Climate Action Figures

Season 2, Episode 32: Kayla

• John Whidden • Season 2 • Episode 32

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Join John Whidden as he catches up with creative consultant Kayla on the final episode of season two of Climate Action Figures. They discuss unique climate actions, share fascinating stories from the season, and tease exciting upcoming episodes. Don't miss the quick tips on reducing waste and a call to action! Plus, fun banter about youthful trends and next season's lineup.

00:00 Welcome to the Final Edition of Season Two

00:37 QuickFix: Ice Cream Cones and Edible Containers

01:27 Crazy Climate Challenges

02:06 Keeping Warm and Composting Tips

04:52 Community Cleanups and E-Bike Adventures

05:38 Turning Off the Hot Water Tank

06:59 Future Plans and Social Media Insights

12:23 Reflecting on Season Two Highlights

15:25 Exciting Plans for Next Season

20:13 What Gives Us Hope

22:13 Thank You and See You Next Season

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Kayla:

Hello again. I'm back. It's Kayla, and you're still tuned into Climate Action Figures.

John:

Hello and welcome to the final edition of Season two of Climate Action Figures. I can't believe we've arrived here already. My name as always is John Whidden, and this week on the show we will get to catch up with creative consultant Kayla. But first this week's QuickFix, which comes to us from Colleen Whidden, who happens to live in the same house as me. And so I said,"of course, we can feature your QuickFix on Climate Action Figures". She says. I always get ice cream in cones because if I get it in a cup, I have to throw away the cup, and if I get it in a cone, I don't have to throw anything away except maybe a little napkin. So thank you very much for that QuickFix, Colleen, and welcome back to the show, Kayla.

Kayla:

Hello. Thank you for having me back. You can't get rid of me.

John:

No, never. We would not want to do that. What do you think about Colleen's QuickFix, Kayla?

Kayla:

I am a big fan of ice cream cones. I think we should have more edible containers of food. that's, that's great. Less waste.

John:

I don't think of an ice cream cone as an edible container, but of course it is. That's brilliant. Kayla, just to be different today, let's do our climate actions first. We, I usually save that for almost the end of each episode, here's one for you. Let's do a crazy challenge because I know that we're both a little bit environmentally crazy, and so let's see if we can one up each other on the things that we do. How about that?

Kayla:

Okay. All right. You're on.

John:

I'll warn you, I'm gonna win

Kayla:

Yes, you are

John:

who's, who's the craziest.

Kayla:

Definitely

John:

Yeah.

Kayla:

Definitely

John:

And, This does not mean you have to do these crazy things that we do, but you know, you can, if you like, I'll just warn you that they can be dangerous for friendships and if you live with someone, even more dangerous. So beware. Okay, let me start it off with, since you've seen me do a lot of episodes from my own home here, and often I'm not wearing a hat, I'm wearing a to. This is because. The house, I just can't stand heating the house to a high temperature with just me at home. So I keep the temperature at 17. Kayla, what do you think about that?

Kayla:

chilly. Um, you are crazier than me.'cause I don't know if I could do 17 degrees. That's really

John:

I just, I wear, I wear lots of layers and at night we turn it down. Colleen's in for the cold overnight'cause we have a cozy comforter, but we go down to 15 overnight. So

Kayla:

That's pretty chilly. I do also try to keep my AC and my heat off as much as possible and put on the layers, but I have bad circulation, so my hands get cold and there's only, like, you can't really do much with mittens, uh, if you're trying

John:

That's true.

Kayla:

So,

John:

This is true and I, I should admit that I turn it up to a balmy 19 for Colleen to arrive home. So she actually wants to continue to come home. That's a good thing.

Kayla:

Shame, I guess you hate the environment. Turning it up to 19.

John:

Exactly. Okay. Your turn.

Kayla:

I keep my compost in the freezer so that if I don't have to take the compost out before it's full, if it's just smelling too bad.'cause it doesn't smell bad if you keep it in the freezer so I can fill up the compost bin every single time.

John:

You just reminded me of another one. I, not that I'm trying to one up you or anything, but, uh, we just went to a conference and we stayed in a hotel with a little bar fridge and we kept a little Tupperware container with our compost in it from, you know, we had banana peels and some pepper, you know, seeds and stuff like that. And anytime we had compost and then we threw it in the fridge.'cause then it didn't go, you know, stinky all week. So there you go.

Kayla:

You

John:

Uh, but. No, but the freezer, the freezer's a good one. I, I, I thought fridge, but I haven't done that with a freezer, so,

Kayla:

it. I can never go back to having my compost not in the freezer.

John:

And we, we had, uh, Derek on talking about worm composting this season. And, uh, so I'm, I'm hoping that at some point Colleen Whidden, I'm gonna get a gift of a worm composter so that I can try that. Okay, on the topic of food, my next one, Kayla, is, I sort of accidentally got an e-bike a year or two ago, but I ride a bike all the time and not usually e-bike, usually regular, but the e-bike I got saddlebags for and the saddlebags are massive and I can do my grocery shopping on my e-bike. So I rarely go to the grocery store without my bike now.

Kayla:

those must be huge saddle bags. I don't know about you, but I, I can't, I, I only go every two weeks, so I can't imagine

John:

it gets a little heavy. Like, it's like you're doing a wheelie all the time. You have a little less steering control with all that weight on the back, but okay, you're next.

Kayla:

okay. My next one is, I participate in all the community cleanups that, my neighborhood does, and it's

John:

Oh.

Kayla:

organize them, which is really fun. also if anyone who knows me is listening, I've had a litter. picker set on my Christmas list for like two years now, because I wanna just, every time I go for a walk in the neighborhood, I would love to just bring it, you know, bring your little claw, grabby thing, you know, bring your little garbage bag and just do a bit of community cleanup every time you go for a walk.

John:

Well, maybe we should have a segment on the show. That's what gift to buy kayla and John.

Kayla:

New

John:

car let's do it.

Kayla:

Yeah, if anyone wants to buy me a new car, I'll take

John:

Electric, of course. Okay. Last one for me. we, when we go away, Colleen and I turn off the hot water tank if we're going for more than two days. And I, I, I tell you this because it leads to a funny story because just the other, I just said we were away at a conference when we got back. Totally forgot to turn on the hot water. And we had an event we were going out to the other night. And so I jumped in the shower quick before we went out. I'm like, man, this is, I'm holding my hand and it's not warming up. And uh, so yeah, I had an ice cold shower.'cause you know.

Kayla:

really good for the circulation.

John:

Exactly. So there you go. If you do that, remember to turn it back on when you get back.

Kayla:

to turn it back on. Yes.

John:

Well, we better get moving on with the show. But that was, uh, great climate actions. Thanks for sharing yours I think we did pretty good battle. We're pretty even on those.

Kayla:

Speaking of the different features that we have on our shows like QuickFixes and Climate Actions, if you have any ideas for the show, anything that you think would be a good addition, um, if you have any more questions for our lovely engineer, or you know, something you want to send to us that we can post to any of our socials, feel free to send that our way. We're always happy to hear what kind of things we can do to keep improving the podcast.

John:

and we'd love to hear from you. So please, uh, send us an email at ClimateActionFigures@gmail.com or contact us through social media now, Kayla. I do not know the answer to this question because I didn't ask you if we could talk about it, so I'm a bit nervous about this, but let's get it over with. are you interested in continuing in your role as creative consultant for another season?

Kayla:

You might have to edit this out. Uh, no, I'm joking. Of course. Yeah.

John:

yeah. You actually got me. It takes a. I can't believe you got me with an editing comment. That was nasty. Colleen is gonna love that. Yes. Okay, so you, okay, great. I was gonna say, you better answer now. Okay. Whew. So teach me something, uh, Kayla link lingo or what's, what are young people talking about these days that I need to know? Because you, you, you've this important role where you keep me up to speed on what young people are thinking and doing, and so teach me something.

Kayla:

yeah. Okay. How to keep you in touch with the kids these days? I, myself am already getting a little bit old for the, the really young crowd. So, I don't know if you've heard of such phrases as, Skibbidy Toilet, Rizz.

John:

Skibbidy Toilet. No.

Kayla:

Okay.

John:

Tell me more.

Kayla:

I don't even know what it means exactly. I've just heard it a couple times. Uh, I think honestly, if you wanted to do some market research, the best thing to do would probably be watching the Minecraft movie. I haven't

John:

Ah,

Kayla:

All the kids these days love Minecraft and probably the Minecraft movie as well. So yeah, if you wanna learn some, some great lingo, check that out.

John:

okay. We will do that. And what about recording here from my dining room table? Is that cool or is that uncool?

Kayla:

I mean, I don't think that's for, for me to judge John. Uh, if you get a lot of hate comments from teenagers about your kitchen, then I guess we

John:

Well, I could put, maybe I should put a Minecraft background behind me.

Kayla:

Oh, perfect. Yeah. Let's see you, uh, in the, in the lava,

John:

Yeah, I don't think so. Now, Kayla, tell me, uh, because I'm always asking you questions about social media, um, I, I've asked people to hit like and subscribe and this is important. Correct.

Kayla:

it is very important if you hit like and subscribe. Uh, it helps make the podcast more visible to other people so it pops up on more people's feeds and suggested. So if you think that this podcast, uh, is enjoyable not just for yourself but for other people. And, you could just send it directly if you are thinking of people who might enjoy it, but it also just helps us be more visible to anyone out there who might be wanting a bit more hope and a bit more inspiration, uh, to not feel so much anxiety about climate change. So make sure to like and subscribe.

John:

and I didn't actually ask that just to get people to do that. I actually asked that because it's good for me to know. Make sure I know why. These are important things. Anyways, on we go. it is our 53rd episode today, so I guess we can be a little self-congratulatory that we made it past 50 episodes. Is that a little narcissistic? I dunno. Can that exist in a not-for-profit podcast? I'm not sure.

Kayla:

Look at us. Go 50

John:

Okay.

Kayla:

Over 50.

John:

Go Climate Action Figures and.

Kayla:

Figures.

John:

And you know, I I, I get emails quite regularly that say, here's how you can monetize this. And I always just ignore them because I'm not interested in monetizing it'cause it's not for profit. But I thought of a funny question that we should answer. Kayla. we refuse sponsorship, but if you had to choose the best and the worst sponsor for Climate Action Figures, what would they be? And I'll do the same and I haven't come up with it yet, so. We'll think hard on the spot. Do you have one?

Kayla:

um,

John:

got one. I've got one.

Kayla:

do you have the best

John:

I've got, I've got my worst. I've got my worst.

Kayla:

worst as well.

John:

Okay. It's probably the same one, right? Okay. You go,

Kayla:

Um, Trump Towers?

John:

oh, that's exactly what I picked.

Kayla:

way.

John:

Except I let you go first because I, I wasn't sure if it's like the Trump organization or Trump Towers or Trump.

Kayla:

That's

John:

I don't know. Anyways.

Kayla:

what, maybe who knows? The, there will be a test of your resolve.'cause you're gonna get an email from the, the Trump Towers organization that's gonna be, we're gonna offer you so much money if you just tell everyone that we're really great.

John:

Go ahead, Donald. Offer me all the money you want. Let's see how that goes.

Kayla:

How it goes.

John:

Okay. The best sponsor. What's the best sponsor? I'm trying to think of an ice cream brand. That would be good. A good local ice cream brand.

Kayla:

Made by Marcus' local to

John:

Camp Ice cream camp. Ice cream is local out here. It was so good.

Kayla:

Oh.

John:

Um, actually, you know what I was thinking, Kayla, because I adopted these long before Climate Action Figures is the laundry strips. you used to get liquid, which is the worst, and then powder is much better. But these strips are, they can come in the mail and in regular envelope and, and that's how you get your laundry detergent. So there's almost no transportation cost environmentally.

Kayla:

Best sponsorship, at least for me would be Canary Refillery, because that is where I live in Calgary. It's the one I go to, it's in Kensington. They always have such great stuff. I get most of my Refillery items there. And yeah, if they wanted to give me, a discount code, I would use it so much.

John:

Okay. I wanna talk about, um, this podcast because I feel, Kayla, like I've been schooled on this podcast. This season alone i've learned about cosmetics creating nanocellulose coatings for drones from seaweed, organic fertilizer from worms, teen organization of protests at the Saskatchewan legislature. Environmental education programs that are amazing in Ontario. First Nations ways of seeing the climate crisis, climate finance in South Korea, a doctor's perspective on community health in India, clean energy banking in Istanbul, relocating homes in Samoa, glacier science, all kinds of perspectives on COP 29 in Baku, we can go on and on, and I've been drenched by hope from these guests that we've had.

Kayla:

Yeah, it's truly been such an inspiring season. I loved Alex's stake facts a lot. Uh, I loved hearing your story about your abandoned croc in the river. That was a,

John:

Oh,

Kayla:

that was a really good one. All

John:

worst nightmare.

Kayla:

all the COP 29 stories. Like it's, it was so cool and I didn't even know about COP at all until I heard about it on this podcast.

John:

Yeah, it was interesting just to hear what COP was like.'cause I knew about COP, but I had no idea. I'd never talked to anybody who's been there. Did I tell you how I found those guests, by the way?

Kayla:

no.

John:

I don't know if I should admit it. I was just thinking, wouldn't it be cool when COP was on to talk to someone live from Baku and see what's it like on the ground there for a young person? And so I thought, how could I, how could I possibly do that? And so I looked on Twitter. And I, I looked up Baku and COP 29, and one of the connections was an organization called Youngo, which we featured a number of times this season. And the reason it kept coming back was because Youngo had a spreadsheet. On their Twitter feed, which was, Hey, young people from Youngo Here are your groups at COP 29 this year, climate finance, Bing, bing, bing. Three names and three email addresses. Uh, mitigation, Bing, bing, bing. Three names, three email addresses, and on and on. And there were about 35 or 40 of these young people and I'm like, I'm doing this for the good of the world, so I should use this list. Right? Even if they've accidentally posted it on Twitter. But it turned out it wasn't accidentally posted. They were okay with having their email addresses out on Twitter. And so I contacted all of them and we ended up with how many, I can't think. 13 or something. Uh, young people. So that's the funny story of me stalking Twitter to find guests and uh, and then. They've said, oh, here's some more people we know that you should talk to, and they seem to really enjoy their time on Climate Action Figures. So it's led to a bunch that we're gonna talk about in a minute too, some more for next season.

Kayla:

Certified internet sleuth. That is pretty impressive.

John:

Oh, that's a, that's a much nicer way of putting it. Thank you. So next season's guest and you're gonna have to stop me'cause I'm gonna get excited and might go on too long. But we picked up a few from those young people we talked to this season, and we're gonna feature them this, this coming, season, starting this fall on Climate Action Figures. I'm very excited about, this special series. It should be five episodes and how much should I give away?

Kayla:

Only a little bit, just

John:

A little more. It's gonna be a First Nations series, it comes from Southern Alberta, from the Blackfoot tribe. And we're gonna talk to a number of First Nations people, young people for the most part, who are gonna tell us some of the cool things they are doing in southern Alberta. So very much looking forward to that.

Kayla:

That sounds so cool. I'm very excited to listen to that.

John:

I've been trying to catch up with this guy named Abhey from the University of Saskatchewan for a long time. He deals with, mental health aspects of climate change. So it's just too perfect for this podcast. And he deals with young people'cause he is at the University of Saskatchewan. what on Earth is CBC's environmental Climate Change Program and he's their mental health columnist. So he has appeared a number of times on, on CB C, on what On Earth. So very excited to talk to him. I think we should check back in on a couple of guests from past seasons, from season one and two. What do you think?

Kayla:

Absolutely! I think it's so important to check back in with some of the guests that we've had because especially as some of the interviewees we've had on here, being young people, their lives move so fast and so much change happens for them more so than us adults, let's say. So will cool to hear what new initiatives And different things they've been working on lately.

John:

I've said that to several of the guests in the first two seasons: we'll have to check back with you in the future. Uh, I think one particular one that I keep thinking of is Aryan, who was, uh, in season one, talked to us about building. He got a grant,$500 grant, Out of Tupperware. He built these little things that trolled the water for, uh, microplastics. very curious to hear what he's doing. And

Kayla:

Absolutely.

John:

Speaking of high school, uh, another one I'm really excited about I. Contacted Sophia Mathur, who is one of the young people in Ontario who took the government to court for, the future people, basically. And, and then it went to the Supreme Court to see if it could be heard.'cause it's such an unusual case. Can you sue the government on behalf of future people? Because of climate change. And so I very curious to talk to her about her experience and how that's going. So we'll catch up with Sophia. She's agreed to be on the show next year.

Kayla:

Wow. That'll be cool.

John:

Here's one who you know and I'm a bit nervous about. Twila. Twila. Whidden is my daughter and your friend.

Kayla:

Yes.

John:

She's grown up with all the craziness. We were talking about all the craziness of not turning up the heat, and I'm afraid she's gonna lambaste me, but I have to do it. I have to face it, don't I, Kayla?

Kayla:

Ya, you're gonna be exposed, for all of the world to see how much you do for the environment.

John:

Yeah.

Kayla:

normal level? Probably not. We'll find out!

John:

Does it, does it damage our children, is the question.

Kayla:

I know. I don't think so. I know my dad, was quite adamant about food not going bad, I have definitely carried it into my adulthood for doing some kind of crazy things that some people might not do to try and make sure that I eat the food before it goes bad.

John:

That's good because a lot of people don't, and I think that's something we need to do our best to do, at least. Right.

Kayla:

I definitely cut off the moldy bits for

John:

Shout out to Ray and since we talked about your dad, we should probably mention your mom, Heather, who has done a lot of really cool work in Uganda as part of her career. And this segue here is that I've talked with some people from the Indigenous Youth Fellowship program and one of them is from Uganda, one from Guyana, and one from America. And so we're hoping we're gonna get to catch up with all three. They've said they're very interested, so that would be another neat one. Let's mention one more just to give folks one more thing to look forward to next season. We were just approached, last week actually by, an organization called Open Wardrobe. They describe themselves as a groundbreaking AI powered platform that's redefining how we approach fashion and sustainability and the creator's mission, uh, is simple and powerful. It's keep clothes in circulation and out of landfills while promoting personal style. So we're gonna try and catch up with their young 25-year-old designer, which, you know, we hear a lot about fast fashion on this show, so sounds like a good thing to dig into, right?

Kayla:

Absolutely. Yeah, that'll be really cool to hear.

John:

We should do the regular thing we always do on the show, which is to ask what gives you hope. So Kayla Macintosh, what gives you hope?

Kayla:

I am gonna shout out something super specific here. There's this one Instagram account that I've been following for a while, and it is Sam Bentley, we can show it here on the screen to show you what his feed looks like and give his handle and everything. he posts videos of good news and oftentimes it's mostly good climate news, I love when it pops up on my feed. It just makes me feel a little bit better because we see so much bad news all the time. So seeing some good climate news and just being more aware of everything happening around the world and initiatives and policies and projects and technologies that are being created and passed and pushed forward that are good things that are happening me feel so good. So that gives me lots of hope.

John:

that's cool. And in case that passed too quickly across your screen, we will put it in the show notes so you can find the link in there as well. We, we've talked about Sam before, and we'll have to try and get him on the show. That would be cool.

Kayla:

Yeah, definitely. and what about you John? What gives you hope?

John:

that's easy because the most hopeful thing, I mean, there's a lot of hope. I have a lot of hope in life and, uh, that's why I started this podcast. But this podcast, ironically has given me way more hope, listening to these young people, talk about the things they're doing from microplastic, Tupperware, that's cleaning waterways in Calgary to young people from Samoa, going to COP 29 in Baku, micro macro. It's just wonderful to hear these things that are happening much in the same way that you're talking about, listening to stories from Sam gives you hope, just, uh, listening to the. The people we talk to on the program and hearing their stories gives me a huge amount of hope. So I get lots out of it too.

Kayla:

Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of hope to be had, and it's good to remind ourselves of that.

John:

Exactly. Well, thanks so much for taking some time to join us here and continuing to be our, creative consultant, Kayla.

Kayla:

Thank you for having me. I love being back. I'll, I'll come on here whenever.

John:

I'll, uh, I'll get the contract out in the mail to you right away. And thank you dear listener and viewer. You have all summer to catch up on missed episodes in case you missed out on any. And as you do so, please as Kayla mentioned, uh, think about someone who might enjoy the episode and send them that link and they can enjoy it as well. We will not be back next week. Same time, same place, but we will be back in the fall to hear from many more Climate Action Figures. Until then,

Kayla:

Go figures!