Answer Me This! Podcast

** Click here for Episode 137 **

This is one of the sadder emails we’ve received at Answer Me This!:

Dear Helen,

Best of luck to you, Helen. I hope you are able to have everything as you like it.

Seems rather inappropriate to make our usual glib remarks at this juncture; but if any of the rest of you have similar melancholies vexing your pasts and you need to vent, please do so in the comments, and hopefully everyone will feel a bit lighter afterwards.

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** Click here for Episode 134 **

Last week Olly feigned surprise at the trope of files being baked into cakes to enable prison escapes. Sarah in Oklahoma ripostes:

You need to watch more cartoons, Olly! While Bugs doesn’t have a cake with a file he does have a pickaxe and map disguised as a loaf of bread.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMx_RlzR2Ro
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_House_Bunny

Evidently Olly not only needs to watch more cartoons, but also brush up on his Irish history, as observed by Stephen:

The controversial Irish politician Eamonn De Valera escaped from Lincoln Jail using a key smuggled in in a cake.

Thanks Sarah and Stephen! So we’ve now got pickaxes, map-bread and key-cakes, but still no files in cakes. Come on people, anyone know of one? Tell us in the comments! Alternatively you can tell us about the many ridiculous things you’ve tried to smuggle into prisons at one stage or another, but we don’t want anyone to get into trouble.

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** Click here for Episode 134 **

Last week we suggested that Dubai sounds like hell on earth, on the grounds of it being a) super-hot; b) a permanent building site; c) full of drunk Brits with sunstroke. That argument still looks good to us. But not to some of you, least of all Louise in Dubai:

You are so wrong Dubai is brilliant.

Tell you what else is brilliant: commas!

I live here and love it and, helen, it isn’t sexist that much I think you are getting Dubai mixed up with saudi arabia where women aren’t even allowed to drive. Dubai isn’t that hot last winter it got down to 12C and last summer it got up to 60C and you can go back to the UK. It’s not Dubai’s fault that tourists don’t check the temperatures.

PLEASE can you apologize to the whole of Dubai.

I could. But it would literally mean nothing.

Then we received the following counter-argument from Joe in Dubai:

i thought i would pass on my knowledge after being in Dubai for 12 years.

PS it really is hell on earth dont ever come here because you will be ripped off and disappointed. 😀

Well, now we don’t know whom to believe! Mike in Dubai, your email is the tiebreaker:

Apropos your ill informed rant about Dubai last week:-

– stop right there, Mike! I think you’ll find our rant was addressed to stupid Brits going over to abuse Dubai and forgetting that they are still expected to remain civilised, even though it’s sunny there.

Answer Me This:
Have any of you ever been to Dubai?
If you should wish to venture here I will gladly show you the old preserved heritage areas; the two hotels, apartments and office in the Burj Khalifa and the freedom which women enjoy – both local and visitors.

It’s really not the most appealing holiday prospect to any of us, but ta ever so for the offer.

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** 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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** 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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** Click here for Episode 130 **

Uh oh, have we got a fight brewing? Listener Nigel is taking issue with Dr Martin Austwick’s science of lightsabers:

The sharp pointy bit of the lightsaber may be made of light but it is not transparent hence does not allow light to pass through it.
Light from another source would not pass through the saber as with any opaque object and it would therefore cast a shadow.

Did they teach you nothing during your DPhil, Martin? Did you buy your doctorate off the internet? You’ll be attracting looks of scorn at the next Institute of Physics beetle drive. How embarrassing.

Meanwhile Adam from Tasmania was inspired to write in by Henry’s tale of semen cologne:

After hearing of the interesting scent that guy used in Episode 130, I was reminded of an interesting perfume that was mentioned in a blog I read recently.
Why dont you have a look and tell me what you think?
http://www.smellmeand.com/gb/#/home/

I AM TOO FRIGHTENED TO LOOK. But you guys go right ahead. We are not responsible for the content of external websites etc etc…

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