Answer Me This! - AMT303: Dewey Decimals, Sexy Cheese and Disney Turkey Legs

Episode Date: November 27, 2014

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Terms and conditions apply. Visit bmo.com slash theiporter to learn more. Did S Club reunite? Cause Hannah screamed out for more. That's gonna be this. That's gonna be this. What are the odds of Paul getting back down on the floor? That's gonna be this. That's gonna be this. Helen and Ollie, that Has to be this. Has to be this. Helen and Ollie has to be this. Always good to start an episode

by talking about something we fucked up in a previous episode. Grant from the Ministry of Truth, by which I mean Minneapolis, has been in touch to say I was listening to episode 302 when I was amazed to hear Ollie claim

that Mario's last name is Mario. Oh, and one of these again. We've had so many of these come in. Well, it's very important. Well, look, if you were amazed, Grant, then you were amazed by a fact which is widely dispersed on the internet. Grant says this is a common misconception

that was spread by the Super Mario Brothers movie from the 90s, but Mario and Luigi are in fact mononymous. Do-do-do-do-do. Mononymous. Do-do-do-do. They do not have any surname at all. Their creator, Shigeru Miyamoto

confirmed in an interview with the gaming magazine Game Informer that Mario I don't know how I missed that because I get every issue check your scrapbook because you keep pages

don't you Mario is really just Mario and Luigi is really just Luigi though I guess I shouldn't be surprised by people who pronounce my name Grant

instead of the American way of I can't say it why do you want to humiliate me this way Grant when you know that I can't say it properly well look Grant I don't accept your correction on this because like I say we've had lots of this correspondence

but all of you proper hardcore gaming nuts all have different advice not hardcore just because they read Game Informer well from the 90s. I think it's fair to say they have a slightly more accelerated interest than the mainstream. And all of you have a different view on this,

because actually, Ben from Coventry, for example, he got in touch to say, well, when Miyamoto first created Mario, he named him Mr. Video. So Mario and Luigi should both be called Mario Video. I'm afraid that just because I don't take the creator's word as gospel... Yeah, because what would he know about the people that he invented? I gave the answer that they're called Mario, Mario and Luigi Mario

because, yes, that was decided by the scriptwriters of the film. But the film is not considered canon. Well, I'm prepared to consider the film canonical because those film writers were paid a lot of money to sit in a room and write an excellent piece of movie making you were pursuing money rather than the truth ollie no a lot of clever men's or and possibly women i don't know i don't know and very unlikely sat in a room got paid a lot of money to think right what is mario and luigi's surname let's look through the annals of mario history this is what they come up with they really shut the bed

then didn't they well let's just call him by his own name. I'm sorry, I think it's all down to the vagaries of the original conceit, as we addressed in the last episode, as I'm not climbing down from my answer. It's almost like the original creator didn't think about creating fully rendered characters. No, well, you only see one side of them. They are very one-dimensional, aren't they?

Hello, it's Dave from Coventry here. I've just been listening to episode 302, and you spoke about Supermarket Sweep, which sends shivers down my spine. When I was a very young lad, my mum and dad were on Supermarket Sweep. And they actually got through to the final round, but they missed out on the £2,000 grand prize because they ran straight past the prunes. But what people don't know is that the supermarket that it was based on was an Asda, which is why my mum is convinced that she lost because she only shopped in Tesco's back then. Oh, and as a side note, my mum and dad were also on Every Second Counts, which is a very old programme with Paul Daniels,

but they don't talk about that because Paul Daniels was a twat. Did they like him? Not a lot. Was he really such a twat that he didn't even supply a good anecdote for them to bandy around about when they were on every second counts? I'm afraid I've met Paul Daniels, you know, in a very, very kind of brief fashion,

and he was very charming. In what context did you meet him, though? You weren't a snivelling contestant being ground under his heel on his game show, were you? I've met him twice, once on the Royal Mileinburgh when he was trying to get students like me to come and watch his magic show well then i can understand why he didn't play it high-handed yes he'd be gregarious at that point come and see my show and the other time was when you and i were working at the bbc and they were filming strictly come dancing on the same night we were there to do a show for five live yep and we were all waiting for a cab in the reception. So then again I suppose I

was an equal with him at that moment we were both talent the time before I was a potential customer of his. Did you actually speak to him? Yeah what he actually did is come up he walked up to me not knowing me at all tapped me on the head which on the head yes which involves exactly like a sort of Nazi style salute from him and said goodness gracious you're a tall man aren't you that's what he said everyone's tall to paul daniels though well yeah he's small he's small daniels i suppose it might have been seen by some people as condescending but i thought it was actually someone for me was a big star when i was a kid you know actually it was a real magical moment for you wasn't it he was getting down he was happy to

chat you know i thought he was he was he was a bit high off the back of having just done Strictly, obviously. He might have been a bit adrenalised. But, you know, he seemed like a nice man. So I reject your parents' analysis. But also, surely you would tell people you were on that quiz, regardless of whether or not the host was a twat, because the host is only part of the experience. A lot of people, though, that are serial quiz participants,

like it sounds like Dave from Coventry's parents are, do so many of these quizzes that, in a way, it's probably easier to say that the host was a twat on one of them than to go into the story of one that perhaps you weren't particularly proud of you've got many under your belt what if they didn't get very far along in the quiz it's easier to say it's because of the sabotage of paul daniels not because of those goddamn prunes hiding i think i think uh people who serially appear on quizzes often have um a sense that they are part of the the talent themselves well they are especially the more difficult quizzes well sort of but actually like a single episode reality show cast yeah the thing is the audience never remember them the audience just see them as a no but they're true what about

wesley two scoops berry generally speaking uh the audience see them as a conduit for themselves What about Eunice Hathart in Gladiators? What about Wesley Two Scoops Berry? Generally speaking, the audience see them as a conduit for themselves. They're watching it and they're thinking, how would I have answered that question? The prude's right there! Grab him! Exactly. And unless you're the person who wins a million pounds on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, you're destined to be forgotten.

You're just a vessel for the audience to project themselves into the show. And I think that's quite hard to take if you're someone who's done a lot of shows and appeared on primetime television. It's the level of mundane chat you need to have as well. Oh, to do that? Yeah. Oh, yes, I've just been doing up my caravan.

No, actually, exactly. You couldn't, Martin, because you have to start the show with, say you're Martin, and what do you do, Martin? I'm a university lecturer. Already. Already. Hard for the audience to relate. Try again, Martin.

What do you do? Oh, right, I'm a computer programmer How about that? Boring Nerd That's quite normal isn't it? Nerd Well let's see if you get with the programme today

Yeah there we go Yeah The questions are going to be pretty basic I can't believe you're laughing at that Ollie Doesn't seem to be your kind of Irv I think it was the flirtatious smile With which Martin delivered the punchline It was very good

He's made for television. Well, here's a question from Moz who says, Ollie, answer me this. Why are there mirrors in the gym? Not even just one mirror on a wall. You're surrounded by them. Why is this? My good lady wife insists that it's for people to check out other people without them knowing.

And it's a hotbed of sexual activity and cruising. I think that depends on which gym. I think, yes. I think if you on which gym. I think, yes. I think if you're talking about, you know, the original Gold's Gym on Venice Beach, you may have a case. If you're talking about the Gold's Gym, for example, on the A41 in Hendon, not so much.

Well, maybe. Maybe, but in my experience, full of elderly Jewish women. Yeah, where else are they supposed to get their cruising on? I don't have an issue. I just, I'm not sure it's a sexual hotbed. Although I'm sure they do have hotbeds because they probably have heated blankets. Moz says, I'm sure that can't be the real reason right

right well technically the reason that gyms have mirrors is so that you can check you have the right form when you're working out yes um because if you lift weights and then you have to crane your neck to see how you look and whether you're holding your posture then obviously by definition you are no longer holding the correct posture yes you need to be looking ahead of you and otherwise it's very bad for you same in things like aerobics yes exactly it's hard particularly when you're as malcoordinated as i um but i do think it is the case that obviously as gyms have evolved and become something that you see on pretty much every high street it's now partly to be honest just that customers expect it customers expect a big long row of treadmills,

even if they're never, ever always occupied. They expect the row of TVs, one showing Sky News, one showing Sky Sports, one showing MTV. And they expect a wall of mirrors because that's what a gym looks like. Also, does it make the gyms look bigger? Yes. Because often they're rather unprepossessing rooms. I think that would be certainly a reason why gym owners wouldn't object to this policy. Yeah, some of them are windowless as well and it gives the impression of windows yes and actually

the gyms that i've been to where they don't have the mirrored walls are the gyms that have good views yes if there's a gym where you can be on a treadmill and looking out you know from a skyscraper 20th floor for example over a stunning vista those are the ones that tend not to have mirrors it's the ones that are above shops that have mirrors. But I'm sure for some people, they are motivated either by the sight of themselves looking very fit, or by the sight of themselves looking red and disgusting, and they think, well, I've got to make myself better. Uma Thurman, I remember, said that after she'd given birth,

she decided to lose weight by eating naked in front of a mirror. Actresses. Yeah. That tells you everything you need to know. There's a lot of self-hatred there isn't so much and so much bonkers well here is a question from liz in brooklyn who says in a conversation about terrible online dating messages we'd received my cousin told me that she had once gotten an okay cupid message from a man who wanted her to give him a hand job

with cheese just when you think you've heard it all. Pulp Fiction 2. Ollie asked me this. How would a cheesy handjob work? Right. One of our friends thought the man must be referring to a hard block of cheese with a hole drilled in it, or a hole automatically in it, like Lear Dammer. That's not a handjob, that's a cheese job. Yeah. Another thought, he must mean a soft cheese.

I assumed he must want a fairly standard handjob with slices of processed cheese in her hands. Oh, kind of a hot dog arrangement, but with your wiener as the wiener. Since I doubt we'll ever get an answer from the man himself, what, they didn't go out? I'm shocked. I have turned to you.

Ollie, what did he mean? Which type of cheese could he have wanted? I mean, personally, my cheese tastes are very seasonal because in summer I want something like a fresh goat and in winter I might want something more farmy. i've recently not not for a handjob it's for eating i i think in reality what he wanted uh is a handjob with cream cheese yes because i've googled handjob with cheese i mean you'd done that before we got this question and the only variant that i can actually find committed to film and people have at this point

committed every sexual practice to film so if it exists you've found it ollie uh is of a man who is first kind of worked into a lather by a lady using as far as i can tell philadelphia as lube effectively okay um i don't know if this is viral marketing for uh craft or whether this was done it's not the normal route they go it's not but after having used it as a lubricant she then um uses his penis to penetrate the hole in a bagel um so the bagel is then it's basically like he's fucking a cream cheese bagel but he's also spreading it in a way in a way yes exactly yes you know what i expected to happen at the end of that scene probably was someone to have to eat that bagel yes i thought the money shot would have been into the bagel and then perhaps that would be served up to the lady squirt of

lemon juice bit of coriander but actually i was very disappointed so you were the final scene was um she just jacked him off with some whipped cream what yeah i know and that would make sense that would be pudding well i know he's already covered he's already covered in ranted dairy products why does he need more i know i yeah i agree i thought maybe at the end she'd at least grate some parmesan on me or something is it squirty cream or properly squirty cream you've set up the cream cheese thing you know this is slightly on it's savory we did not want to go to pudding it we wanted a new york deli themed sex video we wanted an end where at the very least you coated his torso in locks you wouldn't put whipped cream on pastrami would you

exactly i feel like the pudding course version of this would be more pleasant though a donut and then he could glaze the donut yes i think it's more acceptable kinky play although actually i do acknowledge liz that uh to have brought this conversation up on OkCupid as part of a pre-date banter It's bold. It's a bit weird I nonetheless would say in the context actually of a loving relationship as sexual quirks go. You are going home tonight and asking your girlfriend for

a cheesy favour. I'm not sure bringing food into the bedroom is a particularly unusual one Cream cheese, it's savoury and that's a little bit unusual but actually if someone said what I really like to do is sit in bed with, I don't know, a champagne martini, and then you... A champagne martini? That is more deviant than anything you've just described.

And then we like to eat the olives off each other's nipples. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's a bit kinky, but it's mainstream weird, I would say. Average. It's mainstream alternative. It's the XFM of sexual practices. It's when you're licking soup off your partner. That's when things, I would say. Average. It's mainstream alternative. It's the XFM of sexual practices. It's when you're licking soup off your partner.

That's when things get really kinky. Exactly. So actually, I don't think cream cheese as a staple product you'd find in the fridge is necessarily all that odd. What I'm saying, Helen, is that if Martin said to you one day, what I'd really like to do is bring food into the bedroom.

I'm uncomfortable that you're using us as an example. I'm just saying, because you've got a married couple in front of me. We're real people. We're real here. All right, the other way around. Martin, if Helen said to you... Oh, no, that doesn't make it better. If Helen said to you,

can we introduce cream cheese into our lovemaking, it wouldn't be a divorcing issue, would it? It would be something that would be like, okay, that's a weird fantasy, but we'll talk about it. Have you smelt cream cheese that's been out of the fridge for a little while? I don't think this would be very arousing at all. It's mostly petrochemicals, isn't it?

I feel like it's like KY in slightly more solid form. If you've got a question, email your question to answer me, thispod podcast at googlemail.com. Answer me this podcast at googlemail.com. Answer me this podcast at googlemail.com. Answer me this podcast at googlemail.com. So retrospectives, what historical events are we ticking off on this week's run of Today in History?

On Monday, we bring you the real story of the mutiny on the bounty. On Tuesday, the anniversary of the day somebody invented the meatball, but who? On Wednesday, the iconic British car that ripped off an iconic American car. On Thursday, how American airlines invented air miles. And on Friday, the UFO sighting that gripped colonial America. We discuss this and more on Today in History with The Retrospectors. Ten minutes each weekday, wherever you get your podcasts. Here's a question from Sam in Canada who says,

I work in a library and we use the Dewey Decimal System to keep our non-fiction books like Answer Me This. Thanks for the plug, Sam. That is not in any Canadian libraries, is it? I don't think it was even on sale in Canada. Well, maybe someone's made a special effort to order it there. Anyway, thanks for that. To keep our non-fiction books organised.

By the way, just hearing the word Stewie Decimal System brings me immediately straight back to the library in my primary school when I'm seven and the librarian is explaining the system to us. Does it do that for you? No, did you not have that lesson at school? No one has ever explained it to me. We did it every year at my school. Wow.

Training you up to be librarians. Yeah, every year, tour of the school library in the first week of September. They really back the wrong course, didn't they? I knew where all the books were because I'd read them all. Dewey Decimal System was in my brain. I read most of the books in my primary school library before I became a philistine,

including the comic books. It was the last time I read a comic book. You peaked too early, didn't you? Anyway, Sam continues. The Dewey Decimal System is easy to use, but each number is supposed to represent a topic. Right. And sometimes the topics that are related to each other

are really weird. So Helen, answer me this. Who invented the Dewey Decimal System and how did they decide what goes at what number? That was invented by Dewey Cox from Walk Hard. I imagined it was Dewey Duck, Donald's nephew. It was actually a man called Melville Dewey, and he was an educational reformer from a very young age, but also he was very much in favour of spelling reform, so he changed his name from Melville, Mel-V-I-L-L-E

to Melville, Mel-V-I-L. Oh, I see. I thought you meant spelling reform as in like in a B, you know, R-E-F-O-R-M, reform. And he, for a short time,

re-spelled Dewey, which is usually D-E-W-E-Y, as D-U-I. His own name. His own name, Dewey. Was driving under the influence a charge at that time? Was that why he changed it back?

Well, this is the 1870s, so... Driving a horse, maybe. So why was he so keen on coming up with a system to navigate libraries? What had they had in place before that? Chaos. But, you know, like, you go in a second-hand bookshop now, for example, and it's clearly signified, isn't it, biography, military history. I don't think, think oh but it hasn't

got a dewey number on it i just think oh okay well that's where all the books are in alphabetical order within that genre what's the problem with that not necessarily in alphabetical order because when i worked in a second-hand bookshop because it was so old the shelves were different heights so you kind of had to arrange things according to where the books were short enough to fit so poetry it'd be ideal if it was in alphabetical order, but sometimes you had to make arbitrary distinctions of period or genre in order that they would fit on a short shelf. Kind of makes sense, yeah. But he came up with it aged 22 in 1873

when he was working at Amherst College Library. And I think he just thought, well, this would be marvelously well-organised. And then he copyrighted it in 1876. Melville Dewey also tried to switch the u.s over to the metric measurement system and obviously that did not catch on they're still all about gallons and pints and things like that yeah well they're quite traditionalist aren't they in the u.s whereas i guess they didn't really have a book numbering system before he came up with his one so

he got in there no um and he also helped arrange the 1932 Winter Olympics. What a diverse man. He did have an interesting career, didn't he? Yeah. He was the Johnny Marr of his generation. I don't think Johnny Marr has helped with the Olympics yet, has he? He hasn't, but he's done pretty much everything else. Well, he's played guitar. What else has he done? He's done Modest Mouse. He's done Modest Mouse, musical soundtracks. Yeah, but that's all

guitar-based. He's not done Winter Olympics and numerical systems and spelling reform. He said he was the Johnny Marr of his generation. I mean, the Johnny Marr of our generation is different. He's making Johnny Marr look very one-dimensional. Well, here's another question of books now from Richard in Finsbury Park, who says, My mother is 82 years old.

She loves reading and always looks forward to visits from the mobile library. I'm reassured that there are still mobile libraries that are able to operate. As I am such a kind son, continues Richard, I gave my mum a Kindle. She loves it. I've been helping her load Geoffrey Archer novels onto it

and the other shit she likes to read. That is very altruistic of you. She doesn't know that I can add books to her Kindle remotely. Wow, I did not know that that was a possible thing. Yeah, well, it sort of is. I don't think it's designed that you can do it if it's not your Kindle, but obviously since she won't have any web presence, I guess you can effectively...

Well, not obvious. Well... Your grandmother has web presence. No, not really. She runs several Twitter accounts. She does all those Uber facts and stuff, doesn't she? She's Kat Bin Woman. Historical pics.

No, she's got a Yahoo Mail account, but if I was setting up a kindle for my grandmother i would you'd you'd be the mastermind i'd set it up to my email so that i could order her things yeah yeah so i guess that's what he's done so effectively it's his kindle but he's given it to her i guess right he says i live 200 miles away from her doesn't matter because the internet that, yeah, I guess that's his point Anyway, I have done a bad thing I downloaded Fifty Shades of Grey And I changed it How?

I switched the names of the two main characters Anastasia and Christian To the names of my elderly parents Christine and Frank I didn't even know that was possible I didn't know you could do that with Kindles I guess you'd have to download the book and then transform it from a PDF to a Word document and then back again or something like that.

It's hassle, but then what price for a prank? It's worth it for this. It's like an adult version of those Your Name in this book books. I had one when I was a child, a circus one, perfectly innocent, no BDSM, and I loved it. Yeah, whereas this would be like choose your own sex adventure.

Yeah, but I was like, how do they know my brother's name? How do they know what our dog is called? I have put the changed version, continues Richard, onto her Kindle. Richard, you are an absolute mastermind and I salute you. She won't twig that it has been personalised. I know that she'll go around telling people that she's read Fifty Shades of Grey and that it's so remarkable that the main characters have the same names as her and my dad. Well, it is.

So, Helen, answer me this. Was that very wrong? No. And what other books can I defile to fuck about with my elderly parents? Brokeback Mountain. Bible? The problem with the Bible is it's so long and you wouldn't be able to put it on verse one, chapter one.

You'd have to bury it in the middle of a boring story about jacob or something just change the word god to frank and jesus to christine not a problem is this prank slightly going to backfire on richard just the notion of his mother reading a sex book that is effectively about her and richard's father having sex yes that would gross a lot of people out too much to do this otherwise pretty excellent prank. Yes, would you have the balls to read your own doctored version of Fifty Shades of Grey, Richard? Because if you wouldn't, is it fair to ask your mum to do the same? Brilliant joke, though.

And maybe you could put The Answer Me This Christmas on there as well, since we're not that far away. That's right, yeah. Christmas is coming. Christmas is coming. And yes, the perfect present for anyone, including your mum, is the Answer Me This Christmas album. Available at only £2.49 from answermethisstore.com.

And here's a little clip of it for this week's intermission. What about... I don't even know what that is. Is that a ringtone? I don't know what you that is. Is that a ringtone? I don't know what he's doing. Oh, yes. Now I don't know what both of you are doing. Yeah.

No, it layers up, doesn't it? Like, more and more of that as it goes along. It's not really a big Christmas hit, that, though. I'm still... It's on all the albums. No, that's what I call Christmas albums. It's filler, though, isn't it? If you have to go through those albums and take away tracks,

you start with Paul McCartney, don't you? Simply have him go away. albums and take away tracks you start with Paul McCartney don't you simply have him go away I don't like that but I also take out War Is Over by John Lennon I like Feliz Navidad that doesn't get

played very much Feliz Navidad Feliz Navidad I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas is that by is that Mexican is that by Morrison

doobie doobie do do do do doobie doobie do do do do do do do do do do Is that by... Is that Mexican, dude? Is that by Morrison? That was a little snippet of the Answer Me This Christmas album. It's just one month to go. Yes, if you want to feel festive already, why not buy our exclusive album? You will not hear it anywhere else, as if you'd ever hear Answer Me This anywhere else.

It might be booming out of the speakers at department stores, mightn't it? But the point is, it's all material that we made it last year so obviously if you bought it last year you've already got it same one as last year same one as last year uh but uh it's never been transmitted as part of our podcast feed before so all new all new to last year so it's an hour of us answering your christmas questions from last year about for example why does rudolph have a red nose? Kwanzaa. What about that? What do you do with your shitty presents? The dark side of Dr Seuss.

That's in there. Yes. Family dinner disputes. I think now is the time of year to listen to it, isn't it? May is not the time. Correct, yes. So we're doing a big push for the Christmas album, but all of our albums, Jubilee, Sports Day, Holiday and Christmas...

Timeless, one and all. ...are, you know, know taken together only a tenner and four hours worth of us talking extra stuff you may not have heard and they're all available at answer me this store.com and buying them supports the show so thank you for doing it so treat yourself and uh richard who is 23 from bradford has written in about treating himself he says i occasionally treat myself to a m's breakfast. You value yourself very highly. I occasionally treat myself to a stubbed toe, Richard.

I actually treated myself the other day to a McDonald's breakfast and I was shocked to see that the McCafe has ripped off the Starbucks red cups. I mean, I know that they're popular,

but it's such a global competitor, Starbucks to McDonald's. How have they... How? They do the thing where you get a special coloured cup at Christmas. So do Costa. They've got them little Santa jackets. But you'd expect Costa to rip off Starbucks because they're direct competitors. Well, I wouldn't expect McDonald's to be a bastion of original thinking. They've got Christmas, have they?

Well, we're going to go Hanukkah. If they went Eid, I would applaud that. But no, I just think, you you know it's such a starbucks thing they'd be better off not muscling in on that territory it was my opinion yes when i saw it i was like oh that's brazen i think richard would agree with you because he's big into the mcdonald's branding he says mcdonald's has an effective mc branding mc strategy when it mcnames its mc product it mc certainly mc does i understand this and i do enjoy a mcmuffin or a mcflurry who mc doesn't i do not understand why it doesn't extend this to my preferred breakfast option, the bagel.

It's true. It's just called a bagel, isn't it, at McDonald's? Ollie, answer me this. Why be it a McMuffin but not a McBagel? Well, actually, on the subject of originality, I think it does come from that. As far as I can tell, the Mc prefix is added tocdonald's are trying to tell you that they've been innovative within a certain genre yeah but they didn't invent muffins they didn't invent burgers well bear with they did nuggets wait they did okay let's take the mcflurry we can all agree that mcdonald's is sent i mean i don't know if another restaurant did something similar and they ripped it off but essentially they invented the uh uh pizza ice cream factory but in one cup on an international stage mcdonald's invented the idea

of a cheap ice cream layered with a branded sweet right and thus the mcflurry was born in the same way yet they didn't invent muffins but it's not a muffin is it a muck muffin is is a mcdonald's patty not a muffin it's a muck and some meat and some cheese and stuff on a muffin and in that sense i don't think that was a breakfast stuff you could get widely across most of the countries where the mcmuffin is available so in that sense they did invent that product category people weren't eating that for breakfast in this country before the mcmuffin the bagel they can make no claims to the bacon roll and they're very sensitive about this i think in the uk they make no claims to it's not called the mcbacon roll they just call it the bacon roll, and they're very sensitive about this, I think, in the UK, they make no claims to. It's not called the McBacon roll.

They just call it the bacon roll. So as far as I can tell, especially with the breakfast items, Mc, if they invented it, just the plain name if they didn't. Filet-O-Fish then, why isn't that Mc? Because they kind of... Filet-O-Fish is a whole separate conversation. But the Filet-O-Fish comes from a different era, doesn't it? It comes from a different...

It's a classic menu item, so it's different. And those items... I suppose the Muck Hamburger is not a Muck. Exactly. Big Mac is quite good, isn't it? Because it goes minimal. It doesn't go a Big McBurger. It just goes Big Mac.

And actually, it's interesting that the Big Mac is a Mac. Nothing else is a Mac. Everything else is a Muck. And actually, their name is Muck. So why is it a Mac? Why isn't it a Big MC? Because Apple will probably just go apeshit, wouldn't they, if they started calling other things something Mac?

Fish Mac? At this stage, but they had Big Mac before Apple Mac had Apple Mac. Why didn't McDonald's go apeshit on Apple then? Maybe they did. iBurger. It kind of gets complicated with these big brands. It does. Here is another question of food.

It's from Izzy, who is 24 and three three quarters and she's in Taunton. And she says, when I was in Disney World Florida recently. Another place where you always get great cuisine. I noticed that as well as the usual range of extortionately priced snack foods, ice cream, hot dogs, honey floss, etc. There were stands selling ginormous turkey legs to the Disney tourists.

Yes, the Disney turkey leg. I thought this might be a strange one off, but I spotted them all around the park. Yeah, it's a thing. As well as people happily gnawing on these humongous bits of meat as they walked. Yes. In fact, such... Americans are disgusting, actually, aren't they? I think it's lovely that, in a way, what Disney have created is a place,

you know, it's a family place. It's a place where memories are made. It's a place where you relax and enjoy yourself, kick back. Concrete jungle where dreams are made. It's not concrete jungle. Plastic jungle. It's, you know, they work hard to get the smells and the tastes right so that it sort of reeks of nostalgia and turkey fat.

But there is something disgusting about the fact... Put that on the poster. There is something disgusting about the fact that when a nation goes to enjoy itself and relax and kick back, it gnaws on a turkey leg as it walks around from right to right. That is particularly disgusting. Why not a corndog? Indeed. Well, because those are all

There's a pretty gross turkey. Izzy says, such is the popularity of the Disney turkey leg that they even sell souvenir t-shirts with turkey leg emblazoned upon them.

Because I just don't think they've got enough things to print on t-shirts. I think that's right, yeah. What they really need is some sort of the character that they could merch the hell out of.

Maybe focus on that, Disney. They also have turkey leg boxer shorts and turkey leg air freshener to fill your car with the scent of turkey leg yes delicious izzy says i find this extremely weird that's because it is not only is a jumbo turkey leg not a snack but it must be extremely difficult to eat whilst walking around a busy theme park when you feel a bit like fred flintstone as? Maybe that's why they want to do it. Well, it is. In fact, they were originally marketed as

dino legs in the Animal Kingdom theme park. Izzy's got more ranting in her. She says, surely you get big greasy globs of meat juice on your face. Also, when you're finished with it, which must take ages, you have to walk around with a whacking great bone before you can

throw it away. In fairness, there are a lot of bins at Disney World. Most of them sing at you. So it's quite fun putting a thing in the bin. That'd be nice. Izzy says, I find it odd that it's become so popular as a casual theme park snack in the Sunshine State. Well, they eat a lot of strangely warm, comforting food in the warm southern states, I find.

Like a lot of that southern comfort food. You think, how can you eat this on a hot day and yet they do yeah anyway ollie answer me this firstly what are the origins of the disney world turkey leg and why is it so popular and secondly does the turkey leg appear at any other disney resort or only in florida i'm not sure if it appears in the ones outside of the states but it's certainly in disneyland in california as well more than 1.6 million turkey legs sold every year across six parks. Oh, really? Yeah, but those six parks, I reckon, are probably all in America.

Yes, no, I think they are. I don't think they include the ones in Paris, for example. Because can you imagine the French... Qu'est-ce que c'est que ça? Le bandon? To be a proper... Je ne l'ai pas. That would finally start the revolution. Get a proper socialist president.

And Tokyo, I can't really imagine going for it either. You can't eat it with chopsticks. But, yeah, it's something that... I mean, look, there's every kind of possible fairground food in the Disney parks. Popcorn, candy floss, hot dogs, corn dogs, ice creams. That sounds healthy. Indeed, it's not supposed to be healthy. It's supposed to be fun.

And they even have things like special soft serve pineapple ice cream that they call Dole Whip, which you can only buy in one part of Disney World. And the whole way through the parks, they actually have these little things for return visitors. It's all to encourage you to repeat and come back more than once a year if you're really into it. So, for example, like when I was there with my friend, we did this thing where you look for the hidden Mickeys and across every ride there's a hidden mickey and that's this as in the silhouette of the three circles so that can even be like we went to the animal kingdom and there's even a lab bit you can go into where there's petri dishes laid out to look like mickey but once you have identified

the hidden mickeys what what's in it for you yeah but the point is that would take about seven visits to all the theme parks to find them all because there's hundreds of them no no just the satisfaction of a triumphant achievement you can go online and say that you've seen them all yeah exactly that's really fun a physical easter egg okay yeah exactly and and disney are very clever at all that kind of thing and they do manage to find a theme park experience for everyone this weirdly has evolved out of because it's been going for about 30 years the turkey leg thing but it's only got big since 2010 turkey legs are very big though and that's basically because of instagram it's because it looks like a ridiculous holiday photo so when you want to tell your friends i'm at disney world

fuckers like obviously you can do that with a picture of you and tigger but doing that you have to queue for an hour and you know you are standing with a lot of little boys and girls and you do feel a bit weird the easier way to say on facebook i'm at disney world fuckers is to buy a massive turkey leg and pose with it in a stupid way looking primitive i just think that most people would not know to identify turkey legs with disney if you'd only been to euro disney or never been to disney at all yeah such as i yes but it's not for us as this is my point if i'm on instagram but it's for not for me because americans who go to Disney know what it means. And that's why it's become a bigger thing.

And then, yes, they've merchandised it. There are T-shirts available, as you say, the air fresheners. It is very weird. It just sounds like bullshit, though. The way to show that you're at Disney whilst spending money is to buy those plastic Mickey ears and put them on your head. Yes, that is definitely a way to do it. It sounds like a bullshit explanation to me.

Look, it's happened actually fairly organically. I mean, they've rolled out all the related souvenirs because of the public demand but you even a company like disney i think couldn't have predicted that turkey legs would go viral but they have it's like welcome to night vale couldn't have predicted that would be tumblr fan art and cosplay that rocketed them to podcasting success exactly it seems like a pretty practical snack food and uh yeah because no one wants them well they're making a massive fuss so they're saying oh you're gonna walk around with it but it's a it's something on a stick it's a meat lollipop it's an eminently practical it's huge though but turkey is uh it's a healthy meat

but the leg is an unpopular cut because it goes tough very easily it's also quite controversial it to be honest only because disney do it i think if any other business was involved in this this wouldn't be a kind of new york times opinion piece but it has been because disney do it it's quite controversial because apparently the legs come from male turkeys and the turkeys are bred to be as large as possible and eating the leg is like eating a symbol of the fact that we've got these monstrously large turkeys they're bred to be so big and even though actually obviously in a way the bigger the legs are the more they'll be able to support themselves still it's symbolically you're walking around with this kind of bizarre human interference farming method uh being proudly

on display um i think also turkey legs are going to be a pretty cheap thing that you can sell as a single item because the white meat is sold at a premium and then the legs are all left to spare so probably if you're the supplier you can get hold of turkey legs cheaply you don't have to present them in any interesting way you don't have to present them in any interesting way. You don't have to put them in a receptacle because people can just grip them on the bone. So I reckon maybe that is behind it. And then they invented this Instagram wheeze on top in order to shift more turkey legs. Maybe.

Self-fulfilling. Maybe. I still think, I mean, yeah, of course, there must be a cost benefit analysis involved. But I still think, basically, it's about fun, isn't it? And the thing about Disney is you can't have, you know, pina coladas on sale as people walk around the Magic Kingdom. So this is just, it's a thing you do

when you're in Disney World. Some indulgent... Yeah, they want as many of those indulgent treats as they can. Candy floss and turkey legs. So by the end of your trip, you've spent $50 on crap you don't want, but also you remember those smells and pictures

as part of your experience that you only have there. Well, why not, for the ultimate Disney snack, a turkey leg wrapped in candy floss? You jape, but they do actually sell an ice cream in the shape of a turkey leg. That makes more sense than my thing. Well, to my knowledge, it doesn't have real turkey leg underneath it, but it looks like it does.

It looks like a turkey leg that's been dipped in chocolate Frosties. Everyone wants a crudetta with little bits of turkey in it, doesn't they? Delicious. I, I have a pointless obsession In the form, in the form of this question Who invented the vibrator? Which podcast to quiz? Answer me this

Which podcast to quiz Answer me this That was a jingle from listener Adam, so thank you very much Adam. Thanks Adam. And Adam has also been moved to ask us a question via our phone line. Alan and Ollie, answer me this. Is it a good idea to put three or four teaspoons of whatever ice cream you have into your coffee

when you realise there's no milk at home? That's kooky. I'd rather have a black coffee. I think it depends. If you want your coffee to be sweet and tasting a bit of ice cream, then fine. If you want your coffee not to be sweet, unacceptable. Here's a weird thing that I've got into, although I know it's increasingly popular.

Almond milk. You had it here because you had a mutual vegan friend over and you went you i think very uh graciously went and bought stuff that she'd be able to drink i'm a good host i wouldn't even bother to think about that i had a bunch of vegan cakes messing up my bread bin for months because she didn't eat them they're not that nice no they're not nice and almond milk is one of those things that you'd think well it's probably right if you're vegan but it's not gonna be a preference to milk but actually not for any health reason just because i actually quite like the fact that it sort of gives you a little almond flavor a little almond kick to your coffee delicious i've started buying almond milk just to put in my coffee it's nicer than milk but ice cream that's perverse and bad

for you here's another salubrious question from pip in Wimbledon, who says, Helen, answer me this. Why do cats bury their poo? We've got to have something to do. And indeed, their wee. It seems like very fastidious behaviour for what ostensibly is a wild animal. There is nothing wild about my domesticated pet cat. Like, literally nothing. She would survive for no minute out there.

Well, unless somehow the jungle in any way resembles a slanket. We are sure, says Pip, that big cats like lions and tigers don't do this. I think they do, actually. I think they bury their poop. No, they don't because they're fucking lions and tigers, which means they are top of the heap. They're top of the heap, but then do they want to alert other big cats that they've been there with their scent and everything?

Do they just leave it on display? Do they? Yes. I didn't know that. And so the house cats bury theirs because they know that they are subordinate to lions and tigers that might be hanging around your house in hartfordshire okay so so why have domestic cats then developed the bizarrely prudish habit says pip of burying their excretions rather than letting their sphincters run wild and free in the wind very poetic unless your cat has a prolapse so the

instinct arises from the fact that big cats are the top of the pile yeah and they can leave their shit wherever they want because animals can smell each other's pheromones on it so the cats hide it because they know that they're subordinate now theoretically they do that in your house because they think you are the lion or the tiger equivalent they're subordinate to you so if your cat is shitting and pissing everywhere that is basically it going fuck you i'm in charge this is my house i know that coco owns the neighborhood in terms of cats yeah and her name is on the deeds of your house too no but it's really clear no because when we first moved in a few cats would occasionally come into the garden and this primal guttural scream came out

of our cat and they've never been back since and she owns our parade of houses i've not seen any cats come into our garden since. So it's obvious that she owns the garden. Yeah. But I hadn't thought that she might think I own the garden above her. That's nice to know. Well, she knows that you don't own that garden. But the problem with her burying her poo,

which I appreciate she's doing for cleanliness in a way, is that she then gets mud all over her paws and then jumps on the sofa. And then we've got a muddy sofa. So really, she's made the house dirtier. Not as dirty as if she crapped on the sofa. Yeah, but there might be some crap in that mud. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So really, she's making it look like she's being considerate, but actually she's like, ah. Basically, she's some kind of animal. Here's a question from Jenny from Vancouver who says, Ollie, answer me this. In the Phantom of the Opera, do you think the Phantom bones Christine when he takes her down to his lair and she passes out?

I never used to think so, but upon re-watching the film, it seems fairly likely, especially when he says, only you can make my song take flight. Do you think song is a euphemism for penis? No, no, in fairness, I think you can't, from that lyric, draw any conclusions because he is talking romantically there.

He's making an allusion to his heart rather than his wang. Well, that's what you're trained to think, isn't it? No, I think that's the case. So she's suggesting that he rapes Christine? Yes. And she's not the first to suggest it. And actually, I think he probably does. But, you know, in the fashion of a kind of modern post-feminist discussion around sexual consent, it's not clear that she's not partly into him.

And that's the thing. She does pass out. Yes. And she does go down to his lair. But she also does want it. And so it is complicated. Yeah, but still, you want someone to be sensible. You want her.

Yes. She should give her consent. As in awake. Yes. Not like having their head screwed on right i agree with you um i mean legally you you want them to be able to acquiesce correct and not just have suggested acquiescence in their previous behavior fine but this is the thing the behavior that we do see on stage is that she chooses to stay with this man who she's seen threaten to kill her fiancé because she fancies him, not because he's ordering her to. Christine does not go for nice guys, does she? That's it. She doesn't go for nice guys.

So we have to think what happens down in the lair. Now, in the musical, it is left to our imaginations. And some people think something sexual happens. Some people think it's just a romantic moment. Or, you know, at worst, she's suffering from Stockholm Syndrome. But in the sequel love never dies which tanked in the west end canon or non-canon would you say i'd say non-canon okay by far but nonetheless actually weirdly did really well in australia so there's a dvd of it and people talk about it um in the sequel love never dies the lyrics by ben elton to the song beneathath the Moonless Sky make it very clear that actually there was probably some bonking going on because Christine reflects upon the night they spent together.

And I loved you. Yes, I loved you. I'd have followed you anywhere you led. I woke to swear my love and found you gone instead so they were in the same bed together and then he walked out and also she might i mean she won't remember well indeed it's not very nice is it it's not very nice but it sounds like he probably had a go i don't think that's very clear at all it might just be that she woke because i don't know the story but she awoke to to welcome her to the bed

and he'd buggered off. Yeah. I think to make it clearer I think in the story of that she actually has a son who is his. So I think that's fairly clear that he didn't use protection. But we don't know whether it was consensual or not.

That song seems to tell us it was. It doesn't sound good though, does it? How does ghost sex work? He's not a ghost. Oh, he's not a ghost? No, you think he's a ghost. Oh, was that a spoiler? Well, he's more of a ghoul than a ghost. Right. But he's a man, isn't he? He's a human man. He's Beast. He's Beauty and ghost Oh he's not a ghost No you think he's a ghost Oh was that a spoiler He's more of a ghoul

Than a ghost Right But he's a man isn't he He's a human man He's Beast He's Beauty and the Beast Okay So he does need to wear

He has flesh and blood And he does need to wear protection To prevent the impregnation He's got a boner Like a man But he's also got a mask On his face That separates him

From the rest of humanity Okay And he lives in an opera house Which is eccentric Very complex I'd say It's time for me To revisit this But I don't remember It being very good and the rest of humanity. Okay. And he lives in an opera house, which is eccentric. Very complex. I'd say it's time for me to revisit this, but I don't remember it being very good when I saw it as a child,

so I'll just leave it if that's all right. It is my least favourite Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, and that is a long list. And I like some Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals, as we've discussed in the past. Sunset Boulevard, thought it was good, but this is a bit phooey. I don't know why everyone likes it so much.

No, especially if there's non-consensual sexual activity depicted in it as if that's romantic and it's so 80s in a bad way as well it looks really dated if you go and see it now some people would find that great yes i suppose so and i wonder if there was a period where visitors from eastern europe thought it was contemporary but even so now you look at it and it just feels i don't get it i don't get it well that seems like a slightly low note to end this episode of Answer Me This on. Not at all. I think you should go out and consider

every Andrew Lloyd Webber musical and whether sex was happening behind the scenes. I mean, what did Mr Mistoffelees get up to? Just licking his balls. Anyway, listeners, please send us your questions for the next episode of the podcast. And all of our contact details are on our website. AnswerMeThisPodcast.com Where you can find links to the answer me this store which as or mentioned is the place you can buy our christmas album plus you can also uh buy our our old

episodes our first 170 episodes as you wish and our app all from that place so do sounds all right doesn't it support the show and and we will return in two weeks time