ARE YOU READY for your AUDIO TROLLEY DASH? On your marks: you’ve got precisely 43 minutes and 46 seconds to listen to Answer Me This! Episode 302. GO GO GO GO GO!!!
Topics thrown into the trolley of our discourse include:
paperboys Paperboy
David Bowie’s palms
TLC’s ‘busters’
decaffeinated Bob Geldof
sushi grass
the courtship of Cheryl & Ashley Cole
BB cream
trolley dashes
hamster funerals
sushi vs sashimi
hyperemesis gravidarum vs ginger biscuits Twin Peaks vs Supermarket Sweep Fire Walk With Me fanfic
Mario Mario
rice
and
the problem with Dale Winton.
Plus: Olly regrets doing this podcast instead of YouTube beauty tutorials; hypocrite Helen is shamed by her inability to pronounce American names correctly; and Martin the Sound Man would rather be sick than drink peppermint cordial to cure the sicks.
Today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available for your iDevices, Android and Windows gadgets), Olly relishes funny fail videos along the following guidelines: being hit in the balls IS a funny fail, car crashes are NOT funny fails.
Thanks very much to Squarespace.com for supporting this episode, and for giving you 10% off their website-building and -hosting services for a year if you use the code ‘answer’. So use the code ‘answer’. Why wouldn’t you? Don’t you want to treat yourself nicely? Of course you do!
We’ll be back with AMT303 on 27th November 2014; stay strong,
Helen & Olly
••• AMT302 Child-Friendly Rating: 76%. Just a couple of second-tier swears. Small amount of light bawdy content. Pet death may be cause for concern. •••
THE DAY HAS ARRIVED! Answer Me This! Episode 300 is here, in all its tricentennial glory!
You’ve deluged us with questions about AMT300, for example:
“Will it be your last episode?”
“Is it going to feature Gerard Butler and be directed by Zack Snyder?”
“Did you guys ever…you know…?”
“Is it possible to polish a turd?”
“Yeah but seriously guys, is it going to be your last episode?”
Discover all these answers, and many more surprises, by listening to the episode right now via one or all of the following methods:
Don’t read below this point if you don’t want spoilers! Listen to the episode first, then come back here and revise its contents.
Alright??
On the slate for AMT300 are such topics as:
our alternate realities if AMT had never existed evidence of our life of crime
long-term relationships
bumhole problems
mashed potato vs nutmeg
Peter Jackson vs Raymond Carver
bases
nasal honking
hiding your rubber fetish gear
and
garnish.
And the wonderful special guest answerers bending their wisdom to your questions are:
✮Adam Buxton, the man who made us want to do this podcast. He doles out excellent advice on giving your children The Talk, ridding your kitchen of mouse turds, and changing your whole life to avoid minor annoyances. Enjoy more of Adam’s work on YouTube, on Twitter, and at live shows including BUG.
✮Sarah Millican, who even manages to make questions about anal fissures sound charming and wholesome. It’s a gift! Her new DVD Home Bird is available for pre-order; she’s writing for the new online magazine Standard Issue, and she dispenses Sarahmillicandour at twitter.com/SarahMillican75.
✮Jesse and Theresa Thorn, the first couple of podcasting, the power behind the Maximum Fun throne (at MaxFun, they record everything sitting on thrones). Tackling questions upon Americana and parental embarrassment, it’s a rare treat to hear them on a podcast together – but it’s a regular treat to hear them on their own podcasts, which include One Bad Mother, Bullseye, Jordan, Jesse, Go!, Judge John Hodgman… Yeah, it took us nearly eight years to churn out 300 podcasts; they probably do more than that a month. And just in case you needed even more podcast-related excitement on top of this, it’s MaxFunWeek right now, so you can have maximum fun with other podcast aficionados around the world.
✮Josie Long, who delighted you in AMT84 and returns to do the same, on such matters as losing your virginity, beating procrastination and Lord of the Rings – the latter with the help of her boyfriend Simon of the Picturehouse Podcast. We hope this important matter doesn’t come between them… As well as seeing Josie on stage, you can hear her on her Lost Treasures of the Black Heart podcast, and the new series of Radio 4’s Short Cuts.
✮Tony Blackburn. TONY. BLACKBURN! Answering YOUR questions and sounding off about wandering eyes, Hobbits and nutmeg! He was the first voice on Radio 1 in 1967, and he currently has shows on Radio 2, BBC Berkshire, BBC London, BBC Three Counties, KMFM, Magic…phew! Switch on a radio, and Blackburn will probably be talking on it. You can also read him at twitter.com/tonyblackburn.
✮ Today’s new email jingle is by the Hackney Colliery Band – because there are few things more stirring than a brass band. To see them live and listen to their records, including their new EP Common Decency, visit hackneycollieryband.co.uk.
Our special guest answerers supplied such a lot of marvellous material, there’s a bumper tricentennial Bit of Crap on the App today – extra questions about tattoos, pineapples, balloon animals, taramasalata, adventures, wedgies, and there’s even a cameo from AMT190 superstar Jon Ronson. The app is available for your iDevices, Android or Windows playthings, but since it’s an ‘appy day, you appless can also stream or download it via SoundCloud. Or just play it here:
We could not have done these 300 episodes without you, listeners: without your attention; without your support, financial and emotional; and particularly without your questions. Please keep sending those in: call the Question Line on 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis, or email answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. And do celebrate with us at facebook.com/answermethis or twitter.com/HelenAndOlly.
Thanks so much for joining us today! We’ll be back with business-as-usual non-landmark AMT301 on 30th October 2014.
Listeners, who is the bigger idiot: the questioneer who is too big an idiot to make toast, or the podcasters who talk about that big idiot for nearly ten minutes?
The only way to decide is to listen to Answer Me This! Episode 292:
In today’s Bit of Crap on the App, we delve deeper into the grotesque and terrifying world of novelty toasters. Join us if you dare on your iDevice, Android or Windows toy.
If you’ve invented your own amazing multi-functional toaster (“Guys! It can heat soup at the same time as cutting the toast into perfectly equal croutons!”) then build yourself a snazzy online store through our benevolent sponsors Squarespace.com, deploying the code Answer for 10% off their services for a whole year.
We shall return on Thursday 3rd July with AMT293 – but we’ll also be appearing on this Radio Academy panel about podcasting on 25th June; and as we mentioned, we’re also available at our side project podcasts The Media Podcast, Sound Women and Brain Train. Furthermore, to accompany all the SPOOOOOORT that seems to be happening at the moment, you can hear us talking as sportily as we are able on the AMT Sports Day album, available now at answermethisstore.com.
That’s it! We’re off to make some toast. We could be gone for some time.
Helen & Olly
••• AMT292 Child-Friendly Rating: 40%. Swears. Cartoon phallic noses. Kicks off with feedback about parental sex, the very notion of which can be traumatic for your progeny. •••
Hey! Listeners! What are you doing here? Throw your internet devices to the floor and sprint to Chelmsford in order to be second in the queue (behind this week’s questioneer Melanie) at the new Dunkin’ Donuts opening tomorrow in Chelmsford!
Or if you don’t give many shits about that, sit tight and listen to Answer Me This! Episode 283 instead:
Today we speak of:
coffee beans
giving people ‘the tour’
Terry’s Chocolate Orange
Bruno Mars
sushi vinegar
C3P(ost)O(ffice)
close-up Christopher Lee
Red Hot Chili Peppers
red hot chilli peppers IHOP vs NASA
the Duracell Bunny vs the Energizer Bunny
Barbie vs Bratz
sad second-rate Sindy
and
the politics of Polly Pocket.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (install it on your iDevices, Android and Windows gadgets), we wonder why Heston Blumenthal has not yet mass-produced a meat-filled chocolate orange. Not that we want one.
We do want your QUESTIONS, though: leave voicemails on the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis) and deliver emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
Thanks to Squarespace.com for funding this episode; use the code answer2 to snag a 10% discount off their services for a whole year.
We’ll be back on 27th February; in the meantime, listen to Olly on the now-national LBC and Helen on the international-despite-the-name Spark London podcast and Martin on his intergalactic noise-platform.
Byeeee!
Helen & Olly
AMT283 Child-Friendly Rating: 38%. Some swears. Olly talks about his burning genitalia. Speculation about Mrs Pepperpot’s sex life, but in terms a child hopefully won’t fully understand. Intermission features colourful semen. Reference to a Prince Albert that you may have trouble explaining to your youngling.
In writing this post, we’ve learnt that the paintings of Helen Daniels are SO dreadful, even Google Images refuses to index many of them. There’s not even an ironic Tumblr collection! The image above was the only shot we could find of the Kennedy klan’s portrait, but it remains as powerfully repellant as ever.
Why have we waved this horrifying visual in front of your eyes? Listen to Answer Me This! Episode 275 to discover:
On today’s slate:
the British Museum
loans for kids
Colosseum 4 Kids
pet heirs
Sir Hans Sloane
covered bridges
melting marshmallows
and
crayon-eating.
Plus: Olly is waiting for the long overdue system update for wooden furniture; Helen’s swerving from pumpkin-spiced lattes; and Martin the Sound Man has identified the point at which he left childhood for adulthood: when he started fancy-talking about his excrement.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices, Android and Windows) Helen readies herself for the inevitable call asking her to join Gladiators if they ever rereboot it. She may not be match fit, but she’s got her name all picked out.
Until that happens, we will continue to do battle with your QUESTIONS: leave voicemails on the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis) and send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
This episode was brought to you by the largesse of squarespace.com, who are also offering you a 10% discount off their service if you use the code Answer10 after you’ve used up your two weeks’ free website-building experimental phase.
See you next Thursday,
Helen & Olly
AMT275 Child-Friendly Rating: 98%. Educational content; clean language apart from the word ‘shat’. Not bad going, eh?
Trolls have been in the news a lot lately – the online tormentor kind, but not the toys that used to be so popular. Why is that? Did people finally take a clear-eyed look at those dinky little plastic haemorrhoids and realise that they disobeyed William Morris’s dictum regarding beauty/usefulness? Has there been a worldwide shortage of neon hair?
No. Find out the true reason for trolls’ recent retirement from the limelight in Answer Me This! Episode 269:
In which we also learn about:
wicker furniture
family holidays
murder houses
Ray Winstone vs. June Whitfield
indoor-outdoor space
the Lindbergh baby
the seven generic top-level domains
pianists’ page-turners Thomas Dam
and
Yoshi.
Plus: Olly gets to talk about cats, and their glands, and their necks, and their cheeks, and their adorable bums; if Helen were the subject of a Thomas Harris novel, it’d be The Silence of the Chairs; and Martin the Sound Man is indignant at the idea of a male dinosaur laying an egg through his urethra.
This week’s Bit of Crap on the App features a humdinger of a tale: Olly has alphabeticised his spice rack. For reals! Hear all about it, and how Helen has organised her spice rack, on your iDevice or Android.
Also, if you want to have a holiday that is more enjoyable than questioneer Pat from Canada’s, try the AMT Holiday album – no family rows or screaming kids, just one hour of us jabbering on into your ear. What could be more paradisial and relaxing than that?
Don’t be so relaxed that you forget to send us your QUESTIONS, though. Leave voicemails on the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis) and send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
See you next Thursday,
Helen & Olly
AMT269 Child-Friendly Rating: 78%. Some swearing, one attributable to Olly channelling Ray Winstone. References to feline sexual delight. Detraction of possibly beloved-by-children Troll dolls.
PS Oh, HERE’s where all the Trolls disappeared to. (Aside from all the ones that have been hiding out here.)
Although August is coming to a close, and with it the Edinburgh Fringe, there’s still just enough time to incorporate our grade-A publicity techniques into your show. Learn from the masters in Answer Me This! Episode 268:
In which we also consider:
SeaWorld
ark logistics
glacier cherries
Peter Nichols’ Passion Play
Noah’s flood vs. the great flood of Edgware
transporting whales
E number 127
aeroplane seat-reclining etiquette
endless Chorus Line
war poetry
and
Barry Scott.
Plus: Olly warns you not to sit behind him on a flight, as he provides his own, er, jet propulsion; Helen still regrets inadvertently reviving the Al Jolson look for Edinburgh Fringe punters; and Martin the Sound Man fails the ‘name the artificial colourant in the glacé cherries’ game.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App, which is available for iDevices and Android, Helen tells you the magic trick with which you can WOW your friends (or thoroughly disappoint them if all they wanted was a nice refreshing orange).
Don’t disappoint us: send us your nice refreshing QUESTIONS. Leave voicemails on the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis) and send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. If we answer them, as Barry Scott would say: bang, and the doubt is gone.
See you next Thursday,
Helen & Olly
AMT268 Child-Friendly Rating: 75%. In the aftermath of AMT267, this episode opens with further discussion of virginity loss, with concomitant references to genitalia and sexual practices. However the rest of the episode is clean beans, aside from a couple of swears.
PS Because we’d never leave you with an endless Chorus Line:
This week, we learn a few very important lessons about sheep: not to underestimate them intellectually and emotionally; what they have in common with Margaret Thatcher; and what they also have in common with Helen’s mum. Discover these things right now in Answer Me This! Episode 261:
In which we also learn about:
emogothpunk style Casper the Suicidal Ghost
small-talk with accountants
the losers’ cafe in The Apprentice
BHS Dr Martens
free sunglasses
pony-drawn rollers
the Cabinet vs. the Divine Right of Kings
iced coffee vs. cold coffee Olly’s face vs. Richard Gere’s face
The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club
hair-blindness
and
advice from Paul Ross.
Plus: Olly had to go cold turkey on the brown, by which we mean Mr Brown drinks, not heroin; Helen sounds and looks and smells like an old fart; and Martin the Sound Man’s emotional needs are not going to be met by sheep. Let’s not even contemplate whether they can meet his sexual needs, please. But you can meet Martin’s needs by going to his website or YouTube to watch his spectacular new music video (/visual evidence of his nervous breakdown).
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) Helen expresses her ever-unrealised desire for unusual-coloured hair. She may have wimped out of having an experimental phase in her teens, but when she’s a geriatric she WILL go full-bore Marge Simpson. Promise.
Promise us to send us your QUESTIONS for our next series: leave voicemails on the Question Line – call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis – or send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
We’ll be back with AMT262 on 11th July, so please join us then; in the meantime, check back here for our imminent album, the Answer Me This! Holiday, our all-new follow-up to our Top 20 (no really!) albums Jubilee and Sports Day, available for your delectation at answermethispodcast.com/albums.
Byeeee!
Helen & Olly
AMT261 Child-Friendly Rating: 90%.
References to hiding pornographic magazines; very mild profanity.
Happy Special Guest Episode day, listeners! For today, in Answer Me This! Episode 252, we are delighted to be joined by Isy Suttie:
With Isy we discuss:
allowable celebrity shags
A Level revision tips (caution: may not work)
buying condoms
slapping your thighs with mirth
emu pasta
Twitter by osmosis
clean-up dogs
neighbourly mysteries
the curious habits of Seann Walsh Dans le Noir
cheese vs. butter
online bingo vs. offline bingo
otters vs. bears vs. gummy bears
the ‘Roseanne Barr type’ beetle drives
and
Roald Dahl’s Magic Finger.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) we learn more about the pitfalls of fantasy crushes – especially when they’re on Isy – then address a question from James about why girls wear school ties when adult women rarely wear ties (Diane Keaton and Janelle Monae notwithstanding).
If this episode makes you wish for more Isy, her new series Love Letters is on Radio 4 Extra and will be on Radio 4 at the end of April; the latest and last series of Shameless is airing on Channel 4; her recent Sky Living musical comedy Miss Wright is still available on your Skyboxes; and Peep Show is always worth a rewatch.
It’s always worth sending us your QUESTIONS: leave voicemails on the Question Line by calling 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis; or email answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. Furnished with those, we shall return next Thursday with AMT253.
What a surprise the publishers of our book decided not to use this picture! Granted, their usual style of authorial portrait is usually a little more contemplative, a tad more restrained. But they probably thought that to print an image of such timeless, exquisite beauty on the cover of our book would be unfair on all the other books.
Yes. That must have been the reasoning.
To find out why we have unleashed this aesthetics gamechanger, listen to Answer Me This! Episode 247:
Today we discuss:
forked tongues
Liv Tyler’s tits
holiday snaps
smoking vs. self-pleasuring
Pot Noodles vs. aquariums Armageddon vs. Les Miserables
menageries vs. mono-nageries corgis’ Christmas Lion Tower
Bruce Willis in a space suit
and
bedroom antics.
Plus: Olly reveals how the Queen helped Kate and Willsher dogs to mate; Helen’s holiday photo albums all look like this; and Martin the Sound Man ejaculates through his tear ducts, apparently.
As an extension of the final questioneer’s bath masturbation query, this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) considers what else you can do in a bath, if said bath is in Las Vegas. Clue: cleanliness is unlikely to be the most immediate concern.
Our immediate concern is, of course, gathering your QUESTIONS: email them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave voicemails on the Question Line by calling 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis.
Happy Valentine’s Day, listeners! We know how you love to celebrate the feast day of the patron saint of plague, epilepsy and bee-keeping, so we’ve got a wonderful gift for you: A FREE AUDIOBOOK FROM AUDIBLE! Gallivant to answermethispodcast.com/audible right now to get it, then as a warm-up to your many hours of free audio content, listen to half an hour of free audio content, ie Answer Me This! Episode 246:
This week we consider:
the Chinese zodiac
the longest queue ever
Lemar
premium cinema seats
stop-motion water
baby clothes
asexual koalas
Mike Leigh vs. Red Dragon Les Miserables vs. Undercover Boss Mary Poppins vs. The Sound of Music
Pete Doherty vs. Peter Brame
and
the point of kissing.
Plus: Olly’s going to build his business empire on XXX fortune teller fish, whilst Helen’s looking into a range of mouth condoms for slimmers; and Martin the Sound Man is a shrivelled little short tongue man. But at least he’s not the only one.
This week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) is further contemplation upon the masterwork of David Sneddon, star of Fame Academy series 1 and AMT245. It’s a song which bears many hours, nay months, of interpretation. This week’s lesson: what’s up with your sleeves, Sneddon?
Instead of whatever Valentine’s love token you were planning to give us, please send your QUESTIONS: email them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave voicemails on the Question Line by calling 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis. (Although, when we say ‘instead’, we do mean ‘as well as’, if the token was heart-shaped boxes of Ferrero Rocher. Keep ’em coming.)
Plus: Olly wonders why the Black Eyed Peas are so keen to shut things down; Helen hates children who have far better business sense than she has, or ever will have; and Martin the Sound Man thinks an ornamental fence is no obstacle to ardour.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) we go more bananas for bananas, except for bananas that are a year old.
We go bananas for your QUESTIONS, so email them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave voicemails on the Question Line by calling 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis.
Answer Me This! Podcast 