John Walker's Electronic House

Rum Doings Episode Three

by on Sep.02, 2009, under Rum Doings, The Rest

It’s a third episode of the Rum Doings podcast. This week the topic not under discussion is: Are exams getting easier?

Topics that do get discussed include preferred forms of alcohol, the tricks behind sleeping on planes, the nature of cruising, hypermobility syndrome and other medical conditions. Nick (and Nick alone) attempts to win the legal attention of one of the richest men on Earth, then we’re very rude about poor Rick Astley. Find out whether all South Africans are evil, and whether there’s a left or right wing left to enjoy.

To subscribe to the podcast click here, or you can find it in iTunes here. To download it directly, right-click and save as here.

Thank you so much to so many people for kind and encouraging comments. We’re getting close to kind and encouraging numbers of people listening too. But not quite. If you enjoy it, or hate it and want others to agree with you, please email, IM, tweet and blog your interests. It makes a big difference. If you’re a very famous person, do it very publicly, so we are inundated – it’s okay, Nick owns the hosting service.

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21 Comments for this entry

  • Al Byrne

    “I don’t believe in travel sickness. I believe in sea sickness, because of the–”
    “–And Jesus.”

    Fantastic, sirs.

  • Matt

    Splendid!

    A quick question for you, John. If you love Jesus so much, why don’t you marry him?

  • Pace

    British beer is great. It’s my favorite part of going to England. I think Nick should be deported.

  • David McBride

    That was great! Though a very hammy start.

    Regarding blinking 12:00: If you haven’t already seen it, you may well enjoy the Internet Helpdesk sketch:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oI2xK6zbaoI

    Regarding travel sickness: it’s actually caused by a safety feature that’s wired into the brain.

    Your brain has two different means of determining it’s orientation with respect to the world: what the balance centres in the inner ear are telling it, but also from watching the relative motion of your surroundings.

    When these two signals differ — such as when you’re being jostled up and down in the back of a car, reading a book — your brain concludes that it’s malfunctioning, possibly as a result of ingesting something poisonous. So, just to be on the safe side, it empties your stomach.

    This is, however, unhelpful when you’re genuinely reading a book in the back of a moving car.

  • Surgeon

    Well, if you want to try tasty beer, but are more inclined towards stuff that tastes like sweets…
    Then I can highly some lovely Belgian fruit beers

    Particular favourites are :

    Bacchus – Kriekenbier / Frambozenbier
    Fruli – Strawberry Beer
    Timmermans

    Yes, I do get called a mincer in the pub, but I don’t care.

    Mostly you get it in bottles around our way, although our local has Fruli on draft.

    If you can’t find any though, here’s a good online shop :
    http://www.beersofeurope.co.uk/acatalog/

  • NM

    My favourite beer in Belgium was a banana beer. That almost excused the beer. I really don’t see it is unreasonable to object to something that is predominantly bitter. We have evolved a repulsion to bitter things, because they usually indicate that they are unripe or poisonous. I can understand how a tinge of bitterness within a mix can give something an interesting edge, but wither whole flagon of bitter evil? Why battle our evolved aesthetics so?

  • John Walker

    Fruli is quite revolting : )

    However, the best, loveliest beer is La Fin Du Monde:
    http://www.unibroue.com/graphs_our_beers/fin_du_monde.html

    And Blue Moon is pretty good.

    I had a banana beer in Holland that was splendid, too.

  • Ian

    I had apricot beer at a Camra festival that was truly splendid and wholly refreshing too.

    Dunno what my favourite ale is though… Schiehallion would probably be up there somewhere.

  • Owen

    The one ale you really must try, is Innis and Gunn. I’d be surprised if you didn’t like it (although quite what I’m basing that on I don’t know) but I can guarantee it’s like nothing you’ve tasted before.

    Aside from that I will also second the Belgium beers. They’re generally a fair bit sweeter but also actually have flavour, which a lot of regular ale and beers do not.

    Well, not a pleasant flavour anyway.

    Watch the percentages on them though, those Belgium beers are a tad strong :)

  • Owen

    >> the best, loveliest beer is La Fin Du Monde
    Which I notice also weighs in at an impressive 9% You may also like Duvel and Leffe then Mr Walker.

    Mmmm, Leffe…

  • Mike Arthur

    Phil Collins bashing aside, this was good. You guys should check out the Political Compass, it gives a bit more definition to what is considered “left” and “right”.

  • Centy

    Ah banter about the NHS… truely this is my favourite podcast now. Great listen again and if you want a really interesting story to tell go get a sexual health checkup now that borders on anecdotetastic.

  • Yorick

    Liking the new podcast. Very enjoyable to listen to over breakfast… Screw the radio. :)

  • url404

    Just wanted to pop on and say thanks for all the podcasts. Binged on all three during the day. I’m sure I looked a bit mental smiling so much on the bus and the walk home.

    I also now wonder if I “suffer” from hypermobility syndrome due to being able to bend my fingers back to the back of my hand (or 1 cm away at least).

    Looking very much forward to the next podcast.

  • Fat Zombie

    …On the fruit – alcohol side, would I be exiled for saying that I quite enjoy a bottle of Pear Kopparberg from time to time? Very nice.

    I’m glad that there’s more people that do agree that people don’t actually enjoy wine; they just drink it because it’s more adult than drinking orange squash or lemonade at the dinner table. Turned 19 recently, and I still don’t understand beer or lager. I turned towards spirits very early on.

    Oh, yes, very good podcast. (Although I am slightly alarmed by your Now-Show bashing – I enjoy it quite a bit, if for comfort purposes than anything else. Still, I can see how it would annoy you)

  • Benji

    Jolly good podcast, chaps. Keep it up.

  • Fan

    This is AWESOME.
    Please do more of this. Try variations if you ever find it stale. DO NOT EVER STOP DOING THIS PODCAST EVER AS IT IS AWESOME.
    x

  • Heliosicle

    On the topic of travel sickness – I suffer it only when I am on the “home leg” of a journey, when I start to recognise places and because I live in the country the roads start to get very windy, driving isn’t simply “driving in a straight line”!

    Very good again anyway

  • Quercus

    I remember the Spitting Image songs – I even bought the “Wave A chicken In The Air” song many years ago.
    I remember the B side as well. It was a horribly racist (are White South African’s a race?) song but remember that South Africans briefly eclipsed the Nazis at that time as the people we most liked to hate, or in the case of the Americans (gross generalisation alert) overtook the Nazis and the English.

    I think a future edition should be based upon the effect of religious belief on moral behaviour.

  • Bod Notbod

    Enjoyable listen but it has brought to the surface my underlying hypochondria.