Bugle 4124 - Peak Nigel

The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world.

Hello buglers and welcome to issue 4124 of The Bugle.

Quick protest before we start.

What do we want?

An in-depth statistical analysis of modern industrial farming techniques and all the latest gossip from Saudi Arabian TV soap operas.

When do we want it?

Now?

Well, I for one, I'm not giving in to protest.

I'm not going to cave in and roll over, so instead, we're going to do a regular bugle episode, ignoring those two subjects.

Joining me to not contemplate the yield per acre of genetically modified oats in a non-El Nino year in farms of at least 1,500 acres in size, a long overdue welcome back from her globetrotting travels to the quibbling sibling herself, Helen Zaltzmann hello Andy.

Hello Helen.

Welcome back.

Thank you.

It's been ages.

How many countries have you been to since you were last on this August audio newspaper?

When was I last on this August newspaper?

Quite a long time ago, isn't it?

Yeah, I'd say at least six.

Right, and what's...

I mean, who's winning?

Which has been

the best of all the countries?

Oh, shit.

I mean, do you really want to get into that?

Because it's very contentious.

Right.

You really need to go to at least 128 countries and then you can do a knockout.

like Wimbledon, seven rounds.

After World Cup.

Yeah.

Great.

It's 34 episodes since Helen was on this.

I know, Chris

has got quite into the stats engine.

34 episodes.

You've dropped off on him at last.

Yeah.

And how much is that how you do your calendar now, Chris?

Just bugle episodes rather than weeks and months and things.

Yes, it is.

It's the only true way.

My daughter is 400 bugles old.

Well, that is surprising news.

Oh, it's being Chris.

Oh, I see, right?

I'm very

attributed speech, yeah.

Just think that's not the kind of thing you should break between family on a podcast.

Any news?

Not really.

Things have

not much changed, to be honest.

Well, there's been a lot of sport on, I guess.

Lots and lots of sport.

Happy for you.

Yeah, I can't believe you were out of the country during the Cricket World Cup.

That is insane, isn't it?

Didn't know Cricket had a World Cup.

Right.

You are a constant disappointment to me.

And from New York, not here to talk about whether Hafsa, freshly home after completing her doctorate in the USA, will be allowed to walk to the shop unchaperoned in the latest thrilling episode of Theocratic Patriarchy Street.

Another also welcome back to Hari Kondabolu.

Hello, Andy.

It's been a few months.

Yes.

I think since I've been on it.

I want to report to you in the several months that I have not been on this podcast, upwards of three people have stopped me to tell me they listened to the bugle.

Right.

Upwards of three.

Well, that's anything between

three and eight billion.

So we'll take that.

That's probably something.

Oh, is that what upwards means?

Yeah.

Okay, then let me say

three.

Right.

Well, that's not upwards of three.

That is three.

That is

downwards of four, upwards of two.

It's on a level with three.

Yeah, three did not have to be qualified.

You're right.

It's three, three people, including one yesterday on the F-train, a British fellow, a bloke, will you,

said that he was a fan of me

on the bugle, and I said

on the recording.

Right, no, no, no, no.

Not interested in that.

Interested in me groaning with Andy's puns.

The F-Train was your

nickname on the wrestling circuit, wasn't it?

Haven't you missed this?

I went to school with a boy called F-Train.

Boost me in a band called F-Train.

They'll just get him out of the way, shall I?

I mean,

it works for organised religion, isn't it?

You just keep repeating the same formula.

It becomes.

We are recording on the 4th of October 2019.

Don't forget the 7th and 8th of October, Monday and Tuesday of next week, are the north anniversaries of the Bugle Live shows at the Stand Comedy Clubs in Glasgow and Newcastle, featuring me and Alice Fraser.

Do come along to both of those if you feasibly can.

On the 4th of October in 1927,

work began on the sculpting of Mount Rushmore.

by a sculptor named Gutz on Borglum.

What a name that is.

Strong.

Have you come across him in your

Guts on?

Have you ever done a podcast about Gutson Borglum?

I think on Answer Me This, we talked about the origins of Mount Rushmore because it's quite an arrogant thing to do to carve a mountain.

Yes.

I think.

Yeah.

You think?

Have you tried?

I would say.

I haven't because I feel like it's a bit disrespectful.

To the mountain.

Yeah.

And also other people who might want to look at the mountain without seeing some faces on it.

But he's not sculpted all mountains, Helen.

There's other mountains you can look at that don't have political sculpted more than no mountains.

There's also Stone Mountain in Georgia that I can't remember whether he directly had involvement in or whether it was inspired by him, but that is a problematic mountain now.

Yes,

that's very much a Confederate mountain, isn't it?

I don't feel like geology got a choice as to whether it was going to be a Confederate or non-Confederate, and this is why I do not care for the carving of a mountain.

It's just so hard to get consent out of a rock.

That's right, Andy.

That is why

just assume if you're not getting enthusiastic consent from the mountain to carve it, do not carve it.

Right.

Two things it's very hard to get out of the stone: blood and informed consent.

So, but of course, Mount Rusmore's days could be numbered.

Rumours from within the White House suggest it could be blown up next week and replaced with a disconcertingly priapic Jeff Coons plastic statue of Donald Trump.

So, there we go, onwards and upwards.

On the 5th of October in the year 816, King Louis the Pious was crowned Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.

Did not entirely live up to his name, as he later condemned his nephew to death before commuting it to blinding, getting criticised in the Tableau press at the time for going soft on crime, then blinding his nephew, who then died anyway from his wounds after two days of what we can only assume was quite indescribable pain.

So not.

Well, that doesn't scream piety to me.

Not a great uncle.

No.

It's a good story, though.

I can't believe there has not yet been a Broadway musical about it.

Something must have gone wrong

in the works.

As always, the section of Bugle is going straight in the bin.

This week, festivals.

The tickets for next year's Glastonbury Festival apparently sold out in under half an hour.

So we give you a rundown on the other festivals you might like to consider if you're a festival goer, including Mono Fest.

This is a one-person festival service that comes to your house, pitches a tent just for you in your garden, puts a portaloo up, plays music you're not really familiar with in a largely inaudible way, then keeps you up all night with speakers, playing a remorseless bass throb as if from a disco tent in a nearby woodland clearing, pisses on the side of your tent at 5 a.m., overcharges you for food and drink, and periodically says, oh, the mud.

Also, Festicuffs next summer.

It's a pugilism themed festival in which the bands have to physically fight each other for the right to play a set.

Questival, that's a festival really all about the CNN legend Richard Quest.

Alt-Reitermont, that's the Breitbart-sponsored Conservative Thrash Festival at the classic Altamont venue in California.

Some brilliant right-wing thrash acts including Intolerate, Narky Nark and Petula Petula the Strongman Ruler, and headlines The Misogyny of the Lamp.

Steve Bannon also playing a set in the Acoustic Tent, a collection of children's nursery rhymes, given a classic Bannon alt-right twist.

And Codger Fest.

I recommend that for men over the age of 75, with bands including Alvin and the Alzheimer's, The Hip Hop Daytime Trance Acts, Senescence, Octogenaria, and Mega Slow Megadeth.

Plus, a performance of the Hughes New Rock Opera for the old Colostomy.

If you miss this, Helen, I mean, I wrote that specially for your return to this show.

You shouldn't have.

Right, and you're quite right.

Anyway, that section is in the bin.

Top story this week, America.

Well, Harry's just well, I mean, you can bring us up to date with what's been going on in impeachment land.

Well,

there's been continued ferry.

The Democrats have decided that they're trying to push on with impeachment, so they're doing an inquiry, which is really exciting.

And I feel like after the whole process is over,

you know, we'll finally get Trump out with like a year left to go in his second term.

So that's fantastic.

Very timely.

That's right.

12.5% off.

Can't argue that.

It's time for revolution and justice, Andy.

And when I think revolution and justice, I think congressional hearings and reports.

There's going to be a lot of paperwork.

The lame as Rob style musical of that is going to be spectacular.

Just people singing on a big pile of papers.

Do we have the smoking gun yet?

Or is it impossible to find a smoking gun in a room so full of smoke that you can't see the end of your own nose anymore whilst the echoes of multiple gunshots echo eternally around the walls?

It feels like there's lots of things that are close, and technically he's getting away with it.

But when you put them all together, you're like, something's going on.

Like with this phone call that he had with...

the Ukrainians, which the fact that they put out the transcript and clearly there's some indication he did some wrongdoing

and yet he's still talking about it indicates that he has no faith whatsoever in the democratic process to remove him from office

which is one thing Trump and I agree on do you think he even knows about the democratic process I mean he has no clue what any of this stuff means it is boring he doesn't want to know

and pretty and the thing is he's been right it it has been boring and it hasn't led to anything so he actually has saved his time, not being too concerned about it.

Other than a few angry tweets.

There's something.

I feel like

there's an element of banality of evil here, like in terms of how we haven't overturned.

Like

this person is as close to a tyrant as we've ever had in office.

And people are just going along with it.

And I feel like there's an element of banality of evil.

You know, people are just doing their job.

I'm just doing my job.

I don't want to question anything.

He's still the leader.

He's still the president.

I'm just doing my job.

But there's also a problem with democratic bureaucracy when you deal with madmen because bureaucracy is slow.

It's slow, right?

So he could say, I want the Constitution set on fire and the Lincoln Memorial to be in blackface.

And the Democrats would be like, well, how do we feel about this?

I don't want to come off as an elitist who doesn't like a good Constitution burning

or who makes everything like blackface about race.

Let's have a congressional hearing, but first, let's have several congressional subcommittees look at it.

Oh, you know things are heating up when there are subcommittees.

Oh, no.

That means, oh, we're going under.

We're going under the committees.

Also, 47% of people disagree with the president.

33% agree with him, and 20%

don't have an opinion because they're fing morons

and they'll likely be running for Congress.

I mean, that's quite impressive.

I should have 20% after, what, three years of

Trump.

If you've not

made up those numbers, Andy.

Give him a chance, Andy.

Just

see what happens.

Made-up numbers are, you know, what it's all about.

I mean,

loves to make up numbers and things.

Yeah.

The 2020 presidential race, Hari, what's

who who's your pick to romp to victory?

And

what are the chances of Trump holding on to his trophy?

Oh, this country's pretty stupid.

I think it's pretty high.

I've been incredibly, like, I didn't think I could get more disappointed, and I continue to be disappointed.

I like Bernie and I like Elizabeth Warren.

Bernie's having heart issues, and so he's had to suspend his campaign,

which is upsetting.

Because the worry to me is not the heart issues part, the fact that he, I think, had to get a couple of stents.

The worry to me is that I expected him back to work the next day.

Because he's the type of guy that, like, he just pops back up.

So

that's a bit of a worry.

I still do like the idea of him as president with potentially Liz Warren as vice president, because that way you get the socialist in office for a while.

And, you know, he's like in his 70s, but he's like an old 70-something.

So that way you get Bernie Sanders as president, but you eventually get Liz Warren probably within months of him being elected.

Don't you a bit sick of

old white men being in power, Harry.

Because I am.

Oh, yeah.

Also, every other candidate is basically just publicly interviewing for a cabinet position.

They're not going to win, but they waste so much money.

Beto O'Rourke is just insulting that he's, he lost his Senate race to Ted Cruz.

And yet, after that, he feels fully qualified because he is white and mediocre, and that makes him fully qualified to run for President of the United States.

So, I mean, losing to Ted Cruz, is that sort of the equivalent of losing to a rhinoceros in a knitting competition?

Yeah, I mean, to be fair, it's in Texas, so that rhinoceros still would have gotten a percentage.

But

yeah, yeah, it's like if you can't beat Ted Cruz, what are you going to do for the rest of the country?

He really, he's been a congressman in El Paso.

So, I mean, it's just, and he speaks Spanish, kind of.

Yet more stories about Trump's lively attitude towards immigration and some

interesting tactics that he's been apparently in favor of, including a moat full of alligators and shooting immigrants in the leg.

Would the alligators be armed?

I don't know if the alligators will be doing the shooting.

I mean, why not?

In the fantasy world that the world now lives in.

An alligator, for those who don't know, is a large carnivorous reptile.

It is possible that Trump is also planning to use his moat to drown all the alligators who have made allegations against him.

Although, if all of them are drowned in the moat, of course, and even if the moat was a mile wide and 50 meters deep, the naughty Mexicans would be able to just walk over the pile of bodies.

Trump, I mean, he's denied that he's considering a moat, whether with alligators or not, for the USA.

And, I mean, I can understand that.

They don't work.

Take that from us in Britain.

We've got a f ⁇ ing massive one.

And still, still people keep coming over here for whatever reason.

And the shooting immigrants in the legs, Harry, that was apparently

to slow them down.

So it's part of practicality and then just part outright sadism.

Yeah, he was all into it until he was told that it was illegal.

Right.

Yeah, isn't it...

Isn't it frowned upon in the states to shoot not to kill?

You know, if you shoot an intruder in the arm, then you're in more likely, then you're more likely to get prosecuted than if you kill them in some states.

Yeah, especially when it's like a guest-tier country.

If they're in America and they live here, you can murder them.

But if they're guests, it seems a bit rude.

Just send them to them.

They probably won't leave.

Take their stuff away, tidy up.

It's so strange.

He's like a strange mix of Hitler and Wiley Coyote.

Why on earth is Situation

waiting to happen?

I mean, it's just so...

Here's the thing about a moat at the border to prevent immigrants.

I'm not sure if he's been to the border, but it's a desert.

It is dry.

A moat might not last in the desert.

I don't think alligators are native to the desert, as are snakes.

Like snakes you could put in the moat, but again, to expect a watery moat in the desert seems a little unrealistic.

Right.

I mean the way I'm hearing it, Hari, is you, Hari Kondabau, are suggesting a dry moat full of snakes to stop immigrants getting in.

Is that correct?

That is an interesting way

to interpret what I said.

What about

make it into a ball pit?

Right.

Balls don't evaporate like water does.

Also, I mean ball pits are.

Oh, no one comes out of all pitch.

They're a lot of alive.

They're a lot of fun, aren't they?

I don't know.

It's a distraction, isn't it?

I mean, who could not...

I mean, if you're presented with the option of walking across a border or playing in a ball pit,

ball pit's going to win every day of the decade.

It would be kind of interesting, though, if they had like a zip line and a ball pit.

And if you fall into the ball pit, you have to go back.

But if you make it past the ball pit, you get to stay.

I was thinking about that, and then I realized that these are human beings with families to feed and real-life consequences.

I have a question.

What would be the real consequences if there were no borders and no nationality?

Because it seems like a pretty arbitrary system helen i think you could probably do a you know a 200 episode series of podcasts on that question could you not yeah but if you give me like the 14 second answer andy well the pitch

um just the headlines i mean from my point of view it would really ruin international sport it would make it i mean absolute absolute mayhem but then you have shirts versus skins right like the old days um oh i'm shirts i'm definitely shirts

but they tried it in antarctica and everyone left what do you mean everyone left?

How busy was it?

Well, I mean, we don't know.

But there's no one there now, so let's assume that.

There's quite a lot of people there now.

They're in research bases, mainly.

Yeah, they don't count.

Trump has threatened to just shut the border, which presumably has certain logistical consequences given that America exports £200 billion worth of goods across that border.

So is it I mean, is it a problem in reality?

And I guess the question then is, what is reality anyway?

Are we not all living in worlds of our own perceptions?

If I may quote Donald Trump himself in one of his more philosophical moments?

I mean, does reality actually matter in when you have a moat full of crocodiles?

I mean, it really depends how rich you are, doesn't it?

Well, reality.

Whether reality matters or not.

So what is the threshold for reality mattering in terms of...

Well, I think it's richness plus a sociopathic lack of conscience.

Right.

That means

equals reality no longer impacts you.

Well, you don't have to give a shit about it and you can get away with it.

Right.

Oh, it's good to have a dream, isn't it?

Donald Trump has followed up his request to Ukraine to investigate the Biden family with asking China to do it

instead.

I mean, one assumes China was already doing it, given that they basically hacked into the souls of every single person in the entire world through their technological wizardry.

Is there any positive to be seen in this, Hari?

That we see Trump reaching out to Ukraine, reaching out to China.

This is steps on the road to a more international outlook and laying the groundwork for the day when the rest of the world is entitled, as it should be, to vote in the American presidential elections.

Which, I mean, surely, logically, given that your president actually affects the world as much as he or she, he, affects.

affects America, surely we should have some say in it.

I'm not sure if Trump reaching out is actually a sign of

creating greater friendships with the world.

Like, how do you view someone who is mean to you or doesn't even show up unless they need a favor?

Do you know what I mean?

Like,

it's kind of suspect.

Like, with the China stuff, it's like, aren't we in a trade war with them?

Like, I don't know if he knows how war works, but in the middle of the war, you can't be like, hey, time out.

I need you to do me a favor.

You can't stop.

Do you think so?

you mean generally as a human being yeah

oh what is what is happiness

well we can put that on you know what would happen if there were no borders in the world what is happiness imagine there's no heaven andy yeah um i just think that if you were happy then you probably wouldn't be such a screaming jerk all the time

that is possible but then you know maybe it is being a screaming jerk that makes him happy isn't it i mean it's you know but if he has no true understanding of uh friendship then um but he has a true understanding of screaming jerkery.

So he has a true mastery of it, I would say.

He may not understand the art.

He may just have a great instinct.

But then you're getting into the philosophical argument.

Is it happiness or is it fulfillment?

And as a screaming jerk, if he is achieving, you know...

pretty much perfect marks Nadia Komonetchis from the judges for his screaming jerkery, he's feeling fulfilled as a screaming jerk, but as a screaming jerk, he's incapable of feeling the emotion of happiness.

So is he happy?

Well, now I'm just visualising him trying to do a bar routine that Nadia commented she could have done at her peak.

It's an arresting mental image.

Yes.

And he can't.

What's what?

I mean how has America reacted to this this this late?

I mean it is quite bizarre isn't it asking China?

China to investigate and he seems to now just be completely open about it rather than trying to you know hide it behind a sort of wall of secrecy.

Do you think he's got like a fruit machine of like

what bullshit am I gonna do next and which country am I going to inveigle into it?

And it just happened to pull China.

China and Biden's.

That is the only possible explanation that makes sense of the last three years of American politics.

Just see if you can eBay one of those machines, Andy.

Right.

Add to your collection of bullshit generators.

I feel like his approach to this is like, you know how when you have a PC and you have

a bunch of computer viruses on it and things keep popping up and you can't close them faster than they pop up?

That's essentially what he's doing.

If you flood the media with as much as possible at a rate that you can't cover,

you can't react to anymore.

You can't be angry.

You're still on the previous story.

So all of a sudden, we're like, man, I can't believe this.

Did he have this conversation with Ukraine?

He just said, what about China?

And then you lose track of the Ukraine stuff.

Do you think that's a good thing?

It's brilliant, actually.

I worry a bit about what Ukraine thinks of all this because he's pretty much double timing two timing them in front of their faces well with China it's just classic kind of pickup artist technique isn't it showing interest in someone else to get the Ukraine interested in you right oh

he's read the game he's that's his government manual it is possible with China that he was just suffering from extreme parade envy because in the last week China has celebrated the 70th birthday of the Chinese Communist Party with, I mean, it was absolutely spectacular birthday party.

Did you get it a present, Ellen?

Oh, shit.

I'll put something in the post.

Right, you do that.

It's so hard to know what to buy.

What to buy, you know, a large Communist Party on its 70th birthday.

There was no birthday cake.

No, there was no birthday cake, but there was a huge parade with thousands of people doing things in alarming levels of unison and

spectacular fireworks.

I mean, a spectacular fireworks display, but the most spectacular fireworks were the ones that they just paraded around, the intercontinental ballistic missiles that apparently could blast the living shit out of shitloads of cities in America.

I mean, are you excited by this prospect, Hori, of pretty much having a proper, authentic Cold War back on,

possibly within weeks?

80s revival.

I just feel like...

Like all China is getting is like this trade,

these tariffs and stuff.

You know, like it hasn't actually been as brutal as the America has been with other countries like North Korea and Iran.

Like, when they

like, they showed this ballistic nuclear missile that's capable of breaching anti-missile defenses to reach the U.S.

And they're just showing it publicly.

And part of me is thinking, was North Korea like, for real though?

Like, after all this, you're cool with this?

Like, what do we have to do to get away with this?

Make everything you use at an incredibly low cost using slave labor?

Is that what it's going to take?

That always helps.

I mean, it's just, and also it was weird because like President Xi talked about like peaceful development.

Like they have this idea of one China, you know, with Hong Kong and Macau like part of the fold.

And he was talking about, oh, we'd peacefully work together.

And meanwhile, like they're parading weapons around.

Like, oh, yeah, we're totally going to do this peacefully.

Here's something that would destroy your stupid island.

It's like a cop holding a gun while saying, does anyone have suggestions on better policing?

Anybody?

Anybody?

I mean, from our point of view, here in Britain, you know, we are all excitedly looking forward to Brexit and

ridding ourselves of the shackles of the oppressive, undemocratic European Union and turning to countries like China instead.

And

express their freedom to parade giant nuclear missiles around their capital city on their birthday.

And it's exciting.

We think of

our post-Brexit trade future and we look at that parade in China and we think those people know how to organise stuff.

And you look at the French and they're all lounging around smoking Jitan and having coffee in cafes all afternoon.

I don't know who are we better off with, Helen?

Good lord, Andy.

I've changed.

I think this is a dangerous road to go down.

Britain has £70 billion worth of trade with China every year.

A figure that's rocketed up in the last 20 years since 1999 when, of course, we left the European Union and were finally allowed to trade ourselves again.

Oh, hang on, how's this working out?

China is our sixth-largest export market, our fourth-largest source of imports.

These deals range from telecoms, equipment, cars, and clothing to bull semen, and all those kinds of trade deals that the EU has been preventing us from ever making.

So, a bright new future of bull semen trade.

Nigel's news now.

Oh, now this is a section we've not had on the bugle before.

For once, not for Arch-related either.

This week, the world record was broken for the largest gathering of people called Nigel in one place.

433 Nigels met in a pub in Worcestershire to celebrate Nigel-ness

and also to stop the name dying out because apparently in 2016 there were no new Nigels born.

Right.

But now there was a seven-month.

2016 is that is Brexit year.

And no new Nigels.

I mean, you probably could have snuck in a Nigel maybe before about May.

Right.

But

there is a seven-month-old called Nigel who was at the gathering, so maybe the name is going to come back.

They said

a man who changed his name from Nigel to Niall came, and we convinced him to pull himself together.

Have either of you ever been to a gathering of people with the same name as you?

Informally.

No, I've done a couple of gigs that only had one or two people in who might have been called Andy, so I guess it's possible.

I'm part of a Twitter message group with the novelist Hari Kunzru and the PBS anchor Hari Srinivasan.

That's a great group.

Yeah, yeah.

Bloody good novel.

We're all jealous of Hari Srinivasan because he has at Hari on Twitter.

Yeah, it's pretty bad.

Why don't you try and get him blocked and then you can have it?

Oh, man.

I was worried you were going to say, why don't you...

My worry was that you were going to say, what if you got him killed?

And then there would be, and like, that's much more reasonable what you pitch.

Marginally.

My husband is Facebook friends with someone with the same first name and surname as him, and it's fun to see them interact.

The only other Andy Zaltzman I've ever heard about was

an American Jewish swimmer who swam for America in the Maccabee Games in the early 1980s.

Wow.

If you're listening, do email us in.

Probably better at swimming than you were.

Yes.

I got...

Well, that's when we don't need to swim.

We just wait for the tees to part and walk across.

I thought there were no other Helen Zaltzmans, but the other day

I got an email that was a legal summons for another Helen Zaltzman, but spelt with an S, not a Z.

That really gave me the shit for a minute.

I'm just looking at

the statistics on Nigel as a name in Britain.

Back in 1963, 5,500 Nigels

were born.

That was very much Pete Nigel.

When was Farage born?

64, he was born.

Oh, wow.

So he was Pete Nigel.

So yeah, Nigel Farage was born in 1964.

So this is what Farage can do.

He can utterly destroy something just by his mere presence.

5,500 Nigels in 1963.

He's born in 1964.

By 1970, it's down to 2,500.

By 1980, 400, and now, well, it's three of them.

Wow.

I mean, that's...

It's an amazing effect that that man can have on stuff.

Since birth.

I mean, at this point, is the name ruined?

I mean, because they're talking about the preservation of Nigels, but who's going to name their kid Nigel now since Nigel Farage is there?

It's just going to be a bunch of assholes.

And that means their kids are going to be assholes.

Not necessarily the kids can rebel.

Yeah, but...

Yeah, but if they rebelled, like if they truly rebelled, they'd go by their middle name or something.

I feel like they would try to eliminate the Nigel presence.

I just feel like, are we talking about

the quantity of Nigels or the quality of Nigels?

that's not being addressed in this uh this Nigel convention this would be one of the most philosophical bugles we've ever had uh it's also possible given that the the peak Nigel happened in 1963 I think that was wasn't that the year or was that the year of the D.H.

Lawrence court case in which Lady Chateley's lover was allowed to be published it was very much are you suggesting that people were in such sexual spirits that the name Nigel flourished yeah well no no that it then well once Britain became more sexually liberated they stopped calling children Nigel

And were there any Nigellas at this at this?

I mean, it's non-canonical, isn't it?

How many Nigellas are there apart from Nigela Lawson?

And that also, that sounds like a dotty 1970s film.

433 Nigels and a Nigella.

Oh, God.

Oh, no.

And apparently, the Nigels had to wear name badges that said Nigel, and then all the non-Nigels had to wear one saying non-Nigel.

Oh, my God.

It's like 1930s Germany all over again, but less so.

Druid news now, and well, Nigel's might be on the way down, Helen.

Um, but uh, Druids are very much on the comeback trail here in Britain.

Druids are doing great, Andy.

Yeah, uh, apparently, in the last decade, Druid numbers have risen from 3,000 to over 7,000 according to the British Druid Order.

And I wonder whether it's because now the British Druid Order is offering online courses in becoming a Druid.

So it's just a lot more convenient than it used to be.

Yeah, I guess that is the way, isn't it?

Have you considered druidism?

Well, no.

You live near a common, it'd be quite convenient.

Yes.

I also live near a synagogue, and I haven't been there yet in

12 years I've lived where I live.

Maybe, yeah, some kind of halfway house between our Jewish heritage and become a Druid.

Duid.

What would that involve?

You know, some mistletoe and some vinegars.

Involves not eating bacon on the solstice, I think.

And

they say a lot of it is young people because young people are interested in the environment and caring for nature and such.

Maybe they also like cloaks.

Yep.

Everyone loves a cloak.

I think the cloak is an underused garment these days.

I'm a trouser fan, but I think.

Cloak and trousers, Andy.

It's not anything wrong.

I guess so.

In fact, very drafty.

Is there a link between the rise of Druidism and the Brexit vote?

I mean, is this a sign of Britain getting back to our true British selves?

Because this country was going fine until the Romans flounced over here with their fancy foreign ways and started clamping down on the Druid community.

Yeah, they did.

Make Druidism illegal.

Although it clung on till about 1300s, I think.

They taxed solstices.

They made everyone do Latin grammar lessons instead of human sacrifices.

And they banned henging as well.

Now, you're a grand wizard of words, Helen.

Thanks.

According to your business, God.

Can you use henge as a verb?

Well, you just did, Andy.

We went to Salisbury Plain and we henged.

If you can get it into print in consistent enough use, then eventually they might enter it into the dictionary.

So medal, which is now used in athletics coverage as a verb.

Yeah.

You know, he meddled.

Yeah.

With an AL rather than a D D L E.

Yeah, because meddling would prohibit winning a medal, wouldn't it?

I guess so.

And how do you view that linguistically?

Well, Andy, verbing nouns is a linguistic process, sold as linguistic processes.

So deal with it.

What I don't like is adjectives being used as nouns, like advertising slogans, which are like, find you're happy.

right

I feel like it's banal in a way that's manipulating us

into something that I'm not quite sure what it is right so nouning you're happy with as a verb it's adequate all right I'm just saying you might as well accept it it's not new clearly strange inexplicable cults have long been a part of British life and if you're thinking about joining a cult at buglers it can be hard to know which cult would suit you best to help you decide we're now going to have a quick multiple choice psychometric test to give you the guidance you need to work out which of these two two classic British cults you should join.

So here is our Are You a Druid or a Hard Brexiteer?

Or neither.

We're going to give you three questions and then analyse your results.

So question one.

It is the 20th of June.

You can feel a solstice brewing in your bones.

You just know it's on the way.

So do you A, put on a cloak, strap a goat skull to your head, start incanting to the sun and prepare to commune with your fellow believers?

Do you B, call a radio phone in and then bark down the line about how Ramona said summer would never happen again after 2016 because the land would be engulfed in a permanent immutable darkness then scream something about Greta Thunberg being a puppet of the big wind lobby strap a goat skull to your crotch and prepare to perform a human sacrifice or do you see put the telly on to check the cricket score

question two you've been left alone in an empty cell with nothing but a ream of paper and a pen do you a settle down to compose an epic poem exploring the deepest recesses of your own spirituality and the innate symbiotic bonds between nature and the human soul do you b write a strongly worded letter to the daily telegraph about how the eu didn't ever let you use pens because they contravene health and safety regulations, apparently, then write a banner with one big letter on each sheet of paper spelling out the slogans Brexit means whatever I tell you, Brexit means, St.

George makes me horny, and justice for dead angry Doris, then chew up the remaining paper to make a paper-mâché effigy of an immigrant, stab it with the pen repeatedly while shouting, I cannot be held responsible for this, then perform a dirty protest and complain, and I suppose I'm going to have to clear this up, am I?

Or do you C, write out your all-time greatest cricket 11s made up of players beginning with each letter of the alphabet.

Are you noting your answers down, Bugles?

And finally, question three.

You're released from the cell.

You're then introduced to Nigel Farage.

What do you do?

A, walk past him, muttering, you're not a real shaman, and go to spend some time with a tree.

Do you B, ejaculate?

Or do you C, lock yourself back in the cell and start writing out your all-time greatest cricket 11s made up of players with each number of letters and their surnames from four to ten, and then another team with players whose surnames were eleven letters or more.

So note your answers down.

If you answered mostly A, then you are a druid.

If you answered mostly B, you are a hard Brexiteer.

In fact, you are quite possibly Marc Francois.

And if you answered mostly C, you are me.

Final quick bit of Britain news.

Boris Johnson, our alleged Prime Minister, has presented a new solution to the Ireland border issue, which is essentially...

To be honest, that would make way more sense than what he has suggested, which is to have two borders for four years in places that aren't the border, essentially, as far as I can make out.

I mean, we see we're continuing to wrestle with the unfolding legal difficulties of our snap Vegas vote in

2016, presided over by Elvis Presley.

We're still seeing how this pans out with Europe.

The initial response has not been overwhelmingly favourable.

We will report on this in next week's Bugle, which, as I said, is being recorded live in Glasgow on Monday the 7th, and Newcastle on Tuesday the 8th.

Also, next week we'll be covering the World Athletics Championships.

Helen, have you been watching that enthusiastically?

No, but I do like athletics because it's not teams, it's individuals and dangers.

Individuals going about their business, suffering their own personal heartbreak.

That is what I appreciate.

And I also appreciate how Pol Vault, you can tell instantly whether someone has succeeded or not.

Yes.

That's a good sport.

Right.

That's

too binary for me.

I like more shades of grey in my success and failure.

A quick question for both of you.

Why was Doha in Qatar awarded the World Athletics Championships in the first place?

And you have to try and answer this question without using the phrase shitloads of dirty money.

You can't do it, can you?

On merit.

In heavy inverted commas.

Incorrect.

Well, that brings us to the end of this week's bugle.

Helen, delightful to have you back.

Thanks for having me on the show.

You are touring America imminently with The Illusionist.

As of next Wednesday, yes, go to the illusionist.org slash events to find out where the show is in a place proximal to you.

There you go.

Hari, any shows you'd like to alert our listeners to?

Yes, I'm going on a big tour in the fall.

So the three of you who have said I'd love to see you perform,

here's some days.

October 10th in Northampton Mass at the Academy of Music.

I'm in the Comedy Connection in Providence, Rhode Island, the 11th and 12th.

The Comedy Club of Kansas City, Missouri on October 25th and 26th.

The Ann Arbor Comedy Club on November 1 and 2, Dallas Hyenas, November 8 and 9, and then a Wisconsin tour.

Because people want to see me in Wisconsin, apparently.

I couldn't get a venue in Wisconsin, so they must love you.

I got all three of the venues.

I'll be at Eau Claire, Wisconsin on the 20th, the Comedy on State Club, my favorite club in the country, on the 21st to the 23rd.

And then Milwaukee at the back room at Cullic Tivo Coffee, which has been a a dream for me to perform in the back room of a coffee shop.

It's like really living your reality by its best life.

Yep.

Once you've bought your tickets for all of those shows and the live Bugles on Monday and Tuesday in Glasgow and Newcastle, you can also buy tickets for the certifiable history of 2019, my end-of-year review show at Soho Theatre.

Details on the Soho Theatre's website.

That's it from the Bugle this week.

We will now play you out with the lies about our premium subscribers.

If you want to join the voluntary subscription scheme go to thebuglepodcast.com and click the donate button.

Chris, music please.

Paul Thomas has begun to take a crystal decanter with him wherever he goes, plonking it on the table at meetings and filling it with goat's milk before eyeballing everyone else at the meeting and then downing it in one.

For whatever reason, he's now enjoying the most successful successful phase of his career to date.

Similarly, anonymous donor initials DT always takes a punnet of crest to job interviews, places it on the table and says, can you keep an eye on that please?

I'm expecting something big to happen at any moment.

Nick Kinsella was recently disappointed at a restaurant when, after he ordered a single malt after dinner, a waitress came back with a Labrador, which proceeded to shed its hair all over the table.

Yes, that did actually happen.

Morton Everson Berland has never been sure exactly what the game quits involves, but assumes it is like a cross between croquet, table tennis, jousting and shot put.

Sorry, not assumes, hopes.

Kyle Cohen would like the Elizabethan Rough to make a return as universal garb for all elected politicians, particularly in Britain.

Kyle thinks the added formality of the rough would improve standards of behaviour whilst also allowing MPs to work longer hours as they could keep a sandwich tucked away in the rough in case Parliament sits late.

Abby Howell supports this idea but for different reasons.

She thinks the frilly neckwear would force politicians to think a little more responsibly about their words.

At the moment they look sensible but sound ridiculous so if we make them look ridiculous it logically follows that they would want to sound sensible.

No one wants to go two for two on that one, do they?

Neil Carr adds that the 18th century wig might be overdue a comeback too.

It should stop politicians getting so angry.

If they feel the flappy side bits of their wig flapping in their faces they'll be reminded to calm down a bit.

Adam Denning believes the freedom to be flippant, or as he calls it, glibberty, is one of the cornerstones of free speech and democracy.

He would like to see a statue of glibberty erected somewhere to remind us that our forebears sacrificed their lives for our right not to take things seriously enough.

Testify.

Merlin Reynolds was disappointed at a childhood party many years ago when, due to a misunderstanding on an order form, the scheduled balloon modeller did not turn up.

Instead, a baleen modeller came and proceeded to horrify the children by twisting the bristly filter from the mouth of a whale into a series of admittedly amusing shapes.

Anonymous donor M.E.

thinks the world could do with more orangeries, rooms with fruit trees being of course conducive to the kind of meditative relaxation that has somewhat gone out of fashion on today's stroppy planet.

They're like a more environmentally friendly conservatory with added fruit, explains M.E.

James Davies, however, isn't so sold on rooms based on other citrus fruits.

A pomellary would be less relaxing thinks James due to the potential implications of the much heavier permelos splatting onto someone's head whilst they were having a snooze whilst kumquatery would simply be a distractingly sillily named place to try to have a productive sit-down.

David Zazzo has never enjoyed the joke, what do you call a deer with no eyes, no idea, due to being unable to hear the quip without envisaging the true horror of life for an eyeless deer, particularly in the wild.

Jim MacArthur is right with him on this one and has taken to responding to the set-up line, what do you call a deer with no eyes, with the punchline, a heart-rending tragedy that raises a lot of questions about human exploitation of the natural world and the ethics of venison farming.

And finally, Tom Quist had to laugh when he found himself earnestly making the claim that the word over-exaggeration is the most fantastic word in the English language by a factor of at least 600%.

Here endeth the lies.

Hi, Buglers, it's producer Chris here.

I just wanted to very quickly tell you about my new podcast, Mildly Informed, which is in podcast feeds and YouTube right now.

Quite simply, it's a show where me and my friend Richie review literally anything.

So please come join us wherever you get your podcasts right now.