Got any great tips for gaming a hotel breakfast buffet? Do share in the comments; but first, listen to Answer Me This! Episode 297 to learn from the master (ie Olly Mann):
In today’s buffet of audio delights, we’re serving:
Sea Monkey refills
second hand wedding dresses
green peppers vs red peppers
Bob Dylan vs grapefruit juice Steve Wright in the Afternoon vs heroin Harold Von Braunhut
the Pizza Hut salad bar
Oxford divorces
cryptobiosis
spying on your children
and
gobbing in the pot.
Plus: if you see Olly roving towards you armed with a Tupperware tub, he’s either going to take advantage of your buffet or imprison you with fatal consequence; Helen will be survived by a sackful of raw gingerbread; and Martin the Sound Man is a masochist for grapefruit juice.
In today’s Bit of Crap on the App, we tackle another Great British Bake Off question from Katherine from Sheffield. To find out how we go from that to the Sword of Gondor in just four short minutes, fire up the app on your iDevices, Android or Windows playthings. As a happy by-product of buying the app, you’re funding the show – likewise if you splash out on any of our albums or vintage episodes at answermethisstore.com. So you know that along with your purchase you’ll receive a free dose of our eternal gratitude.
And because we’re simply brimful of gratitude today, let’s throw a bucketful over Squarespace.com, for sponsoring this episode, for allowing people to build and host websites easily and beautifully, and for offering you 10% off their services for a whole year if you use the code Answer.
By the way, if you’re keen to start your own podcast, book a ticket for this Guardian Masterclass and on 20th September, Helen and a host of other podcasting mavens will teach you all you need to know, and then some.
We will return with AMT298 on 18th September, and we hope you do too. Cheerio!
Helen & Olly
••• AMT297 Child-Friendly Rating: 88%. Light on profane language. Unfortunate TMI about Olly and Martin’s bodily fluids. Question from a parent running surveillance ops on their teenager, which may instill trust issues in your own offspring. •••
Today we discuss the world’s greatest audio format apart from this one: Desert Island Discs. What would your luxury be? (If you’re a cheating cheater who wants to take a fully-stocked iPod, throw yourself into the sea.) Find out ours, along with myriad other important nuggets of information, in Answer Me This! Episode 259:
In which we also consider:
condoms vs. opera gloves
knits vs. nits
Tim Burton vs. Faust
Olly vs. Ollie vs. Olleigh
cherry-pickers gentlemen’s clubs (nb not ‘gentlemen’s clubs’) The Reform Act This Life
personalised Coke bottles
Simon Cowell’s reflection
mayonnaise spa treatments
retro-live-tweeting
and
Russ Abbott.
Plus: Olly is nostalgic for an infestation of headlice; Helen WOULD with the person who changes the lights in supermarkets; and Martin the Sound Man doesn’t want to swallow himself. Just reflect on that quietly.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) Olly rhapsodises about the Coca-Cola Freestyle Machine. All the different types of sugar water – in one machine! A miracle of modern life.
Another miracle of modern life is to be able to watch thousands of hours of entertainment for FREE thanks to our LoveFilm offer – which, equally miraculously, helps pay for future Answer Me Thises.
As well as free money, we can only sustain the podcast with your QUESTIONS, so send them along in the form of voicemails on the Question Line – call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis – or emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
Holed up in the Holiday Inn in Salford Quays, we contemplated holding a Bed-In for Peace. But then we realised that if we did, the already oversubscribed lifts would become clogged up with press and peaceniks, leaving all the other hotel guests feeling far from peaceful. So, sorry, peace; we made Answer Me This! Episode 232 instead:
Today we consider:
the Virgin Trains slow reveal
personal massagers
naughty Amazon
animal blood donation
magic oily fish
Les Rosbifs
immature students
maths vs. emotion
cottaging
Ping (who?)
and
the Holiday Inn pillow menu.
Plus: Olly would like to reverse decades of progress in gay rights just so he’s got something to read when he’s on the loo; Helen is unlikely to renew her wedding vows, unless the magazine deal is lucrative enough; and Martin the Sound Man goes off to have a rest in the rest room. He’s a very well-rested man.
Check out this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) if you’ve been wondering what happened next in the tale of vengeance from AMT231 and/or why your pineapple jelly won’t set.
We’re relieved to tell you that our Skype problem seems to be fixed, but if you used Skype to ask us a question in August or September, we never got it, so please ask it again by dialling up answermethis. You don’t need to worry if you sent a QUESTION via email (answermethispodcast@googlemail.com) or the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877); it’s safely swimming around with all the other questions in our question tank.
See you next Thursday!
Helen & Olly
Martin the Sound Man has a little alone time with the personal massager in the Holiday Inn.
Cait from Bristol but currently in Orlando got a little wild in her hotel room and now is suffering the shame that inevitably follows:
I am staying in a hotel and have just accidentally got chocolate all over the white bed sheets. Unfortunately, the chocolate looks a lot like I’ve shat myself.
So please answer me this: do I leave housekeeping a note explaining that it’s chocolate and not shit? Do I do nothing and let them think I pooed the bed? Or something else?
It’s so delightfully British of you, Cait, to think of leaving a note! If it makes you feel better, by all means do that – or leave the chocolate wrapper in the bed as an indicator of what has gone on in there (NB also a useful cover in the event of you actually shitting the bed).
However I imagine that the average hotel housekeeper has far too many rooms to clean to spend much time analysing your suspicious-looking stains, or sniffing them to ascertain their origin, or sending off a sample for lab testing. Moreover, they will have surely seen so many scenes of filth and degradation during their careers that your little one-woman scat party would barely warrant an eyebrow-raise.
Although we’ve come
To the end of the road current series,
Still we can’t let go – because we’ll be back on 19th April with yet more Answer Me This!. So long and adieu, here is Episode 210:
Today we ponder:
the Angel of the North Pet Sounds
sham marriage a different type of big bird Tom Jones
Mel Blanc
emotions vs. money
Matt Willis vs. televisions
Alice Cooper vs. vending machines
Jesus vs. Spongebob Squarepants
Father Christmas on film
Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth
and
Abraham Lincoln.
Plus: we learn the one place where Olly actually keeps quiet; Helen whips ’em out for SPRIIIIIINNNG BREEEEAAAK!; and Martin the Sound Man puts a price on his hand in marriage. But you might as well barter him down to something more realistic, like £20 and a Chocolate Orange.
This week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices or Android) is a question from Celeste from Elephant and Castle about whether you can sell your house without the intervention of an estate agent. Of course you can! But, before you ask, you are probably better off not performing your own laser eye surgery.
There is more to listen to during our absence, because by royal appointment (not really) we’ve released the Answer Me This! Jubilee, a 57-minute romp through the massive numbers of questions you lot send us about Her Maj and the like. Click here to get it.
Don’t forget us while we’re away: keep sending your QUESTIONS, as voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis) and emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
Yeah! We’re celebrating big-style, because against all our expectations (and common sense), we bloody well made it to Answer Me This! Episode 200. As befits such a landmark, today’s podcast is a bumper edition, featuring some of our favourite people in the world. Hear:
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)
On the agenda of this special edition are subjects including:
World of Warcraft
bro code Toadie from Neighbours
glühwein
giant peppermills
Dean Martin: boob man
La Roux: lazy
Pamela Anderson the Beavis and Butthead reboot A Child Called It
AMTfans vs. puberty
paramedic studies vs. media studies
Lassie vs. Bagpuss
Olly’s junior business cards
Switzerland 4eva Armand Assante
Cadbury’s Chocolate Eclairs
Malibu’n’barbecue sauce The Three Musketeers panto
and
hot tubs.
Plus: Olly measures himself on the Frasier yardstick; Helen impeded her mother’s career (look, she never ASKED to be born, OK?); and at last we discover multitalented Martin the Sound Man’s weak spot – deficiency at Warhammer.
This week there’s an especially Big Bit of Crap on the App, wherein we learn: how to make a fake G&T; where dolls store their Christmas decorations; at what age you should not accept gifts of pants from your mother; what the hell DFS stands for; the benefits of child labour for a wedding reception; finding love at the kosher butcher’s; the perils of a brown rice diet; and seeing the PG Tips chimps live.
The app is available for iDevices or Android, but on this occasion, the Bonus Bit is available to all of you, smartphone or not; click here to download the MP3, or play this player:
There’s more! If you require some borderline-horrific visuals to accompany this episode, check out the Gallery of Munt.
We couldn’t have made it to 200 episodes without the affection and support of you listeners, so please give yourselves a pat on the back from us, especially if you are one of the legion who supplied us with QUESTIONS. If you aren’t, what are you waiting for? Send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877, Skype answermethis).
We’ll be back next week with the Best of AMT2011, part 1,
We love you, you big diverse bunch. We love the fact that, in the space of Answer Me This! Episode 186, we go from a wannabe Olympian to a sexual Olympian (with a gold medal in Making Shit Up). With a meat-loving Aussie, an excitable pair in Harrods, and a crispy Dave from Smethwick in between:
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 admits to having watched Eurosport without his eyes throwing up, but only because it reminded him of Jake Gyllenhaal films; young Helen was dazzled by Wingdings; and Martin the Sound Man is a pioneer of the Banjo Slap Bass Afrobeat genre – if you want to know what the hell that sounds like, click here to listen to the latest episode of his musical podcast. This week’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available on iPhone and iPad, or Android) is a question from 16-year-old Joe from London. Despite his tender age, he has a very adult romantic problem: he can’t remember his new girlfriend’s birthday, but he knows it’s approaching fast, along with a ton of trouble if he forgets it. Pray for him.
We’re fully aware that the rest of you have problems of your own, so please send them to us and we’ll try to make light entertainment out of your pain. Leave voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis), or send emails answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
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.
Here it is folks, the final Answer Me This! of the second quarter – Episode 140:
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)
As we clear out our desks for the break, we give the following topics an airing:
Wills’n’Harry
eggnog
Anjou
the new Mentos + Coke
Duncan Goodhew vs. Dizzy Gillespie
Leonard Cohen vs. Magnetic Fields
Siberian husky dogs vs. Paula Radcliffe
wedding pyromania
hotel breakfast buffets
goat dowry
Freecycle surprise party
revolving restaurants
and
Narnia in Canada.
Plus: it turns out Olly can multitask after all, but only in hotel bathrooms; Helen manages to make prunes even more boring than you already thought they were; and Martin the Sound Man gives a line reading of The Human Centipede, which is as close as we ever want to get to actually seeing that film.
We hereby bid you adieu for a month, but we’ll be popping back here every week to post up some choice words – and to display the results of the Berocca Challenge that we set you this episode, should any of you choose to rise to it! You can also keep in touch with us via Twitter and Facebook, but more importantly by sending us your QUESTIONS – call 0208 123 5877, Skype answermethis or email answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
Parting is such sweet sorrow. We’ll be back on 15th July. Have a smashing month!
Don your special silly-specs, because now, in INCREDIBLE 3D and GLORIOUS TECHNICOLOUR, it’s Answer Me This! Episode 113:
This classic episode is available to BUY NOW for just 79p, through iTunes or a secure PayPal server, without DRM restriction. CLICK HERE to find out more and support our podcast. (This helps keep our most recent episodes free)
Oh alright, it doesn’t look any different to our other episodes, but it definitely sounds different, for unlike all those other weeks, this week we’re talking about:
Veronica Mars
Sylvia Plath
musical chairs Almost Famous
Priscilla Presley
Shakespeare’s Globe
Sharon Osbourne vs. Robert Mugabe Time Out vs. the rest of the world
a ‘Janet Jackson-style mic’
Granny’s Garden
and
Rebecca Ritters.
Plus: Olly takes a trip down Memory Lane to the days of Lycos and Geocities; Helen proves to be not very ladylike in the bedroom; and Martin the Sound Man uses an expression that should probably get him put on some sort of register. We also reveal just how rock’n’roll we really are. Although I think you know already. More Horlicks than Hendrix, alas.
Now, like squirrels gathering a large supply of hazelnuts to get through the winter, we want to stuff a tree-trunk full of your QUESTIONS to see us right through to spring. So please email them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave a voicemail on Skype IDanswermethis or the question line 0208 123 5877.
And do chip in with your suggestions as to the best party games: leave a comment below, and in due course this blog post will become Party Central. Minus the Twiglets.
See you next week!
Helen and Olly
PS: A madly-skilled young lady disproves Olly’s statement that you can’t play a pop song on a ukulele without sounding like you’re taking the piss:
Answer Me This! Podcast 