The Bugle - Have we invaded Bhutan? – Bugle 4090

Episode Date: December 8, 2018

Andy is with Helen Zaltzman and Hari Kondabolu to look at Mike Pence's new approach to problems, the Queen's (possible) take on Brexit and whether or not it's better to pretend you're older or younger than you actually are.With@HelloBuglersHari KondaboluHelen Zaltzman@ProducerChrisMore episodes and info on our website: http://thebuglepodcast.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dancelaguard fans, you will be thrilled to know a book is coming out if you fund it via Unbound. We are publishing the Dancelaguard Reader by Alice Fraser and Dancelaguard, a glorious insight into the world of Dancelaguard, self-published romance maven, and online bestseller. If you would like to find out how to support it, go to thebugelpodcast.com. If we get enough support, we will publish the book. That's a real thing that's going to happen. Thebugelpodcast.com to support the Danciler Guard Reader. A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A Audio newspaper for a visual world. Hello, the euglers and welcome to issue 4,090 of the bugle audio newspaper for a world now about to enter. It's 38,000th consecutive year of being visual.

I am Andy Zoltzmann and you can call me the human cannonball because like a cannonball I've been overtaken by more modern newer versions of myself that operate way more efficiently have a much wider reach and don't weigh as much. It is the 7th of December not for the first time and we are here in London and I'm delighted to say I'm joined by Well, someone's not been on this show for quite a long time Welcome back after an exciting year to Helen's ultimate. Thank you Andy happy Hanukkah I After an exciting year, two Helen Zoltzmann. Thank you Andy. Happy Hanukkah. I suppose it is. Have you been...

According to my Google calendar of Jewish holidays that I do not observe. Have you been hanging eight stockings on your special candlestick? He he he. Been setting fire to them. That's what you're supposed to do. Um, you've had quite an exciting time during the year. Well, I think the last show we did together was... Beautiful. ...in the States States in May.

Since when you've been on a globe-trotting brush with death? Yes, that's how I like to do it. Take it far away from home, so no one can visit. So you spent what, six, eight weeks in a Tasmanian hospital? Only three weeks in the Tasmanian hospital, Andy. I felt that long. It did feel long. I learned a lot about my roommate, Yurin.

Colin. He was in there with an ice skating injury. 85. Still ripped. Right. The nurse is like, wow, you're 85 and you're like, yeah, I chop a lot of wood. So that is the secret of staying young. Alright. Yeah.

And joining us with his trademark whisper of the number 85. 85. We've come back to our home for. Idland and all the way from the USA, it's Hari Kondabalu. How are you Andy? Hello Helen, how are you? Hi Hari. Do you think it was rougher to be in Tasmania Hospital for three weeks or to get the online feedback to your documentary?

Oh, I would have taken the hospital. Same for it. Yeah. Fewer death threats in the hospital, though. It's probably not the appropriate's for it. Yeah, fewer death threats in the hospital. That's probably not the appropriate place for it. So just by you not being one of God's chosen people, I'm like, hello, no, I'm welcome. And how's London treating you?

London has been rainy and cold. You are welcome. It has been exactly as advertised. You've seen a lot of Infant chimney sweeps around doing the full Dickens Christmas bit. Oh yeah, the whole thing. The whole thing, it's very embarrassing for the nation. We've outved it full.

Fuck only we had a sense of shame. It's been okay. I've been performing at SoHo Theatre. I'm halfway done with the run. I don't like your reviewers. I think the system of reviewing standup is stupid, and it's for dummies, right? How else would you do it? Just have like a big thermometer on stage

during the gig that goes up and down according to how well a joke does. I would rather people, you know, I'm less scientific about it, people laugh. Oh, this feels good. They didn't laugh at that. They're stupid. And then you feel good at the end of it. Right. I'd like to go down the statistical route as a semi-professional cricket statistician. I'd, you know, like, say percentage of jokes that hit, then the depth with which the joke hits the volume tone length of each loft.

Yeah, you could do a multi-dimensional graph with that. What do you do when it's a long setup and it's a huge build? You lose statistically out of that. What is for a hard to measure that? It's like measuring the true worth of a test match in existence. Trads stats don't always do it. Yeah, I was thinking the exact same thing. Anyway, this is a beautiful 4,090 getting closer and

closer to that historic 10,000th episode mark and we are recording on Friday the 7th of December on this day in 1732 hopping distance from where we are recording here in London. The Royal Opera House opened in Covent Garden, now home with the Royal Opera and the Royal Ballet. It's a sparked in 1730 to an instant, 27% rise in reported incidences of unwarranted warbling, a 19% upsurge in vocalised overreaction to personal misfortune, and paved the way for the political failures of Brexit. Because the Royal Opera House has also provoked a 78% decline in the ability and willingness of people to discuss matters calmly, maturely and sensibly without making a song and dance

about everything. Thank you. On the 10th of December, in 1317, just 701 short years ago, the new shopping banquet happened in Sweden, at which King Berger of Sweden seized his two brothers, Valdemar and Erich, and threw them in a dungeon and starved them to death. Hashtag, awkward family Christmas. His name was King Berger.

Yep, it was King Berger. I mean, has that family sued the restaurant at all? His legacy lives on. It was King Berger of Sweden? And he killed ironically, Stavth, Stavth his brothers to death. Oh my God. That was an unhappy meal.

On the 10th of December 1768, so 250 years ago, the first edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica was published all knowledge in the world squished into just three books. They were 40 pages devoted to diseases of horses, but no information about children, which to me that remains the correct way to go about things. And three pages about midwifery that were so scandalously factual that King George III demanded they were ripped out of all copies of the book. And apparently according to the original encyclopedia, Vermicelli is an Afro-Diziac.

I don't know how that stood up to scientific research. When you were delivering your son, did you look up how to do it in the encyclopedia? I did not. No. Well, I mean, midwifery is not the kind of thing that you can learn to do. It's one of those. You've either got it or you haven't. And I found out that day.

Like, perfect pitch. 10 years ago, next week, I just found out I've got it. So you mean like, you're born with that now? Yeah. So if you're a five year old and you're born with it, you could deliver children. Yeah, you could. So the fact they don't get to is age discrimination more than anything else. What is it? Yeah Or is it child labor laws? Oh Yeah, you're right. We never think about this. We always think about kids and factories

But not the talented children that could deliver other children Yeah, well the world is full of injustice full of injustice. As always, the section of the bugle is going straight in the bin. This week we look at humanity's cyborg future. Are you human? Yes, that's unimpressive these days. You're getting closer being obsolete now offense, because the cyborgs are coming and in this section in the bin this week, we review the latest electro-comput-tech hack modifications

to your objectively and chronistically outdated human body, including the Ulfax Atronic Conktech 2.1, a chip in your nose that instantly tells you exactly what that lovely, stroke not lovely smell is, from freshly baked Panamanian penguin cakes to the sweet petroleum musk of a horny motorbike, ding an instant message sent to your brain with thinkable internet links to where you can buy those precious cents on the darknet. Not only that, but it's also well known that smell can provoke powerful feelings of nostalgia and memory, and even if that smell means absolutely nothing to you personally, and prompts no emotional associations with your own life.

A secondary memory faker chip in your prefrontal cortex in your brain will crank into action and load up someone else's memory from its online data place of millions of recollections. Are you bored? I've not been able to toast bread with your own body. Well, that tedium is going to be a thing of the past if you have heating elements implanted in the back of your previously untosty hand. The back of the hand, traditionally one of the least useful parts of the body, at least since parental disciplining procedures evolved through the 20th century. But now, toast anything ranging in size from a crumpet to a muffin on your body, chef, hand grill, powered by the natural electricity of your nervous system and all personality,

waterproof gauntlets, advice for rainy days, not recommended for intimate use. And the sit-safe arse alarm, using technology pioneered for reversing cars, a simple set of cameras and sensors implanted in your beaux can warn you if you're about to sit on something or someone that you don't want to sit on. With built-in chair and bench recognition technology, the sit-safe arse alarm will bleep only if your intended seat contains an extraneous object or person. Safe time looking around for an empty seat on trains, buses and tubes. Now simply shuffle along until you find a spot where the alarm doesn't go off and bingo, somewhere free to sit. That section on cybugs in the bin. Brexit. We've been doing some national open-cast soul-searching here in Britain and not entirely liking what we've been digging up. Helen

you are out of the country for nine months? No longer than that. Not long enough, evidently. And you have returned to even more chaos than you left. Yeah, it's really quite impressive the way they keep out doing themselves to make a bad situation more bad. But it's, I suppose, good that they're exceptional. It's something. It's a little bit more complicated for me because as a person with Indian heritage, I really do enjoy British failure and suffering. So there's that part of me.

But as an American citizen, I don't really have a high ground to stand on when it comes to choices, right? But it does seem very bizarre to begin with the fact that the UK would leave the EU because they were barely in it to begin with considering that you had your own currency and you didn't sign on to the Shengen agreement so you had your own currency, and you didn't sign onto the Shengen Agreement, so you controlled your own immigration, so you were barely in it. So essentially, this news is like Nightcrawler leaving the X-Men. Right, like, oh no, not Nightcrawler. What are we gonna do without Nightcrawler?

Who is going to crawl at night now? Like, it's not. So it's not that big of a thing, so that already it was weird. But, are you trying to wear a taking back control of things that we already had control of? Yes, I mean, that's my expert outside our analysis. Also, it seemed like an incredibly good deal.

Not only, where you barely in it, you still had the advantages of it. It's almost like being in an open relationship where only you are allowed to have sex with other people and then somehow for some reason one day you're like, I'm feeling smothered. I'm an autonomous being and I will live by my own rules and then you break up with the person in the next day for some reason you wake up and you're like, I am very lonely now. Is there someone to trade with? Or Snuggle? Where were you with all these similes before the vote in June 2016? It's been a thrilling week in Parliament. The

government was defeated in not one, not two, not three, not four, but three votes, did I already say three? For three, it was three. Three votes in a day. That's the first time a government has three votes in a day, since the 1970s, they also found in contempt of parliament. Wow! For the first time ever. Not just in contempt of every human being. No, that's just a basic state of political existence for all governments.

But in contempt of parliament. And it's quite interesting insight into how a parliament works. This resulted from what's called a humble address. And if I may quote from the humble address, the humble address will be presented to her majesty, that she will be graciously pleased to give directions that the following papers be laid before Parliament, any legal advice in full, including that provided by the Attorney General on the proposed withdrawal. proposed withdrawal blah blah blah blah. Do you think the Queen is graciously pleased by this or? I don't think she gives a f***. No I think I mean she doesn't have that look about that to be honest. She is well over this. Yeah. She's like I'm

what? 92? 91? 92? I'm not gonna have to live with this. Well I mean you say that but yeah we keep singing that national anthem. She's gonna stay alive forever. God, it's not gonna let her slip off the perch. Wait, it's a weather or not that nation suffers. She's still queen, right? Yeah. And she gets to keep everything. Yeah, absolutely. That's the rules. All the grounds. So she doesn't need to care at all.

This is completely... This is other people suffering, yeah. Yeah. It's a great system. You guys in America, you should go someday. Or maybe she's thinking. Did they're done that? Well, England went and f***ed a lot of other countries and now it's time to come home and f*** itself. I'd better call us a meat on, I guess. The Queen responded with the tradition passed down from history with the words, f***, say, what now you meddling shit as a watching the f***ing horse racing. If you wanted me to actually do something, you might have a lot to think about that before, but you chop the noggin off my great, great, great, great, great,

great, great, great, great, great, great Uncle Charlie. Nachos, please, I've got a pony on the 340 A.D.O.K. There's a five-day debate in Parliament, currently, underway. You like things that last five days, so I do. I do. I do. I do. It is very much like a test match.

How would you advise them to keep the interest going for such a long time? I think the key is to have regular intervals for meals and drinks. So you want two hours debating 40 minutes off for the lunch interval, two hours debating 20 minutes for tea, and then two hours plus and extra half hour, a few debates slowly.

Should they all dress the same? Yeah, I think everyone should be dressed in white and applaud politely. And wear pads? And occasionally abuse each other out of a range of the microphones. Yeah, absolutely wear pads and genital protectors. Hats for the sun. Also, they should be drinking, and that way it's more entertaining the longer it goes. I think we'd probably have a far more lucid high quality of debate if there was

compulsory drinking in Harlem. I think I was the foundation of ancient Greek democracy I'm pretty sure. Theresa May looking as ever as happy as a pig in a pork pie, at least for the pig it's over. Do you feel at all sorry for her Helen after the year that she's had? Yes and no. I think it'd be hard for anyone to really succeed in the position she's been in. However, I do think she has done a worse job than she needed to and has also been consistently terrible throughout her political career and inhumane. So I suppose I've convinced myself that the answer to you're earlier question is no. Right. Do you? I don't feel sorry for her, but she has got that look. It's very similar to the look of a dog that knows you've just made her last appointment with the vet.

She just seems to know what's coming. Some kind of instinct. I don't know, I think that would be a sweet release. It's more like a dog that is being adopted by a family with a really annoying and sadistic child. And the dog is only like eight, so there could be several years of this left. The debate has been, who are highly contest contested and the nation is essentially split and the options are to

please 50% of the people to please the other 50% of the people or to please neither the 50% nor the other 50% and the option C seems to be essential what the government is going to get through Parliament. That is the fair choice. There's been some very heartfelt speeches from various MPs. Harmonica's gravely strange. He conservative MP for West Snutterbridge. Said that he was a descendant of someone who died at the battle of Hastings. And he said, we must respect the votes of the now dead.

And people who are now a voting age, or will at some point be a voting age, in the future have only themselves to blame for not faking some ID and voting on Brexit when they had the chance, fecal. Portchetta Cudlic, the Liberal MP for Ilingworth Raymond, said Britain should not rush into it. We should have a 20 year rolling second referendum where people's average view on the EU is calculated on a minute by minute basis, culminating in a result in the year 2039. Ken Bagatell, Labour MP for Glarch, said that we should pretend to leave and hope that no one looked at it too closely.

That's the Hong Kong option, I believe it's known. And James Bexley said, cut, he conservative MP for Broken Shard, just stood in Parliament and sang his new song, Maggie, Maggie, please come back. Heastings has a kind of pudding, right? The heistings pudding, is that a thing? I think you have heasty pudding

that Harvard has a thing. Oh, I thought that. It's like a corn porridge. Okay, I thought maybe Hastings had a pudding. You're right. I was thinking of hasty pudding. We only have dordling puddings in. Dordling puddings, I don't think he's also a parliamentary constituent. Won't someone and the think of our home county Kent because today in the news there were plenty of articles saying that a no deal Brexit could cause major disruption across Kent because of all of the piles and piles of lorries that are stuck in Kent, unable just to sunt her over to the continent anymore and they're saying rubbish won't be

collected, children won't be able to take exams. People won't be able to register for weddings. Bodies won't make it to the morgue, incent. Only incent. Just incent. Cends gonna come the most exciting place in the world. Finally. Kind of dystopian, very stationary mad max feature.

Scott the castles for it. I mean, the body is not reaching, I mean also take away deliveries could be delayed by up to 15 minutes in some parts of the country. Oh, that's a nightmare. The nightmarons needle's will go mushy. Yeah. And people could easily die in operating theaters because they're new lung is stuck on the M20.

So tough times ahead. So Kent. The, that's not all that can happen to stock market could fall. In Kent. In Kent. In Kent by anything between 0 and 50,000%. Train services could collapse into absolute chaos, thus improving by 15%. The shortage of medical and care staff could lead to the government having to constripe clever dogs to be emergency heroes like Lassie.

Works in Peter Pan. And TV detectives could get 45% worse at solving fictional crimes. The Queen could get 8% shorter. There will be an infestation of warthogs. And Britain will be struck from the list of potential venues for the second coming of Christ. So, it was still on the list? It's a long list. So, the possible scenarios are no deal, shit deal, renegotiate less shit

deal, renegotiate even shitter deal, attempt to renegotiate less shit deal but come back with the same shit deal and awkward smile waving little union jack flag. A second referendum with two or three options, a second referendum with 300 options, one for each plausible variation of leave or remain. A second referendum with no options at all, I quite like this one, it's just a blank piece of paper Which you can just write whatever you want. I mean it won't solve anything, but how people Essentially what we've got now. Civil war, we shouldn't write that off because it's worked quite well in the past. Wars of the roses culminated in 1485

Just a hundred years later Plus a bit Shakespeare Shakespeare who would the civil war be with the different nations of the United Kingdom? No massive pile in everyone just a fight fight fight not armed just like a like a fist fight a British fist fight throughout the country yeah okay our all Scotland Northern Ireland and Wales could stay in the EU but leave the UK and be replaced by Ecuador, Togo and Bhutan. So we keep the formation union. I think we're all in favour of that. Bhutan is an annually called the happiest place on earth. That ranking would go down if we joined the

EU, the UK. Yeah, we can drag any nation to that. That's a mission. Natural cynicism. That's what the Empire was all about. We saw a happy world and we thought no. Our greatest export. It's Britain and Nevada Cracket Bhutan. At Bhutan. Yeah, was it two mountainous and we don't have the skills or the altitude abilities? I don't know. I don't answer that in minutes. Yeah.

Chris is on the Bhutan recently. It was invaded by the British. Of course, because it's a place in the world. You're always trying to get from them. 1865 Treaty of Sinchella after it's defeat by the British Empire, blah blah blah British protectoror blah blah blah blah separatist groups blah blah blah and not there anymore. Alright. A dance was all this time itself. In American news, Mike Pence addressed a crowd during World AIDS Day and once again, as it seems to be the administration's policy, did not mention the LBTQ community, which has the most people affected by the disease.

But to be fair, he went with, if you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all policy, which is a sharp break from the president's being asshole at all times policy. So that takes courage to make that always saying exploit in the Trump administration. Yeah, it's between cowardness and mean spiritedness. Right. That's a huge break, yeah. Did he know it was World Aid's Day?

Was it just his daily address in which he didn't mention LGBTQ plus people? As much as his rhetoric is different than the president's rhetoric, it follows a larger strategy. The administration is using a strategy where if they don't acknowledge something, that means it doesn't exist. Oh, we've all done that. Right. Like with the environment, there is no issue with global warming. So because of that, there is no issue with it, because we said there is no issue with it. We didn't even address it. Very simple solution. Very simple.

So that means that the LGBT community is not dealing with HIV AIDS. Then they've cured it. Right, because they're not affected by it. God, that's genius. Yeah. So it's somewhat simpler than medical science. Yeah, well, here's in scientists,

I do not support this with their fake news and fake logic and fake experiments and research, they would strongly disagree. But I mean, Pence giving a speech on World AIDS Day, given his track record of not being entirely inclusive or supportive of gay rights and related issues. To me, that was rather like getting Ronald McDonald to give the keynote speech at a slow food conference or Jack Ruby to give an address on the critical importance of allowing due legal process in criminal cases. It was bizarre at best awkward and unhelpful. Scott Schutts of the LGBTQ group, Lambda Legal's HIV project called Mike,

actually I'll do this as a multiple choice, Helen. Can you guess what? Scott Schutz called this set about Pences speech. Did he describe as a insightful sensitive tolerant, open-minded and above all, deeply rooted in scientific knowledge and research. B, laugh out loud, funny, genuine belly laugh from start to finish, five stars,

C, oddly sexy, or D, shortsighted and biased. Er, I'm going to go B. In correct? Oh. In correct was shortsighted and biased. Er, classic pants. Christmas news now and Christmas has been cancelled and reinstated by a school in Yorkshire,

Lady Lumbly School in Pickering, told pupils that Christmas was off because the true meaning of Christmas had, quote, been buried under an avalanche of commercialisation. Isn't that the true meaning of Christmas? Well, yes. Snow of commercialisation. Yeah, absolutely. And also, it's not Christmas that has been buried under an avalanche of commercialisation. It's the entire planet.

And that's, of which Christmas is clearly part. What is the true meaning of Christmas given that it's a pagan festival caught by Christians? It's also an individual's birthday party where everyone else gets presents. Oh, vexing. Very upsetting. Lucky, he's so generous-spirited, he doesn't mind. And also, I mean, it's buried under an avalanche

of commercialization, yes, but also, you could express that as saying, made a f*** of a lot more fun. Because, you know, before the avalanche of commercialization just spend the entire day in church praying and stuff eat the roast hedgehog or whatever scraped off the road and then die in hospital of typhoid. Now, presence all the way, surely that's a huge improvement for Christmas. In terms of Christmas as a gateway piece of religion for drawing people in, surely that's going to get kids involved.

Pride people with calendars, gifts. It's the classic Christian strategies, isn't it? I mean, in Africa, you want food, take this book. It's pretty much the same idea. Yeah. Because you get people involved, get impressionable young people hooked on religion, you get a lot of presents, happy songs, everyone being nice, donky midwife and magic reindeer and granny getting drunk and falling asleep in a fruitcake.

Are you in? Hell yeah, good. Now Easter, nail him up, nail him up, nail him up, repent your evil sinner or you'll burn in hell. Eterneg, eterneg, eterneg. I thought the school was actually onto something though because the teacher said there'd be no cards, no parties, no gifts and no Christmas tree unless the students wrote a persuasive argument about where they should celebrate Christmas. And I think being made to question this fairly ubiquitous holiday

is quite a good idea isn't it? Right, it is. Also, you have to ask in terms of commercialisation who started it and clearly it was the three wise men pitching up with their gold, bitflash, frankincense, new age, your own with Arabic bullshit and whatever the third one was. Some controversy over the term, MIR in the Bible, current school of biblical thought is that the gospel stenographer St. Linda was sitting in the corner of the manger, typing up the minutes of the Holy Birth. And just as wise man number three was telling them what he'd brought them as a present. Baby Jesus did his first ever puke, a micro-messionic chunder, forever commemorating

the word, archaeologist digging up the manger, think the actual gift was a breast pump, ironically. And of course, there is nothing more Christian than the commercialization of Christmas speaking as a Jew. more Christian and the commercialization of Christmas speaking as a Jew. Yorkshire has a pudding, right? Yorkshire does have a pudding. Oh, thank you. Is this the most- You passed the citizenship. Is this the most notable thing to happen in Yorkshire since the creation of the pudding? Since- War of the Roses? Yeah, I don't know. When did the Yorkshire pudding- Yeah, I was going, I don't know, when do the yorks are putting? Well, it's a, do you know what it is, hurry? No. It's a batter pudding.

So kind of like pancake mixture that you put in the oven when you're making a roast meat. Ah. And it kind of puffs up and you fill it with gravy. And they also, you can make it a dessert as well. If you wish, you look a little upset. Yeah, how do you make it a dessert? You just fill it in with like frosting?

I guess all fruit, maybe stew fruit, jam. Jam? Gravy and jam. It's the complete all-in-one meal. And have you thought about having a pudding news section of the video, go next time you're on, Harry? Okay, great. I like the idea of doing Yorkshire traditions with Harry.

Next week, dripping. We call to that, Philip Larkin. And the week after that, defensive opening batting. Anyway, are you just dazzled by the plethora of ways in which Britain uses the word pudding? Yes, it's so strange because pudding has just meant desert my whole life, and now all of a sudden you're telling me it could be Something as disgusting as a as a meat bowl. Oh, no, it could be far worse than that. It can be it can be yeah

It can be a blood sausage. It can be a kind of beefy thing that is Has a pastry made with the the kidney fat of animals Man, this is like when I found out about the pie Sydney of animals. Man, this is like when I found out about the pie. So I'll just say the pie always meant like this beautiful, like delicious sweet thing at the end of dinner and again another, there's no need for meat and it but yeah. Just open your mind, open your crust to other options. Luckily Christmas was actually reinstated for the children of Lady Lumbly School but with no Santa instead to keep it real

Reliusly, they had someone's mates dad come into school dressed as King Herod and slay all the boys Just the first born one so you would have been all right. I think the one Herod didn't need to do all the under-to's Oh, yeah, no right. Yeah, I don't think it was the first borner. Yeah, well you're 44 so you'd be all right an under two. Well, you're 44 so you'd be all right. In other Christmas news, a teacher in New Jersey has been sacked for telling children that Santa Claus doesn't exist. Yeah, well, people are fired for telling the truth now. No one likes experts. Truth is the enemy of freedom. Testify. This teacher apparently told the children at Santa wasn't real and that parents just by presence and put them under the tree.

She told the children that reindeer cannot fly and that elves don't exist. Prove it. She went on to say that tooth fairy isn't real. And the same goes for the Easter bunny. I mean, I mean, if they're upset about finding that out, wait until they find out that their entire democracy is a sham. Yeah, but looks on their faces.

And the world they're going to be adults in is melting. Also, this is an unfortunate position the children and they have to now show gratitude for their parents buying them gifts and giving them money. Yeah. That is something they did not have to worry about previously. No, absolutely. Well, as a parent of... See, it was a... In our family, we got one present from Father Christmas. Our discovery... I say, discovery, my suspicion is not proved yet.

I started to believe that Father Christmas did not exist. Because we used to get one present from Father Christmas on top of our stockings, and I went to a friend's house and she had loads of presents and I said, who's that from? She said, that's from Father Christmas. Who knows that one from? Some Father Christmas. All that presents was from Father Christmas. And these five-year-old Sherlock Holmes that I was, I started to piece it all together. The whole edifice of Western capitalism came crushing down before my eyes. You didn't figure out that Father Christmas was a bigot?

I mean, it is possible he was anti-Semitic. I guess he's always got that card up as large red sleeve. Yeah. What are the ethics about lying to children? What's your rubric on this, Andy? Is the possessor of children? I tell them nothing, but the pure,

unvarnished truth, Helen, as you very well know. I know that they really seemed to have trouble understanding what is reality and what isn't, because you've raised them. LAUGHTER That's a really seem to have trouble understanding what is reality and what isn't because you've raised them. That's a good that's a good skill to have though, isn't it? To not know what's real and what's not that helps you navigate the modern world, to assume that nothing can be fully trusted because you have a father who is an inveterate bullshitter. I've set them up for life. Sure. I have told my daughter that baby Jesus and that wasn't real, but can't bring myself to tell her the Santa side of things. Well, she gets a bit more benefit from

Santa because there's a material gain, whereas what's baby Jesus have ever done for her, part from diver her sins? There was also a slight inconsistency, Harry, in the American education system, but it seems that you're not allowed to debunk Santa, but you are allowed to bunk creationism. That is correct. Right. Yes. This is, this makes completely sense to me. My father in law does a lot of Santa gigs because he looks exactly like Santa. But his business card says the Santa Dave, because I think he wants, it just to be clear that he is an ambassador for the Santa myth Right rather than actual Santa himself actual Santa the Santa

There's also a lot of fonts on his business cards. I'm doing know that Santa Claus is real name is not Dave And he has Nicholas isn't it? So I don't think Hulk Hogan's real name was Hulk was it? Nicholas isn't it? Right. So I don't think Hulk Hogan's real name was Hulk, was it? Perfect. No it was Terry.

Went with Hulk? Good idea. It's his son I'm really Hogan. No, I believe it. But I, I, I, did you look that up, Chris, did you also know it? No I was wrestling, kind of, in the Aces. Yeah, I'm a casual wrestling fan. I felt bad that I knew it, did you feel bad?

Doesn't look like it feels bad. No, I feel pretty chopped actually. He looks pretty chopped Terry the wrestler. It doesn't quite have the same ring to it Anyway, so the learnings you can't tell children about the the the tooth fairy You can the government can tell everyone in America to believe in the oil and coal fairy, but the two fairies out and You can't stick it to the sacred Christian cow that is the Easter bunny and The origin of Easter bunny It's coincidentally apparently Jesus on the cross did bunny is with his fingers behind the head of a Roman centurion Which was pretty much his only available form of protest given the you know

Nailie Nailie handhand thing Nanny laid an egg. We did lay an egg. Maybe I should learn about Christianity from another source. I'm starting to question some of these things that you are saying. I'm not sure how true they are. Jesus laying an egg. Prove that he didn't, he could do miracles.

Last week we launched the bugle, Drab vent calendar. A Drab thing for every day of December, up to the... Up to and including the 24th. We're picking it up now with your Drab vent calendar entry for the 10th of December. 10th of December. A packet of stale cheese biscuits found open but mostly unethan in the cupboard. Now four years past their best before date, the top one, slightly nibble. 11th of December. A newspaper advertisement for orthopedic socks cut out with scissors with the order section filled out but never sent. 12th December, Dennis and Marjorie from Down the Road. 13th December, a carriage on a commuter train on a wet January morning, stopped outside

a disused warehouse running 14 minutes late. 14th of December, a lone grey sock in a hedge. 15th of December, a videocassette of highlights of the 1997 seniors golf tour. There will be more thanly drug vent calendar if I can be asked to do it next week. Sora, an advent calendar in a supermarket in Stratum, that each day you get a different screwdriver head. And by Christmas you've got a full socket set. That's what Jesus would have wanted. It was a carpenter. Other news now and how old are you? 36.

And how would you like to be considered legally? 36? Okay, right. Because as our age transformation correspondent, a man in Holland has attempted to have his age legally reduced from what, 69 to 49? Yes, I believe that's right. Right. 69, good age. Yep. But, um, but yeah, I mean, I think his hope is that they would lessen his age 20 years, but I don't think he took into account that the courts could do nothing for his face or his potential

poor penile functions. It seemed to be key in this. Because he wanted to be younger so that he could date younger women on Tinder. Yes, which, first of all, what better way to start a relationship than with an elaborate lie sanctioned by the court? I mean, also creepiness is not a measurable thing. It's a feeling he is creepy. Right. There's nothing you can do about that, but he

doesn't self-identify his creepy. So, therefore, he doesn't want us to see him as creepy. He self-identifies as a young god. Right. I can have all the girls I want, but not after I tell them I'm 69. Right. When did gods need the legal system to stop time? It's good point. The great gods didn't think about that. No. They were really not. I don't think they were necessarily role models. You should look up to romantically for the gods.

No, not respectful at dating. Truly appalling individuals. Also, he's saying that gender is something that one could change. So why couldn't he change his age? And the difference is that for many trans people, they actually believe they've been in the body from much of their life. And for this man, there is no way that when he was 21,

he was like, I am one. I am one years old. Mummy, mummy, can I have a nipple, mummy? Can I have it? This is a sociology lecture, sir. Mummy, I'd have a nipple, Mummy? Can I have it? This is a sociology lecture, sir. Mummy, I'd like a nipple, Mummy. That's ridiculous. Of course, he's a liar.

If he's not something he had, I don't know a lot of time with one-year-olds. Do they not say that? Mummy, I'd like a nipple, Mummy. Not necessarily in those words. The court said that he is at liberty to feel 20 years younger and to act accordingly. Which is kind of the response my mum would have given if I had ever asked her for something. Manage your own emotions, dude. I would like to consider legally considered 66 years old,

so I can get a free seat on a bus. Also also You could much more easily become the oldest person in the world you could hit a good like 150 and just you know Because you made your age 80 years older records a record, isn't it? Yeah It's legal 150 year old man on Tinder would be very funny I can a lot of people would just to see Yeah, yeah. He would do well. I can't believe everything still works for 150 slash 36.

Oh, he's ejaculating sawdust. Well, that brings us to the end of this week's Vughal. How are you, Ron, at the SOHO Theatre until the 16th, the 16th, and then I'm in Copenhagen and then Amsterdam, then Antwerp. Full European tour. I begin at Soho Theatre on the 18th of December. I run a few to the 5th of January with a few days off for things like Christmas and New Year, do come along to that. We'll also feature Alice Fraser. Helen, anything to plug? I've got a gig at SF Sketchfest on January the 25th.

There you go. Consider that plugged. Thank you for listening to Google. By next time we record, we might have an entire new government. We might have voted to join South America. Who knows. These are exciting times. What are we going to get for Christmas? A complete catastrophic collapse of British democracy. What we always wanted. Until next time, goodbye. you