Go to the comments because I really want to read your answers to this question from Johan:
I work at the Swedish equivalent to UK’s Royal Mail. As a terminal worker at one of the biggest post terminals in the country my job is really boring and sometimes stressful. I sort packages big and small and unload lorries filled to the brim with packages, but it is allowed to have headphones at work and your podcast keeps me from dying of boredom.
So answer me this: what is the most boring job you have had?
That is a GOOD question, Johan. Now, as a freelancer with a very messy career path, I’ve had a LOT of jobs – so many that I can only remember about 30% of them. Which is probably for the best.
I’ve had jobs that plunged me into greater despair and discomfort, but for pure brain-chewing boringness, I nominate the job I once had compiling the index for a book about the Queen’s stamp collection. It was not only dullllllllll, but fiendish – I had to make sure there were different entries for, say, King George V the person and King George V the stamp, subdivided by country…Oh god, sorry; merely typing that sentence reopened the vortex of tedium, and this time YOU’RE ALL COMING DOWN WITH ME.
I am giddy with excitement about AMT300! I hope you like it as much as/even more than I do. I guess we’ll all find out next week.
Until then, alternative entertainments.
From home:
Earlier this year, I spoke at the Boring Conference. Martin’s talk about eggs was on the playlist at a previous Thursday Listening Party; now, here’s mine, about the disgusting and depressing contents of cookery books:
Something else which alternately delights and horrifies me is being a freelancer. I’ve been one for nearly ten years, and I still haven’t figured out how to even up the boom-or-bust cycle. So for this month’s Sound Women podcast, I gathered together with some excellent freelancers to discover their secrets (one of them used to work as an official Mrs Potato Head!), and to consolegratulate each other:
To accompany his question about the demise of hitchhiking in AMT299, questioneer Toby in Cheshire alerted us to this episode of Four Thought from Radio 4, in defence of hitchhiking. It’s refreshing to hear someone speaking positively about the MOBILE MURDER NETWORK.
On the subject of journeys, I’m working my way through the winners of the 2014Third Coast Audio Festival, and thanks to Linda Lutton’s Chicago to Mexico – By Bus, I’m having flashbacks to a 36-hour coach journey I endured in 2002 – a mere blink of an eye compared to hers!
The new podcast in everyone’s ears this week is Serial, the long-form investigation of a murder case by This American Life producers Sarah Koenig and Julie Snyder. I chained the first three episodes and now I NEED MORE.
And finally: early this morning I received an email from Olly saying, “It’s 5:43am. Just watched all of this.”
Fill your boots.
Tune in to our various other gigs:
• After four delightful years, my gig on <a href="BBC 5 Live’s Saturday Edition” target=”_blank”>BBC 5 Live’s Saturday Edition just came to an end. Listen to the podcast of the final episode here. •Olly’s on LBC every weekday 1am-4am. Keep pinching yourself to stay awake and join him. • Martin the Sound Man makes numerous other podcasts, including Brain Train about clever things, The Global Lab about cities and stuff, and The Sound of the Ladies music podcast. •AMT episodes 1-170 and the special AMT albums are all available for a piddling little price at answermethisstore.com, and if you buy any of them you’re bankrolling the podcast, for which we are extremely grateful. • Catch up on AMT299 and the episodes preceding it.
Over the years, one question has kept us awake at night (other than, “Did I remember to turn the oven off?” and “How can the next-door neighbours like listening to Duffy this much?”): where do all the spurned Build-A-Bear bears go? Do they end up in a bear workhouse, or are they turned out onto the streets to survive by turning tricks and picking pockets?
Thankfully, no. After Answer Me This! Episode 179 we will, at last, be able to sleep the deep sleep borne out of the relief that the poor orphant bears do find a good home:
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)
In today’s episode we also consider:
Co-op Funerals
doll hospitals
the mystery of Glenn Miller
McCain’s Pizza Rollers
office toys
cycle helmets
the most striking aspect of Jordan’n’Dane Bowers’ sex tape
reality TV vs. reality
Dame Bruce Forsyth Chris Cooley’s cock (NSFW!)
Ruth Badger
the Black Eyed Peas’ next hit (shudder)
20p
Gwyneth Paltrow in Glee
symbolism in ET
and
toff prison.
Plus: Olly sees right through posh Findus Crispy Pancakes to the publicity stunt beneath; Helen surmises why seminal movie scenes such as this are not set in Business Studies lessons; and Martin the Sound Man pipes up in favour of hot goo. Yes, he does.
Please join us next week for episode 180, in which we will do a full 180 on everything we’ve ever said so far, apart from one thing which will remain forever true: we want you to send us your QUESTIONS, by leaving voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or find answermethis on Skype) or sending emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. Gimme gimme gimme.
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