Queen Victoria

Hello everyone, it's time for the episode seven of the series lull.

As regular as clockwork, the seventh episode comes around.

Yeah.

And it's just, it just lacks something, doesn't it?

Well, because it's not the final one.

Because that's got a huge, that's got the D-Mob.

D-Mob Happy.

D-Mob Happy vibe to it, hasn't it?

Yes.

It's not like the sort of last song of the night uh find someone to pair up with and uh snuggle your your face in there no it's not the long slow of their neck yeah it's not the long slow deep kiss no that is the final that is the final episode

where they're holding on to each other and it's not sure if it's for if it's amorous or if it's just for support yeah no it's probably the sort of dashing to the loo checking you haven't got anything in between your teeth just in case they're about to play the last song yeah that's thing really and also thinking maybe just sack off the whole evening just steal a snooker cue Yeah.

And just go on a rampage.

And go to the College Street.

Yeah.

Break into a Halifax.

Maybe break into a Halifax because apparently they do keep all

the money there, someone once said.

Yeah, in shoeboxes.

In shoeboxes, because they think it's the place people would least expect it to be.

But it is all in loose change.

So you're going to need that snooker cue to sort of pokepuck all those coins home.

Aren't you?

And to secure your bindle with.

And to secure your bindle.

Yeah, and then obviously in our month off, we all be bindling then around just around the place.

Yeah, we'd bindle hither and bindle thither, basically.

I mean, that's certainly what the t-shirt is.

Bindle yon and yonder.

Yeah, yon and yonder.

Do you reckon kids these days know about bindles?

It feels like when I was a kid, bindles were like a big deal.

There's a lot of bindles in kind of cartoons.

Because every

most stories began with high adventure, right?

So

if you're setting foot on that long journey, that quest.

You've got to bundle it up.

You've got to get a bindle going.

Because we're talking, these stories come from ancient Europe, don't they?

These mythic

pre-strap.

Pre-strap.

Pre-strap.

So there's no such thing as a backpack.

Pre-strap, pre-luggage.

Pre-bumbag.

Pre-internal pocket.

All there was was a mega pocket, which is what people wore, isn't it?

People kept themselves in a pocket initially.

Get in your pocket, yeah.

Get into a pocket,

wouldn't you?

And then, of course, pockets were attached to snooker cues.

It was a pagan thing, wasn't it?

You danced around the queue.

Yeah.

Pockets were then attached to tables as a place to keep onions.

Weren't they, around kitchen tables?

And then, obviously, if you leave onions out, they go off at different rates and become different colours, don't they?

So you have a yellow onion, a green onion.

That's right.

And of course, there's the incredibly valuable, very, very, very old black onion,

which is, of course, worth the most, isn't it?

Yeah, but I wonder whether kids these days, this is, as you say, the bindle's been around and will be around as part of human mythology for all time.

But I wonder if kids these days, you don't see kids reading Bindle content in the same way, I don't think.

The easy thing is, Ben, I am actually old enough to remember there was still a Bindles on the high street when I was growing up.

There was an old Bindles because, of course, Bindles, every high street, you're going to get your first school Bindle, don't you?

You get your first school Bindle.

It's very exciting.

And there was a picture of Jemima and

Humphrey Gard

Bindle.

Wasn't it in every kitchen, in every kitchen, in every kitchen, in every kitchen?

That was the mantra.

Wasn't it?

There'll be a picture of Jemima and Humphrey Gard Bindle in every kitchen, in every kitchen, in every kitchen, in every kitchen.

And those are the words that we crocheted onto the fabric fridge door that we had back then.

But you know, so a bindle, for people that don't know, a bindle is a.

Don't tell them, Henry.

If people don't know what a bindle is, they shouldn't be here.

They should switch off immediately.

Switch off now.

And maybe go for an adventure.

Maybe grab a random stick or a snooker cue, tie a handkerchief to the end of it.

Will they know what kerchiefs are?

I feel I see the odd neck kerchief around as a sort of, as a fashion accessory at the moment.

Yeah, take the kerchief from around your neck, take that off, attach it to a stick, put some fruit in it,

and just walk and keep walking.

I feel like the visual bindle still exists.

I feel like the visual bindle still exists in illustrated books for very small children.

But I don't think I don't remember them.

Unfortunately, they're not blurbs.

Do you know what I mean?

they're not annotated no one's saying this is a bindle by the way do you know what i mean no one's

i don't see children reading to their kids in the park and and not do you don't see children reading to their kids i don't no

and then saying we're not going to go past page three until you tell me don't tell me what that thing is in that picture that that mouse is carrying over their shoulder oh yeah you get a lot of mice with bindles i i would guess in mice yeah yeah rodents love a bindle this is a little um bee ring a bow tie in me illustrator's bonnet Yeah.

Is this the view from the illustrator's chair?

The most overused jingle of all time.

Did it in every episode since we came up with it?

Pens.

Colour home.

Pencils.

The vanishing point.

Perspective.

The horizon.

Not technically a profession in the traditional sense.

Eraser.

Crayon charcoal.

A view from the illustrator's chair.

With Henry Packer.

And I thought to myself, that beaver needs one thing.

It's either a moustache or a bow tie, but it can't be both.

But I was wrong.

Old fairy tale books.

The illustrations were so scarce and sparsely spread through the book

that

you'd come across the illustration and be like a mouse carrying a bindle walking over a bridge with like

a big sort of like a troll sort of looming up behind it or whatever.

And you wouldn't know what that what story it was referring to because it was so the drawings were spaced out so far away from it.

You have to read the book as well, Henry.

henry that's

the context is the book i had no interest in those extended blurbs as i call them

between the real meat of a book which is the shiny plates as they used to be called the colour plates with the illustration on i'm going to be honest here i actually didn't know what a bindle was i actually don't know what a bindle is but i deduced it from the surrounding information facts that are coming up in the conversation.

It's something that you can do.

I use mental extrapolation techniques.

So what do you think it is?

Do you think it's one of those casings that printer ink cartridges come in?

Bingo.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, it's a stick with your little luggage hung at the end of it, which is a sort of fairy tale standard image.

Yeah, kind of moom-in land sort of vibe.

Yeah.

But also kind of American Gold Rush hobo.

Yes, yes, yes.

And the bindle is yours, yeah, like a big kerchief tied up at the end, so it has a sort of balloon sort of look about it.

Or a buoy, you you know, it's ball-like.

It's not like dangling a sort of shopping bag off the end of your pole.

No, it's a bit classier than that.

But it's also a stressful way to pack because there's no subsections within the bundle.

No.

Again, it's pre-strapped, it's pre-micro pockets, it's pre-um, yeah, um, the Samsonite revolution, which

took place in the 1400s in Ghent.

But it's post-tablecloth, isn't it?

But it's post-tablecloth.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So it's in that sweet spot.

It doesn't have a passport flap.

It's pre-flaps.

It has no charge cable holes.

Yeah.

None of that.

It was before that Dutch monk.

Martin Flapp.

Martin Flaps.

That's two N's, two L's.

And do what you like with the P.

Yeah,

Martin Flapp.

The Dutch monk who had a vision, didn't he?

He was looking at ducks and planning a holiday.

Wasn't it at the same time?

And if he thought we can use flap technology as well.

Well, that's what ducks were originally used for, wasn't it?

Well, that's what they were used for.

Exactly.

He thought he saw the flap.

He saw the flapping of the duck.

Put a passport under its wing.

I could get the duck to fly out in advance to my destination, meet it there.

But obviously, that was then too ambitious.

They then attached the first handle to a duck, and then you've got the wheeled ducks.

Do you want an actual fact that I learned recently?

Yes, please.

The patent for

the first wheeled luggage in history,

1972.

So is that earlier?

Because for me, that's earlier than I would have thought.

Are you thinking that?

We spent thousands of years dragging bags around.

And then someone thousands of years later, after you've got the invention of the wheel, when's that?

Kind of like prehistory.

Yeah.

And then you've got the invention of the luggage, which is probably when.

Well, it's Martin Flat.

Martin Flapp.

It's Martin Flapp's 1400s.

1400s.

And then for 600 years, we didn't think to put those two things together.

But we still had, we had porter culture, didn't we?

They provided the wheels.

So these days, you get your...

Yeah, those guys, they're just for the elite these days.

But back in the day, your average train concourse would be writhing with porters.

Yeah.

So you had no need for your own wheels.

It was a guy with wheels.

Well, Keith Case, which then became bastardized to brick-to-britch case.

It was Keith Case, wasn't it?

For a long time.

And of course, Nigel Havers' grandfather, Nigel Havers Sr.,

he created the Havers sack, which became known as the Haver Sack.

Yes, and let's not forget their maiden aunt carpet bag as well.

That's right.

Well, she invented the car, the pet, and the bag, didn't she?

She was an incredibly brilliant, brilliant woman.

I want to bring us back to a couple of interesting themes that were set up

in the earlier part of the chat.

Welcome to the episode seven, Lol.

Coming back to themes.

I'd like to develop them for you.

Okay, this is nice.

So what I'm going to do is I'm going to develop the theme of straps for a bit

and and throw it

back in your corner and see what you both come up with.

Yeah.

Before you develop that,

just to remind the audience, of course, you'd all know this, but

straps were invented by Martin Strapp.

That's a double T, double R,

double A, and go mad on the P's.

Yeah, and it's not an A, but a U, but with three umlauts.

Yeah, that's right.

And it's a revolving A as well.

And it alternates being invisible but pronounced.

And visible but not pronounced.

Doesn't it?

On alternate days.

But yeah, we're not sure which day it started.

So it's kind of yeah, that's contentious.

So it's contentious.

It's sort of in your corner on the A.

Mike mentioned earlier pre-strap technology.

And actually, there's been something I'd be wanting to get off my chest about straps for quite a while.

I don't have a problem with straps.

And since I'm glad they exist, I realize they're important.

I struggle with straps.

And it's something that I've sort of felt quite a lot of shame about.

And I think actually it's time for me to maybe announce that i i struggle with straps is this a bit like how you can't you still don't know how to get in physically get in a car yeah it's it's linked to that because in that is it seems like you don't know how to get in the like say the straps of a backpack are you one of those people that's putting the backpack on the floor and crawling all the way through the straps and in and back around trying to tie yourself in a knot amongst the straps another thing which quite often i'll do is i'll i'll the the the nearest i'll get it on but it's but it's on the front and in that situation i simply have to pretend to be spanish

and spend the day walking around London.

And make yourself look like you've got something really robbable on you.

Why would that be?

Well, that's why people wear it on the front, isn't it?

It's sort of security, isn't it?

Oh, robber.

Yeah.

Yeah, you said rubberable, Mike.

I thought, yeah, you're not rubberable.

What either.

Do you know what I mean?

Yeah.

It could be an ancient lamp.

Well, I'm always rubberable.

My head, I've been told by many people of different ages and social backgrounds that my head is one of the nicest things to touch on earth.

You've told us about how grease he is.

But what conveys what creates smoothness more perfectly than body grease?

Who are we talking about?

Relatives, friends, fellow comedians, some of them quite successful ones.

Thus add incredibility.

Thus add incredibility to my statement.

Are we talking Mickey Flanagan here?

Well,

we're talking Flanagan's level.

Stadium fillers.

Stadium.

I'd say stadium.

Certainly one stadium filler has said to me, that's one of the nicest things I've ever touched.

Wow.

Because it's got this kind of unnatural...

Well, no, naturalised, but it's got a natural

body grease.

And Ben, as we all know, technology tries and tries and tries again, but it cannot emulate the moisturizing power of body grease.

And generally, body products, natural products in general, which have evolved over millions and millions of years, are better than any Nivea cream or Labrador Garnier thing or whatever.

The stuff that could be described as waste products.

What is that what grease is?

Well, it's quite a lot of what we extrude is waste, largely speaking, isn't it?

Well, yes, it's fully recycled, is how I would describe it.

Yeah, so it's green as well.

That's just another positive.

I struggle with straps in the sense that I struggle to get in a car, but in that situation, I am the strap in a way, because I struggle with threading things through other things.

so and i actually get quite tense in any situation which involves

belts so thread so for example i've recently bought some summary some nice light summary trousers which come with a fabric belt glamorous life of henry packard theme you're getting into karate

fabric belt

that's incorporated within the within the within the item no but it's sort of it it's actually not it's separate from the item but it's so visually contin contiguous with it that you wouldn't know.

By the way, thanks for giving me that karate comment then because it's good to get to get sort of warning on the kind of banter I'm going to I'm going to receive with this trousers So we can actually sort of banter workshop what and I come back with

someone like yeah, and I'm a bloody black belt mate and need them in the bollocks

That sounds dangerous to me.

Yeah, yeah.

And also what colour is the actual belt?

Because that's going to be in play.

It's white.

Yeah, so

it's very much just starting out at karate.

Although it does have a metal sort of hinge on it, which I could use to really take someone's eye out, probably.

But the problem with that is if I was to take the belt off, I wouldn't better get it back on.

And that's something I've realized with this belt is I can't ever take it off because I won't be able to get it back on.

Because I looked at it, it's got two metal kind of loops.

And it's got one of those situations where

it's a strap situation where the belt kind of threads under one, back around itself, then through the other.

Simple as you like.

And I spent my life, people telling me, simple as you like.

Then I try, and then I try and do it.

And sure enough, I've disconnected the parachute instructor

from me and now it's it's a 10 000 feet in the air fight over that parachute

yeah it's just something that i've wanted to get off my chest for a while and it's one of the reasons for example i i'll never be able to get employment as a as a bungee sort of in the world of bungee certainly height certainly not in a kind of safety capacity within the world of bungee i think that comes as a great relief probably to anyone listening really

but you could be like ceo level of bungie it's true but i could be ceo though that's a good point you could go straight to the c-suite i could go very very, very, very, very high to the top and then very, very, very high to the bottom get fired when they realize that I'm really disorganized.

But then promote it again when they realize I can't be in charge of actual bungee safety.

But I have to promote him above his level of

incompetence and make him CEO again, but probably not quite such a high CEO, maybe just an assistant CEO.

Then I get fired from that one, and then I get fired all the way down again.

Let's not fire him quite so lowly this time.

We'll make him head of photocopying rather than photography.

And then I would venture,

like a giant sort of professional bungee, I'd end up sort of hovering in HR.

But so do neither of you have that problem?

I even get it with like a baseball cap, even, even just like the simple sort of, I've just got like a total incapacity to process strap technology.

Buckles, belts, haversacks, rucksacks, bum bags, fanny packs, ruck fannies, fanny wax, fanny wax, flanny jacks.

So maybe the bindle is the way forward for you.

Oh my God.

I've just for the second time this week come up with a multi-billion dollar idea.

I'm bringing bindles back.

I sometimes have the thing with a backpack where you put one arm through, no problem.

Yeah.

And then the second one, you have to somehow, sometimes it's fine.

And then sometimes you're finding you have to sort of fold your arm.

Yes, you have to go into a sort of pterodactyl chick.

Yeah.

Move

with one of your arms.

And you have to sort of break your shoulder out.

That's what I do.

It's just quickly, you just wham it up against a tube door for example you break your shoulder back i mean people commuters do it on the tube in london it's quite fairly natural thing pop each other's shoulders out

you can if you've got a big enough solar plexus you can actually sometimes fold your fold a commuter's head back into their rib cage and just sort of just pile each other up on top of each other

and then you're chucking down the platform at the end they just pop they just pop out into shape again and um carry on with their day but anyway i wonder if anyone else has got any advice they could come in with about straps if it's some sort of course

I would genuinely do a course in straps.

And another thing I would do, I do a course in Arachnophobia.

Those are two things I've thought I'll do a course in.

What if you could somehow collate those things together?

Yeah.

So, could you cure one with the other somehow?

So, by the end, I'd be able to sort of tie a tarantula into sort of beautiful, complex bow, an origami.

You said origami tarantula into something cuter, like a hamster,

a hamstantula, like a great hamstantulas that you're able to wear,

carry around,

give us birthday presents to nieces.

God, that's another good invention.

A bindle full of Taranch hamsters.

Okay, let's turn on the beam machine.

Instead of using the normal beam machine jingle, let's use one sent in by Tom from Ashby de la Zooche.

Oh, nice.

Or Zoosh.

Zoosh, I think.

Where is Ashby de la Zooch?

Midlands.

Oh, is it?

Yeah.

It sounds like a character in a sort of 70s sitcom.

Oh, hang on.

Oh, is the hotel.

Oh, it's a tough day for the hotel.

You're not going to believe this.

We've got two guests in there from Ashby de la Zouche.

Oh, no.

There's no, it'd be a whole thing.

I think it sounds like a sort of 70s entertainer.

And later there'll be songs and dancing and singing and jokes from Ashby de la Zouche.

Pumped in live from his prison cell where he's said it in multiple terms.

That's That's right.

All the way from prison in Malta.

It's Ashby de la Zouche.

And he's got those prison bars sort of tanned onto his face, hasn't he?

He's got a bright red tan with the prison bar line.

Oh, he loves to sunbathe, but he's still got it.

He's still got it.

He has still got it.

He's still been behind bars, but he can.

Oh,

he just does the business, doesn't he?

He does.

Solid gold from the get-go to the let-go.

Ashby de la Zouche.

It's proper jokes.

It's proper jokes and proper crimes.

We're talking talking murder.

We're talking.

They're all major custodial crimes.

You know what?

Some of the jokes are crimes.

Some of the jokes are crimes.

And you know, the great thing about him,

he's in his late

70s now.

Yeah.

But with the body of a much, much older man.

And the moral compass of

the wall of a terrapin.

He's actually still committing crimes from jail.

I don't know how he does it.

The sentences keep rolling in.

He's a real inspiration.

If you can ever get hold of a copy of Ashby Delajouche's cancelled sitcom set in a Chinese restaurant,

don't watch it.

Anyway, this is from Tom from Ashby De La Jouche.

Thank you, Tom.

He writes, hello, beans.

With the women's Euros happening in the football, it occurred to me, for better or for worse, to combine the sweet, lukewarm banter of three bean salad and the musical prowess of Keith Allen and his football classic, Vinder Loo.

I had no idea what I was doing, so it's definitely a bit rough.

Enjoy!

Okay, here we go.

Beam, bee bean, bean machine, beam, bee bean, bean machine, beam, bee bean, beam, bee bean, beam, beam,

beam, bee bean, bean machine, beam, bee bean, beam machine, beam, bee bean, beam, bee beam, beam, beam.

I mean, I think it's appropriate for an episode seven lull jingle.

Didn't, I mean, with the best one in the world, it didn't quite come together.

But also, there was a sense that he hadn't tried that hard, so it would be weird for him to be offended.

Do you know what I mean?

Yeah, I think Keith Allen can share some of the flag on that as well, can't he?

Yeah, well, how was Keith Allen related involved?

It was the

football, that Vindaloo, Vundaloo, right?

So it took its inspiration from something that was already quite not that great.

Quite weakened

down.

Underworks, yeah.

And underworks.

So in a way, it really held that it kept that flame burning.

That sort of half-burning, doesn't it?

Yeah, that sort of weak, watery-looking flame that somehow doesn't convey light or heat.

I think he did directly sample Vindalee by Fat Les.

So, do you think it's worth getting sued over

by Fat Les?

So, Fat Les was the group that was put together by Keith Allen.

Yeah, he was also Ashby Delazeus' tour manager.

He used to drive him around in a sort of special modified jag.

He had to create Ashby Delazouche's pre-gig rider, didn't he?

Every day he had to assemble the 50 rotating pies

on an adapted Lazy Susan.

Yeah.

And Ashby would be expected to attend a lineup in whatever town, because there's always an outstanding warrant in whatever town he's touring in.

Les would make sure that that lineup was out of the way before the gig.

And that was his skill.

And

by the end, he had so many of those

ankle tags and arm tags, didn't he?

He had to create a sort of pretend to be a sort of android character, didn't he?

He got Ashbay de la Zoids.

Ashbay de la Zoids.

He pretended he was a sort of racist mechatron.

But it actually was all just government tags.

Yeah.

Well, thank you, Tom.

Yeah, thank you, Tom.

Yeah, thanks, Tom.

I think, yeah,

you know, and let's let's just all move on from that jingle.

And the same way, as a culture, we have moved from

the juice,

material and work for the most part, haven't we?

Okay, so this week's topic, as sent in by Pete

from Derby,

is

Queen Victoria.

All stand for the king.

We're entering the regal zone.

Regal zone

Off with their heads.

On with the show.

Listen not to the knaves and the shopkeepers.

Bring me more advisors.

The Regal Zone.

Please welcome to the stage.

Ashby de la Zoosh

in his Ashby de la Zoids era.

Oh,

hello.

Queen Victoria.

It's not the first time we've been sent a

heavy-duicy historical topic.

Are you talking about the time we attempted to do an episode about Rasputin and had to stop?

Yeah.

Because we simply didn't know anything about him.

It was unworkable.

Even with heavy-duty tangents, it was unworkable.

Do you think they ever met?

Oh,

that's one of the fascinating historical what-ifs.

Those are the

really pretentious two-hand play.

What if?

What if?

Judy Dench plays Rasputin.

Yes.

Tom Hiddleston as Queen Victoria.

And Ashby de la Zeus as himself.

The ultimate pan-historical matchmaker.

It's Ashby de la Zoids.

His erotic time machine.

She liked a park, I think.

I think that's genuinely why there's loads of Victoria parks all over the nation.

She got behind the old green spaces.

Okay.

Industrial Revolution.

Let's have a green space in a city thing so people

don't die as immediately.

Okay.

I think she was a supporter.

I don't think she came up with the idea.

I think she was a supporter of it.

Yeah, but that's the kind of thing where kings and queens and emperors and empresses always get credit for, oh, and they oversaw a lot of cultural change.

I'm sorry, that is her sitting there, having literally every one of her toes massaged by two different people.

20 Swiss masseuses

and turning a blind eye to some absolutely horrific population-level crimes going on across the world.

Exactly.

There are some lovely parks with duck ponds.

Also, then while that was happening, someone would have put across their desk, so we can either

build a canal to Aberdeen,

we can do a canal from Aberdeen,

we can burn down Aberdeen.

We've got an idea to do with some parks.

We can try and invent the hot dog.

We can invade Burma again, even though we're already in charge of it.

But

we might invade absolute cinch this time.

We can invade it from the inside out this time.

And she'll just gone, oh, yeah, the parks thing, yes, whatever.

And you know what I mean?

And yet history goes, and she was really passionate about parks and reinventing stuff.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Take that, Victoria.

Take that.

But it just happens a lot with rulers and kings and queens and stuff, doesn't it?

In history?

Yeah, it totally.

Yeah.

But yeah, they oversaw a lot of cultural change, did they?

Or did they just happen to be the king?

They happened to be there.

And I suspect probably a lot of people who end up being royal biographies are probably people who are quite into the royal family generally.

Do you know what I mean?

There's not many anti-monarchists who are like, I'm going to write a fair and comprehensive, definitive biography of the institution I loathe.

I'm going to spend the next 20 years of my life immersed in the lore

heraldry of the thing that I hate.

It's more your pull barrel types.

Do you know what I mean?

Yeah.

It's your barrels, it's your starkies.

Your witchells.

Your witchells.

Example.

Perchance a Jenny Bond.

It's people who spend a lot of their time thinking, but we do do this stuff very, very well.

We just do do this very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very well.

We just do patterns.

But we just do a pattern.

No one does it.

We just do do it very well.

Really well trained horses.

Really plumage heavy helmetry.

We do it really, really well.

There's a lot of that, isn't there?

Yeah.

And we do and actually, to be fair, we actually do.

We do do it, really, really.

But no, but we actually do.

No, but we do

do it

really well.

There's something that I always think about with Victoria, or the thing that comes to mind is that something you hear quite a lot is that during the Victorian period, and I think maybe because of Victoria's interest in the Highlands,

people started basically liking nice views, whereas before they saw the Highlands or those kind of places as just kind of like a horrible wasteland that was kind of quite hostile to a tin processing plant.

Exactly.

And then there was this romantic in the 1800s, wasn't there, where suddenly people liked the idea of going to these far-flung sort of windswept places.

And we still like them now.

Have we been tricked into liking them?

Well, that's it.

It's like, will we go off them?

Because it's quite a common thing, isn't it?

That people say the Victorians invented various things.

Yeah.

The Victorians invented the internet.

Victorians invented SpaceX.

The Segway.

They invented the Segway.

Yeah, they invented France.

They invented pickles.

They invented the concept of not pickling.

Yeah, goose sandwiches.

Not all of it took off.

Do you know what I mean?

Yeah, they geese sandwich eye.

So I didn't know about views.

That's fascinating.

Because, of course, Victorians are absolutely fascinating, aren't they?

Something we need to say quite a lot

to get some.

Bard Kingdom Brunel, Charles Dickens,

Florence Nightingale.

Oh, he is hallowed in this corner of this fine.

He's left his mark.

But also, I think about there's always those weird stories, but they had to wear little bras on their ankles.

Little doily bras.

Because the ankles were seen as so sexual that they had to be covered in little doily underwears.

And what else do I know about Victoria?

She wore black for 20 years.

The original goth?

Yep.

To mourn Albert.

To mourn Albert, I think, yeah.

And although was she having it off with Billy Connolly?

That's the question, isn't it?

She didn't smile.

Is that a thing?

Oh, that's her nose, right?

Do you know what I mean?

Was that just because people didn't smile in photographs back then?

Yeah, there's not, you don't get many grinning photos, do you?

Maybe the teeth, I suppose, teeth were bad, but would they have known they were bad?

Is she one of those people that she like had birch teeth?

She had wooden teeth.

Yes.

Yeah, she had birch teeth.

Yeah.

She had a full set of hippo teeth, didn't she?

She had a full set of hippo teeth, including one of those little birds that lives on a hippo's ass,

which would flip between her ass and her mouth, which is seen as one of the reasons she may have died of

old age.

Well, may old age may have got her just before the

arse mites,

the arse in mouth disease,

which is famously slow working.

Did dear old Queen E2?

Did she

QE 2?

It's a wonderful vessel.

Which one was Queen for longest?

Her or Victoria?

E2.

E2.

Was it E2?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Victoria was long, though, right?

Okay, so QE2, 70 years and 214 days.

A good innings.

Yeah.

A very, very good innings.

Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom.

63 years.

Okay.

So seven years shy.

But also, the fact that she being queen actually meant something then makes it more impressive, doesn't it?

Like, it wasn't just ceremonial.

You think there'd have been a bit more wear and tear?

Yeah, because

there's definitely more wear and tear.

It's like a ceremonial spoon compared to an actual spoon.

Which one lasts longest?

Spoons are kind of immortal, aren't they?

I've never like worn out a spoon.

Yeah, I think it's a really odd.

It's a really odd example because I think actually the quotidian spoon is actually going to outlive the ceremonial spoon that eventually will get knocked off and smashed into tiny little bits of fork.

That's a good point.

And you know why that's because it's because a spoon, the more you erode a spoon, the more spoon-like it becomes.

A spoon is a process.

I think it seasons,

the spoonular

physics, isn't it?

Everything becomes spoon-like.

Have you ever seen a worn-out spoon?

No, because it's just a spoon.

It's just a bigger spoon with thinner.

You're saying it's getting eroded evenly all the way around.

Well, I think it will over time.

That's how things get eroded, unless you're doing something very peculiar with your spoons.

But it'll get whereas a fork is different, is it?

Because a fork has prongs.

Tines.

Tines.

Tins.

Okay.

So it can be blunted.

But you cannot blunt the spoon.

The spoon of Britain.

It will simply become more and more spoon-like

and able to carry more and more liquid.

What's a prong?

What do you mean?

Okay.

So, fork is taines.

Yeah, but I think you can say prongs as well.

A ladder is

rungs.

A cow is udders.

Yes.

Yeah.

Okay.

A hand is digits.

Hand is digits.

Yeah, and an armadillo is panels.

Panels.

King Chuck is going to have trouble beating that record, isn't he?

That's going to be a tricky one.

Yes.

Unless he uploads himself to some kind of USB stick.

That's true.

That becomes the monarch.

The royal family is really embracing new technology.

It might take the edge off some of the pageantry, mightn't it?

It's a gamble.

That USB stick is going to have to be sitting on a hell of a cushion.

But we're just the kind of people who do cushions really, really well.

Actually, really small cushions.

From Queen Anne's doll's house.

And he's put enough tassels on it.

And we do attach tassels very, very, very, very, very.

We just do attach them very well.

Tasselmonger to the king.

Tasselmonger.

And from a long line of tasselmongers,

you see the tasselmonger bowing and then stepping back, then stepping forward, stepping to the right.

That's the little tassel dance.

And of course, his

father's, father's, father's, father's, father's, father's, father's, father applied the tassels to the biotapestry.

Of course, the tassels, tasseler to Muncle's father is the tasseler's apprentice, it It works the other way around with Tassler's.

When the Master and the Apprentice are inverted,

he's tasseled by his son before being presented to the Queen Consort.

And it's lovely to see.

And I believe that's Kim Kardashian

there.

And you can tell that she thinks we do this stuff really, really well.

And the fact is we do.

We do do this stuff really, really well.

It's a nice touch there from Kim.

She's fully tasseled tasseled her own ass for the

which um

which certainly by the looks of things Wayne Rooney seems to be enjoying

in the sense that he's had to be restrained

and his head will be placed in a cannon

for the next hundred years

because we do do these these kinds of punishment really really well

and now comes the annual ritual where we all plug Prince Charles's USB stick into an old Dell laptop.

And the Dell laptop today is being presented by a, well, it's a combo of Nicholas Lindhurst

and

an IT teacher from Scunthrall.

Who's also called Nicholas.

Lovely.

Lovely little touch.

We do, of course, do Nicholas's very, very well in this country.

The USB stick and the rest of the royal family will now go to a private ceremony in St.

George's Chapel here in Windsor, which will be led by the comedian and entertainer Ashby De Lazouche.

On day release from Malta,

he can enjoy the cloisters and then he's straight back to prison.

Back in the slammer, that's right.

But it shows that wonderful relationship that we have with Malta and

the strength of the Commonwealth that he's been laid up for today.

And of course the strength of the extradition treaty.

And of course, after Cathedral, in about 20 20 minutes time, the procession will then move to Curries,

where

a selection of potentially smaller USBs with a larger gigabyte capacity will be presented as options.

Along with a selection of miniature pork pies.

And Queen Camilla will decide whether to upload him onto maybe an external SSD drive.

Or maybe people people have been wondering whether they'll move with the times and upload them to the cloud.

And if you don't really understand how the cloud works,

we're now going to discuss that with Nicholas Witchell.

Time to read some emails.

We've got some versions of the email jingle sent in, so I'm going to ask you to choose between

the email jingle made by a teenager.

The email jingle in in the style of an 80s horror trailer.

Okay.

The email jingle in Finnish.

And that's your lot for the moment.

That's a tough one.

Okay.

Okay.

I have one I'm more drawn to, I think.

Okay.

I'm interested in all of those.

I think at some point they all need to get an airing.

That's true.

They will.

They will all eventually be good.

What are you drawn to, Mike?

I'm in the mood.

I'm big time in the mood for Finnish tonight.

Okay.

I don't know why.

I've never been to Finland.

I would love to go to Finland because they feel like it's just something quite distinctive going on there.

And I just, I really want to take a deep dive in Finland.

Is it Nokia?

Is it to do with Nokia?

It's got nothing to do with Nokia at all.

It couldn't be further from Nokia.

The Moomins?

Maybe there's a bit of Moomin.

Is it the idea that you could maybe buy a Moomin-themed Nokia there?

I don't think I know the answer to that until I get there.

I'm happy to go with Finnish.

Yeah, let's do it.

Maya emails from Finland.

She says, greetings from Helsinki.

Greetings.

Please find attached version of your email jingle in Finnish.

I've been meaning to send you a Finnish version for a while now, but after hearing a recent jingle in Swedish, I knew it was now or never.

Nice.

For the last few years, I regularly amuse myself in the sauna by trying to fit the Finnish lyrics to the rhythm of the original jingle.

You see, for example, Postmasters has three syllables in English, but requires 10 in Finnish.

I really like that.

I really like that.

We haven't even got 10 consonants.

Move on.

Keep it moving.

Quickly.

I also considered recording myself sing and jingle whilst in the sauna.

Yeah.

But I was worried that the 80-plus degree heat wouldn't be an optimal temperature for my phone.

Unfortunately, I no longer have weekly access to a sauna.

What?

So you'll just have to imagine the hissing of the stones in the background.

I imagine if a Finn has been denied access to the sauna, that's because they've done something very, very bad.

I assume so.

Yes.

Maybe besmirched the name of Nokia, or perhaps said something negative about the Moomins.

Those are just two thoughts that spring to mind.

By the way, can I say, I was a bit suspicious whether this person might not actually be Scandinavian, but they've passed the test.

They've mentioned Sauna three times in the email, so check it out.

Finland's not part of Scandinavia.

Yeah.

Just get that in before we get bothered.

Yep.

Love the pod, and I especially wanted to highlight the warm feeling I get every time Ben talks about Cardiff.

Oh, yeah.

I was an exchange student at Cardiff University in 2011, and I have such fond memories of those days.

Well,

kind regards or astavilis intellavessin.

Really nice.

I will have got that wrong.

No, but I enjoyed it.

Thank you.

I'm pleased you lent into it, Ben.

Mike is such a sucker for all things finish.

Yeah, yeah, really, really enjoying this.

Now, you're going to have to give me two seconds because she sent it in a format that we can't use.

Is it Nokia?

As you send it through anokia, does it all come in the form of a Nokia text?

You have to re-audio-fy.

I suppose while Ben's doing that, we could just have a chat about Finland, couldn't we?

Yeah.

Well, I think of Finland a lot of the time it's the natural landscapes that I think.

How about you, Mike?

Yeah.

Well, the numerous lakes.

I mean, I can see why it's got its nickname, the land of a thousand lakes

because of the amount of lakes it's got.

How many has it got?

Well,

I mean, probably not a thousand, I'd guess.

Otherwise, you wouldn't call it the land of a thousand lakes.

You'd call it the land with a thousand lakes.

But it's a land of a thousand lakes.

It sort of feels like it's got a thousand.

Might be slightly more magnificent.

It's actually got, I mean, there's an argument, there's a strong argument, it's got about 187,000, actually.

But this is just off the top of your head.

This is just off the top of my screen slash head.

Henry, had you heard of Finland before today?

We come across how you guys want to style out knowing what Finland is.

To be honest, I always thought it was a shark-themed amusement park.

Okay, I've got it working.

This is Maya's version of our email drink.

Excellent.

Here it goes.

Very good.

I mean, Mike, that was like having a chocolate orange

suppository for you.

I feel like

as good as it gets.

I feel like that could stop battles.

Yes.

That was incredibly soothing.

I love that.

One thing I'd say, you know what I'd say based on that is that was so lovely, I'd say I wouldn't call it hell sinky, I'd call it heaven floaty.

I'd save that for your Ashby Delezooche support dates,

probably, for his Nordic tour.

He's got an incredible extradition treaty organized between Maltese and Nordic prisons, where

he's allowed to perform in them.

In return for barrel after barrel upon barrel, a frozen pickled fish.

Oh, God.

Come on, Ben.

Quickly move on.

Should we cut all of that?

Or is it all fine?

Don't you leave it in as a warning?

As a warning.

This is from Louise.

Hello, Louise.

Hello, Beans.

Listen to your recent episode about the 60s.

Henry talks with reverie about guide dogs.

Lovely, thank you.

I was triggered.

I looked after a guide dog puppy, brackets, and trained it, brackets, for a year for the charity.

Walter was an absolute bastard.

My house has never been the same since.

That was six years ago.

He chewed the skirting boards, he chased of the dogs, cats, and latently, cows.

He never shut up, constantly barked, bit people.

He never made it as a guide dog due to his dodgy hips.

But that's shit.

He was just a shit dog.

He'd have killed a blind person.

Please do not romanticise guide dogs.

They're just dogs.

No, Louise,

britain is not ready for this do you know what i mean we've had too many national treasures be disgraced we can't you can't be going for guide dogs i mean we're just not ready we're still we're still healing as a nation you know it's not a scandal we're ready for no if anything we should be going the other direction and somehow melding together guide dogs and the rnli

that's the only thing that's going to do it what rnli royal national the lifeboat lifeboats rescue oh yes imagine getting rescued by a lovely labrador oh

no it wasn't a guide dog.

It failed the...

So I think guide dogs are fine still, because it failed.

That's like someone that didn't get into the RNLI and went on to become a serial killer.

That doesn't make the RNLI bad.

Do you know what I mean?

Patrick and Lewisham writes, Hello Beans.

Some years ago, I was working part-time for a mid-range menswear shop.

Okay.

Next.

Burtons.

River Island.

It's going to be Burtons, isn't it?

When a lone pigeon wandered through our door.

Okay.

Yeah.

My initial efforts to shoe said bird out of the shop backfired catastrophically as it flew over my head and deeper into the shop, hurtling towards a display of wedding hire suits.

This is me editorializing now.

I'm going to say Moss Bross.

Yes,

and I shout.

Alone in the shop, in sweltering heat and dressed in a three-piece tailored-fit navy suit, I was singularly ill-equipped for preventing an unwelcome feathered visitor from shitting all over the rail of Ted Baker's shirts.

Oh no.

Accepting that this task was beyond my limited capabilities, capabilities, I put in a phone call to the local animal shelter.

That's mad.

Hoping that they could coax the pigeon out of the shop and return it to its natural habitat.

Half an hour later, a single ununiformed man with a big net arrived and succeeded only in scaring the pigeon up into the rafters and finally into our stockroom.

He then followed the pigeon into the stockroom and shot it.

What?

Climbing.

Leaving through the front doors of the shop with a pigeon corpse in hand and a cheery thanks, mate.

sure what so was the net just was the net just ceremonial that can't be real that sounds that sounds dodgier doesn't it it feels like there's a kind of unregulated world out there of different types of solution that are available for like animal problems but it sounds like there's only one kind of solution

i i want there to be a uniform do you know what i mean if someone's walking around using firearms for i mean it's got to be the fairly sort of embroidered polo shirt please also you're in a moss bro so i mean put the stick the guy in a dinner jacket at least.

Do you know what I mean?

At least the pigeons being treated with some respect.

That's a James Bond vibe.

Give them more of a bond vibe.

Okay, that's troubling.

Yeah, so how does one?

I suppose this so this all came up from last week when we had an email about someone that tried to rescue a seagull

by

wrestling them into a car.

Sharon of New Zealand.

Sharon of New Zealand.

What's the right thing to do when you see an animal in trouble?

Do you take it home, feed it sugary water, then sugary milk, and let it grow and let it bond and become part of your life so that you just become Ben and I'm always followed around by a stag.

So you can get a really, really moving viral TikTok reunion video a few years later.

Yes.

There's so many of those on TikTok, isn't it?

It's like someone meets like a really like fucked lizard.

They're like, oh my god, this lizard is so fucked.

And then they take it home and they go, first we're feeding it sugary water.

And it's two weeks later.

And now we're feeding it sugary milk.

And it's two weeks later, now we're feeding it sugary.

This is sugary flies.

Sugary flies.

Crunched up and sprinkled onto a caspacho base.

And then it's like six months later, and it's like a beautiful, like...

Well, it's turned into a deer, then, isn't it?

It's turning into a deer.

A gallops out of the shrubbery.

It's turned into a deer.

And gives the blogger a hug.

It's such a viral sort of guarantee, isn't it?

I got into one on YouTube, which was a guy who went to a restaurant

where you can pick your own lobster.

Oh, he didn't rescue a lobster.

From the tank.

He said, I'll have that one.

But don't cook it.

I'll take it home.

Now I'm

feeding it Bayonne's sauce.

Two weeks later.

Now I'm feeding it Hollandaise sauce and introducing it to the idea of a parsley sprig.

Three months later, now I'm covering it in delicious lemon juice.

Oh, so tart.

And then it's like six months later, and it's like, and now it's grown into a beautiful teenage boy

who I call Lubstow.

Hey, Lobstow.

He's got a boiler engineer apprenticeship.

He's never been happy.

But he still doesn't forget where he came from.

And you take him back to the restaurant, and Lubsto was crying, looking in at the tank.

It's my birth mother.

Unlikely Lubstow.

They'd have to have have kept that lobster in here for 16 years.

Yeah, so what happened with the lobster?

They just, the guy just looks after it in his house.

Are they good pets?

Are they good house things?

Aren't they sort of utterly disgusting?

It seems to be happy, certainly.

Sleep in the bed at night on the sofa.

God.

They're like hot, wet, sloppery

alien insects, aren't they, lobsters?

Outside of either a restaurant or a deep-sea dive.

Yeah, it's like going to sleep with some hot, wet scissors, isn't it, really?

Like

sentient scissors.

There's your prongs.

You asked Elia what a prong is.

That's what I'm trying to prong.

I've covered in prongs.

It's all prongs.

Sort of wet, grey, slippery, slimy scissors that have a strong defence instinct that's been developed over millennia.

Oh my god, that's.

Let's try and read some emails that aren't about animals dying.

That would be good.

Yeah, okay, yeah.

That'd be lovely.

Yes, please.

Last week we were talking about Atlantis Morissette having a tribute act or her being her own tribute act.

Yes.

And we've spectacularly failed to come up with the kind of punny name that she would be performing under.

It's true.

Tom Carr emails in simply with the words, Alan isn't Morissette.

Oh, very good.

Well done, Tom.

Well done, yes.

Really good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Of course it has to be that the person's called Alan, though, doesn't it?

Because then it really works.

So if you're...

Oh, yeah, Alan isn't Morissette.

Yeah, if you're called Alan and you do an Alanis Morissette thing, it's even better because Alan isn't Morissette.

Yeah.

trying to take a bit of your glory there, Tom.

Uh, but well, we'll go

or because I was wondering about Atlantis Norrisette, as in like no,

okay, or if you're a guy called Norris,

how about Atlantis Morissette?

And the whole thing is a sort of sub-aqua version,

and she duets with um lobster,

she duets with lobster, isn't it?

Irani, loads, loads of um

sorry,

Help me out.

We're in the same phase of the show

petering out.

That's preaching out.

I can't think of Tom could sort of.

I can't think of a Sabaqua takeover.

That's what Tom was for.

Yeah, maybe Tom could email us in a rewritten version of the song ironic, but to do with being under the sea.

To do everything on the water.

Yeah, okay.

How about this?

An old sea turtle turned 98.

He won the Sabaquiladerie.

You can't just put Sabaqua in front of the words.

Can't I?

How about it's like well, no, it's not like rain.

Rain doesn't make a difference underwater, does it?

No.

It's like a drow out on your wedding day to a trout.

Good.

Keep going.

A free subaqua ride.

You can't just put sub aqua ride.

A free summary ride when you've already pain.

It's the good advice from a wise old monkfish.

You just didn't take

aqua world.

Okay.

Tom, stand down.

Stand down, Tom.

Tomures

life is a funny way of nicking.

This is from Douglas.

It's a bollocking.

Oh, yeah.

And someone sent in their own bollocking jingle.

Mikey from Bognar Regis via Vancouver.

Okay, great.

Most people would prefer to do it the other way around, I would say.

Move from Bognaregis to Vancouver.

I would say, yes.

You're saying that Mikey's made the wrong life choices, Mike?

That's quite a big thing to say.

I think he's misread the memo.

Of course, Bognar Regis was Ashby de Le Zeus's first wife.

Bognar, the beautiful Bognar Regis.

He's been

the reason he's slapped at all, despite being in prison for several life sentences, is to pay off that very, very ugly divorce settlement,

isn't it?

With Bognar.

Sweet Bognar.

Sweet, sweet Bognar.

Okay, anyway, so Mikey has sent in his version of the listener bollocking theme.

Oh, brilliant.

In an orchestral style.

Nice.

That was very good.

Thank you very much for that one.

I think it gives quite a lot of gravitas to this bollock.

But I don't think this bollock necessarily warrants the gravitas, but let's do it anyway.

Let's see.

This is from Douglas.

Dear Beans, sorry for the late bollocking.

I was working on a container ship for eight months, and I'm just catching up.

Wow.

In your episode Ham Salad.

Yeah.

That's probably at least a month old.

That does take us back a bit.

That's longer than a month ago.

Yeah.

Oh, ham salad.

We all remember when

we

recorded the ham salad episode.

Well, we are all exactly where we're sat now.

Exactly.

In your episode, Ham Salad, Henry inaccurately states that Eleanor of Aquitaine married the Hamsburgs.

Right.

This is completely false.

As any student of Plant Hamtaginette's history knows, she's in fact married to Hamry Planhamgenet and their four sons, Hamry the Young King, Racharizzo the Lionheart, John Lackhams, and Geoffrey II, Duke of Brithamy.

It's a long time to be away at sea, isn't it?

There is a period of readjustment.

There's a cost.

There's always a cost to a stint at sea.

There isn't that.

And thank you, because we know we rely on you.

Because, you know, globally speaking.

Because George's friends for the last six months have been Douglas and Hammond.

He's called himself Douglas.

Yeah, we can assume his name is George.

It's not going to be Douglas.

He's not going to have got that right, is he?

But his friends are doing a piston handle and an old diesel-soaked rag.

And those, they're a much more forgiving audience, aren't they, for anecdotes and puns?

Yeah, yeah, very so.

So there is a readjustment period.

The occasional lost albatross.

Yes.

Yeah.

So God bless you, Douglas.

Thank you.

God bless you.

God bless you, Douglas.

And it won't be long before you're back.

Oh, the waves.

Yes.

And actually, maybe hurry back out there because I'm sure that diesel-soaked rag would love to

listen to your incoherent ramblings.

It's time

to pay the ferryman.

Patreon.

Patreon.

Patriot.com.

Forward slash three bean salad.

Thanks to everyone who signed up at our Patreon.

Patriot.com forward slash three bean salad is the place to go.

And if you sign up at the Sean Bean tier, you get a shout-out from the Sean Bean Lounge from Michael, who was there only last night.

Indeed so.

And it was a starry one down there, wasn't it?

Because it was

a Q ⁇ A with Sigourney Weaver.

It was indeed.

Thank you, Benjamin.

And here's my report.

Mid-July arrived, which meant, as per a Q ⁇ A with Sigourney Weaver at the Sean Bean Lounge.

John Pringle, Lina Lee Levapaste, Nick Marson, and Fidel H.

fixed SW up with her rider of a 1 to 1.5 scale replica Hyundai i10 made from prawn cocktail crisps and we got straight down to business.

Alice Callison, Samantha Timmer van der Tau and Dr.

Woodward asked Sigourney Weaver if she wanted to play swing ball and she said no.

Ryan Lepage, Tommy Gabreaux and Guy asked her if she'd ever made a bit of cash on the side selling tropical fruits and she said no.

Kyle Wilkins, Mackenzie Mendez, Niles Jackson and Grant Hayward asked Sigourney Weaver if Sigourney Weaver knew how many bones there were in a hedgehog's skeleton and Sigourney Weaver said no.

Rupert Sparling, Levo, Jess and Willie asked Sigourney Weaver for some money or a piece of one of her shoes and she said no.

Megan Love, Jade Bett and Greg Morrison asked Sigourney Weaver if she'd ever de-scaled an industrial cooling tower and she said no.

Alex Norman, Oliver May and Sophie A wanted to know if she wanted to know what they wanted to know and she said no.

Harry Dillimore, Benjamin Jones and Victoria asked Sigourney Weaver to enroll in a full-time bachelor's degree in war studies from King's College London and she said no.

Daniel Brown, Cloakie, Jade S and James Tasker asked her to talk about Lithuanian folk stories and she said no.

Yvonne Kavanagh, Tom Kemp, Fern Champion and Jamie Taylor asked her if, as an artist, she respected the medium of lukewarm banter podcasts and she said no.

Stephen Ingram, KD A.

Poyle, J.

Frederick Hill and Luke asked Sigourney Weaver if she'd ever considered finding out if she was related even distantly to Cheshire Association of Local Councils officer Jackie Weaver and she said no.

While James Giddings, Luke Harris and Benj Cunningham asked her if she'd like to play a game of who can draw the biggest chicken with them, but she said no.

Sock Redding, Sam Clinton, Rosie and Tom simply wanted to know

Okay, that's the end of the show.

We'll finish off with a version of our theme tune sent in by one of you.

This is from Doug.

Oh, Doug, thank you.

Thanks, Doug.

I was at an indoor bouldering centre in Nottingham yesterday with my son, and whoever was running the music was having a great time with early 2010s American College Indie,

playing about 10 tracks on the bounce that all sounded exactly the same.

This stuff all just sounds like the three-been salad theme, said my son.

So after half an hour of back-breaking garage band, here it is, regards Doug.

He also writes, P.S.

I woke up this morning having had a very detailed dream about getting into a fist fight with Mike Wozniak.

This seems very out of character for us both, but I'd like to take this opportunity to apologise for whatever Dream Me did to upset Dream Mike so much.

Oh, really?

Was it

how it shook down, was it?

Who came out on top, I want to know?

Don't know, we'll see.

Maybe you can tell us.

If you get into a real fist fight with Mike Wozniak, you don't never do no waking up never again.

Dear.

So that's the end of the show.

See you next time.

And thanks for listening.

Douglas's theme.

Goodbye.

Ta-da.

Thank you.

Bye.