Can you believe it’s been 100 episodes? Whiskey Jenny and I cannot, such that we spent several minutes of our lives exclaiming about the mysterious way in which our podcast seems both new and eternal. But we are celebrating with a Patreon launch (!!!), and you can check that out here. The gist is that if you want to give us a small amount of money each month to help cover podcast costs, we will be delighted and grateful.
We’re also doing a giveaway to celebrate our 100th episode, and it features several items that I wanted to keep so badly I had to wrap them up and hide them from myself. To wit: A set of bookish stationery, two pocket-size journals from the inimitable Rifle Paper Co., some charming page flags, and a copy of Alfred Lansing’s genuinely marvelous book Endurance.
This giveaway is open internationally, and there are many ways to enter.
After some persistent jokes that we should have the 100th episode just be a clip show, we have made an episode of the podcast that is all the regular qualities of the podcast, intensified. Which is to say there are two games, more giggling than is probably reasonable, and a very deep dive into the Endurance expedition of Ernest Shackleton. You can listen to the podcast using the embedded player below, or download the file directly to take with you on the go!
Here are the time signatures if you want to skip around!
3:29 – What we’re reading
8:33 – Podcast announcements
15:56 – Diamond Jubilee games!
36:37 – Endurance, Alfred Lansing
1:12:46 – What we’re reading for next time
Here are some Adelie penguins saying “Clark.” Here are some more Adelie penguins saying “Clark.” Here are some pictures from the Endurance expedition. We urge you, in particular, to look at how heavy these lifeboats are to haul, yet how tiny to contemplate using them to sail upon the infinite seas.
This is a leopard seal. I oppose it and all its works and ways.
Get at me on Twitter, email the podcast, and friend me (Gin Jenny) and Whiskey Jenny on Goodreads. Or if you wish, you can find us on iTunes (if you enjoy the podcast, give us a good rating!) or Patreon (all support hugely appreciated).
Credits
Champagne sound is by Andi Roselund (Sangwha Comm)
Photo by: The Illustrious Annalee
Theme song by: Jessie Barbour
Transcript is under the jump.
THEME SONG: You don’t judge a book by its cover. Page one’s not a much better view. And shortly you’re gonna discover the middle won’t mollify you. So whether whiskey’s your go-to or you’re like my gin-drinking friend, no matter what you are imbibing, you’ll be better off in the end reading the end.
[CORK POPS] [CHAMPAGNE POURING] [TRANSCRIPTIONIST NOTE: BOTH JENNYS SOUND ESPECIALLY ENTHUSIASTIC THROUGHOUT THIS EPISODE]GIN JENNY: Welcome to an extra-celebratory edition of the Reading the End bookcast with the demographically similar Jennys. I’m Gin Jenny.
WHISKEY JENNY: And I’m Whiskey Jenny.
GIN JENNY: And we are back to talk to you about books and literary happenings. This is our 100th episode!
WHISKEY JENNY: Number one hundred! Diamond Jubilee! [LAUGHTER]
GIN JENNY: That’s not what diamond jubilee means. Guys, don’t come away with this thinking diamond jubilee means 100th anniversary.
WHISKEY JENNY: No. But it means 100th episode, 100th anniversary on this podcast.
GIN JENNY: It absolutely does. We have so many exciting things to talk about, including two small and one monumentally enormous announcement. We’re going to play exciting, awesome games to celebrate the fact that we’ve been podcasting for 100 episodes. And we’re going to recap Alfred Lansing’s classic account of Ernest Shackleton’s voyage in the Endurance.
WHISKEY JENNY: I think it’s important to note that you do mean recap and not review.
GIN JENNY: Yes, that’s correct. Literally, listeners, I read the front matter of this book, and I messaged Whiskey Jenny to be like, we actually can’t have a topic this week. We’re just going to have to recap this book.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: I mean she didn’t demand it like that, but obviously I was totally on board. We are taking, I think what we’re calling it is the Watership Down approach to this book.
GIN JENNY: Whiskey Jenny, it has been an honor podcasting with you for 100 episodes.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh my gosh, you too. It’s been a delight, and you’re a treasure.
GIN JENNY: If we were starving and you spilled your powdered milk in the snow—
WHISKEY JENNY: [GASP] Don’t even! Oh my god! [LAUGHTER]
GIN JENNY: I would share my powdered milk ration with you, even if you had been yelling at me moments before.
WHISKEY JENNY: I teared up at that part. That was so sweet. [LAUGHTER] It was so sweet!
GIN JENNY: It really was. I told everyone about it. Well listeners, you’ll hear about it.
WHISKEY JENNY: You’ll hear more. But also, I would share my powdered milk with you as well.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, I can’t believe it’s 100 episodes. I feel really— I don’t know, it feels like only moments ago I was nervously asking you if you’d be interested in podcasting with me in a bar.
WHISKEY JENNY: And I was like, oh, what’s a podcast, basically. [LAUGHTER] That’s how long ago it feels.
GIN JENNY: Really? I don’t remember that. I remember Jessie being like, oh a podcast!
WHISKEY JENNY: No, I’m being a little facetious. But I just feel like both moments ago, and also there’s never been a time when I wasn’t podcasting with you. It just feels so normal.
GIN JENNY: I know. I was looking for something, I don’t remember what. I was looking for something in my old tweets and I couldn’t find it. So I was pulling up the general date range when I thought the thing had happened. And it was so long ago, but nevertheless there are podcast episodes. I was like, man, we’re consistent and faithful podcasters!
WHISKEY JENNY: We really are. For 100 episodes. For exactly 100 episodes, as luck would have it.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: I’m sorry, listeners. This has been a lot of us congratulating ourselves. But what I meant is that Whiskey Jenny is the best.
WHISKEY JENNY: No, ‘tis you. You’re a gentleman and a scholar.
GIN JENNY: You, definitely, are the gentleman and scholar.
WHISKEY JENNY: No, it’s you.
GIN JENNY: And I love talking to you about books.
WHISKEY JENNY: I love talking to you about books and everything.
GIN JENNY: And everything. Yeah.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yay.
GIN JENNY: Well, speaking of books, what are you reading?
WHISKEY JENNY: I am reading— what am I reading? I’m reading several things. I’m reading Strangers in Their Own Land by Arlie Russell Hochschild which is— she’s a sociologist and it’s a nonfiction book wherein she does a sociological study of conservative people in this one little area in Louisiana.
GIN JENNY: Yup. Not my area.
WHISKEY JENNY: Not your area. Different area.
GIN JENNY: Cool, cool. And how are you liking it?
WHISKEY JENNY: Eh, it’s, uh.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, I didn’t like the sound of it.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s meh. The most interesting part of it so far is she uses environmental issues and the environment in Louisiana as what she calls a keyhole issue, like to view everything through.
GIN JENNY: Oh, interesting. OK.
WHISKEY JENNY: And all of the environmental stuff in this book is bananas and by far the most interesting part to me.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, there’s a lot of environmental stuff.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s insane what the hell is going on in Louisiana. It’s crazy.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, a lot a lot is going on.
WHISKEY JENNY: A lot! Man. So that’s been really fascinating. But otherwise, I don’t have any new takeaways that I’m like, oh cool, that’s good to know. Then I’m also reading Notwithstanding, which is a collection of interlinked short stories all in the same small town by Louis de Berniere, who wrote Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, who I like. And those are just a real hoot. They’re so cute and English and delightful. And it’s great.
GIN JENNY: Cool.
WHISKEY JENNY: They’re exactly what it says on the tin.
GIN JENNY: [LAUGHTER] I was just thinking that does not sound right up my alley. But I’m happy that you’re happy.
WHISKEY JENNY: I’m very happy. Someone’s been fishing with the children, catching the mythical fish. And there’s one mother and son who live together and they communicate by walkie talkies, and they have a real sweet dog who fetches everything. It’s so cute.
GIN JENNY: Well, good.
WHISKEY JENNY: They leave their door open and just throw him stuff nonstop.
GIN JENNY: Aw. [LAUGHTER] That’s nice. That’s nice.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, it’s really cute. What are you eating?
GIN JENNY: So I am reading Her Body and Other Parties, by Carmen Maria Machado. I have read two of the stories so far, and they’re real weird, as advertised.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, you read short stories now.
GIN JENNY: I read short stories now! I don’t think I read short story collections now. I don’t think I’ve made that leap. I’m reading this one, but I wouldn’t call it a habit. I like reading short stories— SF short stories in SF short story periodicals. That’s what we’ve definitely established I do now.
WHISKEY JENNY: Sure, OK. All right, I’ll mark it down on the, the Theorem Board.
GIN JENNY: Yes, do! So I’m reading that. I’m also reading My Lady’s Choosing by Kitty Curran and Larissa Zageris which is a choosable path romance novel published by Quirk Books.
WHISKEY JENNY: Ooh! Ooh!
GIN JENNY: Yeah, it just came out this week. It’s so much fun. It’s really delightful. You’re the heroine, and you’re an impoverished lady’s companion when the book opens. And you go to a ball, and there’s several different people you can interact with. And there’s lots of different kinds of adventures you can choose between. So one of them, you go and be the governess at this mysterious mansion, and one of them you go off to Egypt and have adventures in Egypt. There’s just a bunch of different genres of adventures that you can pick.
WHISKEY JENNY: This sounds like a total, total delight.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, it’s really fun. And there’s a lot of different suitors. You’re always constantly really wanting to have sex with everyone, so that’s fun.
WHISKEY JENNY: Great. Yeah.
GIN JENNY: Like every time the heroine sees someone, she’s like, I could get on that.
WHISKEY JENNY: Great. I like that everyone is super bangable.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, yeah. And you can end up with lots of different suitors, including a lady. And there’s almost no endings that you would get to them and be like, aw, that sucks.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yay! There better not be. It’s a romance novel! What do you think I read romance for, ladies?
GIN JENNY: I know! So it’s exciting. It’s all the good things about a Choose Your Own Adventure, but not really a lot of downsides. So it’s great.
WHISKEY JENNY: Sounds awesome. I can’t wait. How does the system of reading it work? Do you have a hard copy or—?
GIN JENNY: I have a hard copy.
WHISKEY JENNY: So it just tells you, like, if you choose A go to page 7, or whatever?
GIN JENNY: And if you choose B, go to Page 385. Yeah.
WHISKEY JENNY: Cool. Very cool.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, it’s really fun.
WHISKEY JENNY: Is that how you’re reading it?
GIN JENNY: Yes. Sort of, yes. I’ve done four full storylines, and now I’m kind of skimming through to see what else I’ve missed.
WHISKEY JENNY: Cool.
GIN JENNY: I also keep— there’s a Scottish guy that you can go and help orphans or something in his country.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: Sounds great. Where’s my copy?
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: But due to Scottish romance novel themed trauma in my background, I don’t really care for that. So I’ve been skipping all of his parts.
WHISKEY JENNY: Aw, too bad. [LAUGHTER] Do they time travel?
GIN JENNY: No, I’m afraid they don’t time travel.
WHISKEY JENNY: I, mean that seems reasonable.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. [LAUGHTER] I don’t think there is any time travel. That’s definitely something they could consider for if they wanted to do this again.
WHISKEY JENNY: Sequel.
GIN JENNY: So I’m kind of going through and seeing what stuff happens with the Scottish guy without actually having to go through the adventure. Because my choice with anything relating to the Scottish guy is like, no. I will not go to Scotland with you.
WHISKEY JENNY: Aw, this poor Scottish guy. At every turn, he just wants to save some orphans with you.
GIN JENNY: He really does, and he seems really sincere. I don’t have anything against actual Scotland. It’s just Scotland in romance novels. Actual Scotland seems great.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, totally, yeah.
GIN JENNY: OK, so getting into our thrilling announcements. The first one is that we launched a Patreon!
WHISKEY JENNY: We sure did!
GIN JENNY: Yay!
WHISKEY JENNY: Yay.
GIN JENNY: We love doing this podcast, but we’re hoping to cover some of our hosting costs and other costs associated with producing it— hosting the audio, and hosting the website itself, and paying for the domain name, and hoping we can pay our transcriptionist who does such wonderful work for us. And maybe get new mics, because my mic does this— well, both of our mics do this really annoying thing sometimes that we have not yet figured out how to successfully edit.
WHISKEY JENNY: Do we think that’s our mics? I didn’t know that was a mic thing.
GIN JENNY: I do think it’s our mics. I don’t know for sure. But we could also get new recording software. There’s many options open to us.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: The world is our oyster.
GIN JENNY: Or maybe take an audio recording class. Who knows?
WHISKEY JENNY: Uh, all right, slow your roll. [LAUGHTER] I didn’t say go crazy.
GIN JENNY: So you can see the Patreon at Patreon.com/readingtheend and subscribe as a patron if you want. We would be so grateful and appreciative. But if you don’t want to do that, nothing’s going to change about the podcast. We’re still going to keep producing it twice a month.
WHISKEY JENNY: We’re actually hoping to be able to do more episodes than that.
GIN JENNY: Oh, Whiskey Jenny, say more!
WHISKEY JENNY: If we meet our goals, then we’ll hopefully maybe even do some bonus episodes, for everyone.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. For all.
WHISKEY JENNY: For all.
GIN JENNY: And my brilliant friend came up with a good name for our bonus episode. He said we should call it Perks and Recs. Ah! I’m so excited.
WHISKEY JENNY: Just to be clear though, it’s a perk for all. It’s not just a perk for patrons.
GIN JENNY: Yes, that is the plan. And I don’t know what will go in the bonus episodes yet. I can think of many, many ideas. And you will probably also be able to vote if you are a patron.
WHISKEY JENNY: Gin Jenny, tell us more about what patrons get to do.
GIN JENNY: OK, so we have five dollar levels that you can subscribe at, and we have named them all after polar explorers.
WHISKEY JENNY: Obviously.
GIN JENNY: Because we are nothing if not on brand. So at the Felicity Aston level, if you give us $1 a month, we will be grateful to you forever.
WHISKEY JENNY: Forever and ever. Next up, if you want to give us $2 per month, you’re at the Peter Freuchens level. And you get to, as Gin Jenny said, vote on different things, like discussion topics, different things we might do readalongs to, and just the book that we read for each episode.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. Maybe you can Forcen us. Or make us— do a Hatening for us. For us both! Gosh, that would be weird.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, that would be unusual.
GIN JENNY: I’m saying, the world’s our oyster now.
WHISKEY JENNY: It is.
GIN JENNY: And next up, if you give us $3 a month, you’ll be at Ada Blackjack level. And you’ll still get the voting privileges from the $2 tier level. Also, once a month you can send us some information about what you’re in the mood to read, or a picture of your TBR shelf, and we will pick out your next three books. And we will pick only awesome things for you to read.
WHISKEY JENNY: Well, we’ll try.
GIN JENNY: Yes. Only awesome things. It is our guarantee.
WHISKEY JENNY: We will try our damnedest. [LAUGHTER] At $5 a month, you will be Nansen. Nansen the awesome Norwegian polar explorer whose first name I don’t know how to pronounce.
GIN JENNY: Me neither. Not at all.
WHISKEY JENNY: Sorry, F. Nansen. But I think this might be the level that I’m most excited about, because on this level, in addition to everything else, you get a handmade postcard from us once a month, with your choice of a quote of our choosing that we have loved recently, or your rec list from the $3 tier. And I’m really excited to both make the postcards and figure out what quotes we’re going to put on there.
GIN JENNY: Me, too. Whiskey Jenny is very crafty, and she has sent me a sample postcard, and it was just a delight to receive in the mail.
WHISKEY JENNY: Great. Yay! I’m so glad you liked it.
GIN JENNY: Yes, I really did. And that our final tier, if you give us $15 a month, you’ll be the Ernest Shackleton level, the best of all explorers.
WHISKEY JENNY: They’re obviously ranked in order. [LAUGHTER] Well, some of them are. He’s at the top.
GIN JENNY: He’s at the top. Always. So all the perks in the former tiers, plus every three months that you give at this level, we will pick out a book just for you based on your preferences and send it to you.
WHISKEY JENNY: And send it to them?
GIN JENNY: Yeah.
WHISKEY JENNY: Amazing!
GIN JENNY: We’re not just going to pick it and sit on it.
WHISKEY JENNY: No. You get it in the mail and then you start reading it immediately.
GIN JENNY: [SIGH] Oh, gosh, I love getting stuff in the mail.
WHISKEY JENNY: I love getting books in the mail.
GIN JENNY: Getting books in the mail is the best thing that ever happens.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s so good. Gin Jenny just sent me The Night Circus in the mail, because I didn’t own a hard copy before, and now I do. And it’s so good.
GIN JENNY: It was also exciting packing that up for you, because as I was putting it in the envelope to send it to you, I realized that it had one of those little bookmark ribbons.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, it totally does! Where’d that come from?
GIN JENNY: My mind was blown!
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: This is amazing! I thought those were only in, like, the Bible.
GIN JENNY: I know! And some really good of those little journals that I carry around in my purse to write notes in.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, yeah. That’s our announcement about Patreon.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, we’re super excited and nervous.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s a range of emotions.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, there really is. We are also excited because we’re adding two new segments to the podcast. So the first one is What We’re Something Else-ing. And the deal with this is going to, be prior to every new episode, patrons at the $2 tier and above will get to vote on a category. So you get to make us say what we’re making, or what we’re watching, or listening to, or cooking, or excited about. I don’t cook that much, so my segment, if it is cooking, will be short. And I’m excited about this, because we do other things besides read, and I like talking to Whiskey Jenny about a number of topics, not just books.
WHISKEY JENNY: I also enjoy talking to you about a number of things.
GIN JENNY: Whiskey Jenny, what’s the next thing?
WHISKEY JENNY: OK. I’m really excited about this one, too.
GIN JENNY: Oh my god, I’m so excited.
WHISKEY JENNY: We’ve been sitting on this for so long, because we wanted to announce it in our grand Diamond Jubilee episode. We’re going to do a Lord of the Rings read-along. [SQUEEING] Yay! We’re very, very, very thrilled.
GIN JENNY: I’m so excited.
WHISKEY JENNY: I’m so excited. When we had to go through and decide how we’re going to break it up, I got really excited. I got really excited to pick out which copy I was going to buy, because the only other hard copy I had was a giant bound version— with a bookmark ribbon in it—
GIN JENNY: Hey!
WHISKEY JENNY: —of all of them together, which I can’t haul around on the subway. So I just had to go and buy some more!
GIN JENNY: Yup, yup, yup. Your hands were tied.
WHISKEY JENNY: My hands were tied.
GIN JENNY: Your hands were tied like Frodo inside Mordor.
WHISKEY JENNY: Ay-oh! [LAUGHTER]
So we have broken it up so that each book within the “book” as Tolkien called them— there are typically two books in each of your traditionally bound paperbacks of the trilogy. We’re going to read half of each book for each episode, and then have a grand finale with the appendices.
GIN JENNY: I’m really excited about the appendices.
WHISKEY JENNY: I think I remember the appendices the least. I’m also excited, because I feel like I’m going to be like, what? That happened?
GIN JENNY: Yeah, you’re going to discover all new material.
WHISKEY JENNY: I really am.
GIN JENNY: In between us deciding we wanted to do this and making this announcement, as you know, I started rewatching Lord of the Rings movies.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yes, that’s right.
GIN JENNY: And they are so good.
WHISKEY JENNY: Do they totally hold up?
GIN JENNY: Oh my gosh, they really do. There’s a couple of CGI moments that are not ideal, but Gollum is still really good, and all the casting is just really spot on.
WHISKEY JENNY: Should we talk about the movies? Is that too much? At the end of, like, every second book?
GIN JENNY: Let’s leave it to the patrons to vote and decide.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, look at you! That was so smooth. [LAUGHTER] I’m so impressed.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Maybe it can go in a Perks and Recs episode, us recapping Fellowship of The Ring, the movie!
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah. And again, I want to emphasize recapping, because I am not going to be able to contain my excitement about this series. Much like Shackleton and Watership Down.
If you read the read along with us, next up we’re going to be reading from book one. So that’s sort of part one of The Fellowship of the Ring, the prologue and all the way through chapter 6.
GIN JENNY: Which I think includes Tom Bombadil?
WHISKEY JENNY: I believe it does.
GIN JENNY: I think it’s going to be our major point of contention throughout this readalong.
WHISKEY JENNY: Who’s excited for Tom Bombadil? Raise your hand!
GIN JENNY: Nobody but you!
WHISKEY JENNY: Me? Just me? Just me?
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: It’s you and Stephen Colbert and that’s it.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: I really do love him, and I can’t wait.
GIN JENNY: So strange. Another amazing thing about this, our 100th episode, our Diamond Jubilee.
WHISKEY JENNY: Thank you for referring to it by its proper title.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: We wanted to do a game to celebrate this episode, but there’s only two of us. So what we decided to do is each pick our favorite type of game that we’ve done in the past and administer a short version of that game to each other.
WHISKEY JENNY: So which game, which type of game did you pick?
GIN JENNY: I really like the— remember our New Zealand or not New Zealand game?
WHISKEY JENNY: I sure do.
GIN JENNY: I really loved that game.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s a great game.
GIN JENNY: I don’t know how you felt about it, but I was really excited about it.
WHISKEY JENNY: No, it’s a great game.
GIN JENNY: OK, so in Endurance, as we will learn, there’s quite a harrowing section about Ernest Shackleton’s away team trying to get to South Georgia, which I looked up. And it’s one of a chain of islands in the far, far south Atlantic Ocean. It’s called South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. So this game is going to be South Georgia and/or the South Sandwich Islands or Not South Georgia and/or the South Sandwich Islands.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh my goodness.
GIN JENNY: But everything in this game— I’m going to tell you bunch of facts, and they’re all about islands.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, OK.
GIN JENNY: But some of them are these ones and some are not. OK, you ready?
WHISKEY JENNY: I’m ready.
GIN JENNY: Although this island is governed by the United Kingdom, Argentina claimed it in the 1920s, occupied it in the 1980s, and continues to claim sovereignty over it.
WHISKEY JENNY: I’m going to go with not.
GIN JENNY: It actually is.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh.
GIN JENNY: I know. During the Falklands War between Argentina and the UK, Argentina claimed the Falklands Islands but also South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands.
WHISKEY JENNY: See, I was like, that sounds like the Falklands. She can’t fool me!
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be tricky. It turns out the Falkland War started because some Argentine Marines were posing as scrap metal merchants, and they came on South Georgia and occupied a whaling station, and then used it as a base to occupy the main settlement in South Georgia.
WHISKEY JENNY: They were posing as scrap metal merchants?
GIN JENNY: Scrap metal merchants! We’re just some Argentine scrap merchants, just wandering around selling scrap metal. OK, number two. There is an ongoing effort to protect the bird life on this island by eradicating all rats from the island. And this is a very ambitious project, because this island is seven times larger than any other island where total rat eradication has been attempted.
WHISKEY JENNY: Wow, that is specific. How many islands have they attempted total rat eradication on?
GIN JENNY: Not a huge number. It’s quite challenging.
WHISKEY JENNY: Sure, that’s, yeah, one of those islands.
GIN JENNY: It is. It’s South Georgia.
WHISKEY JENNY: It is? [LAUGHTER] That’s so weird.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Well this is what I found really charming. The reason there are rats there is because South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands were used as way stations for seal and whale hunting expeditions. So the boats would anchor there, and the rats would just come off the boats. So there’s been this huge push to get rid of the rats.
WHISKEY JENNY: So they’re not native.
GIN JENNY: They’re not native. And this year, 2018, they’re doing a big survey to be like, did it work? Are the rats all gone?
WHISKEY JENNY: They’re doing a rat census!
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Yeah, they’re doing a rat census.
WHISKEY JENNY: Man, the rat really needs to work on its PR, though.
GIN JENNY: Oh my gosh, I know. Plus, if you take a ship and land on South Georgia, they take all your cargo and put it in a sealable building, and they do a really thorough inspection to make sure there’s no rats in it.
WHISKEY JENNY: Well, that makes sense.
GIN JENNY: Because they don’t want to undo all their good rat eradication work. It’s like New Zealand and snakes. They’re just real paranoid about it.
WHISKEY JENNY: They don’t have any snakes in New Zealand?
GIN JENNY: Nope.
WHISKEY JENNY: Not a single one?
GIN JENNY: Nope.
WHISKEY JENNY: Wow.
GIN JENNY: And if you see a snake, you can call the government and they’ll come get it. Because they don’t want snakes to invade.
WHISKEY JENNY: [LAUGHTER] Call the government? It sounds like the Avengers are going to fly down from a helicopter and grab the snake.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: No, I think it’s just like if there’s a too-big alligator, you can call Wildlife and Fisheries.
WHISKEY JENNY: No, no, sure.
GIN JENNY: OK, this island features the third largest volcano in the world, Mount Teide and it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
WHISKEY JENNY: No, not them.
GIN JENNY: It’s not them. You’re right. It’s Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands off the coast of Morocco.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s the what? It’s the largest volcano in the world?
GIN JENNY: No, it’s the third largest volcano in the world. Measured from its base— I don’t know if that’s important, but the Wikipedia article mentioned it. I was like, where else would you—
WHISKEY JENNY: I bet it is important. I bet tallest is different from— or no, wait. It’s saying tallest, but measured from its base.
GIN JENNY: It’s not saying tallest, it’s saying largest. That’s why I was confused. If it was saying tallest, measured from its base would make sense to me.
WHISKEY JENNY: Largest, measured from its base.
GIN JENNY: I wondered if it meant underground stuff?
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, so maybe it’s like, what’s the three dimensional value for, like, volume? Is it— volume, probably.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Yeah, volume. Yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know how else you would measure it. That’s all very confusing to me.
WHISKEY JENNY: My other question is, who is in charge of measuring volcanoes?
GIN JENNY: I guess the Guinness Book of—
WHISKEY JENNY: Is that part of the map— people? You know, the map cabal?
GIN JENNY: There’s going to be some map issues in this game.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, great.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, so prepare yourself.
WHISKEY JENNY: So I should save my map cabal jokes, is what you’re saying?
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Yeah, your map cabal material. OK, so when Captain Cook landed on this island, he initially named it after one of his major financial backers. But the final name refers to the person believed responsible for discovering the island in the first place.
WHISKEY JENNY: Captain Cook, huh? Uh— no, not true.
GIN JENNY: It is not true, but it’s close. This is what I learned— I was blown away by this. It’s Hawaii, in fact. And Hawaii was actually named after a Hawaiian mythical person who was supposed to have discovered the islands. But Captain Cook, when he first landed in Hawaii— causing lots of harm over the course of many years. He was a poo poo head. He named them the Sandwich Islands in honor of his financial backer, the Earl of Sandwich.
WHISKEY JENNY: We can’t have two Sandwich Islands, people, come on.
GIN JENNY: I know! And then, so he named the ones that Ernest Shackleton came to the South Sandwich Islands.
WHISKEY JENNY: All right.
GIN JENNY: And, like a total brown noser, he named another place Montague Island, which was the Earl of Sandwich’s surname.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh my god, will you leave off? He gets it!
GIN JENNY: I know!
WHISKEY JENNY: One island chain per backer. That’s a Patreon rule that were instituting.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Also— this is not apropos of anything— but while I was looking up the naming of all the South Sandwich Islands, I discovered that there’s a pair of islands that are part of the South Sandwich Islands chain called the Candlemas Islands. And Captain Cook said it was two islands, but then cartographers who came after him were like, no, it’s just one. And in 1930 they finally and definitely proved it was two islands. I know. And they named the smaller island Vindication Island.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, that is gorgeous.
GIN JENNY: I was like, man, Whiskey Jenny’s going to love this.
WHISKEY JENNY: That is so, so good.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: OK, one of the islands— this is number five. One of the islands in this chain is nicknamed The Forbidden Isle.
WHISKEY JENNY: Ooh. Yeah, sure.
GIN JENNY: It’s actually not.
WHISKEY JENNY: Shoot.
GIN JENNY: Sorry, it’s two Hawaii questions in a row. I randomized these, but this is how it came out. This is Niihau in Hawaii, and it is called The Forbidden Island for the stupidest reason. It’s privately owned.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh. Well, that is some nonsense.
GIN JENNY: I know. Some Scottish lady bought it in 1864 and her descendants still own it. So if you’re not one of them or one of their guests, you can’t come.
WHISKEY JENNY: Terrible.
GIN JENNY: But this appeased me quite a bit, and I think it will appease you as well. There’s no plumbing or running water on the island at all.
WHISKEY JENNY: Hm.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, so it sucks. They bought a crappy island.
WHISKEY JENNY: I mean, is that on purpose? I assume they’re rich enough to install it.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, but what a weird thing to choose.
WHISKEY JENNY: Right?
GIN JENNY: Yeah. And it’s not like the original founding lady chose this. It was in 1964. Many years have passed since then. Her descendants, if they wanted to install plumbing and running water, I feel like, like you said, they could do it.
WHISKEY JENNY: What a choice.
GIN JENNY: I know. OK, number six. This island only gets about 1,000 hours of sunshine per year.
WHISKEY JENNY: 1,000 hours of sunshine per year? True.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, it’s true. It’s South Georgia and the South— probably there are other places that get this small amount of sunlight, but South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands is one of them.
WHISKEY JENNY: Is one of them. [LAUGHTER]
GIN JENNY: Sounds awful.
WHISKEY JENNY: That sounds rough, yes.
GIN JENNY: OK. The largest settlement on this island is named after cookware.
WHISKEY JENNY: After cookware? Hm. No.
GIN JENNY: It is South Georgia and the South—
WHISKEY JENNY: It is?
GIN JENNY: So the South Sandwich Islands are uninhabited, but South Georgia has a settlement called Grytvikan, which is the place Ernest Shackleton went to for help, and that means Pot Bay.
WHISKEY JENNY: Pot Bay. Well, who knew?
GIN JENNY: Yeah. Also, listen to this. So When Shackleton died, his widow had him buried in Grytvikan, and— wait for it— because she said that was where his heart really lay.
WHISKEY JENNY: [WHIMPER]
GIN JENNY: And in 2011, Frank Wild’s ashes were reinterred on the right hand side of Shackleton’s gravesite—
WHISKEY JENNY: [SQUEAL]
GIN JENNY: —with an inscription— I know— with an inscription that said Frank Wild, Shackleton’s Right Hand Man.
WHISKEY JENNY: [GASP] Oh my god!
GIN JENNY: [SQUEAKY] I know.
WHISKEY JENNY: That’s really beautiful.
GIN JENNY: Isn’t that wonderful? I was really, really touched to learn that. OK. Number eight, this island is the only known habitat for the world’s tiniest species of spider.
WHISKEY JENNY: Aw. So cute. But no.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, no. It’s Samoa. It’s the Samoan moss spider, and it measures 0.3 millimeters, which is the exactly correct size for a gel pen. So it’s like the size of period. A dot.
WHISKEY JENNY: A little tiny dot, skittering around.
GIN JENNY: I know, it’s just a little spider. Boy, you wouldn’t know if that was on you, though. That’s the problem.
WHISKEY JENNY: Well, no. I don’t know what it could do, though, if it was on me.
GIN JENNY: Give you a tiny bite.
WHISKEY JENNY: I think it could try.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: You think it’d be like the sharks in James and the Giant Peach?
WHISKEY JENNY: The sharks?
GIN JENNY: Yeah, their mouths couldn’t bite the peach. They kept trying and trying, but to no avail.
WHISKEY JENNY: I think it’d be exactly like that.
GIN JENNY: OK, number nine. Content note: we’re about to talk about Nazis. During World War II, the German foreign office came up with a plan, which was never implemented, to deport Polish Jews to this island. But the plan required British cooperation, so it was scrapped after the Battle of Britain.
WHISKEY JENNY: Huh.
GIN JENNY: Yeah.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yuck. Not true.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, no, not. It’s Madagascar, which is very weird also. Apparently the Polish government— the Polish government, so prior to German occupation— had floated this idea in the 1930s. Yeah, and then during World War II, German officials revived it, and Adolf Eichmann was like, yeah, we’ll do that. But they ended up not being able to, because there were naval blockades. And also Germany needed British merchant vessels to do the plan. Which, when I discovered that, I was like, Jesus, would British merchant vessels have done that, even if they weren’t at war? And then I was like [SIGH], maybe.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yes. Absolutely yes.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. But it made me really sad that Germany felt like they could totally count on British merchant vessels for something so horrible. [SIGH] OK, number 10 is a more cheering question.
WHISKEY JENNY: Hooray. I’m glad we didn’t end on the Nazis.
GIN JENNY: No. I wouldn’t do that to you. OK, so the earliest European discovery of this island was actually by the Dutch East India Company. But their map maker wrote down the wrong coordinates for it, so nobody could find it again.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, crap.
GIN JENNY: I know. So no Europeans came to it for more than a century. And when they did land there, the captain was like, oh my god, I found Antarctica! But he hadn’t.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, interesting. Yeah, I’m going to go for yes.
GIN JENNY: That’s a good guess, but in fact no.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: There’s only two guesses.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, but it made sense with the information that I provided.
WHISKEY JENNY: You can’t fool me.
GIN JENNY: This is actually the Prince Edward Islands, not to be confused with Prince Edward Island in Canada, which I think is silly.
WHISKEY JENNY: All right, map people. We need to have a talk.
GIN JENNY: I know, exactly. God, just stick to, if there’s already an island named after a person, you can’t name another one after that same person.
WHISKEY JENNY: You can’t do it again. You can’t do it again.
GIN JENNY: Or if you are going to do it, you have to do, like, Elizabethtown and Virginia. You know, it has to be far enough apart.
WHISKEY JENNY: Mhm.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, so these are these two islands, Prince Edward Island and Marion Island, and they’re like between the bottom of South Africa and the top of Antarctica. And the Dutch East India Company found in 1663, and the French didn’t get there until 1772.
WHISKEY JENNY: And when the French got there, they were like, we’ve found Antarctica?
GIN JENNY: Antarctica had not actually been discovered yet. They weren’t even sure there was such a thing as Antarctica. So the French were really excited. But it was—
WHISKEY JENNY: Good try, France. Real good try.
GIN JENNY: Yeah.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yay! What a great game.
GIN JENNY: Oh, man. Was that an OK game?
WHISKEY JENNY: It was a wonderful game.
GIN JENNY: OK, cool. Well I heard that you have one that is— I heard that you have one that is cold themed.
WHISKEY JENNY: It is cold themed. So my favorite— well, a genre of game that we have played that I really enjoy and the one that I picked is when you replace one word in the title of a book. And the theme that I have chosen to do this under is cold and—
GIN JENNY: Ice.
WHISKEY JENNY: —Shackleton stories. Yeah.
GIN JENNY: Oh, Shackleton. Oh, OK, OK, all right, all right. I’m so excited.
WHISKEY JENNY: So I have one that’s just to give an example so we can remember how the game works.
GIN JENNY: Thank you. That was so nice of you.
WHISKEY JENNY: Well, I made too many and then I was like, oh, and I don’t like this one as much.
GIN JENNY: Well way to make use of all the parts of the buffalo.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah. And I think if you’re stumped, I can give you the author, too. But I’ll give you first the fake plot synopsis.
GIN JENNY: OK, awesome, awesome.
WHISKEY JENNY: So if I was to say, in this recent romance novel—
GIN JENNY: Oh boy.
WHISKEY JENNY: —recently divorced Tina meets a plumber named Joe who introduces her to arctic exploration.
GIN JENNY: Hmm. Brrroller Girl?
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: That’s a, that’s a great guess. That is the correct, title but I was going for Polar Girl.
GIN JENNY: Polar Girl! I’m so stupid! I can’t believe I didn’t get that. Of course it’s Polar Girl.
WHISKEY JENNY: But I liked Brrroller Girl. That’s really good.
GIN JENNY: [LAUGHTER] Thank you.
WHISKEY JENNY: Number one, a Jewish writer and his iceberg friend take the comics world by storm in this novel set during and around World War II.
GIN JENNY: OK. All right, so this has to be The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay.
WHISKEY JENNY: I think this one might be the hardest one, so I just thought we’d start off with a bang.
GIN JENNY: OK, all right, good, good, good. All right, well I feel like it has to be something that rhymes with Clay, because otherwise I don’t know how you could substitute syllables. Oh man, I don’t know. I give up.
WHISKEY JENNY: Do you want to hear the plot summary again?
GIN JENNY: Yes.
WHISKEY JENNY: A Jewish writer and his iceberg friend take the comics world by storm in this novel set during and around World War II.
GIN JENNY: No, I don’t know. I’m sure— I know there’s a clever thing with the iceberg, but I don’t know what it is.
WHISKEY JENNY: No, no, sorry. It was the toughest one. Maybe I should have saved it, but I thought we’d get it out of the way. The Amazing Adventures of Cavalier and Glacier.
GIN JENNY: Glacier! I love it. That’s so good.
WHISKEY JENNY: OK, sorry. This one is really tricky, too. I’m going to move it.
GIN JENNY: OK.
WHISKEY JENNY: OK, a children’s book often given as a graduation present, about some wintry weather and the journey ahead of it.
GIN JENNY: Oh the Places You’ll Floe?
WHISKEY JENNY: I haven’t reused words. I did do— I will tell you I did a floe rhyme elsewhere, but I didn’t do it here. But that’s a really great guess. I’ll give you that one, but it’s not—
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: No, I don’t know. I’m sorry.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s Snow the Places You’ll Go.
GIN JENNY: Snow the Places You’ll Go. That’s good.
WHISKEY JENNY: Number three. A group of mammals, large mammals, partake in a storytelling competition on their way to visit a shrine.
GIN JENNY: Is it the Canterbury Whales?
WHISKEY JENNY: It is!
GIN JENNY: Yay!
WHISKEY JENNY: Yay. A science fiction novel of a dystopia after a second civil war in America. A genetically altered star wakes up alone in the sea floating on a piece of ice.
GIN JENNY: Can you read it— sorry, can you read it to me again?
WHISKEY JENNY: A science fiction novel of a dystopia after a second civil war in America. The main character, a genetically altered— I think he’s a pop star— wakes up alone in the sea floating on a piece of ice.
GIN JENNY: A genetically altered pop star. Tell me the author?
WHISKEY JENNY: Philip K. Dick.
GIN JENNY: Oh, shoot, I don’t know this one, because I don’t Philip K. Dick. I’m so sorry. I’m letting science fiction down, but I don’t know.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s Floe My Tears the Policeman Said.
GIN JENNY: Oh my god. [LAUGHTER] Well, that actually works out really well, because I missed the floe one, but then you gave me credit for the other one that I put floe in. It works out perfectly.
WHISKEY JENNY: Exactly. OK, in this multi-volume novel, most famously, the narrator tells the story of dipping a madeleine in tea and looking out through a window pane on a cold winter day.
GIN JENNY: OK, so I know this Proust. I’m trying to guess if you went with Remembrance of Times Past or In Search of Lost Time. Tell me it again? I’m sorry.
WHISKEY JENNY: In this multi-volume novel, most famously the narrator tells a story of dipping a madeleine in tea and looking out through a window pane on a cold winter day.
GIN JENNY: OK. I don’t know. I’m so sorry.
WHISKEY JENNY: I did use the title In Search of Lost Time.
GIN JENNY: Oh, OK. OK, that’s helpful. That’s good. OK, In Search of Lost Time. in Search of Frost Time!
WHISKEY JENNY: In Search of Frost Time! Yay!
GIN JENNY: Thank you for the hint. I appreciate it.
WHISKEY JENNY: This next one is a charming epistolary World War II novel, and creative ingredients have to be used when making treats, including blubber.
GIN JENNY: So I think it’s the Guernsey Literary and Potato Pie Society.
WHISKEY JENNY: Mhm.
GIN JENNY: Is it The Guernsey Literary and Potato Seal Pie Society?
WHISKEY JENNY: It sure is!
GIN JENNY: Yay! That’s a really good. Ah, seals.
WHISKEY JENNY: Man, they ate a whole bunch of seals in this book, didn’t they?
GIN JENNY: Oh boy, they sure did. But— well, we’ll talk about it.
WHISKEY JENNY: We’ll talk about it. But when they were like, I just never want to see meat ever again, I think I understood that. On some small level. Even if I make too many lentils and I have to eat lentils for like four meals instead of three, I’m like, I hate lentils now! [LAUGHTER] Why is this so many lentils? They’re so tiny! How did this make so many? [LAUGHTER] Anyway.
GIN JENNY: That’s a preview for you listeners of the What We’re Cooking segment. [LAUGHTER] Actually, but you’re a master chef now since you did your CSA. I’m not a master chef.
GIN JENNY: Yes, you’re a master chef. Truth in television.
WHISKEY JENNY: Nope. Still no. But I do enjoy the structure. Being like, OK, I have beets and an egg. What do I make? Go!
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: That’s too high a difficulty level for me.
WHISKEY JENNY: I just get paralyzed by indecision otherwise.
GIN JENNY: No, I totally understand.
WHISKEY JENNY: OK. This one, this one’s tricksy and false. I’m just telling you.
GIN JENNY: OK. Oh boy. Oh boy. OK, OK.
WHISKEY JENNY: A romantic novel about two people overcoming their hasty judgments of each other and falling in love despite their frosty exteriors.
GIN JENNY: OK, so I think it’s Pride and Prejudice. I’m so hung up on my idea of being like brrr to things, that I want to be for all of them, I want to be like, Brrride and Brrrejudice.
WHISKEY JENNY: That’s great. That’s great.
GIN JENNY: Hmm. It’s tricksy and false, you say. I don’t know.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s Pride and Prejud-ice.
GIN JENNY: Ah ha ha ha. Oh, I get it. I thought you said dice, and I was like, I don’t understand.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, no. Sorry. OK, number eight. A painting of a frigid bird is stolen in this coming of age tale.
GIN JENNY: Oh, OK, OK. It’s The Goldfinch.
WHISKEY JENNY: Mhm.
GIN JENNY: The Coldfinch! Of course it’s The Coldfinch.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yay!
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: I really like that one. That one’s really charming.
WHISKEY JENNY: I give credit for that one to Jessie Barbour. Jessie came up with that one.
GIN JENNY: Oh, thanks, Jessie!
WHISKEY JENNY: Our theme song composer.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, and there at our podcast inception, as well.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah. Wait, was she?
GIN JENNY: Yeah. We were at a bar, it was you, me, and her. And she was very supportive from early on. Much appreciated.
WHISKEY JENNY: Thanks, Jessie.
GIN JENNY: Thanks, Jessie. Man, Jessie has been such a— she’s brought us together in so many ways.
WHISKEY JENNY: Really, truly.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. Man, thanks Jessie.
WHISKEY JENNY: Thanks, Jessie. OK, this is a weird transition. Number nine. Siblings, the product of incest, are kept captive in a frozen wasteland.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: I’m sorry, tell me again?
WHISKEY JENNY: Siblings, the product of incest, are kept captive in a frozen wasteland.
GIN JENNY: OK, what incest books do I know? Gosh, I hate incest books. Tell me the author?
WHISKEY JENNY: VC Andrews.
GIN JENNY: Oh. So I think it’s Flowers in the Attic. I’ve never read Flowers in the Attic.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s Flowers in the Attic, that’s correct.
GIN JENNY: Oh, Flowers in the Arctic, of course.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yay! OK, so this last one I’m the most proud of, but I’m not sure if you’ll get it, because it’s a real stretch.
GIN JENNY: Is this the one you moved from the beginning?
WHISKEY JENNY: No, I purposely had this one last because I like it the most.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: OK, go.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s a 19th century Victorian poem about a forbidden love between King Arthur’s right hand man and a bird.
GIN JENNY: Gosh. I haven’t read Le Morte D’Arthur, so I’m nervous that this is not— who’s the author?
WHISKEY JENNY: Alfred Lord Tennyson.
GIN JENNY: Oh, OK. So it’s Idylls of the King.
WHISKEY JENNY: [WHIMPERING]
GIN JENNY: No?
WHISKEY JENNY: [WHIMPERING]
GIN JENNY: Ah, I see that it is not. [LAUGHTER] I’m basing this on my authors game that I had as a little girl. And I didn’t actually know which one was which, I was just guessing. Because you said King Arthur.
WHISKEY JENNY: He might have wrote that. I’m not saying you’re incorrect there. But this is not the title in question here.
GIN JENNY: That was probably Longfellow anyway. I have a really hard time with Tennyson and Longfellow. Those aren’t the same person, are they? No, they’re not, shut up.
WHISKEY JENNY: I mean, I don’t think they’re doing a long con, but maybe. [LAUGHTER]
GIN JENNY: OK. No, I don’t know. I’m sorry, because I don’t know the source material, so I can’t guess. I’m sorry.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, no, it was a real stretch. I just wanted to do this pun, and I had to come up with something that had this in the title. And it’s also a poem. It’s one random short poem that he wrote. It’s not a giant epic book or anything.
GIN JENNY: Aha, so it might have been in my authors game.
WHISKEY JENNY: I mean, Yeah. I’m not sure.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: OK, tell me the pun.
WHISKEY JENNY: “Sir Lancelot and Queen Penguinevere.”
GIN JENNY: Aah! [LAUGHTER] That’s a really, really, really good. You are rightfully proud of that.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, I love it so much!
GIN JENNY: If I just hadn’t overthought it. If I had just focused on Lancelot and Guinevere’s names. Oh, that’s amazing. That was a great game.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yay, games!
GIN JENNY: OK, well you’re the one who thought of what we’re reading for this episode, so why don’t you introduce it? The greatest idea anyone’s ever had.
WHISKEY JENNY: Well, so in honor of our 100th episode, we thought we would do something important to us in our podcast history, or related to things that we talk about a lot. So we ended up picking the story of Ernest Shackleton. And the specific story that we picked is called Endurance, Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage, by Alfred Lansing. It was published in 1959. What’d you think?
GIN JENNY: Where to begin?
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: I mean, obviously we’re going to start on page one and just go through everything that happened.
GIN JENNY: The preface to this book was one of the greatest things I’ve ever read.
WHISKEY JENNY: It was amazing. The thing that I am amazed— we can do a quick little review of this book. The thing that I’m amazed at is, I think we both already knew the story a lot. We’re pretty familiar with it. And it’s still so captivating, and so interesting, even if you already know exactly what’s going to happen, it’s thrilling. And you’re like, oh my god, is that wave going to take them or not?
GIN JENNY: And you’re like, oh, are they going to make it to Elephant Island?
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, I don’t know. I know, I know that they do, but it’s still like, ooh!
GIN JENNY: Yeah.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s so good at that. It’s so good at the human relationships between all of them, for sure. I want more of that forever, but what it gave me is pretty good. And even though I was familiar with it, there were so many new details that I learned.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, I loved it. I think I can say this because I don’t think my dad listens to this podcast. I want to buy it for my dad for Christmas, I guess. I think he’d really like it, and I would totally like to own a hard copy. I checked it out of the library. But I liked a lot. I can imagine myself rereading it.
WHISKEY JENNY: All right, well, let’s start with the prologue. Let’s get into it.
GIN JENNY: OK, I know it’s our 100th episode and it’s going to run long, and I shouldn’t necessarily spend all this time. But there was just an excerpt from the preface that I was like, oh, this is going to be really good. This is what he says.
“In addition to making their diaries available to me, almost all the surviving members of the expedition submitted to long hours, even days, of interviewing with a courteousness and cooperativeness for which my grateful appreciation is hardly an adequate repayment. The same patient willingness marked the numerous letters in which these men replied to the many questions which arose. I am extremely proud of my association with them.”
WHISKEY JENNY: Merrr.
GIN JENNY: I was so touched. It was so good. And then, as I was recovering from the preface, we got to the character list.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, yeah. Tell me about that.
GIN JENNY: OK. And this was the point when I emailed to say we just need to recap this, top to bottom. There’s a list of everyone who was on the expedition, 28 men, along with the position they held on the ship. So it was like, Ernest Shackleton was the leader, Frank Worsley was the captain, et cetera. One guy’s in there as “motor expert, later storekeeper.” And then all the way down at the bottom it says, “Perce Blackborow, stowaway, later steward.”
WHISKEY JENNY: Stowaway!
GIN JENNY: And I just died. How did I not know there was a stowaway on board?
WHISKEY JENNY: I did know there was a stowaway, but still it’s just such amazing drama right from the beginning.
GIN JENNY: Oh my gosh, I was so excited. If I did know that, then I somehow forgot, but that’s awesome. McNish, the cranky carpenter, is Harry here, but they called him Chippy. I’m sorry, Chippy McNish is not a real name. [LAUGHTER] No. Every time they referred to him in the book as Chippy McNish— none of these names sound real. I was like, stop it.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Yeah, Perce Blackborow sounds like a side character in a really excellent romance novel.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah. And then when they’re preparing to get ready, when they were talking about building the Endurance ship, it was at this very special ship building yard in Norway.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, and they did special stuff to it.
WHISKEY JENNY: They did special stuff to it, because they knew it might be one of the last one they did, so they were all emotionally invested in it. And it uses a kind of wood called greenheart, it’s like the hardest wood of all time, ever. But it just sounds magical.
GIN JENNY: Yes it does.
WHISKEY JENNY: It does not even sound like a real thing. Greenheart?
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: It doesn’t. It sounds like something in maybe a steampunk book, like what the dirigible parts are made of.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, or Arthurian.
GIN JENNY: Oh, yeah. Or like something in Uprooted, that Naomi Novik book we read.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Here we go, “greenheart, a wood so heavy that it weighs more than solid iron and so tough that it cannot be worked with ordinary tools.” it cannot be worked with ordinary tools, which I took to mean that you have to use magic tools.
GIN JENNY: You have to use diamonds.
WHISKEY JENNY: Basically. Also one of the knocks people sometimes level at Ernest Shackleton is like, oh, he was just doing this for fame and money. And I really like this book was not being like, yeah you’re right, he shouldn’t have done it just for the money. Because everyone’s got to make a living somehow.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, and this is what he’s good at.
WHISKEY JENNY: The book argues that maybe he was just really into providing for his wife and financial security, and the premise of, I’m going to do arctic exploration for financial stability and security is bananas. [LAUGHTER] That’s not a valid argument! From that point I was like, all right, so this man is thinking on a very different level.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: It was also funny to me that he said that people were criticizing him for just hiring people on whims and not really doing proper interviews.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, but look how well that turned out.
GIN JENNY: It turned out great, and I thought it was delightful, also. My favorite part from the hiring section is that the guy who ended up being the ship’s meteorologist had no experience at all of being a meteorologist. But he had just come back from Sudan recently, and Ernest Shackleton thought it would be funny if he had just come back from the Sudan and then he went to Antarctica. And he right! That’s hilarious.
WHISKEY JENNY: That’s hilarious. He did it as a joke. It totally lands.
GIN JENNY: It’s really good. [LAUGHTER] It’s so many years later, and that’s still really, really funny. Great work, Ernest Shackleton. You had your eye on the history books and it paid off.
WHISKEY JENNY: I feel like I had something else to say about that meteorologist.
GIN JENNY: Hussey?
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh yeah, he’s Hussy. He’s the practical joker.
GIN JENNY: Oh, right! Right, right, right.
WHISKEY JENNY: All right, anything else before they leave land?
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Well just one thing I wanted to mention. So this journey was four years in the planning. And right as Shackleton was fixing to depart—
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh gosh, yes, this was great. I was telling Alex about this earlier.
GIN JENNY: —World War I started. I just, wow. So as we’re going along, I kind of kept track of the timeline a little bit of what was happening in the World War while the expedition was going on. And what is just mind boggling to me is that they didn’t know any of this, because they were gone for almost two years. And they just didn’t know anything that was happening in World War I.
WHISKEY JENNY: Several days before they were supposed to leave— like days, not months or anything— England declared war. And they telegraphed the Navy or whatever to say, you guys tell us if you want to use our ship and these men, or if you want us to keep going. And the Navy told them to keep going. But I thought I was—
GIN JENNY: Yeah, that was really great.
WHISKEY JENNY: —brave offer. Yeah.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, it was. So it wasn’t all about fame and fortune, Shackleton critics!
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah
GIN JENNY: It really was about financial security for his wife. [LAUGHTER] OK, but then they left. They left.
WHISKEY JENNY: So then the ship leaves.
GIN JENNY: And what’s the best thing that happens after the ship leaves?
WHISKEY JENNY: My favorite thing after the ship leaves, so they sailed to Argentina to gather before they make their final jaunt— jaunt. You know, little jaunt.
GIN JENNY: Little jaunt to Antarctica.
WHISKEY JENNY: And three people got kicked off the team in Argentina! The cook came back drunk one time, and they’re like, well, you’re a terrible cook and now you’re drunk, so you’re not the cook anymore. And then two people got in trouble for fighting, so they didn’t make it into the crew either.
GIN JENNY: Really wise. Because if they were fighting in Argentina, just imagine what it would have been like. Whoof.
WHISKEY JENNY: But can you imagine being those people?
GIN JENNY: That sucks.
WHISKEY JENNY: I guess if you knew the outcome that you were going to make it, would you still choose to go through this?
GIN JENNY: Well what I was just going to say is, I bet when the expedition didn’t come back on schedule, those guys were like, oh, wow, really dodged a bullet there.
WHISKEY JENNY: Phew.
GIN JENNY: And then when they did come back, they were like, oh man. All this glory could have been ours. But I think the best thing about the early part of their journey is that— so the one guy just smuggled his best friend on board. Perce Blackborow had interviewed to be on this expedition. Ernest Shackleton didn’t hire him. And when they were too far away from land to turn back, they were like, guess what!
WHISKEY JENNY: They kicked people off in Argentina and then they needed more people. And they’re like, OK cool, we’ll take this guy. And that guy was like, I’m bringing my friend, too, but don’t tell anyone.
GIN JENNY: Yup. And I loved this story, because they revealed him to Ernest Shackleton. Ernest Shackleton was a real mad, and he was yelling at him. And then he finished up his scolding by saying basically, if we run out of food and anyone has to be eaten, you’ll be the first. What a gem!
WHISKEY JENNY: And then— yeah, and that guy realizes like, oh, he’s going to let me stay. This is fine. And started smiling. Yeah.
GIN JENNY: And Perce Blackborow really suffered on this expedition, as you will learn. I mean, they all did, of course. But yeah. And so then they set off from South Georgia, an island we now know a lot about. And they weren’t even sailing that long before the ship got caught up in the ice floes and it couldn’t move forward or back. It was hemmed in by ice.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, it’s stuck in a pack of ice. They call it the pack.
GIN JENNY: The pack.
WHISKEY JENNY: My favorite part from this little bit, when they’re stuck in the pack—
GIN JENNY: I know what it is.
WHISKEY JENNY: Is it the penguins?
GIN JENNY: Oh, no, I don’t know what it is. All right, go ahead. I thought I had guessed, but I was wrong. This is the thing! This book is so great, there’s so many parts— all right, continue.
WHISKEY JENNY: There’s so many good things. Well, I think we also get the character descriptions in this little part.
GIN JENNY: Oh yeah, I love that they call Frank Worsley Wuzzles.
WHISKEY JENNY: Wuzzles! Lil’ Wuzzles.
GIN JENNY: Wuzzles.
WHISKEY JENNY: One day when they’re stuck in this pack, there’s just always a bunch of penguins around them, Adelie penguins, I think, sledding. Like sledding around and playing. And their call sounds like they’re saying Clark, Clark, which is the name of the gaunt and taciturn Scottish biologist. And they would always joke that the penguins were yelling the gaunt and taciturn Scottish biologist’s name. Clark, Clark, Clark!
GIN JENNY: That’s so sweet!
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: The little penguins want to go sledding with Clark, Clark, Clark!
GIN JENNY: So one thing I should do is find a recording of an Adelie penguin and see if it does indeed sound like Clark.
WHISKEY JENNY: I think Clark is the one who they were like, he always did his share or even more.
GIN JENNY: Unlike some.
WHISKEY JENNY: Unlike some.
GIN JENNY: I was really mad at that guy. We’ll get to it, but.
WHISKEY JENNY: OK, so what’s your favorite part from stuck in the pack?
GIN JENNY: My favorite thing about being stuck in the pack— and Alfred Lansing does this a couple of times. He delivers the best information imaginable as if it’s nothing. So he says, quote, “The dogs were removed to the floes and individual quote “dog-loos” were built for them out of blocks of ice and snow.”
WHISKEY JENNY: Dog-loos!
GIN JENNY: Dog-loos!
WHISKEY JENNY: Dog-loos!
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: I couldn’t cope with that. Even knowing the dogs were not going to survive, that was amazing. By the way, the dogs are not going to survive, so nobody get attached the dogs. And it’s really sad. So they’re stuck in the pack, and then they realize they’re going to have to winter over, right?
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah. I think they keep hoping that the pack is going to open up and they can keep going along on their expedition.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, but it doesn’t. And it doesn’t, and it doesn’t, and it doesn’t.
WHISKEY JENNY: And it’s this horrible waiting period where every day they’re just looking out at the cracks in the ice and being like is that one? Is that one?
GIN JENNY: And it never is.
WHISKEY JENNY: And it never is.
GIN JENNY: Alfred Lansing says, “In all the world, there is no desolation more complete than the polar night.” and that is just boggling to me, that just one day the sun goes out like a candle, and you’re facing months and months of darkness. That’s wild.
WHISKEY JENNY: But that was on the ship though, right?
GIN JENNY: Was that on the ship still? Yeah, I think so.
WHISKEY JENNY: If I had to do this, I would die immediately. But this is like— they’re still in great shape at this point.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Right. They’re still happy as clams, essentially.
WHISKEY JENNY: Snug as a bug in a rug on their little ship, and doing little dances at night, and putting on performances and stuff. And they have walls, and flat surfaces to put their beds on and—
GIN JENNY: Relatively dry sleeping bags.
WHISKEY JENNY: This is happy times. But actually they’re in a wooden ship stuck in a pack of ice for winter. [LAUGHTER] And that’s the best thing that happened to them.
GIN JENNY: With no sun at all. I just can’t emphasize that enough.
WHISKEY JENNY: Never sun. Yeah. OK, so then what happens?
GIN JENNY: As a World War I check in, so the Endurance was still moving during the Christmas truce, and they stopped moving around the same time the Dardanelles campaign launched in Turkey, which was the thing where the Allies were trying to capture Constantinople. So that was going on. And then— and then they had to leave the ship!
WHISKEY JENNY: The pack starts attacking the ship, basically.
GIN JENNY: Starts crunching up the ship.
WHISKEY JENNY: And wins. They have like three days where they’re trying to bail the ship out and salvage it, and they just have to give up.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, they just realize the ship is not going to survive, that this is going to keep crunching and crunching in and in.
WHISKEY JENNY: And the ship is going to sink. So they’ve got to get off. they gotta get off!
GIN JENNY: And although this happens, and they now have to get off the ship and have no shelter, still for the whole of the Antarctic winter, everyone’s still amazingly cool and nice about it.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah. So they move to an ice floe and set up camp. And everyone’s like, phew, at least we don’t have to sit there and wait anymore.
GIN JENNY: Right. And this is Ocean Camp, right?
WHISKEY JENNY: I think this is Ocean Camp, yeah. Sorry, I just liked this quote. Because it’s very true about humans. We don’t like indecision. And he says, “There was even a trace of mild exhilaration in their attitude. At least they had a clear cut task ahead of them. The nine months of indecision, of speculation about what might happen, of aimless drifting with the pack, were over.” So they’re like, yeah. They’re all still like, OK, cool. That’s done. So now what?
GIN JENNY: Yeah, which is amazing. So they’re camped out near the ship for a while, and they’re kind of trying to get things off the ship that they can. And they do all that, but eventually the ship goes all the way down into the water. So they have three lifeboats, and they’re hoping that there will be a way for them to put the lifeboats in the water and sail somewhere, but that keeps not happening. So they eventually decide to walk.
WHISKEY JENNY: Including dragging the three boats.
GIN JENNY: Dragging the three boats. And the boats are not big to be adrift in the ocean in, but they’re big to carry across ice.
WHISKEY JENNY: And plus all of your food.
GIN JENNY: All your food, all the dogs’ food, all the photography stuff, all the weather protection that they’re able to carry.
WHISKEY JENNY: So Shackleton decides that previous overland expeditions have failed because they tried and plan for every expediency. And he thinks better you should try for speed and get to where you have to go as fast as possible, and just be really efficient, and not plan for everything. Which means you have to cut down everything that you’re taking so ruthlessly.
And he starts this by— so they were given a Bible by the Queen Mother, inscribed by her. He takes the Bible, rips out the flyleaf, the 23rd Psalm, and a portion of the Book of Job which has an amazing quote about ice, which I will read next— keeps that and throws the rest of the Bible on the ground.
GIN JENNY: Throws the Bible on the ice! [LAUGHTER] Such a good gesture.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s so boss.
GIN JENNY: The 23rd Psalm, by the way, is “the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want,” in case anyone is curious which one he chose. Which, again, Shackleton, killing it.
WHISKEY JENNY: And then, so the page from the Book of Job that he picks has this quote. “Out of whose womb came the ice? And the hoary frost of heaven, who hath gendered it? The waters are hid as with a stone, and the face of the deep is frozen.”
GIN JENNY: [WHSIPERING] So good.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s so good!
GIN JENNY: I wonder how long he was in his tent being like, which Bible passages should I choose?
WHISKEY JENNY: He’s so good at the emotions of it. He’s just really good at managing people.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, he really is. He seems like an amazing, amazing leader.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah.
GIN JENNY: I was just looking up this anecdote, because it was so good that I was like, is this real? And it looked; it does seem to be real. But I’ve since also learned that one of the people, one of the men on the expedition, McLeod, was too superstitious to leave the Bible behind. So he grabbed it and smuggled it along with him.
WHISKEY JENNY: Man. I can’t believe that. I can’t believe that wasn’t mentioned.
GIN JENNY: I know. I wondered if maybe the people that Alfred Lansing talked to didn’t know.
WHISKEY JENNY: Didn’t realize. Interesting. So they do all that. They make a huge giant deal about, pare it down, take only the essentials. But there’s one dude who has a banjo, and he was ordered to take his banjo. Ordered!
GIN JENNY: Ordered to take his banjo. And the funny thing about this is that much later in the book, people are writing in their diaries, like, that guy only knows like three songs and we’re so tired of them!
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: But they loved it for so long, and they would gather around the banjo and be like, phew. Yay. Now it’s fun time.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. It was really nice.
WHISKEY JENNY: Wherever they were, I loved all the little tiny routines that they would do for themselves and make little homes of the pitiful shelter that they had.
GIN JENNY: So they weren’t able to get super far going overland, and they made this horrible camp aboard an ice floe eventually.
WHISKEY JENNY: And that’s Patience Camp, right?
GIN JENNY: Patience Camp. The horrible one on the ice floe.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s not even an ice— it’s like slushy on top, right? That was my takeaway. They’re like lying in slush.
GIN JENNY: Constantly sleeping in slush. And the trip sounds horrible in many ways. But the detail that really appalled me, Alfred Lansing says nobody ever took off his underwear.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, I just thought that was so strange, that he pointed that out. I was not sure what I was supposed to take away from that.
GIN JENNY: That it was gross. They were all gross. They were all gross and miserable.
WHISKEY JENNY: But they took off their clothes sometimes. Why don’t they— it was confusing.
GIN JENNY: Well, I think he just meant that no one changed their underwear for a year and a half. But that’s not even the bad thing, although that is pretty bad. So everyone was eating diets of exclusively meat, because they were running through their stores, so they had to shoot seals and penguins and stuff to eat. So they were all horribly constipated, and they didn’t have any toilet paper. They just had ice.
WHISKEY JENNY: Just had ice.
GIN JENNY: Oh, it sounds so horrible. I mean, pour one out for the butts of the men of the Endurance. That sounds awful.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah. Later on there’s a lot of talk— there’s a different camp where he talks in detail about people really do not want to pee at night. [LAUGHTER] They really don’t want to leave that camp and pee outside.
GIN JENNY: Yeah.
WHISKEY JENNY: They eventually make a little can inside the tent that you can pee in. But if you get it up to two inches within the top, you have to take it out. And everyone tries to get out of that so hard.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: I feel so sorry for them!
WHISKEY JENNY: I know. They just don’t want to go outside. It’s so cold.
GIN JENNY: They’re constantly wet and cold. And this is the stage at which they killed the dog. So I don’t want to talk about it, it made me really sad. But this is about the time that it happened, just so you know.
WHISKEY JENNY: We’re moving right along from that. I think this is also the time where one dude is in his diary like, oh no, I definitely don’t miss food. And then starts listing a list of 10 extremely specific foods [LAUGHTER] he doesn’t miss at all.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, because while they were Patience Camp, they were legitimately running out of food.
WHISKEY JENNY: They’re down to like, I don’t know, half or quarter rations. Eventually they always would run into a pack of penguins or a pack of seals, or a giant sea lion that would be 1,000 pounds.
GIN JENNY: Oh great, let’s talk about that.
WHISKEY JENNY: But wait, I want to read you his list of foods. “One has very few other longings for civilization.” This is him trying to be like, I don’t miss food at all. “Good bread and butter, Munich beer, Coromandel rock oysters, apple pie, and Devonshire cream are pleasant reminisces rather than longings.”
GIN JENNY: Sure. Super convincing, man. OK, can we talk about the sea leopard? This anecdote was so scary. It was like a scene from Jurassic Park.
So there’s this guy, Orde-Lees, who is our least favorite person on this expedition, right?
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, cause he tries to get out of rowing.
GIN JENNY: He constantly tries to get out of rowing. We’re going to get to the part where they have to row, but suffice it to say, rowing has never been such a miserable task. And Orde-Lees was always like, [WHINING] I don’t want to do a turn. Can someone else have my turn? I’m not good at rowing.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: And then if they did bully him, or finally get him to do it, he would purposely mess up so they’d be like, ugh. Fine, stop it. We need someone who is not going to hit the person in front of them.
GIN JENNY: Ugh. It’s like the guy a bunch of my friends is in college, the brand of guy who’d be like, I’m just not good at washing dishes. Can you do it? I’m just bad at it.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh. Screw that guy.
GIN JENNY: Are you?
WHISKEY JENNY: That guy.
GIN JENNY: Are you?
WHISKEY JENNY: Terrible.
GIN JENNY: Anyway, so this guy, a person that you now understand to be terrible, but nevertheless this story was so scary. He was out looking for food, and all of a sudden a thousand pound leopard seal— look it up. They have so many teeth. A thousand pounds it weighed— more than a thousand pounds— jumped up out of the ice floe to eat him. Already so scary. And Orde-Lees gets scared, he runs away. And he looks back, and the sea leopard is gone.
WHISKEY JENNY: And he’s like, phew! Thank goodness.
GIN JENNY: And he keeps walking across the ice back to camp. And then the thing jumps back up out of the water in front of him!
WHISKEY JENNY: It tracked his shadow. It tracked his shadow!
GIN JENNY: It tracked his shadow under the ice so it could jump up in front of him. That was so scary. Like, I was reading this book, and I know that everyone on this expedition survives, but I was still like, oh my god oh my god oh my god!
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah, so but I think he shouted the first time it happened, and there were other people watching, and they finally shoot that thing.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, Frank Wild, a great, great person, heard the shouting. And he loaded his gun to shoot, and the leopard seal saw him and was like, all right, I’m coming for you now! Which, I mean, oh my gosh, just so scary. But anyway, he shot and killed it, and then they had all that meat. So that was a fortunate ending.
WHISKEY JENNY: Phew. While we’re on animals, this book did not like killer whales.
GIN JENNY: Oh, it didn’t. I’m glad you noticed. I didn’t want to be the one to point it out, but yeah, it didn’t.
WHISKEY JENNY: Really against killer whales. I don’t know. Whenever they described the animals, it was like, the cute little penguins, and the happy seals, and the evil, evil whales.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Maybe they were just really scared of them. Here’s the thing, I know killer whales are called killer whales in common parlance, but they don’t kill people.
WHISKEY JENNY: They hunt like other whales do.
GIN JENNY: They hunt like other whales do. They kill other things. They eat seals and stuff. They don’t want to eat people, and they never eat people.
WHISKEY JENNY: I just thought it was funny that this book was so against them.
GIN JENNY: It was! And I wondered if maybe it was something he had picked up from the diaries of the guys. Like maybe they would see these and be like, oh my god, the worst. Yeah, I don’t know. I was mystified by that.
WHISKEY JENNY: OK, so I think while we’re on Patience Camp, we have the story of the lost milk.
GIN JENNY: Oh my gosh, this was such a sad story. This really tore at my heart.
WHISKEY JENNY: I think what happened, so they’re on Patience Camp for a while floating.
GIN JENNY: And they really are running out of food. It was very— it was making me stressed out.
WHISKEY JENNY: So at this point, they’re hoping that at some point they will be able to leave the little floe that they’re floating on and get in the boats and go somewhere.
GIN JENNY: Tempers are wearing thin, and there’s this one day where a bunch of people were arguing. And one of them spilled his powdered milk, which was his only ration of milk for the day. And he was yelling at the guy— Clark it was. He was yelling at Clark. And he’s like, you asshole, you made me spill my milk. And then and he got all done yelling, and he just stood there looking down at the snow and his milk seeping away like he was about to cry. And then Clark, who he’d been yelling at, came over and put part of his milk into this guy’s cup.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah.
GIN JENNY: And then what happened?
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s one of the few warm things that they get to have, also. And then everyone else around them basically do it, as well. Worsley, Macklin, Rickinson, Kerr, Orde-Lees— whatever— and finally Blackborow, the stowaway, all do the same thing and give him a little bit of his milk. So he has a full ration, too.
GIN JENNY: It was so sweet.
WHISKEY JENNY: And they just drink their milk.
GIN JENNY: I was so touched. It was really, really nice.
WHISKEY JENNY: It was so lovely.
GIN JENNY: Oh, they really stick together.
WHISKEY JENNY: They really do. I’m really impressed at how few arguments like that there were.
GIN JENNY: Yes, that was very notable, because they really do not fight that much. Like, a couple of people will be annoyed with each other, but it really seemed like overall the expedition was very amicable.
WHISKEY JENNY: People write snippy things in their diaries about the number of banjo songs. And somebody sniffed apparently, and somebody else was about to lose it with the guy who sniffed. [LAUGHTER] If that guy sniffs one more time. Angrily writing in his diary at night. It’s so cute!
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: I don’t think we mentioned this, but while they were at Patience Camp, the ice floe was pretty stable, but cracks could appear in it at any time, and they did. And they had to move all their stuff. So it was all very precarious. Your whole home could be in the water if you don’t watch closely enough, and everything’s wet.
WHISKEY JENNY: How did they not all die? I don’t understand it.
GIN JENNY: I don’t know.
WHISKEY JENNY: They were literally living on a floating earthquake made of ice!
GIN JENNY: Yeah!
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: How did they live?
GIN JENNY: Don’t know. Meanwhile, back in World War I. I don’t know why this blew my mind so much, but poison gas debuted while they were away. Isn’t that weird? Everyone knew about it, and they did know about it.
WHISKEY JENNY: They had no idea. So finally the ice opens up and they can get in the boats and try for land nearby. Relatively nearby.
GIN JENNY: You’ll have to look at pictures of these boats. They are not big boats.
WHISKEY JENNY: They’re little rowboats that you would take out on a lake.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. And they’re there just adrift in the infinite sea.
WHISKEY JENNY: They’re teeny tiny row boats, and they’re in the most dangerous ocean of all time.
GIN JENNY: And when they’re able to sleep, which is not very much, they have to camp out on these terrible ice floes that are even worse than Patience Camp.
WHISKEY JENNY: Even ricketier! And might crack at any point!
GIN JENNY: And they do! They crack. Many nights cracks appear. And this is the part where Orde-Lees refuses to row and earns my eternal enmity. Because rowing is horrible. It’s so hard. They’re going against the, again, infinite sea.
WHISKEY JENNY: They’re going against the infinite sea. It’s windy, it’s cold, everything’s frostbitten. They can’t feel anything. They’re so tired, because they can’t sleep. And they’re hungry. They’re cold and wet.
GIN JENNY: They can’t very much control where the boats can go.
WHISKEY JENNY: No, they have to hope for good wind or currents.
GIN JENNY: It was so stressful. The islands— the land was their hope of survival, and they kept seeing land and then being just pushed away from it. And days would pass and they would be like, OK, well now we must be relatively close. And they would check, and they would be so much further away.
WHISKEY JENNY: Because the current had like actually, unbeknownst to them, been taking them really far.
GIN JENNY: When they first mentioned Elephant Island, I thought oh good, phew, they must be almost there, because I remember— no! They were not almost there at all.
WHISKEY JENNY: Gosh.
GIN JENNY: I thought this was so sweet. Perce Blackborow at this point gets frostbite in his feet, so is extra miserable even compared to everyone else. And Shackleton sees that he’s really unhappy, and he’s like hey, we’re about to land on Elephant Island. Nobody has been there before, and you can be the first one ashore.
WHISKEY JENNY: Woo!
GIN JENNY: Which did not turn out to be that good, because Perce Blackborow couldn’t walk properly on his own and Ernest Shackleton forgot. And he was really mad at himself for forgetting. But still, that was just such a— and this is on no sleep at all, right? So he is as exhausted as everyone else.
WHISKEY JENNY: He’s also— and he is so conscientious about doing the same thing as everyone else, so he’s also doing these horrible, horrible rowing shifts.
GIN JENNY: But he still finds time to make sure he’s thinking about everyone’s morale and stuff, which I just— great, great, great job. So they come to Elephant Island. They make a horrible camp there.
WHISKEY JENNY: Finally they make another horrible camp.
GIN JENNY: Well, the thing about Elephant Island, it sucks, but at least they are on land. So it does have that going for it.
WHISKEY JENNY: And then they decide— or they have decided that they need to send out a little mini party to go get help.
GIN JENNY: And I love Ernest Shackleton choosing the away team. Because he picks— he picks the captain, Frank Worsley. Wuzzles. Wuzzles! Because he’s the navigator.
WHISKEY JENNY: He’s the navigator, who has gotten them onto the island that they are on and is going to have to take them across a terrifying ocean again to a tiny little pinprick of land.
GIN JENNY: Right. So he takes him. He takes one other guy who’s a really good sailor. And then the two other people he takes are guys that he think would sow discord if he left them behind. Which I thought was really, really smart and wise.
WHISKEY JENNY: The cranky carpenter, and the guy who we’ve only known as a bully before. He’s not an officer, and everyone else who was not an officer hated him because he was a bully. And then the little happy guy. They take one nice guy because he’s very strong.
GIN JENNY: He’s strong and a hard worker. And then, so Ernest Shackleton leaves Frank Wild in charge. And Frank Wild was the guy who had accompanied him on previous expeditions.
WHISKEY JENNY: Wild is second in command the whole time, right? He’s captain?
GIN JENNY: Wuzzles is captain.
WHISKEY JENNY: Wuzzles is captain. OK. Wild is second to Wuzzles, generally, if they’re all together. But now Wild is in charge of Elephant Island Camp.
GIN JENNY: Elephant Island. And Ernest Shackleton— Ernest Shackleton was so wise, every time he would leave, he would write a letter down. I have left you in charge, signed Ernest Shackleton.
WHISKEY JENNY: Here’s the plan. You’re supposed to do this. And if we don’t come back within six months, do something else. Do this other thing.
GIN JENNY: And he wrote, in his letter to Frank Wild he wrote, “I have every confidence in you and always have had. May God prosper your work and your life. You can convey my love to my people and say I tried my best.”
WHISKEY JENNY: Aww.
GIN JENNY: I know. So he takes off, and he’s going to go to South Georgia and summon rescue. And the timeline that the crew has in mind is he’ll probably be back in a month, but it might be as long as two months. If he’s not back by the start of August, they’re going to start worrying.
So my favorite from this time is that the geologist, Jock Wordie, had been the most thrifty about his tobacco ration. And everyone would come up to him be like, hey, I found an interesting rock.
WHISKEY JENNY: So they’re all out.
GIN JENNY: They’re all out. He’s the only one with any left. So they’ll be like, I found an interesting rock, and I’ll show you if you let me smoke some of your tobacco. And Jock Wordie would be like, no. And they’d be like, OK, but this rock is really, really interesting.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s such a cool rock, though. You’re really going to want to see it.
GIN JENNY: And although Jock Wordies had been all over this island— it was a small island— and he knew what the rocks were, he still couldn’t resist the possibility that they had actually found a really good rock.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: He fell for it every time!
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: I just was so charmed by that! I’m just picturing him being like, well, maybe this rock really is a good one.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: All it took was an interesting rock, basically, for him to be like, ooh, OK. [LAUGHTER] An interesting rock!
GIN JENNY: And this is after a year and a half of this expedition. I mean, we’ve just described it to you. You understand the conditions!
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, gosh. OK. So they’re waiting and waiting and waiting, and it gets to be August, and they’re like, OK, crap. I guess we have to figure out what plan B is.
GIN JENNY: And then what?
WHISKEY JENNY: Cut to— the away team.
GIN JENNY: Yes, the away team. This is actually the part that I found the most stressful. This was, to me, worse than the part where they were at sea for all those hours. Because they were separated now. Like— I don’t know. And it was just one boat.
WHISKEY JENNY: So away team is crossing— there’s one part where even today, the US Navy’s guidebook is like, yeah, we don’t really know what’s there, so be careful. And there’s another part where they’re like, the winds are the strongest ever of anywhere, except maybe hurricanes.
GIN JENNY: And they’re in this one little boat!
WHISKEY JENNY: And they’re in a rowboat! And they have one shot. If they miss—
GIN JENNY: They have one shot. It all depends on Wuzzles’s ability to navigate correctly, and then also their ability to navigate the currents and wind successfully.
WHISKEY JENNY: So there’s one diary entry in this where the sun finally breaks out. This also sounds pretty miserable, because they had to put a bunch of rocks in the bottom to even out the weight, so you’re just sleeping and crawling around on rocks all the time.
GIN JENNY: And their sleeping bags molded, by the way.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh yeah, they rotted. Their water goes foul. They’re in very— they’re frostbitten everywhere. Apparently you get weird sores if you’re just wet with salt water the whole time, so they get these weird white sores.
GIN JENNY: Oh, in this book it mentions that if you have frostbite you get blisters.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh, yeah.
GIN JENNY: And then the water inside the blisters freezes, so it’s just like you have rocks under your skin.
WHISKEY JENNY: I thought it was the rowing blisters that would then freeze.
GIN JENNY: Oh, that makes more sense. That makes more sense.
WHISKEY JENNY: The other thing was, your eyes water because it’s really cold, and then it drips down your nose, and then it freezes on your nose. And eventually you have to break that little piece of ice off. And every time it breaks a little skin off, no matter how gently you do it. So they all just have this unhealed sore on the tip with their nose forever.
GIN JENNY: Poor them.
WHISKEY JENNY: So one of the diary— sorry, two things. One of the diary entries from this time is like, the sun came out. And I legitimately think that this guy was not being sarcastic. He was so excited in his diary to write that basically their clothes are now just damp instead of wet.
[LAUGHTER]And the other time is when somebody else is relieving the happy big guy, later he wrote— so yeah, Wuzzles writes, “McCarthy’s the most irrepressible optimist I’ve ever met. When I relieve him at the helm, boat iced and seas pouring down your neck, he informs me with a happy grin, ‘It’s a grand day, sir.’ I was feeling a bit sour just before.”
GIN JENNY: Aww. That’s really sweet.
WHISKEY JENNY: So then they finally make it to land, where they meant to make it. Within like 19 miles.
GIN JENNY: That’s amazing.
WHISKEY JENNY: That’s amazing! He’s navigating by— literally he only gets to take a measurement a day, because their charts are about to fall apart. So he didn’t even get to check it all the time. He has to do it once and hope he got it right for the next 24 hours.
GIN JENNY: Yup. Man, Wuzzles!
WHISKEY JENNY: With his sextant. By hand. By hand!
GIN JENNY: Oh, Wuzzles.
WHISKEY JENNY: OK, so they make it to land.
GIN JENNY: This is what kills me. They make it to land, and they still are not finished.
WHISKEY JENNY: Oh god no. There’s several other things that happen.
GIN JENNY: They have to, like, scale mountains.
WHISKEY JENNY: They’re like, OK, two people stay here, and three people are going to go across the island overland to where it’s inhabited.
GIN JENNY: This is to Grytviken, where Shackleton was eventually buried.
WHISKEY JENNY: Which has literally never been done before, because it’s impossible and it’s mountains.
GIN JENNY: And it’s mountains. And after all these days, the conditions we have described, nevertheless the three of them go over these mountains on a path that they later learn was insane to take.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yup.
GIN JENNY: And everyone at the whaling station was really excited to see them, though, when they got there.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yeah. After they— so they’ve crossed the mountain with a rope, basically. At some points it’s so steep going down, and it’s so cold and they have to get down quickly so it’s not cold anymore, that Shackleton was just like, we’re going to have to slide.
GIN JENNY: I was about to say that, and then I was like, no. I must have made that up. That’s too crazy, that can’t be real.
WHISKEY JENNY: No, they slid.
GIN JENNY: The slid down.
WHISKEY JENNY: And then they stumble out of the woods. And everyone’s so surprised to see them because no humans come from that direction, because no one can cross the mountains!
GIN JENNY: And Ernest Shackleton introduces himself, and all the guys are like, well, hey! Hi!
WHISKEY JENNY: We thought you all were dead. They stumble out of the mountains, filthy dirty, frostbitten, beards—
GIN JENNY: Exhausted.
WHISKEY JENNY: Probably about to die. Yeah. But the people know who they are. Once he’s like, I’m Shackleton, they’re like, oh, damn.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. Yup. And they collect the other guys. They go get the three guys, and then they have a little celebration. Whiskey Jenny, tell them about the celebration.
WHISKEY JENNY: So it’s a little whaling town. And Worsley describes the large— it’s a large room, full of captains and mates and sailors and hazy with tobacco— so it’s all these Norwegian old whaling salts. I’m just going to read it. “They had sailed the Antarctic seas for 40 years, and they wanted to shake the hands of the men who could bring an open 22-foot boat from Elephant Island, through the Drake passage, to South Georgia. Then every man in that room stood up, and the four old skippers took Shackleton and Worsley and Crean by the hand and congratulated them on what they’d done.”
GIN JENNY: Aww.
WHISKEY JENNY: “Many of the whaler men were bearded and dressed in heavy sweaters and sea boots. There was no formality, no speeches, they had no medals or decorations to bestow. Only their heartfelt admiration for an accomplishment which perhaps only they would ever fully appreciate.”
GIN JENNY: I bet Wuzzles especially really appreciated that, because this was like— I don’t want to say it was all on him, but, yeah.
WHISKEY JENNY: It wasn’t, but he had a very big part to play. That was some very impressive navigation that he did. And these are the guys who get how hard it was.
GIN JENNY: Right. This was like the Oscars of Antarctic navigation.
WHISKEY JENNY: They get it. And they all are like—
GIN JENNY: So then Ernest Shackleton, three days later he’s already trying to get back on the water.
WHISKEY JENNY: To go get the guys that they left.
GIN JENNY: To go get the guys from Elephant Island. By the way, the battle of the Somme began about this time. And he has a really hard time getting a rescue expedition launched, because there’s not suitable boats available. People aren’t willing to go.
WHISKEY JENNY: He tries three times and they have to keep turning back because of ice.
GIN JENNY: And then Britain’s like, oh, we’ll send a ship that can go through the ice. And Ernest Shackleton’s like, screw that, I’m not waiting. And he just buys a ship. It’s not made to go through ice, it’s just a fairly sturdy ship. And he’s like, whatever, I’m just taking this.
WHISKEY JENNY: I think he promises not to take it through ice, and I was like, dude, he’s about to take it through ice for sure.
[LAUGHTER]GIN JENNY: Yeah, we know what he’s going to do. And so he does.
WHISKEY JENNY: He finally makes it through.
GIN JENNY: He finally makes it through. He gets back to Elephant Island. The artist, Marston, was the first one to see the ship. And he’s really cool about it. He comes back to the main camp and he’s like, uh, we should probably put some smoke signals up.
WHISKEY JENNY: And it takes everyone a beat. They’re like, huh? And they’re like [GASP]! [HUGE GASP] [LAUGHTER]
GIN JENNY: This is August 20th. They had decided that if Ernest Shackleton wasn’t back by the start of August, that was it.
WHISKEY JENNY: That was bad news.
GIN JENNY: So they didn’t really think anyone was coming.
WHISKEY JENNY: And they were all so excited— they were all in the tent— that they destroyed the tent in their flurry to get out of the tent. They were going through the walls and stuff.
GIN JENNY: And Perce Blackborow had had frostbite, and he had had several toes removed, so he wasn’t able to walk on his own. So Macklin, the doctor and the sweetest bunny on this expedition, carried him out so he could see the rescue ship approaching.
WHISKEY JENNY: And then they get rescued, and they go back on the ship.
GIN JENNY: They get rescued.
WHISKEY JENNY: And they all survived.
GIN JENNY: All 22. Plus the away team. So all 28 total. It was everything I wanted it to be, this book.
WHISKEY JENNY: Me too. And I had high expectations, and it still lived up to them.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. There was one anecdote about a dog I could have lived without.
WHISKEY JENNY: Sure.
GIN JENNY: That’s my only complaint.
WHISKEY JENNY: Fair. My other complaint is they kind of glossed over some people. They were like, eh, and then they were also there. And I would like to know about every single one of them. Because he spent a lot of time on the officers, and I would really like to know about everyone.
GIN JENNY: Mhm. Especially because— like that anecdote he tells about the geologist. We have not heard anything about the geologist up until then, and he sounds great Oh man.
WHISKEY JENNY: What a book.
GIN JENNY: Whiskey Jenny, this was a great, great, great idea.
WHISKEY JENNY: I’m so glad that we did it together.
GIN JENNY: Me too.
WHISKEY JENNY: And I’m so glad we did it for this episode.
GIN JENNY: Yeah. Our Diamond Jubilee. Well, there’s a lot more in this book. You should all definitely read it if you haven’t. But what are we reading for next time?
WHISKEY JENNY: We are finishing the Hatening next time. Finally, at long last.
GIN JENNY: Yeah, Hatening part two finally arrives. OK, tell me. I’m so excited. I have no idea what it is.
WHISKEY JENNY: It took be a while. And you may tell me that this is against the spirit of the Hatening, or you may tell me it’s against the letter but for the spirit of the Hatening. But I got it down to my final picks, and I picked the one of those that I was most excited to read. So I’m not sure if it’s the one that you’re going to most hate with the fire of a thousand suns, but I think it’s the one that our enjoyment of is going to be the most different.
GIN JENNY: OK, all right. Cool.
WHISKEY JENNY: Like the gap is going to be the biggest.
GIN JENNY: I think that makes sense.
WHISKEY JENNY: And here are the things I think you’re going to hate about it. It’s a multigenerational family saga.
GIN JENNY: Euck.
WHISKEY JENNY: It’s also interconnected townspeople.
GIN JENNY: No, come on. When you were talking about the Captain Corelli’s Mandolin thing, I was like ugh.
WHISKEY JENNY: The setting is really important. There’s going to be a lot of descriptions of beautiful trees and stuff.
GIN JENNY: Oh my god, this sounds awful.
WHISKEY JENNY: The writing has been described as lyrical.
GIN JENNY: No! Oh come on, you just made that up.
[LAUGHTER]WHISKEY JENNY: But I think it might be really plot heavy, so I think you might—
GIN JENNY: So one point in its favor.
WHISKEY JENNY: We are reading The House at the Edge of Night, by Catherine Banner. it’s got a really beautiful cover.
GIN JENNY: Wow, I’ve never heard of it. The House at the Edge of Night, you say?
WHISKEY JENNY: “A sweeping saga about—” I’m just reading the Goodreads thing. “—about four generations of a family who live and love and an enchanting Mediterranean island off the coast of Italy.”
GIN JENNY: Oh my god, it sounds awful.
WHISKEY JENNY: “Combining the romance of Beautiful Ruins with the magical tapestry works of Isabel Allende.”
GIN JENNY: Eugh.
WHISKEY JENNY: Yay!
GIN JENNY: I’m looking it up now and the description that came up in Google says, “A sweeping, propulsive family saga set on a romantic Italian island.” Bluck.
WHISKEY JENNY: I can’t wait. I’m really excited to read it, and I think you’re not going to like it. I think I could have picked something else that you were going to hate more, but I think you’re not going to like it.
GIN JENNY: All right, well I’ll get it from the library tomorrow. I am not looking forward to it at all.
WHISKEY JENNY: Hooray! That mean it worked.
GIN JENNY: I think it’s a great choice. I’m really not at all excited about it. I’m going to get it at the library. Oh, that is— OK, that’s a really beautiful cover, though. That is true.
WHISKEY JENNY: So yeah, that’s what we’re reading. This has been the Diamond Jubilee episode, 100 anniversary episode of the Reading the End bookcast with the demographically similar Jennys. You can visit the blog at readingtheend.com. You can follow us on Twitter at readingtheend. We’re both on Goodreads as Whiskey Jenny and Gin Jenny. You can email us, we hope you will, at readingtheend@gmail.com. Now, for the first time, if you like us and want to support us, you can become a podcast patron at Patreon.com/readingtheend. If you’re listening to us on iTunes, please leave us a review. it really helps people find us.
Until next time, here’s to 100 more episodes.
GIN JENNY: Hooray!
WHISKEY JENNY: I hope we podcast forever.
GIN JENNY: I’ll drink to that.
[GLASSES CLINK]THEME SONG: You don’t judge a book by its cover. Page one’s not a much better view. And shortly you’re gonna discover the middle won’t mollify you. So whether whiskey’s your go-to, or you’re like my gin-drinking friend, no matter what you are imbibing, you’ll be better off in the end reading the end.