Simple Joe

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Today I wanted to share a quick but important update with you. I’m taking a short break from the show so I can fix some structural and process issues behind the scenes and make sure Simple Joe is smoother, more focused, and more valuable for you going forward. This isn’t about stepping away from what I love. Spending this time with you every day truly i...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Email me at joe@thesimplejoe.com or send me a text at 513.399.6468. Just say hi, I would love to hear from you. Show Notes In today’s episode of Simple Joe for Tuesday, January 6th, 2026, I kick things off with a mind-bending fact about chess and just how unimaginably large the number of possible games really is. We check in on the weather for Charlotte...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. On today’s episode of Simple Joe for Monday, January 5, 2026, I kick things off with a truly unsettling but fascinating look at Victorian-era post-mortem photography and how long exposure times made the stillness of the dead appear sharper than the living, which leads to a broader reflection on memory, time, and how differently we capture moments today....

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. In today’s episode of Simple Joe for Friday, January 2, 2026, I start with one of those facts that makes you stop and think, trees in the Pacific Northwest are actually connected underground through fungal networks, sharing nutrients and even warning each other about pests and disease, which turns into a fun, slightly philosophical conversation about wh...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Today, on the very first day of 2026, I start with a quirky fact about a town in Norway where it’s illegal to die, which turns into a reminder that the world is full of strange, practical problems we never think about until we have to. I talk a little about ringing in the new year with friends, coming into the day slower than usual, and why I actually e...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. On this New Year’s Eve episode of Simple Joe, I share a surprising detail about the iconic Times Square ball and how much larger it is than many of us imagined, then spend Wildcard Wednesday reflecting with you on what it means to intentionally de-digitize our lives. I talk about an eight-hour flight where I chose boredom over screens, what happened whe...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. On today’s episode of Simple Joe , I share a fun and quirky Guinness World Records fact about the world’s largest rubber duck collection, owned by Charlotte Lee, and somehow connect it to Cincinnati’s own rubber duck regatta. We check the weather for Rabat, Morocco and Cincinnati, Ohio as the year winds down under cloudy skies, celebrate notable birthda...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. On today’s episode of Simple Joe for Monday, December 29, 2025, I start with a surprisingly relatable fact about how most people have legs that are slightly different lengths and how the brain quietly compensates without us ever noticing, something I definitely relate to more than I realized. I share a few personal reflections, talk through the weather...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. In today’s episode of Simple Joe, I settle into the calm of the day after Christmas with a surprisingly humbling thought about honey and the quiet, unseen work behind the simple things we often take for granted. I reflect on family traditions, missed holiday plans due to illness, time spent with my grandson, and that familiar stretch between Christmas a...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Today is Christmas Day, and I’m really glad you’re here with me. I kicked things off with a wild fact about the longest recorded polar night at the northernmost inhabited places on Earth, more than 65 days without seeing the sun at all, no sunrise, no sunset, just different shades of light and dark, which honestly messes with your sense of time and turn...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. On this Christmas Eve episode of Simple Joe, I share the accidental but heartwarming story of how NORAD began tracking Santa in 1955, a simple mistake that turned into a beloved tradition. We check in on the weather for Honolulu, Hawaii and Cincinnati, Ohio, celebrate birthdays and historic moments from December 24th, and recognize Christmas Eve, Nation...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. In today’s episode of Simple Joe , I start with a strange and fascinating idea: astronauts say space smells like hot metal and seared steak once they’re back inside their spacecraft, which leads me to wonder how something so empty can still leave a trace. We check in on the weather for Perth, Australia, where Christmas week brings intense heat and sunsh...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Today on Simple Joe, I’m thinking about how some of the earliest radio broadcasts are still traveling through space, carrying music, voices, and stories far beyond Earth, and what that might mean about the things we put out into the world. I share the weather for Poughkeepsie, New York, and Cincinnati, Ohio, reflect on birthdays of notable figures like...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. In today’s episode of Simple Joe, I start with a quirky and fascinating fact about how the music we hear can actually change the way food tastes, which leads me into a lighthearted riff about tomatoes, preferences, and how context shapes experience. From there, I share the full three-day weather forecast for Lebo, Kansas and Cincinnati, Ohio, celebrate...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. In today’s Saturday episode of Simple Joe, I explore the surprisingly powerful idea of a “Done for the Day” list, inspired by my recent rereading of Effortless by Greg McKeown, the follow-up to Essentialism. We talk about why traditional to-do lists often leave us feeling overwhelmed and unfinished, even when we work all day, and how defining what “done...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Today on Simple Joe, I start the show by venting about how much I hate paper cuts and why they hurt more than they should, before easing into a reflective Friday episode focused on slowing down and heading into some well-earned downtime. We hear the weather for Jerusalem, Israel, and Cincinnati, Ohio, celebrate December 19 birthdays including Cicely Tys...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. In today’s episode of Simple Joe , I start with one of my favorite kinds of stories, the kind where curiosity changes everything, like how the microwave oven was invented by accident when Percy Spencer noticed a candy bar melt in his pocket. From there, I share the weather for Sterling, Virginia and Cincinnati, Ohio, celebrate birthdays including Keith...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Today’s episode of Simple Joe (Wednesday, December 17, 2025) comes to you from Cheyenne, Wyoming , where I kick things off with a mind-blowing fact about how fast your brain processes images, then roll into the 3-day weather for Cheyenne and Cincinnati before hitting birthdays like Eugene Levy , Bill Pullman , and Sarah Paulson . We also look back at th...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Today’s Simple Joe episode for Tuesday, December 16, 2025 kicks off with a knuckle-cracking truth that made me laugh, because I am a master knuckle cracker and I have heard the arthritis warning my whole life. I also want to say thank you, because a bunch of you checked on me when yesterday’s episode came out late, and that meant more than you know. Fro...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. I’m late today, but I’m glad you’re here with me for Simple Joe on Monday, December 15th, 2025, where we start with a wild little reality check that the average person spends about six months of life sitting at red lights, and I admit I’m still working on not reaching for my phone every time I’m bored. We check in on the weather in Phoenix, Arizona and...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Today on Simple Joe, I’m wrapping up my three-part Why I Believe series by sharing why I openly identify as a Christian. I talk about the Voyager Golden Record and what it says about humanity, then we move through the weather in Southfield, Michigan and Cincinnati, celebrate a few birthdays, and reflect on history and National Monkey Day. The heart of t...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. I’m back home from Sacramento and settling into a Saturday rhythm while we check the weather in Santiago, Chile and Cincinnati, Ohio, and then lean into a personal development question that hits just about everybody: how do you do more of what you love to do, especially when you’re not even sure what that is yet? In this episode, I riff on petrichor, th...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. Today’s Simple Joe episode for Friday, December 12, 2025 is a fun one, starting with the surprising fact that honeybees can recognize human faces, and I share how bees always seem to find me, plus a little warning that they might remember you if you have ever bothered their nest. I’m wrapping up my last day in Sacramento, and we take a quick trip down t...

Welcome to Simple Joe. In this episode of Simple Joe, I start with the wild idea of a 75-second echo in an abandoned oil tank in Scotland and use it to talk about how some moments, and some kindnesses, linger a lot longer than we realize, then I share the weather in Cebu City, Philippines and back home in Cincinnati before celebrating birthdays, a few bits of history, and fun observances like Inte...

Welcome to Simple Joe. I’m glad you’re here. In this episode of Simple Joe, I share the fun origin of voicemail and a few memories of old-school answering machines, give you the weather for Bethel, Ohio and Cincinnati, celebrate birthdays like Dorothy Lamour, Dan Blocker, Susan Dey, Raven-Symoné, and Cincinnati’s own Joe Burrow, and mark Nobel Prize Day, Dewey Decimal System Day, and National Lage...