Neighbours

Welcome back. Welcome back.
We should probably start with an analysis of England's, I'm going to say, performance in the ashes. Take it away, Ben.

Yes. Thank you.
I'm sorry. This is going to be.

Well, I would bear in mind that we're recording this over a week in advance, I think.

Maybe two weeks in advance.

And so that's, you know, obviously I can provide up to the moment Ash's news. Of course, I can.
Yeah.

Me and

baggers and

wobblers. Wobbers.
Chobblers. And jobblers.

That's funny. I did notice actually in the interviews with the players, it's everyone is a jobbers or a knobblers or a wobbler's.
Like, it's really hard to keep track of.

And it's the same for the Australians and the English.

There's an interview with one of the Aussie guys and he was going, yes, well, I've been working really hard with knobblers and and

especially because of, yeah, obviously the experience I had with Chablers last year. Last year.

So it's unclear whether or not they're talking about a coach, a colleague, a joint somewhere on their body. And the Chablers is really acting up.
A Victorian virus.

I'm sorry, it's Chablers. No!

No!

We thought the sewage system had sorted out Chablers.

I slightly misheard you when you said this last week as being Chablers, who's a complete legend. So I lent into my previous complete legend or a medicine ball.
Or a medicine.

It's really hard to tell with Charblers.

Should we? I mean, I'm just very aware that we have listeners, especially in America, who will be so far from understanding anything here. They don't have a wobbling.

They don't even know what the ashes is. They don't even know what sport we're talking about or who we're talking about.
I bet they could guess, though.

Okay, we'll tell you the answer in three seconds. In the meantime, have you guessed? The answer was cricket.
Cricket. Cricket.
Every so often, England plays plays Australia and it's called the Ashes.

For a very long time, I believe.

Yes, it's historic.

Oh, I mean, as in they play for a very long time. Oh, yes.

They have a match, but it seems to last 19 months. Although it only lasted two days

because it all went horribly wrong for England. Because of wabblers.
Because of wabblers.

Wabblers had a right shabblers. Yeah.
He had a royal shabblers. Well, he was throwing absolute crodlers at them.

And by that we mean by that I actually mean

that their bowling coach, Jonathan Crodell has like literally threw the coach at the players.

Really hard to deal with. But of course, on a more sad note,

Nablaz has come down with mud layers.

Running out of noises.

Australians never call each other their name, basically.

It's definitely true. So, for example, if your actual name was David Smith, you'd be Smithers, you'd be Davvers, you'd be Dev Smithers.
Davo. There might be an O.
It could be Davo. They like an O.

Smith O. Or if you've ever done anything that drew any attention in your whole life, for example, if you once dropped a chocolate, you'd be known as Chock Droppers.

Choco Dropo.

That's another sort of rule of nicknaming. But you know what? I've got a theory here I'm going to come out with.
Okay.

Which is what, because I think you can't imagine someone in an American accent saying.

America.

America.

America.

I'd like two tickets for the Chattanooga Choo Choo.

America, America. Get me the DA.
A slice of old farmer's apple pie dandy animal in New York City. No one's ever going to listen to this crazy new music you're making, Mr.

Presley.

Burgers.

Imagine America, like a normal American, right? Going, coming into work and just saying, hey, Sanchez, you're off the case, goddammit. Yeah,

I can imagine that.

So it's just a normal American. Yeah, yeah, any normal American standard.
Day-to-day vernacular.

Yeah, because basically America is a country that's full of people having to take on and off cases, isn't it?

That is my understanding, yes.

I think people are either employed by the police or they're running from the police. As far far as I can tell.

But I think I imagine that language feeds down to everything they do.

So even if you're working in IT or whatever, you're on the case or you're not on the case, even though that case may just involve, for example, restructuring communications.

Yeah, but that's not the way the goddamned pen pushers at City Hall see it. Exactly.
And often if a couple, for example, are breaking up, they'll say,

darling, you're off the case. Exactly.

And that means I'm breaking up with you. Exactly.
We're both off. You know what? I think we should mutually both decide to get off each other's case and do this in a civilized way.

Give me your wedding ring and the other one

and your badge.

That's right. It's also badge culture.
So every job has a metallic badge.

There's no other form of ID. It's very much like we're giving you the benefit here.
Yes.

There's no face. There's no picture of your face on the badge.
There's no sort of bio ID involved. It's just a shiny badge.
Well, it's about the glamour of the badge, isn't it? Yeah.

And the power that the the badge has to because you're right, no one's ever checked a badge. No.
It's just she's a badge. He's a badge.
Yeah. She or he's got a badge.
They're wearing a badge.

They're holding a badge. And also there comes a point in every American's life where at some point they stand on a ferry looking out over

a lonely river at sunset and they think to themselves, you know what, goddammit? Maybe I've actually started to become the badge.

They then throw the badge in the river

and they get their pension.

Hopefully directly into the river and not into a ferry coming in in the opposite direction which which can happen because it happens so often it's a numbers game you know it's the end of the day it's a numbers game and there will be some badges that are swallowed by a larger than normal mackerel for example end up in a a booyah bass somewhere perhaps in in new jersey well a booyah badge exactly um and obviously they're americans uh employed uh they're they're known as badge scrapers people who um they they go around underwater don't they and frog man out of frogman outfits i mean why they're i mean they're literally wearing a wearing wearing air.

Is that an outfit?

It's more than that. Well, they've got different series of outfits, haven't they? They've got their number ones for formal occasions.
Exactly.

I mean, it's a functioning aqualung.

But it's also an outfit. But no, but they they scrape the bottoms of the rivers, don't they?

Because so many badges get thrown out by so many people retiring from different careers that actually there's an entire profession which is badge scraping, which is collecting the badges off the bottom of American rivers.

Yeah. They then get smelted down.
And they're made into firearms, isn't it? And made into firearms.

So the whole thing is self-it's very much a self-fulfilling, vicious cycle, you could argue. Anyway, you were saying, Henry, that you can't.
I haven't finished yet.

I was trying to get you back onto yourself.

Obviously, sometimes the badge scrapers have to, how do they have their moment where they need to throw their badge into the river and decide that they're going to retire?

Well, they have to throw it up, don't they? They have to throw it up. Yeah.
They have to do a sort of kind of a whaleyan spout, I guess. Oh, no, they can do a thing with it.

If you adapt an anti-anti-helicopter missile device, you take out the missile. Yeah.
Stick a badge

and um, that is what a shooting star is

when you see it going the wrong way, when you see it going the wrong way,

um, yeah,

anyway. So, um, what were you saying, Ben?

Well, you very grandly said that you had a theory that you wanted to impart, because yeah, because so if you go back to that classic American thing, we can all imagine Americans saying, Sanchez, you're off the case.

Can you imagine them saying this, Sanchez? Actually, you know what? You're back on the case because I kind of like you. You can't say,

no

What is the bit of a not being

credulous about? You can't because you can't urge American names or oh Sancho's. Yeah, John F.
Kennadurs. You can't do it.
It doesn't because it's not Kendos. He's not Kendos.

Did no one ever call him Kendoz, did they? No one ever called him Obamo. They've got nicknames, but they go for more.
They're more elaborate, aren't they?

Like you'll have a baseball player who's called like Billy the Gryll, Mackenzie. That kind of stuff.

Because he's got a fully functioning grill on his back. Exactly, and he doesn't care who knows that.
Or Jimmy, the bayou pony.

McGuind.

Yeah, it's more specific, isn't it? It's hard to work.

And actually, you sometimes see them at the end of films, don't you, where it's going through and it'll say that the grip was called something like John Gumbo Jones or something. And it has the little

speech marks. Yeah.
And on Dolly, Jimmy Five Eyes. That's actually not a nickname.
That's why he's so good at doing dolly work. Colleen Switchblade Murphy.

It was a real mistake to get her on the production, to be fair.

The other thing you get is people call things like CJ and BJ and TJ, BJ CJ Jr.

And then you have to carry all that on.

Someone else nickname. Well, because if you become the junior.
Yeah, well, that's why you become junior the third. Or the third.

That's when the numbers comes in. Yeah.
Yeah.

But anyway, it's a different nomenclative system and it's a different nomenclative language, right? But I think, I think, I reckon England and Australia have got something in common.

It must be to do with, which is the ers, waggers, athers, badgers. No, those are just an animal.
That's just an animal.

But also the nickname of Stephen Badge.

Whose badge can never be taken away?

Yeah, because sometimes someone will call me like Parters.

that happens henners so henners i've had henners my whole life yeah have you yeah yeah henners i suppose the old waszers comes in waszers was i call you wazza quite a lot but i think because there is a connection but britain and australia has has a certain connection doesn't it that's and his name is our sausage fingered king

yeah all rise everyone stand up

i hope you're saluting i can see both your hands henry which means you're not saluting do the sausage salute

Advocacy the sausage salute. All stand for the king.

We're entering the 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.

No, but I think there's something in that. Breggers, come on, Weggers.

So you've got these English guys called Athers interviewing these Australian guys, and they're all using the same kind of nickname system. Hello?

Is your big revelation that England and Australia are connected in some way?

Can I say, take away the sarky arsehole tone from that comment? And yes,

actually.

We don't yet know exactly what this connection is, but we feel that there is one. But it's uncanny because it's on the other side of the world.
Further aside, it's required.

So, obviously, so the main English commentator is called Aggers.

And there was Blowers, wasn't there?

Blowers. And then there's...
Yeah, there's Henry Blofeld. What's the...

Tuffers? Phil Tuffers.

So what's going on with this? Athers. Athers?

That's Michael Atherton. What's going on with all that? I think there's something in there.
There was one person who escaped all this. Who's that? Who's that? David Gower.

He was simply called David Gower. He was pre-erred.

You can't err an err. Oh, that's -

that's pretty. You can't err an error.
Maybe that's why he rose to the top so quickly. Yeah.
Could be. He was pre-erred.
He was pretty erred.

But probably most of them are desperately excited for the moment. They get erred, aren't they? And that's a sign that you're in.

It's about

chummy groups who've had a big night drinking back in the past and something happened that they've agreed never to talk about again. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.

That real bond. Oh, yeah.
And they've all got something over everyone else because they've all got a victory over it. So it's like mutually assured destruction when it comes to that.

I don't mind saying this. Jonathan Agnew has clearly murdered several people.

Is that

yeah?

And service Phil Taffenal.

You're going on the record there. Going on the record.
You're going to pop in an allegedy just to be on the safe side.

What, and a little allegeders? I guess.

Yeah, but you're right. You've killed someone on a camp.
Let's face it, it's a camping holiday. It's a Christmas camping holiday.
It's a Christmas camping holiday. Christmas cricket camping holiday.

Christmas cricket. Because we don't know what they do in the winter, do we? We don't know what they do in the winter.
And I think it's cricket.

I think they're always trying to nail the perfect cricket camping holiday. It always goes wrong, and they always end up having to murder someone.

Okay, I've been hennered in my life. Was, you know, was you've been Wazzard.
I probably was with you.

Basically, there's quite a nice feeling you get from it of being in a little club. It makes you, it's chummy, isn't it? It's friendly on the one hand.

But on the other hand, I just think it can be slightly coercive. Because when I hear people using those nicknames, on the one hand, I think, oh, you're part of a nice chummy group.

I also think, oh, you've been coerced into a group thing. You've got to free your man.
Free man.

You actually got Jonathan Agg new.

Yeah, take a toke on it, baby. It's good shit.

Free mind, unless you want to carry on quite a successful career as a cricket player. Oh, yeah.
I ain't offering you none of that stuff. Sorry, I should have said.

Yeah.

I do wish I was into Gregor, though. I mean, I'll now and again, like, you know, have a look at some highlights.
But I wish I had the, like we have our mutual friend, Simon. Simos.

Simos. Simos.
Huge fan, loves it. And I wish I had that.
Like, it's a nice passion to have, particularly with cricket, I think, because it's so weird and it goes on for so long.

And like the Ashes, people will completely adjust their sleep patterns and will have bizarre sleep patterns

depending on which side of

the world it's going on and that level of dedication. I don't have that to anything.
So at the moment with the Ashes, when you wake up in the morning, you get the last session of play, I think.

So you can wait. So if you get up at sort of nine-ish or something, you might get a few hours.

But weird thing could happen now, actually, which happens to me, which is if I wake up in the middle of the night

at four or something, I can just turn on the phone and listen to the ashes for a bit. And it's quite a bad idea.
It's really hard to get back to sleep. Because it's so thrilling.

Most engrossing. It's also, it's very different to what gets you to sleep, surely, in terms of your.
You've discussed your sort of you prefer that people having a dreadful time in the Arctic tundra.

That's true. That is true.
How is your search for books about people having an awful time in the Arctic going? I'm having a break. Oh, yeah?

I actually found it quite...

Were you inured to it? I became inured to it. I was like, yeah,

you've eaten a dog. And?

Yeah, give me a recipe. How are you making it? How are you making it?

There's a variety here. Come on.
Yeah, there's only 30% of Percival left. And

yeah.

Because they do end up much of sort of much of a muchness in that people end up really hitting against the same problems every time.

Which is, it's ruddy cold. Yeah.

The dog start to look ruddy tasty.

And

actually, it turns out gaffer taping's sort of

your fingers back on

is a pyrrhic victory.

I mean, first time you try and put

and pick a frozen icicle out of of your snozza.

They're off again.

Yeah, no,

I was halfway through

endurance, which ironically I didn't manage to get.

I only got halfway through endurance.

Which tells us something about how you might have coped in that environment. It's true.

Henry, why are you looking up recipes to

slow cook a husky?

We're only 20 minutes outside of Southampton.

And we're not even on our way to do an Arctic mission. We're on our way to play squash.

Okay, let's turn on the bean machine. Yes, please.

About time. Let's dust it off.

This week's topic, as sent in by Nicole. Nicole, hello, from Oregon.

Ooh, I'd love to go to Oregon. And she has sent in the topic of neighbours.
Nicole, of course, from Oregon would be a neighbor of a Sasquatch. That's who her neighbors are.

I really understand why people could get into the whole Sasquatch spotting scene.

I get that completely. Of all of the sort of weird conspiracy theories, cryptozoological weirdnesses out there,

if I had to pick one, I'd pick that time. Go to the great forests of Washington and Oregon and look for a Sasquatch nest.
It's also just fundamentally an excuse to buy a new fleece, isn't it? It is.

this kind of thing. That's what you have to even boil it all down to that.
Get a new fleece and have a few days to yourself.

Yeah.

You recently went on a hike, Henry. Oh, you've been hiking, haven't you? It's true, actually.
Where did you go? I've got quite a low bar for what I describe as a hike, but yeah. Where was your hike?

I did a hike. I did a nice hike in

Cambridge. So from the town centre

to the bus station. As I said, I've got quite a low bar for a hike.
Some people think.

Okay. Twice round Parker's Peace Park, was it?

Round the boots and back to bed.

Don't know where you got the idea of twice from.

No,

from the town of Cambridge to

a town called,

I mean, don't Google it to see how far away it is, but Grantchester.

Grantchester, which is a suburb of Cambridge. I think it comes up.
I think on Google Maps, it comes up as the same place. It doesn't, it comes up as

it'll say zero on Sunday. So they have the same bin collection days.
Council-wise,

they're just very much peasing a pod.

You basically did a commute.

Yeah.

Yeah, I sort of did it. I did a commute.
You could do the zigzag across a single parking zone, I think is what you've done. Effectively, yeah.

Did you have the gear on, though? Because that's crucial to a hike.

A lot of it is about the gear and the snacks. Okay.
So for me, it's about hiking bingo. That's why I play it here.
That's why I think of it. Okay.
Hiking boots. Tick.

One point. Ducks.
Saw some. Tick.

100 points. You've won the game.
Yeah. That's it.
Emergency bag.

Blister plasters. Tick.
Toilet roll in a waterproof sandwich bag. Tick.

A range of different types of music to disguise different types of embarrassment some people might have while using the toilet roll, the collapsible toilet bowl that I've brought with me for people to use.

And in the event of running out of toilet roll, the flare.

That's a real emergency.

Just burn that turt off.

Point it downwards. It's the only time you should have a flare downwards.

Or askwards. So you've got instructions on how to basically

zip the fleece up right up to your nose and you point the flare down your trousers

and you fire it off. And because all the oxygen is stored

within the fleece, if you've tied it properly, you won't actually go up in flames, but you'll just create a very...

You have to make sure your trousers are secured at the bottoms, otherwise you will get a backdraft.

Yeah, secure the trousers secure the neck and then you just you can shoot that that flare off isn't it because there isn't enough oxygen for you to explode

but that's only

just enough to clean your ass

yeah so well it's interesting you asked me about the bag because um

we

maybe it's time for me to discuss this we there's no such thing as a bagless hike if you're in the wilderness without a bag you're you're lost you're stricken yeah you might as well um set fire to yourself and try and eat yourself as a sort of human duck roll yeah or try and spell yourself out into sos in a gathering somewhere yeah

which again will be a pyrrhic victory if it works

or just walk another mile you're in cambridge

yeah

take about 20 minutes there is there is yeah there is reasons to yeah just to keep you calm for just 10 to 15 minutes or just ask the guy in the guy who's working in the Rymans that you're browsing in for help.

For directions.

Yeah, so I consider anything beyond

the soft folders in terms of depth into Rymans as a hike as well. So if you're beyond the soft folders, so you're into the

mini shelving units. You're into the back-to-school section.
The back-to-school section. That's a hike.

No, so I am.

Well,

you're very right about

how you define a hike is a lot of it's down to the accoutrements and stuff. So for example, so not having a bag means it's not a hike.
Yeah.

Footwear is key. Footwear is key.
The other one is something I've learned something I learnt a while ago, which surprised me, which is

you can't actually can't have an umbrella on a hike. That's quite that's quite

which is sort of counterintuitive. So that was very early on in my hiking days.

I brought an umbrella to a hike. You'd have looked like an absolute fool.

I almost look like as big of a dickhead as all the other actual proper hikers.

But fundamentally, they did look like bigger dickheads than me. As did their dogs.

No, Istray, you can't bring a... Because it was actually in Glencoe in Scotland.
You can't take an umbrella to Glencoe. You can't take an umbrella to Glencoe.
Is it because cities...

cut off wind patterns and therefore the the brolly can work in theory in a city but can't work on an exposed hill. I think it's unserious.
I think

the hiker needs their hands. The hiker should be operating compasses and looking at maps with the hands-on things in laminate sheeting, that sort of stuff.

Resuscitating a friend, resuscitating a friend, starting a fire. Try resuscitating a friend while holding your brolly up.
It's an absolute disaster.

And also, while strangling a nemesis, you might have to do it one on each hand and don't get those two mixed up. And beating off a red deer.

By which you mean in in combat yes yeah in masturbatory combat

the most ancient art

so yeah so so um

accoutrements is key certain things push you into a hiking area and certain things don't that's why fundamentally i believe that most hiking exists so that some so that you can buy yourself a nice fleece a nice new fleece and maybe one with a little zip pocket.

Okay. You think it's an invention? Perhaps.

I think it might be.

When was the fleece invented? Well, exactly. Is this Elizabethan Mark II? Is this in the time of the late Queen? Because most things are Victorian inventions, aren't they?

But maybe this is later than that.

Maybe no one hiked before the invention of the fleece. Well, they would hike in sort of oiled seal skins and things, wouldn't they? Yeah, yeah.
That's right. Well, they'd go on expeditions, you see.

Yes. Yeah.
See, we didn't need to do that anymore because everything was mapped and discovered and was conquered and unconquered.

Well, as I discovered when I arrived in Granchester, I was quite disappointed. It had been discovered.
It turned out

I was quite let down by it.

But it had been discovered as well. I was trying to plant the pack of standards into the front air, into what turned out to be the car park of quite successful tea rooms

that's been there for several generations.

Yeah, so on this hike, so I had my hiking boots and

I had my friend

and bag, I had rucksack.

I'm hugely into rucksack now

as a person. I just, I always have.
The trouble with me is I always have a rucksack on me now. I've become addicted to rucksack over the last couple of years.

But is there a different hiking rucksack to your day-to-day, your city rucksack? No, I've actually... It's got a big monstrous one with a belt on it, for example.
No, it's not one of those clasps.

It's a sort of city hiker. It's a kind of hybrid.
In fact, I bought it from a shop in London, which is which is kind of about the overlap between...

It's urban hiker.

That's the look. I've been there.
It's called Wankers Haven, isn't it?

No, you're getting it mixed up. This one's actually

Dilbert's apotheosis.

But it's,

yeah, people often get them mixed up because they're quite similar.

So, what happened with my bag is my friend said to me, oh,

you're taking a bag. And he said to me, he said, why are you taking a bag?

What an idiot? Hiking. Exactly.

How many pockets is he got

waterproof Glee if he was a bad boy?

He was wearing entirely urban,

completely urban outfit, including. He's asking for it.
You're not going to believe this bit. He was so urban.
He was wearing brown suede sort of chucker boot shoes.

Come on, mate. Fine.
It's a Bach recital.

In a disused church. In a disused church.

It's

an XL Bully fighting ring.

In a disused church.

it's the funeral of the XL bully referee

in a sanctified church

yes it's going to see a conceptual artist who fills disused um churches with disused churches

he fills disused churches with disused churches yeah

Thank you for listening to Three Bean Salad. Do not adjust the settings on your chosen podcast app.
This is the episode about neighbours. I repeat, this is the episode about the topic neighbours.

There was a kid at school who was at my primary school. This is going a long ways back, who ended up in a very, very posh boarding school.
But the kind of posh boarding school where they

it's not, it's not for the elite. Do you know what I mean? It's the guys they want,

they don't want anything to do with them at Gordonston and Harrow and Eaton.

Are you talking about thick poshos? Thick poshos.

And he

he um he was sent on one of the uh an expedition,

I think, like in the Cairngorms, somewhere like that's quite hard work.

Yeah, and it was one of those school expeditions that goes wrong and requires a helicopter and mountain rescue and all the rest of the things. And all the souls saved, everyone fine.

But I think his parents were so disinterested in him at that age or found him so irritating, they hadn't even realized he'd been sent on an expedition until they saw him being rescued on the news

coming out coming out of the helicopter dressed in kitchen foil.

Rupert?

Yes, what is it, darling? Our son, Rupert, he's on the news.

Rupert! All the Ruperts, bring them all in.

Even Rupert the Terrapin.

That's a real emotional somersault, isn't it? To realise that.

Because actually, the

emotional response should actually be, fine.

Well, because Rupert isn't in danger, but you never knew he was. So the correct emotional.
And he's got a great anecdote. Exactly.
So the emotional response, because, yeah, it should just be, fine.

Change the channel, darling.

I'm sure he'll write and tell us all about it in due course. Remind me to give Rupert a particularly stiff handshake on his birthday next year.

Thank you for listening to Three Bean Salad. In case case you're worried, please still do not adjust the settings on your chosen podcast app.
This is the episode about the topic neighbours.

For your hiking bingo, for it to be known that you've hiked,

you either have to be, so we've got ducks. That's a given.

Yeah.

So mountain ducks. Yep.
Savannah ducks, whatever kind of duck it is.

Scuba ducks.

You can't hike underwater, actually. So say above water, that's one of the ticks.
To know that you're hiking. An An unusually large amount of sandwiches.
Well, but that's Mike, that's you. Oh,

because

you operate on a base level of sandwiches. So, for you, no sandwiches is like two sandwiches, isn't it? You operate

on a plus two.

So, your sense of what a lot of sandwiches is compared to most people's is really skewed. Yeah.
So, if Mike doesn't have a sandwich, he's actually on minus two sandwiches.

He's on minus two sandwiches. I literally, at this very moment in time,

have two sandwiches upstairs that are wrapped and ready to go for when i leave the house later i mean that's true yeah mike is such a sandwich-based person have we talked about this enough on the pod we have talked about it yeah i don't know if people really really realize what a core part of mike's personality is

he's got a sandwich he's got a spare sandwich which he may well offer to you and if that warm warm light ever falls on you in your life yeah just be grateful because it's a lovely moment it's like the light coming through the stained glass windows of canterbury cathedral hitting your face isn't it you You, Henry, in particular, have many times taken sucker from

one of my backup sandwiches. I have.
I think I've only ever eaten one Wozniak backup sandwich. I've seen Henry probably 20.

I basically, they basically kept me going throughout my late 30s

to the point where

I was actually told by a doctor that

I have consumed a lifetime's worth of chutney and I should stop

because

there was chutneyface in my upper and mid-intestines, but now irreversible.

I mean, he's actually told me he's seen the men twice my age.

I wouldn't be able to move with that level of chutney.

That'll be it.

But of course, luckily, the great thing is now that

certainly at the age of 40, every man now gets a free text message from the NHS, don't they?

Explaining chutney units.

When he asked me how many chutney units I was eating in a week, I asked him, what's the ideal?

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I was like, are you joking?

In a week?

But he gets me through a half-hour conversation with Mike, wasn't he? On a Monday morning. And in giving you those sandwiches, Henry.
Yeah. Mike was being a good neighbour oh well done

that's for you Nicole we are dedicated to talking about the topic of neighbours

Mike sandwiches by the way are not just plentiful and there

they're often very good as well

well he's kept on upping the ante with surprising with surprising chutneys yeah because every time it's like oh has that got a little bit of and there's this lovely moment where mike looks looks at you and he nods and his eyes glitter.

Limestone. Limestone.

And that's why his eyes glitter so much because the amount of a limestone he's eating now, Mike on his eye.

So I ticked off all the main hiking bingo things.

Big footwear, me worrying about someone else's footwear. So we were walking through muddy fields.
I was looking at my friend.

It wasn't Rupert, was it? It wasn't Rupert. I'm going to call this friend

Ramtopi

Ramtopi. Is that Ramtopi I or the second?

Holy Pharaoh of ancient Egypt.

Nubian king.

Yeah.

So his footwear was all over the place. He was wearing golden slippers.

No use at all.

But he's got diamond hooves.

He completely moot what he wears, I I suppose. And of course, he is,

well, he's an anaconda from the waist up.

Which means waterproofing wasn't an issue. Where do you find the waist on an anaconda?

The waist. Yeah.

It's normally where the fleece ends. So

you wait till it's put on its fleece. Then you can see.
And the bum bag begins. And the bumbag begins.
So my friend Tampoki.

That was cool. That's his beautiful wife, isn't it?

I'm betraying him sleeping with his brother. No, so

he was wearing these suede.

I was like, you fool. I was looking.
Because

there's always this superior, there's a kind of superiority, inferiority kind of measuring sticks of who's wearing what and who's got it right, who's got it wrong.

And I was thinking, for once, I'm the guy. I'm in the box seat here because I've not got a brolly.
I've got a bag.

If you're not sitting on the boot of the Hyundai 10 in the car park changing your footwear, you've gone wrong. Yes.

But also, Henry, I mean, is it not possible that Ram Popeye, whoever his name was, was looking at you thinking, Henry's gone full hiking gear. We're just walking around Cambridge.

Yeah.

It's possible he was thinking that. Yeah.
This is all paved.

Is he worried about the cobblestones in Granchester? What's he worried about? So the walk happened. On the way back, we got slightly.

There was a bit where I got distracted by there were so many ducks. Yeah.

I experienced what's known as duck blindness.

I couldn't tell what

was duck and what wasn't.

Duck.

There were so many ducks. Anyway, I close my eyes and I'd see ducks.

Did you start pulling apart your friend with two forks?

The only cure is to cover a man in a giant pancake at that point and just let him

a giant fleece pancake. Save his life.

Darkness was falling, but luckily

Google Maps was still working and there was a path just on the left which we went up no lot. It was London street lighting.

London street lighting. And pubs.
There's quite a few pubs everywhere. But when we went back to town, we then went out and had an Indian meal in the evening.

I went to the loo at one point and I came back and I said to my friend, that's weird. There's lots of mud everywhere around us.

And then I realized that my

hiking boots had pulled back with them huge clods of mud.

And I was leaving massive clods of mud everywhere I went. And my friend Tampopi had no such problem.
Are you sure you're wearing boots or not? Sort of water skis or something like that?

Or you just tied some tennis jackets to the bottom of your loafers?

Are you wearing horseshoes?

Thank you for listening to Three Bean Salad. We would like to apologise to Nicole from Oregon, whose topic suggestion was neighbours.
We didn't really mention neighbours at all.

This isn't any evidence of a lack of respect that we have for you, Nicole, or indeed the state of Oregon. We're simply quite bad at this job.

We've got some plugging to do. Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah. Certainly time for a couple of pluggers.
Well, okay, there's two, maybe three things to plug, as far as I'm aware.

One is that Mike's tour continues to be on sale. That's true.

That's true. Although I've been ramming that down people's throats lately.

There's an autumn leg as well.

There's a bonus autumn leg that's happening. Get your hot Woz tickets.
Yeah, I've been ramming it down people's bleeding throats.

Mike's been doing some what I would describe as quite charming Instagram videos in order to promote the fact that new venues are going on sale, for example. They tend to involve Pam.
Yes.

There was a recent one where Pam's standing in a river. Yeah.
And you're throwing rocks into Pam's head. Incorrects.

Crucially incorrect.

A

few small pebbles that she catches in her mouth and then drops. How on earth did you learn that you could throw pebbles at your dog and she would catch it and enjoy catching it? I tell you that, but

it wasn't me who learnt that. It was another family member.

It's an occasional treat. She really likes it.
So we don't do it very often, but

it'll be little pebble close range.

Is that what normal dog behaviour is?

I don't know, actually.

She likes to chase stones as well. Like if you throw stones in the river, she'll sort of

chase them about

to where they landed. And she likes doing that.
And occasionally she'll make it clear that she wants to catch a few. You go, all right.
And then you move on.

It was very charming, but I just thought I've never seen that happen between a man and dog before. Yeah.

And what other things might you find out that she likes? Well, this is it. I'm open-minded.

I'm open-minded. You know, I mean, I know some things that she definitely likes.
You know, there's there's lots of stuff she likes. She likes her toys.
She likes digging holes. She likes rolling about

in the piss of anyone else.

But not her own. Not her own piss.
No. She'll piss on piss.
She won't roll in her own piss.

Is it because if she rolled in her own piss, she would actually literally become her own territory and it would create a kind of infinite vortex of... Who's the dog, who's the piss, who's the dog?

That's right. It becomes quite philosophically challenging, certainly for that breed,

isn't it? Because you're visualizing and you're beagles, let's face it.

Yeah, well, she's a pointer type of dog, really, rather than she's a pointer.

So, which gives you a philosopher queen, yeah, yeah, which gives you a clue as to how psychologically sophisticated she is. I mean, she's she's cute and delightful, but pointing

that's about as far as it gets, isn't it? Intellectually.

Careful.

Sorry, sorry. So, there's also rolling in other people's piss.
Sorry, sorry, there's also rolling in other people's piss.

So, that's on sale. I would encourage you to go and check that out.
I mean, there's a few big old venues on there, Mike.

A few briskets.

Secondly, Henry has created a whole new range of Christmas merch, haven't you, Henry?

That's right.

That's right. It's called Henry's Dingle Dangles.

And it's an idea I'm having on the fly, so you have to go with it. And it's next day they either dingle or they dangle.
You get one in the back or not.

The dinglers go downwards and

one or none.

That's still to be confirmed. But the dinglers have a picture of Christmas on it rowing a boat.

It's a new take on

it. And so it's a new take on Christmas.
And another one is a picture of Sandy Toxvig.

Oh, God. We're going to have to go with it.
We haven't got time to rethink. So it's Santa rowing a boat, or it's Sandy Toxvig.

Those would say one dingles, one dangles, and you can hang them on a tree or a child

or a dog or a car. So I'm just looking at an email thread between us and the company that sought out our merch.
Can I just say, this is a bit of a pompadoo, isn't it? It's a pompadou and a half.

And now it's time for

pompadou section.

Pompidou.

The woman who we deal with has sent us an email and you've replied

saying that you intend to make some new Christmas merch. She says, ideally by the week commencing 24th of November.

What's the date today, Henry? Woohoo!

Well, according to the computer, mom 24 nov.

You know what? Well, this is where the gray area of timing that I've created for myself, And it's a comfortable safe space that I live in in relation to time,

which is you look at a deadline or you look at you look at time and a lot of people see it as a left-to-right sort of arrow that's moving

along a piece of paper well along a whereas you fold that piece of paper scrunch it up into a ball and throw it into a bin I fold it back yeah

so which so no one knows which way it's facing and you can't prove anything

and swallow the entire bin

staples and all what are you saying Ben so I so I said ideas by the Monday than November 24th. I don't think it was ideas.
I think it was finished design, isn't it?

By the week. The week commencing.

By

the week

commencing.

How many times do I need to say this before you leave me alone?

By.

Because, yeah, the week commencing. Monday.

Buy.

She think she means buyers in next to adjoining.

Exactly. So the week.

So is it the week adjoining before the week or the week of joining after the week? Well, it wasn't the week before or the week

aside.

No, so

this is the week. So we have commenced the week commencing Monday, the 24th of November.
Now, I said I would do it by

that week. Did I say I would do it by the beginning of that week? Did I say I would do it by the end of that week? Did I say I would do it by the middle of that week? I think it's inherently clear.

Not in the grey area that I've just pointed out that I exist in. Nothing is clear in the grey area.
Nothing is specific. It's a fog.
It's a kind of

conceptual fog. Can I paint this grey area black?

Because she writes, ideally, by the week commencing 24th of November, due to Black Friday being that week. So again,

yeah, so that, yeah, black is, yeah, black is a, it's a solid chunk of,

well, it's a lack lack of colour. It's a solid chunk of commerce, my friend.
It's a solid chunk of commerce.

Okay, so I should, so generally speaking, so for example, I'm just going to give a quick idea of how I operate with time. So if, for example, you're meeting someone at eight o'clock.
Yeah.

Now, I think it's fair to say that

it's impossible to meet anyone at eight o'clock.

It's not possible. You can't.

Yeah. So

already, I mean, calling it that is a kind kind of, it's a philosophical joke, isn't it, that we share amongst ourselves with each other when we say should we meet at eight o'clock.

It's like Voltaire going, oh,

what is time? I don't know. Oh, it's not possible, but oh, hello, should we meet up? I don't know.
Yeah. It's a kind of philosophical, playful enlightenment game.

Eight o'clock, as if. Yeah.
Yeah. Okay.
You can't meet at eight o'clock because to meet at eight o'clock would mean both

me and the target

or

whoever I'm meeting. Or loved one.

Or it may not be someone I'm planning to assassinate. Yeah, you're right.

No, but so the person you're meeting, so the meety.

So if I'm the meter, so for the meter and the me tee

to meet at eight o'clock. I think they're like interchangeable roles here.
Yes, yeah, for example. Well, one person's meter is another person's meety.

But from my point of view, I'm the meter, the person I'm meeting is the meeting. For us both to arrive at eight o'clock isn't possible.

You've got to forget that idea.

Honestly.

You've got to.

Can't.

Can't we make it possible? No, because you both have to arrive at eight o'clock. But you can make.
You can make that happen, I think. It's Achilles' duck.

It's Achilles' duck.

I think you can clamber inside Achilles' duck and make him a Trojan duck. And I think you can make that happen.

That's so offensive to ducks. You do what I do, and you arrive at seven, you case the joint.
Yeah. Okay.

You go and hover in a nearby doorway in the shadows with a perfect view of the meeting location.

You've pasted it out already, so you know that you can paste it out and arrive at that location at exactly eight o'clock. Well, you follow the exact protocol of an assassination attempt.

The exact same protocols, which is why quite often you'll be late for the meeting because you've been

dragged in the back of a van by the FBI, the CIA, Interpol, various international organizations

will monitor your heat maps.

Because why are you scoping out the views of the Costa from the top of London Bridge? For example, the questions like that. Why have you jimmied open the fire exit door for a rapid exit? Just in case.

And why are you wearing a fake invisible in the vertical flesh-coloured moustache on top of your actual moustache?

I still don't know the answer to that one, actually. Why is it you do that? The meat star.

It means your mustache is completely invisible except from the side. It's something I can use as a decoy if I'm being chased by an FBI L station.

Yeah.

So it's a sausage. It is a sausage.

A sausage by any other name. It's a sausage by any other name.
No, but what I mean is, in the same way Achilles' duck, right? We know about Achilles' duck. Achilles' duck can't get across a pond.

It's a philosophical joke.

It's one of Zeno's paradoxes, right?

And I don't know about Zeno's paradoxes.

And the fact that I'm talking about Zeno's paradoxes and Zeno's paradoxes was one of the featured In Our Times best ofs that was played on radio for over the last month may or may not be a coincidence.

Anyway,

Zeno's paradox. So Achilles Duck...

He starts off on one side of the pond, right? To get to the other side of the pond, he has to go halfway across each time. He has to go halfway

to get to the other side of the pond. He has has to go halfway first, right? Yeah, but that's his problem, isn't it?

Whereas there's Bob the Duck down the road who's just going the whole way in one go. Yeah, but we're not talking about Bob the Duck.
No paradox.

Bob the Duck is pragmatic. He's provincial, sure, but he gets it done.
He does get it done, but wouldn't want to be stuck in a lift with that boring.

Yeah.

He's not a duck you want to be stuck in a lift with.

Mind you, you don't want to be stuck in a lift with any duck, to be fair.

The angry truth of a cloaker is so evident in a lift situation.

A panicking cloaker. You just don't notice it when they're on a pond, when they're on a pond.
But as soon as you're in a lift with a duck, it'll lift with a duck.

Believe you me, you're aware of a cloaker and how it works and what it takes to tame it.

Anyway, the point is, it's hard to meet someone at eight. So if I say,

I'll run to the conclusion here, which is, I think when you say to to someone you're meeting at eight, there's an understanding that there's a leeway before and after eight.

Mike gets there before eight. Some people do that.
They're called,

I call them dweebs, but they're often considered to be considerate or nice or

those people.

Or you're late. Or as I call it, quite cool.
Oh, is he into the arts, maybe?

Which means you're quite often a bit late. But to get there on time is so essentially there's a leeway.
So eight o'clock means,

I mean,

I think there's an acceptable sort of perimeter around any time. So

eight o'clock. If you get there at five past eight, you've met at eight, I think.

What do you think about that? I think if someone says let's meet at eight, then that that goes up to five past at least. My doctor surgery gives you 10 mins.
Does it?

If you go past 10 mins late, the appointment has been thrown into the wind.

And you get struck off the NHS, actually.

No more free healthcare. Yeah, and they withdraw the treatment you have had, don't they, from your body?

They'll extract. They'll pull that pacemaker right out there and

pull it right out.

So the NHS, certainly in my neck of the woods, have decided that 10 minutes, that is late. So I think that's fair.
Essentially, but you know what?

What they've done there, they've had to make a decision, which is

they've made a calculation, which is, because what they've said is your appointment is now 10 past eight, effectively.

That's how certainly I would read it.

And you'd therefore miss it.

Under reliably miss it. Well, the thing is,

what I would do mentally, I would say to myself, my appointment is 9, 10 past 8. And I would then add on my usual five-minute leeway, as you say.
So I'd get there at 8.15 and I would miss it.

So it's a dangerous game making an appointment with someone like me. And

over my life, friends and relatives and colleagues have come up with different tactics of...

Because the classic is you make the appointment earlier, but then I'm on to that.

So, you know what I mean? It's a very, very dangerous game of mental tests that can be quite.

Yeah, and it does get quite steamy, actually, Ben. You're right.
It's a steamy game of conceptual chess.

One of the few ways to make it work, isn't it, is they break into your flat during the night as you sleep, change all the clocks

10 minutes in one direction. Yeah.
So that you're waking up in a slightly different reality. That's the only way it can be done, right? Yeah, that's right.

They'll paint on slightly more stubble onto my face than would normally have grown overnight. But then you'll notice that the time with me started at the wrong time.

Exactly, because it's so hard. And actually, what will quite often happen is they'll be waiting for me at the appointment.
I'll turn up 40 minutes late,

driving a truck, and I say, come around the back. I kick open the back doors of the truck, and out pops the entire fake flat that they went around earlier today that I've built.

Supernatural flat, including the mummified version of me that isn't me.

It's just I work with a ham artist based in East London. It's just me made of ham.
We then eat the ham together, but they know they've been outflanked,

they know they've been outflanked, so it's bitter ham at that point, bitter bitter ham.

But um, that's what that's basically essentially the way I look at if I say the week commencing 24th of November, what I mean is Wednesday, the middle of the week.

The week emanates out from a central point in the middle of it in the same way that eight o'clock is the center point of five to eight and five past eight. Yeah.
So the week

the week starts on Wednesday, I would argue.

And works in all directions.

And then works in all directions. What I will say, Henry, is if you don't, if you don't have time to do new merch, I think that's okay.

But just to let the listener know that if they want to get Christmas presents for a Bean listening friend, there's lots of merch there on the at threebean saladshop.com.

I think I'm just going to say I'm going to try and do

a new jigsaw. If I can.

What? Hang on. No? What?

No, but I think what people are worried about is the level of time.

If you don't have enough time, we're looking at a potentially very, very difficult sort of desert, for example, or just the sky

for the jigsaw game. It might have to be a real.
Yeah, it might be missed. And that might be quite

different than what you've done in the past. But what I'm thinking about, Henry, is the fact that last year's jigsaw, which is a regular jigsaw, seems to take you quite a long time.

You made quite a big play of how long it was taking you. Was that just some kind of charade?

Well, it's another move in the game of three-dimensional perspex in a steamy sauna chess that is dealing with me and the concept of time. It's walls within walls.
It's mirrors on top of steam.

You don't know what you're looking at. You don't know what's up and down.
You just don't know. I don't know, even.
You know what I mean? I keep myself ignorant of this stuff in a way to be safer.

How long did it take me to do that jigsaw? There's no answer to that question.

So I think where we've landed is that there may or may not be new merch in the shop.

Yeah, just a quick little plug section. Just a quick little plug section.

Just a quick little plug section.

Have we done the third plug even? No, there's a whole probably the most pressing plug is. Okay, let's do the pressing plug.

Okay, so if you're listening to this podcast in the week of release, this weekend we are doing our final tour date in London at King's Place. Mike, what time did you tell Henry that the

you can't win this battle? You can't.

Anyway, that's on Saturday, I believe it's the 6th of December. Yeah, all the tickets to be there are sold out, but it is the one tour date which we're doing as a streaming one: 7:30 p.m.

UK time, which Henry in Eastern Standard Time would, of course, be

25 past nine.

And in Mongolian meridian time,

five. There we go.

It stays online, though, doesn't it, for a while? If you miss it live. You can either watch it live as it happens, or I think it's probably up for a week or so.

And I'll put a ticket link for that if you'd like to watch our tour from wherever you are, whether it's Waggadoogoo or Wagga Mummas. Wagga Mummas, very nice.

Do wear headphones if you're doing that in Wagga Mummas? Do wear headphones? And then on the next day, the Sunday,

we are doing another two live shows. We're doing a thing called Bonjo's House of Pain, which is a quiz format that we do every on Patreon.
And we're doing an episode called Ratmas 2025.

Those are sold out as well, but we're also streaming those. House of Pain is Bonjo's is at 3, maybe? 3 p.m.
Ratmas is 7? Something like that. Yes.

And we'll also be streaming those if you want to watch those on a stream. And Ratmaswigga could be a real nice little bit of festive fun, won't it, for this time of year? Yeah, exactly.

It can all be found via the sort of Little Wander websites and

King's Place websites, all that sort of business. I will include the links in the show notes.
That is the end of the plug section, everyone. Thank goodness.

Right, so I know we just said that the plug section is over, but this is us actually recording at a later date. Uh, Henry has done his merch work.

Yes, the jigsaw that he announced only about a minute or two ago, as far as we know, isn't happening. Yes.
So if anyone's bought it in the interim, you you've been hacked or scammed.

There isn't one. It'll be a jigsaw out.

It'll be some sort of jigsaw out. Or someone selling potential jigsaws before they're made and holding you to ransom for to pay you back in jigsaw pieces that themselves don't exist either.

So it it

could be a Ponzi scheme, couldn't it?

Which is basically like a triangle s scheme.

But the other way around. And triangle the other round instead of a triangle.

It's impossible to know

whether it's real or not. Do you mean a pyramid scheme?

Oh, fuck.

I got a missed solar pyramid scheme. They told me it was a triangle.

It wasn't even a proper pyramid scheme. I got done with triangle schemes.
It's not even a real pyramid scheme. It's a completely 2D pyramid scheme.

They were able to guarantee you that it wasn't a pyramid scheme. That's the one thing they guaranteed.
It's a triangle scheme. It's a a triangle scheme.

So, Henry, what is actually there? Because there is some good stuff. I've done two new ranges of merch.
One is sporty beans.

It's a sort of sporty, collegiate, Ivy League rift, sort of like campus sportswear. It's kind of I'm on my way to the softball game.
I'm a sophomore. I'm studying

liberal arts. Liberal arts at Yale.
Yeah.

So, yeah, so it's sort of classic sportswear sort of

take on the beans.

And the other range I've made is the Pam range. The Pam range? Finally.

Long last. Yes, please.
Finally,

there's we've got Pam t-shirts, we've got Pam sweat tops, we've got Pam aprons. I would say the headline here is finally, there's a Pam apron.
Yeah, finally.

So yeah, get yourself down to the three bean salad shop. Dot com.com.

And I'm having a fallow year for jigsaws.

So,

what I'll do is, classic move of mine, which is to screw myself over down the line, I'll say now that I'm guaranteeing that I will do a jigsaw next year.

That is not a guarantee, I might well not do one. But the way you operate with time, there's the there's the what you mean by next.

So, everyone knows what next year means, but for you, it might be that next year the term next can be interpreted in a number of different ways.

There's a French concept, which is de main sagras ratis.

Have you heard of that? No, No. What that means is tomorrow you get a free shave and it's a sign in a barber's shop,

in a French barber's window. But it's a conceptual barber's shop.
It's not actually real. Right.
And

it's a kind of thought experiment that proves something.

It's a philosophical thing. I think it's to do.
What does it prove? Well, what it means is de ma sagrise ratis.

Tomorrow free shave. Tomorrow never comes.
Tomorrow never comes, because it's tomorrow free shave. So I will do a jigsaw next year.
Demas ecrais ratis. Tomorrow is a free shave.

I mean, I can keep saying that.

Clear as day. Clear as day.

Thank you to everyone who sent us an email. If you'd like to do so, send it to threebean saladpod at gmail.com.
You could, for example,

send us stories of neighbours that you've had. Interesting neighbours.
We've had an email from Caroline. Hello, Caroline.
The email title is Henry's Icy Miserable Book Club. Oh yeah, nice.
Oh yes.

A few episodes ago Henry asked listeners to recommend books in his preferred genre described as something like people having a terrible time in really cold places. That's true.

And by the way, I am still up for those. I'm just having a little pause from them.

But I'm definitely taking recommendations, if that's what this is. I have the perfect book for you, Henry.
And as I thought about it, I realized that it's also perfect for any provincial dads.

It's called Polar Star by Martin Cruz Smith.

I'm going to list all the reasons I'm recommending it, and it should be clear whether each reason is for Henry's Icy Miserable Book Club or whether it's for the provincial dads.

So, number one,

it's set during the Cold War.

That's a tick in Mike's column. Taking Mike's column.
Yeah.

Number two, the hero is a Russian cop who doesn't play by the rules.

He's crossed the wrong people. Hang on,

how can he operate as as a policeman if he's not following the rules? How the hell is that going? I'm going to work.

What the?

I'm interested in this guy. What the heck is that? How is that even going to play out? Because the rules are.
You've got to follow.

What the?

Okay. I'm interested.
He's crossed the wrong people and now he's on the run. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on, hang on, hang on, whoa, whoa.
You don't...

He's crossed the wrong people. Why would you do that?

Crossing anyone's bad, but the wrong people.

Okay.

Okay. Point three.

He's hiding by working on a fishing fleet in the middle of the Bering Sea. Yes.
Now you've got me interested.

The Bering Sea, in case you've forgotten, is between Russia and Alaska and is largely covered in sea ice. I know it.

I know of it. Four.
His job is on the factory boat, processing fish on a conveyor belt called the Slime Line. That sounds good.
Then there's something for you here as well.

Sorry for all of us here.

Ben, you're going to love the slime line sections.

It's so hard to find. It's so hard to find that in a book these days.
Five, there's a murder. Great.
Solid. Six, the body is pulled frozen from the sea.
I like it.

Seven, the femme fatale is a very sexy American scientist

named Susan.

Oh my God.

Bullseye. Where do I sign? This is incredible.

extraordinary. Eight.
One of the climactic scenes takes place in a fish freezer. Nice.
Sounds good.

I'm imagining a kind of fight scene with people like hurling frozen colds at each other. And slime.
Frozen slime.

And needlessly unpleasant and dangerous hooks. Yes.

Eye gouges. With hooks at both ends.
You know, that kind of stuff. Barbs.

And a slime icicle through the eye.

A slicicle. A slicicle.

Number nine, every single character is tragically unhappy at least 90% of the time, partly from being cold and partly from being Russian in the 80s.

Nice. Moody.

Moody piece.

And number 10, there's a complex ending involving submarine signaling, which Henry will definitely not understand. Oh, Caroline.
This is music to my ears.

I a little bit. I feel a little bit.

She's got me a little bit wrong in terms of my understanding of things like... Of sub-aquatic semaphore.
A sub-aquatic semaphore.

Which I'm actually quite. I was actually described in my one-on-one scroll reports as a natural

at.

But fine.

This sounds very good. All in all, I cannot recommend this book highly enough for both Henry and Mike.
Unfortunately, it has nothing at all to offer, Ben. But that's not on me, Ben.
That's on you.

Well, it's okay, Karen, because as we've discovered,

you're thankfully incorrect about that.

My eyes lit up at the slime line.

I mean, for Bonjo, the idea of the mechanised sort of decapitation and dismembering of fish

is... I mean, it's like a sort of Disney fairy tale for Bonjo.

Especially if it can be conducted in international waters or an ice flow somewhere. Yeah.
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
Somewhere very hard to track. That's got Bonjo feeling all Christmassy, hasn't it? Yeah.

It's beginning to look

like Christmas. And I've got 20,000 herring spines.

He's going to be getting his Christmas cod helmet out, isn't he?

I know Bonjo.

I'm a sprat-filled trousers.

I tell you what, it feels like every year we start talking about Ben's cod helmet earlier and earlier.

We've had this email from Abby. Hello, Abby.

She came to our Birmingham live show. Thank you for coming to that, Abby.
Thanks, Abby. I think.
Hello.

Sorry I'm a little bit late with this, but I thought you might be interested in this review I overheard as one of the ushers left the venue after the Birmingham live show. Uh-oh.
It's short and sweet.

Quote, I just didn't get what they were doing.

Thank you, Abby.

So,

so we have to get through some red tape stuff. So obviously, I will never be crossing the threshold of Birmingham again.
And

Birmingham is now dead to me. Um, I'll be removing Birmingham from all my maps.

It's time

to play the ferryman.

Patreon.

Patreon.

Patreon.com.

Forward slash 3bean salad.

Thank you to everyone who signed up at our Patreon. Yes, thank you.
Thank you very much. Patreon.com forward slash 3bean salad is the place to go to do that.
There are two tiers you can sign up at.

But if you sign up at the Sean Bean tier, you get a shout out from Mike from the Sean Bean Lounge. Indeed, you do.
Where, well, you spent the last month, didn't you, Mike? I have, yes. Well,

it was the annual trip to and tour of the Partic Thistle Stadium, wasn't it?

That's right, Henry. Thank you.
And here's my report.

It was the annual trip to and tour of the Patrick Thistle Stadium at the Sean Bean Lounge last night.

And that's exactly as it sounds, as Sean Bean insisted the stadium be transported wholesale to to the Sean Bean Lounge visiting landmark suite by Luke Chaplin, Kenny Brakes, Ping Raj and Hank by hand and on foot and using no beast of burden other than Matthew Matt Matty Matt Jones, who was to be incentivised without whip or spur but with barbed remarks about his taste in music as a teenager.

The tour was led by Lube Taylor C and Oliver Birch, as although neither knew a thing about the arena, they were also unencumbered with preconceptions and were felt to be best suited to the task.

No sooner had they begun a changing room tasting session than the tour was interrupted by Ella Fletcher and Werna Hedgehog, who claimed to have stumbled across a human finger bone under the East Side subs bench.

Ross French declared it likely to be a chicken bone and so John Wrangell boiled it with carrots, garlic, onions and a little cider vinegar to see if it yielded a chicken broth.

It did not, but instead yielded the forbidden broth of Mandeath.

This was bravely poured away by Lil P with the aid of nuclear level PPE, an extra set of gloves to be on the safe side, and under the supervision of Lil P's parents.

Regrettably, the broth was poured into the beautifully manicured centre of the pitch, whereupon it eroded a hole straight through the earth to the lounge's antipode.

At latitude 52 degrees, 55 minutes, 22 seconds south, longitude 178 degrees, 31 minutes, 24 seconds east, causing leakage of the southern ocean into the turf, which meant North Carolina, Guy the Human Geographer, Stuart Carey and Hannah had to stop playing British Bulldog.

Meanwhile, Hamish Bramble was able to find further remains, having trained as a sniffer dog online.

Holly Annett analysed them with a pocket forensic anthropology lab and suggested they could be the 7th century remains of St.

Kentigern, the first bishop of Glasgow, or they could just be from some geyser.

Lynn Hughes, who'd been nose-deep in Agrisham the whole time, suggested the new finds could be chicken bones and the above process was repeated. Dr.

Annie Page, Jason Rungapadiachi, Mealy Peely and Shanghai Lava also swanned in at various points with the same chicken bone suggestion, leading to further repeats of the above process until all available samples had been made into super-destructive non-chicken broth and the pitch was, not to put too fine a a point on it an abyss nicole sabrina and anne-marie prescott were instructed by sean bean to return the stadium to its usual location simply claim it was like that when we picked it up and then go off grid for their shoe size plus three in years thanks all okay time to finish off with a version of our theme tune sent in by one of you lot this is from jace from

john thanks jace he says for some time now i've been meaning to sit down and put together a theme tune for the show the other day i had a eureka moment i combined the beans with another of my favorite things in life the music of movie director John Carpenter.

Oh, nice. I call this composition Assault on Bean Sync 13.
Nice. That's cool,

that kind of thing. That is cool.
That's like 70s horror sort of synth vibes, isn't it? Looking forward to this one. Yeah, thank you.
Thank you, everyone, for listening. Thank you very much.

See you next time.

Thank you. Bye.

That was good music to be killed by someone wielding a shadduck to. Yes.

Do you mean a shaduck? Yeah.

No, what do you mean? I know it's Apomolo. Sorry.
It's a a horrific death.

It's so soft, it takes ages to go. It needs to be stoved in by pith.

That takes a long time.

To sharpen pith, to be sharp enough to be. No, I was trying to think of that.
What was that funny?

Oh, Mattuk, sorry. That was music to be chased around an American suburban home with by someone wearing a...
Yes.

Or a completely abandoned section of a city. Or an abandoned section of a city, by someone wearing a Nigel Havers mask and wielding a Shadduck.
A mattock.

Henry Packer's Music to be mattocked by.