Baked Beans, Chocolate Digestives and Declan Rice

0:15Romesh Ranganathan:Welcome to the Wolf and Owl email special. Yeah, it's the Wolf and Owl email special with Tom Davis and Romesh Ranganathan. Should we get straight into it? hi Wolf Al Swan and Cat a few months ago I emailed about advice on words when proposing to your other half the time came on Saturday oh my god the time came on Saturday to finally pop the question and with the help from you guys it went very smoothly as you took as you took all the pressure off me thinking it had to be some big speech and I just kept it natural in the moment and went with a flow thankfully it ended with her saying yes which topped it off as requested last time by Tom we bought two tickets to one of his shows the one in Portsmouth which will subsequently be our first ever stand up show live we can't wait oh my gosh sorry for the long email it's not actually that long at all just wanted to say thank you for your advice many thanks a nervous number congratulations wow congratulations isn't that cool mate I feel I feel buzzing back can we even go back and say yeah I want to meet these people yeah Tom wants to meet you so I'll see you before or after the show yeah come and say hello yeah please do go and say hello to Tom yeah and congratulations you've got people coming to the Portsmouth show yeah yeah Portsmouth show weirdly Portsmouth has never been a problem Portsmouth is one of my favourites It's really special, isn't it?

1:27I love Portsmouth. Yeah. It's a great city full of great people. Yeah. And two very special people coming. I'm actually, do you know what? I feel like, wow. They should also come to the club night. Yeah, you should. Tickets to the club night are yours.

1:41Romesh Ranganathan:Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. We haven't even put it on. We don't even know when it is. And now you're offering free tickets. You didn't comps before we even. Oh, you could pick them up as a chauffeur in your Aston. Well, we'll have to strap one of them to the roof. Okay. oh my god shall we that's amazing by the way yeah that's congratulate genuinely give me five that's incredible congratulations man that's good that's made me feel happy yeah made me feel really happy that's good really good two people are getting mad two people are getting mad that is a winner by the way that we should go to I know we've said it a lot and we've gone oh we might go to one but this we're in the mix of this well the nervous number in fairness we DJ at the wedding for free well they've not even suggested that we're invited yeah I'm just saying and neither us can DJ so those are the main obstacles.

2:27Rob Percy's coming with us.

2:28Romesh Ranganathan:So now they've invited Rob Percy. Rob Percy, by the way. And Rob Percy's DJing for free, by the way. That's a wedding gift from us. That's how he makes his living. But now we've offered him... Rob Percy, by the way, I would tell you now, is not just a DJ. I'd say Rob Percy's going to be one of the best wedding guests He's a portal of entertainment system. Oh, I fucking love him. He's so much fun to be around. I think Rob Percy injected into your spirit elevates your mood by at least 20%. Yeah, agreed. it's not Red Bull but in human form alright relax, why don't you marry it I've known how to do that double wedding for adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters Tremphaya offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start Tremphaya is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks, followed by injections under the skin every four or eight weeks If your doctor decides that you can self-inject Tremphaya, proper training is required.

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4:30Okay, do you want to do a question? I'm so buzzing. I'm going to take a moment. Hello, sweet, sweet selves. I recently stumbled upon your podcast and absolutely love it. So I thought I'd ask you a little question. I enjoy doing things to get a reaction out of my partner. I tend to do things that annoy her for a laugh. For example, I recently started a new tradition. every morning I step on the scales in the morning I stick the swans in the air as if I'm at a boxing way in or whenever we're cooking something whether it's a pie a curry or something else I will say do you know what would be great in this a tin of baked beans or my personal favourite simply breathing what is going on here my question is do you guys do anything to get a rise of your better halves or totally normal things that seem to get on their nerves all the best Ian by the way Ian.

5:17I love the fact Ian's just gone with Ian. He's not even...

5:20Romesh Ranganathan:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Really nice. An animal name. Weirdly, the baked bean thing is something I do to Catherine that really annoys her. And I don't do it as a joke. I just think baked beans in everything. In a curry? Baked beans in a curry is amazing. Baked bean curry is actually quite good. Baked bean curry is amazing. Name a thing that baked beans isn't working. A trifle. Well, that's you just trying to be like Ross Geller. No, what do you mean? Fucking savoury. We didn't say that, did you? Yeah, by the way. Name a thing. By the way, I bet if you blitzed them up, put a little bit of sugar in them, they'd be delicious.

5:50Romesh Ranganathan:Okay, here you go with your sugar thing again. After the rhubarb, okay? I'm not getting into this. By the way, it turns out rhubarb's not even a fucking fruit. No, it's a vegetable. But by the way, rhubarb's amazing in a trifle. Right, baked beans. Name a savoury dish that baked beans doesn't go in. All right. Can't. There's not a dish it doesn't go in. I'm thinking, I'm thinking. Lasagna? No, baked beans. baked beans going to lasagna everyone's going oh fuck mate we're fucked we are fucked baked beans are rare I'd argue even the mince is going uh uh baked beans in a vegetarian lasagna is amazing okay fine let me try and think of something else

6:31Romesh Ranganathan:I can't actually there's nothing actually I've thought of one go on I think baked beans would find themselves slightly sort of over on in a Chinese meal yeah I don't think but I don't know if baked beans would. Stir-fried baked beans wouldn't be bad. Maybe. You might be right. Yeah. I mean, yeah, tomato sauce doesn't really belong in a Chinese. No. Indian food it goes great with. Yeah, it goes great. Thai green curry? Yeah, you're right. Thai and Chinese food. Yeah. Kebab? I think beans on the side of a kebab would be banyan. Gives you a little bit of moisture. Pizza? Actually, baked beans, you can get a full English bean.

7:13That's awful. That's fucking dreadful.

7:15Romesh Ranganathan:Do you know what Theo had when we were in Barcelona? A pizza with chips on. Chips and pepperoni. Wow. Yeah. That's a bit like a, what do they call? Are you okay? What's those things called? Gyro. It's like a gyro, right? That's like a... Yeah, isn't it pronounced gyros? Yeah. I call it a gyro. Yeah. Well, we also call it prawn puree. I do quite a lot of things. Eating, by the way. My eating style really annoys cats. If we have poppadoms or prawn crackers, it really annoys Catherine. We can't have a romantic meal with any heart. Because I tend to eat my mouth open with those things. I get so excited about that course in particular.

7:56Yeah, yeah. I just go so, tortilla chips. I go so in.

8:00Romesh Ranganathan:Have you ever made tortilla chips with a tortilla? Oh, no, Catherine does, yeah, yeah. Yeah, delicious. So much better. Yeah. But then it does really sort of bring home how unhealthy those things are. Yeah, yeah, yeah. prawn crackers by the way are just delicious I mean you can't have them but fuck me they're amazing I a lot of what I do gets on Lisa's nerves I think yeah but what I like you know the main thing I do is grip her up you're so funny look oh you like that you're quite gropey around the house I'm not saying gropey it's not like a sexual thing you've got to be careful now as well because your boys are coming of age if they see their dad sort of coming around the house being a bit lechy it's not lechy it's kind of like what's the best way you know like come here it's a bit like that yeah get here well get the TV on come and have a kiss no I wouldn't do that but you know come here come here come here come here I'm affectionate but in a way that's annoying in what sense give Romy a kiss yeah a little bit of that or I might just or I might you know she might be cooking and then I just give her a little cuddle from behind oh that's nice though i know but it's i think sometimes like if you're if you're busy yeah you don't want this fucking no i don't you know what i think you'd like that you don't want olympic clinging on to you no i think you're being harsh on yourself i don't that's a different thing for the boy that's a nice thing for the boys to say well when we're when we're in barcelona oh my god i haven't told you my my barcelona story oh hit me it's not really a story anyway one of the things happened We went to a theme park.

9:37Romesh Ranganathan:Nice. And then Lisa and I had a little peck on the lips. I don't know why. Anyway, it doesn't matter. Just general reflection. There shouldn't be a why. No, but it was off a moment or something. That's nice though. Anyway, Alex said to me, you're too old for that now. What? Wow. Grace makes me and Catherine kiss in front of her. She's like, mommy, daddy have a kiss. Oh, that's quite sweet. Anyway, we were doing a lot of shopping on the last day. And we cut it quite fine to get into the car to go to the airport. I respect that, by the way. Respect what? the fact you've cut it fine i think everyone puts so much emphasis on getting to places early so um we're cutting it quite fine i said to lisa she was buying a handbag or something and i said to her i'm going to take two of the boys back to the hotel we'll get the luggage in the car and then we'll wait for you this is the most that's a fucking that's a vibe do you think so yeah i actually think it's quite sexy anyway the boys the boys which put two boys you take for that job uh that was uh alex and alex and charlie good choice so we're going off we're walking down the street with your oldest boy the boys are a bit tired and i thought i'd do something funny so i knew i had a quacky fart lined up right i love that you call it a quacky fart you know like when you know it's going to be like a yeah so i said we're walking along and i said listen to this nothing to miss that and then and then and then let rip with his fart right yeah and i thought it'd make them laugh unfortunately as i got to the end of the song i hadn't noticed but a group of women sort of got to the other side like to our side of the road from crossing and sort of moved in directly behind us as i finished the song and did the fart oh wow they suddenly hear a group of women cracking up laughing oh wow alex goes oh my god oh my god oh my god they heard then they start pointing at me and nudging their mates and going basically saying this guy's farted and i just fucking ran away you ran well i sort of walked very quickly because it was just fucking humiliating how mad is this right and you can verify this with your brother right this is an insane thing this has happened to you so we were in cornwall me and your brother doing a show we go for what we have a morning walk every morning so we've walked up to the top of this hill cliff thing, looking down at sea, and we come walking back.

11:58The night before, we've had, well, Dave, we've had quite a big lunch. We've had quite a bit, you know, and we've gone out for pizza. So as we're walking down the hill, I was like, I can have a dinner. I'm like, I'm proper guffing notes. And he was sort of making a bit of a joke about it. And we passed this woman who was sort of like looking out to sea and stuff. We sort of walked down the hill a bit, and then we stopped a couple of times just to sort of take pictures. And as we're walking down, your brother's really, he's really funny around, farts he's like he hates them he's quite prudish yeah he's prudish around guffs right so this is mad so i go din get a load of this and i sort of cock my leg like that stand there cock my leg let rip and the woman is literally there and you hadn't noticed no because she was coming down behind me like and obviously height wise she's literally eaten like and i was like i i literally i just mortified just walked out and din went you fart that woman i was like shut up like just keep walking and we just kept like you know it was so fucking like it was literally mortifying yeah it's insane your brother by the way around anything like that i don't think i've ever heard my brother fart he like if you talk about i mean he's the opposite of you what does that mean well no because you and me have we make we we've done a podcast for six years i think probably 70 of it is talking about farts and poos right then if you mention a fart if you go I'm going to have to go to the toilet.

13:21He goes, oh, for God's sake. Like anything else, he'll have a joke about. He just gets really prudish around that. Yeah,

13:27Romesh Ranganathan:I don't think I've ever heard him say I need to take a shit or anything like that. No, no. Interesting. He just slopes off. Yeah. Yeah. He got caught, by the way, bad in a dressing room incident. What happened? Well, we share a dressing room now. We sort of, yeah. And yeah. Why are you sharing a dressing room, by the way? Because we like it. me and him we chat before oh god I don't want to be sat on my own before the show be sat on your own be a fucking grown up why you're about to do a show why do you be sat with the support act forcing your support act to fucking smell your shit there's no forcing no he loves being not that bit he loves it we love it together we sit we chat we joke we laugh okay we watch videos together on YouTube alright I need to chat to Din and get his side of things on this okay we'll get it on a voice note yeah alright This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome.

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14:44Romesh Ranganathan:Hi, Ron and Tom. help settle a debate please what way up do you eat a chocolate digestive do you have chocolate facing up so it sticks to the roof of your mouth or chocolate facing down so it melts in your tongue as you eat it well first of all the way you phrase that is incredibly leading yeah my boyfriend Ian oh hello that could be the same Ian says it's serial killer vibes eating them chocolate way down both him and his mate Matt say my way is wrong they're from Macclesfield so they're a bit weird okay which could explain if the chocolate was meant to be on the top then the writing would be on it and they'd be that way up in the packet please confirm the correct way love you lots thanks Abby thank you Abby by the way Abby always reassures me as a name in what way I can't think I'm a bad Abby I'm not always a nice person okay Tom chocolate digestives I mean I like Abby I think she's a really good person but I'm going to tell you now I can't I've never ever eaten a chocolate biscuit with the chocolate facing down it's insane the chocolate has to be up what are you the other way around okay well okay this if you are you genuinely saying to me first of all i've got a lot to say about this okay well i'll tell you what if you can make a convincing argument then yeah i'll be shocked i can't see i can't fathom so you're telling me a jaffa cake you'd eat with the sponge up yeah sponge up yeah what chocolate down well look that's a bit different okay i'm talking about chocolate chocolate digestives in particular Go, go, go.

16:13Okay. Shout out Jamie Lang, by the way. For what? Well, he's part of the movie. Oh, yeah, of course he is, yeah.

16:18Romesh Ranganathan:It's good to... Candy Kittens are doing one. It's good to see him go. Yeah, but obviously... And he's got the Disney Plus series. Yeah, yeah. Finally, things are looking up for him. I love Jamie. Anywho... No, I do like Jamie. I love Jamie. Not love, love too much, but I do like him. Yeah, he's a good guy. He's a sweetheart. Anyway. Hit me. We talked about this on the Ranganation. Okay. I believe that you should eat chocolate, damn. Why? Okay, I don't believe that you should. I think it's... But why? Because it's a chocolate digestive. Yeah. You're eating it because you like chocolate. By the way, I would say that I think the best way of eating it was two biscuits squeezed together.

16:55Romesh Ranganathan:Okay, we're talking about people, not fucking animals. Okay. All right? So you eat it because you like the chocolate. Yeah. The best way to taste most of the chocolate is with the chocolate facing down. Why? No. Because it hits your tongue straight away. Yeah, but do you not like to chew it? Yeah, of course you do. but straight away you're in Chocolate City, which is Lisa's nickname for me, by the way. Right, so we talked about this on the Ranganation. Yeah. McVitie's saw the debate. Yeah. And they tweeted, the correct way to eat a chocolate digestive is chocolate down. What? So the manufacturers have confirmed.

17:33Romesh Ranganathan:Now, there are some counter-arguments to this. For example, the Jaffa Cake is a good counter-argument. Yeah. The second big counter-argument is pizza, right? All of the flavor of a pizza is on the top. Yep. Right? And you don't eat that upside down. Well, everything would fall off. Well, that's my counter argument. Actually, by the way, can I say, pizza had an amazing pizza whilst I was in Truro in Cornwall. Okay. Home of pizza. Bosso's Pizza Parlor. Beautiful pizza. Okay. Small little business. Yeah. Mom and pop store almost. And they do these big pizza slices. I'd say the best way to eat is a pizza.

18:07I don't think it's anything better than rolling a pizza up. So it's like a sandwich and eating it. Oh, that's good.

18:14Romesh Ranganathan:Yeah. Pizza is the biggest counter argument to the chocolate. Pizza's are different than the digestive. You can't get involved in that. That's a different race. Yeah. And there's a gravity. Yeah. There's a gravity issue. Yeah. But chocolate digestive is chocolate down. That's insane. I'd have to try it now. You're about to have your taste buds blown. You will get chocolate on your fingers. Yeah. I mean, I would say that that's... Because also then I think... At home, that's fine, because there's nothing better than licking your fingers. There's stuff that's better than licking your fingers at home.

18:44Romesh Ranganathan:You've not got Wi-Fi. No, but there's something nice about going... Right, yeah. Yeah, I wouldn't do the unbroken eye contact. Yeah, okay. But I'd say that when you're out in public, and you've got all these little three-packs of digestives, you've got chocolate all over your fingers, it's an nightmare. I get it. Hi, Romesh and Tom. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. I did this the other week. You've made a mistake like this before. Yeah, yeah, okay. Okay, so just let the email take you naturally. Hi, Romesh and Tom. Firstly, I'm a big fan of the show. It's become a staple listen. Romesh, I've followed your work for years and always rated you.

19:20Tom, I'll be honest. I hadn't probably come across your stuff until Silverstone last year, but you were generally one of the highlights of the whole event. Naturally, I did what any normal person would do and immediately binged through everything you've ever done. Now, here's where things take a turn. Not long after, we went to a live recording of Nevermind the Buzzcocks, and Tom, you were there. And then we went to a live female with Unacceptable and guess who was on the team? Mr. Tom Davies again. At this point, I think this is getting suspicious. And then to top it all off, we had the chance to say hello at the end and instead of playing it cool, I panicked and basically dropped the this looks a bit stalkerish line, which I regret to this day.

19:57So my question is, how do you not come across like a stalker when it's generally just a coincidence? Because I'll be seeing Tom later in Nottingham, again in Nottingham later this year and I'm keen to avoid escalating this into something that ends up with security getting involved. Any advice appreciated, ideally before I accidentally attend a third event in a row and complete the trilogy. Cheers, Aaron, a.k.a. the QuickBooks chat. Does that mean anything to your QuickBooks chat? Yeah, it does. Do you explain it? No, I chatted to him, I think, and he mentioned the QuickBooks thing. When did you chat to him?

20:29I think I chatted to him after, I can't remember. I remember having an awkward encounter with someone after the show that you guys make.

20:37Romesh Ranganathan:Unacceptable. Unacceptable. Right. So you chatted to him and he mentioned QuickBooks. I think so. And then did he say the... He made a joke that alluded to the Stalker thing. Right, okay. That I can't 100%. By the way, that sort of stuff never trips me. I'm never like, if someone's nice and genuine, I'm always like, I'm naturally, I try to start a conversation with people I've met before at times and it goes badly. So I think I'm the worst person to ask about this. I've made a fool of myself by just thinking oh yeah I'll crack a joke and that's a way in and it's backfired quite a lot of times I would say that from what I remember of Aaron he was very sweet he was a nice guy and also a great crowd member So Aaron you don't have anything to worry about?

21:23Romesh Ranganathan:No not at all What was the question? After notting him come and How do you not come across like a stalker when it's genuinely just coincident? I think the thing of, oh, you must think I'm a stalker, always struck me. Well, I mean, I wouldn't say it's coincidence that you're going to see him in Nottingham. No, no, you're coming along to a show. I mean, that feels deliberate. That's not happened accidentally, has it? But also, I would say that I just always think, be yourself and just be relaxed and chill and have a laugh. Have you had this scenario? Because you feel like, to me, I always think with you, you're not one of those people who's going to, you'll let the fucking action come to you rather than you go to the action.

21:55Romesh Ranganathan:What does that mean? I think, for example, if you saw Thierry Henry, right? One of your all-time heroes. I don't think for a second you go over to Thierry and start a conversation I think you'd hold back you'd be cool you'd be relaxed and if he didn't come over to you you'd just be like okay that didn't happen that is probably how I'd approach it yeah whereas if that was me and I saw someone that I really idolised you'd follow him home I'd go over and say how I'm a fan I think you're amazing or something like that yeah I mean I think there's probably I think that like it's a bit I remember I told you about this when I went to see I went to see Dre and Snoop and Eminem was out came as a special guest or whatever at that launch thing then Martin was DJing that event at that event he said to me do you want to come and meet them backstage afterwards and I said no even though not in a I'm too good for them way but in a like obviously I'm obsessed with Dre I'm obsessed with Snoop I love Eminem but I just thought I've seen them do what they do I don't want to go back there do you know what I mean like I just I feel like they're not they've not got any interest in me like if if somehow socially we happen to be i'm not saying this would ever happen but if socially we happen to be in the same situation we're at dinner together and then we're whatever that's not gonna say that i've seen you in those scenarios yeah and you have an element of coolness around you and i know you're gonna no i don't but you do like it's like you have an aura now we talk about auras and it's become a thing but you have something about you that makes you very like you don't feel out of place in that sort of scenario I do feel out of place.

23:27But you don't ever give the, you, you haven't, or like this way about you that makes you feel like, oh yeah, he, he, you can, you can walk around those people. It doesn't fit. I know you that, cause I know you well, I know that there's, you, you don't feel like that. Yeah. But I think that almost you carry, well, I think we both feel the same. I then carry it off with like a giddy sort of feeling of someone who's been allowed.

23:50Romesh Ranganathan:So if you, so, cause you, yeah, I just think like, like you, you were about to say Declan. I know for a fact that I've made such a prat out of myself in front of Declan Rice. Even though he's been lovely to me since, I'm more than aware that the first few times I met Declan Rice gave him the lasting impression that I was a fucking loser. And he's lovely to me. And this is nothing against Declan because I think he's a credit to the guy. I mean, I love the guy. But I know for a fact that I was so excited to me. By the way, in Declan's defense, he was like a 19, 20-year-old kid. And I was so overroared with meeting him.

24:23But my thing is, I will tell the person what I think and how great they are. If I think they're a truly brilliant person, I'll go, no, I think you're fucking amazing. Thank you for this or well done for the, you know, whatever. And that's how I compensate. Whereas I think you compensate, yours is a better way of doing it because I think you handle it in a more aloof way that people go, oh, fucking hell, he's a cool character. Even though I think you're probably going through the same sentiment.

24:45Romesh Ranganathan:But if like somebody ever, sometimes people like to be told that somebody's a fan of theirs, right? so they're getting that from from you whereas they're not getting that from me no but i think that that's the difference between is that i think that then you maintain a place of being like if you met declan by the way even though he's just been one of the most instrumental people in winning you the league and and is now going to be an arsenal fucking legend and you have met i know you've met you know if you were to see him it would i think you'll be an even keel where i would still be he's this and i'm a well he'd be he'd not want to say a lady now would he I think you'd still be sweet.

25:24I don't think you'd spend any time talking to me. This would be what would happen if he'd walk in and see us both. He'd go, hey, Declan. He'd go, hey, man, how are you? You all right? Hey, well, Ron. And that would be it. That's what I think would happen. I don't think so. And I'd just sort of go, and then have to sort of go over and chat to, you know, make a fucking fool of myself in front of Gabrielle or Ciliba or something like that. Yeah.