** Click here to listen to EPISODE 51 **
Hello listeners!
We’re having a bit of a technological spring-clean this week, so if you notice anything odd, like your iTunes doing something uncharacteristic with your Answer Me This! collection, panic not. Normality shall be restored very soon. Promise!
Hello there, pretties,
Many* of you have written to us in distress** to ask why Episode 50 didn’t appear on iTunes last week. We’re not quite sure - just some tiny glitch at the mighty iMothership, we gather - but it seems to be there now.
*one or two
**in a mildly irked state
Anyway, as far as we can tell there are no such problems concerning Answer Me This! Episode 51. Just click on this player:
or download:
And this week’s discourse features such diverse elements as:
No Country for Old Men
Taco Bell
Olly’s Great Cinema Swindle
White Dwarf
Michael Winner
George and Lynne from the Sun
testosterone
boobs vs. manboobs
locksmiths
KFC hats
Green Shield Stamps
and
our dads’ underpants.
Moreover, Olly confesses to being a rotten pilfering varmint; Helen has a surprising amount in common with Axl Rose; and Martin the Sound Man teaches us all a lesson about etiquette for swingers. Ugh.
Now, in two episodes’ time we’re taking a month off, so if you’ve got a QUESTION, hurry the hell up and send it to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or our Question Line on 0208 123 5877 (Skype answermethis).
See you next week, yes? Yes!
Helen and Olly
Add this episode to:
Subscribe with iTunes//Archive Jukebox//Email us a question
Facebook Fanclub//Answer Me This! Podcast Superstore//YouTube Channel
** Click here to listen to EPISODE 50 **
Following Episode 50 and questioneer Oli asking, “If Nintendo is a Japanese company then why is its star character (Mario) supposed to be Italian?”, several of you have written in to offer solutions to this mystery.
Luke from Birmingham suggests: “I believe that they made him Italian to match his look (hat and ‘tache). The reason they gave him the hat and the moustache was because they were easier to animate than hair and a mouth back in those days.”
Sounds plausible enough. But what of this hypothesis from JC of japanmanship.blogspot.com: “The story, which may be apocryphal, is that when Mr. Arakawa was setting up Nintendo of America they had this warehouse and when the time came to give Jumpman from Donkey Kong a name they were being hassled by their landlord, an Italian American named Mario. The plumbing angle is a mystery though.”
Hmm. The plot thickens… So let’s add a real-life Italian’s opinion to the mix, courtesy of Rachele from Naples: “I always assumed Mario and Luigi were Italian-American rather than just Italian. I don’t know why, but that’s the vibe I got…also surely the stereotypical plumber nowadays is Polish?”
Well, now we don’t know what to believe! So let’s divert ourselves with an answer to the unanswered question from Episode 49, “Why do they sterilise the needles for lethal injections?” Take it away, Billy from Featherstone:
“The answer is that sterilising the needles makes sure that the person administering the injection doesn’t catch anything if they were to accidentally catch themselves.”
Thanks, Billy from Featherstone! It’s always a pleasure when you lot do our work for us… Also regarding Episode 49, a number of you have written in voicing your anguish at being denied Martin the Sound Man’s response to Dovy’s cribbed-off-the-internet question: “Why is it that when someone tells you that there are over a billion stars in the universe, you believe them, but if they tell you there is wet paint somewhere, you have to touch it to make sure?”
This is what you were missing: humans are naturally curious, and if there’s a way to find out the answer to a question for themselves, they’ll do it (ie sticking their hand onto a freshly-painted fence) rather than relying upon other people. However in the case of stars, people have no practical way of testing this for themselves, so just have to take it as read.
I suppose that seems plausible, Martin, but if as you say people tend to find out the answers to questions for themselves, what the heck would we talk about in this podcast, eh?
Well zipadee doodah, zipadee day - Answer Me This! turns 50 today!
We can’t believe we’ve reached a half-century; imagine, if we’d taken up a more lucrative hobby 15 months ago, such as gold-panning or selling mint-condition Dinky cars on ebay, then… Actually, let’s not think about that after all, because we don’t want to cry on this special day. Instead just hurry along and listen to old Fiddy by clicking on this playa:
Or downloading:
And marking this momentous occasion are such topics as:
blue ice
radiation
Durham Cathedral
Selfridges
the George Foreman Grill
Skins
plumbing, Italian-style
liquitabs
the Gherkin
French kissing
Body Shop Body Butter
and
octodogs.
Plus: Olly plays with his Special Button; Helen gets Turned; and Martin the Sound Man is the very personification of a sexy jester man. But you all knew that already.
Well, I’m sure we can all agree that the first fifty Answer Me This!es have been a veritable rollercoaster of fun, so if you want to be a part of the next fifty, send us a QUESTION by calling our Question Line on 0208 123 5877, Skypeing answermethis, or emailing answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. And eeh by Lordy, we’ll be a hundred before you even know it.
Bye!
Helen and Olly
Add this episode to:
Subscribe with iTunes//Archive Jukebox//Email us a question
Facebook Fanclub//Answer Me This! Podcast Superstore//YouTube Channel
Please get your calculators and workbooks out, because it’s time for Episode 50 minus 1, Episode 7 times 7, Episode 40 plus 9…
Oh, why the blank faces? Come on, it’s not that hard, class! Are you all asleep? It’s EPISODE 49 of Answer Me This!, of course! Hear for yourself by clicking on the following player:
Or, if you prefer delayed gratification, download it:
And what awaits therein? Well, such folderols as:
Bono’s stupid sunglasses
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me
Ronald McDonald
ACME, the old-fashioned Argos Online
curtains
curls vs. combs
circadian rhythms
cockerels
and
the
Coxsackie virus.
Also, Olly sticks his spectacles where the sun don’t shine, Helen calls upon her dad to answer one of the greatest mysteries of our times, and Martin the Sound Man gets no love from the Philippines. So if you’re from the Philippines and you want to send Martin a little consoling love-note - or if you’re from anywhere and want to send us a question - then email answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or call our Question Line by dialling 0208 123 5877 or typing answermethis into Skype.
In other news, we’re having some issues with our bandwidth and have therefore had to bench half our old episodes temporarily. But if for whatever madcap reason you are desperate to hear them, you still can via our Archive Jukebox. It isn’t as snazzy as a Wurlitzer, but it’ll do for now.
See you next week, for Episode 50! Blimey!
Love,
Helen and Olly
PS. Both Helen and Olly are on Sky News next week, Helen on Tuesday at 11.30pm, Olly on Wednesday at the same time. Tune in, if it’s not past your bedtime!
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* Click HERE to listen to EPISODE 48 *
We like it very much when you listeners get in touch elaborating upon subjects in previous podcasts - even though it shows us up as being about as well informed as a pint of frogspawn. So we were delighted to receive the following email from Lewis from Kent, regarding Marie’s bashed elbow in Episode 48 and Mark’s biscuity mess in Episode 46:
I was listening to your last podcast, and I thought I might just point out that the funny bone is not actually a bone, but a collection of nerves, which is why your elbow feels numb when you bang it. Also I was just thinking about when you were discussing digestives, and their inability to fit into normal cups, but! I have a cup that fits a whole digestive! I would send a picture but at the moment I’m emailing from my iPod touch.
Lewis, I don’t suppose your big cup is by any chance the same as this one from our household? I don’t have a digestive biscuit with which to demonstrate the scale (because digestive biscuits are horrid), but this mug is almost big enough to dunk a whole grapefruit into.
However, much as I like a sizeable cup of tea, the main reason I bought this mug was because the supermarket had labelled it ‘Big Cock Mug‘. Fnarrr!
Oh, come on - why’re you all looking at me funny?
Yo there, champs,
After tackling a question in Episode 48 concerning Young Einstein, we found ourselves wondering: whatever happened to its splendidly-named star/director/producer/writer, Yahoo Serious? It’s a whole twenty years since that magnificent film came out, and yet Mr Serious’s CV has been looking rather sparse of late. Perhaps a clue to his recent whereabouts lies in this nugget from IMDB:
Some news reports have confused Yahoo Serious, whose real name is Greg Pead, with the antiques dealer in Sydney named Greg Pead who accused the former Royal butler Paul Burrell of having an affair with him in the 1980s. The two are not the same person nor are they related.
Frankly, the prospect of being confused with someone who actually WANTS people to know he romanced Paul Burrell would be enough to send anyone into hiding for as long as the world’s supply of tinned food can keep them.
But what to listen to while you’re hiding in a remote cave while your reputation is ruined by a former-butler-fancier? Why, Answer Me This! Episode 48, naturellement!
And keeping old Yahoo company this week are topics including:
the Essex University bunny cull
homophones
stereotypical students
old-fashioned romance
My Super-Sweet 16
John Candy
sorbitol
regal philately
2 Unlimited
weapons of mass destruction
and
Ruth Badger.
Plus, Olly looks an umbrella-bearing gift-horse in the mouth; Helen releases her girly side; and, if you thought Martin the Sound Man’s beatboxing sucked, wait till you hear his attempts at techno.
Many thanks to all of you who’ve sent us QUESTIONS; and if YOU want to follow their example, get in touch via our Question Line on 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis; or email answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. There’s a dear.
See you next week, for Episode 49!
Love,
Helen and Olly
Save this episode to:
Subscribe with iTunes//Archive Jukebox//Email us a question
Facebook Fanclub//Answer Me This! Podcast Superstore//YouTube Channel
** Click here to listen to EPISODE 47 **
Thanks ever so much to all of you who’ve been sending us questions. It has been a great treat, and very vexing for us that we haven’t been able to answer them all in the podcast. So here are a few in non-audio form, starting with one from Chris in Kansas:
In your January 9th YouTube, Helen, you were working away with knitting needles in the car. So, Helen, Please answer me this…What were you knitting?
Well spotted, Chris! Indeed I was passing the time on the way to our Amazing Adventure In Luxembourg by knitting a kangaroo for my niece’s Christmas present. It turned out something like this:
And if you fancy making your own woollen marsupial, the pattern is in World of Knitted Toys by Kath Dalmeny.
Meanwhile, David in Maldon asks:
I want to know how come my 13-year-old daughter can spend hours getting her hair and make-up just perfect but her room always looks like an explosion that blew up a branch of Claire’s Accessories inside a New Look store. How can I make her keep her room tidy?
If bribery and pleading have thus far not worked, try taking all her possessions away. That should do it.
In other questioneering, George from London wonders:
Jaffa Cake: Cake or Biscuit?
This is a highly contentious issue, given the Jaffa Cake’s cakey texture but biscuity dimensions and appearance. However in the 1991 court case of McVitie’s vs HM Customs and Excise, Jaffa Cakes were ruled to be cakes not biscuits, on the grounds that like a cake they go hard when stale, whereas biscuits go soft. Which leads us to a question from Sean from Paris:
Why when you leave bread out does it go hard and why when you leave biscuits out do they go soft???? I have been agonising over this for years and at last the route of enlightenment may be ahead…
Get ready, Sean, for the mystery of your life to be solved! This phenomenon arises because biscuits are designed to be hard, with the moisture baked out of them; thus they have lower water content than the surrounding atmosphere, from which moisture infiltrates an uncovered biscuit, rendering it uncrunchy. In contrast, bread (likewise cake) is moister than the air, so if you neglect to use your bread-bin, the water will evaporate leaving a big bready brick.
There. We’ve all learnt something, and it’s barely even lunchtime.
