Frank Off The Radio: The Frank Skinner Podcast

00:06 We're in Manchester. Yeah. From where I'm sitting now I can see what I think is probably the Manchester Ship Canal, is that right? 00:15 Yeah. 00:15 I thought it was man's inhumanity to man, is what I could see. 00:18 No, I think it looks beautiful and it's symbolic of the pathway which brought great industry and effort from this city to the rest of the country. 00:28 Of course, the Midlands canals, they're symbiotic, aren't they? 00:33 No, there's... You know, we've been on it before about facts that people tell you as if they're new facts, but everybody knows them. Birmingham, what do you think the fact is I'm thinking of? Oh, is this... More canals than Venice. 00:45 More canals than Venice. 00:47 Yeah, everybody tells us, you know Birmingham has got... Yes! 00:50 LAUGHTER The taxi driver this morning said, there's a nice canal there, I'll show you. 00:56 Where was he from? LAUGHTER 00:58 That was the same as your impersonation of me. I don't like the idea that I'm doubling up jobs. I'm driving you in and... 01:04 It was kind of a similar accent. 01:06 I do like the idea of someone offering to show you a canal. 01:09 Yeah, meditation puppies. What about the studio? It's so state-of-the-art, Frank. It's very Ibiza Uncovered in here, isn't it? It's quite rave-y. It's lovely. 01:17 Why are we in Manchester, you're asking? I was asking. I think we were all asking. No, I'm on tour at the moment, so I was in Preston, which is nearby, last night, and I'm in Preston tonight. So it was just crazy to go back to London. 01:35 This is my second time in Manchester this week. 01:38 Is it? I just can't leave Manchester alone. I'm like Sir Alex Ferguson. 01:42 You just can't quit Manchester. 01:44 I'm just lingering around, you know, looking down and being a brooding presence. 01:48 What about I got the train down with Daisy and Charlie and we sat down, Frank? I'm not going to lie, it was first. 01:55 And a businessman was there. You got first, did you? Yeah, I insisted. 01:59 Okay. 02:00 And we went down and I said, just FYI, I'm your worst nightmare. I said, we have... I did. Didn't I say that, Daisy? I said, we have loads of bags and we talk a lot. 02:10 He laughed. 02:11 I moved. 02:12 A few minutes later, we heard the guard. The guard came over and went, down here, sir. We can move you down here. 02:17 Oh, no. He moved. Good for him. 02:20 Good for him. And then the guard said, would you like to see a canal? 02:23 No. 02:25 Everyone on the train was thinking, yeah, we know a canal we can show you. Well, I think it's lovely to be here, isn't it? 02:33 Yeah, oh, I'm very excited. I like it. 02:35 We haven't had an away day for a very long time, so it's... 02:38 I love it. 02:38 It's a team bonding exercise. That's what you make it sound like, an away day. I think it is a bit like that. 02:42 I think maybe we should pretend to be animals of our own choice after. 02:47 I do that anyway on Saturday mornings, just none of you have picked up on it. No. 02:51 I thought there was an element of koi poo. Pardon? It's an animal. My tooth is so jagged on the inside. I was eating a wasabi poo. 03:01 No offence, but I didn't notice. 03:03 Yeah. No, it's on the inside anyway. 03:07 I was eating a wasabi pea at Euston Station on my way to Manchester. 03:13 Oh. 03:13 And suddenly I felt a loud crack going on in my mouth. And I basically split a big piece off my tooth. 03:23 Oh, what happened then? 03:24 And then it was loose, but it was still dangling by a thread. So it was there for a couple of days, you know, when they do that. A couple of days? 03:32 Yeah. Because normally you go and get it fixed, darling. 03:34 No, I don't. I have media appointments. Oh. 03:37 Exactly. 03:38 He had a big shoot for Hello magazine to do. 03:44 So I was in Aldershot earlier in the week. We stopped off at the Big Fry, which is... You've got about this week, haven't you? It's an award-winning... It won an award. It's a fish and chip shot. Won an award for Best Love Small Business in the UK. 03:59 Lovely. 04:00 And I had fish and chips there, and I swallowed... 04:05 The tooth came out in a mouthful of cod, and I swallowed it. 04:09 This is one of the worst stories you've ever told. 04:17 792 has texted us. This is Oliver from Manchester. Hi, guys. Just to let Frank know that swallowing a piece of your tooth is completely harmless. I'm no dentist. 04:29 I was starting to think, at last, some professional advice. 04:32 No. Oliver says, I swallowed many a piece of tooth from time to time. He doesn't say whether they're his own canines. I hope you like it here. P.S. I hope you like it here. Maybe you can show me the canal later, Oliver. 04:44 Well, I am. Well, that's good news, though, because I was thinking, you know, about would my digestive juices take on anything as hard as a tooth? 04:52 I think they would. 04:53 But then someone was telling me, a friend of mine, that his son, they did an experiment at their school. One of the kids, a tooth came out, as is the way we're kids. Yeah. And they got two, I think they got two, two tooths. You see, you've got to be saying tooths now. I used to say tooths. And they put one in a glass of water and one in a glass of Coca-Cola. Oh, yeah. Over the weekend. Oh. When they got back on Monday, one in the water, as you'd expect, completely normal. Other tooth, gone. 05:23 Was it? 05:24 Gone. 05:24 Totally gone. 05:26 Anyone from Coca-Cola listening, this is hearsay, obviously. I don't have any hard and fast chemical proof of this. 05:33 Just get veneers, it's fine. Stephen Manfredi says, will Alan be showing you around his favourite haunts? Poundland, Poundworld, 99B store, hashtag thrifty. 05:44 That's unfair. 05:47 Is it unfair? 05:49 It is a bit, yeah. Oh, it's a bit unfair. I'm shouting you down already. 05:52 I went to the Arndale yesterday. Lovely. 05:54 Right. I prefer the northern quarter in Manchester. See? A bit of local material for you there. I'm not the thrifty one that my reputation has painted. 06:02 Well, here's something you might be able to help me with, though, Alan. This is your area, I think. Yeah, yeah. Let's go for it. When I was in Manchester earlier in the week, I was very hungry on the train. 06:14 Oh, yeah. 06:15 And, you know, those Cornwell pasty stores that we get at railway stations? Mm-hmm. So I was going to get opacity and the person I was with said, oh, it's 20 to 10. 06:24 And I said, yeah. 06:27 And she said, I don't know. It's up to you. I wouldn't, I personally, I wouldn't get opacity before 10. LAUGHTER Really? But people are like that. Have you never done that? No, people have rules. 06:42 Like if you want a whiskey or something. 06:44 Yeah, exactly. 06:45 When people say stuff like chips for breakfast. 06:49 Where does that come from, that there's certain times in the day that you're supposed to have food? 06:54 Surely that's one of the pleasures of being an adult. You can just eat when you like, what you like, or not at all, if you like. 07:00 Sometimes I'll get in late and have a couple of Weetabix. 07:03 Oh, really? 07:03 What about cake in the morning? Oh, there's nothing finer. 07:07 See, I like savoury foods in the morning. I quite like, you know... 07:10 When you're in France, then you get, like, boiled ham and stuff on breakfast. 07:14 Yeah, I'm all over that sort of stuff. Pizza, everything. 07:19 I don't understand. I was in Japan once for a month. I hate Japan. 07:25 Absolutely hate Japan. Oh, thank goodness. 07:29 I just don't like it as a country. 07:31 Well, I like to. 07:31 I like Japanese people. I don't like the country. 07:34 And one of the things about it is when you have breakfast in the hotel, it's just like every other meal. There's no special breakfast food in Japan. You just have sushi and... 07:44 And all that tempura. 07:45 And that's what you were like in Manchester train station at 9.40. 07:49 Was there lattice on the pasty? Lattice? Lattice. Latticing. You know the latticing on the top of it. Do you get that on pasties? Yes. 07:57 No, poor pies, you get it. 07:59 No, there's latticing. 08:00 Come on, you've been the most terrible fool. 08:02 I really haven't. In the central section, I'm calling it the central reservation area, there's a latticing on a pasty. 08:10 That's my seat that's squeaking, everyone. Simply no. If anyone's ever seen latticing on a pasty... And if you text us on HL15... I don't mean a pasty as worn by a burlesque dancer. I'm in the edible kind. Then do texting, because I... No. 08:31 568, I'm with Emily. The posh pasty has it. So much better. 08:35 Yeah, I don't think that person can be trusted because they've written pasty. 08:40 P-A-S-T-I-E. Oh, hello, I'd like a pasty, please. 08:45 Good luck. I dare you, I dare you say that about someone who's joined in. 08:48 I like Vince's text which just says, crimping, not latticing. 08:54 That's what they mean. 08:55 Crimping's a very... Crimping, you get around. It's a crossed work. 08:59 Yeah, on a Cornish pasty, it would have crimping, not lattices. 09:02 But latticing is open, isn't it? You can see the innards. 09:06 Exactly, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about proper... 09:11 Mona, I don't think you can see, Charlie. 09:13 Oh, you're squirming like a worm in a hook. 09:16 You just don't like it because there is a posh pasty, isn't there? 09:19 Well, have we established that? I don't think so. 09:21 312 says swallowing a bit of tooth will be harmless. The acid of your digestive system will erode it away. 09:27 Really? 09:29 I'm no professional. 09:31 They're all at it. 09:32 That is work on a pasty. Isn't that just like a steak bake? 09:35 Lovely. Like a steak bake, but that's not a pasty. 09:39 Like a steak bake, touch for the very first time. 09:46 I love that song. 09:47 It was one of her best. One of the least measured texts that we've had is Lattice on a pasty, no. Is that from Morrissey? 09:58 Lattice on a pasty, no. 10:02 It's against nature and it's against God. Emily's a pasty heretic. 10:08 Proud to be so. 10:09 Well, I think the time's with me, Emma. I'm sorry. 10:13 Yeah, but at least things have moved on from you've made a very great fool of yourself. 10:17 Well, I don't know if they've moved on from that. I think that's a basis on which they've been built on. What has been built a mighty tower? Is that the bedrock? I tell you where I played a theatre the other night and it was the theatre where there's a plaque there and it was the last ever appearance in this theatre by Billy Fury. 10:38 Oh, I love Billy Fury. I used to, I should say. 10:40 Last night a million stars... Billy Fury, yeah. Ronald Witcherly was his real name. 10:46 Oh, was it? 10:47 Oh, yeah. I used to be quite a Fury fan. I took Fury Monthly for a while. 10:52 Did you? 10:53 I remember in Fury Monthly, this is how stars have changed, right? Billy Fury said, it was an update, a little Fury update, and it said, he says, he used to write a little bit in there, I don't know if he actually wrote it, but he said, little update on my all-black outfit. 11:13 And I thought, oh, what's this? And he says, I've already got the trousers and the shirt on. 11:19 Um, I'm just, uh, and a Jackie. I'm looking, um, I'm looking for a black tie and some black socks. I've got the shoes. And it was, over the months he was assembling an all-black outfit. Like, over a period of about three months. 11:33 It's not that difficult, though, is it? 11:35 No, not that difficult. Maybe it was then. Do you think he was hinting? Do you think he was sort of, hey, if anybody wants to send me some black socks, I'm in the market for a pair. That was the thing in those days. LAUGHTER 11:46 But anyway, it was great that there was to play. I did feel slight excitement that Billy Fury had done his last... And so I just thought what might be a good text in is if people know any places that have sort of weird associations with celebrities or famous people. Like Lavender Corner. Do you know there's a place near Absolute where we saw Ian Lavender from Dad's Armour? We saw him on all fours on the corner of the street. And I always think of that now as... 12:18 It will always be Lavender Corner. Yeah. There ought to be a plaque there. 12:22 We should say he fell over. 12:24 No, we didn't see him fall. He was just there. He might have just been... Crawling. Yeah, he was having to crawl around the block. Could be his commute, yeah. There should be a plaque, but on the floor, so Ian could read it next time he's in town. 12:40 I missed April Fools this year because I was on some travels. No, I'm delighted because it's my worst day ever. Yeah. I hate April Fools, Frank. 12:49 Well, I am. I'm a big fan. Oh, are you? Yes. 12:53 Who can forget your classic April Fools when you told your girlfriend and mother-in-law that the toilet was broken? That was your April Fool, wasn't it? 13:01 Yeah, and the one when I told my girlfriend that I was going to do a show with Gok Wan. Oh, this was good. This one was really good. In which I wore an avant-garde outfit. Called Would You Wear That. Yeah. 13:10 Did you keep a straight face for that? Totally, to the point where... Really? This was when, some of you may recall this story the last day, maybe the April Fool's before, but yes, and she said she decided that we had to split on this time for this, quite seriously. 13:23 I love that for that. 13:24 And said, you're not the person I thought you were. 13:26 She's right. 13:26 Because I was going to do a show with Gokwan in which I walked around northern towns wearing avant-garde outfits. 13:32 Didn't you do one as well, saying the car had been stolen or something? 13:36 Oh, I've done lots. I didn't do one this year. She had a big hospital appointment on April 4th, which happily has all turned out to be totally fine. But I didn't think it was the morning. No. Because she found up and says, fantastic news, all clear. I did think about, well, it's funny she said that because I've just had a call from them. 13:58 Really? 13:59 And they said, on the contrary? And I thought, no. It's funny you should say that because I had a go at April Fool this year and it's not my day. 14:06 It's not my day. I don't like it. But then somebody told me, oh, I've just sent a text to my mate to prank him for April Fool. And I've got a theory that you forget about it and then someone tells you one that they've done and then you think, oh, I've got until noon. And so you have a go at it. So I'd been to see my osteopath and I went back to my wife and he basically said, this is fixing. Don't come back to me unless it's still a problem in six weeks, but you should be OK. So I'm on my way back and I'm thinking, oh, I'm going to try and prank her. I'm going to try and prank her. I went in and I said, you know, I thought it was going to be better. 14:40 It turns out he's missed something and I've got to get an MRI scan and then they might have to shave a bit off my hip. And basically I'm going to be in traction for a whole month. 14:50 And I'm thinking she's going to think, oh, my God, I've got to look after two kids and the dog all on my own for a moment. 14:55 She just went, oh, how did they miss that? 14:59 Me in traction apparently is no more work for her than me not in traction. It doesn't affect her life at all. 15:06 I also like that you did an April Fool centred around an MRI scan. 15:10 Yeah, terrible. And a shave tip. 15:13 And really badly as well. I knew that I couldn't keep a straight face, so while I was telling her it, I turned and put the kettle on, and I told her it with a bag to her. Really lame. Rubbish. I fell for one. 15:24 I fell for one this year. What was it? There was an internet one. I know we're breaking all the rules here. 15:29 Did they tell you you'd be nominated for ten Sony Awards? No. 15:33 No, it wasn't that. 15:34 Radio Academy, sorry. 15:37 It said that Peter Capaldi... it turns out isn't really the Doctor, that that was a bit of a switch. Oh, wow. And it said that he was the master, you know, who is the Doctor's sort of arch enemy. 15:51 I'm sorry, I don't watch it. 15:52 Yes, well, imagine, think arch enemy. Arch enemy. And he was just... 15:58 pretending to be the Doctor, but in fact he's going to be. And I thought, wow, that's a good twist. What a fantastic plot twist. But you don't want to do, what you don't want to do is April Fool's, when you find the truth, it's less good. 16:11 The April Fool. 16:13 Oh, were you thinking, hang on, this is a casting opportunity again all of a sudden? 16:18 No, I mean, I think, you know, I'm happy about Capaldi as the Doctor, but the idea that they could have switched that and kept us all full wouldn't have been such a brilliant... 16:24 They're now thinking they should have done that. 16:26 But you're supposed... But when it comes... You're supposed to be, like, relieved to find out it's in April. Like, my mate, a very good friend of mine, he got the role of Debris in The Producers in the West End, the sort of... Oh, yes, I know the friend, yeah. He was very, very excited, as you can imagine. It's a brilliant part. 16:46 And he got up on April 4th, and I said, you're definitely doing the Debris role, aren't you, in that? And he said, yeah. 16:51 I said, there's just been a thing on the news that says that Graham Norton's doing it. 16:55 And he said, oh, that'll be a mistake. And he told me after. He said, oh, that's ridiculous. He said, I was dying inside. Absolutely. 17:03 How did you do that? 17:05 Because I then gave him the gift of the truth. 17:08 It's like when people say to me, what's the time? Someone asked me the time and I always had an hour and a half on it. 17:15 And then they go, it's not that, that is. And I go, no. And then suddenly I've given them an extra hour and a half on their life. 17:20 It's not jokes. It's admin creation. That's all you do. 17:23 Oh, well. I'm going to use that as my other poster. Not jokes. Admin creation. Oh, I'll tell you what I did. Now, this is one of the reasons I might move away from the practical joke. 17:36 Go on. 17:38 I've been doing another radio show. What? For Radio 4, a history panel show, which I think I've spoken to you about before. And it's not out for a while, so I'm not plugging. 17:50 But Daisy was... What was your role on it, Daisy? 17:55 Broadcast assistant. 17:56 Broadcast assistant. She was very much the engine room of it. 18:01 And I phoned her up about something else and she said, yeah. And I said, you know what, I can't... I don't feel very well. I'm not going to do it tonight. This was like two hours before the show. And I don't know why I said it, because I was phoning about something else. 18:16 No, you often don't know why you say things. I just can't do it. Something else you told just now, which I can't believe, anyway. 18:21 And Daisy says, oh, God, it's really short notice. I said, no, I'm sorry. And then I thought, I said, no, no, actually, I was joking, I'm not, I am doing it. And she said, I'm sorry, I just feel like crying. LAUGHTER She honestly said that. I thought, oh, I really felt it had gone wrong. I really felt. I could hear, you know, the slight tremble in the voice. That's the problem with pranking. It is. 18:46 Yeah. 18:48 It is the problem with pranking. 18:49 It's like when I gave that friend of my mother's a rubber cookie on a plate. And there was a plate full of normal cookies. That's great. Even if I was doing it with five other people. I did it on my own. And then I put one rubber cookie on there. 19:03 Hang on. How old were you at this point? 19:05 Probably about 11. 19:06 All right. 19:06 And he bit into it. He was Canadian. 19:08 And he went, oh, my door. That's a brilliant prank. 19:16 I cried. 19:18 You know what? 19:18 You've taught me around. I am going to do that. I'd forgotten how brilliant they were. 19:24 I like the detail of it, which seemed to help the laugh, was he was Canadian. 19:28 Yeah. 19:28 I've got a six-year-old, and I think next year, if I could get hold of a rubber cookie for him, he'd be really excited approaching April Fools. 19:34 I think health and safety are probably not allowed. After, ah, my tooth gate. 19:38 Well, also, you can't be serving up cookies before noon, can you? That's when the April Fools cut-off point is. 19:44 Why is that? Do we know? 19:47 Sorry, I'm Googling rubber cookies. LAUGHTER I'll see if I can get some 24 hours. I'll tell you what I don't like. 19:54 When the newspapers do April Fool's... Oh, I hate that. And they put quotes in and you think, well, how can I ever trust you again? You're the newspaper. If you can make up quotes from Nick Clegg about them, you know, making square eggs or something. That was an old one. Oh, that was very daybreak, that. That was ages ago. 20:11 What about the Birmingham Mail? Oh, I love it. I bet the Birmingham's joined in. They printed a picture of a shark in the canal in Birmingham, but they don't have the photo shot properly done. 20:22 Oh, no. 20:22 It's only terrible, Frank. 20:23 Oh, dear. 20:24 Wasn't there another one that they were changing Wolverhampton train station to Wolverine? 20:28 That's quite good. 20:30 If you had a flat near there, you could say, oh, yeah, I live near Wolverine. That'd be brilliant. 20:36 I agree. 20:37 I really like the Slovakia one. What was that one? It said that they were going to do all through the night broadcasts of their various presenters counting sheep on air. Oh, that's good. I'd watch that. I'd watch that. 20:53 You know, like in the early days of when Big Brother was on and people just, you couldn't hear what they were saying because it was contentious. Birdsong. 20:59 You used to get birdsongs if they said anything. 21:01 No, I couldn't bear that. It reminded me too much of the 1997 sort of time in my life. 21:06 Bird song. 21:07 What, the journey? Yeah, yeah. I heard a lot of bird song back then. 21:12 When me and David Baddiel lived together, he got early cable. Oh, yeah. 21:19 And there used to be one channel that at night went to Roaring Log Fire. Nice. Is that right? And we used to put that on. 21:30 Yeah. And there was one Walking Penguins, and it was just on a loop of penguins just pottering about. And I'm not kidding you, we used to laugh our heads off at that, night after night after night. You don't want to necessarily have programmes. You just have stuff on. Yeah. There's people I'd love to hear counting sheep. 21:49 Mm-hmm. Ian McMillan, the Barnsley parrot. 21:51 Oh, Ian McMillan. 21:52 He'd be good at that one. 21:54 One, one sheep. 21:57 Two sheep. 21:59 I see, I see three sheep. That's how it, how it would be. It'd be brilliant. Perfect. Gerry Halliwell, I imagine, would be good at her. Oh, her voice. You imagine Gerry Halliwell in a lot of different circumstances. How dare you say that to me. 22:09 I find, I find her voice a bit, yeah. 22:11 Yeah, but that's, Stephen Hawking. 22:13 It grates on me. 22:14 Stephen Hawking for a sort of special. 22:17 What sort of special? 22:18 You know, I don't know, technological special. 22:23 One sheep. 22:25 Two sheep. 22:27 It's like choosing a ringtone on your phone, wouldn't it be? Which voice would you select for the sheep counting? All celebrities should have to do it. 22:35 It should be a rule. If I got offered celebrity sheep count live through the night, I'd do it. 22:42 I'd like Adrian Charles' sheep count. One sheep. 22:45 LAUGHTER 22:47 No, I think that way. Yeah, there's loads of people. Kate Winsley, I imagine, would put real traction into it. 22:52 I'm not sure if she'd do it, Frank. That's my only issue with that. Do you think she's available for a celebrity? 22:56 Yeah, I'm not sure. 22:58 Is she busy being in films, do you think? 23:01 No, no, but, you know, I imagine, I think she's very down to earth. 23:05 I think if I could choose, I think Graham Norton would be in my top three. Oh, OK. Oh, I'd love him as my sheep counter. 23:11 What about Alan Carr? 23:12 Oh! That's it! 23:15 Little. 23:17 Steady. 641 has texted us, Frank. He calls himself Prisoner 641. Hi, Frank, Emily and Alan. My parents had a rubber cookie. Whenever any workman came to the house... 23:27 The family rubber cookie. Get the rubber cookie out, Marty. 23:35 Whenever any workman came to the house, they were always given a cup of tea and a plate of biscuits, one of which was the rubber one. 23:42 Excellent. 23:43 I would often put an exploding cigarette in their cig packets. When I was having building work on my own house, I left a plastic doggy poo for the builders to find. 23:54 See, this is a regime. 47 years old, this man. It's a regime. Yeah. That's what it is. I think that's brilliant. Maybe I'm going to make my family into the prankster family. Yeah, the prankster. I mean, change it by... Oh, yeah. I was going to change it by depot. Prank skinner, I could call myself. LAUGHTER They've never filled the beetle gap. That's true. That could be me. 24:17 If you changed your name by deed polls at Plank Skinner, I would walk. 24:21 Oh, come on. You got through the past this thing. You can get through this. You shouldn't walk far. No, not in those hills. 24:31 I would walk to that cab paid for by my friends. 24:34 Stop laughing at me. 24:45 We've taken all my radio shows and done a bit of editing and typing. 24:51 It feels like a backward step, I know that people find new things quite frightening. 24:59 I've been on my travels, and I brought you sweets back, didn't I? 25:02 I love it when people bring sweets back from holidays. It's very much like an office job. And it wasn't just the big table around from the airport. 25:10 It's actually from the country you went to. 25:12 It was. Did you get it in the airport, though? Yes, I did. I went to Austin, I should tell our readers. 25:19 Austin, Texas. 25:21 For a jaunt with some of my aviation pals. I have to say, it's a fabulous city. Ostentatious in Austin, Texas. I was. 25:30 I saw bat colonies. I saw Willie Nelson's parking space. I saw Sandra Bullock's cake shop. Just a minute. What are bat colonies? 25:39 Bats? Yeah, bats. I thought you said back. No. 25:43 Actual bats. 25:44 There's loads of bats. What you do is you go and stand on the bridge at seven o'clock when they all come out and there's swarms of them. Oh, I love them. Seven at night? It's like, I said, this is like One Direction. The bats are like celebrities. 25:56 Oh, right. In Austin. 25:59 Now, what I noticed... 26:00 The world's upside down, isn't it? Mm-hmm. It's like the bats say it. 26:03 What I noticed about Texas, Frank, they're very dramatic people. And this is what I like. They're very sort of Tennessee Williams played. Do you know what I mean? Oh, yeah. You don't just... If you go in and you order... Why can't you cope with this infernal heat? 26:18 It's a bit like that. 26:19 That's exactly what it's like. 26:20 They must be off the scale in dramatic people terms if you're calling them dramatic. 26:24 Well, for example, you go into a bar. I said to the barman, oh, I'd like a drink. And he went, I'll get you one, but you have to promise to trust me. 26:33 I'm not joking. That's what he said. Yeah. And how long is he doing? He said... Because he's obviously been in prison since you met him, hasn't he? 26:43 He said, what do you want? 26:46 I said, well, I don't know. I like vodka. 26:49 He said, I told you, you've got to trust me. I said, I trust you. Did you? 26:54 Wow, that's quite a big thing to say to a strange man. 26:56 That's something I've never said before. 26:57 I've said it to a few barmaids. 26:59 Oh, I said it in one incident, which I'll tell you about later. 27:03 There was a barmaid at a pub in Birmingham who used to give me drinks from the slop trays. Of course. 27:08 Lovely. 27:08 You know the slop trays under the... I'd have like eight or nine pints a night without paying. What do y'all want? Yeah. 27:13 So it's like part lager, part bitter. 27:17 Can I just remind everyone that at the start of this broadcast, I was being called thrifty. 27:22 And now he's admitting to having... I wasn't so much thrifty, it's just thirsty. 27:26 LAUGHTER 27:27 Tell me you didn't trust her, Frank. 27:29 Well, I trusted her. It wouldn't kill me what I was drinking. There was probably a little bit of cleaning fluid in there as well. It was mostly any fluid from behind the bar I was prepared to drink. Anyway, I dragged it down to something very domestic. 27:42 So I said, I trust you. 27:44 He said, OK, yeah, I'll trust me. He turned round. He was gone a bit, like the nutty professor. He was doing all these gubbins, a bit like when Marky Smith's kind of tuning up. 27:56 He gave me this drink. It was without doubt the most disgusting thing I've ever had in my life. 28:03 Wow. 28:04 It was an aniseed cocktail. I drank it and I had to pretend to like it because he was hot. 28:10 Oh, no. He was hot? 28:11 Yeah. He was really hot. I drank three of them. I did. You didn't drink three. I drank three of them. 28:19 He really was hot. 28:23 I was on a road trip through Texas and Arizona once. 28:28 We stopped at this restaurant. This waitress came over and said, you guys celebrities? And we said, oh, you know. She said, wow, I recently had a one-night stand with Al Kilmer. 28:45 Oh, small world. 28:46 Can I say that was only her own allegation? I have no evidence if Val's listening. 28:51 A couple of nights later, we went to another bar. 28:53 Hold on, was there no... Was there no Congress? Was there no end to the barman story? 28:58 Well, no, I drank it and I didn't feel... I felt a bit peculiar, so I had to go home. 29:02 Oh, did you come over all unnecessary? You stopped trusting him after a while. 29:05 LAUGHTER 29:07 I wonder how many... He's just getting rid of stuff, isn't he? He's getting rid of stuff. 29:10 Although it was rather odd because he was opposite my hotel. For the rest of your stay. 29:15 What, just standing on the street? 29:17 The bar was opposite my hotel. And he was outside. It was very on the street where you live. It was very friendly. And I saw him having one of his cigareils while I went across to my hotel. And he saw me and I said... And then when I got into the hotel, I turned the lights on and I saw him still there. I didn't like it. He saw me turning the lights on. So I kept the curtains open, just in case. So then a couple of nights later, I found myself in another bar. Blimey. I know. And I don't drink that much these days, so it's hard on me. 29:47 But there was another Bahamun. Right. And I'm afraid he was very handsome as well. 29:53 There's a sort of staffing policy thing coming for us. They get good-looking people to work. It's often the way. 29:59 But there's a complication here, because I'm with one of my gay friends, and he fancies him, and so do I. 30:06 Okay. 30:07 And my gay friend insists he's one of his, and I insist he's one of mine. It got quite nasty. Right. 30:13 Scratch his eyes out. 30:14 Well, everyone else... 30:15 I have to say, it's the same with the Catholics. We're always trying to claim. 30:19 My dad once tried to convince me that Muhammad Ali was a Catholic. 30:24 Seriously. I was saying, Daddy would not be called that. No, he's called that, but he's a Catholic. 30:31 Anyway. 30:32 So we're sitting at the bar. Everyone else is having a nice time, enjoying the evening. We are stuck there in a battle to the death, trying to flirt with this barman. We're both thrusting our chests out. It was awful. He starts lining up shots again. I don't drink shots, but I did to show off because I liked him. He said, do you like whiskey shots? And I love them. I love them. 30:48 Oh, dear. It was awful, Frank. 30:50 The pressure. My gay friend starts saying, I mean, you're working in a bar. I mean, you're obviously, you have a college education, right? 30:58 So he was playing it wrong. 30:59 Yeah. 31:01 Well, when it got to the, I mean, the whole night we spent there. And then it was time to go. And then he said, well, it's my night off tomorrow night, so maybe we can all hang out. 31:10 Oh, let the battle, let the games commence. Yeah. I said, yeah, sounds great. My gay friend says, yeah, I'll take your number. 31:17 He takes the number. I was fuming. 31:20 The next day, we're waiting for the barman to call. No call from him. I thought, well, I look quite good. That's a bit of a shocker. 31:27 He said, I texted him. I don't know why he hasn't been in touch. I said, what did you say? I looked at the little green text that he'd sent. 31:33 It said, hey, great to meet you. Emily and I really can't wait to swing with you tomorrow. 31:39 He'd mistyped. 31:42 Well, to be honest, normally I'd have said no to that, but if I was on my holidays. 31:50 But of course, because he was at home, I suppose he gets there. Oh, that's worth a try, then. 31:58 I'll tell you where we haven't been for a while. 32:14 Do we have emails? We do. Dear Frank, Emily and Alan, my five-year-old daughter, Megan, is a bit cross with Frank. Can I just say that the use of the word cross immediately makes me think that this woman is either very English or a bit middle class. Really? Yeah. I think it's because I grew up with Scottish accents that I would never say cross. I've never said, oh, I was really cross. It sounds to me like Enid Blyton. Scottish people, I think, get angry. 32:39 I was angry. They don't go, oh, I was cross. What would a Scottish person say? That's bizarre. 32:45 Surely they say cross. When they're instructing you how to lay the swords for the sword dance. 32:50 Yeah, they might use the word cross, but not in this context. 32:53 No, I wouldn't normally use the word cross. I use it all the time. 32:57 Yeah, see? 32:58 You're right, you're right. 33:00 My five-year-old daughter, Megan, is a bit cross with Frank. Whilst re-listening to an old podcast, you told someone to shut up, at which Megan registered her disgust, as we're not allowed to say shut up in our house. She said Frank was being rude. She also added how lucky Frank is to be able to work with his husband, Alan. LAUGHTER 33:20 Oh, that's me. Well, you say that, but I mean, it brings extra pressure working with your husband. 33:26 Like Richard and Judy in that regard. 33:27 Yeah, look at poor Judy. LAUGHTER You know, ultimately, you know, we just get each other. And that's why it works. 33:38 I heard you just can't quit him. 33:40 No. You know, I mean, I'm not saying, Megan, there haven't been rough patches there. No. And I have told him to shut up. And it does help that I give ground in big arguments. It's really useful. You do. You do. But, you know what? Unswapping. 33:56 But I'm sorry, Megan, if I offended you with that, if you're listening. But it's just that I find that eventually with people, you have to tell them to shut up. 34:08 Yeah. 34:09 If they feel like they're winding down gradually of their own accord, it's fine. But with some people, they always feel like they're at full pelt. Mm-hm. Yeah. Belt up, I'm all right with. 34:18 I think... 34:19 Shut your cake all. I haven't used that for a few years. 34:21 Shut your cake all. Put a sock in it. Penny Hill. 34:25 Yeah, put a sock in it, haven't I, for ages? 34:28 I think you might have been, I'm going to play devil's advocate here, I think you might have been doing that thing that you do a feigning, outrageous surprise of going, shut up. 34:35 Yeah, the only way is Essex thing, I think I was. I think you were, I think it was ironic. 34:40 I see that being shut up in inverted commas. 34:42 So I was going, shut up, as in I don't believe you. So you see, Megan, I'm not as rude as you think, but you're quite right, it's not nice to tell people to shut up if you're listening. Maybe you should switch it to, I don't believe you. 34:55 That's a really topical catchphrase. 34:57 It's been taken. 34:58 Why didn't you start saying that as well? 35:01 Oh, I still do that. Well, as you know, I frequently answer the phone to Daisy, the producer of this show, with, What's up? 35:08 Which turns her stomach a bit. I'm going to start doing that lip-smacking thirst question. 35:16 Nick has emailed us. He says, Frank, Alan and Emily, on a course this week in the small town of Bromsgrove... Oh, I know it. ...our small group wandered down the high street in search of an evening meal in an unfamiliar town within our generous £20 budget. I approached... Do you think that's per person? 35:35 Sounds all right. I don't know. If you issue a starter... 35:39 It's all gone a bit tipped for my hairdresser. I approached an impressive-looking statue, always worth a look to see who's been immortalised, to read the inscription. Imagine my delight when I read the text. It was none other than A.E. Houseman. 35:58 Well done for going a bit, JR. 36:03 Wow, hey, he hasn't had a mention for a long time. 36:09 Nick then instructs. 36:10 He winds down slowly, ain't he? Yeah. 36:13 Nick instructs to sound the warning. I immediately thought of my three podcast friends, Frank Allen and Emily, and I had to let you know of my excellent experience. It made my week. If Emily would care to join me to view this statue, it would be a pleasure to take her. That is all Nick from Northwich at 034. Interesting. 36:28 Nick from Northwich has called us his three podcast friends, and Northwich isn't that far from Manchester. What are you suggesting? 36:37 Let's just go there. We could be pals with Nick. Fine with that. 36:40 I'll be out for that. 36:42 Bromsgrove, it was in Bromsgrove the first time I ever kissed a girl with glasses on. 36:48 Oh, did you like it? It's all right. 36:50 I like the artificial element. Yeah, and... You should have gone to spec service. 36:58 Yeah, it was all right. She was quite nice. And we kissed some more. 37:03 I don't want to know that bit of this story. 37:04 Are you still song lyrics you're doing? No. Kiss some more. Sounds like you're quoting. 37:09 I don't like that second verse. 37:10 And then the following week we went back to Bromsgrove. Stop telling us what happened. It's like hanging out with Craig Davis. 37:20 And then she got off with my mate. 37:24 Sounds like they didn't chill much, Al. Sorry for laughing. 37:28 No, it was awful, really. It's the story of trauma and we're all cackling. I'd laid all the ground bait and then he came in and... You see those glasses ones, they'll lull you into a full sense of security. Well, me and this same mate, we was playing pool with a few friends a couple of days later. I hadn't mentioned it at all. And he got a very, very lucky bounce off three cushions and the ball went in there. And I was so furious that the whole thing just came flooding out. And I thought, I'm just going to tell him now. But I didn't tell him. 37:58 I told him in song. I complained in song. I sang. 38:02 What did you say? You're so weird. 38:04 I sang. 38:04 Who does that? 38:06 I suddenly... So it went in and I went, oh, oh, and I just went... 38:11 Somebody stole my gal. Somebody stole my gal. Somebody came and took her away. And that was how I... Did you really do that? Honestly, I swear to you, that's true. 38:22 Did you grow up in West Side Story? 38:25 Yeah, I was a jet. 38:27 He sounds like you grew up in Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. Oh, Frank. 38:33 Yes. 38:34 I can't believe that story. 38:36 Well, they were different times. 38:43 Now, then. 38:43 Yeah. 38:45 My favourite news story of the week. Yeah. Definitely. 16-year-old girl in Dover, Stockdown Drive. Yeah. 38:52 Oh, Anne Birchenoff. 38:54 Yes. 38:55 That's her name, isn't it? Birchenoff. 38:56 It's not a common name. 38:57 Ella, isn't it? 38:58 Oh, is it Ella? I'm sorry. Ella Birchenoff. Yeah, it's great. What's her family tree? 39:02 I believe she's called Ella Anne, but I'll let you have that. 39:05 No, it's one of those. I wonder what her porn name is. You made a joke. 39:11 You know, the mum's maiden name, first pet, I bet it won't be as good a porn name as Ella Bertrand. 39:19 What a thing when your real name's better than your porn name as a porn name. How often does that happen? 39:25 Anyway, Ella, who's the 16-year-old schoolgirl, dropped her phone. Perhaps why I'm uncomfortable about those jokes. Okay, well, I'm speaking in the abstract. 39:33 Anyway, she got stuck down a drain, Frank, in Kent. 39:38 Yes, in Dover, I think. 39:39 Yeah. Yeah. 39:40 And I didn't quite understand her... Well, she dropped her phone, was there... 39:44 I think I do understand it. 39:46 Oh, do you? Go on, then. 39:47 And I think I identify with it a lot. Go on. She dropped the phone down the drain. What, with Ella Birchenoff? Yes, I think I identify with Ella Ann Birchenoff. 39:54 OK, well, spare the rod and spot a child. 39:56 I think she dropped the phone down the drain, and here's her thinking. She thought, if I lift this drain out and stick myself in there, I can pick up the phone with my toes, which... I kind of get. 40:07 You know when somebody picks... With her toes? With her feet. You know when you sort of grab something with your feet and lift it up? Are you saying to me that Ella Bertinoff has got sort of dexterous ape feet? 40:18 Yeah. Do you know what it's a bit like? 40:19 Maybe she'd watch My Left Foot that week on DVD. Yeah. 40:22 She got inspired. Very similar to the other day, I got in the bath and I had left my paperback novel... too far away from the bath. But then I had a look and thought, hang on, it's on the rug that I can reach. And so I flicked the rug and the paperback flew towards it. I was so happy. 40:40 If ever you're locked in a cell in the Wild West, you'll be able to get out. I'll come visit you. 40:46 I was so happy. I nearly kicked the bath shelf off. 40:49 Oh, that'd be... What's on the back shelf? Dock? 40:52 Soap? Yeah. There'll be a few of those soaps all worn down. Small hotel soaps. Hotel soaps very worn down. I've got a room full of those. 41:01 That are dangling because they're a bit too small for the gaps on the... Oh, do you know they've been welded together as well for reuse? 41:08 Well, as you know, I got much mocked for bringing the shower gel home that I found at the swimming bus. Well, that I found... 41:15 That's by finding, you said. Yeah. 41:17 But anyway, I've spoken on this show before about my joy in local newspaper photographs when they feel they have to get every element of the story in. You mean the... In one picture. So they'll have manly... One that sticks in my mind, if only one girl got to university, I remember, where I lived, which is quite a thing. LAUGHTER And she was going to study geography, and they had a picture of her in a mortarboard and cape, holding a pile of books and pointing at a map of the world. 41:47 Just to say it all. And they had a picture of Ella Birchenoff, and this is after the fact. They've got actual pictures of her stuck in the drain. They've got her in the drain. 41:55 Yes, her mother took them. That's a whole other story. 41:58 But they took Ella back to the drain in her school uniform now. So you've got the schoolgirl element. So we know she's a schoolgirl. And they got her to climb into the drain. And she's just sitting on the edge of the drain. 42:12 Holding the phone. 42:14 Oh, man, it's so beautiful. LAUGHTER It's all there. 42:17 They've done a recon. What about this mother? She said, um... She rounded the corner, this is the mum, when Ella Bertinoff was stuck in the drain. She rounded the corner as white as a sheet and then started laughing and took a photo. Yeah. 42:32 And I like the fact that she said she'll never live this down. We're going to get these pictures out when she turns 18, as if it's really far away. It's probably about 18 months' time. 42:40 I liked Ella's story of how she said, um... 42:46 My feet, they were in some sort of liquid. She said, I think it was water. She said, but I wasn't taking any chances. So I went straight home and had a bath. Oh, yeah. So you wouldn't have had a bath otherwise, having been stuck down a drain. See what I like about it. She said, I went straight home and jumped in the back. Everybody says, jumped in the back. Yeah, Kat says that. 43:06 I pull her up on it all the time. I'm just going to jump in the shower. Jump in the shower. I say that. You're so on. All the time. The other thing I liked about it was the bottom of the story had loads of recaps on stories when people had been stuck in things, and I think we've covered all of them on this show. 43:19 Is that right? 43:21 I feel proud about that. A woman that was stuck in a coat hanger. 43:23 Oh, there was a woman in the ironing board, wasn't it? A student trapped in ironing board. 43:30 It's cool friends, famous radio days, I don't mean days as in stupa, I mean days as in the sevens of the week.