Three Bean Salad - Museums

Episode Date: January 12, 2022

Holly reckons it’s high time the beans talked about museums. Sure, they get a little embrangled in decommissioned hangars and Eastern European concrete but do also expect to learn the meaning of an onion in a renaissance painting and how to conduct a 16th century eye test.Get in touch:[e-mail]@beansaladpodJoin our PATREON for ad-free episodes and a monthly bonus episode: www.patreon.com/threebeansalad

one, two, three, four, five, six, what? No, why did I do six? It's okay. We've got Henry six. We're good. We're good. It was a moment of madness. Bloody hell. I feel like very telling. Yeah. His first day back at work center, isn't it? Yeah, all over the place. Even though I very much enjoy recording this with you two, and I enjoy my job overall. I had a certain dose of dread this morning. She have the sort of year level Sunday Isis. Yeah,

yeah. And I don't know why, because as I say, I very much enjoy doing this. But I think it seeps in from, you know, everyone else. Yeah. Well, you've got through an awful lot of beef this season, haven't you? Well, the meat situation is absolutely ridiculous. Today, after I finished this, as soon as I finished this recording, I'm going to be boiling and baking a ham. You're still going? I've got more last night eight a side of smoked salmon. Wow. So you really keep it going until

12th night. I think if you come this fall, you have to keep it going for the rest of the year. Now, if you're keeping the festive meats going this deep into January, yeah, we're recording this just before 1212 nights, I think this will go out a bit after. Hopefully, by the time this goes out, you'll have ceased your feasting. And then what three months of total abstinence? Well, I think Henry's right. I think if at this stage, you're

still boiling and baking hounds, it doesn't stop. Yeah, I'm going to say three years gone. Yeah, you're just living like a Tudor Monarch for this. This is my pledge for the whole of 2022, I will only eat things that can be described as bone in including what bone in Viennetta's bone in Stilton. Can if you've got this on the bone, please, you'll just be

saying that green grosses. No, I don't want that bread slice. But if you could run this Onyx collarbone through it. Onyx. Is that an animal? I thought it was like a black. It's a gem, isn't it? A precious black gem. Okay, I've got confused there. I'm gonna have to Google that. That'd be quite a bougie choice to only eat things that have been run through with a bejeweled bone.

That would be very almost ancient Egyptian levels of glamour. Yeah, well, that's my year. That's my 2022. That's what it's going to look like. The dread has dissipated. I've decided it's actually going to be a really glamour to it hard. Absolutely. Yeah, it's going to be so interesting documenting your progress through that year as well. And my inevitable death changes to your cognition of speech.

Great flannel documentary as very high end super size me, isn't it? Yes, it exactly. But unlike super size me, it'll become very clear that to the whole production, won't it? And the view is that you're not you're not going to make it to the summer. Henry, this will be going out. We've just celebrated the new year, although this we're going out in a couple of weeks. So maybe that will alienate the listeners who by this point be

deep into 2022. But how did you see in the new year, Henry? I desperately, desperately sad. I think there was a lot about it means you've really tapped into the zeitgeist, Henry. That was the scene to hit. Basically, you're watching snooker on your own. reruns of snooker from 82. It was it was almost as bad as that. So I've still I've not sort of conquered the sort of TV streaming box system yet. That

world in terms of being on top of it. No, no, no, I still moving the aerial on top of the set trying to get a signal. Um, I have to be holding a large sort of dustbin lid. Yeah. And then I can just sit back and enjoy as long as I'm holding the dustbin lid. At all times. And essentially, I'm either watching streaming stuff. Or I have to go behind the TV route around a bit with some cables,

and then I can be watching live TV. Oh, we're the same. We're the same. I can't really watch live TV. No, any more. Well, what it's done is it's raised the effort bar slightly. If you if you want to watch live TV, you've got to go right. Yeah, I yeah, this is a small amount of effort now. I can't miss who to nanny. I haven't missed a single who exactly decades. Well, that's what it was. This was the year where for the first time ever, I didn't feel it was

worth rooting around with some cables in order to to go from Mandalorian to who to nanny. I thought on the one hand, I've got a kind of, you know, fictional science fiction, helmeted, you know, bounty hunter. And on the other hand, you've got the Mandalorian. Yes. Yeah, doesn't work at all. Doesn't. Yeah, doesn't work out. Come on. No, some of the rhythms. No, on the one hand, no sense at all. No, no, one has never been known to wear a helmet. We can

do this. We can pull this off. We can make this work. On the one hand, I had the option of watching a an epic drama centered around a small wrinkly, shriveled little big eared. Hang on. Allegedly, allegedly powerful and surprisingly long lasting cultural figure. I think I think you might be able to pull this off. On the other hand, I forgot which one that was. I know he's lost it at the last. I think you could pick your

ending to that one. It works both ways, doesn't it? Yeah. No, this year, I just thought it's not actually worth rooting around to watch the who to nanny. I'm pretty sure I know what's going to happen. A bunch of shriveled looking alien types will be brought on in quick succession while you mutter into your grey. So this is what they call music nowadays. Is it? Well, happy new year. Yeah, I'm going to bed. Yeah. Again, with burnt lips from talking to my old gray again.

It's the price I pay every year for being this angry. I feel like of all the things we've ever discussed on this podcast, the who to nanny is one that surely people outside of the UK have no idea like that. I assume it's plugged into every single nation that everyone observes New Year's Eve at the same time. But we can we can give a little bracy of it. Well, I feel like explaining the who to nanny. I don't think it will explain it. Do you know what I mean? We can tell you what what

it is and what happens. It's almost like when you explain it to explain it would would be to kill it. I mean, to explain it is to watch it. I mean, actually, even to watch it is not to fully explain it. You don't know how to understand it. It centers around Jules Holland, former P&S of the band squeeze. He knows his way around a Steinway, the old Jules. And he has a series of musical guests and celebrity guests normally, I haven't seen it for a while. One of my memories is

watching it about two decades ago, and he was going around asking for people's New Year's resolutions. And I think the first couple of people were just like, are going to cut down on the old fags, or, you know, I'm going to wash my jeans less. And then he came to Edward Collins, the guy who sang Edwin Edwin know I'm going to go like you before. He did say that his New Year's resolution was for world peace. You could see all the other celebs who were waiting in line

going, Oh, no, I've been told I'm overbrushing by my dentist. I was going to cut down on that. So literally, everyone at that point, made the New Year's resolution resolution. I don't think they're in a place to make because I don't think any of them were. He's over. He's over. He's overestimated the impact of the song, never met a girl like you before. On the situation in Yugoslavia.

There's basically two camps. There's the people that think they have met a girl like you before. And who contend that. And then there's the people that side with him and contend that they haven't met a girl like you before. So essentially, what it is, is a TV program that's basically all British people watch on New Year's Eve. Yeah. Where this pianist sort of invites a very odd mix of celebrities on. They're not top level celebs.

Who was it this year? I didn't see it. Who was it this year? Well, it was COVID. It was COVID strapped this year. Okay. Was it Chris Whitty? The COVID players? So the UK's top scientist, government scientist Chris Whitty, chief medical officer, bigger pardon, dressed as a lateral flotast.

And then And then Lenny Henry, stuck him up his nose, and dunked his head into Johnson Vantam's open mouth. It was pretty disgusting. And then we had to watch Vantam's body for half an hour to see if lateral stripe would develop on it at any point. And then it did. And the whole thing was gone. I can't actually remember what happens in it because it's sort of there in the background. It replaced, because there was a

point when it was Clive James. That's going back quite a long way, maybe. Do you remember that? I can't remember. I can't remember preheating, Annie, ready. Yeah, I remember Clive James. There was a point where it was Clive James, who was an Australian sort of poet slash broadcaster. Whit. And General Whitt.

Slash take take of the piss off. For an adverts man. Yes, he He plowed that furrow deep. He was a mixture of quite a highbrow poet, who experimented with the language and sort of, you know, coffed wine with intellectuals in the corridors of power and stuff, but and also just love making fun of foreign ads. And made a living more out of the latter, I think.

Yeah, it was increasingly foreign ad stuff. I think it came increasingly irritating to him that that's really what he was known for. And what he was really just undoubtedly very, very good at. Absolutely hammering a Japanese insurance ad. In a way that now these days would be seen as culturally intensive. No way around. Please, it's completely unacceptable.

So it's always been quite a strange. Yeah, it's been quite a strange sort of job in terms of the the CV of the person who takes care of Britain's Yeah, the United Kingdom's New Year's Eve celebrations. It was Clive James and now it's Jules Holland. And pre-Clive James, you'd imagine it was probably like a sort of Navy general who would give a talk about the state of the Navy and smoke 80 cigarettes throughout the show.

Strap a desert of a cannon. And yeah. And fire them at Jerusalem. And the big guy in Belgium is be a longstanding tradition. His job it is to actually collect that that corpse, which would never have never made it all the way. It never made it all the way and dispose of it in a Belgium garden.

I wonder if this sounds baffling though to our foreign listeners, that our nation is so heavily institutionalised. That we will just, you know, New Year's Eve, we celebrate by we sit down calmly and quietly and we observe whatever is being piped through the set. Whereas elsewhere in the world, I don't know, they might be doing parties, dancing on the rooftops of Favayas on the beaches of Copenhagen, you know, on the bridges of Sydney,

whatever, you know, raising a glass. Yes. I think there's a lot of people using just objects around them as percussion and whole towns just breaking out into just rhythmical dancing and just playing the news agent. Yeah, yeah, exactly. With a telephone pole. Yeah, but we just sit in and watch.

So did you guys watch that this year? I didn't actually didn't. I was flicking between the Hoot and Annie on one side. Well, I was watching Only Connect on BBC iPlayer. Right. What's that again? It's quiz quiz thing. Quiz thing with Victoria Coron.

High, a very high end quiz thing. I think, okay, yeah. I was watching the Christmas specials of that, what's three of those on the bounce? Yeah. Then it was then it was maybe quarter to midnight. Yeah, we managed to do the thing you didn't bother to do is go around the back of the telly.

Pull out. You did. Okay, that's good. You still got some life in you. He's still worth saving this one. We'll the other one round the back and just shoot him. But this one. We flicked between Jules Holland's Hoot and Annie,

which wasn't very good. And the BBC One, so that's BBC Two is the Hoot and Annie. BBC One is a strange world where they have the kind of more official bit of the New Year's Eve. Is it a lot of regal kind of stuff? No, no, no. It's like a series of stills of corgis. They just play it through every year, don't they?

Yeah. They have the proper fireworks that happen out of the London Eye and all that. Right, yeah. And there's nothing as magical as I was watching fireworks on a decent telly. There's nothing so it really stares the soul. But this year, they didn't do them properly because they didn't

want people to sort of gather to get COVID. So he said they did a sort of very bad secret location in the garden in Hertfordshire. Well, they sort of did that, but it was just Greenwich. Right. They did it out of Greenwich. And but it I don't know what went wrong, but they wouldn't meant it for any fireworks.

And then they kept cutting to the Globe Theatre, Shakespeare's Globe, where there was a choir doing ABBA covers. They've committed this, haven't they? They really... Stinks of groupthink. Oh, it was absolutely grotesque. Someone's accidentally left choir and ABBA on the same white board unintentionally, just as part of a list.

And someone's come in the room later and just assumed these things were supposed to be put together somehow. It's been a bloody nightmare all going on. It was very bad. It was very bad. Yeah, it felt very lame. It felt like 2022 is going to be a lame year. I didn't hit the telly at all, which I think means that

technically I'm still in 2021. Oh, yeah, I tell you, I've seen Jules Holland ruin someone's oh, man, just that by playing boogie woogie piano over it. Let's get on with that, then. You know, Jules Holland, is it J00? J00 LS. Some other things to know about him. Yeah, it's J00 LS.

And Holland is HO triple L. Triple L, A&D. He's master the art of playing honky tonk piano. So over anything, any other kind of music, guests come on and then, and then I think it's a legal thing they have to agree to. So they'll be singing their song and then you'll cut to Jules doing honky tonk piano. Is that what happens?

Yeah, pretty well. That's part of the song, yeah. And he's really burning the flame for honky tonk, isn't he? Pretty much. He's the last man standing. Also, what is a hoot in Annie? That's a question I've wondered sometimes. That's it, isn't it?

That's why we keep watching every year. It's a bit Scottish somehow. How is it? Oh, is that? I might think of Hogmanay. Yeah, that's maybe Hogmanay. Hoot in Annie. It could be a bit New Orleans-y or it could be a bit Irish.

I don't know what it is. Yeah, I wonder what Americans watch. Reruns of I Love Lucy, presumably. Well, they have things they watch that we don't watch. Like, is it the Grinch Stole Christmas they always watch? It's a Christmas. It's some old, it's a cartoon. Yeah, we've never watched that here.

I don't think I'd even heard of the idea of the Grinch. No. To those in my 20s, probably. Are you aware of the £85 Grinch? No. No. So this year, this was on Twitter this year, where a woman was complaining because she'd paid a man £85 to come around and do a Grinch party with her son,

her eight-year-old son. And she said, I paid this man £85 and I came back to the house to find this. And obviously, I don't really know what the idea of the Grinch is. The idea is that he ruins Christmas. Yeah, he's a Scrooge-like figure in the sense that he's anti the spirit of Christmas. Didn't he steal presents and whatnot? Well, what this guy had done essentially was just like... This guy had done...

This is excellent. I'm enjoying this. I'm sorry. In a sense, you just poured a litre of water. We have to cut to a special sort of... We need to cut to a special sort of jingle or theme here to cover Ben kissing himself. Put a bit of lift music. Yeah, we need a bit of lift music. Sorry, we'll rejoin you.

Sorry, he just... I'm imagining this story, by the way, ends with some children being disappointed. So it's interesting to learn what really gets Ben's funny bone going like nothing else. I think we're going to have to call off the podcast this week. Look, thanks for listening. Yeah, it's a 12-minute episode. We apologize for that. We hope you're back in touch.

Oh, my God. So it turns out this is the thing that amuses me the most. In the world. In the world? Yeah. Yeah. Which is that she paid this man 85 pounds and he came round and poured a litre of water in the studio.

Over her son. For 85 pounds. 85 quid is steeper than ever. 85. Oh, wow. He's getting own brand orange juice. The margins are spectacular there. I mean, is that with bits?

If that's from concentrate, that is absolutely unacceptable. Oh, wow. She was livid. So she paid him 85 quid for a Grinch party. He came round and poured orange juice all over her son. Yeah, well, they lose things. I suppose you've got to be careful what you hire, haven't you? I mean, I'm trying to draw a...

You're trying to find the moral? Yeah, I'm trying to draw a Christmas lesson from this. Or you've got to be... You've got to be careful where you pour orange juice. Careful. You've got to be careful what you pour over a child. There's a moral in there somewhere. And if it isn't just pure goodwill, then you need to think twice.

OK, time to turn on the bean machine. Yes, please. BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP And this week's theme, as sent in by Holly McIntosh. Mm-hm. Thank you, Holly. Doesn't say where she's from. We know where she's from.

But we all know. Yeah, we all know. is museums. Museums. When was the last time either of you went to a museum? Pretty COVID. No, I've been in the COVID era. Have you?

You really? Well done, good for you. When I went on holiday to Estonia, I went to a submarine museum. It's been absolutely enormous. Was that a submarine museum or was that a submarine experience? An Estonian man just bundled you into a sort of coal cellar and said, it was like this. You impressed gang as a submarine monkey for a period of nine months.

There's nothing like a romantic Ben Partridge planned holiday, is there? I'm envisaging a large room with a series of submarines and glass cases, but I'm assuming it wasn't far from that. It was inside a former hangar that formerly held planes that land on the sea. Seaplane? Seaplane. Yeah, so it was an old seaplane hangar. Ben, you say that as if you've ever done anything on a holiday that wasn't in either

a former hangar or an active current hangar. It's pretty much hangars only, isn't it? Hangars of Eastern Europe. Great concrete hangars of Eastern Europe. The longer decommissioned, the better. Absolutely. This one had the biggest free-standing concrete dome of its kind, which is a sort of thing you can't really experience in a coffee table book full of

pictures of concrete domes. You've got to go and see it. You've got to, yeah, and to feel that sense of just how concrete they are. Because, yeah, you can't replicate that in a photo, can you? Just that, the kind of... To touch it, to smell the concrete. The smell that sort of dead smell you get, isn't it, of concrete? Yeah.

Well, it's just because it's a lot of sand, isn't it, mixed with a lot of paste, isn't it? I think it was used. Port weapons and paste. That's it. Sand reinforced paste. Yeah, and what I love with concrete, and you'll see this in a lot of Ben's holiday photos, is that lovely lack of a grain running through it.

If you take the photograph close enough, you don't know where anything is. You don't know where. You don't know how far away are you from the sense of knowing. Is it going up or down? Yeah, for how long does it go up or down, four or deep? And do any of these concepts even matter? All you get is that sense that probably, if you pull back far enough... It's a smooth dome.

That's a smooth dome. So, is the hanger underneath the dome, or is the dome separate? The dome is the hanger. Oh, the dome is the hanger. That's, wow, that must feel good. Well, that's what I said when I walked in. I was like, oh my god, the dome is the hanger. The dome is the hanger.

The dome is the hanger. Oh, darling, this is so magical. The dome is the hanger. And obviously, you've had to, by this point, you've had to work your way through all the crowds of hawkers, selling you little mini-kirik kings with mini-dome. Edible marzipan domes, little tobacco smoking domes. Presumably, Ben, you've said no, darling. We're not bang any of these things, because it's about experiencing the dome.

It's about being in the moment. Because you're not one of these people that likes to stand in front of a hanger and just look at the whole thing through a camera. But you like to be in the moment and experience it, right? Well, that's it. And at this point, as I said, I didn't know that the hanger was the dome. So, I thought, well, darling, let's first look at the hanger, then move on to the largest concrete dome of its kind.

But then, the overwhelming feeling, when you walk in, you realise that the hanger is the dome. Wow. I mean, my God. That's that even work. So, does that mean there are larger non-creep? Does that mean there are larger non-creep? Being the opposite of concrete. For all of our listeners.

Non-creep. Well, that's how Ben sees the world, isn't it? It's either concrete or just everything else is just non-creep, just whatever. And a lovely old mahogany sort of dining table. It's just non-creep, isn't it? It's more of a non-creep. Love. These things are all non-creep.

Arms. Well, there are three things in my world. There's concrete, there's non-creep, and then there is creep. Which is an island. Which is, again, another holiday option, which you generally, I imagine, is shoe in favour of, what, Balkan countries? And Balkan and Baltic. Balkan and Baltic.

The two bowls. Balkan, Baltic, bowls out, let's have a good time. Let's run at a concrete dome as hard as we can and see if we can get to the top. It's an afternoon, isn't it? So, Ben, you must have been, because when you walked in there, you were a guy confident that you knew the difference between a hanger and a concrete dome, weren't you? Yeah.

And that's what travelling does, because it makes you see things from a new perspective. Doesn't it? So, within the dome was an old submarine in the shape of a dome, within which was a smaller dome-shaped submarine. In the shape of an American sandwich for our younger listeners. So there was a whole submarine was in there. Whole submarine. There weren't many people there.

It was just us, essentially. We walked in, it was just us. Me and my girlfriend and the massive submarine. I'd have thought it'd be absolutely crammed with people from all around the world. That's strange. Who'd have thought it? I thought it'd be wading through absolutely huge coach tours and cruise tours. You know the concrete dome, Ben, just quickly.

I do want a picture of this. So, basically, first of all, it's hollowed out, right? It's not solid. Does it mean it's a dome from both the outside? So, you're asking if you had to drill into the dome to find the museum? That's the question. Okay, no, so it's a hollow dome. Oh, so the whole thing's a dome.

I've been picturing a rectangular hanger with a dome on top. The hanger is the dome, Henry. This is why you have to go to these places yourself. You're never going to be able to manage it, Henry, until you physically go there. I've got it now. I would describe that as a dome-like hanger, made out of pure concrete. You've not been there, Henry. You didn't tell me what I would call the dome.

Would you like me to share with you a photograph of the dome? Yeah, go on. Okay, I'm going to put this in the chat. There's a link in the chat. Oh, you're definitely inside a dome. How's that for a concrete dome? Oh, bloody hell, can I say that's nowhere near as big as I was imagining it. I mean, okay, largest concrete dome of its size, but...

Of its size? But isn't anything the largest of its size? You're the largest heavy packer of its size. Currently, at the moment, yeah. But it's not even the biggest shed of its kind, you know what I mean? I mean, it depends how you measure it. Yeah, you could say it's the biggest cat of its kind. I mean, do you know what I mean?

What do you mean? The biggest cat of its kind does mean the biggest cat of its kind. And that's the biggest concrete dome of its kind. Why can't they just say it's the biggest concrete dome, then? Because there are different kinds of concrete domes. Ones that hang as one, which aren't, I suppose. Well, it's unsupported by... There's something about it.

Okay. It's about as well-organized looking as my loft, in terms of like... It's just sort of stuff. There's just these loads of stuff piled up. It looks like a sort of storage. Have you got a diesel-powered submarine in your attic? I remember once, as a sort of young adult, going around, I think it was Paris and it was just in some absolutely massive museum.

It could well have been the Louvre, from what I'm... It's got all the calling cards of the Louvre. But I remember what I developed a technique. I thought, I need to see all the stuff in this museum. But I also want to get out of this museum, you know, in an immediate sense. I don't want to be in this museum in more of a general sense. I want to see all the stuff in this museum.

You want to be able to say that you've... Yeah. You want to have been... I want to have been in this museum. Yeah. I desperately want it to be over and to be in the past. You don't want to be there if you want to have been. I want to have been.

What I did was... There came a point where I worked out that what you could do is... What I could do is I could go to the middle of each room, one by one. So I'd stand in the middle of the room and I'd just do a 360. On the spot. Go... Michael Jackson. Crappy crotch.

Round you go. Yeah. And then... And then Moonwalk to the next room. And then Moonwalk my way back into the Egyptian room. See you later, Renaissance period. Yeah, you do a 360 on the spot. And I've technically seen everything in this room.

And then go into the next room. Stand in the middle. 360 on the spot. I've technically seen everything in this room. Next room. 360. I've technically seen everything in this room. Do you get the picture?

Which is what the experience that Da Vinci was hoping. That's what he wanted. Look, the other thing I want is developed. I tell... It's something I developed in a museum. I think this was in Italy, I think. It was a museum full of the Renaissance masters. It looks like it's just a painting of some people in a dark room

with some onions and sort of sorted veg on the table. But... But actually, onions are very hard to paint. I mean, if you've ever tried to paint an onion in oils. Incredibly hard. And each of those onions represents one of the Dutch sheaths of the Netherlands. And that person sitting at the table may just look like a painting of a man with a kind of shirt that you don't wear anymore these days.

But he may have been one of the lower Burgundians. And also, that rotten skull he's holding in his right hand with lots of worms on it might represent death. It probably does, because it's a bit on the nose. It's quite on the nose, that one. But what happened is, I think it was maybe in Florence. It was some massive museum, the Ephesie, maybe. And obviously, going from room to room, going,

the Renaissance masters. They're bloody good. I mean, that's how you feel when you go in. You're like, well, I cannot wait to see these Renaissance masters. They must have been absolutely brilliant. And you know, but what I found was, you go around the room, there's just so many paintings. And basically, all I wanted was to see ones by people I'd heard of.

Because a lot of the paintings looked a bit sort of similar. And it's just some people in a room, yeah. There's a table, there's a window open. There's a little doggie. There's some fish, veg, et cetera. But were you in a supermarket? There were ways. You had a fish can.

The people were moving. They were giving you change. It was amazing the way the great masters captured the sense in which a man's eyes can follow you around the room. And actually, sometimes his mouth can appear to move. And he can say things like, do you want to buy some fucking veg, mate? Or do you want to get out or move on? All right.

Why are you spinning on the spot? You're going to knock things off the shelves if you do that. But I remember, I developed this thing, which is I'd walk towards a painting. I'd see a painting on the other side of the room. And I'd walk towards it. And I'd be like, is that just a standard painting of some stuff? Or is it a da Vinci? And I'd walk towards it.

And I'd be looking at it going, yeah, it's just some people in a room that guys got a hat. You don't wear that kind of hat anymore these days. Yeah, that's pretty good. Yeah. Is it old? That table looks quite old. Old?

Is that might be a pomegranate? But I'd be walking towards it thinking that. I'd be thinking, but really. This is before you had your eye test. What am I talking about? Of course, that's how they used to do eye tests in the old days, isn't it? It'd be different paintings we rolled out and then begin. A pomegranate distance.

If you had a pomegranate distance of less than two yards. You needed some lenses. And would you say that's an onion or a sweet? Onion or sweet? And now with the right eye. Okay. Okay. So you're saying sweet.

And then so with the left eye, would you say that sweet? Or one of those long things with all the Brussels sprouts still stuck on? So what I'd do is I'd walk towards the painting and I'd be looking at the painting and go, okay, there's the painting. And then quickly I'd glance at the, because what I was trying to do was convince myself and whoever I was with that, that I had a genuine understanding of art and the masters. And then the beauty of perspective and balance in a painting. But I'd look at the painting and be glancing at the dancing at the little blurb thing.

Looking at the painting, glancing at the blurb, looking at the painting. I mean, look at the painting going, yeah, whatever. Looking at the blurb, looking at the painting blurb, painting blurb. And then I'd see, I'd say, is that Da Vinci? Be right there, fucking hell. And as I think I'm seeing Da Vinci on the blurb, I'm looking at the painting and going, fucking hell, that is amazing. Look at the way he's captured the light on that nose.

It's incredible. It's the great. I look back at the thing. Da Vinci is coming more into focus and pretty short is Da Vinci. Look at the way that those... The billowing cloths. The way he's captured the cloth billow and all the folds, the folds amongst her dresses.

How has he captured the less incredible Da Vinci? And then I get a bit closer to be actually from the school of Da Vinci. I'd be like, it's absolute dog shit. Look, it's boring. I know anyone could do that. It's just a woman in front with some veg with the... Yeah, billowing. What's the difference between a billowing dress and a non-billowing?

Just whatever. I don't know, it doesn't matter. So essentially, and then... But when I saw a thing and I did... And if I did, essentially, whenever I recognized the name, it was like Botticelli or something, if I recognized the name of the painter, I'd look at it in a whole new way.

I'd be like, that is absolutely amazing. The light that's captured on that spaniel's nose, just the amount of sweat tones that capture... Just in the nose of that spaniel alone is mastery, is true genius. That soft Botticelli. And then if I hadn't heard of the guy... Got a jelly from his nose moisture period. From his nose moisture period.

And then... You're telling me that this painting was done by the blind opera singer Andrea Bocelli. I went to the Vatican. Obviously, there's some big hitting art in the Vatican. There's the ceiling-based art. There was also a bit where it sits on a wall bit. And I genuinely thought it was dog shit.

It looked like something... You know, if you go to an Italian restaurant, and maybe the manager thinks that he's a bit of an artist, and he's painted like a sort of Italian scene on the wall, maybe? There'll be someone with some loaves and some little children playing, and, ah, here comes the lord with... It's just like a sort of becalling to generational banquets.

Exactly. That kind of scene. But you can always tell that it's not been done by a great master, because it'd be something like, the dog will have one of its legs be loads longer than the other three. And the other three, or something. Or there'll be something just wrong. Yeah.

He'd come onto your hands so everyone's got clenched fists. Yeah. And the sort of avuncular figure serving out the food will have three eyes. There'll be little clues like that. Or the table, instead of having table legs, it'll have hooves. People get mixed up. If you're not a great grandmaster.

And often the little clue is, the sun will have a little smiley face of sunglasses on it. Just so it's really clear what it is. Just so it's clear what it is. But, yeah, the great masters didn't need to do that. Or often they would do it. If you look underneath the paint, there'll be a stick. You'd x-ray it.

If you x-ray it. Well, they'd tend... Yeah, that would... Artists on and off would fold that bit over, so you wouldn't see that bit of the image that's around, often around the back of the canvas. Around the back, there'll be the sun will be wearing shades. And a lot of the dogs will have bow ties and stuff.

Just... It's to help give them character, isn't it? But this thing I saw in the Vatican, it did have that sense about it of cheeky little figures. I don't like it in a painting where there's cheeky little figures. You know, and it's like, oh, this guy, a little cheeky guy. He's got a bit drunk. And he's...

Oh, this is... You know what I mean? He's a little sort of rake-ish Georgian boy with a cup of gin somewhere in the... Yeah, exactly. All that kind of nonsense. So I just thought it was rubbish. And then I had that same expensive view, Henry,

where then it was explained to me this was by Raphael. Yeah, exactly. And he thought it was being one of the greatest freezers ever done, of all, you know. Yeah. And I didn't go, this is a masterpiece, but everyone else around me was really cooing over it. But I genuinely think it's rubbish.

Yeah. Well, even Raphael must have had a warm-up phase, right? I mean, he must have been shit at some point. Surely. Exactly. Six-year-old Raphael. And he would have botched out some stuff that, you know, we wasn't too fussed about as well.

But he'd done some stuff that he... Oh, yeah. He didn't consider his best work. I mean, I'm seeing a sort of game show here thing, sort of fly on the wall or a sort of hidden camera thing, where you take someone around in an Italian art gallery, but you've swapped the blurbs. Or you've swapped out some of the paintings.

So half of them are by the manager of an Italian restaurant. In Reading. And half of them are masters. With a Da Vinci blurb on. With a Da Vinci blurb on, exactly. They've all got Da Vinci blurb. And I think you could justify anything as you'd go, it's so brilliant the way, the naive way in which he's...

The naive way that that man is giving a snickers to a child. Yeah. And exactly. And the way that Roman Centurion is riding that jet ski. Wearing a MAGA hat. He's actually really quite interesting. Right, now time for your emails. Thank you to everyone who sent us an email.

To 3bincelladpod at gmail.com. Now, a bit of a pompadou for us guys, I think. Okay. And now it's time for pompadou section. Pompadou. I'm very aware that this email section is swiftly turning into a very bollock heavy section. So just a general appeal to listener for any emails that aren't just bollocking one of us

for saying something that isn't correct. Yeah. Yeah, we can't get through them all, can we? I mean, we'll already never get to the bottom of the bollock pile, will we? I don't think. Now, it is time for a listener bollocking of the week. Now, obviously, traditionally, I read out the bollockings. It is time for me to fall on my own bollock.

This is unusual. And I wonder whether I should... One of you should read that email. Maybe I'll forward it to you, Mike. Yeah. Good shout. Yeah. Good shout.

And I can receive the bollocking. Okay. Accessing listener bollocking. Bollocking loading. And the summer bollocking of the week. Bollocking loaded. Okay. Okay, here it is.

So this is from Paul Soms of The Hague, which he helpfully points out is about 400 kilometers west-south-west of Bremen. Now, I can read this exactly as it is written. Or I can paraphrase to spare Paul a little embarrassment. To spare Paul embarrassment? Why is that? Has he disgraced himself? A little bit, given that it's a bollocking.

I'll give it you as is. Hello, Beans. Mr. Partridge, it seems to me that you, by taking it upon yourself to dole out the listener's bollockings, have succeeded thus far in daftly avoiding being bollocked yourself. I think he means deftly. No more good, sir. It are, and that's where he's really led himself down.

He's very angry. He's cleave very, very angry, writing this, isn't he? He's gone for a day. Are you so furious he's written? It are. It are. Portuguese escudos and Spanish passatus. And not, as you suggested in the zombies episode, Spanish escudos.

Consider yourself bollocked. All the best wishes in the new year for you and your loved ones. Pulsoms. There we go. So he's tripped himself up in his fury, but the message of the bollocking is clear, Ben. Now, that bollocking came into the email account. I was shame-faced to have received my first bollocking, but then something started twitching within me.

Should I accept this bollocking? Should I reflect this bollocking? I wasn't sure. This is something we all have to live with. And then I received an email from John. Oh, I don't know. With the subject title, a pre-emptive listener bollock back for Ben. Whoa.

Blimey, this is getting quite advanced. Hello, Ben. I might even response to an email you will probably receive. That's not often you get an email that starts like that in life. This is quite kind of a memento level time lifestyle. We live in the information age, so I'm happy to bear with. It's quite chess grandmaster as well, isn't it? Because it's seeing sort of two moves ahead,

which I think they probably do even further than that, don't they, chess grandmasters? But this is certainly grandmaster level, reflecting bollocking stuff. Hello, Ben. I might even respond to an email you'll probably receive, regarding your Boots loyalty card payout segment in Zombie's episode, where you questioned whether they would return the points in the form of old Spanish escudos. Of course, before the Euro, it was in fact Portugal who used escudos

and Spain used pesetas. So, to the person who has probably already emailed in to have a light bollocking to point this out, I'm 100% sure that Ben was referring to the Spanish escudo used between 1864 and 1869. Good grief. Not wishing for the podcast to become a bollocking for all bloodbath, but I hope this bollock-back ammunition will be pointed appropriately yours, John. Thank you, John. Wow.

Wow, what a moment. And of course, there's absolutely no chance of anyone on this podcast fact-checking any of those details whatsoever. You got that right. We'll take them as the gospel truth. And it seems that Ben has been spared. He's your guardian bollock. Well, no, he's like he's got the force.

He's like, this is not the bollocking you're looking for. It's like he's seen it all coming. It's a Jedi bollock. He's deflecting his Jedi mind bollocks. The guy from The Hague. It's amazing to be at a point where a bollocking can be then reflective bollocks without us actually having to get involved. Do you know what I mean?

That happened by itself. Yeah, look, Mum, no hands. Yeah. So an extraordinary bit of bollocking there. Hands free. Reflecto bollock. So that's listening to bollocking of the week. Simone Hudson emails.

G'day Beans. It's only three sentences this email. G'day Beans. Henry Ata Shuttlecock. Love the show, Simone. I don't know what that refers to. Is it a rhetorical question? In which case we can just move on.

We can just say thank you and move on. And it's something for all of us to reflect on. Rachel emails from Canada. Okie dokie. Dear Mr's Bean. Having newly discovered your podcast, I recently listened to an older episode entitled Portraiture, in which you mentioned that each use of the bean machine

warms the earth by three degrees Celsius. This was always going to come back to me. Oh dear. To achieve this degree of warming, the machine's emissions would have to match the stock of carbon held in the atmosphere, which is as of 2020, around 870 billion metric tons. Sounds about right.

She continues, according to a 2017 article in The Guardian, which details the effects of projected sea level rise, a world warmer than today by three degrees Celsius would flood out an estimated 275 million people worldwide, including presumably my coastal Canadian village at sea level elevation. I implore you to explore alternative sources of energy or increase the machine's energy efficiency.

Yours truly Rachel. Sorry Rachel. Yes, sorry Rachel. Unfortunately, the bean machine can only run on fossil fuels, specifically tires, so that's simply not going to change. Sorry. That's the situation. But Henry does recycle and I've got a wood burner in my house

that I don't use, so that's something. Yeah. And I only drive in reverse. That's sucking back, mile for mile. Every bit of carbon he would have otherwise been emitting. It's the equivalent of replanting trees, isn't it? If you reverse, if as many miles as you go forward, if you reverse the same amount.

You're offsetting, yeah. Yeah. So sorry, Rachel. Thanks for flagging that. We'll talk to the boffins and see what we can do. I mean, whether or not there are no boffins, we're not going to have that conversation. Well, she's the boffin, isn't she?

As it turns out, and she's tried to tell us and we're ignoring. In this case, she's the boffin. Yeah. We're ignoring the boffin. We're ignoring. There's one boffin and we're ignoring her. Okay, now it's time to just reflect, really, on what we were doing last night.

We were down at the Sean Bean lounge. It wasn't the normal Sean Bean lounge. We were at the Sean Bean departure lounge, which is an airport departure lounge that you can only get into if you sign up as our patron at patreon.com forward slash three bean salad and become a Sean Bean tier member. And then, of course, you are allowed into the Sean Bean lounge, various Sean Bean lounges across the world, actually,

including this one, the airport departure lounge. And of course, first of all, we were joined by Jared Coplin. And straight away, he came in and he said, can I pilot these planes? And we were like, of course you can. And luckily, Elizabeth Elko was there on hand to show him how to do that. Because she's a bit of a dab hand with a fixed wing. And there was Patricia Campbell as well, who's one of our good Sean Bean

pals who's very much a sort of helicopter stunt pilot. She was able to offer a little masterclass and that's Jared as well. And it only takes about half an hour. That's right. And he was a dab hand himself. And it was great fun. And we all got in the back, didn't we? Because we're all game.

I mean, Lucelli and Riketh, they're so game, aren't they? Lucelli and Riketh. And Lucelli and Riketh was like, let's do this. Let's just get in the plane and let Jared Coplin pilot it and see where we end up. We were taxing down the runway and Jared was really excited. We're all excited. And then, of course, we look back.

Who's turned up too late to get on the plane? Is anybody Granbo? Oh, Granbo. So Granbo is running behind the plane. Granbo number five. Well, Granbo number five and it's late. That's what I was trying to shout at him through the... But you can't speak through those Pestlitz windows on a plane, can you?

But I remember I was shouting it. No, but Eilish Rolford brought like two empty bean cans on a string. So you were able to communicate with Granbo using those. Eilish Rolford doesn't go anywhere without two empty bean cans on a string. Yes. And Aidan, of course, had his DIY kit. He had his drill kit. Drills and saws and hammers and so on.

And also, it's got Ed BP in there as well. Yes, who folds up into himself, doesn't he? Ed BP. That's... He's got the same attitude with Bobby as his name, which is you keep it short. Ed BP. Keep it... Ed BP. And he folds in on himself, doesn't he? And we popped about... Well, I remember Natalie O'Hara was there. She tried to pop Ed BP out, but she got it wrong.

It's a bit like a Leatherman. You need... He's a bit of an act to it. And so he had his... She popped him out with his arm. His head was still stuck under his left armpit, remember? Yeah. Yeah, she corkscrewed him. She got out the corkscrew first, didn't she? So... Yeah. Which actually was a relief because Pip Aidan had turned up

and Pip had thought that Pip had bought a hat, but actually had been corked. Professional milleners that also has a little sort of cellar of wines down the back and Pip could barely breathe. He certainly couldn't speak and nearly that cork popped out ASAP. So Ed BP and Natalie between them were able to pop her open and Pip had a smashing time after that. By which stage, you've been flapping around with that.

You hadn't managed to get Granbo off the ground. Granbo was still down on the runway. Well, so at this point, I was shouting Granbo first blood, wasn't I? I was trying another... You were trying another pun. I was trying another pun. But again, it was wasted. And they were getting so angry until Emma Walton again turned up late. She turns up, she's standing next to Granbo

and she actually then starts trying to shoot the plane down, which I felt was a step too far. We had left them behind, of course. So that's because we thought that Emma was firing rockets at us, but actually she was firing Siobhan McGranigan at us. And Siobhan got snagged. But luckily for us that she did because she'd clamored in. And what does she have with her?

But the ultimate party hamper, which had a set of decks in it, had some lights, had some fine cheeses. It had a series of parachutes because you also had a good idea the whole thing was going to go down pretty soon either way because Jared was losing concentration at this point. Now, at this point, I remember it was around here that Dodie, because me and Dodie had been necking... Well, lovely strawberry deckeries, wasn't it?

Strawberry deckeries. Now, neither of us knew what strawberry deckerie was. So it just turned out it was just some turps which he'd put half a yop into. Which he shouldn't have done because he'd borrowed that yop off Robert Knapp and promised he'd give it back to him at the end of the day, but he didn't. And Robert was very good about it.

He was. But me and Dodie, we were basically off our faces. I actually can't remember now. Oh, that's because Karen Watson hypnotized you as well. Oh, handshake. It wasn't the deckeries that wiped him and me. That was Karen Watson. She'd been practicing hypnotism on Paul Jennings,

who's completely resistant to hypnotism of any kind, as it turns out. And then she'd tried on you and you were highly susceptible. That's why you can't now remember 1992. Try and think of 1992. Do you remember the Barcelona Olympics? It's not there, is it? It's gone. The bar's what?

The bar's what, owner? What imp? What? Yeah. And she installed that memory in Kyra. So Kyra has now got two 1992s to deal with. So when she thinks back to 1992, she's got her 1992. And she's got Stereo 1992.

Yeah. And she's got my 1992 sort of over. Like a doubly exposed photograph. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah, yeah. So we then, what then not happened, we ended up landing in Luton, didn't we?

Is that what happened? Yeah. But not the Luton you think of, the Luton, the private island that's owned by a person, Katie Jones. It's more of a sort of Luton theme. Luton theme, private island. It's a Luton theme, that's all. Yeah.

So it feels like you're in, if you imagine that Luton was surrounded by crystal blue waters. Yeah. It's basically that, isn't it? Yeah. So there's this huge voxel car factory overlooking a series of cramps. And you can just soak up the atmosphere. Ring the bell.

Ring the bell, have a good time. Anyway, thanks to everyone who came last night. Had a great time. And thanks to everyone who signed up at our Patreon, patreon.com, for our three bean salad. Not only do you get access to the Sean Bean lounges, if you join the Sean Bean tier, there are of course, bonus episodes and all sorts.

So check it out. Please. Thanks, everyone. There's one more thing, isn't there, Ben? The theme tune. Yes, please. Choral rendition. Nice.

In the style of Brian May. Wow. Granula Whales song. Guitar. Piano centric electronic version written in septuplets. Spaghetti Western, modern jazz, violin and jazzy wine bar version. Man, we are a sport of a choice. I feel like I chose the last one.

And also the agony of choice is too much for me. I'm quite interested in Brian May because I want to know, is it guitarist Brian May or astronomy Brian May that we're going to get? Or astronomy Brian Cox. Or astronomy Brian Cox. Or succession Brian Cox. I guess from Nick Gill, he writes, Dearest Beans, I've made you a theme tune in the guitar choir style of Brian May,

circa 1977. Okay, sounds good. To be honest, I think I'm relying on Mike to be enthused by the idea. But you may enjoy some ludicrous pomposity. Keep it beany, Nick. Oh, Nick, thank you. Thanks, Nick. We're ready for Nick.

And thanks all for listening. Thank you. Bye. You