Many of you have piped up to defend thissortofthing, including James:
In AMT274, Helen said Kevin Bacon ‘didn’t need to do the EE adverts’. Sadly he does – he and his wife lost SOOOOOO much of his money due to the Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. I think it’s also why he’s doing The Following on TV.
After I found out this, I kind of gave him a free pass in those ads.
Yes – although, when I said ‘need’, I meant artistically rather than financially. And despite all they did lose, the residue of the Bacon-Sedgwick fortune is still probably rather more than the contents of the piggybanks belonging to you, me and all the AMT listeners combined.
Nevertheless, I wouldn’t mind the EE ads so much if they recreated Tremors, using Apple Maps to confuse the Graboids into destroying the wrong town. Or Diner, with Steve Guttenberg telling Kevin off for using a mobile phone at the table. Or Flatliners, about what happens when EE’s 3G reception conks out.
Supplementary learning now thanks to Lee from Cambridge (the one in the US):
I just finished listening to your latest episode 274, in which you discuss the strangeness of the US chain of command.
First, a definition: the President Pro Tempore of the Senate is the leader of the party in power in the Senate (currently Patrick Leahy). He runs the Senate when the President of the Senate isn’t around to do so. Who is the President of the Senate? Why, it’s the Vice President of the US, since there has to be something for Biden to do other than waiting for Obama to die.
Secondly, it’s totally charming that you think we have something approaching a functional parliamentary system! Bless! You cannot call a special presidential election in the US, it states in the Constitution that the presidential elections occur every four years on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November.
Presidents are also now constitutionally barred from serving for more than two terms, so George W. Bush couldn’t have hung on for a while; it would (most likely) have gone down the normal chain of succession into the new House and Senate.
Thanks Lee. Previously we got all our information about the order of spare presidents from the Kevin Kline film Dave. In fact we get all our information about everything from Kevin Kline films*. Between In and Out, Sophie’s Choice, The Ice Storm and A Fish Called Wanda, most matters of import are taken care of.
*A few dozen of which are available on LoveFilm, for which you can have a free month-long trial via answermethispodcast.com/lovefilm. We get free money if you do so; you get to glut yourself on Kevin Kline masterpieces. And Kevin Kline gets…to be Kevin Kline. So everyone’s happy.
Pop the balloons and start gathering all the empties for recycling, because party-ender Katie from Christchurch has been back in touch:
Thanks so much for answering my question about party guests in episode 273.
Olly, thanks, yes, I am a square (but a v lively and fun one until 10pm, I’ll have you know). As it happened the party did start at 2, we played board games and drank wine, most people left at 8, then two people stayed for another TWO AND A HALF HOURS while I fidgeted in my chair and suppressed yawns.
Lesson learned, next time they get an end time, as suggested.
Admittedly, Katie, the last two stragglers are particularly difficult to shift, even if you do institute a closing time. The presence of the other makes each feel that they’re not overstaying their welcome.
Maybe what you need to do is make a big deal of a post-party engagement you yourself have to get to, so they remember they’re obligated to leave your house. March them out with you, then pretend you’ve forgotten something and need to dash back home to get it. At which point, you barricade the front door and take to your bed.
Why even bother listening to Answer Me This! Episode 274 when you can book PAT SHARP AND THE TWINS to come and do Fun House with you????
Once the disappointment has faded that they don’t actually bring the house with them, they just conjure it in words, then you might as well hear today’s episode:
In which we discuss:
Leonard Cohen’s party anthems
parliamentary mutterings
winking
Anne Robinson vs Doris Day
Bourbon biscuits vs Bourbon boozes Breaking Bad vs Streetmate
Bud Lite Platinum vs Old Speckled Hen Platinum Scandal
Justin Timberlake’s part-time jobs
spare American presidents
and six degradations of Kevin Bacon.
Plus: Olly is NOT a winker, whatever you’ve heard; Helen will waive all usual constitutional structure for Michelle Obama; and Martin the Sound Man is happier than you’ve ever heard him. Possibly happier than he’s ever been. Including his wedding day.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices, Android and Windows) Olly worries about being out-butched by a baby. Accept what you cannot change, Olly.
You can change AMT by sending in your QUESTIONS: leave voicemails on the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis) and send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. And you could also change the education of young people by helping Martin raise funds for the charity Arts Emergency: they’ll receive all proceeds of his concept album with Mark Burrows, Kill It With Fire.
You can also give us a bit of money without actually giving us your own money: just take our free LoveFilm trial. With it, you can stream The Perks of Being a Wallflower (as well as thousands of other films and televisuals) then tell us whether you concur with our opinion voiced in AMT233.
Even if you can’t be arsed to do any of those fairly low-stress things, please join us again next Thursday,
Helen & Olly
AMT274 Child-Friendly Rating: 95%. Bit of mid-level swearing right off the mark, but otherwise an episode largely free of ribaldry and profanity. Child-appropriate topics including Fun House, biscuits and Doris Day. The kids are fairly likely to zone out during the politics stuff.
Here’s some retro feedback from Courtney from Columbus, Ohio: retro not only because she’s contemplating a three-year-old episode of AMT, but also because it reminds us of that misty faraway time when people actually quite liked Jeremy Piven. The end-point of this era was somewhere between Grosse Pointe Blank and the start of Entourage – but not for Courtney! The embers of Piv-love still glow and crackle in her heart, which must be a very generous organ indeed if she decided to embark upon listening to AMT chronologically.
She writes:
I found out about your podcast recently and have since been cruising through the episodes – starting with episode ONE!!! The past few episodes, you’ve really been plugging your new book, and with Christmas right around the corner, I may just have to indulge…
Moments ago I listened to AMT158 where you discussed the placement of the perfume counters at the entrances of department stores. I cannot possibly know if someone has written in SINCE episode 158 and I therefore apologize in advance if this has become redundant.
Like many people, I’ve taken a liking to the actor Jeremy Piven, both for his notorious role on Entourage as well as his general demeanor. Last year he had a run on PBS with a show entitled Mr. Selfridge (which again I am not current with and may or may not still be running) as one of the founding fathers of department stores.
On an introductory special, the directors or producers or some equally important behind the scenes people said that when department stores first came about, the human race was still widely using horses and buggies. Needless to say, people were stepping in the road apples, and when they’d enter a shop, the carpets would become disgustingly foul. It was said that Mr. Selfridge or one of his contemporaries decided that if the perfumes were at the front, the stench would be covered, or at least toned down.
Just thought I’d share – love what I’m hearing so far. Although I’m far behind, I hope you’re still “in business”.
We ARE still in business Courtney, thanks! And even better now we know the term ‘road apples’.
Can anybody supply confirmation (or refutation) of the historical information asserted in Mr Selfridge? It seems plausible enough, until you remember that perfume departments are more insidiously stinky than a street full of Edwardian effluent.
I can’t make head or tail of some of the following email from Emilie. Mostly because I am too old for some of the internets that the young people use, although going by the first sentence must be too old for the English grammar and syntax that the young people use as well:
On my instagram I put up a photo of what I changed one if my friends names on Snapchat.
[Can someone translate this for me, please?]
And in a couple of minutes a dude (a random one. Not one of my followers) said he will give me a shoutout. And I had to add him on Snapchat. So I did. And I sent him a Snapchat asking when he was going to shoutout.
He didn’t reply to my question but soon when it was morning where he was, he sent me a snapchat of his erect cock with the Snapchat like “morning dick”. I replied to him saying “what the fuck is your problem?”
The next day, he sent me another one saying “hey baby u up?” I replied with the same I did before.
A couple of hours passed again with another picture of his cock. I did not reply this time but told my younger brother, he then sent him snapchats saying things like “I’m going to rape you up the arse with a razor blade”.
The dude that is sending me these is under 18 so it’s illegal. Now thus brings me to my question, what are some fun ways to get back at him? But I only have one line.
Look, Emilie. You’ve left me no choice but to channel your grandmother and send you a Telegram of Truth:
FORGET ONE-LINE REVENGE ENTAILING HORRIBLE THREATS OF RAPE TO SOMEBODY YOU THINK IS UNDERAGE THOUGH LIKE MANY PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET IS QUITE POSSIBLY NOT ACTUALLY THE AGE YOU THINK HE IS AND JUST REMOVE THIS PERSON AS A CONTACT STOP FOR GOD’S SAKE CHILD WISE UP STOP WHAT THE HELL DID YOU THINK MOST PEOPLE USE SNAPCHAT FOR OTHER THAN COCKSHOTS AND WHY IS IT SO IMPORTANT TO YOU TO RECEIVE A SHOUTOUT ON SNAPCHAT WHATEVER THAT IS STOP STOP SNAPCHATTING UNTIL YOU CAN BE TRUSTED TO SNAPCHAT AT WHICH POINT YOU PROBABLY WON’T EVEN CARE ABOUT SNAPCHAT ANY MORE STOP
That would be a really expensive telegram, but back in my day, when communications cost, people were far more judicious about how they used them.
Snapchat, indeed. Tsk. Now hand me my barley sugars.
Following my ‘It’s easy to sew buttons back onto your clothes, dammit!’ rant in AMT273, here comes a not unexpected question from James:
Helen, what’s the best way to sew a button on a shirt?
James, I can’t be arsed to explain it to you, so I refer you to this very thorough illustrated tutorial. Or you can ask a Pearly King or Queen; they’ve got plenty of experience.
We apologise to Dave for answering his question about book prices in AMT270 in a way that did not please him to the fullest extent:
I would have preferred to hear your views on why the author of a book was selling at a price he knew could be beaten, signed or not, by a retailer he must have had some agreement with via the publisher. He also has a choice of whether to sell his books to Amazon or not.
I know it is not quite as simple as that but generally, online discount stores only get away with it because the publishing industry sells at a heavily discounted price to them. Or am I missing something?
You are a bit, Dave. Firstly, you’re assuming that authors have dominion over such things, whereas practically none of them do. In the corridors of publishing power, authors are the carpet tiles.
But why would authors, and publishers, choose not to sell through Amazon? Both authors and publishers want to sell as many copies through as many retail outlets as possible, and Amazon has become the biggest book-seller of them all.
Secondly, you’re getting yourself into a muddle about the pricing structure, so here’s a riveting precis of how that works:
The publishers set a cost price for a book. Every retailer that stocks said book buys copies for the cost price.
The publishers also set a Recommended Retail Price (RRP), but note the word ‘recommended’: retailers aren’t obliged to sell a product for that price.
Amazon has lower overheads than other retailers, hence it is able to slash the price of a book so it’s barely more than the RRP. Other book retailers then have the choice of selling fewer books, or trying to match the market-dominating price-slashers Amazon. But whichever tack they take, they’re making a loss, and this is one reason why there are far fewer booksellers around nowadays.
None of this should affect the author if they have a good contract in place, in which it is specified that the author is to be paid royalties as a percentage of the RRP, not the sales price. (Of course the usual reason why none of this affects authors is because hardly any sell enough copies of their book to receive any royalties at all.)
Hope that clarifies, Dave. It IS quite a dry explanation, so perhaps now you’ll be happier that we took a different tack answering your question in the first place.
While we reel from the ‘IT’S OCTOBER ALREADY, HOW THE HELL DID THAT HAPPEN?’ feeling, get stuck into Answer Me This! Episode 273:
Today we tackle such subjects as:
Olly Mann vs Eminem
old men vs dead men
Shakespeare vs Star Trek
“carriages at 11pm”
spare buttons
Michelin Guides
naming planets
and The Fat Duck.
Furthermore: Olly is not a particularly discerning restaurant reviewer; the surprise element means Helen is bound for glory in rap battles; and Martin the Sound Man’s not going to helm an AMT Album about rocket science any time soon, though you can buy his new concept album Kill It With Fire – all proceeds go to the charity Arts Emergency.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices or Android) we continue our discussion about Michelin-starred restaurants, but somehow end up considering which wines to pair with a Gregg’s pasty. These things happen.
If you want more AMT to happen, send in your QUESTIONS: leave voicemails on the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis) and send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
And please do give squarespace.com a whirl: they have not only sponsored today’s episode of AMT, but are also offering you a 10% discount off their service if you use the code Answer10, after you’ve had your two weeks’ free website-building fun.
See you next Thursday,
Helen & Olly
AMT273 Child-Friendly Rating: 94%. Light on bawdy-talk and it was SO close to being a swear-free episode until we mentioned of the planet Uranus, causing Martin the Sound Man to make up some sweary planet names of his own. A couple of low-impact swears thereafter. Also a passing reference to bongs, but not one encouraging kids to use them.
We’ve received this question many times before at AMT – eg here and here – but it is one of THE big questions, so here it is again in its latest form from “a very sad and confused” Emily from Aberdeen:
What’s the best way to deal with a break up when the person is your first love? I love my boyfriend a lot but I’m not his first love like he is mine, meaning he doesn’t feel quite the same way I do and it’s just too hard so breaking up seems the best thing to do.
However I have no idea how to cope with it (as pathetic as that sounds) and would really appreciate suggestions of how to move on. I’m 18 and just started university and this just seems like the best thing to do.
Aw, Emily, we feel your pain. Luckily, you’re off to university, where everything will be new and different. Though this alone won’t entirely obliterate the pangs of love, it will provide a massive distraction. Throw yourself into all the new activities presented to you; make new friends; cop off with boys (that you then feel you have to avoid for the rest of your degree).
Readers, please go to the comments to offer any further salves to Emily’s pain. While she awaits your advice, she can take the classic route of cranking up the break-up songs and having a good cathartic wail. AMT listeners have already provided a starter playlist, and there’s a near endless supply of suitable soundtracks to Lovelorn Feelings.
We usually enjoy listeners’ gushing emails in private, but we decided to share this one from John because he is kindly offering to make YOU gush from your privates*:
I wanted to say thanks for the amazing podcasts that you’re putting out, every time I listen to one there’s tears of laughter and sometimes shame.
And as I don’t think you get enough gratitude for this I thought why not give you 10% discount in my store. Feel free to let your listeners know as well (open to UK customers only).
All you need to do is go shopping at www.erotic-moment.co.uk [LINK NSFW OBVIOUSLY] and enter the code podcast1 in the gift voucher section upon checkout. Easy.
There’s a selection of thousands of sex toys; I am sure you could find something to suit.
As well as all of this they’re all delivered extra discreetly so no one has any idea what’s inside.
Which is perfect, as it’s only 84 shopping days till Christmas!
*sorry.
NB: This is not a paid endorsement, just an AMT listener offering wares.
In AMT272, Beth of Leighton Buzzard told us she had prepared for the birth of her child by downloading the AMT Holiday to accompany the agonies of labour. Surprisingly, the sound of our voices didn’t compel the baby to stay in the womb forever, because Beth writes:
I just wanted to say thank you. Not only did I enjoy your holiday album during early labour, but I also listened to your 19 September podcast whilst in the delivery room, 40 hours into (induced) labour and just 2 hours before my baby girl was born.
I didn’t have an epidural so the distraction was very welcome. No bad reviews from me!
As a doting new mum, I couldn’t resist including a picture of your youngest fan, Jennifer, who was born at 3.22am on Friday 20 September:
All together now: awwwwwwwwwwwww. And, in sympathy with Beth’s 42-hour labour, owwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.
Answer Me This! Podcast 