It's time for the....Mystery Sound Extravaganza!

0:00Hi, friends. You might have heard that barks and it and I are on the road this spring with brains on live. We've been to several cities so far and it has been so much fun. Our next two stops are Atlanta and Fort Lauderdale. That's at the end of March. And then we just announced that we added Lawrence, Kansas in May and Columbus, Ohio in June. We're also heading to Chattanooga, Durham, Milwaukee, Portland, Buffalo, and Ann Arbor, Michigan. We hope you'll be able to join us at one of those shows. We can't wait to see you to get tickets and get more information. You can head to brainson.org slash events. That's brainson.org slash events. Brainson universe. You're listening to brainson series about being curious. Everyone loves a

1:01mystery. I know I do. Like who stole the cookies from the cookie jar? Who indeed Molly? Or where's that smell coming from? Someone microwave fish. Or what's this sound? Oh yes, I know what it's time for. It's time for a mystery sounds. Stay tuned. Hello, brainson listeners. It's me Bob. Brainson universe is now its own independent media company. And since I love filing, counting my popsicle stick collection and thinking about decimal points, Molly asked me to be the CFO of brainson universe. At first, I thought CFO stood for craft food

2:04orders. Like I would be in charge of ordering honey from local beekeepers and cheese from local cheesekeepers. But it turns out it stands for chief financial officer, which means I make sure brains on universe has enough money to keep going. I've been looking at the numbers and wow, CFO should stand for counting fans overjoyedly. Is it overjoyedly a word? When I look at all the people who've signed up for smarty pass, it makes me feel overjoyed. When you sign up for smarty pass, you're choosing to support the brainson universe. And that's an amazing thing to do. You can join now at smartypass.org. Counting fans makes me overjoyed, optimistic, obviously delighted. Can't wait to count you too.

3:14You're listening to brainson part of the brainson universe. I'm Molly Bloom and my co-host today is Juniper from Philadelphia. Hi, Juniper. I'm Molly. Today is a mystery sound extravaganza, so I hope your ears are ready to solve lots of mysteries. So Juniper, I'm wondering, do you like guessing the mystery sound? Yeah, I really do. I think it's really fun to guess what other people like have at home and what they're using for it. Totally. Which ones do you find easiest to guess? Probably the ones that come from your kitchen, because my mom really likes to cook and bake, so I really recognize those sounds. Those are familiar in your life. What about the trickyest ones to guess? Those would probably be the ones that are really unusual in the household that isn't really common. Yes. For me, recently, that was rolling a hard-boiled egg

4:16around in a metal bowl, and I was like, I've never done that before. So what would you say is your favorite sound in the world? This is a really hard question. It's either goats or the ocean. Oh, I like both of those sounds so much. Do you know goats personally? No, but I'm a Capricorn, so I feel like I identify it with goats. Gotcha, because Capricorn, the symbol is a goat. Yeah. What do you like about goats? It's like the sound they make, particularly. I just feel it's really goofy and how they act is really goofy. Kind of like cats-ish. Yeah. Can you do an impression of a goat? Oh, that was very good. Very, very nice. Thank you. What would a goat ocean sound like? Maybe like the waves are like, and then the goats are like

5:20all the time. Honestly, I'm just picturing goats on a surfboard for some reason. Oh, yeah, that's a good idea too. Well, let's get to it, Juniper. Do you feel like you're ready for some mystery sounds? Yeah. Awesome. We're going to start with this one. What do you think? I know this noise. I know it by heart, but I don't know what it's called. Okay. Where are you picturing it? I don't know. Where I live for some reason. Mm-hmm. What happened? Oh, like there was a big snow a couple of weeks ago,

6:23so maybe like someone shoveling out the ice. Oh, M.G. Juniper. What? That is a really good guess. Okay. And here's the answer. Hi, my name is Aila from Scotland Aberdeen, and that was a sound of me putting a snow shovel on ice, basically. There's three there's snow, then ice and more snow. When the snow shovel goes in the ice, it makes a sound of it, and it cracks the ice, and when you push it forward, that makes that the sound. Incredible work. Like a hundred percent correct. I'm really surprised that I got that right, because I pretty much never get that right, them right. I'm so impressed. I mean, you guys in the Northeast particularly have had a lot of snow lately, so it makes sense that it's kind of fresh in your mind. Are you the person who has to shovel in your family? Me and my dad tend to shovel, like we shoveled out our car, and then we also shoveled out our car again, because it's snowed recently. So that's why you got it, because

7:28there's a lot. When you're shoveled, you hear that sound a lot. A lot less. Well, excellent work. All right, here is the next mystery sound. What do you think? What? Do you hear that sound? Yeah, I did. It sounds absolutely insane. All I could think of in that was like a ping pong table, so I'm going to see a ping pong table. Okay, very nice, very nice. I picked this out, and I honestly forgot. So let's hear it again. Let's hear it again. Hmm, I think. Well, I still think ping pong table, but like someone's having a really

8:42bad fight with the ping pong table and the ping pong table is winning. Excellent, excellent. Okay, let's hear the answer. Hi, my name is Lila. I'm from Los Angeles, and that was the sound of my catch scratching his scratching post. Oscar is a black hat and has a white belly. He has a brother named Felix, George Brown. The catch scratching post looks like a llama. Okay, well, all right, a cat scratching post. I was close. Yeah, it's like kind of like someone fighting with a ping pong table, except the cat scratching a llama shaped scratchy post. Thank you for that sound, Lila. You got us. Okay, here is the next mystery sound. Okay, I know this. Yeah, what do you think? I think it's like when I was little enough to get

9:52in my bathtub, I like slap the water. Oh, yes. And it would make something like that noise, like totally, totally. So maybe that excellent guess, I'm going to give you a hint, because I do know what this one is. This is a food related sound. So let's hear it again. Well, now it sounds like something's like boiling-ish. Ooh, you're like the bubbles popping. Yeah, like if you put like, if you like boil carrots or whatever, you know, it makes that weird bubbly noise. You're like ramen. Totally. Is there a food that would make that sound on its own not while it's being cooked? Like, it's just that's what sound the food makes. I didn't know food made sounds. My food's always talking to me. It's not like take a bite.

10:54Geez, whoever sent this has the like really one of the best mystery sounds. It's a really good one. You ready for the answer? Yeah. Okay, here it is. My name's Thor. I live in Seattle, Washington, and that was a sound of me shaking my jello in a glass bowl. Wow. I don't really like jello, so that's maybe that's why I started. Yeah, it is a very particular texture. And if that is not your thing, then it's really not your thing. And I feel like that sound is pretty indicative of that texture. So I apologize if that was unpleasant. Dude, it's fine. I just don't like the taste in the taste. Very fair. All right, we have another mystery sound. Do you want to hear it? Yes. Okay, here it is. It kind of sounds like someone taking like 5,000 grains of rice, putting them in a bowl and like a metal bowl and then shaking them around. Okay, yes. So rice is a really good guess.

12:01It's not a kitchen sound. It's a sound that you'd probably do outside while you're doing this. It would you would hear it while you're doing this particular activity. It's a solo activity. Let's hear it again. I haven't been outside in so long. I forget what the outside sounds like. If it's a game with a ball, right? It's not something with a ball. It is something that involves a wiggling kind of moving in a rhythmic way. And it's pretty good exercise. Involves your hips. Oh, wait, blue hoop? Is it that you know, like, you know, they have those little beads in it sometimes. Here's the answer.

13:01Very nice. Yes, we haven't been outside in a while here in the northern part of the country, but yes, hula hooping. It has those little things that sound like rice or sand inside. Little rhythmic. Are you good at hula hoop? I was and then I stopped hula hooping because we don't have hula hoops at home because my grandpa's a juggler. So we use his hula hoops. Your grandpa's a juggler? Yeah. Wow. Okay. May I cordially request a mystery sound related to juggling at some point in the future? Okay. That's really cool. I used to be good at hula hooping when I was a kid, and I recently tried it over the summer. Turns out, I can't do it at all. I cannot run into it. I can do like three, and I used to be able to do like 18 in a row. It's so, it looks so satisfying. That's one of my goals is to get better at the hoop.

14:01Our next sound comes from a parent of a brain-zone listener, one with a cool job that involves helping lots of people stay healthy. So here is that sound. Well, that was noisy. So helping people stay healthy. What do you think? Is it like one of those like, I don't remember what they're called, but they're kind of like mini jackhammers that they put into your teeth to get cavities out or something like that? Oh yeah, that's literally what I was thinking. I don't know the answer to this one either. And I was definitely thinking like a drill. Yeah, like a drill of the dentist off. Yeah. We're going to have the answer right after this quick break.

15:07We are working on an episode about baseballs. Baseball has some really great cheers for fans in the stands like G, double O, D, E, Y, E, good, I, good, I, good, I. But you know what needs some cheers? Science. We want to hear your cheers and chance for science. Juniper, what is your cheer or chance for science? My cheer for science is SCIE and CE. Science. Yes, I love spelling and cheers. It's one of my favorite things. I approve. So listeners, please send your cheers or chance to us at brainson.org slash contact. While you're there, you can also send us questions, ideas and mystery sounds. That's brainson.org slash contact and keep listening. Today's episode is sponsored by Every Plate. Every plate is the go-to dinner solution for busy families, juggling work, school and activities. I don't know about you, but I find meal planning

16:11very challenging. I think part of it is that you have to do it every week. There's always meals to serve. So you know what's made things much easier? It's every plate. It's an affordable meal kit that simplifies weeknight cooking for parents who don't have time for meal time battles. It's perfect for those of us who are balancing school pickups, sports, practice, homework and everything in between. There are 35 plus weekly choices that you can tailor to your family's preferences. There's something for everyone, even the picky eaters. It's cheaper than the grocery store, half the price of takeout, and with upfront everyday low pricing, there are no hidden fees or surprises. Try Every Plate and get $2.99 per meal on your first box plus 10% off for a month. Go to everyplate.com-podcast and use code brainson299 to claim your offer. That's code brainson299 at everyplate.com-podcast to get $2.99 per meal on your first box plus 10% off for a month.

17:12Ditch the dinner time dilemmas with every plate. We're back and we're trying to figure out what this sound is. Okay. What do you think? I think I'm on the lines of the taking care of people think like the mini jackhammer thing, but at the end I did hear kind of like water falling. So maybe that was just an accident or maybe that was part of the noise. It's hard to say. Yeah, I heard that flapping this time too. Like maybe, well maybe it is the drill for the dentist and the dentist took it out of the mouth and then that was the person being like, well, like, well, get out of it. Maybe, maybe. I think I'm going to stick with the jackhammer thing of it. Yeah, me too. Let's see if we're right.

18:19My name is James Hall. I'm a pharmacist in Oakville, Ontario, Canada. What you just heard was a blood pressure cuff inflating. Blood pressure cuffs are used to measure blood pressure. Keeping a healthy blood pressure helps reduce the chance of cardiovascular disease like heart attacks and strokes. Okay. Have you ever gotten your blood pressure checked? Yeah, I think so. We actually went on a trip last night and we were able to, we got to go to a fire station near us with my friends at Girl Scouts and we got to take the blood pressure on our arms. Oh, very cool. I guess when I think of blood pressure, I think about the old tiny old fashion ones with like, gender, pumping it up by hand. But yeah, there's all those like cool machines now that do it. All right, gender, we have another mystery sound from a parent who also happens to be a scientist. Here's that sound. Now, I really like watching like spooky

19:32chills. So to me it kind of sounds like someone pouring like hydrogen or like dry ice and something. Oh yeah, excellent guess. We're going to play it again. See what you think. Yeah, I think I'm going to stick with the dry ice. Hmm, excellent choice. Here is the answer. Hi, my name is Alanafe and that was the sound of my mom scooping out dry ice. Seriously, Juniper, that's incredible. I literally never get these right. So it's like the magic of the studio. I mean those two you got right were like hard and you got them like so specifically right. I am so impressed. Yes, so that was the sound of dry ice. Here's Alanafe's parent and Banda to explain more. Hi, I'm Alanafe's mom.

20:36I work in a lab that studies what happens to our cells when they have the wrong number of chromosomes. We use dry ice to keep things like cells, DNA, RNA, and protein cold for our experiments. My favorite part about working in a lab is that it's kind of like always working on a mystery. Nobody knows the answers, but we're trying to figure them out. Here's a fun fact. Did you know that you share 60% of your DNA with a banana? That's pretty cool because I love bananas. I'm in type banana. F-E-L-L. Okay. My dad is anti-banana, like very much so. To the point like growing up, we couldn't like say banana around. I mean, do you feel that? Do you feel that strongly against me? No, no, no. I mean, I can't hear the word banana. It's just they're just not my, my ventures and not my banana. I understand, I understand. Well, so now we know dry ice is used for science and also spooky TV shows.

21:36Very cool. All right, so Juniper, I've gotten to pick these mystery sounds today, which is super fun. And I understand, though, that you have brought a mystery sound for me, and I'm so excited. Can I hear it? Yes. Okay. Whoa. Okay. This is hard. Okay. I'm going to say what I heard. Maybe something will emerge. I heard like a slapping sound and also like a springy sound. And it happened a bunch of times. You said you like kitchen sounds. Maybe you're chopping something with a spring-loaded chopper. This is, this is a really tricky one. I think I need a little time to mull it over. So why don't we check out what's in the mailbag and then when we come back, maybe I'll have a better

22:40guess. Hello. This is the mailbag where we look at the awesome stuff that you have sent to us. All right. So let's see what we have today in the mailbag. That's my little mailbag song. Okay. Okay. Incredible. Okay. This is a drawing from Celine from Houston, Texas. It is Celine and I having a picnic together. The sky is blue. There are fluffy white clouds. Celine really captured my curly hair and my glasses. We're on two lovely green hills. And there's a picnic basket and two apples, one for each of us. Celine has an awesome red shirt and pink pants. Very stylish. Thank you for this amazing drawing. All right. Here's another amazing drawing. It says, this is Kalea's drawing interpretation of the worm quest from the episode What's Up With Worms. Kalea's from Medford, Oregon. This is a really great picture.

23:43It is. Okay. So there's a worm. There's a couple worms. Very cool. There's, there's challenges. There's trees. There's clouds. There's us. It is a very dramatic and exciting drawing. Thank you for making it. Okay. There's one more drawing I got to talk about. Okay. This is from Eleanor, who lives in Berlin, Germany and Eleanor writes, this is a picture of a person sneezing and oh boy, is it ever? There's incredible action lines around the person's head. This person's eyes are squeezed tight as they sneeze and there's all sorts of green germs coming out of this person's nose. It's very dramatic. There's even a red germ who looks angry. Incredible work, Eleanor. You're really captured. A sneeze. If you have drawings you'd like to send to us or really anything, you got questions. You have maybe a song you wrote. You have a joke to share. We want to hear it. So go to brainson.org slash contact. And that's it for today's mailbag.

24:55Okay. We are back and I'm guessing this mystery sound that Juniper brought in for me. I guess a spring-loaded chopper is that at all close? Okay. So we have... It's a knife. We have... So we have like this middle slip in our kitchen on the side of our fridge and I took the knife off and I kept putting it back on and taking it off and putting it back on. So it's like a magnet? Yeah. Oh, that's so good. Okay. So I was kind of close. Wow. Excellent mystery sound. Thank you. Very good. Okay. Juniper, I have a few more sounds for you before we go. Here's open and ready. Yes. Here is an X mystery sound.

26:06What's your guess? Okay. So in the background, I heard sizzling. But then at the same time, I heard like like the corks on the top of wine bottles popping. Oh. So I don't know what would make that noise. I would say the sizzling part is the key part of the sound and it is a kitchen sound. Go here again. Yeah. All right. Any other thoughts? I don't know. Something on a skill that's like, you know, like when those like totally... Yeah, why don't you take a guess? What do you think is in... What do you think is being sizzled in the skillet? Maybe like a carrot. Carrot? I love it. I feel like you have carrots

27:07on your brain. I do have carrots on the brain. All of carrots. They're really good. All right. Should we see if it's a carrot sizzling? Yes. All right. Here it is. Hi, my name is Shepard and that was a solid of butter bubbly to the pan. Oh, butter. Num, num, num. Yes. It's key to cooking, butter, oil, fat. So you could eventually put a carrot in there. Yeah. And it would be delicious. Carrot with butter. Okay. I'm hungry. Let's hear the next mystery sound. Ok, this one makes me laugh. I think this might be my favorite sound of the day. of the day. Uh-huh. I think so too. What do you think of this? I think it's someone either putting their mouth in front of their fan or they're just going in front of the microphone

28:12and going, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I love it. I think we should hear it again, just, you know, because it's fun. Incredible. Any new thoughts? Maybe this one keeps popping up in my brain. It's like a baby is in front of a dog. And the dog is just staring it down like a really mad at the baby. I really like that. I love a story. Uh, like a Mr. Sound that tells a story here is the answer. Hi, my name is Kora and I'm from Skolka, Illinois. The sound you just heard was my dad

29:14patting my little brother's mouth. Okay, excellent work. It was a baby. So that's a little baby and the dad's patting the mouth while the baby goes, blah, blah, blah, blah. That's hilarious. I love that. Makes me so happy. Thank you for sending that sound. All right. We got a couple more. Here is the second to last mystery sound. Here we go. What do you think? When I first heard of that, I thought of that thing. It lifts up like big boxes of something like big boxes of paper and it makes that weird clunk noise. Very nice. I'm going to give you a hint. Someone's being lifted up and it's something that you might hear at your home

30:17near a car or in a somewhere where you put your car. I think I'm going to stop there before I wait. Well, now that you gave me those hints, is either like a tow truck or it's like one of those car lifts like in the parking lot where they lift up your car. Do you want to hear it again? Yeah. Yeah. I think I'm going to stick with the car lift answer. Okay. Here is the answer. Hi, my name is Maddie and my name is Edith and we are from Walnut Creek, California. And the sound you just heard was us closing our garage door. A garage door? Oh, close that because that weird mechanical sound. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Excellent guessing.

31:24Yeah, lifting up a car and lifting up a car probably makes a similar noise honestly. Okay. Here is the last mystery sound of the day. What do you think? When I first heard that sound, I thought two things at once which was someone roller skating like someone has a microphone down where their rollers are going or like their blades are they're ice skating and it's like just like recording them going to call stuff or like that kind of noise. Juniper. You're really good at this. Let's hear it again. Do you like to stick with your answer? Um, I think I have another idea. Okay.

32:24Which is like a crowd warring that's like like someone that's really rooted like a ton of people that are really rooting for this this person on a sports team. Nice. Okay. So you're hearing sports. You ready for the answer? Yeah. Here it is. Hello. My name is Ashwin. I live in Washington, D.C. And that is the sound of my hockey team practicing with pucks and sticks. Thank you. Juniper. I mean, I'm incredible. I was so close. I'm giving it to you because the first time you're like skates, check, check, check, sports. Uh, yes, absolutely. Maybe not a crowd by his team is there. So 100% full credit from me. Very good work, guessing today, Juniper. And thank you to all of our listeners for sending in these mystery sounds. If you have a mystery sound you'd like to share, you can always send it to us at brainson.org slash contact. Please upload the sound

33:28and your explanation of what it is. Thank you so much. Mystery sounds are everywhere. You just have to keep your ears open. They are fun to hear and even more fun to guess what they are. That's it for this episode of Brains On. This episode was produced by me, Molly Bloom, Mark Sanchez, and Sandin Totten. Special thanks to Emily Nickerson and John Thomas and engineering help from Alex Gazenza. I want to give a big shout out to Tanova and Rami. Brains On is an independent media company. To keep the Brains On universe going, join Smarty Pass. You can do that by heading to SmartyPass.org. Now it's time for the Brains, honor a role. These are the incredible kids who keep a show going with their questions ideas, mystery sounds, drawings, and high fives. Henry from Columbia, South Carolina, Keegan from Toronto, Alexandra from Anchorage, Alaska, Marshall and Anzhi from Cincinnati, Ruby from Dublin, Ireland, Avery from North Carolina, Griffin from Dairy New Hampshire,

34:31Madeline from Duluth, Minnesota, Olivia from Forest Hills, New York, Wolf from Beverly, Massachusetts, Max and Toby from Washington, DC, Aria from Guthrie, Oklahoma, Leo and Charles from Mountain View, California, Nora from Daphne, Alabama, Eliana, and Nora from San Raman, California, Phoebe from Belton, Texas, Cove from American Fort, Utah, Charlotte from Australia, Zebi from Manchester United Kingdom, Francis from Philadelphia, Tray from Rockwell, Texas, Jay from Dayton, Ohio, Adriana from Pittsburgh, Amber from Brooklyn, Bailey and Roy from California, Wesley from Columbia, Missouri, Jagger from Austin, Texas, Leah from Nanjing, China, Nova from Jamestown, New York, Sully from Ontario, Caleb from Glen Falls, New York, Elias from Austin, Texas, Silas from Colorado, April from Napier, New Zealand, Ren from McCall, Idaho, Bodie from New South Wales, Australia, Bennett from San Antonio, Texas, Langston from Harbor Springs, Michigan, Jackson from Lenexa, Kansas, Cora from Hamilton, New York, Jacob and Finn from Highland Park, Illinois, Maddie from Lincoln University, Pennsylvania, Claire from California, Octavia from Phoenix, Jules from Brooklyn, New York, Luca from San and Selma, California, William from Lake Widow, Ohio, Andrew from Shanghai, Micah from Ireland, Freddie from Cricklade, England, Eli from Pendleton, Indiana,

35:34Felix from Brooklyn, New York, Peter from Los Gatos, California, Camillo from New York City, Claire from Sarasota, Florida, Adam from Tarzania, California, Camillo from Boston, Tim from Georgetown, Ontario, Ruby and Dahlia from Calabases, California, Gideon, Harper and Cyrus from Altadena, California, Avery from Pickering, Ontario, Theo from Durham, North Carolina, Henry from Inverness, Florida, Dalton from Pottenham, Belly, New York, and Henry from the Philippines. We'll be back next week with an episode all about flowers. Thanks for listening.