Have you ever nicked a little something to remind you of a holiday? We’ve got a nice china cup pinched from a plane and YOU’LL NEVER TAKE US ALIVE, BRITISH AIRWAYS. What’s yours? One listener’s stolen souvenir came with fond memories and twenty years of guilt. Find out what and why in Answer Me This! Episode 314:
Today we tackle:
tinfoil hats
dumping your training-buddy
same-sex kisses
concierges Kendal Mint Cake vs transubstantiation royal tins of travel sweets vs the unstoppable march of time
stealing from castles vs pissing in a stream
the silent film Wings
a Milton Keynes-themed bar
heritage crime The Grand Budapest Hotel IRL
mummy and daddy
1995
and
giraffe heads.
Plus: though Olly prefers men to machines, he would prefer men to act like machines; Helen wouldn’t tune into a livestream of Princess Middleton giving birth; and Martin the Sound Man doesn’t have high hopes for his fellow academics on the ski slopes, unless the hopes are for a mild sprain rather than a broken arm.
As an addendum to the question about same sex kisses in films, today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available for iThings, Android and Windows devices) concerns the lost lesbians of Love Actually. Yes, they actually left material OUT of that sprawling collage of human emotions.
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‘. Generous!
We’ll return on 28th May 2015 with AMT315, prepare your tinfoil headphones.
Helen & Olly
••• AMT314 Child-Friendly Rating: 85%. Content clean. Swearing inventory: 2x ‘fuck’, 1x ‘shit’. 5% is deducted for each. •••
Martin the Sound Man sports a tinfoil hat at AMT100
Another medical question arrives from Courtney, 34, in Omaha, Nebraska:
I have been lucky enough never to need surgery, but if I do ever need to have my appendix, tonsils, or several inches of my intestines removed…
ANSWER ME THIS:
Would the surgeon allow me to take my innards, rather, my newly outtards, home with me in an alcohol-filled jar?
Medics and surgery-alumni, please go to the comments to supply Courtney with her answer.
I know that after I had my gallbladder removed, in my post-surgical party bag was a little plastic jar filled with gallstones, or a spoonful of gravel off the pavement, difficult to call.
We are on a long road trip, and the other day while in New Mexico or Arizona on I-10, we were in a gas station and saw rattlesnake eggs for sale.
Why would you buy rattlesnake eggs? What purpose would they serve?
Also, a note on the packaging said to keep cool to prevent hatching. They were on the counter in a hot room.
Firstly, what purpose is served by almost any souvenir? I never got any use out of the gold plastic gondola from Venice or the tiny furry drum from South Africa or the kangaroo scrote purse from Sydney. The rattlesnake eggs are on sale so that you can buy them, dump them on a shelf at home, then wait for someone to say, “What are those?” whereupon you say, “Rattlesnake eggs!” and they say, “Ooh! I hope they don’t hatch!” then you carry on watching Take Me Out.
BUT.
Here’s the real sting in the tail:
Rattlesnakes give birth to LIVE YOUNG.
Which means…
RATTLESNAKES DON’T LAY EGGS!
Pull a handbrake turn, zoom back up the I-10, and launch a full inquiry at this gas station. You clearly can’t trust their tourist tat, so what else are they fraudulently selling? Their ‘gas’ is probably watered down Bisto.
On the plus side, you don’t have to worry about that hot room making those fake eggs hatch.
Hi listeners! Are you looking to get rid of any household items, or are you looking for something that Freecycle cannot supply? We ask because it seems in Answer Me This! Episode 299, the show has become the audio equivalent of Loot. It’s been a long time coming.
Plus: Olly has a HUGE…collection of tea towels; Helen doesn’t want to ride in your helicopter, unless it’s too embarrassing to say no; and can anyone explain what Martin the Sound Man meant by ‘Godwin Filter’? We pretended we knew what he was talking about, but really were shrugging inside.
In case you’ve been anxious for the past two months to find out how Helen is faring in her mission to learn to love The Great British Bake Off, you can end that anxiety by listening to today’s Bit of Crap on the App, which is available for iDevices old and new, Android or Windows playthings.
If you’re anxious about how to build a super-nice website, relax! Visit Squarespace.com, have a fiddle with their easy web-building tools, and while you’re at it get 10% off their services for a whole year by using the code Answer.
It can’t have escaped your notice that if today is Episode 299, the next episode is AMT300!!!!111!!!ZOMG!!!!! We wouldn’t have got past one episode without your questions, so please keep sending them in: call the Question Line on 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis, or email answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. And do let us know what is the best thing you’ve learned from Answer Me This! over the years (interpret ‘best’ and ‘learned’ as you will) in a comment here or over on facebook.com/answermethis or twitter.com/HelenAndOlly.
We will return on 16th October with AMT300 (aka #AMT300)! Be sure to join us!
Helen & Olly
••• AMT299 Child-Friendly Rating: 64%. Quite a few cusswords but little vulgar content until the very end, when Olly shoots his load. •••
Victoria Beckham’s jumpsuit, from listener Bee’s collection
Hi listeners,
Above is a sacred relic from the 90s: Victoria Beckham’s jumpsuit, from the post-Geri era of the Spice Girls. It’s also a sacred relic of the 90s, in that it’s from Answer Me This! Episode 290, which is here:
Plus: Olly teaches a child empathy, through Robbie Williams; Helen comes up with a strong concept for the Spice Girls’ fourth album; and Martin the Sound Man reckons going up Anish Kapoor’s Olympic Meccano-crash would be cheap at a third of the price. What IS a bargain is Squarespace.com, who are offering you 10% off for a whole year if you use the code Answer when plumping for their website-building and -hosting services. And the great thing about the 90% you pay is that some of it ends up supporting independent podcasts like this one! Hurrah all round.
In today’s Bit of Crap on the App, Olly voices his disappointment over the ubiquity of Emeli Sandé. Our app is almost as readily available for your iDevices, Android or Windows gadgets.
••• AMT290 Child-Friendly Rating: 95%. Pretty clean – possibly even entirely free of swears – although there is a fleeting reference to a Wenlock and Mandeville sex toy towards the end. •••
Amid all this talk of other things to listen to, don’t forget to apply yourself to Answer Me This! Episode 286:
In which we discuss:
castles
Oktoberfest
chilled red wine
velvet ropes
decorative sticks
babysitting vs kitten-sitting
Mardi Gras vs Pancake Day
Navajo rugs vs dreamcatchers
Glastonbury scheduling EcuadorPanama hats London’s cat cafe
mythical bestiality
and
the first ever porn film.
Plus: Olly was all business, no pleasure at his school leavers’ ball; Helen prefers the pong of garlic breath to perfume; and Martin the Sound Man worries about worldly souvenirs making him into a bellend. Don’t worry Martin, you were already a bellend! JK. (Or is it?)
Today’s Bit of Crap on the App contains more perfume-chat, in which Olly sabotages any future he had as a department store perfume salesperson. Pinch your nose and spray the app into your ears from your iDevices, Android or Windows gadgets.
Here’s something that doesn’t stink: today’s episode-funders Squarespace.com offering you a 10% discount off their services for a whole year if you use the code answer3. What a breath of fresh air!
And finally, we ask that you take a deep breath and send us 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
AMT286 Child-Friendly Rating: 42%. First three quarters are clean, apart from a couple of questioneer-led swears. The episode ends on a question about porn films, but by then your children will probably have fallen asleep during the earlier question about road signs.
Listener Tam has written in with a home-grown alternative to accessories made from sharks’ teeth or ivory or whalebone. Take a look at the picture. Can you tell what the pale-coloured beads are made from? No? Read on to find out:
In an earlier podcast, you were discussing a mother saving her baby’s teeth and whether it was appropriate or not for her to share this with friends. Helen commented in a joking manner that, “What was the mother going to do? Make jewelry out of them?”
Of course she could. I had foot surgery several years ago for a condition called hammer toe. My toes were all bunched up and curled under my foot, making it painful at times to walk. So, to fix this issue, a surgeon cut all of the tendons under all off my toes, and then, on five toes, had to remove the middle toe knuckle; three on the left foot, two on the right. I was awake for the two surgeries and watched the entire process. It only took about a half an hour for each foot, they put me in a surgical boot and I walked right out.
However, I thought that it would be wonderful to have a unique souvenir to show for my trauma. So I kept the knuckles. Once I came home, my husband boiled them to get the meat off, and drilled them for me. My mum gave me some rather fitting beads to make a lovely necklace.
So you see, baby teeth are really no big deal. It’s all in perspective.
That’s right – in perspective of having to BOIL YOUR HUMAN FLESH off your OWN BONES. Did you get the idea from Jeffrey Dahmer’s Etsy store?
As well as the above picture of the finished necklace, Tam kindly included photos of the process prior to completion. Because I don’t want to make casual browsers puke till next Tuesday, you’ll have to click through if you wish to see Tam’s foot pre-surgery, her blood-soaked post-operative appendage, or her disembodied toe-knuckles.
Listeners, over the years you’ve treated us to pictures of your necrotic legs, infected piercings and Satanic effigies. Not wishing to seem ungrateful, but you ARE welcome to send us pictures of things that aren’t leaking pus and blood.
When you woke up this morning, listeners, did you realise this would be the day that Olly revealed how he is in possession of the local equivalent of one of John Wayne Gacy’s prison paintings?
Well, it is that day. Assuming you go ahead and listen to Answer Me This! Episode 225 rather than choose to continue living in ignorance:
Wherein we contemplate:
Danny Boyle
morality in musicals
shouting at children
Ramadan for Olympians
masks
hippie housemates
Maroon 5 vs. pole vaulters
Chicago vs. Bury St Edmunds
Outer Mongolia vs. Darkest Peru Mrs Lovett vs. Wagamama
the Phantom of the Opera vs. The Collector
Timbuktu
what Mein Kampf is missing (aside from a GSOH of course)
ostentatious eccentricity nooks and crannies Coinstar
Hitler’s watercolours
and
Sesame Snaps.
Plus: climbing upon Nelson’s Column, Olly almost exposes his own column; Helen misses the cupboard in which she hid from childhood; and Martin the Sound Man discovers his spirit flower.
This week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available on iDevices and Android) includes the next episode in the series begun by Lauren from Brooklyn in AMT224, ‘Is it OK to steal?’ In today’s thrilling installment, Mike from Crofton Park asks whether he’s allowed to steal his broadband package. How can it be stealing when you can’t even SEE it, right?
If, like Mike and Lauren, you’re tussling with your moral compass – or any other query is bothering you – allow us to solve your problems for you: send your QUESTIONS as voicemails to the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis) or emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
You should click here if you’re in the market for a hippie-proof AMT mug, which must be nigh indestructable if it’s survived five years in our company. If you want to survive 59 minutes 33 seconds more of our company, please invest in the AMT Sports Day too, because on the eve of the Olympics, it would be impolite not to.
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