The Bugle - Donald Loves Big Guns

Episode Date: May 20, 2025

🎧 Support The Bugle! Become a Team Bugle subscriber for bonus episodes, exclusive merch, and the unmatched pleasure of elite-tier status: thebuglepodcast.comThis week, Andy Zaltzman is joined by Tiff Stevenson, Hari Kondabolu, and elite-tier producer Chad for a power-packed episode full of satire, absurdity, and deeply unnecessary sequels.🇺🇸 In American news:Trump gets weirdly complimentary about muscly men in the Middle EastJames Comey—aspiring hitman or maître d’? And we ask: who will save the poor, struggling... private jet-owning white South Africans?💼 The team reveals their old jobs—the cash-grabs, the chaos, and the character-building.🦝 Wildlife news returns with animals doing very animal things.📚 In The Bin: books, including a baffling follow-up to The Joy of Sex. Spoiler: not joyful.📺 Watch our fantasy-comedy series Realms Unknown on this channel and pick up A Passion for Passion here: http://uk.bookshop.org/shop/RealmsUnknownProduced by Chad, along with Laura Turner and Chris Skinner. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world. Hello Buglers and welcome to issue 4341 of the Bugle audio newspaper for a visual world with me, Andy Zoltzman, the silent foghorn of translucent factuality here in the Shed the world's most beautiful visual world. I'm here with Andy Zoltzman, the silent foghorn of translucent factuality here in the shed of death in South London. It is the 19th of May 2025, and the

world has made it through yet another week of this struggling millennium to discuss exactly how it's made it through. I'm joined by two people who may have their cripples with this planet but have stuck with it nonetheless. Firstly, from here in London, it's Tiffany Stevenson. Hello, Tiff. Hi, I'm a bit full on with the makeup. I had my, if you're watching this online, it's a little extra than what I was doing my Edinburgh photos today. So yeah, I've just, well actually,

that's a lie. This is the high glam that's expected when I do the people I mean, do you know how long it takes me to get my hair looking this good for every recording? You've been in makeup for three hours. Haven't you Andy prior to this? 4,300 341 episodes in a row. My hair has been perfect With a few thousand missing episodes in the middle Also joining us looking equally resplendent, I have to say that for the sake of equality and justice. From New York, it's Hari Kondabelli. Now, Hari, I'm not going to ask, how are you?

Thank you. Because that never goes well. So I'm going to instead ask, where do you see yourself being in five years time? Sadly, still doing this. If you're wondering, I've worn this sweatshirt on the bugle more than any other sweatshirt. And I've owned it for 15 years because I too am trying. years because I too am trying. I like that. It's good to say you're trying no one can come at you. Just say you're trying. You're like, well, failure is a possibility that's inbuilt there. Succeeding is also a possibility, but you're trying.

I'm trying. And also, I mean, when the show, this is a podcast, this is an audio show, even if you're looking to looking at this on Close your eyes. This is not supposed to be looked at So anyway, welcome welcome to also to our guest Co-producer for this week another elite level hyper premium a voluntary super subscriber Hello to Chad from Chicago.

Welcome to the Bugle, Chad. Thank you for having me. I'm glad to be here. Chad. Chad, I know you've been listening for a long time. In fact, I've met Chad in Chicago. We watched blues together after one of my stand-up shows there.

So it's a great pleasure to have you on. How's Chicago doing at the moment, generally as a city? It's still trying to make up what season it is. But other than that, I think it's, you know, I can't complain relative to everything else. Well, good. That's I mean, to be honest, if we took that attitude on the bugle, it would never have started that we shouldn't complain relative to everything else. That is fundamentally what the show is. It is complaining despite things. Anyway, we are recording on the 19th of May, 2025. 19th of May is apparently celebrate your elected officials day. I might give that a miss. So let's focus instead on the 20th of May, which is World Bee Day, which in appreciation of the

celebrity insects, the bee, you need to give time on the 20th of May to appreciate the wonders of the apian community and their exploitative feminist monarchical social structures. I have to admit I'm very conflicted on bees. Bees or woke wasps as the right-wing press consider them have been churning out honey for trade with humans for more than 70 years now. But we have to ask, has the time come for another insect to get a go in place of the bees? Frankly, they've had it too good for too long. Also, the day after the 21st of May is World Bee Bee Day Day, in which you have to clean your bees bee bot in an insect appropriate bee day. It's also the 21st of May is World Meditation Day, meaning that the 22nd of May is World Screaming Frustration and Everything Everyone Day, also known as back to normal day. On the 20th of May,

1875, a historic moment in the history of measurement, when the meter convention was signed by 17 nations, leading to the establishment of the International System of Units, which means that we can all know exactly how long things are in the world. Prior to that, there were different units of measurement in every single country in the world, all basically the same, but a bit vague and a bit different. We have the yard, which I think was defined as one tenth of a percent of the distance between one person in an uninteresting conversation, and the point that the person they're trying to talk to is seemingly looking at. Then there's the doppel-Schnitzel, which in Austria, Hungary looking at. Then there's the doppel Schnitzel, which in Austria-Hungaria was the length

of two well flattened Schnitzels laid end to end. One Otter's length, that's an ancient British unit of measurement, as is a quadraparsnips worth, which is four parsnips laid end to end. And the Oof, which is the distance the average medieval knight's midriff retracted when he was flunked in the codpiece by a king's mace. So it was good that

the world unified behind the ever popular meter. As always, a section of this podcast is going straight in the bin. This week, we have a books section, some of the latest books published in the world of books, including the joy of oversimplifying political problems. This is a reissue of the 1970s classic from the same people who did the joy of sex, rather charming pencil-lined drawings of people misrepresenting complex political issues. Now, of course, all that kind of stuff is online and a lot more graphic and violent, and you really should stop your children accessing it if at all possible,

but I guess that's shark as long as they don't get skied out of the fish pond. Also, we reviewed the real Gadget behind the headlines biography of the unhappy life of TV cartoon detective Inspector Gadget, real name Lionel Julio Gadjetovic. The struggles that Gadget had with the inevitable paperwork involved in modern law enforcement and detectivory that dulled so much of the enthusiasm of his early career, so much of the evidence he collated was inadmissible

due to the manner in which he collected it. Also, Gadget struggles with the enthusiasm of his early career, so much of the evidence he collated was inadmissible due to the manner in which he collected it. Also Gadget struggles with the impact of his work on the non-cyborg enabled detectives that he worked alongside and how it destroyed morale across the force, plus the inevitable court cases, the impossibility of getting through x-ray scanners at airports and the psychological impact of the extensive cyborgic adaptations to his body occurs as much as a gift for Gadget, who admitted to, quote, yearning genuine human interactions. And there's a particularly harrowing chapter in which he talks through, well, his romantic struggles, dates which inevitably resulted in people wanting to see his renowned party tricks and whether all parts of his body could extend with the same metallic extravagance.

all parts of his body because extend with the same metallic extravagance. This is interesting, Andy, because no one ever thinks about Edward scissor hands and the time he nipped his ball sack when he was, you know, scissors for hands, mistakes are going to happen. Almost neutered himself. Yeah. I was going to write a book on apathy actually. And then I thought, why bother? That'd be my contribution. Also, finally, in our book review section, we review a book just published, well, a minute

ago, which is entitled Everything That's Wrong With What Israel's Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich Said Today. It's a 20-volume magnum opus published within five minutes of his last speech finishing. Anyway, we might get into some details on that later if we can face the unstoppable chasm of darkness that is hidden within anyway, that section in the bin. Top story this week, American news. Well, since we got you on Hari, we're going to start with the your country at the USA. I

mean, it's just been another another week on this crazy old planet of ours looking I mean, the news over here, one of England's greatest ever footballers had to leave his TV presenting job because he inadvertently reposted an anti semitic trope. It's 2025. Just what happens that our prime minister was accused of channeling the spirit of British politics, most prominent 1960s racist Enoch Powell. Again, it's 2025. It doesn't matter if it actually happened. People think it happened. That's all that counts. The Middle East ceasefire of a

few weeks ago appears to have been misinterpreted as an increased fire. And Vladimir Putin is clinging on to his least trustworthy conversation partner world title, despite what you have to say is fierce competition around the world. But let's start, Harry, with with your president, Donald Trump, who I know you calling him that is always calling that the president, the president of the United States. I'm not sure that's any better. The Andy. It's also Chad's president. So you can share the credit, whatever. Like me,

Donald Trump has been on tour. And like me, he's also left some people laughing and other people staring blankly in confusion. But he's come out of it with a cheeky little $400 million airplane as a gift. So he's been he's been trucking around the Middle East. Hari, what have you what have you made of his, his, his, his contribution to the state of the world over the last week or so?

I mean, we sent a volatile man into a volatile region. What is the worst that could happen? Well, I mean, the first of all, of all, he's just an embarrassing figure. So he goes to Saudi Arabia and they get a mobile McDonald's to greet him because he wants McDonald's. So they have a mobile version of McDonald's, which of course is the dream of every rich seven-year-old. which of course is the dream of every rich seven year old. And then Trump basically proves that you don't need to be poor to be white trash.

I think the biggest thing that we get from this is the relationship with Netanyahu and Israel, right? Because he goes on this, this very, I guess, successful trip to all these Middle Eastern countries. And I want to use that word relationship literally just for a moment, because it was interesting. He met with interim Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharah and described him as a young, attractive guy. He then met with the family of Qatar, of Qatar, and called them tall, handsome guys. Then in Saudi Arabia,

he greeted Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman and said, I like you too much. Right. Which is his version. I think of saying, I wish I knew how to quit you. So what do you have to all that in the context of the Israel relationship, what I think is clear is that he's cuckolding Netanyahu. That is what's happening right now.

Netanyahu just turned into a cuckolding Netanyahu. That is what's happening right now. Netanyahu just turned into a cuck. It sounds like Donald Trump might have done more for LGBTQ rights in that part of the world than anyone else in human history. He was laying it on pretty thick. He called Ahmed Alshara a young attractive guy and then tried to make it less awkward by adding that I absolutely do not want to have sex with, which seems a little over the top. Did he ask them, how are you looking so good? Are you on the fat shot drug?

The fat shot drug. Yeah. The fat shot drug. That's what he's calling it. The fat shot drug. Yeah. The only thing worse is if he called it the fat vaccine. I think that would be slightly worse. It's not good, Andy. The whole trip was tense and embarrassing. When he's talking about Iran, he said he wants to deal with Iran.

He said this, we want them to be a wonderful, safe, great country, but they cannot have a nuclear weapon. This is an offer that will not last forever. And again, that chimes in with Trump's transactional view to life. But also, as all bugle listeners will know, that is not how offers work these days. You know offers, when it says,

this is your last chance to get 20% of these trousers, you know, tomorrow, you're going to get the same email saying 20% of these trousers for the next month. That's your offers are different. It's just you know, you can't use that language anymore. Tiff, I know you've you you've many times toured the Middle East in a diplomatic capacity. How do you rate Trump? How did it go? Well, listen, Trump visited the Qatar gifting suite, which was great.

They set up a gifting suite for him. Every gift horse comes with a mouth. No such thing as a free lunch unless it's a McDonald's. And officials in America are saying, you know, it's unprecedented or unprecedented, which is the term I prefer. But what's kind of mad is that he was gifted a 747 and even conservative kind of talk show hosts and normal supporters of Trump have come out and said, this cannot hold. This is like bonkers.

Ben Shapiro called it out and then everyone's favorite illiterated conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer, most recently found screaming at a self-service machine for coming over here and taking the jobs. She said, I can't believe Donald accepted a Trojan plane or words to that effect. I don't mean, Laura Luma is so awful that Marjorie Taylor Greene had to call out a racist rhetoric. So it's like when the worst of the Trump

supporters think that Trump is doing things wrong, what does that say? I think he's been handed some crypto. There's some kind of talk about corruption in crypto. Crypto, by the way, should never be confused with Crip-toe, which is a fungal foot infection on your left side. Yeah. So I think what's scary, here's what's scary, is that he actually might gain or kind of do more in the Middle East. He's a potentially more of a positive influence in the Middle East than the Dems, which feels insane, right?

I mean, he'll do things for his own benefit. I mean, I'm sure the reasons aren't going to be pure. He'll want to be teeing off at Mar-a-Lago West Bank within the year. Might he actually do some good? I mean, I'm slightly concerned about the fact that he said he wanted the states to get involved and then just make it a freedom zone. I don't know what that means, but it sounds like something at a family leisure center that involves zip lines.

And so I'm not into the idea of a freedom zone. But could it be possible that Trump can actually intervene in a way that's, you know, that actually is helpful and useful to the Palestinian people at this point? Well, I guess, I mean, at the moment, that's not looking wildly positive. I mentioned the Israel finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who has said some, I think it's fair to say fairly

uncompromising things today that the aid that will be left him will be the bare minimum simply so the world doesn't stop us and accuse us of war crimes. What will enter in the coming days, he added, is very little. A few bakeries distributing pizza bread to people in public kitchens, providing one daily serving of cooked food. That's it. He said Israel's military is destroying everything that remains of the Gaza strip. The population will reach the south of the strip, he said, and from there, with God's help, to third countries, which is pretty much what Donald Trump was suggesting.

I don't know if he's interpreting Donald Trump as God, when Trump made those bizarre Riviera of the Middle East comments a little while ago. I'm not sure if God is inclined to step in. He has been eerily quiet, as we've discussed on the show over the last nearly 18 years, he's been eerily quiet in the Middle East situation for heading towards 2000 years now. So I mean, it would be a good time for him to come out of his self-enforced retirement. But I'm not wildly positive that he will. But God, if you are listening to this podcast, and I know, you know, even for someone who is omniscient and omnipresent, there are too many podcasts to keep up with these days. But if you are listening to this, please, please, you know, do say something, anything, anything will do. And Benjamin Netanyahu

said that Israel will take control of all of Gaza. So it's not looking, in terms of reaching a solution, it's still looking quite a way off. But it was interesting reading the Al Jazeera summary of Trump's visit, said that he was promoting a realist approach to the Middle East, which bear in mind that, as I said just weeks ago, he was proposing turning Gaza into essentially a luxury holiday resort. I don't know quite how fixed that realist approach is or how realistic it is. In terms of non-intervention, how that sits with what he says about what America wants to do with that region, with Canada, with Greenland. I guess

he's the thinking interventionist, non-inter non interventionist might be the most credible way of putting it. Anyway, but as always, the thing with with with it's so hard to tell just because you don't know what change of mind or you know, in the sort of detail free zone of Trumpist rhetoric, what will actually emerge. But he clearly had a bit of a thing for that Syrian president. And who can blame it? He is a young, attractive guy. Also, I mean, I rarely say anything positive about Trump, but this fear that by accepting this plane, there's going to have to be some repayment in favors because he accepted this plane from

Qatar. If you know anything about Trump, he doesn't repay favors. He owes so many people money. No, he took the plane. If they actually were foolish enough to expect something in return, the man doesn't give things in return. He's a taker. Like, what are you talking about? That was a brilliant maneuver on his part. The idea that there could be a bribe requires him to have a sufficient attention span to remember that he's been bribed when they try to call that bribery. And I'm not sure that's going to work very well if it was a bribe. And both parties have insisted there are no strings attached, which is always good news for an aeroplane, obviously. In terms of whether

it compromises his integrity, I mean, can it be compromised anymore? Is that not just another set of heels in a melden Marcos's shoe cupboard. But interestingly, the hardcore pro-Trump rules were against it. And bear in mind that they're still supporting it. If he grabbed a doll from an ill child, bit its head off the doll, not the child, belched and kicked the child down a bobsled run, they'd find some way of explaining how Trump was inspiring the child to take control of their own great destiny. So the fact that they've they're skeptical of it was was quite even Ted Cruz said that accepting the gift would pose significant espionage and surveillance problems. And when you have crossed Ted Cruz's maximum point of moral elasticity, maybe it's time to have a look at yourself. In other American news, I mean, this this story might be one of the most 21st century stories there's been in the 21st century so far.

The former director of the FBI, James Comey, has been basically accused of attempting to assassinate President Donald Trump by reposting an online photo. But let me do it again, by posting online a photo of some shells on a beach that spelled out the numbers 8647. Now, I think just from that outline of the story, you could probably write several novels, several multiple-part TV series, and some maybe half a factual book. It just seemed to encapsulate everything about the world at the moment. The reason it became controversial is, well, I mean, aside from the weird fact of FBI

directors, former FBI directors posting photos online anyway, is that Trump is the 47th American president, that's no secret, and that 86 has occasionally been used in some circumstances to mean kill. Now, Comey said he didn't know that that's connotation of it. 86 more commonly used just to mean remove or eject with there was 8646 posted against Joe Biden during his term of office. That term 86 apparently comes from the restaurant industry. And, you know, to be 86 is to be asked to leave a restaurant. And 86 fell between 85 in restaurant talk, which was flubbing an annoying customer's salad. 87, that person is drunk enough that you can probably serve them supermarket wine and charge them for a vintage 1987 Chateau

Lafite. 88 incidentally means use the out of date chicken. 92 means you might need the ice bucket for something that isn't ice. And 73 means spill a bowl of hot soup in that person's lap. They won't sue. We have CCTV footage from the restaurant toilets that gives us considerable leverage. So it's good to know those codes when you're in restaurants. But Tiff, what did you make of this?

Is James Comey openly plotting to assassinate Donald Trump via the medium of cryptic photos? I think it's clear. If he sees seashells on the seashore, the shells he sells are seashells, I'm sure, for if he sells seashells on the seashore, then I'm sure it's a call to assassinate the president. Is that how it works? I think that's how it works? Part of me feels a little bit for Trump when this is twice in one podcast, I'm not enjoying this, you know, because

there's been a couple of assassination attempts and it is it is a leadership role that has quite a high assassination rate or attempted assassination rate. So, you know, what do we know about the person who laid the shells? Did Comey put them down? Was he the person that put them down? You know, or was it an actor? You know, because that's suspicious, John Wilkes Booth, you know, a Marine veteran, then we can gauge how likely it is. And so, I mean, the thing is, once you start thinking about numbers, you get to this point of kind of going, what do numbers even mean? You know, anymore, like 86, it can mean ditch, it can mean get rid of it's also the year I met John Moss from Culture Club. That was a big one for Stevenson, you know. And what

about 8669, which is get rid of overzealous sex positions or 8680085, which is ban teenage boys from getting their calculators, or 86-2020, who needs good eyesight anyway, or 86-2016, the year it all went wrong in the first place. Well, here's the thing. Trump said that Comey knew exactly what he meant, and a child knew what he meant. So I asked my son, what did he mean? And he said, it means he wanted to get rid of the president, like how you kick out or ban someone from a bar or restaurant. It's as clear as day.

Daddy, can I please watch Peppa now? So, I mean, that's from my four-year-old. Clearly, because he asked to see Peppa at the end, so you know it's true. the right. I'm not a like three years ago saying 86 46. So I also love the fact that like, I it's been rebranded X. Nobody I know has ever called it that kill Elon Musk on some level. The fact that no, despite clear branding, nobody cares. You know, it's not the most famous 86. Right. You know, the most famous 86, of course, would be 8675309. 8675309. Jenny, I got your number. I want to make you mine. Jenny, don't change your number. 8675309. So right, he could have meant that. He could have meant that. I mean, there are other possible interpretations of what 8647 meant. One that has been

suggested, I think this is quite plausible, is that they were the marks out of 10 given by Donald Trump for the wives of the first four president of the USA, after perusing their portraits in the White House, when he first moved in there. I don't know what he had against Martha Jefferson, but anyway, yeah, he's to the right. Others suggest 8647 is the year by which American democracy is currently predicted to recover to something approaching stability after two terms of Trump as president. That to me seems a little optimistic. Obviously, when I look at it, I think 86-47, well, that's obviously the test caps of Chris Hadley of New Zealand and Andy Roberts of the West Indies, 86-47.

Maybe even the scores made respectively by David Garan, Alan Lamb against Australia at Laws in the 1985 Ashes Test that England lost before going to win the series 3-1, of course. Alternatively, in the 1947 World Snooker Championship Fred Davis made the highest break of the tournament in frame number 86 of the final. The finals used to go on for a long time in those days, genuinely two weeks of snooker. Happy times, simpler times. Also, you'll like this Chad, 86-47 was the record of the Chicago Cubs after 133 matches of the 2016 Major League Baseball season and as a Cubs fan, you don't need me to tell you what happened that season, Chad. Yes, yes, that was the first time in 108 years that we were happy.

The curse of the GOAT was finally slain. So, but also Donald Trump won the election just two months later after they reached that 86, 47. So read into that what you will. So anyway. Can I say as the woman on this podcast, my vagina is fully healed over at this point. Look, there's no reason why women can't be as nerdily obsessed with sports stats as men in this day and age. That is what Mrs Pankhurst wanted. One final piece of American news. And well, I mean, America, yeah, the Statue of Liberty famously calls for the huddled masses

of the world to find refuge in America. And I think it's fair to say that Donald Trump has not always completely exuded that same Statue of Liberty aura. However, he has found the generosity within his heart to find space in his country, in your country, for one of history's most put upon minorities, white South Africans. Now, so 59 white South Africans have arrived in the US, amidst claims that white South Africans are suffering a genocide, claims which would be true, were there any truth in them? But there isn't. Now, I come at this, I'm the son of a white South African, albeit not an Afrikaner. I think these are specifically Afrikaners from the Afrikaner

population of South Africa. But, you know, as my father escaped South Africa as a white man, not because that, you know, he felt oppressed in any way during those apartheid times. But I think just because he was bored by all the other white South Africans, as far as I can make out, sadly no longer around for me to double check that with him. But I mean, in terms of America being a welcoming beacon to people needing a safe new home, Ari, this is a very, very touching moment. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. You know, after benefiting from apartheid for generations, they are now claiming they're a targeted group in South Africa. And this is this is this precedence for this, by the way, this is similar to the asylum

provided by Brazil in Argentina, who took in quote, German refugees after World War Two. I believe it was called the old Eichmann switcheroo. That is a phrase that's well, I've never heard before and I hope I never hear it again. I mean, they arrived on a charter jet like that's already suspect like 59 South Africans arriving on a charter unlike the Haitians who tried to come into the US in the 90s on a broken down boat, and they didn't even have a decency to charter a yacht? Like, really? No, that's not... When you're a refugee, you come in style. Bugle job section now, and well, a scientific scientific report and when I say scientific they spoke

to a few people has revealed which jobs provide people with satisfaction and which do not. Now I'm very lucky I get a lot of job satisfaction from my portfolio career as well as the comedy for which obviously I'm on call 24 7365 whenever humor is needed. So that comes with a level of stress of never being able to switch off cricket stats. Obviously I'm on call for that 24 7365 and a quarter. So more accurately. And as a swimwear model, I'm still waiting for my first booking is a bit early to tell, but I think I'm going to enjoy it. But amongst the jobs revealed as unrewarding include being a survey interviewer. Clearly, this was doing this survey did not enjoy themselves and might have

slightly tweaked the results. Human Cannonball and podcast producer, depending on the podcast. And podcast producer, depending on the podcast. I might paint that one up. Depends on how rude your podcast hosts are to your guests. Chris. Thank you, Chris. There you go. Rewarding jobs include being a medical professional, special needs teacher, sheet metal worker and ships engineer, but a carpenter, not rewarding.

So I don't know what, take that Jesus for a start, but also what is the massive difference between carpentry and sheet metal working that makes metal so much more rewarding to work with than wood? Because you can see your reflection in it, obviously, Andy. Appealing to human vanity. I mean, I don't understand something because part of the people who are self-employed generally had favorable reviews of their their occupations because they could regulate their work days. If that is true, how come every comedian I know is miserable? Constantly make careers out of complaining about things on stage. Just miserable. How does

that correlate? Happiness is less funny, right? Chad's just dropped into the chat to say because they hate their boss. That's why they're miserable. Why is my boss such an asshole to me? Oh, it's me. I'm an asshole to myself. I always think that when you think about reviewing comedy, like how reviewers think they can hurt you any more than the voice in your own head, which has said the worst things you've ever heard. I'm like, you're never going to write anything that's worse than, than this guy right here. I feel quite lucky because writing obviously, you know, we're all writers writings it up high on the job satisfaction. And I just feel, you know, if it had been a couple of hundred years ago, I wouldn't have I wouldn't be doing this, you know, I'd be a chimney sweep, you know, or selling

matches to feed my pet mouse or something. Just one box. So for me, this is it's all an improvement. Yeah. I mean, my kids do sometimes ask me what would you be? What would you do if you were not a comedian and stroke cricket statistician? And I'll be honest, I have absolutely no fucking idea. I have a maximum of two skills, neither of which will be needed after the nuclear apocalypse. So I think I've hit a sweet spot in human evolution where my jobs exist. So I'm, other

than that, I am a one man rebuke to the entire concept of Darwinism. What did you do before comedy, if anything? Oh, I was an immigrant rights organizer. I worked in Seattle with refugees, victims of hate crimes, things like that. And then African farm owners. And then I went to school for human rights and then decided to get into the even more lucrative career of stand-up comedy. I had just under a year as a sub editor at a business publishing house, sub editing articles about London financial institutions, which is even less exciting than I just made it sound.

What else have you done other than comedy? I've done, I used to do, so for an acting thing, they used to get actors into role play for the Institute of Gynaecologists and Obstetricians. And so you had to like go in and pretend to be a patient and they'd be like, you're pregnant with twins, this might happen. But what would happen is they would fly people in from around the world to take these exams. And then you had to kind of like do bedside manner and stuff. And sometimes it would it would be quite awkward because like colloquialisms or words that weren't maybe necessarily in medical English and people are trying to connect you with you to talk to you about your condition. But it ended

up one of the sessions with a man just roaring at me that I had a broken pussy. So that was quite something. I think any like in between jobs that actors do always end up being bonkers. Like I've done puppet shows in shopping malls. I it was a campaign for like worms in kids and so it was trying to teach kids to to wash their hands so I had two puppets I had one called dirty bastey which was like a dirty like dirty bastey and then I said Sally who said Sally, who Soaps had Sally would, she had lipstick. She was a sponge with lipstick and eyelashes. So like a sexy sponge, unlike a contraceptive sponge, which, and so I had to do this puppet show and teach kit. Like I've done so many bonkers things, so many bonkers jobs in between.

Well, other exciting job news, Donald Trump has appointed Andrew Giuliani as the executive director of the task force overseeing the 2026 Men's Football World Cup in the USA. If that surname sounds familiar, it's because it is fucking familiar. He is the son of former Trump attorney and New York mayor Rudy Giuliani. I mean, this is very exciting from a footballing point of view. I mean, what we have at the 2026 World Cup, a special football that leeches a strange black liquid when it gets hot, possibly related to the essence of pure evil. I mean, this could be very exciting times for football. And a good boost for the beleaguered nepo child industry which has been so criticized

and really needed a bit of a... it's just been too long since people got places purely based on who their parents are and it's good to see it making a bit of a comeback. Wildlife news now and well Chad has requested a couple of wildlife stories. I can't remember from my trip to Chicago what the general state of flora and fauna in the middle of Chicago. I know the river goes green once a year doesn't it? Whether that's a government... It's green most of the year, but it's a different shade of green. So, well, this is a story, you said actually a harrowing story from Alabama, of a runaway kangaroo on the loose causing absolute... Obviously, the headline says runaway. That is not an appropriate term for a kangaroo. Hop away, maybe, or boing away, run away. Let's have some accuracy.

AP News. Federal police ordered an immediate shutdown of all roads and other transport infrastructure across the entire state, if I may exaggerate slightly, for fear that a biblical prophecy that President Trump thought he'd heard about would come true in which pouched animals ran amok across the whole of Alabama, stealing people's children and burgers and discombobulating the good people of Alabama with their strange hoppy means of movement.

With the Kanga ruination of Alabama coming hot on the heels of the victory in the Australian election of the non-Trump toadyinging prime minister, Anthony Albonese. There are now fears that the U S could cut off all ties with the Southern hemispherical nation in order to ensure smooth traffic flows across the Southern States of the USA without kangaroos getting in the way. Uh, very harrowing times for America, obviously, Ari. You just, I mean, you just don't know where this is going to end.

Well, thank God it was an Australian animal and not a Mexican animal because, oh my God, chihuahuas would be being deported left and right right now. People would be hiding their chihuahuas, like Taco Bells would close down. The whole thing would be disastrous. Yeah. Don't inform ICE or Christie will come with their own gun. Yeah. There's an animal that I'm not fond of. It was a privately owned kangaroo, which I found somebody owned. The only name

they could come up with was a C Dundee. I don't know if that means anything to anybody, but C Dundee. the my sweet home, babe. Where can I get a flat white and a stubby? There's nowhere around here for me. The kangaroos thought to have escaped from Australia and made its way across the Pacific Ocean to the Americas on a simple ancient style raft just to prove that kangaroos could indeed be descended from Iowans. But the I mean, where will end? I mean, it's the kind of social breakdown that will was always inevitable once Trump released the January the sixth insurrectionist that if the laws don't apply to them, how on earth do you expect Australian mammals to behave themselves? And you know, it is, you know, that you can't you can't put that particular Pandora back in the box. The motorway with marsupial goes by the name of Sheila. And like many Antibidian animals is fiercely ambitious.

She thinks you can be whatever you want to be. That you can go all the way to the top. Everything is possible. They are very demanding though at baseball games. If you say they can only pitch though. I'll one bat, they insist. For me, they're only in the fourth category of sweetness and adorability as animals go. I say I say they are a band D cute.

You son of a bitch. How dare you? How dare you put us through that? Put us through that! Bandicoot! Oh god! Well, that brings us to the end of this week's bugle. One final thing before we go. Chad is a big hockey fan, and you sent me a link to an article about the tragic loss of the Toronto Maple Leafs in Game 7 last night of their playoff series. Was it the eighth consecutive Game 7 that they've lost? Is that correct? I believe that to be true. Right. I mean that is a heroic persistence. And look, I know many buglers may well be Toronto Maple Leaf

fans. I'm not going to lampoon you in your moment of suffering. I'm just going to say that the whole purpose of sport as a sports fan is to teach you valuable life lessons about the inevitability of failure. And that is what elite sports is truly for. It's not about watching people do things that you can't possibly conceive of doing yourself to their incredible dedication to perfecting themselves physically. It is about seeing the lessons of human life played out before you live in, in real time, and those lessons are that generally you'll f*** up when it matters.

So thank you to the Toronto Maple Leafs for re-teaching that oft-learned lesson to humanity. Well, that brings us to the end of this week's Bugle. Thank you very much for listening. Hari, anything to plug? Yes, I'll be headlining the Gramercy Theatre in New York City on May 29. That might be my biggest show of the year. May 30 to 31 Houston Punchline. And finally, Lafayette, Louisiana Club 337 on June 1. You can find me on Instagram, obviously, if you can spell my name, so you won't find me on Instagram, obviously, if you can spell my name, so you won't find me on Instagram.

Tiff? I am doing, it's build as an evening with Tiff Stevenson at Stony Fest, which is in Milton Keynes, which I'll be doing my last hour show, husband material, and then a career retrospective slash Q&A afterwards afterwards where I will talk about the people I've worked with who's an asshole and who's not you don't come out of it well Andy and I'm also doing my show at the wardrobe theater in I think it's June 27th or 29th roundabout then I should know this shouldn't I should know that on this is the way we do plug on the bugle we bought

objects. Yeah. June the sixth, I'll be doing my I'll be doing husband material. And then I've got to just write a whole new show for the Edinburgh Fringe, which starts in August. So, so you know, buy tickets for that. I'm sure I'll have it a show by August. Thanks enormously to Chad for being an elite premium voluntary subscriber. Thank you. I hope you've enjoyed seeing what it's like to be Chris for a day, Chad. the show. So it's seeing what about politics, we eventually become politicians. Anyway, thanks. Thanks to you and to all bugle subscribers. If you want

to join the bugle voluntary subscription scheme, go to the bugle podcast.com and click the donate button to help keep the show free, flourishing and independent. I don't have a lot to plug. But if you like cricket, the test match special starts on Thursday with England versus Zimbabwe at Trembridge and to be honest looking at the state of the world I am looking forward to it even more than I usually do. We'll be back next week with Helen Zlotson and Josh Gondelman. So until then, goodbye.