Are These Shoes New

 Are These Shoes New

Lex Education is the comedy science podcast hosted by Laura Whiteman

Laura: Hello, and welcome to another episode of Lex Education, the comedy science podcast, where comedian me, Laura. Lex.

Ron: Lex. Lex. Lex.

Laura: Lex tries to learn science from her. Huh? Back from his holidays, brother Ron.

Ron: Bonjour.

Laura: Bonjour, mon fre. Une bon holiday. Trebie. Um, croix. Mange something nice. Sorry. Duolingo al. Uh, it didn't stay in my brain.

Ron: Uh, yes, I had a lovely time. I was in Brussels. I was in Paris. I was in Switzerland. Specifically grand Vaux, which is a village.

Laura: Outside of Lausanne, Los Angeles. Lo San Jillies.

Ron: Jillies, Jilly.

Laura: Uh, which was your favourite, Brussels, Paris, or Switzerland?

Ron: Um, Switzerland.

Laura: Ooh, big money dollar on Switzerland. Are you now going to move to Switzerland?

Ron: No. Um, uh, at least not where my friend lives. It's just so rural.

Laura: Like I said, we've done enough rural, haven't we, in our lives?

Ron: I think we grew up rural, and.

Laura: Now we're city slickers. Big time business boys.

Ron: Yeah, I just like stuff going on and amenities.

Laura: Yeah. Um, um, sorry, cut this. But, mum, m. Well, I'm glad you've had a lovely time, Ron. And we're swapping. I'm going away Friday, uh, on Friday, which I'm very excited about.

Ron: Yes. And we don't have any episodes in the bank.

Laura: We've got nothing. We've got this one, which is going on now, and then we got nothing. Tomorrow needs to be a doozy. I'm gonna think up. I'm gonna think really hard in the car tonight about what we're gonna do for our hundredth episode.

Ron: Who are you driving to? The gig that you're going to, leah?

Laura: No one. Just me.

Ron: Oh. Uh, so no guests this year?

Laura: No, we didn't do a guest. No, Ron, this is the hundredth, not the two year. We didn't have a guest for our 50th.

Ron: I, uh, suppose we didn't mention the 50th, did we?

Laura: No, it was nothing.

Ron: Right. Okay. But. Okay, so we've got a guest for the two year. Great.

Laura: Yeah, it's your turn this year. I got a star O'Brien. Now let's see who you get.

Ron: No, no, because all you bring to the podcast is star clout. So can you bring some again, please? Um.

Laura: Um, no, m. I'll see what I can do.

You haven't edited this episode, so we're going into a cloud of mystery

Uh, anyway, Ron, I'm very glad you're back. You haven't edited this episode, so we're going into a cloud of mystery.

Ron: Yeah. Going in fucking blind. Here's a fun thing. Editing it right now so I can. I can interject whatever I want whenever I want new things.

Laura: Great.

Ron: Yeah, I think this is the first time this has ever happened, isn't it?

Laura: Yeah. Mabes, is this the one with the ear squelch noises?

Ron: I have no idea. Haven't edited.

Laura: I think this might be. I think this episode might contain the most disgusting thing that's ever happened on the podcast.

Ron: I know.

Laura: You know where my headphone was making my ear squelch? Or has that already gone out?

Ron: I feel like I've edited that.

Laura: Uh, did you?

Ron: I might be wrong. I can't remember.

Laura: I don't feel like I've listened to it.

Ron: Maybe not. Then. Who knows?

Laura: Who knows? It's so exciting. Yeah. So, I mean, it's a recap one, isn't it? So it's physics. So you perverts all like that. But.

Ron: Is it a recap one?

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Didn't we just put out a recap?

Laura: Oh, yeah. No, I'm confused. No, you're absolutely, absolutely. Yeah.

Ron: I think it's a biology.

Laura: Yeah. What's happened is I haven't put the title of the last one into the spreadsheet, so. Yes, you're. You're totally right on.

Ron: It's a Greg ahead. Great. I listen to that on the train because, uh, yeah, when I haven't, uh, when Laura does the intros on her own, I do listen.

Tom says if his podcast had the listenership ours has, he wouldn't do it

Laura: I wrote husband to the podcast, and.

Ron: Yes. Yeah. Thank goodness.

Laura: Yeah. He was very drunk.

Ron: He was very cross at us.

Laura: He's always cross at me.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: I don't think he likes me.

Ron: No, I think. But, like, all of his podcasts have fucking fallen through, so I don't think he should be shimmying dirt at anyone.

Laura: Here's the thing, though, Ron. He has standards for his podcast, and if his podcast had the listenership ours has, he wouldn't do it anymore. He doesn't persevere, even though, um, it's not successful, whereas we do.

Ron: But we are successful.

Laura: Oh, we're successful in what we measure it in, whereas Tom measures things in, like, money and is it worth our time? Whereas we're like, we've met cool people and we're having a great time. Shut up.

Ron: We make the princely sum of twelve pound 50 each per episode. And. Okay, sure. If you factor in that, that's like, like, yeah, you know, at least like 3 hours of work, actually.

Laura: That's not. Minus all of the costs of running the podcast.

Ron: That's true. That's true.

Laura: I think it's more like, hey, let's not focus. Let's not focus. It doesn't matter, all right? The whole podcast is a tax write off for me, and that's fine. I love it. You love it. Both the listeners love it. And that's.

Ron: Oh, my God.

Laura: Ron. Yes.

Ron: Episode 99 may or may not be a really good episode next week

I haven't really talked to you about this. I met one of the lurkers this week.

Ron: Hello, lurker.

Laura: Yeah. Uh, have I remembered his name? No. John. Might be John.

Ron: Don't just throw out John because John's a common name.

Laura: No, might have been John. He was. He was a trainer. I remember that. Lives in Bristol. You might know him, Ron.

Ron: Oh, oh, John the trainer.

Laura: You don't know him. Don't be doing that.

Ron: Yeah, no, I'm obviously taking the pin. Although John the trainer, if you, um, if you work at workout Bristol, I might know you.

Laura: Oh, um, he came to a show I did in Bristol on Thursday and said hi and was like, I'm big fan of the podcast, blah, blah, blah. Uh, and we got chatting about everything and I was like, yeah, but I don't think he's a patron and he's never interacted before. And I was like, ah, ah. You're one of the silent majority that just quietly listens. And it's very exciting to meet him.

Ron: Why didn't he sign up to the patreon, though?

Laura: I don't know. Many reasons. Lots of podcasts to listen to. Doesn't want to. I quite like the lurkers. I was excited about it. Don't look for the negatives, Ron. Well, Ron, um, yeah, look at the positives here.

Ron: Yeah, great.

Laura: All right, well, listen, have fun with this episode that neither of us can remember or, um, tell you anything about. And, um, we'll see you afterwards for more nonsense.

Ron: Can't find the sound effect ring. We ready?

Laura: Yes. I've only got one pen, though. Uh, he, uh, wasn't ready. I was ready. The worst part about this is it's a runs record, so I know he's not going to cut any of this. If this was me, this would just all vanish. Has it gone? He's actually left the room. Episode 99 may or may not be a really good episode next week, depending on if I finally came out of my brain slug and sorted as a guest. I really need to. I just haven't got a stunning idea. I need to have a stunning idea. Not had one. Water boy's gone to get more water. It's a very nice sunset at my. Huh. House.

Ron took that mouldy chair and stuck it by the front door

Ron: All right, I'm back.

Laura: I'm quite mad at you, Ron.

Ron: Why?

Laura: I just went upstairs to the roof to get my notepad, and I just remember that you took that fucking mouldy chair and just stuck it by the front door and it's still there. And now I'm the gross neighbour that just has gross furniture in their front garden and I hate you.

Ron: Throw it away.

Laura: How? I don't know how to throw.

Ron: Literally put it in the wheelie bin.

Laura: Why didn't you put it in the wheelie bin?

Ron: Cuz I think we were halfway through recording a podcast or like you charted shit at a shoe or something.

Laura: Well, that's my life all the time. I just. I wish you just left it up there to rot. Yes, because now it's just rotting out the front door.

Ron: That's where things should rot. Maybe a pigeon can form a home in it.

Laura: We found an entire tree trunk on the beach today. Oh wow, that's exciting, isn't it? Thinking about where did that tree come out of the ground and get in the sea and come to us? And it looked like it was bleeding, which we assumed was just.

Ron: Your microphone's doing the thing a bit, is it?

Laura: Why have you started doing that microphone? How about now? Is that better?

Ron: Talk a bit more.

Laura: Hello and welcome to the podcast, Laura. Okay, hang on. How about now, Ron?

Ron: Talk a bit more.

Ron says he likes Joss Norris' clowny comedy

Laura: Um, so this tree trunk. Yeah, it looked like it was bleeding, which we thought was probably doing it.

Ron: Hmm.

Laura: Mhm.

Ron: Yeah, I recognise his face. He's been in stuff.

Laura: Yeah, he has been. He's very funny. It's very clowny. Very. He's very good.

Ron: I like a bit of clowning.

Laura: Yeah, you'd enjoy him. He just has a bit where he just stands on a wobble board. It's good. Um, is my microphone stop making weird noises now?

Ron: Yes.

Laura: Okay. It feels weird to go back to the log, but anyway, we found a log on the beach and it looked like it was bleeding, but we assumed that that was just SAP coming out of it. But it was covered in flies. The flies were loving it. Yeah. And I made a joke about it being a whale's dick, but, oh yeah, Tom sort of smiled in a like, good trial or kind of a way. He.

Ron: Best bit of comedy, um, I've seen recently is I think it was Joss Norris had a bit where about how comedians time their big laugh so they can take a glass of water, but he's not very good at doing that. And then it's just him every time the audience laughs, dashing across the stage to go take a glass, to take a drink. It was very, very well done.

Laura: Sorry, what you doing? I was just texting Tom.

Ron: Oh, about the log.

Laura: No, I said, please, will you bring me back lots and lots of really nice crisps of different kinds. I want a crisp feast.

Ron: Is it because I said someone else was good at comedy?

Laura: No.

Ron: But you like Joss Norris.

Laura: I love Joss Norris. I find him really funny.

Ron: Um.

Laura: Uh, yeah. Ah, I do. Um, um. I find it hard to get going, uh, on the lessons bit. We've just done a lovely intro outro. It's a shame that wasn't the only record.

Ron: Yeah. Um, um. Yeah. What are you doing today?

Laura: Biology.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: Oh, Ron, I'm not in a very good mood.

Ron: No, your mood's really crashed in between these two records as well.

Laura: No, I was in a bad mood in the last one, but because they're, uh, sorry about the burps. They were only like 15 minutes long. I just thought, get on with it, Laura. Get through it. And I did. You know, I'm a professional, but this is 45 minutes and I'm not professional for 45 minutes.

Ron: Should we just take a break? Should we do something else?

Laura: Do you want to play your guitar?

Ron: No, not really.

Laura: No. I think we should just crack on. Cause now it's 08:20 a.m.. I.

Ron: No, I'm not saying we don't record, but we could just, uh, wax lyrical about what's, you know, let's.

I had a weird moment today about Israel and world war three

We could take a look at the news. There's surely gonna be good stuff there that would cheer us up.

Laura: There's nothing there. There's nothing there. But, like, I had a weird point today where I was like, you know, when you realise how indoctrinated you are about something? You ever get those moments?

Ron: Nah. Workers fuck me.

Laura: And today's moment was, I was like, hang on a minute. I'm assuming then, given that world war three is starting this week, I think I might be on Iran's side. And m that felt mad because of how indoctrinated we are in this country to the news being, like, anti Middle east, you know, and just like, they're all crazy and we're the saviours. And I was just like, hold up. No, uh, well, not that I'm on their side, you know, because I just think all warmongering is dreadful, but, oh, it was a weird moment of realising how, um, how propaganda you've been through your life is going. Like, it felt weird to kind of go, well, actually, Iran might have a leg to stand on.

Ron: Well, absolutely. They do. Yeah. 16 of their people were killed in a foreign country.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: Um, but then it's like, you know, do you support retaliation of an eye for an eye, which I don't. But I don't know. That's how world politics works, isn't it? You fight each other. God, it's depressing.

Ron: I don't necessarily support an eye for an eye, but, um, you also do have. Yeah, I don't know. What seems odd with. Are we doing this? What seems odd with everything that's going on in the world at the moment is we seem to have gone back to the 1940s, where we just bombed civilian populations to get a point across, rather than military targets, which is odd to me.

Laura: Yeah. I don't know. I feel horrible because I feel like I've been horribly underspoken about it, but I've been the most sort of over read, I think, I've ever been about a thing. But there is this, like, messiness of wanting to be vocal in the right direction, but then also having learned a lot of lessons in. In the last five or six years about, like, when my voice is appropriate and when it is my turn to talk and when it is the right time to sit back. And I think that there's so. You see so many different opinions on the. Where are all the voices that went anti this? Why are they not condemning this? And you go, oh, God, I need to say something, or, I'm a despot, fascist piece of shit. But then you're like, but actually, is an uninformed voice any help? But then you sit there and you think, well, is silence ever the right answer? Uh, but then you think, am I just saying meaningless platitudes? But then you think, like, well, unless everybody says the meaningless platitude, like, you want to say things like, all killing is wrong, please stop killing. But then you think, oh, that's just nonsense. Who's going to say that? But then you think, but actually, does it take the entire world to stand up and say that for anybody to listen? And does the fact that we're all thinking that but not saying it add to the sense that the people who, uh. Do you know what I mean?

Ron: Yeah, I do know you mean. I mean, I do think that everything that's going on at the moment is one of those situations that is so not a grey area, that I don't think people have to be too worried about being uninformed.

Laura: It's not that it's not a grey area, but there are absolutely ways that it is hurtful to speak about it to people who are very close to me. And it is one of the conflicts, like, say, we compare like Israel Gaza, to Russia, Ukraine. I don't think, to my knowledge, I have any russian friends. I have an awful lot of jewish friends. And the Israel Gaza conflict, for many, many reasons, is very intertwined with the anti semitism being hugely on the rise and the feeling of insecurity for an awful lot of jewish people. And so it feels like to speak or not speak, it doesn't. It's not that I would say anything that I would sort of lay blame at the feet of jewish people or whatever for what is going on with Israel, but it feels like to speak has an effect on them. It has an effect on people close to my circle in a way that other atrocities and conflicts do not like. I can comment on the atrocity in Australia in the weekend, just given, without. Without adding emotional burden at the feet of, like, people I know.

Ron: Fair enough, I guess.

Laura: Yeah. M it's just big, innit?

Ron: Yeah. Strange times.

Laura: Is this the detour that we should do instead of doing the biology?

Ron: Cut that, cut that.

Laura: Cut that. Sure. Edit. You won't cut it.

Ron: Uh, no, probably not. What? Can I see what's on the desk? A blue sharpie and a bio.

Laura: Is that anything?

Danny is our new babysitter for Child of the podcast

I've got all of this stuff here. We had to use a lot of childcare this week. I've gone back to work full time. And so we've got a, uh, lovely regular babysitter, actually, regular listener of the podcast. Danny is our new babysitter for Child of the podcast.

Ron: Hey, Danny.

Laura: So these are all my instructions for how to keep child of the podcast alive. My favourite part of this is where I said, after dinner, can offer chocolate button times one. And then, because we have to keep a food diary for child of the podcast at the moment, chocolate buttons eaten twelve. Child of the podcast, it turns out, is an absolute sass fest in convincing people who are not her parents to do anything she wants. Child of the podcast. I mean, you've seen her in the last two weeks. That child is semi capable of some things. Managed to convince Dani she can change her own nappy.

Ron: Wow.

Laura: She can't change her own nappy. Not at all. Not even close, mate. No. Uh, she doesn't make me laugh, though. Yes, I love that. Just mum and dad aren't here. I wonder what I can do. Oh, I've seen these things being changed. Let me see if I can do it. You can't, child. You absolutely can't.

Ron: Why? Why are you keeping a food diary? Because she never poops. Yeah, yeah, she's still not pooping.

Laura: No, she is. Uh, she's doing really, really well this week, but we are just continuing to keep the food diary just so that, you know, if it comes back around again, we've, uh, done the research, you.

Ron: Know, that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah, that's fair. I'm glad she's pooing.

Laura: Yeah, I'm glad we're all pooing.

Ron: Yeah, I've been doing great poos recently.

Laura: I was doing really good ones. And then the last few days I've been back at work, so my eating's been a bit sporadic. Uh, it's been nice to be at work, though.

I did radio four this week and it went well. I quite liked my piece

Uh, I did radio four this week.

Ron: Yeah, how did that go?

Laura: Well, it's confusing. Wrong, because it goes out to a lot of people. I didn't get a single tweet or message about it and you just kind of feel like you just shouted it off a bridge. I quite liked my piece. I thought it was alright.

Ron: Oh, yeah. How did our stuff about the, uh, runner go down?

Laura: It went well. They wanted it to be more about running and less about politics. And I was like, no.

Ron: Do you know who my sounding board is?

Laura: Yeah. And I was just like, there's just no point having a platform if you just don't use it to do a little bit. But I think it's the happiest I've been in the room doing that because I think when you're writing for a show like that, I write in such a different voice to what I perform in and what I'm like. And then it's exactly the same as what happened with mock the week. My last. Go on. Mock the week was my favourite one. Cause I'd worked out how to be me on it and then obviously it never happened again. And I feel like I got there with the now show. I was like performing it and messing about and being myself and I was like, I've got this. This is great. This is how I do it. And then, you know. But, um, I really liked it.

Ron: That's fun. You've got a new voiceover artist now too. Voiceover agent.

Laura: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Ron: Radio is basically voice over, isn't it? Yeah, that's how I got there. Sorry.

Laura: You should do some more adverts and I won't delete these ones.

Ron: The adverts were fun. Yeah, yeah, they were.

The Francis Galton episode goes out this Friday

Laura: Oh, uh, I meant to say in the intros, outros for the last episode that the Francis Galton episode goes out this Friday. So. Hey, look out in your feed a couple of weeks ago for the Francis Galton episode.

Ron: Yeah, we didn't do many plugs. Cause we talked for 25 minutes about other things.

Laura: Yeah, and, um, to be fair, we've been on this chat for eleven minutes, and we haven't done anything.

Ron: Has this only been eleven minutes? Fuck.

Laura: But, Ron, we haven't done anything. You can't say, has it only been eleven minutes when all we've done is talk about, like, uh, a genocide that you want to edit out anyway?

Ron: Yeah, it's just this has felt like forever.

Laura: Yeah, we got real heavy, man. Uh, this is why we don't do a politics podcast.

Ron: No.

Laura: Are you still listening to your politics.

Ron: Podcast, the news agents? Yeah, I am. I don't listen to every episode, though. Only the ones that, uh, have interesting topics.

Laura: Only the ones with nudity.

Ron: Uh, wow.

Laura: Do you think anybody out there performs their podcast in the nude? I bet there's a nude podcast. Probably Google the naked podcast. Bet that's a thing, Ron. Um.

Ron: The naked podcast, BBC radio Sheffield. Oh, yep. The filth and the fury, two besties in the buffer on a mission to get to the naked truth. Yup. She and duo Jenny Eels and Kat Harbour and undress with a guest for revealing confessions and conversations.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Who are these guests?

Laura: Not me.

Ron: Come. Uh, hairy or wax shaven or plucked. A cervical screening special with Doctor Naomi Sutton. I look kind of like a melted Barbie doll. Steph Kent talks about her gastric bypass, weight loss, loose skin and dramatic surgery. Wigs have become an epic journey for me. Custom wig maker Hailey Ekwoobiri talks hair loss, motherhood, and empowering others. I think this. Yeah, this sounds like a very positive podcast.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: Ah, why don't we see if you can go on it?

Ron: I think it's all women. I don't think they'd want me for the Viva Lavolver special, to be honest.

Laura: But you always. Viva Levolva.

Ron: Look, I've evolved a Volvo like the best of them, but I just don't think, uh. I don't think they should be taking a platform away from a naked woman and giving it to me.

Laura: Yeah. All right. Even if it's to the positive of this podcast.

Ron: Of, um. This one.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Yeah. Props.

Laura: Uh, should we do some science, Ron?

Ron: Yeah, fine.

Laura: It's biology. You can't be mad about biology, surely.

Ron: I was just. I was trying to do a fun segment where we talked about all the things on our desks.

Laura: Were you? I think that was in the. Oh, was that in this?

Ron: Yeah. Yes.

Laura: Oh, yeah. Because I picked up the notepad, and then we started talking about chocolate buttons.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: Yeah.

There's calcium in biscuits, man. So if anything, you should be feeding this kid biscuits

Ron: All right. Okay. 4.6.2. .3 are these cool rainbow straws?

Laura: Have you seen these reusable silicon straws? This one is rainbow.

Ron: Wow. You're trying a lot of different straws.

Laura: I just wanted to drink some milk.

Ron: Why?

Laura: Because they have to have calcium.

Ron: Give it to, like, a biscuit or something.

Laura: A calcium biscuit?

Ron: I don't know.

Laura: Okay, please don't give advice unless you know that the thing that you're advising exists.

Ron: Google calcium biscuit. There you go. Mick M. Vitti's thin arrowroot. Do you have a lot of calcium? No. Hang on. Yeah, it's got calcium in it. It's not really advertising its calcium properties. Hang on. There's calcium in biscuits, man. There's two. There's 235 milligrammes per hundred grammes of biscuit.

Laura: Is that a lot?

Ron: I don't know how much calcium is in milk loads.

Laura: I don't know.

Ron: There's only 125 milligrammes of calcium in 100 grammes of milk. So if anything, you should be feeding this kid biscuits.

Laura: Okay, more biscuits for charter the podcast.

Tim H 52 reviews thin Arrowroot biscuits from McVitties

Ron: All right. And for some reason, McVitie's thin Arrowroot, 200 grammes popped up first. I've never heard of these biscuits. I've got to be honest, they look a bit anaemic and weird. Let's cheque the reviews. 4.4 out of five. Lovely, lovely biscuits. Very much the same as rich tea, but less sweet. Nice and crunchy. Lovely with a cup of tea. My kids loved them. Great value for money, plain and simple. I had never heard of these biscuits before and wasn't sure what to expect. The name put me off slightly, as I imagined it tasting like a herb. But thankfully they were more like a plain but thinner. Ah. Digestive. Not something I would usually go for and, uh, maybe not choose again. But nice with a cup of tea. Three out of five stars. Tasty. I found these biscuits super tasty. They remind me of rich tea biscuits in both taste and texture. So if you're a fan of them, you'll certainly like these. They are at such a good price point for a little snack. Five out of five stars. That's Millie GC. Nice biscuits.

Laura: We simply have to do some science. We simply can't make this podcast just us begging people to stop listening. Okay, it can't be that, uh, I'm.

Ron: Kind of just fascinated as to who the fuck's writing these.

Laura: People like you. You're reading it out on your own podcast.

Ron: Yeah, but who's reviewing biscuits.com?

Laura: A couple of weeks ago, you had a whole segment about a box of broken biscuits that you'd bought, and you spent quite a long time asking me to guess how much they'd cost, how much they weighed, and then ferreting around in the box four different biscuits to tell me about your favourite one.

Ron: Youngest sister of the podcast.

Laura: Now, 18 minutes into this episode and you're talking about other people's relationships. Reviews of, uh, biscuits. You are a biscuit guy.

Ron: Younger sister of the podcast said that that was her favourite moment of the podcast so far, or something to that point.

Laura: Uh, and then she left us a one star review. It just said lack of biscuits.

Ron: In every other episode, this person's written four paragraphs.

Laura: Laura, about a biscuit.

Ron: Yeah. And then giving it three out of five. Tim H 52.

Laura: Tim.

Ron: In the realm of biscuit preferences, taste can be subjective, as evidenced by the divergent experiences within my own household. Thin Arrowroot biscuits by McVitties. While my personal palate did not align with these biscuits, my father found them to be a brilliant, rich tea alternative. And then he has three more paragraphs upon these biscuits. It's quite well written.

Laura: I imagine him sitting down at a desk with a list of everything he ate the day before and starting to type reviews like searching through the web for everywhere that thing is on offer to put that review. And then the sun goes down and he takes off his glasses and rubs his weary eyes. Is like, there aren't enough hours in the day for this. I don't understand how other people are holding down a full time, um, job and reviewing everything to a four paragraph standard.

Ron: Especially when you have to spend so much time saying that some people like some things and other people don't like those things.

Laura: Well, I don't want to be unfair to the idea of Arrowroot. I understand it is not for the common parent.

Ron: And father does like the arrowroot.

I'm listening to an audiobook and it switches to a female narrator

Laura: I've got an annoying thing, Ron. I'm listening to an audiobook. Right. The first book was like 30 hours long, and now I'm on the second one.

Ron: Is this your vampire's one?

Laura: Yeah. And it's like it's all done with, um, um, um. A vampire slayer is telling his story through it, right? But then about 10 hours into this second book, they've switched the perspective of who's telling the story for a second because the interviewer goes and interviews someone else, so they've changed the narrator. And, um, one that's a little bit annoying because I was kind of enjoying the narrator, but because it's now switched to a female perspective. They've decided they need a female narrator. That's kind of annoying. But the most annoying thing is they've not pronounced the names the same.

Ron: Oh.

Laura: And this is a modern book. Like, when did you and Tom, you googled it the other day? Like, the first book was written in 2021 or whatever. This has been written in the last three years. You're aware of the world. Even if this second narrator didn't have to listen to all of the first books, because they've done different accents for different characters and stuff, so it's kind of confusing and annoying, but they're just not even pronouncing the names the same. And you're like, this is basics, isn't it?

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: Isn't it?

Ron: Truly? The producer or whatever should pick that up in a second.

Laura: It's really quite annoying.

Ron: Yeah. That, uh, is odd.

Laura: Yeah.

We've only got 20 minutes left. That's not very long, is it

Ron: All right, Laura, should we do some science?

Laura: Yeah, we should. We've only got 20 minutes left.

Ron: There we go. That's not very long, is it? We can burn through that.

Laura: I kept my mouth shut, so that doesn't count as a burp. That was more like a tummy rumble.

Ron: Echoing around your big head.

Laura: I do have a big head.

Ron: Um. Right, Laura, here we go. 4.6.2. .3 selective breeding. So we've been doing. We kind of, um. Um, going through genetics and stuff again in biology, haven't we?

Laura: Yes.

Ron: Yeah. Um, so now we're going on to, I think, what is new? Uh, ground pastures green when it comes to it, because I don't think we've really talked about selective breeding before, have we?

Laura: You say new as well? I say new. I don't think mom or dad say new. I think they say new.

Ron: New.

Laura: You say new ground.

Ron: That's new. That's new. That's new. That's new. That's new. That's new. I've got a new tv shirt. New. I've got a new tv show that I like to watch. These shoes are new. These shoes aren't.

Laura: I think I'm gonna leave us a one star review. Fucking hell. Uh, I think that's it. I'm out. I'm, uh, out. That was it. That was the straw that broke the 7th disc.

I do not like these new biscuits. I don't. Actually, this one's a four out of five. Biscuits, biscuits,

Biscuits, biscuits, biscuits. New biscuits. New biscuits.

Ron: I do not like these new biscuits.

Laura: I don't.

Ron: I was just looking at some other products on the Sainsbury's website. Actually, this one's a four out of five. Oh, my God.

Laura: I found black beans in Sainsbury's the other day, Ron.

Ron: Nice.

Laura: Yeah. Aven razda. Sainsbury's had two different types. Me and Ron were looking for black beans to make bean burgers. Yeah, they had old El Pasos and they had another kind. Oh, you were actually, uh, distracted reading biscuit movies.

Ron: No, no.

Laura: I'm reading reviews for one litre of vegetable oil

Now I'm reading reviews for one litre of vegetable oil. Four out of five stars. Bottle caps. Did the designer try them out? The oil is fine. The problems with the bottle caps has been discussed on here since pre COVID. Why? Surely someone can sort this out. Quality, five out of five. Taste, five out of five. Value, four out of five. When they say Edna Lori.

Laura: Um, what vegetable?

Ron: Uh, a mix.

Laura: M. Do they all have oil in them?

Ron: Everything's good. Oil in it.

Laura: Everything.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: I tried to tell my audience last night about being burning coal was a clean type of energy and they thought I was crazy.

Ron: Tell me exactly what you told me.

Laura: I said coal was cleaner than M wood.

Ron: That's true.

Laura: Uh, yeah. So I said burn, um, coal. Don't have a wood burner.

Ron: Palm. Canola. Coconut. Safflower. Corn. Peanut. Cotton seed. Palm kernel. And soybean. Raw vegetables.

Laura: Safflower.

Ron: Safflower.

Laura: Safflower. It's a flower.

Ron: It's a flower. It's a noo. Safflower.

Laura: Hi.

Ron: Safflower. Oh, safflowers are pretty. They look kind of like a disco dandelion. Right? Selective breeding. Laura, podcast.

Laura: Cause, um, yeah, it's called Lion King, baby Ra.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: And she calls lions Ra. Yeah, I was talking to her about flowers this week because we've been walking to the swimming pool a lot and we walked past lots of flowers, so she now knows what tulips are and daisies and all sorts. And I was like, and these ones are dandelions. And she was walking along going, dandy ra. Dandy rah rah. Dandy ras. I was like, oh, uh, yeah, you're cool.

Ron: That's very funny.

Laura: Dandy Ra.

Ron: Dandy.

Laura: I think Dandy Ra might be my, uh, drag name.

Ron: I like it. I like it a lot. Poisonous milk?

Laura: Yeah. Did they make you piss yourself?

Ron: I honestly believed when I was a kid that I'd just die.

Laura: I thought I'd piss the bed. I thought that if you got dandelion milk on your fingers, you'd wet the bed.

Ron: Really?

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: I've not heard that one. Uh, they still like playing with dandelion tubes. They've got a satisfying stem.

Laura: This might be the stupidest thing I've ever said out loud. And the second I ask you the question, I'm gonna regret it. But you know dandelion clocks?

Ron: No.

Laura: The fuzzy ones with the, like, uh, dandelions.

Ron: Yeah, those called clocks.

Laura: Yeah, dandelion clock. And you blow it to see what the time is.

Ron: What?

Laura: However many puffs it takes to get all of the little whiskers off it.

The yellow flower turns into the clock once it's been pollinated

That's what time it is.

Ron: Let's move on. That seems like a, uh. You're older than me, but like, are.

Laura: They the boy flowers and the yellow ones are the girls? Is it like a pollination thing? Why are they both dandelions?

Ron: It's different stages. It is the yellow flower, and then once it's been pollinated, it turns into the clock.

Laura: What?

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: How?

Ron: Just grows what?

Laura: Where does all the yellow go? What the fuck? They're the same.

Ron: Yeah, those are seeds. The little what? The little tufts.

Laura: Yeah, I knew that, yeah. So it goes yellow and it goes into being a flower.

Ron: Yeah. And then bees. And that will pollinate it.

Laura: There's loads of bumblebees.

Ron: Fuck its little mouth and get it all pregnant.

Laura: And then the yellow, like, folds back.

Ron: In, I think so, yeah.

Laura: Comes back out again.

Ron: As it comes back out again as.

Laura: A big white animal, a big grey haired lady.

Ron: And then you're coming around going, what time is it? Um, and helping it out.

Laura: Ah, by spreading its seed everywhere.

Ron: Yeah. Just blowing its jizz all over the place.

Laura: We stole a load out of our neighbor's garden today.

Ron: Why?

Laura: Child of the podcast wanted more, and we'd run out in our garden, so I just leant over and picked theirs.

Ron: Picked their what?

Laura: Dandelions.

Ron: The yellow. The boys or the girls?

Laura: Girls. Well, actually, technically they'd be the boys, wouldn't they? Because they're the ones spreading the seed.

Ron: I don't know which one you mean by boys and girls.

Laura: And the same ones.

Ron: They're the same, yeah.

Laura: I never knew that. I can never tell Tom this. Ow.

Ron: Why? Did you really confidently tell him that they were boys and girls?

Laura: No, but I really laughed at him when he said he thought the brown speckled seagulls were the girls and the white ones were the boys. And I was like, no, the brown speckled ones are the juveniles, you idiot. And he'd always thought they were the girls.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: Shh.

Ron: People in shithouses didn't take shit, right, Laura, 4.6 points.

Laura: Why are we procrastinating on the one where we've got loads of the syllabus left?

Ron: I don't know, I'm trying to get.

Laura: You're not, you're not.

Ron: I just said, laura, uh, 4.62.3, which.

Laura: You know, is no way to get me interested because I hate the numbers.

Ron: Bit selective reading. Laura, what can you tell me about.

Laura: Oh, we've done this.

Ron: All right, we'll skip that bit. 4.6.2.

Laura: Haven't we talked about this? Really?

Ron: I don't think so. Well tell me what you know about.

Laura: It and then we'll, you know, if I'm building a breeding milky herd of milk cows, I'm gonna look at the cow that's got the like the most milk coming and I'm gonna want to breed her a lot in the hope that that milkiness is coming into her kids. And if I'm generally trying to be build bigger and um, bigger sheep, I'm going to get my biggest sheep and I'm going to use those for my breeding and I'll eat my smaller sheep, you know, or if I want sheep with real thick fur I'm going to breed the thickest fur in the herd the most and try and keep those traits going.

Ron: All right. And what are the upsides and downsides of this?

Laura: Um, downsides, you never know what's connected to those bits. So thick fur might go hand in hand with kidney failure and then you're getting a lot of thick furred sheep with kidney failure. Um, you're also probably smalling up the gene pool because you're giving yourself fewer, um, sheep to breed from. And the healthiest way to have a population is to have a wide variety of breeding because it gives you good dispersal of problem.

Ron: Yeah, all right, that's basically it. This doesn't necessarily mean that you have to have a really tiny gene pool, but it does mean that you have to manage it quite well. You know, you have to, you do have to stay on top of it and make sure that you're not doing that. Let me just scan, let me just scan. Um, and you do this with plants as well. That's the other thing that you've missed out there.

Laura: Yeah, I don't really understand plants.

Ron: Um, no, that's become startlingly apparent over the last five minutes.

Laura: Like there's some plants that you breed from seeds and then there's some plants that you have to, like graft. Yeah, that's wild, isn't it?

Ron: Yeah.

An interesting, uh, example of selective breeding is the wild mustard plant

An interesting, uh, example of selective breeding lore is the wild mustard plant, Brassica oleracea.

Laura: I think she played, um, Alex Mack in the secret world of Alex Mack.

Ron: No, it's actually mother of the podcast's favourite restaurant, Makot to brassica niche.

Laura: This is terrible, but for a second.

Ron: Brassica aleresia. Uh, Laura. Mhm. Do you know why it's an interesting example of a selective breed?

Laura: Because it bred itself. Um.

Ron: Oh, the doors just closed. Look at that.

Laura: Even your housemates don't want to listen to our podcast.

Ron: No, I don't think they ever have.

Laura: Um, do they know you do it?

Ron: Yeah, they once heard me screaming at you and thought I was really giving out to someone in my team at work. And I had to be like, no, that's not the kind of manager that I am.

Laura: That's the kind of teacher and brother I am.

Ron: Um, no, breeding itself, that's just quite. That's, that's non selective breeding, isn't. That's what all things do everywhere, all the time.

Laura: Ah, they do select. The whole point of evolution is that it's selective breeding, isn't it?

Ron: Yeah, but artificial selection is human intervention on that.

Laura: Are we talking about artificial selection, then?

Ron: Yes.

Laura: Okay, you didn't say that.

Ron: Well, it's apparent through context.

Laura: It's not.

Ron: Yes, it is. No, it is, because then why were all of your examples about thick kidney failure sheep?

Laura: Cause I was really trying to make it not about learning so that you wouldn't go. It's so interesting that you're a little interested in learning.

Ron: No, just because you have less self esteem than you have hair on the side of your head does not mean that that was an insult. I find it interesting that you anthropomorphize everything.

Laura: I don't know if you understand how my brain works, Ron, but I take everything anybody ever notices about me to be a criticism. M okay, so see me, I am.

Ron: Very vocal when I'm criticising you. Please don't read into the things that aren't criticisms, because I want you to feel the full impact of the criticisms. I mean, to lay at you.

Laura: And I do, Ron, but this isn't an either or situation. This is a yes. And this is. Mm hmm. M dumb bins and well done. Um, Laura, you answered that correctly, and all I'm hearing is the gaping chasm of the things that I did not answer correctly.

Ron: Yeah, sort that out, mate. M let me eat an ice cream.

Laura: I made a child of the podcast and ice cream yesterday morning. I got a mint choc chip, and she just sat there going, toothpaste, toothpaste.

Ron: So, you know I made all that hummus. Yes. Uh, last week.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Struggling to get through it, man. Kilo of hummus. Um, so then we had a barbecue yesterday.

Laura: You can't barbecue hummus.

Ron: I thought it would be funny to get some cones, give people that. I was talked out of it, but I thought that would have been really funny.

Laura: That would have been really funny. Would you have frozen it?

Ron: No, I don't think I would have.

Laura: You could still do that over the summer. You could freeze a tub of hummus. And then people be like, guys, I got an ice cream maker. And your friends would be so polite, they wouldn't want to tell you it was disgusting. That's a great prank.

Ron: Yeah. I'll think of a way to pull that off. Tricko.

Laura: I finally had a broccoli I genuinely enjoyed yesterday

Uh, big summer trigger. Uh, Laura, the wild mustard plant is an interesting example of selective breeding because of all of the different things that we have selectively bred out of it. Cauliflower, cabbage, brussels sprouts, broccoli, kale, and kohlrabi are all just this plant, but bred in different directions.

Laura: Brassicas.

Ron: Yeah, brassica oleracea. So with cauliflower, they just bred the ones that had, uh, big flower buds, and then that eventually becomes the cauliflower.

Laura: I really like cauliflower now. I'm a vegetarian. I've grown to love it.

Ron: I like it, but it's not as good as broccoli.

Laura: I actually finally had a broccoli I genuinely enjoyed. Yesterday. I made a miso paste sauce thing, um, with miso soy sauce, maple syrup, oil, and something else in it, um, to, like, put on aubergines and have baked aubergines. And then I had half a broccoli in the fridge. So I was like, I'm just gonna whack that in. And I'll smack some of this paste on that too. Roasted it in that paste. Actually. Delicious. I actively wished I had more of it. I've never felt like that about a green vegetable before.

Ron: You do have a child's mouth. I love broccoli. I genuinely, at least once a week, would have steamed broccoli for lunch.

Laura: Yuck.

Ron: With some sweet potatoes and some sprouts. Sometimes a red pepper.

Laura: I like hummus often.

Ron: Homemade hummus.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: I used to grate cheese on that to, uh, bring me some joy. But I don't do that anymore. I don't have cheese in the house. It's gone.

Laura: I've been grating carrot on a lot.

Ron: Of stuff instead of cheese. That's fucking deranged, you ugly hippie.

Laura: No, you're just, like, on a salad.

Ron: Oh, uh, right.

Laura: That's, like, nachos is great. Carrot all over instead of cheese.

Ron: Mmm. Pizza. Uh.

Laura: God, I'm depressed. That depressed no.

Ron: Yeah, I like a bit of grated carrot. It's good in salads because then it holds on to all of the fat and sugar.

Laura: Yeah, it really holds onto balsamic.

Ron: Well, it's so wet, it means you kind of have to eat that salad, that session, though, because I find all of the liquid will pour out of it when you put it in some kind of.

Laura: How about you, Ron? You cook like a Middle Eastern grandmother for friends and offspring that you simply don't have. Like, it's like you're unaware of the concept of just making food for the meal you're about to have. I don't think I've ever known you cook anything that didn't require eight tupperwares.

Ron: I show love through cooking, so. And then I make lots because I love.

Laura: Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. We're on the same page.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: You and me. Same choir buddy.

Ron: And, you know, it's. Let's just say.

Laura: But, like, when you're grating carrot, just grate how much you want to eat today and then stop grating and put the carrot back in the fridge.

Ron: Oh, nah, but, like, what am I gonna do with half a carrot?

Laura: Grate it tomorrow. Tomorrow?

Ron: Well, then I don't know.

Laura: And then it won't be weeping carrot pus all over your fridge.

Ron: Why don't put loose grated carrot in the fridge? It's in a box. I'm just saying it gets a bit wet in my salad.

Laura: Yeah, but then if you don't grate it, it won't get wet. It's like keeping your carrot in a nappy. That's what a carrot is, a nappied carrot.

Ron: I often start cooking meals and then try and invite people over halfway through. Cause I've made too much food. Oh, uh, that says the number of.

Laura: Times I've spoken to you on a Thursday and you are on your fourth of the same lunch because you just made so much on a Monday. And then you try and pass it off as batch cooking when actually it's just Monday's lunch got out of hand.

Ron: Well, the thing is, like, you know, you build your dinner off one ingredient. It's like you get a tin of beans. But I don't want the beans to be that. Well, uh, with bean chilli, I do, but you know what I mean? Like, you gotta work it around the smallest unit. And sometimes that means fuckloads of stuff because I like a bit of variety.

Laura: How are you having a variety having the same thing every day?

Ron: Well, no, but, you know, like, I make a bolognese or something. And I don't just want it to be whatever I want it to be. Mushrooms and other bolognese is a bad example. Bolognese is a bad example. There's not that much in it. You know, like, I have a curry and, you know, like, I want a bit of paneer in there and pepper and spinach and broccoli and mushrooms.

Not everything freezes. Well, most stuff freezes. But the potatoes didn't freeze well

You know, I want a bit, but then it becomes massive because.

Laura: But then just make a load and then portion it up and freeze it.

Ron: Not everything freezes.

Laura: Well, most stuff freezes.

Ron: It all freezes. I've got a fucking freezer full of, um, smoked mackerel stew. But the potatoes didn't freeze well.

Laura: What do you mean the potatoes didn't freeze well? They're coming out all grainy, drainy, grainy.

Ron: M like a mealy apple.

Laura: Oh, no, we hate mealy apples.

Ron: We hate mealy apples. Pro union. Down with mealy apples. Anyway, cabbage comes from the terminal leaf.

Laura: That's it. That's the end of the episode.

Ron: Uh, at least let me finish this small smear of content that we started.

Laura: We didn't start anything because we're gonna.

Ron: Have to lose five minutes up at the top.

Laura: Why? Ah. Uh, uh.

Ron: Cabbage comes from the terminal leaf buds. Brussels sprouts from the lateral leaf buds.

Laura: Is this going to be. This is going to have to be in the quiz, isn't it?

Ron: Broccoli is the flower buds stem.

Laura: Hang on. Cabbage terminal. What else did you say?

Ron: Brussels sprouts. Lateral.

Laura: Excuse me? Brussels lateral.

Ron: Kale is the leaves.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: And Kohlrabi is the stem.

Laura: What did you say about broccoli?

Ron: Flowers, flower buds, and stem.

Laura: All right. Well, yeah.

Ron: And what people did was they recognised we could eat this plant, and then they just bred the ones that had the biggest leaves together until we had kale. And, you know, Barbara broccoli.

Laura: Oh, my God. You can't tell me this fact again, and I'm gonna keep it.

Ron: Barbara Broccoli, the woman that's behind modded M. James Bond, she's not named after broccoli.

Laura: I said broccoli. I will sit here and talk into the microphone without my headphones on. Ron, if you start saying it again when I put these back in, I'm just going to end it. And the next thing the listeners will hear is a sting, and there will be a quiz, which will just be me going cabbage terminal, Brussels lateral kale leaves, kohlrabi stem, broccoli, flower buds, and stem, and that'll be it.

Ron: Kali is named after.

Laura: Biology Hiya. Hi. There was absolutely naffle content in this episode, wasn't there?

Ron: Yeah. So I'm gonna stop playing with that. Um.

Laura: What are you playing with? You, Willy.

Ron: Put it away.

Laura: Capo.

Ron: Or a capo, as Americans would say it.

Laura: Really? Yeah, because don't they call Capo is like a boss in the mafia.

Ron: Capo tan capo.

Laura: Hmm.

Ron: Anyway, uh, yeah, there really was not a lot of content in this episode.

Laura: Cabbages. Cabbages, cabbages, cabbages.

Laura: I take constipation medication to keep me constipated

Ron: All right, um, so what we're going. So what I've decided to do, Laura, is I've got a few questions that we're going to talk about, but then, uh, you're also going to answer some riddles. The more you take, the more you leave behind. What am I?

Laura: Um, constipation medication.

Ron: It works. But no, the answer is footsteps and you leave footprints. Now, I don't really rate this riddle very highly because those are different things.

Laura: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The more you take, the more you leave behind. Yeah.

Ron: I just think it would be cleaner if it was the same thing.

Laura: I didn't think like that. I thought, what can you take more of in order to leave? More like you don't eat poo to leave the poo in your butt.

Ron: What do you mean, leave the poo in your butt? What do you think constipation medicine does?

Laura: Keeps you constipated.

Ron: Nobody wants to be constipated.

Laura: Sometimes you do. If you've got diarrhoea, you take medicine to stop pooping.

Ron: Yeah, but not to constipate yourself getting rid of diarrhoea.

Laura: No. But sometimes you need to stop pooping.

Ron: Anyway.

Can you name four distinct use cases for selective breeding

All right, first question of the actual quiz. Nora, can you name four distinct use cases for selective breeding?

Laura: No. Should I be able to? Yes, I've written down selective breeding.

Ron: Mhm.

Laura: And then it's just a list of vegetables.

Ron: Um.

Laura: Make the animals bigger.

Ron: Animals which produce more meat or milk. Ding.

Laura: Um, healthier species like breeding out weaknesses in, um, plants and animals. Plants.

Ron: Disease resistance in food crops. Ding. Good job, Laura.

Laura: Two more, um, variations to vary the food supply. For example, brassica or laceria.

Ron: No, not giving you that one.

Laura: Why?

Ron: Because that's not one.

Laura: Making up new foods.

Ron: No, I'm not giving you that one.

Laura: Why?

Ron: Because they didn't go, you know, well, only tender stem broccoli. Did. They do that, but that happened in the nineties.

Laura: Barbara broccoli. Did you not named after a broccoli? No. Uh, Barbara broccoli or broccoli used to be called Barbara broccoli.

Ron: Is actually named after Barbara broccoli.

Laura: So you and your bloody factor. Like Tom with his fucking green wasabi. Jesus.

Ron: Wow. Turn your head. Your hair at the back is great.

Laura: Is it? What's happened?

Ron: It's just you look like pride rock.

Laura: Oh, yeah, it's really sticky uppie. Mmm. Yeah.

Ron: Um.

Laura: I don't not look like a flock of seagulls right now.

Ron: Yeah, it's very chandler in flashbacks.

Laura: It is, isn't it? Um. That's fun. I've got a triangular head, like an upside down ice cream. Um, right. So, improving meat supply, disease resistance, um, selective breeding.

Ron: What other things do we breed?

Laura: Babies.

Ron: What is always.

Laura: Oh, dog species specific species of dogs. Like getting, um, sexy dogs for crafts.

Ron: I'll give you it. Domestic dogs with gentle nature, usually because we're taming them from wolves. And, um, the last one we didn't actually talk about, but we talked about any of this. The last one, um, is. How can I lead you there? I'm not gonna bother you. Don't get it. It's large or unusual flowers.

Laura: Yeah, that one's stupid. That one's really stupid. I used to have a great book about a man that grew a big marrow and then a big slug, I think ate the town. Abet Cole.

Ron: Yeah, great. I remember that one.

Laura: Abet Cole. Enormous vegetables. It was something like that.

Ron: And then all the bugs got really big to eat the enormous vegetables.

Laura: Yeah, yeah, yeah. The trouble with Granddad. Yeah, that's what it's called. And he made these massive vegetables and then, like, they made a police, um, station out of a big marrow.

Ron: Oh.

Laura: Great book.

Ron: Yeah, great stuff. What a nice granddad. Really nice granddad in that.

Laura: Troubling, though.

Ron: Good stuff.

What eight letter word can have a letter taken away and still makes a word

Anyway, so, Laura.

Laura: Yep?

Ron: What eight letter word can have a letter taken away and still makes a word? Take another letter away and it still makes a word? Keep on doing that until you have one left. What is the word?

Laura: What. What eight letter word can?

Ron: What eight letter word can you keep on taking letters away and it still makes a word until you've just got one letter? Um.

Laura: Um. Oh, is it, ah.

Ron: Remove one letter from it? Ah, remove m one letter from it? Ah, remove one letter from it? Ah, ah, remove one letter from it. Remove one letter from it. Ah, uh, remove one letter from it. Ah, uh, remove the last letter from it.

Laura: A.

Ron: Well, it does work. It's not the one I've got written down, but I'll give you the mark for that. The answer that they've got is starting.

Laura: Tarting.

Ron: Staring.

Laura: Oh, I thought it had to be from each end.

Ron: Nobody told you that?

Laura: That's not a riddle. As much as you've lost a day sitting down doing a puzzle.

Ron: Yeah, that's, that's not a riddle. That's. They worked out that you could do this with the word starting and then.

Laura: Yeah, that's not a riddle. If a sphinx said that to me, I'd just walk away.

Ron: I think if I was to use this riddle more, I'd. Or like, you know, if I wanted it to be more clever, I'd like say what eight letter words start or like, what words starting with eight letters. You know, like have it in. Um. Cause it goes starting. Staring. String.

Laura: Sting.

Ron: Sing. Sin in. I. Yeah.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: It does work, but it's not exciting.

Laura: No. And also this would have been a very long quiz if I'd actually sat down to work that out.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura, please discuss the mechanism with which that selective breeding takes place

Laura, please discuss the mechanism with which that selective breeding takes place.

Laura: What are, uh, you talking about, mechanism?

Ron: Yeah, how does it work?

Laura: A lock?

Ron: Yeah, like a lock. Describe the lock that's involved with selective breeding.

Laura: What do you mean mechanism?

Ron: How it works? How do you selectively breed?

Laura: You choose two animals that have the features that you want and you breed them together and hope that their babies have it.

Ron: And then.

Laura: And then you get, you know, more and do it again.

Ron: More what?

Laura: More ones with the features you want. Smash them together.

Ron: Where do you get the more from?

Laura: Like maybe from the offspring. Or maybe you have to use another one if none of the offspring had it.

Ron: Yeah. Alright. I'll give you half the marks for that.

Laura: Why?

Ron: It's a bit of shit. No, this wasn't very good. It wasn't wrong, but it just wasn't good.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: Okay, Laura, what has a head, a tail is brown and has no legs.

Laura: A head, a tail is brown and has no legs. I don't know why that is. Brown is so funny. Um, a poo.

Ron: No, it's not a poo. Boos don't have heads or tails.

Laura: They do, do they? Yeah. Um, what about a penny?

Ron: It is a penny. Is it because I said heads or tails like that?

Laura: No, I just thought for longer after my joker ever poo.

Ron: Okay, Laura, what are the downsides of selective breeding and how do they occur?

Laura: You, um, might be breeding in weaknesses that you can't see in the genome because they're quiet bits. You have a genetic variation. A species is always stronger with big genetic variants. The more you downpipe the genes, the easier it is for things to go wrong. Um, and dogs can't breathe sometimes.

Ron: I wasn't listening. Can you say all of that again?

Laura: No. Rewind the tape. Thank you.

Can you name three consecutive days without using the words Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday

Ron: Okay, and last question. David's father.

Laura: The doctor is his mother.

Ron: David's father has three sons. Snap, crackle. And who?

Laura: David.

Ron: It is David. These riddles suck. Can you name three consecutive days without using the words Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday or Sunday?

Laura: Yesterday, today, tomorrow.

Ron: Yes. I thought Christmas Eve, Christmas. Boxing day.

Laura: I love it, Ron. Yes, Maundy. Thursday. Good. Friday.

Ron: No, because you said Thursday and Friday.

Laura: Oh, yeah, well, I got it right the first time, so.

Ron: Whack.

Laura: Whack.

Ron: A doctor and a bus driver are, ah, both in love with the same woman and an attractive girl named Sarah. Sorry, not ant. A doctor and a bus driver are, uh, both in love with the same woman. An attractive girl named Sarah. The bus driver had to go on a long bus trip that would last at least a week. Before he left, he gave Sarah seven apples. Why?

Laura: To keep the doctor away. Yeah, every day.

Ron: That sucks as well.

Laura: That's more like a joke.

Ron: Yeah, that is a joke. I think this one's a joke as well.

What room do ghosts avoid? Once you're dead, what room

What room do ghosts avoid?

Laura: Um. Um. Hmm. What room ghosts. Oh, um, void. What are ghosts scared of? Nothing, really. What are you scared of? Once you're dead, what room do ghosts avoid? How do you get rid of a ghost?

Ron: Luigi.

Laura: Luigi room.

Ron: They're scared of Luigi.

Laura: Imagine if you went to someone's house and they just had a whole room dedicated to Luigi.

Ron: This is the Luigi's room.

Laura: Marry them. Imagine. Then you take off your clothes. You got Luigi costume underneath.

Ron: Either that or it's a Romeo and Juliet thing and you've got a mario. Yeah, or worse, a waluigi.

Laura: Waluigi. Um, wait, what was the question? What room? What wouldn't a ghost want to hang out?

Ron: I'll give you a clue. It's not a specific room. As in it's not like the Oval Office.

Laura: Okay. It's a type of room.

Ron: Yeah.

Laura: Okay, so ghosts, they might be jealous of people with bodies. That's not really such body room. Oh, yeah. They like to say, ooh, boo. Spectre boots. Boot. The boot route. But you'd think they'd love that because they love to say boo. I'm struggling with things that ghosts aren't into.

Ron: They're such a happy ghost.

Laura: Fewer limitations. What does a ghost not want? A busting room. I don't know, Ron. This one's got me stumped.

Ron: The living room.

Laura: Oh, it was staring me in the face.

Ron: You're in the living room.

Laura: I'm in the dining room.

Ron: You better start believing in living rooms, Laura. What belongs to you but is used by more, by others?

Laura: What belongs to me but is used? My name.

Ron: Yes. You live in a one story house made entirely of red wood. What colour would the stairs be?

Laura: There wouldn't be any. I live in a one story house.

Ron: Yeah. You don't get caught out.

Laura: No.

Ron: I am not alive, but I grow. I don't have lungs, but I need air. Ah. I don't have a mouth, but water kills me. What am I, a plant?

Laura: No. They are alive. Mould. Black mould.

Ron: Also alive.

Laura: Oh, um. Say it again.

Ron: I'm not alive, but I grow. I don't have lungs, but I need air. I don't have a mouth, but water kills me.

Laura: I don't know. Don't know that one.

Ron: Fire.

Laura: Fire. Uh, yeah. Still, after all these years.

Ron: Don't understand. Um.

Laura: Fire gets me m every time.

Ron: All right, last one. Last.

Laura: I think it because it said air. And actually, a fire does not need air.

Ron: It needs oxygen, which is in the.

Laura: It is in the air. On. But it could be in a vacuum that just had oxygen and didn't have the other components of air and it would be fine.

Ron: Sure.

A boy was at a carnival and went to the bottom

Laura: Science.

Ron: Last one.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: A boy at a carnival. A boy was at a carnival and went to a booth where a man said to the boy, if I write your exact weight on this piece of paper, then you have to give me $50. But if I cannot, I will pay you $50. The boy looked around and saw no scale. So he agrees, thinking no matter what the carnie writes, he'll just say he weighs more or less.

Laura: Can't say Carney anymore.

Ron: In the end, the boy ended up paying the man $50. How did the man win the bet?

Laura: Wait, say it again.

Ron: A boy was at a carnival and went to the bottom.

Laura: You can leave out all the illustrations.

Ron: A boy was at a carnival and went to a booth where a man said to the boy, if I write your exact weight on this piece of. It's dollars, isn't it? Um. Oh, my God. If I ride your exact weight on this piece of paper, then you have to give me $50. But if I cannot, then I will pay you $50. The boy looked around and saw no scale. So he agrees, thinking no matter what the carnie, the carnival working man, writes, he'll just say he weighs more or less. In the end, the boy ended up paying the man $50. How did the man win the bet?

Laura: Maybe he meant wait, as in how long you're going to wait.

Ron: Nope. That's not the case.

Laura: Maybe this scales.

Ron: Good.

Laura: Thank you. That's when it helps to think in spellings. Um, the chair made of scales.

Ron: What chair?

Laura: I don't know. Or the booth was a weight. A weighing machine? No, the little boy was just too innocent. Just couldn't lie. I was so surprised that the man realised.

Ron: Realised what?

Laura: What he weighed.

Ron: How the man know?

Laura: He's just good at looking at him and gauging it.

Ron: No.

Laura: Did he use one of those? Um. Um. He like put a hook in the back of his neck, lifted him up on one of those like suitcase weighing things.

Ron: No, this one's really dumb.

Laura: Um, um. Do all little boys weigh the same?

Ron: The man, it says in the answer, the man did exactly as he said he would and he wrote your exact weight.

Laura: That, uh, one's rubbish.

Ron: That one's rubbish.

Well, I did much better on riddles than I did on science

Laura: Well, I did much better on riddles than I did on science.

Ron: Yeah, that was fun, wasn't it? We should have done a riddles podcast this whole time. Put it on the list. We'll do a riddles Patreon episode.

Laura: Okay.

Ron: And we should make up our own riddles for each other.

Laura: Oh, yeah. Going in.

Ron: That will be.

Laura: What's that? A, uh, wet break. That's a wet break really, isn't it?

Ron: It's nothing. If anything, it's a wet break.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: Pop quiz in a while.

Laura: Well, no, we were still the fucking time. Um, we were scheduled to have one, but then because we started recapping physics, I thought we will leave off pop quizzes for a bit.

Ron: What a merry time that was.

Laura: So much biology.

Ron: Yeah, I liked the bit where we talked about biology. And you know what my second favourite bit was?

Laura: Was it where we. And then you can cut and edit a bit of it to put in here.

Ron: I won't do that.

Laura: We play it like a clips episode.

Ron: Um. Um, no, my second favourite bit would have been the quiz, probably. Uh, for me, it goes main bulk and then quiz. Those are my two favourites. What about you?

Laura: I think I loved all the sound effects. I was really surprised by all the new sound effects that you chose to use in that episode. I thought that was really clever.

Ron: Are you talking about your ear?

Laura: No, because we don't actually know if that was in this episode. No, I mean all of the downloaded sound effects that you found and put in and enjoyed doing. Um, I liked the interjections where you recorded little bits to put in as like mini reviews of the podcast as it was going along.

Ron: Why are you putting all this pressure on when I've got to do all of this in a day, including intros.

Laura: Outros, because you've just had a holiday, so fuck you.

Ron: Well, you, you never do anything and then you go on holiday and then you. You come back and it's the same old shite every week, mate.

Laura: I'm slogging through our fucking bank holiday episode, trying to sort it out so that we're not having conversations with nine years ago versions of ourselves.

Ron: Yeah, well done.

Laura: Why are you so antagonistic? Have you not had lunch?

Ron: I have had lunch.

Laura: Oh, then you're just being horrible. It's not even that you're hungry. No, I have to go to dentist.

Ron: Anything? I'm full, I'm hungry.

Laura: Maybe it's me being horrible. No, it's you. Anyway, um, Ron, I wanted to say to the patrons, I haven't forgotten the tea towel. The tea towel is still in development. I just haven't had a chance to sort it all out yet. But child of the podcast now goes to nursery, so I have a few hours a week to get some stuff done. So it's coming. I reckon it'll be sort of in the pipeline by the summer, so do keep your eyes peeled, then you can.

Ron: Dry your teas with this towel.

Laura: Yeah, man, you can have so much tea, you can drain all the tea from the towel.

Ron: What do you think they called tea towels before people started drinking tea in the UK?

Laura: I think people have been drinking tea since before towels existed.

Ron: Then what did they dry things with before tea?

Laura: I don't think they did dry things. I think you just, um, had things dirty and wet.

Ron: You don't think the Romans had towels?

Laura: I think the Romans had tea.

Ron: I don't think the Romans had tea.

Laura: I think the Romans had tea because they inspected tea leaves.

Ron: What?

Laura: Yeah, they were all into tea leaves, weren't they?

Ron: Tea.

Laura: And I don't mean thieves. For all our cockney listeners, some of.

Ron: The foods that we know and love today were unknown to the Romans, including bananas, chilli, pepper, corn, sugar, peanuts, tea, rice, chocolate, tomatoes, potato and coffee. No, they didn't have tea.

Laura: Yeah, they fucked me.

Ron: Can you imagine how productive they'd have been at, ah, you know, screwing the world up if they were caffeinated while.

Laura: They were doing it?

Ron: Jesus Christ.

I wonder what Romans drank wine and what it might have tasted like

Laura: I'm often interested in what, um, you know, like, because Romans drank wine and stuff. I wonder what that wine actually tasted like. Do you think we'd have recognised it as wine?

Ron: I think so. Because it'd still be made out of grapes. I do wonder. Yeah, I think what would have varied or could have potentially varied would have been, um, how strong it was because they, you know, because they had, you know, wine sort of feels a very specific, um, a very specific type of drink for us, you know, whereas for them there's, you know, they didn't have Bailey's or, um, tia maria or like, schnapps, probably. So I think, you know, wine might have been more wide reaching in the same way that, like, people used to drink, like, really weak beer because all the water had poo in it.

Laura: Yeah. I got distracted thinking about a bit I could do about how before tea towels, we had teat owls and you would use a heavily nippled owl to dry your stuff.

Ron: Weirdly, that's actually a joke that's already been done in, uh, pappy's flat shirt.

Sometimes words do do that. Like, I was listening to etymologicon

Slammed down the episode with Paul F. Tompkins.

Laura: Oh.

Ron: Ow.

Laura: Yeah. Because do you know, sometimes words do do that. Like, I was listening to this thing called etymologicon, that book that I enjoyed. And, um, did you know that aprons used to be called naprons? And it's an example of the n moving from the a ah, from the word to the a. So it used to be a ah, Napron. And then it like, changed within language to become an apron. And sometimes ends and, like, words like that just sort of jump from one to the other.

Ron: Interesting.

Laura: Yeah.

Ron: I guess that because it goes from the nape of your neck.

Laura: Yeah, maybe. Yeah. Can you hear shout out the podcast?

Ron: Yeah, yeah.

Laura: She's so great at the moment.

Ron: Thank you for your support, but maybe not. Maybe we don't appreciate you at all

Um, um, it's time for the register. On, um.

Ron: Register. Dum da da dum da da dum.

Laura: By the day of recording, it's only seven months until the next advent calendar.

Ron: Um, register.

Laura: It's a very special register today, Ron, with only one person on the register, and that person is Kristin. Kristin got in touch to say, hey, dudes, where's my thank you? And we were like, we've fucking done it. Kristen, you idiot. Shut up. Yeah, Kristen did some research. We haven't done it, Ron. We bloody haven't done it. No, what happened, Ron, is Kristin is one of the absolute swarthy brillianters that left us a review on Apple podcasts. And we read that out and said, thank you for that, but we haven't thanked them for being a patron.

Ron: Fucking what?

Laura: Kristen, I don't think we can blame Kristen for this. Kristin has done, um, two good things for the patron. I financially supported it and left us a review. That's real nice. And for some reason.

Ron: No, I can see it here on the list Kristen L. Keytar player for Bob Marley as they cheer up the ho downing sad boys. However, they are leaving the band due to a past torrid love affair with one of the sound engineers, aka neutrons. They're the third person we did it for.

Laura: Oh, so what? Right, right back. No, we went. When did we start doing the register?

Ron: Fuck news.

Laura: Okay, well, say that again. Less angry with Kristen.

Ron: No, Kristen. You kiss your own ass.

Laura: No, Kristen. Um. Smooch. What's the opposite of kissing your own eyes? Just. Just appreciate it without touching it. Appreciate that ass, but take the lips away. I don't mind thanking people twice, Ron. And thanks for the review and, um, for the patron money. We're so grateful to all of it. And, um, for some reason, software that shows us we've got reviews sends me your review every third month or so. So I just get to reread it and I like it. Also, thank you to the person that left a review that literally just said, this is to counteract the one star review, uh, and called them a butt muncher or something that really love that energy. It was a quote of yours. They said, munch some fat turds or something. What was it? Hang on. Oh, another Ron sound effect. Meaty tads. That was it.

Ron: Meaty tads.

Laura: Uh, eat a bag of meaty dads. Thank you. Uh, tiny ninja 22. Very grateful.

Ron: Yeah. But. Yeah, Kristen, get outtaown. You, uh, you're in. You. You got a classic lex ed reference for yours. Sad boys. Really pervasive. Comes from episode fucking two. So if that's not good enough for you, you can have the Patreon money back.

Laura: I think it.

Ron: What?

Laura: No, they can't. It's already spent and on gel pens. And second, I think it was good enough, Ron, there was just some confusion. Please stop being so angry and bitter.

Ron: No, I worked really hard at this podcast. No, you can't. I can't be having. Can't be having listeners just like we're not.

Laura: Look, Ron, we can't remember what happens in this episode. People are listening to.

Ron: You want them to shut your whore's mouth as well? Look, I have kept up one segment, one segment in the episode, so I.

Laura: Don'T know if we're gonna say that this is a segment that's been kept.

Ron: Up, so I won't. I just won't have it.

Laura: That was nice, wasn't it? What a lovely end to the episode. Thank you for your support, but maybe not. Thank you. Maybe fuck you. Maybe. Maybe we don't appreciate you at all. And it's all just a, uh, thin veneer of pretending to be your friend in a parasocial relationship so that you give us money. Maybe it's that. Is that what you want, Ron?

So I wasn't listening. It was just say, class dismissed. I thought it would be funny if I was just cross

Ron: So I wasn't listening.

Laura: Jesus Christ.

Ron: We love you. Really, everyone? I thought. I thought it would be funny if I was just cross.

Laura: It was just say, class dismissed.

Ron: Oh, sorry, Claustus. That's another segment. That's another segment that I've kept.

Laura: I have to remind you, every dang day.

Ron: Yeah. Do I have to say it? Uh.