Look It Up

If you've ever wondered whether animals could be ambidextrous, or what happens when you put a gun in a refrigerator, or what Presidents of the United States do after their terms end, this podcast will relieve you of the effort of having to look it up yourself. Look It Up is a podcast for the indiscriminately curious. Establish contact by email at [email protected].

14: bean pools, international dairy, Soviet Union trumpet solos 05/21/2020

14: bean pools, international dairy, Soviet Union trumpet solos Today: filling various sizes of swimming pool with beans, how to find the correct dairy product in France, and the prevalence of trumpets in Soviet movies. Stick around as well for shorts, where we'll find out how much is in a ton of money and when you can resume wearing white if you stop on Labor Day. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/14507573

13: Microwaving clothes, ants and mountains, meringue safety 10/11/2017

13: Microwaving clothes, ants and mountains, meringue safety Look It Up is a podcast for the curious. On this episode: can you microwave clothes to dry them? Are humans to ants as mountains are to humans? And a brief discussion on meringue safety. Sources: bit.ly/microclothes, bit.ly/duckmolt, bit.ly/meringues1, bit.ly/meringues2. Outro: /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/5831385

12: Fallow fields, Amtrak, otters 09/22/2017

12: Fallow fields, Amtrak, otters Look It Up is a podcast for the curious. On today's episode: are farmers given enough incentive to leave fields fallow? How does Amtrak stay in business? And otters. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/5767209

11: Voronoi school districts, rhubarb pie, blankets 01/06/2017

11: Voronoi school districts, rhubarb pie, blankets On this week's episode: do school district boundaries follow the lines suggested by a Voronoi diagram? What are the origins of the Prairie Home Companion song about rhubarb pie? Are some types of blankets warmer than others? 0:42 - Voronoi school districts 3:09 - Rhubarb pie 7:06 - Shorts 7:40 - Blankets 9:33 - Sources 10:05 - Lev Theremin playing the theremin Sources: supplementary images for "Voronoi school districts," bit.ly/liuschools1. School district boundaries, bit.ly/liuschools2. Prairie Home Companion, prairiehome.org. A book about Lawrence Tibbett, bit.ly/liulawrence. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/4969891

Supplementary images for Episode 11: Voronoi school districts 01/06/2017

Supplementary images for Episode 11: Voronoi school districts These images accompany the "Voronoi school districts" segment in Episode 11. Above: Missoula, MT. Bottom layer Google Maps, middle layer Voronoi, top layer actual school districts. Above: Missoula, MT. Bottom layer Google Maps, top layer Voronoi. Above: Santa Rosa, CA. Bottom layer Google Maps, middle layer (colour) actual school district boundaries, top layer Voronoi. Above: Santa Rosa, CA. Bottom layer Google Maps, top layer Voronoi. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/4969843

10: Hammock heat loss, dangerous transport, weekday etymologies 09/13/2016

10: Hammock heat loss, dangerous transport, weekday etymologies Look It Up is a podcast for the indiscriminately curious. On this week's episode: why do I get so cold in a hammock? Which type of transport is safest per mile traveled? Where did the names for the days of the week come from? Sources: transportation statistics from the NTSB and IIHS, bit.ly/liutransport1, bit.ly/liutransport2, and bit.ly/liutransport3. Weekday etymologies on Wikipedia, bit.ly/liuweekdays. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/4664555

9: Lunar gymnastics, data scraping, forfeitures 08/31/2016

9: Lunar gymnastics, data scraping, forfeitures Look It Up is a podcast for the indiscriminately curious. On this episode: 0:43 - What would gymnastics look like in low gravity? 4:19 - What is data scaping? 5:52 - Shorts: does the third-party doctrine apply to iMessage? What happens if you drive over a road flare? 6:48 - Forfeitures, a segment about the weird stuff the US Government seizes 9:09 - Sources. NASA video about movement in space suits, bit.ly/liugravity. Scientific American article on lunar Olympic gymnastics, bit.ly/liugymnastics. SLU Law Journal article about iMessage and the third-party doctrine, bit.ly/liudoctrine. US Government forfeiture website, . Today's episode featured a clip from Philippe Beer Gabel's "Cats in my mind" and "Mystical Picnic" by Nutmeg, all from the Free Music Archive, freemusicarchive.org Keep in touch on twitter (@liupodcast), or email [email protected]. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/4631652

8: Closed cities, safest states, rebar 08/16/2016

8: Closed cities, safest states, rebar On this week's episode: what are closed cities? Is there anywhere in the US that's safe from natural disasters? What is rebar for and how is it made? Contact the podcast at or on twitter at @liupodcast. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/4595272

7: Perfect pitch, divisibility rules, forfeitures 07/26/2016

7: Perfect pitch, divisibility rules, forfeitures This week: what tone languages have to do with perfect pitch, how to tell if a number is divisible by 13 (or 17, 19, etc.), and the return of Forfeitures. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/4544228

6: Fumigation tents, sternal fractures, patents. 07/15/2016

6: Fumigation tents, sternal fractures, patents. This week: why fumigation tents look like circus tents, how easy it is to break your sternum, and how to apply for a patent in the United States. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/4517204

5: Grain silos, etymologies, license plates 06/14/2016

5: Grain silos, etymologies, license plates This week: a history of grain silos, etymologies, and what'll happen when California runs out of license plate combinations. Also on this episode, shorts and a list of cool stuff seized by United States Customs and Border Protection officers. Sources: grain silos at bit.ly/liugrains and bit.ly/grains2; license plate article at bit.ly/liuplates; forfeiture lists at forfeiture.gov. Contact with any questions or comments! /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/4440807

4: 1500s Marches, Foreign Keyboards, Historic Pronunciation 01/09/2016

4: 1500s Marches, Foreign Keyboards, Historic Pronunciation On this episode of Look It Up: were there marches in the 1500s? How do you type on a Japanese or Chinese keyboard? Is there a correlation between geographic location or political party and whether you say "an -" or "a historic?" /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/4065747

3: Post-Presidential jobs, heroin highway, unfinished house tax laws 10/06/2015

3: Post-Presidential jobs, heroin highway, unfinished house tax laws On this week's episode of Look It Up: what kinds of jobs do former Presidents of the United States have? What and where is the heroin highway? Can I leave a house unfinished and not pay property taxes on it? /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/3843283

2: Refrigerated Guns, Pronunciation Surveys, Equity Politicians 09/22/2015

2: Refrigerated Guns, Pronunciation Surveys, Equity Politicians This week's episode of Look It Up deals with whether or not it's safe to refrigerate guns, a survey looking to see whether Republicans say "an historic" disproportionately more than Democrats, and what would happen if Equity name rules applied to politicians. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/3814025

Help me study something! 3-question survey. 09/14/2015

Help me study something! 3-question survey. Gearing up for a new segment, and I'd appreciate your help. Click on the following link to take an extremely short (3-question) survey: . /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/3797301

1: World's Fairs, Generational Furniture, Ambidextrous Animals 09/03/2015

1: World's Fairs, Generational Furniture, Ambidextrous Animals This week on Look It Up: World's Fairs and how they're surprisingly still a thing, how different generations make furniture-purchasing decisions, and whether or not animals can be ambidextrous. /episode/index/show/lookitup/id/3777580

Look It Up

TOPICS