Off Air... with Jane and Fi - Barely presentable and just about hanging together (with Susie Dent)

Episode Date: December 4, 2025

A final thank you to everyone for thanking us for thanking you… get it? Fi dives into open-water faux pas, Spotify Wrapped, early-years parenting, and the future of AI - she’s got range! Plus, we peel back a few more doors on Hetty’s advent calendar. Also, lexicographer Susie Dent discusses her new book ‘Words for Life’ with Fi and Rosie Wright. You can listen to our 'I've got the house to myself' playlist here: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2MkG0A4kkX74TJuVKUPAuJ If you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] us on Instagram! @janeandfiPodcast Producer: Eve SalusburyExecutive Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Okay, let's put the microphones up for this bit, please, Eve. Hi, Fee. Yes, hello, Eve. So poor Eve. We've just been having a perfectly normal conversation, but in normal life would just be a chat. And then, because it's the podcast, it's, no, come on, record it. Everything is content.

thing is content, which is the ultimate line, isn't it? It's from Nora Ephraum. And she made such a career out of telling us stuff about her life, but in such a glorious way. And I can't think of anybody who in her time was doing it with quite such panache and style. Have you ever read I feel bad about my neck? I have not. You should. You'd really love it. You'd really love it. It's a collection of essays. she wrote over the years on everything from ageing, which is where the title comes from, to the breakdown of her marriage,

and also some of the stuff about knowing who Deep Throat was. I would highly recommend Nora Ephron to anybody, especially our younger listeners. Now, I'm going to get to a fantastic email called Nippy Tits from your powdered oak milk correspondent in a couple of moments' time, but we would just like to say thank you to everybody who said thank you

to us saying thank you on the Spotify Unwrapped Thing Me Jiggy Wotsett So we are the top podcast for many of you And that is so lovely, lovely, lovely to know Some of you really I think you're the ones who leave the podcast running As you fall asleep

Because some of you've got just the most astounding number of minutes It seems more minutes than are actually in the year But thank you very much indeed Because we love the fact that you're there Way, way, way more than you love the fact that we are there. The Spotify Unwrapped thing is just such brilliant marketing

for Spotify, isn't it? It's just extraordinary. This time of year we talk about nothing but what's your track? How many have you listened to? What's your age? So incoming from Eve and that is the normal chat

that we were having before we decided we needed to record it for the purposes of commerciality. You were making an excuse about what's on you all this. Can I just say on the wrapped thing that all the other apps now are getting on it. I opened my Lloyd's Bank this morning

and it tried to give me a rapt of my finance. Who the hell wants that? Not me. And am I saying it wrong? Is Spotify wrapped? I'm saying unwrapped. Oh no, it's wrapped because it's a wrap-up of the year. God.

I shouldn't be allowed out without a younger person as a kind of guide dog. Right. Yes, okay, Spotify wrapped. Sorry, so Lloyd's Bank were trying to wrap up your transaction. Yeah, which I didn't. I just shut that very quickly. Oh, that's just bizarre.

And also, God, I would just, that would not be good. I would start using the bank less if it told me what I was spending my money on. I'd prefer just to hide away and not know. It's quite weird. It'd be mainly the coffee bar here, I think. Yeah. But anyway, look, you were saying. So I was saying that my Spotify rap is not representative of my music taste

because I use Spotify so much mostly for running. so it's a lot of rap and 90s hip-hop that I would never ever listen to of a normal day so I'm actually just opting out you're opting out but you can't opt out because everybody asks you you can't just say I don't know so it's a lot of Jay-Z but I really never otherwise listen to Jay-Z

okay do you know what in the genres that you've just described there are far worse people it could be so I think you're good with Jay-Z. You're all right, yeah. And then my top albums were mostly Lily Allen albums. Okay, that's good. That's good.

And what's your age? 38. 38, and how old are you? 27. I totally know where that's coming. Yesterday I asked Fee what her wrapped age would be because when Fee comes into the office in the morning, she really could be listening to absolutely anything

from Coldplay to some kind of obscure... I know. 70s band, maybe even something. quite classical sometimes. So what was your age in the end? So my age was 66. Yeah, and I'm 50, nearly 57. So it's not far off, actually.

But my daughter, who's still in her teens, only just, but she's still in her teens, her age is 71. Was she listening to? I don't know. So she really loves all of that 1970s. She listens to a lot of David Bowie, so I think that would really age you.

the note of you spending money at the coffee bar. Oh, we've got coffees are outside. Oh, my God. Bring them on, bring them on, bring them on. But it is a fantastic marketing tool for Spotify because, look, we're just giving them endless, endless free bants at the moment. Thank you. So, yeah, my top genres were indie pop, indie rock, swamp rock. I don't even know what swamp rock is.

Oldies and pop and soul. But I was surprised, actually, that my listening age was 66 because my top tracks include Messy by Lola Young. I got that right. Yes, yeah. And one of Lily Allen's tracks.

So I would have thought that was bringing it down a lot. So I must be listening to. Vera Lynn. This is what I mean. You never know. Just bizarre. Anyway, look, we'll muddle through the next year. But thank you.

And then we need to stop. So I've said thank you to you for saying thank you to us for the fact that we bothered to do a thank you and put it on Spotify to thank you. So that's the end of it, isn't it? My heart hurts. No, that's it.

No more. No more. No more. Right, should we do nippy tits from your powder table correspondent? Right, dear Fee, Eve and Jane. By the way, Jane is delighted to receive all of your very kind messages and her and her family are doing okay.

There are some difficult times in Crosby, and Jane will be back just as soon as she can, but as many of you have said, and we completely agree with this, sometimes the show simply mustn't go on because it's only show business and other things are way more important. This one comes in from Victoria,

who is our powdered oak milk correspondence. Something that makes me smile and sometimes chuckle out loud, I'm an open water swimmer in the Cotswolds and frequent Lake 32 in the Cotswolds Lakes. formerly the Cotswolds Water Park but the name was recently changed by the council as apparently tourists were driving around looking for an actual water

flume type park I mean really especially in the Cotswolds Victoria each winter Lake 32 hosts nippy dippers alongside the year round blue tits a couple of years ago a friend got the two groups mixed up and referred to one as nippy tits possibly one of the most hilarious

open water faux par I can think of we'd like to compile a list of open water faux par There'd be many Each autumn when the nippy dipper application email gets sent around I spend a good few minutes chuckling as it really tickles

and yes we do all have nippy tits or even blue tits sometimes when the water temperature takes a tumble I would implore anyone interested in having a dip to try it my first dip which led to a full blown swim was when the air temperature

was two degrees but the water temperature was nine it felt a bit like a crappy tepid bath but was weirdly addictive It really lists my spirits, but does mean I have to return home pretty sharply after the dip as I have M.E. And my body crashes. The coldest I swam in was when the water was a mere two degrees. I can confirm I had very nubby tits.

And despite the padding in the costume and wetsuit, everybody else could see that too. I've been meaning to get back in touch following my powdered oat milk email. I need to correct the statistic in my original email. It actually takes 6,098 litres of water. to produce one litre of almond milk. Yes, indeed. And you've got the source in there, so I completely believe that it is correct.

It does come by another newspaper. That's okay. It's a reputable one, very much at the competition. But that's extraordinary Victoria, 6,000 litres of water to produce one litre of almond milk. I'm going to say,

we should just stop buying almond milk. That's daft. That's more than the... astonishing amount of water you need to produce one pair of jeans that's always horrendous isn't it because of all of the washing off of the dye apart from anything else and but on the subject of cold water swimming open water swimming um i don't need converting to it at all i hugely admire you for doing it i haven't done it myself for a couple of years because you do need to go into it gently so for heaven's sake don't be one of those people who thinks right it's December this is the day

that I'm going to give it a try because your body does need to acclimatise to it and get used to it and I would just add and you know you can take the woman out of the BBC you can never take the BBC out of the woman I would always go with a friend I would start at a much much more palatable time of year

and I would definitely the blue tits have got a fantastic website and you can read lots of stuff about what you need to do and how you need to do cold water swimming safely because there have been some terrible terrible, terrible mishaps and fatalities from people who've taken cold water swimming

especially at this time of year too far but Victoria thank you you just touched on so many different buttons there and I think that the title of your email will become could we do that could we do an email title kind of list that we keep our eyes and ears across for next year

the husband's quite in the background there have been some absolutely superb ones Sometimes I steal them for podcast titles. Okay. Your podcast titles are very good, though. They always make me laugh. Because it's a bit like an etcher sketch. I think when Jane and I leave the studio,

we just go, and we just completely forget what it is that we've talked about. Sorry about that, everybody. But it's true. So sometimes I'm looking back for something. I have pen and paper. Yes, yeah. No, they're always just cracking ones. Kirstie wanted to get in touch about small lines.

And do you know, I think this one will stay with me forever, actually, our original correspondent who described her life, raising her kids over 25 years as a small life. And so many of you, so many of you have, I know, got really decent thoughts about that. And it's a humbling phrase, isn't it? But we just don't want it to be diminutive because it's just such an important thing to do. I think it is really, really hard these days if it is your choice to stay home and raise a family to feel that society is valuing that

because the messaging all of the time is just how quickly can you get back into the workforce how quickly can you become an active economic unit? What else do you do? And that is the question all the time, isn't it? After you've had a baby, when are you going back to work? is usually the second question after what's it called.

And that can feel incredibly pressurising and also just a little bit depressing. And I don't know, our original correspondent who was definitely struggling at 15 months, you know, just when you do that list of what it is that's in your day, it is mind-boggling, isn't it, to think about how tired and grouchy that would make you. Kirsty says I had to write in to thank your two correspondence,

who wrote in about having small lives as a result of staying at home to parent. Three years ago, I quit my career job to do that. And honestly, I've had so many of the feelings they describe around identity and powerlessness, as well as feeling so lucky to be able to make this choice. My daughter is now five and started school in September. Hang out the Rising Five bunting. Now, Eve, you don't have the children. No.

And I'm not going to add that dreadful word. do people do that to you already at the yet no okay good good good good haven't had it yet yet yet this is so loaded we're not just walking wombs do you even understand the term rising fives no no good yep let's keep it that way what does it mean no it's because it should be in the trunk of things you just don't have to worry about yet love stay breezy stay breezy choose where you live on account of where you want to live because it's in the same trunk as catcher into areas

I'm starting to try and find my way career-wise again and I wanted to write and share a couple of wonderful job sites who provide flexible role or roles around the school day now this is just superb so write these down kids five hour club and ten to two so that's TEN the letter two and then TWO

have both got some real opportunities often for a couple of days a week or inside school time. So presumably 10 to 2 is referring to that gap that you have once your kid or kids have gone to school and the five-hour club must be referring to the same kind of thing and how blamint fantastic that some people are offering jobs completely knowing the very high calibre of applicants they're going to get these wonderful women who find themselves with some time to do a job

but not the same time that they had before. So five-hour club and ten to two. Kirsty says thank you so much to your correspondence for making me feel less alone during my time as a stay-at-home parent and affirming that even though it isn't always recognised it is still the valuable work. Love to all the parents, it's hard but it's worth it. You got this.

Absolutely lovely sentiment. Tilly Norwood is the title of Pearl's email after listening to your interview with Aline Van de Veldon. I have just one question. What is the point of Tilly Norwood? Well, Tilly Norwood and an awful lot of other AI creations are going to become part of a norm, not the norm, but a norm very quickly.

Would you be happy to go and see an AI movie Eve, if you knew that every character in it is AI and it just I don't know, would it just become part of our viewing panoply in the same way that animation is, that cartooners you know, I think now when you watch

an action movie there's a bit of you that just goes, yeah, that's CGI, whatever I think it's a tough one because is it just the same as going to see a cartoon and when Avatar comes out and we celebrate the super advanced CGI and how far tech's got us

to recreate something is it any different to that it is but maybe that's because I just associate AI as something that's a bit sinister yeah we had a really and I'm completely with you I don't know I don't know which part of my glasses I'm looking at the world

through anymore at all and whether I need to put my positive specs on or my doom laden specs but we obviously played the interview out on our last radio show in the absence of on message Mandy I would just like to point out that is between

two and four it's on Times Radio it's free why don't you join us it's got so much in it it's got solid news it's got other bits of news it's got culture and it's got the big interview of the day we're on DAB come and find us breathe so we played the interview out yesterday

and we had so many responses to it and one guy wrote in and he said I'm 57. I used to work in financial services. I got made redundant. I've moved into AI. I'm having a great time. I'm on a really good salary. It is a growth industry. Don't diss it too much. It's the Luddites who are getting the most, you know, kind of bandwidth and who have the loudest voice at the moment. And I thought, oh, okay, well, that's somebody who's got, you know, proper experience of this industry. How fabulous that you can find a place for yourself when you're 57.

and you've been made redundant in a kind of what somebody at some stage is going to call a legacy industry. So, you know, I don't know where we'll be in five years' time looking at people like Tilly Norwood. But I completely agree, Pearl. You do think at the moment, what's the point?

But I suspect that, you know, the point is huge, actually, and it'll be massively successful. There are two things that are definitely disappointing, though, aren't there? One, the AI scrape and what AI already knows about the world means that a young woman, a young attractive woman, gets her kit off or has her clothes, taken off her pretty quickly in cyber reality. That's just horrendous, isn't it? I mean, just so soul-destroying. And Aline did describe that as happening to Tilly Norwood. So she just, you know, someone created, content, AI created content, and she just went to a premiere without a pair of trousers on.

I think, well, that's because lots of actresses go to premieres, you know, freeing their nipples and stuff, and you just think, okay, well, there is a consequence, isn't there, to that? And it's not great. It's just not great. So there's that. And also, why not just make an actress that's just slightly less than perfectly symmetrically pert? Just a couple of, a couple of lumps and bumps and bump. so we're just maybe not that kind of maybe not that thin those are my thoughts

keep them coming sad about Sunday comes in from Anne Davis and Kent and it is about the show and I'm going to give a shout out because you've written such a lovely email

to your daughter so here we go I totally understand why the show can't go on I was looking forward to a riot this evening however when it is rescheduled

my daughter Georgie may be able to attend as well and I just love the way that this is shoehorned in and it's done so so brilliant so here goes. At present she's sowing madly to keep up with Christmas orders and fares for her business, yoga pod. She makes yoga props, i.e. meditation cushions, eye pillows, etc. I was going to suggest another game that you could play. I keep thinking you're going to

read out my email when yet again Anne gets mentioned, but no luck so far. Now is your time. The game would be how many Anne's, Susan's and Janes there are in the audience and how few Claudia's Cassandra's or Victoria's role. We just had one. Just had a Victoria. My husband and I have taken our children around much of Europe camping and my husband Richard and I now go away once a month in our motorhome which is called Dizzy all over the country and Europe.

It's the only way we can afford it and it allows us total flexibility. Well, I hope that you have enormous amounts of fun in Dizzy. Why is it called Dizzy? Have there been too many fun times? and I'm dizzy. And you're right, we do have an awful lot of Anne's, Susan's and James. I think we've got quite a lot of Victoria's.

I don't think we've got many Cassandras. And I just don't understand why you call your daughter to Cassandra because in the ancient classics, I mean, she doesn't have a great life. She can tell the future, but she is thrown out by her community and Builders being a mad woman for speaking the truth, so I think that's quite a tough one.

And Claudia's... Actually, I know a tiny Claudia, a baby Claudia, so maybe. Prove us wrong. Right, Eve, over to you to open. Can we do two because we won't be here tomorrow from Hetty's amazing Advent calendar, and then we will bring in the guest. Let's do it.

Oh, so did we elaborate on yesterday's? Oh, no. So yesterday's, you read it out. So number three, the third yesterday, Fee's mission was to sneak the phrase, jingle all the way into the podcast episode. Which you did do, actually. It did it twice.

So well done. Oh, the fourth is a really, really lovely one. God, Hetty, you're so generous. It is a book token. Lovely, lovely, lovely. Whoever opens a day's advent window, use this gift card to buy someone in the studio a book. Well, I'll be buying you a book.

We have got a lot of books. Maybe we should give it to someone else. We do. We actually do have an absurd amount of books. So how lovely, we will give it to somebody else, definitely. And do you want to do, can you do five? That's what, do you do the fifth. Because otherwise we'll get a backlog.

Oh, this is a fun one. It's a QR code and it says, listen to this album to get into the Christmas spirit. Oh, la, la, la. now do you want to you can QR just in case it's Mariah Carey

because I can't do that I'm afraid Do you not like Mariah? I've got nothing against her personally I love the way that she lives her life do you remember you might be a bit too young for this

but she came to London once she was staying at a hotel in Kensington and I remember you would definitely be too young for this actually because it was back in the 1990s I remember being sent to cover it as a reporter and I was sent to cover it

just because of how she was living at the hotel. So the whole hotel the steps out the front had to have a thousand lit candles on for her arrival. I mean it was just so brilliantly divaress and all of the rest of it.

And I say all hail, Mariah Carey. Because we don't, yeah, we don't want our stars to be normal. We don't want to see you on the school run. I'm so sorry we want to light a thousand candles. What is it? It's not Mariah. It is Benjamin Britain and a choir of King's College a ceremony of carols. Oh.

Oh, gosh, okay, well, that's brilliant. You're safe. That's absolutely brilliant and that's proper. We'll definitely do that, Hetty. I've just realised that next door, so there's a lot of people, we've got a glass screen in between this studio and the other studio, and there are a lot of people in there. And Chris Evans, look, that's Chris Evans, isn't it?

He said, I didn't recognise him without his glasses on. He's the one in the beanie? He's the one in a beanie hat. Yep. He's taller than I thought, actually. He's very tall, isn't he? And he's very skinny. and he's got all his running kit on

because he runs to work. She's just going to run out of him. Maybe, yeah. Do you think Jane and I would be in a fit state if we ran to work every morning? Do you think it would be wise? I'm not in the shoes you were fee.

No, I'd love to see Jane running because I don't think Jane's actually, she's fitter than she makes out because she does kind of extra strength Pilates every week. But the only time I've ever seen her run,

like properly run, was when she desperately desperately wanted to get a particular chair the other side of the piazza when we used to record fortunately and it was because it was in the sunshine it was like the place we wanted to be and she just one moment I was talking to her

the next one, off she went and she was like a kind of I don't know what it was like a low it was like a very very fast low level stote or otter moved at speed very close to the ground not great the bouncing strides Imagine that.

Just more of a... Anyway, she got it. Oh, they're doing a lot of back slapping. Oh, God, of course. Yeah, bro. Compared to Chris Evans, you'd probably have to set off quite early than you're going to get in. That's rude.

That's very... Because he's very tall. He lives in Buckinghamshire. I live a mile and a half up the road. What kind of respect is this? In fairness, I didn't know. No, that's quite enough. Put down your microphone.

I'll tell you what it comes at house, isn't it? Emboldened she is. Susie Dent is our guest today. She's got a book, you know, it's not Christmas and her Susie Dent's in the studio talking about one of her fantastic books. And I should just tell you, actually, that Rosie Wright is asking many of the questions in this interview because I am doing the afternoon show with a combination of Rosie Wright and Royan Needs. for this week and for next week too. So we welcome Rosie on board and here is our conversation

with the fantastic Susie Dent. Susie, this time of year is very of the time when the dictionary's published their words of the year. Some of them are quite miserable. We've learned about parasocial relationships which I suspect some people have with you. I doubt it. Rage bait, content online that infuriates us. What would be your word of the year? Do you know what, every New Year's Eve, I pitch a really hopeful word because I think I just, please let it be the year for this one. And it's one of the lost positives in the dictionary, which like a Mayfly disappeared after about a day. And it's respair, which is fresh hope and a recovery from despair. And I think it's such a gorgeous word.

Sadly, I don't think it applies to this one, but I'm really hoping, you know, for the future. What else? Do you know what? I quite like, I think one of the dictionary publishers, now all teachers will hate me for this but I find 6-7 quite fascinating so you know about 6-7 yes please look at me as the flight

do you hear this regularly yes no no I don't thankfully my kids are too old to be involved in it and the Prime Minister unfortunately got acquainted with 6-7 and trapped by a school child it is so massive isn't it it is and what happened he went to a classroom and they were opening a book and obviously inevitably landed on page 6 or 7

and everyone started doing the six, seven dance, including the prime minister. And the teacher said on the way out, that's actually banned, you know. Yes, it is banned from some schools. I mean, sometimes there are attempts to ban, you know, certain sort of slang words, etc. And I kind of understand the reason for it, because presumably it is quite disruptive, six, seven all the time. However, it's really difficult to police language. I mean, it's almost impossible. And English doesn't have an authority whereby, you know, there is an academy saying you can use this word or you can't use this word.

In France, they do try, but it's fairly impossible. They don't want any English words coming into the language and, you know, that they're everywhere. So it's really, really difficult. The reason I find it interesting, albeit probably very annoying for a lot of people, is that no one seems to quite know what it means. I think it's drifted into the sort of, you know, so-so idea. but actually another reason I think it is quite fun is that kids get so excited about talking about these sort of things and the one before was skibbidi I think

which again nobody seemed to know what it meant and it's the kind of hybrid of the offline online world where something online then quickly gets to be spoken offline so for all that it's really irritating I'm sure I just find it quite interesting as a lexicographer to look at this one yeah very difficult to police a primary school classroom's language as well I mentioned the Prime Minister got in trouble. Very occasionally, Susie, you sort of lean into what's happening in the political world

and we'll publish on social media a word of the day. The other day it was Quokawadja, I hope I'm saying that right, a 19th century word, a puppet politician whose strings are pulled entirely by someone else. Yes. How carefully do you deploy those words when you choose to pick them? Do you know, yes, sometimes, of course, they're sort of inspired by something that I've read or seen. Quite often, though, they are also fairly self-referential. So, you know, there was one, I think, that I just encourage lots of people to apply it to various politicians, but honestly it was all about me.

It was the Scots word, Hingham Tringham, which was barely presentable and just about hanging together, which is how I felt that day. But my timeline was suddenly full of pictures of different people, and that is the joy of languages. You can take a word and think, I know that who that applies to, or I know who I'm going to use that of. Sadly, it's often insults, but there, you know, there are some compliments in the dictionary too. But, yeah, that is, I guess, what I hope people will do is pick it up and run with it because it's fairly useful, arguably, of quite a few, you know, people. Having said that, I do think if you look at the historical thesaurus, which is a lot more fun than you would think, you can see epithets for politicians or people in public office, and they do tend to be really negative.

And we do seem in language also to have a negative bias. we rarely grasp for the positive when we could actually you know just do away with I don't know I've been on a mission to replace lost to bring back the lost positives which are words like cooth or gruntled or ruthless or feckful etc they've just all disappeared I love that we talk about that quite a lot in the podcast

well things like nobody ever says that somebody's kemped but we will call them unkempt you can say kemped yeah but nobody does Nobody does. I'm definitely not Kempt this morning, and nor am I Sheffled. Sheveled doesn't exist yet, sadly. But, yeah, Kempter is from the German Gkempt meaning well combed, which, as you can see, I'm not. But, yes, there are so many of them there. I love Gormful, you know, to be full of Gormless, because Gormless is quite mean, isn't it? It is. And Fekful, full of effect, as I say, an Ept, you can be a persona grata, all of these. Can't yet be reconbobulated, but I think. it's only matter of time yeah i'm with you on that it'll be good to be recombulated wouldn't it absolutely this book you've written is a just a complete fascinating tome of so many different words

apt for each day of the year as we head in this season of advent um one of your december words is a binfluencer introduce us to yours please yes so um yes if i did have the choice to to choose words of the year i would give credit to whoever um whom ever created this one because this describes the neighbour who religiously puts their bin out quite early and is always the first and everyone else follows like lemmings they also know which bin to put out which is quite a challenge and yeah they are a bimluencer are you the bimluencer on your street sadly not no that's something called jim well done jim very christmas to you jim bimluencer is definitely in the sort of more slang version of words that we're using and we were

talking a little earlier about some of the slang that maybe we're not wanting to welcome for you were saying your son often just opts out words now in sentences well there's quite there's quite a thing to say I'm going town yeah I'm going exactly I'm going school yeah I'm going club I'm going library not used often enough actually but how where's that influence come from? I generally don't know the preposition is just dropped completely and I've been noticing exactly the same thing

you will also find and this I'm not sure if this one is drifting away, but a couple of years ago they would say, why are you, why are you fiddling with the Wi-Fi? Because internet. There was no of. So because was also losing it. And that seemed to be the first that I really noticed. Do you think it is to do with texting where so much has dropped out, including most vowels? And, you know, you just, and certainly all punctuation. My kids told me off for using aggressive punctuation and texts. Aggressive? Well, that's so interesting. Yeah. I was actually, I, for some reason, was accused of saying that full stops were aggressive,

which I absolutely have never said. But what I had said, I think to Stephen Frye at a book festival, is that I could just about, having thought about it, understand why younger generations are saying full stops are aggressive in certain context. So if you were to send a WhatsApp message to someone saying, I'm going on holiday to wherever, to Barbados, you could get a, that's great with an exclamation mark, that's probably the one you want. You could get a, that's great with no punctuation at all. If you've got a, that's great, full stop,

that would possibly, could read passive aggressive. And my, teenagers definitely read it that way, whether or not it's right or wrong. I mean, clearly we need full stops. I'm not saying we do not, we don't need them. but punctuation is a subject to evolution as anything else really and I guess that's part of it whether we love it or not I've definitely been in the habit of re-reading an email

and then removing some exclamation marks because I've put too many in to try and look sort of appeasing rather than just saying straightforwardly what I like the other habit I've noticed a lot recently actually amongst my generation is people referring to objects as people so they'll say with an outfit oh she's nice And you think that's, yeah, or talking about a bag or a, you know, new piece of makeup, which feels bizarre. That's very interesting.

Yes. Oh, I'm learning something. I've not heard that. You may now spot. It really makes me feel a bit unwell. And I feel a bit like, oh, I'm my dad's generation when he gets really cross when, you know, I've got three younger sisters. And less and fewer, I have to say, can be used interchangeably to his fury. Part of this is just reality, isn't it?

We have habits and trends and things that change. What are the rules that we need to absolutely? stand firm and cling on to? Well, just be concise, be clear, and be articulate and as beautiful as you can. Be as new as you can with your vocabulary because I think that makes such a difference. And there's a lot of evidence now that choosing the right word can actually have profound benefits for our mind. So choosing positive words rather than negative ones.

You can reframe your brain and the way that you think. If you have a good EQ or emotional quotient as well as an IQ, you can choose the right vocabulary to describe how you feel and research is showing that you hit the bottle less, you go to the doctor less, you live longer. So there are quite astounding benefits. Also to swearing famously now, having a good swear, usually privately, not aggressively at someone else,

but that has distinct physiological benefits. It lowers your cortisol levels and it raises your serotonin levels. So language is so important. When it comes to hard and fast grammatical rules, English, famously, I suppose, doesn't really have that many that work universally. It's very gnarly and it is slightly chaotic, which is why I love it, because so many influences have come to bear on it. But the I before E accept off to C rule, I think it was an episode of QI that calculated, you know,

almost 100 exceptions. So one dictionary publisher has come up with this ridiculous pneumonia to capture all the exceptions. So it's really hard to find rules that you can pass on to non-native speakers. or to learners. I suppose we are immersed in ones that we don't know we know, like the order of adjectives or, you know, the sounds of words and where to kind of put stress, etc. But I find English delightful from that point of view, but it's really hard to learn and to teach. I'm not going to ask you your favourite swear word of the year, although it is tempting because we wouldn't be able to broadcast it anyway. But the final thing, the Times has been running

a campaign to try and get people reading because actually individuals, of course, all age groups, are far more likely to read on social media than in any other format. Because actually a love of words comes from learning new ones, doesn't it? And if all of our reading is happening online and the social media drivel or the AI slop, another word of the year, this year, that's where the problem starts, isn't it? Lack of reading, lack of love for reading. Yeah, I mean, there is a lot of evidence now that the separation between children

who are exposed to a lot of vocabulary through reading and through listening and through talking at dinner, the dinner table, etc. And those who don't have that benefit that actually the gap is getting wider and wider. So we definitely do need to address that. And reading is just the best way in. And I think what you tend to find is that once you can actually convince a child or an adult actually to pick up a book and start reading, then the infection is already there and it becomes a joy. It's just that hurdle, isn't it? It is just actually getting someone to open a book and sort of stick with it

because famously attention spans, thanks to social media, much for you now. Just on that point, I wonder whether things will change as the younger generation becomes the generation in charge of publishing and writing or whatever because something quite weird happens

between children's books and adult books where the length of a book and adult book becomes huge by comparison. I think daunting by comparison. Very true. And if we accept that we have children with slightly diminished attention spans, isn't one thing we could do to actually play to that and just commissioned shorter books? Your book is the perfect length of the day, so it can actually sit in your loo.

Yeah, but it's kind of moving with the times that we need to do, don't we? That's a really, really good point. And actually, that's where social media can probably help as well. So book talk is huge. and actually serialisation, you know, some of the greatest novels like Dickens, famously, was serialised. So we could go back to that, even on social media,

so that kids are really, really looking forward to the next instalment as much as they're looking forward to the next episode for whatever they're watching. I think there is definitely something to be done there. And short stories, novellant, are, you know, are amazing. I picked up Brayman Carver's short stories the other day, I haven't done that for ages, and that's such an art form. So, yeah, I think that's a very good point.

Very happy Christmas to you. enjoy all of your words at Christmas. In fact Christmas gives us lovely words, doesn't it? It does. It does. A luxurious variety of them. It does. Some of them from old dialects which is wonderful. So

will you be scurry funging fee? I try not to do it in public anymore but when I find a quiet moment. Yes, of course I will I don't know what that is, Susie. Oh, it's so useful. So scurry funging is essentially madly dashing around the house and a

to tidy up just before visitors arrive. How wonderful to say you don't do it anymore, Fee. How excellent and grown up of you. I am such a scurry funder, I have to say. Susie Dance book is called Words for Life to Boost Every Day of the Year. And it is out now. And I think probably it would fit inside a stocking,

albeit a very big stocking. We will be back on Monday. Well, I'll be here. I don't know about Eve. I'm still going to get over. I won't be here on Monday because, oh dear Eve. So I'm sorry about bumps in the proceedings here. Jane and I weren't ever going to be here on Monday

because we needed to go and lie down in quite a dark room after our show on Sunday, which for obvious reasons we have had to cancel. So we will all regroup on Tuesday for the rest of the week. Do keep your emails coming. We would definitely love to hear more stories about lodgers that you have been and lodgers that you have had and we will also always

always take experiences of early years parenting and any suggestions on how to make it a little bit better and any thoughts that you've got about Susie Denton, her marvellous words, you can do that too Jane and Fiatimes.com. Radio, have a lovely weekend, goodbye. Congratulations. You've staggered somehow to the end of another Offair with Jane and Fee. Thank you.

If you'd like to hear us do this live, and we do do it live, every day, Monday to Thursday, 2 till 4 on Times Radio. The Jeopardy is off the scale. And if you listen to this, you'll understand exactly why that's the case. So you can get the radio online, on DAB, or on the free Times Radio app. Offair is produced by Eve Salisbury and the executive producer is Rosie Cutler.