The Gargle - Blood moustache | Baby smells | Friend recession

Episode Date: December 1, 2023

Guest editors Alison Spittle and John-Luke Roberts join host Alice Fraser for episode 139 of The Gargle - the sonic glossy magazine to The Bugle, with one rule: no politics! Blood cell moustache Meta target teens Baby smells Friendship recession Reviews Story 1: https://auburnpub.com/partners/video-elephant/life-entertainment/entertainment/scientists-give-red-blood-cell-world-s-tiniest-moustache/video_979ce246-5df3-5f78-bd1f-5c1c8a388f7f.html?s=08Story 2: https://www.wsj.com/business/media/meta-designed-products-to-capitalize-on-teen-vulnerabilities-states-allege-6791dad5Story 3: https://www.insider.com/dior-releases-230-scented-water-for-babies-baby-skincare-2023-11?s=08Story 4: https://jingdaily.com/soul-social-app-china-friendship-recession/HOW TO SUPPORT THE GARGLE- Keep The Gargle alive and well by joining Team Bugle with a one-off payment, or become a Team Bugler or Super Bugler to receive extra bonus treats!https://www.thebuglepodcast.com/donateCONTENTS00:00 Start01:42 Front cover02:42 Satirical cartoon03:28 Story 1: Scientists give red blood cell world's tiniest moustache08:26 Ads10:09 Story 2: Meta designed products to capitalise on teen vulnerabilities 16:09 Reviews20:07 Story 3: Dior releases $230 scented water for babies28:35 Story 4: How Gen Z app Soul is tackling China's 'friendship recession' 35:53 Bye / Anything to plug?  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi, it's producer Chris from The Bugle here. Did you know that I have a new series of my podcast, Richie Firth Travel Hacker, out now? It's the show where Richie Firth and I talk about how to make travel better in our very special way. In this series, we discuss line bikes, Teslas, the London overground, and a whole bunch of other random stuff that possibly involves wheels

or tracks or engines of some variety. God, what a hot sell this is. I mean, you must be so excited. Listen now. ACAST powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend. Every sport has their big, juicy controversy. Boxing has the Mike Tyson ear bite.

Cycling has Lance Armstrong. Baseball has its steroid era. Curling has... Broomgate. It's a story of broken relationships, houses divided, corporate rivalry, and a performance-enhancing broom. It was a year I'd like to forget. Broomgate, available now. Acast helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts everywhere.

Acast.com. This is a podcast from The Bugle. impulsive movement the vicar made by the mantelpiece, staring into the fire. I will do my best to be a most conformable wife and never give you cause to regret your sacrifice. Sacrifice? Margaret, oh Margaret! Two swift steps from the fire and he was on his knees before her. Margaret, forgive me, I never married you to spare your scandal. I was glad, glad, I tell you, to have the chance to offer anything to one so far above me.

I was selfish only, though I cloaked it in fine words. I wanted you, only you. Her eyes flew up wide to meet his. Suddenly they were breast to breast, all doubts cast aside. Oh, Mr. Adesprit, call me Pericles. Oh, Pericles. Oh, Pericles, how foolish I have been. My love, only as foolish as the gargle.

This is The Gargle, a sonic, glossy magazine to the Bugles, audio newspaper for Visual World. All of the news, none of the politics. I'm your host, Alice Fraser, and your guest editors for this week's edition of the magazine are Alison Spittel. Hello. Boo, boo, boo. And John Luke Roberts. Hi. Is that what we're doing now, right?

Yeah, we're impersonating chickens. Yeah, but before we beatbox down and get into the rhythmic rap battle that is this week's top story, let's have a look at the front cover. The front cover of this week's top story, let's have a look at the front cover. The front cover of this week's magazine is Harry Styles posing provocatively with his own controversial hairline, which has been making news

in the last few weeks, Harry Styles' hairline. I don't understand why it's such a scandal that he may or may not be balding. To me, I don't really understand balding as an unattractive thing. To me, I like to think of it as a slow-motion skull strip tease. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's a beautiful way.

They put balding people in bars and people get entertained. Just get a nipple tattooed in the very centre of your skull and wait for it to slowly be revealed and then stop saying, my eyes are down here. But what if you end up just ravaged by babies? They see it and they're latching on like nobody's business. You're trying to sing Watermelon, whatever it is, and there's a baby on your head ruining your concert.

Ravaged by babies, ironically enough, the title of Harry Styles' next album. The satirical cartoon this week is the stressful American politics of recently past Thanksgiving being given a fast and furious noz boost by the introduction of weight loss drug Ozempic. A huge amount of hand-wringing in America

about the impact of Ozempik on Thanksgiving dinners, just in case you're worried about how stressful it is. What's a Zempik? Oh, that's the thing you put in there and it makes your appetite go down? Yeah, yeah. It's the diabetes drug that people are using off-label to lose weight in huge chunks.

I assume it doesn't come off in chunks. I presume it does. They carve you like a turkey, you know. It's just gone every week. Let's jump into our top story this week. Top story is 2016 hipster paradise news, I guess, which is the news that Australian scientists in pursuit of the Movember Fundraising for Men's Mental Health Initiative have managed to put a teeny tiny moustache on a red blood cell.

The tiniest moustache measuring just five microns. They've managed to paste it onto a blood cell, presumably for a purpose, to create a moustache so tiny it cannot be seen with the naked eye, which, to be fair, any 13-year-old boy can do with enough effort. Alison Spittel, you've judged a moustache in the past. Can you unpack this one for us?

Yeah, I love it. This is done by some Australian scientist and it's to advertise that Movember is happening. It's to gain awareness for Movember as if people aren't aware that Movember is happening when, you know, there's about six different colleagues that are saying, don't worry, I'm not wearing, I'm not growing this moustache for fun.

I'm growing this for cancer. And it feels like, it feels like um it feels like we give we give people the chance to be whimsical but we give them the excuse to be whimsical with their with their uh with their body hair and that makes me sad because I think you should just grow a moustache because you want to grow a moustache and I I love I love the pictures that come with this uh story it looks like this red blood cell is in witness protection you know and uh it's it's wearing a disguise for its own good maybe like what red blood cells do they have like natural enemies within are they rivals with white

blood cells or do they get along quite well there's like white blood cells red blood cells and plasma and i don't want to make it like sectarian in your veins but i wonder like how how did it how is their relationship do you know you mean sort of west side story yes i would love to see a musical of i would love to see any red blood cell try and click and goo, you know, that would be wonderful. I think they're probably more friendly colleagues than nemeses. Than nemeses. Okay, that's good. I think if they're nemeses, you're in trouble, basically.

Oh, God, yeah, that's a disease. That's a form of disease that no one's going to come out well out of that. I don't know. I'd like to see an autoimmune version of West Side Story. I think it could be. Hey, look, it's cancer I thought I told you to get out of here 10 years ago well I'm back baby you know that's very sad actually so I agree with Alison on the Movember thing I think it's it's, as somebody who often has a moustache, I feel like Movember is the coward's excuse for it.

Just grow the thing. Don't take this pretense of charity to do what you want to do anyway. It's a bit like a smaller version of when people go off to walk the Great Wall of China but raise lots of money for a charity while they're doing it. No, you just wanted to do something unpleasant for sponsorship. Don't do something that you wanted to do anyway, but you're looking for an excuse. That's my angry.

My other point is, why are scientists doing this? There's lots of other science which would be much more helpful than to raise awareness by making something that cannot even be seen. But that feels like 75% of all gargle stories is why are scientists doing this? Yeah, but there's not going to be... Imagine if... I don't think...

There's always the chance of an accidental breakthrough that they go, oh, wow, this applies to this. We're not going to get... There's no world in which trying to put a tiny moustache on a red blood cell through a series of improbable occurrences ends up with climate change being fixed. sounds like a decent screenplay it does sound like the beginning of a upbeat updated Jekyll and Hyde story when someone gets injected with the tiny moustache and it

starts manifesting uh look I feel like growing a moust mustache for men's mental health awareness is a a really lovely and laudable thing for people to do this month though i would say uh if you grow startling enough facial hair at any time of year it will raise awareness of men's mental health i'm just i'm just looking at this blood cell again. The moustache is not... It's exactly the moustache of Julius Pringles, the Pringles logo man. This is an origin story for Julius Pringles. The scientists go in, they put a moustache and red blood cell and then a crisp-pushing or a crisp-like object-pushing circle goes wild.

Well, that's what they say about arterial blood. Once you pop, you can't stop. Your ad section now, because you can't be what you can't buy. And this episode of the podcast is brought to you by not believing in ghosts. If you're watching a spooky movie alone at night in a dark house and your light bulb flickers, try not believing in ghosts. If you feel the touch of phantom fingers on your ankles as you take a totally sensible late-night shortcut through a deconsecrated graveyard, try not believing in ghosts. If you see mysterious messages traced in mist on your bedroom mirror

that you brought at a haunted op shop while the face of your long-dead great-grandmother mouths the words to her favourite song and the radio slowly plays an off-key version of 30s jazz, try really, really, really hard not believing in ghosts. Not believing in ghosts. The only proven tactic to keep ghosts away. If you're unwell or tired or pregnant, try sustaining yourself with small, nutrient-dense meals such as soups and sustaining broths

if the broth is too salty try adding half a glass of water sometimes half a glass less salty is half a glass more soup a small town it's the sort of place no one ever gets murdered

a horrible murder it was the most horrible murder I've ever seen, and I'm a professional murderer lookerer. A modern whodunit. We have no idea whodunit. A journalist who's in too deep. Nobody here knows that I'm actually the murderer. The new True Crime podcast from Cash Grab Network.

True Crime. Active Crime Scene. big juicy controversy. Boxing has the Mike Tyson ear bite. Cycling has Lance Armstrong. Baseball has its steroid era. Curling has Broomgate. It's a story of broken relationships, houses divided, corporate rivalry, and a performance enhancing broom. It was a year I'd like to forget. Broomgate. Available now. Acast helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts. Everywhere. Acast.com. In other advertising news, this is the news that Meta, ex-Facebook but not ex, apparently has been accused of designing its platform to get children and teens addicted to it.

Ironically enough, given that Facebook is now populated mainly by the over 50s crowd but John Luke Roberts you've had an argument with an angry uncle on Facebook before can you unpack this story for us? Yes so well that I mean you just did didn't you they've their court documents allege that Meta has not been sufficiently throwing children off its platform who aren't allowed to be on its platform and even worse have been designing the whole thing to make children addicted to it anyway

now we know that they've been designing it to make adults addicted to it I know that because I looked at my phone 30 times in the last 5 minutes we've been recording. Just scrolling down and down and down for no good reason. And a tiny little boost of somebody like that thing I did. So that's, well, this is a story.

Meta say they're not doing that, but that's what Meta would say anyway. And my uncle actually isn't on Facebook because he's not that kind of uncle. He's a nice stayed uncle who stays at home and reads books and the internet I think is still a mystery to him. The best kind of uncle as we're all rapidly discovering. Absolutely, absolutely. Now my brother, don't get me started on him. He called Tony Blair a Trotskyite the other day,

which just blew my mind. Anyway, I know. Where do you go from there? How do you carry on? He thinks that capitalism would be the... Ring the politics bell, Pat. He thinks capitalism is the solution to things or would be if anyone had ever tried it.

Wow. We should really give it a go. Yeah, that's what we should then maybe that's what we should do my favorite bit about the story is that it's an open secret and they refer to this as an open secret of underage people and i read that headline and this is the best story that's ever come after that headline like i was so afraid of what was going to happen next but uh yeah it's it's just basically gone that meta are a bit sneaky and i'm very happy that i didn't have facebook as a teenager but i did have a bit of social media i had bibo and i had uh myspace now bibo kind of definitely destroyed my brain in regards to he had to pick

16 top friends and I would look through all the kids in my school and if I wasn't in their top friends I would make a massive effort to befriend them, then get in their top friends and then drop them like a hot shit and move on to the next person. I was an absolute friend slut

back in the day. I just wanted to be liked. And comedy is really helpful with that personality trait of mine. I really cured myself from that. But yeah, it basically... Why are we always... I don't think we're surprised, but it's funny that meta are still in somewhat given they're denying it and it's like we know anecdotally and now we know like from actual evidence of you

that you are you are doing stuff that that wrecks children's brains i mean most apps nowadays are designed to essentially be pokey machines to just hit that dopamine reward system even the scrolling thing is meant to give you a kind of a feeling that you're you're gambling and i think the the most uh sort of telling thing is that almost every tech executive doesn't let their children use it so yes that's a big thing i wonder do people who invented vapes and the vape industry let children it feels like we are allowing our children to be damaged for capitalism whether it be vaping or uh with social media we know what's bad but the kids are addicted to it and want it and we give it to them

rather than like have a well i don't know i don't have kids so i can't be talking like this well meta made a statement about this, saying it favours shifting the burden of policing underage usage to app stores and parents, and that things like Google and Apple would have to obtain parental approval whenever youths under 16 download apps, which sounds like a five-minute challenge for youths under 16

who have been faking their parents' signature uh report cards for the last five years oh i i had a full-on period for two years uh when i didn't need to when i you know when i was getting off pe my my mum was signing a little slip to say that i was menstruating at the time uh Probably the Guinness Book of Records for the longest ever menstruation because it was just for a full two years. So I feel like, yeah, I feel like allowing kids to get around their parents is just a cool challenge. Gosh, Alison, Alison,

the number of tiny moustaches which could have found a home in those two years. I know, they're just dead. It's like a barber's floor so it is just full of mustaches yeah i know someone whose parents involuntarily taught him lock picking by putting increasingly elaborate locks on the basement where they kept the stuff that he wanted to get at so oh wow oh i remember one time like no one drank gin in my house and then my aunt came round and she poured out a bit of gin she's like that is

water and that was because I kept stealing the gin as a teenager and filling it up with water and I just pretended I was a reverse Jesus I was a reverse Jesus. I was like, you know. And that brings us to our reviews.

As you know, each week we ask our guest editors to bring in something to review out of five stars. Alison Spittel, what have you brought in for us this week? So I am reviewing this. This is a coaster that has two naked people on it um i don't know where it's come from it's just in my house i don't know where it is so i'm reviewing it uh it's a very good it's a very good coaster it kind of listen to this solid uh keeps the heat off a table but to talk through uh the the picture itself the male has socks on and the the woman character doesn't have socks on uh it makes me feel a bit happy arousal not much to be honest with you but i don't know what the aim of this coaster is so i'm gonna give it uh

like could you what do you think their names would be if you were to name these two people alice well first of all to be specific they're two naked people facing the viewer and they are they appear to be either protecting each other's modesty or finger each other why not both and i just um i'm gonna go paul and beck Becky Ann that's what I think they're called and um yeah they're covering they're covering each other up it's very cute um I I presume it belongs to my flatmate um I hope it does because he's the only person I live with and if he doesn't own them I don't know how they got into the house but I'll find out for next time I'm on how many stars four for cuteness out of five John Luke what have you brought in for us this week in preparation for this session last night I was

looking through my notebooks thinking what can I review what do I have opinions on and I've decided instead to review my notebook keeping practices because my notebooks my notebooks are where I keep my jokes they have ideas about things like I've got an idea how about I'm not being able to meet a very tall person without telling them they're tall that's a reasonable idea you could stretch that out to a you know but I'm not going to do that the problem is as I've been looking through this oh I don't want to do the tall thing tomorrow I don't want to do the. The problem is, as I've been looking through this, oh, I don't want to do the tall thing tomorrow. I don't want to do the thing about portaloos because I've done that before. Oh, what about the word crisps?

That has piss in it, but we just go on as if it's normal. But the problem is, as I'm looking through this, what fits a review thing? I keep my journal in the same book as my notes. And so I've been going through this and being hit regularly as I'm stumbling over my comic things by the various emotionally unpleasant things

which have happened to me over the last couple of years so there's basically I look at I look I'm looking who is that funny is that funny it's very hard to tell if something's funny when you're immediately hit by the grief of a divorce just one afterwards so I would like to basically this is a self-reflexive review and i would like to review my notebook keeping and i give it i give it one star i need to separate these things out put them in different places so that in the future i can be the hilarious ball of bonhomie that i'm meant to be. It was one star wasn't it? One star yeah one star. Well I don't know artistically I think six stars maybe I think there's a certain there's

a there's a there's a beauty in there from the way that those things are put in contrast with each other and the things it can throw up but I don't like it on a personal level. Artistically it's shades of light and darkness interspersed seemingly at random but actually if you examine them there's a deep underlying thread of commonality Just like life itself my notebooks hold a mirror up to life

as all art should Oh you've really brought me round I think they're great And in underage smell news now fashion house dior has released a bottle of scented water for babies that is going to cost 230 dollars which is significantly more expensive than Dior's best-selling fragrances for adults. You know, I love the smell of a baby.

Alison Spittel, you also enjoy the smell of a baby. Can you unpack this story for us? Oh, I was like, I think this is one of the stories that filled me most with rage because we must have had this conversation several times before. I'm probably

not gonna have kids right uh but there's nothing i love more than the smell of a baby's head like genuinely it a smell of a baby's head for me is like wet earth in the sun you know like uh just one of those great smells that you can never recreate also the pliability of a baby's head. It's like wet earth. I just love kissing wet earth. But yeah, it's one of those smells that is the most incredible smells in the world. And I just can't believe that Dior would make a better smell than the top of a baby's head. They've described the bouquet. a better smell than the top of a baby's head they've described the bouquet and i think it's got like there was like smells of pear in this uh in this new baby water smell i don't want my baby to smell like a pear you know i want my baby to smell like old milk and human skin because that's

what isn't that the combo would you describe what would you describe the bouquet of a baby's head to be like there's nothing that it smells like other than itself. I feel like you could sell the smell of a baby to someone else, but trying to make your baby smell not like a baby is a bad move because there's nothing that smells better than a baby in its own particularly. Because it has that thing, that kind of controversial edge to it, like a truffle or something where it is in objectively sort of disgusting but nonetheless impossible to turn away from uh yeah i always used to resent when when i would

introduce people to my baby and they'd be wearing a strong perfume and they'd cuddle my baby and give me back my baby smelling of their horrible perfume instead of it's it's babyness i think you're right i think a baby's head smells slightly like cheese do you know what i mean imagine getting a perfume that smelled like a baby i would wear it but i'd be weirded out by the people that were attracted to me do you know what i mean like because i think people wear perfume there's two reasons and it's like either sex because they want not that everything's for sex but they want to smell attractive, right? And the other reason people smell or wear perfume is to cover up other smells.

To prevent the scent of the bloodhounds. What? Yes. Big time. But like, you don't need to do that to a baby. And it's baby water, isn't it? So I presume you're bathing the baby in this kind of perfume stuff. That's the vibe it's giving.

Or is it just you're spritzing your baby? I think it's water just because there's no alcohol in it. Because they don't want to put alcohol in a baby perfume. That's fair. Because they took alcohol out of like a colic medicine. Now, my mum had a few. I don't know why. because I'm the oldest child, but I had a big...

I used to babysit from a very young age with very young babies. Oh, I thought you were going to say you reversed babysat. Like as a two-year-old, you were looking after your 10-year-old siblings. Imagine that, yeah. But I changed my sister's first nappy. And have you ever changed... A first nappy is like it's crazy because

you expect like a little baby shit i don't know like a little poo emoji but it comes out like mint sauce and i was just so great you know that was crazy to me that it would be so green and then like well you meant the color i was just checking you meant the color not the smell so as a sidebar for people who are interested uh what happens is when a baby babies don't have any fat they start with fur they have like little hairs all over their bodies and then as they grow fat in the womb they shed all of their hair and then they practice like breathing and eating by eating all the hair and so their first poo is made up of this like horrific slurry and after that baby poo becomes uh remarkably inoffensive until they start solid food because it is essentially just cheese that was yeah it's cheese that's what it named baby bells baby bells

i think if wax wrapped pellets if i was the ad department for baby bell too i wouldn't lean into that angle the thing is what you've described um if the smell of the baby is naturally like attractive and it and obviously that makes sense that there's evolutionary ways to have like to protect your baby if actually this may be a safety measure to disguise the smell so nobody takes your baby to smell it so you get to keep your baby because they think oh no that's just a pair there's no need in taking those i can get one of those at the supermarket so i actually think expensive handbag yeah is that deal so what Dior are doing is a public good. And actually, $230 to keep your baby, I think that's a great deal.

It's like a ransom, isn't it? Yeah. It prevents you, apparently, they are upset over this, like scientists, because it could prevent you from bonding with your own baby. Because the whole... You're so right, John, about how humans have been made that... You know, they make the smell of a baby good

because babies cry a lot. And you go, oh, f*** off, baby. But then you smell it and you're like, oh, all is forgiven, you know? And I hate the idea of you not being able to bond with your baby because it smells like Dior I have that problem just with people who smell like dupe or Davidoff cool water sorry to any listeners who wear that but I get triggered by the smell of dupe and not like not any terrible memories with it but i can smell it on the tube sometimes and i'm like is this a 16 year old boy from ireland like who is on this tube that's

wearing dupe it just it just feels wrong would the reverse mechanism work so that if a baby instead of screaming the baby is very very smelly but it's mercifully silent like would that also be a way of um you know would that be a way for a baby to survive? Or if the baby started doing jokes or something, or little compliments, you know, like you pick up the three-month-old baby and it's like, you're capable of love. You see, yeah, the affirmations from a baby,

I think a baby doing jokes would just get right up my nose. The precociousness of that is it precociousness gosh I'm 30 I bet a precocious baby could could say the right word for I wonder what types of baby and what types of jokes a baby would do and trying to think of like a baby third joke it's like uh peekaboo where is that guy i mean uh my daughter's first joke was uh is it a hat it's not a hat i mean obviously she didn't have the words for that because this was pre-words but it was a pretty funny joke it's not a hat it's uh i've uh you know i i've i've spent quite a lot of money

training at clown school and many people have never gone up to that level I think well sorry to clarify for the listener who is watching this on YouTube for the premise of the joke to work the thing that she's using as a hat can't be a hat

just want to make it clear oh well no until you get meta i think a little bit down the line you could start to introduce hats and then the and then the joke would be that no it is a hat but i'm saying it's not a hat or a drawing of a hat that would be pretty good very french i would literally watch that in a fringe show though you're describing something I literally have and in friendship news now the news that China is in a friendship recession and there are various people trying to remedy slash benefit from that problem. Jean-Luc, you understand recessions.

Can you unpack this story for us? Well, I see you say I understand recessions rather than understand friendship. So that's telling. Well, yeah, the thing which is really strong, I mean, I think this is a study done by a like a social media app called Soul, which they've done to try and say that they can help, which seems to me, as we've sort of

proven the opposite of what social media does, but they can deal with the friendship recession by helping you make imaginary friends. Imaginary friends has never been the problem, right? In fact, that is part of the friendship recession. Although, actually, if we should deal with friendship in purely economic terms, like talking about them as recessions, maybe this is the right way because money's

kind of imaginary too. So we can just go completely down to, if we treat, this is it, if we treat friendship like capitalism, we've got it solved. You don't need the chicken itself, you just need the coin that represents the chicken. You don't need the friend. You just need the little picture of a friend. And then you can sort this out. Maybe we'll have friendship inflation where everyone has really, really big friends. I mean, the picture of the friend is a relevant thing

because one of the ways in which this app soul is trying to pursue genuineness is by having its members interact under avatars rather than their real pictures on the premise that the more fakely you represent yourself the more truly you'll actually inhabit yourself well i think actually this is to me it's the philosophy of batman forever when there's an awful lot of time given over to the idea of wearing a mask revealing your true self so um soul have just picked up on that it's such a weird thing this avatar um because they're described when you talk about the relationship between capitalism and friendship because they have like almost like

sponsored avatar packages from companies and they say this is to forge a deeper connection for brands to forge a deeper connection with people which is a weird thing to want like I don't want my brand to forge a deeper connection with me and they have like companies like Chevrolet who then sponsor avatar packs where you can pick like hair inspired by Chevrolet or glasses or accessories. And then there's all these other different companies. And I was thinking of like, what company would I like to represent me as an avatar and to forge a deeper connection with? And I think that would be, I think that would be the chocolate brand M&M. And the M&M store to sponsor some avatar packs for me because I quite like the

green M&M I think she's a sexy lady and if I was to misrepresent myself I mean I must have done this when I was a teenager I used to misrepresent myself all the time on the internet I used to go in chat rooms and he used to always be ASL 16 female California and I'd be like 12 living in the middle of Ireland but I felt like that was I think that's closer to honest than I was I was like 63 living in Minnesota I was always like a discontented housewife but I love that I love that because were you so you were 63 so did you have to like did people ask you questions about your life

and you had to like answer it as what you thought a 63 year old yeah I just give sort of benevolent advice to people who were trying to have cyber sex with each other you'd be like

I hope you use protection some some cyber protection from them don't jump into anything too quickly oh my god that's wonderful i used to go in this vampire chat room a lot as a teenager and people used to really build up incredible worlds when i look at it you know like instead the intro would be like a vampire uh walks into the tavern and puts down his coat and looks around this is incredible three paragraph intro and then i would come in as like clown car on fire 69 and i would pretend to be a i would pretend to be a vehicle that's on fire in the bar. And I'd be like, the flames, the flames. And they would always try and kill me.

Because I'd be annoying. I'd be like, I've got a force field. You can't throw me out. Until the moderators would throw me out. But I had a great time. That's what I used to do. It was a definite kind of cry for help from me. To be fair, a flaming vehicle has just as much uh right to be in a

tavern as a vampire i mean what's that vampire drinking in there beer it's ridiculous go to a blood bank that's where the vampire should be you did you did that world of service by making it at least slightly realistic yeah just and also i have to wait to be invited in like a vampire. You know, like, come in, flaming vehicle. But yeah, that was the thing I used to do. It was good fun. I love this story because it just... It kind of reminded me of the... It's almost like aspects of the internet

in the late 90s, early 2000s that I really enjoyed. You know, this whole avatar thing. This feels like a very early 2000s that i really enjoyed you know this whole avatar thing that this feels like a very early 2000s idea to represent yourself virtually what the second life what of the one of the most menacing things about this article is uh souls uh the app souls attempt at monetization mentioning among other things that gen z consumers crave active involvement rather than passive consumption which feels to me like the first of uh three steps that end with people having to do their own advertising to themselves like the way you now have to beep your own stuff going through the checkout you have to like why would i like this brand what's good about coca-cola and then you have

to do the work and make yourself wanted but it's it's like some of the advertisements especially on the tube now is very much like it'll go like uh you're working 12 hours a day why not get a takeaway and it just it just feels like it's you're basically on life is shit why not get a takeaway and it just it just feels like it's you're basically on life is shit why not get a takeaway to keep yourself from going over the edge just try and feel if any single one of your red blood cells has a tiny mustache on it yeah i just feel like this is the real like this is the real last straw for all of those girls in like 2016 who got a tiny mustache tattooed on the inside of their index finger my friend has a tiny mustache and then another finger that says yolo so when she goes like this it has a mustache here and then yolo here so it kind of helps when she

poses like that she she has a house now she has a mortgage and a house. And fair play to her. Fiona Frawley, I'll give you a call out there. Great comedian and great tattoos. And that brings us to the end of the episode. I'm flipping through the ads at the back. John Luke Roberts, have you got anything to plug? Well, if you're in London, I am hosting my hopefully annual Christmas gig as Geoffrey Chaucer, the Mediæ Vilput,

on the 17th of December at 21 Soho. And who's on that? Rosie Jones, Hugh Davies, Frankie Thompson, Ella the Great and Christian Brighty. And maybe a secret Christmas visitor. Ho, ho ho ho his father will have Father Christmas their Father Christmas is going to be there

also my podcast Soundheap is coming back in the new year we'll announce that shortly that's the podcast of too many podcasts I'm very happy about that and looking for that we'll be launching in February if you're in London I highly recommend going to this Christmas show.

If you have not seen Chaucer doing his thing, you will have missed an enormous amount of penis. Well, it's not real. I just need to say it's not a real penis. It's made of modelling balloons, and I'm sort of offended that people think it's a real penis. Uninflated modelling balloons. I mean, come on, guys.

Alison, have you got anything to plug? Yes. So my play Glacier starts in the old fire station in Oxford next Monday. So if you come on the Monday, the Wednesday or the Friday, say hello because I'm going to be there because I'm a freak who likes to watch my own plays. And then I got a tour that's coming up

called Soup that's on in the new year. If you go to my Instagram or my website, alisonsville.com, you'll find all information. And also Soho Theatre have just announced I'm doing a run in March. so please come along to that and i'm also this is out on friday go watch me on house of games and see how it all ends and i'll talk about it when i'm back on the podcast and i can be free i can't wait um you

can find me online at patreon.com slash alicefraser one stop shop for all of my stand up specials podcasts, blogs, my weekly salons and my now twice weekly writers meetings if you're working on something, if you have any creative urges we come along, we write together, then we do a bit of a workshop

if you feel like sharing or if you feel like hiding, it's all we're all very welcome at the moment you get access to all of that for a dollar a month please get on board that before I start to get more organized and charge more money and also my show twists and chronos my two solo shows of the last two years will be out before Christmas with go faster stripe and also available on my Patreon there. So that's quite an exciting thing if you like my stand-up comedy. This is a Bugle podcast and Alice Fraser production. Your editor is Ped Hunter. Your executive producer is Chris Skinner. I'll talk to you again next week. You can listen to other programs from The Bugle, including The Bugle, Catharsis, Tiny Revolutions, Top Stories

and The Gargle, wherever you find your podcasts.