Author Archive
March 22, 2011
** Click here for Episode 171 **
Here’s a question from Adam in London, who does not want to be mistaken for all you other Adams from London. He says:
In episode 170 you talked about the other Martin Austwick that came up on Helen’s Twitter suggest list. This got me thinking about my name and other people with it.
My name is Adam Clifford. Unfortunately I share my name with a goofy looking American gay porn star. If you go to adamclifford.com (DON’T!) there he is in all his… Erm… Splendid glory. He also ‘proudly’ comes up on Google image searches for my name.
So, answer me this!
1) Is there anything I can do to get my name back for me from him or Google? If it was a Hollywood star then I wouldn’t mind, but a PORN STAR?! Obviously I’m worried about a potential employer googling me and being faced with this monstrosity, not giving me the job of my dreams or reporting me to the police. What can I do?
2) Why, as a porn star, would you use your own name? I’m assuming it’s his real name, I can’t imagine anyone choosing a name as bland as mine for sexy things. Couldn’t he just choose another name?
In answer to your first question, Adam, you clearly need to do something that will get you even more Google-juice than a porn star. This may take a while, though, and depending upon your chosen method, might be even more damaging to your employment prospects.
Secondly, many male porn actors do seem to go by normal names. Perhaps, like them, Adam Clifford feels no shame about his profession; perhaps, like them, Adam Clifford does not, like the rest of us, relish the opportunity to take a name containing the word ‘Donkey’ or ending in ‘xxxx’; perhaps, like them, Adam Clifford couldn’t ‘just choose another name’ because he has absolutely no imagination. He is a non-stop boffing-machine and nothing else.
Therefore I suggest to you, Adam Clifford (the SFW Adam Clifford), that instead YOU change your name. You say yourself that it is bland; well, release yourself from the too-many-Adam-Cliffords problem by going for something a little jazzier, ideally which will also impress potential employers at the same time. Captain Briefcase might work.
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Tags:prawn
Posted in Answer Us Back! Your time to opine, extracurricular questions | 3 Comments »
March 22, 2011
** Click here for Episode 171 **
Here’s an email from someone who, understandably, wishes to remain anonymous. So we will know him only as Sexy Windmaster:
I have this friend, who shall remain nameless, and whilst trying out a few movements garnered from my Kama Sutra app, I happened to experience an auditory discharge* at the very moment of entry.
I tried to ignore it, but she fell about in laughter and said I had ruined the moment and she might never be able to have sex with me again. I was left tumescent and embarrassed in Somerset.
My question is, what is the correct etiquette for dealing with accidental discharges, whether auditory or otherwise, in the height of passion? If a raspberry or fanny fart is perfectly acceptable, why should a normal fart raise such strong objections?
My own thoughts are that it’s a very messy business and, a bit like living on a farm, it’s all part of a rich tapestry, farts and all.
Readers, I don’t know your thoughts on such matters – personally, my years of service in Sevenoaks School’s Needlework Club means that farting and tapestry NEVER go together – but Sexy Windymaster needs to know them, in order to avoid being blue-balled by his own bowels again. Proceed to the comments, and apprise him upon the most debonair way to excuse a trump without spoiling the sexytime. A noise can be laughed off, but a stench is more difficult to excuse in the moment, so you’re going to have to work hard on this problem.
* I assume he means an audible discharge, rather than his ears produced a parp.
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Posted in extracurricular questions, User-generated answers | 3 Comments »
March 22, 2011
** Click here for Episode 171 **
Today’s correspondent, David from Paisley, is a postman who listens to Answer Me This! on his rounds. That’s not relevant to his question; it is just the sort of detail which intrigues us. His question, meanwhile, is the sort which intrigues the world throughout all of time?
Little thing that I have recently been discussing with my girlfriend: what is the difference between being in love and loving someone? I don’t think there is a difference, but she says there is a massive difference! I am confused!
This is a serious matter (especially if they’re arguing about the difference because David’s girlfriend is telling him that she loves him but is not IN love with him and will he please stop calling and stop sending flowers and stop standing outside her bedroom window with a boombox). Therefore, commentariat, mobilise yourselves to instruct David of the difference; or, conversely, to instruct the girlfriend of the non-difference.
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Posted in extracurricular questions, User-generated answers | 6 Comments »
March 17, 2011
Dear Team AMT,
We hope you are all safe and sound wherever you are in the world, and that this year’s trend for End of Days-style disasters has left you unscathed. We can’t stave off the apocalypse, but we can offer you 29 minutes of distraction while you wait, in the form of Answer Me This! Episode 171:
This classic episode is available to BUY NOW for just 79p at the Answer Me This! Store, through a secure server, without DRM restriction. CLICK HERE to find out more and support our podcast. (This helps keep our most recent episodes free)
On today’s conversational dance-card are topics including:
Brian Wilson
broken teapots
Kafka
5ive vs. Jesus Lizard
Dorothy Wordsworth vs. Macaulay Culkin
William Wordsworth vs. Jade Goody
stupid shoe-shaped planters
fairy codmothers
Kate Middleton’s genetically modified footmen
Harold Wilson’s lying wife
Pandaemonium
Fifteen to One
Christ’s comeback tour
and
flesh-trampolining.
Plus: Olly suggests that Cinderella be a bit more nonconformist in her eveningwear style if she wants to make a splash in society; Helen’s green brogues make her an outcast in the Apple Store; and Martin the Sound Man’s dainty guts could bring in the win if any of us decided to go on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?. Major Charles Ingram, eat your heartfart out!
Today’s Bit of Crap on the App is a discussion upon whether sentimental idiots like Olly should cook peas for their cats, or whether said beasts should learn to tough it out. You can get that app for iPhone or Android for mere pence; but remember, it costs nothing to send us your QUESTIONS, so squander a load of no-money by leaving voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or findanswermethis on Skype) or emailing answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. We may not be rich, but a wealth of questions is all the wealth we need. (Well, it isn’t, but that’s hardly your problem, is it? And as soon as we get our Playdate with the Stars agency off the ground, we’ll be rolling in the good stuff.)
See you next week!
Helen & Olly
Tags:apocalypse, bands, Blankety Blank, body, bottoms, Buddha, Bullseye, bums, Chess, Cinderella, closing down sales, crockery, Crystal Maze, DFS, Dorothy Wordsworth, Duke of Edinburgh, euphemisms, ex-military, fairy godmothers, fairy tales, fiction, footwear, frogs, Fun House, furniture, game shows, garden centres, gardening, genitalia, godparents, gynaecologists, gynaecology, hierarchy, horticulture, Houses of Parliament, HP Sauce, incest, Jade Goody, John Hannah, kings, kitchenware, Linus Roache, literature, Lizzie Roper, Macaulay Culkin, medical, mice, Michael Jackson, military, military operations, monarchy, music, names, ornaments, overstepping boundaries, physique, plants, poetry, politicians, pop, Prince Philip, princes, prizes, professionalism, quizzes, recession, retail, reunions, romantic poets, royalty, sales, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, sex, shoes, shops, siblings, Steps, stores, tea, teapots, Telford, telly, the Queen, TV, vagina, weddings, West Midlands, William Wordsworth, Wills'n'Kate
Posted in PODCASTS | 6 Comments »
March 16, 2011
** Click here for Episode 170 **
Jon in Sussex:
Just listened to 170 when you ask if anyone had named a military operation. Well I haven’t, but when I was 22 I did get to name four housing estates in London. I got packed off to the local library for a day or two to find anything of interest in the local history and then drew up a shortlist and made my recommendation.
Unfortunately, some of the more obscure names were rejected, such as Ethlered, Immin and Peada – that last one would have been a bit of a disaster!
So, answer me this: if you could rename the town where you were born, what would you go for and why?
I wonder whether Tunbridge Wells would continue to be such a stuffed shirt if it was renamed Zaltzman-on-Sea (yes, I know it’s miles from the sea, but it’s nice to give people hope (Hope that one day, rising sea levels will take care of the place.)).
Kids, it’s time for you to mosey to the comments to play Fantasy Council Expensive Rebranding Exercise. The best one gets to spearhead a letter campaign to the Governer of St Petersburg to see if they’d be up for another name change, seeing as it’s been 20 years since the last one.
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Posted in extracurricular questions, User-generated answers | 4 Comments »
March 16, 2011
** Click here for Episode 170 **
Well obviously we’re not giving away a car. But it looks like you people are more than capable of winning them elsewhere. Several of you have sent in stories, from which we can deduce the following common themes: 1. you nearly threw away the winning ticket; 2. you didn’t believe it anyway; 3. you couldn’t afford to keep the free car anyway.
Here are a couple of your tales of free cars. (more…)
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March 16, 2011
** Click here for Episode 170 **
Our next correspondent wishes to remain anonymous. And for good reason: because he’s only a bona fide PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR! So let’s call him Magnum, because we so rarely get the opportunity to call someone that:
Many Police Services utilise the skills of Private Investigation and research firms.
This is because (and I do not mean to criticise) most Detectives are not aware of the wealth of information available on-line both in the UK and internationally and they rely on their special powers (legislatively, not super-heroes!) to solve crimes.
My employers have assisted with intelligence to convict terrorists, paedophiles and a wealth of money laundering and financial crimes.
Additionally many large insurers, investors and mega national companies instruct us as investigators to gather evidence in order to pursue multi-million pound frauds etc perpetrated against them through the civil courts, as Police cannot or will not investigate such matters.
It sounds like Magnum here has a bit of a chip on his shoulder about the police. We like to think that at 6pm they all lay down truncheons and plastic disguises, and head out to a car park to settle their differences with a big dance battle.
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Posted in Answer Us Back! Your time to opine, inside scoop | Leave a Comment »
March 10, 2011
Hello chums,
Round here, we thought there’s no way the opening ceremony of next year’s London Olympics could be anything but a damp squib. Given our Glorious Nation’s inherent shyness, we assumed we’d be lucky if the expected pageantry ascended such heights as the whole squad doing the David Brent dance, with commentary from Myleene Klass wearing a low-cut dress and speaking only in adjectives. But au contraire, we were much mistaken! Here, in Answer Me This! Episode 170, we discover what’s going to make the Olympics go with a bang:
This classic episode is available to BUY NOW for just 79p at the Answer Me This! Store, through a secure server, without DRM restriction. CLICK HERE to find out more and support our podcast. (This helps keep our most recent episodes free)
Accompanying the episode, like a flock of primary schoolkids wearing national dress, are topics including:
Booze Britain
Ibiza Uncovered
Winston Churchill
coffee stirrers
Jaws
dog trends
Wiesbaden
Danger UXB
monkeys in clothes
fancy-dress football
the abandoned bomb register
Jonathan Creek’s downtime
illegal snoods
the other Martin Austwick
the real-life Miss Marple
dihydroxyacetone
and
the Maillard Reaction.
Plus: Olly is silenced by booze; Helen’s not going to be winning a car anytime soon; and Martin the Sound Man intimates that the dinosaurs might have survived, if only someone had bought them little pink coats with diamante on. Martin would also like you to know that his latest album is out today, which is sadly diamante-free but not without other compensations – download or buy a special edition physical copy here.
Today’s Bit of Crap on the App is the Deleted Scenes from our chat about amateur detectives. How does one get from the FBI to Paul Ross in five easy steps? Find out for yourself on iPhone or Android.
We be wanting your QUESTIONS for next week, so send them as voicemails to the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or findanswermethis on Skype) or emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. And you know what else is next week? Red Nose Day! So if you fancy a bit of pain-free fundraising (ie no climbing mountains or digging latrines or songs involving Bob Geldof), please come along to Literary Death Match on Friday 18th March, in which Helen joins Spaced alumna Jessica StevensonHynes to judge the bookish equivalent of sumo wrestling.
Helen & Olly
Tags:Agatha Christie, alcohol, Amanda Lamb, amateur detectives, animal clothing, animals, aquatic life, army, Barack Obama, bombs, booze, cars, Churchill, Cliff Richard, clothing, coffee, coffee machines, crime, Crystal Palace, Dave Gorman, David Beckham, David Bowie, detectives, dogs, drinking, emoticons, excrement, explosives, fake tan, FBI, fish, football, genitals, Germany, Graham Norton, Hitchen, Ibiza, implements, inebriation, investigation, Iraq, ITV, Jessica Fletcher, Jonathan Creek, London, London 2012, London Olympics, Luftwaffe, Madame Tussauds, marine life, military, Miriam Margolyes, Miss Marple, missions, MoD, murder, Murder She Wrote, Nazis, office politics, ointment, Olly's fake tan, Olympic Stadium, Olympics, Paul Ross, pets, Poirot, poo, prizes, San Francisco, scat, Scotland, sharks, Sharon Marshall, Sherlock, shopping malls, sister cities, skin, sleuth, sports, stupid stupid stupid, tanning, telly, the Blitz, the FA, tights, towns, Tunbridge Wells, TV, twin towns, underwear, unexploded bombs, wangs, waxworks, weapons, Winston Churchill, WWI, WWII
Posted in PODCASTS | 2 Comments »
March 10, 2011
** Click here for Episode 169 **
Nom nom nom, it’s time to chew on the following question from John in North Hollywood:
I am 28 years old and a pretty good cook, but I still enjoy eating an entire box of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese Dinner now and then. I know, objectively, that it is vile. It’s a totally unnatural hue of orange and doesn’t actually taste much like cheese, but it’s one of the first things I ever learned how to cook and has become a comfort food.
So answer me this: What are your nostalgic comfort foods?
Here at AMT Kitchen (twinned with the heart attack ward), we all enjoy a potato waffle or five. Martin the Sound Man also loves to tuck into a nice big bag of pork scratchings, like the good Midlands boy that he is. If you too have a snack that reminds you of the cosy embrace of childhood but will probably kill you before you reach middle age, please tell us about it in the comments.
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Posted in extracurricular questions, User-generated answers | 2 Comments »
March 10, 2011
** Click here for Episode 169 **
Help is at hand for the aspiring author wife of questioneer Dave from Colorado from last week, stymied by her own lethargy. Lewis from Cardiff sympathises:
Much like Dave’s wife from episode 169 I have the same problem of tremendous procrastination. This caused me to have to learn an entire module for my Chemistry degree in just 2 days. However I did find something to help called the Magic Work Cycle.
Simply put, it’s a way of dividing every hour into 30 minutes of hard work and 30 minutes of goofing around, work solidly for just 30 minutes (which we’ll all agree isn’t a long period of time) then when the time is up you can do whatever you want for the next 30 minutes (I suggest an episode of South Park), repeat this for a few hours and you’ll be shocked how much gets done.
The promise of half an hour of relaxation helps keep you motivated through the 30 minutes of work, so motivated in fact that I got far more done in 30 minutes using this method than I have ever know myself to in a usual procrastination filled hour. I’m sure this method will help Dave’s wife as I am living proof that this works, in that modules exam I got a 2:1, narrowly missing a first.
Pat from Canada also recommends the following kick up the arse in book form:
I suggest that he get her a book called The Artist’s Way
by Julia Cameron.
I read this book a couple of years ago as part of a course and found it to be both inspiring and comforting. It has a series of exercises and assignments that you complete each week and through this you identify where you are sabotaging yourself and you can have a lot a fun. I did with with a group of 10 women and couldn’t wait to get to the next chapter. Julia Cameron wrote this book about 25 years ago and many artists and celebrities have cited it as a great way to get your act together.
It’s true – I’ve even heard that Patsy Kensit uses it, and she’s a creative force to be reckoned with.
However I still think that Mrs Dave would be far more productive if she didn’t have the comforts of infinite time and financial support. Ringfence your money and force her to take a dead-end job, Dave, and she’ll be bound to use her few remaining spare hours far more productively.
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Posted in Answer Us Back! Your time to opine | Leave a Comment »
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