Episode 69 • Human Sounds
Hum
Yawn
Sigh
Giggle
Hiccups
Story
Receptionist: Hey, sorry for the wait, Mr and Mrs Lopez, the marriage counselor will see you soon.
Mrs Lopez: Alright, thank you. Bob. Bob!
Mr Lopez: What?
Mrs Lopez: This is exactly why we need to see a therapist. You never listen to me. How can I stay in a marriage if my husband doesn’t even listen to me?!
Mr Lopez: I’m sorry…
[Humming]
Mrs Lopez: Bob, Bob… Can you stop it? We’re in a waiting room. You can’t sing. You’re bothering people.
Mr Lopez: I wasn’t singing, I was humming.
Mrs Lopez:I don’t care. Just stop it, please!
[Yawning]
Mrs Lopez: Are you serious? What are you? 4 years old?
Mr Lopez: What now? I can’t even yawn now? I’m tired! And bored! We’ve been here forever!
Mrs Lopez: I’m just saying, maybe you could yawn a little less loudly.
Mr Lopez: Alright sorry… I’ll try…
[Sigh]
Mrs Lopez: What’s wrong? What are you sighing about? If there’s something wrong, just tell me.
Mr Lopez: How long do you think it’ll be before they let us in.
Mrs Lopez: I don’t know. Not soon enough.
[Giggle]
Mrs Lopez: Why are you giggling now? What’s so funny?
Mr Lopez: Oh, nothing. Just this meme my brother sent me.
[Hiccups]
Mrs Lopez: Okay, you’ve gotta be kidding me! Now you’ve got the hiccups?
Mr Lopez: Wha- [hiccups]? I can’t help it!
Mrs Lopez: Here, drink some water!
Mr Lopez: Thanks! I think I’m fine now.
Mrs Lopez: Thank goodness!
… [hiccups]
Mrs Lopez: Aaargh! Enough! I want a divorce!
Questions
Lots of sounds today. That was a real fun episode to record. I have to admit. All right, let's begin with sound number one because they're all sounds today.
Hum
'I wasn’t singing, I was humming.'
• If you hum a song, do you sing with your mouth open or closed?
If you, hum a song, you sing it with your mouth closed. Obviously, it's not singing at that point, but you have your mouth closed.
• If you don’t know the words to a song, do you hum it or sing it anyway?
I know that lots of people, when they don't know the words to a song, they just make them up. They invent them and they just say whatever they want, even if it's not a real language but in my case, I think I prefer to hum it, I don't like making up words.
• Can you try humming your favorite song?
All right. Ready? You're probably not going to know the song. It's not super popular, but this is my favorite song. Here we go. I'm going to hum it, not sing it. [humming] All right. If you know this song, let me know. I'm not going to tell you what it is, but that was humming.
Yawn
'I can’t even yawn now?'
• What sound do you make when yawning?
Actually, you can make lots of sounds, but you can make, for example, this sound [yawns]. All right? There's people that do it a little less loudly and they go [yawns] and that's it.
• When do you yawn? When you’re hungry or when you’re tired?
I think you only yawn when you're tired, right? You open your mouth, you take in a lot of air and then let it out when you're tired but some people, I think they say, they claim that they do that when they're hungry, which I don't know if it's true or not. I personally think it's only when you're tired, but if you are one of those people that yawn when you're hungry, then let me know because I'd be super curious.
• Is it rude to yawn in public in your country?
Yes, it's a little rude, especially if you're talking to someone. I don't think it's that bad if you're on the bus and you feel like you have to yawn, you can do it. Usually, you would cover your mouth with your hand so you don't show all of your teeth, tongue, and all of the inside of your body to other people.
Sigh
'What are you sighing about?'
Be careful with the pronunciation. Okay. It's sigh. The last two letters are silent.
• What sound do you make when sighing?
This is the sound that you make [sighs] or even without using your voice, you can go, [sighs].
• What can make someone sigh?
There are a lot of reasons why someone would sigh. One of them could be relief. Imagine you are really scared and then you're not scared anymore. Then you go [sighs] to release the tension or sometimes you can also do it when you're overwhelmed. I know that's one of the reasons why I do it. If I have too many tasks to do, I go [sighs] to take a deep breath and regroup and make sure I know what to do next. Another reason could be from anger. If someone tells you something that makes you really angry, you have to go, [sighs] to take a moment and not get really mad all of a sudden. These are just some of the reasons why someone would sigh.
• Do you think you sigh frequently?
It's hard to tell. I think it's something that we do without really realizing that we're doing it. I don't know. I maybe sigh once a day, but to be honest with you, I don't have an exact number.
Giggle
'Why are you giggling now?'
• What sound do you make when giggling?
If you are giggling, again, it depends on the person, but I would do something like, [giggles] okay, no, this is totally fake. This is not how I giggle. Oh, there we go. [laugh] I can't do my giggle on purpose, but giggling is this kind of laughter.
• If you’re giggling, is it because you’ve seen or heard something incredibly funny or only kind of funny?
If you're giggling it's because you've seen or heard something funny, it's not [laughs]. It's not that laughter and giggle is more like, [giggles] like this. It's very wide, it's done a lot by babies, babies do that a lot. Especially little ones that can't talk, if you do something funny, they're going to giggle.
• What things make you giggle?
Lately, I think TikToks. Every now and then I get on TikTok and I watch a few videos and some of them are funny, not like crazy funny, but some of them make me giggle.
Hiccups
'Now you’ve got the hiccups?'
• If you’ve got the hiccups, what sound will you make?
If you've got the hiccups, you can't control it and you're going to make this sound. [hiccups]
• What causes hiccups?
Technical-, scientifically speaking, I'm not sure. I know it's something with your diaphragm, it does something weird, but what I can tell you is that it happens sometimes when you're eating too fast or when you do something weird with your mouth, I think.
• Do you have any remedies for hiccups?
Unfortunately, I don't. I think I would be rich if I did because there's not something that works for everybody, but I've heard all kinds of remedies - you got to drink from the wrong side of the glass. You got to hold your breath. You got to do this. You got to do that. I don't know. To be honest with you, I have tried them all and nothing has worked consistently for me. Maybe it works once and that's it. The best advice I could give you is wait and let it pass because it most likely will pass.
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