Season 6 Episode 12: Diamonds, Dogs Decrease Dread, and Author Michelle Waitzman

Kris and I uncover the secrets of lab-grown diamonds, embracing the science that sculpts these lustrous marvels.

We'll even delve into the high-stakes world of diamond selection, sharing a tale from my own quest for the perfect engagement ring.

But the sparkle doesn't stop with gemstones; we're beyond thrilled to welcome Michelle Waitzman to our show. Her insights on the therapeutic wonder of dogs, and her book "Be as Happy as Your Dog," promise to shed light on how our furry friends can teach us to cherish the joys of life, wagging tails and all.

This week's conversation is a heartfelt blend of the technical and the tender, as we examine the remarkable role of therapy dogs in supporting patients through the rigors of hemodialysis. These four-legged companions offer more than comfort; they're a beacon of hope and adherence in a sea of medical monotony. As we pivot from the clinical to the canine, Michelle Waitzman captivates us with her tales of rescue dogs and the paw-prints they leave on our hearts. Her approach melds the wisdom of wagging tails with the principles of positive psychology, unlocking the secret to a more fulfilled existence.

Finally, we wrap up with a nod to life's simple pleasures, and how moderation can make a treat truly a treat—cue memories from "Parks and Recreation" and the exuberance of "Treat Yo' Self" day. From self-publishing trials to pet antics, we share a slice of our lives, including the gentle giant, Bunsen, and his escapades as a misunderstood 'big baby' dog!

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Transcript

Speaker 2: 0:08

Hello science enthusiasts. My name is Jason Zukoski. I'm a high school chemistry teacher and a science communicator, but I'm also the dog dad of Bunsen and Beaker, the science dogs on social media. If you love science and you love pets, you've come to the right place. Put on your lab coat, put on your safety glasses and hold on to your tail. This is the Science Podcast. Hello and welcome back to the Science Podcast. We hope you're happy and healthy out there. This is episode 12 of season 6.

Speaker 2: 0:41

We had to take a week off last week. Sorry about the delay. It got really busy for our family and we were gone to Comic-Con. We are probably going to share some stories about that at the end, but it was a really fun time at the Calgary Expo being characters from this really fun video game called Baldur's Gate 3. I had to wear a bald cap I might talk about that in the family section and we brought the dogs, which was a lot of fun as well. Let's get. Wear a bald cap. I might talk about that in the family section and we brought the dogs, which was a lot of fun as well. Let's get right to the show.

Speaker 2: 1:10

In science news, chris and I are going to be talking about diamonds and in pet science, we're going to be breaking down this wholesome study that showed that folks who are going through a really intensive medical procedure may benefit from having therapy dogs present. Our guest and ask an expert is Michelle Weitzman, who's an author of a bunch of different types of books, but the main one it's such a wholesome book is about how we could all be more like a dog to help with our life and happiness. Okay, some diamond puns. What did the diamond say to the geologist? Well, you can't handle my pressure. What did the diamond say to its best friend, the sapphire? You're a gem, don't ever change. Okay, on with the show, because there's no time like Science Time. This week in science news, let's talk about artificial diamonds. Now, chris, you're here with me as a co-host. Is it true that diamonds are a girl's best friend?

Speaker 3: 2:17

I'd like to think so. I love them.

Speaker 2: 2:20

You love diamonds really.

Speaker 3: 2:22

I do.

Speaker 2: 2:24

Did you know? I tell this to my students. Did you know that when I was in university, part of one of my science electives was a geology option? I took geology and I learned a little bit about diamonds, about clarity and color.

Speaker 3: 2:40

Oh, tell me more.

Speaker 2: 2:42

Oh, I don't know if I should, but there is. There's a clarity in color. Clarity, of course, is the number of bubbles naturally occurring bubbles within diamond. The more clear a diamond is, the more expensive it is. Oh, I know. Oh, yes, and the closer to yellow or off-white, the less expensive a diamond is. So you can actually get a diamond that is as close to off-white as possible, with lots of bubbles, but the human eye can't detect it, and then therefore get a bigger diamond for your bang.

Speaker 3: 3:16

For your buck.

Speaker 2: 3:17

That's right, and I may have employed this on your engagement ring diamond. It has bubbles in it, but the net that your eye can't perceive it. So the whole point is like why would you get one with less bubbles if you can't even tell?

Speaker 3: 3:33

You know what happened in my high school physics classroom.

Speaker 2: 3:36

What's that?

Speaker 3: 3:37

My teacher had a laser and what he would do is he would ask for volunteers to bring up their rings. And what he would do is he would ask for volunteers to bring up their rings and he would try and set it up as a prism, and so it would definitely create a prism on the wall if it was a quality gem, and some of the gems that came up and were put through his laser were not quality gems at all uh-ohoh, did that cause hard feelings. I think so.

Speaker 2: 4:08

Hey, but speaking of things that are extremely tough, how are diamonds normally made?

Speaker 3: 4:15

Natural diamonds form in the Earth's mantle under immense pressure, so typically 140 to 190 kilometers below the surface, and they are created under high pressure around 725,000 pounds per square inch, and another measure of that is five gigapascals.

Speaker 2: 4:37

Ooh, I love gigapascals.

Speaker 3: 4:40

Do you?

Speaker 2: 4:41

I don't know.

Speaker 3: 4:42

But you just can't have high pressure. You have to have high temperature, around 900 to 1,300 degrees Celsius, which is approximately 1,652 to 2,392 degrees Fahrenheit.

Speaker 2: 5:00

So a lot of pressure and a lot of heat.

Speaker 3: 5:02

Heat and pressure. So a lot of pressure and a lot of heat. Heat and pressure. So carbon atoms in the mantle are subjected to these extreme conditions, which causes them to crystallize and form diamond structures over millions to billions of years. So they take a long time.

Speaker 2: 5:18

The diamonds that we pull up today, they weren't made yesterday.

Speaker 3: 5:20

They're not made yesterday. No.

Speaker 2: 5:22

So if they're formed deep under the crust, like 190 kilometers below the surface, how do they even get up here, like, how do we find them?

Speaker 3: 5:29

Diamonds are brought closer to the surface through volcanic eruptions. They are carried in volcanic rock known as kimberlite or lamproite.

Speaker 2: 5:38

Ooh, I like lamproite.

Speaker 3: 5:41

How do you know about lamproite?

Speaker 2: 5:43

I took a geology elective. I just told you.

Speaker 3: 5:45

Oh, that's right.

Speaker 2: 5:48

And calcite All the sites.

Speaker 3: 5:51

So once they get near the surface, after they travel that distance, these rocks that they catch a ride on may erode, which releases the diamonds into riverbeds or ocean floors, and that's where they're mined.

Speaker 2: 6:04

And I believe also in the Northwest Territories and the Yukon, they may find them along a lava tube that's come up from deep under the earth. So if you can find where lava somehow got up on the earth, then maybe there's diamonds along that path.

Speaker 3: 6:21

By lava diamonds.

Speaker 2: 6:22

Okay, we do have to mention it's not just for a fancy jewelry, but they're incredibly tough. Diamonds are the hardest thing on earth. I don't know if you want to say the hardest thing on earth, but on the Mohs hardness scale diamonds are way up there, and when I worked in the oil patch we had drilling bits that were diamond tipped right. That was the idea. Was they were able to grind through what other type, any type of rock that was underneath the ground? The diamond tip drill would go right through it.

Speaker 3: 6:49

So cut through it like butter.

Speaker 2: 6:51

I guess so. But this brings us to the main story today and that is an advancement in laboratory grown diamonds Now. Normally laboratories try to mimic what happens deep under the earth. It requires five gigapascals of pressure and those super high temperatures you mentioned, and to give folks like it's really hard to wrap your head around what a gigapascal is, yes, please tell me, because they're your favorite. Yeah, a gigapascal is 5 million times roughly. It's 5 million times more pressure than regular atmospheric pressure, which is around 100 kilopascals on any given day.

Speaker 3: 7:37

Interesting.

Speaker 2: 7:37

Thanks to advancements in the medium that the diamonds are being grown in. They are using liquid gallium, iron, nickel and silicon and then they blast it with carbon-rich methane and oxygen. It allows them to grow the diamonds slightly cooler at around 1,000 degrees Celsius. Slightly cooler it's only cooler by 500 degrees. But the big breakthrough is it can be done at near atmospheric pressures, so you don't need that insane five gigapascals of pressure.

Speaker 3: 8:12

Can they even make that five million gigapascals of pressure in the lab?

Speaker 2: 8:18

Oh yeah, they do this all the time. The lab grown diamonds aren't anything new and the technology keeps getting better and better. There was a couple studies years ago that they put to the test a lab-grown diamond versus a naturally occurring diamond and they gave it to a gemologist or somebody that studies gems and that person couldn't tell the difference between the two.

Speaker 1: 8:40

When it first started, they were Really, really.

Speaker 2: 8:44

Yeah, when they first started, the lab-grown diamonds had a weird color to them, Like they were always an off color and they were very small. But the technology's improved so much.

Speaker 3: 8:55

But with naked eye? No, but with appraisal device, maybe.

Speaker 2: 9:00

So really, like Chris, the only way folks can tell the difference between a lab-grown diamond and a naturally occurring diamond is they usually laser the lab-grown diamond with LG. So you have to see that under a microscope and that stands for lab-grown, because you're supposed to tell people that a diamond is lab-grown. Now this raises a whole bunch of interesting questions. Do you have any right off the top of your head? What would this potentially cause?

Speaker 3: 9:27

Women to be upset if they don't get naturally formed diamond.

Speaker 2: 9:32

If you can somehow make this without that high pressure, it's going to make the whole process cheaper. Right, having that really hard, oh my goodness.

Speaker 3: 9:41

So if they're cheaper, then that bottoms out the industry of diamonds.

Speaker 2: 9:47

If diamonds are normally incredibly hard to get and relatively rare, but you can make them in the lab for a lot cheaper, it's really they're uncertain if this technique will impact the diamond jewelry industry, which relies on conventional mining and the old school high pressure, high temperature methods.

Speaker 3: 10:11

Yeah, and consumers willing to pay the price for those diamonds.

Speaker 2: 10:17

I think there's still be a market. Let's say this all comes to pass and is really cheap way cheaper to get a lab grown diamond. There are knockoff fashion products that you cannot tell. The difference between Louis Vuitton knockoffs that the average person wouldn't be able to tell. And even if you took it to somebody who knew what they were looking for, they might get tricked. I think there's always going to be a demand for those name brand the real diamonds. So that's a little bit about the new technique of growing diamonds Interesting. I would hazard a guess that diamonds really aren't a girl's best friend. I think that's an outdated saying. I think your best friend might be Bunsen or Beaker.

Speaker 3: 10:57

They are. Bunsen and Beaker are diamonds in my eye.

Speaker 2: 11:01

Yeah, they're just as special and just as rare. Unfortunately, they don't fit on a ring. So that's science news for this week. This week in pet science, let's talk a little bit about how dogs could potentially decrease the stress of folks that are going through a pretty intensive medical procedure. I'm trying to think of like times I've been pretty stressed out getting some kind of medical procedure. I'm trying to think of like times I've been pretty stressed out getting some kind of medical procedure and luckily, aside from a couple blips, I've been pretty healthy. But I'd hazard a guess that I would be much less stressed if I had a dog around to pet.

Speaker 3: 11:37

I think so, Jason. I think so Because every time you go to give blood or have blood taken, you pass out.

Speaker 2: 11:47

Not every time, but it is quite common.

Speaker 3: 11:50

It is common, like you, are the person that has to sit behind with your head in between your knees because you might pass out.

Speaker 2: 11:58

Actually, they just get me to lie down. Now. I just tell them I'm like I don't know what it is, but if you take my blood, my body's no, that's my blood and it fights back and passes out. The medical procedure that we're going to talk about today is hemodialysis. Chris, could you break down a little bit about what hemodialysis is?

Speaker 3: 12:16

Yes, hemodialysis is required for individuals with severe kidney dysfunction or failure. What kidneys do is that they filter waste and excess fluid from the blood and they maintain your electrolyte balance and produce hormones for bone health and also are important in red blood cell production. And so when your kidneys fail, waste and fluids can build up, leading to serious complications. So what? Yeah, so what hemodialysis does? It artificially performs kidney functions by filtering blood through a dialyzer.

Speaker 2: 12:52

When do you need that to happen? Can your kidneys be working, or is it like at the end of? Is it at the end of how your kidneys are going to be working?

Speaker 3: 13:01

So hemodialysis is necessary for individuals with end stage kidney disease, and the dialyzer acts as an artificial kidney filtering waste and excess fluid from the blood.

Speaker 2: 13:13

Your blood goes in and the machine cleans it and it comes back out again into your body.

Speaker 3: 13:19

Yeah, so without having hemodialysis. Waste and fluid buildup can lead to life-threatening complications.

Speaker 1: 13:26

Wow.

Speaker 3: 13:27

And it's time-consuming because it's frequent and the clinic visits can last indefinitely and it's often required several times a week to maintain health and prevent complications in kidney failure patients.

Speaker 2: 13:43

So what kind of time? Like two times a week, like how long does it take for a session, you go in there to get your blood filtered.

Speaker 3: 13:50

Each session is between three to five hours.

Speaker 2: 13:52

Oh, my goodness. Okay. So that's great because that gives me a little bit of background in the next section here. That's an absolutely huge chunk of your life if you're in this situation.

Speaker 3: 14:01

I agree.

Speaker 2: 14:02

Yeah. So here comes the study. As you mentioned, Chris, being very strict with your hemodialysis regimen is you're going to die if you don't right, Like you're going to get super sick and you're probably going to die if you don't go. And what happens with folks that are in this situation is it's not fun, it's time consuming and they skip it. Like people start to not go as often and that's because they're just so burnt out of the long-term use of hemodialysis. So this study was looking at how how could we help these folks out with their mental health, to make their attitude more positive towards these time-consuming, boring and like soul-crushing medical treatments that just go on indefinitely. So they looked at using animal-assisted interventions. And here's the point maybe I wouldn't pass out as much if I had a dog, if I had buns in her beak around to pet. They took folks from four outpatient clinics and they participated in a one-on-one, very in-depth interview and the folks were recorded and they were transcribed and they took a look at a couple things in the study From pre-dialysis, four main themes emerged.

Speaker 2: 15:28

Okay, the first one was dread and suffering, which just it hurts my heart, Chris. That was the main thing that came out of the study is all of these people dreaded their HD treatments and like they were suffering, like they just hated it. That just is gross to me. I feel bad for folks that are going through this. The second theme that emerged was a yearning for the presence of therapy dogs at the clinic. And then, throughout the study, they brought in therapy dogs and what they found was the attitudes changed. The therapy dogs aided in this battle of treatment adherence, meaning that people were less likely to miss their treatment. Now there were some logistics here. Therapy dogs don't grow on trees. We've talked before, We've presented, about therapy dogs, right? The amount of training that goes into a good therapy dog is astronomical. Like, how many in red? How many therapy dogs has read your public and read your Catholic do you think have for kids? Not many, right?

Speaker 3: 16:35

Not very many.

Speaker 2: 16:36

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 16:37

I'd love to see more but the participants. In their narratives they highlighted the perceived value of the animals in their clinic, in the clinic setting. And one thing I loved in reading this study and the way that they coded the interviews just reminded me of the work I did in my master's and it was a lot of work to do the line-by-line coding and looking for themes and I had post-it notes all downstairs.

Speaker 1: 17:06

I remember this.

Speaker 3: 17:07

Yeah, and I would go and I would take pictures of them and I would go look at them and I would search for emerging themes. So me reading through the structure of the interview was very interesting to me in this study.

Speaker 2: 17:23

There was no great advancement. This was just a trial and a discussion with the patients. After, there's good evidence here that incorporating therapy dogs into these patients' healthcare routine probably will improve their outcomes. They will be less likely to skip their treatment and, as you again mentioned, if you miss your treatments, it is not good for you if you are an end stage kidney failure. So thinking outside the box and bringing in therapy animals might be a low cost solution that will eliminate long term complications from folks who are just hating going in to have hemodialysis.

Speaker 2: 18:05

That's Pet Science for this week. Hello everybody, here's some ways you can keep the science podcast free, number one in our show notes. Sign up to be a member of our Paw Pack Plus community. It's an amazing community of folks who love pets and folks who love science. We have tons of bonus Bunsen and Beaker content there and we have live streams every Sunday with our community. It's tons of fun. Also, think about checking out our merch store. We've got the Bunsen stuffy, the Beaker stuffy and now the Ginger stuffy. That's right, ginger, the science cat, has a little replica. It's adorable. It's so soft, with the giant fluffy tail, safety glasses and a lab coat. And number three, if you're listening to the podcast on any place that rates podcasts, give us a great rating and tell your family and friends to listen too. Okay, on with the show. Back to the interviews. It's time for Ask an Expert on the Science Podcast, and I have author Michelle Weitzman with me today. Michelle, how are you doing?

Speaker 4: 19:09

I'm doing great. It's awesome to be here.

Speaker 2: 19:12

Yay, we're really excited to talk to you. I always ask guests this question, though, right off the start when are you in the world? Where are you calling into the show from?

Speaker 4: 19:20

I am in Toronto.

Speaker 2: 19:23

Oh, so you're just a little bit east of Alberta.

Speaker 4: 19:28

Just a little hop or a three-day drive.

Speaker 2: 19:29

Have you done the drive across Ontario?

Speaker 4: 19:33

I have a couple of times.

Speaker 2: 19:36

Where were you going, Michelle? That is a drive and a half.

Speaker 4: 19:39

Many years ago I did the road trip from Toronto to Calgary. Really yeah.

Speaker 2: 19:46

Why were you going to Calgary? Was it family? Are you going to the rodeo? The stampede?

Speaker 4: 19:51

I have not been to the stampede. I knew somebody who was moving from Toronto to Calgary and I took the opportunity to ride shotgun and go for a road trip.

Speaker 2: 20:03

I have a confession to make. I have not been further east in Canada than Manitoba. I have not been to Ontario, Quebec or the Maritime Provinces, though my family has many times.

Speaker 4: 20:14

Okay, I made it out to Newfoundland a few years ago, just before the pandemic. That was a little bucket list thing of mine.

Speaker 2: 20:23

I hear it is gorgeous out that way.

Speaker 4: 20:27

It is. I highly recommend it.

Speaker 2: 20:30

So, michelle, I introduced you as an author. You've written actually lots of books. I'm just looking at your list of different books Moon, living Abroad in New Zealand, psychic Animals. But we're here today to talk about your book called Be as Happy as your Dog and I don't want to put words in your mouth, but could you explain what the book is about to folks that maybe are interested in hearing about it?

Speaker 4: 20:57

Sure. So it's a self-help book and the basis of it is that dogs seem to have this happiness thing figured out. They live 90% of the time happy, unless something is going terribly wrong for them, and we struggle to do that for a variety of reasons. So I wanted to see why dogs find this so easy and what we can learn from them and apply to our human lives so that we can enjoy that happiness too.

Speaker 2: 21:35

That's such a topical thing nowadays is, I feel there's a big push to, there's more of an emphasis's more of an emphasis, especially on the younger generations, with being happy rather than making money. There seems to be this big push that mental health is way more important than it has been in the past. Do you notice that too?

Speaker 4: 21:57

Absolutely, and I think part of that is the realization that maybe we didn't have in previous generations that making money doesn't actually make you happy.

Speaker 3: 22:10

No.

Speaker 2: 22:10

I think that was 60 to 80 hours a week to make all that overtime money. There's not a lot of room for joy.

Speaker 4: 22:18

Exactly. So, yeah, that idea that you should be happy now and not say, well, if I work hard now, I'm going to make money and that will make me happy later.

Speaker 2: 22:30

Dogs seem to live in the moment, so that goes with it there. I do have a question Like how did you come up with the idea for this? Were you watching dogs? Do you have a dog yourself?

Speaker 4: 22:41

I have two dogs. They are both from a rescue.

Speaker 2: 22:44

Okay.

Speaker 4: 22:46

And I think, like anybody who's ever lived with a dog, at some point you look at the dogs and you say, wow, it takes so little to make this dog happy. And why can't I do that? And so I had this sort of idea that sprung in my head. I thought let's list some of the things dogs do and let's see what the human equivalent of those things would be. And that was the basis for the book, and the subtitle is 16 dog tested ways to be happier using positive psychology. Yeah, so each of the 16 chapters learning new tricks, wagging their tail, playing, playing fetch, accepting praise, things like that and I look at why dogs do it, and then I look at how humans could do it.

Speaker 2: 23:43

So there's some social psychology built into this book.

Speaker 4: 23:46

Yes, and it is all based on a field of research called positive psychology. I spelled it with a P-A-W at the beginning because oh hey, we're down with the puns.

Speaker 2: 23:55

Yeah, it's all good there.

Speaker 4: 23:57

But it's a field that's been around since about the 1980s and it's basically the science of living your most fulfilling life, and whatever it means for you, or like looking to ways to improve, like looking for the things that give people the most satisfaction in life, and so it was an area that wasn't really studied by psychologists.

Speaker 4: 24:24

They were busy trying to figure out how to solve people's psychological problems, and so if you didn't have a diagnosable psychological problem, psychologists weren't interested in you. And that changed in the 1980s, when some researchers started going, hey, wouldn't it be great if we did some research on how everyone could improve their lives? And so it took off from there.

Speaker 2: 24:55

That is so interesting, like the whole area of psychology really focused on the people with who were in immediate crisis at that point, not necessarily the general public.

Speaker 4: 25:08

Yeah, which is, of course, very important, but there was this whole bunch of people who weren't really benefiting from psychology at all and there was a lot to learn about how people think and how they feel and how they go about their lives and what they think will make them happy and what actually does make them happy.

Speaker 2: 25:33

So I don't want you to, of course, give away everything in your book. When I interview authors, I know you want to give people a teaser, so they pick up A couple of things, like when I was looking on Amazon one, you have a chapter about wagging your tail. Could we talk a little bit about that? What? How, as as we generally don't have tails as humans, how could we wag our tail like dogs?

Speaker 4: 26:03

Right. So why do dogs wag their tails? They wag their tails whenever something makes them happy or excited, but not quite, because, contrary to what you might think, dogs only wag their tails when there's somebody there to see it. They don't wag their tails when they're alone.

Speaker 2: 26:24

It's a communication device.

Speaker 4: 26:26

It is a communication device from dog to dog and dog to person. My chapter on wagging your tail is all about celebrating and letting people know when something good happens. So we tend to celebrate big things our birthdays, getting a new job, buying a house, whatever like that but there are lots of good little things that happen every day that we think are not worth celebrating. We think that's no big deal and the moment just passes. But by celebrating the moment, by telling somebody else, hey, guess what just happened. Or hey, guess what I just found out, hey, guess what I just found out, you emphasize that happy moment and you solidify it in your mind and it becomes a bigger deal because you've made it a bigger deal.

Speaker 2: 27:25

And that has the ability to make you happier for longer, because that win is like a win is a win, like it's something positive in your life.

Speaker 4: 27:32

Absolutely, and we as a species have a negativity bias which is evolutionary. In the times before we would be at risk a lot of the time, and so we had to be alert to anything negative that was going on, any threat that might be around, and that was much more important than noticing oh, the sky looks pretty today. Your life depended on it. But now we still have that bias in our minds. We pay more attention to things that are going badly and we remember those things more. If you look back in your life and you say, oh, what do I remember about this? If you look back in your life and you say, oh, what do I remember about this, you'll find that the negative experiences are much more cemented in your mind than the positive ones.

Speaker 4: 28:18

So wagging your tail just helps you. Even that out a bit and remember that all these good things are actually happening in your life, because it's easy to forget, it's easy to think only bad things are happening to me when, in fact, every single day, there are lots of good things happening, you're just not noticing them.

Speaker 2: 28:41

I often wonder about dogs if they how much of the past with like negative things that they truly remember. Obviously they become wary of people that are cruel to them or situations that are spooky, like tripping and falling coming up the stairs. I don't think a dog ever thinks twice about that going forward.

Speaker 4: 29:02

Nor are they embarrassed if somebody sees them do it.

Speaker 2: 29:05

Yeah.

Speaker 4: 29:06

They don't feel that that social shame, oh yeah yeah oh, I've done something silly.

Speaker 2: 29:12

I hope nobody saw yeah, if anything, humans are hopeful to catch that on video because it does great on social media yeah, if you can catch your dog tripping on the stairs you're doing well I like that.

Speaker 2: 29:26

I, right before we chatted, took our dogs out on our property that we love, on a farm, and they were frolicking through our the forest behind our house, down through the creek and I just our golden retriever was bounding through the melting creek and the melting snow and she was covered in mud and was had the biggest smile on her face and it's really hard not to feel that way when you're around a dog that's smiling and wagging its tail.

Speaker 4: 29:52

Yeah, it's contagious, that's for sure.

Speaker 2: 29:56

So another chapter in your book I wonder if we could just touch on it briefly is chasing the uncatchable. Is this a reference to like dogs will go after things that they have no business going after, or no, they don't have the conception that there's no way they could catch it.

Speaker 4: 30:16

So dogs will chase things, like some dogs chase cars, some dogs will chase bicycles or anything. My dog sometimes tries to chase birds, regardless of the fact that he's aware they can fly and he can't. But dogs love the chase like they get energized by it. We have things that we chase. We might consider those to be our dreams or big goals, and chasing those things even if maybe there's a very little chance we'll succeed can actually be very satisfying and can give you a lot of purpose in your life.

Speaker 1: 31:00

Hmm.

Speaker 4: 31:02

As long as you enjoy the trip, you appreciate everything that you're doing along the way to get there and your happiness doesn't hinge on winning an Oscar or winning a marathon or whatever. Things can seem overwhelmingly hard to achieve, but chipping away at those goals and learning new skills and trying new things and getting better at stuff is inherently satisfying for us piece of advice I can give them is if you think about everything all at once and trying to go from zero to 100, that's going to give anybody anxiety Guaranteed.

Speaker 2: 31:56

a house builder doesn't just decide in one day to go from nothing to a house. There's all of these little steps along the way. I like that advice, the chipping away thing.

Speaker 4: 32:08

Yeah, and you might never achieve your goals or your dreams. In the book I say the difference between a dream and a goal is that a goal is something in your own mind you think you could probably achieve if you worked really hard at it, whereas a dream is something you don't necessarily believe will ever happen for you, but you do believe that it would make you really happy if it did, and so you're willing to keep working at it, even though it might not really come to fruition.

Speaker 2: 32:45

Our golden retriever Beaker. She loves to dig and she digs after she hunts right. She's hunting for the critters that live in the ground on our farm and occasionally she catches them. Most of the time she doesn't, but man does she not give up. I'll tell you that.

Speaker 4: 33:03

Yeah, we've got a digger too. She just loves it, even if there's nothing to dig for, she just loves digging.

Speaker 2: 33:13

There's some people who go to beaches and they don't make sandcastles, they just dig holes. So I get it. I think that it's a mammalian thing. So in the book, did you have to consult, like we've been talking about positive psychology? Did you have to consult, like different studies, to double check some things as you were going?

Speaker 4: 33:33

Yeah, absolutely so. I did two kinds of research for this book one on dog cognition, which has been really advancing at a high speed for the last 20, 25 years. For a long time there was very little proper research done on dogs and how they think and how they feel, and I guess we have a changing relationship with dogs and scientists got more curious about how smart are they and what do they really think about and what do they really know how to do so there was some fascinating research to look into on that which formed part of the basis of the book, the Dog Side. And then there was a lot of research on positive psychology and the studies they've done and what they found about what helps people to thrive in their day-to-day lives.

Speaker 2: 34:32

That's awesome. We're a science-based podcast, so that makes us anytime we talk to authors that are making advice or giving people self-help stuff. We love it when it's grounded within research, so that's great.

Speaker 4: 34:46

Absolutely yeah.

Speaker 2: 34:47

Yeah, and the dog. The amount of evidence evidence not evidence, I want to say the amount of findings on dog cognition is just going through the roof.

Speaker 4: 34:56

Like every week, I swear there's some new study that's finding something really cool out about these amazing creatures yeah, there's a lot of information, and the more we find out, the more we realize they're not that different from us.

Speaker 2: 35:11

Yeah, I love that. I broke down a study not too long ago and it was dogs literally get confused, just like humans. If you say the ball and you show them a ball, their brain does the same kind of brain waves as ours do. And then, if you say ball and you show them like a duck, they're like what, what?

Speaker 4: 35:30

is wrong with my person.

Speaker 2: 35:32

Yeah, and they get confused. But it's because they've made a mental image of the ball, just like we do. When somebody says ball, we're like, okay, you can picture a ball, and then they show you a duck and for a second you're like that doesn't compute. That is wrong, yeah.

Speaker 4: 35:45

Yeah, no. It's amazing how similar we really are when you get down to it, just biologically. I think maybe 20 years ago people would have thought my book ridiculous. Of course we're not going to learn how to be happy by watching dogs. I think today we know better. We actually have a lot to learn from dogs.

Speaker 2: 36:08

Yeah, awesome. Do you have as an author? Do you have a favorite part of the book? Was there one part that was just so fun to write or came easily?

Speaker 4: 36:20

Gosh, that's hard. I think maybe my favorite part to write was the chapter called enjoy some treats, because dogs inherently they never turn down a treat. It's good they don't go. Oh, I'm watching my waistline, or oh, I didn't get to the gym today. I didn't have a very long walk. I shouldn't really have a treat.

Speaker 4: 36:41

The way we deal with ourselves and feel guilty and try to control our own behavior around treats, and I think it's really unhealthy the way we use those negative things with treating ourselves, and and so I tried to address that in the book, and it's, I think, particularly true for women. Women have this feeling that they're not supposed to or they have to earn it, they have to do something specific before they can allow themselves a treat. And I looked at ways that we can, first of all, stop considering only things that are bad for us treats, because there are lots of treats that aren't bad for us and also to stop looking at whether you've earned a treat or not and instead just look at a treat and say, okay, I know this treat has these downsides, I know I like this treat. How much do I like it and how bad are the downsides and is the treat worth it?

Speaker 4: 37:48

Because some treats are worth it once in a while. They make you that much happier that you can deal with the downsides. And some treats aren't worth it. Sometimes somebody offers you something and you know it's bad for you and you're not really that crazy about it anyway. So if you stop and think about it and go do I actually want this treat? Is it worth it?

Speaker 2: 38:13

maybe not, maybe I'll just say no, thank you I feel like if our bernice mountain dog bunsen had his way, it would be treats all day, every day. Second, third breakfast and double dinners yeah so it is. Do you think, do you talk about how it's okay to have a treat occasionally, but treats all the time lead to some issues potentially?

Speaker 4: 38:38

This is the thing is how you define what a treat is.

Speaker 1: 38:42

And so when you look, at.

Speaker 4: 38:43

The actual definition of a treat is anything that's out of the ordinary and gives you pleasure. So it's really not necessarily associating with food, Like for a dog. Going on a hike might be a treat.

Speaker 2: 39:00

Oh, huge yeah.

Speaker 4: 39:00

Going swimming might be a treat. Getting a new toy would be a treat. There's that, and so for us, a treat might be getting together with friends for the evening or taking a day off, going somewhere warm in the middle of winter.

Speaker 2: 39:17

Oh, you don't have to tell me twice about that. We had a pretty cold winter.

Speaker 4: 39:22

Although you can't have treats all the time, because then they're not out of the ordinary, you can have a variety of different treats. You don't have to have the same treat every day, and that way you're not eating 85 chocolate bars. Maybe you're having two chocolate bars a month and other treats on the other days.

Speaker 2: 39:46

You're right. They're reframing what a treat is really important. Yeah, yeah, it doesn't have to be a a a secret.

Speaker 4: 39:54

And realizing that if you have it every day, it's no longer a treat, it's a habit.

Speaker 2: 39:59

Ooh, I like that. Have you watched the TV show parks and recreation?

Speaker 4: 40:06

Oh, not for a long time.

Speaker 2: 40:07

Oh, there was two characters. They have treat yourself day. Ah, yes, yeah, so that was one of my favorite episodes.

Speaker 4: 40:16

As long as it's not every day.

Speaker 2: 40:18

Yeah, it was like once in a while, but they went all out for treat yourself. That's the point.

Speaker 4: 40:22

Absolutely. Sometimes you should.

Speaker 2: 40:24

Do you have any plans in the future for future book ideas? Are you turning some ideas in your head? You got some stuff down on paper.

Speaker 4: 40:31

I just finished publishing the workbook that goes with this book and I'm now working on the audiobook version, so I'm still mired down in this one for now. A lot of work Are you's going to take. I'm trying to do it all myself. We'll see how it goes. But yeah, it's a lot of work to do an audio book. And I nearly cried because one of the researchers I quote in the book has an unpronounceable name.

Speaker 4: 41:09

I was like okay, I have to learn how he says his name so I can say it in the audio book.

Speaker 2: 41:19

I had a heck of a time on this podcast when I was talking about the Icelandic volcanoes that were erupting. Oh, yes, that would be a challenge, because you have like 36 letters and I had to pronounce it over and over again. I still didn't get it fluently.

Speaker 4: 41:35

Yeah, no, some things are difficult if it's not your language. But yeah, I don't know what my next book project will be. As you said, I've written a few books before and none of them have anything to do with each other. I'm a publicist nightmare because I don't have a niche. I only write nonfiction. But I follow my curiosity. So when something catches my attention I may think, oh, maybe there's a book in this and I'll start to think about it and I'll start to do some research and see if there's enough in it that I could put a good book together. That's how I come up with my ideas and some of them go nowhere and some of them end up as books.

Speaker 2: 42:22

That's awesome. I hear you for how much work it is to do this stuff yourself. Our text from Bunsen we published that ourself. I did the whole audio book and that it was a whole thing. I'll tell you that was a lot of work. So, kudos, it is.

Speaker 4: 42:38

I I have the advantage of having to gone to broadcasting school many a year ago. Recording is not out of the realm for me, but but I it's still going to take an awfully long time to put that audio book together. I'm so proud of myself when I do.

Speaker 2: 43:00

Yeah, it's a good feeling wrapping the audio book. You do need a. Did you need a break in between? Like you get done the book and you're like I need just to take a break because the audio book is such a huge, overwhelming like job comparatively.

Speaker 4: 43:15

Yeah for sure. Yeah, I debated on and off whether I was going to do an audio book and I finally bit the bullet and said yeah, okay, I got to do an audio book, but it took me a while to get into action. That might be a chapter to get into action.

Speaker 2: 43:31

That's a is that might be a chapter in your dog book, Like sometimes you need to take a nap, take a break, just like a dog.

Speaker 4: 43:36

Oh, there is. There's a whole chapter called curl up and sleep.

Speaker 2: 43:40

Oh yeah because that's important too oh man, do you wish you could sleep as good as dogs sleep.

Speaker 4: 43:47

They just sleep so good I don't know like one of my dogs sleeps well, but the other one, I swear, gets up like once an hour just to change positions and stuff yeah, that's true.

Speaker 2: 44:02

I just look at, I just look at our burner and he just like when it's time to sleep he'll just lay on the floor like a giant log and just be out like out cold on the floor.

Speaker 4: 44:16

Nice.

Speaker 2: 44:16

Some days I'm just like man. I wish I could just sleep like Bunsen. Yep, thanks for talking with us about your book Fascinating. It sounds so fun. Where can people pick it up? Where can they find it?

Speaker 4: 44:28

It is available pretty much at all the standard online places. You can get it at Amazon and Indigo and all those kinds of places. I also have it on the BeAs happy as your dogcom website If you want a special signed copy for someone.

Speaker 2: 44:49

Oh, that's awesome. Okay, we'll make sure there's a link in our show notes to Amazon, probably, and also your website, maybe. Great, all right, I'll say that again, we'll make sure there's a link in our show notes to both Amazon and the website so people can grab it either way.

Speaker 4: 45:09

Perfect.

Speaker 2: 45:10

Awesome, Michelle. We have a couple of standard questions we ask all our guests. The first one is to share a pet story. Now, this is the. This is great because we've been talking about dogs all the time, but I was wondering if you have a memorable pet story you could share with us.

Speaker 4: 45:26

Sure, I'll tell you one of the ones that I talk about in the book, which is about our dog Marlo. And I work from home I'm self-employed, so I have a home office and one day I was in my office and I could hear Marlo barking in the yard, and then he'd stop, and then he'd bark again, and then he'd stop, and then he'd bark again, and it was going on for an unusually long time. So I stopped what I was doing and went out to see what was going on in the yard.

Speaker 5: 46:00

Okay.

Speaker 4: 46:01

And in our neighbor's yard there's a big tree and there was a crow in the tree and Marlo was barking at the crow and the crow was squawking back at Marlo and the two of them were having a very heated argument about something and I just thought it was the funniest thing that they were like Marlo, what are you doing? Why are you doing? Why are you fighting with a crow? The crow is smarter than you. Do not mess with the crows.

Speaker 2: 46:34

Crows are wicked smart and probably that crow told all of the other crows just how much of a jerk Marlo was.

Speaker 4: 46:42

Probably he's been okay so far, but he does try to get at the crows and I think he should watch his back frankly, they're plotting his demise or something.

Speaker 2: 46:53

And didn't? The crows didn't decide to move away? They're okay with. They're okay with being in the the premises they're not going anywhere okay, so obviously marlo wasn't intimidating enough.

Speaker 4: 47:05

No.

Speaker 2: 47:07

I love that. And what's your other dog's name? You said you had two dogs.

Speaker 4: 47:10

Oh, the other dog is named Nuka.

Speaker 2: 47:13

Nuka okay yeah, and a rescue mixed breed kind of thing.

Speaker 4: 47:18

Yeah, so Nuka is, she looks like a yellow lab but she's skinnier. And Marlo looks like a white, like a, a white malamute but with floppy ears oh fun yeah okay, thanks for sharing your your pet story with us.

Speaker 2: 47:38

I love it. That's so many. No, it's tough to keep it to just one. You could share another one if you want. People will. People would love to hear it, but I can cut this if not.

Speaker 4: 47:48

No, let's keep with one.

Speaker 2: 47:50

The other standard question we ask our guests for is a super fact. It's something that you know that when you share with people it blows their minds a bit. Do you have a super fact for us?

Speaker 4: 48:00

Sure, I can share with you a positive psychology super fact.

Speaker 4: 48:04

Ooh, yes, share with you a positive psychology super fact. So we all have a baseline happiness level. That is our sort of normal state and varies from person to person, and 50% of that is determined by genetics. There's nothing you can do about it. You are genetically a certain level of happy. You are genetically a certain level of happy. 10% of it is determined by things like your life circumstances, how much money you have, where you live, whether you're in a relationship, things like that that we think are the things that make us happy. But it only actually accounts for 10%.

Speaker 1: 48:46

Hmm.

Speaker 4: 48:52

And then the other 40% is based on your actions and your attitude. So people think oh, happiness, it's not really in my control, it's because of my job or because of my relationship or whatever. But 40% of your happiness is always in your control.

Speaker 2: 49:11

And that leads a lot of credence to people. If only I had X, Y, Z, I'd be happier.

Speaker 4: 49:19

And then when you get X, y, z, you're not because you get used to it very quickly. If you'll hear these stories all the time about people who won the lottery and a year later they're miserable, yeah, because apparently they got used to being rich really fast and then it wasn't making them happy, no, and making them happy.

Speaker 2: 49:46

No, it might actually even send you in the opposite way, because people who you think really only like you for your money, and once you start to realize that that must be a very lonely prospect.

Speaker 4: 49:57

Yeah, it is. I think it's probably very stressful trying to decide what to do, because suddenly you have all this money in your hands and what do I do with it? How do am I supposed to be making the world a better place or buying a luxury villa in Tuscany?

Speaker 2: 50:17

I would buy a private mountain. That's what I would do. Wow, move there and get a cabin with dogs. Wow, that's my plan.

Speaker 4: 50:26

That's a good plan.

Speaker 2: 50:28

I approve I'm sure there's probably some mountain I could get from the alberta government out there possibly. I don't know how one buys a mountain I don't know, coal companies do it all the time. Hey, oh, okay, that is a super fact. Michelle, thanks for sharing that. You're very welcome. Yeah, like, I almost want to say that, like a dog, a pet, an animal that brings you joy is a big percentage of that too. Is that within the 10% or is that, like how you act around the animal would be part of the 40% there?

Speaker 4: 51:07

I think it's both right. Having a pet does seem to make people generally happier, but the way you interact with your pet and how much you appreciate your pet and how you make the most of having your pet, that's part of that 40%. Do I walk my dog myself or do I hire somebody to do it? Do I enjoy snuggling or do I ignore it? Yeah, definitely it plays into both the 10% and the 40%.

Speaker 2: 51:44

I tell you I take in the dogs when I get home from work on a walk, Even if it's super stupid cold. That's probably a highlight of my day, Every single day.

Speaker 4: 51:55

There you go, and yet some people will say, oh, I have to walk the dogs. And that's the difference between the person who makes themselves happy, chooses to be happy about walking their dogs, and the person who chooses not to be happy about it.

Speaker 2: 52:12

That's true. I wish I could just tell those people to just look at the dog's face when they're on a walk.

Speaker 4: 52:17

Yeah, sometimes you feel like shaking people. I see people walking their dogs and they're staring at their phone the whole time. Walking their dogs and they're staring at their phone the whole time. I think you're on a walk with your dog. Be on a walk with your dog, the phone can wait.

Speaker 2: 52:33

That's right. Whatever you're doing on your phone is not that important compared to that time.

Speaker 4: 52:39

Yeah, one day your dog will be gone and your phone will still be there.

Speaker 2: 52:44

Yeah, and everything's bad on your phone anyways, like honestly, it's all very bad.

Speaker 4: 52:48

Except podcasts.

Speaker 2: 52:49

Except for podcasts. You could be walking your dog and listening to a podcast. That's a happy compromise. You could be listening to this podcast while you're walking your dog. That is a great compromise, all right. Thanks for the super fact, michelle you're very welcome we're at the end of our interview. Michelle, are you on social media yourself like people? Can people connect with you or ask you questions, or are you mostly just the author behind the book?

Speaker 2: 53:20

no, I have uh social media accounts, as, be as happy as your dog on both facebook and instagram okay, we'll make sure one of those meta links is in our show notes as well. Thanks so much for being a guest today, michelle. This was a really fun interview I've set. I don't know how to really phrase this, but I was the teacher speaker at a at our school's graduation a couple years ago. The grade 12s chose me as the teacher who would give the speech to the grads and my speech was live your life like your dog. That was the advice I gave to the kids, so this really resonates with me and everything that we try to do with the Bunsen and Beaker brand. Thank you for being on our show.

Speaker 4: 54:08

Thank you.

Speaker 5: 54:10

Okay, it is time for story time with me, adam. If you don't know what story time is, story time is when we talk about stories that have happened within the past one or two weeks. You know what I will start. So we had a guest at our house the other day. It was Annalise's mom.

Speaker 5: 54:30

Annalise's mom lives like a province away, so like further away, and she came to visit she lives out on the Shuswap which is really really nice and cool. But she came over to papa's house to visit, to visit annalee, see how she's doing and everything, um, and then she wanted to come and see bunsen and beaker. And so, uh, we, we brought her over to come see the dogs and bunsen was being super weird he was, he was very much a baby and very much wanting attention. And whenever, whenever, um, sharla, which is Annalise's mom's name um, whenever she would give attention to either Beaker or the cat, bunsen would like, would like, punch her and like body check her as much attention as possible. And then I was like, well, that's weird, he's not usually like that and I get as much attention as possible. And then I was like, well, that's weird, he's not usually like that. And then I thought about it for two seconds I was like, no, he is usually like that, he, he will. He will do anything that he can to get as much attention as possible, because he's just a little baby.

Speaker 5: 55:36

He's a baby in in a big dog's clothes and but then I thought about it. I was like but like, he sounds kind of aggressive when you hear him from, like outside. If he's barking because like someone's walking up to the house, he sounds terrifying. But if you were to come inside, I don't think, I don't know, he's just a big baby and I think he's helped our house stay secure because the FedEx guy, like the uh, we got a FedEx package recently the FedEx guy came up and Bunsen started barking at him and like ran away from our house. But Bunsen's, he's just a funny guy. He's just a funny little baby who who's a little princess too, because he won't eat. Uh, he won't eat food if it's too cold or if or um, he won't eat food if it's too cold or if or um, he won't eat food if it's too different to what he's used to, um, but yeah, that's, that's my story. Is bunsen just being a big baby but seeming really scary? Uh, mom, do you have a story?

Speaker 3: 56:37

I sure do. We went to comic-con and we went to an airbnb and bunsen, as per usual, was his usual baby self, where the first night he doesn't do well, he's nervous or unsettled in the home. So it was a long night for me, because I'm able to sleep anywhere, and so I had to go sleep downstairs and rub him, and then I tried to come upstairs at one o'clock in the morning and then 10 minutes later he was breathing in my face, not settled, not sleeping. So I had to go downstairs and hang out with him while he relaxed. So that's what happened. But then he also. Jason was playing with Beaker outside and he was throwing tennis balls to her, and Bunsen was like, hey, I think I'm going to get in on this action. And he was chasing tennis balls too, which is super cute. And that's my story.

Speaker 2: 57:41

Alright, dad, do you have a story? Sure, so my story maybe isn't the best news ever. Tuesday morning Bunsen woke up, or we woke up, and we noticed he was limping. And this is nothing new. Bunsen's hurt himself before One time, famously. Chris will never let me forget this.

Speaker 2: 58:03

I got up too fast. By getting up too fast I hurt Bunsen. I got up very quickly and Bunsen sprang up and pulled something in his leg. Um, but his, his limp, really hasn't got better. It's.

Speaker 2: 58:15

We're doing this on Thursday, so it's. It's been a bad thing for about three days, I think. It's getting better, but very slowly. So we've decided to take him to the vet. Um, adam is actually going to help me out because I I can go in the morning, but for not for too long. So bun bun's like I'm gonna have to take him and adam's gonna have to come grab him from the vet to bring him home. Because I gotta go, I gotta go teach.

Speaker 2: 58:40

We're hoping it's nothing serious. Um, but it but it's, but it's. You know, he's bounced back faster, I want to say um, from other sprains or when he's faked an injury or jump through the snow too much. Um, the only other time where he was injured for a long period of time was when he had a partial ACL tear um a winter ago. So again, we want to make sure it's nothing serious and if it is something serious, he doesn't hurt himself worse. So that's the Bunsen update.

Speaker 2: 59:14

Chris and I did take Beaker on a walk by herself and, holy man, the Norbert has backed up the water an incredible amount in places and I think that's just going to be the story. Like every time it rains, that dam is holding back all that rainwater so, like normally, you could jump across the creek and there's no way now. And the first pool is ridiculously huge compared to what it normally is. Now I'm not saying it's a lake or really even a pond, but for what it normally is it is considerably bigger in how much water is there. And that's my story.

Speaker 5: 59:56

All right, we have a special guest on the podcast. We have another special guest, I guess because we interviewed a special guest earlier, but we have another one. In my section, we have a special someone on story time Special someone.

Speaker 2: 1:00:15

What is your story?

Speaker 1: 1:00:20

Hello, he didn't introduce me very well, but if you, I'm Annalise as you know.

Speaker 1: 1:00:30

So my story is I just recently got a new job at a greenhouse and the cats have been missing me a lot, and so every day, like when I leave, Larry specifically he's like meowing at the porch door and it melts my heart and makes me so sad that I have to leave. And then when I get home, he is there waiting for me, meowing at the door, and he has just been so much more cuddly and lovey lately and it's just it's made me sad but it's also made me a little more happy too. That's my story.

Speaker 5: 1:01:10

Yeah, larry, larry is kind of like a dog. He's like a dog cat. He's funny, um, but anyway, that is, that is story time. Thank you so much for listening to uh, this section of the podcast.

Speaker 2: 1:01:31

Thank you for sticking around to the end and I hope to see y'all on the next podcast episode. Bye-bye, that's it for this week's show. Thanks for coming back week after week to listen to the Science Podcast. Special thanks to our guests this week Michelle Weitzman and the Top Dogs, who are our top patrons on the Paw Pack. If you love our show, it's a great way to support us. So check out the link in the show notes to join the Paw Pack. Okay, chris, let's hear those names.

Speaker 3: 1:01:48

Bianca Hyde, mary Ryder, tracy Domingue, susan Wagner, andrew Lin, helen Chin, Tracy Halberg, amy C, jennifer Smathers, laura Stephenson, holly Birch, brenda Clark, Anne Uchida, peggy McKeel, terry Adam, debbie Anderson, sandy Breimer, tracy Leinbaugh, marianne McNally, fun Lisa, Shelley Smith, julie Smith, diane Allen, brianne Haas, linda Sherry, carol McDonald, catherine Jordan Courtney Proven, donna Craig McDonald, catherine Jordan Courtney Proven, donna Craig, wendy Diane Mason and Luke Liz Button, kathy Zerker and Ben Rathart.

Speaker 2: 1:02:34

For science, empathy and cuteness.