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This week Dave and Steel reflect on the year that was 2015. We discuss news you might have missed in science, technology, and medicine, and give our 2015: The Year in Review summary, covering highlights from the year in sports, and share our list of bests from 2015 (new bands, food, day trips, films, children’s books, podcasts, films, magazines, humans, and social issues), say goodbye to some prominent people who died this last year, share great music from Leon Bridges, Anna B. Savage, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, The Tallest Man on Earth, The Handsome Family, and Dom La Nena & Rosemary Standley, before closing the episode out with some timeless wisdom from Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address.
Links
2015: The Year in Review [Important News You Might Have Missed]
Science, Technology, & Medicine
- January 13: The first lab-grown, contracting human muscle is announced by Duke University
- March 2: First ever image captured of light as both a particle and a wave!
- March 6: NASA’s Dawn probe orbits Ceres, the first time a spacecraft from earth has ever visited a dwarf planet [Ceres is the biggest object in the asteroid belt]
- March 30: A 1,000-year-old treatment for eye infections – containing onion, garlic and part of a cow’s stomach – has been shown to completely wipe out staphylococcus aureus [MRSA]
- June 19: A major study confirms that Earth is currently witnessing the start of a mass extinction event the likes of which have not been seen for at least 65 million years. It is being precipitated by human actions over the past 500 years
- June 30: Cuba becomes 1st country in the world to eradicate mother-to-child transmission of HIV & syphilis. July 20: Cuba & US establish full diplomatic relations (after 54 years!)
- July 21: Men who become fathers experience weight gain according to a new, large-scale study that tracked more than 10,000 men over a 20-year period. Men who didn’t become dads actually lost weight over the same time period. SCIENTIFIC PROOF OF DAD BOD.
- October 21: Emmett Brown, Marty McFly and Jennifer Parker arrive from the year 1985, see shoes with self-tying laces, people riding hoverboards and learn that Cubs finally won the World Series, beating the Miami Gators. [Also the day the Cubs lost the NLCS to the Mets]
The Year in Sports
- Basketball: The Warriors rule the NBA. And rule it beautifully!
- Rugby: New Zealand won the Rugby World Cup. Amazing, considering the size of New Zealand. The country has just 4.5 million people: fewer than Costa Rica, or South Carolina or Louisiana!
- Soccer: USA won the Women’s World Cup against Japan by a score of 5-2. Carli Lloyd scored a hat trick in the final, including a goal from inside her own half.
- Baseball: Royals win the World Series!
Other News
- February 14 – The New York Police Department reports no murders in New York City over a 12-day period for the first time in the city’s history, citing extreme weather as possible reason.
- March 21: Dan Jennejohn gets married to Camille Gamboa. Steel and Dave and their kids see each other in person!
- June 17: Treasury Secretary Jack Lew announces that an image of a woman will replace Alexander Hamilton on the $10 bill starting in 2020, with Lew planning to choose the woman by the end of this year. Rosa Parks, Harriet Tubman, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Susan B. Anthony are considered frontrunners.
- August 21: Banksy opens Dismaland in Weston-super-Mare in Somerset, England. Dave almost takes his kids here on vacation before trauma dreams about Skegness force him to revise his plans and go to the real Disney World instead.
Best of [the year in review]
Best new band
- Dave – Leon Bridges
- Steel – Dom La Nena
Best Food you had in 2015
- Steel – The Acorn [Vancouver, BC]
- Dave – Burger at Arizona Wilderness Brewing Co.
Best Meal under $10
- Dave – Backyard Taco in Mesa, AZ
- Steel – Luang Prabang Thai food cart in Madison, WI
Best Day Trip
- Dave – The Sea Life aquarium in Mesa, AZ
Best expensive purchase of the year
- Steel – Fancy new camera [Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ1000]
- Dave – My house in Snowflake
Best Hike you took
- Steel – Stanley Park, Prospect Point, Lost Lagoon — Vancouver
- Dave – Kanab, UT
Best Film
- Dave – 1st place: Cinderella; 2nd place: Furious 7; 3rd place: Creed; Honorable Mention: Mad Max: Fury Road
- Steel – tie: Let the Fire Burn and What Happened, Miss Simone?
Best Children’s Book you read this year
- Steel – Journey – Aaron Becker
- Dave – It’s only Stanley – Jon Agee
Best board game
- Dave – Lords of Waterdeep
- Steel – Ticket to Ride Europe
Best Non-OTC podcast
- Steel – The Memory Palace
- Dave – Reveal OR The Bill Simmons Podcast
Best Condiment
- Dave – Honey
- Steel – Green dragon hot sauce, Trader Joe’s
Magazine you subscribe to
- Steel – Poetry
- Dave – Arizona Highways
Man of the Year
- Dave – John Oliver
- Steel – Bono
Woman of the Year
- Dave – Rachel Nichols
- Steel – Loretta Lynch
Social Issue of the Year
- Dave – police violence in the US, especially against unarmed black men
- Steel – Global Climate Change & the recent conference in Paris
Unchained Melodies: Songs of the year edition
Book Wisdom
Dave shared the concluding paragraphs of Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address, delivered just before the conclusion of the American Civil War.