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Half as Interesting

Season 2023 · Episode 55

Why It Takes 7+ Years to Shut Down a Nuclear Plant

0.07mSeptember 19, 2023

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Episode 1Why Building Ski Lifts Is Incredibly Hard
Episode 2The Massively Complicated Task of Buying Insurance for a Satellite
Episode 3Why Canada’s Teachers Run an Investment Firm in Singapore
Episode 4The Navy’s Obscure, Super-Efficient Swim Stroke
Episode 5The Weirdly Complex Science of Snow Removal
Episode 6Why the IRS Taxes Illegal Income
Episode 7The Corporate Conspiracy Behind California’s Smallest Town
Episode 8

How Amish People Get Around Not Using Electricity

Episode 9Why Soda Cans are Shaped Differently in Hawaii

Episode 10Why the US Gov Reshapes the Mississippi River

Episode 11The Genius $250 Toll Road from Minnesota to Minnesota

Episode 12How Science Made You Finally Like Brussels Sprouts

Episode 13Why Every Baseball Stadium Has Different Rules

Episode 14Why It’s Impossible to Build a Crochet Machine

Episode 15Why American Lawns All Look The Same

Episode 16The NY Subway's Weirdly Successful Lost and Found System

Episode 17North Korea’s Bizarre New Propaganda Program

Episode 18How Witness Protection Manages to Keep a 100% Success Rate

Episode 19How Amazon Broke the US Patent Office

Episode 20The Continent-Sized Algae Blob That’s Coming for Florida

Episode 21How To Spot a Really Good Art Forgery

Episode 22The Court That Settles Wikipedia Editor Drama

Episode 23The Material So Classified We Forgot How to Make It

Episode 24This Diabetes Drug Causes Weight Loss (and Chaos)

Episode 25Why You Can Legally Steal From a Sinking Ship

Episode 26The Giant Propaganda Show That’s In Almost Every City

Episode 27How the White House Reads Every Letter it Gets

Episode 28How Much Happiness Can Money Buy?

Episode 29The Super Obvious Ways to Get Around Campaign Finance Laws

Episode 30Why We're Reaching the Theoretical Limit of Computer Power

Episode 31Why It Took 13 Years to Engineer The Taco Bell Crunchwrap

Episode 32The Website Where You Can Order The Bubonic Plague

Episode 33Dyson’s Disinformation War with Big Paper Towel

Episode 34How Planes Forecast Turbulence

Episode 35Why Tape Storage is Making a Sneaky Comeback

Episode 36How the Fake Meat Industry Saved Dippin’ Dots

Episode 37How the World’s 4 Cryogenics Companies Actually Work

Episode 38The Intense Logistics of Truffles

Episode 39Why the US and China Are Squabbling Over This One Wire

Episode 40How Argentina Accidentally Gave Germans 40% Off Everything

Episode 41We've Made 400 Videos for the Internet. Here are the Worst Ones.

Episode 42Why The US Navy Really Needs This One Forest in Indiana

Episode 43Why This Airline Only Has One Commercial Flight Per Month

Episode 44Trains’ Weirdly Massive Problem with Leaves

Episode 45How Porsche Owns Volkswagen and Volkswagen Owns Porsche

Episode 46Why the US Government Has No Idea How Many Buildings It Owns

Episode 47The Weirdly Lucrative Business of Searching for Old Jeans

Episode 48Chicago’s $10 Billion Street Parking Mistake

Episode 49Why Only 24 Pilots Are Allowed to Land at This Airport

Episode 50The Remote Town Where 13.2% of People are Millionaires

Episode 51How The Pentagon Became The World’s Most Secure Building

Episode 52The Surprisingly Complex Logistics of Product Returns

Episode 53Every Mistake We’ve Ever Made VI: Return of the Jed-lie

Episode 54The 3100-Mile Longest Official Running Race in the World

Episode 55Why It Takes 7+ Years to Shut Down a Nuclear Plant

Episode 56The Only River That Flows Into Both the Atlantic and the Pacific

Episode 57How to Fail a Kitchen Inspection

Episode 58How The President’s Official Vacation Home Works

Episode 59Why Venice’s New €8 Billion Flood Barrier Only Kinda Works

Episode 60The Design Flaw That Made Hyundais Absurdly Easy to Steal

Episode 61Australia’s Huge Mistake of Selling All Their Water

Episode 62How Submarines Survive at 36,201 Feet Below

Episode 63Why China Built an Antenna Bigger Than NYC

Episode 64Why Qatar Airways Flies An Almost-Empty Flight to Adelaide

Episode 65How 70% of Britain’s Cash Went Missing

Episode 66How This Utah Hotel Legally Became a Town

Episode 67Why The US is in 42 Different National Emergencies

Episode 68The 128 Airlines So Dangerous They’re Banned in the EU

Episode 69Why the US Gov Pays $10 Million a Year for This Yacht

Episode 70The Arctic Vault That Protects Data from the Apocalypse

Episode 71NASA’s Year-Long, Totally Fake Mission to Mars

Episode 72The Vault That Holds 5% of the World’s Gold

Episode 73The Controversial Machine That’s Ruining Bowling

Episode 74What Exactly Happens When You Check a Bag

Episode 75The Super-Secure Delivery Service That Only Diplomats Can Use

Episode 76Why China Took the US’ Pandas