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More information is available at Hewlett.org. Hey guys, it's Peter. Once again, in your weight weight feed, I am so pleased to present you another episode of How To Do Everything by Weight Weight Producers Ian and Mike. Now remember, you can only get these episodes of How To Do Everything in our feed for a short while. So if you love the kind of mysteries that Mike and Ian are revealing,
make sure you subscribe to How To Do Everything at their own feed. Thanks. At this very moment, the hockey prelimbs at the Winter Olympics in Milan, Cortina are happening.
“And I think it's fair to say the man that made it all possible is Don Moffitt.”
Don is the chief ice maker for ice hockey at the games. That means he's in charge of building the rank and making sure the ice is perfect. He's done this at five Olympic games. He's joining us online now from Milan. Don, what gives you the magic touch with ice? You know, I don't know that there's a magic touch. It's just a kind of a passion for the sport of hockey that, you know, I just want to create the best surface I can for the, you know, for the
best athlete in the world to be able to do what they do without them having to worry about ice conditions or problems with the rinks. And now I have, you know, a vast amount of experience dealing with the Olympics, which are very difficult. You know, there's just so much bureaucracy
that I'm always incredibly excited when I actually get to get a, you know, an ice tool or a
zamboni onto the ice or, you know, start making ice type thing. Now this, this venue, it's not a
“hockey venue. It's not purpose built, right? It's a concert hall, do you understand?”
Yeah, it's a concert entertainment venue. Yep. So there must have been unique challenges this time. Yeah, there, there was a lot of different challenges. You know, right from the start, we had an Italian company create a, a temporary rink situation where we have insulation on the, on the concrete floor because we don't want to freeze their new floor and break it. And then on top of that insulation is our refrigeration piping. Does it, uh, being in a concert hall does it sound
great? This ice, it does. Really? It does. Well, well, with, with this temporary system, it's, it's funny. It's one of the things that I'm talking to teams and, and players about is it's going to sound way different than a normal, you know, for example, in any child building. The, the ice is much, much louder. It sounds hollow. Yeah. You know, the players start to say that it feels hollow, but then they're like, no, no, it feels good, but it just sounds weird. Oh, so they, it, since,
it sounds hollower than they're used to it, I guess it would make you nervous if you were skating on it.
Yes. Well, just for the first, you know, it's, it's funny when they, when the players first
jump on, they start skating around and you see them looking down at the ice going, what the heck is going on? You know, and then they get into practice when they, they forget about it. So,
“but what if fun element for us is viewers to know when we're watching them skate?”
Yep. Yeah. With all that action on the ice, are you done really protective of your ice when you're watching a game? Oh, you feel like, oh, come on, guys. I'm during the games, not so much, because I want, I don't want to have any effect on the teams of the players, you know, leading up to the games. Oh, yes. And yeah, it's, it's my child. I'm very protective of it. You know, anybody that's going on, whether it's photographers, practice ceremony practices, anything,
I have to approve and make sure that I know that they're going on and, and give them directions and make sure that they're timing sits with, with our timing to get things ready for the games. Is that, is that your spectator experience, like, you know, when we watch, we're watching who's going to score, who's going to win? Yep. Are you thinking about the ice the whole time when they're playing? Oh, 100%. Really? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I'm listening to the sound of the skates. I'm
watching the skate marks. I'm, I'm feeling the snow and picking the snow up during the TV timeouts when there's commercials that on the TV channels. I'm out on the eye surface with an infrared gun measuring temperatures. And, you know, the ice in the air to make sure that everything's still good. Wow. Wow. Yeah. I'm pretty busy during this. Pretty busy during a game. So if we're watching the game, we should be able to find you somewhere.
Maybe I'll be nice.
show a lie. They go away. And, you know, commercials kind of run sports nowadays. Yeah. Well, I guess that's true. So when you're, when you're out to eat and you get ice water, or, I don't know, if you're a cocktail person, you get a cocktail. Are you, do you check out the ice in your drink? Absolutely. Yeah. Really? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I want to see if it's, I want to see if it's nice and crystal clear. It's cloudy. If it's cloudy, then I know the water's not quite
the best, or it was made at the wrong temperature. Wait a second, Don. So what's your ice
game at home? What are you doing in your, your own freezer? Do you have the special, you know, ice things? No, and nothing. I've got crazy. No, I've got some nice filters. You know, so I've got some nice ice cubes, but just, just some really good filters on the, on the waterline going
“to the freezer. Did you have to do that yourself or did that come with the? Yeah, no, no, I didn't”
do that. So are you the chief ice maker in your own home then, too? Yeah, pretty much, pretty much. Yeah. Well, Don, thank you so much for talking to us about what you do. Absolutely, no problem at all. This is how to do everything. I mean, and I'm Mike,
on today's show, what to do when you meet someone with the same name as you. But first,
over the last couple years, people who are taking surveys online have encountered an odd error. Anna Brown is a survey methodologist at the Pew Research Center. And can you tell us about this? Of course. So, yeah, we had one of our surveys in the field, and we found out that some people, as they went through the survey, many of the questions looked perfectly normal. And then they would come to a yes, no question, such as, you know, to ever use the internet. And it would say
forks, no, instead of yes or no. And people were understandably a little confused about what was
going on. The one I saw first was the question was, are you pregnant and your choices were forks
or no? Yeah, so that was actually, this has been popping up on other people's surveys as well. So, yeah, on kind of medical questionnaires that you fill out before Dr. Supplement, that seems to be a common place that we've been seeing this online. Yeah, so we realize that we were not alone. Okay, so these are online or at least on computer surveys that people are filling out. And whenever it says you choose between yes or no, it says you're choosing between forks and no,
“what's happening? So, that's, that's what we wondered. Yeah. This has never happened to us before.”
We tried to replicate it. We tried, we just started going through the survey a bunch of times, using different browsers, using phones, using computers, and then my coworker message me, and it was like, it's real. I saw four. And so from there, we were able to figure it out. And something in the survey was telling the Google Chrome browser this surveys in Spanish. So, what I was doing was it was trying to translate this survey that was completely in English into English.
Yeah, so indeed, it looks like they have now fixed this issue in Google Translate, but up until recently, if you went to Google Translate, and you said, I'm typing in Spanish, but you wrote yes in English, and then told that you wanted it to translate from Spanish to English, it would translate yes to forks. Whatever was happening, the software was saying, I don't know what this word is. I guess it's probably forks.
Yeah, I can't really speak to you what was going through Google Translate's head when it did that, but yeah, something there was, there were some crosswires. Wow. So, I don't know, what point, like how many responses had you received? Do you know that people
“completed the survey by selecting, while I guess if my choices are forks or no, my answer is forks?”
Right, so obviously our next thought was, oh no, we need to make sure this isn't completely, you know, destroying our survey. I mean, we had sent out tens of thousands of letters inviting people to take the survey, and also every single person who pointed out, clearly understood that it was a yes, no question. They all said, the word yes is being replaced by forks, so it's not like,
They were like, I don't know what forks could possibly mean.
isolated incident, only happened to hopefully a handful of people, and it didn't seem to really
impact the results, but yeah, we were a little bit worried there for a minute, but we're pretty confident in the results now. I just want to say, this is the funniest Pew Research Survey I've ever read. Yeah, it's definitely the funniest thing that's ever happened to me. I would not say, you know, three methodology is known for its humor necessarily, so I was very popular at the annual conference that year.
“I think for the rest of the show, what we should do is we should replace any yes with forks, just to give”
a sort of audio experience of what the people take these surveys face, just to see what it's like to
live in a world where forks is what you say instead of yes. Do you, Mike, do you think this is a good idea to do this? Forks. Support for NPR and the following message come from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, investing in creative thinkers and problem solvers who help people, communities, and the planet flourish. More information is available at Hewlett.org. If you have a question you'd like to ask, go ahead and send it to us at [email protected]. That's our email address.
It can be how to question. It can be a simple forks or no question. Whatever it is you are
“wondering about whatever it is you need help with, go ahead and send it to us and we will do our best.”
Hey Valerie, what can we help you with? My name is a little unique, not unusual, but I don't need a lot of Valerie. However, when I do, it's like an old friend you haven't seen in a decade and there's this instant connection and it's just a feeling of oh my gosh I can't believe it's you. Uh huh, forks. What is that magic that's happening? Can you tell us Valerie about your most recent meeting with another Valerie? Flex. That was just a few months ago. It had been a long time since
I met another Valerie maybe four years or something. Oh. So it's actually at the doctor's office and I had to go with my desk and you know talk to them. So this woman heard me say my name and he was a Valerie of course. So once I left the front desk she came over and she was like my name is Valerie too and I was like hello, you know? You're the whole thing of all the table you put to you and then she was like oh when you're birthday it was a whole thing.
No. So you're at the doctor's office which is a place where we actually have laws to protect people's privacy. This other person overheard you and she just couldn't help but introduce herself to you. Right. So Valerie I'm thinking maybe the person to call here, the people to call here. My parents are named Sean and Sean. It's spelled the same. My mom and dad are both named Sean Chillog. So it's something they've been dealing with for 50 years and I
feel like if they'll take our call we should see if they can give us some insight into the connection of people with the same name. I found great. Hi, it's Sean Chillog and I am the female Sean Chillog. And I'm Sean Chillog the male Sean Chillog. Welcome Sean's. Thank you. You two have been together
“since what? Your junior year of high school? No. You mean in a not platonic way?”
Remantically. You've been a couple since. Yeah. Yeah, it was we were 50. Well the first time I heard of Sean he was just a little bitty and he was I mean I didn't see him my brother just told me about him because he had been a lifeguard and told me about this tiniest boy
making the one-mile badge you get for swimming a mile and he said that not only was it amazing
to see this little guy swimming. His name was Sean. Wow. So how old do you think you were then dad? Maybe 11 or so. Wow. I think you were more like five. No, I don't think I was. I could have
Been 10 I guess.
You met at a boy scout camp? No. Yeah, she was she was a horrible at this.
“I got to see this short swimmer. Where is he? Yeah. Dad, do you remember the first time”
you heard about Sean? Yes. Well I'd heard about her just in passing. But the first MSR was
it some probably a junior high basketball game. What was your first date? Oh, I'm sure we went to the movie. Do you think there was nothing to do in Logan? I'm sure we were. Other than sense there wasn't anything. Okay, all right. Yeah, Ian, see you guys, come on. Yeah, we're going to try and edit it out of my brain. I'm going to turn an echo on so that it lives forever. Well, I remember mom,
I found your, I think maybe your sophomore year, yearbook from high school and dad had written
in the back to Sean. You have a cool name. I hope to get to know you better. Sean. Oh, another sounds like Sean. Do you think, do you think you all would be together if you weren't both named Sean? Was that a big part of your early connection? Oh, little things. No, I don't
“either. I mean, that's why we met, but we just liked each other. Can you all remember a time or two”
that both being named Sean? People have had a funny or surprising reaction to it? One time, I'm a person, but I didn't know any personal pronouns because I was talking about Sean, but she thought I was talking about myself. How long did that go on for? Well, actually it must have been a semester because it was back in the days and college. You know, I guess I spoke about him a lot. In derogatory ways. Yeah.
Well, that does it for this week's show. Would you learn the end? Well, I learned that if you're kid out there thinking about what you want to be when you grow up, one possible job is master of ice. Ice master, Don didn't ever talk about being called the ice master,
“but that's how he is known in the Olympic coverage. Which really sounds like a superhero. And then I think”
everything Don does is amazing, but I think if you heard you were about to meet the ice master,
you would think Don had more going on. Is it possible? And I don't we didn't get into this into the technical parts, but we don't know that Don doesn't shoot ice out of his hands to make the hockey ring totally. Yeah. The idea that you could make a hockey ring in a old Italian concert hall is implausible without superpowers. Yeah. It's ridiculous. Nice try, Don. What about you, Mike? What did you learn today? I learned that your parents had sex. Yeah. You know, if you asked me,
Ian, would you like me to stop talking about that? My answer will be forks. How to do everything is produced by Skyler Swenson with technical direction from Lourno White. Our intern is Sean Gillock, and we're not going to tell you which one. Send us your questions to how to add NPR.org. I'm Ian, and I'm Mike. Thanks. Thanks. Support for NPR and the following message come from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation,
investing in creative thinkers and problem solvers who help people, communities, and the planet flourish. More information is available at Hewlett.org.
