Off Air... with Jane and Fi - I've never got on with a rhombus

Episode Date: December 5, 2022

Jane and Fi ask what shape vegan food should be, how best to make small talk at parties, and do pilots ever get used to aeroplane toilets?Pilot and author of 'How to Land a Plane' and 'Imagine a City' Mark Vanhoenacker has the answers to at least one of those questions.If you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] Producer: Kate LeeTimes Radio Producer: Rosie CutlerPodcast Executive Producer: Ben Mitchell Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Right. So we've stopped doing introductions to the podcast, haven't we? We just drift into it. Here we are, drifting into our very successful podcast, Off Air with Jane and Fi. Thank you for listening. We are really touched, aren't we? We're very touched. And actually, that's the spin-off podcast, isn't it?

Drift in. Drift in. Tune out. Show up. Go home. Right. We've got loads of lovely emails. And thank you for sending them.

Jane and Fi at times.radio. And do you know what, Jane? I love it when the emails go rogue. Which ones is? Well, just when people start talking about things that they just want to talk about. But let's go with triangular-shaped bean burgers. Yeah, I like this.

Yep. This comes from Vicky. Love your podcast. Thanks for sharing input from someone who was making the case for meat-shaped vegan food. I think that was you, wasn't it? Well, I'm just puzzled because I cater for a vegan and a vegetarian. And so much of their food is meat-shaped, plant-based content. Oh, yes.

And then we got the lovely email from someone explaining that it was for people who were kind of vegetarian adjacent. So they were comforted by the fact that a vegetarian thing was shaped like something they could identify in the meat world. Because I also said, when I was a vegetarian, back in the late 80s and 90s, you just had the vegetables, and in my case, the gravy. I just didn't eat the meat. And we weren't catered for.

So I didn't care. It's been a difficult life jane i'm amazed that you've come through it with so much bonami and i'm using a french word there which we will talk about later i'm going to carry on with vicky's email which says i thought i'd share my own thoughts on this matter does pork have the monopoly on cylinder shapes it's a beefy old question does beef have the only rights to a circle aka a burger as cylinders and circles meat shaped vicky you've gone all from one now if vegan food was shaped as a roasted chicken which is obviously animal shaped well some of them aren't are they i think i could understand why somebody would be confused by that but i don't think that exists maybe mushed together beans should only be provided in square shapes or triangles

so as not to cause confusion. Surely beetroot burgers have more right to be circular than beef burgers, though, as beetroots are actually circular, unlike cows. Food for thought. Keep up the good work. Vicky, you've really started something there. Vicky, I think that's gone to the top of my emails of the year pile that has because you know she's really made me think um and why is it that pork is only served in cylinder shapes it's very odd i mean you can have beef sausages can't you but they're all chicken sausages now i've noticed but they're not as common or as popular i think the

great thing in that is just asking why food shapes can never be square or triangular. And it's true. Once you gravitate from triangle things in kids' foods, and some spaghetti and notably the cheeses are in triangle form, you don't often come across a triangle in adult food life. There's the Toblerone, triangular chocolate. Yeah, it's not really on your plate though, is it? And maybe the vegans should claim the triangle.

The vegetarians should claim the square. And if you're a little bit of both, you could have a rhombus. I never got on with the rhombus. This is on a similar vein from Katrina, who says, you asked last week why vegetarians feel the need for meat product shaped items. And I wanted to state that not all of us do. Many would be less than delighted at a dinner party to discover their plate piled high with lovingly crafted replica animal limbs. That does make you think, doesn't it? As you mentioned, there appears to be a generational divide on this, which I think might relate to somebody's primary reason for giving up meat. In recent years, being vegan or veggie has become closely linked with the environment.

And that's absolutely right. There was no way that the environment was my reason not to eat meat for that seven years in which I didn't eat meat. Anyway, Katrina goes on. Many have given up or reduced meat consumption due to the knock-on effects on climate change, rather than because they find meat itself unappealing. And the explosion in meat substitute products caters well for this demographic, especially those who are flexitarian and still enjoy meat. In contrast, one of the biggest social issues of the 1990s was animal cruelty. People were out demonstrating against animal testing, battery farming or the production of fur coats. And the Meat is Murder campaign became part of this. Nearly all my friends experimented with vegetarianism

during this decade for that reason. Although most were ultimately lured back into the fold by a late night kebab or a Sunday roast. And you're talking about me, basically, Katrina, although in my case, it was a trip to Florida that did it for me. Oh, Lordy. There's more of a story there, isn't there? No, I just

couldn't find anything remotely vegetarian and suddenly fancied a McDonald's. Oh. And that was it. So it always makes me slightly smile that some vegetarians close to my heart have caved in and gone for the sausage that's what's brought them down or a bacon sandwich has brought vegetarians down because it just seems like a

massive leap off the high diving board to go in on a sausage people always say it's the smell of bacon you're right they do but actually i've never been that attracted by the smell of bacon, you're right. But actually, I've never been that attracted by the smell of bacon, or indeed by bacon itself, because I'm not keen on fat. But I also love in Katrina's email, lovingly crafted replica animal limbs. That really lays it on the line. And I think there's a restaurant in that, isn't there? There's definitely one in East London. Katrina's really made me think, I mean, a chicken leg

is quite literally the leg of a chicken. Yeah, I know. And you call it a chicken leg, and you don't think... If the menu quite literally the leg of a chicken yeah i know and you call it a chicken leg and you don't think if you was if the menu said the leg of a chicken you'd think about the whole thing rather differently wouldn't you well you were but then you're heading towards the i'm a celebrity nonsense aren't you where you over identify body parts sometimes it's better not to know uh can i do one that is titled agree with, or will that give you high dudgeon? You're right. No, go on.

Hi, Jane and Fi. As I often do, says beep. I found myself agreeing with Fi during Thursday's episode of Our Fair. Just deep breathe, Jane. You'll be fine. Fi, you're absolutely right to say that you're not just entitled to ask about someone's heritage in a lot of situations. And beep, I would say most situations in your email with connections to Nigeria and Ghana who asked when it's okay to ask about

someone's heritage I recognize a sort of well-meaning impulse I'm white British and had a long-term relationship with a British Nigerian man in my 20s and as such probably have ever so slightly more familiarity with Nigerian culture than the average white mill town dwelling northerner. I understand that sometimes you recognize something and feel an urge to show that you love or know or miss something about a particular culture but to question someone on their heritage in order to reveal your own knowledge even if it's because you wish to share something joyful about it is still centering yourself at the expense of a person of colour's right to exist as an individual

go about their day without having to be othered or otherwise represent the whole of their culture goes on to say I've had many fascinating and enlightening conversations about Nigeria about heritage and culture and how it feels to exist between two cultures with my then boyfriend and other friends. That's not just information that you're entitled to when you meet someone at an event or down the shops. I'll be grateful if you didn't use my name in the

unlikely event that you read this, so you're just going to have to bleep it out. I'm really sorry, Katie. I didn't read that bit right at the end. Would that be all right? Should I say a beep, and then you can put it back in. Beep! There we go. This is from another listener who says, I listened to your take on the lady-in-waiting who asked Ngozi Fulani where she was really from,

and it made me reflect on my own experiences as a Jewish woman. Now, I'm not a religious person, so I'm like many UK Jewish people who has Jewish roots but chooses to be secular. There have certainly been times when people's first response to hearing that I'm Jewish is to say oh I didn't know you don't look Jewish whatever that means and then sometimes the next question is do you eat bacon? I find this really uncomfortable because of course I do but I don't necessarily feel comfortable going into the ins and outs of my ways of living as a Jewish woman.

It's personal. And there is a certain amount of complexity about having being brought up in a loving Jewish home and then choosing to be secular. Until I listened to your show, I hadn't really named this as anti-Semitic and indeed maybe it isn't. But I always then feel on the back foot, so to speak, and I find myself stuttering my words. But I always then feel on the back foot, so to speak, and I find myself stuttering my words. And yes, I do often come away from those conversations feeling discombobulated. And I suppose of that a little bit like Ngozi did. And that is from Abigail. Abigail, thank you for that. And that's a good point. I mean, it's extraordinary, isn't it? I remember this is nothing to do with race, but I remember the most uncomfortable situation I ever felt in as a as a grown up, actually, honestly, was when I had my second daughter who was born with a funny hip and had to go into one of those orthopedic harnesses,

which is quite unusual. You don't actually see them that often. I'm not even sure they're still used. Anyway, I took her. She was very young and it was a summer's day and I took her out to the park and it was very conspicuous, this harness. If anybody's ever seen them, they'll know that the child's legs are sort of forced into a froggy position by the harness which is putting the hip joint together. That's what it's doing.

It's working at making sure it goes into the right place. And a woman I'd never met before came up to me, bold as brass, and said, did you throw that baby down the stairs? Ooh. And I know this has nothing to do with race, but it was a quite astounding thing that she felt able to ask me. And she didn't do it with a, there wasn't,

I mean, it wouldn't have been a funny thing to say anyway, but it wasn't a misguided attempt to start a conversation. In the same way that sometimes, you know, if you saw someone who had a cut lip, you might attempt to make a joke about it. Well, I think that's dodgy territory, isn't it? No, if you've fallen down when you're drunk or something like that, it wasn't that kind of thing. I don't think so. I think it was just someone who thought it was perfectly okay to ask a harassed mother who looked a bit...

So what did you say? I just got really upset and just said, no, of course not, and just walked on. I mean, but what... Honestly, what can you do in such a... So I know, I appreciate that. I've gone off on, you know, disappeared down a conversational cul-de-sac

that's nothing to do with race, but I do... I'm often astounded by how people behave and the rights some people have or think they have to impose their questions on other people. Just absurd. I hope something good has come out of all of the conversations about Logan Susan Hussey. Because I think her line

of questioning and just the where are you from, where are you really from all rolled into one question is asked of too many people, more than we might like to think so hopefully lots of people have listened, checked themselves in a little bit. I really really hope so

we do hear, I think, I think I'm right in saying that the King and the Queen Consort there have been overtures made to Ngozi Fulani to perhaps have a conversation to facilitate some sort of meeting where all this can be aired in a sort of conciliatory

and in a happy and well-operated environment. The whole thing just makes you feel a bit sad. But I think you're right, maybe this is an opportunity for lots of people to learn and to think about the way they conduct themselves. I love the way that you just managed to roll off the tongue

the King and the Queen Consort. Because we've been ticked off, haven't we, for saying on air Camilla, just Camilla, as if she's a mate of ours, which she's not. And of course she does have a much more kind of official title now. But also, I don't think it's uncommon to refer to the royal family. And that's one of the huge problems that the royal family is experiencing at the moment. It's got a lot of problems.

But that kind of, we feel a familiarity with them that we shouldn't really feel. It's a terrible thing. But most of us, and I'm sure I've said this before, most of us have family lives that, you know, frankly, wouldn't withstand a great deal of scrutiny. Definitely not. You and I have both made some mistakes. I don't know why I've slipped into that voice. And certainly, you know, if you were to do a fly on the wall documentary about my home life, you'd be bored to tears. I don't think either of us would make volume three of the Netflix documentary we really wouldn't but

um at the moment it's sort of almost tempting because most of us have got quite a lot going on not least the fact that we've got all sorts of you know concerns about money and about Christmas and about relatives and all the rest but um sometimes you look at the royal family and think oh well clearly they're having as many struggles as we are just with more houses um this is from suzy who says um i'm not sure this is really helpful but i am navigating corporate america as a british person and we've settled on two useful ways in when meeting new people rather than asking questions like are you married or do you have kids we found tell me about your family is a much better way to open up a conversation similarly tell me about yourself is a nice way to ask people

for personal info that they're willing to share without it being an interrogation and i think that's very useful i should say suzy is from formby on merseyside and went to the same school as me although she does point out in the 90s what would your opening question be in small talk at a drinks party um gosh that's a good one I actually Susie's absolutely right um oh tell me a bit about yourself is a really nice open way of starting a conversation I mean I generally ask for somebody if i could see their degree certificate that's my and yes and i also throw in the fact that i do have a bronze medal for life saving okay i always like have you had a busy day have you had a bit that's a good one because then someone can just you know they just tell you a bit about yourself yeah don't ask that to some middle-aged men though because 17 hours later you'll still be hearing about just how busy

and important they are so you've got to watch yourself a bit however we interviewed a man today on the program who was fascinating that is what's called a link that is a link here we go this one is for you if you've ever been on a plane and have asked to visit the cockpit mark van honacker is a pilot best-selling author of skyfaring, which is part memoir, part careers advice, all about why he chose to fly high up in the sky. I feel a song coming on. A pilot of some of the world's best and biggest airlines. His new book is called Imagine a City, and it's all about what makes a city, its personality, its people, as well as how beautiful cities look

from the sky. We asked him to paint us a picture from the cockpit. This is really my favourite time of year to paint that picture in the northern hemisphere, where obviously there's so much darkness around during the day, I mean, you know, during the day and night. You know, I think cities are perhaps most evocative from above at night, when we cross a coastline, maybe like the east coast of the US or Japan, perhaps. And we see this whole line of cities looking sort of simultaneously biological and technical, almost like an image of civilization itself and moving below us, apparently silently.

Perhaps above us, we have the Northern Lights, which is a feature of so many flights across the north at this time of year, over Canada, for example. And so, yeah, the view of cities from above is one of the most special things we can see from the cockpit, I think. Have you ever been scared when you're flying? We were just talking about our first experiences of flight. And, you know, when you're not the pilot, the first time you get on board as a passenger, you just can't really understand how it is that it's all working. It's an understandable fear for us.

I've never, never been afraid as a pilot. You know, the training we go through is so incredibly rigorous and ongoing and recurrent. You know, every six months or so, we're in these flight simulators, which costs a good portion of the cost of an actual airplane. And they simulate the whole world, including its cities and obviously its airports and its weather. And so, you know, that experience of being afraid while flying is something that I know some people have. I often get letters from passengers, from customers who've, you know, had that fear their whole lives. But it's not something that I'm, you know, that doesn't survive the extensive training process that every pilot, especially a commercial pilot,

will go through. Mark, I am not a very happy flyer. And I wonder whether you can reassure me about, I know logically it's one of the safest modes of travel. Why does it make so many of us feel so frightened at times? You know, I often, when I get emails from readers of Skyfaring or Imagine a City, you know, often it's that they've had, you know, perhaps a bumpy flight, you know, early on, or perhaps they didn't fly for a long time and came to flying later in their lives than some of us do. I think there's often that kind of a story in someone's background. And, you know, one of the things that's most helpful, I think, is to come up to the cockpit before departure, when it's still permitted, and to speak to the pilots and ask, you know, if we have a few minutes, we're always happy to talk to people.

Also, your cabin crew, of course, are very familiar with, you know, dealing with customers who are perhaps a little uneasy when they get on board and they have a series of, you know, techniques and conversational tools that are very helpful. I think, you know, many people find turbulence to be, you know, uncomfortable. And, you know, we always say that turbulence is uncomfortable, but it's never dangerous. And that's something which is, you know, obvious to us in the flight deck, but it's something that is often reassuring to customers who have not explored before. Sorry to harp on about this, but how is it not dangerous? It does feel, frankly, dangerous.

Yeah, I mean, it can feel uncomfortable, but I can assure you it is not dangerous. There is a test they do when they're certifying an aircraft called a wing box test. I hope I have the name right, where they bend the wings of an airliner up just to you know, to test them. And my understanding is they can almost reach vertical. And so when you look out of the window of your flight and you see the wing bouncing a little bit as you're moving through the sky, it is, you know, it is nothing, absolutely nothing to worry about. And of course, that's something that we,

it's very familiar to us as pilots, but it's something that passengers may not always be aware of. Can you take us back to your childhood, Mark? Because actually imagining a world outside of your own family was really important to you, wasn't it? It was. I grew up in a small city in western Massachusetts called Pittsfield, and I had two great loves there. I was in love with airplanes and with flying, and I had lots

of model airplanes and would go to air shows with my dad and look up at the planes flying above us to larger cities and from larger cities. And I was also, you know, really drawn to cities. And, you know, I had a light-up globe. You can tell I was one of the cool kids on the block with my illuminated globe. But I really did love to turn that globe and to read out the names of the cities on its far side and to think about what it would be like

to someday go to those places. And, you know, many young people dream of leaving their homes and going to going to bigger and brighter places. And, you know, in my version of it combined both the idea of those places and, of course, airplanes. It's it's a little bit more than that, I think, for you, though, isn't it? Just because your family life wasn't it was blighted by divorce, wasn't it? So so being somewhere else, having an imaginary life somewhere else was very important to you. And I'm sure lots of people can really understand that. Yeah, you know, everyone, you know, that story of a young person who dreams

of going elsewhere is a very old story. And many of us will have their own version of it. And for me, it was, you know, it was even things as seemingly small now as a speech impediment. I had trouble saying that hard American R, which meant people often couldn't understand my first name when I was a kid. And, you know, that's the kind of thing that looms very large for a young person. And, you know, my father, who was from Belgium and had lived in a number of countries and spoke a number of languages, you know, at one point he told me, you know, it became clear to me that there were other languages with different R's. And so as a kid, I thought, oh, well, I'll just grow up and learn one of those languages and move to that place and

everything will be fine. So I had both a push and a pull, I suppose. I was leaving home. Mark Van Honacker is our guest this afternoon. His latest book is called Imagine a City a Pilot Sees the World. I really loved your chapter about Delhi, Mark, because you talk about seeing the literal embodiment of partition. Can you tell us a bit more about that? Yeah, which is obviously a story that's been in the news this year as well with the anniversary of those events. So when you fly, one of the ways in which flying is marvelous is that you see how borderless the world can appear to be from above.

But, of course, there are some borders you can see. You can see the U.S.-Canadian border if you know that the agricultural patterns shift as you cross the border. And, of course, the border between India and Pakistan is lit at night. It is. A few borders are. Yeah. And so you can see this line going across the landscape. And Delhi is a city that means a lot to me because a friend of mine is from there.

Her family is from there. And I learned a lot about that city before I ever went there from her. And then later had a chance to go there and to be guided by, she wasn't with me, but she and her father sort of told me which sites to see first and which places to go. And it's one of the ways in which a city becomes meaningful, I think, if you have those personal connections to it. I love the bit in the book, Mark, where you talk about coming to London,

I think, for the first time, and you're on, I think it was the M25. You write about it as though it's rather a romantic trip, but to most of us, the very thought of the M25 is truly terrifying. But you were really amused by the notion of a sign that just said the North. And you just point out that obviously, Britain is a small enough country for signs like that to make some sense. I mean, you just couldn't do it in the United States, could you? No, you couldn't. And you cannot, I mean, you could locate yourself. Not only does it tell you the size of the country, but it tells you roughly where you are on it,

which is a good thing when you first arrive here. Yeah, I remember that bus journey, that coach journey very, very well. Because you come from a huge country, does Britain seem a teeny tiny, rather parochial sort of place by comparison? Well, it seems like a smaller place geographically, I think. You know, that's quite clear. I think in Skyfaring, I talked about measuring countries in terms of hours, you know,

in Algeria being a two or three hour country and, you know, the US being a six or seven hour country, depending on the direction you cross it, and the UK obviously being smaller. But of course, it doesn't seem parochial at all, especially given its history, and especially to a pilot who

flies from it to places all over the world, to cities all over the world. The shadows that you can see from the sky in the book, you talk about the rings around Erbil and Baghdad, you know, evidence of previous cities. Does that do the same thing to you that astronauts often talk about, which is actually slightly change your perspective of the modern world? I think so. You know, that perspective I talked about earlier of seeing cities from above at night and how marvelous it is. You know, when I see that, I think sometimes I'm channeling those videos that you see sometimes from space stations or satellites of, you know, truly an entire country kind of turning towards you at this very slow, steady and silent pace.

And there is a bit of an earthrise moment maybe from the cockpit. I think, of course, we live in this incredibly urban world now. More than half of us live in cities now. I think two thirds of us will by 2050. So that sense of an urban world is at the heart of Imagine a City. But do you think if more people could see that incredible view, it might help change perspectives too? And I understand there's a terrible irony in that, isn't there? Because you'd be on board a plane that is using up a large amount of airline fuel

that is very bad for the world that you're looking at down below? Yeah, you know, I think travel is something that is an incredibly important thing and incredibly important to people now more than ever. I think no one could look at the world and think we need less connection across it. And I do feel that, you know, obviously safety is our top priority at work, but over the last few years, I've been flying for about 20 years now, the climate crisis has become, you know, a really, really important part of how we go about our job, whether that's, you know, shutting an engine down as we taxi in or using iPads now, which we've replaced all our

paper manuals, which are very heavy to carry around the world. The plane, you know, no one who's read Skyfaring could doubt my love for the 747, which, you know, is a plane that I dreamed of flying when I was a child. In fact, one of my colleagues, she didn't want to become a pilot. She only wanted to become a 747 pilot. And she did. We flew together once. But the plane I fly now, the 787, is about a third more efficient. And, you know, that feels good. It feels good to be flying a plane that's, you know, a very big step in that direction.

Can you just tell us a bit more then about the plane that you're currently flying? How many passengers? What size is the engine? Let's get nerdy, if you don't mind. Well, you're going to wish you didn't say that. Oh, OK. I will. You're going to wish you didn't say that. Oh, okay. No, I'm kidding. I'll try to keep my geekery to a minimum. But yeah, so I fly a plane called the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. There are three versions of it. It's notable to passengers because it has windows,

which are significantly larger than previous airplanes. It has a wonderfully advanced flight deck. It has a head-up display, which is something that I hadn't used before on the 747 or the Airbus. And it has a bedroom, a little bedroom for the pilots to take their rest in on our longest sectors. And it has a more natural cabin air environment, so people tend to feel better when they, when they disembark. Can we ask you lots of questions that you will have been asked so many times before, but just from the curious passenger angle. Sure. Yes, please. Yeah.

Do you ever get used to an onboard toilet? Well, that's actually, I've never been asked that before. Well done. You know, it's not, yeah, that's a good, it's, well, obviously it's, it lacks some of the comforts of home, but, but it's, it's sort of its purpose. And, and it's a small price to pay for, for journeying across the world, I would say. Right. And what about the co-pilot that you work with? Let's say you're flying tomorrow on the 787. The co-pilot you're working with, will you know them?

Will you have worked with them before or will they be a total stranger? So every flight has a captain and a first officer on board. I'm first officer. And generally, we probably won't have flown with them before. It's, you know, the 787 fleet is, you know, it's a large fleet. So it's usually the case that I haven't flown with them before. What happens if you don't get on? Or if they do something really annoying like chew gum with their mouth open?

Well, we don't chew gum. In terms of, you know, getting along, you know, I think it's obviously a very professional environment. Most of us love our jobs. We're very happy to be there. And we, of course, have a whole set of procedures that we have to follow. I would say that more than half the words we say in the flight deck are written down in a manual. And people come from all different backgrounds.

I'm fond of that, you know, that saying that everyone knows something you don't know. And, you know, I often fly with people who have military backgrounds, who grew up overseas, as I did, who have, you know, very long histories of aviation in their families, which I don't have. So there's always some good stories. And yeah, it's a very pleasant working environment, I find. So are you telling me then that when the pilot comes on or the first officer and tells us that there's somebody really wonderful in charge of giving out the refreshments and they're really good and you know that they'll look after us properly, you're lying because you don't know who they are and you've never worked with them before and you've got no idea whether

they're any good. Well, often with the cabin crew, we have worked with them before and you've got no idea whether they're any good well well often with the cabin crew we have flown with them senior cabin crew members the in-flight managers um are uh there's obviously a smaller number of them than the entire crew but you know of course everyone's trained to the to the same the same high standards so we can be we can be pretty confident of that is it true that you never eat the same food as the other person in charge of the plane just in case one meal is off? You know, there's a lot of rumors about flying. That is one of the most pervasive. That's no longer a rule. Another rumor that's actually cautious is that you have to have perfect eyesight to fly. I get that in a lot of emails from readers say, oh, I want to become a pilot,

but I don't have perfect eyesight. So just so you know, it can be if you have correctable vision within certain standards, the career is definitely open to you. Can I ask a really obvious question, but where would you most like to be as dawn erupts over a skyscape somewhere in the world and you're in the cockpit? Oh, that is a tough question. I think, you know, I think I'm going to go with Cape Town there, especially this time of year when a little sun goes a long way. You know, it's such a remarkable city with such a, you know, with such a long history. And, you know, I think all the most beautiful cities tend to combine mountains and water and possibly a Mediterranean climate as well. So I'm going to I'm going to go with I'm going to go with Cape Town.

Also, you know, it's such a long way from such a long way from from the UK. But it's you know, it's it's tied to it historically as well. And it's a fascinating place. And I wish it was a 787 route. It's no longer a 787. It's no longer a route I fly regularly. And Mark, are you a nervous passenger? No, I am not a nervous passenger. I love to sit by the window seat. In fact, you know, some of the scenes I described in Imagine a City in the new book are most appreciated from the window seat where you can enjoy the view, have some afternoon tea, and not worry about the driving.

Mark Van Honecker talking to us earlier on today. I loved his honesty about all the little bits and pieces about being a pilot. And it must be the most, if you're not scared, I'd be absolutely terrified, it must be the most wonderful job to be able to see the earth from up above as what you do for a living day after day. It must be beautiful, Jane, really beautiful. He didn't actually sound like a traditional... I suppose I'm thinking, and I guess I'm being terribly sexist here

because I'm imagining a man. But I think when I first flew, all the pilots were men. I don't recall hearing the voice of a female pilot. I've never heard the voice of a female pilot. I have, but it was a long time into my flying life that I did. But you'd always get, and the traditional voice of a pilot is this rather urbane, nothing to see here, everybody. Good afternoon. I'm Brian Cathcart.

We'll be cruising at 30,000 feet. Robert, the chief purser, is here for your every whim and desire. We'll be touching down in Dhaka at about seven o'clock. I'll leave you to get some rest. Exactly. And I heard a rather different voice from Mark, someone who just sounded, if I'm honest, a little more, this is awful, but just a little more thoughtful.

Sorry, I'm damning Brian Cathcart without ever having met him. He'd be a wonderful man. But you know what I mean? There's a sort of delivery, isn't there, that Mark was a refreshing alternative to that. But look, I want capable people to be flying planes. Let's be clear about it. I don't want some exuberant fool flying me across. You don't really want a gag-a-minute merchant. I don't want some exuberant fool flying me across.

You don't really want a gag-a-minute merchant. I don't want Peter Kay. I want someone who knows what they're up to. Do you like Peter Kay? I love Peter Kay. Yeah, I've read a review of his new show, and I think, oh, I'd like to go and see that, but I don't think there's any chance of seeing it.

No, and some of the reviews have only been kind of two or three stars, and I just discarded that. I mean, I'd happily go and see him. And even if it's a complete revisit of all of his old stuff, I don't really care. I couldn't get tickets, though. I think I was 217,553rd in the queue. I gave up.

Maybe Santa will deliver. Who knows? Thank you so much for listening and for emailing us. We do appreciate it. And if perhaps you've listened to this, the podcast, but haven't tried the live radio show, well, you want to try it. Monday to Thursday, three o'clock till five. It's like

the podcast, only we're live. So there's more jeopardy, more cock-ups, and sometimes things go really quite triumphantly pear-shaped. But sometimes we just talk really quite interestingly about a range of topics. Well, I mean mean you do house of lords reform who knew turned out to be a gripper we talked about that for a very long time today

okay now don't complain it's jane and fee at times dot radio please okay you can unfasten your seat belts now can i you always strap me up like this. OK, goodnight, everybody. Sleep tight. You have been listening to Off Air with Jane Garvey and Fee Glover. Our Times Radio producer is Rosie Cutler and the podcast executive producer 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.