Short Stuff: Victorian Flower Language

Graffiti – the good kind, done with lots of style and skill – developed when some kids in NYC took up cans of spray paint and started to figure out how to outdo one another. They laid down styles that are so fine they’re still being used by artists today.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What do you do when you want to tell someone you’re smitten with them but you live in a society so repressive decorum prevents you from even speaking such things? Why, you can say it with flowers! And that’s just what people in the Victorian Era did.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The era of AM radio isn't over, but it's well past its heyday. Dive in today for a trip down memory lane. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

For millennia, we have tried to put human personalities into neat types, an effort psychology took up early in its history in an effort to legitimize itself. But is the idea of types – which all personality inventories are based on - flawed to begin with? Find out in this classic episode.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Pop Tarts are a legendary breakfast treat in the United States. They're fruit-filled toaster pastries with very little fruit. But who cares right? It's all about that toasty goodness. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

People who’ve found themselves in life-or-death situations with their endurance at its limit have reported sensing another presence with them, urging them to continue on and survive. No one knows what the heck is going on here but it sure is interesting.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 1905, an engineering mistake created a brand new 400-square-mile sea (lake?) in the California desert. People made the most of it at first, but it didn’t take long to become a toxic brew that now threatens the health of anyone in breathing distance.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Conversion therapy is a misguided attempt by religious zealots to convert people from gay to straight. News flash - it doesn't work. Learn all about this abhorrent practice in this classic episode.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 1996, a small group of German tourists disappeared in Death Valley National Park without a trace. Fifteen years later, the tenacity of one man solved the case.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Did Native Americans really smoke peace pipes? Well yes and no. They smoked pipes for many reasons, sometimes to commemorate peace. But they never called them peace pipes.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.