No Such Thing As A Glazed Lizard Donut

11:35Dan Schreiber:I think it tells you about your mental state here's a question for you guys Jackson Pollock we all know and love Jackson Pollock do you think a child could do it? so it's just basically it's dripping lines on a canvas they're kind of squiggles on a canvas lots of different colours do you think a child could do it? I think so

11:55James Harkin:Could they get away with a Pollock imitation that we would say that's a Pollock? Is that what you mean? Wait, are they forging a Pollock? That's what I'm asking. Let's say, for instance, Andy forges a Pollock. That sounds like a euphemism. And a 10-year-old forges a Pollock. Don't come in, Mum. I'm forging a Pollock. What's that dripping? Oh, God. Like a 10-year-old forges a Pollock Or Andy forges a Pollock Which one is going to be the best forgery? I think a child will be more naive about it And therefore better You are absolutely right When computers have analysed Ones that children have done Ones that adults have done And ones that Pollock have done The Pollock ones are more like children's ones Than like adult ones No way Because they're more simple People like them a bit more Because it's almost like Shapes are easier to see But when adults try and do it, they always try and do it a little bit too complicated.

12:52James Harkin:That is the skill of the artist in a way, is to reclaim that innocent childlike state. The innocent state, exactly. Here's an interesting thing relevant to the fact that this is about names of art. A lot of artists don't like naming their art pieces. That's why you often see something just called untitled. And a lot of people, like Ringo Starr of the Beatles, when he is giving names to his artwork, He has to pick a name because when you're saving a file on MS Paint, you have to write a name, right? So he just calls them 1234, doesn't he? He calls them Ringo's artwork one, Ringo's artwork this one, Ringo's artwork finished, finished this one.

13:31James Harkin:Real final. But yeah, so they have to give it a name. They're often asked if it's going on exhibitions, touring and so on. What's this called? And they have to give it the name so it can be catalogued and not lost. and this is a thing that only started happening sort of as the 18th century came around. Before then, you just didn't give names to any pieces of art because they didn't travel around. They were staying in people's houses, so you didn't need a name for them.

13:53Anna Ptaszynski:They were either massive or they were on the wall of a monastery or whatever, as in they were locationally specific. Yeah, and if it was on the monastery, you would know it was St. Clair devouring an angel because you're a monk, so you know that stuff. Or if it was in your house, you know it's Uncle George, like you don't need a title for it. Or it's a lemon. as everyone knows it's a bloody good leaven and also nobody can read so no one's coming by going what's this

14:20James Harkin:is that a melon so then also the names that we do have for certain paintings are not names given by the artist the Mona Lisa that was someone many many many years later who just needed to give it a name and that stuck

14:33Dan Schreiber:but I think that modern paintings do benefit from titles so you know what was in the artist's head because that's got to be the point of all this bollocks And yet it doesn't seem to matter. I mean, there's this case of Pacifi, which is one of his most famous paintings, which I actually think is quite nice to look at. Painted it in 1943 and it was originally called Moby Dick. Now, Pacifi is the queen who gave birth to the Minotaur when she shagged a bull. Moby Dick, obviously, is Moby Dick, a whale in a story. Does it look like either of them? Obviously not. It looks like a load of things that a child could paint.

15:07Dan Schreiber:But I find that bizarre that Pollock called it Moby Dick thinking it was that. And then he just showed it to Peggy Guggenheim and another art critic. And they said, like the painting, don't like the title. Have you thought about calling it Pacific? Because one art critic had read the story that morning and Pollock was like, yeah, we could switch to that. So what then am I supposed to be saying in that painting?

15:26Anna Ptaszynski:But does it matter? Well, he can't call them all Squiggle. He's going to give them some name. Some people do. Some people say you just like Squiggle number three or whatever. So Whistler, famous for? His mother. His mum. Whistler's mother. He called that painting Arrangement in Grey and Black No. 1. And what the point of that was is he was trying to draw attention to how it's composed rather than, look at my mum. You know, so that's why he calls it that.

15:54Dan Schreiber:Well, you shouldn't have such a fit mum, Whistler. Yeah, yeah.

15:57Anna Ptaszynski:It didn't work because everyone just calls it Whistler's mother, obviously. And they're more interested in the son painting his mother.

16:01Dan Schreiber:Also, if you say the grey and black painting, there are just loads of those around. Whereas if you say the one of Whistler's mother. Even a bunch of people started giving it the right name You know, the black and white and grey one People were like, which one? You know, the one of Whistler's mother And they realised, eventually

16:14James Harkin:It's a title that sounds like you're trying to be woke in some kind of way You know, the black and white one The black and white one, you've seen it I don't see colour It seems to me quite obvious that he didn't name that Because if he did, it would be called My Mother My Mother Have you seen his Your Mum series of pages?

16:31Anna Ptaszynski:They're wonderful Wonderful

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18:14okay it is time for fact number two and that is james okay my fact this week is that most disney princesses are ambidextrous i just thought we'd done too much pretentiousness

18:24Anna Ptaszynski:yeah so we're going lowbrow is that because they've reversed the film for the projector so obviously it's backwards. So they're all left-handed

18:35Dan Schreiber:but then they thought they had to compensate so they remade them right-handed and they ended up with both.

18:39Anna Ptaszynski:Yeah, see my colleague Anna for the clarification. It's because it's not enough

18:42Dan Schreiber:to have a 16-inch waist and huge boobs and long blonde hair and just be perfect. You have to be good with both hands as well. But enough about you.

18:53So this is a study from Montclair University and they looked at how Disney princesses have evolved over the years and really they wanted to see whether attitudes towards handedness has changed and they did it by looking at the princesses and they found that before 1992 most princesses were right-handed and most villains were left-handed or more villains were left-handed than princesses but in general things have kind of changed over the last like 20-30 years and now the characters are much less strongly handed than they ever have been before and they have quite a few left-handed princesses and quite a lot of right-handed villains now and they don't really know why it is they put it down to perhaps that there was a group of animators called the nine old men uh who had these kind of ideas that villains should be left-handed and that good people should be right-handed someone else said that it could be the handedness of the animators you maybe they've just employed a load of left-handed animators and that's why they're doing it i personally think probably it's because the animators keep forgetting what they're supposed to do make them right with whatever hand is closest to the camera it's like we put the pot on this side so she can get it with that hand but this is what they say they think that it might be due to the left-handedness being less of a bad thing than it has been in the past yeah absolutely because people were left-handed people

20:15Anna Ptaszynski:in the 50s and 60s in schools were forcibly yeah made to write with their right hand exactly so a

20:21James Harkin:A good example of that is Ringo Starr. And we've mentioned this many, many years ago, but he was left-handed, and he got made to become a right-handed person in his childhood. But then he slowly, after he left school and left home, went back to being left-handed. So he drums as a left-handed drummer, but he writes with his right hand. He'll sign with his right hand. What about his artworks? What does he produce those? I think he draws them with his right hand, but he saves the file with his left.

20:49Anna Ptaszynski:Yeah, it must just be that it's less of a social stigma. There's much less Well you say it must be

20:53Dan Schreiber:I think it's Just because it's random right No The animators are thinking through

20:57Anna Ptaszynski:No but in the old days There was more social stigma Even though this is my fact I will kind of agree with Anna Also it's a very small sample size Yeah True How many Disney princesses are there There's been like a dozen Because they are They're always like an indication Of the society that they're Produced in right The Disney princesses Because the very early ones Are homemakers You know Snow White Cinderella Aurora who I didn't know was in Sleeping Beauty and then the modern ones are all CEOs and stuff. Are they? Are they? Moana? They're girl bosses. Watch Ariel running under the sea. Is it maybe like some wave power that she's getting?

21:34Anna Ptaszynski:What's Mulan doing? She's running like under the sea Tidal Solutions Incorporated. Right, yeah. But do you know they've got more agency is what I was going to say.

21:43Dan Schreiber:Yeah, they've changed enormously although I can't believe Ariel's the most modern Disney princess you can think of. James, come on. It was more of which one is least likely to be a CEO. CEO. No, you're absolutely right. Disney princesses now are just, they're sort of like painfully strong, confident women. I want one who's just like as lazy and crap as me. Where's the lazy crap one? I ask you. One thing that hasn't changed that much is hand size. I'm actually reading this ages ago and now I can't not see it. If you compare hand size of women to hand size of men in Disney films, it is insane. they are on average three to four times bigger and I was looking at the difference in hand size between women and men on average and men's hands are 12 % bigger 8 to 12 % four times bigger yes it's mad are you just watching Beauty and the Beast I'm telling you what was it that was looked at How to Train Your Dragon 2 weirdly Gnomeo and Juliet Frozen four times bigger Gnomeo and Juliet Frozen is the only one of those that has a Disney princess in it yes this is just women and men right I wanted to do a

22:46Anna Ptaszynski:I once did a table read through for Sherlock Gnomes 2 Oh sorry Gnomeo and Juliet 2 Sherlock Gnomes Where they get a load of improvised comedians in to read the script Who did you read as? I'm very proud to say I played Sherlock Gnomes And then they went with someone called James McAvoy For the real thing I thought I was auditioning I was not Your hands are too small Maybe if I read this really well They won't give their all to James McAvoy Disney princesses I did not know that this is A canonical thing There are only 13 of them And They have to be very specific Kinds of person So they have to be human They can't start off in a sequel Wait a minute, what about the mermaid?

23:31Anna Ptaszynski:Yeah, you're right, that's controversial She's only half human But she's a princess for sure

23:36James Harkin:How does it end? Does she stay in human form? No, she has her legs at the end, doesn't she? So she does stay in human form

23:43Dan Schreiber:She doesn't go back to fish So maybe that counts as human. So right at the end she qualifies.

23:46Anna Ptaszynski:She's the daughter of Fishman in the sea, isn't she? Yeah. But they can be born royal or they can marry royal or they can be Mulan, who apparently just gets around it. Anyway, I found this wonderful argument on the website Polygon that there is a Disney-owned franchise which does have a queen who should be included in the Disney Princess canon, which is the queen from Alien. How big are her hands? Well, her timing. But, you know, she's bipedal. So she's human-like in some respects You know, she's a wonderful mother She's explored multiple planets, defends her children She's a strong woman, inspirational figure From a magical far-off land I just love the argument Does she have blonde hair and big boobs?

24:26It's not clear

24:29Anna Ptaszynski:She's got big eggs, I'll say that much

24:32James Harkin:Look at me, eggs on her Yeah, two of the princesses that were part of the canonical 13 Got demoted So I don't know what the number was When they were there

24:48Yeah it was

24:49James Harkin:Tinkerbell was one Tinkerbell from Peter Pan Not a human, a fairy So she got put in her own new category And she was a sidekick She didn't have her own sidekick There's quite a few interesting things that qualify for it And in The Hunchback of Notre Dame Esmeralda got taken away because she's not a princess

25:05Anna Ptaszynski:But neither is Mulan The whole thing falls apart on those examinations It's basically whoever they're going to put in the big show in Disneyland, isn't it? Basically, that's who it is. If the film does really, really, really well, you're likelier to be made a princess. As in some films just bombed. Mulan is a Chinese girl who is not a princess or anything. This is in the original Chinese story. So she's like a peasant girl. And then she joins the army, pretends to be a boy. And then they find out that she's not a boy. And then she saves the country or something. I can confirm that's also in the Disney film.

25:38That's in the Disney film. What isn't in the Disney film is in the original stories, she served under the Emperor Yang of Sui, who wanted to take her as a concubine, but she took her own life before he could.

25:52Dan Schreiber:That's in the city. Have you not seen Mulan 2? I haven't seen it, no.

25:55Anna Ptaszynski:Very short film, Mulan 2. Yeah, yeah. Wow. Yeah. Gosh. Or she could be a concubine in Moulin Rouge. Brilliant. Very nice. I haven't seen the Hunchback of Notre Dame one. But I do know that the character Esmeralda in the book certainly does seductive dances for nearby men. And I don't know if that made it into the film. Well, you know who did it?

26:17Dan Schreiber:Yes. Oh my gosh, there's the most dark song in the film about how much the villain fancies and wants to shag Esmeralda, even though he also hates her. It's very inappropriate.

26:26James Harkin:Well, you know who voiced Esmeralda? I believe I'm right in saying this. Demi Moore, who was in Striptease.

26:31Dan Schreiber:Hey.

26:33Anna Ptaszynski:Well, as well as many others. The prosecution rests, Your Honor. That was You presented That was such a flourish Yeah And it's really good knowledge But it's No I don't think it means What you think it means

26:49It's just like Like you said Demi more It was like everyone Was automatically supposed to go Oh who was famously In scripting

26:54James Harkin:Can't believe I had to say The extra bit of that sentence

26:57Dan Schreiber:In fact And go Oh it's come full circle Okay Yeah There's a topless woman In The Rescuers Okay I forgive your pardon

27:03Anna Ptaszynski:What's the rescuers Sorry what's the rescuers The two mice They're too little Chippendale are they?

27:08Dan Schreiber:It's so much like Chippendale but they're Bernard and Bianca mice who ride atop a large bird. Is this the topless woman

27:16James Harkin:you're talking about?

27:17Dan Schreiber:That's not the topless woman.

27:18James Harkin:Chippendale are such better names for kids animation characters than Bernard and Bianca. Hey it was the 70s. Wait a minute. What are the name of the strippers? Chippendales. Oh this is coming full circle. I rest my case. Here we go.

27:32Anna Ptaszynski:And you know who played Chip? Demi Moore.

27:36Dan Schreiber:Andy did the run through there's a topless woman she's not meant to be there but this is amazing I'd never heard this because you know there are all those like in The Lion King he plumps in the sand and it spells out sex and there's always rumours like that this is for real in 1977 the first Rescuers was released it wasn't until 1999 that it was noticed that in a few of the shots Bernard and Bianca are on the back of the big bird the albatross and in the background in the window there's it's actually a real it's not a cartoon and it's a real image of a topless woman. I couldn't make out her head.

28:08Dan Schreiber:It's just her boobs and sort of slim torso. And it stayed in between 1977 and 1999 when someone pointed it out and Disney suddenly had to say, we don't know who put that in there. No animators are putting their hands up and saying it was me. And they removed it and recalled all the videos. Imagine if you're the woman and you know your boobs were in The Rescuers. You're not going to watch it like in the cinema and go, wait a minute, rewind, rewind, rewind, rewind. darling how dare you um i really like the way all these studies are done on disney princesses and

28:41Anna Ptaszynski:the social attitudes that they reveal or how they change and all of this because they get a lot of stuff pinned on them and i'm sure i know it does have an influence on the children watching right i do know that but i think sometimes academics might go a bit far so there was a study by a Durham University expert about the cultural perceptions of work who says that these princesses in these films may have contributed to reluctance among the younger workforce to join traditional workplaces. You're always hearing, right, that the kids these days, they don't want to come into the office, all of this.

29:12Anna Ptaszynski:Maybe that's because Cinderella has to slave away for her stepsisters and that's why millennials want flexibility in the workplace.

29:19Dan Schreiber:Millennials aren't watching Cinderella, lads. Who are these Durham University academics? Exactly. Maybe Do they all want to grow their hair really, really, really long and throw it out of the tower? Surely you do want to do the work because if you work hard enough, eventually you'll get swept away by a prince or something. Is that what happens?

29:34Anna Ptaszynski:Yeah. And that's exactly the same expert said, if you think about that situation in a modern workplace, that's a dangerous view to have. You just carry on being exploited because you think everything is going to turn out to be okay. I just don't think that's a reasonable... There's plenty of stuff to pin on those films, but I don't think people wanting to work from home two days a week is because of Cinderella.

29:53Dan Schreiber:I also think it's a stretch to call people who do these studies academics, to be fair. Wow. I'm very happy for them to confront me about that. Interesting.

30:01Anna Ptaszynski:Here comes Anna's big crunching fist again.

30:05Dan Schreiber:I've just got ambidextrous stuff. So there was the Ambidextral Culture Society in the early 1900s, which I hadn't heard of, but it is the cause of Boy Scouts handshakes. I also didn't know this. I don't know that either. Boy Scout handshakes, always left-handed, apparently. And it's because there was this guy called John Jackson. He was a head teacher at a Belfast school. And he decided that we all should become ambidextrous because we're wasting half of our brain by being either right-handed or left-handed. He wrote that each hand eventually should be absolutely independent of the other. One hand should be writing a letter while the other can play the piano with no diminution of concentration.

30:44He said, why are you playing on the piano with one hand?

30:50Dan Schreiber:Chopstick.

30:54Dan Schreiber:you're right piano was a terrible example maybe this guy was an idiot i mean his theory is pretty wacky um but he said he imagined a brave new world of two-handed two-brained citizens and it was a very pervasive view that training yourself to use your other hand would make you smarter it really pervaded until the 50s and 60s when they disproved it and baden powell was one of the adopters who was vice president of the society and who believed that you know make yourself right with the other hand and your brain will get better actually it doesn't at all and there's some evidence that maybe it would make it worse because the reason that we have lateralized brains is so that we can specialize in certain things yeah was anyone else here in the scouts yeah you're in the scouts yeah did you ever do this left hand i've never heard of it either yeah i don't think of scouts

31:36Anna Ptaszynski:as having a hand check i think of masons as having one yeah freemasons i'm sure i'm sure it does

31:41Dan Schreiber:exist but we didn't do it in bolster i know no i think maybe it might have died out you know we're all getting more ambidextrous are we yeah as we get older one thing that we do gain as we get older is more ambidexterity there was a 2007 study that looked at a bunch of different age groups youngest group age 25 on three writing tasks much better with their right hand or their left hand in everything depending on you know if they're right or left-handed at 50 they were better with their dominant hand at some things but like an aiming task they were about equal and then by 70 and 80 people were equally good with both hands at most of the tests and it's because you're just quite shit at that point with both hands.

32:20Dan Schreiber:It is literally just because your right hand gets worse and worse and worse until it's as bad as your left hand or vice versa. So you're kind of that ambidextrous, you're ambisinistrous. I'm afraid that's the case, yeah.

32:37James Harkin:Okay, it is time for fact number three and that is Andy. My fact is Saddam Hussein

32:44Anna Ptaszynski:and Nelson Mandela had the same tailor. Where there are always awkward weights in the room. Probably in the room. So this was a guy called Recep Caesar. The really strange thing about him is he was a Kurd, right? In fact, I think he might still be alive. But, you know, Saddam Hussein visited enormous evil on the Kurdish people. But as Recep Caesar said, he was a good customer to me. So Saddam went there for, I think, 80 suits. He was a very loyal customer. And this guy, Caesar, has served all sorts of people, lots and lots of world leaders. So Pakistan's president, Afghanistan's Nelson Mandela was only a one-time customer Yeah, he bought a jacket and trousers From Recep Caesar's label I'm not sure he even went to the shop or anything He was probably on Robben Island at the time Perhaps, yeah It was in 2000, so I think he's off by then

33:38Dan Schreiber:Do we know why he didn't do repeat custom? Did he not like the things? The clientele, yeah Yeah, shots of Hussein being sent to him Nelson Mandela had very specific suits that he wore, didn't he? He had like African patterns on his suits and stuff. So he wouldn't have worn these ones.

33:53Anna Ptaszynski:So maybe this was for a rare occasion. What do you think Mandela would make of your headline, Andy? I think he'd forgive me for it.

34:03This guy, I saw an interview with him who said that he watched Saddam's trial with great interest because he wanted to see how he looked in his suit.

34:11Anna Ptaszynski:Yeah, probably the only guy watching for that reason. He said that sales in Iraq tripled during the trial Because people were watching saying Love the fit

34:20Dan Schreiber:Why would you need ever 80 suits? How sweaty a man was Saddam Hussein?

34:24Anna Ptaszynski:I suppose that's kind of the Zuckerberg thing You open the wardrobe And it's just all the same clothes So you don't have to think about what you wear

34:31Dan Schreiber:Just take another suit off the thing But that means that he only does a wash once every two months Yeah that's true

34:38Anna Ptaszynski:So it's a very busy day when you see Saddam at the laundrette I don't know Anna Why do dictators get dozens of cars When you can only drive one at a time I don't know

34:48Dan Schreiber:You're saying it's not all about practicality I'm saying it's not exclusively that Why have the royal family got such a big house

34:54Anna Ptaszynski:They could live in two or two now You can only have one living room You've only got one arse to sit on one side for

35:04Dan Schreiber:I've been wearing the same pants for ten years And I'm absolutely fine

35:08James Harkin:When he was in court I love this little detail in an interview that he gave where they said, do you know what you provided for him? And he brought out a list from his files and he said it shows two complete outfits with a total cost of 1 ,540 and we included two pairs of socks as a gift. I'm giving him gifts as well, are you? That little extra detail of the socks is wonderful. Gosh. Speaking of socks, did you know you can buy socks made by the Pope's official tailor?

35:35Anna Ptaszynski:Amazing. Yeah, I've bought some but they've not arrived yet. Have you? Yeah, I've got some coming in the post. We might bring it up in a duel sometime. Oh, wow. But yeah, the tailor of the Pope is called Gamarelli. And basically in the late 20th century, the rules on like vestments for priests kind of changed. And there were not as many priests anymore. And when the Iron Curtain came down, the priests in Eastern Europe were not getting these clothes anymore. So basically they started losing a load of money. and so they decided to diversify and started making normal suits for normal people. So they were making stuff for priests and popes and stuff, but now you can just buy one of their suits and you can buy socks.

36:18Dan Schreiber:And are they novelty socks with lots of brightly coloured polka dots on them? No, but they're the ones that the Pope wears. Mine are the same colour.

36:26Anna Ptaszynski:No. James, I was reading about this too. Gamma Relly, because they do, how do you say, holy socks. Well, not holy socks, as in they don't have But they're in individual pairs And they're knee length silk apparently Have you re-ordered knee length silk socks? And if you're a different level in the church She gets to wear a different colour They do, it's like karate belts You have black scarlet and violet socks And only the Pope So hang on, are you saying you've managed to get Have you put your addresses like the Vatican And you're having it redirected through a PO box Supposedly they only sell the white knee length ones to the Pope But I made you wrong On their website they sold them I don't know, maybe I've ordered something different Might be a different shade or something Maybe there's going to be a Swiss guard arriving with them to arrest you And take you into custody Well maybe I become Pope as soon as I put them on The easy way in, the loophole This is a movie The Pope sucks, basically There's a mix up at the sorting office The Pope gets my Sort of like wacky golf socks And I get his And then when I put them on, I turn into the Pope Beautiful And he wins the PGA He has to do a podcast And he, I've got to say it, he's out of his depth The kind of stuff we do?

37:38Anna Ptaszynski:Yeah He delivers amazing speeches He knows fuck all about Disney princesses Absolutely

37:48Anna Ptaszynski:This is a good film

37:49James Harkin:Wow You know your question earlier about why would you need so many suits? James Bond on average will have 60 suits of the same kind He's not real Yeah, so So this is when they're filming. If they're doing a scene where he's in a particular suit, 60 versions of that suit will be tailor-made to Savile Row standards. And they use Tom Ford for the last Daniel Craig ones. 30 of those will go to the stunt doubles who will be acting in the scene. Now, this is for an action scene. Okay. But he basically has an impossible suit. Because when he's on a motorbike, the coat that he's wearing has longer arms specifically made, so it doesn't come up.

38:28James Harkin:I think he'll inspect a gadget. Exactly. It's so odd. But his trousers are tailor-made to be longer if you see him on a motorbike in that suit so that his ankles don't show. He doesn't look like Rishi Sunak on a motorbike.

38:40Dan Schreiber:That's amazing.

38:41James Harkin:So Bond is wearing, technically, an impossible suit.

38:44Dan Schreiber:That's amazing. Why doesn't everyone do that? Why don't all men, when they want to cross their legs, immediately put on a different pair of trousers? Another famous tailor is a guy called Jonathan Mayer, who was Bo Brummel's tailor. and he and Bo Brummel, the reason I bring it up now, is that they invented a new kind of trousers which had a loop underneath and you would put the loop underneath your feet and so whenever you moved your legs, it wouldn't ride up or down. I don't want to reveal my social status here, but just like Jodhpurs. Yeah, actually, I don't know if you know it, but I do a bit of horse riding myself.

39:19And I would say it's exactly like that.

39:22Anna Ptaszynski:James has been on a horse once in your absence and he's not let us forget about it.

39:25Dan Schreiber:Jesus Christ. Did they squeeze you into a pair of jumpers with those elastic bits around the foot?

39:30Anna Ptaszynski:No, they didn't.

39:31Dan Schreiber:Not a pro yet.

39:34Anna Ptaszynski:Several row tailors are having a good time at the moment. Are they? Can you guess why? Because you've just mentioned them on the podcast. Yeah, so, you know, if you guys do want to send a few over to us, we'll read out on our inside legs at the end of the show. I actually, I like a Disney princess. I dress to both sides.

39:53Is it to do with pop culture at all? It's to do with something that's happening a lot now Ah, okay What's happening a lot now? People are wearing suits

40:01Dan Schreiber:People are having to go back into the office No, people on Zoom wearing suits Because they want to seem professional

40:06Anna Ptaszynski:It's got an O and a Z in it This thing that people are having a lot of A Zempick! They're going to Australia

40:10James Harkin:Nope, not Oz I was on Wizard of Oz, so

40:14Anna Ptaszynski:Yeah, there's a big Judy Garland core trend in the city at the moment a lot of business were wearing gingham suits

40:20Dan Schreiber:so many pairs of red shoes there it's a zempic

40:24Anna Ptaszynski:so basically people are having a zempic finding their shape is changing quite a bit and they're then getting clothes altered you know maybe clothes that have fit them perfectly a year ago but now really don't or clients are saying things to one tailor like I'm going to wear a thick velvet dinner jacket for the first time

40:43Dan Schreiber:that's what you naturally do when you've lost a couple of stones

40:45James Harkin:getting more experimental Circling back to Saddam Hussein And having so many different Having so many different suits while in jail He was on the pen wasn't he No but he was losing his weight going up and down And so they did do it to different sizes

41:00Dan Schreiber:Well one of my favourite Conversations with a tailor And I've got a lot in my bank Is about that, is about how size changes And the tailor needs to adjust to that And this is the conversation that Lyndon Johnson had with his tailor Which if you haven't heard it is absolutely fantastic You have to look it up on YouTube He's ordering six new pairs of trousers and Lyndon Johnson like I think we've probably talked about him he's quite an unpleasant man he's doing a power play a lot of the time and he's really obsessed with his penis and he said I want half an inch left in the waist I vary 10 to 15 pounds a month is that a good Lyndon Johnson?

41:30Dan Schreiber:no he's more has anyone heard him?

41:32Anna Ptaszynski:I don't think the voice is so well known I think just tell us what he said

41:37Dan Schreiber:he says look I vary 10 to 15 pounds a month so you need to leave half an inch in in the waist so I can let it out if I want which I thought quite impressive that he can let out his own trousers when he wants to. And then he said, the crutch down where your nuts hang is always a little too... You've gone back into it. You can't say down where your nuts hang in an English accent, can you? The crutch down where your nuts hang is always a little too tight. So when you make them, give me an inch so that I can let it out there because they cut me. It's like riding a wire fence. And when I gain a little weight, they cut me under there.

42:09Dan Schreiber:Leave me an inch from where the zipper... That's a big burp he does. From where the zipper ends. round under the back and back to my bum hole. And it just goes on and on. This incredibly intense conversation with his tailor, talking about how much more space he needs for his balls and his bum hole. And then at the end...

42:28James Harkin:Who is recording this, by the way?

42:30Dan Schreiber:I don't know why it's recorded. I guess it's just a matter of public record.

42:33Anna Ptaszynski:White House conversations. But probably because it's America, they'll have said, right, this needs to go in the presidential library. Now we need to preserve this artifact for all time.

42:42Dan Schreiber:And it's just a bizarre touch at the end when the guy says, where would you like it sent? And he says, the White House. Look, I have to go. I've got to go to a funeral now. So let me hand you over to my boy who will take it from here. Right. It's just amazing. It's very interesting.

42:54Anna Ptaszynski:Yeah, I'm sure Taylor's, any Taylor who doesn't know to conceal the bum hole isn't doing their job. Do you know what I mean? It feels like as soon as you get your cloth, that's the first bit of cloth that goes there. And then you work out from there, don't you?

43:08James Harkin:It's amazing. I wonder if you search the Library of Congress with the word bum hole. How many times has that come up? might that be the unique moment well we've got president garfield of course he's way through his bum hole so maybe there's um maybe there's a book in it

43:26Dan Schreiber:powerful bum holes yeah white house bum first bum hole yeah there's something in this i think

43:31Anna Ptaszynski:we should focus on the body swap with you and the pope first but i do think that's good not paying your tailor is a big thing isn't it sorry what do you mean not paying your tailor You know, in the old days, that was the mark of a true aristocrat Was that your tailor was constantly saying My children are hungry, I need to eat And you're saying, yeah, I think I'll pay you in a year Really? Yeah

43:50James Harkin:Not paying your tailor was a huge, you know, thing for the upper classes Okay My friend is a tailor, a Savile Row tailor And weirdly, she was saying this just the other day She said, no one ever pays That's so... Yeah, she's like, it's nuts We have to invoice for months and months and months

44:05Anna Ptaszynski:They've got a card machine at the till now I just don't understand So basically, I only bring this up because of speaking of world leaders' tailors There was a 19th century one called E. Torts It's a great name And Churchill never paid Spent six years, I think Owing for some gold-laced trousers And then another tailor he had later on 1937 He owed them 197 quid Quite a lot of money in today's money Over 10 grand They were so insistent on saying Look, can you just pay us for the clothes, please? That he said, right, I'm not coming anymore I'm dumping you as my tailor Outrageous! Did they fight him for the breeches?

44:39There you go.

45:08now.

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45:47James Harkin:Okay, it is time for our final fact of the show, and that is Anna.

45:51Dan Schreiber:My fact this week is that desert grassland whiptail lizards get pregnant by pretending to mate with each other.

45:58James Harkin:This is crazy. Yeah, this is pretty amazing.

46:00Dan Schreiber:Yeah, it's basically by grinding.

46:05Dan Schreiber:sorry I wish I hadn't used that word I was sick these are amazing though so many species of whiptail lizards are all female desert grassland whiptail lizards are an all female species they're across North America and basically this fact was discovered in 1979 there was a biologist called David Cruz who had collected a bunch of them because he'd heard these are all female this is amazing we'll have a look at how this works and he noticed one lizard in the cage biting its cage mate's legs and tail, which he knew was a sign that they were mating because that's what they do. They bite their legs and tail and then climbed on top of her and started riding her, adopting, as I think he described it, the donut pose, which is kind of where, imagine you're riding someone, but also you're bending your head around and biting their tummy and there's a little hole in the middle that you could sort of fit your hand through.

46:53Dan Schreiber:They look like a bracelet or a donut, in fact.

46:56Anna Ptaszynski:But these were female lizards, both females?

46:58Dan Schreiber:Two females. and the thing is this actually helps them to get pregnant because by simulating this act of mating at the right time it triggers these hormonal changes in the receivers as in the person underneath's body that mean that the egg can start developing into a new lizard yeah it's really interesting and it's different times of the month they'll be either like the male as it were um version or the female version as in different times of the month if they're higher in progesterone then they'll know that they're to go on top.

47:28James Harkin:And they do it as a couple. Is it the same two lizards or might they find another lizard to act the male role? I think they go to find another.

47:34Dan Schreiber:I think maybe they pass it on. So once you've got pregnant as a female, then you can play the male role and go and pass it forward to someone else. Oh, wow. Yeah, pay it forward. It's nuts. Well, there are no nuts. That's the thing, isn't it? It's nutless. Nutless. One thing I found interesting is there's a guy who studies this called Professor Alexander Mikheyev. and he says that it's almost i mean he slightly anthropomorphizes it but he says it's nature and evolution placing certain checks on eliminating sex completely even though they're not having sex they're still going through some of the motions and that means that sex is not going away because actually having sex is a good thing for animals because it usually means that they can diversity yeah you get diversity in your genome and stuff like that but this is the really bizarre thing

48:23Anna Ptaszynski:because they are doing the activity of sex, but they're not having sex. And as a result, the one who gets pregnant, her genome is completely replicated in the next generation, right? So they're not getting the advantage of sex, which is mixing up your genes and more resilience and diversity across the species. They're just having to do the sex. And it's like a little clone.

48:43Dan Schreiber:They're getting to do the sex, Andy. Okay, let's not say having to do the sex.

48:47Anna Ptaszynski:Okay. All right. I wasn't aware we were suddenly a sex positive podcast. but actually i think in some of these lizards i don't know if it's this exact same species but they have twice as many chromosomes as other lizards yes and so actually it's not an exact clone because let's say you have a hundred different genes or whatever you might get half of them from one of your set of chromosomes and half of them from the other set of chromosomes so actually there is some shuffling going on yeah and probably what happened is this species is a hybrid of two other species but when they mated one time they somehow got both sets of chromosomes

49:24Dan Schreiber:inside them yeah and in fact they've got because we have like two sets and they've got a third set which makes it so they've got three sets so they're doing all this shuffling um like recombination we call it when we we do it via sex um so yeah it's not what i thought at all like parthenogenesis doesn't lead to clones so it actually seems that if we could perfect it men become um okay and i Look, I just want to read a quote that I really enjoyed because I thought this was good. This was in it was in a Nautilus article, I think, website Nautilus, which is very good. Sex is far from the perfect way to reproduce.

49:58Dan Schreiber:It imposes a huge cost on a species and that cost is called males. If half a species is made up of males, obviously, who can't make babies. Like, what's the point in that half? They're just a massive waste. So there was a big push for this in the 1970s, especially among radical feminist lesbians who basically said, this is happening in the animal kingdom. Let's do it in humans as well. And let's get rid of all the men. And when you look into it, basically, they're all radical feminist lesbians, but they're also quite eugenicistic and also quite interracial superiority. There's one amazing paper about these people written by Greta Resenbrink.

50:37But it's almost impossible to find anyone who was into this idea who wasn't also a eugenicist. I wasn't necessarily saying, I'm definitely married to it.

50:46Dan Schreiber:For evolutionary purposes, you can see the advantage of not having any males.

50:50Anna Ptaszynski:Everyone can have a baby at one point or another, which means you can spread the species further. It all came from some work by a friend of the podcast, actually, Dr. Helen Spurway. And she was the one who was, I think, in a relationship with JBS Haldane. And those two did loads of experiments about not having oxygen in their bodies. Yeah, I remember. so as well as doing that she did a lot of work on guppies who reproduce through pathogenesis and she was the one who said i don't see any reason why humans can't do it in fact there's there are reasons why humans can't do it and she was the one who said it and it was her work that all of these people started jumping on the back of saying well let's do this how did they propose

51:30Dan Schreiber:to do it there's quite a big jump isn't there from let's do this to let's start reproducing Parthenogenetically Yeah I think the idea Well for instance When this started There was one tabloid Who kind of got on the back of it As well And started sending out Messages saying Have you ever Given birth to someone Without having sex And loads of people Replying going Yes I did It was me

51:52Anna Ptaszynski:It was me That's so funny This is really cool 1 % of American mothers Nearly Claim their births Are virgin births Come on

52:01Dan Schreiber:Why do you say Like that Dan That's completely insane

52:03James Harkin:No, I read it. I find it fascinating because there's qualifications behind that 1%.

52:10Anna Ptaszynski:Absolutely. So this comes from 2013 and it was 0.8 % of respondents who said that they gave birth despite being virgins. And the good news is there are things you can do to make it likelier that you can have a virgin birth. So 31 % of the virgin mothers had signed a chastity pledge. That really helps. If it's during Advent That's even more helpful I think something like 60 % Some mad number found out They were pregnant during Advent Run up to Christmas You're likely to be younger And also to have parents Who did not tell you about sex Or contraception Those are the things you can do To really game the system

52:43James Harkin:And ensure you have a virgin birth Very cool Very nice Hey by the way This whole thing That these two lizards go through The act that you were describing If you would like to experience That yourself There's actually a workshop You can do to simulate it. Were you kind of getting a donut with someone? Yeah, well, I assume the donut must be part of it. There's a play that gets put on in various places around the world by two performance artists. It is called The Desert Grassland Whiptail Lizards. It's a dance drama. They dress up as the lizards. They come out on stage, and there's sort of scientific captions explaining what's going on.

53:20James Harkin:They just sort of put their tongues out and so on, and then they start mating on stage. and then you see a post-coital moment at the end of the play. And it was so successful. It was so successful. What's it called? It's literally called Desert Grassland Whip-Tails Lizards. They needed to give it a more pretentious name. At the moment, I'm not really into it. But there is a...

53:42Anna Ptaszynski:The Donut of Erotica would be good. Oh, yes. Donut of Love. Donut of Love. Double glazed. Oh. Because like Donuts have glazing. They have glazing.

53:54James Harkin:Yeah, I don't think anyone's getting glazed in this scenario. But clearly it was so popular. They got asked, how do I get involved? And so they do workshops now where you come and you lay down as the lizard and you understand the movements. And it's this specific one. And I've seen photos. It looks fantastic. That's got to be 100 % pervert audience for the workshop, isn't it? It doesn't look like that's how it's being presented. We have actually touched on these guys before. Just to quickly say, people who listen to the Mary Roach episode might remember we talked about the state lizard of New Mexico which is the leaping lesbian lizard and that is a subspecies of the ones that we're talking about another whiptail another whiptail yeah and again the reason they're called the leaping lesbian lizard is because they mate without need for males

54:45Dan Schreiber:did anyone else start to feel a bit sorry for all whiptail lizards that they are known for just one single thing when you're actually trying to research anything else about them. Yeah. You can get to page 20 ,000 on Google and you're still at, oh, they have lesbian sex. They probably have really interesting hobbies. I read that they stress eat in response to noise. Oh. So there's a load of them who are living near an air base in America. And whenever the aircraft go over, they have a higher level of cortisol, so they're more stressed and they're also eating way more. Oh. So that's one thing. Yeah.

55:18They also don't like eating Very colourful grasshoppers They found that the more Brightly coloured a grasshopper is The less likely it is that these whiptails will eat it May I be honest

55:29Anna Ptaszynski:I can see why this has left to page 2001 on Google

55:36Anna Ptaszynski:Is sex worthwhile? This is the debate Is it? Yeah Between who? You and your wife Yes it is because you get genetic diversity. That's it, right? All animals, right, have genetic mutations that crop up every now and again. In humans, it is possible to deal with negative mutations through this recombination thing that Anna, you mentioned. But with other animals, like pure parthenogenesis animals, which never have to have sex, they only clone themselves, the bad mutations just escalate. And then mutations are normally negative. So they just slowly affect your fitness over time until that genetic line, that particular lizard or whatever, is just absolutely screwed.

56:19Anna Ptaszynski:You know, it just can't function very well in the world. You can't say, I'd like to go back to only having two balls, please, or whatever.

56:25Dan Schreiber:Well, learn to have sex. Well, actually, that does sometimes happen. So there's some species of stick insects that have arguably the best or the worst of both worlds, whichever way you look at it, in that they reproduce pathogenetically, but every now and then they have sex. and so yeah they've just they've looked at their like the genetic line of all these guys and seen that it's very similar very similar very similar very similar and then suddenly there's like quite a big difference and it looks like they're having sex at that moment and then they'll go back to pathogenesis for a few more generations that's crazy that generation must be so disapproved of when it comes along but every generation thinks they invented sex right in this case it's actually true yeah but it's like fashion it comes around in 70 year cycles or something doesn't it sex is back um there there seem to be other species that have sex sometimes and then um parthenogenetically procreate sometimes and one of them is um boa boa snakes so in 2024 there was a brazilian rainbow boa called ronaldo um i don't know why it doesn't have any feet um been kept in a cage in Portsmouth and hadn't been in contact with another snake for nine years so they claimed and there was a student monitoring his cage and student came reported to their superiors her superiors that 14 babies had appeared in Ronaldo's cage and I feel how bad would this intern have been that the animal care technician who this was reported to said we just didn't believe him at first they thought they'd made a mistake which is quite weird to come and report that you've seen 40 new snakes in the cage for the boss to go I don't think you have no you must have can you go and recount it's just one

58:17James Harkin:okay that's it that is all of our facts thank you so much for listening if you'd like to get in contact with any of us about the things that we've said over the course of this podcast we are all online on social media I'm on Instagram under Schreiberland Andy At Andrew Hunter M. James? No such thing as James Harkin. Yep. Or you can get to us as a group by going. Where, Anna?

58:35Dan Schreiber:You can email podcast.qi.com or on Instagram at no such thing.

58:39James Harkin:That's right. And if you would like to contribute to the Monday show, which is known as Little Fish, do send in your best facts to that email address as well, podcast.qi.com, or the feedback that you've got about the show generally, because we gather all that stuff up and we bring it to our secret club, Club Fish, which exists on Patreon. If you want to join patreon.com slash clubfish, and you'll find multiple tiers of exciting stuff that you can get involved with. One of which is drop us a line. This is the audience feedback show. We love reading out your mail. So do check that out. Otherwise, just come back next week because we're going to have another episode.

59:14James Harkin:Thank you as ever to our team here, Lee and Lee, Ethan Ruperalia, as well as the other fish busters. And we will see you again next week with another episode. Goodbye.

59:43We'll be right back.

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