous people in the world: Treb Heining, whose work with balloons has transformed, well, ballooning, I guess. Hear his wonderful story (the ups and the downs), as well as news stories about the new Portland waterfront skate park, a new study about the regret rate of transition surgeries, things Portland were in the top 10 for in 2023, a pastor tries to deep fry a McDonald's employee, and more. Happy new year, weirdos!

It's that time of year again - let's go back and revisit Mark's top-of-show Dad Jokes for 2023. Happy new year!

This week Todd welcomes Dave Baehler of the NotNerd Podcast to give a final news roundup up the year! Join us as we tackle news about the "holy grail" of male contraception, ChatGPT gets seasonal affective disorder, First Thursdays at the Portland Art Museum, Big Pink's new security robot, Google's top searches of 2023 (and forever), a rare pair of Nike's gets donated, and more. Happy holidays!

Looking for a fun holiday excursion or something to do with out-of-town folk? Why not take a tour of some of Portland's finest hand-made chocolatiers? Mark takes us on a first-hand journey -- with samples! -- to some of the best. All that, as well as a look at "Greedflation," retail stores lying about consumer theft, PlayStation takes your purchased movies back, Oregon's first humanoid robot company, Texas wants to leave the union (so do it already, Texas!), "rizz," a new rhino at the Oregon zoo, and someone gets assaulted by a sausage. It's a Christmas miracle!

This week Todd is joined by co-host of the NotNerd podcast Nate Heath to discuss everything from flying hamburgers, to Portland's new ice rink, "super pigs," woolly mammoth resurrection, Banksy's identity, retailers lying about theft issues, and a closer look at some of the successful Universal Basic Income experiments happening all over the United States. Be sure to subscribe to the NotNerd podcast wherever you get your podcasts!

Fonts didn't suddenly spring into existence with the word processor in the 1980s. In fact, fonts have been around since people have been writing things down, back to 8500 BC. Take a ride with us to see how we go from cuneiform to comic sans on this episode.

From tracing apps to stranded astronauts to MDMA to Lloyd Center to ABBA to Best Buy to Netflix to Twinkies to the Jantzen Beach carousel to black holes to photons to Costco selling out of gold bars, I think we pretty much cover everything in this episode.

The human body is 2.5% metal, which we need in order to produce electricity, heal our skin, and make us move and think, among other things. We're not saying we're robots, but we're sort of robots. This week we dive into the weird world of metals, and how exactly our bodies need and use them to pilot the other 97.5% of us that's an organic, goopy pile of flesh and guts.