We’re settling a lot of couples’ disputes in Answer Me This Episode 398. Who’s from the biggest village? Potato in tacos: Y/N? Did all animation used to be worse, or specifically just in Disney’s straight to video sequels? Prepare yourself for:
biggest village by area vs biggest village by population
ramen tacos vs gums Return of Jafar The Hunchback of Notre Dame part deux The Lion King 1½
wedding rings
wedding shirts
wedding beards
the valuation of drugs
Ancient Romans 4 magnetism
cats in squares
and
edamame.
in today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for Apple and Android – there’s a bit more about Disney+ and which films it may tactfully have hidden from view.
Hear our other work:
• Olly hosts several podcasts, and you can find them all at ollymann.com. Subscribe to his all new daily show The Retrospectors!
• Helen makes The Allusionist, an entertainment show about language, and Veronica Mars Investigations, recapping every episode of Veronica Mars from the beginning – now digging into season 4.
• Martin makes music – including a new EP – which you can hear palebirdmusic.com, on the Pale Bird podcast, and on Spotify etc. His brand new podcast Neutrino Watch is different every time you download it. You can also join him in contemplating the work of every song by Tom Waits Tom Waits in Song By Song, and he produced and composed the kids’ science podcast Maddie’s Sound Explorers, hosted by Maddie Moate.
This episode is sponsored by:
• Manscaped, a full range of grooming products for your furry parts. Get 20% off plus free shipping with the code ANSWER at Manscaped.com
• Squarespace. Visit squarespace.com/answer and get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain with the discount code ‘answer‘.
Buy AMT episodes 1-200, our six special albums including AMT Holiday for your summer staycation and Sports Day for these ballsporty times, and our Best Of compilations from 2007-2015 at answermethisstore.com.
Beloved listeners: as we’ve said in the past, AMT doesn’t tend to discuss current events, as we know a lot of you turn to the show to give yourselves a brief break from dealing with reality. We hope you’re holding up and finding ways to be productive. Meanwhile, here’s Answer Me This! Episode 386, a hearty plateful of low-stress chat about topics including:
lava lamp blobfulness
your neighbour’s dirty doormat
sitcom sets
Magnums vs Soleros
the Jolly Butcher vs the Jolly Postman
butchers’ dummies
retrieving the sex toys you left at your ex’s house
and
wedding snubs.
Today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for Apple and Android – we consider combining two 1990s fads: lava lamps and Mr Blobby.
Hear our other work:
• Helen makes The Allusionist, an entertainment show about language, and Veronica Mars Investigations, recapping every episode of Veronica Mars from the beginning.
• Olly hosts many podcasts, and you can find them all at ollymann.com, as well as his recent appearance on BBC Radio 4’s My Teenage Diary.
• Martin makes music which you can hear palebirdmusic.com, on the Pale Bird podcast, and on Spotify etc. You can also join him in contemplating the work of every song by Tom Waits Tom Waits in Song By Song.
This episode is sponsored by:
• The Great Courses Plus, the streaming library of courses on topics from yoga to mystery fiction to formal logic to dog training. AMT listeners get a free month at thegreatcoursesplus.com/answer.
• Squarespace. Visit squarespace.com/answer and get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain with the discount code ‘answer‘.
Buy AMT episodes 1-200, our six special albums including the all new Home Entertainment, and our Best Of compilations from 2007-2015 at answermethisstore.com.
We’ll be back with AMT387 on 2 July 2020, and there’ll be a Retro AMT episode in your feeds on 21 May.
Helen & Olly
••• AMT386 Child-Friendly Rating: 67%. Mostly pretty clean, except there is this question about sex toys, so it just depends on whether you want to run the risk of having to explain to your child what those are. •••
As you were going to St Ives, did you meet a man with seven wives + 7x7x7 cats coming FROM St Ives or did you catch up with them as they were also heading TO St Ives? Ugh! Fucking riddles! We face this beast in Answer Me This! Episode 378 plus problems with:
Blue Peter pet SCANDALS
attraction/lack thereof
the Hairy Bikers’ friendship
‘Solomon Grundy’ vs ‘Seven Days‘
home CCTV
kombucha
and
getting over a lipstick fetishist.
In this month’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for iPadPhones, Android and Windows devices – we learn a bit more about naming Baby Lion Toby.
Also!
1. Helen has started a NEW PODCAST! Listen to Veronica Mars Investigations, wherein she and musician/Buffy aficionado Jenny Owen Youngs recap every episode of Veronica Mars from the start.
3. Martin is releasing four albums of new music this year! Hear them at palebirdmusic.com, on the Pale Bird podcast, and on Spotify etc.
4. See Helen and Martin on stage! The Allusionist live tour is landing in cities across North America. Check theallusionist.org/events for listings.
This episode is sponsored by Squarespace, with which you can easily and quickly set up a good-looking website for your projects eg your Oscar-nominated documentary. Visit squarespace.com/answer and get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain with the discount code ‘answer‘.
Upon the last Winter Olympics in 2014, we fair shat ourselves with surprise and delight when Lizzy Yarnold, who won gold for Team GB in the skeleton, listens to AMT! She’s competing again this time, so GOOD LUCK, Lizzy. Do it for all of us who get most of our exercise running for the ice cream van.
People of all athletic abilities, Olympian or not: get ready to race through Answer Me This! Episode 359, to learn about:
pope tropes
hotel toothpaste
chewing toothpicks
your auntie’s Facebook pic Dave Claus The Santa Dave
Defence Against the Dark Arts
Dumbledore’s aptitude for HR
the Center Parcs trees
the Center Parcs dome
the Center Parcs soft play that’s located in the bar/the Center Parcs bar that’s located in the soft play
karakia
cocktail swords
buttermilk
butterfat
and
globules.
Plus: we hear the latest in Olly’s gold pen nightmare scenario #OllyMannProblems; Martin figures out his title for when, as a Son of Santa, he inevitably takes up Santa duties; and Helen is already running down the beach to go swimming with some snazzy fish, so SEE YA.
The conversation about advance ticket-buying continues in today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for iPadPhones, Android and Windows devices – as Olly wonders whether his son, aged 2, will be too sophisticated to enjoy the Teletubbies live on the stages of Hertfordshire..
Thanks to Squarespace for sponsoring the show, and for making it so easy to set up a good-looking website for your business, store, restaurant, art portfolio, band, podcast, smug travel wankery, etc. Have a go during the two-week free trial, then get 10% off Squarespace’s website-hosting and -designing services for a whole year with the discount code ‘answer‘.
You can also get two free Audible audiobooks if you go to answermethispodcast.com/audible. Two free audiobooks are better than one free audiobook which is better than no free audiobooks, so get yourself free audiobooks!
Send us your QUESTIONS: deliver a voice memo or a written question by emailing answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. You can still use the old ways of calling the Question Line on 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis, but a lot of those messages haven’t been reaching us lately or are coming out sounding like you’ve just been eaten by a robot. So a voice memo is a safer bet.
Ever run over a fox and thought, “Mmm, maybe I could cook that up for dinner – but how?” No? Well, listen to Answer Me This! Episode 350 anyway. You never know when survivalist recipes might come in handy.
In today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for iPadPhones, Android and Windows devices – cats square off against their greatest adversaries: cucumbers.
Thanks jolly much to today’s sponsors Squarespace.com. Get 10% off their website-hosting and -designing services for a whole year with the discount code ‘answer‘.
Martin just won a BRITISH PODCAST AWARD for his Tom Waits podcast Waits Waits Don’t Tell MeBut Waits There’s MoreSong By Song! Well done Martin!
You can also hear our past selves in the retro AMT episode we throw into your feed mid-month; to get it, subscribe to AMT on your podcatcher of choice. Or if you want more of them at the time of your choosing, they’re all available at answermethisstore.com, along with our special albums.
Who let the dogs out? And who got the dogs stoned? We address these very important canine questions in Answer Me This! Episode 335, along with others more about:
Lego love, lost
wedding gambling
Soda Stream vs Nutribullet
pissing dolls vs pissing Elmo
theatre-adjacent Italian restaurants
the Crystal Palace pizza district
Tony Awards for Tonys
Oscar Isaac
Oscar Hammerstein II
and
Oscar seatfillers.
Plus: Olly is DONE with Star Wars, so don’t even bother; Helen is waiting for the Emmys to introduce a podcasting category; and Martin the Sound Man could improve his gifting game.
Need something to ease you off the thrill of the Wimblesport, or hype you up for the imminent Olympics? Try the AMT Sports Day album from answermethisstore.com, where you can also purchase our other albums and episodes 1-200 – including AMTs 186 and 187 for the full Owl City experience by proxy. And remember to get your free audiobook at answermethispodcast.com/audible.
Plus: Olly is obedient to nobody and nothing, except cookbooks; getting-out-of-doing-the-housework schemes suck Helen right into a sub-dom situation; and we can all hope to see the return of the Martin the Sound Man On Ice show.
In today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available for iThings, Android and Windows devices) renowned theatre- and Disney-adorer Olly rejects Disney on Ice for not being theatrical enough; but we may come up with an ice show that does satisfy him.
••• AMT319 Child-Friendly Rating: 28%. Some swears.
Martin refers to Marilyn Manson, whose very name corrupts the youth. If you switch it off half an hour in, you will spare your innocent children the final question about a relationship with a dominatrix, which entails discussion of BDSM, sex and Adult Situations. •••
Costume designer Anie’s proof of Ice Cinderella’s dress colour.
Here’s a conundrum from an anonymous man upon which, readers, I’d appreciate your input in the comments. He writes:
I went on holiday to Amsterdam last year with my now ex. I am now in a new relationship, and have booked a holiday to Amsterdam. So far it’s okay, my current girlfriend has no issues returning to the city for a ‘romantic city break’ despite knowing that the last time I went was with significant ex and (it did take me a long while to get over it blah blah).
However, Helen and Olly, answer me this: should I tell my new girlfriend that the hotel we’ve booked is the same as the one I went to with my ex?
I want to be honest, but at the same time I don’t want it to seem I am just reliving the past etc etc…
For the record, the reason for booking the same hotel is its good location, good price, good mix of guests and they do a really good breakfast…
Mm-hmm, and I’m sure it’s the ONLY hotel in Amsterdam capable of supplying those things.
You say ‘I don’t want it to seem I am just reliving the past’, so WHY ARE YOU RELIVING THE PAST? Or at the very least, rewriting it with a different woman playing the part of ‘girlfriend in Amsterdam’? There are plenty of romantic cities you could visit that you had not been to within the last year with somebody else. But you chose this one. The real question is “Why?” but I suspect you are unwilling to know that answer.
Alright, fine: your question was whether to tell your girlfriend. I don’t think you’ll need to. When she sees you trying to hug the hotel room wall and blubbering about how much you’ve missed it, she’ll probably figure it out.
Plus: for Olly, giving is better than receiving (when it comes to picture messages); Helen does not belong on wheels; and Martin the Sound Man searches for logic in cartoon characters off adverts, which is really the wrong place to look.
All we want for Christmas are your QUESTIONS, so shove them into our stockings, by which we mean leave a message on the Question Line – call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis – or send an email to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. Also, forge the bounds of internet friendship at facebook.com/answermethis and twitter.com/HelenAndOlly. Not LinkedIn, NEVER LinkedIn.
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’. That’s got to be better than anything you win in a cracker. (Except for the set of tiny screwdrivers or a bottle-opener shaped like an animal; both of these come in surprisingly useful. But, you know, the miniature pack of cards or tiny plastic comb or annoying puzzle made out of metal rings.)
The Best of AMT 2014 will be out next Thursday, 18th December. Return then!
Helen & Olly
••• AMT304 Child-Friendly Rating: 74%. Opens with further discussion of AMT303‘s cheese handjobs, but once the first couple of minutes are over, the rest of the episode’s topics are clean aside from two or three strong swears. •••
Much as we want to, we can’t save Team AMT members from themselves. We told Kris once. We told Kris twice. And now it appears we have to tell him for a third time that his ex-girlfriend is manipulative, selfish, advantage-taking monster and he needs to GET RID:
Guess what, we got back together in January! After 8 months of crazy (her seeing 2-3 guys, falling pregnant etc) we decided that the fact we had talked every day meant something….and now we’ve broken up again (3 weeks ago). We had been discussing marriage and even up until two weeks ago were talking about getting back together and looking for a place.
It won’t surprise you to know that a week after our break up, she has met a new fellow via internet dating. She has described him ‘feeling like the one’. And he’s even asked her to move in with him in little over a month’s time. Yet surprisingly her behaviour has not seemed consistent. We awkwardly bumped into each other on the dating website, and she was still looking for guys after she’d met him.
She also has a box of my stuff she’s been ‘too busy to send’. She now claims she needs to source a box, which I suggested she could grab from the post office. She refuted that suggestion saying it would cost $10 and her parents have boxes for free.
Perhaps most baffling of all is that while she’s asked me to be happy she’s found her one, when I mentioned my own foray into the dating scene it was met with scorn and nitpicking on how stupid she sounded. It was the day after that she then changed her Facebook status as if to send me a message. I will admit to my own dalliance with immaturity by sending back a book which contained those lovely dovey questions. It was basically a bible of how I was the one and perfect for her – my argument was she’d kept our other sentimental shit in the past but to me it just felt hollow.
I guess the condensed version of this is, if she’s so happy with the ‘one’ why would she ever call me (admittedly not every day maybe every few days) and why would she pour such scorn on my own dating – I mean I’m happy she’s happy; why is this not mutual?
Because, as we said before Kris, this woman wants you to be available to her on her terms whenever she pleases. Your happiness is not important to her; frankly you are not important to her. She gives shits only about herself.
Even the most well-balanced person doesn’t relish hearing that an ex has moved on, even in the most friendly of circumstances. However, this woman is not that person. She does sound rather messed up – but regardless of that, she seems to be completely unrewarding as an object for your affections. Read your own emails: she has repeatedly demonstrated this.
So – say it with me, readers:
CUT HER OUT OF YOUR LIFE, KRIS!
I hardly think I can make this message clearer. And if you write to us again in 8-12 months with the same problem, I will assume that you have a fetish either for shit relationships, or for me berating you. Whichever it is, I don’t want to help you indulge in it.
He wasn’t good enough for you! You’re better off without him! and other platitudes go out to Matilda in California, who writes:
My boyfriend and I just decided (somewhat mutually) that we needed to stop seeing each other, since I’ve just started a Master’s program, and he wants to move to New Zealand for an indeterminate amount of time. I still care about him very much, so this has been a little bit rough for me.
At night, when I’m not finishing a paper or making dinner, I have taken to spending my time watching sad movies about people who have broken up with each other, listening to sad songs, and weeping uncontrollably into a pillow.
So, answer me this: What has helped you during a breakup, and can you recommend any songs that I should add to my “End of Times” playlist?
Readers, get yourselves to the comments and compile the epitome of break-up playlists. NB Matilda, avoid listening to songs you might need in future years, because once you’ve recovered from the break-up, it can be unpleasant to return to the music that sustained you through the difficult times.
This week, listener Melvyn from Israel got in touch to ask whether we have a system for identifying AMT episodes which are suitable for his children to listen to. So from this point forward*, each episode will have a rating so you parents/children are aware of the incidence of blue language and depraved material. Answer Me This! Episode 260 scores a Child Friendly Rating of 70% (mild swearing/bawdy talk and one question about dicks).
Today we discuss:
Wagon Wheels
jalapeños
disappointing Oxford Circus Loose Women‘s stools (not as in bowel movement stools)
tuk tuk drivers
Fentimans
The Pammy vs. The Governess
Lord Adonis
helium
and
dressing to the left/right.
Plus: Olly has a simple but cunning method for hiding his Special Racy Magazines; Helen is a fan of neither Buckfast nor Red Bull; and the only thing bigger than Martin the Sound Man’s head is his…ego?
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) we discuss Desert Island Drugs. We may be squares in our normal lives, but leave us to die alone on a desert island and we’ll give any intoxicants a whirl.
Answer Me This! Podcast 