Something Rhymes with Purple - Fobly-Mobly

Episode Date: June 11, 2019

We’re talking local dialect this week. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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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. Something else Giles, I have a poem, a very, very short poem for you, which was one of the winners selected for National Poetry Day a couple of years ago. Well, it's basically the definition of one very, very popular dialect word,

and I want you to guess which one it is, if you possibly can. OK? I'm ready. You know, face like thunder, eyes rolling like rain clouds, turn the whole room grey when you walk in type thing, that missed your bus, hole in your shoe, favourite pub's been turned into a coffee shop, kind of sorrow, rage, moodiness that sludges out the corners of your mouth.

Can you guess? No idea whatsoever. I'm not good on dialect. Okay. Well, it was written by Toby Campion. I think it's absolutely brilliant. And it's a poem about the word Mardi. Mardi?

Mardi. Do you remember Arctic Monkeys, Mardi Bum? I sort of do know Mardi Bum. Okay. I'm more familiar with Mardi Gras. A different kind of Mardi. That's the I. That means Tuesday. That means Tuesday, doesn't it? Well, it's so hard to define Mardi because it encapsulates all

those wonderful emotions that Toby presents there. But it basically means a sort of irritable, peevish, sulky, well, everything that Toby describes. That is being Mardi. And I absolutely love it. And it originally was from Yorkshire and it has spread pretty much nationally now. But it's one of my favourite dialect words. And that's what we're talking about today. Good. What are we? We are Something Rhymes With Purple. So this is the podcast, the fairly new podcast,

with me, Susie Dent, and Giles Brandreth. And something does rhyme with purple. It's the word herple. Yes. I used to think that nothing rhymed with purple or silver or orange. And I don't think anything really does rhyme with silver or orange properly. But herple does rhyme with purple. And herple is what? It means to walk with difficulty. To walk with difficulty. But I have to say, our wonderful podcast listeners, and we have fairly loyal following following so thank you so much for listening to us and for tweeting in because a couple of people who tweeted in words

that I had no idea existed one of them is the equestrian term Kerpal which rhymes clearly with purple and I think I'm going to look it up quickly in my trusty Oxford English dictionary but I think it's part of a horse's harness

oh actually no it's the rump or part of a horse's harness. Oh, actually, no, it's the rump or posterior of a horse, according to this. So there you go. More than one thing does rhyme with purple, so I'm learning all the time. So a kerple and a herple rhyme with purple. Yes. And we are here today talking about dialects. What, in a nutshell, is a dialect? Well, gosh, that's such a big question because dialect doesn't necessarily mean a regional vocabulary. You might have a dialect online, for example, so people who like to speak doggo. Have you heard of doggo?

It's the new language with which we speak to dogs, apparently. This is a whole new podcast. As in woof woof? A whole other episode. Yes, that is a dialect in itself. But traditionally, a dialect encompasses local vocabulary and local pronunciation. So do we all speak in a dialect? Is there a dialect?

I mean, when I was brought up, it's not to do with accent. Is it to do with accent? What's it to do with vocabulary? Well, most people think of dialect as purely pronunciation, but it's vocabulary too. So, for example, well, actually, I was going to ask you what you call being cold, but instead, I am going to do a short quiz on you. Now, this was in the New York Times. It was absolutely fantastic. A lot of people sent this to me. It was basically called, I think, the Anglo, the British Irish dialect quiz. And essentially, it says, what does

the way you speak say about where you're from? So it gives lots of different questions and then it will try and locate on a map. This is the New York Times. It'll tell you or try to locate where you're from. So are you ready? I'm ready. Okay. So how do you pronounce S-C-O-N-E?

What are the big questions? S-C-O-N-E. Scon. Me too. Okay. I won't have this scone business. We'll discuss it later. But scone. And too. Okay. I won't have this scone business. We'll discuss it later. But scone is... And also, I'm afraid

it's essential to put the cream on first and then the jam. I know Dawn French, who listens to our podcast, has a different view about this. Well, it depends if you're from Devon or Cornwall. I know. But basically, it's... Jam first if you're in Cornwall. I know that. I know that. That's the way they do it down there. We do not

approve or agree. I do. Don't look at me. I know that. That's the way they do it down there. We do not approve or agree. I do. No, well, don't look at me. It's scum. I always put my jam first. It's scum. Even though my dad's from Devon. Right.

Okay. Which of these words, if any, would you use for a young person characterized by loutish behavior and low social status? Yob. Yob. Okay. Is that there? Yeah.

Oh, good. What were the alternatives? Oh, chav, scally, stig, ned, scumbag. Oh, please. What do you call the small grey bug that curls up into a ball when it's touched? The small grey... Oh, I keep away from that sort of creature. Small grey bug.

I don't know. It curls up into a ball when it's touched. A porcupine? It's got spines on it, is it? No, it's like a tiny, tiny little thing that might creep into your house. And often goes onto its back and its legs go... Is it a woodlouse? Is it a fat pig? Ally a roly-poly a cheese log granny grey chucky pig cheesy bug etc i avoid all of those i don't think there's any words that have crossed my vocabulary

i'm going to put down this is the the only person i know that would say i don't know what that is i don't know what it is i honestly don't know what it is what kind honestly don't know what it is. What kind of a life do you think I lead? How do you pronounce the... I live in a lovely, clean home. How do you pronounce the A in L-A-S-T? Last. OK. R-A-L-A-S-T. Not last. Last. OK. I'm racing through these because I love them. But people, I hope, are taking part. I hope if you're listening to this, you too are taking part and you may not sound like I sound.

So you may come from a different part of the world. What word would you use for a child soft shoes worn for pe gym shoes oh interesting they were plimsolls for me different generation plimsolls or or trainers obviously gym shoes okay how do you prefer how do you refer to your mother be careful old dear mammy mammy mammy old lady i called my mother i suppose either mummy or ma. Ma. Okay. Ma.

Ma. What word would you use for a piece of long-cushioned furniture in the main room of a house? Long-cushioned furniture? The sofa? Yeah. Yeah, what is the alternative? That's going to be you and non-you English, isn't it? Where you've got sati and sofa.

I know it is a bit, actually. Anyway, go on. How do you refer to your grandmother? Granny. Yeah. Very similar to your grandmother? Granny. Yeah. Very similar to mine, some of these. People often come up to me and say,

oh, my nan loves you. They very rarely come up and say, I love you. Sometimes they say, my mum loves you, but it's usually, my nan loves you.

Which word would you use for someone you think is stupid? Look at me and you can tell me. Stupid. Dunce. Fool. Okay. Dunce. Fool. Okay. Dunce. What are the others?

Fool's not on there, actually. Pillock. Pillock. I love that. That was mine. Numpty. Numpty. Wazzock.

Numpty's quite fun. Blank. Idiot. Burke. I quite like Numpty. Burke is... I wouldn't use Burke because I know it's rhyming slang for something very rude. Barkley.

Barkley. Sorry, Barkley. But then it wouldn't be Bark, not Burke, be bark, not burk, wouldn't it? Of course, duh. Which one? Numpty? Numpty, I like numpty, but I wouldn't really use it.

Oh, what would you use? Pillock? I wouldn't use pillock, certainly. Numpty, I'll give her numpty. Idiot. Oh, you're an idiot. What word would you use for a heavy rainfall? So would you say it's bucketing down,

it's chucking it down, it's lashing, tipping, pissing? Oh, I certainly wouldn't use pissing. What would you say, bucketing? What kind of person do you think I am, Susie Dent? Different to me. Bucketing? Bucketing. What do you call it when a person gets a ride on the back of someone else's bike?

A freebie. Oh, I was going to say a croggy. I've never heard of that. A croggy? Yeah. Do you know, we live very different lives. It's interesting, isn't it? We do. I haven't done that for a while though. How do we, the riding pillion, what word would you use for playing truant?

Skiving. Yep. Right, let's see if it's got you right. And I want to see if it's got you right as well. And then the listeners. It did have me right. Good. And people can get this themselves

by going to Google and looking up New York Times. Newyorktimes.com, yes. Dialect quiz. Well, look, I'll show you. It's south. Oh, there's a map. Some of it's far south. It kind of got me.

It got Paul, our producer, spot on because he's from Derry. You see, what is interesting is I don't think it gets me particularly at all. Well, it gets, I suppose, where I was brought up as a young person, but it doesn't really get my family background because I think the way I sound is very typical middle class. Yeah, it's just got to this entire guy, isn't it? I don't think I am regional so much as... But it's given you South and South East.

It's given me South and South East, which I suppose is what is middle class. But in fact, my grandfather, my grandparents came from the Northwest, from Liverpool. My mother's family came from Lancashire around Manchester. I think what it shows is that you grew up with RP, Received Pronunciation. I did. And interestingly, when I was a boy, it wasn't called Received Pronunciation. RP is now, it used to be something that actors would go to drama school and they'd be taught receive pronunciation so that you could, you know, if you were hoping to play an Aquarian in The Crown, you could do RP. Now, it's no longer compulsory at drama schools like RADA or Central to do RP.

We celebrate whatever voice you come with. I think, technically, you ought to be told to do receive pronunciation. If you listen to people, television stars, film stars of the 1940s and 1950s, they all have rather pinched, actually rather more like that voices, rather more strangulated. They talked even more like that.

The Queen, when she was young, talked much more like this. The Queen's an interesting one because like everything, words follow fashion. And I've spoken to a lot of uh djs who when they started if they were from the black country for example as adrian charles would be is um they had it drummed out of them in order to be able to speak rp but now if you have a regional accent i think it's an advantage and that's wonderful so we are bracing regional accents like nothing before. So

Geordie is the coolest brand on the phonetic map, really. Everyone wants to speak like a Geordie. I love it. But there are some that are mocked still. So the Birmingham accent, I think, is still... I love it. Don't ask me to try because I absolutely can't.

Obviously, they're steeped in history but the one good thing I would say is that people think that our regional vocabulary and not so much our accents because I think we retain those, but our regional vocabulary is dying out and that we're all beginning to speak this bland monolithic language.

But actually the BBC did a fantastic project a few years ago called The Voices Project and it showed that we are still speaking regionally and so when we go home you know we might say that we're cold to our friends at work but when we go home it's like putting on a sort of woolly baggy jumper it's your old hufflepuff the old comfy clothes and then you will start talking in your sort of regional dialect so you might say you're shrammed or you're nethered um or you're parky or it's brassic or whatever. Actually, brassic is broke, isn't it?

But that's when you start talking locally. The advantage of the local talk is that it's rich and it's interesting and it tells people maybe where you come from. The disadvantage is that it can be a little bit excluding of others. Yes, it's tribal. When I was a member of parliament, I was a member of parliament for the city of Chester, which is in the northwest of England in Cheshire, not far from Liverpool where my family come from, strong Liverpool accents. But actually in Chester, you could be in the home counties. They speak with a kind of neutral received pronunciation.

And a bank, the MBNA, a bank from America, came and wanted to have a call center in the northwest of England. And there were two possibilities. One was to go to North Wales or to come two miles away to Chester. And Chester won, even though they were offering subsidies. The Welsh people were offering subsidies to get the company to go to Wales. Only two miles apart, they went to Chester because the local people spoke with this neutral accent that didn't send out any signals. And it was a call centre for people getting in touch from throughout the British Isles.

And they wanted a neutral voice. And they thought, well, if we have a North Wales voice... See, I love it when I call someone and they've got a strong accent. I could listen to the... I know this is not the most popular, but I could listen to the Northern Irish accent as I could the Dublin accent. I love a Northern Irish accent.

People, I'm told, the research suggests that people trust a Scottish accent most of all, which is why often on commercial voiceovers they do have a Scottish accent for banks and things. So the Scottish accent is to the benefit. So a dialect is, is a dialect an accent? No, it's a vocabulary. It's both. It's both. Dialect encompasses both vocabulary and pronunciation. And famously, there are certain tests that dialectologists or dialecticians will pose to ascertain where people are from, but also to map how quickly dialects change. So you can go 30 miles, within 30 miles miles you will find that the word, for example,

for a bread roll changes. Is it a bap? Is it a stotty? Is it a cob? What do you call a bread roll? A bread roll. I'll have one of those bread rolls by a good man. Okay. I'd feel ridiculous going in and saying I'll have a cob. They might send me a horse.

A snotty? A stotty, not a snotty. A stotty you would find. If you go to Newcastle, you will get a stotty not a snotty stotty you would find if you if you go to newcastle you will get a stotty you'll get fish fingers and a stotty is the best thing ever um so that's one of the key things but you know there are there are people who are so that their ears are so receptive and so highly attuned to accents that they will be able to tell you which side of a of a high street in Leeds, say, someone was born. That's how good their ear has become. I would absolutely kill to do that. But also, very interestingly, animals apparently have accents too. So ducks have been shown, there was

an experiment done to see how ducks in Somerset quacked and whether their quack was different to ducks from the north. And indeed they were. They had a sort of West Country burr. Can you believe that? And this has been proved over and over again that somehow animals are sort of picking up the sounds that are around them and develop an accent of their own.

I love that. Is Cockney a dialect? It's a tribal language which is located in a particular area. So the original Cockney, yes, with sound of bow bells and all that, would have been. Because, I mean, I always used to think it dated from around the 1840s and it sort of originated in the east end of London. Yes, it originated amongst costumongers who wanted to, you know, talk the talk and not be understood by other people.

They might have been up to no good. They might have been sort of, you know, selling things that fell be understood by other people they might have been up to no good they might have been sort of you know selling things that fell off the back of a lorry and so

they developed this kind of banter so it was it was tribal it was unifying but it was also quite useful

because it evaded the authority I mean for a bubble bath for love let's do my very quick cockney rhyming slang

quiz ascot races er something faces braces oh yeah battle cruiser rhyming slang quiz. Ascot races. Something faces. Braces. Oh, cool. Battle cruiser. Bruiser. Boozer.

Oh, duh. This is quite difficult. Boracic. Boracic lint skint. Very good. Boracic lint skint. Brahms and Liszt. Pissed.

Very good. Laugh and joke. No idea. Smoke. I will go for a laugh and joke? No idea. Smoke? I would go for a laugh and joke. Oh, raspberry tart. Farts, that's where blowing a raspberry comes from. Oh, does it?

Yes. Blowing a raspberry tart fart, yes. I didn't know that because I thought a raspberry was done with the lips. It sounds like a fart. I didn't know that. Yes. Oh, can I teach you something, incidentally, because we'd like to go down a bit of the corner. Don't teach me how to blow a raspberry.

Yeah, well, now, I'll teach you how to do good lip wobbles, because people don't do good lip wobbles. I've noticed this. I have huge lips as well, so... I've got... My lips are disappearing as the years are going by. Yours are growing and mine are disappearing. OK. You need to be able to wobble your lips for you to be able to speak in a relaxed way. Can you do this in a to speak in a relaxed way.

Can you do this in a dialect, in a regional way? Well, I don't know. Are we going completely off piste, off grounds and lists? We can go off for a moment. If ducks can speak in different accents, I just wanted to share this with you because this is an incidental. People need something to take home from the podcast, and this is what they're taking home today. People need to get their lips moving at the beginning of the day. I'm refusing to do this.

You're refusing to do it. Okay. Well, I'm just sharing this with the listeners, and if it survives the edit, it survives the edit. If it doesn't, it doesn't. This is for blowing a good raspberry. Press your forefingers against the edge of your mouth, about a centimetre away from the edge of your mouth, and you can sustain that lip wobble for almost ever. Oh, it isn't quite working.

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Benjamin Moore, but the subjects that we love to collect local words in are really sort of quite unpleasant, I suppose. So there were loads for blisters, for example, whether you call them a bleb or a blob or a blit. In fact, they're all very onomatopoeic. But armpit was another one. Hold on, armpit? Armpit, you're oxter. You're what? You're oxter. You're what?

You're oxter. Actually, as a great verb, to oxter someone is, if they've had a sort of heavy night in the pub, if you oxter them, you sort of carry them under your arm. You sort of help them. That's amazing. Okay. Whether you're knock-kneed or pigeon-toed,

or I guess what it proves is that we're a fairly gossipy bunch. So, you know, talking about the weather, talking about other people's deficiencies, etc. And there are so many different words for gossiping. So I'll give you a few. Jangle in Liverpool. Jaffoc in Cheshire. Pross from Devon. I've never heard Jaffoc.

And I spent a lot of time in Cheshire. It sounds like your mouthful at the same time. Jaffoc. What does it mean? It's just a gossip. Oh, we had a good Jaffic. Yeah. Conjobble is another one.

Conjobble. Conjobble. Oh, I love that. I know. It sounds a bit rude. I think it can be rude, but I think it can also mean to have a good gossip while you're eating over lunch.

Oh, we had a good Conjobble. We had a good Conjobble. What else? Chamrag. Likewise, I think it sort of comes from kind of grinding or chewing the rag, which was a synonym for the tongue. A hortumouth is a sort of blusterer, someone who just loves sounding off. I mean, so many for gossiping.

And tea drinking is another one. Tea drinking, beer drinking. So many words for that. Do you put a brew on? Do you mash your tea? What do you do to your tea? I certainly don't mash. Do not. I have a cup. I suppose I might have a cuppa. You have a cuppa, but do a brew on? Do you mash your tea? What do you do to your tea? I certainly don't mash. Do not.

I have a cup. See, that's from beer brewing as well. I suppose I might have a cuppa. You have a cuppa, but do you brew it? Do you steep it? What do you do? Well, actually, I don't brew it. I suppose I steep it.

What I've taken to doing with my tea is I have it in a bag, a tea bag, and I pop it in the... Well, no, not every... Some people are still into loose tea. Put it in the microwave. No. Some people are into loose tea still. Yes, loose tea. No, no, No. Some people are into loose tea still. Yes, loose tea.

No, no, I'm just appalled at the microwave thing. Well, people, what do they do? What do they do? Well, they just pour hot water on a teabag, most of us. Yes, that's what I do. Tell me about the people in the microwave. I thought you were going to mention microwaves. No, thank you.

I don't. We did once have a Christmas by the microwave, you know. Your Christmases are notorious. I used to ask what you were doing for Christmas, and you just said, it's just the two of us, and we'll be having a salad. Because you don't do Christmas, do you? Well, of course we do Christmas.

We do do Christmas, but a simple Christmas, because we are veggies. Me too. And it can be. The year that really was a bit sad was when we decided we'd just do a microwave Christmas. Oh, yeah. Maybe this is the time I'm thinking of. And we all lined up by the microwave at one o'clock. By ten past one, we'd cooked our meal and we'd eaten it.

And then there was sort of two hours to wait till the Queen came on. Oh, it was a bit tedious. Oh, we talked here. Sorry. I was going to mention the Queen earlier. Yes. Which is that if you compare her early Christmas broadcasts with today's, she's gone quite estuary, as they say. So her accent has definitely, definitely changed with the times. I was mentioning that in terms of fashion. We all follow the fashion, even the Queen. So has mine.

If you see, I first did my own television programme, believe it or not, 50 years ago, Christmas 1969. It was called Child of the Sixties. And I was still a student. I sat on a stool, interviewed the great and the good of the day. And fortunately, it's been wiped, because they wiped a lot of programs to reuse the tape. But if you could have heard me, because there are odd clips of me at that period, it's a complete joke. I make Jacob Rees-Mogg sound like the artful Dodger. Right. I mean, it is so... Oh, how you do, everybody?

Lots of Latin phrases. Well, no, not so much Latin phrases. Just that the accent is so sort of strangulated. But when it comes to tea, I pop a tea bag into a mug and I pour boiling water on top of it from a tap now. I've got a tap that issues boiling water. And then I leave the tea bag in. I like to see the tea bag floating in a rather sinister way. I know, I do the same. And a spoon. I'm not sure

about the spoon, because that can get in the eye. No, it's fine. Yes, I'm pretty much like you, but at some point the tea bag has to come out. Now, is... Can I just say, Victorian slang for being mother and pouring tea was known as bitching the pot. Oh, I'd like that. Can I play mothers?

Can I bitch the pot? I love that. Oh, I like that. Is it a dialect if you are in Wales or in Scotland? I have families, you know, that come from Wales. In fact, well, they're really Anglo-Welsh, properly Anglo-Welsh. My grandparents were Anglo-Welsh. My parents were truly Anglo-Welsh.

They burnt down their own cottage. So they are really English people who spend time in Wales. But my wife's mother was born in Swansea. My wife was born in Swansea. I love the South Wales accent, the gentle South Wales accent. But there they have their own language, Welsh. No, that's a language. That's not a dialect. That is a language, a distinct language. Oh, yes, it's a wonderful language. No, that's a language.

That is a language, a distinct language. Oh, yes, it's a wonderful language. Dialect is merely a version of the standard language. Yes. So we have English dialects. So in Wales, are there dialect words? There probably are Welsh dialects, I'm sure. Just as German has lots of dialects. So, yes, dialect crosses many, many languages.

And will there be a difference between what they speak in North Wales in terms of dialects and what they speak in South Wales? I'm sure. Yes, it's all regional. I love time that I spend in Ireland, both in the Republic of Ireland and particularly in Northern Ireland, which is one of the most beautiful parts of the United Kingdom. It is, isn't it? I only discovered that recently because I'd never been and I went to Belfast and was bowled over. Had you been before?

I had never been and I just loved the vibe of it and the architecture and it brought to mind, I'm sorry that this is so well known because I wish I had some beautiful Northern Irish dialect word up my sleeve, but it's the obvious one. It's crack. Crack. And that means, what does that mean? A good spirit, a good feeling. It's like fun, amusement, entertainment. And how do you spell crack? It's C-R-A-I-C. Crack. It that means, what does that mean? A good spirit, a good feeling. It's like fun, amusement, entertainment. And how do you spell crack? It's C-R-A-I-C.

Crack. It's pronounced crack. And I think I have already said in an earlier episode how famously on Countdown, I love this word so much that I hit the desk with passion and said, I love crack. Much to the amusement of everybody else. Oh, because of course there's crack cocaine. Yes. Susie, this is the moment that I really look forward to, the three new words, or rather old words, that you're going to introduce me to,

to enrich my vocabulary, because it pays to increase your word power. It certainly does. Now, some of these are dialect, as you would expect. In fact, all of them are going to be dialect today, so let's start again. My three have each come from a particular dialect, obviously. And the first is not something I

think any of us are really going to need, at least not very often. Perhaps seasoned walkers might like to know about a flinterkin. Be careful not to step on a flinterkin. A flinterkin? How do we spell flinterkin? F-L-I-N-T-E-R-K-I-N. That is from Orkney, and it means a dry cow pat. Oh, there's nothing more annoying than stepping in a dry cow pat. Actually, there is. Stepping in a...

A wet one. A wet one. Ooh. This is why I don't go to the country. Oh, I love the... Do you really like the country? Yes, I do. Here's another gorgeous one, which, again, is regional.

Now, it depends. It's mostly northern, but you might find it down south as well. And it's a glimmer gawk. A glimmer gawk. I absolutely love this word. A glimmer gawk is an owl. How do you spell it? Glimmer?

It's G-L-I-M-M-E-R. So glimmer. And then a gawk, also known as a bob owler in certain places. G-A-U-K. Yes. All one word. Yeah, a little hyphen in between, possibly. A glimmer gawk.

Yeah, so you'll find it in Gloucestershire, you'll find it in Lincolnshire, you'll find it in certain places up north. And bob owler as well, I love, too. That was one of the National Poetry Day submissions too. And all of these went in the dictionary because dictionaries are really desperately trying to capture dialect because so much of it is part of an oral tradition

and we rely on printed sources. So we're making huge concerted efforts to capture new dialect and old dialect. I know we've touched on this before, but to get into the dictionary, do you allow something that's only spoken? It has to be written down somewhere. Excuse me. An old dialect. Just, I know we've touched on this before, but to get into the dictionary, do you allow something that's only spoken? It has to be written down somewhere. It does, but, you know, nowadays you can have transcripts

of conversations, that kind of thing. So we're digging deep to find the printed records and also to transcribe spoken conversations. I made a mistake, actually. A bobowler is not an owl. It's a large moth. A bobowl? A bobowler. Is that your third word? No. I'm just throwing that in. it's a large moth a bob owl a bob owler is that your third word no i'm just throwing that that's a bonus together with it your bonus this week is

bob owler which is a moth yes but our two big ones so far the glimmer gawk which is an owl from gloucestershire what was the first one again uh it was a flinterkin from orkney a flinterkin from orkney which is a hard cow pat. Yes. And I am going back to, I won't go to Yorkshire actually this time, but back to dialect, into the Fs. And this is fobbly mobbly. Fobbly mobbly. If you're feeling fobbly mobbly, you're on either one thing or the other.

You're just feeling a bit meh. It's the kind of dialect version of meh. Meh. M-E-H. M-E-H. M-E-H equals fobbly. I think that's very good. I've been feeling a bit fobbly mobbly recently, actually.

I've just been a bit sort of... Neither well nor unwell. Yeah. Just so-so. Mardy. Mardy I love. Bit Mardy. But meh, fobbly mobbly. I love that word.

I go to Yorkshire a lot. Do you go to Yorkshire? I love Yorkshire. It's one of my favourite places. Because Countdown, of course, was in Leeds. That's where it started. Absolutely. So no way. You must come to visit. You've never been to see my teddy bear collection, have you? No.

Well, you must. I haven't. You must come. It's not far from York. It's not far from Ripon. It's a summer called Newby Hall. Have you heard of Newby Hall? I have. York. It's not far from Ripon. It's a summer called Newby Hall. Have you heard of Newby Hall? I have. Newby Hall is a beautiful historic house and the grounds are terribly well kept.

You will very rarely, though there are cattle there, very rarely come across a flintikin. Let's hope not. If you've enjoyed listening to us today, first of all thank you and secondly if you could give us a review or rate us and help spread the word we would be hugely grateful and thankful.

Something Rhymes with Purple is a Something Else production produced by Paul Smith with help from Russell Finch, Steve Ackerman, Josh Gibbs and the lovely Gully. Oh, good old Gully. You see Gully and you no longer feel fobbly mobbly, do you? Never.