WeWow on the Weekend (10/18/25)

Summary

Wow in the World – WeWow on the Weekend (10/18/25)

Episode Overview

This "WeWow on the Weekend" edition of the Wow in the World podcast delivers a blend of the show's signature silly banter, a fun unboxing, and a fascinating re-air of a classic science segment from Season 1: “The Fish with the Killer Kiss.” Host Dennis, assisted by his giant pigeon friend Reggie, explores the weird and wild world of the tubelip wrasse—a fish with lips that let it eat poisonous coral—mixing science facts with laughs and engaging storytelling for curious kids and their grown-ups.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Opening Shenanigans & Mail Delivery

[02:40–05:28]

• Dennis introduces himself and Reggie, teasing Reggie’s identity as a giant pigeon.
• Mail arrives in the middle of the banter, with a humorous exchange about the importance of the mail carrier in the neighborhood.
• Dennis receives a package and, prompted by Reggie, starts a round of “What’s in this box?”
  • Unboxing outcome: It’s a special ice cube tray—one that makes ice spheres instead of cubes, leading to a quick demo (and a reminder that the ice isn’t instant).
    • ”Round ice is fancier than square ice. Everyone knows that.” – Dennis ([05:00])

2. Inside Tinkercast Studios: Listening to a Classic Science Segment

[06:20–13:44]

• Dennis and Reggie introduce a "flashback" segment, featuring the Wow in the World Season 1 episode, “The Fish with the Killer Kiss.”
• Mindy and Guy unpack the biology and odd habits of the tubelip wrasse—a small, colorful coral reef fish with thick, slimy lips used to eat poisonous coral.

Science Spotlight: The Tubelip Wrasse’s Gross and Amazing Adaptations

• What’s grosser than gross?
  ”What's grosser than gross, Guy Raz is a killer kiss from a fish with big, thick suction cuppy fish lips. Lips that look like an upside down mushroom top. Fish lips that are covered in slime…” – Mindy ([08:30])

• The tubelip wrasse, native to Indian Ocean coral reefs and featured in many aquariums, has evolved to feed on poisonous coral, a rarity among fish species.

• Coral can be sharp and coated in poisonous slime, making it dangerous for most sea creatures.

  • “Some types of coral are covered in a slimy coating that is poisonous to small sea creatures.” – Guy Raz ([10:05])

• Special Feeding Technique:

  • The fish puckers up, using a long, tube-like mouth with mucus-covered lips to “kiss” the coral, forming a suction seal.
    • ”The tubelet wrasse puckers up and puts its slimy, mucusy lips on the coral like it's going in for a kiss.” – Mindy ([11:28])
  • The fish’s lips have special detectors to scout the tastiest spot ([12:00]).
  • Upon “kissing,” the wrasse sucks off the coral’s flesh and mucus, leaving a characteristic mark.

• How does it avoid being poisoned?

  • Scientists speculate the fish’s mucus acts as a barrier against the coral’s stinging cells.
    • “They think that maybe the tubelip wrasse’s slimy magic mucus-producing lips might actually form sort of a barrier or protective shield.” – Mindy ([12:54])

• Gross-out humor and friendly teasing abound:

  • “Well, I'm just glad that I'll never have to come face to face with a smooching tubelip wrasse.” – Guy Raz ([13:30])
  • Mindy jokes about pulling one out of Guy’s bathtub.

3. Closing Antics and Audience Participation

[13:58–15:15]

• Dennis and Reggie react with playful disgust to the fish segment (“Ew, ew, ew, ew!”) and plan not to discuss gross fish lips with the mail carrier.
• Reminder for listeners to call in with questions—Dennis’s voicemail ([14:40]).
• Episode wraps up with Dennis’s sing-song goodbye.

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Reggie, you'll never guess who's coming on the show tomorrow... the mail carrier. She’s very powerful.” – Dennis ([04:30])
• “Round ice is fancier than square ice. Everyone knows that.” – Dennis ([05:00])
• “What's grosser than gross, Guy Raz is a killer kiss from a fish with big, thick suction cuppy fish lips... covered in slime.” – Mindy ([08:30])
• “The tubelet wrasse is so tough that it eats the poisonous coral for breakfast.” – Mindy ([10:42])
• “Once the lips seal against the coral, they start acting like a vacuum cleaner, sucking up the good parts but separating the poisonous parts from being eaten.” – Mindy ([13:19])
• “Don't tell me you're gonna pull one out of your pocket.” – Guy Raz ([13:36])
• “No, I'm gonna pull one out of your bathtub.” – Mindy ([13:38])

---

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Mail delivery & unboxing: 02:40–05:28
• Inside Tinkercast Studios (Tubelip Wrasse segment begins): 06:20
• Gross and amazing fish science: 08:30–13:44
• Dennis & Reggie’s reactions and call for questions: 13:58–15:15

---

Tone & Style

• The episode is light-hearted, silly, and engaging, filled with playful banter, relatable kid humor, and a knack for making even the grossest science facts fun.

---

In Summary

This WeWow episode is a delightful blend of humor, curiosity, and science, perfect for weekend listening. Whether you’re here for silly songs, zany unboxings, or want to learn why some fish “kiss” coral with mushroomy lips, there’s plenty for listeners of all ages to say, “WOW!”

Transcript

[Guy Raz]

Grown Ups Wondery subscribers can listen to wow in the World early and ad free right now. Join Wondery in the Wondery App or Wondery Kids plus on Apple Podcasts.

[Mindy Thomas]

Hey wowhouser fams. Mindy here. And before we start the show, it's almost Halloween. And to celebrate with all of Boo. I mean you, we've put together some of our favorite spooky episodes of wow in the World and Halloween experiments and crafts all in one place. So you can make your Halloween extra WOW from home. Plus, if you want to dress up like someone from the wow crew this year, you can find Halloween costume ideas from your fellow wowzers there too. We can't wait to see what costumes you come up with this year. Oh, and just a tip for how to make your Mindy costume more realistic, add some leftover Mac and cheese to your jacket pocket. For activities, episodes, videos and more wows, visit Tinkercast.com Halloween that's Tinkercast.com Halloween that's it. And now let's get back to the show.

[Sponsor/Announcer]

Hey Grown Ups. If you are listening to wow in the World, you're probably already a fan of blending science, technology, engineering, art and math with fun. And if you're looking for another great screen free way for your kids to learn and play, check out Kiwico. Kiwico delivers monthly crates with exciting steam projects for kids of all ages. Each crate highlights new fundamental skills for kids to learn while they play. Subscription crates are split up by age and interest area, but you can also shop all of the awesome crafts and experiments that Kiwico has to offer a la carte. It can be hard to find a creative gift to keep your children engaged, challenged, and off their screens. But Kiwico has you covered. And best of all, you get to play and learn right along with them. Tinker. Create and innovate with Kiwico. Get up to 50% off your first crate at kiwico.com promo code wow. That's up to 50% off your first Crate at K-I W I C O.com promo code wow.

[Dennis & Reggie]

Ah ah ah ah. We wow on the weekend. We wow on the weekend. We wow on the weekend. Cause this is what we do on the weekend. Talking, laughing. Me and Reggie singing, laughing.

[Sponsor/Announcer]

And then we.

[Dennis & Reggie]

Oh wait, no, I said laughing twice. Ah, whatever. We wow on the weekend. Yeah we wow on the weekend.

[Mindy Thomas]

Quack quack.

[Dennis & Reggie]

We wow on the weekend. Cause this is what we do on the weekend. Hello and welcome to We Wow on the Weekend. I'm your host, Dennis, and that's my co host, Reggie. What? No, I don't need to say you're a giant pigeon. The listeners already know that. Fine. If you're tuning in for the first time because you've apparently been living under a rock. My co host, Reggie, is a giant pigeon. Right. And I'm a regular sized human person, not giant. Oh, right. Ants might think I'm giant. Good point. Now what? Who is it? Package for Dennis. The mail's here. The mail's here, Reggie. It'll just take a second. Hello, regular sized human mail carrier Person. Not my name. Right, sorry. Can I get a signature for this? Oh, sure. Sure, sure, sure, sure, sure, sure. There you go. Much obliged. And here's your package. Thank you. Oh, hey, wait. Post officer lady wanna be on my show? It's called Wee Wow on the weekend? Uh, no, sorry. I gotta finish my mail route. All right, that's okay. I know you're very busy and very important and very cool, But I could come back tomorrow. Hooray. That would be amazing. Okay, have fun delivering the mail and knocking on all the doors and ringing all the doorbells and shaking everyone's packages to try to guess what's inside them. Reggie, Reggie, you'll never guess who's coming on the show tomorrow. What? How'd you guess? Oh, you heard the who. Even the part where she said no. And the part where I got all rambly and embarrassed. Whatever, it doesn't matter. I got the most important person in the whole neighborhood as a guest on my show. Oh, sorry. The most important person in the whole neighborhood as a guest on our show. Reggie the mail carrier is so the most important person in the whole neighborhood because she carries the mail, Reggie. And she knows who's writing letters to each other and who's getting which magazines and who lives in which house. She's very powerful. My what? Oh, right. My package. Oh, Reggie, you're a genius. We can play what's in this box? Ah. Ahem. Found a box that was delivered to my house by the mail carrier. And now I'm gonna find out what's in the box. Okay, here we go.

[Mindy Thomas]

Ready?

[Dennis & Reggie]

What's in this box? Hooray. It's the special ice cube tray. I ordered it. Oh, it makes better ice than ice cubes, Reggie. It makes ice spheres. Because, Reggie, round ice is fancier than square ice. Everyone knows that. Fine, I'll show you. You just put the COVID on like this. Then you just use your water bottle to pour some water in this little hole here, and voila, spherical ice. Oh, right. I Forgot to freeze it. It's still water. It's not funny, Reggie. Okay, it's a little funny. All right, what's next? Oh, good idea. Let's do a little segment I like to call Inside Tinkercast Studios.

[Guy Raz]

Ahem.

[Dennis & Reggie]

Inside Tinkercast Studios. This is the part where we revisit an episode of one of my favorite Tinkercast shows. And today we're listening to wow. In the world. Season 1, Episod 12 called the Fish with the Killer Kiss. Reggie, no, this one sounds scary and kind of gross. Killer kisses? Oh, it's about a kind of fish that eats its food by kissing it. Well, that sounds kinda cool. Okay, I take it back. I wanna listen. Okay, here we go. And play.

[Mindy Thomas]

Wee.

[Dennis & Reggie]

Wow.

[Mindy Thomas]

Will be right back. Grown ups, this message is for you. That's it. Now back to the show.

[Dennis & Reggie]

Wow in the world.

[Mindy Thomas]

Hey, Guy Raz, what's grosser than gross?

[Guy Raz]

Eating a picnic lunch in a trash dump.

[Mindy Thomas]

No, having a picnic lunch in a trash dump isn't gross, Guy Raz. Uh, it's convenient. You don't even have to throw your trash away because you're already in a dump.

[Guy Raz]

Uh, it took me three days to get the smell off my clothes.

[Mindy Thomas]

Oh, no, that smell wasn't from the trash dump, Guy Raz. Uh, that smell was from the time that I was borrowing your kitchen and your blender to make a shrimp smoothie.

[Guy Raz]

Oh, man.

[Mindy Thomas]

Please. Anywho, forgot to put the lid on the blender. Next thing I know, it's exploding all over your kitchen and I had to clean it up or you'd freak out. Yeah, so I grabbed the first thing that I could find. Your tweed blazer hanging in your coat closet.

[Guy Raz]

What?

[Mindy Thomas]

Worked like a charm. But I forgot to tell you about it until now. Sorry, but that's not even what I'm talking about. What's grosser than gross, Guy Raz is a killer kiss from a fish with big, thick suction cuppy fish lips. Lips that look like an upside down mushroom top. Fish lips that are covered in slime from cells that push out a never ending stream of just not, like, mucus.

[Guy Raz]

Mindy, that's just disgusting.

[Mindy Thomas]

Yep.

[Guy Raz]

Where do you come up with these things?

[Mindy Thomas]

Science.

[Guy Raz]

Science? Yeah.

[Mindy Thomas]

I'm not even making this up, Guy Raz. You know, science is full of wonder and beauty and discovery, but it's also about some really gross stuff.

[Guy Raz]

Okay, tell me more about this fish.

[Mindy Thomas]

So two marine biologists named Victor Huerta and David Bellwood from Australia's James Cook University recently spent a lot of time Trying to figure out how in the world this fish called the tubelip wrasse is able to survive living in coral reefs.

[Guy Raz]

The tubelip wrasse. What a name.

[Mindy Thomas]

What a fish. So the tube lip wrasse is this colorful fish and it's just a little over six and a half inches long. And it lives in coral reefs in the Indian Ocean, but you can also find them in some major aquariums around the world, which is where I first noticed its crazy fish lips.

[Guy Raz]

Wow. So we might be able to actually see this fish up close and personal.

[Mindy Thomas]

Yeah, for sure. So we all know how they would survive living in aquariums, but how they survive living in coral reefs is another story.

[Guy Raz]

Huh? How so?

[Mindy Thomas]

So you know the deal with coral, right?

[Guy Raz]

You better believe it.

[Mindy Thomas]

Coral looks really beautiful to us humans, but to some small fish and other little tiny sea wandering organisms like zooplankton, coral can be deadly.

[Guy Raz]

Yeah, because some coral is super sharp to the touch, and some types of coral are covered in a slimy coating that is poisonous to small sea creatures.

[Mindy Thomas]

Yeah. And as you know, when it comes to eating for survival, fish in the wild can't order pizza delivery when they're.

[Guy Raz]

Hungry, nor would they want to necessarily.

[Mindy Thomas]

And they don't have humans to drop in fish flakes every other day either.

[Guy Raz]

So what do they eat?

[Mindy Thomas]

Okay, so Guy Raz, saddle up your seahorse and buckle your seatbelt.

[Guy Raz]

Well, you know, I'm always wearing one just to be safe.

[Mindy Thomas]

What? Oh man, you are? Really?

[Guy Raz]

What?

[Mindy Thomas]

Okay, what I mean to say is get ready for this, because the tubelet brass is so tough that it eats the poisonous coral for breakfast.

[Guy Raz]

Wow. Then what does it eat for lunch and dinner?

[Mindy Thomas]

Guy Raz, there are something like 6,000 species of fish living in these razor shar venomous coral reefs, and only 128 of them are tough enough and brave enough to eat them. So it's super rare.

[Guy Raz]

And the tube lip wrasse, I guess, is one of those species.

[Mindy Thomas]

Yep.

[Guy Raz]

So how do they do it? I mean, because coral is hard.

[Mindy Thomas]

Well, that's one of the big questions that these marine biologists set out to discover.

[Guy Raz]

And did they find their answer?

[Mindy Thomas]

They sure did. And do you want to know what they found?

[Guy Raz]

Absolutely.

[Mindy Thomas]

Okay, so first the tubelet brass puckers up and puts its slimy, mucusy lips on the coral like it's going in for a kiss.

[Guy Raz]

Ugh. Are you making this up?

[Mindy Thomas]

What? No, this is for real. Just listen. Okay?

[Guy Raz]

Okay.

[Mindy Thomas]

If you were to see its lips coming at you, they would look like a slimy, upside down Mushroom top.

[Guy Raz]

You are right. This is grosser than gross.

[Mindy Thomas]

And it gets even grosser. So then it uses these little tiny detectors in its slimy mushroom lips to help it inspect the best part of the coral for eating.

[Guy Raz]

Interesting.

[Mindy Thomas]

And then when it's ready, it puckers up, making its lips almost the shape of a long tube. And it forms a section around the spot that it wants to eat. And then it goes in for the kiss. These marine biologists were even able to hear the sound.

[Guy Raz]

That is amazing.

[Mindy Thomas]

And it's not over, Guy Raz. Finally, it's. It sucks the coral's mucus and flesh right off. And it even leaves a mark. You can totally see the spot where the coral's been kissed by the slimy mushroom fish lips.

[Guy Raz]

So how are they able to do this without getting stung by the venomous poisonous coral?

[Mindy Thomas]

Well, these marine biologists don't know for sure, but based on what they've observed, they think that maybe the tulip wrasses, slimy magic mucus producing lips might actually form sort of a barrier or protective shield guarding it from the stinging cells.

[Guy Raz]

Wow. And this makes it possible for the fish to eat the flesh or the meaty parts off of the coral?

[Mindy Thomas]

Yeah. Once the lips seal against the coral, they start acting like a vacuum cleaner, sucking up the good parts but separating the poisonous parts from being eat.

[Dennis & Reggie]

Wow.

[Mindy Thomas]

Crazy, right?

[Guy Raz]

Yeah. Well, I'm just glad that I'll never have to come face to face with a smooching tube lip wrasse.

[Mindy Thomas]

Guy Raz.

[Guy Raz]

Don't tell me you're gonna pull one out of your pocket.

[Mindy Thomas]

No, I'm gonna pull one out of your bathtub.

[Guy Raz]

What?

[Mindy Thomas]

Pucker up, buttercup. It's coming for ya.

[Guy Raz]

Oh, Mindy, please.

[Mindy Thomas]

Just kidding. I couldn't get my hands on a tublip wrasse. Uh, it's just a long nosed pygmy shark.

[Guy Raz]

Come back.

[Mindy Thomas]

I think he likes you.

[Dennis & Reggie]

Ew, Reggie, that was disgusting. All that kissing and mucus and mushroom lips. Ew. Ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew. Reggie, when the post officer comes over tomorrow, do not talk about fish lips or anything else like that. No, don't talk about that either. Okay, let's wrap this up. I need to go take a bath and pick out my outfit for tomorrow and go to bed so I could get a full 18 hours of sleep. Thanks everyone for listening to this episode of Wewow on the weekend. If you have a question for me, call and leave me a message at 1-888-7. Wow.

[Guy Raz]

Wow.

[Dennis & Reggie]

That's 1-888-7 wow. Wow. I just might answer your question on Wee Wow on the weekend. All right, let's do the goodbye song. Now that's the end of the show. I need to go and get ready for a but I'll do another show tomorrow. But for now, that's the end of the show. Eh Eh. Bye.

[Mindy Thomas]

Grown ups. If you like wow in the world, you can listen early and ad free right now on Wondery.

[Guy Raz]

Join Wondery in the Wondery app or on Wondery Kids plus on Apple Podcasts. Prime members can listen ad free on Amazon Music.

[Mindy Thomas]

And before you go, tell us about yourself filling out a short survey at wondery. Com Survey.