CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Good evening, buona sera, bon soir,
good evening, good evening, good evening
and welcome to QI, where tonight we are looking at lungs,
livers and other bits beginning with L.
Joining me are the luscious legs of Jo Brand.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
The lustrous locks of Phill Jupitus.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
The lovely larynx of Josh Widdicombe.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
And the lily-livered Alan Davies.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
So, let's examine your organs. Jo goes...
FIRST FEW BARS OF TOCCATA AND FUGUE BY BACH
Phill goes...
NEXT FEW BARS OF TOCCATA AND FUGUE BY BACH
Josh goes...
NEXT FEW BARS OF TOCCATA AND FUGUE BY BACH
And Alan goes....
LA CUCARACHA PLAYS ON ELECTRIC ORGAN
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
Anyway, in this L series, we have a special bonus,
which is if there's a lavatorial question, it's a Spend A Penny.
- There you go. - JAUNTY JINGLE, FLUSHING
Because L is for lavatory,
there may be a question which involves something lavatorial.
If you think you've spotted the question, wave your penny.
So, let's have a look at question one.
What was the problem with the first ever contact lenses?
- ORGAN MUSIC PLAYS - Jo Brand?
Were they made of hydrochloric acid?
- LAUGHTER - That would have been a serious problem.
I presume they were massive and heavy and awkward and difficult?
They were very awkward, massive and difficult.
I'll give you 20 years either way to say what year they first appeared.
- ALAN AND JOSH: 1920. - Oh, that's weird.
Whoa!
- Scary. - That was odd!
No, it's not that. 1880, actually.
It was in Germany, where they grind lenses extremely well.
And there was one pioneer called August Muller,
who could only wear them for half an hour,
and then only after he had used cocaine on his eyes to numb them
cos they were very, very painful.
- Best excuse ever! - Yeah.
"Oh, my eyes, they're so..."
- "Mein augen!" Yeah. - "Ooooh...."
LAUGHTER
"Oh, my eyesight is so irritable and keen!"
"My eyes are talking nonsense!"
They used to saw off the bottom of test tubes
and then grind them smooth and put them in.
They were used not for vision correction.
Originally, they were concealing eye damage and things like that,
to protect sensitive eyes. And then...
Was the eye damage caused by the contact lenses?
Well, you'd think! But then they got more sophisticated with it.
By the 1920s and '30s in America they were quite popular,
but only with incredibly rich people.
- That's quite a big one, there. - That is big.
LAUGHTER
In the '20s and '30s they cost more than a car, one set.
So, it was only very rich daddies who would let...
Because their daughters didn't want to wear glasses.
And if you watch Hollywood movies of the '30s and '40s,
you will see that no actress wears glasses,
except an actress who is playing a part that is basically
a librarian, a dowd, a frump...
I'm not looking at you when I'm saying that!
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
- IN AMERICAN ACCENT: - "Why, Miss Quimby, you're beautiful!"
Anyway, we have borrowed some objects
from the world-famous British Optical Association Museum.
And you each have, and I'm going to start with Phill,
you have an optical object
and I'd like you to tell me what you think it might be.
Oh. Right.
- Well, it's got a lovely leather surround. - Yes.
- Right, so why would you want to see things this red? - Yeah.
Was it for nascent superhero Communist Man?
LAUGHTER
Are they literally rose-tinted glasses? Are you feeling...?
"Ah, the '80s! The Style Council!"
LAUGHTER
"The Guardian with a decent header font. Oh!"
LAUGHTER
"Araucaria, his crosswords were easy, then. Oh!"
- Pump up the volume... - "Billy Bragg! Billy Bragg!"
- As you can see, they look like flying goggles. - Yeah, yeah.
And that's what they are, but they're not for flying.
- Then they're not flying goggles. - JO: Driving.
- They are for... - Don't be picky, he doesn't like that.
They are for pilots. They're for night pilots.
- It's so they can acclimatise their eyes for darkness. - Oh. - Oh!
So they go to the canteen where the lady says...
- ALAN SPEAKS GERMAN - .."Flying tonight, love?"
Cos if you're flying tonight, you've got extra eggs and bacon
because the chances were you wouldn't come back.
I would say that rather they make everyone you bump into
- look like a Dutch prostitute. - Yeah, there is an element of that.
Dance for me, Stephen! Dance for me.
Oh!
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
You made me!
All right.
You are a unique individual, if you don't mind me saying.
Have a go.
Why can't I dance without people laughing?!
- I don't understand! - You bring joy, you're like...
I missed that lesson that everybody else went to at school
where they were taught how to dance at a discotheque.
LAUGHTER
Anyway, Alan, what have you got that's optical?
- It looks like an ordinary pair of glasses. - Yeah, it is.
And it has three...
Put them on and describe what you see.
LAUGHTER
- You won't be surprised to hear that my vision is somewhat obscured. - Yes.
LAUGHTER
- But look at the audience. - They make three...
And what do I...? What can you see? Can you see...?
They're kind of like binoculars, where you can see...
- Can you see me doing anything? - No.
Are they not working, Alan?
Dance. Dance!
Whoa!
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
Are they meant to be for peripheral vision?
- They were designed for drivers who had... - Jesus!
LAUGHTER
Who had bad eyesight and it was to improve their peripheral vision.
But it clearly doesn't work!
There'd be no chance of driving in these!
You'd just be like that all the time!
LAUGHTER
Well, that's unfortunate.
Well... But thank you for trying them and next up is Josh.
- What have you got? - They're very fashionable, aren't they?
Yeah.
No, what you haven't done though...
- PHILL: - "I will take the red pill."
LAUGHTER
- What you haven't... - Oh, I see!
Yeah, you haven't...fully... exploited their...
Exactly, what have you got there? Corners.
- Now put them on. - Oh!
No, they're exactly the same...
If I were to tell you that these are, despite their modern look,
they're actually WAY over 100 years old.
They're mid-19th century.
What do you think they might help with?
- Um... - If I were to say one of the great British love stories...
Oh!
- Wow. - Very good.
- They just keep getting... - Yeah, the gift that keeps giving.
But one of the great British love story movies.
Strangers On A Train... No.
- You're in the right area. - Brief Encounter.
Brief Encounter.
How do they meet, Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard in Brief Encounter?
- Train station? - It was... He... - She leans out the window...
And pokes him in the eye.
She gets something in her eye?
She gets a smut in her eye, he's a doctor,
he comes with a hanky...
The basic thing is...
From the open carriage days of railways onwards,
because of steam, smuts, so on, people got really stung in the eyes.
- And these were railway spectacles. - I'm sorry, who's speaking now?
LAUGHTER
That makes no sense!
And yet it's funny.
So, if she'd had a pair of these, that wouldn't have been quite the film it was, would it?
It really wouldn't. It would've lasted about ten minutes.
If he'd had a pair of these on, he'd have poked her eye out!
I think I could tell what they do better, Josh, if you'd dance for me.
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
- Never got that reaction before! - Yeah.
I wish I'd brought more Edam.
Is that a kind of ecstasy cheese?
Oh, there's a thing the drug dealers haven't thought of...
- Ecstasy cheese! - ..psychotropic cheeses!
- ALAN: Edam. - Edam.
Jo, it's your turn.
Oh, you've got a bonnet.
Lovely bonnet.
Oh, and something hanging from it, there you are.
LAUGHTER
How cool is THAT?
That's great, isn't it?
You are Mrs Norris in Mansfield Park.
It's a Jane Austen moment.
"Holmes, I never realised it was you!"
I can't see a bloody thing through it, though.
What am I supposed to be able to see?
I honestly think you look absolutely gorgeous.
If there had been...
If there had been a character from Mansfield Park in Colditz, she...
"So...
"So, you vish to escape from mein prison camp.
"Not before we have done a little embroidery, no?"
LAUGHTER
I think it's more sort of Dickensian, isn't it?
Like Mrs Gamp, the elderly prostitute.
"I say, sir, let me see your penis."
Now, this is what these goggles were for!
She's got the idea, that one! These are definitely Dutch.
- I'm going to have to... - "Even with my monocle, it's awfully small."
Oh!
You know how to make a man feel very, very unhappy.
SHE MOUTHS
Enough, enough. I have... I have the most delicate from this museum...
It's a fan. It's an eventail.
Beautiful fan, for fanning yourself, obviously,
but it has a secret lens in the middle,
so I can see what you're doing.
So it allows people who apparently are fanning themselves
and not taking any notice of anyone else
to have a very...
- I'm not going to lie to you... - Yeah.
There is a slight different technique when you start looking at me to when you're fanning yourself.
- STEPHEN LAUGHS - Mm!
God, you're really fanning yourself very slowly there, Stephen.
Rrrreow!
- Yeah... - I think I'm putting these back on.
- Yes, and they were very popular. - I've just actually...
A friend of mine.... Cos, like, opera glasses always seem really
- old-fashioned, don't they? - Aren't they? Mm.
And he was at the theatre with his elderly aunt,
she'd never seen them before, and she said, "How do these work?"
He said, "You just put your money in
"and then you can see what's going on onstage," and she went,
"Can't see a thing!"
LAUGHTER
Oh, that's very sweet.
So, good, excellent.
Name something this lizard is doing as well as running.
ORGAN MUSIC PLAYS
Yes, Josh?
Is he worrying what's wrong with his legs?
He might be.
I don't think lizards ever worry. He looks quite cheerful.
- What might he be doing, what do all animals do, virtually? - Hunting?
- Hunting, yeah. - Sniffing.
- Sniffing, what does that involve? - Breathing. - Well, uses its tongue.
- What do you mean, what does it involve? - Breathing?
- Breathing, Josh said. - KLAXON SOUNDS
Oh! Sorry. I was cruel, I pushed you on that. He's not breathing.
That's the strange thing about lizards,
they have to twist their bodies so much
that it compresses their lungs and they can't breathe.
So, they do a bit of a run and then they stop, as we'll see.
He's running, running, running, not breathing at all,
and then he thinks, "Oh, blimey, I need some oxygen!"
- He'll stop. - STEPHEN PANTS
It's only when he's straight, only when he's heteros...
No, only when he's straight...
that he can...
That's just silly, makes no sense.
- ..that he can breathe. - You were like the Oxbridge Johnny Morris, then.
"He's running along, baaa, oh, no."
But we have an example. The fastest humans on Earth run which race?
- 100 metres. - The 100 metres, and it's said that some 100-metres sprinters
don't breathe throughout the race.
I mean, they obviously take gulps in, oxygenate themselves,
get all ready, like that, and then they're running and...
And you see them in slow motion, going...
And then lower down,
"Phedabida, phedabida, phedabida." And, um...
LAUGHTER
- Is that the noise it makes? - That's the noise it makes. - Wow.
When it reaches 20mph, that's the noise it starts to make.
Wow!
Yeah, exactly.
"Phedabida!"
- # Doo doo, do-do-do. # - LAUGHTER
I happen to have a friend who was a judge
- in the Linford Christie lunch box case... - Lookalike competition!
- No, lunch box case. - Oh. - Who's that?
I can't remember what it was about, but there was this issue of
his lunch box came up, Linford Christie's lunch box,
and the judge said, "What exactly IS a lunch box?"
And I teased him about it, and he said,
"No, no, I want you to understand I knew exactly what it meant,
"but I have to ask on behalf of the jury,"
that's why judges are always quoted as saying,
"And so what is a muppet precisely?
"Are you saying he was a member of the Beatles?
"Are you saying he was a ladybird, or some sort of...?"
No, it's... But, yeah.
- I've got a thing. Has anyone else got... - Have you, darling?
- LAUGHTER - And it goes "phedabida".
LAUGHTER
- I can't walk and drink at the same time. - Ah.
I really struggle with it.
- Is that normal? - No, I think it is. Who wants to throw in their...
Well, I think you'd have to go slowly,
because the motion creates a wave
- that will slop over the side of the glass. It's just... - Exactly.
..physics.
LAUGHTER
Yeah, the ability to do two things at once.
We can ask the audience and we can ask you,
it's easier for the audience cos of the way they're sitting down.
All you have to do is revolve your right foot clockwise.
That's easy, isn't it? And then, with your right hand, make a six.
Is your foot suddenly going...?
- Oh, wow! That's weird! - Oh, I don't like that. - Isn't that extraordinary!
- What was it? What foot? Right foot. - That's weird.
- Right foot clockwise. - Yeah. - And then do a six.
- You have to think about it. - You really do, don't you? - Oh! Oh!
That was instant!
You really have to think about it
to the point where you nearly break your foot off.
You forget what's clockwise.
And you start going up and down and not...
Argh, argh, no!
- I'm absolutely fighting it! - You're in agony.
But I couldn't do the six, I couldn't finish the six. I just did a C.
Yes. Exactly. It's a bitch, isn't it? It's really fascinating.
Oh, I'm going to remember that one.
People say, "What do you remember from QI?" And I remember nothing!
- Even if you watch your foot. - Yeah.
I mean, this isn't great television, what I'm doing at this moment.
You can raise your foot, put your foot on the desk if you want.
Right, so...
- glad I wore my natty socks today. - Yeah, they've very natty.
Argh!
It is fascinating, isn't it?
I can't even remember what a six looks like!
LAUGHTER
Oh, little Alan, I'm so sorry!
I won't able to walk, I'll be going...
"Aah, help me-e-e-e!"
Just tracks on the pavement.
- Well, you're absolutely right. - Like a Dalek on the stairs.
Did you find that when you were filming Jonathan Creek or something
that sometimes you suddenly kind of forget how to walk?
Because the camera's on you and...
"Oh, do I? How... Oh!"
- Do you ever get that or...? - (No.)
- No. Oh, well... - LAUGHTER
- Damn you! - Sorry!
All right.
Lizards can't breathe and walk at the same time
and our audience are even worse.
Lizards have four legs, but what's got eight legs,
sits in the middle of a spider's web,
but is NOT a spider?
ORGAN MUSIC PLAYS
- Jo Brand? - One and a half flies.
LAUGHTER
- And the half a fly has lost a leg. - Wouldn't that be nine legs?
No, and the half has lost a leg, that's been eaten.
- In theory, that is right. - If... Yes, why...
Don't you hate it when you try and help a spider
and it resists you, and then one of its legs comes off.
- Don't you hate that? - That is so annoying!
Just get on the paper! And daddy-longlegs, they're even worse.
- Yeah, they are. - You'd think the spider could do the six
and the clockwise with its two legs.
It probably can, EASILY.
Yeah, it's laughing up its sleeve at us.
If they have sleeves, eight sleeves, it's laughing up its eight sleeves.
This does seem very bizarre.
It sits in the middle of a web, has eight legs,
looks exactly like a spider, but it isn't a spider.
Is it an unlucky octopus?
- A beached octopus. - A beached octopus!
- Well, given... - Is it some sort of predator that wants to eat spiders?
- Is it one of those? - Actually, it's the reverse.
It's a spider that wants to DETER predators,
so it creates a fake spider.
- Shut up! - There.
That's made of its dead skin,
it's made of leaf mould. It's made of all kinds of bits and pieces.
There you can see the sort of body,
you only see four of the legs there,
it's already making a woman in the audience wet herself.
LAUGHTER
- Did someone just make that? - A spider did.
- Oh, is that real? - Spiders make them. That's the point, they make them.
- Is that to scale? - Well, it's...
Almost, in the sense that it's five times bigger than the actual spider.
So, the spider is quite small and it makes this enormous spider,
and sometimes, it lives in a pouch in the abdomen,
and no-one's quite sure why. They think it may be to deter predators,
because it looks too big, or it may be to suggest
to other spiders that you can't steal this web,
- because it's occupied. - It's like a scarecrow, really, isn't it?
Basically, yeah. Or turning your lights on in your house to put burglars off.
- It may just be a hobby. - Yes.
LAUGHTER
When your life is sitting in the corner of a shed eating flies...
- You need a hobby. - You've got to have something, haven't you?
It is in the middle of the Peruvian jungle,
where there are not so many sheds.
- They don't even eat them, do they? They drink them. - They what?
Because they wrap them up in their silky web
and then the prey dissolves into a fluid
and then they suck it when it's a liquid thing.
- "Hmm, that's good eatin'." - Yeah, isn't it? - Yeah.
The amazing thing is, and this is really extraordinary,
is that another species of spider altogether,
as far away as you can virtually get on the planet,
11,000 or so miles away, across from Peru in the Philippines,
does almost exactly the same thing and nobody knows
if that's convergent evolution or whether it's...
It'd be a weird raft that managed to get all the way across that amount of water.
- It's just God, Stephen, it's just God. - Just God.
LAUGHTER
I overlooked that possibility.
- Mysterious ways, mysterious ways. - Very mysterious ways.
So, that's the Peruvian spider that makes huge models of itself.
Are those spiders to scale?
LAUGHTER
Because, I'm telling you now,
Japan are going to be all over that.
- IN JAPANESE ACCENT: - "Oh, no! Giant spider, no!"
I quite like this map behind Alan, because it looks like...
"And now the spider forecast with Alan Davies.
"South America, large, red."
It's like when you're on a plane and they have the map
with the little plane, if you turned it on and it was that,
you'd shit yourself.
It always has such random cities on it as well, doesn't it?
- It doesn't have like Paris, Rome, Venice. - Yeah, King's Lynn!
- LAUGHTER - Yeah, exactly, it's very strange.
I never quite understood that. Very peculiar.
Anyway! Peruvian spiders make huge models of themselves
and put them in the middle of their webs.
Speaking of things with lots of legs,
why can I never seem to catch the perfect centipede?
ORGAN MUSIC PLAYS
- Yes, Jo? - Is it cos you're too pissed all the time?
LAUGHTER
- Why, thank you for that(!) - Just a guess.
A lucky guess!
Cos they don't have 100 legs.
- They don't have 100 legs. - No.
- Well remembered! - They don't. We had it on this show.
- We did. - LAUGHTER
But it was a long time ago.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
You're absolutely right, but that's not the reason one won't catch a perfect one
cos you could have a perfect one that had...98 legs
because what would 98 legs mean?
That it had how many pairs of legs?
- 49. - 49.
49.
But why can't it have 100?
That'd be 50 pairs...
- No reason. - There is a reason. - Does it have to have an odd number of pairs?
Yes, an odd number of pairs.
For some reason, all centipedes have an odd number of pairs of legs
but that's not the reason I can never catch a perfect one,
cos a perfect centipede would have, say, 102 legs.
The legs are amazing.
- Astounding. - They go in a kind of wave.
Yes, they do. It's not...
Not at the moment cos it's climbing, but when it starts walking,
they go in a wave. Ooh!
- LAUGHTER - Yeah. - That's only got about...
- If only they were massive, I wish they were massive and they went down the - high street. Oh, don't!
No, but nice and benign and friendly - "Hello, morning!"
Like if all vicars were centipedes or something.
- It's just a fact of life, everyone just accept it. - Yeah.
Anyway, moving on...
If I caught a 102-footed centipede that would be a perfect centipede,
but I'm talking about why I can't catch a perfect one.
They're elusive.
They are elusive, but that would be not being able to catch one.
Is it cos nobody's perfect?
LAUGHTER
That's a lovely point. No, it's really because if you chase them
- and you start to try and catch them... - Their legs fall off.
- They jettison legs. - They throw them at you.
- Well, they kind of do. - LAUGHTER
That's basically what they do!
Exactly!
LAUGHTER
They do! You've got it. That's what they do.
APPLAUSE
In order to distract a predator, they jettison their legs.
So, it stops, the predator will go,
"Ooh, I'll have an eat of that leg," and meanwhile, they're haring off.
- God's weird, isn't he? - He really is. A strange fellow.
Very strange fellow. And there are lizards that use a similar technique in Pakistan,
the leopard gecko has a tail that it can shed,
which will keep moving for really quite a considerable time
after it's been discarded, about...
- Keep moving, you say? - Yep.
Yeah, that's one hot gecko.
It's called autotomy. It is self-amputation, if you like,
but it literally will drop its tail and the tail will wiggle
for half an hour after it's been separated from the parent body,
which is... As you say, God is amazing.
Yeah, so there you go. Autotomy.
And speaking of abandoned body parts,
which body part beginning with L
did Queen Victoria leave with the Empress of France?
There's Queen Victoria, and there's the...
- I was going to say labia and that would be just awful. - I know.
What were you going to say?
- KLAXON SOUNDS - Oh!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Oh, dear, dear, dear, dear, dear.
- We're off! - Is it her little finger?
- Liver, larynx. - Is it a lock of hair? - Lock of hair is the right answer!
- CHEERING AND APPLAUSE - Brilliant!
But she virtually invented this sort of
Victorian sentimental obsession with locks of hair.
When her husband died, she kept lots of Albert's hair, but she gave...
- They've taken the photo away, but really... - I know.
..she looks so pissed off that her crown doesn't fit her.
- It just looks like a complete... - Shall we go back? - Yes, can we?
..comedy crown!
"No, honestly, it's absolutely meant to be this size."
"It doesn't fit me!" "Yes, yes, honestly, it's exactly as intended."
"It's for a child!" "No, no, no..."
- The Empress is going, "My bonnet's perfect." - It is.
It's rather like Jo's bonnet. It was, your monocle bonnet.
Yeah, exactly. Aw, you could be the Empress of France.
Double vision. Yes. Do you think I could be the Empress of France?
- Easily. - "Let them eat cake!"
So, let's cut to what she gave.
It was a bracelet made of her own hair.
It's an astonishing gift.
But this was what Victorians were obsessed with.
Knitting, braiding, plaiting, making things out of hair.
Artists powdered hair down. Do you remember those things, as a child,
when you would put glue, like Pritt, the non-sticky sticky stuff on it,
and then you would sprinkle glitter? Do you remember that?
- Copydex. - Or Copydex you could use, which smelt slightly chlorinous
- and was a wonderfully... - Semen.
LAUGHTER
- Not angry. - BOTH: Disappointed.
LAUGHTER
Dear me. Oh, well.
Yeah. That's what artists would do,
they would put glue on and then they'd sprinkle the powdered hair.
So, hair was a big kind of deal.
Lord Byron was considered the most handsome and extraordinary figure.
There you can see a little locket hanging...
Although it's beautifully made as a braid
and with gold, as you can see, and that could be made to fit
into a waistcoat or something, for a man's...
"Here you go, Lady Casterby,
"this watch chain is made of my pubes.
"Ha-ha! And now a poem!"
LAUGHTER
Well, Lord Byron didn't necessarily give his own hair away,
it's that he was so handsome and so adored that...
- LAUGHTER - That's a painting!
But what was wrong with his hands?
It was generally agreed by all who met and knew him,
he was a hugely charming man.
- According to his own diaries anyway. - "Lady Tappleton..."
No, no, he had... Letters were written to him,
women sent him locks of their own hair.
So he used locks of his Newfoundland dog,
which he sent back to the women, which they didn't notice,
they thought it was Byron's hair.
"Lady Suffolk,
"I apologise for giving you mange with my latest gift.
"But meanwhile, I shall come round to your house and I shall rotate
"my right foot and draw a six in the air. Ha-ha! Poem?"
There's a good reason why that might have been difficult for Lord Byron.
- Oh, of course, yes, yes. - He had a dodgy foot.
Despite that, he managed to achieve a great athletic feat.
- He swam. - He swam the...? - Hellespont.
- Straits of somewhere. - The Hellespont!
You know these things, you pretend to be an ignorant pig.
- LAUGHTER - I only went...
- I mean, sorry! You pretend... - An ignorant what?
No, I meant to say you pretend to be pig-ignorant!
- LAUGHTER - And it came out wrong!
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
Know what I'm going to do with you? I'm going to make you run across a field
and I'm going to pull all your legs and arms off...
I don't want to lower the tone, but didn't Lady Caroline Lamb
- pull out handfuls of her pubic hair and send them to Byron? - Yes.
And she was responsible for the most famous description of him.
- Yes. - "Mad, bad and dangerous to know."
"Dangerous to have tea with."
Fabulous woman. There was a movie about her, I think Sarah Miles...
- Yeah. - JO: - Oh, that's right.
Yeah. Yeah, Sarah Miles, she used to drink her own pee.
- Yes, she was a urinobibe. - Yep.
As was the Prime Minister of India, Morarji Desai,
who became prime minister at the age of 80.
And he drank his pee every day.
Anyway, the Empress Eugenie, her name was,
and she was the wife of Napoleon III.
There's Eugenie. She had a fantastic real name -
Dona Maria Eugenia Ignacia Augustina
de Palafox-Portocarrero de Guzman y Kirkpatrick.
- That was her name. - Kirkpatrick.
Yeah.
- APPLAUSE - Thank you. - Crikey.
But what was very pleasing is that she was known as "Carrots".
Because that was her nickname at school in Bristol,
where she lived, and she died in Britain as well.
I had no idea that we had a hipster Napoleon.
- Yeah, he was a hipster, yeah. - Check him out.
- Yeah, he's pretty good. - "Er, can I have a flat white, please?"
LAUGHTER
"No, the jacket, I got it in this vintage place, it's great."
Yes. Queen Victoria gave the Empress of France
a bracelet made of her own hair.
We move now to a less lovely L -
why would you put a leech on a leash?
Is it a medicinal leech?
- It's a medicinal leech. - OK.
So, basically, there are various places you could put it.
Where might you want a leech to go?
No, no!
They've been used for medicinal purposes for centuries.
- They use them in the NHS today, don't they? - Yes, they absolutely do.
- Do they? - Yeah. - You put them on a wound, don't you,
- and they eat bits that are infected or... - No, that's the maggots.
You put maggots on a wound, and they eat the dead flesh.
Leeches actually...
- Have I travelled back in time? - No.
LAUGHTER
Those migraine headaches are caused by a demon living in your...
HE IS DROWNED OUT BY LAUGHTER
If you have a member reattached - a finger or some other member -
it's kept in ice and then it's sewn back on,
and it has a very good prognosis,
but you can attach leeches and what it does is
it actually helps the capillaries join together and thrive.
So, it's like a kind of biologically-active cauterising?
Yes, yeah, it's really extraordinary.
- Oh, I don't care, I don't want it. - Does it hurt?
- It doesn't really hurt much, no. - How do you know?
Well, I'm told it doesn't hurt.
I don't know, you and your public school ways, and...
- "Fry, time for a leeching!" - Yeah, it doesn't...
"Scrotum."
"Yes, sir?"
"Get Fry."
It doesn't hurt as much as double...
"It's time for his leeching."
"What do you want, Scrotum?" "It's time for your leeching, Fry."
It doesn't hurt as much as Dr Staveley slamming your dick
in the desk, I admit.
It's... Look, I love to shock you, it's sweet.
Do you remember John Wayne Bobbitt?
- Oh! - Oh, yeah. - John Wayne Bobbitt.
Yeah, he went to Winchester...
No, no, of course I remember Bobbitt who severed his wife...
His wife severed his...
Yeah, she cut his penis off and then threw it out the window
- of a moving car, so it took some finding. - They took him...
They sewed it back on, then he made some money out of porn films, weirdly!
Yeah, he must have been rather impressed that a penis
that took some finding was found.
He must have thought, "Yes!"
Let's hope they found the right one, that would have been a disaster!
- LAUGHTER - Stop it.
Yeah. I can imagine him at the line-up.
"Can I see number three again?"
You're too used to that programme, that's just sick.
Yep, they were often popped up on a leash, up the bottom,
to deal with intestinal problems.
- Oh, up the inside? - Yep, or down the throat
to deal with bronchial problems.
- Ooh. - Yeah, exactly.
I know, or you could actually use them on the scrotum
for strained testicles. Have you ever had strained testicles?
- I'd rather have leeches on my balls. - JOSH: - What, as a pudding?
Hang on!
- One doctor wrote... - Yeah, strained testicles and custard.
That's what prunes are.
That's prunes.
Yeah, and as I say, these days they're used to encourage
capillary growth on severed members.
Doctors USED to put leeches on leashes
to send them up patients' bottoms.
Now, what did Georgian gentlemen keep in the sideboard
for after dinner?
Small Georgian ladies.
- After Eights. - After Eights!
LAUGHTER
Porn.
After 1713, it would be.
Porn. Well, actually, it was something
that disgusted a French observer and he wrote about it in a letter.
So, you've got a chance here for serious points.
Ah, Alan, quickly!
Shut up, he's done it before me! JAUNTY JINGLE, FLUSHING
Oh, there we are, two of you, three of you.
You all get the points except Jo, I'm afraid.
The fact is, it was chamber pots.
It was Rochefoucauld, not the famous Rochefoucauld,
but another Rochefoucauld, Francois de la Rochefoucauld,
who wrote in his diary "The sideboard..."
This was in Suffolk, in 1784,
"The sideboard is garnished also with chamber pots in line
"with the common practice of going over to the sideboard to pee,
"while the others are drinking.
"Nothing is hidden. I find that very indecent."
Chamber pots lasted well into the 20th century,
because there were many households that weren't on mains supplies.
- Many of them... - They didn't have a WC.
Exactly, they had outdoor loos
and they popped a chamber pot under the bed.
And chamber pots were, I won't say exactly witty,
but they had things written on them
which were quite surprising, really, thinking of a previous age
where you imagine people were rather more prudish. Look at these.
"Use me well and keep me clean.
"And I'll not tell what I have seen."
So, you pooed onto an eye. Or you peed onto an eye.
And there were some during the Second World War that had
a picture of Hitler, so you could poo on Hitler's face.
Which is pleasing in a way.
That's your chamber pot.
Now, it's time to dip the crouton of confidence
into the all-melting fondue of General Ignorance.
What kind of wine goes best with a human liver?
Oh! A Chianti.
- Whoa! - KLAXON SOUNDS
That's what Hannibal Lecter says.
- That's what he says in... - In Silence Of The Lambs.
- "I'll have some fava beans and a fine Chianti." - What are fava beans to...?
- Little white beans, aren't they? - To reclaim your...
- What would we call them in England? - Butter beans? Broad beans?
Broad beans, yeah, you get a few points back from the massive deficit
that you've already...
Um, yeah, it's in the novel. Who wrote the novels involved with...?
- Thomas Harris. - Thomas Harris is right.
He, being rather sort of smart and giving Hannibal Lecter good taste,
knew that something fatty and greasy like a liver is not
complemented well by a Chianti.
He knew that it was best accompanied
by something a little more full-bodied.
Something like, for instance, an Amarone,
which is what is in the novel.
Which is a sort of Valpolicella-type wine,
- and that is... - Why did they change it, Stephen?
Because they felt most people hadn't heard of an Amarone
and they might think it was some sort of biscuit or something.
They're quite correct. It sounds like an amaretto.
- It is like an amaretto, exactly. - What, Hollywood dumbing something down?
- Yeah, I know, it's hard to believe, isn't it? - What the F?!
"White wine with meat? Eurgh!"
But why would it have been a rather disastrous decision to eat
- a human liver anyway? - Toxic? - Yes, they are toxic.
- Do you know what the toxin is? - No. - Is it vitamin something? - Yes.
- Vitamin E? - Actually, A. - A.
A lot of vitamins can't be stored.
As you know, vitamin C, you pee out the residue,
so the idea of taking these 5,000 milligrams a day is just...
- That's why you have bright yellow wee. - Exactly.
You're giving the rats the vitamin C.
You're giving the rats the vitamins, precisely!
They grow more and more immune and stronger daily!
"Why, they'll be as powerful as the Prime Minister of India!"
"I'm recycling!"
But, yeah, the liver, it stores vitamin A,
which in excess can be quite dangerous.
Helps you see at night, though.
Livers can regenerate themselves, did you know that?
- Like Doctor Who. - Like Doctor Who, yeah.
There's the liver drawn by...
- Da Vinci. - Yeah, Leonardo,
and you can see there his famous mirror writing, which is...
I know the drawings are amazing enough, but as a boy,
I tried using a mirror to write mirror writing, it's just...
I mean, you think drawing a six with your hand and doing a...
Why did he do that?
No-one's quite sure why he wanted it to be secret, but he did.
- For Dan Brown! - Yes!
- LAUGHTER - For the one who was... - Whoooo!
Whoooo!
"There's secrets in the Vatican, Josh. Let's go and find them."
I'm genuinely uncomfortable in this situation.
If you use those goggles you can see the map.
- PHILL GASPS - No?!
The amazing thing, the magical thing about livers is
if you take a small liver from a small dog,
and you transplant it into a large dog, the small liver will grow to
the size it would have been in the bigger dog, which is extraordinary.
- (Shut up!) - Wow.
Yes.
You see, I often run out of things to do with the children at weekends.
- Now you know. - We're going to try that. Yeah.
Now, also you know a fantastic slang word
and it's a liver-disturber, and it's American 19th-century slang for?
- An alcoholic? - No.
A huge dong.
- A huge dong? - Yeah, a liver-disturber!
ALL GROAN
- Oh! - Oh! We think... Exactly!
We think WE'RE sick?! These are Victorian Americans!
"I got a tonsil-troubler!"
LAUGHTER
Have you heard the prank call...
A guy phones up the pizza place and he goes, "Do you deliver?"
- Oh, no! - And he says, "Yes, we deliver."
And he goes, "All right, I'll have liver, cheese, onion, olives..."
"We don't have any liver."
"Do you DELIVER?"
"Yes, we deliver." "Right, I'll have liver..."
- And it goes on... - Oh, that is...
It's very likely on the interweb. It's very funny.
Excellent, I'll look it up.
Now, who sat in the middle at the Last Supper?
- SPANISH ACCENT: Jesus. - Jesus?
Oh... KLAXON SOUNDS
No matter how you pronounce it, it wasn't he.
- JOSH: - Judas.
Nor was it Judas, the traitor.
- Peter. - No-one.
Nor was it Peter. No-one is the right answer.
- No-one's in the middle. - No, it's not that no-one was in the middle...
it's that no-one sat.
- Oh, shut up, they're all standing! - Yeah!
- LAUGHTER - No, they're not standing.
- FUNNY ACCENT: - Shut up! You shut up!
LAUGHTER
- I don't shut up, you shut up! - LAUGHTER
You don't tell me to shut up!
No, the...
Stop, stop it now!
Just stop it now!
The thing is, in Palestine, which was a Roman province,
they ate like Romans. They lay on their stomachs like Romans.
That can't be good for digestion, can it?
No, you'd think not,
but we know that's the way they ate, more or less, because in the Bible,
"Now there was one leaning on Jesus' bosom,
"one of his disciples whom Jesus loved."
And that, you know, you kind of see how that would have worked.
That's how they lay to eat. Rather pleasing.
- Very odd, though. - A bit odd, to us, cos we don't do that.
Even in a picnic, you wouldn't want to be lying on your front.
I agree. I don't like it.
I can't even, you know, a hot chocolate in bed
I have to sit up in order to swallow it.
LAUGHTER
There's nothing... There is nothing about that
that is anything other than straightforward!
We were just immediately thinking of the man who sang
Brother Louie in the '70s, that's all we were thinking.
- # I believe in... - # I believe in miracles
# You sexy thing... #
I'll have to sit up now!
LAUGHTER
Oh, lordy, lordy, bless.
Now, nobody sat anywhere at the Last Supper, everyone was lying down.
Well, now, who's in charge of all the ants?
Adam.
LAUGHTER
- KLAXON SOUNDS - Very good, but...
No!
- Yeah. We were there before you, I'm afraid. - Is it a queen?
A queen ant, of course, that's going to get a klaxon as well.
- KLAXON SOUNDS - Oh.
Is it something like the weather or the climate or something?
- The weather probably is as good an answer as any. - And they don't control themselves.
The fact is, they are a self-organising colony.
There is no leader. But there's the queen.
All the queen does is lay thousands and thousands
and thousands of eggs in her life and then dies of exhaustion.
And the ants just get on with being ants
and there are just signals sent between each one
that somehow sort of ripple outwards
into what appears to be organisation.
But it's a bit like flocks of starlings
or shoals of mackerel that have this incredible sort of...
You think, "What's the intelligence behind this?"
It's like the Tartan Army.
LAUGHTER
No-one knows how they do it, but they do it.
They somehow do it. Exactly.
The way, at a football match,
a chant will grow and then suddenly die.
You think, "That's... Who's organising that?" and no-one is.
It's just a sort of feature of large groups.
It's very odd.
And that's true of ants, who are, you know, and termites.
- They love football, don't they? - They love football. They do indeed. North ants, in particular.
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
It seems there's no-one in charge of the ants,
but there is someone in charge of the scores, and that's me or I.
And it's very interesting, because in first place,
with a positive integer, one point, Phill Jupitus!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
On minus six, in second place,
Jo Brand!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Highly respectable - for him, it's a triumph -
on minus 26, Alan Davies!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
So, now, looky here,
on minus 30, Josh Widdicombe!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
And so it's thanks and good night from Josh, Phill, Jo, Alan and me.
And we leave you with some last words.
The last words of American murderer
James Allen Red Dog, executed in 1993.
"I'd like to thank my family and friends and Mr Pankowski
"for supporting me and all the others who treated me with kindness.
"For the rest of you, y'all can kiss my ass." Good night.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE