Posts Tagged ‘whales’

AMT416: “Fondue is good and creates a good mood”

March 26, 2026

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AMT416 sends us on a Learning Journey about:

John Noakes cleaning Nelson’s Column
LEGO Titanic sets
World Book Day
curried whale
meat fondue
dirty Downing St
novelizations of film/TV shows
and
what to do with wedding suits post-divorce.

Plus: Olly and his new massage gun are very happy together; Helen of course managed to find the absolute least cool way to rebel against a school custom; and Martin the Sound Man says he loves wearing suits, despite never actually wearing suits as they conflict with his self-image of someone who does a more physical job than sitting at a computer and occasionally twiddling knobs on an audio interface…

Now is a GREAT time to become a patron at patreon.com/answermethis if you haven’t already, because the next edition of our video livestream series Petty Problems is happening Sunday 29th March! Join us for that, and in return for your patronage, you also get the whole Petty Problems back catalogue, a batch of Bonus Bits each month, and an ad-free version of AMT416. If you sign up at one of the higher Patreon tiers, you get access to an RSS feed with ALL the AMT stuff EVER, including our entire back catalogue, our six themed albums, the retro AMTs, and every Bit of Crapp from the AMT App.

So send us your trivial unserious questions for Petty Problems, as well as questions of any other level of seriousness, in writing or voice note, to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave a voicemail at 0208 123 5877 like the old days. Remember to include the formula “Helen and/or Olly, answer me this”, and let us know a name (pseudonyms are fine) and pronouns to use for you.

AMT417 will be out 30 April 2026. Mid-month, there will also be an episode of our new feature Answer Us Back, where you answer us back about questions from our recent and distant back catalogue. So send in your feedback about any question or answer from any episode ever.

Check out our other work:

Olly‘s several podcasts include Today in History with the Retrospectors and his monthly magazine show The Modern Mann. All can be found via ollymann.com.

Helen makes the entertainment podcast about language, The Allusionist, which returns in early April. You can also hear her on recent episodes of The Bugle, and with Martin guesting on a recent episode of Material Girls podcast about the word ‘daddy’, speaking of which…

Martin‘s song therein, ‘Daddy Really Cares’, is available to buy from his Bandcamp. All proceeds go to organisations helping trans youth in the UK and Canada.

This episode is sponsored by: 

Saily, flexible eSIM data roaming plans for when you’re abroad. Download SAILY in your app store and use our code amt15 at checkout to get an exclusive 15% off your first purchase. For further details go to saily.com/amt15.

The London Review of Books, the twice-monthly literary mag full of essays, reviews and more by excellent writers. Get a 6 month print and digital subscription for just £12 at LRB.me/answer.

Squarespace, the all in one platform for creating and running your online empire. Go to squarespace.com/answer, play around with the two-week free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, get a 10% discount on your first purchase of a website or domain with the code ANSWER.

EPISODE 340: the post-pre-Netflix world

September 22, 2016

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Listeners, how terribly remiss of us to make it through three quarters of 2016 without marking the fact that it has been designated by the UN as the International Year of Pulses. But thankfully there’s still three months of it in which to celebrate, starting with a pulverised pea party in Answer Me This! Episode 340. We also speak of:

VHS tapes
bear shit
whale shit
mushy peas
candy floss
Graham from Canada nostalgia
double beds
The Hays Code
bad advice from The Modern Man (NOT The Modern Mann)
marrowfat facts (marrowfacts?)
and
FitFatbit.

Plus: Olly finally unsubscribed from his ‘Paying for a gym is just as productive as attending a gym’ fitness plan; Helen advises on her specialist subject: avoiding social interaction; and Martin the Sound Man is all umami and no trousers.

In today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available on iThings, Android and Windows devices – an anonymous questioneer has a dilemma about free wine. Well, it’s not really free. Someone always pays. Just, in this case, not him. (But possibly Martin, twice, because he is SUCH a good citizen.)

If you want to spend your wine budget on more AMT, head to answermethisstore.com to stock up on our albums and our first 200 episodes. You can also generate FREE MONEY for us and a FREE AUDIOBOOK for you at answermethispodcast.com/audible.

To send us questions for future episodes, call the Question Line on 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis, and email answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. Be our interfriend at twitter.com/helenandolly and facebook.com/answermethis.

We’ll be back on 6 October with AMT341,

Helen & Olly

••• AMT340 Child-Friendly Rating: 44%. Quite a few strong swears. References to sex. •••

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EPISODE 268 – you’ll just be left with a really fat lion

August 22, 2013


Hello listeners,

Although August is coming to a close, and with it the Edinburgh Fringe, there’s still just enough time to incorporate our grade-A publicity techniques into your show. Learn from the masters in Answer Me This! Episode 268:

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In which we also consider:

SeaWorld
ark logistics
glacier cherries
Peter Nichols’ Passion Play
Noah’s flood vs. the great flood of Edgware
transporting whales
E number 127
aeroplane seat-reclining etiquette
endless Chorus Line
war poetry
and
Barry Scott.

Plus: Olly warns you not to sit behind him on a flight, as he provides his own, er, jet propulsion; Helen still regrets inadvertently reviving the Al Jolson look for Edinburgh Fringe punters; and Martin the Sound Man fails the ‘name the artificial colourant in the glacé cherries’ game.

In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App, which is available for iDevices and Android, Helen tells you the magic trick with which you can WOW your friends (or thoroughly disappoint them if all they wanted was a nice refreshing orange).

Don’t disappoint us: send us your nice refreshing QUESTIONS. Leave voicemails on the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis) and send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. If we answer them, as Barry Scott would say: bang, and the doubt is gone.

See you next Thursday,

Helen & Olly

AMT268 Child-Friendly Rating: 75%. In the aftermath of AMT267, this episode opens with further discussion of virginity loss, with concomitant references to genitalia and sexual practices. However the rest of the episode is clean beans, aside from a couple of swears.

PS Because we’d never leave you with an endless Chorus Line:

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EPISODE 193…not.

October 20, 2011

…actually, not ‘not’. See what a pain in the arse that joke is? Leave it in the 90s, people! This is our plea in Answer Me This! Episode 193:

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)

Today we ponder upon:

Indian cows
Utterly Butterly
beluga whales vs. beluga caviar
holy salt
claiming sanctuary
charity shop returns policies
cloud computing
flyers
milk.com
contact lenses
Teri Hatcher in Swedish
shoe mnemonics
breastfeeding men
transubstantiation
and
the irony of Google Chrome.

Plus: Olly is jealous of you people who’ve had milkmen (oo-er, missus!); Helen will be hiding in plain sight when she goes on the lam; and Martin the Sound Man is happy to be the theme of your stag/hen parties. L-plates and fake veils do look great against a tweed jacket and facial hair.

This week’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available for iPhones, iPads and Android devices) is about the books that wind up in charity shops before they are even dog-eared. Not this book, though! Perish the thought.

Do NOT, however, perish thoughts of sending us your QUESTIONS. Pose them to us as voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or fire up the Skype and look for answermethis) or emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. In the Age of Austerity, it’s one thing you needn’t stint upon.

See you next Thursday,

Helen & Olly

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EPISODE 187 – the fruit always wins

August 11, 2011

Team AMT! Please line up at the assembly points and let us check you’re all present and correct. Everyone OK? Nobody hurt? Good. Here’s Answer Me This! Episode 187, which as it happens was recorded before our home country irreparably damaged its international reputation for decorous manners.

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)

Today we talk of:

fruit machines
the holy iPad
moneysupermarket.com vs. Swingers
the distinctive Requiem for a Dream soundtrack
Edo in Crystal Palace
David Beckham’s pants
buttery John Lydon
Paddy McGuinness’s penile pain
scaring The Hoosiers
Girl From Rio
the King James Bible
skip-diving
whale fellatio
the Edinburgh festival
and
the biggest testicles in the world.

Plus: Olly finds that his musical tastes have not matured at all when it comes to classic New Kids on the Block; Helen’s love of a) free food and b) sushi is severely tested; and Martin the Sound Man will be multitasking at the Green Man Festival next weekend. Watch him transform from a nerdy scientist to a nerdy musician in the blink of an eye! We’ll also be there too, reading extracts from the AMT Book, so please come to see us all at the Solar Stage in Einstein’s Garden, if you can make time between the folk bands and the crumpet-eating.

Make more time for this week’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available on iPhone and iPad, or Android), which is a question from Chrissie from Cheltenham about whether can-can dancers cover their nether regions properly. Additionally, please make time to ask us some QUESTIONS as well: leave voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis), or send emails answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.

See you next week, assuming civilisation still exists by then,

Helen & Olly

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EPISODE 185 – the Pyjama Experience

July 28, 2011

Good morning Team AMT,

It was a race against time to complete this week’s episode and make it to London Road before curtain up. “But it’s the National Theatre!” you wail. “They don’t DO curtains.” You’re right. We’re talking metaphorical curtains. But we’re not talking metaphorical curtains in Answer Me This! Episode 185:

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)

We are, instead, talking about:

marriage certificates
prize belts
toy guard dogs
claret jugs
meat feast pizza
Ian Huntley vs. Poirot
killer whales vs. sharks
spiders vs. bananas
The Shamen, Bob Dylan and Lulu vs. the BBC
Jerry Sadowitz
‘Je T’aime’
Slinky Dog
how Noel Edmonds’s Multi-Coloured Swap Shop begat Live & Kicking
Orcus
Rodney Alcala
tall geriatrics
and
krill.

Plus: Olly lays waste to Percy Pig and Pals; Helen tells you how to liven up a TV gameshow; and Martin the Sound Man thinks the Strokes and Primal Scream are a bunch of wusses. This week’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available on iPhone and iPad, or Android) tackles Olly’s golfing future. Will he? Won’t he? Will his shoulder pop out of its socket yet again? That’s not something anyone wants to see as they tee off.

We can’t tee off next week’s episode without your QUESTIONS, so deliver them as voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or find answermethis on Skype) or emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. Fooooore!

xoxo,

Helen & Olly

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