The Bugle - Sh*t away Scottie (4201)

Episode Date: July 23, 2021

Andy, Alice and Sami Shah look at some of the biggest stories over the last week - Toyko Olympics, Billionaire Spacemen, Eric Clapton vaccine warrior, plus, politics and fast-food toilets! We are funded entirely by you, the listener. Listeners who sign up via thebuglepodcast.com have long enjoyed the opportunity to get: mentions on the show (in the form of lies), merchandise and general sense of wellbeing for supporting this fine work of art. As of this week you can also support the show directly via Apple Podcasts. Our new channel ‘Team Bugle’ also includes The Last Post, The Gargle and Tiny Revolutions, shows which currently carry ads - but they will be completely ad free on this channel. So if you love The Bugle, and it’s siblings, then please support The Bugle via our website or Apple Podcasts where you can subscribe today.Buy a loved one Bugle Merch - COLD AND WET WEAVER T SHIRTS ON SALE NOW). Listen to The Gargle here: https://pod.link/GargleFollow us on YouTube or Insta and see parts of this episode with actual video.The Bugle is hosted this week by:Andy ZaltzmanAlice FraserSami ShahAnd produced by Chris Skinner & Ross Ramsey-Golding 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! Oh, buglers. Sorry that... ...create on my laptop is not working. That's the... ...on between the W and R.

...uh, not... ...Hydal for a podcast, according in English. ...To but... ...Honst. I'll give it a whack. That's better. Onwit to... ...Sau.

...Better. I'm Andy Altzman. Altzman and I'm broadcasting live from the shit. Oh that's good news. That last one came back. I was about to do a bit about Dracula learning to do basic mathematics. Could have been very awkward for a family show like this. Anyway, welcome to Bugle issue 4200 and 1. Iron Man Disaltsman and never let it be said that... Thank you. It's Bugle, as I said, issue 22001. I'm here in London and the same cannot be said for either of my two guests today.

Both coming to you live from the world's most southerly hemisphere from Australia within the hemisphere to be precise returning for the first time in two weeks it's allis phraser and for the first time in four years the wonderful sami char welcome uh... to both of you uh... particularly sami it's uh... it's uh... well it's been it's been too long

great to have you back on the show how you uh... thank you for having back andy um... i figured my uh... last time i was on for about four years ago now I offended you by doing a pan-run And and had before me iced out of the show and I and I appreciate you giving me another opportunity I shall not I shall be more respectful this time around And well you are in Melbourne I am indeed yeah lockdown, as we call it here,

we are the masters of lockdown. We have perfected lockdown as an art, as a Zen Buddhist retreat approach to the COVID situation. And we're doing great. We're, I mean, this is our lockdown number five here in Melbourne, which if you do something five times, I think this American Gladwell rule, now we are experts at it automatically. So, yeah, we're just rocking this lockdown. Unless, unlike my friends in Sydney, who are a mess, let's be honest. Yes, of all the cities in Australia and the stereotypical characteristics, I don't think

Melbourne needed to be the one that was sitting at home writing sad poetry. That was a skill set they already possessed, but for now Sydney is developing that ability. And how are things in Sydney, Alice? I mean, you've, are you in a fifth lockdown for Sydney? Is this becoming competitive between Australia's two big cities and you need camera in between to average things out? No so this is our second city wide lockdown. We've been doing the very pin point precision of the lockdowns up until this point where it seems to have gone wide and our defence wasn't good enough. That's the only sport metaphor I know. We'll know that. Well, we'll know that talk about this a bit more later in the show, but in here, everything's

fine. We've opened up with barely a third of a million new cases a week. So, just different approaches, different approaches, I guess history will probably be a pretty aggressive judge of both of them. We are according on the 22nd of July 2021, on this day in 1894, the first ever motor race was held in France between the cities of Paris and Ruean. After someone had a really great idea that you could advertising logos on clothing and needed some kind of means to make that worth doing. Officially, it was a race for horseless carriages. It included a one and a half hour break for lunch,

a very, very French event. And the average speed of the first car across the line was a dizzying 12 miles an hour. But that didn't win the trophy because the trophy was given instead of the car, which, quote, came closest to the ideal. Now, I mean, that might be the massive lunch break, the sort of philosophical end to the race. What is the most French event in history? As always, a section of the bugle is going straight in the bin.

This week, Moths, it's international Moth Week this week. So we have a full pullout section about Moths, in which we ask, seriously, what the f***ing point of Moths are, they're like a cross between an unfinished butterfly, and the remnant of a disappointing biscuit. The Moth is acknowledged, even by the international society for the promotion of Moths as, quote, a bit drab as insects go, and frankly one of the many species of the world could do without Moths are of course most famous for eating people's clothes, but why no

F***ing reason I think they're just jealous and also we look at great moths in history. F***ing silly. I mean it's so hard to separate those two isn't it Alice? It's so often. History shows that. We look at great moths in history. The 13th century Flemish Prince Bertrand the Strange under collection of 10,000 moths and would challenge his courtiers to correctly name them all or face immediate execution. In the 1950s pop legend Elsie May sludge it, sure her career knows dive after

eating a moth live on stage during an appearance on the Ed Sullivan show, during a controversially provocative performance of her Billboard number one single, If You Dare To Fly Away. And inspired by the Scottish King Robert the Bruce and his battle-predicting spider, early 19th century British general Sir Garmund Falhoek, decided to abandon a planned attack on a hill fought in Andalusia. During the penitual war after watching a moth, unsuccessfully tried to fly out of a window for 45 minutes. It was a sign that all things ended in failure,

said Falhoop to the subsequent government inquiry, without adequately explaining why he'd spent the next fortnight in Torrey, Malino, Stringing, San Bougas, slammers. And of course, we look at the Tiger Moth aircraft, renowned as an aircraft in the 1930s. But it has emerged that the origin of the Tiger Moth was from an attempt by former US President and enthusiastic

wildlife slayer Teddy Roosevelt to breed a flying tiger that would be more of a challenge for him to shoot. Roosevelt thought the unprinciple flutter patterns of the Moth plus the camouflage and ferocity of the Tiger would be quotes a thrilling combination of natural wonders to savagely bring to death in great quantities. And of course, a quick feature on the Miami Moths, the shortest-lived major minor league franchise ever, which went out of business after appropriate enough, just over a week, it seemed appropriate, said the owner, Craybon Hargeli. That section, in the bin. Top story this week. Bugle Olympics special.

Yes, it's about to happen, probably. The Tokyo 2020 Olympics 2021 have, well in fact already kind of begun, sort of as we were called, some pre-opening ceremony events have already taken place, early matches and football and softball. And the Olympics will soon be fully underway unless they're not they'll be up and running unless they get disqualified after a full start or trip over their shoelaces and like crying on the ground saying why why why it's amazing that here we are we're recording on the Thursday the Olympics ceremony is tomorrow and no one seems to quite know

if these Olympics will genuinely happen. And I mean, even if they do, they are going to be the glumist sporting event in history. What's the excitement levels in the sport-loving nation of Australia? I mean, we are passionately excited beyond the edges of our seats. We are watching that 90s cinematic trope, will they or won't they and why would they? Sammy is locked down in Melbourne. I guess you know, you know, the wall to wall sports got to be a bit of a bit of a boon, but and Australia is a great Olympic nation Melbourne hosted it back in 56th and he hosted it in 2000 and well just this week it's been

announced that Brisbane is the host of the 2032 games. I mean what's the react I mean we should say that Brisbane beat off strong competition from let me just check the list absolutely nowhere else whatsoever to land the hosting rights which are due to take place in the 72032, which is scheduled to be a week after Australia finishes, giving COVID vaccines to the over 50s, I think, on current rates. So what's the mood in Australia after this news?

There is just remarkable amount of joy here, excitement. There is one question that a lot of people have right now. Is, Brisbane is the only city that has been contender for the 2032 Olympics, and it turns out that five people voted against even them. So why do five people hate Brisbane? What the f*** is Brisbane ever done? Why do you think there was so little competition for the 2030?

Was it used to be that there were, rafts of cities all wanting to bid for their Olympics? I mean, is it perhaps an unwillingness of cities around the world now to be saddled with billions of dollars of debt, a 72,000 seat Greco-Roman wrestling arena, a Randy Albatross have broken political promises around the next and the nagging sense that things will never be quite as fun after the limpicks ever again. So, I mean, it's almost, it's not just the money, it's the sense that that'll be the peak and there's nothing to look forward to I'll speak from London here. I think it's because 2032 as a year is so far

into a future that we know is not going to exist that at this point you might as well be talking about the year 3032 when it comes to having the next Olympics. I can't plan things till next Thursday every single fan I made for next week has been cancelled. 2032, sure! Book whatever you want for 2032. That's the year I booked all my meetings, my tax accountant meeting, my meetings with my school, daughter school parent teacher. 2032 is not a real year, it's a different year.

I think it's possible that they've been scared off by the plethora of bad things that have been happening to Tokyo, seemingly the best place to possibly hold the Olympics being very organized and orderly, but after losing, seemingly every single person in a leadership position to the vagaries of them having done or said horrendous shit in the past, I feel like people just don't want their histories raked up with that kind of vigor. The Queensland Premier, Anastasia Palaschuk, had said she would not attend the opening ceremony in Tokyo where she's been for the announcement of the bidding process because of I forget the reason. She wanted to finish a book, a chess club. No, no, no, it's that massive global pandemic. That's what, um, so she wasn't gonna go to the opening ceremony in Tokyo.

She said she wouldn't said what shit from her room and, uh, John Coates got, well, as I said, a little, uh, on the, um, smug man at C sort, um, he said, you are going to the opening ceremony. I am still the deputy chair of the candidature leadership group. So far as I understand, there will be an opening and closing ceremony in 2032. And all of you have got to get along there and understand the tradition parts of that. And what's involved in an opening ceremony? None of you are staying behind in your rooms. All right, maybe not quite in that tone of voice. But I mean, this is not a great start to Brisbane, as a showcase of more modern Australia, was it?

It's a very Queensland thing to do. One of the things you have to understand about Queensland is it is what's often been described as the Florida of Australia. It is the kind of state. If ethnicity is, if Queenslanders can be considered an ethnicity, maybe it is time for an ethnic cleansing. It's something that we often said about Queensland.

And this kind of like mansplaining overreaction from a person whose job title is the truly deputy chair of the candidature leadership group which might as well He's once set above sundry custodian when it comes to useless job titles telling the premier how to behave I mean Alice it was a quite a curious message to send out this none of you are staying behind and hiding in your rooms a curious message sent it to a nation 50% of whom are currently in lockdown Yes, I'm afraid that Australians are equally split between being annoyed that she's going,

being annoyed that she said she wouldn't go, being annoyed that she didn't go and not realizing that she did go, and just generally being annoyed at problems in their own personal lives that they are now projecting onto the wider political landscape, because that's the only way we know how to express our emotions in these troubling times,

and it's that or punch your toaster. Ha ha ha. Back to Tokyo 2020 2021, as I forget what it's officially called now. Um, the, it's been a hugely troubled games for obvious reasons. Um, and, uh, to the extent where now sponsors are getting wary of being associated with top level sport. Now generally sponsors want to be associated with top levels, but whatever the cost financially and to the ethics and spirit of sports and humanity in general. But they now getting very worried about how unpopular these games have become with the people of Japan

as the pandemic continues to model its way around the world. And these sponsors are starting to vault out of the arena like Sergai Bubka escaping from jail. Can you think of a more sad sporting event that's ever taken place? I mean, it's terribly sad to watch these sponsors jumping ship, Toyota, among others, they're downplaying, they're not showing up, they're not coming to watch these sponsors jumping ship Toyota among others, they're downplaying, they're not showing up, they're not coming to watch. And it's almost like Andy, they don't care about humanity running faster, jumping high on achieving greater things that all they care about is the is the swathes of people who will go and buy overpriced merchandise.

As if trying to set the tone for this was not difficult enough for the opening ceremony, preparations have been further smithereamed today, Thursday as we recall, when the show's director was sacked over a joke about the Holocaust, he made on a TV comedy show back in the 1990s. Now, I once again, this is a major failure in the initial vetting process, isn't it? Because you would have thought these days that process would involve a question to the director of your Olympic opening ceremony, along the lines of, did you ever make a joke about the Holocaust on a 1990s TV comedy show?

Yes or no? But obviously that vetting did not happen. It's almost like Japan's painfully insular tradition of hierarchical rigidity and the unquestioned authority of those in power makes for slightly uncomfortable mix with modern public transparency culture. If you were designing an opening ceremony for this game, how would you express everything that's come to be associated? I mean, I can't really see how it can involve anything apart from getting 3,000 dancers forming into a giant teardrop and then slowly trickling down

a giant inflardrop, and then slowly trickling down a giant inflatable globe. It does make sense that there is a bit of controversy though. Yeah, because there is, you know, we've got the Japanese organizing the entire Olympic ceremony and hosting it in Tokyo, and the head of the Olympics, of the IOC, the President is Thomas Bach, who is a former Olympic fencer and German lawyer and the last time Germany and Japan collaborated over anything, a lot of people got really upset and so maybe this time around our reaction is naïve on our part and we should have anticipated a lot more

controversy. I like that as a summary of the second one, a lot of people got really upset. Nicely down, down played. One of the swimmers, Alicia Chores on Facebook, and this really shows the links that athletes go to to succeed in top level sport. Imagine dedicating five years of your life and striving for another start at the most important sporting event, giving up your private life and work sacrificing your family and your dedication results in a type of flop. And I mean, sacrificing your family, I mean, it's a bit old, but it shows the dedication, doesn't it? If you want to work, I mean, it's always, I work for aga Memnon back in the day, of course,

of the Trojan War though. I'm going to guess it would be quite a good strategy on the start blocks of a swimming race to just put your opponents off if you suddenly start performing a human sacrifice. Then you think you might get an advantage when the race starts that funny pingy sound, sends the swimmers off if everyone's looking at something. What the f*** are they doing in late eight? There are some new sports in London 2012, the Tokyo 2021 version. We'll give you a rundown now on these new sports

that will be entertaining you on your TV screens over the next couple of weeks, as long as everything isn't canceled. Speed climbing, well, I mean, this is another sport that will have other species on the planet, muttering, yeah, well done humans. You want to see how it's really f***ing done? You can also apply to that anything involves running,

swimming, jumping, unarmed fighting, hanging upside down, plummeting into water, or most forms of vaulting. But speed climbing is, oh, that's coming in. And I mean, Alice, you mentioned just before we came on air that in, as lockdown continues, you felt like climbing up the walls. Now you are going to literally be able to see people climbing up walls at incredible speed is this good or bad for you as a Sydney world?

I mean, this is so good for me. It's, it's, it's be climbing surfing karate and skateboarding at the four new sports. So if you wanted to be cool in the 90s, slap on a hypercolot T-shirt and send your yo-yo around the world, this is the Olympics for you. Of course it makes me wonder what's going to happen when the Olympics come to Brisbane that what will the new sports be other than hat wearing ballroom, which is where you do a dance in the sticky heat to give your testicles space to breathe and trying to run away from a crocodile at the sport in which only one person is the winner.

Well, there was a multi-pithin sketch in which they had Olympic being eaten by a crocodile. And like so many comedy sketches It may become reality in Brisbane It is important though that now with surfing and climbing and skateboarding and karate They have finally catered to the often neglected hipster barista with a man-bound demographic That has been left out of the Olympics for so long And the surfing is part of a new Olympic scheme to introduce sporting events which have featured

in popular songs which have claimed that everybody was participating in them. So, hence following the Beach Boys inspired edition of surfing to the 2020 Games, Paris 2024 will include Kung Fu fighting and Los Angeles 20 2028, we'll see talking, Returners of Spaceport. Of course, this began in the Winter Olympics. The skeleton event was introduced to the Winter Olympics in 2002 after the success of the REM song, Everybody Hurts, which of course was short for hurdles,

but it was abbreviated for rhythm. 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 Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa the man who have everything, get for the man who has everything. And the answer was the yacht that Jeff Bezos bought himself that needed another yacht just to work. Well, being the ceaseless investigative journalist that he is, Bezos has now added the question, where does the man who has everything take the man, who has everything, no doubt we'll have high how, when, and I'm not sure we'll get around to why, because there's no status for actually answers to that. But the answer is to that. It took himself kind of into space Alice you are our billionaire is firing themselves upwards correspondent. It's another great moment for pointless expenditure and things flying up into space. Yes indeed and the Jeff Bezos and his self-saturizing rocket have decided to add a cowboy hat to the post- fleeting flight press conference for maximum something.

Bezos said that the space flight reinforced his commitment to fighting climate change, but going into space and seeing the fragility of the Earth below him, reinforced his commitment to fight. It's like those people who, when they have a child say, I have a child and it gave me the revelation that, you know, it's not all about me. And it's like, it took that, it took that to make you realize. Why do you think, Sammy, it bees us the world's richest man,

financially, if not spiritually, has unnecessarily used the chunk of his unnecessary wealth to fly into space in a giant penis. Let's call it what it was, for basically just long enough to take a piss in zero gravity before then plopping back down to earth. Look Andy, I've been divorced. I've been divorced twice in fact and it's not fun. You do crazy stuff. You dye your hair blonde. You get a fitness instructor who convinces you to start drinking protein shakes or maybe you sign up for a

scuba diving course so you can finally confront your fear of sharks and then cancel the night before because you panic even though the sign up fees is non-refundable. These are all hypothetical situations. So in that case, I do have a lot of sympathy for the four basers wearing a cartoonishy large cowboy hat and firing yourself into space in a rocket shape. So obviously like a penis, it might as well have veins down its side. That's just a strive for help. That's all it really is.

And I mean, it was there. It was so, so unimpressively brief, this trip, that the whole thing took 11 minutes. And he did say it, the press conference afterwards, the former Amazon boss, and no time happiness in the workplace champion of champions winner from overworked underpaid warehouse staff monthly magazine He said it was a bit disappointing to be honest I was hoping to be able to see all the forest fires all the floods all the failing crops and all the forced migrations of the desperate Seeking a viable place to live and feel like a maleficent deity, but sadly it wasn't really like that at all. I can confirm however that the earth is probably round. It turns out that 11 minutes of a good time is all that Bezos is capable of, which does explain his last divorce finally.

Now meanwhile, back on Earth, well the apocalypse continues, a pace, Siberia is on fire, there is catastrophic flooding in multiple places around the world, huge heat waves. And the BBC news, whether intentionally or not, as they were covering the Bezos rocket launch, they also in the same quarter an hour time slot, Ran a story about Sudanese migrants paddling across the English channel in inflatable rubber dinghies in their desperation to find somewhere to live. I mean, can you think of anything that two stories that Jux to pose more appropriately to highlight are strange and questionable priorities as a planet at the moment than those two? Well, you know, Jeff Bezos did come back down to earth and immediately give $100,000

to Van Jones. So that's good. Right. Quite a famous news reporter. What are you going to spend it on? Probably good stuff. Look, let's just assume that they're all doing these things benevolently. I wish actually that they would do these things malevolently

because then at least we might get some results. Even if the malevolentness was gone, he went up into space and then bombed the rest of us into dust. At least we'd know once and for all what the intentions were and there would be some change that was different from what we currently experiencing which is a slow death, a slow roasting death. You're right at your right, Sammy, you're right. It is more depressing if we think they're doing their best. Yeah, we've had so we've had two billionaires in space in the last two weeks and not us

either of them has cackled maniacally when they've gone there. That's a massive letdown for all humanity, quite right. I feel they should leave that to Elon Musk. I think that's interesting. I think he would think that was funny. And it probably would be quite funny, but not as funny as it would be depressing, which I think is Elon Musk's sweet spot for comedy.

The 1960s Blues guitarists news now. And well, also slightly related to Covid. Eric Clapton has announced that he will not be performing in any venue that requires ticket holders to have had Covid vaccines. The legendary Axe wielder is well, taking a curious approach to the reopening of society. Yes, he's released this statement and also in the way that you know it's a legitimate statement, he released it exclusively to Italian architect and vaccine skeptic Robin Monotti Grazia dei, who put it out to the world through the reputable channels of his unverified Instagram account. Clapton said that he does what he's calling it a discriminated audience. If venues insist on people being vaccinated or showing a negative COVID test or proof of prior infection, which is

the current plan for a lot of venues, he's saying unless there's provision made for all people to attend or reserve the right to cancel the show. Clapton went on to say, I also insist that we reintroduce smallpox so that people who want to go to a concert bearing the hideous weeping flags of their independent spirit may mosh postulantly with their co-concert goers. I just, it's always so sad when people who are good at one

thing turn out to be really, really terrible at another thing. Who would have thought that impeccable guitar fingering skills and blowing your brains out with hippy bullshit in the 60s would be incompatible with logic and proportional risk assessment later down the line? Kratten has also come out and made a statement that he's a big fan now of British politician Desmond Swayne. Swayne,ain of course also believes that the pandemic's overblown. Swain has also been very publicly racist in the past. He said he thinks blackface is just a bit of fun, uh, which actually makes sense when you realize a claptain in the past

has at concerts told audience members who were foreigners to leave the country and has said he's why about Britain becoming a black colony and used a bunch of racial slurs. It turns out the reason Eric Clapton shocked the sheriff was because the sheriff wasn't white. The thing you have to understand about Eric Clapton is it's important to note that he's freaked out at the response his body had to the vaccine saying he expected to feel wonderful tonight instead I'm sorry I have to do this instead she suffered the kind of pain that caused him

to start as the Kiwis say heaven tears in heaven pains tears in heaven is another song the thing he doesn't realize is the vaccines response varies from person to person to person. It took four years for you to come back last time. I'm not interrupting. I'm going down like a Viking. Sorry. The vaccine response varies from person to person.

It's all in the way that you use it. He's of course come under a lot of criticism and it makes sense to him, for him to lay low, for a while. Lay low, of course, thank you for that. One Andy, I'll excuse myself now from the rule. It's the worst when you explain them. How does it feel to be able to? I was disappointed with how few Eric Clappping songs I knew by the way. I mean I did look up. I saw him at a charity event a few years ago as a cricket charity event that I went to and he did some played music afterwards as he itself and does.

And sort of his thing. We were standing about three yards away from him, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time, whatever his political views and views on on co-ed. It's one of the most bizarre experiences of my life that I was watching Eric Clapton play as if he was in my living room on the sofa. And I turned around on the former England cricketer Alan Lam was standing on a table waving a jacket around his head, but then hit me in the eye. And it was a bizarre experience. And I mean, the freedom that Britain is now enjoying, freedom day as it was

incorrectly named and arrogantly named by the government in certain sections of the media, on the 19th, the start of this week, basically all our COVID restrictions were released, masks, distancing, social gatherings, or based on the evidence of recent football tournaments, anti-social gatherings, as they should be called. They're all now fine. As I mentioned earlier on, we've had just a mere one-third of a million positive tests over the previous week. How does that compare with the number of positive tests in Australia? I think we had 120 today, which was high.

Yes. So, in Melbourne, I believe we had 120 today, which was high. Yes. So, in Melbourne, I believe we are at 22, which is very high for us. So, I mean, a third of a million is, I mean, we're doing better. Like a bit more than that. Yes, a little bit more. But I mean, I guess Australia, the butterfly flaps its wings at one bat slightly coughs and then 12 million people go into lockdown. So, it's just different approaches to the unique chaos of COVID.

And the political strategy for the government, they've been much criticized for this, but it's well constructed, because they just layer incompetence upon incompetence, inconsistency upon inconsistency, malpractice on malpractice, until people are just reduced to saying, ah, what the f*** she's done now, Ah, just made nothing to me anymore. And it just kind of rumbles off. And there we go. Well, the Australian government is doing the school yard why are you hitting yourself tactic of telling everyone

that the only way to get out of this is to vaccinate our way out while also very cleverly not providing vaccines to us. We also had the Prime Minister come out and make a statement that, hey, at least we're not doing as badly as New Zealand, which, by the way, is actually doing better than us in terms of vaccination rates. So he was wrong about the one thing that he tried to say that he was right about. Yes. I mean, back here in Britain, we're sort of entering the latest of our many fingers crossed

phases of this crisis. And the government is once again channeling its inner goldilocks and inserting Britain's collective fingers into all the electrical sockets in the three-beers house until they find the one that is just right. And it turns out that, you know, freedom day, which has a touch of the Kim Jong's about it, who ever came out without branding. They missed, obviously missed out the words, from responsibility, because this is essentially, the government has just outsourced blame

and responsibility for everything to other organizations, to people. So Julius Pransbury, the MPRI for much wittering and government minister for the wholesale abdication of responsibility, looking haggard and overworked as always these days, said issue this statement saying to the people of this country, do as we have neither said nor done,

please try not to get it all, it'll probably be all right and all that vaccines. So here we are. It's, but you mentioned the Australian Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, he has however cleared up a story that needed clearing up, or didn't need clearing up depending on your version of the story. Alice, you are our prime ministers having allegedly shat themselves in fast

food outlets correspondent. Just bring us up to date with the latest. Yes, and this is a story that came out on the day that Melbourne went into its lockdown that Sydney announced, Harsha, lockdown regulations, people having to say, at home in more higher quantities and the shutting down of retail, Scomo came out and clarified the story, not in response to questioning mind you, clarified the story that he had shared himself in a McDonald's and Engadine in 1997 by saying,

he did not, in fact, shit himself, in a McDonald's and Engadine in 1997, despite the plaque there claims differently. And I feel that this is not the kind of story that you would bring up to deny unless it was something that you had definitely done. It doesn't speak to a certain lack of It doesn't speak to a certain lack of quality conspiracy theories in Australia. In America, conspiracy theories are that there's UFOs in area 51 of it, or the CIA, to JFK. In Australia, the conspiracy theory is that the Prime Minister possibly shat himself in a macros in the 1990s.

I mean, that's, you know, dick what you got. Ha ha ha. And, you know, only 9% of Australians are fully vaccinated. Despite all the advantages Australia has as a nation, economically, as a, you know, its geography, and, you know, the control of the virus that it managed to exert in the early months of the crisis. But I would ask you this, as a resident of Australia, would you rather have a Prime Minister who had never taken a dump in a fast food outlet but also spanned up the most

important challenge of his premiership or a Prime Minister who took a live daily dump in a fast food outlet on national television but could competently order a vaccine. Which I mean, which is quite hard decision to make, isn't it? Well, somebody who spent three and a half hours on the line to get a primary vaccine shot booked in for the second of September, I would say, shoot away, it's burning here. That's right.

He does make a lot of curry, by the way. This is one of the things I have to know one of the prime minister here is that he loves making curry. So he is, I know, doubt prone to shitting himself a lot more than he's likely to admit. Well, I think I can't think of a more appropriate story on which to bring the bugle to its summer hiatus. I'm off on holiday for a couple of weeks and the test matches begin you could listen to me

on BBC's Test Max Special Radio coverage of that the Bugle will be back in August with full episodes. At some point we will put out sub episodes over the next few weeks and there is a live Bug will show on the 7th of September in London at the Underbellies London Wonderground site in Earls Court. Chris Addison will be appearing live in person. Alice will be appearing live via a screen in in person.

We'll say it's at the term. But and it will be also it will be the first live audience I've performed to in about 21 months. So come and see me flounder around hoping that as people say it is like getting back on a bike but also failing to remember that I have always been really shit at cycling. That is the seventh of September. Sam, where else can people find your work online? Well, I was going to say that you can find me doing comedy shows, but you've really got

into this, not in a very in lockdown. So I suppose the best place to find me is on my Patreon, if I may be so mercenary by saying patreon.com, that's Samy sure. I put a standard comedy, I put up short stories, early drafts of ongoing novels and things like that, just a whole bunch of things that you can throw your money at me, throw enough money and I'll take a shit in the macros and I'll say that I'm a real obvious. Things are dying, not straight. The Australian way. I'm just trying to integrate into Australian society as best an immigrant can.

Alice as well as the gargle and the last post within the Bugle Stable where else can people find you? People can find me on patreon.com slash elsephrase where I have my weekly T-cell-ons as well as being a one-stop shop for all of my stand-up specials podcasts and blogs. But you should also do the voluntary subscription to the Bugle because I just invoiced Chris Skinner for the first time since February. I think you didn't need it. Right, well on that note, please do join our Voluncie to the description scheme. Go to the buglepodcast.com and click the donate button. You can join us a recurring donor or make a one-off contribution to keep this show free, flourishing and independent. Thank you very much for listening.

There will be output over the next few weeks and we will be back after the summer break. Goodbye.