Off Air... with Jane and Fi - Ding dongs and dong dings

Episode Date: November 17, 2022

Nice bums, strong thighs, and easy on the eyes...but should we be objectifying the likes of Jack Grealish and the rest of the England football team?Also, with the Spanish team being refused their favourite chorizo in Qatar they ask what the British equivalent would be.They're also joined by the author and journalist Sali Hughes to talk about her new book Everything is Washable.If you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] Radio Producer: Rosie CutlerPodcast Executive Producer: Ben Mitchell Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

VoiceOver describes what's happening on your iPhone screen. VoiceOver on. Settings. So you can navigate it just by listening. Books. Contacts. Calendar. Double tap to open. Breakfast with Anna from 10 to 11. And get on with your day. Accessibility. There's more to iPhone. We've got to the end of the week, haven't we?

It's Welcome to Off Air with her, Jane Garvey. And you. Well, you can say my name. Does it hurt? Fee glove. Yeah, OK. We are a bit tired this week, aren't we? Well, we are now, but I've enjoyed the week, I was attempting to say. Yes, me too.

It's been good fun. I think we've been doing the programme now for this is I'm talking here about the live radio show but doing it was it six weeks or five weeks I think it's five it's only five okay well I think we are getting into the swing in the sense that I'm not worrying when things go wrong and we're we were always going to be a bit ramshackle and but I like that feel I think we always will be yes no we always will be but I'm more relaxed in being so now I know what you mean and also I think it's I mean it's like going anywhere new isn't it uh you learn where the furniture is yeah not to bump into it well can

I just put there isn't enough furniture in that office and I think it's okay for us to make the observation it's not big enough we're crammed in I come out of the studio after the live show somebody's sitting at my desk and I've put because I eat my sandwich at the desk I've already I've started to leave you know the bit of crumbs

in the keyboard for someone else to have to fiddle about with probably not very nice for other people I do try and tidy up before I go into the studio well because it's the lovely

Lucy Fisher who comes and sits at my desk and I worship Lucy Fisher I think she's amazing it's probably a good reason that she doesn't sit at my desk maybe she looked at at your desk and thought, no, I'll take the snack. If you're negating, I'll sit in Fiona's. Yeah, that could be a good point. Lovely. Okay. Now, we did have a little, it was quite interesting today, actually, because

we had a ding dong. Not a ding dong, more of a dong ding, I think, with associate editor of the Saturday Times magazine, Jane Mulkerins, about their decision to run a feature called World Cup Hotties. Yep. Now, I'm in all kinds of different sorts of points of view about this, because I just feel honour bound to say that if it were women, I would be incandescent with women. Yeah, we should explain what it is. So it is page two, actually.

I don't want to draw too much. Of the Saturday Times magazine. It's 11 from heaven. Can't get excited about the World Cup in Qatar. Maybe you're not focusing on the right things, by which we mean cheekbones, abs and thighs. And then there are lots of pictures of... They're not naked.

Did I need to say that probably not um it is the times yes but you can you can just see some very well honed yes i mean let's put it this way they're not being celebrated in this article for their silky skills or their amazing tackling or their charity work indeed their charity work they are being celebrated purely and simply. Well, they're being objectified. They are, aren't they? Absolutely. It's on page two of the Saturday Times magazine.

If you, like Fee and I, want to be absolutely appalled. Well, look, let's have a serious conversation about it because you raised the point with Jane that if it was women, and especially if it was women who had been photographed and written about by men, and you were saying, oh, look at these lionesses with hardly any clothes on, that would be a terrible, terrible revisiting, really, of the 1970s. And we would all think we've left that behind. That shouldn't be happening anymore. Show some respect. So why are we still doing it to men? I don't know why we are.

some respect so why are we still doing it to men i don't know why we are no well i'm not entirely sure that uh jane could find any other argument than because because they look nice yes and um but i suppose a fashion fashion pieces are not illustrated by the likes of of me wearing a new frock um so i don't know it's um We're tying ourselves up. Well, I'm tying myself up in knots. We just wanted to talk about the hypocrisy surrounding the objectification of young, fit, male bodies

and whether or not we are entirely at ease with it. Yeah, and I don't think we are entirely at ease with it. We established that. Well, Jane and Fee at Times.Radio, if you want to pitch in, because by the time Monday's off-air rolls round, it will be officially underway, the Men's World Cup. And I know there are all sorts of issues associated with the tournament, but I've said for a while now that I think perhaps once the football gets going,

a lot of people will find themselves completely invested in it. I could be wrong, but England play on Monday and so do Wales. So it's starting. Yeah, I'm very interested to see how what we're now calling the World Cup tingle actually emerges on Monday for you. WCT. Well, as I said on the programme, my telly is bossed. So it's all on the chap who's coming round tomorrow morning. And it is a chap. Obviously, I requested a woman, but they couldn't supply her.

I was going to say, do you want to start another ding dong? It happens to be a chap. Obviously I requested a woman but they couldn't supply her. Yeah I was going to say do you want to start another ding dong? It happens to be a man. Okay you're clutching a little bit of a clipping there. Oh yeah no it's just the story that I didn't have time for in the show today. This is about it's about the Spanish team at the Men's World Cup who haven't been able to take their favourite pork products to Qatar obviously for a string of good reasons. But this is what I really thought was astounding. According to industry figures, Spaniards spent 1.5 billion euros on 98,740 tonnes of cured hams in 2020. That's

an enormous amount of that thing I can't pronounce. Oh, sorry, and another 1.5 billion euros on 145,000 tonnes of other cured pork products such as chorizo. Chorizo?

If I'd married a Spaniard and had a son, I was going to call him Tavitha. Were you? Yeah, Tavitha. Didn't happen, didn't come to pass. What a missed opportunity. Is there a British equivalent? So if you'd had a son, what would you have called him?

Ham. Pork and pepper. Just ham. Hello both, says Helen. She says, sent an appreciation. I was a loyal listener of your previous work. You kept me going through the pandemic. I listened once a week on my Monday bike ride

and always valued your insights and humour, which caught the mood in the moment. That's a very kind thing to say, Helen. Like many people, change is a challenge and I'm struggling to adapt to your new programmes. Sadly, two feelings are swirling around for me. The predominant one, the curse of female life, is that I can't keep up a daily radio program and an additional daily takeout podcast. Well, I mean, you and us both.

Helen says I'm already weeks behind. So are we. The second emotion is also curiously female, a sense that because I don't listen to Times Radio, that something else has happened somewhere else and I don't know about it. It's silly. Of course, I could listen to Times Radio, but honestly, I'm not sure I have that much time in my life for my own thoughts, let alone a single radio pairing. just say that you should never worry that you're missing something hugely hugely important because our times radio program three till five monday to thursday uh contains news when it happens but it it is the news that you're going to hear all around you we try and do it well and in a times radio way but you shouldn't feel that if you don't listen three till five you're not going to be able to stay across i think you'll still be able to go about your business. Please don't worry about it.

And I'm not sure that that is a female thing. Do you think it is? I'd never considered that before. That kind of, I don't know everything and I should know everything. I mean, I have that sense of panic all the time. Well, it does tend to be the case that men will spout forth on any subject under the sun. Even if they don't know about it.

What are you thinking about there? It doesn't hold me back. I'm not a man, but if I were, I if they don't know about it. They have no clue at all. What are you thinking about there? It doesn't hold me back. It doesn't, I'm not a man, but if I were, I suspect it wouldn't hold me back. No, I mean, I've been, we've all been in cabs with fellas holding forth on a range of subjects, you know, childbirth, international feminism.

And, you know, that funny lane on the Euston Road that was shut for a long time. Oh, dear me. Yes, well, exactly. But anyway, can I just say thank you to Kat from London who has taken me up

on my remark about the omission from the English school curriculum of English-Irish relations. I vaguely knew, says Kat, that my mum moved to England in her 20s to escape the religious

and cultural tensions of her hometown just on the Northern Irish side of the border. However, she never talked about these tensions or their historical background. I didn't really think to dig deeper into any of her throwaway comments, such as the colour orange instantly making her feel tense, or her insistence on correcting the birthplace for any ancestor

born before 3 May 1921 from Northern Ireland to Ireland in our family tree. I only thought to ask recently why none of her family were involved in the Second World War. I had no idea that conscription was never introduced there, or why. During the heady, semi-enthusiastic stage of lockdown homeschooling, I decided to bring history to life by conferencing in Granny to answer my eight-year-old's question about why there were two islands on the map. Whether lockdown caused an introspective mood or just because there was little else to do,

my mum finally said quite a bit about growing up in a troubled island. While reminiscing, though, she seemed to forget her target audience, whose eyes got bigger and bigger as she mused on the church, IRA, bombings, etc., and I ended up having to swiftly terminate the lesson before we got on to kneecapping or other similar horrors um Kat thank you and you're it is interesting isn't it that there's so much of of our family's history that we never know because we either don't ask the right questions we don't have time to ask the questions or simply they don't want to talk about it you know I often i always think not often i always think on um november the 11th of my paternal grandfather

who um was actually quite a grumpy rather a pompous man but i know he was at the som but he just never talked about it and slightly frustrating me my dad didn't ever ask him but my dad claims he didn't want to talk about it or we wouldn't have wanted to talk about it i'd still quite like to have known something so I have the same thing in my family my dad's family it was entirely a forces family dad was the first in three generations to leave the army and live his life in in civvy street and I know so little about all of the campaigns that they fought in which you know across so that spans 150 years all around the world a really dreadful time actually in british history where if you're in the army you were being asked to go places and do things i think that we now recognize as unimaginable and wrong and i know that there

was that sentiment in my family too but i never asked them it's not written down anywhere it's not i really annoy myself because, you know, you and I work in an audio medium where we ask questions, and isn't that extraordinary that we don't know our own family histories? I think it's true, really frustratingly, that a lot of First World War records were destroyed in a bombing raid in the Second World War. So that doesn't help if you're keen to try and find out

something about your own family's involvement. And do you know if your family history has been lost in that? I don't know. I have got my paternal grandfather's army number, and I know his regiment, but he was taken prisoner as well. But he never talked about that. I mean, it's just so... And he died when I was 10, and he was quite a pompous bloke.

Oh, gosh. Well, OK. It doesn't run... I know what you're thinking, does it? No, I wasn't going to say anything like that at all. He was always very nice to me. I was his grandchild, but I suspect probably not the most terrific parent

because he just didn't know how to be... Yeah. Anyway, poor chap. He's obviously no longer with us. He'd be quite strange if he was. he'd be certainly an age uh christine says thank you for your honesty about how challenging it can be to deal with big changes in midlife it certainly makes you feel discombobulated and probably takes longer to create and settle into new patterns i've had major changes to deal with at 58 says christine i think the great joy of being more experienced, though,

is that you're quicker to recognise when it's beginning to work well and focus on using that to help you find a good recovery point amongst the new chaos. You know yourself better in midlife and can hopefully also be better at reflecting objectively and then you can ditch what doesn't work really quickly. Christine's got some good advice here. She says gut instinct is your friend.

Oh, yeah. That's true, isn't it? Yeah, always befriend your gut in many ways. Listen to it and feed it as we're constantly learning on Wellness Wednesday. I know. I think on Wellness Wednesday coming up next week, we're going to do breathing. Oh, are we? I love it because this week we did standing.

Standing up. We've done sleeping. So maybe week six, being alive. Sally Hughes is a very talented journalist, and she writes about many things. I think a lot of people know her as a beauty journalist. It's certainly where she's excelled over the last ten years or so. And she was our big-name guest this afternoon.

She's got a new book out. It's a kind of guide to life. It's called Everything everything is washable with an asterisk that says almost we enjoyed her company didn't we yes i thought she was very entertaining and also and very sensible as well and grounded um she did have a tough start um so she's not one of those people careful yes i did steady myself a little bit there who now writes about very expensive beauty creams uh Sally has has got an interesting backstory uh so I'm from the South Wales Valley um I grew up with a single father and uh two brothers initially four brothers all together later on and um I left school when I was 14 and The passage that you're talking about, which opens the book,

I felt like I had to really explain why I'm so obsessed with home and why I have such strong views on home. And so it starts with the story where several years ago now, I was working at the Hay Festival in South Wales with my then boyfriend, now husband. And we decided one free afternoon to take the car and go and look at everywhere I grew up at so so my primary school the local library my grandparents house where I was born and so on and we ended up in the house I'd grown up in or outside it rather and we peered through the window as discreetly and politely as we could until an absolutely lovely older couple came outside and in true South Wales fashion invited us in for a

cup of tea and they showed us around the house they were absolutely charming the house just looked so lovely and gorgeous I was really moved by happy and loving how happy and loving the house was and then they said to me oh we're so happy that you've come now and seen it now because when we bought it from a man who'd lived here after you it It was disgusting. It was squalid. There were newspapers everywhere. There was rubbish everywhere. There was scrap in the garden. There was vermin. It was filthy dirty. And it was occupied by a man who had mental health and drink problems, whose wife had left him. And everything had gone badly wrong. And you would have been so upset to see it then. And of course, I was just too embarrassed and too proud to tell them and my

new boyfriend that that was in fact my father. And the house, I was just too embarrassed and too proud to tell them and my new boyfriend that that was in fact my father. And the house sounded exactly the same as when I lived in it. It didn't sound different at all, but I was just so mortified by it. It took me a few years to come clean. And that was in fact my house and my dad. So Sally, it's quite a trip you've been on from that start, which to put it mildly sounds challenging to a world where frankly you are you're in a position to help others to really do good things to help other people get through the sorts of experiences that you were familiar with in your adolescence and thinking today actually about the financial situation and you're not unfamiliar with

the whole idea of not being able to put the heating on and not being entirely certain what you're going to eat. Absolutely, I'm not unfamiliar with that. Fortunately, it's been a very long time since I've had to worry about turning the heating on. But certainly I did at one point. I didn't have, well, at two occasions, actually, I didn't have a home in which to put heating on. I was homeless. put heating on I was homeless and so yes that kind of spurred me on to co-found a charity in 2018 which unfortunately is going from strength to strength because people need it more than ever it's called Beauty Banks and what we do is we persuade hygiene and beauty companies to give

us large amounts of surplus products which we then redistribute to people who desperately need them and can't afford them. So shower gel, toothpaste, toothbrushes, deodorant, soap, that kind of thing. And we then give those to food banks, mental health trusts, schools, women's refuges, family centres, and so on around the country for people in Britain living in poverty. Right. And we really are in a world, are we, where some people can't afford shower gel or soap? There are so many people in this country, including very many of them working people. Most people who claim benefits, as we know, are working people. There are very many of those people who have to choose between eating and staying clean.

And now, of course, we're throwing light and heat into the mix more than ever before. The very lowest priority is always going to be your personal grooming and personal care that's just inevitable that's how we're wired we need to stay warm and eat first and foremost so unfortunately calls for our services have grown so much in the past few months it's actually terrifying our deliveries have gone up by 75 percent in the first half of this year. And the stats for the next quarter, when we finish gathering those, look altogether worse again. And so, yes, it is certainly the case that very many people in this country can't afford hygiene products. There are lots of babies wearing one nappy a day, for example. There are families sharing toothbrushes. It's very hard to

imagine, but it's absolutely true. and there are very many stories as well aren't there of people actually shying away from public spaces not wanting to go to work because they're embarrassed about their personal hygiene the same for kids at school so we hear you on your charity work completely again I think you confound expectations with the book Sally because you know on the front cover you might think everything is washable, life lesson, Sally Hughes, beauty journalist, it's going to be stuff about how to get the perfect arched eyebrow. And that, you know, that can be important. But it's much, much more than that, isn't it? I mean, you've got a lot about mental health, you've got a lot about just getting through life. Which bit would you point people towards first, in what is, I mean, it's a lot, isn't it? It's 300 pages,

400 pages of advice. What's the most important bit to you? Well, it's a big old chunk, but I'm not traditionally a beauty journalist. I have a beauty column, but I was what other journalists patronisingly call a proper journalist for decades before I started writing about beauty. But in fact, yes, I was really determined with this book to go back to my roots and write about lots of other issues. And in terms of what's important, I just think we put too much emphasis on that. Our lives are not like that. It's, you know, our daily lives are about things that are unimportant, things that are fun, things that are dutiful, sometimes things that are life or death. And they're all in the mix together, which is why in my book, you'll read how to make a perfect martini, but you'll also

read how to make a will, how to settle family disputes, how to care for a friend and support a friend going through IVF, how to talk to loved ones with cancer or who've just had bad news, alongside which genes make your bum look great and that is life that is life and I think we should all stop kind of hand-wringing about that especially as women we're so kind of preached to about this as though we can't concentrate our pretty little heads on more more than one thing at any given time it's so silly that's not life life is a high low experience and thank goodness I wouldn't want it any other way just before we go to some well-timed adverts I know that lots of people listening at home will say oh my god which jeans are best for your bum yeah do ask I'm glad you have

right well things have become more confused haven't they in recent years because having a really big bottom is now fashionable so it really depends if you want your bottom to look bigger or smaller. But if you want it to look smaller, you want bigger pockets and you want them well positioned. Slanted is good if you've got a bit of a flat bum. And also if you've got a sticky out tummy, if you're happy with that, fabulous. If you want it to look flatter, you are better off with a zip than a button fly and you certainly need high waisted. Apparently low- waisted jeans are coming back over my dead body two kids later. There is absolutely no way I'm ever doing that and I think that's fundamental with jeans. Never follow fashion. Wear the type

of jeans that make you look and feel good. They're one of those items that should be fashion immune in my opinion voiceover describes what's happening on your iphone screen voiceover on settings so you can navigate it just by listening books contacts calendar double tap to open breakfast with anna from 10 to 11 and get on with your day accessibility there's more to iPhone our guest is Sally Hughes now where were you for you were talking about the right size of jeans for your bottom oh no I was delighted with that answer I like the idea of a slightly slanted pocket I've never tried that before and I really really hope Sally that we've like the idea of a slightly slanted pocket. I've never tried that before. And I really, really hope, Sally, that we've seen the back of a dangerous decade of skinny jeans. I mean, who were they meant for? Okay, controversially, I quite like a skinny jean, but it has to be a very high-waisted one with a good kind of sucky innie tummy. I like a flare. I like a skinny. What I'm less good at are those in the middle.

Okay. I've got dangerously large calves. So I look like, you know, those pictures of Henry VIII standing. Oh, please. That's what I look like in skinny jeans. It's extremely unattractive. Now, Sally, my book has just fallen open. I'm just ignoring Fi.

She's so hard on herself uh my book has fallen open at the bit how to have a relaxing christmas right okay uh chance would be a fine thing sally what have you got in your locker here um well i think people need to stop convincing themselves they need to do some elaborate christmas lunch i think it's weird it's the one day where you're supposed to feel happy and relaxed. So personally, I only ever do one course. Nobody wants more than one course for Christmas lunch. You can save your pudding until early evening. Everybody always feels a bit sick at the end of the main course anyway. I would certainly never do a starter. And also, I won't put up with anybody kind of infighting over food within the family. We decide in advance what we're having and everybody will eat the same thing. So last year I made a porcini and wild mushroom lasagna

for Christmas lunch. Who says you've got to have turkey or chicken? In my experience, most people demand turkey and then moan about how dry it is the whole time. Yeah, but that's part of the tradition. You're not meant to enjoy yourself, Sally. Well, see, i do enjoy myself i love christmas and i think cut corners wherever you can if you need to scoop out a jar and put it in a pretty dish with the sprig of something on it to make it look like you made your own cranberry or whatever go ahead get whatever you can made ready um and take credit for it if you need to i don't think you win a prize at all for doing too much at Christmas. You just end up fraggled. Yeah, you see, Jane is a slave to Christmas. No, you are, though. You are a martyr on the

mistletoe. And I'm with Sally. I think you just need to put some things in the oven, switch it on and a tinfoil tray and everyone will be happier. I don't want to hark back to our earlier conversation, but it's in the genes. Right, carry on. Sally, do you worry ever about giving advice? has anyone ever come back and said actually fairy lights ruined my life uh no but to be fair I kind of stay in my lane I think you know my criteria for this book was why me why not YouTube and I felt that if I didn't know something already it would be cheating to find out and then put it in the book, really. Because I just thought,

well, in that case, you might as well just watch a video on YouTube. I have no business really talking about it. So everything in the book is something I either knew from a young age, or I didn't know and really learned the hard way and came a cropper. And you can kind of benefit from my calamitous experience. And it was always something where I felt I had just cause to talk about it. and I think there were a couple of bits in the book buying a new car for example I love driving I know nothing about cars and so years ago I deferred to a consumer journalist friend of mine Leslie who drives cars for a living who tests cars for a living and I credit her within the book if I didn't know something and I had to learn from a friend I will say in the book that I did and but there's lots of things I just don't go near I don't know how to change a tyre so it

didn't go in the book now lots of people might want to know how to change a tyre but don't come knocking on my door I would say because I haven't the foggiest call the AA. You are very very honest about being a mother and what it can do to you and I wonder what you just say about the early months of parenthood. I mean, it's a while ago now, but you don't forget, do you? I was a lunatic. And somebody shouted at me once at an event about postnatal depression and said, I shouldn't refer to myself as a lunatic because it's stigmatizing. But actually, I think women should be allowed to describe exactly how they felt at such a weird time because you're really it's really frowned upon to share your experiences of being miserable as a new mother but so many of us are I certainly

was my first child was I think four months old when my father died so I became a parent and lost a parent within six months um that sent me crackers. I was bored. I felt bereft of my career. I honestly felt as though that was another death, the fact that I wasn't going to work. And it took me a long, long time to get over it. And I made changes the second time around, where I understood myself better and knew that I didn't have to try and be mother of the year and end up being consequently a crap one. I kept working as much as I could. I tried very, very hard not to beat myself up about not getting things right. And I wasn't afraid to say how I felt. And I think that's half the problem. I think motherhood's that thing where you're meant to just

be so happy and so thrilled with it, doing this job for which there is no training, no sick leave, no paid leave, no holiday, nothing. You're meant to have this ridiculous job with conditions that don't exist in any other. And you're just meant to love it all the time, or you're terribly ungrateful and broken. And I think that's a really, really damaging thing. Yeah, no, I think I think you're absolutely right there. I think the more women who say, I had a tough time, and I sort of wish somebody had told me that I might, and then perhaps it wouldn't have been quite as bad as it was. I think I think that's really true.

I think the mistake people make is that everybody tells expectant mums that labour will be horrible and that early motherhood will be wonderful. But in fact, for lots of us, labour is fine and it's nothing to be frightened of. But it's the early motherhood that's difficult. And we just sort of impose this silly narrative on people that, oh, labour will be agony and dangerous and terrible. And then you'll have a lovely time because you'll have your baby. But actually, for lots of us, it's the opposite. And I dare say for lots of people, both are terrible or both are wonderful. Author and journalist Sally Hughes and her book Everything is Washable, A Real Guide to Life, is out now. We love hearing from you all,

so please do continue to send us emails if you'd like to. Jane and Fi at times.radio. To be honest, it really doesn't have to bear any relevance to the stuff that we're talking about here. We love your life stories and experiences. If you want to tweet us, it's at times radio. And you can also leave a review of this podcast, wherever it is that you're listening to us right now.

And you can be as honest as you like. Well, not really. No, please don't be that honest. And just to say again, that article is on page two of the magazine. It's absolutely dreadful. Don't undo the very good work that you did. Sorry. is Ben Mitchell. Now, you can listen to us on the free Times Radio app or you can download every episode from wherever

you get your podcasts. And don't forget that if you like what you heard and thought, hey, I want to listen to this but live, then you can

Monday to Thursday 3 till 5 on Times Radio. Embrace the live radio jeopardy. Thank you for listening and hope you can join us off air very soon.

Goodbye. VoiceOver describes what's happening on your iPhone screen. VoiceOver on. Settings. So you can navigate it just by listening. Books. Contacts. Calendar.

Double tap to open. Breakfast with Anna from 10 to 11. And get on with your day. Accessibility. There's more to iPhone.