Those little red-hated fellas that hang out in your garden? There’s enough for a whole Spirits episode on that? The answer might surprise you as we dig into the mythological (and alchemical, shoutout Paracelsus!) origins of just where they came from, and why they’re hanging out with your hydrangeas!
Content Warning: This episode contains conversations about or mentions of grief, racism, drug use, drowning, immolation, abuse, sex, eugenics, animal attacks, and animal death.
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Cast & Crew
- Co-Hosts: Julia Schifini and Amanda McLoughlin
- Editor: Bren Frederick
- Music: Brandon Grugle, based on "Danger Storm" by Kevin MacLeod
- Artwork: Allyson Wakeman
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About Us
Spirits is a boozy podcast about mythology, legends, and folklore. Every episode, co-hosts Julia and Amanda mix a drink and discuss a new story or character from a wide range of places, eras, and cultures. Learn brand-new stories and enjoy retellings of your favorite myths, served over ice every week, on Spirits.
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0:00.0 | The Welcome to Spirits podcast to boosy dive into mythology, legends, and folklore. |
0:32.6 | Every week we pour a drink and learn about a new story from around the world. |
0:36.3 | I'm Amanda. |
0:37.1 | And I'm Julia. And Amanda, |
0:39.0 | recently we were talking about our gardening superstitions, right? Yes. It's finally spring. I'm out in |
0:45.4 | the garden. I was doing some cleanup out in the garden the other day. And I love kind of like the |
0:52.0 | post-winter cleanup of the garden. Because one, it's a lot of me telling Jake, no, no, don't break up those leaves. |
0:58.8 | That's where all the bugs plant their eggs. |
1:02.0 | And then what does Jake say? |
1:03.3 | Jake goes, what kind of bugs? |
1:04.6 | I'm like, well, all kinds of bugs. |
1:06.0 | And he said, we should break them up then. |
1:07.3 | I said, no, you can't throw out the good bugs with the bad bugs. |
1:10.2 | We need the pollinators. And he says, okay, I'll leave that corner of the yard unraked. And I said, |
1:16.7 | fair enough. That's compromise, baby. But one of the things he was also asking me as we were starting |
1:21.6 | to clean up the yard was if there were any sort of decorations I wanted to put in the garden this year. Mostly because our local gardening store has a lot of like different, like, statues and |
1:31.3 | like stone benches and stuff like that. |
1:33.7 | So he was like, you know, it could be nice to put something out there into the garden |
1:37.9 | to make it feel, I don't know, homeier. |
1:40.2 | And it got me thinking a lot about all the different kinds of things that people put in their gardens, like, you know, the lawn flamingos, the ceramic bunnies, solar lights, and everything like that. |
1:53.0 | And then a particular one that I think is of interest to us and relevant to us here on the podcast, which is the garden gnome. How did that little guy |
2:03.1 | get so known for being among people's hydrangees, Julia? That's a great question, Amanda, |
... |
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