Valentine’s Day

Episode notes

Alex Schmidt is joined by bestselling author Jason Pargin (‘John Dies At The End’ series, ‘Zoey Ashe’ series) for a look at why Valentine’s Day is secretly incredibly fascinating.

Visit http://sifpod.fun/ for research sources, handy links, and this week’s bonus episode.

LINKS FOR THE GUEST:

• PREORDER the new novel by Jason Pargin! It’s called If This Book Exists, You’re In The Wrong Universe. Here’s a preview quote from the novel. 
• Jason’s blog post about the new novel, and the value of pre-orders.
• Zoey Punches The Future In The Dick by Jason Pargin
• Jason’s website
• Jason’s Substack
• Jason Pargin on Twitter
• Note: Jason’s suggestion of “chocolate” did not win the topic polls for March 2022. It’ll be included in the next poll, for April 2022 (which goes live in early March).

RESOURCES USED TO INFORM THE EPISODE’S LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:

• native-land.ca
• U.S. Department Of Arts And Culture
• The True Native New Yorkers Can Never Truly Reclaim Their Homeland (Smithsonian)
• Mapping Manahatta: 10 Lenape sites in New York City (6sqft)

RESEARCH SOURCES:

• The ‘real’ St. Valentine was no patron of love (The Conversation)
• The New Valentine’s Day Is Coming for All Your Relationships (The Atlantic)
• The Best Candy Heart Sayings From the Past 120 Years (Reader’s Digest)
• Love is in the air, but not on airwaves as Pakistan bans Valentine’s Day (Reuters)
• In Pakistan, Valentine’s Day Brings Out Roses And Culture Wars (NPR Parallels)
• Alex used this U.S. Census data for that very rough estimate of how many Americans are under 30 years old (~40%).
• The War on Valentine’s Day in India (The Atlantic)
• Which countries love and hate Valentine’s Day? (BBC News)
• How the Valentine’s Day Heart Got Its Shape (TIME)
• Cherubic Cupid Is Everywhere on Valentine’s Day. Here’s Why That Famous Embodiment of Desire Is a Child (TIME)
• How did the human heart become associated with love? And how did it turn into the shape we know today? (TED Ideas)
• Why Do We Give Chocolate For Valentine’s Day? (Mental Floss)
• Tweet by @DumbGuyPod: “At the CVS and lol”

• Johnny Weissmuller (IMDb)
• Disney Fandom Wikia page for ‘Tarzan’ (1999)
• IMDb page for ‘George of the Jungle’ (1997)
• Alex remembered, after taping, that there was a big 2016 Tarzan movie starring Alexander Skarsgard, Samuel L. Jackson, Margot Robbie.
• China is acting blatantly protectionist in an industry that’s hugely important to the US (CNBC)
• Games Of Thrones Remains The Most Pirated TV Show In The World (Screenrant)
• Watching Foreign Movies Is Illegal In North Korea, But Some Do It Anyway (NPR Morning Edition)
• How Many Heart Emojis Are There? (Emojipedia) — there are 29! Alex under-guessed by quite a bit.