Answer Me This! - AMT329: Loyalty, Christmas Truthers, and the Shitting Uncle

Episode Date: December 10, 2015

One questioneer wrestles with the ethics of breeding Christmas-truther children who ruin everything for the other kiddos; another introduces us to the Catalan Christmas tradition we now desperately need to borrow. And there's plenty more in AMT329; get it at . 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 JJ Abrams a stage name for Jar Jar? Answer me this, answer me this Is there beef between Dumbo and Baba? Answer me this, answer me this Helen and Ollie, answer me this We begin today's episode with a question of loyalty. It's from Peter who says, I am not a huge expensive coffee drinker. We wouldn't want

to think that of you. The shame of it. The shame. But I do frequent a Cafe Nero when I visit a local client on a weekly basis. So you know I want to know what Peter does for a job. I'm gonna guess massage therapy. I mean, no reason I'm guessing that peter says i have been collecting my loyalty stamps haven't we all i mean who doesn't have like five half empty cafe nero loyalty cards stuffed in their wallet i've actually started saying no now when they say do you have a boots card do you have a nero card i say no even though actually the truth is yes i do it's just at home somewhere in the back of a drawer no because i i think the convenience that i'm buying myself at that point of not having to have loads of cards in my wallet is worth Because I think the convenience that I'm buying myself at that point of not having

to have loads of cards in my wallet is worth missing out on the occasional free coffee. You should carry around a ring binder with you with all of the cards in the catalogued pages. Actually there are electronic versions now aren't there? You can download apps. Yeah there's a Costa app. I know that. I don't want the apps of companies. I have an app with the London bus times and even though I've turned all the notifications off immediately, it wishes me good morning every day. Someone told me that there's actually on the Starbucks app a functionality that you can request in advance before you get there for your drink to be ready when you're there. Oh, geez, so you don't have to interact with a human being. Because what Starbucks baristas need is to be treated more like automatons.

Yes, exactly. Well, actually, I must say, Peter, i too am a fan of cafe nero but uh just a warning to everyone listening if you're a little bit sensitive like i am to caffeine oh are you i do find myself buzzing like a vibrator when i've had a cafe nero and it's because there's two shots of espresso in there so here's my tip you say i'd like an americano please i'd like it large do i look like a man who's going to drink a small one? But can I have one shot decaf, one shot normal? Now, it is 30p more expensive, but you get the intensity of the coffee taste

without the intensity of the caffeine buzz. That is a good tip. Thanks. Peter says, horribly, just as I had collected eight stamps on my latest card, which is one short of the required nine to acquire a free drink. Oh, you're so nearly there, Peter. I lost my card.

Horror. Horror indeed. When I was next in Cafe Nero, the barista, who is the same friendly guy I see each week, he asked me for my loyalty card and I had to shamefacedly explain I had mislaid it. Eight weeks, eight weeks of visits, Peter, this guy thought his stamps meant something to you.

To my delight, he issued me a brand new one complete with eight stamps. Oh, okay. And he added the ninth for my latest purchase. Wow. I was looking forward to my free coffee the next week. That is American level of customer service that you don't normally see in this country.

Very good. Very good. That's because he recognised you and you built up that relationship over a number of weeks. He knows you're not lying because he's witnessed the accumulation of those stamps. Exactly. Peter says, however...

Oh, God. On the Sunday, I was doing some laundry when my original loyalty card, complete with eight stamps, fell out of one of my shirts as I was about to put it in my washing machine. Therefore, I only need to purchase one more coffee in order to now acquire another freebie. This is good news, Peter.

This isn't a problem. You've got a free coffee on the stamps that he gave you just for recognising you, and you've got a free coffee waiting for you at home. It's the dream. It's a problem for Peter, Ollie. He says, answer me this. Is it morally right to use both loyalty cards

in order to obtain two free coffees, even though the second one was only obtained through the good-naturedness of my barista body it's astonishing isn't it how the incredibly overwhelming presence of coffee shops on our high streets has made us all immune to the fact that they are serving us hot water and steamed milk essentially so that people are like two whole free coffees how could i possibly ask this large corporation to give me those? You know, there's a lot of profit in coffee. The whole point of the loyalty card system is to get your loyalty, Peter. The very fact that you are questioning whether it is morally right

to do this company out of one free coffee when you're going to buy another nine. He is more than loyal, isn't he? He's self-sacrificing. It proves that you are incredibly brand loyal. If anything, Mero will be clipping this moment out and putting it on their own internal company christmas card so yes i think it's fine in this context and that barista does not care absolutely and very occasionally like if the baristas know you they'll give you a free coffee anyway because they'll just go oh yeah that person

who buys like five cups of coffee a day yeah people say that pret do this a lot but give away their food to homeless people at the end of every day, the wankers. And they don't even have loyalty cards. But sometimes apparently to regulars they give them a free drink or something. I've never had this. No. I know why as

well. Because I'm promiscuous with my PrEP outlets. Too old. No. Well, I can only speak from working in my office at the radio station I work at. Everyone who's under 25, when I was working overnight, if you go into prep 11pm on Trafalgar Square,

everyone under 25 got given free croissants, free apples, whatever. Really? I went in never once, not once. To be fair though, the under 25s in London are probably earning a below living wage income. They need it more. And the under 2525s in London are probably earning a below-living-wage income. They need it more.

And the under-25s serving them recognise that. Yeah. I've been given free stuff. I'm older than both of you, put together. But a few weeks ago, in a pret in one of London's main stations, I was buying some stuff. I was wearing the dress that I'm wearing now, Ollie, which is a homemade concoction made out of a Dutch wax print fabric

that is commonly sold in African countries. Yes. Listeners, imagine something that's halfway between a sort of Zulu dress and a John Lewis curtain. Yeah, OK. I paid for my stuff and the manager came running over saying, you're wearing the fabric of my country, the Ivory Coast. Take whatever you want.

Oh, that's brilliant. But I'd already paid and maybe he'd deduced that. And he's like, this is an extravagant but also empty gesture. Here's a question from John who says, Ollie, answer me this. What does the hyphen B part of oral B stand for? Brush. Huh. Disappointing.

Oral B being the toothbrushing equipment. Correct. Not blowjob. Not blowjob. Although all blowjob is a tautology isn't it really although i've seen some videos on the internet actually of people using electric toothbrushes for all kinds of things i mean were you looking for those videos no that was genuine genuine pop up yeah i can't remember what the key word was but there was stimulation involving oral b

products that i'm pretty sure wasn't sanctioned by head office oh yeah would you like a toothbrush fact i'd i'd simply adore one at this stage yeah the first toothbrush produced resembling the brushes that we know and love these days of the type that all b produce uh so we stick with bristles on yep care to guess the year it's earlier than a ken bruce year would be 1783 1838 AD? AD Wrong Oh, was it from China 5,000 years before Christ?

Somewhere between the two It was from China Yeah, of course it was 700 AD Very good That's really early Tang Dynasty, made of hog hairs It took the West a long time to catch on

About 1800s basically till we got toothbrushes as we know them now mass produced yeah yeah i mean no needs clean teeth because you're gonna die because you're gonna die you can chew with your gums you're just gonna die because they use like sticks and stuff to clean their teeth they did yeah well and people still do people still use effectively gum sticks i suppose floss is a bit like poking your teeth with a stick part of the mix though isn't it still better to brush well i mean that's what we're told now but later generations could totally debunk what we're doing to our teeth guess the year first usable electric toothbrush i say usable because like a century before someone came up with a patent for one before electricity had been

invented do you mean electricity like battery or mains or do you mean electricity like dr frankenstein i mean electricity and it's funny you say battery or mains or do you mean electricity like dr frankenstein i mean electricity and it's funny you say battery or mains you did plug it into the mains voltage it ran off the wall yeah something that would not be considered safe these days guess the year 1932 1890 1954 wow i think it's quite late yeah i would have thought end of the second world war people would have electric toothbrushes but but no, 1954. Well, I mean, they had rationing and a lot of privations to deal with. Let's ask our grandparents.

What were you wasting your time on other than thinking, how can I make my toothbrush electric? If you've got a question, email your question. To unsubmit this podcast, go to gmail.com. Unsubmit this podcast, go to gmail.com. So retrospectives, what historical events are we ticking off on this week's run of Today in History? On Monday, we bring you the real story of the mutiny on the bounty. So, Retrospecters, 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. Christmas is heading ever closer into view. Isn't it? Isn't it? Christmas, it's nearly here. Christmas. Have no fear.

Christmas. Comes once a year. Christmas, give me a year. Christmas. Give me a beer. I can't bear it. Which one are you? Which one's that? I don't know, but it's at the beginning of Gremlins,

so I associate it with horror. Anyway, last episode, Helen, you will recall, you euphemistically talked of the administrative process of Christmas gifts. Yes, I think we're going to have to continue this euphemism because we know that some young listeners are paying attention to this and we do not want to disenchant them if they remain in an enchanted state about the festivities well okay yes i think we might have to continue that euphemism for about

another 30 seconds otherwise we won't have to deal with this question we've received so parents if you're listening you are getting what we're meaning about the administration system of christmas presents turn it off until your child who does not know there is an administration system is out of your shot all right yes exactly don't want to bear responsibility for what's about to happen if they are it's from dana who says my wife laura and i have never lied to our children about the administrative process of christmas gift giving wink wink this in the past caused some small consternation amongst our friends. However, now that we are in Christmas school play season,

we have been summoned into school to discuss the, quote, troubling behaviour of our progeny. Oh, their progeny are truthers. I think that's what's happening here. Reading between the lines, I think someone's been spoiling the nativity play. Since then, we've been barraged at the school gates by other parents with acrimonious accusations of ruining Christmas and destroying the magic,

with one particularly peeved person threatening to contact social services over the matter. Wow. Because it's not like social services are overstretched. Particularly at Christmas. My belief is that the incensed individuals are merely projecting a rose-tinted view of their own childhood, misapplying magic to receiving a surprise. But then I'm an engineer, not a psychologist.

I don't know if people are being rose-tinted about their own childhoods so much as not wanting to be the killjoy that spoils the current generation of children's childhoods as evidently your children are the i suppose the messiahs of christmas agnosticism our children when compared to their peers of the same age have shown no sign of enjoying the season any less they're not lacking in enthusiasm or excitement for trees and decorations and singing carols and the giving, receiving and unwrapping of gifts. Good pagans.

So, Helen, answer me this. Am I a massively smug parent? Should we count out the demands of the other parents and join the consensual international conspiracy? Are we, in short, terrible parents for not colluding in a communal lie? Just to bring everyone up to speed now the kids aren't listening, right? Just in case you haven't followed that rather florid email.

These are parents who have told their kids Santa doesn't exist and now they've gone into school and ruined it for fucking everybody. That's what this is about. Right, okay. Should they have done that or not? This is a very interesting question, I think. And while I'm glad that I got to experience the Santa myth as a credulous child if I was a parent I would have to wonder whether I was going to beget that for another generation because there are other things where I think well that's ridiculous so I'll just leave it in the past

but this it's kind of fun to lie to children why would you deny yourself that while it's still possible in a benevolent way rather than actually screwing them up and you lie to children all the time yeah just because you're trying to get them not to touch a hot saucepan or whatever say why why why why so so of course in the process of bringing up children lies are involved a lot of things that are quite self indulgent really for you as a parent as well my truth is more important and if your choice is you want to bring your kids up in absolute truth, that's fine, isn't it? But you're not considering every other parent's right to bring their children up with, as you put it, this widely held conspiracy about Father Christmas. That's what most people are doing.

So you have to respect that. Yeah. But then one also has to respect that if they want to bring their children up, not believing or not even thinking Santa is a default and they are deviating from the default but just you know you're starting off in a Santa-less place and everyone else is opting into Santa rather than them opting out if you're being kind of honest and open about that it doesn't really behoove you to say to the children all right this is what we believe but keep it quiet because you know we're highly closeted Santa atheists but that's the truth that is the truth that's the society we're stuck with

i guess but if you're like you can't just deal with the half truth like if you think my kids are mature enough to understand that father christmas doesn't exist then your kids unfortunately have to also be mature enough to understand they can't go around blabbing to other children who believe it and if they can't deal with that then you you've told them too early there is a difference between telling them the truth and not telling them the lie you don't have to pretend you don't have to do the thing where you eat the mince pie yes eat the carrot and do the footprints on the on the stairs and all that shit people do you don't have to do that but when they ask you does father christmas exist you can answer them honestly they probably won't

ask you that question until they're a certain age when i was growing up i went to a christian school and we had bible readings every day and we had biblical instruction before we had historical instruction about the origins of the world yeah but because i was brought up in an atheist household with jewish cultural practices i always knew that that was aversion yes it was to me something that was... Aversion. Yes, it was, to me, something that was useful and interesting to know about but not the truth, and to other people of great spiritual and or historical importance. So is this the same as that?

But I didn't go around going, what you believe is bullshit! Because you're not Richard Dawkins. I would be torn if I was raising children between wanting to be honest with them and not really wanting to be the cause of the christmas demystification for wider people which would be cowardly actually so i can kind of see these questionnaires point but they also sound like they're being a bit militant about it well

this is the thing so of course they've asked us a question are we terrible parents now obviously you're not terrible parents your choice to bring up your kids how you want but you've neglected the impact this is going to have on the wider community around you from your point of view maybe not everyone else is as enlightened as you but however you want to look at it most people bring their kids up to believe in santa claus so you should have thought about it i didn't see that see the harm with most cultural practices you can kind of get well it's not entirely truthful or maybe there's it's a there's a mythical element but you know there's also these negative aspects with this it's like I don't really see

what the negatives are I mean well you find out that your mum and dad your sole source of knowledge that you can rely on to tell you the truth have been lying to you

consistently every Christmas yeah but my mum was lying all the time about being a smoker yeah and we could smell it so we knew I remember finding out

and not going oh this is a really terrible lie I was a bit disappointed but I remember thinking oh well I understand why they did that so i've got to keep them doing it for my sister because it's a really lovely thing she's three years younger than me so you know whatever age i was i wasn't gonna spoil it for her well it's also i look it's personal choice

but i think i genuinely think the reason the vast majority of people choose to go with it is it's fun yes it is actually fun and it is part of our culture and actually it is divorced from uh christmas as a religious time of year it is just a thing that everyone can agree is a bit of a laugh really it's you are being a bit sour my nieces and nephews uh i don't know whether any of them yet no so i am helping uphold the myth i don't want to be the one to break it the oldest one is nearly 10 so if it hasn't happened yet it's not far off i mean they're looking at hardcore pornography although they're really fanciful because it wasn't that long ago that she was saying to me very seriously there are fairies living under the spare bed and i was like really you know i

couldn't really hold back my cynicism for the fairies is that unfair do you know she probably was testing you to see how far you'd go with that she knows there aren't fairies is that unfair do you know she probably was testing you to see how far you'd go with that she knows there aren't fairies living she does she does i mean i always sort of knew that father christmas was unlikely but possible i always had it in that category or it's like when you watch conjuring and you're like well i know that that isn't real but the way that it has been done to look like magic is still quite magical yeah the engineering behind it is still quite magical just suspending a disbelief yeah the the problem that i fall into is then extending the existence of father christmas to adults there is a conspiracy around it which i know is because kids could be listening

or watching mainstream media and stuff but it's a bit i'll give you an example i'm often on the radio on christmas day uh because guess what that's not a slot that they can find many people to present well you're up against the queen's speech uh yeah indeed uh but until well hitherto as a childless jew uh willing to freelance my way through the radio schedule uh i normally get quite a plumb slot on christmas day but and indeed this year i'm on christmas day as well um but i always then have this issue about do i mention the norad thing do you know about that no okay on christmas day it's the number one twitter trend and if you go on to google you click on the logo and it turns into norad the norad is the north american aerospace defense command right so they're scanning the

skies above the usa to see if the us is under attack from military aircraft okay that's what they do all year round and this is a big pr thing for them that big thing in like war games yeah where they're in the control center the bombs about to drop that's nor that's all right right yeah i've not seen it okay so they put a christmas spin on their pr where they're saying we're watching santa's we're watching santa and everyone goes for it because partly because there's no news on christmas day or no like serious news that people want to hear. So what you do when you're on a news station on Christmas Day, I mean, even Sky News do this. Once an hour, they'll say, and let's just check in with the NORAD satellite and see where Santa's gone to.

And I suppose it's probably configured to tie in with something like, you know, 5am in every country in the world or whatever. As you'll say, oh, Santa's in Indonesia at the moment, you know. But I'm on a radio station for grown-ups in the middle of the day why am I saying to these grown-ups nudge nudge wink wink let's see where Santa's on to on the NORAD system for one thing I'm promoting this company

that you wouldn't normally be talking about secondly it's made up it's not news Santa isn't over Indonesia at the moment and yet everyone knows Santa doesn't show up on radar well this is the problem does everyone know Santa doesn't show up on radar. This is the problem. Does everyone know Santa doesn't show up on radar? Is there a small portion of the audience

that have yet to have the scales fall from their eyes? And I'm just playing into this conspiracy. That's what concerns me. He's probably moving too quickly. The Doppler shift would scramble the sensors. Well, talking of a Christmas tradition that I would love to see implemented in my home, here's an email from Eleanor in London

who says, Helen, answer me this. Have you heard of the Catalan Christmas tradition of the shitting uncle? No, I haven't. That's amazing. Oh, is this the thing that's in the nativity scene? No.

Oh, wait. No, but now I want to know what you're referring to. I think it's in Catalan. Yeah, when I went to Barcelona before Christmas, I was wowed by all the little shitting figurines they sell. And you're supposed to sneak them into your nativity scenes. Wow. For good luck.

That's so subversive. It is. But they started off with being kind of just normal child figurines. Now you can get like nuns and the queen and businessmen. Sorry, just to be clear. Little clay figurines of people shitting. You've got a nativity of the three wise men in Bethlehem. You've got the little baby Jesus. You've got the horse. You've got a nativity of the three wise men in Bethlehem, you've got the little baby Jesus,

you've got the horse, you've got the stable and then you've got the queen taking a dump in the corner. Yeah. That's so weird. At least it's doubling the number of women

in the scene, right? Where does that tradition come from? That's amazing. Well, that tradition is a 300-year-old tradition. It is apparently because Catalonians

see poo as a sign of good luck as it fertilises the earth and it symbolises a good harvest in the year ahead. Oh, that's gross. That is genuinely gross. But it was probably somebody who had a mischievous sense of humour who thought, let's see how far I can get

with this little shitting figure that I've carved. Well, this is an amazing tangent, but it isn't the tradition that Eleanor was talking about. What is it about Catalonia and shitting Christmas traditions? She says, on a recent trip to Barcelona, a local tried to explain to us their tradition where children use sticks to beat a log-type creature which has a face and

a red hat until it farts. Then, eventually, shits out the presents after which it is named. Wow. What? The shitting uncle. Tio de Nadal or Caga Tio. So what is it, like a piñata? Like a piñata of shit.

How does it make a farting noise? I think that's in your imagination when you're playing with it. So you just have Nodal in the background going... In reality, as far as I can work out, instead of just having your presents under the tree, you have this probably made of plastic but log-shaped toy. People have real logs with a red hat on and a face and you keep them by the fire if you don't have a fire you wrap them in a red

blanket it's like something out of a young spank mare cartoon it is and and from i think the 8th of december the children have to feed the log so it grows bigger and then on christmas eve it's big enough because it's full of presents so then you hit it with sticks to help it shit that's extraordinary that is science Martin that's dystopian no it's magnificent that's so weird and they sing a song to help it shit as well but they feed it nice things like sweets and and I think usually it shits presents that are for the family to share so often edible presents and then when it's shot until it can shit no more it'll shit out an onion or it'll piss a bowl of water So how does it do an onion? I mean how does it do anything?

It's a miracle Ollie, it's a Christmas miracle I think I'm going to be easy with a glass of water surely So is it a bit like reaching into the stocking to see what Santa's left, you reach in to see what it's shat out or is there a mechanism where it falls on the floor? You fist the shitting uncle, that's how it works I would really like to hear from any of you who can explain further the mechanics of this system but what i understand is you beat the log until it shits and then maybe you leave the room while it does the shits and

then you return and the shits are right there i think that's how it's done so the children don't see the process of the why would you want to demystify how the log shits well we talk about a lot of other christmas traditions in the answer me this christmas album our very own christmas tradition i'm sure it is a christmas tradition in many households around the world gather around children on christmas eve and fire off the gramophone i wouldn't be surprised i think out of all of our albums and this goes for anyone who's ever made a novelty christmas single of any kind i think it probably bears more repetition i'm sure there are probably people that bought our Christmas album 2013 and have

listened every Christmas since. I think at Christmas I will tolerate repetition in a way that I don't the rest of the year. Indeed. Of say, films and things. Anyway, this is our final chance to do a big sell on the Answer Me This Christmas album. Then we pack it up in the attic for another year. Yes, but it is material that has not

been in the podcast, except for a little excerpt that we're about to play for today's intermission. Yes, and like all of our first 200 episodes and our other albums, it is available on iTunes, it's available on Amazon, but if you buy it from us, we get a higher portion of your cash at answermethisstore.com. That is the shitting log of our enterprise. Here's a question from Daniel who says, Helen, answer me this.

How did the whole mistletoe kissing tradition come about? The origins of the mistletoe are disputed, so I'm going to go for the funnest one. Please. Which is that it's from a Scandinavian myth, which is that Baldr the Beautiful, god of light and spring, dreamt that his life was in danger,

so his mother, goddess of love, her name was Frigga Funny name for the goddess of love isn't it? Ironic. Bit solo She travelled the world asking everything, earth, air, fire and water not to hurt her son but Loki, the god of fire, he was

looking for things with which to kill Baldor the beautiful and the only thing that Frigga had forgotten to ask not to hurt Baldor was the humble mistletoe plant. Right. And so Loki used it to poison Baldor the Beautiful with a dart. But the tears of Baldor's mother became the white berries of the plant, and she said that never again could mistletoe be used as a weapon, and she would place a kiss on anyone who passed under it.

Good. I was waiting until this fable went into hyper bullshit mode and now we have it here's a question from mark in durham who says last week i went to the theater to immerse myself in the cultural masterpiece that is elf the musical jealous not jealous bit jealous because i like the film i would like to see the show but judging by the poster i feel like i would be in for some extremely ropey American accents done by Brits. Yeah, I think that's probably about right. And I'm not sure I can handle it. I think you can tell as well by the... I mean, it's a mainstream show.

So, of course, they're always going to go for a quote from The Sun rather than The Guardian. But if the best review is four stars, an enjoyable night out, glamour, then you know it's probably... Yeah, I'm not sure glamour yes then you know it's probably yeah i'm not sure glamour has a theatre critic uh dare you glamour theatre critic was just relieved not to have to spend another night watching ibsen for four hours but also it's really expensive this the tickets in london i think are 50 or more pounds for the cheap seats i was going to say yeah it's broken records for i can't remember the news story now but it's the most expensive theatre ticket of all

time in london is to go and see Elf the Musical. Top price seats, I think there's something like £250. But do you think if we were, say, to go in February, then it would be considerably more reasonable? Yeah, but who wants to see a Christmas show in February? I'd go and see Elf the Musical for free. Someone gave me a ticket for Elf the Musical. Now I'm willing to do that, listeners, if any of you have that power.

Yes. When the show mercifully broke for the interval. Well there you are you see Mark doesn't think it's a great show either and he traveled down from Durham. Well he probably paid more than the ticket to get the train down. Exactly yeah. When the show broke for the interval down came the safety curtain. Okay well that's not a feature of Elf the Musical that's just going to the theatre you're describing now. He's put it in inverted commas, so he seems to be pretty unimpressed by it. He says, Ollie, answer me this.

What function does the safety curtain serve? Yeah, the clue is in the name. How much safety does a curtain offer in a given situation? Am I being really thick here? Is it bulletproof or something? It is actually often iron. No. What?

Yeah. How? Is it more like chain or solid sheet yeah if you think about it so like we've been to the theater quite a lot with each other a lot of people listening it's one of our things little thing we like to do cheap matinee what do you say jersey boys us and a load of pensioners brilliant legally blonde where you're the only guy in the audience sure uh if you think about there was a very short cue for the gents uh if you think about when we go to the national theater or the barbican theaters that were built in the

70s they actually do have safety curtains that look like concrete do you remember like in the littleton there's the one that comes up and it's two big slabs of to match the date the horrific decor of the national theater there's a sort of brutalist safety curtain love a bit of brutalism well anyway there is and that's's because even the ones that look like just red curtains, they actually have to be fireproof. That's the point of them. They're originally made of asbestos-based materials. Can't do that anymore.

But then how come they're not there at the beginning? How come they're only there in the interval? Because the point is not that there's any more risk during the interval. The point is that every theatre has to have one. Right. And every theatre has to have one right uh and every theater has to demonstrate periodically that it's working okay so it used to be in the theater licensing act that you had to show the audience at the interval that the safety curtain was working and i suppose it's

also useful because you have to change the scenes behind it you have to do that anyway but also it's not controlled necessarily from the booth with all the other things that are electronic these days it involves a winch and it takes five minutes to take down and put up again wow so you have to have a space of time either side of that to do it okay so the interval's handy for that the stage manager's not doing anything else nothing else to look at so yeah so that was the old reason now i think it is kind of tradition i don't think it has to be shown to the audience but of course it has to be there uh the licensing act of 2003 says where a safety curtain is provided it should be arranged so as to protect the audience from the effects of a fire or smoke on stage for sufficient time to enable the safe evacuation of the auditorium yeah because a lot of london theaters

particularly that are old are kind of lethal yeah i mean nowadays they have put fire exits in them but still there's only so much you can do often there's a very narrow stair for a large number of people say so it's about protecting the audience the actors get burned alive um but you know unless it protects the actors from a fire in the auditorium yeah it doesn't really it's designed to protect the audience but there's a good reason for that which is back in the day those stages were illuminated by gas light again not really an issue now but uh you know imagine uh an issue that would be much more common when your set had perhaps 200 gas lights pointing at it good point and there were no fire exits and life was cheap there's at least one um plaque in postman's park dedicated to someone who

was killed um putting out someone who whose dress had caught fire in the theatre. Oh, really? Yeah. So, yeah, it needs to be made of non-combustible material or inherently or durably treated flame-retarded fabric. Right. So it doesn't have to be iron now, although some chaps in the theatre, darling, still refer to it as the iron. Right, or the iron curtain because little Soviet throwback.

Yeah, I'm sure the Richardsons enjoy that joke. I wonder where they keep it, if it's a sheet of iron. Right, or the iron curtain because little Soviet throwback. Yeah, I'm sure the Richardsons enjoy that joke. I wonder where they keep it. If it's a sheet of iron, not all theatres can accommodate a huge sheet of iron. Yeah, well, I imagine most of them, it's more the flame retardant fabric. That does seem like a more sensible option for a curtain. But it is safer than a non-safety curtain.

So you should be reassured. Maybe all of our curtains should be replaced with safety curtains and uh i quite like seeing a safety curtain because you know the thing about the theater is it's playing on your imagination isn't it for the hour that you're watching each part hopefully i mean you know if it's two hours yeah there's only so much patience your ass can take uh but for the hour that you're watching each half you're transported to a different world aren't you napoleonic france or you know salem in the 10th century whatever it is yeah um and the safety curtain is kind of a grounding for me it's a little palate cleanser in the interval oh yeah we're in a theater and we're in this specific theater that has its own history as well yeah yeah

and some of them have their own history like the savoy safety curtain you know you think of doily cart theater company all this stuff's quite cool and a lot of drama takes place in scenes of physical or emotional risk for the characters and it's just a bit of reassurance halfway through for you you're back in a safe theatre have an ice cream 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 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 and may we take this moment to say thank you very much to Squarespace for sponsoring this episode of the show for letting us do websites like well my website is theillusionist.org that I built on Squarespace well I did my podcast on Squarespace it's on my song and how are you finding it

that's really good I've built a Squarespace website for my podcast Modern Man as well and I did it all with Squarespace templates, and it took me a couple of hours. And I'm very pleased with it. It works. It works on mobile like all their websites do. The fact that it can automatically adapt your formats

to suit mobile and desktop and iPad in this day and age is invaluable. If you want to be like all three of us and build yourself a website on Squarespace, then go to squarespace.com, experiment with the two-week free trial, and then if you choose to sign up, then you can get 10% off for a year using the code ANSWER. Hello, this is Joe from Seattle, currently living in Argentina. And Helen and Ollie, answer me this.

What does a screensaver actually save the screen from? Because the screen's still on. Phosphor burning. What? Phosphor burning. Yeah. What? Phosphor burning.

So when screens used to be cathode ray tubes and they used to shoot beams of electron, that's a phosphorescent chemical which would light up. And if you did that too much, it would deplete the chemical. Yeah, that's what I said. Phosphor burning. But does the screens, it would deplete the chemical. Yeah, that's what I said. Phosphor burning. But does the screensaver not also deplete those chemicals? The reason it moved around was that it wouldn't be burning in the same place.

Oh, I see. So if you've got an image which is gradually moving around, it's burning in a little bit rather than just at the same point. I can see that these things were pretty handy in the old analogue cathode ray screen days. Is it still the same kind of situation in a modern flat screen device? No, but...

But people love them screensavers and they want to keep a little piece of history flashing around pointlessly in front of their faces. Yeah, it's funny, isn't it? I'm sure that whenever, I guess roughly the 10th of the century, it stopped being necessary to have screensavers. The computer engineers thought by now we'd

stop using them no one would have them anymore but uh people love them i'd say even more i mean mobile phones have them and they don't need them at all but people love having a photo or a slideshow or and i think what it is is that we've become ever more dependent on our devices and yet our devices increasingly are all looking like black rectangles so it's just a way of personalizing it isn't it choosing what you have on that is the thing that makes it yours it also tells you it's working even if it's not directly responsive yeah if it was just a black screen you're pressing it and why isn't it opening it seems very wasteful though very wasteful of power surely than just making it sleep if you want it to look not like a black rectangle why don't you put like some dolls on top of it or something well i don't think it does well you have the choice of making it sleep don't you so it is literally not like a black rectangle, why don't you put some dolls on top of it or something? Well, I don't think it does.

You have the choice of making it sleep, don't you? So it is literally your choice. But maybe people don't realise they have that choice because they're like, oh, screensavers, that probably saves my screen. Maybe. I don't know. It sort of goes back to the Santa question in a way.

There's a nostalgia attached with 1995 era screensavers, isn't there? The bouncing Microsoft ball with all the different colours that kind of explodes as it goes around the screen. That one that looks like a galaxy. Yeah. Yeah, wow. Yeah, that was exciting.

Do you remember? There was a time not long ago, like when we were teenagers, although obviously to teenagers listening who were born then, this feels like a long time ago. And a screensaver far, far away. There was a time where

to get the internet onto your computer, you could go into a branch of NatWest. What? And on the counter in the bank, you'd be able to pick up a CD-ROM, which would have a version of Netscape on it, but it would be like a NatWest version of Netscape. Or it would fall out of the Sunday supplements. Yeah, install the internet on your computer.

And those CDs would often come with an exciting, you know, NatWest slash Sunday Times screensaver as well. An amazing Sonny Lumiere experience. Because people didn't know where to get screensavers from. It was one of the, until about 10 years ago, it was one of the best ways to get bugs on your computer was by Googling free screensaver downloads. Wow.

And then a few years later it would have been ringtones. Now I wonder what it is. It's porn. Oh, okay. It's porn. Always porn. Trusty porn. Because it's the speed, you see.

Right. So with a screensaver speed, you see. Right. So with a screensaver download, you can inject some terrible malware code onto someone's computer. But now as the internet's got faster, you can show them a porn movie whilst you're doing it. They don't even know. How many social networks are you on? Vivo, Friendster, Parkview, Porn,

MySpace, Ping and Google Buzz. If you want to be our pal, go to this URL. Facebook.com slash AnswerMeThis or Twitter.com slash HelenAndDolly but please don't follow us in real life. Here's a question from Grant in Toronto who says, I flew into a rural airport recently and my plane's baggage was carted to the terminal

by the usual little baggage trolley. Do you have that in mind? Do you know what that is? What do you mean by the usual little baggage trolley? Do you have that in mind? Do you know what that is? What do you mean by the usual little baggage trolley? One of those little open-sided vehicles that drives the baggage trolley. Oh, yes, yes, I know what you mean. You don't always see it.

I'm always straight off the plane. I don't know about you, but as soon as the plane lands, psychologically, I'm in my hotel room already, and everything in between is just get me there as soon as possible. No looking out the window. I don't look around. No distractions. Not interested.

They're really heavy, those things. Presumably they're heavy so they don't topple over because of the baggage he says they drove the trolley right into the baggage claim hall and the baggage handler proceeded to remove all the bags and dump them on the ground where we pick them up no baggage carousel involved that sounds like a great system are you being ironic no you think it does because grant thinks it does i think it sucks i like a baggage carousel in vol that sounds like a great system are you being ironic no you think it does because grant thinks it does i think it sucks i like a baggage carousel i hate that that's the nub of the next five minutes of the show so grant says the entire process for a plane of about 120 passengers took no more than 20 minutes from touchdown to me leaving the airport bag in hand so helen answered me this why do baggage carousels exist with all the pointless waiting involved?

What advantage do they possibly hold over this low-tech solution? Well, Grant, just please imagine for me airports that are not tiny and rural, that have more than one plane with more than 120 passengers that they have to deal with more than one time. I mean, you're in Toronto, which is a major hub for air travel i'm going to use heathrow one of the biggest airports in the world in london yeah yeah and they're dealing with one flight landing or taking off every 45 seconds and there are about 1400 flights taking off and landing there every day so you need room to fit all those planes when they're you you know, waiting to have passengers put on.

And having a little room next to where each plane comes in where someone dumps the bags is probably not the best use of room. So the more planes you've got, the bigger the airport has to be because planes are rather a cumbersome vehicle and they don't stack up neatly. And so the airport becomes rather sprawling. And that's why at Heathrow it takes you like 20 minutes to walk from the plane to the baggage. And they're dealing with so much baggage they kind of need to process it in a more automated way I think there are 200,000 passengers a day and you do not want that amount of baggage just in a big pile on the ground ideally no I think also imagine Grant that not everyone is as able-bodied as I imagine you probably are like you found it easy to get stuck in pick your bag up off the floor but you know you've got people in wheelchairs you've got children you've got people who can't pick up heavy things it's easier isn't it if it's

going past them and they just have to reach out and grab the bag and I find something reassuringly sort of hypnotic about the carousel and I say reassuring because everyone panics slightly don't they when they get off the plane they think be there my bag be there even though i mean has that ever actually happened to you the bag isn't there i don't want to jinx it but no it hasn't it's happened to me once it is shit i'm always paranoid i'm always thinking what about my unique costume jewelry or you're thinking hmm there was i thinking my uh black samsonite case was distinctive in some way turns out other people in the world have made the very same purchase.

Dream on, mate. Because that's going on the back of your head, I find it very therapeutic to just see this kind of gently moving carousel. Are you thinking, what would it be like if I got on there and behaved like a little piece of luggage? What would I see? What adventures would I have?

I'm not, because I did it when I was six. Oh my God, you did? I did it. Well, any six-year-old listening to this, if you've come back after the Santa Claus stuff, do it. Whoa. Because as an adult, they're like,

don't put your children on there. But if you're a kid and you just climb on it, I mean, you'll be fine. Your leg won't get mangled or anything. I do. Did you go right round it? I didn't go behind the curtain. No, see, that's the thing.

I went round on the carousel, Helen. It was really fun. Yeah, I know. But if you'd gone behind the curtain, it might have been like the climactic scene in Monsters, Inc. I know, it might have been. But the point is, I i know it might have been but the point is i've got it out my system now so i'm not doing what everyone else is doing and thinking those two things is my bag there and i wish i could just jump on that carousel did you get into trouble no get down

oh yeah my parents weren't thrilled about it no but we were in cyprus couldn't give a shit really just bloke with a moustache came up to me and said hey i also wonder as well whether the baggage carousel system and whatever does happen behind the scenes that you did not witness is more convenient for airport staff because presumably there must be an amount of luggage that is not picked up and if it was just strewn all over the floor that would be a lot more work for them than it ending up at the end of a conveyor belt also you notice don't you just as a civilian waiting for your bag to arrive the same bags going going round and round. You start spotting the patterns.

Yeah. It's weirdly easier, I think, to see the ones that have been there for longer than if they're just sitting in the corner. It's also easier to see your bag in a series of moving objects than in a huge stack. Yeah. So, okay, so we're pro-carousel. Sorry.

Martin, now why do you think it's such a great idea to abandon the carousel? Well, I mean, I take your point about logistics, but I think it's just all our sensible points that make sense. They're all sensible, but there's several circles of hell in an airport, but when you get off a flight and you're jet-lagged,

that's one of them. One of them is standing in line in customs for an hour, and one of them is staring at a carousel going, has someone taken my bag? Is it coming ever? When you're talking

to the immigration officials, an extra concern for me since I've started doing this ridiculous job that we do now that I struggle to define yeah is having to define what i do for a living i had this last month in boston it's just like as you're saying it you're thinking do they think i'm a terrorist because i'm being shamed but actually it's just hard to explain yeah well this one she said what are you here for and i said business meetings because i was there on radiotopia meeting business radiotopia dime and she said what kind of business and i said podcasting

and she looked very unimpressed and you know i wasn't expecting her to look impressed the helen zaltzman no she looked like that was not going to get me through that gate yeah and she said well who do you work for and i said well i work for myself and she said well who are your meetings with then and i was like well this gets really complicated it's like the public radio exchange it's like a body that was formed to be like you know bypassing the public radio system for independent creators and she was like i'm only asking because i like watching the british tv shows so i was wondering what your show was but that was not the impression she gave during the interrogation that that was what she was asking no well because it's always with that edge of i could deport you yeah at any moment i could

i think she was just fucking with me wrong answer you're going home because she knew that i wasn't going to kick off yeah grant why aren't you tackling these important problems leave the innocent baggage carousels to do their job that's right uh well uh there is nothing left to do in this episode for us but to once again thank Squarespace, our sponsor for this week. And to thank you listeners for listening and for supplying your questions. And we will thank you in advance for sending us more questions for Answer Me This in 2016,

because this is the last question answering episode of the year, because the next episode is our annual best of, becoming out a couple of days before Christmas, if I finished it in time. What a perfect Christmas treat. For drowning out the family argument it is no it really is it is a miracle of editing helen i'm always astounded by uh by what you managed to drag up answer me this is really made by the stuff that is removed but we still want your questions for when we return in the new year all of our contact details can be located upon our website answer me this podcast.com where you also find our social

media accounts our other projects a bunch of posts about things that haven't been in the show and links to our albums and our old episodes at answer me this store.com so next episode on the feed best of see you then oh it'll be marvelous as the name on the feed, best of. See you then. Oh, it'll be marvellous. As the name suggests, the best, the best of this year. The best. The very best. Bye!