Answer Me This! - AMT363: Parliamentary Mace-Fights, In-Flight Magazines, and the Soupsoaker

Episode Date: June 7, 2018

While you're young, should you make a wig of your own hair? Why are bathroom walls across America filled with razor blades? And what's James Cameron been up to lately? Find out all in AMT363. There's more about this episode at . June is full of SPORTY SPORT, so while watching people kick balls or thwack balls, listen to the AMT Sports Day special, an hour of surprisingly great AMT-ness all about the sports. Get it from iTunes, Amazon and . Send us questions for future episodes: email words or voice memos to [e-mail], call 0208 123 5877, Skype answermethis. Tweet us http://twitter.com/helenandolly Facebook http://facebook.com/answermethis Subscribe on iTunes http://iTunes.com/AnswerMeThis Buy old episodes, albums and our Best Of compilations at . Hear Helen Zaltzman's podcast The Allusionist at http://theallusionist.org, Olly Mann's The Modern Mann at http://modernmann.co.uk, and Martin Austwick's Song By Song at . Squarespace! Want to build a website? Go to , and get a 10% discount on your first purchase of a website or domain with the code 'answer'. The Bluffers' Guides are back! Rapidly become well-informed in subjects from jazz to management to fishing to dogs at . Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Did Trump think Kim Kardashian was leader of North Korea? Why is Melania hiding under Brighton Pier? Last episode, we were chatting about a cardboard cutout of Kylie in Specsavers and whether that is life-size. And a listener, who let's call him Bob, has just worked with Kylie. And he says, I can confirm she is five feet tall. Oh, right. Good. Yeah. And is legit involved in the designing of her Specsavers range. She also designs a range of cushions, apparently.

Yes, they're available from Next. Seekwind eyelet curtains as well. Bob's last fact about Kylie and her specs is that she doesn't wear her glasses in publicity shots because she doesn't like the fact she has to wear them. That's some interesting psychology, isn't it? I'm so full of self-loathing for these specs that I'm going to design some and make other

people wear them and then pretend I love them. Specky, specky four eyes with their declining vision. Not me, Kylie. I'm ageless. That's it, isn't it? It's an aging thing. It does make you feel older when you have to start to wear glasses. I started wearing glasses when I was one and a half. Do you know, actually, since we last recorded, Kylie turned 50.

Oh. She posted a photo, as I think I will when I turn 50, of herself naked straddling a diamond-encrusted guitar. Yeah, I remember my dad doing that for his 50th. It's going to be cold, was my first thought. Those diamonds are going to be abrasive upon her nipples. And although she does look amazing for 50, I think in a way it's slightly a shame that what she's still doing

is saying, just like she was when she was 20, look, sex and music, those are my things. Because as we're learning, you know, cushions and eyewear, she does that too. It and eyewear she does that too it's a nice guitar sure it is a nice guitar it's a country style thing isn't it because that's her i don't know if you notice that's her thing at the moment her new album is of course it is i mean madonna went through that phase yeah dolly parton is still well hold on dolly parton is legitimately a country star yes what kylie's done is a a country inspired album uh in the same way that McDonald's might have Chinese-style ribs or whatever.

It's a tribute to some country memes. What I mean is you have Dolly Parton leading the way for being a glamorous, sexy country star well into other people's retirement age bracket. And Madonna did a little bit of that, although less sexy and more flannel shirty yeah now without googling it what would you say Madonna's current phases the last thing I was aware of Madonna doing was falling over backwards in that Versace dress at the Brits

which was amazing but not for the reasons she intended oh so Madonna's current phase is not slapstick then exactly yeah that's kind of it's true though isn't it think about it I think Madonna's slightly out the limelight isn't she i wonder if that's a choice but uh it was the met ball uh in may and the theme was catholicism basically and they put madonna at the top of a big flight of stairs she's on home turf exactly with a load of monk backing singers and she sang like a prayer wow to people like rihanna wearing pope hats perfect use of madonna okay yeah exactly okay good thank you for the madonna update i just thought isn't it interesting when like people who have massive mainstream careers slightly disappear off the

radar like yesterday at one o'clock in the morning when i was sitting on a train and bored i went on imdb just to see what james cameron was up to what is he up to i suddenly thought yeah i suddenly thought wow he directed the two biggest films of all time and now what? What's he done for the last ten years? Is he just driving submarines around? Did he do his Marianas Trench film already? He's done a bunch of IMAX films but I don't think they really count. Like proper movies.

He hasn't made one since 2009 with Avatar. So anyway, I looked at it. Guess what he's doing? Is it Avatar 2 and 3? Titanic 2? It's Avatar 2, Avatar 3, Avatar 4 and Avatar 5. That is what is currently in production at the moment. Well, that will keep him busy.

I'm quite excited to see Avatar 2, but I doubt my excitement will continue until Avatar 5. That's my guess. I think that a more legit question is, what was James Cameron doing between Titanic and Avatar? That's a 12-year stretch. Just slowly digitising Sigourney Weaver, I think. Well, I mean, that's a good use of his time.

We've had some feedback as well from Ben in Washington, who says he was listening to last month's show and heard the story about the concerned atheist. A lot of people are very, very invested in the dating life of Mr Concerned Atheist. He's the bloke who was flirting with the Christian lady over bickies. Or flirting with a woman we don't even know to be Christian at a church over bickies. Yes, a woman he presumes to be Christian and how does he tell her that he's not? That's basically it. Ben says, I want to reassure him that the difference in beliefs doesn't have to get in the way of a potential relationship. My partner and I are a testament to that testifying you do use the word testament which

yeah is a religious word uh i met him my partner about five years ago whilst he was in seminary so religion came up pretty quickly it's kind of unavoidable there yeah that's a definite sign that the person you fancy is into it there's no like oh i turned up to the ceremony because i heard there were free toasties on wednesday yeah i grew up in a christian household continues ben and whilst i understand his beliefs i don't share them we've agreed to both acknowledge that there is no way to prove the existence of god and not to try to persuade the other to change their beliefs. I mean, if only the leaders of all the world religions did the same thing, Ben. Imagine all the people.

My advice to concerned atheists would be to skip church for a Sunday or two before asking this woman on a date. That may prompt her to ask where he was or at least say that she hadn't seen him for a few weeks. And that would be his opportunity to explain that he's not religious. Okay. Yeah, that seems sensible, unless concerned atheist is worried that if he gets out of the game for a couple of church seasons, that someone else will sneak in there over the bickies.

This woman's got good bicky banter. She's, you know, a hot slice of church action. I think it's worth taking the risk, though. I mean, I definitely think even if someone else has got involved in that setting, it's unlikely to have escalated very quickly. I still think two weeks later, it's all right for him to say, I'm back and I'm ready for you now. Just thinking of Grease 2 here.

If he comes back on a motorbike wearing a leather jacket, then she'll be unable to resist. Oh, sure. Here's a question from Ryan from Melbourne, Australia, who is 21, and he says, I am more concerned about running out of time in life than anyone this young has any right to be. With this in mind, mid last year,

I decided that if I didn't start growing my hair out in my really early 20s, I'd never have the chance before I needed to look professional and be employed. Now, it's coming along nicely, but it is currently in an awkward phase of being too long to be tidy but too short to tie back. I have resorted to headbands, but as a result of having this awkward length hair, many times a day, I fantasise about giving up and cutting it all off. But, Ollie, answer me this. Would it be a good idea to, when you're young, grow out your hair and make wigs from it so that when you're older

and your hair is thinning or grey, you have access to a more youthful version of your own real hair in your original colour and style. Okay, so if what you're asking, Ryan, is age 37, do I wish I had in my airing cupboard a ball of hair that I grew from my own head 20 years ago that I could now apply with a safety pin or glue, my answer would be fuck no. It's a stupid idea. However however i do now have a bald patch uh it's not too noticeable because i do have really thick hair that sort of turns in around it like a hawthorn hedge and you're very tall it's above people's eyeline um but you know it is there so it is true that if i thought that

would bother me 25 years hence then 25 years, perhaps I could have looked into doing this. But I think the reality is when you get to an age where that's a consideration, your plan from when you were 21 will seem irrelevant. Just as if I said to you now, you know, dig up the time capsule you left in your granny's garden when you were seven, you probably wouldn't be interested in what was inside it apart from through nostalgia. Like that younger version of yourself doesn't have that much bearing on on how you feel right now firstly i would just like to say i will much prefer the gray color of my hair than the kind of boring mouse color that the rest of it is pre-gray i mean spiritually

you've had gray hair since seven spiritually yes physically it's coming in slowly ever since i was 23 not fast enough not fast enough i do wonder how long a wig made out of real human hair looks lustrous and good for so like if you had the wig made with your 20 year old hair and then age 70 wore it would it just be kind of brittle and gross also you need to grow your hair really long even to make a short wig you need a foot of hair well i've looked into this actually because you can get companies to make wigs from your own hair um the reason that most of these companies are set up actually is for women who lose their hair because of chemotherapy yeah um so there is a sort of legitimate need that you can sort of understand why people would want a wig of their own hair and

need it need it quickly rather than as hel suggests, sitting on it for two or three decades. But what they require is four to six inches of your own hair in sections. What you need to do is grow it into several small ponytails and then you cut it just above the hairband so that you're sending a straight cut with lots of hair in the best condition you've got. Also uh also presumably you've got some fun finger puppets right there as well you know before you send it off but it's not as easy as just growing it four to six inches and then cutting it into bits because it can take three heads of hair to make one wig and also that's a very short wig if you're giving them four inches of hair i thought they needed like 10 inches to make a short wig because the knotting takes up so much hair. And also most ponytails contain only up to 80% usable hair. I don't know what

makes the 20% unusable, but there you go. Also, having wigs made is extremely expensive, isn't it? It's thousands. It is, although actually I was surprised it's not madly expensive in comparison to getting a premium wig anyway so I mean obviously you know you can get one for 20 quid from the joke shop but a proper premium wig made from real hair is about two thousand pounds anyway and to make one from your own hair a premium wig is about the same and you can't there are companies that offer it for the cheapest I've seen is 420 US dollars to make a wig from your own hair um but presumably that's like a sort of toupee type thing also like if you get your hair made into a wig now you might choose a really shit style like imagine you got your hair made

into a wig in 1987 and then 30 years later you're like axl rose style doesn't suit me now i'd like to see your hair Axl Rose style, Helen. Well, you never will. If you've got a question, email your question to answer me, this podcast at googlemail.com Answer me, this podcast at googlemail.com So, retrospectives, what historical events are we ticking off on this week's run of Today in History?

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

She says, I'm in an American Airlines flight. So she's texted us from the plane. How exciting. And they have their own magazine with Karen Gillan on the cover. I just had to Google Karen Gillan, by the way. I didn't know who that was. Do you know who that is? I know that she was in Doctor Who and the recent Jumanji film and a bunch of other things, but I haven't seen her in much.

She was in the Kevin Bishop show. I probably saw her in that. But since then, she's quite a big deal, I've just discovered she's in Avengers and Guardians of the Galaxy. She's doing well. She's in the big short as well. Is Karen Gillan a female character in the big short that has something more to do than being sexy and turning to the camera and delivering some financial exegesis? I doubt it. Anyway, Anne in New York, she says, Helen, answer me this. What is the point of airline magazines? Why would anyone want to be on their cover, especially someone as famous as Karen Gillan? OK, I have been on a lot of flights in the past year and a lot of them have been without seatback televisions. I know. Imagine the privation. And also a lot of them wouldn't even let you use small electrical devices during takeoff and landing. Yeah, isn't it weird that the airlines have not worked out what the rules should be on that one yet and they all have their own policy?

That strikes me as a thing that should not be an airline policy issue. Like either it is safe or isn't safe for you to be looking at your portable devices. Sort it out, airlines. Thus, I have discovered that some of these airline mags are now really quite good. Yeah. Because they know that they are competing with entertainment we bring on board ourselves. So they've really upped their game. There's some beautiful photography.

There's some articles that are actually interesting rather than just a press release for like some Disneyland knockoff theme park. Yeah. Or a perfume. Yeah. Well, this is one purpose of the magazines. Selling shit. Yeah, sure. or a perfume yeah well this is one purpose of the magazines selling shit yeah sure luxury goods watches but also the destinations that the airlines serve and specific hotels and restaurants

and resorts and events such as music tours or food festivals or that kind of thing but they do it in a way that actually is quite readable now. They get decent journalists to write about destinations that they are familiar with. And to be honest, also, I'm sitting there with nothing to do. That is the only time I'm likely to read a magazine feature about Karen Gillan when I'm leafing through the plane mag. They know that you're a captive audience because also a lot of people read these. I think 80% of passengers read them,

according to some survey I looked at. And often you're just looking for the in-flight entertainment listings or people are looking for the route maps. That's the second most popular reason to look in these magazines, just to look at that little map and see where else American Airlines serves. Yeah, isn't that weird? I do that. And I'm not even interested in airline routes. I wouldn't list it in my top 100 interests.

And yet when I'm on a plane, I'm like, oh, Ljubljana. We should go there. It's a conversation starter, isn't it? Did you know you can go to Tel Aviv from Gatwick? I don't know why that's interesting. I'm not interested. Go for the route maps. Stay for the long read about salt flats or something.

To be honest, I will read any article about packing. That is my boring, peaceful, fun thing to do. Well, like the strategy, like shrink wrap your clothes or whatever. Or like, here's a celebrity I've never heard of talking about the five things they always have in their carry-on luggage. Adore it. Adore it. But these magazines, they're not even

just for passengers. A lot of them have their own websites now. They're getting a lot of readership from that. And the readership is pretty massive. No, that's weird. The idea of like the downloadable tablet edition in a world where we're not confined to media choices and we have the world to choose from. What are you reading? Oh, it's just the in-flight magazine of Etihad. It's weird. Why would you do that? Well, because maybe the airlines are like, the one cool thing we have is these photos that we commissioned someone to take of the pyramids. You know, we paid a lot for people to go and take photos of anthills in the desert.

And then people might look at those photos and be like, you know what, I will book a short break to Spain. I guess there's that issue as well of kind of differentiating your brand. Actually, especially when you're on the plane. Yeah. not that much because there's all this stuff isn't it oh who did you fly oh i flew lufthansa what were they like yeah they're all right that conversation people have which they insist on having yeah i always think if you're flying with a major airline from european airport like the answer is always yeah it was fine it was fine because of course it's like all the planes are either built by boeing or air bus all hopefully comply with the same safety regulations all of them have got a humorous safety video now yeah exactly they even use the same caterers although they put their own spin on

it so really all they have to differentiate their brand is literally the branding the logo the color of everything the color of the air stewards uniforms and their customer service and the in-flight magazine like it uniforms and their customer service, and the in-flight magazine. Like, it's a way, isn't it, with the in-flight magazine to say, this is who we are, this is what we believe in, this is the kind of airline we are. I don't think that's really true. I mean, I've been on so many flights recently where there's no seat-back entertainment or PowerPoint. So you can't, like, work and you can't watch a movie and you're reduced to reading a book. Imagine.

But also also these magazines have a pretty high circulation ba's high life magazine claims to have 3.6 million readers worldwide that is huge that is worth it for karen gillen yeah and those readers are going to be spending more time reading it as well and niche audiences i mean we would say this wouldn't we because we sell advertising to podcast listeners but niche audiences are a great way to tell advertisers that they're reaching a particular audience that they want. So that's why BA, for example, have Business Life magazine as well as High Life magazine.

And that's just for business class and first class. I mean, that's really narrow audience. But at the same time, if you know you are reaching, you know, all 30 people that are flying first class heathrow to denver that day then that's really valuable if you run a five-star hotel in denver isn't it yeah and it's a very responsive audience uh surveys show that 30 of readers book a holiday after reading about a place in a magazine and if you're a travel related business you know that if you get people on a plane there are people who are open to travel and they might also have the money to do it it's like there's a magazine i get called ferment

which uh comes with a beer box subscription that i get and it's just about craft beer which frankly i'm not really interested in reading about but because i do like drinking i do read it because it's glossy and it's pretty and it tells me a little bit about the beers that are in the box and it kind of looks cool and you know it's all because it's craft beer it's all about these independent producers in Brighton or whatever and how they've stumbled into the business and you know they are advertising me directly as a craft beer drinker but you know well done them clever idea not a magazine I would buy and just anecdotally you and I know Ollie that people do read these

magazines because aren't to me they used to be on ba's in-flight entertainment system yes and people used to send us photos of the listing in the magazine yes i wouldn't spot that i don't read the listings for the audio channels on an in-flight entertainment system but people are that desperate that hard up for stuff to do with their eyes yeah you're right it's kind of the in-flight equivalent of reading the back of the shampoo bottle when you go for a shit and you've forgotten to bring your magazine, isn't it? Because also a lot of people are nervous flyers and it can be quite boring even if you're not scared of it. So just anything is distracting.

I know what you're thinking, Helen. It's time to play a quiz based around the titles of in-flight magazines. Oh, hello. And that's just as well because I have some examples here of in-flight magazines. You need to match the magazine to the airline. Are you ready? Out of all 250 in-flight entertainment mags, okay, I can try.

Altitude. Which airline stocks the magazine Altitude? I mean, it really could be any of them, because one thing that airlines have in common is going high in the sky. That's true. I could have equally chosen Elevate, which is the in-flight magazine of Air Serbia, but I didn't. I chose Altitude. Oh, jeez. Altitude. It was Air Moldova.

Really? Tip of your tongue, wasn't it? Tip of your tongue. OK, which airline stocks the in-flight magazine Holland Herald? Oh, I know that one. That is the longest continuing in-flight magazine and it is KLM's and it's been going since 1966. Correct. 52 years. That's extraordinary, isn't it? Do you know the name of Air France's in-flight magazine?

It's called... Boff. Magazine. That's actually kind of classy there, isn't it? That is also lazy as fuck. Why isn't the airline just called planes uh okay finally uh which international airline based in america i'm giving you hints here stocks sky magazine sky not sadly the 90s with the gender neutral cover

stars and karen krasanovich like loaded for kids i miss sky magazine i miss so many magazines of the 90s i really wanted to be a journalist in the 90s because i loved magazines so much and then they all shut down yeah so i did this instead wow sky magazine okay delta yes very good well done it was delta sky magazine but it's still a generic title isn't it? I think my favourite out of all the major airlines, although they've now closed, sadly, was, do you remember BMI Baby? Which in itself is a pun,

so quite a fun name for an airline. When you just realised. BMI Baby, yeah. Yeah. I guess if even you didn't realise when a pun was being played upon you, that's why the business strategy didn't work. But BMI Baby used to stock,

their magazine was called yeah baby oh i know that's horrifically 90s but at the time that would have been quite cool i think why are all yas fan sites just about one thing the only way is up is not the only song she sings what about abandon me one true woman or good thing going her single from 96 you should make your own yaz site to fill in the gaps since you seem to think all the current yaz sites are crap go to squarespace.com build your yaz site and put yaz back on the map the only way is up Thank you very much Due Squarespace for sponsoring Answer Me This

Yes although they haven't invited us still to feature on their homepage of Brand Ambassadors I don't know why John Malkovich is there

someone Helen trying to sell Peruvian quinoa chocolate bars is on their homepage but not us Come on

We fit seamlessly into that hipster world Why are we not there? We fit as seamlessly into that hipster world why are we not there we fit as well into that hipster world as quinoa does into a chocolate bar i recently heard from very long-term listener to answer me this ace coggins wow and i remember meeting ace coggins when she was but a child and answer me this is 100th episode she came with her mom she was really young then i think she's since done a master's degree. That's how long this show has been around. And she said,

thanks to the Squarespace plugs on Answer Me This, I thought I'd see what the fuss was about. What's her website? She's not mentioned. Maybe it's an Answer Me This fan site, and that's why she doesn't want to tell me what it is. Yeah. She wants to tell you it exists, but she doesn't want to send you the link. Or maybe it's all cat memes, and she knows I'm not interested, but I am interested

in her well-being and the continuation of her life with us as this little audio backdrop to it but anyway if you want to be like ace coggins and you already have answered me this in common she's our john malkovich get into ace coggins's head through a tiny door then go to squarespace.com answer you can use their two-week free trial and have a go with their templates and the drag and drop tools to create the website of your dreams remember you get 10 off your first year's order of a website or domain using our discount code answer here's a question from patrick who says ollie your house of commons looks terribly cramped so i'm glad you're getting it extended in a new kitchen put in i think he means the british house

of commons in london yes he's just choosing me as a british representative and the government and the opposition sit so close to each other so ollie answer me this has anyone ever tried to hit another mp with that big mace right in the middle uh well uh to answer this helen i have searched for the word mace in the wikipedia article list of incidents of grave disorder in the british house of commons oh all this research is taken from hansard which is the official document of what happens in the House of Commons. And that obviously pre-exists when they had cameras in Parliament. There is one example of this happening. And it was quite recent. It was Michael Hesseltine on the 27th of May 1976. I'll read you the Guardian article from the time and thank you for bringing this to our attention

because without you Patrick I wouldn't have known this bit of parliamentary history because it happened just before I was politically sentient so here it is this is what the Guardian said at the time nothing like it has been seen in the Commons chamber for more than 40 years as soon as the whips announced

that a government majority had been achieved by 304 votes to 303 it's a close race labour mps stood up and began to sing the red flag i'm not familiar with that song it's all tannenbaum it's the german thing oh tannenbaum oh tannenbaum we'll keep the red flag flying wow there's another example of a an anthem being translated isn't it with the same tune i hadn't thought about that anyway yeah as they reached the words we'll keep the red flag flying here mr michael heseltine tory spokesman at the conclusion of the debate jumped up and seized the mace from its rack beneath the speaker's chair as he waved it aggressively towards the labour benches his shadow shadow cabinet colleague, Mr James Pryor, wrested it from his hands and replaced it in its rack the wrong way round.

So they both got fired. Exactly. What I love about British parliamentary reporting, even in The Guardian, is that equal emphasis is given to the fact that a member of parliament aggressively, threateningly waved a mace at some colleagues to the fact that someone member of parliament aggressively threateningly waved a mace at some colleagues to the fact that someone put it in the wrong way round and therefore a terrible breach of etiquette upon a royal material was made a shameful day for britain whilst mr prior was changing ends so to speak a fracas developed in front of the tory front bench mr jeffrey rippon

a former tory minister seemed to be in full physical conflict with Mr Dennis Canavan, Labour MP for Stirlingshire West. So Michael Heseltine had done this and then two other MPs just started naked wrestling or something? Yeah, well, I mean, so look, I'm not going to say who started it. I wasn't there. Obviously, Michael Heseltine felt aggrieved at having just lost a debate by one vote.

But I would point out that what they were discussing was the aircraft and shipbuilding bill. It's very heady stuff. Doesn't seem that emotive to me. Is it more because of the heavily left context of the red flag? Sure. But they had just won and they were happy about it. They were being dicks,

but you're being more of a dick to then pick up a mace anyway yeah that seems like an escalation yeah anyway as the altercation turned into something very like a brawl in the middle of the floor of the commons deputy speaker samaya gulpun rose and declared the house is suspended for 20 minutes uh and cutting to the chase uh when they then resumed they immediately adjourned so as to not have another fisticuffs that's a very dramatic story in the wikipedia article incidents with the mace in the house of commons they are few and far between so yeah the next one was 1988 when ron brown labor mp for leith picked up the mace during a debate on the so-called poll tax and threw it to the floor in protest,

the mace was damaged. Oh, wow. I remember that. He had to pay £1,500 towards the cost of mace repairs. How much is that mace worth? It must be a fortune. Yeah. Yeah, well, priceless. So the thing is, right, so we should explain what the mace is, OK, so if you're listening overseas,

we're not talking about, like, a sort of rape spray. Or like the outer husk of nutmeg. Oh, it's just kind of a cudgel, doesn't it? But it's a much more ornate cudgel than the name would suggest. It's a five foot long silver stick covered in gold with a crown on the end. It's like a big cocktail swizzle stick made of goth. Yes, that is exactly what it's like. But if you stir a cocktail with it, you will get fined.

So the reason why it's offensive to people is it has two prongs to it, right? And the mace doesn't. The offence does. It's got a single prong. The first prong of the offence would be essentially, it's not the MP's property. It's representing the crown when it's in there. Technically, in our constitution, without it being there, because it's representing the monarch,

the house can't pass laws. So it's fundamental to our completely ridiculous constitution. But nonetheless, it is fundamental. No wonder Oliver Cromwell told them to take the mace away, because it's fundamental to our completely ridiculous constitution. But nonetheless, it is fundamental. No wonder Oliver Cromwell told them to take the mace away because it's stupid. No, not this one, because this one dates from the reign of Charles II. So that whole troublesome period of history for the monarchy had just been resolved. But that's the second prong of why it's offensive to people.

I think regardless of whether you believe that it's ridiculous or not that we can only have a parliamentary debate in the presence of a stick representing the queen the point is that particular stick does date from the reign of charles ii so it is a properly priceless object that's old and it's been used every day in a performative but nonetheless you know fundamental part of our constitution so to pick it it up and, you know, fuck about with it, it's just unnecessary, isn't it? A bit rude. But then it's also unnecessary to have a symbolic stick.

It's the equivalent of, like, if you disagree with a judge going up and taking his wig off. It's just like, just don't do that. It's rude. Yeah, but we were asked whether anyone had used this mace like a pugil stick for contact violence, and it appears that they haven't so even just touching it and moving it is terrifying enough so in 2009 the Labour MP John McDonnell he was very angry during a debate about the proposed expansion of Heathrow Airport took the mace dropped it on

an empty bench so no harm to the mace, and he was suspended for five days for contempt of Parliament. And I'm just saying, if you don't have these symbolic objects, then there are fewer ways to cause artificial offence. Maybe you should just get rid of them. You can't have the Queen sitting there the whole time. She'll get really bored.

She's already really bored. We're presuming. We don't know. Although she does seem quite bored when she's interviewed these days. Yeah, that's a boring job. What is interesting is when the Queen opens the House of Parliament, which she actually does from the house of lords doesn't she when she does it from the lord's chamber yeah she doesn't want to mix with the

commons the um stick that they have in the lords which represents the queen is removed because she's there do you only see one or the other you don't see the stick and the queen in the same place don't you think she would have wanted to sub herself in with the the mace at various boring ceremonial banquets basically any banquet that didn't involve sitting next to michelle obama just send the stick i just love the idea that prince charles could send the stick to open a new arts department at a university or something i mean it would be a great photo opportunity these days wouldn't it it would actually be brilliant they were originally weapons they used to symbolize um the authority the military, but also they used to have blades on them, I think. Yeah.

Well, OK, so to address that point of Patrick's question, actually, it's not a ridiculous point. When he says your House of Commons looks terribly cramped and the government and opposition sit so close to each other, I mean, the mace is a red herring because it's not intended to be there as a weapon, but it is there to show, I suppose, military and processional strength. But the reason that they, in fact, are not so close,

they are, in fact, exactly two swords lengths away, is symbolically that they're not going to have a physical fight. So they did consider that in designing the chamber. What if you got an extra long sword? You could just really circumvent that safety measure. Again, just not terribly British, is it, of our elected representatives? Independent thought. Well, you know, not playing by fair play and rules. Back in the day, they would, by the day, I mean 1650 or something, they would leave the chamber and settle things by duel. I mean, that's really settling things very definitively.

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 want to look like Olly Mann I want to smell like Olly Mann I want to be like Olly Mann I want to chase like Olly Mann I want to look like Olly Mann I want to talk like Olly Mann I want to talk like Olly Mann this episode of answer me this is sponsored by bluffers guides do you remember bluffers guides they are back they're back baby they they started in 1965 they've been around as long as robert

downey jr and jk rowling and chris rock and dr dray. Bjork and Slash. Okay, so what we're saying is it's a brand with heritage, but they have been brought back by Haynes Publishing, who have completely revamped the way they look. And they're still basically the same idea, though. They're little pocket-sized guides that you can carry around with you that bring you up to scratch on any given topic. Yes. So there's one on beer, there's one on wine, there's one on beer, there's one on wine,

there's one on cats, there's one on chocolate, there's one on jazz. Opera, social media, golf, etiquette. Yeah. But the idea of the Bluffer's Guide is to make you well informed about a subject in just a couple of hours. And they know that you want to be this listener's love to spend a short amount of time acquiring information about a thing.

Yeah, it won't surprise you to know, Helen, that as a child, I used to gaze longingly at bluffers guides in the bookshop because the very concept was so exciting to me that in just, in basically in a two hour read, I'd know enough about a subject to make it appear that I knew loads. And that's been my modus operandi ever since. The seeds were sown way earlier than we ever imagined for this show. Exactly. So all of those classic guides have been republished but also they've got a brand new one which is the bluffers guide to brexit i haven't read it yet um and maybe the prime minister

should but that's going to be published uh this month uh if you want to get any of the bluffers guides they are all out now for 6.99 a piece and we will link to them at answer me this podcast.com now listeners if you want to send us questions in your own voice you can skype us on answer me this you can call us on 0208 123 5877 but at the moment the safest thing to do is to record a voice memo and email it to us as jacob here has done. Hi Helen, Ollie and Martin. I'm wondering what the plan was for the capacity of old-fashioned razor disposal units that you'd find in bathroom, behind bathroom cabinets and bathroom sinks in houses that were built in the 50s. It seems like there's not a way to retrieve the razors and eventually the razor disposal area would have to fill up um i don't think that they predicted um that we would stop using that

kind of razor obviating the issue um but what was the plan it seems a little short-sighted i had never heard of these razor disposal units until now thanks to jacob what are they it seems to be a little razor blade size slit in the back of a bathroom cabinet or the bathroom mirror or even in the wall through which you drop one of those single use flat razor blades invented in 1901 by king camp gillette and these seem to be a feature of i think maybe american houses and i think it's first half of the 20th century these were quite common features but why what why can't you just put it in the bin was it because razors are dangerous yeah razors are dangerous and they

thought put it in the wall who gives a shit out of sight out of mind someone in the future's problem when they come to renovate the house and find a pile of blades inside the hollow of the wall live for today there is no tomorrow classic attitudes uh also these razor blades were so thin that a lot of them have just rusted away into powder oh right okay yeah which is kind of like recycling ish it seems like these stopped being built into houses in the 1960s which was when the cartridge razor blade was invented and therefore the rectangular little flat one became less ubiquitous and you end up throwing away more actually don't you that seems counterintuitive doesn't it like someone invents a disposable razor because it's a bit tedious having to sharpen a knife or

buy a special knife but then that's the perfect product in in the 1950s and then they innovate it by bulking it up and giving you more things to throw away until eventually you're throwing away the whole thing because it's so cheap and then you'd have to have a massive hole in the wall that would take all your plastic and then you'd basically be living in a house full of rubbish yeah it's interesting isn't it houses having these built-in features for stuff the house i grew up in had on the loo wall a permanent box for that square single sheet waterproof toilet paper oh weird who wants that in their home next that is school toilet paper yeah it's a sort of satirical toilet paper my parents house actually my mum lives in a an old house parts of it date

back to kind of 1600s and they have a dining room which is the most original room in the house and there's a little wooden ledge built into the wall how big when it pulls out the wall i would say eight nine inches huh is it for a dagger no uh it's for your serving staff to sit on huh it probably was seen as a kindness at the time. Yeah. Like, we don't make our servants stand in the corner of the room like they're animals. We have a piece of wood that pulls out the wall they can perch on so comfortably. And during periods after domestic servants were likely to inhabit your parents' house,

did you use it as a cheeseboard or something? No, we used it in the sense that my dad would show eight-year-olds like me and my friends. You never guess what this is. I've never seen it used for anything other than that, but it's a nice little feature. It's quite fun. Here's a question from Zib who says, Ollie, answer me this. When were water guns invented? Well, I'm glad you asked because without researching, I would have assumed when plastic was invented, right? Because my whole life, that's what water guns look like. It's a squirty pistol based on compressing air in plastic. But no. You could have a metal one, but then wouldn't it get rusty? You could have, Helen, in 1896, a cast iron one. Wow.

Yeah, that's the first patent. But basically, it seems ever since guns were invented, young boys in particular, I guess, but children have wanted to play with a fun junior version of what all those soldiers are killing themselves with. So right from the beginning, people have found ways to put water in guns for kids. But the first patent was in 1896, made from cast iron.

And the way it worked was it had a little kind of eyedropper type squeeze bulb on the bottom that you'd fill up with water and then you squeezed it manually with your hands. Later, they adjusted that so that it was squeezing the trigger that squeezed the bulb to make the water shoot out. But yeah, 18 1896 made of cast iron obviously the super soaker was the gun of our childhoods the soup soaker squirt people with soup seriously register that now helen don't delay 1989 the super soaker came to be and 1977 was the first air pressure pump water gun. It was called the Cosmic Liquidator, which I think we can all agree is not as good a name as Super Soaker.

I mean, that also sounds like the name of a soup. Yes, it does, actually. Or like a blender in which you would make soup. And then Super Soaker got bought by Nerf, which is quite interesting because, therefore, the thing that I was terrified of as a child and the thing that I enjoyed playing with as a child in the gun-shaped department are now both owned by the same company yeah it's very confusing but nerf it's quite

interesting if you go on their website clearly making a point not to call them guns what are you supposed to call them water projectile devices uh they're called water blasters and um the traditional nerf gun if you like the the foam one that's called like a dart cartridge dispenser or something it's ridiculous because it's clearly a gun in the shape of a gun but yes it's a blaster it's a dart blaster it's not a gun it's like a gun i don't know if you know helen but a gun is actually a bullet blaster a blood soaker Hello. I'm Wilson, the ball from Castaway, and here is my song about my favorite balls. Football, rugby ball, volleyball ball, tennis ball, zoe ball, basketball, Netball, handball, debutante ball. Bowling ball, baseball, big sweaty ball. Answer Me This Sports Day, a marathon of fun and games, out now at answermethispodcast.com slash albums here's a question from fluffy who says i am 11 i have recently

challenged my 52 year old mum to a 10 kilometer race wow the race is in four months ollie answer me this what kind of thing do you recommend me to do to train oh because this is my specialist area yes you'd love to run and love to win and love to train most of all i mean you know the running's okay but it's the challenge of relentlessly exercising for a purpose that's vague over a series of weeks that's what i really love yeah we know what we we both love is uh feeling a lifetime of humiliation through the medium of exercise fluffy says if i win my mum says i can have a cat and i really really really really want one it sounds a bit to me like maybe your mom's agreed to this because she thinks either you'll get bored

with training yourself because you're 11 years old so she's not going to really have to train and run a 10k run because you'll get bored of it or she'll just buy you off with a cat and then you'll forget about it like sounds like since the goal is the cat, she can, at any point, she can say, you know what? I'm 52. Fuck this. Here's a cat. Well, maybe your mum really wants the challenge to motivate her to run a 10K. Because I would think an 11-year-old would be quite speedy competition.

But I guess she is already open to the idea of you having a cat. So, you know, you could probably get one out of her even if you lose because she's agreed to it under certain circumstances which means she is cat willing well when you say lose i think this is everything that i've seen online in terms of training when you're 11 years old is very much about don't make it too competitive i mean this is advice obviously for adults about how to make sure their children are happy when they're training to be in a race. But you seem like an advanced 11-year-old, Fluffy, so I'm just going to tell you how it is. Probably best for your health that you don't really push yourself in terms of time, because those races are designed for adults. So although

training together is a good idea, and maybe looking at your times and stuff, because you will incentivize each other to prepare for the race. Basically, what it says is if you're a kid taking part in a 10k race, just focus on the participation. Focus on the fact that you are achieving something by taking part in the race. That's amazing, even if you just managed to complete it.

Don't worry about what time you get. Now, speaking for your mother, I imagine she'll find that quite reassuring as well because if she's running along by your side she can pretend to the rest of the family that she's supporting you in this noble aim of you know just participating and not winning but also takes the pressure off her because basically she's just going to get whatever time you get i don't really know what is required to run a 10k at any age don't act so surprised but um i wonder whether you could either agree with your mother that you'll both walk it together so you can have a nice chat is there any shame in walking a 10k

no it's still very good exercise it's okay very good exercise yeah but there is shame in walking a marathon it seems to me unless you're dressed as a dog or a hot dog or paramedic yeah that's okay uh but for some reason 10k is because they're slightly the entry-level marathon um it seems to be one that more people people do who aren't really in a fit state to be running you know people who are overcoming uh injury and illness and things like that so it's okay you can walk 10k no problem i think it's still very impressive to walk a 26 mile marathon course. Admittedly, you might get in some people's way, but that's a hefty walk. More walking races, less showboat running.

Why not? So I think asking your mum to walk it together as a fun activity is one option. The other option is sabotaging her. Sure. How would you make your parent run slower? Lego. Just strew the whole course with Lego? Yeah, or the house the day before.

Don't do that. It's not very nice. And I think also you want your mum to feel good about this whole thing because if she wins, she's going to be feeling pretty cool about winning a race at 52 if she's not usually a runner. And maybe she'll be feeling so great about it that she'll buy you a cat i am considering we are considering buying a second cat we're seriously considering it now yeah opening up your family it's because coco isn't getting any younger yeah i mean the

cats don't reverse age she's been living for the last six months whilst our house work was happening you remember our house is being rebuilt at the moment she's been living basically in the garden whilst the builders do the house so she's gone sort of quasi feral cool is it like she's in castaway yeah exactly yeah yeah yeah she's got a few of harvey's old toys lying around the garden which are her wilson um and she started shitting down the side of the um like pile of cement that the builders leave down the side of the house as well so it's just like all these golden turds protruding down the gutter which is not great when you're showing people around your shiny new house extension why are they golden turds because they've been in cement they've been dipped in sand and concrete and then rained on oh

no so they're like permanent cement sculpture turds yes exactly that is what she's doing it's a bit retro white weird isn't it my love for her has not dimmed but you can see why it might so so the thinking was um she's going to be pissed off when we introduce a new cat into the equation we might as well do it now when she's basically spent all of winter living outside the house that she was attached to has changed completely inside with a whole new layout and her whole world's going to fall apart because we're about to move a two-year-old back in with her and she's already forgotten all about him right life is tough for her let's just do it now let's get a second cat and at the same time my wife has been working

weekends in a cattery and there's a cat in there who's six years old basically a lap cat nice cat and the owner is an old lady who's gone into hospital and now the council have to pay the cattery fee and it's going on for months and taking ages and the logistics of it difficult but basically this cat's going to be homeless she's going to feel responsible we have a home i think it might happen i think we might get a second cat coco's already disrupted it means she might be emotionally open to cats just as fluffy's mother might be but basically fluffy despite all of the advice online saying, you know, don't pressure children to get involved in running, you know, it should be a team effort.

It should don't make them body conscious. You know, don't worry too much about the time they're going to get. Make sure their sleep patterns aren't affected. I'll just leave you with this. Mo Farah's first race, he was 13. Really? So you've got to get on with it, basically.

It depends what you've set your sight on here and how much you want that cat. But, you know, if you want to come ninth in the English schools cross-country and go on to be our greatest ever runner, get on it. Okay, that is the end of this episode of Answer Me This. But please send us questions for next episode. All of our contact details are on our website.

AnswerMeThisPodcast.com And whilst you're there, check out the links to following us on Twitter and Facebook and also follow the links to the Answer Me This store where you can buy our first 200 episodes and our albums and our apps and donate to the show as well. And also I'm doing some gigs in Australia while I'm here. Well, you've already missed the ones I did in Sydney and Melbourne by the time this comes up, but I'm doing one in Perth on the 22nd of June, the most remote big city in the world. I'm also doing a show in Wellington in New Zealand on the 16th of July. What does Helen Zaltzman do at her live appearances these days? Oh, well, it's an exciting word-based hour of onstage entertainment featuring Martin doing some excellent soundtrack work. Yeah, and and sing some songs we're going to do

some illusionist type stuff it's a good fun show this is linked directly to your british podcast award-winning show about language and words the illusionist which people should check out if they haven't already at the illusionist.org what have you got going on this month ollie uh well the modern man is on a break at the moment so if i may direct your attentions to the week unwrapped uh it is a show in which me and three clever people discuss underreported under the radar news stories of the week so for example whilst everyone else was talking about trump and north korea we did a podcast about the return of cornish pop songs and the over prescription of calpol you can find that at theweekunwrapped.com and martin you You can tune in to songbysongpodcast.com,

our podcast about all of the songs that Tom Waits has ever recorded in chronological order. At the moment, our guest is Lily Sloan from A Therapist Walks Into A Bar podcast, and we're talking about some of the tracks on Frank's Wild Years, performed by the Steppenwolf Theatre Company with Laurie Metcalf. Laurie Metcalf? Yeah, she was in Frank's Wild Years. Just found that out. Out of Lady Bird. performed by the Steppenwolf Theatre Company with Laurie Metcalf. Laurie Metcalf? Yeah, she was in Franks Wildears.

I just found that out. Out of Lady Bird. Hold on. Are you saying the Steppenwolf Theatre Company recorded an album with Tom Waits? Yeah, they did a play. They performed his play, Franks Wildears. Now you're interested, Ollie. Yeah.

I am actually marginally interested now, yeah. Is Gary Sinise on it? He was the director. And if you just want to hear more, answer me this. Then please do supply us with your questions., otherwise we'll have nothing to talk about. And also there's more Answer Me This. In the middle of the month we will drop a retro Answer Me This into your feed. You have to subscribe to get it.

That is the only way and it is available for just a month. And we will be back on the first Thursday of July with a brand new episode. So rejoin us then. Bye!