Jingle those bells, it’s festive Answer Me This episode 392, and, as the episode contains Jesus porn, Christmas parental deceit/logistics, and swears, we’re just going to put this right here:
AMT392 Child-Friendly Rating: 1%.
Today’s inquiries include:
The Elf on the Shelf™
Christmas decorations made out of hospital supplies
the White House turkey pardon
swanky advent calendars
pen advent calendars
dog advent calendars (of and for)
the health impact of glitter
too many photo-based gifts
and
12x Jesus’s foreskin.
For more AMT festive content, there’s our Christmas album, with questions about Kwanzaa, kissing under mistletoe, and Rudolph’s red nose; and on the free feed check out AMT329 for our favourite festive friend the Shitting Log; AMT380 for candy canes, the history of eating turkey at Christmas, and artificial trees being invented in a bog brush factory; Zwarte Piet and other Santa/Father Christmas/St Nick sidekicks turn up in AMT368, and AMT328 whether you ever see pictures of Mary pregnant with Jesus; in AMT357 the fake or real snow in Home Alone 2…there’s a lot! Enough to keep you going till Twelfth Night.
In today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for Apple and Android – we have the Tale of Two Christmas Trees.
Hear our other work:
• Helen makes The Allusionist entertainment show about language – hear the festive episodes here and the swearalong quiz here – and Veronica Mars Investigations, recapping every episode of Veronica Mars from the beginning – season 3 has begun!
• Olly hosts many podcasts, and you can find them all at ollymann.com, including The Week Unwrapped and The Modern Mann – hear the festive episodes here.
• Martin makes music – including a new EP – 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, and he produced and composed the new kids’ science podcast Maddie’s Sound Explorers, hosted by Maddie Moate.
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‘.
Send us your QUESTIONS, in writing or as voice recordings, to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com for us to answer in 2021! We’ll be back with AMT393 on 7 January, and there’ll be a Retro AMT episode in your feeds on 17 December.
Helen & Olly
••• AMT392 Child-Friendly Rating: 1%. As aforementioned: questions about Jesus porn, and the secret mechanics of festive mythmaking etc. •••
Apologies for the unscheduled absence of a fresh episode in July, listeners: Helen’s neck had other plans for the past few weeks. But hooray, Helen is out of hospital and all new Answer Me This! Episode 364 is here! WARNING: there’s a bit of Medical Stuff in the first few minutes of this episode, so if you’re sensitive to that, skip to the 4-minute mark, after which you can hear about:
Paw Patrol vs the football World Cup
post-swim communal shower etiquette
cosmetology Cast Away
jesters’ staffs
cranberry farming
lost birthday presents Bram Stoker’s Dracula
and
an inflated bladder on a stick.
There is more cranberry-chat in today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for iPadPhones, Android and Windows devices. We discover a previous, more ferocious name for the fruit, and reminisce about The Delia Effect (not a euphemism for a UTI or the soothing thereof with cranberry juice).
Check in with our other work: Olly hosts The Modern Mann; and Helen and Martin are performing the Allusionist live show on stages in the UK, Ireland, the US and Canada this autumn – check where and when at theallusionist.org/events.
Thanks to Squarespace for sponsoring the show, and for making it so easy to set up a good-looking website for your projects. Visit squarespace.com/answer and get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain with the discount code ‘answer‘.
The Bluffers’ Guides are back! Rapidly become passingly well-informed in subjects from cats to fishing to social media to wine at bluffers.com.
Send us your QUESTIONS: any time, 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. So emailing a voice memo is the safer bet.
This week, we wonder at the morals of fairy tales. You know, the stupid underlying ‘meaning’ that spoils the fun of a far-out fictional confection, and ensures that kiddies absorb some very dubious life lessons. There are probably some very dubious life lessons in AMT216, but at least we’re not pretending we have any morals.
Plus: Olly would like Aesop’s Fables to be more like a Choose Your Own Adventure book; Helen is the Sookie Stackhouse of AMT; and Martin the Sound Man gets quite emotional about the tale of the Elves and the Shoemaker. Thankfully he recovered sufficiently to launch a contest for under-18 songwriters, which you can find out about by clicking here.
This week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices or Android) is a question from a couple of chaps on their way to Alton Towers. Cue a blast of Mann Rage directed at theme park rides that blatantly used to be other theme park rides. Oh God, why dost thou torment him thus?
What is not a torment is asking us a QUESTION! (Though reading some of them is a torment for us.) Send an email to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave a voicemail on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis).
And assuming the elves will step in to finish off our chores, we will see you again next week for AMT217.
There’s a new hot trend amongst AMT listeners: broken legs! Lynne from Doncaster started it:
I broke my leg on the 4th of April 2012, well I actually broke my tibia and fibula clean in half. I had an operation to fix it where they inserted a metal rod down my tibia bone and fixed it into place with two screws at the bottom of my leg and two screws underneath my knee.
The physiotherapist sent me home with a leaflet, which says that part of my physio is to clench my buttocks together and release. Answer me this: how does clenching my bum cheeks together and releasing them, fix my terribly broken leg?
You can’t reasonably expect a buttock-clench to knit together broken bones! My guess would be that it is to keep those muscles from completely atrophying while your leg is out of action, and maybe also something to do with blood flow? If you are a physio reading this, please do enlighten us in the comments, for you are wise in the mysteries of recuperation.
Chiara should prepare to clench her buttocks for medical reasons too:
I am currently writing to you from my hospital bed – on Friday a car drove straight into my on my bike, snapping my tibia and fibula clean in two, puncturing the skin. Big owee.
When they operated on me on Friday they put a rod in my tibia, but no cast, so that I was standing on crutches 28 hours later – modern medicine is really quite miraculous!
Answer me this – What is the rod in my leg made of?
Doctors/surgeons/manufacturers of metal implants, please tell us of what Chiara is made. I believe she and Lynne are now technically cyborgs, so we have to answer their questions to keep them sweet, lest they rise from their convalescence couches and go all Terminator on us.
Happy Advent, Team AMT! Let’s open the first door of our advent calendar……..oh. It’s a bloody Robin Redbreast, like it is every bloody year. Better luck tomorrow, eh? At least there is the consolation of today’s other new surprise, Answer Me This! Episode 199:
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)
Plus: Olly warns against handling screwdrivers with your buttocks when attempting DIY tasks; Helen says NO to Grandpa Joe; and Martin the Sound Man plans the toast-based timelapse video that will be going viral shortly after he’s finished his breakfast.
This week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices or Android) is a question from Katherine about how to compile the perfect mixtape with which to woo her new boyfriend. We also learn how not to woo Olly’s mum, and how many Strangelove songs it is permissible to add to one compilation (clue: either one, or none).
We are VERY VERY EXCITED about next week’s episode, because it is of course going to be AMT200! It’s a milestone we never imagined we would reach, but by crikey, here we (almost) are. It will be a rather different affair to AMT100 – the party whistles are still ringing in our ears – but it’ll definitely be a bit special. And like every single one of the episodes preceding it, it will be based upon your QUESTIONS, so send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com and leave voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877, Skype answermethis).
As we’ve also mentioned, another AMT landmark lurks around the corner, namely our 5th BIRTHDAY, so help us celebrate by sending something suitable to the following address:
It’s pretty unusual for us podcasters to venture out of our comfortable armchairs, let alone venture into the great not-indoors. Last weekend, however, we donned our cagoules, stocked up on wet-wipes, and took in a lungful of folk-laced fresh air at the Green Man festival – where we had such a smashing time, we decided to record Answer Me This! Episode 189 right there:
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)
Plus: Olly fears the revenge of Kris Marshall; Helen discovers a sport she IS interested in: topless frisbee; and Martin the Sound Man sees a future where Batman and Catwoman give birth to Dustin Hoffman.
As you’ll hear, we were joined this week by some unexpected guests in the shape of wasps. (They weren’t just shaped like wasps; they were wasps.) Next week, we should be joined by a much less stingy and stripy special guest in the shape of Jon Ronson. (He’s not just shaped like Jon Ronson, he is Jon Ronson.) So concoct some QUESTIONS for the fan of psychopaths, goat-starers and Robbie Williams, and send them in the form of voicemails to the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis) or emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
We do hope that Jon remembers to turn up, but whether he does or not, we’ll deffers see you next Thursday,
To all our listeners in the Northern Hemisphere: hope you enjoyed the summer solstice! Only 185 sleeps to go until Christmas! Wooooo!
Southern Hemispherical listeners: happy mid-winter’s day! Now roll on summer! Woo woooo!
Equatorial listeners: as you were.
One thing that is the same the world over is Answer Me This! Episode 180:
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 it, we speak of such things as:
Gunther from Friends
seaside rock
the Wailing Wall
chocolate mousse
Claridge’s tea
mango lassi Face/Off
disappointing fudge
hypnotherapy vs. stage hypnosis
British postboxes vs. French postboxes
Lady Godiva vs. Ed Balls
and
wanking in the Ritz.
Plus: Olly is made of stronger stuff than Carrie Bradshaw; Helen was hypnotised for love; and Martin the Sound Man admits to a few awkward moments in his honeymoon. He likes to live life like an Ashton Kutcher film, he does. Accordingly, before any and every decision, Mr Kutcher thinks, “What would Martin the Sound Man Do [WWMTSMD]?” And Demi Moore sighs, and thinks that if only she’d stayed with Bruce Willis, she wouldn’t ever have to talk about sound cards over breakfast.
This week, we’re popping up on a couple of other podcasts: Pappy’s Flatshare Slamdown, the new comedy quiz show from the AMT37 alumni; and Radio 4Xtra’s What’s So Funny?, wherein we talk in a not-so-funny way about podcasting.
Despite flirting with other podcasts, AMT will always be our (audio)boo, so keep the love alive by sending your QUESTIONS – leave voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or find answermethis on Skype) or send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com – that we may magically create next week’s episode with them.
Rejoice! We’ve at last reached not-especially-impressive-numerical-landmark-when-you-think-about-it Episode 150:
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)
And duly we celebrate this really-not-at-all-momentous occasion with such topics as:
Caddyshack Caddyshack II
Craig Phillips
Collins academic diaries
Adolf Hitler’s great-nephew
Gillian McKeith
Curiously Cinnamon
knickers full of coins
Paperchase medical supplies
doner kebabs = engineering feats
Postman Pat’s new job
floaters
Opal Fruits
canine panniers
boarding school trains
wretched funk
clockwise Usain Bolt Platform 9 3/4
and
the end of days.
Plus: Olly gives you the insider knowledge that guarantees to get you on telly; Helen does not want her Everyman’s Library books despoiled by cover illustrations; and Martin the Sound Man has a top tip for stingy people who wish to be kind to the sensitive skin of strippers. Tuck a copy of his album into their garter, that’ll make them happy! This week’s bonus bit on the app is a question from Simon from Wimbledon wondering why people say Inception is confusing. Because that’s what you’re supposed to say about it, durrr.
This is the last episode of the series, but we won’t be away for long: we’ll be returning with Episode 151 on 7th October, which gives you plenty time to get your bargainous audiobooks (and we will be superlatively grateful to you if you do) as well as send us QUESTIONS for the new series: ask them with your voice on 0208 123 5877 or Skype IDanswermethis, or with your written words by emailing answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. Because you’ve furnished us with far more questions than we can squeeze into the podcast this series, we’ll be tackling some of them here on the website during our break – and check back here anon if you’re curious about this world record attempt that we’re abetting on September 30th.
So long, farewell, auf wiedersehen and goodbye, until October 7th!
This week, in Answer Me This! Episode 146, we turn to prayer. Don’t worry though; we counterbalance that with computer-game sadism.
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)
Appearing this week in our speech are:
exploding Anthea Turner (don’t worry, she survived!) The Daily Bra (a bit NSFW)
‘Whistle While You Work’ vs. ‘Girls and Boys Come Out To Play’ vs. ‘Greensleeves’
Theme Park
Katamari Damacy
you singular vs. you plural
young Mann’s evil marketing ruses
Skype at a wedding
the Siemens TJ 10500 Dressman Spaced
busy Henry VIII
the JFK death-film
and
Queen Victoria’s forbidden thunderbox
Plus: windy Olly has to choose between his girlfriend and his trouser-press; Helen is going to Hell for what she did to the Lord’s Prayer; and Martin the Sound Man says something sensible about balls for once. We’re also delighted to hear that love blooms between you listeners in even the unlikeliest of places (namely facebook.com/answermethis)
Meanwhile, over on the AMT app, there’s a very curious question from Kiki in Manchester about the Amelie-ish discovery of a mysterious photo of a baby surrounded by matchsticks. Have any of you mislaid such a thing? And in this week’s episode of Great British Questions, our toilet humour knows no bounds. The series is now finished, but come back next week for our Great British Outtakes reel.
Next week, in episode 147, we’ll be joined by special guest Ian Collins of the Late Show on talkSPORT; so send your QUESTIONS for Ian (and us) by leaving a voice message on 0208 123 5877 or Skype IDanswermethis, or firing off an email to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
This week, there’s no finer entertainment than the live footage of Charles Taylor’s trial at the Hague. But second in the chart, and hopefully less upsetting to Mia Farrow, is Answer Me This! Episode 145:
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)
Amongst the evidence we disclose are such exhibits as:
Bombalurina
kopi luwak
Brixton
Gwen Stefani’s stockings
sewer gas lamps vs. energy-saving lightbulbs
Nice biscuits vs. nice biscuits vs. no biscuits
Morrison’s sausages Inside Nature’s Giants
Ben de Lisi’s new gig
interspecies romance
crotch branding
steam power
and
the frozen pea goldfish detox
Plus: Olly teaches the etiquette demanded of an interaction with the police (1. curtsey; 2. hold your kid gloves in your left hand at all times; 3. turn widdershins only); Helen prioritises which side to expose to a wardfull of patients; and Martin the Sound Man takes a big bubbly bath in listener love for his new album (out now on iTunes, Amazon and in pretty physical form, Martyfans! Go on, make an old man very happy).
Now don’t just sit there, bursting with pent-up QUESTIONS; send them to us instead! We like them in the form of a voice message on 0208 123 5877 or Skype IDanswermethis, or an email to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. They will come in really handy for Episode 146, which you can hear next Thursday; and on Tuesday, come back for the final episode of Great British Questions, in which we take toilet humour to new levels.
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