¶ Opening Chat
- Ben's thoughts are elsewhere, thinking of his Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson mannequin perhaps, which is in transit. Any Johnson role could arrive (Jumanji being ideal), not some random non-Johnson character (e.g. Mrs Doubtfire or one of the horses from Ben-Hur). Or perhaps one of his personal life roles, such as mentor to Simon (Le Bon, who is thriving).
- Ben is currently mid-sagne. Despite his professed passion for lasagne, this is the first he has (partially) made. Pam hurtles in at this news and Mike is astonished that Ben has never made one before.
- Henry compares this to Ben never having tried to make his own Mona Lisa. It is transgressive, like attempting to touch greatness.
- Has anyone ever started to make a lasagne and stopped mid-sagne to record a podcast? Ben started making the ragu on God's day. Whitsun? Friday, in worship of Freyja?
- The internet was a minefield in the matter of whether Ben should refrigerate the ragu after making it. Henry has encountered this when asking the internet whether he can eat a chicken when it's a colour he doesn't recognise and it's pleading its own case (they will then retire to the pub for a couple of ales).
- The tomato sauce was too hot to put in the fridge even when decanted into a jar. This is the pain point wherein Henry will invent the 'slow-cool-ifier' using one of those toasters from a hotel breakfast buffet that is set to the minimum iteration, philosophically, of the concept of toasting. You will find a man named Brian or Peter also watching the hotel toaster, with whom you can chat and joke, unless you are Mike, who will go off and look at the muesli unless Brian/Peter is particularly bold in his toaster chat, when Mike will then escape through the nearest window wearing a Weetabix crown for safety.
- Henry's invention would slowly draw the hot sauce into the fridge at the pace of the hotel toaster. It would be aimed at the day-to-day person who has made a too-hot bolognese late at night and wants to go to bed/freelancers with a bit too much time on their hands.
- Ben watched YouTube video creators such as Dr Refrigerator who are obsessed with this single idea who advised cooling to 8 degrees. But how? By using a pre-frigerator! Or by making an ice bath in the sink, like the opposite of a bain-marie (a bain-pierre?).
- Ben then got his meat thermometer out. Wa-hey, cue the Johnson jokes, inevitable when you've got 3 guys chatting shit. The Johnson in this case is The Rock, who changes colour like a Global Hypercolor T-shirt when dipped in, or the next gen, where he changes into the costume from his different roles according to how hot the sauce is (hottest = The Mummy).
- Henry considers all thermometers meat thermometers because he is made of meat. So is his computer a meat computer? Mike and Ben describe a meat thermometer to him, which he recognises as the thing used when cooking a turkey to give 'turkey time'. But Ben's has a digital readout for accurate, instant temperature information. Probably bought while doomscrolling, which Henry does, despite not having one idea to rub against another about how to use it and what the readout '65' means. Henry will fight Ben on this, despite the latter being functionally amoral.
- Dr Microbes on YouTube is insistent the sauce should be 8 degrees before going in the fridge. Henry is still hung up on what microbes are (gross little insects?) and when they exist vis-à-vis temperature in an 18-to-30 holiday metaphor that proves he has his finger on the pulse of Millennials.
- Is it same-day-delivery liquid nitrogen time? Loads of ice cubes into the sauce? Old ski glove in the freezer, 2 hrs later put it on, fondle the bolognese? Maximise surface area by spreading it out, on a towel or in 6 or 7 small containers and plastic bags, as Ben actually did. If a police officer discovered these, it would be assumed to be missing people in the bags. Or Shergar/Lucan.
- Should we be eating found burgers off the floor like the early hominids did when they were attracted out of the trees ("Ooh, what's that?")? A good time of year to have the squits anyway, as there's not much on. Netflix on the toilet. Amazon Prime and puking into the bath.
¶ Topic Chat
- Greek statues could be Henry covered in flour or Henry riding a lion, with no arms, or with his dick chipped off and in the British Museum.
- Those Greek statues are always really built, even if they're an old philosopher or geometer. Doing 1,000 crunches an hour while also coming up with world-changing theories on angles so that he can express what his buttocks look like (90 degree, cubic buttocks). Meanwhile the Trojans are just trying to walk the dog and feed the kids – how are those Greeks managing it all?
- Henry sees the universe as split in two: the flaccid and Tony Blair as Heat's Torso of the Week (this is where 'tone'd comes from). The flaccid being 'book guys' but Henry isn't even one of those. Muscly and well-read like the Ancient Greeks – unachievable.
- Is Batman that guy, or does his suit just have the 6-pack on it and underneath he looks like Ben?
- Henry is aiming for the giant, promotional maggot look, which is very hard to sculpt. Marble can only manage one chin.
- The Ancient Greeks didn't have steroids, etc, like the modern bodybuilders, so how did they achieve the look without it being a full-time job + enhancements?
- The quality of life for a bodybuilder must be atrocious. Is it a pathalogical addiction or is that justification from fairly shapeless people (not including Mike 'The Body' Wozniak, who is full Tony Blair).
- Wrestling and luzzing of things was valued in a culture that invented the gymnasium.
- Henry is allowed to say that the Ancient Greeks would have been hairy fuckers because his dad is Turkish. The sculptors must have had to go on whatever the subject said was under their body hair ("Just do me perfect, thanks."). We are told the sculptures would have been painted back then, but perhaps they were also covered in guano and badger fur for verité.
- Henry's Beefcake Journey update: he's still lifting the stick. No weights, just helium balloons. Going once a week is maintaining your current level of shapelessness, i.e. water in a pink balloon with a crude face drawn on.
- What has made Henry enjoy going to the gym: hanging out by the vending machines looking at his phone, checking the lockers for any spare change, picking up fungal infections (those guys are working hard under his feet).
- The man attending to Henry and his stick last time no longer wants to see him (it's not him, it's Henry).
Kelly Vivanco's Show Art
¶ Emails
- Ian from Indiana writes about the Eagle Scouts in the USA, which only 6% of scouts attain (the elite militia). Henry didn't make it past the Beavers (the eagle's easiest prey thanks to their paddle-like tail, upon which you can display chutneys). Ian earned a pocket knife when he was a scout and tells the Beans the scouts' motto, which they are well aware of thanks to scouting being invented in the UK (by Rudyard Kipling/Robert Baden-Powell). Ben went to Beavers, Cubs, and Scouts. Henry finds the progression of creatures strange: adult fully grown beaver with cheeseboard tail and orange teeth (because of iron?) (recently reintroduced in Cumbria) then progresses to a baby bear and then to a scout, sent ahead in a military campaign. Ian studied in England and took a trip to Edinburgh, visiting the Scottish Parliament with his Eagle Scout knife in his pocket (perhaps to whittle the Stone of Scone). Ian warned the security guard that he had a knife, which could be a threat or a come-on. The guard took it off him but was kind enough not to arrest him. Mike warns Ben that he could be arrested at any time as he carries a keyring Swiss army knife wherever he goes (but sadly no spoon for eating pasta salad on the train). If you've bought a carving knife at Lakeland, you've just got to peg it out of there, contravening the only instruction on the packet. The guard didn't arrest Ian because he just thought he was a dumb American, who might at any moment start telling him how Scottish he was. More so than this tin of traditional haggis shortbread. This kind of tourist probably bleeds tartan and is from the same clan as Princess Diana, related to the Loch Ness Monster with a certificate to prove it, and felt Shrek spoke to them. Apologies to the Scottish-American listeners (such as President Trump) and their lovely old abuela. Ian never did get his knife back. Ben would have buried the knife in Holyrood Park. Henry would have Hannibal Lectered the situation, wearing masks of people's faces, including a rubber King Prince Charles mask bought on the Royal Mile.
- Martha writes about bad Christmas presents. She received a biscuit barrel for her 21st birthday from her boyfriend and suggests that other listeners can send in their worst presents, doing some nice producing. She is now the Beans' producer and is asked to come up with a new format point as there hasn't been one since the start of the podcast.
- Jack is a 'trailing spouse' with a wife who works in international education. The Beans think being in the slipstream of a cool diplomat sounds ideal, just standing around at a party with a ludicrous tan while people pass around canapés. Eventually coats are flung onto you and your partner loses all respect, while you lean into it with facial piercings to allow umbrellas and briefcases to be hung from you, a ticket system and attendant. Soon your lower body starts to mahoganise, and moths appear, leading to a treatment that creates an acrid fug, impeding Britain's soft power from progressing around the globe. Your only hope is to put about a rumour that you were whittled from the bow of The Golden Hind and be caked in a laminate, perhaps something with 'epoxy' in the name, mounted in Perspex in a minor consulate. Eventually your grandson spots you in the ceiling of the Panamanian consulate, but it's not clear why he's there when he lost his passport in Peru (this grandson is not good at admin, and a bit of a shitshow, perhaps because his grandad wasn't present in his life). The Beans warn Jack that this is his future. He is currently living in deepest China and attempts a switcheroo about being 'incomprehensible to outsiders' with 'questionable quality control' and led by a tyrannical figure. Jack has become obsessed with laundry efficiency during his time in this humid environment. Henry has also become fixated on spreading the clothes over a wide surface area to dry efficiently. Jack reached Laundry Zero and stood at the event horizon of the soiled clothing singularity. Mike worries that Jack needs to up his chat game for his partner, although the chat is perfectly lukewarm for the Beans. Jack warns the Beans that Ego Death can be experienced after achieving Laundry Zero: if you stare into the empty laundry basket, it will stare back at you, but what does it see? The trouble with prophets is that they are often seen as quite boring.
¶ Jingles
- Pam (1:52)
- Digestive Tract Talk (22:49)
- Bean Machine (23:11)
- Beefcake Journey (23:54)
- Emails (36:17)
- The Regal Zone (48:34)
- The Old Switcheroo (55:43)
- Patreon (1:00:06)
¶ Sean Bean Lounge
- Arts and crafts night: biennial using felt tips to draw eyes on ping pong balls, cutting those ping pong balls in half and then sticking them to things to make them look like they have faces night (48 patrons).
¶ Listener Theme Tune
- Jay was listening to the timetravel epsiode with the human mouth trumpet and wanted to bring the quality level down by performing mouth trumpet through an app designed to make a voice sound silly.
¶ Notable Quotes
- I'm hearing a lot of bolognoise in this conversation. We need to cut through it to the bologfacts.
- It's Shagaluf: Bacteria Edition.
- Chill out, Dr Microbes!
- How do you sculpt flab?
- They were basically mobile bushes with feet at the bottom.
- I'm the oldest beaver in the world.
- You could suck yogurt off a knife?!
- My name is Greg McScotch! You don't get more Scottish than that!
- It's King Prince Charles, and Queen (She's Not Really The Queen) Camilla.