0:04

Hey, and welcome to the shorty. I'm

0:06

Josh, there's Chuck, there's Jerry.

0:08

We don't say last names on these because we're crunched

0:10

for time. Does that mean we need to

0:12

say welcome to the long form

0:14

when it comes to the other ones? All

0:17

right, I think that's a great idea. Change is

0:19

good, But you have to roll your L Welcome

0:21

to the long for WHOA,

0:24

I didn't know you were so good at that. Wait, there's

0:26

an L, N and R in there. Let's see if I can do it. Welcome

0:28

to the long from

0:32

How is that you look like and

0:34

sound like you're underwater and eating

0:36

peanut butter? Uh?

0:39

Speaking of eating peanut butter, did

0:41

you know that in ancient Rome, if you ate a couple

0:43

of gallons of peanut butter, it was very acceptable

0:46

to stroll on over to a vomitorium

0:49

and throw it up and stick a feather down

0:51

your throat, or have sorry, have some young

0:53

child stick a feather down your throat, or Bill

0:55

murray so you could so

0:58

you could throw up and then eat even

1:00

more peanut butter. That's right, Chuck,

1:02

that's an indisputable fact of history.

1:06

Not true. No, And

1:08

you know what something was bugging me researching

1:10

this, I was like, I feel like I've

1:12

said something like on

1:14

the podcast before where I referenced this

1:17

being correct and

1:19

it wasn't. I probably did.

1:21

But I'm in pretty good company because we've

1:24

got this idea that that,

1:26

yeah, in ancient Rome, it was totally normal

1:28

to go throw up basically binge and purge,

1:31

but purge in like a public area

1:34

that's designated to go purge.

1:37

Um that that's been

1:39

around for at least since the nineteen

1:41

twenties, and we can trace it all the way

1:43

back to Algius Huxley. Actually,

1:46

who who created this misconception?

1:48

Yeah, I mean I thought this was a true

1:50

fact up until two days ago.

1:52

Basically everyone does. So don't

1:55

feel bad again. You're in the company

1:57

of Algius Huxley. How

1:59

you pren on that Huxley? Not

2:02

the first name Algius Algius?

2:04

What do you pronounce it as Deletrius? I think

2:07

you're you're swapping the U and the oh Aldus

2:11

Aldus. I think it's Aldus. Oh,

2:14

I like Algius, all right, I've re christened

2:16

him. Well, he was a very alguous person.

2:20

I don't know what that word means. I just

2:22

made it up, Okay, good, because

2:24

I was really embarrassed for a second. Yeah.

2:26

So apparently, well, let's

2:28

go back to Rome to quote the

2:30

Great Frank Black and the Catholic song, uh

2:34

vomitorius, which is the pull

2:37

of vomitory Um. There were these

2:39

things in ancient Rome, apparently, but

2:42

it was just a very well, to my

2:44

ear, weird name for

2:46

a very u now common

2:49

thing. Yeah, and they actually

2:51

know who was the first two references a guy named

2:53

Macrobius back in the fourth century CE.

2:56

He just used it as a term to describe,

2:59

based clear, a passage into and

3:01

out of, say like the Colosseum,

3:04

where people would be disgorged

3:08

out at such a gross word into like

3:10

um. Like you've been to Colosseum, right to

3:13

the Colosseum, Yeah, okay,

3:15

same here. It's an amazing place. Um,

3:19

and there's there's just a lot of

3:21

walking space that's actually

3:23

really effectively designed. And

3:25

one of the reasons why it's so effectively designed

3:27

is because of these passageways

3:30

to basically to your seat and then back

3:32

out into the main walkway around the perimeter

3:35

inside the Colosseum.

3:38

Those places in and out between the

3:40

two those are vomitoria.

3:42

Yeah, what's what do we call them today? It's a not

3:45

a portal but a portico

3:47

maybe. No. I mean it's just like it's like any

3:50

modern stadium design. It's the

3:52

the hallway

3:54

open thing that you walk through

3:57

and then you're like, now I'm in the stadium.

3:59

What do you call concourse? No? I

4:01

think we should just go back to calling the vomitoria.

4:04

Yeah, I'm gonna say that next time I go to a Falcons

4:06

game. Hey, meet me at the vomatory

4:09

to pardon me? Can you direct

4:11

me to my vomatorium? I

4:14

can't think of the word, and it's really bugging me. I

4:17

know what you're talking about, and I want to say it's

4:19

like portal too. I mean, it is a

4:21

portal. Maybe some people call them that, but I

4:23

think that's what they're called, like sports.

4:26

Yeah, so there were seventy six of these

4:28

though around up and

4:30

down the coliseum. And apparently

4:32

did you say how many people that they could shuttle

4:34

in and out of there? Yet? No? Apparently

4:37

fifty thousand people could get

4:39

in and out of this thing, uh

4:41

and like to their seats within about fifteen minutes.

4:43

That's not bad, that's amazing. Can

4:46

you imagine the porschemoho I just sit there in time

4:48

it by looking at the sun,

4:51

so many went blind right until it

4:54

finally happened. They'd have to replace the first in every

4:56

thirty seconds they were carting him away. Would

4:58

be like, I got thirty

5:00

seconds. Uh,

5:03

what is the name of those things that's

5:05

gonna buck me? I don't know. Uh.

5:08

Should we take a break and talk about Aldus

5:10

Huxley again? Algius? All

5:13

right? Right after this? All

5:42

right, so you set us up with Algius

5:44

Huxley. What in the world did this? How

5:46

could in the world could he have affected this? I

5:48

mean, I guess he just heard of it before,

5:51

and basically he mentions

5:53

it in passing in a single line. He

5:55

wrote a comic novel um

5:58

called Antick Hay about

6:00

post World War one decadent like

6:03

upper upper class society

6:06

and um he just basically mentioned

6:08

like a goth coming into a vomitorium,

6:11

and UM. I from

6:14

the line I saw it didn't even really seemed

6:17

to be like he was talking about the

6:19

goth was gonna come throw up or anything

6:21

like that. Um. But that

6:24

was the first instance they could

6:26

find if somebody using it

6:28

not in the way that Macrobius was

6:30

was using it as that portal thingy.

6:32

Right, So so they think that

6:34

he was the first one to say this or put

6:37

it down and pen to paper. And

6:39

you have to give him a break because he just injected

6:41

a tremendous amount of LSD under his own

6:44

eye before he started writing

6:46

this, right, So we're gonna excuse

6:48

him. The next person who gets

6:51

zero excuse whatsoever is Lewis

6:53

Mumford. And he was an

6:55

historian, he was a critic. He

6:58

should have known better. He did not do his which

7:00

apparently had been reading al Drus Huxley

7:02

and just basically cited it as

7:05

fact in one of his books, The City in

7:07

History. Yeah, and he he full on to

7:09

find it as uh, where

7:11

you over eat and you go and make yourself

7:13

throw up And he just made

7:16

that up. Yeah,

7:18

as a fan of Huxley's I guess yeah,

7:20

I guess so. I don't think he ever took

7:22

a drop of acet either. He has zero excuse

7:25

Lewis Mumford does. Uh. Well,

7:27

here's the thing though, and this is where it does get kind

7:29

of gross, because even though they

7:32

did not originate in ancient Rome, there

7:35

are real vomitoriums,

7:37

apparently in places

7:39

like Vietnam, and I look

7:42

this up and I was trying to find a picture and I did find

7:44

one, and it looks like where you would

7:46

go to the sink and wash up in a public

7:48

bathroom. But it has

7:51

it looks like a tiny toilet

7:53

bowl, like it's got the shape of a toilet

7:55

bowl on a you know, like waist high.

7:58

And then above this least this one it

8:01

had a little tiny toilet tank. Even it

8:03

looks like a miniature toilet except

8:06

waiste high. So I saw when

8:08

that was like a big stainless steel sink

8:10

with like one of those like dishwasher

8:13

like you have you ever washed dishes for a living? That

8:15

was the first job. So you know, that's right. We

8:17

talked about that, didn't you read out like everybody?

8:20

And the Chase Barbecue? I didn't d out anybody. What are

8:22

you talking about? What was it? I worked

8:24

at JJ's. I was a boy and dishwasher, but

8:26

they stuck their tennis shoe and like the Brunswick

8:28

stewards that. Yeah, but I didn't

8:30

read amount I should have, Okay. Yeah,

8:33

So anyway, um, so

8:35

you know, like the dishwashing sink thing,

8:38

the Fawcett it had

8:40

like one of those, so I guess you're expected to

8:42

rinse the sink out after you vomited into

8:44

it. But the way you know what you're doing and I

8:47

saw your picture too, um,

8:49

is there's a sign, like a like a road

8:51

sign type graphic of

8:53

of somebody throwing up. Yeah,

8:57

and that's how you know to use it. So it's like it's

8:59

like thick action became reality.

9:02

Yeah, so like it has someone kind of been

9:04

over heaving out. Uh.

9:07

You know Graphic Spew great

9:10

great band name, right, they're sort

9:12

of they opened up for Guar for a while. Oh

9:14

man, I'll bet actually I did see

9:16

a band called Vomitory. Um. Oh, I'm

9:18

sure Graphic Spew though, man

9:21

a lie. But

9:23

apparently all over ho Chi Minh City you can

9:25

find these things, and some

9:28

of them even have um

9:30

like pictures of ancient Rome and stuff,

9:33

I guess as a nod to the

9:35

false claim that they started in ancient Rome.

9:38

My head's about a pop and what about

9:40

Germany? That gets even grosser. So this

9:43

article on how stuff works says that they're puke

9:45

pants. They're known colloquially

9:48

as a puke pants. Not true. The

9:50

only place I saw that on the internet is

9:52

in this how stuff Works article. But

9:54

there are vomitoriums in Germany.

9:57

There's a place called Hoffbrow House in

9:59

Munich. It's a beer hall that's known to have

10:01

I've been there. Oh really, I've been

10:03

to the Hot Boy House. Did you see the vomitorium?

10:07

No, sorry, the puke pan. I

10:09

did all my puking in the potted plants. Oh

10:12

there, you god, I think that's that's ghosh,

10:14

man, that's like wearing white after labor day. No,

10:16

so there is one at the Hot Boy House. Supposedly, that's

10:19

what I saw on trip Advisor. So

10:21

our article claiming that in German frat

10:23

houses that first of all, I didn't know

10:25

Germany had fraternitys. That's got to be this.

10:28

This whole thing just stinks of conception.

10:30

Yeah. Well their source was antique

10:33

dash Photos whatever

10:36

that is. It's a Crystal Lynx site.

10:38

I think. So. At the very

10:40

least we know that in Germany there are designated

10:42

puke places, and anyone who's

10:45

I mean, I guess. I mean, first

10:47

of all, you shouldn't be drinking so much that you regularly

10:49

throw up anyway, that's point number one.

10:52

But uh, if you've ever been

10:54

in a bathroom stall and walked in like

10:56

Oh boy, I gotta pee and it's

10:58

just got vomit every where. It's

11:00

one of the worst experiences you can have as a human.

11:02

Yeah, especially if you don't have to pee but

11:05

have to pooph We'll forget it.

11:07

It's like Trainspotting. What is I

11:09

never saw that movie? What happens? Then? Well,

11:11

there's a scene where he goes to throw

11:13

up some heroine that he had ingested so

11:16

he can shoot it. Man.

11:18

It's like it's a sort of a dreamy sequence

11:20

of the bathroom is labeled as the worst

11:22

bathroom in Scotland, and

11:24

it's nasty, and he pukes in there

11:27

and then reaches in and eventually you and

11:29

McGregor goes all the way into the toilet

11:31

and swims around. So it's

11:33

it's a fantasy sequence. It does sound a little

11:35

dreamy, you know, everyone's fantasy

11:38

about going into a poop

11:40

puke infested toilet and swimming

11:43

And I'm missing out not having seen train Spotting.

11:46

Yeah, it's a classic. Okay, well

11:48

I'll go check it out. All right, you got anything else on

11:50

this gross? I'm ready to move on. Yeah, I am

11:52

to everybody. We're moving on. If you

11:54

want to get in touch with us. You can go onto

11:56

our website Stuff you Should Know dot com, look for

11:59

our social meds inked, and then send

12:01

us an email to Stuff Podcast at how stuff

12:03

Works dot com