APPLAUSE
Well!
Good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening,
good evening, good evening.
And welcome to QI, where tonight the crowd is baying, the adrenalin's pumping
and we're ready for fight or flight.
In the red corner, we have Sean "Fists Of Fury" Lock
and "Gentleman" Johnny Vegas!
APPLAUSE
And...in the blue corner, Pam "Float Like A Bee" Ayres
and Alan "Sting Like A Butterfly" Davies!
APPLAUSE
Fabulous.
So on your flights of fancy tonight, you may want to buzz somebody,
so fire away. Pam goes...
MACHINE-GUN AND PLANE ENGINE
Oh, wow. It's like a machine-gun.
- Do you know, I think it actually IS a machine-gun. - I think it is a machine-gun.
Johnny goes...
PLANE DIVES AND SHOTS FIRE
- Oh, with full body swerve. - I think I should lean. He's all over me!
And Sean goes...
HEAVY FIRE
Pumping. And Alan goes...
FAST DIVE THEN CRASH
Oh, dear.
APPLAUSE
And so we plummet straight into our first topic, which is freefall parachuting.
We've got some film for you. Pay close attention.
So what happens next?
That's the question.
He's about to pull the ripcord and what will happen?
That area around my groin, it went a sort of a yellow colour.
Alan, I can understand doing one exciting thing at a time,
but why do freefalling AND sodomy at the same time?
Why not just do one and THEN the other?
It was such a reasonable price.
Was it literally all-in?
But in fact, what is the thing that happens after the ripcord is pulled?
- I did a parachute jump. - I know. You did a static one, didn't you? - I did a static-line one.
I just want to put this in, so you know I'm a woman of some substance.
I did one on my own, where the bloke hits you on the shoulder
and says, "Go!" And as you go, the string becomes taut and pulls off
the bag and the parachute opens.
- That's very much... - This is what you hope happens. - And did it? - Yes.
- I believe... - It was a great relief. - I believe that you, as it happens, obviously, like Alan, felt some...
- erotic feelings towards your instructor. Is that correct? - I did.
I took a shine to the instructor.
I think that's why I jumped out the aircraft, really, cos I wanted to impress him.
I often do that. If I like a woman, I jump out of the window.
- Just to show them that I really care. - "Are you impressed?"
I dig chicks in flats!
No, what of course we wanted you to say, which you're not stupid enough
to say, but I have to confess, this is really because I as a child was convinced...
- Every time I'd seen... - You shoot upwards? - Yeah. That when you open the parachute, the guy goes upwards.
And of course, I subsequently learned that it's because
the cameraman who's showing it is still in freefall, so relative
to him, it looks as if you're going up.
- Look, we can see. - There he goes!
- It looks so much as if you're just shooting upwards. - Yeah. It's the most lovely feeling
when the canopy opens, because you can see everything and you've got your toggles
- and you can gently steer... - Also, you know you're not going to die. - Yeah.
That was THE moment for me.
The euphoria when it opens.
How high up were you?
I was 12,000ft.
- 12,000? - Mm. - That's pretty high. I mean, that's, what...?
- 45 seconds of freefall. - Two and a half miles.
Want to know what the world record is? Can you guess what the world record is?
- Well, someone went nearly to space, didn't they, and jumped out? - Almost, yes.
Which is in fact was 32,000 metres, which is something...
18 miles up...? Something like that.
- Don't you freeze or your eardrums go or something? - Well, I can imagine if you had flappy cuffs,
it would be very noisy on the way down. He actually went...he went as far...
- Who was it, Adam Ant, did this jump? - He went as a fop.
- He achieved... - I'm a dandy highwayman!
Well, he achieved a speed of 614mph...
- Gosh! - which is pretty scary, but he said it was gorgeous.
He said it was as if he'd remained stationary and the balloon had shot
upwards, so it was rather to that effect. Now, why did "Shorty" Longbottom have a pink Spitfire?
MACHINE-GUN AND PLANE ENGINE
- Who...? Ooh, Pam. - It was puffed.
LAUGHTER
- It was...? Say again. - Puffed!
- Puffed? - It was PUFFED-OUT, yes.
- Oh, I see. - It was exhausted from its exertions. - Oh, I see!
LAUGHTER
Thank God for that!
I was worried for a moment that we'd strayed into territory
- that just wasn't quite right, somehow. - No.
Actually, it was a pretty new one and it was a very light one.
- It was a very special one. - Did he take hen-dos out on a weekend?
You know, when the war slowed down?
- It got dull. - Some lass with an L-plate on,
did he get her in the back and take her around town?
What were the female members of the RAF? What were they called?
- Wrens. - WAAFs. - WAAFs. And how would you know that?
- Because I was one. - Oh! We seem to be in your territory again.
Yeah, I joined the Women's Royal Air Force
and I went to Singapore and Germany and I had a very nice time.
- Excellent. - LAUGHTER
- It's very good to know. - You should do recruiting. - You should!
"I had a lovely time."
I've always been looking for the recruiting sergeant with a bread knife, as a matter of fact,
because he said to me, "What do you like doing?",
and I said, "Drawing," and he put me in a drawing office,
which was all maths and technical drawing and that,
and I couldn't do it.
- What a bad man! - Yes, he was a bad man.
Evil. Evil.
They did that to me at school, they said, "What do you want to do?"
I said, "Maths." They put me in a maths class!
- No! - Can you believe that? - That's not good enough.
When I was obviously built for dancing.
LAUGHTER
It was outrageous.
Was your drawing anything to do with aerial photographs?
- That sort of thing, yes. - Well, then, this answer...
- I can give you a little bit of inside info, here. - Go on.
If you are studying aerial photography
and you see a photograph which contains a cricket pitch,
and you happen to know the focal length of the camera,
you can calculate the scale.
I thought you were going to say, "Calculate the score" then.
- Because you know a cricket pitch is 22 yards, therefore... - Yes.
But presumably, when the Spitfire's flying over Germany,
the Germans are the kind of utter swine who won't play cricket.
- LAUGHTER - So it was tricky if you didn't have- a cricket pitch on the photograph.
But suppose in the early days of the war,
you wanted to send an aeroplane over to take photographs...
Is it some sort of disguise? Camouflage?
Camouflage is the right answer.
- Pink skies, or pink... - Yeah.
Actually, first they made it blue, and that stood out. And there it is.
"Shorty" Longbottom's pink Spitfire.
If it did get spotted when it was taking pictures,
wouldn't the other planes just naturally flirt with it?
You'd think this would be the big...
The pilots would abandon their dog-fighting skills
and just go, "Hello!"
It came back from the Dambusters thing pregnant.
Well, it certainly shows...
You've got to love your country
to be prepared to go up in one of those,
but when it's a cloudy day, the sky has a sort of pink tinge to it.
A pink, pearly tone, doesn't it?
- Yes. - Or alternatively, if you want to camouflage your aircraft,
you could paint it as a ship.
LAUGHTER
Yes.
And it was at that point that Ayres was asked to leave the round.
Yes.
Exactly.
The whole of Germany turned into that bloke
from the Laurel And Hardy films.
Throwing booze away.
Exactly.
Stephen, I must point out, I can't hear anything you say!
I'm just...
You're welcome to stay like that, or take it off.
If the show's going well, let me keep talking.
Well, there we are.
Reconnaissance Spitfires were painted pink to match the clouds.
Now, who gives a flying fff-fish?
- There they are. - Gosh! - Aren't they amazing? - Lovely, aren't they?
- Beautiful animals. - I was told that flying fish only ever fly alone.
That sounds like a code, Alan.
"Flying fish only fly alone."
I've seen them. They fly in shoals.
I was on scuba-diving trip and I met a German and he was adamant.
"Zey only fly alone!"
They would fly on their own, wouldn't they?
What you mean is they don't fly in a formation like the Red Devils.
They don't leap out and pass one another, like that.
No, they don't do that.
Do you know what the French for a flying fish is?
Poisson...d'aeroplane?
LAUGHTER
Actually, it's slightly more creepy
for those of us of a certain generation.
It's Exocet.
- Oh, gosh. - And what do you know of the Exocet?
It's a missile.
It was a missile, yes. It was used against us in the Falklands War.
So do they fly or glide?
Neither.
I've seen them and they fly for...
Sorry, Johnny, I'm so excited I must say this.
They fly for ages.
When I saw them, my first flying fish,
I couldn't believe they were really fish, because they flew for so long,
and they weave and they sort of duck and dive, like that.
I thought, "They cannot be fish", because they flew for so long.
They flew for minutes and minutes and minutes,
and then suddenly they all go plonk,
and they're gone, so you know they were really fish.
I don't know what you were eating or drinking on that occasion,
but I have it here on pretty solid authority
that 30 seconds is a long time for them to stay in the air in one go.
Which is a long glide, 30 seconds.
It appears that they glide,
but even if they move these pectoral fins
that have become their wings, even slightly,
that would count as flying but it seems they are fixed.
Who's going to tell Pam that she probably witnessed a duck?
LAUGHTER
It wasn't a duck. I heard what he said. It wasn't a duck.
It was not a duck at all.
- No? - Is that what he said? - He did. He may have done.
And my sister breeds ducks,
so I know the difference between a duck and a flying fish.
It just looks to me like you keep telling me to eff off.
You - duck - duck - fish.
I didn't realise you'd noticed.
That kind of language, Pam. I'm glad my ears are cut off.
The people who most love them are the people of Tao,
an island off Taiwan, where it's their staple diet.
- Do they taste nice, then? - Well, I...
- Hard to catch, I'd have thought. - Exactly.
Do you use a 12-bore or a net?
Or one in each hand. That's what I do.
No, you'd just make a little landing strip.
LAUGHTER
Put some lights on it, you know, some tea candles.
Then wave them in!
Stand there with a stick, waiting for them to go...
Bring it in?
Oh, they've all got grand ideas of being jumbo jets.
Here's a supplementary question, however.
What's the opposite of a flying fish?
Tunnelling flamingo.
LAUGHTER
Is it going to be some sort of bottom-dwelling...
- What do fish do, usually? - Is it a sinking bat? - Fish usually swim.
- What usually flies? - Birds. - Birds. - Birds.
- A swimming bird. - A swimming bird. - Come on, that's a point.
- There's loads of them. - There are loads of them,
- but which birds are particularly astonishing? - Chocolate biscuit.
- Cormorants. - Chocolate biscuit!
- Chocolate biscuit. - P-P-Pick up a-a-a-a... A stork.
LAUGHTER
No, it is indeed a penguin and they have their wings,
which are of course now perfect flippers for swimming,
but the fact is, to a scientist,
swimming and flying are absolutely no different.
It's the same muscles, the same principles at work,
it's just the medium of one is water and the other is air.
As far as the penguin's concerned, it's doing what all birds do.
It's just doing it in the water.
It looks magnificent but what's the point of developing that,
if no other birds can see it?
It... Why would it want other birds to see it?
You're going, "It's magnificent."
He's swimming round going, "Look at this! Look what I've done!"
All the other birds are going, "Look at that BEEP!"
We're the only creatures, Johnny, that like to show off, I think.
I don't think animals like to show off, do they?
Apart from peacocks, and quite a few others, come to think of it now.
LAUGHTER
In fact, all of them. And the ones with the spines and the horns.
LAUGHTER
So, from flying fish to the fishing fly. Ho ho.
Why do women make the best fishermen?
MACHINE-GUN FIRE
They're all descended from mermaids.
LAUGHTER
It's a very sweet thought.
I don't know that that's true.
I can imagine you whispering that into a girl's ear.
And in 1654, they negotiated a deal with the octopus witch
to let them also have their voices back.
LAUGHTER
I need to write this down!
If I can teach my kids this.
- This is... - 16...
- It was a massive summit. - Was it?
You might be right, Johnny. I'm not sure. I'll check.
It was like Rivers Of Blood speech,
because a lot of the mackerel were told to BLEEP in shoals.
Right. I see that now. OK. OK.
- I think I actually know this. - Yes? Go on.
- Tell, tell. - I did know a bloke,
he used to get his wife to give him a discarded pubic hair,
because there was a chemical in it
and he used to hair-rig his boilies fishing for carp,
because they think it gives off...
You're absolutely right. This is what people think.
APPLAUSE
You're right.
We called him a pervert for years.
You're right that this is what people think.
As it happens, it is completely untrue.
LAUGHTER
Someone wrote a letter to The Field in which he said
he'd had huge success using his wife's pubic hairs,
and a whole generation of fishermen copied this.
There was a belief that pheromones, which are probably the chemicals you were after,
pheromones that women give off...
But there are a number of problems with this,
- there is absolutely no evidence that humans give off pheromones of any kind. - So why are women...
The fact is, the British record for the largest fish caught
on these islands is held by women.
There was a 64lb salmon caught by a Miss Georgina Ballantyne.
The fact is, she was a very experienced angler.
Why does she think it's a saxophone?
LAUGHTER
- She does. - "We'll be in a relationship."
- "Oh, dear God, throw me back!" - In fact...
And there was a 66lb catfish caught at Oundle
by another woman, Bev Street.
The point is, if men had caught these enormous fish,
no-one would be groping around for reasons
as to why men were good fishermen. The fact that women hold the record
has everyone suddenly going, "There must be some explanation for that.
"It can't be because they're good at fishing.
"It must be because they give off a chemical!"
Bizarre theory. Well, there you have it, anyway.
Fantastic.
Now, when lions fight bears, which one wins?
LAUGHTER
MACHINE-GUN FIRE
- Yes, Johnny? - Which one's had the Stella?
Let's leave your sponsor out of it if we can, Johnny.
Is the answer that they never meet, they're on different continents?
They wouldn't naturally meet but as it happens, they have met.
It's been organised. A very sick human...
It's been organised?
In a car-park?
Kind of in a car park, in California, I'm afraid.
It was during the Gold Rush.
I'd back a lion.
- You'd go with the lion, would you? - KLAXON
Oh, no. I'm afraid it is the bear every time.
- Really? - The skull of the lion is thin
and although it's muscular, it has no real bone-strength
in the way that a bear does,
and a bear can just crush the skull of a lion like that.
The lion never gets a chance to get in there
and do its thing on the neck,
and the bear would win every time.
It was during the Gold Rush, the Californians,
to entertain the prospectors and the miners,
started with bears against various other animals.
- Against a bull, for example. - Yuck. How horrible.
It's so cruel and unpleasant.
People got bored with the bear winning, so they shipped in lions
and the lions put on a brave show to start with,
and everyone thought they would win,
- and they roared in there but the bear was just too... - Dnnn!
- Every time... - Poor old lion. - ..Crushed its skull.
- My dad was a boxer. - Was he? - Yeah.
Mine was an Irish setter.
- Was he? - LAUGHTER
Sorry.
Was he really?
Very superstitious man, he was.
He had this horseshoe that he took everywhere with him.
Yes?
And he kept it in the boxing glove?
You must have known my dad!
That would backfire, though.
- That would break your hand, wouldn't it? - You feel it would.
Let's come to a question almost on that very subject,
because it's interesting. Name something that's easier to do when you're wearing boxing gloves.
Frisk a porcupine!
Very good!
Give up masturbating!
LAUGHTER
Yes, I suppose.
Yes, but I suppose what I was coming to
was what's so bizarre about boxing gloves, in a way,
is that what it really makes it easier to do is to kill someone.
- Yeah. - It's a lot easier to kill people wearing boxing gloves
- than it was ever in the bare-knuckle days. - Why?
In those days almost no-one ever died.
There were two recorded instances
in 150 years of bare-knuckle prize-fighting.
I like the shorts!
They're pretty splendid, aren't they?
You can't hit someone as hard, can you? Repeatedly.
The thing is, if you try and hit someone on the jaw,
you break your own fist,
so in the old days people punched against the chest
and the stomach and the arms and everything else,
but they avoided the chin - they would hurt themselves.
As soon as you put gloves on,
- they were battering each other in the face... - I see.
I mean, four people a year die in America alone from boxing injuries.
It's a very dangerous sport indeed.
But in the bare-knuckle days, which had no time limits to their rounds,
people would survive and walk away.
In the words of the British boxer
and former world middleweight champion Alan Minter,
"Sure, there have been injuries and deaths in boxing,
"but none of them serious."
Now, what kind of birds used to go out with Viking sailors?
Turkeys. Chickens.
- No. - Geese.
Swans. Birds we didn't have here till they arrived.
- They helped them find their way... - Yes. - ..Through the fog.
Not through the fog, no.
It was to discover new lands, which the Vikings liked to do.
What would be the purpose of it?
How useful would a bird be? It's really cunning, this.
- Is it one that would go up high and see further than you could see? - Yes.- A talking bird!
Either that, or imagine a bird that couldn't land on the water, couldn't swim...
So when it saw land, it would head towards land and you'd follow it.
- But if there was no land? - It would drown? - No, get back in the ship. - Oh, right.
It would go, "There's nowhere for me to go but the ship." It had to be a non-migratory bird,
one that doesn't usually fly over the water, that can't land in the water.
You'd let it fly. It goes up to about 5,000ft and you can still see it.
If there's land, it will shoot off to the land, so you follow it in that direction.
If there's no land and you're still right in the middle of the ocean, it would
come back down again and you'd carry on sailing. Yes?
- Is it a budgie? - It's not a budgie.
What a pity.
- It's actually a... Noah uses it. - Is it a gander?
- It's not a gander. - Is it a dove?
- No. Before the dove, if you remember, in the Bible, he used... - Punters, help us.
- Raven. - Very good.
I was going to say that.
I was going to say that at the start.
- Ah! There it is, there's the raven. Yes, a raven. - Can't land on water.
So the religious maniac in the audience got it right.
No, I'm only joking. It was indeed. Of course, Noah used that first. Isn't that a cunning thing to do?
There was a particular Viking, and his name was Flopsi...
Is he the one with the pink ship?
- LAUGHTER - No, I got his name a bit wrong.
- Did he have very long ears? - There was a group of them.
Floki is to this day apparently... Vilgerdarson, he is known to this day as Raven-Floki
because he discovered, at least for the Vikings,
he discovered Iceland that way, by sending a raven.
- Now in which direction do rockets... - What if the ravens...
Sorry. What if the ravens are sat in a studio now, making their own show,
going, "And it was the first raven that ingeniously used humans..."
I like the way your mind works.
"..to transport us..." You know what I mean?
Johnny, they wouldn't say that. They wouldn't say that. They'd go, "Kaa! Kaa!"
Think these things through!
- I believe they would say... - There's nothing worse than a half-baked idea.
Oh, don't bully the poor thing.
Right, in which direction do rockets accelerate best?
- HEAVY FIRE - Yes?
- Down. - No.
- I just felt like doing that. - Oh, fair enough.
Do they leave the ground quicker
than they return to the ground? Is that the thing?
No, it's where do they get their maximum acceleration? In which position?
- Horizontal. - Horizontal is the right answer.
Although they have to leave quickly like that,
they tip and the moment their weight is not over the thruster,
they generate lift and they're like planes, almost.
And most of their work is done horizontally, not vertically.
- But you know when there was the Greenham Common protest about cruise missiles? - I remember that.
And one of the things they used to say was, "Oh, these missiles, they're shaped like penises.
"They're about man's aggression."
And you're thinking, "They're shaped like that because that's the most aerodynamic shape."
They wouldn't be very successful if they were shaped like vaginas, would they?
And now to the point where, as your flight instructor, I propel
you towards the yawning void of general ignorance, so fingers on your firing buttons, if you please.
Which of the armed services refers to the left and right sides of an aeroplane as port and starboard?
HEAVY FIRE
- Yes? - That would be the Navy, wouldn't it?
Oh, it's not the Navy, in fact.
- For very good reasons. - The RAF?
The RAF do and the Army does, and all the others, but not the Fleet Air Arm or the Navy,
because they have aeroplanes on boats sometimes,
at different angles, and they have to keep port and starboard as being
according to the axis of the boat.
Otherwise, if the plane's facing the wrong way, you could get death and confusion and disaster.
So in the training manuals for that sea harrier, it says the left wing and the right wing.
And now, what's this chap wearing, here?
Please show me, while we're still in the Navy and the Army.
A busby.
Oh, thank you, Pam. You were doing so well. No, he's not wearing a busby.
- A bearskin? - It is a bearskin, yes. - I was going to say a medal.
It is called a busby though, isn't it?
It's not called a busby. We will show you a busby.
There, on the right hand and the left hand.
Those are busbies. Much shorter. But what is the bearskin made of?
- Bear. - Nylon? - Wood? - Acrylic.
- Bear. - You're quite right. - Ostensibly, bear hair.
Bear hair. They tried making bearskins out of acrylics and nylons and various other things,
but they get bedraggled in the wet and they stand up with static electricity and look preposterous.
So, of course, you wouldn't want to look preposterous on parade.
What would win in a fight between them two hats?
If you go back to the first photograph, of the guy in the bearskin, there. Do you know, Pam,
- because you said your... Who did you say was in the Guards? - My dad was a Grenadier Guard.
Now, there are five regiments in the Brigade Of Guards. Can you tell me which he's in?
- There's a way of telling. - I'm afraid I don't know.
- My father wouldn't be very pleased with me. - Buttons. - Yes.
The Grenadier Guards' buttons are evenly spaced.
In pairs, like this, it means he's in the Coldstream Guards.
- Oh, I didn't know that. - If they're in threes, you're in the Scottish Guards.
- And there's an Irish Guards. - In fours, it's the Irish Guards, and fives is the Welsh Guards.
What if you've got a zip?
- A zip? - Yeah. Or you're like a stripper, it's just Velcro.
I'm going to change your guard!
I'm going to be trooping my colour!
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
Oh, dear.
Guards were indeed very...
There were lots of stories about men doing things with Guardsmen in the '50s and '60s.
And that story of Churchill being woken up one morning when he was PM in the '50s
and he was told, "I'm afraid there's a bit of a scandal, Prime Minister.
"One of our backbench MPs was found with a Guardsman in St James's Park in the bushes last night
"by the police, and the papers have got hold of it."
Churchill said, "Last night?" He said, "Yes."
Churchill said, "It was very cold last night, wasn't it?"
And the PPA said, "Well, yes, actually, Prime Minister.
"I believe it was one of the coldest February nights for 30 years."
Churchill said, "Makes you proud to be British."
Don't think they'd have that attitude now.
Anyway, yes, the tall hat worn by the Foot Guards is a bearskin.
Short one with the flap worn by the Hussars and the Royal Horse Artillery, that's a busby.
And now, be very afraid.
Be very, very afraid indeed. Or invite me to come outside, because I'm ready to tell you the scores.
Oh, no!
Well, it's really, really interesting.
In first place, would you believe,
and it's only her first appearance, it's Pam Ayres!
- Oh! - ENTHUSIASTIC APPLAUSE
In second place, with plus one, is Johnny Vegas!
Yeah!
Miles behind, with minus 11, is Alan Davies, who's not last!
Which means that freefalling at terminal velocity this evening,
on minus 12, Sean Lock!
APPLAUSE
So that's all from us this week. My thanks to Sean, Johnny,
Pam and Alan, and I leave you with this thought on the subject of fight or flight from Michael Freedman.
The scientific name for an animal that doesn't either run from or fight its enemies is "lunch".
Goodnight.
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