Great British Questions Episode 1: Cheese

July 20, 2010 by

Hello chaps!

Recently, VisitBritain sent me and Olly on a trip around Britain in order to answer the nation’s most pressing questions in the form of five short videos.

So prepare yourself for Episode One of Helen and Olly’s Great British Questions:

Where is the cheesiest place in Britain?

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Here’s where we went in our pursuit of cheesiness:

• Paxton and Whitfield cheesemongers in Bath, part of a 200-year-old cheese-purveying business.
• Cheddar Gorge in Somerset, where you can take a tour of the cheese caves, ride an open-topped bus through the gorge, visit the museum of prehistoric cheese, and of course, eat a whole load of cheese.
• The Leagram Organic Dairy near Chipping, Lancashire, where you can not only buy some classic Lancastrian cheeses, but also be taught to make cheese by cheesemaker extraordinaire Bob Kitching. He can turn milk into cheese in the blink of an eye, and also has more naughty jokes about cheese than you ever imagined possible.
• The annual Stilton cheese-rolling. Get your entry forms in now to compete in the 2011 roll!

We enthusiastically recommend all those places. See below for photos of our antics; and please tune in next Tuesday for Episode Two: Film. For more VisitBritain finery, join their Facebook page.

We also owe massive thanks to Bob Smart at the Cheddar Caves, cheese enthusiast Warwick Davis, Uncle Henry’s for the cheese and treats, Tebay Services for not minding when Olly threw a pot of lime cheese everywhere, and, most of all, Tess Longfield and Rachel Aked at VisitBritain.

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Posted in extracurricular activities, frippery, videos | 12 Comments »

EPISODE 141 – classic Napoleon syndrome

July 15, 2010 by

Hello again!

Dry those tears, untie those yellow ribbons round the ole oak trees, because we are, as promised a month ago, BACK. We’ve had a lovely sort-of-holiday (which you can find out more about next Tuesday!), and are raring to go with Answer Me This! Episode 141:


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)

It’s a corker of an episode for fans of older ladies, with appearances from vintage hotties Merle Oberon (phwoar!), Marguerite Patten (schwing!), Joan Hickson (hubba hubba!) and Angela Lansbury (fapfapfapfapfap), along with unrelated topics of conversation including:

Sea World
the brains of Tostao
Brad Meldhau vs. jazzercise, Jazzles and Jazz apples
Cantona vs. Sartre
Polar Bear vs. music for polar bears
Gone with the Wind vs. Bollywood
the Azerbaijan Film Institute’s top 100 movies?
Being Erica
the Big E agricultural festival
kiiking
kiwi fruit
and
the best Miss Marple.

Plus: Olly reenacts The Wrong Trousers at a posh wedding (say, do any of you want to bid on a pair of 38″ Hugo Boss trousers, worn once?); Helen is a philistine when it comes to Citizen Kane and ball ponds; and Martin the Sound Man must have grown up a bit over the break because he manages not to cackle at the phrase ‘ball pond’. Meanwhile, over on our new app, this week’s extra content is a merry tale of gazpacho. Soup-er!

Having been off on our break, we’ve returned with much to tell you about, including Martin the Sound Man’s new album, ‘We Went to the Bottom of the Ocean’ (make sure to endure to the very end of this episode for a sample track!) and our new series of videos, Helen and Olly’s Great British Questions, which will kick off next Tuesday. But amidst all this novelty, please remember to supply AMT with its very life-blood by sending us a QUESTION, so please do that by leaving a voice message on 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis or by sending an email to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.

See you next week, with plenty more excitement in the offing!

Helen and Olly

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Posted in PODCASTS | 8 Comments »

eating a big apple

July 14, 2010 by

** We’ll be back on July 15th; meanwhile click here to listen to
past episodes of Answer Me This! **

New York’s one of the top cities about which to ask questions this week, because here’s another New York-related query. This time it’s from the lovely Sarah, formerly from Gayton, now from Norman, but imminently to be from New York:

I’m moving to New York to go to acting school. So, what are some GREAT places to eat? I’ve never been in my life, but I am a total foodie and am up for trying almost anything.

BUT, I’m also a student, so I don’t want to go broke after one great meal. Suggestions?

I doubt my vantage point from Crystal Palace, some 3465 miles away from the nosh-houses of New York, is optimal for answering this question; but we know many of you are New York-savvy, so go to the comments and avail Sarah of your feeding tips.

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Posted in extracurricular questions, User-generated answers | 5 Comments »

vanilla phone death

July 14, 2010 by

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Here’s a long, sad story from Andreas in Sweden, but it’s a good one, so strap in:

Last week, while doing my job involving making food colouring, aromas and being cooked alive because it’s 30 cunting degrees in Sweden, you destroyed my phone and made my day shit overall.

I was going to produce something called “Vanilla Extract” to be sent off to a ice cream company for them to make vanilla ice cream. To get the obvious flavour of this concoction I needed to, through a tap mechanism, pour a undiluted mixture of ethanol and vanilla seeds into a bucket as an ingredient. This ingredient is kept in a big, cylindrical tank that holds 200 litres of the shit. To check if there was enough left in the tank for me to finish my assignment, I took the lid off of it and put it aside. Pleased with what I saw, I knocked off for lunch.

Upon my return I did what I always do when my boss is on a business trip (he’s a right shit, by the way): I got out my phone and put on some Answer Me This! To hear it better I put it on top of the tank. Instead of your funny banter streaming into my ears, I heard a splash, a gurgle and my phone hitting the bottom of the tank.

I hurried to find something to stand on. I got up on an empty cardboard box and from there climbed onto the tank and shoved my entire arm into the alcohol and vanilla. Having a bunch of tiny cuts on my hand did not make this a more pleasant experience.

I finally got the phone out of the tank and had by now sort of lost my footing on the side of the tank. I quickly put one foot on the box I had used to get up there. I had forgotten it was empty and put my big, fat foot right in the center of it. I fell onto my knee, hitting the shitting corner of the rig the tank rests on.

Long story short, you destroyed my phone and ruined my day.

We’re terribly sorry, Andreas, that your phone died in the effort to manufacture the most boring ice cream flavour. But we don’t feel directly responsible for your calamity, therefore will not be buying you a new phone. Or knee. Also, worse things have happened in the name of vanilla, viz:

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Where do babies come from?

July 14, 2010 by

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Here’s a pranking opportunity from Izzy:

Our sexual education lesson coming up at school, so answer me this:
What HILARIOUS sex-related questions should I post in the Q & A box for my poor teacher to read to the year?

Izzy! It would be highly irresponsible of us to encourage a sex ed class to descend into mirth, given the shocking teen pregnancy and STD rates in this country; and the average secondary school teacher has surely suffered more than enough.

However, we’re not above passing the buck of irresponsibility to you guys! Go to the comments and post the question you hope will make a roomful of embarrassed people even more embarrassed. Anything to help the students forget the horrific realisation that their teacher has probably Done It at some point.

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rate my eggs

July 14, 2010 by

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Here’s a frontline report from a bona fide turkey egg eater, Deborah from Camden, to crack the ovine mystery of Episode 139:

I had a turkey egg for the first time recently – my mother got it from some absurdly posh farmers’ market in Kent that sold stuff like quince trees alongside the usual foreribs and heritage carrots.

They looked fantastic – like very large hen’s eggs dusted with cocoa like Mini Eggs – and tasted good too (though maybe because I fried them in a pan I’d just used for bacon?).

I’d say they came third in the seven birds eggs I was tasting for my blog, below quail and ostrich but above hen, duck, goose and pheasant. The shell was very hard – probably because turkeys are so massive they’d crush them otherwise.

Full write-up of the 7 different eggs HERE.

Thankyou, Debbie, for your tireless eggy quest, saving us from having to rustle some turkey eggs from a poultry farm in the dead of night. Now, who can tell us what crocodile eggs taste like?

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So good they named it twice – and sang about it more than twice

July 14, 2010 by

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In Episode 140, Karen in East Grinstead expressed her desire to compile a New York-themed megamix. Turns out she’s been pipped to the post by Chris from Cambridge:

Approximately a year ago, for reasons beyond my recall, I put together a playlist of songs (tenuously) about New York City. So imagine my surprise when I discovered that a fellow listener was doing precisely the same thing!!! Perhaps they would be interested in what I came up with…

The East River – Jeffrey Lewis
You Said Something – PJ Harvey
Survival Car – Fountains of Wayne
New York City Fuck Off – Matson Jones
Me & Julio down by the Schoolyard – Paul Simon
New York Times – Bobbi Humphrey
Old Soul Song – Bright Eyes
Union Square – Tom Waits
Take the A-Train – Duke Ellington
Just because I’m Irish – Jonathan Richman
Living for the City – Stevie Wonder
New York, I love you, but you’re bringing me down – LCD Soundsystem
Frank Mills – The Lemonheads
Across 110th St – Bobby Womack
NYC’s like a graveyard – Moldy Peaches
Fairytale of New York – Pogues
Summer in the City – Regina Spektor (I always assumed it was about NYC, but admittedly have no proof…)
Harlem Shuffle – Bob & Earl
Tennessee Blues – Steve Earle

That looks like it would fill up almost an entire C90, but if you feel Chris has failed to include a copper-bottomed NYC classic, admonish him in the comments.

Next week: we compile the ultimate playlist about Swindon! Who’s in?

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Excitement in the AMT camp

July 4, 2010 by

** We’ll be back on July 15th; meanwhile click here
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Hello chums! If you’ve missed the sound of our various voices during our month off, solace is at hand.

1. Following our New Year’s Eve web awards extravaganza, BBC 5 Live were kind enough to ask us to do another show about all the latest japery online. Click here to listen to it.
Web 2010 with Helen and Olly includes interviews with writer and documentary-maker Jon Ronson, fashionista Trinny Woodall, and fellow podcasters Stephen Brook of the Guardian’s Media Talk and Luke Moore of The Football Ramble.
We sure hope you enjoy the show! It’s available on BBC iPlayer until 7pm Sunday 11th July; if you’re interested in the websites and things we talk about, there’s a list of links HERE.

2. Very good news for those of you who’ve been missing the voice of Martin the Sound Man: he has released his first album! Ten spiffing tracks by his musical alter ego The Sound of the Ladies are available to download HERE; you decide the price you want to pay for them. Neato!

So, we hope those things tide you over, and that you’ve been keeping well in our absence. See you on 15th July for Answer Me This! Episode 141.

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duped!

July 4, 2010 by

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Gulling the gullible is a jolly good wheeze, as we found out in Episode 139, and M from London found out many years before that:

I might have one of the best dupes…it was delivered with scathing sarcasm, but the poor girl was so dense that she has never figured out the truth!

In 2004, I was working for the Red Cross and was coming back from an education session deep in the American South. A woman (aged 29ish at the time) I was working with began musing philosophically in the back of the van. After wobbling about for a bit, she asked me that she’d always wondered what black people were called outside of the USA…

I informed her that Africa was actually a country in South America, so there was no difference and all people of African origin could safely be called African American as they were all from the American continent. She said “Oh! That’s great. It totally makes sense. Thank you!”

Well…fast forward 6 years. She still believes this and reports from friends still working with her confirm that she regularly tells the snickering public about this. It’s so generally ridiculous that no one has ever corrected her. Who misses an entire continent and hundreds of years of the slave trade at school? I guess that question has already been answered.

Good work, M from London. If any of the rest of you have done a dupe as good and as long-lasting as that, please share it with us in the comments. We’re a bit dim, so will probably swallow it whole.

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Love thy mother-in-law

July 4, 2010 by

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The voice of experience emanates from Cher in Kentucky in response to Andrew in Australia’s question featured in Episode 140:

A fellow listener asked about ways to suck up to the parents of one’s significant other. Having been married three times, engaged seven times before that, I have significant experience in that department.

Rule No. 1: Choose your battles. When the parent presents as an intractable bitch, leave it and go for the other parent. At first sight of my, my first husband’s mother’s first words to me were, “Jesus, you’re not a Catholic, are you?” She said it more to the crucifix at my throat (at which she bared her fangs) than to me.

I promptly ignored her and asked his father to tell me about the Battle of the Bulge. He pulled out maps, memorabilia, and held my ear for hours. When the bitch’s boy turned out to be gay and a tree-worshiping Pagan (bit of your own back, Ma!), I missed his dad more than I missed him.

Rule No. 2: To thine own self be true; they’ll figure you out eventually. Prior to the Bitch, for several fiances I converted to their religion (to impress the parents), one Protestant faith being the same as any other. Eventually I would get found out, though. What was I thinking, you ask? I was quite young, and it was Mississippi.

Rule No. 3: Find the deal-breaker, and don’t break it. With my mother-in-law, “living in sin” and pre-marital sex were a huge deal breaker. Let me add that she’s 90. She nagged my husband and his brother into their prior marriages so that they would discontinue living in sin. Forearmed with that knowledge, when I visited before our marriage, I was prepared when she asked me whether I would sleep in the guest room with my then fiance or on the couch. “I can’t sleep with him, ma’am. We aren’t married yet.” BINGO, we have a winner!

Rule No. 4: Take care of them. His people are my people. If you want them to like you and care about you, like them and care about them. It might not work, but it’s a good place to start. When you marry a person, you marry into a family, like it or not.

In that case, Cher has a MASSIVE extended family. I’m trying to picture how one can find oneself engaged as many as seven times, not even counting the ones that culminated in marriage, but it turns out I simply do not have sufficient imagination. She offers very sensible advice though, so we can all benefit without enduring the hassle of ten engagements.

Incidentally if any of you readers have managed to be betrothed more times than that, let us know in the comments! The first one to notch up twenty fiance(e)s wins a prize.

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Human Centipede

June 29, 2010 by

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Uh oh, Kat from London is angry. At us. Must’ve been something we said in Episode 140:

Dear Helen and Olly – or, as you shall be known hereafter, you utter bastards.

There I was, happily walking to work and enjoying the double chocolate-chip goodness of my breakfast cookie treat, when suddenly Helen starts talking about mouth-to-anus films.

I haven’t been able to look at a double choc-chip biscuit OR get that horrible image out of my head since, and I can’t even listen to the podcast in case Helen strays from her usual topics of classical education and word games and starts dissecting Two Girls one Cup instead.

So answer me this: how the fuckety balls do I get the image of a human centipede out of my head? Is a lobotomy really the only way?

Fortunately, Kat, we have found another way. Stare for long enough at this cheerful chap, and all thoughts of horrible mouth-stitched-to-anus-until-everyone-chokes-on-faeces movies will be banished from your mind.

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it’s not rocket science; it’s marketing for rocket science

June 29, 2010 by

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The following is a problem which is surely not too common amongst you, yet is certainly quite pressing for Malika, Head of Marketing at the National Space Centre:

I wonder if you can save my sanity and put to an end the number of people who use the following phrase when speaking to me on a daily basis…

IT’S NOT EXACTLY ROCKET SCIENCE, IS IT!

Yes I work at the National Space Centre and we have rockets and real science happening all around us, but as I work in marketing I realise what I do is not rocket science, so answer me this – how can I politely explain to people that I have heard this about a thousand times this year alone and it just isn’t funny any more!

Mosey to the comments, readers, and sharpen up some fine ripostes for Malika to fire at these jokesters.

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