Someone might as well benefit from a sad situation, but Mark in Portland, Oregon‘s conscience is piquing him:
When we saw that Leonard Cohen was coming to Portland, we were excited. Then we saw that tickets were over $120 each! I’m sure this is his last tour and I was sad not to be going.
Then a few weeks ago, my friend told me that his mother had tickets to the show, but she had died unexpectedly and wanted us to have her tickets. We are at once embarrassed and grateful for this awkward opportunity.
We want to honor my best friend’s mom somehow, so we feel like we aren’t just somehow benefitting from a wonderful person’s death.
So, answer me this: what should we do to enjoy the show without feeling like total assholes?
Ask your friend whether there was a good cause which was particularly dear to his mother and donate the equivalent ticket money to them, or to a charity whose mission is to prevent whatever caused her unexpected death. Also check whether you can be any help to your friend in sorting out her estate – to take some of the weight off his shoulders, not just so you can rifle through her collection of Leonard Cohen records.
Of all the adult websites in all the world, Barry from Melbourne stumbled upon this one:
Would you tell a friend’s wife if you found pictures of her naked, on an adult amateur website?
I am not just talking sexy lingerie shots, this is full legs ahoy stuff?
It would be a rather great coincidence if the wife just happened to raise her legs in the ahoy position by accident, at a moment when, unbeknownst to her, a camera shutter just happened to be closing. Is it not rather possible, nay likely, that she is complicit in the creation and distribution of these pictures? Or at least, not so unaware of their existence and destination that she would require you to illuminate her?
The real question is:
Do you want your friend’s wife to know that you know what she looks like when doing the YMCA dance with her legs?
Friends, step into the comments and assist Barry with some soothing, sensible words. He seems a little frazzled. That’s what too much time perusing the internet will do to a mind.
You’ll recall Paul (rhymes!) from AMT240, who wanted to boss his family into going on holiday to his choice of Toronto rather than their choice of Vancouver.
With regards to Paul’s desire to visit Toronto over Vancouver with his family, I’m going to make this easy for him: don’t be a fuckin’ idiot, Paul! I’ve lived in Toronto all my life and I can’t think of a duller place to visit. Okay, maybe Cleveland Ohio would be duller, but not by much.
Don’t get me wrong, as a place to live Toronto is pretty great. I won’t get into all the reasons it’s a nice place to live because they’re not relevant to this discussion; but as a place to visit? Please. Any historical buildings we might have had, we’ve torn down and replaced with completely uninspired glass and steel boxes. We have a museum and an art gallery which are mediocre by world standards and a transit system which we forgot to finish. And if you dislike the heat, you have definitely chosen the wrong town – Toronto in July is stinking hot and humid.
Vancouver on the other hand…is also dull. But at least it’s not as humid in the summertime. Topographically speaking it’s beautiful, but the city itself is a bore and its inhabitants are all smug, vegan hippies. Kill me now. The best thing about Vancouver is the countryside surrounding Vancouver.
Go to Moscow…not that I’ve ever been there mind you, but at least it’s got some history and some gorgeous architecture.
If you have to go to a Canadian city, go to Montreal. It’s beautiful and historic, and fun.
Hope you haven’t already booked your flights, Paul.
We hope you enjoyed the Best of Answer Me This! 2012 – Part I last week. If you did, you’ll also enjoy The Best of Answer Me This! 2012 – Part II, and if you didn’t, maybe you’ll prefer The Best of Answer Me This! 2012 – Part II. Either way, you should listen to The Best of Answer Me This! 2012 – Part II:
This classic episode is available to BUY NOW for just £1.99 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)
Wherein we meet again our auld acquaintances:
Phantom of the Opera
Hamlet Hamlet
Prince Philip’s bladder Killer Net
Angela Lansbury fantasies
R Kelly’s fancy parties
the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution
Devon vs Cornwall scone wars
sex Jenga
the Owl and the Pussycat
the 21st-century Sweeney Todd
Olly’s solo sex tape
Helen taking an off-brand fruit into the Apple store
and
Charlie’s Angles.
And there are more previously unheard bits of AMT, which you can have more of every week if you posess the AMT App, available for iDevices and Android – on which you also get our Best Of episodes from the past five years, if you trawl through diligently enough.
Please be generous with your QUESTIONS for AMT in 2013: email them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave voicemails on the Question Line by calling 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis.
We’ll be back on 10th January 2013, but you can still hear plenty of us before then:
• We’ll be running through the year’s biggest online events on Saturday Edition, BBC 5 Live 8pm 29th December or available shortly after as the Let’s Talk About Tech podcast.
• Olly will be Manning the microphone on LBC 97.3 FM, 1-4am most nights from Xmas Eve to Jan 3rd – check lbc.co.uk for the schedule, and rouse yourself from your festive stupor to give him a call and keep him company.
• Helen will crop up on BBC 5 Live’s Radio Review of 2012, hosted by Jane Garvey and Mike Sweeney, which will be broadcast on at 11pm on Christmas Eve, repeated 4pm on Christmas Day, or, if you want to listen at a more sensible time, it’ll be available on the 5 Live website straight after.
• You can hear us discussing Christmas gadgets and songs on Steve Wright in the Afternoon on BBC Radio 2 on 20th December. UPDATE: Here’s the link to the item on iPlayer.
• And we wrote some bits for the Celebrity Juice Christmas Specials; part one is already on ITV Player and part two will follow on tonight.
We hope you have very happy festivities, and we’ll see you next year!
Helen & Olly
PS if you need more noise to drown out the sound of sleighbells and Wizzard, direct yourself to our Jubilee and Sports Day albums, as well as AMT1-120.
Over the AMT years, we thought we made it clear that we are not keen on the idea of joining the Mile High Club. We cannot feel sexy on planes because we are too busy thinking about death/trying to stop our eyeballs drying out/watching as many 2.5-star films as we can. Plus plane lavatories, the traditional location for an exquisite and classy act of mid-air copulation, are disgusting.
But despite all this, Lauren in Canada is undeterred:
So I am from England and my boyfriend is Canadian. We are currently living together in Canada but we will be flying over to London to spend this Christmas with my family.
Our plane takes off just before midnight and will be a nice night flight. I am thinking this is the perfect opportunity to try and join the mile high club, you know just for a laugh. The lights will be dimmed, and most people will be trying to sleep, so should be easy enough to sneak off to the bathroom.
I am aware that it’s not going to be mind blowing or romantic, I just want to have the experience. Id even be happy with some heavy petting under the complimentary blankets!!!!
However, the boyfriend isn’t too keen on the idea and told me that it’s a ‘federal offence’. I think he is scared at being marched through Heathrow in handcuffs whilst meeting my Dad for the first time.
So Helen and Olly, answer me this: Can we really get into actual serious trouble?
AND
more importantly, how can I pursuade him to give it a try!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
First question first: realistically, unless you’re doing something VERY depraved and disruptive to others, your punishment is likely to be no stronger than a frown and a polite admonition from the flight attendants. But technically it could be a legal transgression, depending upon the laws of the country of take-off, the country of landing, and the country you’re flying over at the time. So choose your moment carefully, Lauren, because if you get caught over Greenland, they’ll feed your genitals to a polar bear.
As for your second question, reread the opening paragraph, Lauren. We cannot overcome our horror to help you. However, perhaps our disgusting and unhygienicracy and adventurous readers can assist? Go to the comments and suggest to Lauren how she can convince her reluctant boyfriend to let her ring his jingle bells at 30,000 feet.
It’s lovely to see you listeners help each other. Nicole from Santa Barbara, California has written with reassurance for Concerned from Hebden Bridge from AMT238, who was worried that he would faint at the sight of a new human being worming its way out of his wife. Nicole says:
My husband is also notoriously squeamish: when he was younger, he fainted putting eye drops in his eyes, and also nearly fainted during our first ultrasound too–it was the swing inside me and the word “yolk sac” that did it.
We went to the labour classes and he had to walk out of the room during almost all of the videos for fear of fainting. I knew it was going to be tough for him during the actual labour, so we planned ahead of time that he’d be sitting at my head, facing the computer screen that showed my heartbeat and contractions.
The doctors made him leave the room when it was time for my epidural (because a lot of fathers-to-be faint then), and walked out twice during the actual labour, but he was able to be next to me for the important part. Our arrangement worked well, he didn’t see anything except my face and a beeping line on a computer until the doctors handed him our son (all cleaned up). No fainting!
Hooray! So plan ahead, Concerned, and if you think that your wife’s pained screaming face might trigger your swooning switch, ask her to wear a mask – you can get a classic old Spitting Image one of John Major on eBay.
Hey guys! Remember when we…? And that time when…? And that thing where…? Ah, good times. So many good times! Please join us in reliving half of them in The Best of Answer Me This! 2012 – Part I:
This classic episode is available to BUY NOW for just £1.99 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)
In which we reacquaint ourselves with such beloved old friends as:
The Elves and the Shoemaker
Fabio and Fabio
Hong King Disney
nurse fantasies
the Elgin Marbles
PATP
the seawater cure
Will.I.Am’s nursery rhymes
Pink Lady apples
sexy snowgirls
mad neighbours
bloody Big Bird and dead Kes
Helen’s childhood crush on Inspector Morse
Olly’s kidney
and
Martin the Sound Man’s blue girlfriend.
Plus: drunk callers! Parping! D*ve from Sm*thw*ck!!! And if you enjoyed the assemblage of previously unheard material, ie the blooper reel, you can hear more of that sort of thing every week if you obtain the AMT app for your iDevices and Android.
Join us again next Thursday for the second half of our annual retrospective, and do also supply us with QUESTIONS for AMT 2013. Email them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave voicemails on the Question Line by calling 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis.
Here is a question of Christmas and crafts from Elizabeth:
I am in college and very poor. So instead of giving presents I bought at a shop for Christmas, I give homemade presents. Answer me this: how do I know if my friends and family enjoy the gifts or if they are just being polite?
Even with presents you have bought at a shop, you cannot truly know. Of course, when you’ve invested your time, skill and artistry into the present, those doubts can be even harder to vanquish. A clue is whether the recipients are still keeping the items prominently displayed around the house by Easter.
Readers, what do you think? If someone gives you a home-made object, do you treasure it for the uniqueness and effort, or do you curse it and its creator for not buying you a ‘proper’ present? Please inform Elizabeth in the comments.
I am biased because I don’t particularly enjoy receiving gifts any more, while I do make a lot of stupid ones for my nearest and dearest. For instance, last Christmas I gave my brother a home-made red felt lobster that was three feet long. I’m not certain that he liked it, but at least I could be sure he didn’t already have one.
Above is a photo sent to us by Stephen in Tokyo, who asks:
What is a Jewish race tongue?
I’ve attached a photo of the English version of instructions for disposing of rubbish in my building. The instructions won’t win any prizes for literary style but I can just about guess what it most of it means…except for the bit about a Jewish race tongue. What is it and how big is one? Is there a chance that I may have unwittingly disposed of one in the wrong fashion?
Readers, could you go to the comments to shed light up this? Perhaps you could feed the phrase ‘Jewish race tongue’ into Google Translate, turn it back into Japanese, and translate that properly.
Thanks to you people, I now feel more prepared for an Antipodean Christmas than a Northern Hemispherical one! Rohan writes:
Growing up in the outback, Christmas was a mixtures of both the old and the new. We have the traditional Christmas stuff but also Australian Christmas stuff such as kangaroos with Santa hats etc. Also there are Australian carols such as Rolf Harris’s ‘Six White Boomers’ (boomers is slang for large kangaroos).
Rob adds:
I laughed when you were discussing the celebration of Christmas in Oz and whether snow scenes etc were suitable ways of marking the “occasion”. I have lived in Noosa, Queensland for 5 years, previously Sydney and London for 20 years.
The snow scene here is very much the norm despite there being no resemblance to a northern hemisphere weather pattern in Dec/Jan or ever.
Below is a snap taken from Friday’s Noosa Lights switch on depicting Santa riding on a beach buggy surf life saving vehicle accompanied by four saucily dressed female helpers. Noosa is sub-tropical unlike Sydney, Melbourne or Tasmania where it does get chilly. It was 6pm and about 30c and Santa would have been sweating the proverbial weight off dressed in his garb.
About 50 metres away there is golden beach with waves rolling in, as you can see most of the public are dressed in beach gear, the entire Christmas narrative of snow, sleighs and reindeer is ridiculous in this climate but routinely appears in shop window displays.
At least in his line of work, Santa can pinch some toiletries to conceal his sweaty stench.
Following bossy Paul‘s Toronto vs. Vancouver holiday destination question in AMT240, we’ve received quite a few defences of Toronto, several recommendations for Montreal, and very little regarding Vancouver. This suggests that Vancouverites either think Vancouver is not as good as Toronto and/or Montreal, or they’re so laid back they don’t feel the need to spring to the defence of their splendid hometown. And/or they like Vancouver so much they don’t want Paul in it.
Vancouverites, if you’re reading this, by all means go to the comments to clarify the reason for your silence. Meanwhile, the Torontonians have spoken up. Andrew from Toronto sums up the qualities of the cities:
I live in Toronto, but love to visit montreal. They are all very different cities. If I were your listener, I would go to Toronto (not boring Olly!), and take an overnight trip to montreal.
Toronto is: ancient streetcars; hilarious fired mayors; grubby, wonderful, diverse Kensington market; TV trucks smashed through walls; 3 hours from Algonquin and 5 hours from Montreal; Honest Ed’s; art festivals; delicious St Lawrence market; a “little” ethni-copia: Little India, Little Italy, Little Portugal, Little Chinatown, Chinatown, Greektown; Church Street; FOOD, so much good food (just stay away from the financial district and the distillery district for it); Burgers Priest.
Montreal is: authentic bagels; Celine Dion’s smoked meat; sour Francophones who pretend not to understand English, and won’t give directions to bakeries because they feel culturally oppressed; jazz festivals; beautiful old Montreal; corrupt corrupt politians, like, Chicago corrupt; tam tam.
Vancouver is: beautiful mountains; indecipherable highway system; Stanley Park; rainy; Battlestar Galactica; pot; ridiculously expensive real estate; Skid Row; relaxed; Vij’s.
There’s a Chinatown AND a Little Chinatown? I’m booking a two-week dim sum tour in the January sales.
Next, Dani presents a considered case:
I was born and raised in Toronto, but moved to Vancouver at 19 and lived there for four years.
While in general I’m inclined to agree with Olly that Vancouver is an overall ‘nicer’ place to visit than Toronto, remember that Paul was looking for an interesting cold-weather destination. Vancouver in the winter is probably not dissimilar to the UK, with generally cold but not below freezing temperatures, lots of drizzle, and weeks on end without sunlight. (After typing all this, I realize that he might be thinking of skiing/wintersports that one might enjoy in Whistler, etc. Of course there is that. I just tend to think of the city proper when I think Vancouver)
Toronto in the winter is plenty cold, but if you plan on staying in the middle of the city, you’ll find yourself in a sea of brown, salty slush. Many of the nicer things to do in Toronto (there are some beautiful parks and great shopping districts) would frankly be kind of a downer in the middle of winter (and this coming from someone who loves the city and considers it home.)
I think if he is set on a Canadian vacation in winter, Helen’s suggestion of Montreal would be a better option. And you’d have a chance to try some real poutine! (Shut it, it’s delicious, and vastly superior to Putin on pretty much every count.)
It’s true. Poutine is corrupted by curds and gravy, whilst Putin – well, it’s difficult even to know where to start.
Brace yourselves, listeners: in Answer Me This! Episode 240, those two titans of the Northern Hemisphere, Russia and Canada, face off for the bout you’ve all been waiting for. KABOOM!!!!
Sort of.
This week we speak of:
Andy Warhol’s wig
podcatchers
Russell Brand’s dad
penis pasta
Guinness World Record adjudicators
mean mean mother-in-law
pleasing your partner’s parents
the death of Borders
holidays with Paul Daniels
and
poutine vs. Putin.
Plus: you may be surprised to hear that Olly is a one-doughnut Mann; Helen’s ex-boyfriend moved the earth for her, literally; and Martin the Sound Man unleashes his inner Sarah Palin. Watch out, world.
This week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) is a question from Sam about Gems TV, that 24/7 diamond of entertainment.
Next week is the first half of the Best of Answer Me This! 2012, but for your chance to appear in the Best of Answer Me This! 2013, send us QUESTIONS for the new year. Email them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave voicemails on the Question Line by calling 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis.
Also please do try out our other weekly podcasting exploit The Joy of Tech from BBC 5 Live, in which we talk about the week’s internet events alongside experts in tech, cars, gaming and other highlights of modern existence.
Answer Me This! Podcast 