Do Go On - 423 - The Making of the Oxford Dictionary: a Tale of Murder and Insanity

Episode Date: November 29, 2023

Creating the Oxford English Dictionary was a mammoth task and the story takes some surprising twists and turns! This is the most voted for topic for this year's Blocktober, enjoy!This is a comedy/history podcast, the report begins at approximately 06:25 (though as always, we go off on tangents throughout the report).Support the show and get rewards like bonus episodes: patreon.com/DoGoOnPodLive show tickets: https://dogoonpod.com/live-shows/ Submit a topic idea directly to the hat: dogoonpod.com/suggest-a-topic/  Check out our other podcasts:Book Cheat: https://play.acast.com/s/book-cheatPrime Mates: https://play.acast.com/s/prime-mates/Listen Now: https://play.acast.com/s/listen-now/Who Knew It with Matt Stewart: https://play.acast.com/s/who-knew-it-with-matt-stewart/ Our awesome theme song by Evan Munro-Smith and logo by Peader ThomasDo Go On acknowledges the traditional owners of the land we record on, the Wurundjeri people, in the Kulin nation. We pay our respects to elders, past and present.  REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING:forgottennewsmakers.com/2010/11/08/dr-william-minor-1834-1920-insane-doctor-who-contributed-to-the-oxford-english-dictionarybritannica.com/topic/The-Oxford-English-Dictionaryoed.com/information/about-the-oed/history-of-the-oed/?tl=trueabc.net.au/news/2020-04-09/history-of-the-oxford-english-dictionary/12010628hindustantimes.com/hollywood/the-mad-murderous-origins-of-the-oxford-english-dictionary/story-x9LpDO47RYfbqxvo4w9QwM.htmlbaumanrarebooks.com/blog/story-behind-creation-oxford-english-dictionary/smh.com.au/culture/books/the-word-nerds-who-lived-and-died-for-the-oxford-english-dictionary-20230904-p5e1tv.html Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Melbourne and Canada, we got exciting news for you. And we should also say this is 2026. Jess, what year is it? 2026. Thank God you're here. Right now, I'm in Melbourne doing my show with Serengy Amarna 630 each night at the Cooper's Inn Hotel, having so much fun. We'd love to see you there. Canada, we are visiting you in September this year.

If you've somehow missed the news, we are heading up Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto for shows. That's going to be so much fun. Tickets for all this stuff, I believe, are online. And I'm here too. And welcome to another episode of Do Go On. My name is Dave Warnocky and as always I'm here with Jess Perkins. Hello. And Matt Stewart.

Thank you Dave. Hello. Thank you Dave. And welcome to you too, Dave and Jess. And thank you. Quick question. How good is it to be alive? A question that hasn't been posed for a while.

And I would like to consider it. And I think my answer is I wish I was never born. Okay. Well, this week I'm going to jump on. Matt's side because this is big people. Okay. We've been counting... This is big people.

Yeah, it goes all the way to the top. This isn't for children. To a person. No, this isn't adult podcasting now. Our young ears turn off. I don't have pants on. Whoa. And we've warned you, okay?

No, this is big. We've been counting down the biggest topics of the year for the last eight weeks. And it all comes down to this. The number one most voted for topic of Blockbuster Tober-Slas-Blovenba. Yes. Tover grace period, 20-23 people. Oh, man.

Can I say before we reveal what it is, this won the vote by an absolute landslide. Wow. Unbelievable. It was pretty tight between second spot and ninth spot. They were all 20-something percent of the vote. Shit. But today's topic was just shy of 40%. Whoa.

That's pretty unanimous. The people want this. Yes. That's amazing. If you think of four and ten being unanimous, that. Exactly. Yes. This fucking guy, right?

This fucking guy. Well, I mean, if you only accept the opinion of the top 40% as I do. Yeah. This is 100% of the top 40%. That's true. Okay, there's too many numbers. That's hurt my brain a little bit. So, yeah, this, but it was by far, like,

The next closest was 28 or 29% of the votes. So this was a big, big vote puller. Yeah, big, big vote puller. Oh, my goodness. It's going to be good. All right. And look, you say that because obviously there is a spreadsheet somewhere that Dave and I would know, if we just looked at it, we'd know what this topic is.

I have no idea. Dave, have you got any recollection? Can't say I do. Great. Can't say I do. So we're going in blind. We're going in blind. We should be safe.

So Blockbuster Tober is the, our. Our annual countdown of our most requested topics, Matt puts together a massive poll of a couple hundred topics that have all been requested many, many times and says, hey, what do you want to talk about? And thousands of people voted, you could vote for multiple topics. Yep. But this one, obviously, it piqued the interest of four in ten people on the vote, which is incredible. It's huge.

All right. So we always start. Do you want to explain how the show works, Dave? Well, we take it in terms of report on a topic, often suggested to us by one of the listeners, go away, do a bit of research and bring it back for the group. And as Matt was about to say, we always start with a question that gets us onto topic. What's it going to be? The question this week is, what book describes itself as the last word on the English language?

Give us a book of records. Incorrect. Last word of the English language. Last word on the English language. They're saying this is the book. If you want English language, this is the Bible. It's not the Bible. The Bible?

It's the last word, amen. There's the whole Bible a prayer. Amen. It's, yeah. Sometimes, have you ever been at one of those dinners where they say, all right, let's read the Bible? Yeah. As the, what do you call those things before? Grace.

Grace. I thought he couldn't think of the word church. What do they call that thing? We had people go in and read the Bible. What do they call that? What's that? What is that? What is that?

Okay, it's a book about the English language. Yes. Is it the dictionary? Yes, specifically. Oxford. It is the Oxford English Dictionary. Wow, you go Oxford over Cambridge. Okay, interesting.

Well, no, I'm only saying what the Oxford English Dictionary describes itself as the last word on the English language. So the most voted on topic for Block was the dictionary. Yeah. Have our listeners taken the piss? Are they okay? Are they all right? Have we run out? Should Block end?

Are you just going to read? Have we done all the good topics? Will you just be reading words in their definition? Yeah, I'm going to be reading the dictionary today. It's going to be our longest episode ever. No, I'm going to tell the history. And it's only been suggested by two people. So that's another interesting thing.

Wow. So much vote, but only two people. Tyler Spiwack from Deerfield in Illinois. Incredible. In the United States. I was just in Illinois. Very cool. Is that where Chicago is?

Yes. Yes. And also from Lauren. in Warnable. Ah. Have you been... In Victoria, where I am right now. Oh my God.

Wow. He's a traveller. He has wanderlust. Are we learnt to believe that maybe Lauren has been using some sort of bot system to get thousands of votes for this topic. No. One of two people to suggest. What you've got to understand is this story involves intrigue. A lot of words.

Oh, intrigue is a word, yes. History. That is also in the dictionary. A murder. Oh, I don't know if a murder is in the dictionary, but probably murder. Of crows. Oh, really? A collective noun.

It's good, you know, there's a bit going on, all right? Cool. Okay, yeah, well, at first I did think the voters, the listeners, had lost their minds, but it sounds like there's an interesting story to it. I trust them. I trust them with, not my life, but probably with my podcast. Yeah, trust them with the vote. So this is how the topic was pitched, and potentially this will be the name of the episode.

Okay. The Making of the Oxford Dictionary, a tale of murder and insanity. Whoa, we do like both of those things here. Dictionaries and murder. Can we take all of insanity? Yeah. So I'm going to take it back to the beginning. And this is according to Anavdas Sharma writing for the Hindustan Times.

In November of 1857, the members of the London Philological Society sat down to hear a paper by the Dean of Westminster. A guy named Richard Trench. There's a lot of good names in this. Yeah. That is one of but many. Dick Trench. Dick Trench. That's good stuff.

Dick Trench. Okay, maybe that's the best. We're going to get. All right. Who wants Dick Trench in the group chat? Well, if Dave is, what are you, Dave? Rick Paine. I think that could change to Dick Trench.

Okay, that's right. We have nicknames in our podcast group chat, the change in time and time. And the joy is you never see your own one. No. See, you forget who you are. I'll forget in a couple of weeks that I'm popping up every day in your inboxes. Dick Trench. I'm currently Bastard Paul.

I like to tag you as just at Bastard. Matt is Francois Paine. This is all referencing an episode of Who Knewit from about months ago. I don't remember what Bastard Paul is. I can't really remember the origin either. Anyway, Dick Trench. So Dick Trench argued to the London Philo logical society, that the English system of preserving words was so inadequate that the

task needed to be taken up from scratch that what Britain needed more than ever was a worthy successor to Johnson's Dictionary, which is another... Johnson's Dictionary. Johnson's Dick. Yeah. Johnson obviously being another word for Dick. Dick Dictionary. Can that be mine?

Dick Dictionary? That's pretty good. So this dictionary by Johnson that they mentioned there, that was the go-to word list of the day, according to Anna Kelsey Sugg, which is an awesome name, writing for Radio National. Kelsey Sugg said that Samuel Johnson's dictionary was published since 1755. So it was already a pretty old book. Oh, yeah, he's a pretty famous guy that put together the first dictionary in that guy, right? I don't know if it was the first dictionary. That seems to be slightly contentious.

Right, but that's a famous person. Yeah. Like he's a lifelong pursuit of putting something together. His book, I believe, was called a dictionary of the English language in which the words are deduced from their originals and illustrated in their different significations by examples from the best, from the Beft writers to which are prefixed, a history of the language and an English. grammar by Samuel Johnson. I am.

I did not, I didn't understand a word of that. I can see why he decided not to be a novelist. It's such a crazy title. It's way too long. It's so long. And there's like different fonts. Yeah. It's actually impossible to read.

A graphic designer would have a connoption over that, I think. Well, you hurt me try and read it. Yeah. There were words, did Bess used to be spelled Beph? It doesn't matter. But it, like, it just kept going. What about his portrait? Like, they really captured how angry he looked.

Oh my God. He looks like he's gassy. Yeah. But he's also, he's got, he's got poodle hair. You know how people were, like, sat for portraits for, like, days? Yeah. Because he kept that expression for three straight days. That's just his face.

Don't you know, his hair looks like poodle ears. He does. He looks like he's got the same ears as Humphrey, my daughter. And he was clearly from a different generation, because I think every man involved in the Oxford Dictionary had a big, bushy grey beard and he was clean-shaven. So you can see the dick trench there, the divide, so to speak, the dictionary trench. So apparently his book, according to author Pip Williams, included made-up definitions

and idiosyncratic spelling and was, quote, completely incomplete. At the time, it was the go-to, but it wasn't up to the job. So the Philological Society, London-based organisation, devoted to the scholarly study of language, agreed that a new system was required. They agreed with Dick Trench there. They're like, you know what? You bang on. Let's get to work.

And this all kicked off the process towards the new English dictionary. The project was to be spearheaded by a trio of fantastically named fellows. Herbert Coleridge, Frederick Fernival, and Richard Chenerville, and Richard Chenerville. Trench. Oh my goodness. Dick Trench. Dick Trench. And did you know Dick Trench's middle name was Chenovix?

That's what I would have guessed. Yeah. Gun to my head. If you said, guess Dick Trench's middle name, I would have said Chenovus. Chenovic. Yeah, probably Chenovic. Or James. Genovic.

The big two. Yeah, yeah. The ambitious idea was to re-examine the English language from the Anglo-Saxon times onwards. And as it turned out, it took a while to accomplish. Okay. So they were basically back to like around 1,100, something like that. So they were looking at centuries of words. According to the OED, the Oxford English Dictionary website itself,

the dictionary was to be based on actual evidence of words in use, taken from printed sources dating from all periods of the language's history. Herbert Coleridge was named as the original editor, and he and Frederick Fernival amassed a group of volunteer readers to scour English literature and extract quotations to illustrate the usage of words. These quotations were sent in on small pieces of paper, collectively known as slips. How do they do it?

How do they do it? This is a group of guys who know words. Yes. And that's how they can come up with something like slips. Beautiful. So you see a word and then you go, oh, that's one. And then you write it down. Oh, that's a word.

That's a word. So like the first person is like, the. Yeah. Send it in. And they go, tick it off. And they come up with the definition of the. Yeah. Well, they'll have a quote.

They'll go, we found. there's that written in 1342 in an essay. And this is the sentence, and this is the essay it was written in, who was written by the year. And then they'll sort all the vows they get in and figure out what the earliest one was. And then they're sort of referencing the history of the word as well, which I didn't realize the Oxford Dictionary is a little different to other dictionaries, where it's not just the definitions, but it's also sort of like a bit of etymological history,

if I'm saying that word right? Yeah. I wish there was a place I could find out. That does make the task a lot harder, doesn't it? Yeah. We also have to trace it back rather than just, this is what it means, I reckon? Yeah. The?

That's why Samuel Johnson was able to do it all himself. Yeah. Probably. Even if it took him his whole life, you were saying. I think it's just a long time, a long, long time. A life is a long time, Dave. It's all relative, I suppose. And that guy looks like he lived a long time.

That seems like he, yeah. He needed to. shit. And also, look at that face. That man has got stomach cramps. There's a, there's a famous biography of him.

You get nothing from David. He loves poop chat. Well, that's why it doesn't like the constipation chat. Yeah, he's like, I'm not interested in it. If he's not pooping,

I don't want to hear about it. Get it out or shut up. If it's not out, it's not in my mind or attention. Were you going to say something? Dave, it doesn't matter. Oh,

if there's a famous biography of him, of him, it's often listed as, like, you know, one of the first great biographies. Oh, cool. There you go. I think Dave, maybe, and I think everyone listening should put this in the hat, Dave, to do an episode on Samuel Johnson. Yeah, and his bell movement. In the secret life of us.

So four years after the dictionary was proposed, the editor Coleridge died suddenly and unexpectedly. And even though they've done four years of work, believe it or not, the vast majority, the project was still incomplete. What do you mean? That would have been a real relief for him. This is taking so long. I don't have to worry about it anymore. Yeah.

It was honestly, it was so much work. This was really fun at the start. I thought it would take us like three or four weeks. It was supposed to be a bit of fun. Now, it's like, fucking out. We're four years in and we haven't even got to be.

This is terrible. Sweet release of death. Oh, thank you. Thank you. He's all these last words were, thank God. And then Fernival said, we're not up to tea yet. Can you keep it in the ace?

Fernival took over the job, but according to Anav Das Sharma, Fernival devoted most of his time to frequenting the red light districts of Victorian England, debating socialism and cycling. The big three. Big three pastimes. You've got to get down with the real people and find out how they're speaking. Yeah. Yeah.

What do they bring into the vernacular? Yeah. So he hardly did any work. Apparently was very enthusiastic, but his work ethic was just not up to scratch. So he got nearly nothing done. 22 years after the book was proposed in 1879, things started to pick up a little bit when new editor James Murray was appointed. James Murray, that's a name of somebody who's going to get shit done. Yeah.

Those other guys don't have to work hard. Their names are doing all their work for them. James Murray, he's got to make something of himself. because he is not memorable. Exactly, he's fighting for a personality. And apparently, like, he was a pretty obscure guy at the time. Of course he was. It's James Murray.

Yeah. Who? I've met a million James Murray. I've basically forgotten. He was a teacher, I think. Oh, so boring. Mr. Murray, okay. Yeah, whatever.

I would say, though, while James Murray isn't that impressive, if you throw in his middle names of Augustus Henry, then maybe does that add a little something to it? James Augustus Henry Murray. I'm still bored. Yeah. I fell asleep towards the end of that sentence. Augustus is really picking up.

Yes. And then Henry. Oh, yeah, Henry. James Henry Murray is no good. Augustus is. That's pretty good. But if you're shortened it to J-A-H-M, jam. That's pretty good.

That is, okay. But it's quite jamming. Jarm. Jarm. I'm sure. He's jammed to me, that's for sure. So, my. Murray, or Jarm, was a bit of a freak, learning around 25 different languages throughout his life.

He also taught himself botany, geology and astronomy and helped found an archaeological society at the age of 19. That's how much, you get more time in your day if your name is as boring as James Murray. You know what he's not doing? Fucking. He's not. He's not. He's got no friends, no girlfriend or boyfriend, no partner at all. Whoa. He's just learning languages. Yeah, the telescope is his partner.

Teaching himself botany. Words. Words are my lovers. Disgusting. Words like lovers. It's one of mine. He really turned on charm. He's the main guy in the story too.

Okay, great. Okay, we've got to get on board with charm then. I love him. But he's a real, he's an overachiever. And I think what we are threatened by is people who've done something with their lives. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, you're 100% correct. So I just want to bring him down.

I'm like, okay, mate, you got a few too many qualifications, and it's making me feel like a piece of shit. I did a three-year degree, took me four years, and I have got nothing to show for it. Yeah, there's that guy that... I barely know one language. There's a guy that in America who was a soldier, then became a doctor, then became an astronaut.

You're like, come, I think it was before he was 40. It's like, fuck. That's not fair. Stop. Stop it. Leave something for the rest of this. Sit down and play a video game or something, you know? That's fair, and...

Be a piece of shit. Yeah, and we don't have the excuse. of exciting names either. No, we've got the most boring update. Dave's is the... Only Warnocky. Warneke's doing the heavy lifting there. Middle name James.

Yeah. You, don't get me started on you, Matthew, James Stewart. So boring. Jessica Ann Perkins. What the fuck. Yeah. I'm talking about Johnny Kim, who still is only 39 years old.

And he wasn't just in the army. He was, or in the armed forces. He was a Navy SEAL as well. So it was Navy SEAL, Naval Aviator, physician and NASA astronaut. And he's 39. Still only 39 now. He figured out how to stop aging as well.

So he's been 39 for about 10 years. How do you get qualified in all of those things before 39? Do you what I mean? All of those things take time. Do they not? Yeah. I would have thought so. He must be just studying concurrently.

That's a nightmare. Maybe just doing one online course while he's sitting in electric theatre doing it in real life course. I don't like that. That's too much for me. I don't like that. And I don't like him. He's my hero, Johnny Kim.

Johnny Kim, I don't know you, but I don't like you. Now, Jam, because he's the main character of this report, I'm going to get on board. Yeah, I love him. I was projecting my own insecurities onto him. I think it's amazing that he knows 25, I can't name 25 languages. That's a real term. Is he doing like, he does, he knows. knows every single type of sign language.

And this is before duolingo. Yeah. How's he doing? Surely he's not fluent, you know? Maybe he's like, I speak French, and he speaks French to a French person. They're like, what the fuck is he saying? Yeah. But like, you would get to 10 and then after that, like you're saying, people don't know that many languages.

You could just lie. Yeah. You could say, yeah, yeah, yeah, Swahili. I got it. All good. I know a few are cake languages, ones that you haven't heard of. Yeah. The ones that no one else on the pun still speak.

Can confirm? I think the person I know with the most of the most of the most of the most of the most of the most languages knows three and that is so impressive to me. And they just know the names of three. She knows the names of three. It's amazing. She can name three languages. The third one you're like, I've never heard of, but I believe you.

German, you say. What? Wow. No, her third language is English and she's one of those people that goes, I'm so sorry for my terrible English and then says the most complex sentences and you're like, fuck you. Yeah, that was terrible because I couldn't understand it because I'm not at that level. It's too smart for me.

So he's got the job, a charm in. 1879. This is 22 years after the book was proposed. Things are kicking up a notch because that same year, Oxford also got on board and the Oxford University Press agreed to be the publisher. So at this point, it wasn't even the Oxford Dictionary until 22 years into its life. They stepped in and said, hey, we'll publish this because before that it was just the philological Society. A word I'd never heard of before, but it obviously meant someone about words.

You've been nailing it. Every time you say it does sound like you're about to go, la la la la la la la la la la la la la la for la la la logan's society. I love it. So, yeah, according to Oxford, Murray, apart from everything else, he was a self-taught scholar from the lowlands of Scotland.

And yeah, he'd been into language his whole life. Love language. Obviously, everyone involved in this has a big beard and loves language. Yeah. Yes. Like, I think I'll stop mentioning it, but everyone speaks multiple languages. It's so threatening to me. So he got, he's working in Mill Hill, London, still sort of part-time because he's still

working as a teacher. And he converts his shed at the back into a building called the Scriptorium. How do you feel like that, Jess? I feel like you could be off him again. Welcome to the scriptorium. James, this is a shed. Actually, Dave. Move the whippersnipper.

I think you'll find. I fucking love that. Scriptor. Scriptorium, that rules. So he's out there and it's just full of books. The walls are just lined with shelves and pigeonholes with slips of paper, words and everything. Eventually, oxen. publishing is like, we've got to take this up a notch.

We need you to go full time. And he moved to Oxford, got a new house with a new shed, which he dubbed the scriptorium too. According to Pip Williams, that's where he and his team of lexicographers, if I'm saying that right, and assistants went every day to collate and to draft the definitions of every word in the English language. It's just, it's funny to think now, like, all the ones that keep updated, that all the work's been done, so you just have to update, which is in itself a huge job. But to start from scratch is... Like, where do you start?

Hectic, yeah. Well, they went with A, and I think that's right. And were they the ones that decided what order the alphabet went in? Yes. Wow. So then how do you start with A, you know? Absolutely free for all. I've been quoting Pip Williams a bit.

She wrote a book called The Dictionary of Lost Words, which was historical fiction novel from a couple years ago, but it was set inside the scriptorium. Oh, cool. Yeah. Pip Williams is a great name. Great name. It's like it's bordering on boring.

But the Pip saves it. The Pip, yeah, the Pip does so much. Yeah. But if her full name is Philippa, wow, now Philip is still pretty cool. Yeah, that's pretty good, I reckon. Yeah. Yeah.

Williams is letting her down. Pip is saving the day. I think Williams, because, yeah, because Jess Williams is like pretty good name, but forgettable. Yeah. Pip Williams. Imagine Pip Perkins. Pit Perkins.

That's insane. I feel like Pip Perkins would be an ace fighter pilot. I agree. Pip Perkins! Yeah. I couldn't think of anything a pilot would say. Pip Perkins. We're wrong.

Ladies and gentlemen, is your captain, Pipperkins speaking. You messes just message us when you from your train. trip saying you had a couple of pilots with some great names. Oh, yeah, there was one flight. I can't remember what their names were, but it was something like Kevin and Phil or something. I don't know why, but it was just like two names you don't hear that often anymore, and never together. Never together. Never Kevin shall meet a Phil.

And I hope they thought I was laughing at something else. So, Murray's now on board, and he really turbocharged the volunteer reading program. as well, which is set up before. Like, it was sort of crowdsourced. Yeah, right. Hey, send in your words. Got any words? Do you get a prize?

No, prize. It's just for the good of the dictionary. According to Anna Kelsey Sugg, Murray enlisted the help of thousands of ordinary people. He sent a call out to the public in pamphlets, distributed far and wide and republished in certain journals, asking people to find quotations from magazines, journals, books, or newspapers containing words he and his

colleagues were looking for. People from all around the world began mailing tiny little slips in, which is what they called them, which were about the size of a postcard, and they contained references to words the dictionary team sought. Cordon Mary Olson of Bowman Rare Books, besides these submissions, the OED required the work of many others. Sorders, sub-editors, assistant editors, editors, editors, compositors, printers, proofreaders, professional authorities, delegates, and Oxford Deans, these dastily deans. The poets Tennyson and Browning were consulted about the meaning of the words that appeared in their poems. All right, I love you, poetry.

What's this word, then? I think it's great, and I know what it means. What do you think it means? But what do you, just in case, yeah, because some of the other people around the scriptorum don't seem to get it, and I just want to confirm. You tell me, though. Let's say it together. It means a good day. Yeah, that's what I said.

Good Dave, yep, that's what I said. I'm panicking up here. J.R.R. Tolkien was an assistant lexicographer for one year as well. Lexicographer. Am I saying that right? I don't know, so I assume so. Even Murray's kids helped him through the years. That's right.

I know Jess, you said. he was a man that was alone. There's no way he has kids and has taught himself 25 languages and bought me. With his second wife... Oh my gosh. His first wife sadly passed away.

With his second wife, he had 11 children. Get! Absolutely fucked. You know what? No, I am turning on jam. I hate him. How do you fit so much in to a life?

How dare you? I think the answer is he probably didn't do much with the children. No, no. What he did was, he put him to work. So he paid them pocket money to sort the slips into alphabetical order. Oh, okay. Well, he didn't have children.

He had colleagues. Yeah, that's right. I like to view my children as housemates. Eleven children. That's too many stars. I wonder if you know what was causing it. Fuck. I hate this.

I hate him. Too much. You know what I did the other day? I lost about six hours of the day just playing a little video game where I was farming and doing magic in a little town. Farming and magic. Yeah, it's a beautiful game. Oh, okay.

Here we go. Farming and magic. Yeah, okay, we get it. You're a big, you're a high roll. Those are my hobbies. One of those would be impressive. I've taught myself farming and magic. See, jam?

It's easy. According to Kelsey Sugg, the team at the scriptorium would sort the slips chronologically to determine the history of the word from the oldest example of its use right up to the most up to date. The lexicographer's job was to go through these textual examples of words, fashion meanings and show how a word might have changed throughout history. That's what would be put in as an entry in the Oxford English Dictionary, Pip William says. Pep Williams says.

Wow. Pip William, fire a pilot. And this is where the Oxford differentiates itself from Australia's Macquarie Dictionary, for example, or the Collins Dictionary. According to Williams, those dictionaries give us modern up-to-date meanings of a word, but they don't give us the history of the word. Whereas the Oxford English Dictionary is a historical text. So it gives you the history of the word.

It gives you the earliest known use of the word in text, which is really important, according to Williams. It takes you from maybe the 1530s all the way up to the current day. I also read that it takes you back even further than that. That is pretty amazing, but also, you've got the internet now for that. You know? Just give me one of those cute little dictionaries. Yeah, yeah.

I'll flick through that. You know, a good site on the internet? What's that? Oxford English Dictionary. Ah. Yeah. dot com. OED.com.

Dot com. Dot com. For instance, if you looked up the word pants in the Collins dictionary, it will tell you the British definition is pants are a piece of underwear, which have two holes to put your legs through, an elastic around the top to hold them up around your waist or hips. Okay, so that's what you get the Collins dictionary. Sure.

It would also have the proper meaning of pants being, you know what trousers trousers yeah i know i don't know why the english have it wrong it's their language how do i get it so wrong uh but according to anna kelsey sugg if you looked up pants in a modern oxford dictionary you'd also learn that in the 1800s the words was considered a vulgar abbreviation of pantaloons uh-huh so you get that history yeah which is fun couldn't have figured that out myself i love that it was vulgar vulgar oh how dare you How do. How do?

I guess we're actually kind of the only ones who, not the only ones, but like, Americans would say like panties. Hmm. And pants in the UK is underwear, but we'd call them undies. Yeah, that is, we are children. We are children. Undies, because they're underwear. Do we, yeah, but I mean, I think that's what, do you call them undies, things you wear?

Yeah. Huh. I think I call them jocks? Jocks? Yeah, well, jocks are male. Oh. I don't wear jocks. But undies, I think, is, that's like a gender neutral term, is it?

Yes. Wow. How about that? How about that? Dave, you've lost it. You're lost in thought. What do you call them? You got your drawer at your house where your underwear goes?

Some country calls them drawers, don't they? Drop, draw. Yeah, undies, underwear, boxes. Boxer briefs. Boxer briefs. Those are two different things. Tighty whitties. Yes.

Tighty? My G-bang. Okay. Tidy Witties, it's like, that's an American thing, right? Yeah. That's a style of undies in America. Yeah. And all the tidy-wydies I've seen on the big screen and the little screen are the floppiest underwear I've ever seen.

They're not tidy. They're not tight. They're all so saggy and floppy. I just think, like, words have meanings. Yeah. Let's stick to them. Yeah. Yeah, I agree.

I think we should do what they did back. when you start of the story, throw it all out, start again. Start again. Yeah, you reckon we'd start again again? It's been 150 years since I started, throw it out. So I think, start fresh. Let's go to the Philological Society and say, this Oxford dictionary is crap. Yeah, it's not up to it.

Throw it out. It makes no sense. We're going again. Yeah. I think that's reasonable. Let's start at our own scriptorium. In a shed? In a shed.

Have either of you got a shed? No. Oh, yeah, I do. I mean, it's not as big as this one. It is a literal, you know, cupboard. Okay. That'll do. It's cozy.

Yeah. Good service in there with our... Moves the whippersnipper. Let's get to work. So basically, with words in the Oxford Diction, you get the historical context and a bit of the evolution of the words. It's so funny, I had no idea about any of this. Yeah. I wouldn't have thought that that's what made it different from the Cambridge

Dictionary or the Macquarie, like you're saying. Yeah. I don't know. Why didn't, I don't know about the Cambridge Dictionary. I wouldn't even use that as, you know, a napkin. What about toilet paper? Would you use it as toilet paper? Well, a general never shit.

Oh, of course. So I would have no need to. You know, sometimes I have the smaller dictionaries. They call it the concise dictionary. Yeah. As a child in primary school, I thought that was pronounced conchise. Oh. I thought it was the conchise dictionary.

I was like, I guess that means small? The conchise. Fucking idiot. You are an idiot. You were and are. I don't know. I think that's fair enough. I'm certainly going to sit in my glasshouse and make fun of you for mispronouncing a word.

I can because I say everything perfectly all the time. Yeah, you're infallible. That's right. According to the Britannica, the aim of the dictionary is to present in alphabetical series the words that have formed the English vocabulary from the time of the earliest records down to the present day, with all the relevant facts concerning their form, sense history and etymology. That's all pretty much common sense stuff to me. So anyway, when Murray took on the project,

he estimated it would take about 10 years from to complete it. Wow. And it had already been going for 20. 22, yeah. But, you know, there was a bit of faff in that. There was that guy like cycling. I'm talking about socialism in the red light district. But this guy sounds like he gets stuff done.

So if a guy that gets stuff done, thinks it's going to take 10 years. I back that. Yeah. Well, you know, he's probably being conservative, probably get it in time. Yeah, five. Five, yeah. Eight max. But he's giving himself 10 in case he pops out a few more children.

Yes. He's not sure where they keep coming from, but. So, anyway, he's like 10 years. Obviously, he knows it's a big task. And he's thinking it'll probably end up being four volumes, each of around 1,600 pages. So after five years. so many. After five years, he would have expected to be, you know,

had two of the volumes done and be somewhere up around M, I guess. But he was a little bit off. After five years, they'd completed all the way from A up till ant. And it's putting up. All right, let's just do a quick stock take. All right, we've got seven words. That's pretty good. That's more than a word of you. The mail system back then, you know, slips to go on to get there. So I think, I guess they were like, we better get put something out at this point. You can't put up from A to End.

No, that is what they did. You can't. The dictionary is covered 10 pages. And it purports to be like covering every word from A to end. Oh, that's so funny. But that's what they did on the 1st of February 1884. They published the first fascicle. And I had to look this up.

Luckily, there was a website I found called OED.com. And fascicle means a part of a work published by installments. And the earliest known use of the noun fascicle is from 1622 in the writing of a soldier named Francis Markham. Right. See, that's the kind of stuff you get. Yeah. But you wouldn't know that if you bought from A to Ant.

No, that's what. They're about 200 years away from that. So from A to Ant was 352 pages and it sold 4,000 copies. Okay, that's pretty good. The equivalent of about 70 bucks in today's money. Buy a book for 70 bucks, which gives you the meanings of the words from A to Ant. Is that still available? I'd love to buy a copy from.

It would be worth so much money now. You're actually from A to Ant. Oh, it's so funny. But yeah, it was obviously, that's five years. So it's proving to be a mammoth exercise. Pitt Williams said it was akin to mapping the human genome. That's how big of an enterprise it was. If you did it all.

Yeah, if you did the whole genome. They've like set up the microscope at this stage. It's like, okay, I think, so the heads of the top, we'll start there, and they got down to hair. I haven't quite made to scalp yet. According to Kelsey Sugg, Murray wanted a dictionary that documented all words, including the colloquial and informal. There would be these perennial arguments about which words were worthy of being in the dictionary and which weren't, Pip Williams said. But the delegates of Oxford University Press, who were funding the project, were keen for a more efficient approach.

They're starting to be like, come on, we've got to hurry this thing along a bit. Fair. They were constantly putting pressure on Murray to curtail the number of words that were in the dictionary. They were saying some words are not as important as others. If a word wasn't written down, it never had a chance of being in the dictionary, Pitt Williams explains, which is, it's funny to think about it. And until reading Pitt Williams talk about it, I'm like, yeah, that makes sense. How do you, how would you get them otherwise? But it means all these words, like back then, everyone's not writing their own

blogs and stuff like we all do now. Yeah, yeah. These days, you know, you just go through. Go through a blog, pick up a web, but back then, you're right, they're not doing as much. They're not doing as much. They're more to vlogs. As modern types do. Yes. We're all blogging away. Yeah.

But they, so there'd be whole industries, which would have specific terms that they use orally. Yeah. They just never get written down because even back then, you know, people don't read and write as much as they do now as well. So there's all these different areas of life. Williams talks about, you know, for instance, the birthing room or the laundry or the scullery or the coal mine, all these areas, there'd be specific words to those industries that were just never recorded. Right, but once you write them down in the dictionary, they're written down. So is that enough? Yes, but they're not getting into the dictionary if they haven't already been written down. It is interesting. So that's what Williams is like, we never questioned dictionaries. If you want to solve a Scrabble dispute, you go to the dictionary and no one will argue about the validity of the dictionaries.

meaning of a word. And all of a sudden I thought, well, hang on a minute, you can argue it, because the original source is biased. It's really an interesting point, because it's this small group of guys who are putting it together. Yeah. They're all coming from the, they're all just, you know, word nerds. Yeah. So they would have no idea about the word for... They've never been in a birthing room. Yeah. Or a laundry. That's why we still don't know the word for, you know, the bit inside a mum. We don't know it. We just don't know.

No. And we will never know. No, we'll never know because no one will write it down. I for one, don't want to know. No. That's where I side with Murray. Oh no, actually Murray wanted all words to be written down. It was the people at Oxford are like, come on.

Come on, come, man, let's hurry it up. I just sort of got a bit lost for a second there in thought, thinking about, like, if I was going to do a dictionary now, and I would start by looking at the dictionary. So I can understand it is quite a big task. It's a big task. I know we've been teasing them for a bit here, but it is pretty huge actually. But if you said to me, all right, think of a word starting with A.

There's a big possibility I would have said ant. I would have started with. Yeah. That's just like, all right, so we got an ant. Because you learn all your words from the A to Z of animals. Yeah, exactly. Ant, then we'll move on to obviously beavers. Oh, my.

Oh my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Well, now we're cooking. Now we're cooking. C? Cat. Yeah, cat.

D-Dog. E. Elephant. Elephant. Oh, I had eel. I had elf, which didn't quite fit the scope, did it? So, even with fewer words than Murray wanted, the OED says it was still clear that a much more comprehensive work was being produced than had been imagined by the philological Society.

La La La La La La Social Society almost said he's earlier. So, you know, we're three decades in now. In fact,

dictionary work relied on so much correspondence that a post box was installed right outside Murray's Oxford home where it still stands

today. That's awesome. Yeah. Got his own post box. That's like... That's the dream. Is there any

higher on other than that? Yeah. Do you reckon he would have got mad of other neighbours were putting post in there? Hey. Whoa.

Whoa. Hey. Get it. That better be philological. That's not philological. Are you mailing something to me? If not. I mean, if you are, you could just hand deliver it.

That'd be much easier. But if not, if not. Postage. Throw it away. I feel quite lucky that there is a post box, like, just out the front of my apartment building. Oh, right. I don't even know where my local is. There you go.

I feel really smart about that. Stop doxing yourself, Jess. Sorry. Don't come and find me. Don't. You know, now post, I'd be suss on every postage. I already am. I don't trust him.

Oh, you can't gain access, can you? Okay. Can't open a gate? Fuck, it out. So he started realizing there was more work than he was initially hoping, but he was still like, I want to do it alone. But Oxford are like, you need help. And they started pushing for other people to get involved. He started working with this guy called Henry Bradley.

How do we feel about Henry Bradley? Bradley is in terms of boring name. Pretty dull, right? It's a bit dull. I mean, it's more interesting than Matt Stewart. Yes. It definitely is. But, you know, I was about to say, yeah, because Henry Bradley's two first names.

And then I realized. But it's weird to have a Henry Bradley. I agree. Don't you think? Yeah. So, it's messy. Mari starts corresponding with him. And by 1886 Oxford University Press insisted that Bradley be brought in to help with the letter

B. He's named Bradley. Yeah. He's qualified. He gets it. He's lived with B his whole life. And in 1887, he was promoted to co-editor. Oh, he's promoted to C.

Yeah, that's what I thought. He was, in a way, co-editor. Right, co-editor, so there's two now in the show. Yes, and Marys, Marys not love it. He's working in a separate location, but, yeah, Marry's like, I can do this myself. I'll just work faster, and I'll get faster. I'm just starting to get used to it now.

I'm getting into a groove. After how long? A long time. Over the following years, Bradley was also given the responsibility for the letters E to G, L to M, S to S, H, S T, and W. Big responsibilities, I think I'll agree.

They're some of the big ones. S to S-H. So S is its own thing. S to S-A, well, S is split up. Obviously, there must be quite a few S's. Yeah, interesting. Because he didn't get S-H. What's up to H?

L-A-M-H-I. He didn't get I. S-I. And what's before T? S. S. So he, to some reason, they took off S-I to SS. Right.

And then he's also like E to G. And then what was after that? L to M. He's got quite a few. W. Yeah. W. Good one.

In 1897, the year that the VFL was counted coincidentally. That's actually not. not a quintess at all. It's just a... Anyway, in 1897, a man named William Craigie started working on the dictionary. In 901, Craigie was also promoted to co-editor. So it's a triumvir and all of a sudden. A word I'd have to look up in the dictionary.

And I'm possibly not using correctly. Please don't look it up. So we've got Craigie, Murray and Bradley. I'm afraid this project was just too darn large. So we've got three editors. But the OED editors... still had a little space left to cram on one more philological ass. And personally, I think that ass belonged to the best-named editor of the lot.

Charles Talbot onions. Spelled like the... Spelled like onions. That's great. Talbot onions. Charlie onions. Charlie onions. Hey, says Charlie onions.

He'd help with a dictionary. I love it. Yeah, that's great. Talbot. Talbot onions. Bot onions. That rules. So good.

Charlie onions. Charlie onions. So Charlie onions is the fourth. He's the fourth. Co-editor. Yeah. Wow. Murray must be losing his mind.

Yeah. Murray's pissed, right? All right. Fine. I'll have one. No. Okay. Two.

That's it. Four. Okay. Onion. Fuck. Yeah. He's losing. He's losing his mind.

Okay. He's like, surely this is where the insanity comes in. Is Murray still in, eh? Murray's still in. I'm up to aunt eater. I'm up to aunt eater. Ha.

So Onion started working on the project in 1895, and according to the OED, from 906 to 1913, he worked on the dictionary under Henry Bradley and William Craigie, preparing portions of M, N, R, and S. And in 1914... It's been gone forever already. Yeah, that's right, it's almost 20 years in before he was promoted to co-editor

and was responsible in that capacity for the sections S-U-N-Z. Jesus, there mustn't have been heaps in there. W.H to working and X, Y and Z. So that he's... Whatever, have the scraps. Last man in is getting scraps for sure, yeah. Xylophone.

Yoga. Done. Zebra. I'm done. Next. What else we got? What's next? I'll do numbers now.

So the editors worked away on different sections each, and they all had their own teams of assistance. Apparently, Tolkien later gave a nod to the four editors in one of his stories. There was a part where he said, when a word needed defining, we'd ask the four wise clerks of Oxenford. Which just makes me think, did he, I mean, did he actually do anything? Did he have an imagination? Is that a typo? Yeah.

Anyway, I mentioned these volunteers from around the world, sending in the slips which the Dictionary was built on, and I'll tell you more about some of them after this quick break. So yes, this rag-tag band of word nerds and ne'er-do-wells from around the world, all volunteering for the greater good of the OED. I try to look up other words for greater good and really struggle to find some. No synonyms. Yeah, it's just years before the Thesaurus? Are they like, oh my God.

That would freak him out, the idea of that. You got to run before you can walk. break their brain. They'd be like, I can't, I can't do that. I'm still working from W to working. I'm not even up to working yet. I'm working my way towards working. Sarah Ogilvy writes about many of these volunteers in her book,

The Dictionary People, the Unsung Heroes who created the Oxford English Dictionary. I think we're throwing heroes around that much, are we? A little bit of mayo on that one. No, they're on song. We've got to be singing about these heroes. These heroes. These heroes. Okay.

God bless those brave boys and girls. We've just ended World War I in the story. The real heroes, those brave, brave boys. But it's amazing how many books, both fictional and non-fictional, are about the Oxford Dictionary and how it was written. People are obsessed by it. Well, as we know, nearly 40% of voters. Yeah, people are so keen on this one.

According to Ken Haley writing for the Sydney Morning Herald, Ogilvie's work stems from a serendipitous find, a discarded volume that turned out to contain Murray's address books, identifying 3,000 contributors who provided the building blocks of the masterwork. So it sounds like she just somehow stumbled upon this book that had his little black book inside with all the volunteers and notes against them and stuff. And like years later?

Yeah. Yeah, this is like Ogilvy's, you know, I think this book was written quite recently. Yeah, okay, cool. That is a fascinating bit of history to have. Yeah, amazing. And she's an Aussie. I don't really know how she came across it. I think it might have even been published this year.

Oh, incredible. Yeah, so it's quite a recent. But she's going around door to door, seeing if they're still there? Yeah, yeah. Hey, you remember when you submitted some West of the Dictionary about 100 years ago? What were they? She just got really lucky finding his book. She has no right.

She has no right to be writing her book. But she's like, I got the info. I got the book. I got it. So I'm going to write it. In the book, Ogilvy has a chapter called hopeless contributors, which lists a bunch of volunteers who weren't up to snuff according to the OED's various editors. So she's got these notes.

Wow. And they were all hopeless for different reasons. Hopeless is a bit. A bit full on, isn't it? A bit unfair. A bit unfair. Well, you don't know. I haven't even told you what.

Well, they're sending in letters and it just says, butter. Yeah. I cook with this. Yeah. Butter. Written in crayon. Butter, I like it. I've written this one in butter.

I think you'll find it's delicious. Have a lick. All right. Here's what butter means to me. Yum. One word, yum Now I'll define yum for you And they're like, they're hopeless

Oh my God According to Haley They were hopeless for different reasons Some refused to send in their citation slips That's pretty hopeless They refused I've got some great words I will not send them in

These are mine now You can come collect them But I will not be posting them They're really good They don't trust posties And I get that Others produce slipshod work A few to whom Murray had sent specially selected volumes

Promise much but produced nothing. For instance, next to the name T.W. Tonkin of Barnes, Murray wrote, quote, Imposter stole the book. Imposter. Imposter. I don't think Murray will put it in much more full-on terms. No, that's right.

You know you've peed him right on. Yeah, T.W. Tonkin. Hailey writes that a more diligent sleuth was Eleanor Marks, Carl's daughter, Carl Marx's daughter. I'm glad he's clever. Daughter of Carl, you know Carl? From down the shop? From down the shop. Yeah, you went to school with your dad.

Carl! Come on! Come on! We used to go to Carl's house. Carl's pool was huge. All the kids love Carl's pool. And you don't know, Cal. One of Carl's daughter, Eleanor's words that got in was Ruffle.

and she started a Madam Bovary citation. I cited in citation, which was pretty clumsy, but I had nowhere to go. I couldn't think of another word for citation. What could you do? What could you possibly do? I was stuck. That's, I mean, it would feel good if you got one.

Oh, yeah. That's a good feel. I can imagine if you're like, Ruffle, got in, got it, that's mine. I'm in the dictionary, baby. According to Haley, more than 10% of dictionary people were clergymen. For some reason, he suggested it's because maybe they had a bit more time on their hands. Wow, that's offensive. But they're maybe just big readers.

Yeah, I mean, they've got the good book is there at all times? A lot of pages? All of them that they're sending in, it's just, that one was from Jesus. Jesus said that one. I credit Jesus. I credit Jesus with everything. Thanks, Jesus. My lunch, Jesus.

Thanks, Jesus. I think we're losing our life. a little bit. I think you're inventing these characters. They're going on about butter and Carl's pool. And then we're priests thinking, Jesus. They're all very believable 3-day characters. Thanks, Jesus.

One of the clergymen was a vegetarian vicar named John Mayer. And he included other words for vegetarian, including frutitarian and nutarian. in. Okay. Those ones didn't quite catch on, but I think they got in there. Three of the four most prolific contributors. I'm saying that weird, aren't I? No.

No, I sounded like music to my ears. That's beautiful. Contributors. Yeah, okay. That's perfection. Three of the four most prolific contributors were asylum inmates, and the fourth most prolific ran an asylum, which made Ogilvy ask,

was it their madness that drove them to do so much dictionary work, or was it the dictionary work that drove them mad? Oh, that's great. No, they're already in the asylum. Yeah. So it probably is that. And is it the same asylum? Sarah, sorry.

Sarah, sorry. Sorry, I mean. Personally, love your work. Love your work, but that's ridiculous. Should say this Sarah as well if you are listening as far in. We're a silly podcast. We mean no harm. We're not making fun of...

I think she heard the butter stuff and was like, I'm not taking these people too seriously. But she's stuck with us. And that's what I love about Sarah. Like, come on. Nobody's like... you know, crediting us in their podcast, you know what I mean? Nobody's like, why. I'm using these dumb asses of sorts.

I don't remember just yesterday. Do you remember an episode of ours is in the National Film and Sound Archive? Do you remember that? They wrote to us and asked them run by the Australian government. I don't remember. The video games crash episode is forever part of the National Film and Sound Archive. Why that one? I can't.

Maybe there wasn't much media on that event. It wasn't even an Australian. No, but they wrote to us and asked And then I think we gave them like a You know, we're like, sure No money involved or anything They just put it in there That should have been a bit of a

Quit pro quo You know what I mean? We should have gotten one submarine for it Yeah Yeah And they would probably Make that deal Because the Australian government's never actually

There's always in the future The submarines Yeah They're promised so many submarines In so many years Yeah It's always We're always about to get some

Great submarines. So should I not have asked for a submarine? You know what we need, Australia, what we need as a country is to spend more money than any other thing on future submarines. Future subs. I agree. You really, I mean, if you buy subs now, they're already out of date. Yeah. But if you buy future subs, they're never out of date.

You never even have them. Yeah. They can't be obsolete because you don't have one. We're always about to get the most up-to-date submarine. I do remember we got the one time we made the mistake of actually getting them and by the time we got them they were out of date. Yeah. And I don't think they ever quite worked.

But I vaguely remember the Collins class submarines. Probably made by the dictionary people. Should have got Oxford to do it, obviously. Yeah, Oxford subs, they're the good ones. Yeah, and it would take a really short time, for sure. I think they make similar estimations on budget and time. Five years. Yeah.

Easy. Get eight to eight. I'm fascinated by the people in the asylum The three people that are patients In the asylum and then also someone who's at the facility Are they all they're egging each other on Like it's like a group activity? It's just a coincidence

Incredible Yeah really interesting I'm going to talk about one of them in particular And his name was William Minor By the way I should also say Jess and Dave This guy William Minor Middle name, how do you see this? Chester

William Chester. William Chester minor. Oh, William C minor's pretty good. Yeah. C minor. Yeah. Can you give me a C minor? Oh.

Anyway, before we talk more about him, Tim Randall from Brisbane and Alex Buxel from St. Louis or St. Louis. I cannot get it in my head. Because I think there's a St. Louis and St. Louis. Oh, okay. That'd be why. I think. And you ticked him both off.

Well done. So they also, they suggested I'd do a, or we do it, an episode on William Chester, Minor in particular. So let me tell you about him. When Tyler, one of the topics suggested, suggested this topic, he specifically wanted us to focus on this guy, minor, and he linked to an article by Debbie Fulks on her website, Forgotten Newsmakers.com,

which has a bunch of great essays worth a look. And yeah, so when I said this topic was put down as a tale of murderers, in insanity. That was all about this guy, William Minor. But he was super prolific. I think he ends up being, of all the volunteers, the second most have the second most entries included. So he was born in 1834 to American missionaries, but he lived in what is now Sri Lanka. So I think he didn't get to America until as a teenager. But he also, like everyone else involved in this had a huge beard and knew a lot of languages. And he eventually became a doctor graduating from Yale Medical School in 1863. This was in the middle of the American Civil War. So after graduating,

he joined the union as a surgeon. But according to Fulks, he didn't like the isolation of the hospital and requested to be sent to battle. Eventually he got his wish and was sent to Northern Virginia, where he first encountered the filth of a field hospital an excruciating pain of soldiers suffering from gangrene. Wow. His friends described him as a sensitive man who loved to paint, play the flute and read books, and the battlefield was not an easy place for a man

with such artistic sensibilities. You can't hear the flute over the gunshots. Keep it down. See? A beautiful instrument. See with all that gunshots, you're making me make it sound like a d'all. different instrument.

While in the army, Biner was tasked with the grisly job of branding an Irish soldier with a D on his face using a hot iron that was meant as a deterrent against deserting. Apparently this was a big thing they'd either do it on their leg, I think, or on their face. And was he like, this is a civil war in America. I'm Irish. I don't have anything to do with this.

I have a dog in this fight. This is a mistake. This is a Kentucky tour. I wandered off. I'm so sorry. If I can just find my people, I keep going. I keep going. I thought this was an interactive theatre experience, but I guess it is.

Yeah, honestly, it's a bit much. Yeah, branding someone on the face is awful. Apparently, yeah, that freaked him out and he had these fears that the size who was going to come and get and, you know, come for revenge and stuff. He got pretty paranoid about that. Journalist Simon Winchester, who is another guy who's written a book about the Oxidictionary, suggests that such tasks and the full-on conditions of the war generally may have played a part in minor developing a case of severe dementia and paranoia. Fulks continues, minor was later transferred to a hospital in Alexandria where he distinguished himself and received

a promotion to assistant surgeon in the US Army. He moved. to Governor's Isle in New York where he treated cholera patients. So he was obviously pretty impressive as a surgeon, and he worked his way right up towards the top. But it was here that he began to exhibit signs of paranoia and promiscuous behavior, which, as he grew up in a super religious family, parents were missionaries, so he was very conflicted by, like, all of a sudden having sexual desires.

Right, from missionary to missionary, my God. That's right. Just looks disgusting. Is that where that comes from? I don't know. Yeah, you wouldn't know. Look it up in the Oxford English Dictionary. Let's see if this thing works.

Okay, missionary. Let's see what we got here. A person sent on or engaged in a religious mission abroad or to act as a missionary, do missionary work. So they don't have missionary in there. Should we submit it and get our name in there? Okay, but now look out doggy style.

I found another article because the Oxford online dictionary does have a bit of a paywall as well. Classic. I mean, they spent two centuries on it at this point. You can get to a bit of stuff, but Columbia University writes, in the missionary position, the woman lies on her back. Okay, well, I don't need to know. Though Christian missionaries didn't invent this position, they were inspiration for the name. They were the inspiration for them. Right, okay.

There you go. There you go. Apparently, evidence of the position's existence in art predates the Christian era. Wow. Isn't that like, obviously, that feels like that would have been one. of the first ones, I reckon. Turns out people have been having sex for a while. A little while. That's interesting. Anyways, can you Google when was sex invented?

Back to Fuchs. So, so he's now worked his way up in the army. He's sort of two-I-see as a surgeon. So yeah, he's starting to show these signs of promiscuous behavior. He started carrying a cult 38 and spending the nights with sex workers. Around this time, he contracted a venereal disease and on one occasion he made a failed attempt to cure himself by injecting white wine into his urethro. Oh, that was my impression. But yeah, I'm like, I'm like, that seems pretty like wild. You can't just have a stab of that.

And I'm like, oh no, you studied medicine at Yale. Yeah, that's right. Did it work? No. White wine did not solve the venereal infection. Wet wine spritzer. Interesting. Interesting.

The bubble. Do it. In 1868, he was diagnosed as delusional and was willingly admitted to the government hospital for the insane in Washington, D.C., officially retiring from the US Army. According to Arnav Daschama, after being released, minor immigrated to London, looking for a better climate to help his dementia. I don't know if London's ever been called a better climate before. What are you doing? But an incident there would seal his fate. one of the notorious crime-infested areas in Victorian London was a place called Lambeth Marsh

and this is where he went to live. And here, minor, where he would frequent the red light districts, was haunted by severe paranoia. He believed people were breaking into his home and this culminated one day in minor shooting and killing a man named George Merritt on the 17th of February 1872. minor believe merit to be a thief but he was just a man on his way to work shit he was on his way to just a working class guy working on his way to work in a warehouse oh no that's not that's not good no um he was arrested and later confessed it was a case of

mistaken identity wow uh fuchs continues during the trial the full scope of minor's mental illness came out and he was committed to the asylum for the criminally insane in broadmore so basically found not guilty on the basis of insanity. Miner's life at Broadmoor was very comfortable, though. His status as a surgeon was respected, and he was given two adjacent rooms, one for sleeping and one for him to paint, play the flute and read. Because, man, you wouldn't want to be his next one over, would you? I'm going to keep it down in there.

I love the flute. It's a beautiful instrument. It's a lovely instrument. Because of his pension from the US Army, Miner was allowed to buy steak, wine, brandy newspapers and books for his collection. He even hired other inmates to perform chores for him. It sounds like he was living like a king.

Yeah, he actually sounds like a pretty great life. Aside from the fact he murdered someone. And also, he's still traumat at nights, especially. He has these delusions and visions. Yeah, awful. So Minor felt very remorseful for his crime. And he sought permission to pay his victim's widow restitution, which was accepted. And she appreciated.

She was now a single mother. So he sort of helped pay, like he helped, you know, pay her children's way. Wow. And it even led to her, them kind of striking up a friendship almost. She would visit regularly delivering books to him that he bought, which is quite strange. And in one of these books, minor found a pamphlet written by editor James Murray, Jarm, asking for volunteers to help create the first Oxford English Dictionary. So this is what's such a, this story.

This is, he's one of the key figures, key volunteers. Um, if he didn't murder. Yeah. He wouldn't have ended up here. It's just like this really weird series of events that led to him getting this perfect job for him. Is murder good? Is that what we're thinking? I think so.

I think so. Yes. No. No. I will say. No, he's saying no, I don't think so. I know it is good, yes. I don't think I know.

As Fulkes writes, the doctor set about this task with voracious energy, meticulously copying words and quotations from volumes of books. He started working in tandem with the editor in Oxford, Jarm, writing to him to find out which letter he was working on and then searching through his papers to send him words starting with that letter. Miner and Murray corresponded regularly, say even weekly, and the first time Murray visited Minor at Broadmoor years later, he was shocked to discover that minor was an inmate and not a staff doctor. So he'd been talking to this guy, he's a doctor at an asylum,

assuming he was working, not living there. And the editor and the volunteer met together many times over the years and developed a friendship based on a mutual. mutual love of reading and words. Wow. Two big, bushy bearded man. According to Arnav Das Sharma, Mari noted that without Minas' contribution,

the OED, Oxford English Dictionary, would have had over four centuries of word origins missing from its roster. Many words that Miner rescued came from his eccentric reading choices, including essays about political philosophy, but all sorts of different things. One example, according to know, William DeLong, writing for all that's interesting, was in an essay published in 1608.

Minea found the word colander on page 102, countenance on page 10 and ulcerated on page 12. Wow. Three very handy words that I use nearly every day. Yeah, I wonder what that story was. Over the period of 20 years or more, minor supplied at least 12,000 quotations in his weekly correspondence with Murray. That's amazing.

That's incredible. But despite his impeccable work for the dictionary and Murray's petitions for his release, Miner remained in Broadmoor for decades. He ended up being that he was there for longer than anyone else. According to Fulks, his knightly torments during which he claimed to have uncontrollable sexual desires never abated, and he saw himself as a vile sinner in the eyes of God. And on December 3rd, 1902, when Minor was 68 years old, in an act of penance, he cut off his own D. What?

Yeah, apparently he's sent for a doctor, he's like, hey, can I get some help here? That knife I used to cut out quotes and stuff. I've got up to D. Oh, my God. Wow. Wow. He branded that man, D, cut off his own D. Yeah.

That feels like full circle. Yeah, penance paid. Two years after his self-mutilation, minor became increasingly sick. He was 76 years old when he was. given permission to return to America to live out of the last of his days. So this was years later again. Wow. And apparently that was, there's, you know, different sources, but apparently that was,

he was given that release based on the petition from Murray. And according to Arnav Das Sharma, Winston Churchill was the politician who approved his release. I don't know. I'd take his word for it. I'd trust Arnav Das Sharma with my life. Yeah. Back to Fulks. Marr and his wife went to Broadmoor to say.

say goodbye in person and to give minor six unpublished volumes of the Oxford English Dictionary to take with him. Dr. Minor returned to the government hospital for the insane in Washington, D.C., and during the nine years he lived there, he was diagnosed as having schizophrenia, a term that only came into usage in 1912. In 1919, minor's nephew successfully petitioned to have his uncle moved to a hospital for the elderly insane in Hartford, Connecticut, called the retreat, and less than a year later, minor died of pneumonia. in his sleep. According to DeLong, Miner's innocuous grave in Connecticut simply lists his name followed by birth and death dates. It says nothing of his contributions to the English language.

So yeah, that's the story of Miner, which is a big chunk of what probably makes people interested in this story. Yeah, super interesting. But I'll go back and sort of finish briefly about how the dictionary will continue to be put together because we haven't even, hasn't even been fully published yet. I mean, it has now, I should say, where I'm up to in the story. It's out now. It is out now. It was out this week. At an all good bookshops.

It's crazy. So, Murray hoped it would take about 10 years. When the job was finally completed, it was April of 1928, almost 50 years after Murray took on the challenge, and 71 years after it was initially proposed. Was Murray still alive? Unfortunately, he was not. No. Neither was Bradley. Neither of them are sort of completion.

No. Leading Charlie onions. Charlie onions are still alive now. Charlie onions will live forever in our hearts. Murray died in 1915. Oh, wow. Yeah. So it's a bit sad.

But according to the Oxford English Dictionary, instead of 6,400 pages in four volumes, like I was sort of originally thinking, the dictionary culminated in 10 volumes containing over 250,000 main entries and almost 2 million, quotations. It was published under the imposing name a new English dictionary on historical principles, although it had also come to be known as the Oxford English Dictionary. And with the

second volume, it ended up changing its name officially to Oxford English dictionary. Wow. So it was 10 books. Yeah. Are they charging 70 bucks each? Yeah. Well, no, that was just for the... That was Ada and. Yeah, that wasn't even a volume. That was just a... I forget what was the word? Some word of... Yeah, no, I can't remember. rather. It was a fun word. Yeah, wow.

And I'm glad to have learned it. Yeah, no, so they'd be, so A, the volume one was. Was it facile? Facile, yeah, facel-y, facile. No, it wasn't facile, but it was something like that. Fasical, fascicle. Fasicle. Because it sounded like popsicle.

Anyway, in 1888, A and B was released. That was volume one. Then C was released in 1893's volume two, 1897 D and E. was volume 3, so on, so on. So they were doing it bit by bit, but then were new words coming in there going, fuck, I forgot dinosaur. I feel like an idiot.

Shit. Yeah, well, that's the thing. It never ends. You just can't. And this whole story probably sounds like a bit of a sausage fest. But according to Williams, and Pip Williams' interest in this whole story was about talking a bit about the women who were involved.

in the process as well. She said there were women assistants. Women receptionists. There were women cooks. Women wives. They were women. They were women. They were women.

Let's not forget her contribution. And there are also women volunteers, but she said we don't know much about them. Yeah. According to Kelly Sugg, Williams is frustrated by the lack of recognition for these women. Something exemplified by an event in 1928. That year, a dinner was held in London's Goldsmiths hall to celebrate the completion. of all sections of the dictionary, and it was so auspicious an occasion that the Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin presided over it. It's a quick aside, Baldwin began his toast that night,

saying that if he was lost on a deserted island, he would choose the Oxford English Dictionary for Company because, quote, our history, our novels, our poems, our plays, they are all in this one book. Oh, I mean, I get what you're saying, but it's a boring one. But you get to pick your own story there. You go, all right, how does war and peace start? Okay, it starts with something from page four here. Yep. And I can't remember.

Yeah. Anyway, back to Kelsey. So that night, in attendance were 150 men, including the prime minister. And this was despite some women having worked on the dictionary for as long as 50 years. None of them scored an invite. 50 years. However, William says three women who had contributed invaluable work to the dictionary. including Edith Thompson, Ross Frith Murray, who gave birth to 11,

Morris 5th. And Eleanor Bradley were allowed to sit in the balcony of the hall and watch the men eat. And two of them were just wives of the editors. Yeah. Incredible stuff. But, you know, they were, that would work. And they were allowed to sit in a balcony. Women love to sit in balconies.

And watch people like, how's the steak? Smells good. All right. I'll be quiet. That sounds very nice. The guy who killed people had more rights. Yeah. Anyway, with this in mind, it's probably not a wild leap to think that the book was a little biased towards the male point of view.

And as of the feminists of the podcast. I didn't have vagina in it. Sorry, Jess, I'm making a point here. As the feminist of the podcast, I think it's important, I point that out. Yeah. According to Kelsey Sugg, at the time of the first dictionary, the text available to lexicographers, for instance, technical manuals, professional texts, literature and journalism were mostly written by men. The first dictionary had to be agended text, William says.

The original sources were mostly written by men and people interpreting them were men. The people drafting the definitions were men. They had the power to exclude and they had the power to include. Any comment, Dave? As the misogynist of the pod. That is not true. It is not true at all. I think he doth protest too much.

I love women. I've got one at home. I've got one. Some of my best friends are women. Honestly, Dave. Some of my best friends own women. Sorry, Jess, I was. Honestly, Dave, it is pretty disappointing. I really think you should have stepped up there and said something.

Oh, yawning, a bit boring, is it? Yeah. Me standing up to prejudice. Anyway, once the first edition was completed in 1928, it was time. time to get back to work, despite what some word Nazis think. Language is always evolving, and so a dictionary can never really be finished. As the OED writes, after 50 years of work on the first iteration of the dictionary, the editors must have found this exhausting to contemplate.

Nevertheless, as soon as the original 10 volumes were completed, the remaining two editors, Craigie and onions, for two surviving members, they're kind of the McCartney and Ringo star of the... for lavable lads from Liverpool. So Craig and Onions had to, as soon as it was finished, they had to start compiling a single volume supplement to the dictionary published five years later in 1933. It was like a best of.

Yeah. And then at the same time, the first edition was reissued in 12 volumes and the work was formally given its current title, the Oxford English Dictionary. But yeah, they had to go straight back to work revising, like straight after. It must have been like... Yeah, of course. It's like washing, you know.

doing. I've just finished washing. I've completed washing. No more laundry. Yeah. And then you look down and you realize you're wearing clothes. Yeah. And you're like, fuck, I'm dutying these ones right now. Right now. This is sweaty work. Oh. And then you're interview. They're like, how does it feel to finish? It feels splendid. Hang on. Splendid. Splendid. I fucking forgot splendid. Yeah. It would be just never ending. Since then, 1933, when that supplement was released, many updates and revisions have been published. and since the year 2000, the Oxford English Dictionary has existed online. That's right, the World Wide Web.

And it's always evolving with regular three-month updates being published. Codden to Kelsey Sugg, the Oxford Dictionary, which recognises that the English language is continually evolving, constantly collects new words and new meanings. And words are never removed. They form part of the dictionary's picture of history. It's fascinating to see the trajectory of a word in their life cycle, Pip Williams says Now, I know

Bob, you love it when I bring the story home to Australia Oh my God Well, apparently Get ready to cry I've been to cities What did you start singing? Either the English or American one, I forget But it's one of the real patriotic ones

No, I sing the Qantas song Stirlcum of Australia Look at the Qantas song Never had any laugh before love. So apparently in the modern era One of the big volunteer contributors is a Brisbane art named Chris Collier And according to Haley

He produced 100,000 slips from 1975 to 2010 And among them He got words in like Kit off, as in naked, sea changer, snakey, and petrolhead, which were all accepted by the OED, but they rejected one of his suggestions, Brisbane. Really? Oh, come on. That's, what does snakey mean?

A bit snakey. Oh, mate. Snake-like? I mean, you're the snake-iest guy. I don't know. I feel like, you know, look in a mirror. That's what snakey is. You look like a snake.

I look it up from Oxford language. All neck. Snakey. Like a snake in appearance. Yes. Look at you. But it does, eh? Second definition.

Informal. Australian. Angry. Irritable. What are you snaky about? It's the example of kids. Both of those work for you. You look like a snake and you are always irritable.

What am I snaky about? Not knowing what this fucking means. Blimey. Blimey. Blimey. I hated that. Blimey. Don't ever say blime me again.

Listering to himself, what's going on here? So I thought to finish, I'd take you through some Oxford English Dictionary Words of the Year. A bunch of different dictionaries do this. I thought you were going to go through here. Some of my favourite words. Yeah, and I was like, well, I reckon we could just break for lunch. I love ants so much now. So, you can tell me a year.

It's been gone since 2004, but the most recent one listed here from last year, Goblin Mode. Oh, my God. When was that last year? Last year, Goblin mode. What's Goblin mode? Oh, it's Internet speak.

Yes. Oh, yeah, okay, yeah. You know, people going, getting very hedonistic. I'm going full Goblin mode. Oh, yeah, yeah, okay. 2021 was Vax. 2017, youth quake, which I don't like particularly.

What's a youth quake? I don't think I've ever heard that before. Oh my God. Well, it's because you guys are old. Yeah, we were already old in 2017. It comes from youth and quake. Yes. It's a notable, noticeable shift in society or culture

in response to the activity or taste of younger members of the culture. It's a youth quake. It's the youth's shaking things up. It really does sound like a word that an old person came up with it. Oh, it sounded more to me like something a young person would say, like, we're like, we're like changing the world. Yeah, yeah. Hold on, put on a seatbelt.

A youthquakes coming. It's also the name of a 1980s new wave album by Deader Alive. So that's how cutting edge it was. Wow. It's an 80s word. The first one seems to have been Chav from 2004. But the Australian Macquarie Dictionary also does a word. of the year each year.

And there's been some pretty fun ones, including doom scrolling in 2020. Yep. Milkshake duck in 2017. Sure. But maybe the best one. Muffin top 2006, meaning the little bit of a little bit of stomach

hanging up over your pants. Yeah. That's nice. Yeah, it's nice, isn't it? I like when they're positive. Make you feel good about yourself. Yeah. That's nice.

I think, But some of them I'm like, I've never heard of that. Like, in 2007, it was pod slurping. I don't know what that is and I don't think I want to know. I need to know. What is a pod slurp? It's the act of using a portable data storage device, such as an iPod digital audio player

to elicitly download large quantity of confidential data by directly plugging it into a computer where the data are held and which may be on the inside of a firewall. Oh, yeah, yeah. I remember in 2007, we're all doing that. We're all pod slurial. Was that on Larmwire? It's a different time.

We're all pots like me. Directly from the mainframe of a live wire. Yeah. It's funny because all of them are pretty dull. Stroll out in 2021 based on the government of the days, taking their time putting out the vaccines, I think. The stroll out. Oh, that's right. Yeah.

Slow roll out. Oh, that's funny. That's a bit of fun. Yeah, but they're all very internety words. Council culture, Me Too, Milkshake, Duck. fake news, mansplane. Burkini. Burkini was 2011.

A swimsuit for women where it covers the whole body except for the face. Burkini. 2011, that were big. Beautiful time. Anyway, I thought that would be more fun than it was. No, it was fun.

Miriam Webster's 2007 one was Woot with the zeros for O's. Remember Woot? In 2001. I think I hate the internet. Yeah. I think I've decided I hate the internet. But it's also, it's the internet being filtered through like these really old institutions and dictionaries.

So it's, yeah. It's not a good mix between the two. Yeah. It feels like your grandma's trying to say like, yeat. And you're like, shut up, grandma. It's embarrassing. Yeah. Are the two that Miriam Webster's 2017 words?

of the year was feminism, which I can get one. Their word of the year in 2017? Yeah, because they're normally, aren't they, like, quite an up-to-date word, but that one does feel like, maybe that was... The editor's like, never heard of it. Wow. I might misunderstand what this is about. Anyway, was that an interesting tale?

I mean, it was... I don't think we've done a report like that before. Oh, that was... It's honestly, it's fascinating and it's such an epic task, and I'm amazed that they completed it at all. It's so big. Mm. I found it, yeah.

Yeah, it was really fascinating to read about, but in the telling, I did feel like it maybe could have been told better. No, I think that it had everything. It had murder. Yes. It had intrigue. It had words. What were the other things we were supposed to have? It took them all.

Guy cutting off his own deed. Exactly. And it's funny because we had the murder and the insanity, but we kind of felt for the guy. Mm. You know? And that's rare. Yeah. Amazing.

Yeah, he did contribute to society and tried to write his wrong. Yeah. Amazing. What a story. And I really, at the start, was like, we're going to talk about a dictionary. Okay. The people have voted poorly, but they've proven me wrong once again.

I was shocked that it was the number one. Yeah, it was a great story. And it was number one, like, right off the bat. And it just held the lead by a big margin the whole way through. I mean, it's obviously an interesting story. Dozens of people seem to have written books about it. Yeah, that's right. A pivotal part of these movies as well.

There's a nerds. Yeah. There's movies. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, there's a movie. Marvel's doing it. Word boy.

About the relationship between minor and, um, and, uh, charm. Oh, that's, that's interesting. Yeah. Played by two bearded men. Whoa. Wow. Okay. I believe it.

Yeah. It's come out? It's already been released. Yeah. What was it called? There's something in the madman. Just very, um, it's funny to use the word madman. The professor and the madman?

Yes, that's right. 2019, two very famous actors. Who is it? We've got Sean Lowe. Sean Penn. Oh. And. Jude Law.

Give you a clue. Our very own. Hugh Jackman. Older. Older. Sam Neal. John Farmer. Slightly younger.

Younger than Sam Neal, older than Hugh Jackman. Oh. Nicole Kidman? No. Older. It's going to be a bearded man. A bearded man. Controversial.

Hugo weaving. Oh, controversial. Controversial. Mel. It's Ralph. M. Roll Farris Controversial is such a funny way to describe

Oh yeah Mel's very controversial Actually both of those guys are a bit controversial aren't they Do we still claim Mel Gibson No I don't think we do anymore Well he also He wasn't born a year Yeah not technically I think

But he's Australian in the movie Gallipoli Yeah And we claimed him for that And Mad Max But I'm not sure who's who It looks like James Murray is Mel Gibson And Sean Penn is Dr. Minor

There you go interesting. So it's 2019. I would have gone the other way and I would have made Mel go method and cut his dick off. Budget 25 million. Whoa. 5.1 million.

Didn't do so well at the box office. David did very poorly indeed. Well, there you go. Deserve better. Matt, fantastic report. Great work. Excellent. So proud of you.

Love that. A number one blocktastic topic. There it is. Honestly, this is the happiest but also saddest time of you because we've crowned the champion, but now it's the longest time between the next block. But since we brought in November, it's only ever 10 months away. You're right. And at least, you know, we finish November and then it's nearly Christmas.

Yes, it's a lot. We'll have a Christmas episode out in a few weeks. Absolutely, we will. Which is very exciting. So excited about Christmas. And then we go on like a summer holiday. The pod doesn't, but we do. Yeah.

So I'm stoked, actually. This is, I love this time of year. Beautiful time of year. Every spring all the way through to summer. and then I also love autumn, which is comedy festival. It's really in the winter. And then winter is footy season. You love all times of year.

How good is it to be a lot? I think Melbourne's great because it's got the seasons. And I don't think other cities have them. They don't have them. Traveling around, it was interesting to find that other people thought they also had seasons. Oh, that's so cute. And I thought it was cute. And they had like coffee as well.

Just let them believe it. Did they have art and culture? Yeah, well, they said they did. Oh, it's so cute. I bet they didn't have laneways. Man, I had a lot of good coffee in America. What? Yeah.

It was, I'm like, guys, you can't do good coffee. We've been telling ourselves for years that we're the only ones who have good coffee. You famously don't do good coffee. Although they were, usually did reference Melbourne on the menus. Oh, interesting. Made me sing, A beautiful cities that never close down from New York. I'm going to roll

An old London town That's beautiful Bada Bada You're going higher I'll go higher Oh I'm all

Australia Are we still recording What are we doing? To some reason yes I can't remember I just like came to And I feel like I don't know

I don't remember the last few minutes What have we been doing What we've been doing is making a lot of work for AJ. Yeah, sorry, AJ. Well, I think that brings us to everyone's favorite section of the show. And I've been missing this. Oh, Matt, we have been missing you, to be honest.

It's been too much talking for me. It's been very overwhelming. I've had to introduce the jingle, do the jingle. You know, it's been a lot. So I'm so happy you're back. Well, it's so good to be back. So this is the part of the show where we thank our fantastic Patreon supporters. If you want to get involved in this,

you can sign up at patreon.com. do go on pod. All these fantastic supporters. They're the people who keep this show going, as well as, you know, all of you listeners. If I'm being frank, and I would like to be, all of you listening, if it wasn't for you. Exactly.

Maddie. Maddie. No, I'm sorry. But if it wasn't for them, this show wouldn't exist. Or at least it would be more of philosophical question. Like, if no one's listening, does a podcast exist? Mate, there's plenty of bloody podcasts out there that nobody's listening to, mate, let me tell you.

Not this one. Heaps of people listening. Heaps of people. Because if no one's listening to this, no one will know that we said it and it won't even matter. Exactly. It was a perfect crime. Oh, no, we're spiraling.

And, yeah, anyway, people who support us on Patreon. Where have you gone? Where'd you go? People who support us on patreon.com slash digorn pod, there's a bunch of different levels. You can choose a level. Different monetary levels. Yes.

You get different things for the different levels. What are some of the things, Jess? You can get access to three bonus episodes a month. You get to vote on topics. You get early access to tickets to live shows and various events that we do. And you can also join the Facebook group, which is the nicest corner of the internet. So lovely in there. So nice.

It's the nicest place. I agree. I think it keeps us all on Facebook. It 100% is on the original. Oh, it's so. I would be gone from Facebook and a heart. You are welcome, Zuckerberg. And, yeah, so all those things.

One of the other ones that just may not have mentioned, I zoned out, is the Sydney Schoenberg level. If you sign up on that level, you get to give us a fact, a quarter of a question. In a section of the show, we like to call, that quite a question. Oh, my God. I've been on for two weeks and you think you can speak for me. I'm so sorry. How dare you step on my toes?

It'll never happen again. Do you want me to do it this week? No, no, Jess, I think this section actually has a jingle, doesn't it? Fact. No, but then he still has to say. There's another line he has to say. It goes something like this. Fact quote or question.

Ding. He always remembers the ding. Hmm. She always remembers the sing. And this spot. He always remembers the bring. He brings a cheese putter to work every day. Every day.

My God. Gooda. And I say, stop. It's clogging me up. But I can't say no. So in this section, I'll read out four facts, quotes or questions. rags or suggestions or really whatever they like from four different supporters. They each get to give us their name, a title, and then the fact of the quote of question.

It can be anything. It's so exciting. First up this week, it comes from, and I don't read them out, so I read them out. So sometimes I'm as shocked as you are. First one this week comes from a man named Nathan needs a username. Okay. And Nathan needs a beautiful surname. Nathan needs a username.

has the title of Steve. Okay. I think that's a good username, no. I'm not sure what to call you. Anyway, Nathan or Steve is off in your back. If it was in the credits of a movie, it would be Nathan, and then in quotation marks, Steve needs a username. Yeah.

Nathan, Steve needs a unit. You know what I mean? Like the Rock Johnson. Dwayne the Rock Johnson, yes. Dwayne the Steve Johnson. Yeah. Anyway, Dwayne the Steve Johnson. A few weeks ago, as of writing, Matt made a cameo for me to congratulate my friend Josh on his recent engagement.

Since then, possibly thanks to Matt, Josh has asked me to be one of his groomsmen. That's so good beforehand. Never considered him. Beforehand, he didn't know me. But did you just organise a guy to do a video? Well, then, you're in. You're in the inner circle now. You're the kind of guy that could organise a buck party for me.

He says, he asked me. while we were waiting outside of Aunty Donner's show in Glasgow, which was a real nice touch. So this is my brag that I get to be involved in the wedding of two of the coolest people I know, and a thank you to Matt for helping convince them that I was cool enough.

Also, I guess I forgive you for writing, Nathan, fuck you when you signed my poster when we met you and Dave last year in Glasgow. Well, I appreciate you finally finding it in your heart to forgive me. Yeah, I think I wrote a nice message to trying to counteract. Why would I have written that? That must have been part of a bit we were doing there.

You were trying to offend everyone. Oh, did I do it? You're a bad boy. We all know that. Yeah. Well, hey. It makes sense. It tracks.

Nathan. I'm going to say this. And this is from the heart. Yeah. Fuck you. No, congratulations. That's so nice. We hope you have a lovely time inside the wedding party.

It's a beautiful place to be. Do you think there's a chance that if we give another shout out, congratulations to Josh on the pod. We'll get bumped up to the best man. And then one more, bumped up to groom. That's right. Josh's partner's like... Let's keep shouting him out every week until he is the bride, groom, celebrant.

Yeah, what's the highest? It's celebrating. Celebrant. Is that the highest it goes? Probably. Yeah. The Archbishop of Canterbury. I think eventually you become Governor General of Australia.

I think so. All right. Thank you very much. Nathan needs a username. And congratulations, Josh. So I'm trying to say. You're right? Congratulations, Josh.

And congratulations Josh. That's the sound of a best man. Yeah, Dave was drowning. been a best man? I've never been a best man. Have you been a groomsman? I have been a groomsman for my dear friend Jace. Ah, Jace.

What a man, Jake. Love Jace. We're in the company of a professional best man. Oh, yeah. Matt Stewart. He's had the tap many a time. The next one this week comes from a Lauren, aka, hang on, Matt's future wife.

Wow. Wow. This is how we find out. This is how we find out. Can I be the best man? Ah, sure. Yes. Finally.

Finally. I should have got in. I should have got in faster. Let's see how Lauren explains this. I don't want Matt's a very common name. True. Hey again, bestest podcasters ever. Hello. Jeez.

Laine on a bit thick, man. I love that from you, Lauren. Love that from you. We're already betrothed. You don't have to suck up. You can be real with us, all of us. Show us your real sound. Yeah.

Be vulnerable. I was formerly known as the professional. cat patter and annoyererer. But as you can see, my title has changed. In one of the podcasts I listened to recently, Matt said he'd be accepting any proposals he gets. So my question is, Matt, will you marry me? Wow.

Love putting it on the spot, too. But you have said it on the record, apparently. Even though none of us remember you saying that. I don't remember what we talked about on this episode. We talked about... Dosh, gosh, dot. If I've said it on a podcast, is that legally binding? I think so.

Okay, well, I do. A thousand times yes. Wait, Matt, I think we can, I think that's lovely that you're willing to just, you know, honour that contract, but I think we could get some stuff out of it. So I think, I think your first question should be, where's the ring? Okay. Yeah, good stuff. Show me that ring. Show me the ring.

What kind of carrot we talk in? I don't mean no thing if it ain't got that ring. Exactly right. Is that a thing? It's at this stage, it's an empty proposal because as we all know, love is about jewels. Yes. And we want a dowry. Yes, we would like a dowry.

Huge dowry, please. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Obviously, once he's married, you won't have any time for us anymore. Yeah, that's what happens when you get married. Yeah. What would be in a dairy? Doury's normally cows, isn't it? We'd accept goats as well.

Goat or land, we'll take land. We'll take land. Or land dowry. Yeah. I would take a small parcel of land and cash as well, but I would like it in a hession bag. So if we have cows and land, that's like a farm. So not a dowry, we're on a dairy. Yes, we will accept a dairy for Matt Stewart.

We want a dairy, dairy, dairy, dairy, dairy. Dairy Dairy, please. Hey, Matt, congrats. Thank you so much. Anyway, my future wife goes on. Y'all seem curious about my job doing coal testing. Basically, I work in a big, hot, dirty shed throwing coal around. Ooh, I wonder if that's the scriptorium.

Sounds beautiful. That's kind of what they did. They didn't throw coal around. They threw words around. But coal is a word. Oh, my God. Yeah, he was in the mines all day. Can't believe that?

Well, he was minor. It was one of the guys riding. to him. This is all making so much sense. It's all tying back together. This is working out a little too well if you ask me. So she finds the best quality coal so the big drills at the mine site know where to drill for more coal.

We also test for moisture content so they can safely load coal onto ships. That's the simplified version and not everything that we do, but I hope it gets the point across. Thank you. It does. Also, the coal does not taste good, Dave. It's so funny, thinking the things we must have said to get. Because it's all sounding absolutely bat shit. So you're like, okay, I'm assuming we recorded this one late at night or when we're

hungry. Eating cold? Yeah, I stand by it. I reckon it would taste great and you're just trying to... Why would coal taste good? You're trying to keep us away from a beautiful taste. Oh, yes. Lauren says that cold dust often gets in my mouth and nose and it is naste hay.

Or I don't know how that, maybe that was going to end by saying nustaste hay. Yeah, yeah. It's a fine line between Nast Tay and Nast Tastee. Agreed. One of those things where you taste it and you go, I don't know if I like that and you keep going back for more. Yeah, yeah, yeah. One of those. Begem-a-law.

You're like, oh, I can't stop eating it, but I don't, it's not good, but I love it. It's hard work, but decent pay, which means I was able to purchase my own four-bedroom two-bathroom home when I was 24. Got you with a brag too, boobies. Oh, my God. Matt, you're marrying into wealth. Yeah. That's fantastic. I'm okay with this, Matt.

Can we come live with you? Four bedrooms. Yeah, that's one for each. Yeah. And a spare. Wait, no, I'd assume Lauren's living there too. Yeah, but you're married, so you're sharing with Lauren. Oh, okay.

So, yeah, married people have to share a room. How is that fair? Dave definitely doesn't do that. I'll be on the master suite. Anyway, I love you, Matt, Jess and Dave. Please say it back. I'm so alone and stuff for affection. I live by myself with my three cats.

Oh, that's two second up the other rooms. So the problem is you buy a massive house. And then, you know, if it's just you and your cats, there's a lot of room. You know, maybe that feels overwhelming. We should move in, absolutely. Agreed. Yeah, okay. The cats have to go, though.

But did you hear, Lauren asked for us to say, I love you back and you? Yeah. I've never said this before to anyone. That was a really. Because it's a psycho thing to say. I love your back. I love you back. Okay.

Okay. Thank you so much, Lauren. Next one comes from. No one else like I go. No. Oh no, well, yours is implied. Yeah. I mean, you don't agree to marry someone unless you're pretty head over heels in love with them.

Head over heels in love with their full bedroom two bathroom house. Yeah, I'm picturing like someone just caked in cold dust. Yeah. Cat fur, sticking. to it. Beautiful. A little chicken woman. I want what's going on.

Anyways. Next one comes from Patrick J. Early. Okay, CEO of making the radio static noise from the old planet broadcasting sting as soon as the theme music ends at the end of every episode.

Remember that? What? Was it more? Yeah, it's more of that. It was spelled CKK. Oh. Okay. Sorry, I lose my mind over there.

And can I just say, congratulations, Josh. At this stage, we have, you've said it enough times that Nathan is bride now, which is huge. That's second from the top, one away from Governor General, Austria. So Patrick is offering a brag, very braggy week in the fact quote of question bag. Writing, hey team, apologies in advance for how much I wrote. there's just so much to say. A few years ago, my girlfriend at the time introduced me to do go on with the DB Cooper episode. I never listened to a podcast before and I didn't think they were my sort of thing.

I was wrong. I'm happy to admit that now. But I wasn't an immediate convert. In January of 2003, skimming head, I started listening from episode one and after being confused by Jess's hatred of accountants in the DB Cooper episode. What's confusing about it? I've listened exclusively chronologically, with the exception of joining the 400th episode live stream so that I could make sure I got all the injokes along the way.

Wow. At the time of writing this, I'm up to episode 406. Jeez, you're getting close. Wait, it started in January of this year. That's amazing. Hey, by the way, talking about... That doesn't... What?

It was 2023. It wasn't January this year. Oh. But that's more than one a day. That's hectic. Are you really taking it in? I think you should go back and start again. That's way more.

Is it not? Yeah. Yeah, because it's over 400 episodes in 10 months, isn't it? That's crazy! In a good way. I'm saying this in a, you know, I'm impressed. Hey, Jess, you didn't flinch before, I guess because we weren't recording, because you hate accountants, but there's a shoot going on downstairs and they've built

a whole submarine set down there. We were just told. How do you feel about that? It's what I said. Submarine. Submarine. That's what I heard. I hear submarine too

I'm going to have to I'm going to have to do some damage You're going to shit in the set I'm going to do a lot more than shit in the set I just think they're silly I don't hate them I think they're silly

I imagine it's a comedy thing they're probably making fun of them too Because they're silly Yeah up periscopes It actually makes heaps of sense To be filming comedy sketches About the silliest thing So yeah no no that's fine

I won't shit in it yet Unless I learn it's an homage to submarines and then I will be defecating. Patrick continues, I'm an independent Aussie musician and my brag is that also at the time of writing this I recently released a new EP. I thought I'd use some of my limited advertising budget to finally support my favourite podcasts, as well as share my excitement about the new EP with the wonderful listeners. I make pop rock music under the name Pearl Lee and the EP is called It's Real Now It Has a Name There are songs about mental health, love,

Breakups and Self-Relection I also sent you guys a do-go-on jingle that I wrote a few months ago originally to the main email and then recently to this special jingle email you set up after I got up to that episode By the time you're reading this, maybe you've already played it on the show.

I want to say thank you to the three for the hundreds of hours of entertainment and for making me scream with laughter Dave's character work. Shout out to the sheriff from Roswell. Matt's thousand noises. Shout out to the gun sounds from the Eureka Stockade and Jess's uncontrollable laughter

at dog ship riffs and terrible jokes. Shout out too well. Really, I just make other people look good. Every single episode. That's what I contribute. I mean, you're not laughing at your own terrible jokes. You're laughing at our hour, so that's bad for all the weeks are terrible.

My skill is doing bad sound effects. At least you're doing something. I think laughing is doing a lot, Jess. Wow. And you're also very funny too. I disagree with what Patrick's saying. I think you're out of value. You guys said I've gotten funnier since I got hit by a car.

Well, they've said that. I've just jumped on on the riff. So you don't think so. I thought you've always been very funny. No, I always thought you were very funny. The bar was very high. And so were the handlepost. Patrick finishes by saying you're absolute legends and you bring a lot of joy to so many people.

Should I? And so far, I've once again, of course, forgotten that I started a new email address. Yeah, we've checked it once, I believe. Can you chuck us the ox? Are we? Yeah, I was just thinking of the same thing. Pearl, let's play him. Let's play a bit of Pearl Lee. Look at some Pearl Lee. Because people are going. How's Lee spelled? It's Eld. I've looked at it. Pearl Lee is on Spotify. So two words, Pearl and then Lee is L.A. Great. Great photo. Standing in the forest with your guitar case. Love this. Oh, beautiful. Isn't that a lovely shot?

A verified artist. Can you believe it? All right. So, are you ready? You all ready for this? Ready. All right, here we go. This is Pearl Lee's jingle.

None of us have heard this before. Oh, actually, is the auxiliary thing on? Oh, no. Yeah, you probably have to turn that on as well. Probably. Fucking hell. Dave. Watch me for the changes.

The good news is it was already on. That is good news. All right, you ready? He's wasted everyone's time. I'm ready. listeners suggest they prepare a report for the other two who were in the dark on what they're going to listen to it starts with a question to get on track and once you do go on there's no going back yes a nice finish there yeah that was awesome that's fantastic work that's so much belie

thank you so much um no notes loved it that's great and thanks for the reminder that that is that because it looks like there's a couple others in here. Great. And what's the email of people? Did want to send us to a jingle. It is. Isn't it do jingle on? It is do jingle on at gmail.com.

Fantastic. So please. If any musos out there want to get involved. Oh my God, it's in my head now. Do go. Would it be a bit cringy for us to go around singing? Singing the theme? I think yes.

Okay. Just double checking. Thank you so much for that, Patrick. And finally this week, we've got C.J. Tour. Tour. And I'm not fully sure if that's how he say his name, but I met him in Chicago, actually saw his show at the I.O. Theatre. He's an improviser.

Cool. Ten years this show's been running Friday nights every week at I.O. No, at annoyance, sorry, was. Can you hear that? Sorry, I was just gulping away. Oh, sorry, could you hear that? Sorry. Have it a bit of trick

Do you want me to interview Dry over here? Oh sorry I'm just having a... Sorry, is that? I'm just having a trick. I just have to cheers to congratulations, Josh. And I just had to watch it down with some liquid.

Dave set up a little woodworking station in the corner of a circular sore air. Oh, sorry, is that... Sorry, is that interrupting you guys? Bang, bang, bang, bang. Sorry, is that... If we... Sorry.

I'm not going back to the tape And the hero people could actually hear it. I don't think people heard anything, but we did. Goog, goag, go on. I didn't mean to say, CJ, 10 years of the I.O. Sorry, and annoyance. Annoyance. But he does shows that I.O.

Speaking off. Glock, gog, go, gaw. Well, he might even be mentioning it here. But, yeah, CJ, lovely man. And it was fun hanging out with him and a bunch of other patron supporters in Chicago. CJ's giving himself the title of a mysterious benefactor from the States. I love that. serious benefactor.

I'll drink to that. And he's given us a fact writing, Hello, Matt was kind enough to, oh, here we go, he's going to explain it. Matt was kind enough to attend our show

while visiting the windy city. So I thought I would repay his kindness by upgrading my membership because I refused to let him hold any debts over me. Fair. Do you hear me, old man?

Our ledger is clean. That's awesome. Fact. To balance things even further, my fact will be one that honors Dave and Jess. Oh, finally. You did an episode with Joel and Cass from Sans Pants about the 1908 New York to Paris Motor Race.

But did you know, they made a farcical film about this event called The Great Race, which starred former Jess Topic Natalie Wood and brackets, listen up, Dave. Close brackets, I'm loving the sass that's dripping off this. What? Well, no, just saying, listen up. Are you paying attention? And it's funny, he didn't even know that you're going to be distracted by a water bottle. Gug, gook, go, go, go. And listen up, Dave, that film ends with the largest pie fight in the history of cinema.

Yes, I've seen that movie and it does. Really? Yeah, I think we had it on a tape or some point. It's, it might be... Did you realise that was Natalie Wood? No, I didn't realize that. It might be Jack Lemon. He's in it too.

The Great Race, right? Yeah. Yeah, I've seen it. Dave, is that to you? It is Jack Lemon. Tony Curtis. Natalie Wood. I have found it on YouTube.

It's called the video's called The Great Race, dash detail, dash lull, in brackets, best pie flinging in a movie forever. How do you feel about a pie fight, Dave? Does feel wasteful of pie. Wasteful of pie. And Dave, what would you say the Great Racist? So, Jack Lemon plays a really good villain in that. It's really funny.

Jack Lemmon's, what a legend. It's really good. Apparently the scene took five days to shoot and featured over 4,000 pies. Wow, I'm just watching some highlights of it now. It looks awesome. It looks like it would have been fun to... Probably you reckon fun for the first day. Yeah.

Tadious for days two to five. And just as the... I'm guessing cream pies. Whether it's minced meat or cream, whatever it is, isn't going to feel good. It's all dessert pies, custard, raspberry sort of stuff. But in cinema, that would just be... It would be shaving cream and stuff, isn't it? Yeah, yeah.

You've got to tie some cats together. Cream doesn't look like cream on the screen. CJ, finished it by saying, thank you all for your wonderful. program. I hope Matt shared the fact that your soothing voices kept me sane during quarantine when I was up late at night with a newborn. I didn't share that with you, but I'll share that with you now. Share what? Well, CJ found our voice is very soothing while he was up with his newborn recently. Oh, that's so nice. You three may be the reason my Chicago baby has a thick Australian accent. Good. And thank you, Matt, for reading this fairly long letter. I owe you one. Oh, oh no. Oh, I'm not to

just got up to the bit where Peter Fork, aka Colombo, just copps a bunch of pies to the face. Holy shit. What a film. I mean, I haven't seen it for easily 20 years, but it was enjoyable at the time. It's a bit of, Jack Levin's got a bit of the pantomime kind of vibe about it. It's fun. Good stuff. If anyone's in Chicago or heading to Chicago, I'm looking for a show to see on a Friday night.

At an annoyance theatre, it's called Hitch Cocktails. Oh, that's good. So it's the night we were there. They asked for, you know, a weird fear. and someone said revolving doors and it set up this whole it was fantastic a show

and CJ was the doorman at this revolving doors dormant that's good and I mean I'm really selling it you know like all these things you have to be there but the other thing is if you're ever offered

insane a drink or the liquid you have to drink the alcohol so they're all Oh I'll be drinking the liquid yeah Oh sorry Can you hear that? They're all getting...

Glock, gawg, go, gaw! They get, like, yeah, the fact that they're able to pull it all together while getting increasingly intoxicated at the same time. And it's a great title, too. Yeah. It's a kind of thing, surely. It starts with the title. Yeah, we work together back.

And then suddenly you've been doing the show for 10 years. Thank you so much to C.J. Patrick, Lauren, and Nathan. The next thing we like to do is thank a few of our other great supporters. Jess, you can only come up with a game based on their topic in hand. Yes. So I've gone to the Oxford English Dictionary.com. And I have got a bunch of recently added and recently updated words. And I'm going to give them all a word. Fantastic.

Wow. I love that. Do you love it? This is actually really good. I love that almost as much as I love water. We've already changed your name once in the group chat today, but I think glug might be the new one. What was my new name again? Dick.

Dick Trench. Come on. I have to leave it. Dik, Glug trench. Yes, I'm doing it right now. Thank you. Dick Glug trench. Can I kick us off?

What's wrong with us? I don't know. It's hot in here. That's what it is. We haven't not been in the same room for a month or something. Yeah. Here's... It's pheromones.

It'd be more than a month. It's pheromones. I reckon before I left, you were being hit by a car. It was keeping me busy. Do you remember, though, when I got hit by a car and I was messaging you from the hospital, like, I reckon I could maybe do the podcast tomorrow, but maybe see if somebody's free. And you guys were having another message without me going, She's not going to be doing the podcast.

I think she should have the day off. Because I got hit by a car. Yeah. But it worked out for the best because you're so funny now. I'm really funny now. It was a real upgrade. If I can kick us off, I'd love to thank from Seattle, the Emerald City in Washington in the United States.

It's Mark Smith. Not the singer from the fall. Wow. Could it be? Probably. Maybe. Let me give you an option. Do you want from recently added or recently updated?

Added. added. Okay. Updated. No, no, no, no, no. I have one. I haven't. Got away.

Ooh, got away. Got away. Got away. Got away. Got away. Got away. And it's in the language of immigration law enforcement, a person who has entered the United States illegally and has not been apprehended by customs. They got away.

They're a gotaway. The number of actual gotaways is derived in the following. I mean, it's a US slang. It is a noun. Because, yeah, you've got away. You got away. Yeah. I love it.

I love language. Beautiful. Thank you so much to Mark E. Smith. I've added the E. Mark got away Smith. Mark gotaway Smith. Yeah, these workers are good nicknames, I think.

Next up from Emberra in Great Britain in Scotland. It's Becker Waring or Waring. More like Becca Treasure Trail. Cool. Talk me through it. a noun, a literal or figurative trail which leads to treasure, wealth or other gain. Specifically, a game in which players follow a trail of clues to find a hidden prize. And it's called treasure trail.

Treasure trail. That's a new word. That's brand new. Bloody hell. Recently added. And finally for me, I'd love to thank, from Amherst in MA, probably Massachusetts, I think. We always stumble on this one. In the United States, it's Jacqueline Kang.

Jacqueline, hydro fracking Kang That's a great thing, Boil, girl Hydro fracking King. Go's well with Kang. Cang, Hydrofrecking Kang. Hydrofucking Kang.

It sounds like you're saying hide your freaking kang. Yeah, could you hide your fucking kang? The parents are coming home. Hide your fracking kang, quick. The principal's coming. It's natural. Everyone's got one.

Dave's refusing the hardest fracking can. It's natural. It's natural. No, I won't. I won't be ashamed of my fracking Kang. Jess, do you want to thank a few? Or Dave, no, Dave, what don't you? Because Jess is doing the whole hard work here.

Jess is on the OED. I'll read out some names. Thank you so much from Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania. Did you get there? I didn't, but that's on the Golden Mile. When we do our tour, obviously, I'm going to go all the way down that golden mile. When we do our CJ tour. Yeah.

When we are, yeah, the Golden Mile all the way from. there to Vermont Just keep it going Well no it starts in Gary Through Ohio To do Vermont Pittsburgh Chuck a Ui

Not a Ui Chuck a lefty Oh no From Pittsburgh It's Adam Dashner Big exciting one for Adam Because Adam actually gets The word of the day

Whoa Another noun Cringle cringle Is that one word Cringle crangle cringle Cringle cringle It's hyphenated It's hyphencangle

It's an English regional, northern, a zigzag, a mass of twists and turns. It's a real cringle-crangle. Adam, cringle-crangle, dashed. That happened when Debbie Kringle married, Gary Krangle.

Yeah, and she's independent. Yeah, so their kids were a bit of a mess. And they were from the north. A real twist and turn kind of kid, you know? I'd also like to think from Bruenfield in, this is Broome Field for Colorado, Tim Conley. Volgate.

Volgate, Tim, Vulgate Conley. Vulgate, of course, is an adjective and a noun. Widely known or familiar. Widespread or popular. Wow, he's pretty vulgate. Oh, Gouldgate. Don't be so vulgate. Don't be so widespread or popular.

Yeah, it sounds like an adult-only toothpaste. Volgate. Yeah, like it's vulgar. Vulgate. I thought you were going to say, like, toothpaste for your vad. I was like, I don't think you should be put in toothpaste. I imagine that's, now that you've said that's probably what everyone was thinking I meant. But what I was thinking was...

Like vulva, Colgate. Yeah. Yeah, that's... Wow. Again, I cannot stress enough, do not put toothpaste there. And, Jess, of course, vulvas, that's MA. For mature audiences only. Children shouldn't...

They shouldn't know about that. ...know about that sort of stuff. I would like to thank from Officer here in Victoria. It's Ash Bar. Bond made. Bond made. Is that anything to do with James? You know, I'm pretty...

It's not a good one. A woman or girl who is held in slavery or is otherwise obliged to work without payment. Okay. It's not a good one. You know what? I'm sure that Bond made is... Bond made was one of the words that went missing from the original dictionary. And, you know, Pip Williams.

Yeah, she talks about that's one of the words that's found by her... She's got a character called Esme who's working in the descriptorium and finds the word bond made. Oh, wow. And then creates this. And that's, yeah, I haven't read the book. That's very cool. I've got to download it on to listen to. What are the chances?

Because that's just on recently updated on the website. Amazing. Wow. They finally got it in there after 100 something years. Probably maybe even, yeah, more than 100 years. Wow. I don't know. I can't do the sums.

Who knows? Can't be known. Do you want me to keep going with names if you've got nothing? No, I'm going to, I'm going to jump back in here. here, Dave, and thank from Richmond in Virginia. Oh. Ashley Botkin. Flirty.

Oh, yeah. Flirty is me? Like T-D-E. Oh. So a person who is flirted with by another, like the flirted or the flirtee. Isn't that nice? The flirtee. Dave, do you want to do one?

Flirting. No, no, be flirted with by me. Yeah, okay. Oh, I don't know how to flirt. That's the thing. I'm pretending I don't, but I'm flirting. I wouldn't even know how to flirt. Compliment his arms.

I'd love to, oh man, I would love to flirt with you, but I don't even know how to. See, I am flirting. I don't think you are. I wouldn't even know how to, but if I would flirt with anyone, it would be with you, Dave. I would compliment his arms. That's what I said for you to do. No, I can't lie through a flirt. I can't lie through a flirt.

You could say that, you could say, wow, they're so bony. Oh, wow, look at those arms. everybody quick look at his own is it always customary for the flirty to feel so uncomfortable yes yes i think that is part of us success success uh should i kick on this oh my god this person is from address unknown currently assume from deep within the fortress of the moles it's armad katana and the word is nup nup nup to the cup it's colloquial although originally US, now chiefly Australian and New Zealand. And it just means no.

Nap. That's interesting. Because I don't say nup. I say like nah. Nah. Nah. Like an NA kind of. I reckon.

And then NAH is nah. But normally it's just nah. Nah. God we're a beautiful culture. I don't know. Nah. Well, it sounds like we've borrowed this. Like we borrowed most things from America.

Hmm. Online. You can have a back if you need it. America. I think it's really just because it rhymed to Melbourne Cup that it's got a big fluff. People love to say that. I missed all of that.

Yeah. Were people nuffin much this year? I didn't see a lot about the cup at all. Right. Yeah, me either really. Which is nice. Didn't watch it, don't know who won? No.

I reckon a horse would have almost definitely won it. Well, you're going to have to fact check that because I didn't watch it. I will not make a claim if I haven't seen it. That's fair. Personally, I was great to get away from it. I find all this. sort of gambling uncouth, so I went to Vegas. And finally, I'd love to thank from Manteca in California, Eric with the Spice Eric.

Oh, another noun, domestic god. Oh, my God. Recently added, a god who presides over a household, or more generally, the home, a representation of such a god. There you go. There you go. They will just let anything in now. Yeah, they will.

That's lovely. Because it feels like the two words are already there. But even phrases almost. Yep. That's not a phrase. G string's recently been updated as well. So that's good, isn't it? Finally saying that it's on the guitar.

Well, it changes it up to the H string now. Heyo! Thank you so much. H is after G. To Eric, Ahmed, Ashley, Ash, Tim, Adam, Jacqueline, Becker and Mark. And the last thing we need to do is welcome a few people into the Triptitch Club. I mean, is there any better episode to be into the Trip Ditch Club? club than on the final episode of block for the year.

Yeah, about a dictionary. Oh my gosh. Big. Huge. Dave, do you want to quickly explain how this works? Basically, the Triptage Club. This is our celebration, our commemoration of people that have supported the show on the shoutout level or above for three consecutive years.

They've never dropped off. They've stayed true. And to stay true to them, we welcome them into our clubhouse, our theatre of the mind, sort of revolving restaurant slash lounge slash snooker hall, whatever you want it to be. in there. Jess is behind the bar. She's got some cocktails and foods. I book a band and we welcome you in.

We hype you up and just have a great time in there. As you're explaining it, I'm like, you two really do all the work here. Normally, I'm just sort of explaining it and I'm dishing that bit off as well now. So I think I've got this fucking nut-ed. Nutted. Jess, what do you got there behind the bar? You normally got something, a bit of a drink? You know what I've got this week, actually, is just I've just got a like a

martini glass and it's got like a it's got a salt rim and then inside is just melted butter. Oh yeah. Salty butter. That's awesome. We're talking about how it's crazy because it's yum. That sounds like a yum cocktail. We're talking about how yum butter is. Salted butter.

Salted butter. A knob. I always have a knob. Talk about, you know, going to a wedding or any of those sort of kind of formally kind of things where you get little butter things. Yeah. Nubs of butter. I'm like, I don't know if people have them normally at home, but.

But like they're the only times I associate them with. You know, you're sitting at a round table. There's napkins and everything. Yep. Which is what I call the Cambridge Dictionary. And yeah, you got those just little nubs of butter with a bit of salt. You put them on those little bread rolls. Yeah, it's never enough butter though, is it?

No, or bread rolls. Yes. And then they insist on bringing you other kinds of food. Fuck it off. Fuck off. Bring me more of this butter. More butter. More butter.

It's yum. So that's what I've got unlimited butter. That's fantastic. And Dave? A band. And you're never going to believe it. Obviously, I've been in talks with this band for many months to get them here because they headline festivals all around the world and specifically playing in full their

debut album, which of course includes the hit single, Oxford, comma, vampire weekend a year. We've got Vampire Weekend! Yes. In the 15-year celebration of their first album. Wow. How about that? Huge. How about that?

How about that? How about that? I'm flabbergasted. Anyway, I'm on the door. I've got a list of names. I'm going to be brooding them out. I want to be brooding them out. And Dave, he's going to be hyping them up.

Jess is hopping up Dave. Dave will hype you up in the form of some weak wordplay. And everyone who's already inside the room will be clapping along. All right. So we pumped if you hear your name, run on in. Here we go. First up from Terrace in British Columbia. Canada, it's Mark when.

They're hitting the mark, it's Mark when. Oh, when will they come on in? Now it's Mark when. Yes. From Melbourne here in Australia, it's Max Massingham. The knight just hit Maximum Massingham. Oh, that's a great name. From, they don't stop from address unknown can only shoot from deep within the

fortress of the moles. It's Dora buckle. Buckle in and feel the Dora. Yeah, don't feel the Dora. What, like, strap in and fill the jeans, that kind of thing. It was a play on John Farnham's old guitarist. fill buckle, fill the buckle. Gotcha.

Is that what you're doing? Yes, I'm a big fan of John Pharnam's guitarists. Know them all by name. Also from the Southern Suns. And... Big fan. From... I sold him in a heating system back in the day.

I do like that story. Preston here in Melbourne, it's Edward Gunning. I've been Gunning for an Edward and now I'm filling fine. From Greenville in South Carolina in the United States is Ryan Zicker. No Zika virus here, but there is this Ryan Zika. From Horsham here in Victoria. Australia is Nicole DeMorton. A caution, it's Nicole DeMorton.

Yes, he's barely needing me at all. He's doing so well. Sounds of slip since I've left from Keynesburg. In New Jersey in the United States, it's Michael Will. Where there's a Will, there's a Michael. Yes, it was so obvious. And finally from Lainsborough in, or Lansborough, from in Massachusetts in the United States, it's Shannon and Brian Cook.

Well, there's not Shannon. Shannon and Brian Cook. There's not too many cooks. There's two cooks. Shannon and Brian. Just the right amount of cooks. Shut up. You have been away and yet we have just fallen right back into step with one another.

So welcome in. Make yourselves at home. Shannon and Brian Cook. I wonder if that's Brian Cook the old Jollong Football Club boss. Michael Will, Nicole, Ryan, Edward Dora, Max and Mark. Make yourselves at home one and all. And that brings us to the end of the episode. Can you believe it?

The end of another Blovember slash block tober. It's a sad time. This is tragic. But also a beautiful moment. Beautiful to a moment that we've celebrated yet another Blocktober Blovember. And like we said before, you know, now it's into the Christmas season, our favorite season. I'm chucking the block tree out on the street. Yep.

And it's time to put up the Christmas tree. Yeah. Or Dave, the Kreeh-Mish. Kish. But look, I'll just tell people that if they would like to suggest a topic, you can do so over, you can, there's a link in the show notes, it's also on our website, which is do go on pod.com. You can find us on social media at do go on pod or do go on podcast on TikTok. And also, we just want to remind you that we love you. Dave, boot at home.

Hey, just in case there are still tickets available, we don't know if they are, but this weekend, Saturday, December the 2nd, at 4.30 p.m., we're doing our annual live, Chrismi show downstairs. Morris House in the City. Get tickets at dogoonpod.com if they are still available. If not, thank you so much for listening. And until then, also thank you so much. Happy block. Goodbye. Later.

Bye. So I'm keen to know what it is, man. I'm just having a look. The second most votes was 28%. So so much higher than that. Yeah, wow. And I think people are going to be excited about me getting those percentage numbers just right. There were people at home just going to tell me.

Wait, tell me what number it was. Let's be specific. Yeah. Please. And so I'm glad you've done that. He said around 29, but is it 28? Is it 30? Yeah.

Is it 29? Don't say around 29 if it's 29. 28.05% okay? Holy. There I said it. Shit. Whoa. But yeah, this one, I mean, can I tell you the exact number?

Please. I don't know. Are you ready for this? I don't know if I am. I'm sitting down. Okay. 39.25%. So not 40.

Oh, my God. You lied to me. I said just shy of 40. Go to the tape. Please add a lot of this waffle out. Yeah. This has been awful. We're really building up the tension of this topic with some numbers.

Some real tangible numbers. Don't forget to sign up to our tour mailing list so we know where in the world you are and we can come and tell you when we're coming there. Wherever we go, we always hear six months later, oh, you should come to Manchester. We were just in Manchester. But this way you'll never miss out. And don't forget to sign up, go to our Instagram, click our live. link tree very very easy it means we know to come to you and you also know that we're coming to you yeah you will come to you you come to us very good and we give you a spam free guarantee