Answer Me This! Episode 308 is a surprisingly jobs-themed episode, with questions about whether your tertiary education should prepare you for one, to how your hair can affect your ability to get one, to what you do when you lose one.
On today’s roster are such topics as:
cat-cleaning
pink hair
green hair
vocations
FDR’s hot dog banquet Bill Clinton’s night out with the lads
redundancy
sleeping naked
fainting at Elvis
and
throwing knickers at Tom Jones.
Plus: a typo made Olly a lot more popular in 90s chatrooms; if you’ve been made redundant, join Helen at the Daytime Cinema Club; and Martin the Sound Man manages to make a big pile of underwear sound like the grossest, most unappealing, least sexy thing possible.
In today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – which you can get for your iDevices, Android and Windows gadgets – we continue to contemplate the question about how our nightwear-averse questioneer could dress for slumber. There must be a compromise between a tutu and a full suit of armour.
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‘. Which you should, to demonstrate your devotion to this podcast.
Since we are devoted to providing you with this podcast, we’ll return on 5th March 2015 with AMT309.
Helen & Olly
••• AMT308 Child-Friendly Rating: 64%. A few swears, though the strongest are right at the end, so you could cut out before then. Very mild bawdiness in the question about naked sleeping, but nothing that would startle a nun. •••
Overshadowed by a special guest appearance from Missy Elliott*, here’s Answer Me This! Episode 307:
*Not really. She refuses to respond to our postcards.
On today’s question-answering slate:
female strippers
male strippers
drupes
Grumpy Cat beckoning cats Cats Lil Bub: the Chris Martin of cats
Ben Lashes
fast food delivery
wedding diplomacy
Happy Meal toys
Ronald McDonald vs Carol Vorderman
human beatboxing
coconuts
and
Femidoms.
Plus: Olly’s brain or his wang can be stimulated, but never at the same time; Helen could have been the late-90s Beanie Baby trading magnate of Tunbridge Wells; and Martin the Sound Man exercises uncharacteristic restraint in the face of a question about beatboxing. Though he still manages to sound like he’s polishing a window with his own spit.
Today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App contains further contemplation of memes and cats and the internet’s favourite/Helen’s least favourite, cat memes. Hear on your iDevices, Android and Windows gadgets.
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‘. Use it use it use it!
With every fibre of our being, we yearn for your QUESTIONS. Leave voicemails on the Question Line – call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis – or send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
It was a pedigree theoretical cat. The best breed, in my opinion: it doesn’t moult, piss on the carpet or claw at visitors.
Do any of you know whether or not Erwin Schrödinger actually owned a cat? Since his famous thought experiment involved dead cat, I always assumed he probably wasn’t a fan of the live kind.
Happy Thanksgiving to AMT’s American pals! Today’s episode is thematically appropriate for you, since it involves a question about Disney’s turkey legs; so don your turkey boxer shorts and turkey tops, strap on your turkey watch, inhale the delicious scent of turkey, plug in your turkey headphones and listen to Answer Me This! Episode 303*:
We also speak of such non-turkey topics as:
mirrors in the gym
sexy cheese
a pat from Paul Daniels
the Dewey Decimal System
Meville Dewey vs Melvil Dui
McDonald’s bagels
wanking into bagels
ripping off Starbucks
hidden Mickeys Fifty Shades of Grey-based pranks
and
cat scat chat.
Plus: Olly favours almond milk over animal milk (maybe the question about cheesy handjobs put him off); size matters to Helen, when it comes to shelving second-hand books; and Martin the Sound Man is never going to be a serial TV quiz contestant
Today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available for your iDevices, Android and Windows gadgets) is stuffed full of praise for the bountiful foods of Manchester. If you like the sound of the Answer Me This! Christmas – and even Scrooge can get behind it – then you can buy it and episodes 1-170 as an early prezzie for yourself at answermethisstore.com. You’re funding the future of AMT with your purchases, so Thank You from the future!
We’ll be back with AMT304 on 11th December 2014; stay out of trouble in the meantime,
Helen & Olly
••• AMT303 Child-Friendly Rating: 30%. Sweary from the off. Obscene question about cheese ten minutes in, followed by a Fifty Shades of Grey-based prank, then the possibly non-consensual and definitely unprotected sex in Phantom of the Opera. Overall, not an episode to listen to on the school run. •••
* And here is Helen sporting one of your traditional Thanksgiving hats:
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. •••
Jordan from Bridgend, South Wales is throwing down the gauntlet to Sea Monkeys:
I never had Sea Monkeys as a child but wanted you to check out what I did have as a child… TRIOPS!
They are similar to Sea Monkeys in the way you hatch and look after them, but they are amazing! When I was a kid I had this huge plastic tank which had tunnels running Off it to different rooms: there was the feeding room, the hatching room and others.
I’d recommend these to anyone who is thinking of getting the crappy Sea Monkeys.
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. •••
In AMT292 we left Pat from Canada pissing around her garden to keep raccoons away. But Sara from California but living in the Ozarks has another solution:
I have a solution for Pat’s raccoon poop problem and that is to get a large dog. Or perhaps a small one, but ours is large. Raccoons used to use the chimney of my parents’ backyard fireplace as a toilet. I can even remember my dad building a wooden pyramid to cover it in an unsuccessful attempt to prevent the raccoon menace. As soon as we got a dog, the raccoons disappeared. The chimney is the current dog’s barking-at-cats stand.
It’s not a flawless solution: even if you eliminate the raccoon poop, you’ll still be left with a load of dog poop. And what if the dog doesn’t deter the raccoons at all? Look how well these two are getting along!
If that happens, Pat, here’s a guide to caring for your new pet raccoons. In brief: don’t let them eat too many sweets; don’t smack them; and don’t let them chew through your electrical cords. Now we know.
Plus: Olly details the specifications for choosing his new alarm clock, so set your own alarm clock to jolt you back into consciousness afterwards; Helen comes up with a Doctor Who reboot for Matt Smith and an amazing sit- for a sitcom, so TV commissioners, prepare a bucket of cash and call her in for a meeting; and Martin the Sound Man won’t let you through a gate until you give him a little somethin-somethin. APPROACH WITH CAUTION.
Today’s Bit of Crap on the App, Helen gets doorbell envy. To hear all about that grievous condition, push the button on your iDevices, Android or Windows gadgets.
No need to envy other people’s nice websites – now you can build your own through Squarespace.com, who not only kindly funded today’s show, but are also offering you a 10% discount off their services for a whole year if you use the code answer. We used Squarespace to build answermethisstore.com and it was even easier to set up shop than it is to set up this shop.
Keep us in business by sending in your questions: call the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis) or email answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
Back in a fortnight,
Helen & Olly
PS Get well soon, Dave from Smethwick!
AMT287 Child-Friendly Rating: 95%.
No unsuitable content, aside from the demystification of Hello Kitty. An F-bomb is detonated during the discussion of keyboard shortcuts, but thanks to the subject matter, there’s no way your kids will be paying attention.
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.)
Today, in Answer Me This! Episode 264, we pretend to remember the most beloved 20th century canine entertainer. No, not Lassie! No, not Rin Tin Tin. No, not Columbo’s Basset hound… Alright, one of the Top 40 (give or take) most beloved 20th century canine entertainers: Schnorbitz.
Plus: Olly is a human salad, with the Body Shop providing the dressing (but don’t put any strawberries in it!); Helen makes things other than podcasts; and Martin the Sound Man resolves to suspend his scepticism. We’re sure that’ll last more than 0 minutes.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App, which is available for iDevices and Android, we consider the Bacardi Bat and its similarity to Captain Birdseye. Certainly if we were choosing one of them as the voice of a joke Twitter account, we’d go for the one that can at least communicate in words. Sonar doesn’t translate well to tweets.
If you would like us to translate your QUESTIONS into podcast, send them to us as voicemails deposited on the Question Line – call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis – or emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
See you next Thursday,
Helen & Olly
AMT264 Child-Friendly Rating: 50%. Bit of swearing, short discussion about sex, plus a section about a dead dog. Children do get upset by dead dogs.
Hello listeners,
Answer Me This! Podcast 