Answer Me This! - AMT310: Brownies, Crisps and the Jurassic Park Ballet

Episode Date: March 19, 2015

Today's episode features post-coital smoking, Cubs in a car crash, and the continuing soap opera of one poor questioneer's life. Visit http://answermethispodcast.com/episode310 for more information about this episode, plus a whole load of other jazz.Send questions to [e-mail], or the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis)Tweet us http://twitter.com/helenandollyBe our Facebook friend at http://facebook.com/answermethisSubscribe on iTunes http://iTunes.com/AnswerMeThisBuy old episodes and albums at http://answermethisstore.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is the Marmite Easter egg the first Easter egg? Answer me this, answer me this While they were up on the moon, did Mog stick it to Meg? Answer me this, answer me this Helen and Ollie, answer me this Beans, beans, good for your heart The more you eat, the more you Photoshop us into pictures of beans Inspired by our chat about baked bean baths for charity

announced me this episode 309. Oh, yeah. I'm almost slightly reluctant to even talk about this because, you know, it does have the possibility that we could be encouraging this to become a meme. A bean meme. A bean meme. It was a bit disturbing and a bit funny when we saw the first one, which was me depicted in a kind of naive Julian Opie kind kind of style uh in a bath of beans

with one bean seductively dripping over my shoulder and that was from sally did you have beans on your nipples uh no i had one nipple on display the other was obscured by an upturned leg it's all about the coyness isn't it it is i mean look it was a bit disturbing but it was also very well done and yes very well done my girlfriend who is a graphic designer, pointed out that to create that many beans in a bath graphically would have taken... 180 litres of beans, as aforementioned. Would have taken a long time. Listener Simon made you look like Jack Nicholson

hacking through the door in The Shining but with beans instead of a door. But with beans instead of a door. That's a fair description. And then followed up with one where all the beans were little versions of your face. With one Martin in a where's wally style we've put a gallery up on our website yes answer me this podcast.com slash beans gallery hi my name

is lizzie i called exactly a month ago to say i've been made redundant in episode 308 for people who want to revise so now two weeks into redundancy and today my long-term boyfriend broke up with me. So I didn't have any job or any partner. And I live with him. Helen and Ollie and Martin and Salma answered me this. What do I do? I'm fucked. What do I do now?

Oh, Lizzie. You're not fucked, Lizzie. I like the fact that even though the wound was so fresh, again, she called us. Yeah, absolutely. No time to heal, just straight on the phone to tell us. I think our advice is similar to what we said when you lost your job. It's all about being positive, isn't it?

It's about establishing the next chapter. Yes. And who likes books where the next chapter has all the same characters that are in the previous chapter? Good point. Not me. I like a completely fresh cast of characters and for my protagonist to have a new job

and a new partner in every chapter. Keeps it fresh, doesn't it? Yes. Although, probably for her own health, she needs to mourn the relationship a bit. Oh, that's true. Rather than completely bury it with this dazzling cast of new Dickensian fops

designed to keep Ollie's interest. Yeah, you're getting dangerously close to some real advice here, Helen, which of course is, yes, you're right, that she's already kind of making light of this in a way by calling us about it, but actually she does need to mourn the relationship. She does need to, in a way, just accept

she has lost her job, she has lost her partner. It's sort of all right to be a bit depressed for a while, isn't it? Maybe channel your emotion into song and you could be the next Adele. Yes. Now, obviously it's not ideal, changing your job, romantic situation and living situation at once,

but you were already sad about one of those things, so you might as well get the sadness about all three of those things out the way in one go, rather than protractedly ruining more of your life. Killing three emotional birds with one devastating sledgehammer stone. Well done for making her feel better about her scenario. Actually, Lizzie's pretty much in the same situation

as the short-haired Gwyneth Paltrow in Sliding Doors. Oh, yes. Remind me. She's a cool one. She caught her boyfriend cheating on the day she was sacked from her job, and so she had to move out of their flat. Yes, she did. And so she had to get a haircut and set herself up as a PR freelancer.

Okay, so the best thing that actually Lizzie could do is... Get with John Hanna. Get with John Hanna and listen to some aqua. Lizzie, it's not all about having to move house as our next question from penny in london illustrates she says i've recently moved house and i have been receiving the previous occupants tesco club card vouchers totaling about 15 pounds there you are lizzie think about that you could still be getting your ex-partner's tesco club card vouchers delivered huh as god closes one door he opens a window and throws money through it. I have no forwarding address

for the previous occupant, so Ollie, answer me this. Can I use these vouchers or should I bin them? Why would you bin them? Yeah, exactly. What's the moral benefit to binning them?

Well, the moral benefit to binning them could be a scenario whereby the person who's moved has, and I realise this is highly unlikely in anyone's actual life, prioritised within the first few weeks of moving that one of the most important things for them to change,

along with the gas, the electricity, their mortgage and everything else, voter registration, is of course the address on their Tesco club card. If they've been that efficient, then they may already have been sent duplicate vouchers and by spending them you might be preventing them from receiving those vouchers in the post oh i see so there is that small risk but chances are chances are chances are no one gives that much of a shit about their tesco club card vouchers including you because if you're really worried you'd send them to tesco's

with a concerned letter accompanying it saying please please track down this person, please. I think it is arguably a collateral damage of moving home these days. The answer is technically you can't use these vouchers. Tesco say you can't. Do they have people's names on them? They have the name on when they scan them at the till. It actually says the name. So if it does say, you know, Mr. Japudra Patel and you're a white woman, it will look slightly ridiculous. Who's looking?

Especially at the robot checkouts. Well, that's it. So the tip is, and I'm usually very against the. But who's looking, especially at the robot checkouts? Well, that's it. So the tip is, and I'm usually very against the robot checkouts. I know you hate the robot checkouts. As you know, I think, you know, it's Audrey 2 and we're all feeding the plants until the machines take over. However... That's probably what we're saying, darling.

However, I think if you do go and use the robot checkouts, of course, literally no one is there to check the name. Technically, if you use a £7 coupon, it comes up as approval needed. The teenager who is manning the four tills at once does not give any shits and will just say, yes, approval given. So you could spend them. The only thing is, though, opening other people's posts is illegal. Yes, it is, though. Marketing messaging, though. Something that is clearly marketing messaging. No one's going to

take you to court for that are they joe in seattle and helen and ollie answer me this how do you get all that kind of stuck on burnt on grease off of a stove top i use two different solutions uh the first is uh going on groupon and finding an oven cleaner to come over for about a tenner and do it for me oh no you use slave labor yeah i guess great yeah nice tip uh the other uh is the polti vaporetino luxe steam gun available for 34 pounds 95 from john lewis joe's in seattle where they do not have john lewis although i'm sure that there are steam guns available i'm sure there i'm sure this particular one is but i can vouch for it you never see the scene in robocop where he does the housework but if you did he'd be using the polti vaporetino lux steam gun no he wouldn't because he's probably already got a steam gun

built in sure and it's what i'm saying is it's made by polti vaporetino okay yeah because it is awesome it's fun i mean it's the only way to make oven cleaning fun do you now steam everything whether it needs it or not no because it is a bit of a pain to to heat up like you have to plug it in and wait five minutes but once you've heated it up for the oven you think well maybe i'll just steam this toasted sandwich exactly i'll steam the cat i do do that so once i've done the oven top cleaner which i do like once a month once it's plugged in i do things like i steam the outside of the kettle to clean it things are a bit unnecessary have you steamed yourself to emulate a posh bar at your own home um i think if it accidentally went directly in your eyes it would probably disable you severely so i

i haven't trusted myself. Yeah, I could have, but I haven't. Below the waist. But it's brilliant. Bit of bleach, then wait five minutes, wait for the thing to heat up, then and it just comes off. So if you don't want to fork out on your own steamer

or use bleach and your stove has a little rim around the stovetop, then you can just pour boiling water onto it and leave it for a bit. And then the grease lifts up, then you kind of soak it up with a sponge and get rid of it really because that sounds like a sort of housewife's tale that's not really true like when people say for everything using lemon and vinegar yeah yeah no this is really works just hot water yeah leave it for a while blowing my mind it's like when my dentist said to me do you use toothpaste every day this is so different to

the commercials my dentist said to me like do you use toothpaste every day and i was like yeah he's like you don't have to you've got an electric toothbrush you can just use water sometimes blew my mind well apparently the brushing is more important than the fluoride the fluoride is just something you have to use like once or twice a week fluoride's just a minor ingredient in the toothpaste ollie it's yeah but but it's the active ingredient right but it's the brushing that's the important thing speed of the brushing in the water is fine to clean your teeth but a large effect of the toothpaste uh as done by the mint is making your mouth not smell like a dog's anus yes but i use uh i don't know why i'm being so brand centric today but i use oral brie mouthwash as well so i'm delighted so

my mouth is always minty fresh so that's not an issue for me yeah but then you're still buying a thing aren't you i know i'm just saying i was amazed that he my dentist was recommending me not to use toothpaste and actually i think the toothpaste might help the brush move over your teeth with the greatest movement maybe he likes dog's anus breath helen maybe that probably does yeah yeah in his job where it's so chemically just wants something real but um generally my solution to grease on any part of my stove is just wait for it to be burnt off by use does that ever happen i just find that it to be burnt off by use. Does that ever happen? I just find that it gets further caked on.

My mum's theory was never to wash the grill pan and it seemed to work for her. It worked for me until I caused a fire in my own oven. You should have just kept at it. The fire is when it's working. If you've got a question email your question to unsubmit this podcast to give them out at home unsubmit this podcast

To give them out a call Unsubmit this podcast To give them out a call Unsubmit Oh-ho-ho-ho Unsubmit Oh-ho-ho-ho 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 James, who says, Helen, answer me this. What is the etymology of brownie? As in the little pixie thing that the junior version of The Guides is named after. Is it racist? Or am I just assuming that because there are so many of them in the works of Enid Blyton? And then he says, Helen, I bet you were a brownie. I was a brownie. Yeah, a little cross-eyed, male-coordinated brownie. Yeah. What did you have a purchase for? I can't remember because although

Baden-Powell went to my school, so you'd think they'd be very heavily into this. Wow, that's cool. Well, sort of. No, that is cool. Yeah, when he used to have ice cream on his birthday, as I think I've mentioned on the podcast before, even though that's February, not a good ice cream time. So even though Baden-Powell went to the school, the Brownies were quite an informal Brownie troupe.

They weren't that driven. I've got this, I think, late 70s Brownie guide handbook here that was mine. And there's a very hot drawing of the Queen. She doesn't look at all like the Queen. What? But she's very doe-eyed, and she has razor-sharp cheekbones. And she has...

She looks like Commander Makara. What is that thing on the stick? A scepter. Yeah, she has a scepter sort of spiked through her head. It's a trick of perspective. Yeah, well, she's got a crown on one side, even though she's wearing the crown as well, an orb on the other, and a spectre through the middle.

It looks like a percentage sign with the Queen in the middle. I'll put a picture on the website. That's the easiest thing. Why would a brownie handbook from the late 70s have a guide to recognising the Queen? Is it in case you stumble across her in the woods? Well, she doesn't even look like the Queen, does she? She looks more like young Princess Diana in that photo. She does, yeah. Presumably, because when you do meet the Queen, you want to be prepared.

Whereas if you just barge past her, rather than offering to show her your badges or your sash or a pebble you just picked up in the woods on your nature trail, that would be a real opportunity missed. So I'm interested in your brownie experiences, Helen, but before we move on, I need you to answer this question.

Why are brownies called brownies? I've never thought about it before. Is it because they dress in brown? Well, I thought that was the case, and I wonder whether secretly it was, but the mythological explanation was, well, when brownies were founded as the under-11s subset

of the Girl Guides in 1914, they were called the Rosebuds, which I think is a bit virginity-ish. Yes, it is a little. And the Rosebuds disliked this strongly. So in 1915... What do you mean

the Rosebuds disliked it? The Rosebuds did not... The actual group themselves. They did not care for the name. Self-determined. Yes. So Baden- What do you mean the Rosebuds disliked it? The Rosebuds did not... The actual group themselves. They did not care for the name. Self-determined. Yes. So Baden-Powell changed Rosebuds to Brownies. And the given reason was that it was after a fairy story from 1870 by Mrs. Ewing.

You know Mrs. Ewing. Oh, yeah. It's some annoying children. After their mothers had a really busy day, she said, Oh, dear, how be a little bit racist. He did every kind of useful work, but nobody ever saw him. He always slipped away before the people of the house got up. But he was the greatest blessing to everyone. Everyone was happy and the home was bright and clean. So yeah, there's a bit of a servitude aspect to it.

And also interesting that you'd name a group of young girls after what was clearly... After a domestic. But a domestic man. Not even aspiring to a female role model. Yes, a woman could never do all those things without being heard. Useless woman. So the kids go off and find these goblin-ish creatures. What a shit fairy story.

And that's why there are so many pixies and imps and stuff in the brownies as well. They're all named after these little creeps. Very well. Did you enjoy being a brownie? Yeah, it was fine. Got to hang out with my friends. What did you learn? I learned some of those songs where you go around

and sing the line after the last group of people. Campfires burning, campfires burning. No, we didn't have that because there weren't campfires at our brownies. That would have set fire to the gym. And also, I imagine your polyester skirts. Oh, God, the uniforms then, they were off. They looked like a floating turd or a pine cone. Maybe that's what brownies are really named after.

God, I wouldn't be surprised. Baden Powell, like, yeah, all right, you can have your FEMO organisation, but there's a sting in the tail. Name you after my crap. So I don't think I learned any transferable skills. I wonder whether I missed out then, because it will not surprise you to know,

bearing in mind my complete malcoordination and inability at sport and lack of enthusiasm for teams, that I was not a scout. Although weirdly... Were you not a cub? I wasn't a cub or a scout, but weirdly, as I've got older, I have become more interested in all the things that the scouts do. You've started wearing a woggle, haven't you? Camping, walking, dressing up, homoeroticism, all of that.

I've got much more into it as I've got older. Just last week, a cub scout leader crashed into the lamppost outside my house. Good golly. Were they drunk? Well, I hope not because they were looking after a crowd of Cub Scouts. Oh, were they in the Cub bus? Yeah. It was midnight.

My girlfriend was looking out the window and said, that's weird. There's a troop of Cub Scouts walking past our front door. Doop, doop, doop, doop, doop. Which isn't something you expect to see. Any odd jobs to do mr exactly at midnight on a saturday in 2015 it's a bit like village of the damned um so of course i looked out the window and she indeed was correct there was a troop of cub scouts walking past our door and then the leader drove past in a jeep pulled over and picked them up and obviously they'd been on

some sort of nighttime orientation exercise you say obvious they could have been off robbing something it's possible but we picked them up shepherded them in the back and then pulled away and straight into the lamppost outside my house and managed to knock the light out so it now doesn't function anymore oh so the lamppost was on yes it wasn't just he couldn't see the lamppost because it was dark yeah no um drunk hidden in plain sight and i thought two things i thought one can't be bothered to go out and help was that one of the things oh no he was fine he just drove. He just drove off, hit and run. But the two things I thought, one, would I report a Cub Scout leader? Because I saw who it was.

I didn't get the number plate, but I saw the car and I know where their base is. And you saw which badges he had. I thought, could I report a Cub Scout leader for damaging council property? Because I'd feel a bit bad because they're sort of a charity, aren't they? And I'd feel a bit bad that they had to pay for it

and then secondly I thought in a way it's quite good he's knocked the light out because now we haven't got a yellow light coming through our window

into our bedroom so he did it for you so I'm sort of grateful you're going to feel really happy about that until someone plays into your front room because the street light's right

get the lamp fixed but put a standard lamp style lampshade on it you know one of the ones with a little silk fringing. Look quite cool. It's a nice idea, but I'd need a cherry picker to get up there and change it. Yeah, that'd be fun. You'll put it to her.

Yes, but as established, I'm not the kind of hunting, fishing and shooting physique of man that, like, if I'd been in the Scouts, I probably could climb a lamppost and put a lampshade on it. It's fun in a box. Get one of the cubs to shin up there and put it up. He's got penance to do. You should just phone them up and be like i know what you did last summer i was very surprised to read that uh in 2015 still one in four eight-year-olds is in the brownies in the uk yeah that is a high number of eight-year-olds getting recruited into the brown army yeah i suppose as a parent it's like the perfect thing because it

seems like something that you're doing to make your child sort of morally uh equipped and also you know learn things that they might use yeah in the physical world when they're older it's seen as being a good thing to do and yet basically it gets the kid out your hair for a few hours you can go to the casino yeah exactly um i always find it amusing when you read the stories about them trying to modernize the brownies and the scouts though oh yeah because i remember the brownie hamburg after the one i've got here it was like when they modernized snap crackle and pop and made them have 80s style trainers on and like little spiked hair and things like that rather than being the uh the the 50s spivs that they were before because i'm all for inclusivity uh and i imagine that some kids like myself when i was young who felt left out by this kind of activity would now be more embraced by the

scouts yeah because they probably teach coding there, or hacking or something. Exactly, so some of the new badges they introduced last year Disability You get a brownie badge in disability What do you have to do? I imagine it's like helping old women in wheelchairs but it might be just an understanding of other people's disabilities. Okay. Space

You can get one in space Does that respect some other people's personal space? If it was I would never get that badge Well can you get a badge For having an intermission? Because if so We're going to get one right now

And in preparation For the dropping Of the next Royal Baby Which apparently is on the cards Here's a clip from The Answer Me This Jubilee album One hour of regal material Available now

Along with all the other albums We've done And our first 170 episodes From AnswerMeThisStore.com. Here's a question from Erin who says, following the royal wedding, I fell into a short but shameful obsession with the world's royal families. You weren't the only one, it's fine.

And began googling royal families for eligible princes Oh god Whilst reading up on the line of succession for the Danish royal family I saw a picture of the Queen's coat of arms As the Queen of Denmark Which features quite prominently Two giant men with clubs wearing shrubs as underwear There appears to be a bear preparing to fist a ram

in the bottom left of that shield. Yeah, you know, that's just Denmark. I don't know why Erin is so struck by the Danish one when the UK one... Yeah, it's pretty weird. It's got a unicorn on it! Yeah. Which is weirder than two normal human men

that happen to be wearing leafy pants. Listeners, if you fancy calling us with a question, then save the following number. Or you can Skype answer me this. Let's hear who's been in touch. My name's Lucy and I'm from Brighton. Helen and Ollie answer me this. I've just come out of the pub and had an epiphany. Is Jurassic Park the ballet a good idea? If so, should I dedicate all of my spare time and savings to this idea? Thanks!

Yes, all of your time and all of your savings. Don't keep anything back. This could be the new Cats. Yeah, I'm sorry to break it to you, Lucy, but... It's not been done, has it? Jurassic Park the Ballet has already been done. Everything's been done! Well, I don't know if it was ever staged.

I wasn't curious enough to follow the links. But there is an audition video posted to YouTube. People ballet dancing to... That's actually quite a beautiful song for dance. And actually, from that point of view, it's not such a ridiculous idea. A lot of people use movie soundtracks, don't they? Particularly the work of John Williams as an introduction to classical music. And some of the movement of dinosaurs were very well expressed balletically.

No, that's where I... The smaller dinosaurs. Yes, indeed. Like the raptors. That's where I... Yeah, I think the issue is there's a lot of stomping in Jurassic Park. Yeah, club dancers could do it. Generally speaking, the physique of ballet dancers

is not really equipped for depicting water-shaking stomping. I can imagine a group of dancers representing a single leg and sort of moving as a unit. Thumping around. But no, you use timpani. You wouldn't have to be the footfall of the dancers. The music would change as in the film. Starts light, gets more menacing.

Maybe I'm just a bit jaded. Having mounted my own production at Edinburgh Festival a few years ago, I think the question you have to ask yourself is not, is it a good idea that people might come to if I did it? But actually, beyond that, is it a good idea that a cigar-chomping showbiz executive might think is commercial? Because otherwise, actually, you're relying on state-subsidised arts organizations to back it they're not going to back jurassic park the ballet because it's a shit idea so how can you say that i think it's i think it's not the worst idea i think it's

quite a dismember i went to edward scissorhands the ballet before christmas and that was absolutely magical yeah right okay so that matthew bourne could do this jurassic park if he wanted to literally needs to be him jurassic park, you know, it is intellectual property that belongs to a major film studio. Musicals and things are very expensive to mount anyway. Yeah, exactly. But if you've got to appease Spielberg... Yeah.

I don't think as well, if you think about the characters in Jurassic Park, they necessarily lend themselves to balletic depictions. No, the kids just run around screaming, don't they? Dickie Attenborough has a stick. Jeff Goldblum is... Jeff Goldblum, he's like seven foot tall. I mean, it's just none of these characters. Also, he's injured for half of it.

The tubby one that is trying to escape and instead gets killed. Yeah, not great. Laura Dern, though, that'd be all right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. One character down. He's a chaotician, isn't he? Goldblum, he's a chaotician,

so he could have people representing fractals and chaos theory. That could be quite beautiful. A chaotician? Yeah, that's what he describes himself as. It's not really a thing, but it's... Are you sure he says that? Because he's chewing gum almost the whole time

and smiling smugly. He could be saying anything. He could actually say I'm a geographer and it would just sound like chaotician. I'm a chaotician. I think there are probably some big films that could be successful ballets. Maybe Alien.

Bit of a pas de deux between Sigourney and the Alien. Maybe Alien 4. Actually, how about this? Seriously. Home Alone. A ballet? Bit of a pas de deux between Sigourney and the alien. Okay. Actually, how about this? Seriously. Okay. Home Alone. A ballet. Yeah, because you've got the wintry thing like Edward Scissorhands.

You've got... Because people who don't go to ballet book ballet as a Christmas treat, don't they? Yes, they do. So you've got the Christmas theme. Yeah. And you've got slapstick, which would be funny. So then you've got comedy sequences. But also the sort of balletic way in which Kevin prances around the house setting up the traps

versus the clumsy robbers sort of coming in foot by foot. I think that could work quite well. Need more people on stage though than Macaulay Culkin and two robbers. Planes, trains and automobiles. That's a classic Christmas film and it has all these different forms of transport

you could represent through dance. That would be brilliant. Would it? Yeah, I'd watch that. It's quite dialogue heavy. That's the challenge. There's quite a lot of slaps national lampoon's christmas vacation because when he gets blown up by that gas explosion that would be a really big leap for the dancer i'll tell you actually what would be the coup de tiage of jurassic park the ballet yes uh helicopter on stage now i know miss saigon has

done it but you know to be honest that in itself seems to be the reason why people buy tickets for miss saigon so it seems to me there reason why people buy tickets for Miss Saigon so it seems to me there is room for competition in that sphere that's true Ollie and I

were once queuing for tickets at a theatre at the theatre where Miss Saigon is now the Prince Edward the Prince Edward but we were going to see Jersey Boys

and this was like a year or so before Miss Saigon was coming to stage and the couple in front of us were like we want tickets

but which side will the helicopter come in on the ticket person was like I don't know yet I don't know Miss Saigon and they were like yeah but if it's the left then we want to be sitting here and if it's the right we want to be but which side will the helicopter come in on? The ticket person was like, I don't know yet. I don't know, it's ages away.

And they were like, yeah, but if it's the left, then we want to be sitting here. And if it's the right, we want to be sitting on the other side. It really was a five minute conversation about, can we see the helicopter? Well, we only took in five minutes, but they were there before we got there. They could have been there all day.

I've since been to see the revived production of Miss Saigon. Which side? If you are curious about booking tickets. It's all I want to know. If you consider this a spoiler, just put your fingers in your ears for the next 10 seconds. In the revived version of Miss Saigon, the helicopter effect is more of an effect than a prop.

Is it like shadow puppetry or something? It's basically massive fuck-off fans that blow wind in your face that go down from the top of the back of the stage to the bottom of the back of the stage. So you feel a helicopter taking off and you see lights in your face. But you don't necessarily see it in the same way that you used to. So it's impressionistic. It is quite impressionistic

and there is a helicopter on stage but the effect is all about the wind and therefore I don't think it matters where you're sitting so don't waste your money

trying to see the helicopter just sit in the middle and then you'll see it yeah you'll be fine shhh it's the question line it's the question line. It's a question line.

0208-123-5877. Answer me this. Shh. Answer me this. I don't know nothing. Such a perlover It's a question line It's a question line

0-2-R-8-1-2-3-5-8-R-B-7 Here's a question from Mike, who says, A famous series of television adverts were made for Hamlet cigars between 1966 and 1997. 1999, actually. Sorry to be a bit pedantic. Sorry, Mike. They weren't on telly then.

They were just in the cinema. But you were allowed to show tobacco ads in the cinema for a few years longer than on telly. Yeah, but maybe he's just talking about the television ads. Maybe, maybe. They went out with the major government. Like I say, I was being pedantic. He says, featuring Bach's Aeronogy String and the tagline happiness is a cigar called hamlet

please answer me this is it true that one of them actually featured jesus lighting up on the cross but was banned after a few airings in the early 70s the only references i can find are people who are commenting on a youtube video of a compilation of other Hamlet ads saying, oh, these were great. And then, do you remember the one in the 70s that got banned after a couple of viewings? I saw it and I couldn't believe it. I wonder, and I'm just putting this out there, I don't know.

You reckon false memories. I think what might be the case is that they are misremembering what might have been a Kenny Everett parody. Because Kenny Everett used to parody the Hamlet cigar commercials i remember that i remember a ross abbott parody well it was a popular trope yeah and that is a joke that kenny everett would do isn't it especially in the era of life of brian you can imagine that joke so i

just wonder if i can't imagine any advertising agency in the 70s would think it was a good idea to do that no and in a purely practical sense you couldn't show Jesus smoking it on the cross because how would he put the cigar in his mouth? Yeah, exactly. If he was holding it in his hand or lighting it, it's impossible. You need two free hands for that. Yeah, although he was a miracle worker, so maybe he found a way. Yeah, but if that was his final miracle, a bit of a shit one.

Yeah. Compared to water into wine. He seriously needs to prioritise. Also, I mean, generally, you know, health and safety wise, you don't want to be smoking around wooden structures. Yeah, but I think the only thing worse than being crucified is being crucified on a cross that's on fire. Also, I mean, generally, you know, health and safety-wise, you don't want to be smoking around wooden structures. Yeah, but I think... Oh, God, yeah, the only thing worse than being crucified is being crucified

on a cross that's on fire. No, because I think that would speed things up a bit because crucifixion, you're drowning slowly as your lungs fill with fluid, so maybe smoking is the least of his problems

in that scenario. Still, you know, he's introducing a further threat to his life, isn't he? Maybe that's why Amish people smoke pipes, you know, less open flame around the wood. Yeah, but then the beards have to be very flammable. It's awful, he's introducing a further threat to his life, isn't he? Maybe that's why Amish people smoke pipes. Less open flame around the wood.

But then the beards have to be very flammable. It's true. It seems to me such a bizarre idea now that in our living memory there was a time you could go to the cinema to watch a family film and be pitched tobacco and alcohol. But I remember going to watch family films in the 90s and there would be the Hamlet ads and there'd be a Smirnoff ad. Parents, you're going to need these films in the 90s and there would be the Hamlet ads and there'd be a Smirnoff ad.

Parents, you're going to need these to get you through the next two hours. And it was seen as a kind of incursion of people's freedom of speech to remove them. Whereas now it just seems not like Nanny State gone mad, but Nanny State being sensible to not show children those ads. It's astonishing just how people remember this campaign. I mean, I know it ran for 40 years, but it's been now 15 years since it was on advertising it's pernicious people still remember that slogan happiness is a cigar called hamlet which actually you know when you consider the product is named after an anxiety stricken man going through an existential crisis after the death of his father you know it's not even a slogan that particularly you know should

lodge in your brain is it yeah but hamlet in many ways is quite a lot like a smoker it's quite jittery he probably would like to have a smoke and go and pace up and down outside the castle walls. I see the point, but if you were saying, right, which Shakespeare play gives me a sense of inner relaxation and well-being like a small cigar, you wouldn't think Hamlet. Which would you think, though? A Shylock?

Troilus and Cressida. No. Yeah, I see your point. Yeah. I suppose one of the romances, you know, something a bit thin. What, like Midsummer Night's Dream? Probably Midsummer Night's Dream Just go and smoke a bottom

You see the problem A puck Yeah it's just not good You look like you need a puck You can see how that campaign would have played out Another question of smoking It's from Will in Oxford who says Helen answer me this

Can you explain the origin of the post-coital cigarette? When did a cigarette become cinematic shorthand for these people just banged it's quite a difficult thing to google without either getting a lot of triple x sites or sites about lung cancer so i suppose surely one element of this is that just generally smoking was sold as sexy for many many years in fact most of its years and also there were the freudian associations of putting a cylindrical object in your mouth yeah and so before they showed actual sex on screen the smoking suggested some kind of sensuality and release attention to the mouth it doesn't

surprise me that at all that it comes from an era of hollywood where all you could show was a kiss so of course that's the way to to demonstrate something but i think it was based on real life experience very commonly people had a cigarette after they after they screwed each other but back in the day um before they started linking cigarettes to lots of diseases um people were smoking all the time wasn't it just that the time while they were having sex with any time they weren't smoking yes and even then they probably were but they couldn't show it on the films um but this was most probably because um the tobacco companies were paying for product placement in films and if you showed it happening right after sex then people would associate the

smoking with pleasure yes and that association has been a very strong one yes and it's something you still see as a trope isn't it but it's something that's used now really by comedies in a knowing way I think it's like a have let up having had sex at some point. Of course. That image is still going strong, isn't it? In cartoons and in comedies. But in dramas these days, because they could still use it as shorthand, but they don't, partly because it's a cliche,

but partly because in dramas now, you are allowed to show a bit of nookie, aren't you? It's the opposite situation to old Hollywood. So they do, they show 15 seconds of Brad Pitt's chest or Rosamund Pike's tits or whatever. It would be more controversial to show the smoking. Yeah, it would. Generally.

But also now smoking has a very strong period drama association. So in Mad Men, they'll smoke dozens of cigarettes in every episode because that's set in the 60s. Yeah. But now it would seem, I suppose, uncharacteristic in modern life that you were trying to represent.

Tarantino would have character smoke in bed now, wouldn't he? Yeah, of course he would. But then he loves the references to the past. It would be a throwback to a specific film from the 70s that no one had seen. In researching this, I discovered a syndrome called post-coital tristesse, which is melancholy that washes over you post-coitally. It sounds like the name of an art installation, doesn't it? So I was wondering whether the post-coital cigarette trope

is partly because the people in life and people on the screen be shown to be doing something that isn't awkward silence post-coitaly it punctures the awkward silence doesn't it because they are doing something but they don't have to talk to each other when they're feeling the post-coital tristesse this is uh apparently originated by um the ancient greek dr galen um who like discovered the uh the nervous system and the blood system and stuff he said every animal is sad after coitus except the human female and the rooster why are all yas fan sites just about one thing the only way is up is not the only song she sings what about abandon me one true woman or good thing going.

Her single from 96. You should make your own Yaz site to fill in the gaps. Since you seem to think all the current Yaz sites are crap. Go to squarespace.com, build your Yaz site and put Yaz back on the map. The only way is up. Thank you Squarespace for sponsoring this episode of Answer Me This and for allowing you listeners

and us to build fantastic websites without a great deal of difficulty. Oh good god yes it's easy if you want to create a website with Squarespace all you do is go, you don't even have to put in your credit card you can register for a free trial you can get practising building your site right now build a shop, build a portfolio blog, gallery, whatever blog gallery whatever you like click whatever and then if you like it

then you pay for it and if you pay for it you get 10 off by using the code answer what's not to love i don't know website which is difficult because squarespace is good yeah yeah just don't build a website if you don't like it why would you do that that? Perverse. Hi, Helen and I, it's Bruce from Derbyshire Column. So, Anthony Biss, what is it that bacon rashers are called? Bacon rashers. Slightly unclear etymology, Bruce, I'm afraid, but it's probably

from the Middle English word rash, which meant to cut the same root as razor. Okay, but it's not... Because it's a slice of bacon. How long has the rasher been a thing? Well, this, I think it's 1590s. But before that, it was called a collop. Wow. What does a collop mean?

A collop is a rasher of bacon. That's a fun word, though, isn't it? It's a great word. Collop doesn't sound that appetising, does it? Well, not as rasher. Rasher sounds like rashes. It's not a word I tend to use, though, because it just doesn't seem to be essential.

Well, if you were saying to me, though, go to the supermarket and get a packet of bacon what, what would you say? You would say the word, surely. You'd just say go and get a packet of bacon, wouldn't you? Yeah, but you wouldn't say go and get a packet of rashers, even though rashers only pertains to bacon. That's true. So it's pretty much pointless. You wouldn't say how many

rashers of bacon would you like with your eggs? Yeah. I think you've just stumbled across a really interesting branding idea. Have I? Why has no one created chicken rashers? Well, they probably have, but... I know they've done faking a really interesting branding idea. Have I? Why has no one created chicken rashers? Well, they probably have. I know they've done bacon and all that shit. But actually, not that it's meant to taste like bacon, but that cut applied to a different kind of meat.

Lamb rashers. I'd try those. I have had lamb bacon and it is amazing. Has it? Yeah. It sounds good. On a chicken, you can't have that cut because they're configured differently. They are, yeah. You need the belly fat.

Sarah from Kent says, I love chicken flavour crisps. Weird. Yeah, I like them really? yeah they're really good rubbish no they're quantifiably not good better than eating dust

but if you're choosing flavours of crisps they're in the bottom 10% better than prawn cocktail and salt and vinegar barely much better than salt and vinegar they're equal to prawn cocktail salt and vinegar is a classic and you're a dickhead

you can't handle my crisps Sarah says I love chicken flavour crisps like Martin who's a dickhead but Helen answer me this exactly how much actual chicken is there in chicken flavour crisps, like Martin, who's a dickhead. But, Helen, answer me this. Exactly how much actual chicken is there in chicken flavour crisps? Is there any chicken at all? On my packet of chicken hula hoops, it says roast chicken.

I didn't know you could get roast chicken hula hoops. I didn't either. How foul. Oh, that'd be lovely. Was that a pun? It was, yeah. Actually, as I said it, I was aware of it, but I didn't think it was funny enough to remark upon,

so I'm glad you filled that void. Martin is really letting himself down in this section. But, continues Sarah, on the packet of hula hoops, it doesn't actually say chicken in the ingredients. It says may contain egg. So it's got egg, but no chicken. And then she puts a question mark and an exclamation mark as if to indicate WTF. I haven't checked the ingredients on roast chicken hula hoops

because I refuse to believe those exist. But I know that roast chicken walkers crisps exist, and they got into loads of trouble in 2013 when they introduced actual meat into their flavorings whereas before they were vegetarian so you think why bother because it's probably not cheaper to have actual meat why why because it's smoky bacon was something you could eat if you were halal but you can't now because it's actually got bacon in it yeah or kosher so but what is the what is the content so now in walker's chicken crisps there is Devon Free Range dried chicken breast on the ingredients list.

But that is the 10th ingredient of the roast chicken seasoning subsection, which is the fourth biggest ingredient in the whole crisp. So the 10th ingredient of the flavouring. So that is it's below paprika and it's way below salt, which is the predominant flavour. Yes. I was wondering if it was turmeric. I was wondering what made it yellow. It's paprika, isn't it? That's basically what you're tasting, isn't it? Yeah, well, you're tasting paprika below dried garlic,

dried onion, dried yeast, potassium chloride, parsley. I mean, the thing is, most of those Walker's flavours don't taste remotely of what they're supposed to be anyway. So it's a marketing gimmick, so they can say free-range organic. But actually, you're not buying it because of that. You're buying it because it tastes like Walker's roast chicken flavoured crisps, which roast chicken flavored crisps which never tastes anything like

chicken because chicken doesn't taste that intensely of anything bottles don't taste of milk the foam shrimps don't taste of shrimp you wouldn't want the prawn cocktail crisps to actually taste a prawn cocktail because then you buy prawn crackers prawn cocktail crisps do not contain any prawn oh really so they're still vegetarian but bacon crisps and chicken crisps they are ruined for you veggies when you think about it it's actually only really salt and salt and vinegar that are what they say they are. I mean, it's not flavouring, it is actually the topping. Good point.

Here's another crisps question from Laurie from Bristol who says, I'm on holiday with my girlfriend and it's occurred to me that walkers crisps are being referred to as lades. You must be having a fantastic holiday. Ollie, answer me this. Is Britain the only country that has walkers? And if so, why? Yeah, it's boring but yes yes uh britain is the only country that has walkers but it is all part of the same global conglomerate and it is that uh essentially the lays corporation

which then became frito lays yes which then became owned by pepsi uh now own every major crisp manufacturer in the world and in britain that was walkers which they bought in 1989 but they didn't change the brand because it was very well established here with over 50 percent of the crisp market wow but it's odd that the graphic of lays looks like walkers all over the world uh it's not that odd frito lays bought walkers one of the assets they bought was the logo and they thought that the british logo was better than what they had in the states on their on their lace crisps that they already had yeah so they so they changed the logo all around the world to copy the british one why can't frito-lay bring themselves to sell cheetos in britain well i can't answer you helen why but it's more of a primal scream than a

question i can't answer you but i'm quite glad that they don't because i'd be consuming a lot more oil you would have that yellow crack finger permanently wouldn't you would you care to guess how many packets of crisps a day the Walker's site in Leicester creates? Oh. It's more than you think. Double it before you say. 20 million.

6 billion. Martin's got it in one. Well done, Martin. 6 billion bags of crisps. One for every person in the world. And that's just you. You both overshot it, but then I'd oversold it. Yeah, exactly.

It's your fault. It's double what I would have thought. 20,000. Four. Stop it. It's 11 million. Okay. That's your fault. It's double what I would have thought. 20,000. Four. No, stop it. It's 11 million. Okay. That's a lot.

11 million bags of crisps a day. So you told me to double it. I would have been very close if I hadn't listened to you. How many packets of crisps do you eat in your average year? 11 million. I eat about six bags of crisps a year. What?

Yeah. Yeah, but that's because you're on a no carbs regime. Not really. I've always not been that fond of crisps. I mean, I like them. I'm glad they exist as part of the snacking ecosystem. 11 million bags are eaten every day, effectively,

for them to be making that many. Amazing. So there's one for every four men, every child in the country. Well, I think that is a convenient point at which to end this episode of Answer Me This, but please do supply your questions for future episodes of Answer Me This

via email, phone and Skype. And our contact details are on our website AnswerMeThisPodcast.com where remember you can see our gallery of bean-based art Do we really want to encourage more people to think oh I'll photoshop a picture of them in some beans Yeah it's tricky because Bean khaki

On one hand obviously not and on the other hand I'm sort of curious to see what other creative things people can do involving our face and beans. That's not so much a challenge as a threat. Before we go, we should thank once again Squarespace for their sponsorship of this episode. Thank you very much, Squarespace. Thank you. And we'll see you next time.

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