0:02

You don't get Hello

0:11

and welcome to another episode of

0:14

No Such Thing is a Fish,

0:16

a weekly podcast coming to you

0:18

from the QI offices in Hoburn.

0:21

My name is Dan Schreiber, I

0:23

am sitting here with Andrew Hunter

0:25

Murray, James Harkin, and Anna Tashinsky.

0:28

Once again, we have gathered around

0:30

the microphones with our four favorite

0:32

facts for the last seven days,

0:34

and in no particular order, here

0:37

we go. Starting with fact number

0:39

one, that is Anna. My fact this

0:41

week is that some planes are

0:44

specifically built to carry other planes.

0:46

How degrading. Is it? I think it's

0:48

a bit degrading for those planes. Just,

0:50

you know, you're the... Oh, I think

0:53

they're the king planes, do you? Yeah,

0:55

I think they're the planes without which

0:57

other planes cannot be. I think they're

0:59

more like a wing, man. Very nice.

1:01

Well, well, whatever their social hierarchical stations

1:04

in plain community, these are really cool

1:06

looking planes. So I was just reading

1:08

about playing construction, how planes put together,

1:10

and it was saying how all the

1:13

different bits are made in different places.

1:15

Now I was thinking how on earth

1:17

they get them to where they're assembled and

1:19

read that for Airbus, which is the

1:21

world's biggest aircraft maker, they use this

1:23

thing called BelugaXL, which looks just like

1:25

a Beluga whale. which is quite cool.

1:27

It's got the big, we've talked about

1:29

melons, haven't we, on the progger? Sure.

1:31

They're big foreheads. Yeah. The James looking

1:34

skeptical, it doesn't look exactly like a

1:36

blue whale. You wouldn't confuse it with

1:38

what I've seen in the image. I

1:40

think they look a bit like them. I'm

1:42

just trying to think if the average listener

1:44

is going to know what a beluga looks

1:46

like. Maybe a dolphin. They picked a dolphin

1:49

with a big melon on its head. Yeah.

1:51

Big bulbous head. Yeah. And they paint them

1:53

to look like beluga whales. They paint the

1:55

smile on to make them look friendly. Yes.

1:58

They're very charming looking looking planes. Yeah,

2:00

the biggest whale in the world as

2:02

a result, aren't they? Yeah. Oh, nice.

2:04

And they designed, they can carry two

2:06

wings for an Airbus A350, which is

2:08

itself a really big play. And they

2:10

were designed, I think, specifically to carry

2:12

two of those to fit them in,

2:14

because those wings are massive. And the

2:16

whole face of the whale comes off.

2:18

So you don't load them in the

2:20

back. You just pull off the whale's

2:22

head. Well it sort of lifts up.

2:24

It lifts up. Yeah. Yeah. So do

2:26

the wings. So do the wings go

2:28

on the wings go on the wings

2:30

go on the wings go on the

2:32

inside on the inside. On the inside.

2:34

Yeah. Did you not just attach them

2:36

to the actual? But then how do

2:38

you fly back when you get there?

2:40

No, double wings. Get them there faster.

2:42

Oh, like a biplane. Like a biplane.

2:44

I don't know why they haven't thought

2:46

with that. Yes. But the beluga is

2:48

one of the smallest whales in the

2:50

world. So actually, it's just interesting. Should

2:52

be a very small plane. Yeah, it's

2:54

poorly named. Yeah, silly. You know it's

2:56

crazy as well. So this, the beluga

2:58

XL is a more recent innovation is

3:00

a more recent innovation, is a more

3:02

recent innovation from the original innovation from

3:04

the original innovation from the original, on

3:06

the original belugas, it's just two. Really?

3:08

That's it. You put the, you put

3:10

the wings in, pilot, co-pilot. I achieve

3:13

not like two flight attendants. But now

3:15

the Excel has a third member. The

3:17

loadmaster. Oh, very cool. The suggested one

3:19

person's loading the wings on. Yes, quite

3:21

wild. Is it to make sure I

3:23

suppose that they stay strapped down during

3:25

the flight? Yeah. It's all right. I

3:27

got it. That's a pretty sexy job

3:29

title. Yeah. What are you, oh I'm

3:31

a load master? Oh yeah, what do.

3:33

I watch a small piece of Velcro

3:35

in terror, fearing it's going to come

3:37

undone. Cool, cool. I've got to speak

3:39

to this person over here now. They

3:41

didn't always use error plays to get

3:43

these things around. The Airbus A380, they

3:45

used to move everything around using something

3:47

called the Itineraire Agrand Gabari. And that

3:49

is a water enrolled route that was

3:51

created just to move pieces of this

3:53

airplane around Europe. No way! So cool.

3:55

They dig sort of giant canals across

3:57

Europe that we didn't notice. Well I

3:59

think they more used existing canals and

4:01

made them a bit wider. Cool. And

4:03

also used existing roads and made them

4:05

a bit stronger. But basically they were

4:07

put together in to lose, but the

4:09

bits were made in France, Germany, Spain,

4:11

United Kingdom even. And so they had

4:13

to bring all the bits together to

4:15

to lose. so they could make them

4:17

but they had to reinforce everything because

4:19

they're so big. And they always travel

4:21

at night time. So they pack up

4:23

in some layby during the day and

4:25

then at night time they drive around

4:27

with these. They do all these big

4:29

load people largely because it's a real

4:31

inconvenience in the day but that makes

4:33

it sound sexy as well. Oh it

4:35

sounds covert yeah. I'm a night load

4:37

mask. Yeah I don't normally come to

4:40

these parties because I'm a bit of

4:42

a night load mask. On that, James.

4:44

So you know how NASA gets his

4:46

rockets around? I do, actually. Okay, well,

4:48

can you pretend you don't? Oh, did

4:50

they attach balloons to it and float

4:52

around? No, ooh, they... They use barges.

4:54

They have a barge called Pegasus. And

4:56

they load the rocket on. Because it's

4:58

from the assembly factory is in Louisiana,

5:00

and they need to get it to

5:02

the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. And

5:04

it's 100 meters long, and they just

5:06

load the rocket on. And then it

5:08

doesn't have an engine. The tugs have

5:10

to just tug it all the way.

5:12

How far are those two places apart?

5:14

They're quite far. From where to where

5:16

to where to where to... From where

5:18

to where to... From where to where

5:20

to... To where to where? To where

5:22

to where? To where to where? It's

5:24

weird, isn't it? It's weird because the

5:26

word barge is so... Yeah, you picture

5:28

it's like towed in the hole or

5:30

something. We're in Venice. Yeah, all Venice.

5:32

If you go to Venice with your

5:34

wife, are you saying, hey, let's get

5:36

a barge. Darling, I've got us the

5:38

most amazing deal. Now there will only

5:40

be three staff on the barge, but

5:42

we will Velcro you down. Yeah, what

5:44

I found interesting about that NASA badge

5:46

is actually, it's only about 50% longer.

5:48

and wider than a standard canal boat?

5:50

Because canal boats are quite long, aren't

5:52

they? It's... I mean having stayed on

5:54

a canal boat for a week, it

5:56

doesn't feel spacious. Maybe not a narrow

5:58

boat, like the tiny narrow boats. Oh,

6:00

and I'm talking about a racing gym

6:02

style narrowfoot. It's 310 by 50 feet,

6:05

so I'm pretty sure that that's not,

6:07

it's only, it's not twice as big

6:09

as a normal canal boat. Wow, it's

6:11

pretty amazing, isn't it? But they have

6:13

got another way of doing a thing

6:15

called a pregnant guppy. Oh, right. Which

6:17

is a modified Boeing 377. Yes, and

6:19

this was at the start. Well, they

6:21

made their first pregnant guppy start of

6:23

the space race. So I think then

6:25

they went back to barges for a

6:27

while, because this was in the 60s.

6:29

and it was a massive problem because

6:31

at that time I made it on

6:33

the west coast and then had to

6:35

be taken to Cape Canaveral and yeah

6:37

it was just taking forever and they

6:39

had to go through the Panama Canal

6:41

and it took about 30 days. You

6:43

mean the America Canal? Sorry, sorry yes.

6:45

and they took the transport time from

6:47

25 to 35 days down to 18

6:49

hours. But it was that's what inspired

6:51

the beluga designs because if you look

6:53

at them they look kind of similar

6:55

don't they really do? Yeah the pregnant

6:57

guppy the guppy in spite of the

6:59

guppy in spite of yeah yeah absolutely

7:01

how they're all nautical or they're all

7:03

sea creatures you know guppies and belugas

7:05

and I think that's deliberate the beluga

7:07

was a nod to the guppy the

7:09

guppy was a nod to the guppy

7:11

the guppy was a the guppy such

7:13

great names these planes. Yeah, yeah. So

7:15

cool. Hey, this is pretty cool. The

7:17

Bluger Exel, it doesn't just take wings.

7:19

It often gets, well, sometimes gets asked

7:21

to bring a few other things. And

7:23

at one time in 1999, it carried

7:25

the Liberty Leading the People painting. So

7:27

this is that French painting by Eugene

7:29

de laisse. And the things you make

7:32

when you say that, it's such a

7:34

shame the listener can't see it. That's

7:36

why I'm not allowed to go to

7:38

for us. And yeah, so that's very

7:40

famous. It's a massive, it's a massive

7:42

camp. It's like the. one of them's

7:44

holding a big flag. Yeah, and there's

7:46

a lady in a bit of a

7:48

state of undress. Yeah, she's definitely in

7:50

an emotional state. Yeah, yeah. One of

7:52

the buttons has fallen off. Yes. Yeah.

7:54

She'll be livid when she finds out

7:56

someone was painting that. It was it

7:58

was loaned from Paris to Tokyo, and

8:00

so they needed to get it over

8:02

there. It's too large to fit in

8:04

what was, I guess, the biggest transport

8:06

plane at the time, Boeing 747. Boeingowing

8:08

seven. So they needed to do. It

8:10

is 9.8 feet tall and 11.8 feet

8:12

long. That is small. I feel like

8:14

I've been in a boe example 7.

8:16

That's about the same size as this

8:18

wall, isn't it? Yeah. It's a bit

8:20

smaller, a bit taller and a bit

8:22

taller. But you've got to package it

8:24

up and you need to make sure

8:26

it's really good packaging, right? So that's

8:28

going to have a tons of bubble

8:30

wrap. You know, and you order for

8:32

like a, you know, sometimes you order,

8:34

like a lipstick, just like a lipstick,

8:36

like a lipstick, like a lipstick, like

8:38

a lipstick, like a lipstick, like a

8:40

lipstick, like a lipstick, like a lipstick,

8:42

like a lipstick, like a lipstick, like

8:44

a lipstick, like a lipstick, like a

8:46

lipstick, like a lipstick, like a lipstick,

8:48

like a lipstick, like a lipstick, like

8:50

a lipstick, like a lipstick, like a

8:52

lipstick, like a lipstick, like a lipstick,

8:54

like a lipstick, like a lipstick, like

8:57

a lipstick, like a lipstick, like a

8:59

lipstick and I bought a bag of

9:01

crisps and then I forgot about it

9:03

and then halfway through the flight went,

9:05

oh I'll have that bag of crisps,

9:07

I went to my bag and the

9:09

bag of crisps was enormous, like because

9:11

the pressure changed. Oh right. Okay, so

9:13

like, okay. So I wondered if you

9:15

had an enormous bubble wrap. around your

9:17

painting, whether the whole thing would just

9:19

balloon to like 10 times a size.

9:21

So it looks small when you put

9:23

it in and then it's going that

9:25

could fit on a 7-4-7. Exactly. You

9:27

wait until we get the air. But

9:29

yeah, they had to put it in

9:31

a vertical position. There was a special

9:33

pressurized container so it didn't get damaged

9:35

on the way and they had these

9:37

anti-vibration devices that were in it as

9:39

well. Just in case the load master

9:41

got excited. Like led the field in

9:43

this, I think the Germans had a

9:45

pretty good record for a while. Did

9:47

you hear about the Blumenvos, BV141? I'm

9:49

just going to go speak to this

9:51

guy now. This is so amazing. So

9:53

picture a classic, let's say a ball

9:55

of playing from the war, you know,

9:57

you've got the... main fuselage in the

9:59

middle, you've got the wings on either

10:01

side, and you've got an engine on

10:03

each wing, and maybe the propeller on

10:05

each. Got it. Okay. Classic plane. Yeah,

10:07

classic plane. Maybe next time just say,

10:09

picture a plane. No, no, no, no,

10:11

no. Picture a person. You got a

10:13

second ball play. Second ball style bomber,

10:15

right? This was a plane which had

10:17

the fuselage, sure. But that's not in

10:19

the middle? Huh? So there's a wing,

10:21

then there's a fuselage, then there's a

10:24

separate wing and the crew are sitting

10:26

in a little pod halfway along that

10:28

wing? It is the weirdest looking thing.

10:30

What's the reason? Reconnaissance. So it gave

10:32

a better view for Reconnaissance photos to

10:34

have... you not being in the main

10:36

bit of the plane. Because the wing

10:38

doesn't get in the way maybe. I

10:40

always think the wing gets in the

10:42

way of the view a bit when

10:44

you look out the wind. And that's

10:46

actually invented a wingless plane, which they

10:48

flew, called the flying bathtub. And it

10:50

was in the 1960s, they're experimenting. If

10:52

you look at a photo of it,

10:54

it literally, it looks like just the

10:56

plane, no wings. And it managed to

10:58

take off. And what's giving it the

11:00

lift? You have to roll it down

11:02

a roll it down a roll it

11:04

down a hell with three, with three

11:06

yol it down a hell with three

11:08

yol it, with three yol. It's what

11:10

for the oldest generation? Yeah, don't explain

11:12

it. You know, what's the actual answer

11:14

please? I was sort of hoping James'

11:16

joke would make us run past that.

11:18

I'll always wait out the joke. Turn

11:20

to the arts and thank you very

11:22

much. So we don't, we don't have

11:24

a flu. A flu. A flu. A

11:26

flu. Do you want to hear a

11:28

plane we never got? The Lockheed flat

11:30

bed? Okay. This is bananas? Okay, so...

11:32

What's the thing about planes? You've got

11:34

your two wings. You're going to have

11:36

an engine underneath your wings. Okay. Okay,

11:38

but you put everything you got in

11:40

your plane, right? Or your people in

11:42

their bags. There's still a load of

11:44

space above them, isn't there? There's still

11:46

a load of headroom that is unnecessary

11:49

wasting of that tube. So what if

11:51

you had a plane which had the

11:53

wings and it's got the head in

11:55

the tail? Yeah. But then it's just

11:57

like a flat bed truck in the

11:59

middle truck in the middle. It's not

12:01

a tube. Okay, so do the people

12:03

have to lie down in it? It's

12:05

not for people, sorry. Oh, it's for

12:07

like, it's for like, I don't know,

12:09

like a big lorry or a tank

12:11

or whatever, like something you need to

12:13

move by air that just goes in

12:15

an open top sandwich. Nice, a convertible

12:17

plane. Cool! And that was designed. And

12:19

tragically, it was, I don't think it

12:21

was built, it was designed in the

12:23

80s. The pilots get to sit in

12:25

the compartment, but mostly it's open to

12:27

the house. Yeah, otherwise your hair would get

12:29

completely messed up, wouldn't it? Do you guys know

12:31

about the X-planes? Yes, where have they gone? They

12:33

were meant to be the future. Well, what about

12:36

us is how the X-Men get around? Yes, exactly.

12:38

They are the future and basically

12:40

we only learn about them after

12:42

they've been declassified. So, you know, there might

12:44

be still some explains being made but we

12:46

don't know about them yet, right? But we

12:49

know about the ones which have been made

12:51

and weren't useful. A lot of them were

12:53

missiles. There was one called the

12:55

stiletto, which looks like basically... the

12:57

bottom of a shoe, of a

12:59

women's shoe, extremely thin aeroplane. They

13:01

thought it might be able to

13:03

go really, really fast. Who's making

13:05

all these explanations? This is the

13:08

US. Okay. Yeah. And what's

13:10

their category of their secret

13:12

until they're released? Yeah, so

13:14

if you're making a secret

13:16

sort of wacky plane and

13:18

you're in the American military,

13:20

Dick dastardly is in charge,

13:22

then you give them an

13:24

X designation. Nice see. at

13:26

Mac 9.6, so that's 9.6

13:28

times the speed of sound.

13:30

We spent 7,000 miles per

13:32

hour. No. But the engine that

13:35

only was able to run for

13:37

10 seconds. They got that fast,

13:39

but they couldn't do it for

13:41

very long. You still put Paris,

13:44

couldn't you really? That's great. When

13:46

I tell you guys one really

13:48

amazing thing about moving big stuff

13:51

around, wind turbines, those big sort

13:53

of arms of wind turbines, you

13:55

have to basically make them in

13:57

one piece and then get... them

14:00

to where they need to go. You

14:02

can't make them and then stick them

14:04

together because they need to be really

14:06

strong. And so they put them on

14:08

enormous flatbed trucks, right? But sometimes the

14:10

place where you need to put your

14:12

wind turbine is in the countryside. How

14:14

do you get through a little town

14:16

with these massive wind turbine trucks? Do

14:19

you have to just take everything? down

14:21

basically like anything that goes over the

14:23

street any wires or sometimes that would

14:25

happen yeah in the past that's had

14:27

to happen or they've had to like

14:29

make roads way wider they've had to

14:31

pave over the top of roundabouts because

14:33

they can't go roundabouts but they've invented

14:35

a new class of vehicle called the

14:37

self-propelled rotor blade adapter and this is

14:39

amazing so you drive your truck and

14:41

it's on a flatbed and then the

14:43

rotor blade of the wind turbine can

14:46

move upwards so that it's to the

14:48

ground, which means you can drive it

14:50

much better around like tight corners. It

14:52

does mean you've got the biggest sail

14:54

known to man. They would only do

14:56

it at night time and everything's really

14:58

quiet, but otherwise you're like you're knocking

15:00

down like... trees and I've actually seen,

15:02

I think they sometimes don't do it

15:04

at night because there's a really good

15:06

video of someone driving, I think it's

15:08

in hull, a really good video of

15:11

a truck which looks microscopic when you

15:13

put a 100 meter, like wind turbines

15:15

might get up to 100 meters long,

15:17

I think this one's 70 meter long.

15:19

turbine blade on it, sticking up like

15:21

James says in the air, and then

15:23

behind it there's one guy walking in

15:25

fluorescent gear with a hard hat on.

15:27

He's the loadmaster. Okay, it is time

15:29

for fact number two and that is

15:31

Andy. My fact is that Japan has

15:33

just experienced its maximum number of traffic

15:36

lights. Is this by royal decree? Yeah,

15:38

it's an imperial thing. They've decided they're

15:40

just too darn money. No. What is

15:42

this? Like, how can you do that?

15:44

How can you be sure that they're

15:46

not going to add more? I'm not

15:48

positive, but barring surprising demographic shifts. I

15:50

see. Which aren't unheard of. Japan will

15:52

never have as many traffic lights as

15:54

it does now. It's your fact that

15:56

Japan's population is going down. No, that's

15:58

no. It is closely related to that

16:01

fact. Okay. I'll grant you that. This

16:03

was a piece in the FT. And

16:05

it was about the fact that, um...

16:07

Japan's population is going down. And if

16:09

you've got a few people, you need

16:11

fewer traffic lights. Do you remember we

16:13

did the thing about conveyor bells? That

16:15

man-Japanese scheme, to have conveyor bells instead

16:17

of freight lorries. You know, in bits

16:19

of rural roads, the country. Basically, many

16:21

traffic lights are quite old now, and

16:23

roads in rural areas are emptying of

16:26

traffic. So the police have just announced

16:28

from this year more traffic lights will

16:30

be decommissioned than newly installed. So the

16:32

total number is going down demographics. It's

16:34

called the 2025 problem actually in Japan,

16:36

which is where this massive baby boomer

16:38

generation, they are moving from early old

16:40

to old old. They're over 75 now,

16:42

so they're moving into more of the...

16:44

And that's not advanced old age, but

16:46

you know what I mean? They're getting

16:48

older, and that just means big changes,

16:50

man, this is one of them. Yeah?

16:53

Is it that they don't know how

16:55

to use traffic lights anymore, because they're

16:57

getting older? No, it's more like that

16:59

will lead to lots of shifts in

17:01

terms of the amount of social care

17:03

you need for people, for people, in

17:05

terms of the amount of social care

17:07

you need for, for people, if you

17:09

have, in the amount of social care

17:11

you need, for, for people, you need,

17:13

you need, in, in, in, in, in,

17:15

in, in, in, in, in, in, in,

17:18

in, in, in, in, in, in, in,

17:20

in, in, in, in, in, in, in,

17:22

in, in, in, in, in, in, in,

17:24

in, in, in, in, in, in, in,

17:26

in, in, in, in, in, in, in,

17:28

in, in, in the fact that the

17:30

traffic lights themselves, they have a life

17:32

expectancy of 19 years. And so if

17:34

you want to redo them up, it

17:36

costs about 6,000 pounds in order to

17:38

do each traffic light. And they're just

17:40

saying, actually, let's just take them down.

17:43

It's a population and old age of

17:45

the lights themselves. So as to your

17:47

question, James, if Japan suddenly goes on

17:49

the bonkithol of the century. and suddenly

17:51

the population's gonna double then they might

17:53

consider Japanese bunker time. I love it.

17:55

You mentioned robots. Yeah. Robot is what

17:57

a traffic light is in South Africa.

17:59

Beautiful. What does that mean? That's what

18:01

they call them. Robots. Yeah, yeah. One

18:03

of the cool robots. Traffic lights. I

18:05

think you can have the same name

18:08

for two things. Don't think so. It

18:10

might get confusing though. It might be.

18:12

They were originally called that. So in

18:14

Johannesburg, the first one. came in 1927

18:16

and they were called robots and they

18:18

still are but they're quite unreliable in

18:20

Joe Berg and people knock them over

18:22

quite a lot. They're Johannesburg drivers damage

18:24

81 robots a month and they have

18:26

to replace them and they often replace

18:28

them with quite high-tech things and those

18:30

high-tech things often get stolen. because they

18:33

have lots of metal in the cables

18:35

and stuff like that. They fitted loads

18:37

of them with a monitoring system, but

18:39

the monitoring system had sim cards in

18:41

and people realized they could just steal

18:43

the sim cards and use them in

18:45

their phones and make free calls. Wait,

18:47

what? And the problem is so bad

18:49

that in some cases, jail sentences or

18:51

attacking robots can be as high as

18:53

they are for murder in Johannesburgers. Wow.

18:55

Because they decided we're going to stop

18:58

this so we're going to make the...

19:00

polishments really high. Wow! Yeah, big problem.

19:02

That is a big problem. Singapore's got

19:04

an interesting thing with its traffic lights.

19:06

Depending on who's crossing the road, you

19:08

might be stuck at a red light

19:10

in your car longer than if someone

19:12

else was crossing the road. Is this

19:14

a riddle? Yeah, go for it. Is

19:16

it that they've got centers to tell

19:18

if it's someone in a wheelchair or

19:20

an elderly person who takes longer to

19:22

cross? So yeah, but it's not senses.

19:25

This is a new thing which they're

19:27

going to slowly spread out through all

19:29

of Singapore, which is if an elderly

19:31

person is trying to cross the road,

19:33

they have a car, which is kind

19:35

of like a pensioner's card, which they

19:37

tap onto the side, which tells the

19:39

signal that there's an old person crossing,

19:41

and they get an additional 13 seconds.

19:43

to cross the road. I think that's

19:45

such a good idea. I spend a

19:47

lot of time with pedestrian crossings thinking,

19:50

this is way too little time if

19:52

you're really old. Sometimes I can even

19:54

only just get across. And especially if

19:56

you're not there at the very start.

19:58

If you're an older person, you're like,

20:00

I'm not going to start unless I

20:02

was there at the beginning. Some of

20:04

the roads in Singapore are quite long

20:06

as well. Yeah, they're quite wide. Yeah,

20:08

they have lots of lanes, like almost

20:10

as wide as our motorways, but they're

20:12

just normal air roads. God, imagine getting

20:15

to sort of the middle of a

20:17

12 lane road realizing and looking behind

20:19

and in front and thinking, which should

20:21

attack my car. partly because they might

20:23

take a bit longer to cross but

20:25

also partly because they're way less visible

20:27

because you're at a lower height so

20:29

in Vienna the cameras can detect that

20:31

and they sort of work out with

20:33

99% accuracy whether you want to cross

20:35

the road or not. How cool is

20:37

that? I honestly thought we had similar

20:40

things in London I must say like

20:42

there's one near our house which gets

20:44

you across to the park and I

20:46

swear when people are slowly going across

20:48

it it stays on for longer. Oh

20:50

really? You've got to get out there

20:52

with your stopwatch. Did you know outrage

20:54

of outrage that, well first of all

20:56

I've always been fascinated by traffic light

20:58

technology and I've like Google this loads

21:00

before, like how they all coordinated, how

21:02

many lights are rigged up with the

21:05

same system? Because you know they all

21:07

seem to change in coordination with each

21:09

other. You have something called a green

21:11

wave. Do you know what green wave

21:13

is? Well I came back from the

21:15

airport the other day and I was

21:17

driving from Stansted into central London and

21:19

it felt like every single light was

21:21

on green. I just got so lucky.

21:23

That's because you had your crisps that

21:25

you were in a good mood. But

21:27

what I thought is if you hit

21:30

one green does that mean you're going

21:32

to hit all the greens because you're

21:34

just going at the right pace? Well

21:36

it usually depends on whether you're in

21:38

a row of traffic. Well no one

21:40

was there it's the middle of the

21:42

night. Okay well that's very weird and

21:44

you just got lucky I think. Oh

21:46

no. If it was the middle of

21:48

the light they just have them on

21:50

green unless another car comes. But the

21:52

green wave is basically... Were you driving

21:54

a wind turbine blade at the tile?

21:57

of lights along the same road, along

21:59

the same stretch of road, are coordinated

22:01

to go green one after the other

22:03

to stop cars stopping. Now usually it

22:05

only works if you're in a row

22:07

of traffic because environmentally it's much more

22:09

friendly to not have lots of cars

22:11

stopping and starting because you know when

22:13

engines stop and start that's worse for

22:15

the environment. So people say that if

22:17

you are in a green wave, if

22:19

you catch a green wave, then a

22:22

bit like getting in a slip stream

22:24

you've got to stay close to the

22:26

car in the car in front. so

22:28

that you can get through all the

22:30

greens. Because if suddenly you let enough

22:32

distance between you and the car and

22:35

front happen, then the light will go red.

22:37

Okay. So is it? So is everyone on

22:39

board? Are you sort of, are you in

22:41

the car going, oh my God, we're in

22:43

a green wave? You should be. Right. And

22:45

then you all try and congru it along.

22:47

Yeah. Yeah. That's pretty cool. London has thing

22:49

called scoots, which is smart traffic lights,

22:51

which is smart traffic lights. cars and

22:53

trucks and people go through depending on

22:56

what's best for the environment. So if

22:58

there's like some really big heavy goods

23:00

vehicles that go through London they think

23:02

we don't want them staying in central

23:04

London and clogging up the air so

23:06

we're gonna kind of give them a

23:08

bit of a free run on the green lights

23:10

and that's using smart cameras and all that

23:12

kind of stuff that they can do that.

23:14

That's so cool. I know and they have

23:16

a similar one in Amsterdam which can

23:19

talk to your phone and they can

23:21

give cyclist priority when it's raining. Wow,

23:23

that's so amazing. The Dutch are so

23:25

far ahead of the game. But they're

23:28

kind of thinking to stop this. In

23:30

fact, they might have recently stopped it

23:32

because they hadn't really thought about the

23:35

privacy risks of being able to see

23:37

where everyone's going all the time. What's

23:39

the harm? A few people have complained

23:41

about it. So I'm not sure if

23:44

it's still going, but for a while

23:46

that was definitely the problem. There's people

23:48

who were cycling home from their lover's, that's...

23:50

use for say like if there's a major

23:53

incident and you need ambulances to get through.

23:55

In America they have that. In the UK

23:57

we don't have it because ambulances just go

23:59

through. red lights. Yeah, oh yes, but

24:01

there is, again in the Netherlands, there's

24:04

a traffic light system in, oh gosh

24:06

I can pronounce it wrong, Her Togenbosch,

24:08

which has all these detection loops like

24:11

plugged into the whole town software. So

24:13

all the city buses have these transponders

24:15

on which talk to the junctions. If

24:18

the bus is running on time, the

24:20

light works as normal. If the bus

24:22

is running late, the lights change to

24:24

give the bus priority. And if the

24:27

bus is early, the light says, yeah,

24:29

you can hold that. The light just

24:31

stops the bus for the sake of

24:34

it. So stops the bus and lets

24:36

the other traffic through first. Well, this

24:38

is the explosive thing. I realised about

24:41

this country is that, yeah, we don't

24:43

have it with emergency vehicles, whereas America

24:45

does. And I should say, because I

24:48

read so many forms with ambulance people

24:50

saying, we never go through red lights

24:52

unless it's safe. We've got there in

24:54

great time. We have left a trail

24:57

of destruction. But, you know, can't override

24:59

red lights whenever they want? The buses!

25:01

In this country, it's so cool. So

25:04

if a bus has the appropriate technology,

25:06

which is the bus radio link... I

25:08

think you're thinking of cyclists. You're always

25:11

hopping on the back of passing cyclists

25:13

and tapping them with your oyster card

25:15

for staying on until you've reached a

25:18

destination. This is true. They have certain

25:20

different bits of tech that can do

25:22

it, but one of them is bus

25:24

priority radio link, which communicates with traffic

25:27

lights. You have this radio link that's...

25:29

says I'm coming along I'm a bus

25:31

let the light stay green for me

25:34

and the light will stay green for

25:36

the bus because again it's better because

25:38

buses are more efficient they're carrying more

25:41

people bad for the environment for them

25:43

to stop and start sometimes you'll see

25:45

and I really want to see one

25:48

of these now a sensor on the

25:50

road before traffic lights and it's a

25:52

bus stop just before the light on

25:54

the bus stop and the bus stop

25:57

and it senses that a bus has

25:59

gone past and it relays information to

26:01

the traffic light saying if you're on

26:04

green for a bit longer is coming.

26:06

Let him through. These buses are getting

26:08

away with murder. I'm calling cars a

26:11

bed. Such a miserable response. I am

26:13

being cheated here by this bus going

26:15

through efficiently. My Ferrari having to sit

26:18

here idling. Okay, which is better? Reversing

26:20

into a parking space or going in

26:22

face first. I have this argument with

26:24

my husband all the time. I always

26:27

go in face first. I was reverse,

26:29

I wonder if it's a gender thing.

26:31

I believe it's easier to reverse into

26:34

any spot. All right, you're doing the

26:36

touch, the challenging guy. Because then I

26:38

reverse coming out, don't I? We both

26:41

have to reverse, we both have to

26:43

reverse at some stage. Although my dream

26:45

is, I drive in straight and then

26:48

the person in front of me and

26:50

the other parking spot leaves and I

26:52

could just go straight between the parking

26:54

spot. That's a great day when that

26:57

happens. I knew this would be a

26:59

hot button topic. And if you're listening

27:01

at home and you've got opinions about

27:04

whether you reverse, you'll go face first.

27:06

Okay, here's another reason why you should

27:08

do what Anna does. So there is

27:11

a writer called Tom Vanderbilt, who's an

27:13

American traffic writer, and basically, particularly in

27:15

America, which is where he's focused on,

27:17

there are loads of crashes, you know,

27:20

some of them fatal in car parks,

27:22

and it's because people, and it's also

27:24

because American cars are way bigger than

27:27

European ones, people just get in, they

27:29

reverse out, visibility is much reduced. However,

27:31

there are some places where it is

27:34

illegal in America to reverse into a

27:36

parking space. Really? What? What? I know.

27:38

There's a city in California called San

27:41

Luis Obispo, I'm sure I'm saying that

27:43

wrong too, which has made it illegal

27:45

to reverse into a space. I don't

27:47

know. Everyone who lives there is a

27:50

woman in a 1950 sexist joke, aren't

27:52

they? It's just chaos. Like it's clearly

27:54

safer to do the opposite of the

27:57

law in this place, which is nuts.

27:59

It must be the fights, right, because

28:01

in order to reversing, you have to

28:04

pass the spot. And then it's like

28:06

you've changed your mind. They go, actually,

28:08

I'm going to, and they're going, no,

28:11

I'm a, I'm a front Parker. Yeah,

28:13

I think that's probably it. Can I

28:15

say one last thing about an effect

28:17

of traffic changes? So New York City

28:20

has just, a little bit of glamour,

28:22

has just introduced congestion charge. Okay. Yeah,

28:24

very late. London had it about, what?

28:27

15, 20 years ago, Durham had it

28:29

before that, so we did it. Oh

28:31

nice, okay, well New York is finally

28:34

caught up with swing and Durham and

28:36

brought in a congestion charge and it's

28:38

like it's it's only a month or

28:41

two in and it's you know politically

28:43

sort of much vexed because some people

28:45

are saying oh it's terrible it's woke

28:47

by blah blah but it's cut down

28:50

traffic a massive amount like it's just

28:52

journeys are much smoother now but the

28:54

other weird effect it's cut down another

28:57

thing that's common in New York what's

28:59

Honking. Oh, okay. Honk-related complaints are down

29:01

70%. Oh, really? 70%. Is that just

29:04

car honking? Or is it also people

29:06

pretending to grab people's breasts? Well, no,

29:08

actually, those are up hugely, sadly. And

29:11

also load the number of instances of

29:13

people saying, I'm walking here. Oh, that's

29:15

a car? That's tragically down. 94% really

29:17

sad. Okay,

29:20

it is time for fact number three

29:23

and that is James. Okay, my fact

29:25

this week is that bacteria eat clouds.

29:27

So it turns out up in the

29:29

sky, there's a lot of stuff living

29:32

up there. Lots of stuff. And a

29:34

lot of it is very small, so

29:36

fungal spores, viruses, and bacteria. And the

29:38

bacteria, how they can live up there

29:41

for so long, is that they get

29:43

their energy from... the little bits that

29:45

make clouds. So if you think about

29:47

it, a cloud is made out of

29:50

water, right? But the water can't just

29:52

stay up there by itself. It needs

29:54

to get around something. So there's little

29:56

bits. of dust. There might be little

29:58

bits of dead animals up there, little

30:01

bits of, you know... dead fungal spores

30:03

something like that. Dead animal like the

30:05

leg of a rabbit. The road kill

30:07

that the planes hit. Tiny cellular. I

30:10

meant tiny cellular things yeah as opposed

30:12

to a trunk off an elephant. But

30:14

yeah that so that stuff might be

30:16

made of carbon and the the bacteria

30:19

can use this carbon to make a

30:21

molecule called adenosine triphosphate or ATP which

30:23

is basically what we all use. We're

30:25

all living things use. it to create

30:28

energy and they get theirs from this

30:30

stuff that's in clouds. Yeah, cool. I

30:32

always thought these are nucleators, the little

30:34

bits that clouds gather around and I

30:36

always thought they were mainly dust and

30:39

bits of earth and basically water attached

30:41

to them forms ice around them and

30:43

that's clouds. But actually... up to 100%

30:45

of them in some places and the

30:48

vast majority of biological. So it's largely

30:50

the corpses of other bacteria that bacteria

30:52

are eating. A lot of, I mean,

30:54

a lot of dust is like, comes

30:57

from bacteria or... It's wild to think,

30:59

though, that when it rains, there's an

31:01

estimate that says a single square meter

31:03

of ground gets pelted with a hundred

31:06

million bacteria during every hour of rainstorm.

31:08

Yeah, I... You're being rained by bacteria.

31:10

Because I don't really like using umbrellas.

31:12

because I feel like it's a bit

31:14

soft and so like I always go

31:17

out in the rain and I'm just

31:19

kind of happy to get wet and

31:21

also because I'm from Boston I feel

31:23

like it reminds me of home when

31:26

it rains yeah right but now that

31:28

I know all that bacteria is coming

31:30

down as well I feel like I

31:32

might have to use an umbrella. Now

31:35

you know you're being bombarded with fungal

31:37

sports I know yeah you've got real

31:39

two mixed signals coming in there that's

31:41

so you James I recently considered buying

31:44

a second umbrella stand Honestly, if anyone

31:46

listening wants to know the difference between

31:48

me and Abby, that pretty much sounds

31:50

us. Yeah. It's pretty wild though that

31:52

it's not just the rain. That I,

31:55

you know, I grew up by the

31:57

beaches in Australia. Every crashing wave was

31:59

pumped. bacteria into my face. I just

32:01

didn't know that. It's crazy because I

32:04

always go swimming completely naked because I

32:06

think if you wear a swimsuit that's

32:08

soft. Now you're Burkini aren't you? I

32:10

read a piece which I'm sure you

32:13

guys all did which was printed in

32:15

microbiology today in 2005. I'd read it

32:17

before. This was a fantastic I just

32:19

wanted to give a shout out to

32:22

Dale Griffin. I don't know if he's

32:24

still trading or still listening but it's

32:26

about soil moving across the earth every

32:28

year. I just want to read you

32:30

the quote, the current estimate of

32:33

the soil moving some distance in

32:35

the Earth's atmosphere each year is

32:37

approximately 3 billion metric tons. If

32:40

that was converted into 1964

32:42

Volkswagen Beatles, based on

32:44

weight and dimensions, there would

32:46

be enough beetles to create

32:48

a 42 kilometre tall tower

32:50

with base area equivalent to the

32:52

walled city of Chester UK. Oh my God!

32:54

Hang on, so think about that. I'm

32:57

struggling to think about this. Did we

32:59

need the beetles in there? Yes, because

33:01

the soil making the towel. No, no, no,

33:03

because the soil is dense of the beetles.

33:05

The soil is converted, 3 billion

33:07

tons of soil, converted to 3

33:09

billion tons of Volkswagen beetles. Because

33:11

you got the inside of a

33:13

Volkswagen beetle is not full of

33:15

soil. No, not unless you've been

33:17

doing some very heavy driving. Interesting.

33:19

Interesting, okay, well. I say interesting.

33:21

It's a cool tower. Do we

33:23

need Chester anymore? Wouldn't it be

33:26

better to have a 42 km

33:28

tall tower? Tea hailstorms. You know

33:30

about these? Tea plantations? Yes. They're

33:32

more common hailstorms over

33:34

tea plantations. And it was this

33:36

really big mystery. In 1979, there

33:39

was a scientist in Kenya who was

33:41

aware that the world record for

33:43

hailstorms was on Kenyan tea plantations.

33:45

They got 132 days of them

33:47

a year of them a year.

33:49

Wow. which is a lot of hail and didn't

33:52

know why and it turns out it's all the

33:54

tea pickers fault. Basically as they walk through the

33:56

tea plantation picking the tea they kick up bits

33:58

of leaf bits of dead... tea leaf into

34:01

the air and there's a bacteria

34:03

in tea leaf that attaches itself

34:05

to the leaves as they rot

34:07

and they're flawless hail nucleators so

34:09

as you kick up the tea

34:11

leaves into the air you free

34:13

up these bacteria they go straight

34:15

up into the air and they

34:17

hail down again. Does it damage

34:19

the tea? Must do, right? It

34:21

seems like it would but it's

34:23

not like they're constantly having to

34:25

move the tea plantates to escape

34:27

the hills storm. There's a science

34:29

writer writer called, I think it's

34:31

called Zimmer. who's writing a lot

34:34

of the same as a consummer

34:36

and he writes a lot about

34:38

these things which are collectively aeroplankton

34:40

is the term for them and

34:42

it contributes a huge amount to

34:44

the circle of life. So there's

34:46

a bacteria called pseudomonas and it's

34:48

very good turning water to ice

34:50

or helping water turn to ice.

34:52

So when a plant is covered

34:54

in this stuff on the ground

34:56

with these bacteria and rainlands the

34:58

pseudomas bacteria turn the water to

35:00

ice the leaf cracks the leaf

35:02

cracks open. and the bacteria can

35:05

then get inside the leaf, which

35:07

is what it's trying to do.

35:09

It's trying to feed on the

35:11

leaf. So that's what the bacteria's

35:13

function is, and it sort of

35:15

damages the plant. But clouds containing

35:17

those bacteria rain more, and it

35:19

might be that that helps plants

35:21

need rain more, because that helps

35:23

plants grow, because plants need rain

35:25

to grow. So actually everyone's helping

35:27

everyone in this. So they're kind

35:29

of bacteria... motorways in the sky,

35:31

which is mad. These kind of...

35:33

They traffic light controlled or is

35:35

it like a roundabout way system?

35:38

Well there's this thing, the environment

35:40

is called the aerobio, like outdoor

35:42

above us. is the aerobium. So

35:44

in cities the aerobium is less

35:46

diverse and there are few microbes

35:48

and then the countryside loads more

35:50

microbes in the countryside and maybe

35:52

this affects whether you get asthma

35:54

you know the environment you live

35:56

in whether you breathe in more

35:58

or fewer all different kinds of

36:00

these things sort of effects that.

36:02

But some scientists think that the

36:04

2001 foot and mouth outbreak in

36:06

the UK which was cattle livestock

36:09

foot in mouth not human one.

36:11

they think it might have been

36:13

due to a storm in North

36:15

Africa, which may have carried spores

36:17

north, because a week after that

36:19

storm, cases of foot mouth started

36:21

happening. How interesting. Could be that?

36:23

And that's the Sahara, I think,

36:25

wasn't it, which gets blamed for

36:27

a lot of stuff being carried.

36:29

I think it was from there

36:31

that they thought it might have

36:33

come. Because similarly, I think we've

36:35

talked before about how... a lot

36:37

of the sand in the Caribbean

36:39

is blown over from the Sahara

36:42

and there was this major coral

36:44

disease in 1999 which killed off

36:46

loads of Caribbean coral. It was

36:48

a fungus called Aspergilla Sidawii and

36:50

it happened to coincide with all

36:52

these dust storms in the Sahara

36:54

and this fungus lived in the

36:56

Sahara Desert, been picked up, blown

36:58

all the way over to the

37:00

Caribbean. killed a bunch of coral.

37:02

Bloody Sahara Desert. I read something

37:04

about this which I don't have

37:06

in my notes because it was

37:08

years ago, but I think there's

37:10

an underwater cave in the Caribbean

37:13

which is one of the best

37:15

places to study old sand from

37:17

the Sahara because it flies over

37:19

there. It hits the water. It

37:21

goes down. It gets into this

37:23

cave and it's kind of stuck

37:25

there and no one can contaminate

37:27

it or anything. And I think

37:29

it's called the Dam Cave. Oh

37:31

wow. That feels like an enterprising

37:33

scientist has said, well I need

37:35

to study the Sahara, but I'm

37:37

going to need to study from

37:39

the Caribbean. That's incredible. I think

37:41

that's true. That is so good.

37:43

The Dan Cave sounds like something

37:46

so much more disgusting than that

37:48

actually. It's like a mancave. It's

37:50

so weird. I was thinking like

37:52

superhero backcaves, or I like. just

37:54

wanking the corner. There's no need

37:56

for that. That's what my life

37:58

said. Okay, it is time for

38:00

our final fact of the show

38:02

and that is my fact. My

38:04

fact this week is that. That

38:06

number one selling singer Sabrina Carpenter

38:08

is the niece of another number

38:10

one selling singer Bart Simpson. Wow.

38:12

It's a confusing fact because much

38:14

like me none of you would

38:16

have heard of the Sabrina Carpenter.

38:19

And you won't know the Bart

38:21

Simpson fellow. Okay, so a lot

38:23

of people will know that Sabrina

38:25

Carpenter is one of the biggest

38:27

pop stars in the world right

38:29

now, and she has had a

38:31

bunch of singles that have gone

38:33

to number one, Me Espresso, for

38:35

example, is one, and it turns

38:37

out that her auntie is Nancy

38:39

Cartwright, the voice of Bart Simpson,

38:41

who herself had a number one

38:43

hit, would do the Bartman. Can

38:45

I just say, I read someone

38:47

on red it, someone called Blomennixen.

38:50

saying that that makes Nancy Cartwright

38:52

a carpenter aunt. Because she's got

38:54

Sabrina Carpenter and Carpenter and Carpenter

38:56

and her name of a species.

38:58

Nice, that's good. Yeah, that's pretty

39:00

good. Oh and Anne is a

39:02

Northern pronunciation of aunt. Yes, yes.

39:04

Got it, thank you. That was

39:06

the missing link I needed. I

39:08

just thought it was a good

39:10

joke but not good enough that

39:12

I was going to claim it

39:14

myself. You thought you'd buy the

39:16

kite. You can always edit out

39:18

the redbit bit if it's really

39:20

well. Are you a fan of

39:23

Sabrina Carpenterer? Are you a fan

39:25

of Sabrina Carpenter? Album cover of

39:27

her last but one album, Email's

39:29

I Can't Send, was inspired by

39:31

old photos of Kate Moss. I

39:33

think of her as a modern

39:35

day Leslie Gore. I actually think

39:37

you would like her. I actually

39:39

think she's great. I actually think

39:41

you would like her. I actually

39:43

think you would like her because

39:45

who was the person we spoke

39:47

about who sang? Oh, it's my

39:49

party. It's my party. Leslie Gore.

39:51

Yeah, I think of her as

39:54

a modern day Leslie Gore. Like

39:56

her song, please, please please. I

39:58

reckon it's pretty much the modern

40:00

version of that song. I'm always

40:02

open to new talent. I'll give

40:04

this. I'll give her a go

40:06

and see if maybe we can

40:08

help her. Do so apparently she's

40:10

doing fine without me. She'll do

40:12

it okay. of the carpenters who

40:14

had a career after. Oh, she's

40:16

not current carpenter, sister. Yeah. She's

40:18

not related to the carpenters. What

40:20

we've got here is two people

40:22

who live in the modern world,

40:24

and they've got me and Anna.

40:27

Well, let me give you a

40:29

bit back around about Sabrina carpenter.

40:31

So Nancy Cartwright. Stepbrother is David

40:33

Carpenter who is Sabrina Carpenter's dad.

40:35

He is an x-ray servicing company

40:37

member His sorry sorry he David

40:39

Carpenter works x-ray servicing company member

40:41

Yeah, it doesn't feel very important

40:43

That fact is not really well.

40:45

I mean you said it in

40:47

the same way that you would

40:49

say he's a teacher I's a

40:51

doctor Have you ever met someone

40:53

like that at a party? Again,

40:55

you're moving on to the next

40:57

person. I'm going home with the

41:00

loadmuffle at this point. Get your

41:02

big truck, you pulled. Her mom

41:04

is a chiropractor. The reason I

41:06

mentioned these two things, the reason

41:08

I mentioned it is because outside

41:10

of Nancy Cartwright, there's no... connection

41:12

to the world of entertainment. She's

41:14

not a Nepal baby. Exactly. She's

41:16

often accused of that as a

41:18

result of that connection, but they

41:20

don't seem to be that. She

41:22

started her. She can get all

41:24

the X-rays, she works. And it's

41:26

fun. She back clicked. You are

41:28

in luck, my friend. She released

41:31

her first single, which was called

41:33

Can't Blame a Girl for Trying.

41:35

One week after Fish started. So

41:37

she is as old as Fish

41:39

for one week. Yeah, March 14,

41:41

2014. We could have a joint

41:43

birthday party. She's still got a

41:45

week to catch up and be

41:47

as big as us. She started

41:49

off, she did a Miley Cyrus

41:51

singing competition when she was 10

41:53

years old. We're going to have

41:55

to explain around. She don't Billy

41:57

Ray Cyrus. who worked in the

41:59

musicist. It was an x-ray guy,

42:01

that's right. But it was like

42:04

a competition for Miley Cyrus Fine

42:06

Club members, but it was kind

42:08

of voted for by people. It's

42:10

one of those early internet things. And

42:12

it was mentioning loads of her local

42:14

newspapers and they basically said vote

42:16

for her, vote for her, so she got down

42:19

to the final like three or four people. She

42:21

was only 10 years old and everyone else was

42:23

like older teenagers doing it. Was that when she...

42:25

started out when when Fish was done. That would

42:28

happen. That was earlier and then she went on

42:30

to YouTube because she got big on this competition

42:32

and put a load of songs on YouTube and

42:34

then got massive on YouTube. I think she got

42:36

picked up by the Disney Club or someone. Yeah,

42:39

she did a show called Girl Meets World which

42:41

I think was a reboot, a boy meets world

42:43

which is a big show when I was a

42:45

teenager. She was cast as the lead character, the

42:48

Lindsay Lohan character and the mean girls musical

42:50

that Tina Tina Tina did on stage. So

42:52

she had a bit of a bit of

42:54

a bit of a career ahead of it.

42:56

and then she did this a lot of

42:58

slogging away before you're an overnight success

43:01

exactly is this is this

43:03

like an ad crossover swap

43:05

because she gonna release a song

43:07

about no such thing as a

43:09

fish and exchange for this party

43:11

come on it's like we're not

43:14

expecting any publicity back from the

43:16

traffic lighting to Shioi Is this

43:18

disappointing or am I being

43:20

judgmental? She's big on Scientology.

43:23

I know they all are, but she's really big.

43:25

What do you mean they all are?

43:27

All the famous people. Have you not

43:29

seen the roof of most cavern? It's

43:31

one of those big pyramid wire things

43:33

that you wear. She, Cartwright, was awarded

43:36

in 2023, the status of

43:38

patron Excalibur with honours by

43:40

the Church of Scientology, which

43:42

she called the most beautiful

43:44

acknowledgement I've ever received in

43:47

my life. which I think is really weird

43:49

to appreciate that because the reason she's got

43:51

it I assume is that she's donated 20

43:53

million dollars to the Church of Scientology. So

43:55

where the Simpsons money goes? Well there's a

43:57

lot of Simpsons money isn't it? Yeah absolutely.

43:59

I mean this album that you're talking

44:02

about then this was the Simpsons

44:04

Sing the Blues released in 1990.

44:06

Oh I'm sorry yeah yeah the

44:08

one with dude about man on

44:10

it exactly that was the first

44:12

track and that sold in the

44:14

UK it's on 400,000 I remember

44:16

it was absolutely Monday. Yeah well

44:18

yeah went to number one here

44:20

but it didn't in America oddly

44:22

and what's weird is it was

44:24

it was only played on Sky

44:26

One at this point, The Simpsons,

44:28

in the UK, so for overseas

44:30

listeners that's a sort of, what

44:32

do you have to pay for

44:34

it? Yeah, it's a pay-for channel,

44:36

so quite wild. The album sounds

44:38

very good, it's got lots of

44:40

great musicians on it, BB King,

44:42

D.J.J.J. Jeff, I mean, this is

44:44

my, these are my people I

44:46

think, it was listed that Michael

44:48

Jackson was the composer of Do

44:50

the Batmanman, which I think we

44:52

might have said on this show

44:54

on this show, we might have

44:56

said on this show, on this

44:58

show, on this show, and I

45:00

believe that's not, and I believe

45:02

that's not, I believe that's not,

45:04

that's not actually, that's not actually

45:06

true, but it got sold two

45:08

million copies in the USA. I

45:10

mean it was a really, I

45:12

think people forget how massive the

45:14

Simpsons was. Yeah, biggest, biggest part,

45:16

you never? It felt, well until

45:18

the new Chinese movie, Naysja. I

45:20

can't take another pop culture reference.

45:22

No, no, no, no. It's just

45:24

as a new animated movie, which

45:26

is the biggest animated movie of

45:28

all time. Oh, really? Literally. She

45:30

was Bart. She did various different

45:32

roles. So she did, in my

45:34

little pony, she did a voice

45:36

that was quite similar to Bart

45:38

Simpson, but probably for me, most

45:40

iconically, she did the voice of,

45:42

if you remember, who framed Roger

45:44

Abbott, There's a moment where there

45:46

is a shoe being dipped into

45:48

a vat of acid. That's that's

45:50

her. That's Nancy Carter. That is

45:52

quite a seminal bit of that.

45:54

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't think

45:56

that's even on a Wikipedia page.

45:58

You need to get that up

46:00

there. That's funny. Guys, who's the

46:02

main creator of the Simpsons that

46:04

comes up? Matt Groning. Greening. Not

46:06

him? Sorry, it is. I just

46:08

can't believe I've been saying groaning

46:10

all these years. You see that

46:12

name so much. You think groaning

46:14

is graining? Graining. Do you know

46:16

what his parents called? Oh, it'll

46:18

be like... Mr. and Mrs. Grading?

46:20

Wouldn't it be like Homer and

46:22

Marge or... Is it? No. His

46:24

dad's a consultant radiology company member,

46:26

isn't he? Yeah. The effects it

46:28

had in the early years was

46:30

brilliant. I just love all the

46:32

thing because it... There was a

46:34

time where the Simpsons was really

46:36

big in the news, and I

46:38

know they're still making it now,

46:40

but there was a time where

46:42

like it prompted big headlines. So

46:44

in 1996, the New York Times

46:46

reported that there was a mega-glut

46:48

of saxophony happening in America. All

46:51

children wanted to learn the saxophone

46:53

because of Lisa Simpson. Yeah, that's

46:55

sad. Saxeachers said, they interviewed saxeachers

46:57

who said this is just, you

46:59

know, it's a nightmare. They would

47:01

have a whole band of saxophone

47:03

students students. So this is like,

47:05

who were we talking about last

47:07

week the farmers who complain when

47:09

they get too big a year?

47:11

The saxophone, do you have the

47:13

saxophone farmers? Probably saxophone, too killed,

47:15

Roy. Sorry band leaders were furious

47:17

about this because they, you know,

47:19

they desperately needed a pickleau and

47:21

all they got was a saxophone

47:23

telling us. Yeah, that makes sense.

47:25

And they interviewed one who said,

47:27

also due to the fact that

47:29

if you go to the steam...

47:31

sexiest man ever to live. So

47:33

the reason I said Homer and

47:35

Marj before is because I do

47:37

know that fact that he named

47:39

all the characters after his family

47:41

except for Bart which was an

47:43

anagram of brat and he sort

47:45

of came up with him in

47:47

the moment but I was reading

47:49

up on his sister Lisa graining

47:51

and she married a man called

47:53

Craig Bartlett. Which car of the

47:55

radiology department? Craig Bartlett is the

47:57

creator of another show that's called

47:59

Hey Arnold, which is a massive

48:01

show. Yeah, and Dinosaur Train was

48:03

a more recent one, which my

48:05

son grew up on. But yeah,

48:07

so that is a real powerhouse

48:09

of a family. cartoon connections. He

48:11

also named a lot of characters

48:13

in The Simpsons after Places he

48:15

knew about. So he grew up

48:17

in Portland in Oregon and streets

48:19

where he grew up, near where

48:21

he grew up, included Flanders Street.

48:23

Lovejoy Street, Reverend Lovejoy. And there

48:25

was Burnside Street in Montgomery Park

48:27

next to each other, Montgomery Burns.

48:29

And then Portland also has Terwilliger

48:31

Boulevard. And of course the real

48:33

name of Side Show Bob is

48:35

Robert Underdunk Terwilliger. But he didn't

48:37

name him after it. Oh no!

48:39

Completely different person. They were interviewed

48:41

once and they named Sideshow Bub

48:43

after a character from the film

48:45

The Five Thousand Fingers of Tea,

48:47

who was called Dr. Tewa liquor,

48:49

and it has nothing to do

48:51

with the fact that also in

48:53

Portland Oregon there's a street called

48:55

Tewa liquor boulevard. That's a total

48:57

coincidence. Maggie Simpson, is the baby.

48:59

Yeah. Her first word was daddy,

49:01

and it was said by friend

49:03

of the podcast, Elizabeth Taylor. Do

49:05

you know who voices Maggie? So

49:07

Maggie is... Let's the trailer? We

49:09

get the dummy suck. So you

49:11

mean who does the dummy suck?

49:13

Yeah, who does the dummy suck

49:15

in? Is it also? Is it

49:17

Matt graining? It's Matt grain? Is

49:19

it? Yeah, it's nice. It's an

49:21

easy way to make a lot

49:23

of money, isn't it? I think

49:25

it's like when we talked about

49:27

Simon Cal doing the cowbell just

49:29

to get the credits. It's like

49:31

I'm just going to get a

49:33

credit on this. He can't need

49:35

more. It can't be the difference

49:37

as the producer of the show.

49:39

It can't be the difference between

49:41

him. 100% he'll get paid for

49:43

that. That's very funny. That's a

49:45

main character. I'm going to say

49:47

that's his opinion as to why

49:49

he's doing it. I don't believe

49:51

that's his motivation. off in these

49:53

shows sometimes is to get a

49:56

little extra on the back end.

49:58

I'd love to start a feud

50:00

with the Simpsons and then maybe

50:02

they'll put us in the Simpsons

50:04

as some evil. I mean no

50:06

one watches it anymore so it

50:08

doesn't really matter but there you

50:10

go there's a few of you.

50:12

Gosh that would be yeah yeah.

50:14

They used to get into great

50:16

beef with people all the time

50:18

and they recently have had a

50:20

bit they've had a bit with

50:22

Morrissey. Okay, he hates beef. They

50:24

parodied him in an episode called

50:26

Panic on the Streets of Springfield.

50:28

They had a singer who had

50:30

a quiff and was a vegan.

50:32

And you know, they just took

50:34

the Mickey a bit. It was

50:36

pretty gentle. And Morrissey complained, you

50:38

are especially despised if your music

50:40

affects people in a strong and

50:42

beautiful way. In fact, the worst

50:44

thing you can do in 2021

50:46

is lend a bit of strength

50:48

to the lives of others. There

50:50

is no place in modern music

50:52

for anyone with strong emotions. In

50:54

a world obsessed with hate laws,

50:56

there are none that protect me.

50:58

Hang on, was this targeted at

51:00

the Simpsons? Yes! Okay, so the

51:02

story just sounds like a generic

51:04

statement. No, it was his statement.

51:06

It was the dear Simpsons. There

51:08

he is. They've had high profile

51:10

beef with world leaders, so they

51:12

had Barbara Bush called them out

51:14

saying that it wasn't a show

51:16

you should watch and March Simpson

51:18

wrote a letter to Barbara Bush

51:20

in response saying that she actually

51:22

thinks her family is a good

51:24

family. They've had episodes where, because

51:26

of you see it as a

51:28

global product, For example, there was

51:30

one episode they had to remove

51:32

the line about Mao Zedong being

51:34

a little angel who killed 50

51:36

million people. They thought that wasn't

51:38

appropriate in Japan. Can you cut

51:40

after angel? Japan, there was an

51:42

episode where they had to lose

51:44

a bit because... They mentioned the

51:46

massive Japanese bonkathon. Yeah, Homer tosses

51:48

the Japanese Emperor into a sumo

51:50

thong dumpster. So in fact, that

51:52

whole episode was banned. Right. Okay,

51:54

do you think that Maud should

51:56

dump Homer? Not after all this

51:58

time, I think. Oh really? Well

52:00

I just think once you've been in

52:02

a relationship for when was my

52:04

marriage, once you've been in the

52:06

marriage for at least 12 years

52:09

you shouldn't dump your husband. I

52:11

think yeah I think once the

52:13

kids are grown up and out

52:15

of home unfortunately that's never happening.

52:17

Okay I only asked because you

52:19

go've asked there long suffering test

52:21

audiences this in 2018. Yeah, all

52:23

right. They call 20 people trapped

52:25

in a room. What did they

52:27

say? The business. Thank you for

52:29

asking. So 14% of women said March

52:32

should dump Homer. Only 8% of

52:34

men said that. So. Man being

52:36

a bit more forgiving. Can't believe so few

52:38

of eyes are though. Well, you, it's not

52:40

a good husband. I just want to

52:42

say what you said. When asked, the

52:44

majority, 52% of Simpson's fans, consider Homer,

52:46

a man who frequently strangles his son,

52:49

has framed March for drink driving, committed

52:51

bigamy, caused his father's kidneys to fail,

52:53

has worked for a terrorist organisation, and

52:55

is frequently asleep or absent in his

52:57

role overseeing safety at a nuclear power

52:59

plant. to be a good person. Has

53:01

he not also, like, he's definitely been

53:03

to space? He must have, I bet

53:05

he saved the world like three or

53:07

four times. Yeah, he probably has. You're

53:09

saying you take the rough for

53:11

this move? Yeah. I agree. So

53:13

by contrast, but whose escapades are

53:15

far more child-like and consequence light

53:17

is almost twice as likely to

53:19

be seen as a bad person

53:21

at 22% yet Maggie who shot

53:23

Mr. Do you guys the right

53:25

page for that? Yeah, exactly. It

53:27

was like Dallas. Yeah, the whole

53:29

JR. Well, you guys weren't old

53:31

enough for Dallas. No, no, no.

53:33

But yeah, I was there for

53:36

it. I remember it. Apparently only,

53:38

they had lots of forums at the

53:40

time saying, can you guess who it

53:42

is? And the showwriters said, only one

53:44

person got that it was. I remember

53:46

you could bet on it. And I remember,

53:48

I don't think even, it was one of

53:51

the option. It was one of the option.

53:53

You weren't old enough to bet at this

53:55

time when this was going. When did

53:57

it happen? He had a fake ID on

53:59

990. in the 90s? Well I was

54:02

born in 78. Okay so I

54:04

was able to in 96 I

54:06

could. I'm just picturing the scene

54:08

in the batting shop like a

54:10

load of jaded regulars gathered around

54:12

the horse racing screen and alone

54:14

like nerds in the other corner

54:16

watching the citizens. And it comes

54:19

in the smaggy oh! Terror up

54:21

your ticket. One guy goes to

54:23

the counter pulls up and stacks

54:25

and stacks of cat. Isn't that

54:27

Matt Grinnick? Okay,

54:32

that's it. That is all of our facts.

54:34

Thank you so much for listening. If you'd

54:36

like to get in contact with any of

54:39

us about the things that we have said

54:41

over the course of this podcast, we can

54:43

all be found on our social media accounts.

54:45

I'm on Instagram on at Shribaland. Andy. I'm

54:47

on Blue Sky at Andrew Hunter M. James.

54:49

My Instagram is nothing is James Harkin. And

54:51

if you want to get to us as

54:53

a group, Anna. You can find us on

54:56

at no such thing on Twitter or at

54:58

no such thing as a fish on Instagram

55:00

or email podcast at kiwai.com. Yeah, do send

55:02

in some emails because they will make their

55:04

way, hopefully, to our bonus episode that happens

55:06

in Club Fish. Clubfish is our secret members

55:08

club that you can find at No Such

55:10

Thing as a fish.com. We do a show

55:12

called Drop Us a Line where we go

55:15

through the mailbag and answer all of your

55:17

questions. You can also find all of our

55:19

previous episodes on that website. There's merchandise. There's

55:21

an upcoming live show at the Cross Wires

55:23

Festival in Sheffield that's happening in July. Check

55:25

that out and come see us live if

55:27

you're around. Otherwise, come back next week. We'll

55:29

be back with another episode and we'll see

55:32

you then. Goodbye.