Lateral with Tom Scott 94: The empty pizza box
Jul 26, 2024
Hank Green, Ceri Riley, and Daniel Peake tackle quirky questions about pencils, pyromaniacs, and protoplasm on a comedy panel game podcast. They delve into mysterious puzzles, analyze Billy Joel's song, discuss unique pizza orders, and ponder why traffic cones scatter at a New Zealand tunnel. The conversation also touches on unconventional timekeeping, musical solutions, and the largest biological cell people see regularly.
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Billy Joel's 54-Name Chronological Time Capsule
- Billy Joel's We Didn't Start the Fire name-checks 54 individuals and events in chronological order across its verses.
- That creates an 18-month window (May 1951–Sep 1952) when every person mentioned was alive, because the song mixes older historical figures and recently born celebrities like Sally Ride.
Empty Pizza Box Became Porch Insulator During COVID
- Some US delivery drivers started including an extra empty pizza box with deliveries during the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Restaurants used the empty box as an insulated platform to keep customers' food off wet or dirty porches when leaving orders contact-free.
Nail Value Drove 1645 Virginia Arson Law
- 17th-century Virginian planters frequently burned down cheap plantation buildings to retrieve valuable iron nails.
- A 1645 law forbade this and instead paid departing owners nails computed by two unbiased estimators.