Author Archive
May 5, 2010
** Click here for Episode 133 **
Here is a plea from Annabelle in Durham, North Carolina:
I am a junior in high school in the US. This summer, I am getting paid by the State Department to go to Russia for two months and learn Russian (I feel just like James Bond).
They have sent me various safety handbooks, mostly full of slightly scary things like “We are not saying to lie if you are gay and say you are straight while in Russia, we are just saying the Russian police like to brutalize pride parades” and “Dealing with misogyny and sexual harassment while in Russia”, as well as several things that don’t really affect me, telling us how much trouble we will be in for drinking or going to clubs.
Answer me this: is there any advice you would give to a teenage girl regarding being in Russia?
Well, when I was 15 I went to stay in a suburb of Moscow, where I learnt that to fit in with the native teenage girls you need to wear tinsel in your hair and be an enthusiastic advocate of Bon Jovi. But times have changed since 1995 – just ask the band Menswe@r – so if any of you have more up-to-date advice for Annabelle in her Russian adventure, please bestow it in the comments.
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Posted in extracurricular questions, User-generated answers | 3 Comments »
May 4, 2010
** Click here for Episode 133 **
Last week we wondered how Yoda’s syntactical mischief is expressed in other languages. Tom from Battersea sheds light on the linguistic larkery:
Re: Star Wars in other languages, I couldn’t resist piping up, as I spent a year in my early twenties making replica light sabers in an Umbrian hill town. I was so poor I lived off stale panettone and coffee for weeks at a time, and it was so cold in my tiny flat that the oil set hard in my cupboard.
Wait right there, Tom – this sounds like a promising scenario for a rom com! Do any of you readers have an in with the greenlight guy at Universal?
Il Maestro Yoda does indeed fuck around with standard sentence structure in the same way as in English, sticking the verb at the end for wise effect. For example, instead of saying ‘TU HAI molta fretta giovane Jedi’ [you have much haste, young Jedi], he says, ‘Molta fretta HAI TU, giovane Jedi’ [much haste have you, young Jedi].
It is a different bloke who did the dubbing for the recent ‘prequel’ Star Wars films, but he tries to maintain the same sound as the bloke who dubbed the original films. In general, Yoda’s voice is less guttural in Italian than the English voice, less alien, and more wise old man, sort of thing – they’re trying to recreate an Umberto-Eco-after-six-hours-of-armchair-discussion at an Italian arts festival type of character, rather than the grumpy persona George Lucas originally went for.
Sounds much better than the original! Umberto Eco would certainly be a pleasing addition to the Star Wars oeuvre, although probably has less appeal than Yoda in the range of spin-off collectable dolls and backpacks.
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Tags:movies, Star Wars
Posted in Answer Us Back! Your time to opine | 1 Comment »
May 4, 2010
** Click here for Episode 133 **
Everyone, thankyou so much for your lovely messages regarding my betrothal to Martin the Sound Man. And apologies for taking him off the market.
We’ve no idea when or where the nuptials will take place as yet, but we’ve currently no plans for the cynical scheme suggested by Ben from Stafford:
When you get married could you guys have a MASSIVE wedding party somewhere in the country and invite all the Answer Me This! fans to wish you a happy life and charge people to get in to ease on your cost?
No chance, Ben; I’m not Jordan!
Naomi from France also has a suggestion:
At Helen and Martin’s wedding, you could play ALL the stuff they’ve ever said about marriage on AMTP, and then have a Big Brother type voice saying: ‘And look at them now!’
Again: NO.
Happily, we’re not the only new engagement; congratulations are in order for young CJ from Wales:
On the 23rd March I proposed to my now fiancee Emma-Lea who I love and would do anything in the world for! I love her so much and I trust her with my life, to prove this I have told her more about me than ANYONE else will ever know, I told her EVERYTHING I can think of and remember and then told her my facebook password because I love and trust her so much! She has told me everything and her facebook password too! We’re now in the position where we can tell each other everything and we have each other’s passwords to facebook which our lives are virtually on so Helen and Martin answer me this, do you or would you tell one another everything and share your passwords where by you could destroy the others life if you so wished but love and trust each other enough to know neither of you would ever do that?
Aaah CJ, when you get to our age it’s enough of a struggle just to remember your own password.
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Tags:love, marriage, no, private lives, weddings
Posted in extracurricular questions | Leave a Comment »
April 29, 2010
ELECTION ELECTION WINEHOUSE’SBROKENBOOBS ELECTION ELECTION ELECTION KATONA. That’s all we’re hearing about this week, and frankly it’s wearing us down. Listeners, perhaps you feel the same; or perhaps you don’t live in Britain and therefore didn’t even know there was an election on. And now that you do, you couldn’t give a tortoise’s bra about it. But hopefully we can all agree to settle down and listen to Answer Me This! Episode 133, before returning to deface Tory pamphlets/whatever the hell you non-Brit-residents were up to:
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)
This week we speak of:
Tory tax breaks
Smith Kendon travel sweets
Kenneth Tynan
Scotney Castle
Birmingham Selfridges
Tate Modern
satnav wipes
sphygmomanometers
sexting vs. proper infidelity
Facebook vs. Friends Reunited
syntax vs. inflections
souvenir pencils
the Paris Expo
James
Citizen Kane
Sarah Kane
Hamlet II
In the Night Garden
and
Ozwald Boateng.
Plus: Olly yearns for the rural life, tilling the soil and raising livestock; Helen is shocked by the potty-mouth affecting Woman’s Hour; and Martin the Sound Man seems to know more about blood pressure than the average district nurse. And some news that might be more exciting to us than to you, and more exciting to our mums than anyone else.
You know what’s definitely exciting all round, though? Your QUESTIONS! So give us a thrill by sending them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com, Skype ID answermethis or our question line 0208 123 5877. Our timbers are shivering in anticipation.
See you next Thursday!
Helen and Olly
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Olly models Helen's fake engagement ring
Tags:1990s, bad plans, BBC, blood, careers, cars, confectionery, cybersex, David Cameron, David Mamet, dogging, Eiffel tower, Facebook, films, food, Hamlet, infidelity, James, jobs, Justin Bieber, linguistics, love, marriage, medical, money, motoring, movies, National Trust, news, old people, Paris, politics, pop, pregnancy, proposals, Radio 4, revivals, Ruth Rendell, school, Shakespeare, sheep, Sit Down, spoilers, Star Wars, Steve Coogan, swearing, syntax, tax, telly, theatre, tourism, travel, Yoda
Posted in PODCASTS | 22 Comments »
April 29, 2010
** Click here for Episode 132 **
I’m sure most hot-blooded ladies are turned on by the sight of Christian Bale running around with the chainsaw then talking to Willem Dafoe, but evidently not Emma, who says:
Some years back, when I was a singleton and American Psycho was in cinemas, I agreed to a date with a seemingly normal chap. When he called to arrange the data he was pretty insistent that American Psycho would make an ideal first date film. I did not agree. Somehow I feel that female mutilation, extreme violence and rape do not make the best start to a relationship. In the end I told him I would rather not go out with him at all and, after a few more phone calls to try and sell me the American-Psycho-ideal-first-date thing, he gave up. I still feel that I probably escaped a bit of a nutter.
So Helen and Olly please answer me this: What is the worst date you have ever been on, or almost been on?
It’s hard for any of us to answer this question: partly because we’ve all been in our respective relationships that dating seems a very distant memory; partly because we’re English and, back in our single prime, people here never went on dates – they just got drunk and molested each other. That was the native form, until internet dating came along and made people more courtly/completely perplexed by the whole process.
But hey, let’s kick off our own My Very Worst Date-style thread right here: readers, head to the comments and blab about YOUR own dating horror-stories. I could pretend it was for some noble purpose, but it’s obviously so we can all have a jolly chuckle at your expense. Go forth and enable.
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Tags:Fail, romance, yuk
Posted in extracurricular questions, User-generated answers | 4 Comments »
April 22, 2010
Rejoice, listeners, for in Answer Me This! Episode 132, your prayers have at last been answered! Well, some of the prayers of some of you, specifically those asking if we could get Andy Zaltzman onto the show. Any other prayers will continue to be in vain, unless we’re backing the wrong horse atheism-wise.
Anyway. It took a lot of form-filling, tear-drenched phone-calls to his agent, and complaining to Mum; but here Andy is:
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)
Inevitably, whenever and wherever Andy speaks, he speaks of sport. But we also manage to shoehorn in:
Wine Gums
Gordon Brown
Denise Van Outen
cricket vs. blogging
Andy vs. Liverpool
curry vs. Martin the Sound Man
surveyors vs. honesty
football hooligans vs. Johannesburg
Beth Ditto
Kim Jong-Il
the Sistine Chapel
pebbledash
and
the real problem with George W Bush.
Plus: Olly decries the cuisine of Spain; Helen tells you how best to decide your vote in the forthcoming election; Martin the Sound Man lines up a new band name for when in-fighting rends The Sound of the Ladies apart; and Andy comes up with an all-too-literal means of how to ask for a lady’s hand in marriage. His wife’s knitting career was brought to an abrupt end when he plighted his troth.
If you want a bit more of Andy in your life, then you can: go to see him do stand-up; listen to his podcast The Bugle, co-starring John Oliver; read his cricket blog; and buy his book. Or you could try marrying in to the Zaltzman family, but almost all vacancies have been filled.
The AMT service returns to normal next week, so please send in your QUESTIONS for the usual treatment – email them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave a voicemail on Skype ID answermethis or our question line 0208 123 5877. No sport, we beg of you. This episode contained more than the entirety of the rest of our lives combined.
See you next Thursday!
Helen and Olly
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Tags:2 girls 1 cup, Andy Zaltzman, art, bowels, childhood, confectionery, constitution, cricket, decor, family, fathers, food, football, George W Bush, humour, hypocrisy, John Oliver, lies, Michelangelo, monarchy, politics, Queen, relationships, Richard Pryor, royalty, rugby, satire, school, siblings, solemnity, South Africa, sport, The Big Breakfast, The Bugle, TV, US politics, World Cup, yuk
Posted in PODCASTS, special guest episode | 6 Comments »
April 21, 2010
** Click here for Episode 131 **
Hal in Liverpool has written in to shed some light on the abiding ‘No mobiles in petrol stations’ mystery:
When I was working for Vodafone last year, I was taught that the real reason you’re not allowed to use your mobile at petrol stations is that on old fashioned non-digital counters on the pump could be manipulated by mobile phone signals. Sounds like bollocks, but worth throwing my hat into the ring.
Richard independently corroborates Hal’s story:
I heard somewhere that there was one particular model of petrol pump that was affected by mobiles and would register and incorrect amount of petrol dispensed when a mobile was used in the vicinity. Petrol companies didn’t want this knowledge to get out so banned them for safety reasons instead.
Sorry, can’t cite you a source as I heard this a good few years ago. It’s probably rubbish anyway.
It’s no more rubbish-sounding than the previous explanations; but frankly neither the petrol nor mobile phone industries are renowned for their transparency. Any of you who work for either and fancy playing snitch, place a comment below to tell us the truth behind this folly.
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Posted in Answer Us Back! Your time to opine | 1 Comment »
April 21, 2010
** Click here for Episode 131 **
Here’s some retro feedback from Alex in Sunderland:
I was just listening to an old podcast of yours about school rumours and thought you’d like to know an amusing one from my school.
When I was about 15, some lad in my year claimed, as you do, that he had connections to the local mafia and told explicit lies detailing how he and his father had brokered a drug deal, among other piles of bullshit.
In parody of this, my friend decided to spread the rumour that he had connections with an international Russian gun-running cartel and he had a shipment of AK-47 assault rifles stashed in his house, which we found pretty funny at the time but nobody really took seriously for obvious reasons.
A couple of days later, during English, the deputy head of the school came into my lesson and removed my friend from the lesson. He looked angry so we assumed he’d done something pretty bad. Turns out this rumour about the Russian gun traffickers had worked its way to the faculty and my friend had been seriously questioned by the deputy head as to the whereabouts of these weapons he had. He was threatened with expulsion and the police were briefly involved but thankfully the whole student population who weren’t retarded vouched for this being a rumour.
I’m aware this sounds like bullshit but I will swear it’s the truth.
Just like when one of my school cohorts was rumoured to be shagging the head of music; this sounded like bullshit, until the head of music very suddenly left ‘to teach in Brazil’ and said cohort similarly vanished to complete her A-levels at a convent or something.
Anyone else who has some not-bullshit school rumours they wish to share, tell the whole class by taking it to the comments.
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Tags:school
Posted in Answer Us Back! Your time to opine | Leave a Comment »
April 21, 2010
** Click here for Episode 131 **
Watch out, everybody! There’s another volcano erupting, but this one is unlikely to leave the European airline industry in tatters. However, weird noisy West End shows are not going to escape the blast from Steve in Cheltenham:
re Episode 131 theme tune: “Who the hell is still buying tickets to Stomp?”
Can I just say, fuck me, this should be the big news story, bigger than the elections.
I’ve hated Stomp all my life, everything they stand for, their unoriginal art of making music accessible to bundles of tramps and the unemployed. Anyone who bangs spoons on a radiator for a living is a twat in my opinion, get a real fucking job.
It’s as if Stomp has tapped into a dormant Neanderthal gene, the one that used to drive us to make hideous dins perhaps to ward off sabre-toothed cats, but evolution said sabre-toothed cats love drum and bass; you dickwads are better off making sharp pointy things to throw at the cats instead of enticing them into your drum circle like it’s a drug-fuelled rave.
Now, if Stomp were a nomadic cartload of chimpanzees who had created this method of music in order to exchange its audience for food, then
fine, I’d endure five quid’s-worth on a seasonal basis just to see the chimps smile again as they tuck into corn husks and half-apples.
Kaboom! Watch Steve go!
I’ve never seen Stomp, but I can’t pretend it has ever affected my life in any way, ever. I think Steve might – might – be overreacting. However I’m afraid to tell him that for fear of setting off a pyroclastic flow of rage that sweeps eastwards from Cheltenham to wipe out Crystal Palace.
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Posted in Answer Us Back! Your time to opine | 1 Comment »
April 21, 2010
** Click here for Episode 131 **
With the sun out and the May Day bank holiday fast approaching, this email from Jim from Tewkesbury seems timely:
Referring to the swan- and duck-related banter in episode 129, I thought I
would share with you a game invented by a lady of my late acquaintance, namely Duck Racing (the game, not the lady).
This involves throwing bread at one side of the pond, then when all the competitors have gathered together, throwing bread to the other end of the pond. The race is immediately underway and the big stakes can be laid down. Winner takes all.
So, Helen and Olly, answer me this; what do you do to spice things up when indulging in the ever-popular British pastime of “going to some town or village for the afternoon”?
You mean you’ve exhausted the pleasures of the pub/tea-room/post office/churchyard/horse show/National Trust property before the afternoon is out? You must live at the speed of light, Jim from Tewkesbury. But readers, what can you suggest for people looking to adopt this sort of pastime? Head to the comments to tell us all how to enjoy ourselves in the minor conurbations of Great Britain.
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Posted in Answer Us Back! Your time to opine, extracurricular questions, User-generated answers | 1 Comment »
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