Something Rhymes with Purple - Fartcatcher

Episode Date: July 2, 2019

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Discover exciting games and events. Plus, find amazing hidden gems in cities full of adventures, delicious food, and diverse cultures. You'll love it so much, you'll want to extend your stay beyond the matches. Get the ball rolling on your soccer getaway. Head to visittheusa.com. don't turn off but today we're talking about politics yes politics hello and welcome to the podcast something rhymes with purple with me suzy dent and giles brandreth who's sitting opposite me, in my kitchen, which, as we've established in previous episodes,

is full of bananas and not much else, hence the echo. So forgive us for that. But I love a banana. You love a banana. And I told you last time we were together, when you said, what word would I have tattooed on my body if I was to have a tattoo? And I'm not planning to, but I'd have the word yecks,

because I discovered it when I used to play a tattoo, and I'm not planning to, but I'd have the word yex, because I discovered it when I used to play a lot of Scrabble and found it to be a very useful Scrabble word, Y-E-X. And you couldn't guess what it was. You thought when I gave you multiple choices, it was part of a horse's hoof. And I told you it's a kind of a hiccup, an old word for a hiccup. And you doubted that. But you've done your homework since. What is a yex? Yeah, well, it is a hiccup, although the first meaning was a sob or a gasp or a gulp. So it kind of evolved from there into a hiccup.

It goes back to our Germanic invaders and the German geskon, I guess, which is Old High German, meaning to yawn. So there it goes. It's like stonutation, which is also yawning. meaning to yawn. So there it goes. It's like stonutation, which is also yawning. And how do you spell it? Y-E-X? Y-E-X, or originally it was Y-E-S-K, yesk. Well, I got one over on you last week with yesk, and I think you're going to get one over on me this week, because what I want to ask you is this. I've long told this story. As you know, I was a Member of Parliament briefly in the 1990s.

And I loved telling the story as a consequence of the lines on the floor of the Chamber of the House of Commons. The two, when you're speaking in a debate, if you picture the House of Commons, the Chamber of the House of Commons, you will know that people are opposite one another. And if you've looked closely at the green carpet, you'll see there's a thin red line in front of each of the two front benches. Well, when I arrived in Parliament, it was explained to me that members of Parliament don't shake hands with one another. This is because the origin of chivalry, the handshake came to show that you were friends. You didn't, you know, because at the House of Commons, we're all honourable members,

we don't need to make that proof. So there are no handshakes at the House of Commons, and no swords, no daggers, because we're all there as friends. And they take this very seriously. And in the Chamber of the House of Commons, there are these two thin red lines between the two front benches. And those two, and he mustn't step over the lines in a debate. And the two thin red lines are an exact distance apart. The distance is the distance of two outstretched arms and two full-length swords. So in the House of Commons, sword fighting is not allowed. Sword fighting is strictly taboo. Backstabbing, of course, is quite a different matter.

Anyway, the point is that those two thin red lines, I used to say you had to stay behind them or you'd be ruled out of order. That was the origin of the expression towing the line. That is what I thought. I hate being the party pooper. Everything I do, I'm the party pooper. The one that comes along and says, pop to your balloon. I'm sorry about this. The OED would disagree a little bit and that they think it originated in the us you know so many things that we think of being quintessentially british end up being american like stiff upper lip was american in origin believe it or not i mean honestly you couldn't get more stephen fry could you than stiff upper lip um toe the line, it says US 1813, and it started off as towing the mark, and then towing the line 1834, all to do with being on a ship.

Oh, actually, it's to stand in a row. I'm reading the OED here. And then to present oneself in readiness for a race contest or undertaking. So that was the first. So actually to be at the starting line rather than sort of be behind, you know, a line and then conform to the required standards. So it's kind of shifted over time.

Is this one true, in the bag? Because as you'll see, if you're standing, as you come into the House of Commons, you'll see the speaker is on a dais at the other end. What you don't see is behind the speaker's chair is literally a dais at the other end. What you don't see is behind the Speaker's chair is literally a physical bag that you can put petitions in. And the expression was putting things in the bag.

It's in the bag meant I've delivered this petition to Parliament. It's in the bag. The bag does exist behind the Speaker's chair. Is that the origin of the expression? It's in the bag. bag does exist behind the speaker's chair is that the origin of the expression it's in the bag pause for effect pause for flinching on my part according to my dictionary yeah um it's a game bag so it's a game it's like if you're out poaching or if you're um officially shooting game which i wouldn't ever recommend you would put your booty in the bag in the game bag apparently well into this fine start to my week, two of my favourite stories from Parliament. Obviously, they've had then a wonderful life in the political sphere. So it doesn't discount them at all.

It's just that their origins might have been slightly different. Well, tell me about parliamentary terms, parliamentary language, stuff that really does genuinely have its origins in the world of politics and parliament. Okay, well, I'll start off with Roman times and the word candidate. Candidate is a relative of candida, which most people would think of when they think of thrush. Let's move on quickly. Or being candid is white, basically. Cand Candid is meant white. And it goes back to Roman wannabes for public office who would wear white, pristine white togas in order to symbolise their purity and integrity,

which quite often wasn't the case. How amusing. So they would swan around in white togas and they were the original white-clad candidates. So a candidate is a white-clad person who is purer than pure, literally whiter than white. That is amusing. Martin Bell, wasn't he? He had the white suit. He was. He stood as an independent in the 1997 election against Neil Hamilton. That's right. Because there'd been allegations made of sleaze against Neil Hamilton. Yes, Yes that's right It was the decade of sleaze

And that was Oh yes And he was elected And I think then even possibly Re-elected The man in the white suit That's why he wore the white suit I don't know if that's why he wore it

But it was a nice link Well it was his Like I used to have Colourful jumpers Martin Bell Had white suits But isn't that amusing They're purer than pure

Look at the candidates now For anything Well Anyway On we go. So that's the Origen campaign. Give me another one. This is interesting. And then in Roman times, they would walk about in order to canvass their votes. And the Latin for walking about was ambire.

It's linked to ambulare with the idea of ambulance being ambulant. It's linked to ambience. There's so many words in English. Anyway, they would walk about canvassing their votes and they were ambitious. So ambition goes back to those Roman candidates who walked around in search of votes. I'm slack-mouthed.

The origin of the word ambition relates to politics, the candidates ambulating, showing their ambition. Yes. That's where it all began. Yes. Oh, Boris, there's nothing new. Of course, he might have known this because I think he's a bit of a classicist.

He's also a throttle-bottom, which is another great political epithet. Please, that's a bit personal. I do think that Boris is a bit of a throttle-bottom, if you'll forgive me. A throttle-bottom is a bumbling, slightly inept person in public office. Snolly-goster. Forgive me, what is the origin of throttle-bottom is a bumbling, slightly inept person in public office. Snollygoster.

Forgive me. What is the origin of Throttlebottom? Throttlebottom was, it's a very good question. It's the name of a character. Is it a Victorian novel of some kind? Is it a Dickens character? It's not Dickens. I'm looking up Mr. Throttlebottom. I'm going to look for my search history in this. It's the book of The I Sing by George Kaufman. And Mr. Alexander Throttlebottom runs for Vice President of the United States. And I imagine he was rather inept. George S. Kaufman was a brilliant American humorist who wrote movies and plays. I happen to know that, so I'm throwing it in.

And he created Mr. Throttlebottom. He did. What was the other one you mentioned? I think I've heard you say this before. Snallygoster. I've definitely, definitely mentioned it. What's a Snallygoster? Snallygoster is an entirely corrupt politician.

Ah, well, we don't know any of those. We don't know any of those. It goes back to an old US word, Snallygaster, who was a mythical monster that would eat children. And a bit like Bugbear, which was a similar thing, parents would use the presence or the imminent presence of the Bugbear or the Snallygaster as a warning to their kids. If they didn't do what they were told, they would be eaten by the Snallygaster.

Any more from Rome, from ancient Rome, political terms? You've got me there. Anything more from the world of parliament before we have uh our little ad break um i've got loads oh yes give us some but one of the things i really don't like are the um the euphemisms the political euphemisms i think we're all you know we're all at one in that so things are um we don't talk about public spending anymore we talk about public investment you think? And then wasn't it Gordon Brown who spoke

of post-neoclassical endogenous growth theory? What did he mean? I don't think anyone knows. Really just that the government would make a difference to the economy. I think that was the point. Interestingly, Gordon Brown is more interested in words and language than you would imagine.

People find this hard to believe. He's very eloquent. He's not only eloquent, he loves poetry. He once invited me to an evening of poetry readings in Downing Street. Amazing. Well, it was quite amazing. I went along and there he was with a lot of poets.

He got up and he read some poetry himself. It was quite unexpected. And it was quite interesting to me. I was, it was. An election was coming. And a few weeks later, I was in Stratford-upon-Avon. And there was Gordon Brown and his wife and children. They were going to a play. And there were some people in the cafe next to me saying, oh, look at him. He's just trying to show he's got a family. And I thought, this poor man, he's obviously just come because I know, I happen to know he likes Shakespeare. He's taking his family to the theatre and the people are sneering at him

thinking he's doing it for advantage. It's a rotten business. We are all quite cynical. About politicians, aren't we? There was a lovely article written in the Telegraph a few years ago about how the PM, you'll know this, right? So they have their own political version of the A-team, really, and they're known as the Berserkers. Have you heard this? No, not in my day. We had no Berserkers in my day. And their job is to kind of...

A few books, but that's another matter. The people in Parliament, they issue roars of support when they're speaking or kind of snarls at the opposition. And Berserker goes back to Viking warriors who would put on a berserk, which was a bearskin coat, and then whip themselves up into some kind of amazing frenzy inspired by the spirit of the bear, whose skin they had donned, and then go into kind of berserker rage

and be invincible, pretty much. Let me, this is interesting. Prime Minister's questions, there's always a lot of noise, a lot of rah-rah, because, and some of it is indeed, indeed encouraged. The A-team that you mentioned, the whips who are in charge of kind of parliamentary business and ensuring that the votes go through, they may have an A-team of backbenchers who are going to support the government and who do go in and cheer. But the reason the cheering is important, it's not for the general public. It's for the morale within the place. Because having been there as a member of parliament, if your man or woman gets up and there's silence, it's quite alarming and sort of energy saps out of the building and you feel,

the poor person is left there alone. So the noise is made. The rest of us have to put up with that. Yeah, you do. You have to expose yourself at some point. But this is the reason I'm explaining it to you. Okay, sorry. Is the reason it happens is that when it doesn't happen, something is amiss.

And you may have seen, for example, during the last days of Mrs. May's premiership, there were fewer and fewer people on her benches in the House of Commons. There was less and less noise. And it's quite debilitating if you are the Speaker. So that's one of the reasons it goes on. It's for, because the authority- It's so raw though, isn't it? The authority of the leader begins in the Chamber of the House of Commons. So unless whoever the

leader of the opposition is, well, at the moment, Jeremy Corbyn, unless he has behind him troops who are supporting him, the fact that he doesn't becomes evident week in, week out. And that is bad for his morale and bad for the morale of the troops around him. So he ensures that he has supportive people near him and people who, you're telling me, used to be called berserkers. It's not a phrase I've heard.

When were people called berserkers? I think this is quite recently. So maybe they just knew themselves as the berserkers. Oh, and also maybe since my time because, you know. And then there's the Q team that meet before PMQ. Yes. PMQs, I should say. The A team is a group of backbenchers who basically are there

to be supportive of the government. The Q team are the people who are there to put help for questions. And to agree the absolute lexicon for the day, as far as I can work out. So they absolutely determine which words should be strong and stable. So the line that is going to be taken so that people are being consistent. Yeah. That's the Q team. Yeah.

And then there's all this sort of um i find slightly ridiculous you know will the minister join me in congratulating and does my right honorable friend agree with me i just find those formulations so archaic now yes maybe you're right i mean the reason they were done originally was to distance the person well first of all to remind you where the person came from. Yeah. So it's, you know, will the member for so-and-so, it's to remind you they are there as representing where they come from.

And also so that you're not actually talking about the individual as an individual. You're not allowed to use their names. You are the right honourable member, my right honourable friend, if it's on the same side. You're only a right honourable if you're a privy councillor. If you're an ordinary member of parliament, you are the honourable friend if it's on the same side. You're only a right honourable if you're a privy councillor. If you're an ordinary member of parliament, you are the honourable member. And the idea is, instead of shouting abuse at one another by having to refer to the leader of the opposition as, the right honourable gentleman, it sort of diffuses that. It's supposed to put a slight

barrier and make people behave better. That's the origin of it. That's very interesting. There certainly was in my day, quite a collegiate atmosphere between the parties because people do actually end up working quite well together. And what about whip? That began with the whipper end, didn't it? It's a hunting term.

I was a government whip. Essentially, the whips are both the parliamentary police, the SS of Parliament, but they also are the human resources arm. Every MP has a whip. There are about 13, 14 whips on each side. And the whip is the person who is responsible for basically ensuring the government's business goes through. business goes through, each whip will have 20 or 30 MPs in his or her, you know, on their list, on their card. And the idea is that you should know everything that that person is thinking and feeling and wanting, so that you can ensure that they do support the government or the opposition or whatever party's label they were elected on. That's the role of the whips. And it's a hunting term. The whipper in was the person who got the hounds whipped in to follow the scent. And it's kind of all linked to whip round as well. It goes back to those parliamentary whips who would take the figurative whip

and get people sort of together. And then it was transferred over to monies. I mean, do you remember the series House of Cards? I do. With the chief whip there, talked to the camera, who's sort of played rather like a Richard III Machiavellian figure. That was slightly exaggerated, I think. On the whole, people as whips, they're perceived as being rather sinister figures who are doing a lot of arm twisting, forcing people to vote.

There sometimes is an element of that. But on the whole, the most effective whips are the ones who do it with kindness. Integrity. With integrity, actually understanding your person, making them know that you understand what they're about. We have to say, and I'm guilty of this too, because I tweet all sorts of odious terms for politicians, of which fart catcher might be one of my favourites. Please.

Fart catcher is somebody. What's a fart catcher? It used to be a lackey or a valet who would follow so closely in his master's footsteps that, well, you can guess the rest. So very encyclical. Actually, I've spent my life as a fart catcher. I mean, at school. Charles Brand with fart catcher. No, but in a way, I know that's true.

I understand. I was the person who sat in the middle of the front row at school, you, but in a way, I know that's true. I understand. I was the person who sat in the middle of the front row at school, you know, teacher's pet, as it were. And I suppose when I got to parliament, I thought, well, I didn't mind in a way because I thought, well, I've been elected, you know, on this, wearing this rosette. I supported the manifesto. I'm quite happy to go along with it. And when a government has a large majority, you can defy the whips. It's amusing with Jeremy Corbyn, now the leader of the opposition, who I knew quite well when I was an MP. Jeremy, in those days, he never listened to his whips. He rebelled literally hundreds of times.

Now, of course, he's the leader of the opposition. He has quite an active whips department, and he is trying to ensure that his whips make sure that his MPs do his bidding. He used to be a rebel himself. Now he raises an eyebrow, if not much more, to the rebels in his own ranks. Yes. But yes, it has to be said that politicians have had a really hard rap over the centuries and that, you know, recent rhetoric has got incredibly cutthroat and bloodthirsty in a way that's actually been thought to incite violence in some way. So linguistically, people have to be really careful, I think, when it comes to politicians. We don't want any violence incited here.

In fact, I think it's time for a break. Well, yes. And then we want to speak more bunkum because I want to show you where bunkum came from. Oh, a break and then bunkum. Depending on the ad, it could be bunkum and then bunkum. 1800 Tequila believes that taste is more than just a detail. It's everything.

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I take a letter of the alphabet that has to be a word. A letter of the alphabet, you take a second letter, then a third letter, then a fourth letter. Each time, it's got to be a word okay a letter of the alphabet you take a second letter then a third letter then a fourth letter each time it's got to be a real word and i began last night with the letter a i added an n yeah in different article a n then a n g there's such a word it's the hairy yes it's the hairy part of an ear of barley then anger a-n-g-e on its own which is it's trouble affliction anguish it's a version of it remember you have the oed i have an assortment of scrabble i don't want to start weeding the oed at midnight angel hooked on it as i am angel yes angelie a-n-g-e- Angelica. Oh no, it's one letter, isn't it? We haven't got there yet. Angeli is okay. It's a town in Finland. What were you offering them? Angelic. Angelic, exactly. Angelica. Angelica is an aromatic plant used in cooking. Angelical.

Exactly. You're getting there. She's beginning to doze off having the nature of an angel. That's hard. The next one. I can think of the adverb, but not one letter. Okay, what would it be? Angelicals. Nuns of the order. I'm afraid it's an extinct order now, but it was founded in Milan in 1530. Nice.

By this point, you're asleep. By this point, I am asleep. It's just a fun game to play. Yeah. Building with words. The point is, words and language do everything. A lot of what I say is bunkum. What's the origin of bunkum? Bunkum.

So many words in the political lexicon for a political humbug. Flapdoodle is one. You can be a flapdoodler. And a flummery is another one. And bunkum is another. Bunkum is the name of a county in North Carolina in the US and it was in the 16th Congress when near the close of the debate about slave labor particular debate the member for Buncombe County rose to speak the house was really impatient just to get

to the end and settle this once and for all but he spoke and he spoke and he spoke and he spoke. And people gathered around him begging him to stop. And he said, no, I am doing this for Buncombe County. And ever since, Buncombe has become a word for a really unnecessarily, tediously long and utterly meaningless speech. That's brilliant. Like a filibuster. It's the same sort of thing as Buncombe.

Yeah, well, the filibusters were pirates, weren't they? Oh, were they? Yes. When you're filibuster. It's the same sort of thing as Buncombe. Yeah, well, the filibusters were pirates, weren't they? Oh, were they? Yes. When you're filibustering, you're on your feet and you may be talking Buncombe, but you're keeping the thing going. And this used to be done in my day. One would do it, one would organise a filibuster in Parliament. Let's say a vote was expected at 10 o'clock at night. You had to keep going at 10 o'clock at night because your people weren't necessarily back from supper until 10 o'clock. So somebody had to fill out the time and you would do it by filibustering. But you've been quite obstructive, I guess, haven't you? Well, you're just keeping

the thing going so that it doesn't collapse. The opposition are wanting to call a vote because they've got their people there early and you can only talk in a way that's relevant to the matter in hand or the speaker should stop you. So a skilful filibuster is filling the air with sound that is relevant, not simply talking bunkum. What's the origin? Well, it is from a Dutch word for a freebooter because they were pirate adventurers, the first filibusters, who pillaged Spanish colonies in the West Indies. And from there, anybody who's a filibuster in their action is sort of engaged in unauthorized action. First of all, against states.

And then I guess maybe they're just sort of filling in an unauthorized or unofficial way. Yeah, interesting. Long, long journey, that one. That has come a long journey, filibuster. We haven't talked about the Brexican either, have we? Oh, oh, oh, people tune in to Something around Scyth Purple to get away from Brexit. Sorry. It's made the whole nation unhappy for three years.

But tell me the origin of the word Brexit. Who came up with it first? I actually don't know if we know the exact origin, the exact person. There are people who make claims. It's not the first version of it. There was an earlier version, wasn't there? People talked about Greece leaving the European Union. Yeah.

So, Grexit became popular. Brexit for lexicographers became famous because nobody had a definition for it. And Theresa May obviously just kept saying Brexit is Brexit. It's like, well, yes, then what is Brexit? But it came about before. 2012, according to this, in a blog. Stumbling towards the Brexit.

That's four years before we got round to the referendum. Brexit was already part of the lexicon. Yeah, yeah. I know we've talked about portmanteau words. It's a portmanteau word. Two different words brought together. Has it not spawned its own brexican? Brexcosis, which is a horrible one.

What's that? Despair amongst remoners. Brex through, brexplosion. Oh, it's awful. Bregret, for people who are feeling maybe they voted the wrong way Yes I'm suffering terrible Also the backstop I mean I know that's an old term isn't it

From baseball or something like that It's an American sporting term Nobody understands it The Irish backstop They keep repeating the Irish They've got no idea what they're talking about No this is quite interesting. I have to say on one of them as well,

but you would hope that our politicians would know. No. Do you know that's the one thing I discovered when I was in politics? Cricket. Nobody knows anything. It's the same as a longstop in cricket, sorry. A backstop is the same as a longstop?

Yeah. It would be easier. Yeah, American, but cricket. They called it the Irish longstop. That's what I do now. It's we've abandoned the backstop. We are now aiming for the Irish longstop, part of the great tradition. It's an American phrase, is it?

It is. Excellent. It is, it is. I've got a quote from you, actually, which I liked, which relates to your weekly surgeries, I guess, and how difficult they must have been and trying sometimes, however rewarding. This is when constituents,

the one thing to be said in favour of the British system is that every MP has a constituency and usually once a week, certainly once a fortnight, regularly, they let members of, you know, people who, you know, they're voters, the electorate, come and meet them to share their problems. Your quote, this I love, is,

happiness is the constituency in the rearview mirror. Are you embarrassed about that? I said that to you privately, darling. I didn't expect that to end up in your dictionary of quotations. Oh, but sometimes. I think it's in your own dictionary of quotations. Oh, no, sometimes, honestly. I mean, when the election came round that I lost my seat, I mean, by then I knew I had contempt for my constituents. But to find that the feeling was entirely mutual, that was the shock to the system. There's a lovely, lovely quote from someone called Dick Tuck, who competed in the California. You have to be careful.

Say that carefully. Oh, dear. Never mind Jeremy Hunt. Now, please welcome Dick Tuck. After being defeated in the California state primary, he said, he accepts six words of pain. The people have spoken, the bastards, well, the bastards. Is that the origin of that? Because it's a line a lot of people use. Oh, is it? I've not heard it. Yeah, apparently so. Apparently so. What was it called again? Dick Tuck. I love it. Dick Tuck. I love it. Oh, okay. Now, lots of people have been in touch. They tweet us individually because we both have Twitter handles.

I'm GilesB1, G-Y-L-E-S-B-1, and people send in questions. And also people email us at purple, P-U-R-P-L-E, at something else, something spelt without a G,.com. And Susie, I have to say something. My wife has started listening to our podcast just to keep an eye on me. And she said the other day, you described the at symbol when giving the address as an ampersand. Don't you know anything? Susie was too polite to correct you. An ampersand is an abbreviation for the word and. It's a little symbol. It looks a bit like a sort of distorted eight. I think M and S, that kind of thing. That's the ampersand.

The ampersand between the M and the S. Yes. Is there a word for the at sign, as in purple at something else? Yes. Oh, what is that word? The at sign. Or the at symbol. I don't think we have one. Really? No.

It's called the at sign. At symbol, yes. So if you want to get in touch with us, it's purple at something else dot com. Isn't that interesting? People know, though I've said at, they're not going to write A-T, are they? They're not. I've said purple at something else and people know it's that symbol. Anyway, what's somebody written to us about this?

Craig Lumsden has written in to say, there's an interesting thing I heard recently about paying through the nose. In olden times, if you were due money, the law enforcers would take an axe to one's nose. Is this true? Paying through the nose is to pay an exorbitant price for something. It does have that story attached to it that in the days after the Danish invasion of Britain, so think Vikings, they were particularly strict with their tax laws. And the harsh punishment, if anybody failed to pay, was the nose tax. The debtor had his nose slit open, apparently. Not true, we think, we think, we think.

better had his nose slit open, apparently. Not true, we think, we think, we think. And it was quite fascinating because it might, might possibly go back to the Greek rhinos, meaning nose. As in rhinoceros. As in rhinoceros, exactly. Rhinos is a nose. And rhino, as we've established in one of our previous programmes,

was slang for money. So it's possibly a play on words for that. But who knows? It came in the 18th, 17th century, I think. And I think it just simply means it might cause you a nosebleed if you have to pay it. Paying through the nose. Yes. But thanks for the question, Craig. Very good. Now, look, have you got a trio of fun words for us this week? I do. I love this trio of words. My challenge is to remember them. Okay.

I think you might remember this one. The thing we ought to have is a website where we can put all these words up so people can remember them. It's true. Well, we can tweet them. We can tweet them. Okay. Does the canteen in the House of Commons do good sausages? We call it the tea room.

It's the members' tea room. They're members' tea room, members' dining room. And yes, bangers and mash, sausages are there. Okay, I have an old word for sausages and they're forever known as this in my house, bags of mystery. This is what they were called because nobody completely knew what was in them.

Bags of mystery. I love it. Isn't that great? I think that's true of many a modern sausage. I think that's very true too. Bags of mystery. Yeah. You and? I think that's true of many a modern sausage. I think that's very true too. Bags of mystery. You and I are veggies, aren't we? We're both vegetarians. We are. We're not vegans, either of us.

I'm kind of heading in that direction, but I've not completely gone that direction because I'm finding protein quite hard by the way. That's a whole other subject. But yeah, I'm kind of between vegetarianism and veganism. And we do have vegetarian sausages, which can be quite nice. Yes. And they are all bags of mystery to me because I've got no idea. I'm taking it on trust. I'll have some veggie sausages, please.

What are they putting in there? Mushroom protein, aren't they? Oh, are they? Is that what corn is? It's corn. Corn, yeah. That's mushroom protein. It's some sort of fungi.

Is that a commercial name, corn? It is, yeah, trademark, yeah. It's just a trademark name. Yeah. Okay, so bags of mystery. And my second one, forgive me, listeners, if I have mentioned this one before, but it's possibly my favourite discovery from the last three years. In the OED, there's a whole section on trumping, as you would imagine. To trump in cards comes from triumph, to trump is to break wind, as we know. But Trump-eriness from the 19th century describes something that is showy and flashy, but ultimately utterly worthless. Isn't that brilliant?

Don't need to say anything else to that one. And the third one, closely linked, actually, but can equally be applied to British politics as to US politics, is clusterfuck. A deliberately mishandled situation or undertaking. It's an omni-shambles, but I prefer clusterfuck. An omni-shambles is a clusterfuck. Yeah, and it's in the dictionary. A clusterfuck. Lots of things have been fucked up. It's a clusterfuck. It's a total clusterfuck. So a collective noun, because we were talking about those the other day, the collective noun for political caucus. It's a clusterfuck.

Yes, the collective noun for politicians these days is a clusterfuck of politicians. There we go. You heard it first on Something Rhymes With Purple. Give us a review, rate us, help us spread the word. If you've got a question you'd like us to answer or you'd just like to get in touch, you can also email us at purple at something else dot com something rhymes with purple is a something else production produced by paul smith with additional production from russell finch lawrence bassett steve ackerman

and gully i am peckish have you got any bags of mystery in the fridge?