The Gargle - Post-Covid | Environment | Animals

Episode Date: March 29, 2021

Andy Zaltzman and Sarah Keyworth join Alice Fraser for episode six of The Gargle - the weekly topical comedy podcast from The Bugle. 👃 Nasal sanitiser 🌛 Sexy moon news🌊 Bottom trawling💧 Garden hose erections🥩 Peak meat imminent🐄 Seaweed curbs cow farts🦎 Smooth newts🐍 Snakes on life raftThis is a show from The Bugle. Follow us on Twitter.This episode was produced by Ped Hunter and Chris Skinner. 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. Faster than a speeding bullet. More powerful than a locomotive. Acast.com Yes, it's the gargle, strange visitor from the bugle universe who came to Earth with powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. Because unlike 90% of her colleagues in the news satire business, she's a woman. The gargle which can change the course of mighty rivers, bend steel, and who, disguised this week as Andrew Zaltzman and Sarah Keyworth, mild-mannered reporters for a great metropolitan, quote, newspaper, end quote, fights a never-ending battle for truth, justice, and the news stories you love without the politics that make you want to shoot yourself from the face of the earth in a rocket.

I'm talking to you, Elon Musk. And now, another exciting episode in the adventures of The Gargle. Andy, Sarah, welcome to the show. Hello. Hello. Hi. Thank you for having me. The front cover of the magazine this week is a picture of the east coast of Australia in a wet dress and eyeliner saying, if you can't handle me at my bushfire season,

you don't deserve me at my floods causing spider plagues. Sub headings in screamers, Prince Harry flaunts his new figurehead positions, marginally more meaningful than his last one. And the satirical cartoon this week as the Olympic torch relay begins in Fukushima. This week's satirical cartoon is censored and all our cartoonists have been preemptively both fired and cancelled. We apologise for any offence caused by you imagining the deeply offensive jokes that might have been made here about Fukushima and the Olympic torch. The replacement harmless satirical cartoon is the sideways boat in the Suez Canal dressed as

Gandalf from the Lord of the Rings shouting you shall not pass at a bulrog made of flame and shadow that represents the economy. And now we open the magazine to section one. Top section this week is the reupholstered virus innovations in the world of virus and this story is where Israeli scientists have claimed to invent a nose sanitizer that will kill 99.9 percent of viruses sarah you've kept your nose clean of late would you like to tell us about this story yeah basically they've developed a hand sanitizer for the nose which i love this concept because it feels like they were maybe looking over at the uk going nobody's gonna take it if going, nobody's going to take it.

If we're going to get them to take it, they need to snort it. That's just a bunch of people in the UK like, I prefer to do it up the nose if that's possible. Yeah, no, I'm excited to try it. Apparently it's supposed to protect from the contagion element of having COVID. If you already have COVID and you do a little snort of this, it basically blocks your nose.

So it's just a little nose mask, isn't it? It's the equivalent of putting a tampon up your nose. Has that not been tried? It has been tried by potentially somebody on the Zoom call. Well, there's 99% of viruses, 99.9% of viruses being killed by this nose sanitiser. Is that the same 99.9% of germs that all hand sanitisers claim to kill? In which case, have they just been snorting Purell?

And I've said this before and I'll say it again. Can we not try and take down that 1%, please? Well, this is what I'm concerned about with this as a snout spray sceptic. It's the 0.1% that really worries me. I'm sure stopping 99.9% of viruses getting in is all very well, but that in no way outweighs the 0.1% that are getting through. Because what if that 0.1% turns my skin into lizard-like scales or turns my eyes into beetroots?

What then? I can't take that risk. Slightly worried that you're sounding slightly like an anti-vaxxer there. Well, I'm not an anti-vaxxer. I'm an anti-snout sprayer. And, you know, what if I take the spray and it stops 999 out of every 1,000 viruses? What if I then get run over by an escaped bus? What good is it doing to me then? So there are simply too many unknowns.

I can't take this. I can't take it. Well, the person giving you mouth-to-mouth can rest easy at night. Andy, there is no medicine that you can snort that will make you invincible. But there is one medicine you can snort that will make you feel invincible. Love that we're calling that medicine right now. And the stock market is rocketing in America as meme-fuelled investors high on GameStop power fling their stimulus checks into the ever-hungry maw of the forest fire that is And the stock market is rocketing in America as meme-fuelled investors high on GameStop power fling their stimulus checks into the ever-hungry maw of the forest fire that is economic growth. Andy Zaltzman, you're a published self-taught economist who spent years embedded within the economy to discover its secrets.

What's happening here? Well, I mean, the economy has had a tough, tough time, really. It's basically an endangered species, the the economy and needs all the help it can get and um i mean really these stimulus checks are designed to you know to save the economy but i think really what people need to use them for is prepping for the next crisis i think it's deeply i mean gambling which is essentially what stock trading is that is as valid as eating as a human activity. I mean, what is the point of being alive if you're not risking yours and your dependents' futures by gambling on stocks or sport? But I think we need to turn this money to building ourselves underground bunkers with enough supplies to last for 20 years so that when the next virus comes, we're much better prepared.

And instead of this sort of halfway house between human life and full lockdown, we just bury ourselves underground for 20 years and come out and pick up where we left off. So that's what this money should be spent on. I mean, in terms of the economy, as you said, I've been embedded in the economy now for 46 years. And I've become, it's almost a kind of Stockholm syndrome that we've become, I wouldn't say friends, but I hope we've learned to respect it. I think I respect the economy more than it respects me, to be honest.

The economy respects nobody, I'm afraid. Sarah Keyworth, would you be stimulused by a check? I mean, because this is specifically the US stock market, isn't it? This is Americans just being handed money and choosing to gamble with it rather than actually use it for any sort of important means. There was an article in an interview with a guy, a Trombonist?

Trump supporter. Who has lost more than half of his work. He's decided to invest his stimulus checks in a cinema chain. And it's the most bizarre thing because there's a picture of him clutching his trombone like it's his baby. And you think, this guy is... You shouldn't be taking his money, this guy's having a breakdown. Also, is it not quite impressive as a trombonist in the current climate if you've managed to keep half your work?

If he's only lost half, I mean, what tromboning work is there? Andy, I didn't believe a word of it. The guy's lost his mind. How much Zoom tromboning work is there? Andy, I didn't believe a word of it. The guy's lost his mind. How much Zoom tromboning is there to do other than walking around behind Nazi power rallies and making them sound ridiculous with a sad trombone soundtrack? I don't know what the work is.

There's this website called OnlyFans, which I think a lot of tromboning happens on there. Perhaps that's where he's making his money. Yes, his username is Tromboner. Maybe they used an american health service when you know people are given bad diagnoses as a kind of there is the whole time just to lighten the mood a bit they're calling them stimmies as well these stimulus checks are called stimmies of course and i just think the moment you have the first one over someone goes thank you for my stimmy. You go, actually, I'm going to take that back. It's deeply upsetting. And your turn of phrase of don't take his money

is clearly having a nervous breakdown is true of literally every single transaction that happens in the American economy. Exactly. Yeah. Leave that poor man alone. Your ad section now, because in what other context could you, the listener and I, the producer of this content, both be secondary to the actual business transaction for which our connection is merely the conduit? Are you worried your dog doesn't make you look rich? Try Rich Dogs Luxury Dog Farm and Undisclosed Waste Products Factory for your next dog. We sell all three kinds of rich dogs. Rich dogs that are too glossy, have too much hair,

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that I've heard several male comedians in the UK do about lying on your hand until it goes numb. I just think Hermit hounds would be very popular amongst them. 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 And now it's time for our second section, Science News. And our Science News section begins with some sexy buried moon news. Ladies and gentlemen, I bet you didn't think that was going to be the story of today. This is an article about the remains of the impact that created the moon from Earth. And the impact was a protoplanet called Theia hitting the Earth. And the article about it is possibly the most pornographic piece of interplanetary literature I have ever read.

Have you read this story? Yeah, I mean, I'm only just calmed down to be honest. I mean it was a real you know interplanetary bodice ripper. I mean it just makes you think what would happen if Venus and Mars ever finally get it on. That is going to be hot. Yeah so the simulations consistently showed that mantle rocks 1.5 percent to 3.5 percent denser than Earth's would survive and end up as piles near the core. It's this sweet spot for the density, says one of the scientists. There may be holes in them, Romanovich says.

There may be a bundle of tubes. Perhaps the real story behind the density is the distribution depth. Alice, I mean, is this a real scientist? Do scientists use terms like sweet spot and bundle? I think Alice wrote this. This is a hoax. When they're talking about the moon, they do. I think you've accidentally stumbled on some planetary fan fiction

dressed up as a news story. I mean, the graphicness of the writing. A new picture of the moon forming impactor suggests it could have delivered a cargo of dense rock deep inside the Earth. So upsetting. It just goes to show that even scientists can write reports with their dicks in their hands. So I was reading about this.

So Theia, the object that smashed into Earth, and is now currently residing like some form of alien life being prepared to leap out at our weakest moment which could be quite soon there are clearly they're clearly aliens basically when i read this article about this this collision however many years ago uh i mean it might even be the full six thousand years

ago at the very start of time maybe this is how god made the earth with these two planets smashing together i haven't read the bible for a. But clearly this is a long game by the aliens. They've buried themselves on Earth. They're letting us destroy our own civilisation. They're just going to come and finish us off with a few swift punches. But it did raise a fascinating possibility for me. Theia, the object that hit Earth, is speculated to be a similar size to Earth and the collision basically merged the two and created a moon,

which does raise a fascinating possibility for snookers. That if a snooker ball is hit hard enough into another snooker ball, it could merge into a bigger snooker ball with a much smaller satellite snooklet ball orbiting around it. Now, I've done the maths and I've guessed the physics, ball orbiting around it. Now, I've done the maths and I've guessed the physics and I think you'd have to hit the snooker ball at 34,326

miles an hour for that physical reaction to happen. Coincidentally, which is the exact number of balls that Jimmy Anderson has bowled for England in Test Match Cricket. So, read into that. This is my show, not your show. You're not allowed to do extended snooker metaphors here. I've just made up that rule and I'm going

to enforce it. Andy doesn't talk for the rest of the podcast i'm out it's all snooker bits the weirdest part for me in this article was this sort of strangely i don't know it's the name of this planet but it's all it feels weirdly gendered it feels like earth has been this nice guy. He's cracking on. He's got his wife and his kids. And then suddenly some woman is discovered leeching off of him after all these years. And it's very much Earth is the victim in this situation.

And when you go back to the original story, it takes two to create a moon, you know? Yeah, what was he wearing on his mantle? I think he's just as guilty as she is. Mainly volcanoes. Well, then it's Mother Earth, isn't it? And maybe Mother Earth is pregnant. Isn't that not quite exciting?

We should be congratulating. Okay, that's getting weird. It started weird. It's not getting weird. It started weird. It's not getting weird. It's getting too weird. The source material was originally weird. It's the first scientific article I've read that needed a rating on it, is all I'm saying.

Speaking of which, the next story, scientists studying garden hoses and the erect penises of mammals, you don't need to know why, have discovered that they're basically the same thing. Andrew, you're working at the bottom of your garden. Can you help me explain how this works? Well, scientists have done... Andrew, you've been kicked out of the house. Tell us about dicks.

The research that is arguably most needed, which has found that the human erection took its inspiration from the garden hose, if I've read the article correctly. That's prior to the invention of the garden hose in, I believe, it was about 400 BC in classical Athens. The human penis was entirely flaccid. However, the structure of the garden hose

inspired the ancient Greeks, who were horny old bastards, let's not forget, to use the technology from the garden hose and the structures that maintain the hose's structural integrity post-issue, and applied that to the human penis, which enabled the Stiffy, named after the then Athenian leader

Stiphocrates to become a much well highly regarded part of the male female copulatory process so so essentially this is it and it doesn't make you think you know I guess if there's one garden implement that Planck was going to take inspiration from, it's probably good news that it was the hose rather than the trowel, the shovel or the scarifier. And now, hundreds of years later, it makes perfect sense why people in the suburbs get so angry when there's a hosepipe ban.

The scientific heartache of the scientists was apparently testing dissected slivers of armadillo penis. Doesn't explain that to anyone. Again, you don't need to know why. Well, exactly. I mean, at what point in your career do you start thinking, is this what I dreamed of as a child, looking at dissected slivers of armadillo penis under a microscope?

Maybe it is. I love the idea that hosepipe was the original material. It's the first bit that we discovered because uh the article is suggesting that the reason that mammals can maintain such stiff erections is because it's the same technology as a hose pipe which makes me really commend how horny the person was who made a hosepipe the first time so all we need now is to work out a means of affixing a tap at the end of the male pipe and i think that could solve a lot of problems in the world

it'd absolutely ruin water fights though wouldn't it but? But I mean, it's interesting that the scientist was researching the armadillo penis because armadillos need more erectile assistance than any other species because they are incapable of love. Do you know that?

The way you started that, I thought you were going to go it's interesting that he was researching armadillo penises because personally, not my favourite kind of penis. started that I thought you were going to go it's interesting that he was researching armadillo penises because personally not my favourite kind of penis You have a favourite kind of penis? My last choice God made the armadillo

penis very much as he made the mountains and the rivers and the clouds so we should respect it as such Absolutely in the sense that he didn't Meanwhile a pop out post vaccine Disney princess pop up We should respect it as such. Absolutely, in the sense that he didn't. Meanwhile, a pop-out post-vaccine Disney princess pop-up quiz. Are you an Elsa, a live-action Mulan or a Raya? Question one, you'll miss which of these when COVID ends?

A, not being able to put off the answer to a difficult question by freezing in place and pretending to be buffering. B, not having old people thank you for cringing away from them. C, not being disguised as a man while you flirt with your superior officer. D, coping with the lack of a zoom filter and the effect of that on your real face. E, the power to control the cold. Or F, something to do with the dragon. I haven't seen the movie yet. Andrew, Sarah, what are your post-COVID plans? Are you going to be having licking parties? Are you going to be breathing on people now that vaccines are coming out?

Have you got a roadmap for your own socialisation? No. Well, it's got to be a gradual process, hasn't it, Alice? It's like emerging from a prison sentence. So, you know, I assume the government here in Britain, if it's like emerging from a prison sentence. So, you know, I assume the government here in Britain, if it's like emerging from a prison sentence, is planning to do absolutely nothing to stop us going straight back into lockdown, if they're being politically consistent.

I would all be to say, just put me back in there. It's the only life I know. So I don't know. I mean, it's going to be interesting to see what... I mean, personally, I've really missed insulting people to their faces. You know, it's all gone online now. And I'm looking forward to everyone just getting together and calling each other c*** face-to-face in a good old-fashioned British way

because that's something that I feel we've lost from our culture during lockdown. I mean, it's going to be hard, you know, the gradual easing back to normality. I'm not sure that's going to work. I think we need compulsory normality enforced by the police, rigorously enforced, but if people do anything that wasn't previously normal in the old normality, then they should be jailed. I want to return like Voldemort in the fourth Harry Potter film.

I want Andy Zaltzman to carry me into a graveyard, sacrifice his own hand. I've got a bad back. For my strength. I want a circle of my friends to be watching in robes. And I want to torture a 14-year-old boy for several hours. That's my plan. It's good to have an achievable goal, Sarah.

Thank you. Are you free, Andy, 21st of June? I feel like you've just marked yourself as a millennial in the gun sights of the Generation Z, Sarah I have In terms of social interaction and how people try to rebuild those social structures that's going to be difficult and just news breaking today

the government is going to be difficult and just um news breaking today the government is going to be issuing official small talk lanyards um so that you don't actually have to have conversations with people just you know it'll they're the sort of electronic lanyard to just say i'm fine uh my family's fine and i saw the game last night and um of course the london one comes just with saying do not talk to me do not look at me do not come within two meters on me which is just getting back to the way we used to live in the before times and formalizing the messages we convey with our faces here in London on an actual readable printout yeah continue to pretend I don't have a mouth there are some

benches in London parks that previously before all this had like signs on them that said like this is a social bench and if you sit here you are signifying to other people that you are willing to sit and have a chat and my plan for returning to normality is to go around and burn all of those benches. Well that's all the time we have for section two now it's time for your reviews section. Sarah Keyworth did you bring in anything to review i did yeah i have started to dip my toe into the world of tiktok i know alice you look scandalized i don't i'm not making videos i'm posting old videos of stand-up on there so like i feel like i'm i'm issuing an apology i'm sorry for what i've done on the internet no i'm not scandalised, I'm impressed

Really? I don't know I'm ashamed The two aren't mutually exclusive Yeah But the problem is that I'm simultaneously fascinated and infuriated by TikTok and that no more exemplified

by one I found this morning which is a woman and I'm not going to name names because I don't want to be a dick because she seems very nice but she's a Michelin star chef and she's essentially teaching people how to chop vegetables and I saw this and it was like how to cut a tomato and I was furious I was, and it's got something like 3 million views. And I was thinking, how is this possible? How is it possible that nobody knows how to do this?

Because ultimately you just, a tomato is one of the softest fruits. You just go for it, don't you? You find a way. And then at the same time I was thinking, but if people don't know, she's doing God's work. If you are stuck in a house with all of these whole tomatoes with absolutely no idea where to start.

How do I crack this code? Then it's fantastic. So I think I'd give her like three out of five stars because she's executing it very well, the tomato Andy video. But at the same time, I think I'm not mad at her, I'm just angry. I'm just upset about the situation. So, I mean, how do you do it? Because I've tried using a sword and it doesn't often work. It's supposed to be a sword.

Yeah, but it depends on how sharp the sword is, Andy. You strike me as a man who has a very blunt sword Thank you very much That's a compliment I don't know if I'm going too far back on the backswing Maybe I need to Do I need to hold the tomato? Because I'm throwing it in the air at the moment And then swiping it Do you know what, I'll send you the video I think you need to hit it in the air at the moment and then swiping it.

Do you know what? I'll send you the video. I think you need to hit it with the edge of the blade, not the flat of the blade. I think what you're doing is just playing cricket, Andrew. Oh, yeah, it could be that. Andy's actually just playing snooker with his tomatoes and a sword. Speaking of which, Andrew, have you brought something in to review? Well, I have, actually, and it's also to do with the kitchen.

I'm reviewing The Fork, which I'm giving four stars for the fork. One of the all-time great eating utensils, the fork has played a heroic role not only in picking up food off plates at mealtimes, but also in human evolution. The invention of the fork enabled humanity not to waste its time trying to evolve claws and instead focus on developing economic structures to control the planet. As a means of picking up food off a plate with the express purpose of transporting it towards your mouth for consideration for ingestive assumption into the digestival tract, the fork has few rivals, especially when used in conjunction with a knife, spoon or another fork.

More manipulatable than a garden spade and gentler on your food and your face than a javelin, the fork has much to recommend it. Furthermore, the fork, available at many shops if you ask nicely has also been offered rent-free as a no obligation object loan in cafes and restaurants for some time now it is the best of the leading eat table aid utensils for supporting a point in a discussion as well or argument over the course of any meal it's more forceful and direct than a spoon when waggled towards your interlocutor, but less threatening than a knife and less ambiguous than a pair of chopsticks. A fork can inforstulise any words, especially when accessorised with a biperonged sausage.

The fork, however, it should be said, is not without drawbacks. It can cause injury or fall asleep on during a late night meal. It lacks the musicality of the spoon and is a little on the patriarchal side of acceptability these days with its micro follicular tines. It also can conduct lightning when irresponsibly used outdoors in a thunderstorm and it sounds a bit rude.

Furthermore, it does not prevent COVID like vaccines do. But still, it is a four star implement, highly recommended for anyone who enjoys jabbing something into something else and then eating that something else. And you don't know how to chop a tomato. Not yet. Now it's time for section three.

The environment, and our top story in the environment this week is that bottom trawling, which is a thing they do in the ocean and not behind the bike shed, bottom trawling in the ocean releases as much carbon as air travel. As somebody who's been forced to not air travel for the past year, Andrew, have you got your head around this story? I haven't been forced not to air travel, Alice.

I've chosen not to for the sake of the environment. It's just mainly coincided with the global lockdown. But Andy has been doing a lot of bottom trawling, so I don't think he's a good guy. I have been doing a huge amount of bottom trawling so i don't think he's a good guy i have been doing a huge amount of bottom trawling so uh yeah one gigaton of carbon a year released by uh by bottom trawling that that's that sounds like a lot it's also about the only gig that's going on at the moment that i've heard about so uh i'm right on side with this the reports author said it's clear that humanity and the economy will benefit from a healthier ocean. And that is a key when you're doing a report like this, is you have to put and the economy in that sentence.

Otherwise, there is no chance of anyone taking any notice. If it was just humanity benefiting from a healthier ocean, no one gives a shit. If it's the things that live in the ocean benefiting from a healthier ocean, people give even less of a shit. But if the economy is affected, you have our full undivided

human attention so uh it's a very well phrased uh report this it adds so we can realize those benefits quickly if countries work together to protect at least 30 of the ocean by the year 2030 and this is where it all falls apart if that is a big if if a historical president has ever anything to go by 30 that sounds like a lot of hard work. That's f***ing loads of the ocean. The ocean is massive, so humans don't respond to challenges like that. It's got to be achievable. If it was like 0.001% of the ocean, then we can contextualise it.

Maybe, Phil, we can just go to the seaside and do our little bit to not trawl a bit of the sea and feel like we're contributing. And also by the year 2030 A, that's way too soon because we'd have to get our arses in gear in under a decade and B, that's way too far away because that is two electoral cycles away

it might as well be in the year 3000. So in summary, we're doomed. So you're suggesting we shouldn't bother? Yeah, definitely not. It's past the next election, there's no f***ing point What I like doing with countries around the world Is putting them in little categories in my head Some call this racism, some call this realpolitik

But my favourite part of this article Is it's created a whole new category of associations between countries That I was not previously associating in my head The top ten countries with the most carbon emissions from bottom trawling China, Russia, you get the theme, Italy. Love a fish though, don't they? Yep. Mad about fish in Italy.

The UK, Denmark, France, the Netherlands. The Netherlands? Norway, Croatia and Spain. How is Spain the top 10 anything? Because you have to take 2 to 4pm off every day. You can't trawl the bottom of the ocean. Is that what you're saying? They're doing it in their sleep, aren't they?

It's very efficient to be causing one of the most damaging things to the whole environment. So this report said, we can realise those benefits quickly if countries work together to protect at least 30% of our ocean by 2030. Zach Goldsmith, who is a government minister for the pacific and the environment said the paper highlights the need for countries to work together to protect at least 30 of the global ocean by 2030 so what he has done this government minister he has cut and pasted a press release that is the

level of governmental engagement we have in this issue. That is so heartbreaking. Speaking of other environmental positives, apparently feeding cows seaweed curbs one of the most polluting things in the world, which is the methane farts of cows. Sarah Keyworth, you like cows. Have you been following this story? Yeah, I think this is the same scientist that was doing the armadillo dick stuff, isn't it?

He's just been f***ing with animals. It's so weird. Why would you think about it? Why would your instinct be, do you know what, I'm going to give that cow a bit of seaweed, just see what happens with its farts? Because you do one or the other. You think about the cow's farts or you give it seaweed.

You don't think this will change something in there in there i mean basically what's happened here is someone's had a takeaway whilst researching a cow and thought oh what's that let's give this a go yeah the cow's poking its head through the door going are you gonna eat that i think more likely someone was trying to invent a fishy tasting cow that's true Maybe the cow went bottom trawling. I mean, it's quite a big issue. Livestock contributes 14.5% of anthropogenic methane emissions, the worst kind of methane emission.

And cows are particularly gaseously expulsive. Even, this was interesting from this research, even lady cows, because unlike with humans, female cows do break wind albeit only around 10-12% as much as the lad cows so there's quite a big difference between our species. Well in this particular article which is in PopSci

they take a swing at vegans in the last paragraph saying that not everyone in the world is able to reduce their meat or dairy intake for the sake of the climate. I just think that's funny. I just assume it would save a lot of time if the humans just ate the seaweed and left the cows alone. But I understand that that is not possible. Is that not an argument for eating meat?

That if you're eating a cow, you're stopping it farting? Surely that stacks up, doesn't it? But the more cow you eat, the more they'll breed farting cows it's a vicious circle it's a vicious cow circle and it will always have farts in it unless we get them on a die of seaweed even if they stop

farting in real life those lad cows you're talking about will just start doing it under their armpits pull my hoof well it's not all bad news for vegans apparently the growth of about we'll just start doing it under their armpits. Pull my hoof. Well, it's not all bad news for vegans. Apparently the growth of plant-based alternatives, animal product alternatives, in Europe and America means that those countries may stop eating meat.

They'll reach peak meat consumption at 2025 and start dropping down in the meat consumption stakes. No pun intended. That is a lie, Alice. That is an absolute lie. There was clearly a pun intended there. I'm shy away from it. Don't forget the stable that this podcast belongs to.

Never forget who you are. Okay, when I say no pun intended, I meant I didn't write that bit. I was just making it up off the top of my head. So it was... It was subliminally intended. You knew what you were doing. Unforeseen, unpremeditated.

Don't deny your true self. Unpremeditated pun, which is the best kind, I would say. How mad would it be if this story went viral and people suddenly went off eating cows because they were like, I actually prefer knowing that they fart. That was a little bit of the appeal. Well, we're solving this problem from both ends,

which is that these plant-based meat alternatives are going to become increasingly convincing and increasingly affordable and increasingly available and appealing to consumers, which is going to give a big blow to the dairy industry. I feel there are going to be many sad cows, sad that they're not being eaten on the assumption that they enjoy being eaten.

I don't know. But will you be investing in fake meat, Sarah? I mean, I'm a vegetarian, so I suppose I am. I will be investing in fake meat. I feel like, you know, in terms of spending your stimulus check, you should probably be spending it on fake meat alternatives so that they become increasingly available. I will only invest if they specifically

say that they will they will create that that sense that the the thing that you're eating has at some point for artists andy well i think there's a big psychological side to this uh are humans prepared to give up meat and and not not the eating of meat not the taste of meat not any nutritional side of it so you can get that elsewhere are humans prepared to give up that feeling of being a mafia boss with the power to have something killed on your behalf anytime you want because that is essentially the subtext of a packet of bacon so i'm not sure we're ready to make to make that so also i mean i think the reason why we're going to eat less meat,

less animal meat, is because based on how humans now interact online, I think we're only about three logical steps away from the world just becoming a giant, 7.5 billion strong cannibalistic orgy of violence and score settling. So I think we're just going to eat each other rather than eat farting cows.

So I think that could... Actually, that's probably good for the environment. Well, look, I think that this war between the two sets of scientists, the methane-reducing cow scientists and the meat-reducing plant scientists, is evident in every line of both of these sets of articles that I've been doing research on.

And I think it's a race to the top. Either we end up with scentless cows or we end up with cowless cows either way but also there's something I need to pick up on this that the report was saying avoiding meat is the single biggest way to reduce your carbon footprint I would dispute that having done some research on members of my family I think it's the second biggest way to reduce your carbon footprint because we analyze the carbon footprint of everyone in my family. And my great-uncle Geoff has the smallest carbon footprint because he died in 1967. So I think that's probably the best thing you can do.

Also, education's a key part of this, isn't it? Because kids' books don't encourage children not to eat... To die young. Well, not to eat animals. I mean, it depends how you read them, Sarah. And the subtext that you see in those Mr Men stories and quite how explicit you make that to your children

before bedtime. I mean, Mr Tickle, that is way too 1970s. But look, anyway, that's a different story. He's been banned, hasn't he? Not before time. But kids' stories don't tell the full... They don't tell what... They're not just cute little farm animals, are they?

You don't get a pig called Sausage in a kids book, do you? So they don't associate... If all kids books that featured a farm animal were forced to show the slaughter processing and packaging of that animal,

then you would have a much more vegetarian generation of children. And when are your children's books coming out, Andy? It's a good time to plug them. Still in discussion. Still in discussion. Now it's time for a fold-out personality spotlight listicle. Did you know that Jensen Karp, the man who found shrimp in his cinnamon

toast crunch, isn't the hero we all assumed he was by virtue of his having tweeted something funny that happened to him through no act of his own? What? No. Turns out that he, like so many good things in this world, is a creep. Good thing we found that out before he became a beloved part of our childhoods. Now it's time for section four, Animal Kingdom news, which is to be distinguished from the stories about cows.

This week, animals are doing it for themselves. And in this instance, it is Noah's Ark, the thing that they're doing for themselves as floods on the east coast of New South Wales lead to both fleeing spider plagues looking exactly like your nightmares and some motherfucking snakes on a motherfucking life raft. This is a story and as somebody who just drove from Sydney to Queensland and walked a little bit by a flooded river and ended up with spider webs up to my knees, I am personally traumatised by this exact... I've been part of the news today.

But flood rescue specialists in New South Wales fire and rescue services got more than they planned after snakes and insects started climbing up on the raft when what they were trying to rescue was people. And cats. I know you are very far away, Sarah, but do you find this story appealing? Absolutely not. This is the stuff of nightmares for me sydney can't catch a break either it's just shit after shit for sydney what i liked about the story is

that they really did emphasize who they were trying to save just so if anybody got confused and thought that this was a rescue mission for a bunch of snakes but they were like no we were trying to rescue two adults four four children and two cats. And I was like, no, as art rules, that's too, too many children, I'm afraid. You should have forsaken two children and gone for two snakes. That's very true. Andy? Well, I mean, I think this needs to be clamped down on very hard, giving snakes any form of assistance to survive in flood situations because have these things

these souped up giant worms have they not done enough damage to our species ever since the whole have an apple pretty nudie lady incident that brought sin and suffering into the world I mean never forgive never forget and that's why I never give a snake a ride on a life raft

and I think Australia is going soft they kicked them off. Yeah, not soon enough. They kicked them out, yeah. The Italians would have turned them into pasta. Interestingly, the mechanism that drives snakes is the same mechanism that drives the common or garden erection. The garden erection.

Is there a difference between a common erection and a garden erection? One is slightly green. The garden one isn't poisonous. You can be found in the bushes outside your house. What I want to know is how you get a cat on a lifeboat. What, without the fox and the chicken and the grain falling off? We're back on the moon. And in other animal news,

it's about to be our favorite time of year smooth newt mating season in your backyard speaking of common or backyard erections this is a kind of a british animal which you can tell by the fact that it's not trying to bite or murder you and uh apparently this is what is about to be happening if you have a garden in your garden, which is exciting. It's a huge part of the British year, the smooth new mating season. We set our annual British clock by it. We get the bunting out, Union Jacks everywhere, as we admiringly applaud and encourage the newts to f*** as God intended. It's a great part of the year.

The smooth newt is, well, I mean, in layman's terms, it's a piddling little micro-dinosaur. It's an evolutionary has-been that only grows up to 10 centimetres long. And it derives its name, the smooth newt, from its super-suave courtship ritual. This is why it's called the smooth newt, because the gentleman smooth newt is almost James Bond-like in his seductive skills.

The reptilian Romeo's spludge a packet of spermatoids onto a rock. He then waggles his tail vigorously at the lady newt, who, if sufficiently libidinised by the lizard Lothario's erotic exhibitionism, will then use said spermal deposition to imperflitate her over-eggs. So it's a classic mating ritual, really. And in this day and age, do you not think, male humans, we're always on the lookout for sex tips from other species because it's turned out that we can't be trusted

with traditional male human behaviours. And the smooth newt could have something for us because they perform the act and then leave it up to the lady newt to decide if she then also wants to participate. So I think this is really the future of courtship. It's like if Louis CK did his business in a pot plant before inviting his colleague into the hotel room. Yes, exactly.

Yeah, but the thing is, I don't think that human men are majorly far away from this because what you've left out there andy is that this this new sponks onto a rock and then the lady new turns up and carefully wraps it in a leaf and so just like it's just a tale as old as time with it with this new situation where a man turns up makes a mess and the woman has to show up after him, tidy it all up, and sort it out. I think it's a real shame. What pleasure does she get out of that?

She turns up, she goes, oh, for f***'s sake. The satisfaction of a job well done. She goes, oh, that was my best rock. I'll go and get a leaf. She tidies it up. Next thing she knows, she's pregnant. She doesn't remember that happening.

I'd be fuming if I were a lady newt. I wouldn't call him smooth. I'd call him inconsiderate. Too often those two things go hand in hand, surprisingly. Charm is an amoral quality, Sarah Keyworth. But my favourite bit, I've done a lot of research into newts, is that in a number of places looking up newts and what they do and who they are as a species,

a number of websites and forums describe the newtlets or efts as looking at one point in their development like miniature dragons. But of course dragons don't exist in in this podcast universe dragons do not exist so what they mean is that dragons look like very big newts yeah yeah you're right but you don't get that in in you know didn't get that in game of thrones you know we've seen the size of that i think it's a real show that the people doing pr for newts need to up their game if people know more what a dragon looks like than a newt. Bow to the queen of newts. It would have sped up a lot of Tolkien fiction, wouldn't it,

if he'd been able to go, it's just like a big newt, really. So like a big newt that loves money for some reason. And our final story for today is about a talking dog that has become a star on tiktok this is the classic end of the news section story about a talking dog that's become famous on tiktok because there's actual news in australia this week and we don't have room for a feel-good australia story apparently people are desperately trying to jump aboard this talking dog trend and train their dogs to talk, presumably so that they can make money off them on TikTok. Sarah, you're our TikTok expert. Can you dive into depth on this story?

I thought the point of having a dog was that you didn't have to negotiate with it. I thought it was like terrorists. You know, you either have a baby or you have a dog but you you accept that the baby at some point will start answering back you don't then go i'm gonna teach this creature that i am supposed to be in charge of to fight with me about things i watch this video the dog is insubordinate it's like i want to go for a walk and they're like no we've been for a walk we're not going for a walk now and it's like i want to go for a f***ing walk. And you think, well, if you're old enough to ask for a walk, take yourself for a walk, mate.

Honestly, I don't understand the desire to allow this creature to have a go at you when you've given it so much already. If I'm on the camp of not teaching children to speak. You get a job with the Ministry of Education here, I think. To me, Alice, this is a definite sign that human civilisation has run its course, that this is what we're now reverting to. It could also be that actually we're just getting back to human basics, more traditional forms of entertainment,

because is the talking dog on TikTok not merely our third millennium equivalent of the cave painting of a bison? I think maybe we're just returning to our human roots. Of course, we like to think dogs are our spiritual soulmates, but the dog evolutionarily is a philandering killer with no real sense of social or parental responsibility, so not a good doggy by most accepted ethical metrics. But I think now what we're seeing with this TikTok thing

is the domestication of the doggy was only phase one. Full anthropomorphisation of the dog is phase two, followed by phase three, which is giving dogs control of the planet as we leave in giant spaceships for another inhabitable world far, far away from here, leaving the doggies to clear up all our shit for once. See how you like it, you toilet adverse quadrupedal crap machines.

It's also ironic, I feel, in the current climate that we're training dogs to communicate through words at the exact time that humans are worse at communicating with each other using words than probably at any point in our history. You can barely even recommend a sandwich filling without

someone flinging a death threat in your direction these days, let alone trying to have a nuanced debate about important issues like history, politics, or the use of video technology in sport. So I think this has come at a very bad time. Have you seen it, Andy? Because they have all these series of buttons,

and it's things like, I think there's like, walk, and there's mum, and there's good. But then there is also, I think there's like walk and there's mum and there's good, but then there is also I'll kill you and you deserve to die and your entire family is a waste of space. So I think it's sort of in keeping with the way that we communicate in this day and age. And with the mum button, is there a button next to it that says you're not my real or not?

Yes, of course. I think it's implied when a dog is saying it. If these dogs are indeed the first step in an artistic tradition like the bison cave paintings, you know, in 3,000 years when flaming newts are ravaging the countryside, will we look back on this moment as the dawn of a new era? God, I f***ing hope not. That would be a great title for a podcast for

you sarah god i hope not i hope not that could be a smash hit that brings us to the end of the show we're at the classified section at the end of the magazine flipping past some lawnmower ads some lawnmower ads and some adult advertisements andrew have you got anything to plug? Do I have anything to plug? No, not really. No. Oxygen was terrific. You have a podcast too, don't you? Oh, I do have a podcast called The Bugle.

So if you've enjoyed this, you might enjoy that as well. So check it out. Oh, yeah. Also, there's a two-part Radio 4 series that is available online on the BBC Sounds app with Anuvab Pal, star of The Bugle. Have you had him on The Gargle yet, Alice? No, we had him on The Last Post. No, not on The Gargle. Star of The Last Post, and I would assume at some point in the future, The Gargle.

Anyway, there's a two-part Radio 4 series that you can find online called Future Empire Effect. And Sarah Keyworth, have you got anything to plug? I have a show on BBC Radio 4 that is also available on BBC Sounds. It's called Are You a Boy or a Girl? This is coming out on Tuesday, did you say? Yes. It's my birthday the Tuesday after, so if you want to send me

a newt, I'll take one. Female newts only because there's a lot of spunk around here that needs cleaning up. It'll be neatly wrapped in a leaf. So it's quite nice. Yes. It'd be lovely, something to open, finally.

If you are in Australia, I will be at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival from the 2nd to the 18th of April. Subsequently, I'll be at the Sydney Comedy Festival. If you're in neither of those places, join my Patreon, patreon.com slash Alice Fraser, where I will be streaming some of those shows when they are good. The Gargle is an Alice Fraser and the Bugle Podcasts production.

Your editor is Ped Hunter. Your executive producer is Chris Skinner. And I will talk to you again next week.