The Frank Skinner Show - A Disastrous Valentine's Day

Episode Date: February 20, 2026

This time Frank and Emily are joined by Milo Edwards! Frank has a moral dilemma and has had a phone call from the police. Also Milo has a tale from a Russian train journey. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's Frank off the radio, Frank Off the Radio, Frank O'O, it's the Frank Skinner podcast, don't you know. Hey, I'm a real human being, but I don't have a man of my own. This is Frank Skinner. This is Frank off the radio. I'm joined today by Emily Dean and Milo Edwards is with us for the first ever time. Hello. Welcome. Follow the podcast on X and Instagram.

You can email the podcast via Frank off the radio, Avalon, UK.com. We need a WhatsApp thing, Mila, but we've got our readers to compose. Okay, that's good, a bit of free labour. We'd love to see that. Exactly, here we go. I think that's my favourite. I find it really relaxing.

One of the listeners in Helsinki sent that one in. I was listening to Pantera on the tube the other night. Are you familiar with their work? I've heard of them. I've got a sort of vague overview. It's very sort of... And I realised, people staring at me, and I thought, oh God, people still recognise me, this is exciting. But they weren't, I think I was properly head-banging on my own.

And people at someone had nodded to their friend and elbow to look at that old man nodding. And I realised, and I didn't stop. Oh, you felt no shame. joy of it, it means more to me than these people. I love you pushed on through. Well done, Frank. That's beautiful. You've transcended being English. I have.

It's a real victory. And also, it just, when you're listening to someone like that, it's like you're not really on the tube at all. You're in a sort of a Pantera bubble. Pantera bubble does sound like something you could get to add to your normal wash. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Have you got into Pantera because of, is this a buzz? Well, no, I saw Pantera live and look, I won't go into all the details.

But two of their key members are no longer with us. And so a friend of mine said, you can't see them now. It's a fucking tribute act, as he put it, which is harsh, I thought. And unlike David Badell. Yeah, but they were brilliant. So I go from, I vary. Today on the way in it was Jeth Rotal.

Okay. Do you think it's sort of liberating, though, being sort of conspicuous but without being recognised, if you're someone who's often recognised? Yeah, I think it probably is. I think this is probably why celebrities going for shoplifting

and public displays of sexuality. No offence to Anthony Royal Thompson late of this parish. Winona Ryder, she bounced back. Yes, who is the most famous celebrity shoplifter? I presume it wasn't public sex stuff. Because we always talk about who's in the chair. So the celebrity shoplifting show.

Well, it was Richard Mayle. It was Richard Mayle. Do you remember that one, Milo? Because celebrity shoplifting is a very maidly talk show topic, ironically. He could have been on his own show. What's going on with these guys? I think it could be a great Edinburgh show for someone.

Should we bring back the stocks? Is that the only way to deal with it? If they brought back the stock, they might have been forgiven. That was their problem. Yeah, it was Winona, Richard. Have we got any more? Well, of course.

Do write in if you're a celebrity. There's a podcast in itself. Can I say the pioneer of this was Dame Isabel Barnett? Really? It was a TV star in the 50s. When there wasn't any TV, you might think. But literally people who just got their tellies for the coronation would then put on what's my line with Dame Isabel Barnett.

And she did it. Now, I think we should say that people do it for, they don't just do it for theft reasons. No, sometimes my great-grandmother was a kleptomaniac. And she was tremendously disgraced. Is that what you get it from? No, she used to go into shops and she'd say, do you know, I used to nick from that store,

but they don't trust you like they used to. When I lived in the... She had a point. It was outrageous. When I lived in the East End, there was a woman, local woman, was a famous shoplifters. All the big selfridges did all the big ones. Like you talk about people playing like a Madison Square Garden.

She did all the big shops and she died and they had a massive, you know, the East End love of funeral. Oh, yeah. And she had a floral display at the side of her coffin that said, gone shopping. It's lovely. That's very nice. Yeah, I had something happened to me the other day that's never happened before.

Well, I get recognised sometimes, but I'd been in Sainsbury's in Harlow and Essex. And I left and I'd been tagged in a tweet where someone had said, just seen Milo Edwards in Harlow Sainsbury's. And I was like, well, thank God I wasn't shoplifting. Yeah. I was a good job I was doing normal shopping and not buying anything weird. And not the chemist because that, you know, you want to be discreet in a chemist.

But I got back home and my, well, she wasn't my wife then. We lived together and she said, what were you doing in Super Drug? And she'd sit in it on what was then Twitter. And I ended up in the only way I could really ease the situation was to show her an itemized price. thing to sell that there was nothing like of a sexual nature I mean I'd bought it was Sans Loub as I think

the French sorry yeah sorry yeah I think it was Stuart Lee who described Twitter as like a Stasi staffed by gullible volunteers and sometimes it does feel like that yeah yeah it's I don't know well

Baroness Joan Bakewell is a good friend of mine I don't even ever heard of it inventor of the Tart No, well, don't say that because she had a very famous affair with Harold Pinter. And she was known as the thinking woman's crumpet in the 60s, wasn't it, Frank? That was a rather misogynistic. The thinking woman's tart was right there.

Yes, I was just going to say. You can't say that about her. She's fantastic. Anyway, she is. She said to me, well, we could never have had an affair now, what with the social media? And I think his true celebrity affairs must be bloody. difficult to pull off.

Yeah, you've got to go for old school joke shop disguises. Yeah, nose and glasses. I'm glad she laid down the law fact. Howard Winston is the honest. See, Howard Winston is the bloke invented? Is that the guy you did,

what's the thing when you make babies, IVF? What's that going on? Oh, yes. Robert Winston. Robert Winston. Robert Winston. It wouldn't work with him.

It's more de brets by the minute. You go, you're getting to know me. Congratulations. Howard Winston, I think, was a middleweight boxer from the 1970s. That's where I went wrong. But anyway, it'd be hard for Robert Winston to get away with the joke shop disguise

because that's his face. Oh my God, I'd have to put a plaster over his moustache. It wouldn't work. It just wouldn't work. Ah, yes. So, could I just run a moral dilemma by you? I was on the way here today and I passed collectors for Battersea dogs,

open brackets and cats home. Oh. Which is a bit I would put in the same category as and women. But the cats get a mention. I mean, that would be a weird third addition to that list. Dogs, cats, women, we're not fussy. But, you know, they get a mention the cats,

but they don't get top Billy. I mean... I'd love it if women were third. That would be great. In order of the sympathy that the British public have for each member of that list. Yeah. No, I would...

In my list, I'd be second, Emily. Oh, thank you. Do you know what? They would in mine as well. Oh, they're very magnanimous with you. They can bloody look after themselves, whereas dogs. Yeah. Frank, you know I'd also look dogs first.

Anyway, the guy said, you know, he rattled a tin at me and I said, I'm too fucking cold. And was that wrong? I mean, you know what I'm going to do? There's probably dogs and cats that are cold this winter. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to throw this over to Milo to deal with. Oh, I am.

As a rule, I have no sympathy for the charity people outside the shops because I feel like it's a real intrusion. But especially when it's dogs and cats related. That's so far down my list of priorities. It was nice knowing you. No, but I mean, like, as a charity, like, they're like starving. Like, you've got to. They're getting my house.

You've got to do a nicer of, yeah. I know what you mean. I'm leaving my house to the Daxons. But you better be a bungalow. No. Well, they make a nice draft. Excluder once they've got the house. Yeah, yeah, that's great, yeah.

But have you noticed that they've gotten cleverer? Like, they've caught me out before. The dogs? No, no, the charity people. Oh, yeah. What do they do? So they often hang out outside the Sainsbury's by my office. You're always there, aren't you? Yeah. And one day they were out there and I went in and they tried to get me and I was like, no, no, no, no. And then I came back out and the guy was like, oh, nice jacket.

Where did you get it? And so I started explaining it. And he was like, yeah, I think it was Batterie Dogs and Cats Home as well. And this was in East London. You're well off your patch there. And I was like, he sucked me in. I felt really defeated by it. It felt like the SS guy going, good luck.

And I'd, you know, once they're like a vampire, once you initiate the conversation, they've got you. Well, it's hard because I felt bad about the I'm cold excuse as I walked away. Whereas in the past when I've been approached by animal charities, my sort of standard, they don't have souls. I feel, I think that's fine. I hate it when he goes all St Thomas Aquinas.

I think it's reasonable, Frank, actually, simply because of the way in which you were approached. And I do think Milo's right. It can feel, frankly, relentless sometimes, especially in this area. But you know, one of the things I least in life is the reasonable. Anyway, look, there might be people listening to this. I mean, I know you get recognised in sounds like,

but there might be people who are not familiar with your work. There might be people in this fucking studio who aren't. So who are you, Milo? Who am I? Well, unfortunately for me, I'm a stand-up comedian. Yeah. I love stand-up comedians. Yeah, well, we have to say that.

No, I really do, though. I'm as big a fan as I am an exponent, I would say. Oh, okay. I mean, I guess fan and exponent, doesn't an exponent mean someone who promotes it? Oh, I thought he meant someone who did he. I don't know. I could be wrong on this.

I don't know. Look, I don't want you guys falling out this early doors. There's no VAR for this. I'm always looking to learn. Yeah. And we're going to stop. Maybe I'm confusing it with proponent. I don't know.

Maybe I am. Yeah, it could be. But then I've just realized that I could also be wrong. I love this first day. Yeah. This is good. Well, maybe this is flirting. I think we're grappling up for who's wrong.

You're made for each other. Your Englishness has come back. This is like when I met Rob Halford, who was the lead singer with Judas Priest. And we had an argument about who was a legend. I absolutely insisted that he was a legend. And then I gave in that I was one as well. Sorry, carry on. Yes, yeah, I'm a stand-up comedian and a podcaster.

So this is... And you know you're rushing. which you already established. I think Frank liked that. He likes a bit of, he likes a Russian speaker. Well, I,

I usually go Japanese with my speakers. But do I like, is it all right to like a Russian speaker? Is it less cool than it was since the invasion? I think here it's fine. The only place where it's sometimes

controversial is with, I do get some, I get some grief online from Ukrainians sometimes. Okay. But only, but in this sort of weird, reflexive way where a lot of them assume that any mention of Russia in any way or any mention even of a Russian thing, like a Russian author, means that you're some kind of Putin supporting Russian nationalist nutcase.

Yeah, I can. And I do have to push back on that a little bit. Because every Russian I know has basically gone to great personal hardship to oppose the war and leave the country and all that kind of stuff. Okay. But there is a slightly... Can I say this is considerably heavier than we normally go on this? Well, I just feel slightly backed into it.

I mean, most things are considerably heavier that we normally go. Just the word to the wise. I'm a legend. I'll accept it and we can move on. Yeah. Although I do like that he kept, I mean, this is one thing in his favour. I appreciate it. It's a small thing. Who's he? My love.

Oh, sorry. He did. I often get the most. Very wise men. To me, they're the same person. I'll be honest with you. Such an easy mistake to me. I do like that he kept the dog that he was given by,

Was it the Korean, it was some Premier Anyway gave him a husky, and he still got that dog, and that means something to me. I should think it means someone to the dog if he got out of career at one place. That's sort of like pardoning a turkey. Exactly. It's that tradition. Oh, no, but he did a bad thing with it. Was it a big black dog? No, that's another dog. One of my specialist subject is presidential dogs. Right.

Anyway, back to Frank in the studio. No, he met, who was the former female German chancellor? Anglam Merkel. Angler Merkel. Angler Merkel is frightened of dogs. And when she met Putin, he bought a big black dog with him. It was such a deliberate piece of unkindness. Oh, dear.

Yeah. Yeah, he's got a real good thing. Oh, he's got a nasty side. Yeah. It's hard to believe. Nobody's perfect. You know, I really love. He loved his early stuff. I can't watch it anymore.

It's like Woody Allen. We used to love him. Can't anymore. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's unfortunate. So what you've been up to, Milo? Well, I've actually, I've just got back from Ireland, but I was thinking about, as we were talking about Russia, one time I was travelling in Russia to a show.

So I used to be a TV comedian on Russian TV. Oh, wow. Wow, eh. Yeah, which was pretty mad. and hard to explain to people. So your Russian is through the roof. Lawless. It's pretty good. And so are you doing, what's the show?

Is it like a stand-up that you're doing on TV? Is it kind of like live at the Apollo? I mean, it was a long time ago now. But yes, the show I was on was almost exactly like live at the Apollo, except that it had a sort of rotating cast. Oh, so you were in rap? Yeah. You weren't booked for it.

You were kind of like, you basically had a salaried job with the TV company, which was curiously owned by Gasprom. I don't know if they got discounts on their home heating or anything like that. So yeah, and we used to get booked. It was funny because it was like on one level it was quite, you'd get a lot of stuff paid for you and like you'd kind of get invited to cool stuff. But then also so many of your bookings,

you would just get random messages on the internet from guys in provincial Russian towns. And it was like a gold rush for comedy because there was no stand up really and it was all starting up. And there was like this massive enthusiasm for it off the TV. And so guys would just start. up a comedy night in like a restaurant. I remember when it was like that in the UK.

Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. But nothing lasts forever. No, no. Yeah, I'm sure it's very professional there now. But yeah, so they used to... And there was massive enthusiasm. So you'd be doing a show in a restaurant, but there'd be like 300 people there.

And you'd be being paid a lot of money, but the setup would be like mad. And so, yeah, this guy booked us to come to Volugda, and which is like way up in the north, like kind of nearish, St Petersburg, but not that close, like out in the forest. And I was on the train with this Bellerore. Russian girl. And so we were both

foreigners, but she kind of is a native Russian speaker in Belarus and Russia are quite similar. And then I was like, oh, let's, it was like a 16 hour train. So it was like overnight and then a full day. I thought you meant she was a really good looking Russian girl. I wasn't going to comment on her attractiveness.

It's the Bella Russian. Oh, I see what you mean. Yeah, you lost me. Sorry, I'm getting my languages mixed up. But yeah, so she was like, yeah, let's do that. So we go there for some lunch in the middle of the day. And they bring out the menu. And one of the things on the menu was Carbonara.

And I was like, I'm not sure I trust a Russian railway's carbonara. A bit strange. I'm guessing it would be a lot of carbon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, that's anywhere in Russia. There's a little particular in the air, I would say. And she then goes, she's like, no, I've had the Aja de Carbonara before. And it's all right.

So I'm like, okay, right. So we ordered the carbonara. And then the train stopped. woman comes over and she's like, oh, the carbunaro's going to be about 40 minutes, because the stove doesn't work while the train's not moving. Oh, okay. And I was like, oh, it's a bit like toilets in England. Yes.

Yes, the train toilets. Can you not use the train toilet, frankly? You're not supposed to use them when they're in the station. But why is that? Is it because the we will go on the tracks? It's because the old trains, it's not really on much on the new trains, but the old trains that used to just be basically a hole that went straight onto the track. So obviously, if you're on the platform.

Oh, okay. You don't want that. I'm glad I know. Yeah. That's where the Bob Dylan album, Blood on the Track, got its name for. What, some guy in dire need of a colonoscopy. Or a lady. To be fair.

And, in brackets, and women. Yeah, yeah. I just feel like women generally have better rectal health than the average. Oh, wow. That's the particular prejudice that I'm bringing to the show if we want to pinpointed. I think you're probably not wrong. I have regular colonoscopies. I think women eat more fibre.

I think very. Fetty rectal health came second in the skeleton in the Winter Olympics last week. Can we get back to the... You need good rectal health for that. Can we get back to this Siberian train? You just go backwards, aren't it? Clear as the holes. Anyway.

Beautiful. Back to the Siberian train, wherever we are. Yeah, so we ordered this carbonara. It takes like 40 minutes and then they bring it. And there's Dill all over the top. Oh, I hate Dill. Yeah. Well, the Russians love putting Dill on it absolutely everything.

Because it's like the only thing that grows in the Russian. winter and so they've got kind of Stockholm syndrome with Dill where they're convinced it's good when actually they just used to eat it because it's all there was and so they'll put it on anything pizza, pasta, sushi, I've seen it everywhere. I used to be in a Facebook group called Dill Watch that was Westerners who lived in Russia and they used to refer to it as the weed and people would post pictures of like the weirdest places that encountered Dill. Anyway that was my sidebar on Dill. We sort of scrape the Dill off, eat the Carbonara, the Carbinar is fine. this carbinear also costs like two pounds.

So the woman comes back over and she goes, would you like to see the dessert menu? And I'm like, you know what? We've only spent two quid. Let's see the dessert menu. So she brings it over and the dessert options are Apple strudel or vanilla ice cream. And having dealt with Russian customer service before,

I'm saying to Arena, I'm like, look, ideally what you'd want really is apple strudel and ice cream. But I think that might shatter this woman's brain if we try and order two things together. So she comes back over and I'm like, could we possibly have like some apple strudel each and some vanilla ice cream each?

And she was like, I'm afraid we've not got the apple strudel. And then I'm like, well in that case I guess we'll have the vanilla ice cream and she goes, we've not got the vanilla ice cream. And I'm like, why have you brought me this menu? And then she gives me this look like, I asked you if you want to see dessert menu. You said yes, I bring you dessert menu.

It's simple question. I did not say we have anything on the menu. So it was deal all round. Yeah, God, a Dill ice cream. Yeah, very good. I would, I loathe Dill. So I would really struggle in Russia. Yeah, yeah.

There's a lot of things, I think, that you'd struggle with Russia. Yeah, I don't know if, having only known you a few minutes. Tell me, come on. Put your money where your mouth is. I would not say that the kind of DeBrette's guide, genteel politeness, gets you very far in Russia. Oh, okay. Yeah. And it's something that I value.

What a thing. Sad indictment of Russia that is. Sounds like a more sad indictment of me, but I can live with it. No, it's a very pushing and shoving type country. Oh, no, I don't like pushing and shoving. Yeah. It's people of... I think they're one of the best double acts I ever saw.

Hello, I'm Dave pushing, and I'm Steve shoving, and we are... Anyway, sort of like Cannon and Ball. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Oh, so listen, it was Valentine's Day this week. Oh, did you do something nice? Did you get any action guys? Mind your own beeswax.

That's a different edition of the DeBrette's guide that Frank's working from. None of your business. What did you do? Well, I bought my partner. Here was my idea. My wife was due to go away on Mondi. And so I wasn't going.

And so I thought, if I get a flowers for Valentine's, Day, which is Saturday. She'll be leaving on Monday that she's not going to get the benefit, you know. So I thought I'll get her flowers on Thursday and then she gets a chance for the full range. So the flowers came for Valentine's Day, VA Day, as I like to call it, victory over autonomy. Right, yeah. And they arrived and she said to me, I came down and I said, oh, the flowers arrived.

She said, yes, now, let me tell you what's wrong with this gift. Wow. What a bold start. Yeah. So I pulled up a chair. She said, and this is honestly how she began. She said, ignoring the fact that they're not very nice flowers. Did she say that?

Yeah. Wow. I love her. That was the first thing. Christ, she really is on a different page of the device. guides. That's the new edition. She said, look, they're delivered in a stupid box

from, and I can't remember the name of them. I know who it'll be. It wasn't into flora. It was blooming wild. No. Anyway, it was one of those things. She said, they're delivered in a stupid box. You didn't get them. I said, well, I paid. She said, you said to

your PA, get cats on flowers. Is she right? Let's not go. It's not going to the minutiae of this. But she said, I would rather you'd gone down to that tree by the corner of Nassington Road.

There's a tree with daffodils growing at the side of it. She said, I'd rather you'd gone down there, grabbed a handful from the ground, and gave them to me. She said, at least you would have gone and got them. I like that she's saying that, like, that was the worst option. Like, surely the next option down is like petrol station.

But that's the most likely alternative. You don't want garage flowers. No, no. But I've got you a screenwash as well. But even why, the bitter pill of knowing that she hated the present was somewhat sugared by the idea of saving about 70 quid next year. And also, she's given you very clear instructions. She's named a geographical location.

She's named the road, the type of flowers. Yeah. But look, there's something else I want to tell you, right? Oh my God. I was called by the police this week. What? Now, Milo won't know about this, but I'm not often on trend generally.

This isn't like a U-Tree thing. I thought you were saying you're not often called by the police. This is an operation of U-Tree. But I am on trend at the moment, in that I recently had my parcel shelf stolen. Yes. Do you know what a parcel shelf is? I do, yeah.

I'm a driving man. Okay, okay. Anyway, so it was... They stole just the shelf. Yeah, they smashed the back window and took the parcel shelf. They'd have better on it. It's sort of like a pay-it-forward situation. Well, I just want to say, Frank, before, you know, this is, Frank's been in the newspaper.

Right. So there have been a number of articles, yeah. I saw one saying... I saw him picking daffodils around the tree. I saw him looking desperate. Frank Skinner becomes latest victim of bizarre crime waves. That was in the paper? Yeah, it was in the Daily Mail.

sweeping London's, wait for it, affluent middle-class post codes, as thieves breaks into his Lexus and steal his parcel shelf. Then... You said break in. They came into the fucking bat window. I wouldn't even call that breaking in.

That's vandalism, isn't he? Well, the Highgate Society sent out a warning to locals recently. Did they? Yes, which I got just saying, these have struck five times in three weeks. They mentioned, I think, the Frank Skinner incident. I didn't know the Highgate Society were aware of these. that this was...

You're on their radar. The Highgate Society, and their job is mainly involves preserving colour of years old, you know, tomb and house. Does Karl Marx have a parcel shelf

on that sort of monument? Not anymore, sadly. Long gone. But the Highgate Society advised residents to maybe keep parcel shelves indoors for a few weeks.

How's that going to help it? That's where I keep my parcel, to be fair. Well, like they're tulips or something. They don't like the frost. They're mushrooms. They're recovering from an operation. Keep them in darkness.

Can I just say you were all over the press because of this? I didn't know that. Who told them that? I don't know, but maybe they listened to this podcast. What? That would be ridiculous. So the police got in touch. So they got in touch and they said, look, we found a site on eBay

where we think they're selling your parcel shelf. And I said, oh, okay. How much is it? I thought they would just give me. helpful. You can buy it back. Yeah, and they said, do you think you could identify it? Oh.

That's quite different. And I honestly heard myself saying, well, the thing is, it's usually behind me. I honestly said that in some time to be polite way. Of course I can't fucking, I've never

looked, I've never really looked it up. I said if they took the dog, I'd probably have like, okay. 84%, but I wouldn't be 100 on it. It's like when they show you the back of your head at the barbers. Yeah. Well, this doesn't concern me. Exactly.

You know what this is? None of my business. Yeah. I'm just looking for... What sort of man doesn't recognise his own parcel show? Yeah, I know. The country's gone to the dogs. So anyway, I said I'm not at all confident that I.

Really? She said, well, look, I'll send you... I'll send you at the site. Did they make an E-fit first? You described your parcel show? And they're the sketch artist I always said that Of course, sketch artists

Yeah, yeah Yeah Artis impression Have you seen this parcel shelf? Yeah So hang on They said The police sent you

The eBay link So they then sent me The eBay link And it was a picture Of a pasture How much? How much? So they

Oh, it was quite 80? First, if I bought a new one from Lexus It's like 800 quid Wow This was about 220. That's a bargain.

You should buy your parcel show. Yeah, there's something. I had two problems with it. First of all, I didn't recognise it. I didn't think that. I said to the woman, this worried me after, because I said, I'll be honest,

they all look the same to me. And I thought, oh no, if there's a public prosecution, if there's another investigation of racism in the Met, I might come up on word search for putting that in an email. But they do all look the, you know, it's a parcel shelf. I said, honestly, I can't tell you that I recognise this thing. And my feeling was I didn't want to be like, you know Miss Hannigan's brother in Annie,

who turns up pretending to be Annie's dad so that he can claim the reward. I thought, I don't want to say, yes, it's my parcel shelf. and then I'm taking someone else's parcel. What if the police are tricking you or something? That would concern me as well. They're just trying to find out. It's just like a honey trap. They're trying to find out if you're lying, basically.

If you're trying to claim goods that aren't yours. Yeah, like you've got to describe the parcel shelves to get it back. It happened to me the other day. My passport fell out of my pocket in a Mexican restaurant in Dublin, which is a half a sentence. Well, so there's too many countries in a lot of this hand of them. And I went back there. I was like, oh, it's very unlike me to lose.

my passport but I think my out of my pocket unzipped and I hung my coat over a chair like upside down or something anyway so I go around there in the morning and I was like I think I left my passport here and the lady's like oh yeah there was a passport and then she took the passport out and she looked at the photo page and like checked it was me and checked quite closely

and I'm like sorry do you think there's a possibility that I'm going around restaurants in Dublin asking if anyone's left a passport on the off chance that I can then nick someone else's passport who also doesn't look like me So I wouldn't pass the test. It's a bit desperate, isn't it?

I think I'd have checked the photo. Would you? Well, it's just there, isn't it, on a passport? I mean, if my photo had been on the parcel shelf, I would have felt much more confident about the whole thing. You joke about that, but I think that's what people are going to have to start doing. I think you're going to have to start getting the parcel shelf engraved Frank Skinner MBA. Oh, no.

You know, you go in some... That'll just make it more valuable. They'll put on eBay Frank Skinner's parcel shelf. There's been a shit bunch of flowers on here. Maybe a nice photo of him with David Badeal, one of the loaded covers. No, but it'll look like, you know, when you said those gravestones that have the photo on as well? I don't like that. Can we just be honest about that?

Why don't we like, I don't like that, Frank. Why don't we like the photos on the gravestone? I don't know what it is, but... Don't mix your mediums. It's Russian mafia coded. They used to do that in the 90s, the gravestones where it's like them. But they used to be more like carved in, but it would be like them in. relief in a track suit sat on the bonnet of their Mercedes.

Really? Carved into the Stamon. There's a lot of Russian graves in Highgate Cemetery. Oh really? Which I visit a lot, yes. It'd be like pistol billing or whatever. You could take a crayon and pencil and do hoodlum robings. Yeah.

In the cemetery. That'd be a great collection, wouldn't it? Like a rogues gallery. They're very big on pricey mordiards, aren't they? They spend a lot on death. They love a bit of gaudy. stuff. I mean, Trump would fit right in. It would be great for it. Well, it does sort

off, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, look, what happened in the end with the parcel shelf? I had to say. Did you say no? I said, I would, I cannot honestly say this is my parcel shelf. And she emailed that, well, we wouldn't want you to lie.

I thought, what's happened to the men? They've lost their way. Yeah. Under oath, swearing that it's your parcel shelf. Frank, that's your. She was very nice. But what if it was? Well, it might.

I mean, it was the right. Obviously, they didn't just pick one at random. There was one that was from my model of car. Yeah. They could do a sort of glass slipper type situation where they're sort of bringing parcel shelves and trying them in the back of your car. Yeah, but tell me, what is the advantage of me getting my parcel shelf back

when I have to keep it in the house unless it's stolen? Yeah. You might as well just not have one. Just don't have the parcel shelf. Kath went to a meeting, a police shelf. meeting down the road about the thefts. And there was a woman said, well, I found about 20 of these sort of

black plastic things in my garden. I don't know what they were in my garden. So I put them in the bin, the binman took them away. Was that the parcel shelf? And someone was stacking parcel shelves, hiding them in a garden. Well, that's where it's gone, Frank. I think you should have taken the parcel shelf, I'll be honest. I was

at a New Year's Eve party once. And it was the premier of the film Starship Troopers. Is this going to be the room with the Coatsy story? Oh. No, no, you didn't. Just briefly, I'll tell Milo because he doesn't know. But there was basically... No, I don't know it.

I'm just... Oh, it was, Frank, yeah. To see him where it goes. So it was a Premier of Starship Troopers. It was a huge event. And I thought, New Year's Eve great. Free Party on New Year's Eve. It was a huge event in Clap and Common.

And then I think the people at the Coat Check had maybe taken some substances. They'd got very merry, certainly. And when it came to 2 o'clock, we went to leave. Where the coats had been, there was just coats. everywhere and people scrambling on the floor to grab coats. You couldn't get your coat back. So any coat would do. So I was saying I feel awful taking someone's coat.

And this woman was saying, look, you've just got to love, you've got no choice. You know, it's every man for himself here. Wow. And you were like handwomen. Handcats. Let's not forget it. Their coats would stand out, I think. They tend to keep theirs on.

So I felt so awful about it, Frank, taking someone's coat. Was there anything in the pockets? Well, I did, in the end, I had no choice because my friends were now can be saying, look, and they all had coats on. There were men with size eight, sort of, you know, leather coats. And I felt awful when the people came to get their coats, but I'm just saying in that scenario, it's rough justice, but that's what has to happen. It's an almost exact replica of the long poem, the dogs that had a parliament,

about dogs gathering for a parliament, and they all had to hang their, how, can I put this, assholes on hooks. They weren't allowed to take them into the parliament. And then when they came out, they couldn't find them. So everyone just grabbed the nearest arsehole and went. And that's why dogs always sniff each of those arsoles to see if it's there. That was a long, long poem that explained why dogs do that.

I love grabbing the nearest asshole. You've met. I did that on New Year's evening. Dear reader, I married him. It's the Frank Skinner podcast. A new winter change is blowing. It's the Frank Skinner podcast. I'm not totally sure how it's going.

Thanks for listening to the podcast. Make sure to like and follow so you never miss an episode. And if you want to get in touch, you can email the podcast via Frank off the radio at Avalonuk.com. now.