Loremen Podcast - S5 Ep37: Loremen S5Ep37 - The High Peak Beast

Episode Date: June 20, 2024

If you manage to guess the nature of this episode's cryptid then please write in and claim your prize! Inspired by Steve Cliffe's Moor Mysteries, James and Alasdair return to Derbyshire's Peak District. The Loremen are on the hunt for stones adorned with strange carvings. We're on the hunt for the truth about Parma Violets. And we are on the hunt for the most surprising beast in the podcast's history. You are going to be stunned. Don't look at the episode graphic. This episode was edited by Joseph Burrows - Audio Editor. Come see us LIVE Again! https://www.angelcomedy.co.uk/event-detail/loremen-live-again-18th-aug-the-bill-murray-london-tickets-202408181730/ LoreBoys nether say die! Support the Loremen here (and get stuff): patreon.com/loremenpod ko-fi.com/loremen Check the sweet, sweet merch here... https://www.teepublic.com/stores/loremen-podcast?ref_id=24631 @loremenpod youtube.com/loremenpodcast www.instagram.com/loremenpod www.facebook.com/loremenpod

Welcome to Lawmen, a podcast about local legends and obscure curiosities from days of yore. I'm James Shakeshaft. And my name is Alistair Beckett-King. And Alistair, this is spooky in a way we've not had before. Nobody has heard a story like this before, except people who've heard this story before. Yes, it's people who've re-listened to all the podcasts. This is a brand new cryptid.

It's more than that, James. It's a phenomenon. It is. Come with us, listener, as we go to the Peak District, to the High Peak, to investigate the High Peak Beast. And whatever you're picturing,

it's not that. It is. You are Whatever you're picturing, it's not that. It is. You are definitely wrong. A hundred percent it's not that. Alistair, what I want to talk to you about tonight is not a load of stuff about broccoli that has been cut and put into the bonus material that is available to the patreons no including a patented life hack but i got a new book recently what be its name it's its name is more mysteries is it now is that more as in the moors or more as in m-o-r-e it's not it's not a sequel or is itor as in M-O-R-E? It's not a sequel. Or is it Moor as in mother in Swedish?

Oh, or it could be mysteries about the Moors from the past because it is spelt the same way. It is Moor as in Moor as in some land. And the region it's talking about is the Peak District. So it is Moor mysteries. And you do wonder what he's going to call the sequel. He's paying himself into a corner there as Steve Cliff. It's a great book.

It's a decent size, a booklet, I'd say. The blurb on the back. What of Templar knights, Roman soldiers, a Bronze Age sky dish, crashed aircraft, paranormal lights and ley lines got to do with buried treasure, hidden caves, supernatural hounds and a skull from a burial mound which cast a spell over a whole area of the peak.

Find out on an investigative journey. Oh my gosh. Does it say that? Find out on an investigative journey into the lost heritage of the hills. Wow. I mean, that first that is that is like a lawman blurb before you go on it when when i've done my first go that's a reference to something only you and i know about which is what what the blurbs look like before i edit them what they

start out as some of the longest sentences known to man, you're listening to the voice of a guy who doesn't know what a full stop is, but oh boy, he likes commas. And a dash. And go for a dash as quick as you like. A colon and a dash, making that little dot dot twang. It looks like I'm doing an emoji. Wow, that was a great, and a sky dish. A sky dish, like satellite TV tv sky dish or is that another

thing that is another thing because you probably can't put sky dishes up because it's probably most of the area it is probably listed it'll be an a on won't it it is it's have you heard of the nebra sky dish no the nebra sky dish it was found and it was a bronze a unique bronze age artifact unearthed by metal detectorists in 1999 on a hill in germany 1999 the nebra disc is made from bronze with a beautiful blue green patina patina i think it's patina patina but you want to say patina but it sounds like an instrument if you say it like that it's surface it's surface is is it surface or surface it's usually pronounced surface yeah usually people pronounce that surface surface is decorated with celestial symbols in gold and it's thought to have helped bronze age farmers with seasonal

planting and harvesting using astronomical observations. Hey, that sounds like one of your Edinburgh reviews. I was going to say, astronomical observations are like, if you want broccoli to last, you can just pop it in some water. It's a flower. That's not going to make any sense. Oh, unless you've listened to the patreon bonus oh speaking of dad jokes though while we're here i just want to send you this sign that i had to take a picture of because i knew it would come in useful it's it's the sign for haddonham carpets which is a carpet

shop in a local village near me and it's one of them signs where they've got their own like log line and it's flooring specialists since 1975 i saw that sign and i said to myself i know we've had enough of experts but this seems like it's taking it too far so what you've done there james if i can just break that down for the list please do is rather than flooring the noun you, you're imagining flooring the verb for, you know, like punching. As in to deck. Yeah, to deck, to floor, to flatten. You would wonder if they do have an outside, like, wooden flooring shop, which talks about decking specialists.

Yes, perhaps since 2003. Because that's the same joke but with different words that's the same joke, but with different words. Essentially the same joke, yeah. But again, Alistair, I'm not here to do a bunch of dad jokes. My dad, my tight five dad minutes, I want to tell you about more mysteries, more mysteries by Steve Cliff. And I want to tell you about the lights over Longdendale.

That's a place name. Wow. Longdendale. Longdendale. Longdendale. Mm. Longdendale. That's a place name. Wow. Longdendale. Longdendale. Longdendale. Longdendale. I did actually speak to my mother-in-law for pronunciations for this.

Oh, wow. Wow. That's more than we normally do. Yep. Longdendale. There we go. So now we're paying out royalties forever. Thanks, James.

Brilliant. Because she grew up in the Peak District, and so she knows all these places. She knows your Glossops, which has a really good bookshop that I went into recently, by the way. She knows your Hadfields, where the League of Gentlemen was filmed. Ooh. She knows your Tint Whistle.

Okay. Seems to be a town that defines itself by why it isn't. It's not a whistle. Very good. A trickster there. I do have more. You do have more, Dad Joe.

Okay. This is the area of the New Mills, which is a town where, and I'm queuing you up here, Alistair, for what I anticipate to be an extraordinary anecdote slash astronomical observation. The Swizzle, New Mills is the location of the Swizzle's Sweet Factory. Okay. Thank you, James. Strap in.

Oh, yeah. Quick question for you. Actually, this question can go to the listener as well. Unless you happen to be near them on a bus while they're listening. Could happen. Presumably out loud like a ruffian. James, who invented Palmer Violets? Swizzles. Okay. That is kind of irritating to me, but that is the correct answer. Okay. And I venture to say that some people listening to this podcast might have gone, huh?

It's not swizzles. Parma violets were invented by Michael Faraday. What? Yeah. The well-known, the inventor of the Faraday cage. The cage fighter.

The scientist. He wasn't a cage fighter, but if he was, he would have been brilliant at it. Michael Faraday. Someone was talking about Michael Faraday, and I thought, all right, I'll be helpful here. I'll be a good conversationalist.

I'll chip in my Michael Faraday fact, which is Michael Faraday invented Parma Violet. I thought, before I do that, I'll just check. Did you play your Michael Faraday Faraday alarm? What would that sound like? I don't know. Just... Because of the electricity. Faraday fact.

Faraday fact. Faraday fact. Perhaps we should explain what Palma Violets are, because I'm not sure how popular they are internationally, bearing in mind that while I was Googling about this, I discovered that they are millennials' least favourite suite. Yeah, I was going to say, they're not popular in this country, and I've seen them. If I had been in a snarky frame of mind when you'd asked me the question, who invented the palmer violet,

I would have said, I don't know, some grandma, because they famously smell. Smell and taste of grandmas. Yes. They have the chalky texture of maybe a love heart, but without the love heart hook. They want to be pink, but they're basically white. Yeah. I think they want to be violet.

Well, oh, yeah. Yes, they're supposed to be violet, but they're barely violet. And you're right. According to the authoritative website, Mr. Sim's Old Sweetie Shop, which appears to be based in Hong Kong, looking at the Earl. Anyway, Mr. Sim's Old Sweetie Shop says they're named after the violet flower of Parma, Italy, which it takes its flavour from. Parma violets were launched in the 1940s by Swizzles, Maslow Company. Although internet rumours claim they were invented by the scientist Michael Faraday. How dare you accuse me of spreading misinformation, Mr. Sims, if that is your real name.

This isn't an internet rumour. I've believed my entire life that Michael Faraday invented palmer violets. And I went to speak to... I thought you were going to say, I went to my grave, still thinking that. I went and asked my lover and confidant. I didn't cue her up in any way. I said, who invented palm of violence? She said, Michael Faraday.

I said, yes. That's because you've brainwashed her, Alistair. No, we've never discussed it. We've never discussed this. You mutter about it in your sleep. Your Farrow alarm's going off in your sleep. No, of course. in your sleep, your Farrah alarms going off in your sleep. No, of course she sleeps in a Faraday cage to prevent the penetration of mental energies.

So I tried to work out why do we both think that Palmer Violets, why do lots of people think that Palmer Violets were invented by Michael Faraday? And as usual, when you do, I'm going to say investigative journalism, I mean Googling. It all comes back to Johnny Ball. The BBC Radio 2 broadcaster Zoe Ball's dad. That's right. Thank you for explaining that for Americans who don't know who Johnny Ball is but do know who Zoe Ball is.

If they know who Fatboy Slim is, Fatboy Slim's former father-in-law. If they know who Fatboy Slim is, Fatboy Slim's former father-in-law. That's such an obscure way of trying to explain who Johnny Ball is. He was a science broadcaster when we were kids who had a sort of mad scientist energy. He was very funny and enthusiastic. Yeah, a lot of time for him. He staged a number of musicals educating people about science, one of which was called The Michael Faraday All-Electric Roadshow, which toured around at least the north of England. Searching on Twitter has brought up a few people who have come a cropper

in exactly the same way I did, and I'll protect their identities out of respect for the dead platform that is Twitter. But some of them have realized that the source of this apparent myth is the Michael Faraday All Electric Roadshow, which toured around teaching us about Michael Faraday and what was Volta's first name? The Italian scientist? I want to say like Eugene, but no way was he called Eugene Volta. That's such a nerd's name. How do you spell Volta? It's like Volt with an A. Volta Trucks.

Alejandro. Alejandro, which is Italian for Eugene. Alejandro Giuseppe Antonio Anastasio Volta. Now that's an Italian guy's name. That's all the Italian guy's names. He sang a song about animal electricity, which is what he believed in. Because if you wire- Someone playing him, right? Some electrodes up to frog's legs. Oh yeah, yeah. It wasn't really Michael Faraday in the musical,

and it wasn't really Alejandro Volta. But he would make little frog's legs dance by giving them little jolts of electricity. And I think we were all convinced that we were told that Michael Faraday invented palm of eyelids. But looking back, I think what's most likely is that there is a scene in that play where they just throw out sweets to the audience. And I think maybe the actor improvised the line, and here's another one of my inventions. And we grabbed a hold of palm of eyelids and thought, ah, a fact for life. Michael Faraday invented Palmer Violets.

Of course. Of course. Yeah. You don't know your power, theatre and education performers. Ah, terrifying. We didn't get Johnny Ball. To be fair, we didn't get the real Johnny Ball on tour. No, it wasn't the real.

We just got, yeah. We got a sub ball, yeah. Aw. We got an understudy. An under Johnny, if you will. For the sub ball, that's bad. I just wanted to set the record straight and reveal the origins of what I think of as a suburban legend.

That is wicked. That's really good. Thanks very much. You're doing the Lord's work there by clearing up. It also makes you wonder what other sweets were invented by famous inventors who didn't really specialise in sweets. John Logie Baird did Push Pops, maybe. Anyway, Alistair, thank you for clearing up that confusion.

I'm about to generate some. It's a one-in-one-out policy on confusion because I want to talk to you about the devil's elbow oh now this is a very familiar sounding place name construction there's the famously the devil's in derbyshire in pete yeah pete cavern aka the devil's that's a fireman going up and down a pole yeah bottom hole this is from tom tom middleton's work and thomas middleton published a book in 1900 called the legends of longdendale he also he's also the author of the annals of hide and old godly i think godly's a play is that googly can't tell if it's godly or Gooley from the picture.

Oh, it's not going to be Old Gooley. The Devil's Elbow was created. It's a rock, right? It was created when a mystery light froze the devil's arm into a rock. Ooh, a mystery light. There's a lot of mystery lights up on Longdendale. They're called the Longdendale lights. A lot of them centre around a place called Shining Clough.

But again, that's not what I'm here to talk to you about. What I want to tell you about is the 1950s. Oh yeah, tell me about them. And that railway man, John Davies, lived in a cottage and he needed to get home from Woodhead and he was riding along a bit of the road

called the Devil's Elbow above Nell's Pike so is he on a train or is he in a car no he's on a motorbike oh actually he was riding along Nell's Pike

which is a rocky edge above the Devil's Elbow I'm picturing him as a kind of greaser yes like in that new film that's coming out yes or rebel without of course that that old film that came out oh what you're rebelling what what's that rebelling against john what's that got that's uh the old taster of the accent to come

because we've got a quote here from john davies i was on my motorbike on a section up road known as devil's elbow the moon lit everything up as bright as day and as i rounded the corner level with a farm something sort of told me to stop a great black wall appeared in front i couldn't see through it oh i had to stop right in front of it it It didn't frighten me, but I had a queer sensation. It was like a massive black slug sliding across road and up moor. It had a head, just like a whale, and a white eye with a black pupil going around and around. After it disappeared, I got off and had a look. But there were nothing there.

There you go. James, that's the best thing I've ever heard. Hey! That's the best thing I've ever heard. What? It's a big black slug. Just appeared in the middle of the road. There's an image. There's eyes spinning around.

You're kind of googling around. Yeah. From the description there, it kind of sounds like Devil's Elbow is a stretch of the road rather than a stone. You know, like a hairpin bend. Yeah, yeah i think so from the way he described it it kind of sounds like a place where the teens would meet up and race yeah he said it was a section at road didn't he section at road known as devil's elbow about hey everyone has two elbows well not everyone well not that but a lot of people have two elbows that's a good point he described this encounter as between Ogden Clough and the track which enters the road above the higher Deepclough Farm. I've been over there a thousand of times, but never seen anything like it.

I've heard many stories about ghosts of Roman soldiers being seen on Moors. They're supposed to appear at night on the first full moon in spring. I'd believe anything about this valley. It's a weird place at night. There you go. The words, not my words, Alistair, the a weird place at night. There you go. The words, not my words, Alistair, the words of John Davies. Wow. Yeah.

And then there's a bunch of stories of people seeing Roman soldiers. The Manchester Evening News carried an article in 1979 about walkers on the Pennine Way. Two or three ghostly Roman soldiers wandering on Bleaklow. In 1932, four climbers breathlessly arrived at Crookston Barn in Edale and described how they'd lain in the heather and watched a Roman legion march past in the lane. So, yeah, Alistair, what is going on at Higher Deepclough Farm? I don't know.

There's some kind of giant slug situation. Frankly, I have no interest whatsoever in these Roman soldiers. Get them out of the way. Yeah. If I see a ghost, I'll just be like, get out. We're waiting for slugs. You can either help me look for slugs, Centurion, or you can get out of here.

Hit the road, which you invented, so thank you. What are they farming at Hyadikla Farm? Massive cabbages? Because if they are, they're in trouble. We're going to need a lot more salt. You're going to need a bigger shaker. Oh, lovely. That is rolling like a slug.

You ever seen a big mess of slugs? But Alistair, leaving that, I've got another little story for you from Glossop and a place called Malslow. Malslow? Nice. Spot on. Glossop and a place called Malslow. Malslow? Nice! Spot on! And there, they discovered a bunch of weird stones with strange carvings on them.

Please be carvings of slugs. Well, in the mid-1700s, there were still remains of a stone castle on this hill called Malslow, or as they called it castle hill some some very bad naming around low low means hill i guess oh mouse what does mouse mean it means a mouse so in the 1700s there were the remains of the stone castle and ditches and earthworks and they were going to build a small catholic chapel and it was due to be erected in 1780, but the workmen digging the foundations stopped when they broke into a vault and found, and I quote, some are odd. And it was in 1840, so 60 years later,

the Wesleyan minister, George Marsden, discovered some very strangely carved stones, and they've got eight of them he thought them weird enough that he would collect them but he didn't think them so weird that he didn't build them into the eaves of his house in Hadfield and they remained there until the Duke of Norfolk a local landowner with a very inaccurate name, requested them. And he was very much of the vibe of, they belong in a museum. And he donated them to the newly formed Glossop Antiquarian Society, who, it says here, kept them in storage for 50 years.

So they did a proper Indiana Jones on them. Just shoved them in a drawer. Popped them in a box, in a cupboard. I think they were better off in the guy's house where anyone could see them. I think so too. So in 1908, they had been described as probably of Anglo-Saxon origin. What's so special about these stones? Can you describe them to me?

Well, they've got these sort of pictures on them. Let me use Steve's words here. One looks like a phallus, others like leaves or anvils. One seems to be the letter A. One's like the face of a cat or horned animal. Let me send you that picture. It's a very crude drawing.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's like the ghost of a cat. And there, yeah, you've got the phallus there. And one is said to be a woman with her hair in a bun, but special lighting is needed to see it. Right.

Well, it's not that then, is it? And two, can you see those little five indentations like on a, yeah, Dior or Domino's? That's known locally as the valley pattern and it signifies a woman. So, yeah, I was imagining something a bit less impressive, I'll be honest. Relief. They look like they're shards of a larger bar relief or something like that.

Something like that. And in 1984, Glynis Reeve took over finding out what these were and doing a dig. She was tasked with surveying and re-excavating a trench that had been dug in 1963 by pupils from Glossop Grammar School. So Child Labour had done a previous trench. I thought maybe we should try an adult. Well, she got help from the University of Manchester Archaeology Unit and site assistance funded on a Manpower Services Commission project. So they managed to establish that the castle was a Norman ringwork,

quite a rare one, which was probably where an earlier Iron Age hillfort had been. They found remains of stone buildings and a spiral stair, as in a staircase, not S-T-A-I-R, not S-T-A-R-E. It's not someone rolling their eyes. So she was doing all this digging and she realized that a lot of local people quite anxious nervous local people were turning up and asking what who the excavators were and what they were doing so she thought i'll put on an exhibition i'll put on an exhibition that'll chill everyone out create some positive interest

and it says here one man came and stared at the stones for a long time, then left, shaking from head to foot. Yep, terrible, terrible idea. Do you want all the lights to go out and someone be murdered? He said they were evil and should be covered up. Look, I'm looking at them right now and all I can say is that man is right. Glynis commented that she wondered what people expected to find. An eavesdropping visitor said,

the entrance to hell. This is in the 70s, right? This is 83, 84 to 86. So this is within our lifetimes. She received late night telephone calls, warnings of horned figures, the old ways, and threatening that someone would end up nailed to a tree. So to try and chill things out, she decided that on the Festival of Beltane in May... This is a bad start to a plan.

Carry on. She and two of her colleagues would stay the whole night there. Why? This is worse than the guy who insisted on leaving that cabbage patch open. And they were frightened by rustling in the trees and they saw torches in the woods.

But she stood in the middle of the excavations and said in a clear voice, you have nothing to fear from us. And apparently after that, things seemed to calm down. The phone call stopped and no one came in to complain. So she just faced the supernatural powers, bopped them on the nose, and they backed off. Well, yeah, it seems so.

Or did the locals who were harassing her back off? So she decided that perhaps Malzlo was a site sacred and it was still used for religious purposes. She'd seen a TV interview on Chronicle TV with a woman whose identity had been concealed who claimed to be the guardian of the old ways. And that was some doco from 1977. So she was probably still around.

Well, she was re-interviewed for a new documentary in 86, which also filmed The Dig, and she declared that it, The Dig, had brought the wrong sort of publicity, which had upset members of the old tradition. The Dig has brought the wrong sort of publicity, which had upset members of the old tradition. The gig has brought the wrong sort of publicity. Yes. I'm trying to talk like a voice changer.

Nice one. Well, in the 80s as well. Yeah. They just get the guy that did Gerry Adams' voice. In those days, they didn't even voice change you. They just plonked you in front of a window so that you were just slightly dark. It's like anybody who has the brightness controls

on their remote. Just find out who you are. But yeah, Tully didn't have that power in them days, brightness. No, no. So the Malsoe Stones ended up at Buxton Museum, and they were assembled into an arch above the doorway, which I think was supposed to resemble the original, that vicar's, where he'd put them in his roof.

So they ended up back on an arch? Yes. But while in storage in Glossop, they were said to have been the cause of malfunctioning computers and even a power failure. I mean, this was their... This would have been in the 90s, which is when computers did most of their failing.

And there you go. That's what they look like over the archway of the door. They look great because, and now I'm for the first time looking at a photograph of them. They look brilliant, but they look quite crap at the same time. They look really Doctor Who quality, special effects. And I don't, I don't mean you, I'm sorry, children. I don't mean you knew Doctor Who with Disney money. I mean, like bad Doctor Who, where it looks bad, but good at the same time.

Do you know what I mean? Yes, exactly. And Alistair, I'm just going to send you this picture. And I've zoomed in. I'm sending you a second picture where I'll zoom in on something I want you to pay particular attention to. Oh! It sounds like you found it yourself. You've zoomed in.

Yeah. I can see something. You might say it was a manatee, a whale or a fish of some kind. But if you squint your brain a bit. It's a big slug. It's a great big slug. With an arm. With an arm. And then just above its sort of snout end.

Wacky eyeballs. There's two floating eyeballs. Like a cartoon from the 90s. One's bigger than the other. Like Earthworm Jim. Yes. So there you go, Alistair. I think you'll find I've blown this case wide open.

Proof if proof be need be. Proof if proof be need be. Yes, exactly. James, I'd like to shake you by the hand. Thank you very much. So I think I'm going to write to Steve Cliff and say, I think you'll find, Steve, there are more Moa mysteries. Mm-hmm.

And we'll get a collab on a new book. So there you have it, Alistair, the high-peak slug, which may have been slithering around the area for thousands of years or since the 80s or since the Norman age, maybe. That's incredible. The idea of a big black wall in front of him was good enough. I was excited enough about mysterious lights and a big black wall, but for it to turn out to be a giant slug,

well, maybe he just got smaller. Yeah. That could have been what happened. Yeah. The slugs didn't get smaller. So you're ready to score my slug, my big old slug. Yeah. Let's pop a number on this mollusk.

Oh, is it a mollusk? No, it's a nematode, isn't it? I'm on the Wikipedia page for slugs, and it says it's a mollusk. You've Wikipedia'd slug. Oh, it's a gastropod, which means stomach foot. It's like those pubs, isn't it? Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. But it really is not far from a gastropub. And that's why I think that's why the idea of gastropubs makes me feel a bit sick. It is a disgusting name. I've always thought that. And I'm sure a lot of people are with me. Maybe even more people than think Michael Faraday invented Palmer violence. No, I'm not letting you make that bonus.

That is canon full main episode quality facts. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what I'm saying. We need to clear up at least as much as we muddy. I imply in there that I've muddied the Peak District by saying that there is a brand new cryptid, a big old slug, slithering around. So, first category, naming. Well, I appreciate the lengths you've gone to to get the pronunciations right.

For once. For once. I really enjoyed... Bleakclough and Clough. There's the last two, Bleakclough and Clough. There's the last two, Bleak, Clough and Clough. Sampling, Fatboy Slim style. Johnny Ball's former son-in-law. Yes, of course I'm talking about Johnny Ball's former son-in-law.

I appreciated you sampling your mother-in-law. I think it's made the podcast 10% more radical and significantly more hip and rad where rad is just short for radical that's the same thing again never mind yeah great

cool yeah so well I haven't actually given you a number yet so don't celebrate yet London Dale The Devil's Elbow The Devil's Elbow's good

Ogden Clough and I enjoyed the fun that you had with the name More Mysteries I think we all enjoyed your enjoyment. More Mysteries. Of that semi-homophone, depending on where you're from.

Mal's Law. So I'm going to say it's a four. All right. And a lot of those points belong to your mother-in-law. Yeah, all right, I'll let her know. I said to the mother-in-law, could you record several place names into a recording device for me? I said, will you be on my podcast?

She said, Longdon Dale. Wait, wait, wait. I think I can do a joke there. What was the name of the chuff place? Ogden Clough. She said Ogden Clough. I said, there's no need to be rude. There you go.

It's the best I can do. Best I can do. Next up, Supernatural. Five out of five. Yes. It's five out of five. It's a out of five it's a huge big old slug inky black slug shaped five creeping inexorably across the road a great black wall appeared in front i had to stop right in front of it it didn't frighten me but i had a queer sensation it were like a massive black slug sliding across road and up moor and up moor and up moor.

It had a head just like a whale and a white eye. We're black pupil going around and around. After it disappeared, I got off and had a look, but there was not, but they were not there. Terrific story. Yeah, I've never heard anything like it. Bunch of Romans just chucked in. Yeah. Terrific story. Yeah, I've never heard anything like it. Bunch of Romans. Just chucked in. Yeah. Probably cut them.

Shove your Romans. Not bothered about them. But the slug, I love the slug. It's five out of five. The weird stones. The weird stones. Threatening telephone calls. A vault with summer odd in it.

I haven't actually thought of any bespoke categories. I got too excited about that whole slug thing. Because I really only just realised that, that like i had two fun stories and then i only just realized that that picture was of a slug just before we started recording really really just came together at the last yeah yeah it worked brilliantly do you have any thoughts for the third well the listener doesn't know is alistair nipped off to the loo there to give me the time to think of the last two categories because I hadn't thought of them previously.

But all I've done is thought of two puns. So category three. That's going to be radically different from the usual way you come up with category titles. Category three, the third. Category the third. But there's more. But there's more.

Yeah. But there's more. Yeah, because there was more. Yeahaterpillar III. But there's more. But there's more. Yeah. But there's more. Yeah, because there was more. Yeah, there was more. There was more to my firmly held belief that Michael Faraday invented palm of violets. Exactly. That was a rabbit hole that went not particularly deep, but still, it went down. You can't say it didn't.

It went into a vault where they found somewhere odd. Where there's one big slug, there's got to be more. That's the thing. If you only see one slug, it probably means there's loads in the walls or something. If you have two friends who aren't giant slugs, then you're a giant slug. Then, yeah, you're probably a giant slug.

Probably. And, of course, the moor itself of the High Peak and that. The moor itself, yeah. Yeah. And the inevitable sequels to our slug jaws film, which I think we'll probably have to call foot. Considering that is what a slug has for a mouth and stomach. As far as I,

as far as I know. Yeah. Ugh. Pod. No, that doesn't give the right idea, does it? Slug!

Exclamation mark. I feel like slug, exclamation mark. We want to save that for the musical. We don't want to waste an exclamation mark now. And so what are we talking? Well, my feeling is that it's a three. Yeah, that's fair enough, I think. But in the spirit of the category,

I feel like I should give you a bit more and go for a four. Yes. Brilliant. Okay, and my final pun, I mean, dad joke, I mean category, swizzle me this. Okay. All right. Swizzle me this.

Doesn't mean anything as a category. But it's sort of like a riddle me this. And that Faraday bit of fake news was kind of a bit of a riddle that you solved. Yeah, I suppose I did. It was a swizzle that so many people were tricked into thinking that Michael Faraday invented the palm of violet for no reason at all.

Yeah, there's no advantage to creating that myth. They can't have done it on purpose. The swizzle, the swizzles that the guardian of the old ways and their followers were getting up to with poor old Glynnis. Just to be clear, James, you keep using the word swizzle as if it has an understood meaning that we all share. I'm not sure I know what that is. Well, it's a swizzle, isn't it? Is a swizz short for a swizzle? I don't know. Why would they name their candy confectionery company swizzle if it means cheat? Like a hoax or a cheater or something.

And James, I'm going to have to eat humble pie, which was probably invented. It was invented by Einstein. Yeah, I don't know. Some famous inventor. I couldn't think of the guy who did those Hoovers. Well, like whatever his name is, Dyson. Yeah. The guy who did those Hoovers.

Well, like, whatever his name is, Dyson. Yeah. Swizzle is a mixed alcoholic drink, according to the dictionary.cambridge.org. It's an act of spinning or turning. It's a small amount of something, especially food, that is circular in shape. So I can see how that became sweets. And it is a situation in which someone tricks another person or tries to get money from them dishonestly or unfairly. Oh, yes. You are absolutely right james it was it is the the fifth or sixth definition uk informal old-fashioned the best kind of definition yeah so i i was really planning to give you a low score there but now i can't it's an absolute swizzle yeah i'm not feeling good about this this is my last five you've given it to me nice thank you very

much what were you picturing listener it wasn't a giant slug was? It wasn't a giant slug, was it? If it was a giant slug, write in, actually, and we will get the help you need. And if you thought Michael Faraday invented poma violets, also tell us. But thank you very much, listener, for listening, and thank you very much for leaving us a five-star review. And if you want to hear more, because there's definitely some bonus stuff from this one,

join us on patreon.com forward slash lawmen pod. And thank you very much to all the people who already do support us there. And thank you very much to Joe for editing this. And thank you, Alistair, actually. Yeah, thank you, James. Oh, thanks. And just to end the episode out, would you like to hear a list of other Swizzles products?

Well, yes. Yeah. We're not getting paid by Swizzles, are we? No. All right. Well, then read them in a sarcastic voice. Mr. Chews. Rubbish.

Rainbow dust. Heteronormative. Fun gums. F. Rubbish. Rainbow Dust. Heteronormative. Fun Gums. Fruity Pops. Klimpies. That isn't real. Klimpies. Klimpies.

Klimpies. Klimpies. And my final favourite, Banana Skids. I think I saw them playing at university.