Title: Screw You William Wilberforce. What Did You Ever Achieve?

acast Time: 1:01:09
Youtube Time: N/A

Original Record Date: August 3, 2019
acast Publication Date: August 3, 2019
Youtube Publication Date: N/A

Please Welcome a Man
Who has now seen four ghosts.

Acronym Modification
Richard Herring’s Looking Surprisingly Trim Podcast

Cool Kids
I was hanging out having dinner at the Only Fools and Horses, the (cushty) Dining Experience. It’s amazing. It’s like a load of people pretend to be the characters from Only Fools and Horses. The brilliant thing is they haven’t gotten permissions from any of the Only Fools and Horses people who created it. They just do it off their own back. That’s what’s really good about it. They don’t pay anyone for doing that. And it’s so funny to see them doing all of the stuff you’ve seen on Only Fools and Horses except worse. I had such a good time. The guy who plays Boycie in that…

Guest Best Known
LB: For her performance as Sharon Starr in Doctors.
SM: For the work they have done with Kleenex. And so am I.

Audience

Better or Worse than Last Week: Better
Like or Unlike Wikipedia: N/A

Member Member Note
Liam also attended yesterday’s show
RH notes that Liam may win the Rick & Morty notebook

Emergency Questions

Lucy Beaumont

Have you ever seen a ghost?

I feel ghosts. I’ve never seen them. But I feel them, yeah. A dog once got into bed with me – a ghost dog. Weird. Yeah, and I’ve had a ghost cat, as well. I feel animals more than humans. Yeah, it was big. Oh, and it was horrible. And the person who lived in the house before me had bred dogs. Yeah, and the cat was a night – I mean, you wouldn’t want to get a ghost parrot, would you? DO your head in. But the cat was a nuisance. They kept knocking stuff off. You know, like… And put some milk out for it. The milk was gone after a couple of weeks. […] The last preview I did – Have you ever been in the – Oh my word. So in Barnard Castle, the Old Well Inn Hotel, room number 10. Just ask to go in. Don’t stay there, just ask to look in it. I’ve never been so scared in all my life. That was – And then they let me stay. I couldn’t even; I was so petrified I couldn’t even stay in the room. And looked it up. So where that’s built, 300 people died of cholera. And that room became where they kept the coffins. It used to be a funeral parlour. It was so scary. And then I said to the lady, I said, “Look, I’ve looked it up.” And she was scared, the girl at reception. She then got really freaked out. And then I got locked out and I couldn’t get back into where she was at reception. So I had to go around – I had to go around the back where the window was and I [unclear]. And I had to knock on the door. And I freaked her out. Her face, just… Because what I do now, if I go to a hotel I say to him, “Has anyone died in this room?” And if they don’t know, I say, “I’ll let you know.”

What is the most mundane encounter you have had with a celebrity?

Oh, God. Well, I thought I worked with her, and I went up to say, “Oh…” And it was Vanessa Phelps. And then I went, “Oh, you’re Vanessa Phelps. Oh.” Oh, and it was awful. It was really embarrassing. *RH corrects that the last name is “Feltz,” not “Phelps”.*

If you could have a sexual superpower, what would it be?

Sexual superpower? Oh, maybe to be in another room when it’s happening. Let’s get the washing-up done.

Would you rather have the living face of your own twin, who you had mostly absorbed in utero staring out of your stomach, who would be able to think independently and talk and pass comment on what you were up to and chat with you when you’re lonely, or live on top of a pole in the desert for thirty years like Simeon Stylites?

I did have a real lot of teeth when I was younger. Like, you know, like… *RH asks if it was too many teeth.* Yeah, and it was a bit like that, because they say you can get teeth, don’t they? *RH posits that LB absorbed the teeth of her in utero twin.* Yeah, my mum had to – I had photos done from school and she thought they were demonic. She had to say them flat because they were following her around the room. But I have heard that you can have, like, teeth in grooves, yeah. No, that would be nice, wouldn’t it? To talk to, yeah. No, yeah definitely. *RH notes that the absorbed twin might resent you.* Well, maybe the pole then. Can I have something else instead? *RH refuses to provide another option.* The pole, then.

Have you ever seen a UFO?

Yeah, of course. All the time. *RH asks if LB has seen a UFO in Hull.* Yeah. Hull is a hotbed of alien activity. They had the first-ever sighting in 1806. The first-ever recorded sighting. And after that there’s been many sightings. Been in 1994; an alien waving out my window. A woman took a picture of an alien in her bedroom, waving. Yeah, and he sort of looked quite happy. It was in the paper. I saw – I had a really long conversation with Brian Cox about it actually. Because I asked him, “Do you believe in aliens?” And he said, “No.” And I said, “You’re wrong.” And I told him about, I was at my mum’s once. And I don’t  – someone, I think, was growing cannabis, in the flat above, but I don’t know if that was related. But, and, we just saw this, like… It was, like, fluid yet solid. Like, it was, like, iridescent. Like, it’s so hard to explain. And it just floated really, really slowly – just above the window. And I said to Brian, “What could that have been?” And he said, “A balloon.”

If the sun wasn’t going to come up tomorrow unless you threw a member of your family into a volcano, which member of your family would you throw into the volcano, or would you not throw anyone in and doom your hemisphere to icy death? 

Um, oh I’d probably throw the oldest member in then. Oldest member of the family. Aw, that’s my granddad. *RH notes that the oldest member of his family is his father.* Can I have him? I’ll do that, then. I’ll throw your granddad in. Mine’s just had a hip operation, so he needs a few more years of it.

Scummy Mummies

Have you ever bought a biscuit or chocolate bar that has turned up with an ingredient missing from it? And was it better or worse?

*RH describes recent cases of this happening.* HT: Oh, I’ve seen that. People are irate. I think Reverend Kate Bottley did a tweet about that. I once bought some cheesy Wotsits but instead of it just being a Wotsit, it was just the flavouring. And it was like these big – Has anyone else had this happen? Oh my God. And we’d been smoking a bit of stuff and so I held it in my hand, we were just all… It was like a cheese brain that had come in the packet. And we took it in turns, to have alittle nibble on this. Yeah, it was amazing. So it’s like that anomaly thing. It’s like when you used to get a massive corn flake in your corn flake box. And you were like, “Oh my God, this is the best day of my life!” But yeah, and I have had the Kit Kat thing; it’s weird. It’s great.

EG: Yeah, I don’t think I’ve ever. I don’t really like chocolate, so I don’t really know if that – Maybe I should start eating chocolate just so this kind of magical thing can happen. I do substitute things a lot in my own cooking. Like, ’cause like, sometimes you want to cook something fancy, like [unclear], something like that, and you haven’t got any ricotta or pomegranate molasses. You can just use Dairylea and Ribena. That’s a tip for you there. You’re welcome.

What faulty machine once gave you an unexpected cash or free item windfall?

HT: At uni there was a night when the um, you know, what’s it called… The machine that gives you chips and soft drinks. Yes, a vending machine was just giving out free stuff. And it was like the best night of our lives. Just Coke, Coke, Coke, Coke. It was amazing. And obviously the college caught onto it pretty quickly, because it was completely empty, but yeah, that was amazing.

EG: Not a vending machine, but when I was also at university there was a weekend where,  because we had like – I’m so old, right? I’m so old that I didn’t have to pay to go to university. That’s how long ago it was. And we had, like, one phone per corridor in all our residence. No one had mobiles. And the phone was quite expensive. But one weekend something broke in the phone system, which meant you could ring anyone for free, all the time. So obviously all the foreign students were calling Brazil for twelve hours at a time. And then us English students were like, we started phoning sex lines. And in those days you had the ones where – I don’t know if you remember – you leave voicemails. Like, you leave a sexy voicemail. And then someone else leaves a sexy voicemail back. So we were all sending each other erotic voicemails, even though we were two doors apart in the same corridor. It was a good weekend. It’s worth staying alive for things like that.

Would you rather date a man who was a 6-foot tall penis with a face like Mark Reckless or a man who instead of having a penis had a tiny man growing out of there?

EG: Can we choose who the tiny man is? Could it be someone cool like Richard Osman or something? *RH advises that the man can be chosen, but not the tiny man.*  So wait, he looks like – *RH explains dynamics of the 6-foot tall penis.* How does he eat? How does he go to the toilet? *RH advises that he wees like a regular penis and that he eats through the top of his head.*  Does he have the balls? *RH notes that there are no balls but there’s a slug-like base.* So then that’s more difficult. If you have, like, I’m trying to think how you would manouver that in and out of an Uber, do you kno what I mean? You’d have to transport him places. I don’t know. What do you think? No, but I’m going to go with the two men. I’m going to get them to form their own comedy double act, and then we can be a sketch group.

HT: Like a giant worm. Uh, I mean, the fact that there’d be two men on a man. That’s a lot of men in one thing. I’d just go for the giant cock. Why not? Give it a go.

Have you ever seen a ghost?

EG: No, ’cause they’re not real. Have you seen Rentaghost? *HT confirms that she has not.* I just sorted out our Saturday night.

HT: I’ve watched the film. I mean, Ghost, that’s a lovely film.

Would you rather be the face of a twin, mostly absorbed in utero, staring out of the stomach of your otherwise regular twin – you would be able to think independently and talk and pass comment on what they were up to and chat with them if they’re lonely or if you’re lonely, or be the prisoner of a randy bigfoot, who so far has treated you kindly enough but has a look in his eye?

EG: I mean, that last one sounds a bit like my marriage, to be honest. So, I’m kind of used to that. Well, even the first one, like, having this sort of appendage that sort of, you know, talks at you all the time. *It’s noted that EG would be the appendage.* Right. Well, again, it’s not unlike being in a double act, to be honest.

HT: Randy bigfoot. Sounds a bit like BFG gone wrong, doesn’t it? I think bigfoot, thank you very much.

Notes

Audio only.

Recorded at the New Town Theatre.

RH notes that there are twice the amount of audience members as yesterday’s show.

New Ricky & Morty notebook cover reads, “I’m sorry but your opinion means very little to me.”

RH states that the Rick & Morthy notebook would be given away at the end of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe to the audience member who has attending the most shows.

At the end of the interview RH collects donations for Scope.

RH states that the audience is better than last day’s audience.

RH notes that the venue also serves as a Masonic Lodge.

Scummy Mummies are Helen Thom and Ellie Gibson.