Answer Me This! - AMT312: Jobs in Antarctica, Yog(h)(o)urt, and Small Manparts

Episode Date: April 16, 2015

Today we hear from questioneers who are dreaming of Antarctica, dreaming of pub quiz victory, and dreaming of riding a non-tiny wanger. Read more about the episode at Send questions to , or the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis)Tweet us Be our Facebook friend at Subscribe on iTunes Buy old episodes and albums at answermethisstore.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Which Tony Blair will you vote for, David or Ed? Answer me this, answer me this Is Nick Clegg feeling anything except utter dread? Answer me this, answer me this Helen and Ollie, answer me this Now last time we were talking about the announcements on tube trains to guide the visually impaired. Yes. Do you remember that?

Please alight here for Answer Me This 3.11 revision. Exactly. Sarah says, in Answer Me This 3.11, you were mentioning how Moorfield's Eye Hospital is announced at Old Street tube station. And Helen was right. There are eight exits from the underground. We were saying it'd be very hard.

What's the point of telling a blind person to come off here if they then walk straight to a wall? It's a very complex underground station with a terrifying road system at ground level. But she clarifies for us. There is a large, about a foot wide, green line that runs from inside the underground station to the main entrance of Moorfields. All a visually impaired person needs to do is follow the line to get into the hospital. And to know that that line is there in the first place. Well, you can't account for stupid people who haven't done the research, Helen.

The line is also raised about a centimetre, so it's easy to follow even without using vision at all. Very good. They've thought of everything. But... Oh, sting in the tail. Mark also wrote to say, there is the green line.

However, on my very first unaided trip to Moorfields, suitably armed with the information about the green line, and as a seriously blind person, I duly located the line and diligently followed it into the abyss that I'd hoped and trusted was the correct route Oh dear Unfortunately, around halfway there

I encountered a building renovation scheme to one of the buildings on Old Street and the scaffolding had been positioned right in the middle of the green line That's really cunty, isn't it? It's equal opportunities though, isn't it? Because Old Street's a nightmare for everyone Why make it particularly easier for visually impaired people

They're just giving them the experience of everyone else Of being baffled when they get there and not being able to find their way around Yay Let me out to civilisation is what everyone thinks, blind or not I really hope that Mark found Moorfields But the fact that his email ends with ARG Makes me think that might be the last anyone heard of Mark Well also

On the subject of Answer Me This, episode 3 ross has written in regarding the debate as to whether night nurse the medicine or night nurse the song was first he says a quick look at the united kingdom trademark listings provides the answer well it might for you ross but i'm not used to the uk trademark listings website what do you mean you're not used to it how much time have you spent getting to know i spent half an hour trying to find this answer last time maybe if the uk trademark listings are so good at answering questions i should get them to co-host the show with me anyway what's the answer ross says night nurse yeah the medicine was trademarked in 1972 whilst an earlier serum was registered in 1934 okay well as i predicted it wasn't after the song so i did answer it

correctly i just didn't know that i didn know that. So thank you for telling me. But you were incorrect in your supposition that they had not used the song Night Nurse to advertise the medicine Night Nurse. Yeah. Because Michael says there was a 2002 advert. And the proof is on YouTube. I'm astonished.

I was guessing that that had never happened because why on earth would you? Because it's got the same name and that's all anyone cares about. It's not like you can remember the rest of the lyrics. All you can remember is the... It doesn't matter what else the song goes on to say. Well, I stand corrected.

Happy to. This is Gilby in London. Helen and Ollie and Smith. How come I've got a PhD in all kinds of shit and I know all kinds of random things and yet I always lose the pub quizzes? So he's an academic, but he's bad at pub quizzes i've known quite a lot of stupid people with phds i'm not talking about martin obviously

but it is possible that you know a lot about one thing yes a lot of random shit about one thing it's also equally possible that you could be an absolute genius and fail at pub quizzes because they deliberately target the quiz at the demography that is attending the local public house and that is a wide range of intellect yeah can one person possibly be good at the 70s tv themes round exactly and the spice girls round well this is it so i went to a pub quiz a couple of months ago and i actually deliberately constructed a team that i was pretty pleased with because i was covering the entertainment and also sort of news and politics but then also on my team i had someone who was interested in sport yes that's

the valuable component real black spot for me yeah and then I had someone else who was kind of into like geography and sort of the world so I thought between us like they can ask us who played football on the Nile on a question of sport and I'd know it um and uh we were doing really really well and i think we were possibly leading but then they had a draw a cock round that's not a quiz that's a hen do yeah exactly and how did you fail do you not know what a cock looks like well our cock wasn't as good as everyone else's cock and it didn't have as many like desperate jokes written on it it was just a sort of fairly workaday image of a cock what did they want from the cock drawing did they want a very anatomical cock or did they want the most classic bus stop cock with like three pubes and jizz i think three pubes per ball had had they wanted the latter i

still would have failed but from recollection the ones that actually sailed through i mean i don't remember it in detail because obviously i took to the liquor as soon as i realized we weren't winning um but the one that sailed through and got two rounds worth of points by the way just for drawing a cock that's appalling equivalent to like 12 general knowledge questions which we dazed that is not a good quiz not a good quiz uh was i think someone had done like a satirical joke like maybe they'd done one that looked like faraj oh you know and i just i couldn't draw nigel farage that's fine no one asked you to draw nigel farage. Exactly. I was fuming. You should be fuming. What was the prize?

Oh, about ten. I thought you were going to say like a giant inflatable cock. But it's for its own sake, isn't it? You know, you enter a pub quiz because you want to win. And you only want to do things that you get disproportionately praised for, don't you? And also, it's the fact that even if you turn up with a really solid quiz team, other people have done

the stuff around it like they've thought about their name yes so you know someone turns up what's your name i always think oh fuck what's her name i don't know uh we've all got glasses with the four blokes with glasses it's crap and then someone else be what's your name we're quiz tina aguilera that always comes up doesn't it oh but it's so good of a reckleston yeah i think also though gilby it's reasonable just to accept that clever people are not necessarily clever at everything. For instance, I love words and language stuff,

and yet I'm bad at Scrabble and the words rounds on Countdown. I'm good at the maths round on Countdown. It's like Martin is a documentedly intelligent man, and yet he is very bad at seeing things right in front of his face and not falling over things. So we've all got our weak spots, Gilby, and maybe yours is better. I don't think there's a good definition of intelligence. Here is a question from Rebecca from London who says,

a while ago I came out of a building at university and someone tried to hand me a leaflet which said Jews for Jesus on it. I said no because I didn't want one. But then as I walked away, I thought, isn't the really essential difference between Jews and Christians that Jews aren't really for Jesus? It's one of the crucial differences, I grant you, yeah. Well, he asked me this.

What is Jews for Jesus? Jews for Jesus is an evangelical group of Christians, but it is specifically aimed at people who are born into Jewish families and saying, look, you can maintain your Jewish identity. You can still be a Jew. So you can be an ethnic Jew. You can be be a Jew. So you can be an ethnic Jew. You can be an ethnic Jew who does Passover and believes in the Old Testament and has a bar mitzvah.

But you also think that Jesus was the Messiah. You just won't have Christmas. You won't have Christmas. And all of your relatives are wrong when they say that you have to be one or the other. And they say you can't have it all in this life. That's it. You can absolutely have it all.

You can believe that you are part of the chosen people, but also that God chose to have a son in this life that's it you can have absolutely have it all you can believe that you are part of the chosen people but also that god chose to have a son in a virgin and then kill him and then raise him again and then establish a british headquarters on the a41 all of it is possible why not worship that absolute pervert but if you ever wanted to go and live in israel then you can't be a jew for jesus because there a test case. I guess, in fairness, Israel realised that if Jews for Jesus really took off, then they'd be giving right to a passport to a lot of people that would then come to their country and from the inside destroy Judaism. So it's kind of contrary to the spirit of the state of Israel in the first place. That's slightly paranoid, but I see the point.

Here's a question from Rob in Sidmouth in Devon who says, toilet paper brands often attempt to convince us that they are in some sense luxurious. Yeah there's not much marketing potential in telling people that your toilet paper is poor. Austere scratchy, unabsorbent What do they market Jay's

hygiene as though? Because it is basically tracing paper that stuff isn't it? For people who like the misery of a 1940s boarding school yeah he says ollie answer me this what is the most expensive toilet paper in the world is there a genuinely luxury brand of toilet paper i.e one that all the top knobs use if so what is it how much does it cost and does it claim any high profile endorsements there are two answers to that question because there is the answer to the question what is the most expensive toilet roll which is technically

available but is obviously a big press stunt and no one really buys harrods must have some that's 200 quid and made out of mink well probably i'll give you the answer in a minute but it's so absurd that obviously it's not the real answer then there's the real answer which is is there a brand that is expensive but still you know you can imagine someone famous buying. First of all, the one that was clearly just a press stunt is there is an Australian sort of toilet paper delivery business called Toilet Paper Man. I can't believe I'm even doing their business right now and publicising them.

That's such a drab name. If you're going to be shilling very expensive toilet paper, you can't do it under that business name. Well, exactly. They're not shilling expensive toilet paper. They are shilling toilet paper. That is what they do. As a press stunt a few years ago they decided to start selling

toilet paper that was made from 22 carat gold oh that's like the victoria's secret million dollar diamond bra it's bullshit isn't it i mean like clearly no one would buy it it costs 825 000 pounds it's not even practical it's made from solid gold that wouldn't be at all absorbent king midas' toilet paper. Apparently, it does provide a gentle wipe for the utmost comfort. You wouldn't be able to flush gold away, though. But anyway, the real answer, as far as I can tell, that is actually sort of mass-produced and appears to be bought by celebrities,

for example, the Emperor of Japan... Celebrity. He's actually got a job. ...is a Japanese brand. It's kind of obvious when you think about it because everything to do with toilets ultimately leads you to japan doesn't it at some point it is called hanabisho um it is uh 32 pounds i mean it's 5 000 yen which translates to about 32 pounds uh for a pack of three which means each roll costs about 11 quid um so that is considerably

more expensive than your average roll of andrex but it's nonetheless a mass-produced brand that people do buy if they've got too much money. And what's so great about it? It is made from the finest wood fibre pulp from Canada and treated with water from the Nyodo River, which was ranked the cleanest in all of Japan. Hmm, that seems a bit wasteful.

Yes, I think it probably is. But if you're the emperor of Japan, you've got that kind of money to burn. Exactly. But then I'm surprised they're not making it out of finest bamboo threads because bamboo makes some very soft textiles. Not just that. Each roll is signed by the maker to ensure quality.

That doesn't ensure quality at all. Well, no, it doesn't really, does it? I suppose it's like a trademark stamp, but a real one. It shows they've checked it, doesn't it? Yeah, but the ink would get absorbed by the toilet paper. I think it shows an artisan skill has gone into making it doesn't it um and it's packaged very beautifully according to the website of the toilet paper uh it feels as if your skin is being gently swathed in silk i think though that the black toilet paper we talked about a few months

ago because russell brand and simon cowell allegedly have it i think that was about 50 quid a roll that's probably just because you can't mass sell black toilet paper because it's stupid. I think if you really wanted super expensive toilet paper, why don't you just wipe your arse on banknotes? Oi! Shut up and answer me this. Come on then. Why don't you shut your ugly face?

I'm not ugly, it's the condition. It's no condition, it's the tuggliness, man. Answer me this. Pods cost at googlemail.com Answer me this podcast at googlemail.com Answer me this podcast at googlemail.com

Answer me this podcast at googlemail.com Now, seriously though, go back to your own country. That's what we're all thinking, isn't it? It's what we're all thinking. It's got a question. I ain't got no questions. Don't look at me. Shut your mouth. 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. Time for a question from S, age 24 and a half. That's an identity-concealing S, isn't it? Not an actual name. I guess. I guess.

And S, age 24 and a half, says, I'd love to work in Antarctica. Okay. Why? But I'm not a citizen of a country with a research programme. Oh dear. And I don't even have a science-related university degree. Not planned for this at all, have you? Born in

the wrong place, studying the wrong thing. So Helen answered me this. Is this an impossible dream i'm willing to clean things and wash dishes and i'm not afraid of cold weather sure you are aware though s that it's midsummer high is around nought degrees centigrade not even counting for wind chill yeah so i think that cold weather might get a bit wearing and also the six months of darkness you have to be in very good health to get a bit wearing. And also the six months of darkness, you have to be in very good health to get a job in Antarctica,

both physically and psychologically, because they don't have very comprehensive facilities. So they psychologically test you before and see if you can cope with all the dark. There are two exclamation marks on the email. I'm not afraid of cold weather, exclamation mark, exclamation mark. Yeah, well, let's test that. Why don't you go and live in an industrial freezer for four months? It does imply to me that they're saying they're aware

that that is downplaying the situation and that this is the coldest, driest continent on Earth. I mean, I can't imagine why you would want to go and work there unless you were really interested in the scientific research. But maybe they are actually interested in the research, they just don't have the degree. I might just be really into the film The Thing. Or the film Happy Feet.

Or the X-Files movie. I don't think any of these are realistic depictions of what it's like there. You don't know. I don't know. You've not been. That's right. That is right. And I wonder as well whether S has dismissed the idea of going as a tourist, for whatever reason. Can you go as a tourist? They're worried that

Antarctica's climate is going to be very much adversely affected by the amount of tourism. What, it will start warming up too much as people take flash photography? The snow will get discoloured from all the footprints. And it's very hard to get rubbish, for instance, off Antarctica. So for every person, you have to factor that in. So the answer is yes, you can go as a tourist,

but it's really difficult for you. It's expensive as well, because you can only go at certain times of year and you can only approach from certain ways. It's kind of exciting though. It is the closest thing to going to the moon without leaving the earth.

Yeah, I suppose. It's so remote and inhospitable. If the moon had penguins on it. Nothing about it appeals to me and the coldest place I've ever worked is Edinburgh

and I'd have enough of that after a month. I mean, I was even thinking, you know, because James Corden's in the news, you know, starting his big US chat show yeah

you know he's moved all the way to I guess it's New York is it to make that or LA for his dream job you know and I was thinking well would I you know not I'm saying this is a very realistic scenario would you move to Antarctica

to be Antarctica's favourite late night talk show host precisely that and I don't think I don't think I would actually leave the UK for any job that was long term I think if it was for a few months it'd be great what about if it's in a sunny place no I think even even if it was California I think I would actually leave the UK for any job that was long term. I think if it was for a few months, it'd be great. What about if it's in a sunny place? No, I think even if it was California, I think I'd...

Yeah, no, I don't think I would. Because of family and friends and stuff here. Well, S is not bothered about family and friends. But to go and get what sounds like a minimum wage job, and I doubt they even have minimum wage in Antarctica since they don't really have a government. Yeah, who does govern Antarctica? Antarctica is governed by like four different countries

that claim to bits of it. And no one cares because no one fucking lives there apart from the penguin. You'd get kicked to death by a penguin if you're naughty. But actually, interesting thing, in 2012 for the Diamond Jubilee, the Queen was given a bit of Antarctica that previously had not been laid claim to

by any particular nation. So there is now an area of Antarctica called Queen Elizabeth Land. Has it got any rides? I would love if it did. The Prince Philip is just a massive hole in the ground. It's got to be one of these ones that is really, really inaccessible if it hadn't been claimed.

I mean, it's meaningless to her, isn't it? She's got so much free shit. She's the queen! Also, giving someone that for effectively their birthday. I know it's the Jubilee, but really it's kind of like her work birthday. I mean, that is like when someone gives you a certificate saying you own a bit of the moon, isn't it? It is meaningless.

If she went there to try and lay claim to Queen Elizabeth land, she'd be like the old man in Nebraska. But then maybe she'll be like Dr. Evil, or whatever he's called, at the end of the film version of Watchmen. And she goes and builds her castle of evil down there and goes to plot dooms. Well, it's an option, isn't it? I think she's been waiting for it. She did a very fine job restoring

the fire damage wing of Windsor Castle. Yeah, time for a doom castle. She's no stranger to a new build. Can I make a more practical suggestion to help us? If you insist. I think there's a big enough scientific institution there that by now they must have an artist in residence programme. So all you have to do

is set yourself up as a poet or a painter or whatever and you know make something vaguely plausible. That's a good idea actually it's like all these people

pretending to care about science and they get money from the Wellcome collection. There are arts and media opportunities but they are quite sporadic it seems a lot of them they'll go for a year

and then shut down and I don't think most of them actually pay you so they'll get you there well but there's not much to spend your money on when you're there they can't not feed you anyway the national science foundation which is us-based has an artist and writers program and the deadline for applications is the first of may this year for arts and journalism and photography and history projects so hurry up but i think they're super super competitive because even the jobs even the most lowly jobs because you don't have to do a science job there you can do a

support workers job there it's like cooking or waste disposal or it or carpentry even those are extremely difficult to get and i read this quite sad blog by a guy who'd spent four years pretty much devoting his life to getting one of these jobs. And he'd applied for dozens. If you're not from a country where there is a program, it is very difficult. It's very competitive, even if you are from one of the countries that has a program. There are a few jobs you can get at the Living Museum at Port Lockray on Goudier Island, which is off a peninsula. So how remote is that?

That is a tiny island off antarctica yeah so it's pretty much going to fit the bill for us i say and it helps if you speak uh several languages and have special skills in computing and carpentry and stuff or electrical engineering and apparently every time there's a film or documentary about antarctica on the telly applications increase tenfold people are weird aren't they people are so weird you know that i don't get away from it all only live a simpler life that is more complicated due to the difficulty of not dying for whatever reason whether you believe in god or whether you believe we've evolved purely you know in darwinistic terms our bodies are telling us not to live there

you know we are being there's a very clear signal when a place is inhospitable that it should probably remain inhospitable yeah but look how well dubai has been doing yeah i wouldn't want to live there either there's less barry mantello in antarctica there is that for it well let's head to the other side of the globe now for today's intermission which is from answer me this episode 134 available now along with all of our other classic episodes and albums at answermethisstore.com. Why do Fox's Glacier Mints have a picture of a polar bear rather than a fox? It seems that the fox would make much more sense. Well, no, the fox would...

I know what they mean, right? But the point is, Fox is clearly with someone's name. They established the company. And people who happen to have the same name as an animal and then set up a company after their name obviously have quite a highfalutin impression of themselves they're not going to want to represent their name their history their heritage their ancestry with a little funny cartoon animal of a fox whereas obviously glacier mints polar bear lives on a glacier yeah i heard something really mental about this right the polar bear is called peppy

and was introduced in 1922. And foxes actually shot and had taxidermied some polar bears, which they sent on tour around Britain until the 60s, when the people in the 60s were like, hang on, this seems like a very wrong thing to do for advertising. I'm never grateful to have a fox's glass here.

You can make a lovely igloo out of them. Listeners, please do call in with your questions you can dial the following number 02081235807 or you can skype answer me this let's hear who's been in touch hello my name's adam i'm calling from uh southeast london helen and ollie answer me this. I work for the ambulance service answering 999 calls and work very long 12 hour shifts, sometimes doing some very difficult and depressing work as I'm sure you can understand. I've taken to trying to clear my head and cheer myself up on my breaks by walking around outside. The issue is our call centre is in the darkest waterloo and the area around the call centre is not particularly nice. Now considering I work both

daytimes and nighttimes this sometimes means that I'm walking around at one to three o'clock in the morning trying to get some fresh air and cheer myself up. So the question I'm asking is Helen and Ollie and Martin the Soundman, how do I get some fresh air and cheer myself up during a night shift without looking like I'm either looking to buy drugs or some sort of mentalist? I was wondering whether you might look less suspicious

walking around in the night if you had a high-vis jacket on and you look like suspicious walking around in the night uh if you had a high-vis jacket on and you look like you're working on the roads or something because you see a lot of people doing that at night but in the day if you're worried about why you're walking around these not very walking friendly areas you would just pretend to be jogging or something but at night jogging at night still seems weird so i reckon put on the appearance of a night worker yeah except if this was an episode of mr bean you you'd then get roped into digging a manhole, obviously. That is an occupational hazard,

but it might cheer Adam up amidst these very long shifts of misery. Adam, who exactly are you worried about seeing you and judging you? The perfectly above board people that are around at one in the morning. Exactly. If you get the sense as you walk around that most people around there are drug addicts and or mentalists, as you say, then why are you worried about what junkies and people with mental health problems are going to think about you?

If it's other people like you who are innocently working, they're going to be thinking the same thing about themselves. You might even be able to share a nod of recognition with the only other person on the street who is sober. Most areas of London, you are used to seeing people around at all hours of the day. Especially at international, well, what was an international terminal like Waterloo? That's true. You could go for a walk through the train terminus. That's not a bad idea. But I assume that Adam is in a part of Waterloo

that means it's not very easy for him to go on a walk, say, along the riverbank. You're always close to the riverbank if you're in Waterloo, though. Yeah, but he could be right at the Elephant and Castle end, which would also chime in with him being near some estates he's not particularly enjoying. Feeling he's made some bad life choices um well i think generally speaking if you've got cams on if you're listening to something like this for example you mean big

headphones i mean big headphones yeah and i'm talking headphones we talked about i'm talking full-on you know george michael when doing a charity single for stockhaken and waterman type if you're wearing those and walking briskly, people will know that you mean business. I.e. you are not to be meddled with. I.e. you are not looking for drugs. They'll understand that you're a young professional merely moving from one place to the other in your own time. You don't want to engage with anyone else. That's my tip for walking around in London at night.

Or you could get a dog and be walking the dog. The problem is you've got to keep the dog in the office then. Well, maybe that would cheer him up though. It would cheer everyone up in an at night. Or you could get a dog and be walking the dog. The problem is you've got to keep the dog in the office then. Well, maybe that would cheer him up though. It would cheer everyone up in an ambulance centre, wouldn't it? Yeah. I realise that it is a big life commitment to have a dog. And also you'd be keeping a dog on very unpredictable hours. Yeah. A dog is for

life, not just to let mentalists near your workplace think that you're not mental. You could get a toy dog on wheels, but then that might not help with the people thinking you're mental notion um i like what you were saying about the high-vis jacket though i wonder if there's a compromise that looks like work gear i mean actually you're probably not wearing a suit because you're in a call center you're probably just wearing a t-shirt could you get some ambulance related merch yeah yeah nhs polo shirt i'm not saying pose as a paramedic but you can get official looking garb

but i was gonna say just a suit actually if you're wearing a suit that means i'm at work no that's so weird though wearing a suit at three in the morning like no i'm at work perfectly normal here's my bowl i had good day i think just making yourself visible is a big part of it isn't it like if you're so if you're sort of wearing dark clothes and especially if you're a woman that sees like a figure kind of come out of the shadows that's more just knowing that someone you can see someone from 50 meters away oh they're probably just yeah but you see how the headphones would help now in that scenario if they're listening to the headphones they're not preying on you i mean they might be but you know you'd be thinking oh they've got another priority here and that's the reach the end of this fascinating song or what's the one

thing that more clearly than anything spells out lunch lunch break. Lunchbox. Yes. Transformers Lunchbox. Yeah. No one's going to beat you up with one of those. They might, because it's got hard corners. I've got an idea there, Adam. Dress as a ghost. Go on.

Why not play this to the hilt? It's like a double bluff, isn't it, then? Absolutely. Here is a question from Drew from Knoxville, Tennessee, who says, I was watching the BBC series of House of Cards. That's's amazing isn't it that is something that netflix has brought the world isn't it imagine just two years ago a man from knoxville writing to us saying i've just been watching the classic 1980s bbc political drama house of cards and it's rainy and that just wouldn't happen yeah starring ian richardson as francis urquhart who spoiler alert becomes prime minister

and in scenes set in the House of Commons during Prime Minister's question time, I noticed that he steps up to a microphone set on a table. You are very observant, Drew. Upon which seems to be a set of old leather-bound books with some certain ceremonial placement and purpose, as though these very books

were foundational to the representative government. As if some books left at the heart of Parliament couldn't be there by pure coincidence. Or they couldn't be hiding a videocassette in a mock leather sleeve. Ollie, answer me this. Are these books some gravely important constitutional documents or maybe something else like the Magna Carta, the Rules of Order, Parliamentary Minutes, Accounts Ledgers, Samuel Peep's super secret diaries, autograph books, Masonic arcaneary, pastry recipes. None of those. Are they books with many

pictures? I bet there are no pictures. There are no pictures. He's thought about this so much. He's left out the really obvious solution for what they are, though. Are they the Harry Potter books with the adult bindings rather than the childish bindings? Obviously that's what they are. All seven. Most important contributing factor to british

tourism over the past decades of course that would be honored in parliament is it the concise oxford dictionary uh no are you actually pulling my dick or do you neither of you guess no i don't know i can't guess what could be the most important book photo albums the bible yes thank you it's the bible of course it's the bible yeah why dictionaries better so when you go to the House of Commons and you become an MP, you swear in. Every MP after the election will swear in. You just choose a swear word. Just choose a swear word.

You stand up in the House of Commons and you swear an allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen on God. You do that over the book of your choice. If you're not religious, you can have a solemn affirmation, which does not include an oath. But there is no option to be not a monarchist. Because you are serving Her Majesty the Queen. But can you really be a monarchist if you're not religious, you can have a solemn affirmation, which does not include an oath. But there is no option to be not a monarchist, because you are serving a monarchy. But can you really be a monarchist if you're religious? Because the whole thing's ridiculous

if you don't believe in the divine right of kings. But anyway, the point is that the books that you're swearing on are the books in the middle. So there is a copy of the Bible, there is a copy of the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Quran, etc. And actually, if you think about modern-day parliament buildings, because obviously ours is

not that modern quite old yeah um i'd imagine it's not that accessible for people with limited mobility and i bet they don't have enough loos indeed but if you think about australia for example uh if you've ever seen the australian parliament on tv it's much more modern building as you'd expect uh actually weirdly our dispatch box and the thing that the prime minister is leaning on in the house of commons a gift from Australia what's in it? I'm not sure what's in it I think possibly more books actually it's probably just

lamingtons yeah the Australian Parliament they too even though it's a modern building and they have a sort of Ikea looking desk

in the middle of it they too have loads of modern copies of the Bible in the middle that is the tradition so that's what you're doing yeah you're debating over the Bible

quite cool though one of the books is a burnt copy of the Bible that was the victim of the bomb in the House of Commons in the 1940s and has been restored. But it still looks like a burnt book. Who bombed the House of Commons in the 1940s?

Hitler. Was it Hitler? Yeah, yeah. He was a big guy at the time. He was really dominating the bombing scene in London in the 1940s. A bomb hit the House of Commons, not a bomb was brought in. He didn't walk in with a rucksack. Yeah, Hitler shoe-bombed the House of Commons. I've made my fortune on the dark web selling machine guns

But my dream is to monetise my homemade cream buns They don't sit too well listed next to AK-47s. My poor lonely buns. Build your bun shop of dreams using squarespace.com. There's 24-7 support if you get it wrong. And you'll be selling more buns than guns before very long. If you evade the law. I've just been arrested. Thanks very, very much to Squarespace for sponsoring this episode of Answer Me This.

Yes, thank you for everything you do for all podcasts around the world, but particularly this one. But also we appreciate what Squarespace offer in terms of lovely website design. I think the audience would appreciate it too, Helen. I think they would. I've been using it. It's very spiffy and it's very easy. Yes, it's basically like web design, but with magic dust. It's like web design for people who don't know how to do web design. That is me. Yeah, me too.

And that could be you, listeners. And if you want to have a go, then you can try the two-week free trial at squarespace.com. And then if you like it, sign up, get 10% off for a year using the code ANSWER. Here's a question from Tim in Bordeaux. That's in France. I knew that, Tim. Yeah, but some of the in Bordeaux That's in France I knew that Tim Some of the listeners might not

He says Helen answer me this At what stage in the no doubt rich and complex history of ice cream Did vanilla become the default flavour Surely plain ice cream Would just taste of cream Much like plain yoghurt tastes Of yoghurt

And yet the ground zero ice cream tends to be vanilla flavoured. Doesn't it, though? Your thoughts on this would be most appreciated. Do you taste... I mean, do you, Olly, Ran and you, Helen Zotsman, do you taste vanilla in vanilla ice cream? Because I very rarely do. It depends on the ice cream. If it's like Mr Whippy, then you don't.

That's true. If you're having Haagen-Dazs, you probably do, don't you? So when people say the words vanilla ice cream if it's like mr whippy then you don't that's true like if you're having haagen-dazs you probably do don't you so when when people say the words vanilla ice cream what comes to mind is a yellow scooped ball of like cornish full cream ice cream looks like mashed potato a little i guess um and i'm imagining it tasting delicious because i like vanilla ice cream i know you're not a massive fan i'm imagining it tasting like a waste of time um i like the taste of vanilla ice cream but i don't know what vanilla tastes like. To me, it just tastes like creamy sugar, which is very, very nice. But when it comes

to, say, Wall's ice cream, like Cornetto, that is sugar and cream, isn't it? It's not vanilla that I'm tasting. Right, Martin, you're smelling vanilla essence now. Can you see the resemblance? Ring any bells? I just can't really place it. It's really strong. I don't know how you don't get it. That's why I don't like it, because it has a taste and smell identity.

No, I hate the smell of it as well. But actually, Tim's saying, imagine if the standard flavour was just cream. That would taste of nothing. Well, it would taste of sugar more. I prefer vanilla to that. It's still what most vanilla ice cream predominantly tastes of, sugar.

If you go to Italy and have those ice creams that are like Fiori di Latte or cream or something, they don't taste any different from vanilla ice cream to me. Maybe you're vanilla blind. Yeah, maybe I am. Anyway, how did vanilla come to be the dominant flavour of not particularly a strong flavour? Well, I'm going to point the finger of vanilla blame at Thomas Jefferson

because vanilla was a popular ice cream flavouring in France. I think people had been using it for a while to flavour things like hot chocolate. It's a very old flavouring. Jefferson went to France and was so enraptured by the French vanilla ice cream that he brought the recipe back to America and in the Library of Congress is a handwritten recipe by Thomas Jefferson for vanilla ice cream. Wow. Maybe that's what's inside the dispatch box. It's actually a cooler. So I wonder whether it was just like, oh, do as Thomas Jefferson does, or whether it was like vanilla ice cream was probably a kind of status symbol for a long time because vanilla was very expensive did you have to import it to the states yeah okay cream and sugar and eggs were

expensive luxury goods so put them all together and also by putting the vanilla into that mixture you are extending the vanilla because a little vanilla can go a long way when you put it in in ice cream so maybe it was a status symbol, and then its ubiquity made it into something very humdrum. Here's another question of food from Anya and Jonas from Devon, who say, today we were in Sainsbury's, walking down the dairy aisle, and we noticed that one of the sections was labelled yoghurt. Unbelievable.

Yes. The temerity of the place. Yeah, I'm maybe not doing justice to this revelation, by the way, I'm reading it out, because this is a question of spelling. The way they've spelt it, as it was spelt in the Sainsbury's, is Y-O-G-U-R-T. Okay? Okay. Yogurt.

Yes. Yog-urt. We were confused and a little outraged, as we both had been taught in primary school and throughout our lives. Age 25, you had a booster of a hat to spell yoghurt. To spell it as yoghurt. Y-O-G-H-U-R-T. After some research, we found that yoghurt can be spelled as yoghurt.

Yoghurt, as you saw it in Sainsbury's. And also yoghurt. Y-O-G-H-O-U-R-T. That's a real outlier. So we've got yoghurt with an H in, without an H in, and with an H and an O in it. Putting the ho in yoghurt. Helen, answer me this.

Which spelling of yoghurt is correct? Spell checkers only underline yoghurt, but it's left the other two alone. So the other two are in popular parlance, but which is correct, Helen? You understand that it's all yogurt right does it matter where's the word from is it french it's turkish turkish so um it's uh it entered the english language in the 1620s and um i think in turkish it was spelt with

just the g with a little accent over it but that meant it was a soft g so like yogurt or something i don't speak turkish i'm terribly sorry i know the soft thing you're talking about you see that on other turkish food stuff yoghurt yeah okay um and it's a transliteration basically so yeah i think they put the h in because of that but the g is more similar to the turkish spelling and yet there aren't similar as far as i can see transliteration discrepancies with japanese foodstuffs like sushi is always s-U-S-H-I and that's transliterated from a completely different alphabet. Why with Turkish would there be this issue? I think with some languages

there are sounds that translate easily into the Roman alphabet and in some that aren't. Okay, I suppose that's fair. But I suppose the G-H is quite a flexible phoneme in English anyway because it can be in cough or through. Or gherkin.

Yeah, exactly. So that's a real messy phoneme. English anyway, because it can be in cough or through. Or gherkin. Yeah, exactly. So that's a real messy phoneme. Phoneme's gone wild. But the extra vowel, I don't know. I'd say the extra vowel is non-canonical. The oghort. And yet, does that mean it's incorrect? Because if it's still aiming for the same thing,

it's aiming to appropriate a pronunciation. Does that mean it's wrong? I just think if you're taking words from another language, then it's just very difficult to decide on the correct way when the language is not that similar to the language you're bringing them into. And therefore, permissible to have like 10 different spellings of hummus?

That does seem to be the way, doesn't it? Hummus? Yeah. Both hummus and yoghurt, I would probably go for the shortest one So I wouldn't go for the Hummus because that's adding letters I'd just go for the

But what about when my dad calls it hummus Like is that just wrong? I'm not going to tell him he's wrong He's lived longer than I have maybe he's seen more hummus than I have Isn't there one kind of hummus that has the same spelling As the kind of hummus which means organic matter And soil It's just complicated isn't it when you bring in these fancy immigrant foodstuffs

trying to change our language. Middle Eastern foods come over here and try and invade our mouths. In your case, they've succeeded. They have strongly succeeded. Without yoghurt or hummus, I would be half the man, literally, that I am now. I wonder, though, whether Sainsbury's has to have meetings where they decide on the official Sainsbury's spelling of yogurt like the guardian style guide decides that they're going to spell

bellend as two words whereas i think it's the sunday people that has it one word and other people hyphenate it but they actually have to decide these things yeah well you've got to be consistent exactly yeah it gives me satisfaction that someone has had to decide it's someone's job that it's yogurt in sainsbury's yes yeah. And yet some of those pots of yoghurt in the yoghurt aisle will say yoghurt differently, won't they? And that is probably going to cause these people a lot of bother. I suppose when you're Sainsbury's, you're deciding, as our questionnaires point out,

not just what is on your own brand yoghurt pot, but what is going above the aisle on the sign. Yeah, don't have to change that sign once it's up i'm an answer me this fan i listen with my nan she is not so keen she finds it too obscene i follow them on twitter though ashton kutcher's fitter i want to take things further just one step short of murder i I want to look like Olly Mann. I want to smell like Olly Mann. I want to feel like Olly Mann. I want to chase like Olly Mann. I want to look like Olly Mann.

I want to look like Olly Mann. I want to feel like Olly Mann. Here's a question from Holly, who is 28 and from Aberdeen. She says, I recently started online dating and much to my surprise, the first date I went on was great. And I've been seeing the same guy on a semi-regular basis for the last two months. Well, it sounds like you've got the perfect relationship. Thanks for that, Holly.

And we'll see you in a couple of weeks time here on Answer Me This. No. No? More happens in this email. Oh, okay. After going out for dinner together last week, I went back to his place to stay over for the first time. So off I went to bed with this tall, handsome, strapping man.

Uh-huh. And things were going well until I reached down and felt, well, pretty much nothing. Oh. He has the smallest penis I have ever seen in my life. How many have you seen? We need that raw data to be able to assess. Can you arrange them so they

look like a bar chart are you a penis expert or are you just a fan i don't know what the average sample is for a 28 year old sexually active woman yeah who is heterosexual i'd say between half a dozen and a dozen probably is average okay so let's say she's seen half a dozen before smallest she's ever seen in her life that's only one or six yeah yeah fair enough i'm already speaking up for this guy i feel sorry for him. I feel sorry for him. Don't feel sorry for him. He's tall, strapping and handsome. Oh, okay.

Holly says, I've only ever heard rumours of them being this small. It's roughly the size of a highlighter pen. Now, what kind of highlighter pen are we talking here? Presumably the minis like you've got, where you've got the set of four in a tiny little key fob. We're talking about highlighter pens, not penises here. I don't know what your penis is. It's a highlighter penis though, isn't it?

Like you choose in different colours. Mine is probably roughly the size of a full-sized tableau, boss. You're talking about the half size. Congratulations, don't know what your penis is. It's a highlighter penis though, isn't it? Like you chose in different colours. Mine is probably roughly the size of a full-size Stabilo boss. You're talking about the half size. Congratulations, don't want to know. I'm saying there's a big range of highlighters, right? But she's talking about the ones that are smaller than the little finger,

the traditional small penis size. Yeah. I think they're a bit bigger than that, aren't they? Are we talking penises or highlighter pens? I don't know anymore. The small Stabilo boss highlighter pens are really small. About the size of the first two joints

of my little finger. But you're the only person I know, Ollie, who has possessed a small Stabilo Boss highlighter pen. No, I've never seen those. I've seen the normal ones, and they're sort of like, they've got a kind of oblong cross section. They're probably about that long.

About four inches long, like the average male penis. Yes, yes. I think that's fairly respectable. Yes, that's what I was saying. I'm happy enough. Ollie wasn't. Ollie says,

because I didn't want to embarrass him, I just carried on as if I was having. I'm happy enough. Holly wasn't. Holly says, because I didn't want to embarrass him, I just carried on as if I was having a great time. An Oscar-worthy performance given the circumstances. That's right,

because no woman has ever pretended to have fun during sex before. We have a nice time together and he is a lovely guy, but I like having sex and I just can't work with that. Ollie, answer me this.

How do I end things with this guy without letting on that it's because the sex was rubbish? P.S. I know I sound like I'm being shallow and superficial, but it really is tiny. Well, if you were shallow, I don't think it would be such an issue. But it's two different issues, isn't it? Someone having a small penis and the sex being rubbish. Absolutely.

Although, let me just say right from the outset, like she's internet dating. They've only been together for a bit. The whole purpose of internet dating is you do kind of get to choose what you want from the beginning so she's still shopping for a man exactly i know that it's uh not really the done thing on sort of romantic websites where straight people meet for love but nonetheless you know if she was able to specify drop down menu i want you know average to large penis she wants um large board marker exactly yes if she were able to say that i think she would have done so in fairness to her i think now having discovered he has a very small penis she's he is thinking do i want to spend the rest of my life with him

if she really doesn't it's better to get out now and and be honest to herself about that so i think there isn't anything but not be honest to him never be honest to him that's because it's unfair absolutely unfair there's nothing you can do about it you're just gonna make him feel terrible yeah and as you point out other women who aren't preoccupied with the size of penis Never be honest to him That's because it's unfair Absolutely unfair There's nothing you can do about it You're just going to make him feel terrible Yeah, totally And as you point out Other women Who aren't preoccupied with the size of penis Would nonetheless be able to have

A happy sex life with him With his small penis Well, maybe he's bad at sex Well, he could be both indeed, yeah Because people with small penises Are able to be good at sex And in fact, a lot of them Really try to overcompensate

Using other parts of their bodies. Oral techniques. Yeah, manual. Sex toys. But the thing is, if you are the person who is dating someone who has a very, very small penis, the thing to do is make them think like all of those things are their idea. Don't in any way suggest. You are not satisfying me, try something else.

Yeah, get down there and munch my muff. Don't say that. But maybe it's never been a problem with anyone else indeed maybe you're just not sexually compatible which is another issue but holly i would uh maybe dump him in a way that is quite ambiguous because what might happen see he's the first guy you've met on internet dating you're like oh everything's great except for his penis but after a few go rounds you might think actually he was a pretty good guy. Yeah.

And if you've said, sorry, I can't deal with your tiny knob, then that's it. Definitely don't say that. In fairness to Holly, she has agreed that she's not going to say that. She's asking, how do I let him down without telling him that's the reason? Bearing in mind that they obviously click in other ways and he is a nice guy.

And that is tricky, isn't it? Because anything else that you might do to try and compensate sort of involves to some extent acknowledging that not everything is brilliant in the bedroom and you don't want to go down that path even though ultimately you're going to dump him anyway how do you kindly dump somebody that you don't particularly know well i'm sorry i'm just not i'm not sure i'm ready for a relationship yet i'm not sure i'm i'm not sure you and i are that compatible blah blah yeah those are the standard get outs and he's going to be hurt

but he's not going to think it's because of the size of my penis. I suppose you could, because you're internet dating, say, look, before we get too deep, don't say that, before we go too far down this track, you should know that I was dating someone else when we started dating. Well, unless she's made it too obvious that he was the first guy she met

and therefore she hasn't met any others. Yeah. Depends what groundwork she's laid, if she's been too honest yeah do you need that excuse if you're breaking up with someone that you've any name or had a relationship with for a short time yeah presumably not couldn't you just say i'm gonna be really busy at work for the next uh or could you just say i don't think i'm you know it was nice we had a nice time but i don't see a future but obviously she was seeing a future until she saw his penis then she wasn't saying anything but that happens all the time people sleep together and that puts I don't see a future. But obviously she was seeing a future until she saw his penis.

Then she wasn't seeing anything. But that happens all the time. People sleep together and that puts them off one another. Maybe you should wait for him to dump you. Sorry, I can't love a woman with a giant vagina. There's a subplot in The Godfather about that. What? Yeah, not in the film.

In the book there's a subplot. Very much not in the film. It's the brother that gets killed. That's all of them. He's got a really huge penis and no other man can satisfy his wife. And then some doctor realises that she's got a gigantic vagina and she has surgery to have a smaller vagina. I'm not making this up. No. Okay.

You're using an obscure literary example but it is worth making the point that just because you did not have a pleasurable experience on him, other women might do. Or you might, Holly, if you would just be a bit more open-minded and maybe concentrate a bit more and try some different techniques before you give up on this guy if he's so great in every other way. And also maybe he was nervous because it was your first time spending the night together and maybe that affected his performance and maybe he would be better at sex.

Maybe if he was more relaxed then he'd have a sex. Maybe. He's more comfortable with you. Yeah, maybe if he was more relaxed, then he'd have a full 12 inches, because he's got a very responsive penis. No, but she was saying the sex was rubbish. Maybe he would put in a better performance at sex. She's very size-focused, Helen. Maybe he was nervous, because you whipped out a tape measure going,

how can it really be? Anyway, listeners, if you've got advice for Holly, or if you just have a question. I've got an average-sized penis, but the girl I'm with seems to think it's tiny. How do I dump her? Then send all of the questions that come into your head to us via our usual contact details, all of which are on our website.

AnswerMeThisPodcast.com When you're on there, you can also click the buttons to follow us on Facebook and Twitter. And you can visit AnswerMeThisStore.com to get our albums and our old episodes and our apps. Yes, all of that if you'd like to hand us money. If you'd just like to listen to more free stuff, you can listen to Helen's podcast, The Allusionist. You certainly can. And you can listen to Olly on the Media podcast. And both of those come out in the weeks where Answer Me This does not come out. So we've got you covered every week.

Every week, there's some Helen and Olly. Only on certain weeks do we talk about people's penises. There's some occasional Martin Simon as well. Yeah? Sure. What's your website, Martin? Soundoftheladies.com for music. The Sound of the Ladies.

And then there's the Global Lab and Brain Train and yeah, those are the podcasts I do. I should just fade out on him listing all of his podcasts and I can fade up again next week in real time. And we must remember to thank Squarespace once again for their support. From the bottom of our tiny highlighter pen-sized hearts. Thank you, Squarespace.

And please return in two weeks' time for the next Answer Me This. Bye!