Ever been cured by a snake? No? Well, thought we should ask. Find out why in Answer Me This! Episode 320, as well as stuff about:
red velvet cake
the first romcom
Overboard
BDSM vs podcasting
baby names vs dog names
Ritz cracker apple pie
Frankie and Benny’s
sacred snakes
Much Ado About Nothing
Ghostface Chillah
points on your driving licence
registering your baby
Leavenworth, WA (see the bottom of this post)
the Rod of Asclepius
and
your local Munch.
Plus: Olly remembers his dad’s Martian business plan*, that is still up for grabs if any of you want to do it; Helen has ‘Baby On Board!’ windscreen signs in the crosshairs; and Martin the Sound Man’s parents named him Martin hoping he’d take after one of the nice Martins, rather than Amis or Scorsese.
*If you do decide to give this a whirl – or you have a less doomed idea for a business – build the website using today’s sponsor Squarespace.com. Tinker around during the free two-week trial, then you can have 10% off their website-building and -hosting services for a year if you use the code ‘ANSWER‘. You get a URL and loads of storage thrown in. AND Squarespace manages to make your site look nice on desktop, mobile and tablet, which is far more than most site hosts do (ahem ahem this one).
In today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available for iThings, Android and Windows devices) is a question from Kate about those metal bars that run around the bottom of bars. Bonus appearance from the town that plays Northern Exposure.
As always, we crave your questions. Leave voicemails on the Question Line – call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis – and send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. And join the virtual cuddle-party at facebook.com/answermethis and twitter.com/HelenAndOlly.
We’ll return on 20th August 2015 with AMT321. Be there. Or our hearts will yearn for you.
Helen & Olly
••• AMT320 Child-Friendly Rating: 34%. It opens with feedback regarding AMT319‘s dominatrix question, which, though heartwarming, may be riper than you feel your children should cope with. Some swears thereafter, but we suspect you’ll already have saved this for post-watershed listening. •••
PS Feast your eyes on LEAVENWORTH! The happiest place on earth (or at the very least, Washington State).
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Tags: Adele, ambulances, Americana, Ancient Greece, Ancient Greeks, apple pie, artificial colourings, artificial foodstuffs, Asclepius, babies, baby names, Bavarian, BDSM, cake, children, crime, criminal charges, dominatrices, dominatrix, drivers, driving, driving licence, etymology, fake, famous Martins, Fetlife, films, food, food colouring, Frankie and Benny's, Ghostface Chillah, Ghostface Killah, goldfish, Goldie Hawn, Greece, Greek gods, Greek myths, Harold Lloyd, healing, hospitals, Hugh Grant, Jeremy Corbyn, Jobyna Ralston, Julia Roberts, Keanu Reeves, kink, Kurt Russell, Leavenworth, logos, Martin Amis, Martin Rossiter, Martin Scorsese, meet-cute, Midsummer Night's Dream, minigolf, movies, Much Ado About Nothing, munch, munches, myth, names, nipples, nippy, Notting HIll, Olly's dad, Overboard, paramedics, parents, pets, Planet Hollywood, play streets, points, Pretty Woman, recipes, red velvet cake, register offices, relationships, Rex, Richard Gere, Ritz crackers, Rod of Asclepius, romantic comedies, romcoms, sex, Shoreditch, silent film, snakes, Snapchat, Squarespace, Stanley Mann, substitute food, symbols, The Great Depression, theme restaurants, themed attractions, themed towns, William Shakespeare, Wu-Tang Clan
Answer Me This! Podcast 
August 13, 2015 at 1:57 am |
Yes! Thank you for crediting Much Ado About Nothing as the first romcom. When you were reading the question, that’s what came to mind for me, for much the same reasons as you outlined.
While the earlier Merry Wives of Windsor could also be cited, it doesn’t have the same hallmark tropes of romcoms that Much Ado has
August 10, 2015 at 2:27 am |
I watched all kinds of crap tv growing up in the States, and as undiscerning as I was, this included the show Blossom. I distinctly remember an episode where Six replies to a question about the origin of her name with “that’s how many beers my dad says it took,” or something to that effect.
On another matter, when I was at school in the late 1980s, the Ritz cracker pie was still being assigned as a cooking assignment in my home economics class in Richmond, VA. Though I don’t recall anything else about the cookery unit we did, I do recall having to waste some perfectly good crackers making a fake apple pie to be graded on by my teacher. I vaguely recall that – if you did the assignment – you passed. There was a contest, though, with prizes awarded for the “best” pie. We had about 20 students in the class, and we all had the same pie to bake, given some vague directions. For the life of me, I don’t know why my teacher would want to inflict tasting these pies on herself or on us. They were terrible and repetitive. The student who won distinguished herself by providing whipped cream to serve along side.
I do hope that the powers that be have seen fit to change the home ec curriculum by now.
August 8, 2015 at 10:03 am |
There is a cardiothoracic surgeon in New Jersey whose parents allowed him to choose his name at around 8 or 9. His name? Loki Skylizard… http://www.nameoftheyear.com/2014/03/2014-name-of-year-bulltron-and-sithole.html
August 20, 2015 at 7:25 am |
And THIS is why you should perhaps hold off on letting your kids name themselves until they’re older. Say, 45.
August 7, 2015 at 7:50 am |
On the subject of dog’s names for humans, my father-in-law was called William Arthur Rex but always went by the name Rex. When we were making a drink we never tired of asking “Tea Rex?”. My son is also called Spike but, as I am a Star Wars fan and our surname is Barker, his middle name is Chu so He is Chu Barker. By the time we registered his name my wife was too tired to argue.
August 6, 2015 at 5:52 pm |
From the wiki page of American Olympic gold medalist Picabo Street: “Her parents decided to let Picabo choose her own name when she was old enough, so for the first two years of her life she was called “baby girl” or “little girl”. At age 3 she was forced to be named in order to get a passport. She was named after the nearby village of Picabo.”