Off Air... with Jane and Fi - Here's a genuine bit of sincerity for you

Episode Date: November 15, 2023

Before today's email special episode begins, Jane is asking if she can move in with Fi, and Fi says no. Elsewhere, Jane and Fi go through all of the big topics you've been emailing in about recently. Jane's Cliff Richard anecdote is somehow still making the cut. If you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] Follow us on Instagram! @janeandfi Assistant Producer: Megan McElroy Times Radio Producer: Rosie Cutler 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. Good evening and welcome to this email special.

They're all special. Today was the day we discovered that we're 15 in the podcast charts news section gb gb but not gb news no because that would be a low point please god that never happens i can honestly say i do rule that out so thank you very much to those of you who are keeping us in the news chart. Clip that, Megan. Just to make sure. Yeah. We're not strictly speaking a current affairs podcast, but I suppose we do have daily references to current affairs, don't we? So I guess that kind of probably is all right. Yeah, I don't think you should check your charts, actually. No, no, no, I don't. But it happened to be written down in front of me today, so I couldn't really ignore it. OK. You're not desperately adding something to a PowerPoint presentation

before you fall asleep every night. I like to check my pension, see how that's doing. Oh, now. You see, you shouldn't do that, should you? I know you shouldn't. You should only look kind of once or twice a year. That's what they tell you. Yeah.

Yeah. Because at the moment, if you look... Very depressing. Extraordinarily depressing. Yes. Thanks, Quasi. I will have to move in with you look... Very depressing. Extraordinarily depressing. Yeah, so... Thanks, Quasi. I will have to move in with you, I'm afraid. No, there's absolutely no need for that at all.

OK, so these are some of the emails that we've picked over a whole range of different topics over the last couple of weeks. And we actually... Here's a bit of genuine sincerity coming your way, because all sincerity is genuine, just to say thank you, because the emails have been brilliant and they've been consistent and we just couldn't do this without you. So thank you

all for bothering to email janeandfee at times.radio. So there are quite a few themes that emerged over the last couple of weeks, aren't there? And we've saved some of the longer emails to put into this edition. And shall I start with a weight-obsessed dad? Because we were discussing weight. We had a brilliant email, didn't we, from a mum who didn't really know what to say to her daughter, who she believed to be overweight. And it started off some really interesting themes of conversation. So this one is anonymous, and it goes like this. I heard the letter from your listener wondering how she could talk to her daughter about being overweight and Jane mentioned that it was usually the mothers who noticed these

things and passed on their issues with food and I agree it probably is generally the woman but I thought you might like to hear what it's like to grow up with a very loving but very critical father who had an unhealthy obsession with women's weight and looks. He just couldn't help commenting on larger women in cafes, on the TV, friends of my mother. And I was never overweight, but I wasn't skinny. And though I probably already had issues due to being the funny one in a group of pretty girlfriends, that is a whole other email thread. That is, and we'd welcome those too. Very much like to hear things on that. It certainly didn't help having a father who

commented on the smallest things. Once he advised that I shouldn't wear a particular Snoopy T-shirt because it was too tight on my arms and made them look fat. Needless to say, I wore long sleeves for a long time after that. I fasted a lot in my late teens and twenties and had body dysmorphia. I'm now in my mid-forties and thankfully I'm much less controlled than I used to be. I've always been very careful around my children, never to talk about food or weight.

They're slim and active young boys. However, I do hear it leak out with my husband when we're on holiday. It makes me very anxious eating out all the time and I hear myself gently and passive-aggressively suggesting he doesn't drink quite so much or eat all those chips and I feel ashamed I'd like to be able to explain to him where it comes from but although he's loving and kind I've never been able to talk to him about my food issues which shows just how deep the shame goes my father died six years ago commenting on the overweight nurses until the end

oh dear and I just thought that was such a beautiful email because it's not offering loads of advice or you know suggesting that there's a kind of conclusive way to go about all of these things but it just shows you're absolutely right that penultimate sentence it shows just how deep the shame goes so even though obviously you're in what I hope is a good relationship now and you've got kids and, you know, they are slim and active, as you say, there's still something that's coming to the surface all the time for you. And it's just so heartbreaking, isn't it? That, you know, your dad, gosh, I mean, what would he have said if someone had challenged him over his opinion on female weight? And what would he have said if you had told him, you know, just how deep it had gone when he criticised you? You know, I bet he would have been absolutely mortified, really, really mortified.

So I just wanted to say thank you for sharing that, because I think, you you know for people who are going through all of these issues either as the parent or the child themselves it's just enormously helpful sometimes to hear that other people have had to live their life in a similar vein and are just trying to kind of do the best actually and you can't always find a solution to those things that happen to you in childhood no it's naive to think you can and good on you for just kind of you know cracking on with it and realizing what you're doing really yeah and i absolutely um i'm glad that somebody there has referenced their father's view of weight because it's i didn't mean to suggest that it was only women who ever referenced it because i i know that isn't true um but it's it's such a shame

that that correspondent can't just cannot quite find a way through to talking about this with her husband, who seems like a nice guy. And the thing about any issue around food is, food is omnipresent. There is no escape. It's not like alcohol. It's not even like smoking. It's not like drugs. It's always going to be there.

You're always going to be eating. You're always going to be thinking about eating. There's always the possibility of a meal with other people. This is just, it's just omnipresent. It's not going to go away. And it just, but equally, it's such a wonderful thing to enjoy if you are able to enjoy it. And if you do manage to have a chat with your husband, then do let us know how it goes. If you want to, you don't have to at all. This is from another anonymous listener. I'd be very grateful for some advice on how to deal with a 17-year-old daughter

who is a little bit overweight. It's a struggle to know if and when and how to say anything. This evening, I pointed out that she didn't need to just eat something because it's in front of her and she went quite mad. My usual gentle, spirited, lovely girl yelled at me to shut up and stormed off. What should I do? She has my build and I would have loved for someone to have helped me not get overweight when I was her age. But her age are so sensitive to body shaming. I think that first paragraph that is exactly what I was alluding to when I think the subject first arose and I feel

for the two individuals involved in this situation I really do I completely understand why the mum here wants to spare her daughter from whatever she went through and I also I've had 17 year old daughters I've been a 17 year old daughter. There is no good time to make a suggestion about what your child is eating, how they're eating it, and whether or not they should be eating it. I'm afraid to that listener, I'm no expert, I would just say, frankly, don't say that.

Just don't bother mentioning it. Because on the whole, if you make an issue of food, it's inclined to stay an issue, isn't it? So there's a very similar email here from another anonymous correspondent who refers back to the original email that we had. Your correspondent talked of intervention drawing parallels between under-eating and over-eating. I can only see two options for intervention.

One, put her daughter in an environment where food is restricted. If so, I hope she can afford to keep them locked up for life. Or two, get her daughter to a doctor to explain about weight, health and options. I can guarantee no epiphany. Her daughter is likely not lacking education and the coercion could be very damaging. And the lady who wrote in doesn't mention love in her email. But I'm going to assume she loves her daughter and I'm going to suggest when she feels negative thoughts creeping

in she replaces them with my daughter has a beautiful laugh or my daughter is so kind or my daughter deserves to feel so loved because her daughter's weight is none of her business her daughter is an adult with her own free will? Yeah. It's so difficult because the email I just read out from the mother of the teenager clearly loves her and she believes that she suffered as a result of being overweight for whatever reason and she desperately wants her daughter to avoid the same judgment and some of the same miserable experiences she remembers from her own adolescence. So I don't think there's any suggestion that she doesn't love the child. And sometimes don't you think that some of the weirdest things that we

say and do as parents actually do come from a place of love but it's a little bit twisted and it's a little bit weird and it doesn't always make sense. Can I inject a slight bit of levity just because I wanted to say thank you to Patricia, who says, what a relief for Fee that Mike Pence is not in the presidential running. No more worries about listeners thinking she's talking about my pants. I'll leave my accent alone, Patricia. It is a shame that my pantsence is no longer with us. Me pence! Can I just... I've been reading a little bit,

and that'll surprise a lot of people, about the American presidential race. And it's far from a certainty that people are now beginning to seriously question the whole idea of Trump versus Biden. And if I were a betting woman, which of course I'm not, I might think it might be worth scooting down somewhere to put a bet on it being between two other people completely.

Yeah, I mean, you and I have had this conversation so many times on air, haven't we? Where we just cannot believe that there isn't a really, really serious whole committee room that's operating 24 hours a day, considering who might be able to step in in case Joe Biden, for whatever reason, doesn't quite make it. And I'm not saying that in a horrible way, but it would seem sensible to have that committee absolutely packed to the rafters. I would certainly bear it all in mind he's uh he's 80 isn't he he's just looks so frail sometimes and i feel for him and i really

actually i thought kate mccann was fantastic she came in one day and we're talking about this um on the radio program and and she said you know what you what you have to recognize is actually his wisdom and his longevity in politics means that he's got a 20-year relationship with the president of China. It's stuff like that that we're not seeing. So we just see the visuals, we just see the optics. We go, he's really old, he needs a handrail wherever he goes, he's fallen over this thing.

But that's not what the Democrats are treasuring. And that is very hard to replicate, isn't it? It is. And actually, I remember exactly what you referenced there when Kate came in and said, I think she'd been in a press conference with him, hadn't she? And she'd just been actually genuinely quite bowled over by that breadth of experience

and the longevity of his diplomatic relationships. And of course, some people are saying the same this week about Dave, now Lord Cameron, back amongst us. I think, what is he? He's 50. He's only, he's actually very young. He's 57? I think he probably is about 56, 57. And he left because he left Downing Street when he was only 49. Yeah, I think he's 57.

Have you seen the news clip? They're all gathering outside 10 Downing Street on the day of the reshuffle. And he gets out of a ministerial Range Rover or some kind of official car and there's just this very quiet voice saying what the hell just the last face anyone expected to see what the actual what yeah okay um please keep me anonymous says this emailer I have never emailed before, but I just feel compelled after hearing about the mother of the overweight daughter. I am an overweight daughter, despite exercise and healthy diet. It is my build. I would ask that the mother treads very carefully. The disdain and pressure you feel from society when you are larger is already so hard.

Speaking from personal experience, the small and probably well-meaning comments from my mother about my weight have really stung. Coming from someone who you are told should love you unconditionally, feeling their judgment on your appearance, even from a place of love, can really wound. I would suggest focus on her daughter's mental health. That should be her main concern and it's very important. But other than that, I would not focus on her daughter's mental health. That should be her main concern. And it's very important. But other than that, I would not mention weight. Thank you very much for that. That's a very thoughtful, thoughtful email.

It just reminds me of a couple of years ago when I was doing an interview elsewhere about with a noted child, an adolescent expert who'd written a book about rearing girls. And it was a man, as it turned out. And he said that what you have to bear in mind, and I'm paraphrasing here, is that looks don't matter. And I said, I'm really sorry, but I've been a teenage girl and looks do matter. They really, really matter. And it doesn't matter how many times people tell you that they don't matter in the real world out there. You know damn well that they do. And especially now, especially now. Yeah. Yeah. I actually I really do suggest that the male experts just listen to the to the young women and the young boys in their life and just appreciate that in an ideal world, of course looks shouldn't matter, but let's get real.

We all know they do. So this is quite pertinent. It's called Listen to the Children. And it comes from Kate who says, children have been showing us that the education system in England asks too much of its children for years. It isn't the teachers that are pushing them. It's the government driven curriculum. So this was off the back of, I think it must have

been a conversation with Esther Ranson saying, let's listen to the children. And our correspondent goes on to say, I don't think there's a teacher in the land who would argue against children having a more diverse experience at school. It's something we feel all children need and deserve. But if teachers are asked to deliver specific numbers of hours on maths, English and phonics, not to mention all the other ridiculous initiatives that get brought in all the time, there simply aren't enough hours in the day. And she goes on to say, I could harp on for hours about this topic, but I just wanted to say hurrah for Esther. And I wish more people held her views don't our children deserve better and

sometimes I think just you know to your point and what you were just saying there we rely on on parenting experts so much these days don't we and there are lots and lots of them around and as we have said a couple of times before on the podcast, you know, the person who writes a book about parenting, studies parenting or whatever, you know, it is like a restaurant reviewing itself. You know, the review has to be done by the people who are actually sampling the service. And that is the children. And at the moment, they've got so much to tell us, Jane, because their world is so different to ours. I think never more so than generations but perhaps if you live through the industrial revolution you know the life that was experienced by your parents was so remarkably

different to the one that you were experiencing the same kind of gap existed but i think we really really do just need to do a little bit more listening and a little bit less i told you so yeah stuff yeah because growing up now is nothing like, I mean, I appreciate you and I became parents when we were relatively mature, so perhaps... Creakingly old, love. Does that mean that the generation, so in theory the generation gap should be much bigger

between our generation of mothers and fathers and our children because we are on the whole much older than our parents were when they had us. Yeah, I'm sure that plays a part. But I'm not sure it's true. I think, I don't know, because I think we're, well, probably I would say this. I think we're able to have some quite open conversations with our children, probably conversations that were not possible for my generation.

I don't know. Maybe, maybe I'm just being rose tinted about this. We might take some thoughts on that. Ah um you spoke about mothers anonymous you spoke about mothers being harder on their daughters where weight is concerned any hope i still had for my ex-husband's emotional intelligence died when he looked at our then adolescent daughter one day made a shape like two brackets with his hands and said, what's this? Her body was moving to a more womanly shape. We'd recently had an excellent talk from her school's head mistress telling us to avoid criticising ourselves physically in front of our daughters. My bum looks

big in this etc. Early mid-naughties so the focus was very much on teenage girls eating issues. I have got friends who worry about their sons too. My daughter is in her 30s now. She's fit and active and slim, sometimes a bit too slim. In my wider family, weight was a thing. My lovely, naturally slim mother, who's a grazer, tried to help with my distress but couldn't really understand how people gained weight anyway. Aunts, one of whom undertook dangerous measures to lose weight whenever she needed to, frequently warned of the dangers of becoming like

Cousin X or Singer Y. The 70s were the start of the seriously effed up publicity. Cardboard crackers and bread that made you fly in the sky with seriously catchy tunes I can still remember. What was that bread?

Nimble. Nimble. Nimble. Bloody awful. Everyone took off in a hot air balloon after eating it, didn't they? They were so light. So light and airy. It was mainly just air.

Thank you for all of your suggestions about clothes pegs. There was almost a peg standoff because a couple of people wrote in to tell us that we really needed to use recycled plastic pegs uh this one comes from Ali B who says we need to get them from the popular online company we all use far too much the pegs are bright green and made in Italy not China from recycled plastic they're mighty strong and have withstood all weathers so far. And she knows this because she moved to the Windy Wirral last autumn

and discovered quite swiftly that if she wanted to avoid the breeze from the Irish Sea scattering her enormous old lady pants around the neighbours' gardens, she needed stronger clothes pegs. But then this one comes in and it might beat everybody because it comes from the Falkland Islands, Jane. OK, I think that is the winner. It's from Alice who says, in the Falkland Islands where winds average 20km an hour

and over 40km an hour quite regularly, we use metal clothes pegs. Quite simply, nothing else does the job. It does mean your clothes dry quickly though. Well, I mean, that's worth moving all that way for, isn't it? I hope you're OK, Alice. I've always just found it so terrifying that the Falkland Islands are so far away. Well, I would like to hear more about daily life in the Falkland Islands. So if you can

be bothered, please do email again and tell us what you do. And tell us whether, I mean, do you live near Port Stanley? What has Port Stanley got these days in terms of facilities? Has it got a Costa? Has it got a Costa? Has it got a Costa? Could you get a flat white? I bet there's a Pret. Oh my God. I mean, there will be a Pret

and it'll be shipping out its Christmas baguettes even as we speak. And you'll go in there every day thinking, I like Pret. And then you'll stand in front of their stands and go, there's nothing here I like. I don't know. There's everything I like there.

I've got to be honest. Do you remember, I can plug it because it doesn't exist anymore, the chain Eat. I do, yeah. That was fabulous. It was fabulous. They did a chicken stew, didn't they? It was a chicken pot pie.

Chicken pot pie, yes. A little pastry topping. But also in November and December, they did a turkey dinner in a bucket. Nice. You could bring that in. It was absolutely wonderful. It had a chipolata, it had cranberry, mash,

gravy, good quality turkey and much else besides. Yeah. There was one near the other place that we used to work at, wasn't there, which was dangerous to go into because it was just entirely full of your colleagues. So, you know, if you wanted a bit of a break at lunchtime, it didn't matter how much you wanted the chicken pot pie.

It was still unwise to go in because you'd always get harangued by a senior manager. 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 right this one comes in from Sarah who says uh you appeared in a recent extremely vivid and at the time very stressful dream. I was being interviewed by you both about my book. The book title was A Strong Family History of Maths. The problem was that while I had some ideas about the content, there'd been some misunderstanding because I hadn't actually written the book. Not that anybody else had either. Essentially an interview about a non-existent book. And you say, Sarah, possibly a contender for the most boring anecdote, but no, that belongs to Jane with her,

I went to get bin bags, there weren't any bin bags. No, it's recycling sacks. I'm so sorry. Well, that makes all the difference. It does. In my real work, sorry, in my real life, my work as a community paediatrician in the NHS is full of fascinating and memorable patients and families,

and my family life is fairly full of drama too, to the point that at, in respect to some of my sister's life choices, my mother coined the acronym NNFN. No need for Netflix. Did your sister know that? Oh dear. Seems quite a harsh judgement. Several years ago when I was asking a parent in my clinic a standard question,

any family history of mental delay, learning difficulties, autism or similar, they answered no. No autism, but we do have a strong family history of maths. I thought at the time, fleetingly, as many people do I believe, if I ever write a book, there is the title. And there it goes. Yeah, that would work. I think it would. I think it would fly off the shelves. And Sarah says something that quite a few people have said, which is

maybe from time to time have someone who hasn't written a book on. Oh, God. Well, we welcome that. Which reminds me, here's Claire, who says, how do you manage to read all the books that you do is there a secret I manage one book every month or so and I'm constantly frustrated by my inability to find time to read more there are loads of great books out there and I'm sad I'll never get to read them all any tips well I mean you're never going to read every single book that's out there so don't worry about that Claire um how do we do well I think the answer is I speed read a great deal which I'm ashamed to say means that I don't always savour every single paragraph. If there's

a description of landscape I tend to flick over. Isn't that awful? So I can't tell you whether it was windy or what that tree looked like or anything like that at all what the sunset looked like. Non-fiction I find easier to read quickly than fiction would that be true maybe i think also it is worth pointing out there are two of us so um the people who are listening closer uh too closely possibly may have noticed that one of us always kind of takes the lead in an interview which does mean that they have generally really read the book and the other person has done a skim. Yeah. So I speed read too, but also I find it very difficult to speed read fiction, actually.

You can't really, can you? No, I do like to really savour it. Because you lose all the nuances. And just to give away a little bit of a secret here, very much showing my pants, if it's a really fantastic book i don't finish it before doing the interview because also i don't think in interviews you should give away the ending of a book so quite often i haven't got to the end i just don't care well that's the difference between you and me so the butler did it in case you're wondering no but

it's it's like with the lee child book this week the secret i've saved the ending of that because i want to read that in my own time, Jane. You don't know what The Secret is? No, don't tell me. La, la, la, la, la, la, la. Fingers and ears. Victoria says, I find the term chicklet very offensive. Is there a term dicklet that is used for books such as the Jack Reacher series?

If there isn't, then there bloody well should be. Okay, I actually kind of wither there. Although I've got to out myself and say I love a bit of dicklet. series if there isn't then the bloody world should be okay i actually kind of wither there um although i enjoy i've got to out myself and say i love a bit of dick lit um maybe that's a good point because um chick lit does sound dismissive yes and i think people are very loathe to use it now yeah they are but it's still around you still get people saying that they like it or that there are sections in bookshops devoted to that sort of thing or perhaps you're right perhaps they don't have those signs anymore don't they okay

um she also says there's a touch of the captain mannering sergeant wilson about your radio friendship i'll let you work out who's who now i like dad's army a. It's one of those sitcoms from back in the day that still works. It is genuinely funny. I'm going to disagree there. Oh, you don't think so? No, I do. I really think it's funny. Just all that marching around and, yeah.

Oh, no, but it's very, I mean, my granddad was in the Home Guard, so maybe that's why he had some quite funny stories. I like to think that we're some of the wives in Dallas, Jane. So you've got some great choices there. Pamela. Pamela. Sue Ellen. Well, no, because I'd be the poison dwarf, wouldn't I?

Charlene. Charlene, and I don't think she was a wife, was she? Oh, no, she married Ray Krebs. Yes. Did she marry Ray Krebs? She did. No, did she? No, Donna was married to Ray. Oh, eventually, she married to Ray Krebs. Yes. Did she marry Ray Krebs? She did. No. Did she?

No, Donna was married to Ray. Oh, eventually she was. But I think Ray and Charlene had an affair. Oh. Because it was ridiculous because Charlene was about 4'3". Nothing wrong with that. And Ray Krebs was well over 6'4". He was a 6'4". Yeah, he was also about 75.

Hello, Jane and Fee. Following on from the listener who sent an email recently and apologised for their English, I saw this online and it made me giggle. It's from Hazel Rose D on the X. When I was in school,

I was doing my French speaking exam and I started crying because I literally couldn't do it. And my French teacher said, it's OK, you're not the worst. The girl before you answered the questions in English but just with a French accent so who was it Michael Owen who was it

who did that at a press conference I forgot it wasn't my clone I don't think it was my clone but it was um it was who god who was it that's really going to annoy me now because it was, God, who was it? That's really going to annoy me now. Because it was funny. He just started answering questions in his lively French accent. I've come to Paris Saint-Germain. Oh, I'll look it up, actually. It was good. Yes, see if you can find out who. Michael Owen has form because I think he went on record

and said he'd never watched a film. Oh, gosh. Which is quite unusual, isn't it? Never to have seen any film. Or maybe he'd seen one film. Here we go. Who was it? Joey Barton.

Joey Barton. Joey Barton. Thank you, Megan, very much. A little bit of, I think the jury's out on Joey Barton. It's been out more than once. Anyway, that's probably not that funny, really. You do make me laugh, says Claire. Gr grasping for facts like a scene from Dinner Ladies, as I find myself constantly doing the same.

When you were discussing Agatha Christie's husbands and disappearance, I was shouting, shouting, but unfortunately you can't hear. I've just finished Lucy Worsley's excellent biography of Agatha Christie, and you were partly correct, partly correct when you mentioned Guildford. I think that was you, wasn't it? When Agatha realised that her first husband, Archibald Christie, was having an affair with a woman called Nancy Neal, she left the house and abandoned her car in Surrey.

Now, when I read that originally, I thought it said abandoned her cat in Surrey, and I was absolutely horrified but it's all right it was only her car so I think better of her now. She then caught a train to North Yorkshire and stayed in a hotel in Harrogate under a pseudonym. It's a great book well worth a read. Also Ree Fee's aversion to going to the theatre. My sister and I saw Sunset Boulevard at the weekend. I've heard other people talk about this. Nicole Scherzinger was brilliant and the whole production was unlike anything we'd seen before. Well...

Is that going to get you there? Nope, but thank you. I'm OK. I'm OK. I'm OK. What is it? Is it because you don't want to queue up for a tub of vanilla in the interval? I get a little bit claustrophobic and a little bit weirded out and I think ooh, they're

up on stage. They're pretending? Do you know what I mean? Sometimes they're really acting. Yes, well actors are known for that. Alexa is another person who just said, it was Harrogate! I've just started that Lucy Worsley book

yes I've got a copy of that about Agatha Christie we could get her on but she sold loads of copies so we don't need to oh it would be quite good fun actually so her shtick for it for writing the book is very much that we need to see Agatha Christie through a different prism of really

extraordinary pushing of boundaries for women, because we do regard her as a slightly kind of staid creature. But actually, when you think of her contribution, it is massive. And she's still widely read, isn't she? So she is the third most widely read author after Shakespeare and all the blokes who wrote the Bible. Shakespeare and all the blokes who wrote the Bible. God, I think, is the name you're groping for. All the blokes who wrote the Bible.

Yeah. Okay. If you are religious, I'd just like to apologise. Is that true? So it goes Shakespeare, the Bible, and then Agatha Christie. And then Agatha Christie. What about J.K. Rowling? Well, I don't know. This is all...

I mean, that's why we should get Lucy Worsley on, I don't know. But also, you know, she's very interesting on that, the time and the place that Agatha Christie was writing in, so the kind of things that she included, racist language and all of that, Lucy Worsley's very interesting on... Because it's not about forgiving somebody for that, but it is about recognising a different time and a different place. But I've only just started the book, so I'll report back a bit later. Well, yes, do keep us updated.

We're a little giddy tonight because we're going out. We are, so we're going on a... It's not a works do, is it? Come on, let's be honest. It's not really a works do. You and I would not be going out for dinner to this phenomenally posh restaurant on a Wednesday night were it not a works do. No, but it's not like it's a works do for the team. We're going to meet the people who put the adverts into this.

I tell you what, it's a posh restaurant, so maybe we'll meet a celebrity in the toilet, which is a very slick way of getting onto this email. Well done. Thank you. Andy in Margate joins us. Hello, Andy. Having discovered off-air a month ago... Well, welcome aboard. Okay, come on. We welcome all newcomers. Yes, no, we absolutely do. You've become an integral part of my morning dog walk. Today, a memory from about 1970 was stirred by the listener whose claim to fame was sitting on a loose seat shortly after Jilly Cooper. Now, my loose seat claim to fame is, do you remember? Because I have mentioned it before.

Oh, I can't, I'm sorry. You mentioned the television programme in which you starred only about five minutes ago. Oh, so it was Dallas. So you sat, genuinely, so it was Dallas. Mm-hmm. So you sat... Genuinely, I can't remember. No, OK, I sat on the loose seat directly after Linda Gray. And you've told me that anecdote before. I definitely have.

I blanked it. Well, I think it's a good loo anecdote story. OK, where were you? LA. Oh, yes, you've been to Los Angeles. I had a life before I met you. Oh, my word. I mean, not much of one, obviously.

During the day in question, the BBC had... We're back to Andy and Margaret now. We're not in my dizzy life. During the day in question, the BBC had visited my grammar school in Gloucester. He's just shoehorning in there the fact that he went to a grammar school to film a round, now I do remember this, a round of the TV show Top of the Form. Remember that? No. Okay. Do you remember Ask the Family? Yes. That was hilarious. My sister and I used to sit in absolute pleats of laughter watching Ask the Family because we were trying to imagine what our

family would have been like on that show. We would have been crap. So who was the guy who presented it? Oh, that was Robert Robinson. Yes. He always had a kind of tweed suit on. Yes, he was sort of very headmasterly. And I mean, I'm not being funny, but some of the kids in particular, I mean, you can imagine how horrible my sister and I were about that.

They were quite nerdy. There was no family fortunes. There really wasn't. But we were mocking only because we knew that we were being good. So we'd just argue and the whole thing would have to be abandoned. It would be terrible. Anyway, back to Andy in Margate. He was at school in Gloucester, remember?

Grammar school, grammar school. And they were filming a round of the TV show Top of the Form. In the evening, I was still buzzing with excitement and keen to relay the experience to my family when my dad got home from work and managed to top all my stories about Top of the Form with guess what? When I popped out at lunchtime,

I found myself standing at the very next urinal to Geoffrey Wheeler. He was the host of Top of the Form. Now, bearing in mind that the said Mr Wheeler was also at that time presenting songs of praise, you'll be relieved to hear that I'm unable to fabricate any link between this anecdote and another of yesterday's references, i.e. Tickle Cop Bridge. Right. OK, I'll be off with you, Andy. I think it can get very breezy in Margate. You need to go... You be careful on those walks.

We had a terrible text into the programme today. Oh, God, which I read out. Yeah, don't go on. God's sake. When you started reading it, it was like, Jane, don't read that. No, no, but it made just about tongs and a penis. Yeah.

It's all right. I don't think anybody noticed. I certainly... Well, I didn't, until it was too late. So we definitely need to know more about your trip to Los Angeles. I'd rather not.

But Linda Gray for what it's worth was absolutely lovely. So was there a queue for the loo? No, I was waiting outside she came out, held the door. Lovely lady. Very nice and do you think that she's sitting in a parallel universe somewhere today saying Jane Garvey, she came in just as I was leaving the store? I think it's unlikely. I

was then at the time a local radio presenter, so I think it's probably unlikely. They had bigger budgets back then, didn't they? BBC Harrods and Worcester did a lot of OBs in LA. Actually, perhaps I will. I don't know why. I can't remember when it was, but yeah, it was definitely her. Yeah. She was lovely. Well, that's very nice. I stood in a queue for the loo with Jennifer Aniston. But I didn't actually then sit on a loo seat after her. So it's just not such a good anecdote. No, it isn't.

But you've told it. She is beautiful. Is she? Absolutely beautiful woman. Yeah. And I've watched all of The Morning Show now. And she's just, I think she's very underrated as an actress like you oh I've always thought she was good well do some people not rate

her I think she got slightly plonked in the you know in the celebrity pages of magazines too much for her to be taken as seriously as some of those other actresses are so if you think of Cate Blanchett or Nicole Kidman I think they're given more welly than Jennifer Aniston is, but I think she's really brilliant. And because she can do comedy as well. She's got good comedy chops and acting chops. Well, you said you didn't like acting. I was going to say timing, but you completely ruined that.

Oh, well, there you go. It's unfortunate, isn't it? Also, by the way, I do think that the tributes that the cast of friends have paid to matthew perry have been really touching and um you know i i watched it because particularly you know my kids love friends and um but it's actually been really rather it's good to know that i think they genuinely were close and supported each other and tried to support him too so it's great it great. It's good to know that, isn't it? Yeah, it is. Melissa says, I was inspired to write to you as I read the first of your book club books in French to dust off my degree in French literature.

That, of course, was Freshwater for Flowers. I was in Paris last weekend just on a tourist trip and spotted Changez l'eau des fleurs has been turned into a play and the premiere was that very weekend. I booked, went, was upgraded to the stalls and it was excellent. I did find myself wondering whether there were any other off-air listeners in the audience. That's from Melissa and thank you very much for that. We didn't know it was a play, did we?

No, quite a long play. It would be quite a long play and I'm you very much for that we didn't know it was a play, did we? No, quite a long play It would be quite a long play and I'm going to say quite a tedious one but Melissa said no, it was excellent It was very mean No, I just didn't like the book I've got no good at me pretending I can't contradict what I said at the time

Are you enjoying Boy Swallows Universe? Not that much but it's... Did you enjoy My Sister the Serial Killer? Yes, I did It was short, it was snappy, it said what it said. It did what it did on the tin, it entertained me, it left my life. I don't think I'm going to think about it much in the future,

but at the time, I thought it was excellent. Well, our book club special is kind of this time next week, isn't it? If you say so, you're almost certainly correct. Yeah, I think it is. OK. Well, if you love... Oh, no, you don't like theatre, do you? So you won't be going to see that.

No, I won't. It's just not possible. I feel that the pressure is on me to go to the theatre now. I'll give it a go. Maybe next year. Hang on one second. You might need to tighten up this bit, or you could just leave it in,

because I think the listeners probably need a bit of a pause too. Right, should we just do one last one? Have you got something that we can go out on with a lovely crescendo and a perfect cadence? It's not a crescendo, but it is something we should bear in mind. It's from Pauline, the one with the menopause. I'm afraid that doesn't single you out, Pauline, because that could be...

What percentage of our audience do you think is menopausal well i think including the men 98 you're probably right um can i ask you a huge favor please i was on my way to work this morning listening in the car to yesterday's podcast and i was re listen to this i was really enjoying jane's story about Cliff. Felix surprised. As the story unfolded, though, her voice got softer and softer, to the point that I had to turn my radio volume to full blast, and even then it was difficult to make out. No, it was just the universe working on

behalf of me. However, once the story was finished, the volume of your voices went back to normal. Again. Yeah, I do think that... Do you think that, I mean, Cliff is, as we know, a Christian gentleman. Could it be that other forces were trying to intervene poorly? I would not rule it out. I really wouldn't rule it out.

Yeah. What do you think you'll go and see next? Oh, and what is my next, you know, well, the only thing I've got booked now is the panto. That's not until December. I will look for something cultural. Yeah, so you've kind of had quite a large cultural burp. Now you're just going to pause for a while. I think it's time to purge my pipes of all culture.

But if anyone's got anything they'd like to recommend, a film, actually. Do you know, I haven't been to the cinema for ages and ages. I'm off to see Napoleon, actually Napoleon actually. Are you not interested? Well actually that takes us back to Dad's Army doesn't it because who was it who was always, oh it was the warden who would always call Captain Manoring Napoleon because he was quite short. And Napoleon in Ridley Scott's film is played by... Joachim Phoenix. Joachim. What kind of a life? You call a lad Joachim.

He's, I suppose, what nationality is he? Is that Spanish? No, I think they're American, aren't they? No, they are, but I think the Phoenix family are American. But Joachim... Am I pronouncing it right? The Scouse isn't really helping here. How do you pronounce it? Joachim. Pauline's not picking that up because you're whispering. I don't know where this is going, but I think that we need to say thank you very much for everybody's emails

and hopefully you can join us when we just revert to normal tomorrow yeah uh and uh I don't know what else to say Jane no I'm out of puff okay but we look forward as people have enjoyed my reviews of um uh ballet did I mention the ballet uh certainly you all got my review of Sir Clifford so we all look forward to hearing what Fi has made of Ridley Scott's magnum opus. Okay, I'll take some notes and I'll bring them in. That's exciting for everybody. Good evening. Good evening. Good night. Well done for getting to the end of another episode of Off Air with Jane Garvey and Fee Glover. Our Times Radio producer is Rosie Cutler

and the podcast executive producer is Henry Tribe. And don't forget, there is even more of us every afternoon on Times Radio. It's Monday to Thursday, three till five. You can pop us on when you're pottering around the house or heading out in the car on the school run. Or running a bank. Thank you for joining us and we hope you can join us again on Off Air very soon. Don't be so silly.

Running a bank? I know, ladies. A lady listener. I'm sorry. Sorry. Calendar, double tap to open. Breakfast with Anna, from 10 to 11. And get on with your day. Accessibility, there's more to iPhone.