QI 10x13

1. This programme contains some strong language.

2. Well, good evening, good evening, good evening.

3. I'm running out of good evenings. To the QI Job Centre.

4. Scanning the situations vacant tonight are

5. retired civil servant, Sarah Millican.

6. Former cloakroom attendant, David Mitchell.

7. Unemployed pianist and saxophonist, the Reverend Richard Coles.

8. And ex-Epping flea market sandwich-board man, Alan Davies.

9. By their buzzers shall ye know them.

10. And Sarah goes...

11. Ooh. And David goes...

12. That's a cloakroom being attended. Richard goes...

13. Aw, bless you, I've heard you on Waterloo Bridge. And Alan goes...

14. 'Sandwiches, sandwiches!'

15. That's what you mean by a sandwich board, is it?

16. Not strictly.

17. I'd like to say, the cloakroom I attended was for actual cloaks.

18. It wasn't a euphemism. Oh, it really was a cloakroom?

19. It was for where people left their coats and bags,

20. and I suppose the occasional cloak. And...

21. But with it being in the 20th century, it wasn't very cloak-heavy.

22. No. Anyway, let's begin with our first question.

23. Confucius once said, "Give someone a job they love

24. "and they'll never have to work again."

25. So, what sort of jobs are these?

26. We've given you what, in the social media world, as you know,

27. is called a cloud. 'Sandwiches!'

28. Yep?

29. That's only going to get funnier, isn't it?

30. I hope so. Yeah.

31. A ripper is a murderer.

32. Well, obviously, yes...

33. A highly-skilled murderer. An expert.

34. In Whitechapel, usually. Yes, yes! Yeah. Sometimes in... I knew that was right.

35. These days most murderers are amateur, though, aren't they?

36. It's very difficult to make a living out of it.

37. As a job, yeah. No, it's a good point. It's true.

38. A ripper, actually, you might know. There is a word,

39. it's the kind of word a crossword fiend might know - riparian.

40. Riparian, does that mean anything to you?

41. I feel it should.

42. Yes. It comes from the Latin "ripa" - river bank.

43. So the riparian means of the riverside, of the river bank.

44. A fish seller who sells fish off the banks...

45. Oh, this is like a 3-2-1 clip. I know, I'm so sorry.

46. I thought we were getting somewhere,

47. it's going to be someone who repairs the banks of rivers.

48. OK, no, he sells fish now!

49. I'm so sorry.

50. A burgrailler.

51. That's presumably someone who grills burgers?

52. Just, the general spelling in the average burger joint. No.

53. A burgrailler was someone who removed burrs

54. from the teeth of combs in a cotton mill.

55. Oh, I thought it was going to be from the Queen Mother.

56. And we have a willyer, which comes from the same profession.

57. Is that someone who was both in the Black Eyed Peas and the Wurzels?

58. Oh, it's will.ay.er!

59. will.I. arr!

60. Will.I. err!

61. Oh, very good.

62. Excellent.

63. You see, your years working with Jimmy Somerville and The Communards

64. have not dulled the edge of your wit, I'm glad to see.

65. It's actually a willyer, it's also called the woollyer.

66. But willyer is a more common name for it

67. and, again, we're back in the world of the loom,

68. operating a willying machine, which sep...

69. I've done that! Yes, thank you, ladies and gentlemen.

70. Wharfinger, you might be able to work out.

71. There's an odd thing that we do in English,

72. which is that we add a letter N where one isn't necessary.

73. So, for example, if someone is on a passage, on a journey,

74. we don't call them a passager, we call them a passenger.

75. If someone sends a message we don't call them a messager,

76. we call them a messenger.

77. It's a very odd English thing, of adding this N.

78. And a wharfiger is someone who might...?

79. Wharfage?

80. Yeah, own a wharf. Basically, a wharf owner is a wharfinger.

81. Do people own wharves now?

82. These days you don't meet many people who say, "I'm in the wharf business."

83. Actually you might have a Worf... I've got a lovely wharf!

84. Star Trek: The Second Generation had a character called Worf, didn't it?

85. He was a Klingon with a big nose. Was he? Oh, yes. And no sense of humour.

86. You do surprise me with the moments when you dip into popular culture, which ones you choose.

87. I am secretly a bit of a Trekkie, I have to say. Are you?

88. Make it so.

89. Could you play Vulcan chess?

90. Oh, no, that's very difficult. Do you remember Vulcan chess?

91. I remember Vulcan chess. Very, very difficult.

92. And T'Pau, do you remember there was a pop group called T'Pau? We toured with them.

93. That took their name from an episode of Star Trek.

94. You toured with T'Pau?

95. When you're on tour, if you're in a band, you tend to be on the same circuit as other bands

96. and we used to bump into Carol Decker,

97. who was the singer from T'Pau.

98. You'd be in a hotel with T'Pau and Public Image.

99. So you'd be having your breakfast between John Lydon and Carol Decker in a strange, weird sort of...

100. I'd like to see you partying with Shaun Ryder from...

101. But there was no partying, because, actually,

102. if you're on tour, you're so busy.

103. Everyone is in bed by ten, it's the people around who...

104. No, no, maybe they didn't tell you about the parties that went on afterwards.

105. I once stayed in a hotel in America with Black Grape,

106. which was the band that Shaun Ryder formed after he left,

107. you know, Manchester,

108. and it was so rowdy on the floor of the hotel...

109. Rowdy! When I woke up... Hey!

110. When I woke up the next morning, I opened the door

111. and there was a bottle of extremely high-quality brandy

112. with a little note saying, "Hope you weren't disturbed. Love, Shaun."

113. And I looked all the way down both sides of the corridor

114. and there was a bottle of brandy there.

115. We did have a bass player who came down one morning as we were checking out

116. and said he had trashed his room.

117. We were quite pleased,

118. because no-one had ever done that in our band, at all.

119. But it turned out that actually what he'd done

120. was tear up a copy of the Guardian.

121. And we made him go and tidy it up again.

122. All right.

123. A nut-steamer. Yes.

124. Is that somebody who works in a spa?

125. Sounds right. It does sound right.

126. Flong maker. Yes.

127. I have a theory that this might be a gentleman

128. who makes foundation garments for ladies.

129. And it's those very thin things

130. which are a cross between a thong and dental floss.

131. Oh, I know just what you mean. Yes. An arse-floss piece of...

132. Yes. Yeah, ooh! Ooh. Yes, horrible, yes.

133. The person cleaning it is the one you feel sorry for.

134. No, flong actually is a corruption of the French word "flan".

135. It means a heavy base.

136. Oh, isn't that interesting?

137. And it's actually from the word "printing".

138. What the flong made was actually... Because it was solid,

139. the Greek for solid is "stereo", and it was known as stereotyping.

140. Because you were making the same thing each time.

141. You made a stereotype.

142. And oddly enough, the noise the ink made was rendered as "cliche".

143. The noise. "Cliche, cliche" noise that it made

144. when you rolled the ink.

145. So both stereotype and cliche, which sort of mean the same thing,

146. are both printers' terms.

147. And so, literally, a cliche is made by stereotyping.

148. Yes, exactly. Right. It is incredibly pleasing. Yeah.

149. And we're only here to be quite interesting,

150. we don't expect you to be rolling on the floor barking like a seal,

151. vomiting with laughter at that thought.

152. But I do hope you will take it home,

153. wrap it in a little parcel of lavender paper

154. and store it in the bottom part of your drawer.

155. I'm worried I'll get it wrong. Yeah, OK.

156. I'm planning to slightly mis-remember it

157. and see some version of it in 20 years' time.

158. So, the one we can't help you with is a macaroni loper,

159. no-one seems to know.

160. We think it may be simply some sort of pasta job

161. of twisting macaroni into a...

162. Making necklaces out of macaroni, that's what it is.

163. But the reason we know all these are all jobs

164. is because of the 1891 UK census - people had to put their profession.

165. And these are just some of the professions.

166. So, we just know that someone in the 1891 census,

167. or probably more than one person, said "Oh, I'm a macaroni loper."

168. Yes. And no-one's ever explained.

169. No, unfortunately.

170. Because, nowadays in the census, don't some people...

171. They put that their religion is Jedi, as a sort of joke.

172. Maybe the macaroni lopers are having a laugh at our expense.

173. I once had to have a discussion about that,

174. when I was involved in prison chaplaincy,

175. because one of the prisoners wanted a Jedi chaplain.

176. No! Yeah.

177. In the end we found a shaman in Lincoln who did the job.

178. And did he come with a little lightsaber?

179. No, he had a shaking stick.

180. But we thought that was the nearest we could get. That would do.

181. Yeah. Wow! That's pretty impressive.

182. Star Wars will outlive all the major religions, I'm sure.

183. You think? Yeah. Maybe it will. Maybe.

184. Someone clapping!

185. There's one little Ewok at the back!

186. Anyway, there we go, that's question one over with.

187. What might an inspector of nuisances do?

188. Did nuisance use to mean something else?

189. Was it like nuisance, meaning a noise or a party or a...

190. Well, yes, it would include a noise, yes.

191. It was basically, kind of, an equivalent

192. of today's Environmental Health Officer.

193. They were appointed by the local authority

194. as sanitary and health issues...

195. One man's nuisance is another man's rowdy evening in the hotel, isn't it?

196. Yes, but this is like... Who decides what a nuisance is?

197. Well, this is like, you know, if your neighbour is a hoarder,

198. or they're smelly.

199. This was in days before the more common sanitation that we expect.

200. So if it was really smelly, very noisy.

201. They would also disinfect houses that had had smallpox.

202. They were also responsible for the scavengers,

203. and what were the scavengers?

204. Were they people who made a living

205. through going through the leavings of others?

206. That's what you would think. Like mud-larkers going through the beaches.

207. It actually had a more specific and unsavoury meaning, originally.

208. Is it waste? Waste. Night soil men, they used to be called.

209. Night soil. Ooh. Night soil. They stole poo?

210. Well, not stole, but... Just ones you've done in the night?

211. People had...

212. People had outside jacksies,

213. that were not connected to any system of sewers.

214. They were just a hole.

215. It was just a hole, and so there would be a pile of poo

216. and the night soil man would come with his spade

217. and he'd take your poo away. Right.

218. And that was a job - not a pleasant one.

219. They were known as scavengers.

220. And it was a deeply unpleasant, but a deeply necessary job, obviously.

221. Would you have to tip your scavenger,

222. like you have to do with milkmen and postmen at Christmas?

223. It's a very good question. You leave a Christmas box.

224. You leave a Christmas box! A perfect varnished stool.

225. The best stool you've produced, you save it up for him.

226. Your favourite one. I had a thoroughly good dinner that day

227. and I think that's quality, that stuff.

228. That's right, you can't spot a nut or a crack in it.

229. It's absolutely lovely. Lovely. Lovely. That's what you'd do.

230. It doesn't remain in that... I know this,

231. because I was a chaplain for a bit in Uganda,

232. and they have scavengers, night soil people there.

233. But I only saw it once and I shudder to recall it,

234. but it was sort of mulched down, if I may put it that way.

235. Ah. So it's not... So it loses its...

236. So it's not in its shape and form?

237. It's slop. Slop.

238. The same thing happens with squirty cream. Exactly.

239. It comes out a lovely shape. Yes, you're right.

240. But leave it for a few minutes and it's all gone... Loses its form, doesn't it?

241. It does, yeah.

242. And no-one likes a stool that's lost its form.

243. Yeah. Absolutely. Points deducted.

244. You've just ruined squirty cream!

245. Points deducted for a sloppy stool.

246. Anyway, enough already, let's move on.

247. Now, what is it about software engineers

248. that drives people to violence?

249. I don't like software which anticipates needs I don't have.

250. The sort of spell-checker thing,

251. which corrects your spelling to words you didn't want to spell.

252. I've got RSI now from correcting the corrections on my phone.

253. If I want to type the C word - and I do sometimes...

254. Yeah.

255. It comes up with Cynthia, and that's my mother-in-law's name.

256. Right. And she's lovely, and it seems so unfair.

257. Let's hope it doesn't work the other way round.

258. Well, unfortunately in the original Greek, it is Kunthia.

259. Is it? There is no letter Y in Greek. It's an upsilon, it's a U.

260. That's alarming. It is Kunthia.

261. No, I'm going back to the very first software engineer that ever was.

262. Babbage?

263. Well, Babbage owed an enormous debt to this person.

264. Ada Lovelace. Ada Lovelace also owed a debt to this person.

265. Ada Lovelace wanted to use the same... I'll get my cloak.

266. You've done very well! Ada Lovelace was the daughter of?

267. Mr Software.

268. So disappointing.

269. Because, you know, you have a Mr Baker, don't you? Yes, you do.

270. And a Mr Butcher. Mr Cooper.

271. Old Jeremiah Software!

272. But it's so much more interesting than that,

273. she happened to be the daughter of Lord Byron,

274. and she was one of the great mathematicians of her age.

275. And she was a woman we should celebrate.

276. And she was a colleague, as you say, of Charles Babbage,

277. and they had got their difference engine,

278. and they wanted to steal the idea of a Frenchman,

279. who'd come up with the idea.

280. And it's a software idea, it was for automating something.

281. As a little boy, he used to sit on a particular type of machine

282. and watch it working and thinking, "I could make this better."

283. And he invented the punch-card system for it.

284. And he has... Its name is...

285. It's not those pianos that play themselves?

286. No, Pianolas use the same system. But this is before that.

287. It's much more useful,

288. because it made something everybody in the world wanted to buy.

289. Which is clothes. And textiles.

290. Oh, is it for, like, a pattern on cloth?

291. A loom. A loom. It's a loom, and it's a particular kind of loom...

292. Jacquard.

293. Jacquard is the name, Joseph Marie Jacquard.

294. And he was an extraordinary man, born in 1752,

295. and these looms were used right up until our lifetimes.

296. But there you are.

297. Look at that. That's what he invented.

298. Now, you look at those punch cards, you think, now, what can that do?

299. Babbage correctly saw

300. this couldn't just make a loom and a tapestry and a picture,

301. but it could also possibly do calculations

302. and other such things that mathematicians were interested in.

303. And so we have a portrait of Jacquard himself,

304. which is done in woven silk using a Jacquard loom.

305. That is done by punched cards. Isn't that astonishing?

306. The depth, the tone, look at the knees there, the way the cloth is.

307. I mean, that's... It looks almost like a photograph, doesn't it?

308. It almost looks like a photograph. Yeah. That is...

309. You'd think he'd be happier, wouldn't you?

310. Well, that's true. Smiling in photographs is a very recent thing.

311. Oh, really? It was never considered normal,

312. it was considered weird to smile in photographs.

313. But the question was, why did he drive people to violence?

314. Ah, because he...

315. Was it like Luddites, did they come and smash his machinery?

316. They did, because it took so much work away from them.

317. Are these the shoe throwers? Ah. The saboteurs?

318. And what's the French for a wooden shoe? A sabot.

319. A sabot is a clog.

320. And they would throw their clogs into the looms to break them up,

321. and a sabot, it was known as sabotage.

322. And that's where we get our word "sabotage".

323. They would sabotage his machines.

324. And actually Luddites in Britain were nothing like as violent

325. as the saboteurs of France, in Lyon and places like that.

326. Different footwear, I suppose. Different footwear.

327. You can do more with a clog, can't you, than a conventional shoe?

328. We had an outbreak of it in my parish. Did you?

329. Yeah, I'm afraid so.

330. It's a shoe area,

331. so when the automation of the shoe trade came in,

332. there was a bit of smashing up of machines.

333. That's a nightmare though,

334. because if the people are destroying the machines with shoes,

335. if the machine's still going, they're just making ammunition.

336. For their own destruction. That's so true.

337. And just the irony of it. Yeah.

338. Just immediately, as they come out, chuck them back at the machine!

339. You don't have to use shoes to make a machine break,

340. it's just the French wore wooden clogs and those sabots.

341. But it is fascinating, isn't it, to think of it?

342. Where would we be without trees?

343. Well, so true.

344. You're right.

345. Anyway, the first automated looms caused rioting by French weavers.

346. Name as many famous butlers as you can.

347. Jeeves.

348. Jeeves?

349. Dear, oh, dear, oh, dear. Jeeves was not a butler!

350. Was he not a butler? He was a man.

351. He was a valet, he was a gentleman's personal gentleman.

352. A valet, sorry. What about Hudson from Upstairs Downstairs?

353. Hudson would certainly count, yes, absolutely.

354. A butler has to be head of a household.

355. A valet is a personal attendant, a gentleman's personal gentleman.

356. Oh, Christ!

357. I mean, you got away with this, didn't you, really?

358. Because you were quite young to play the role, weren't you?

359. I was young, yes.

360. I mean, you in particular, because he is quite a bit older, isn't he?

361. Well, in Carry On, Jeeves,

362. which is the very first appearance of Jeeves in Wodehouse,

363. "a darkish, youngish chap stood in the doorway,"

364. is the only physical description you get of Jeeves.

365. But as Bertie Wooster said of him,

366. "Although he is not a butler,

367. "if it comes down to it, he can buttle with the best of them."

368. And so... But the butler was literally a bottler,

369. he looked after the cellar. What about John Gielgud in Arthur?

370. Yes, he played... Well, was he a butler or was he a valet?

371. It's hard to tell. I'm saying he was a butler.

372. A gentleman, a man. My man, they used to say. My man.

373. The Fifth Duke of Portland so relied on his valet

374. that, when the doctor visited, the doctor would stand outside the room,

375. the valet would do the rummaging around and call out what he saw!

376. "I'm just inserting my finger into His Grace now!

377. "I would say it's a, sort of, yellowy-blue colour."

378. And the doctor would say, "That's a very bad sign."

379. Or a very good sign. But...

380. "All five of His Grace's testicles are in order."

381. It is a most bizarre thing.

382. Many years ago, I was asked, as I'm sure you've been asked,

383. to address the Oxford Union.

384. They have asked me, but I always imagine that they just ask me along just so that they can go, "Pfft!"

385. No! They would love you. They would love you. They'd also...

386. We have an entertainment, ha-ha-ha!

387. Ask him something, ha-ha-ha!

388. Make the clown dance!

389. We've got someone from Essex!

390. He doesn't know! Ha-ha!

391. Take my cloak.

392. No.

393. I went, and I remember this quite -

394. even for Oxford - astonishing young man, in a wing collar...

395. .. who spoke in the most extraordinary manner,

396. whose name was Jacob Rees-Mogg,

397. and he was the son of William Rees-Mogg,

398. who had, for a time, been the Editor of the Times.

399. Oh, he's an MP now, is he? And he's now an MP.

400. And he...

401. We may have a picture of him, there he is.

402. You're never going to mistake him for an Essex chav, are you?

403. And surprisingly... He's River Dancing there, isn't he?

404. He's very tall, isn't he? Bigger than the houses.

405. He is very tall, yes.

406. That may be a parallax effect, I'm not sure.

407. But anyway, he was infuriated

408. when leafleting the streets of central Fife,

409. by the fact that he was mocked

410. because he was assisted by his nanny.

411. And what was so extraordinary was his response.

412. His response was,

413. "Well, I do wish you wouldn't keep going on about my nanny.

414. "If I had a valet, you'd think it was perfectly normal!"

415. A man of the people.

416. I've had a tweet relationship with Jacob Rees-Mogg.

417. Is he a Twitter friend?

418. Well, I think...

419. I don't know if it's actually him, but he quotes to me Anglican psalms.

420. That's very like him.

421. I can't think there would be anyone who wasn't him

422. who would want to do that.

423. It does seem a very strange pastime, I have to say.

424. He's stopped talking to me now though, but he did for a while.

425. He's very busy running the country, with his nanny and his valet.

426. I think the nanny was doing the tweeting for him.

427. Mary Poppins and Jeeves are helping him out, that's all we need worry about.

428. Thank goodness. All is well in the world of Jacob Rees-Mogg, and I'm sure he's a lovely man.

429. Anyway, Jeeves was a valet, not a butler.

430. What use is a sheep in a gold rush?

431. Yes?

432. It can be cold and lonely on those prairies.

433. Yes, that's the first thing that would come into a man of God's mind.

434. Huddle for warmth, Stephen, huddle together for warmth.

435. No, well, the gold rushes aren't always in cold countries. But...

436. Is that what... Hang on, the Lord is your shepherd

437. and, on a cold night on his own, he might shaft you?

438. I believe...

439. I believe his rod comforts you.

440. They didn't teach me anything at theological college about this.

441. Oh, sorry, I do apologise.

442. Would you filter stuff through wool, thereby extracting the golden ore?

443. The man is right on the money, quite literally.

444. That's exactly what you'd do. Exactly what you do.

445. You take the fleece and the water runs through it

446. and it leaves behind the flecks of gold

447. and then you dry the fleece and shake them out.

448. It's as simple as that, it's a very good way, better than panning.

449. And there are people who believe, indeed there's one man who wrote a book about it,

450. his name is Tim Severin, he wrote a book called The Jason Voyage,

451. he's one of those people who believes a lot of Greek myths, a lot of myths generally,

452. are based on originally true stories that have become exaggerated.

453. And he believes The Golden Fleece may be one such an example.

454. Jason may well have taken a golden fleece

455. that someone had been using for panning for gold.

456. So, now, what would be the best planet in the solar system

457. to take your annual holiday in?

458. Or on? Yes?

459. Earth.

460. Absolutely the right answer, I can frankly say.

461. I don't think there could be a better answer.

462. Well, the great advantage of Earth is that you can survive on it.

463. Yes.

464. It's so lovely on a holiday, isn't it? Yeah, it is, yeah.

465. To be able to breathe air again. To just live through it. Yeah.

466. Yeah, exactly. Hello?

467. Uranus.

468. Why Uranus?

469. Because it would be much longer.

470. Ah, now, there you're getting very interesting.

471. It's about how long a year is or a season is.

472. Yeah. How long is a Uranian year?

473. A Uranian year is 84 Earth years.

474. 84. But each day is only 17 hours,

475. so, again, it spins faster than us.

476. So how long would a fortnight be?

477. Oh, God! Why am I...

478. It's a very good question indeed.

479. 17 x 14 would be a fortnight.

480. Would be a fortnight. How long is a year on Jupiter then?

481. A year is about 12 of our years, but it spins very quickly,

482. so a day on Jupiter is only about ten hours. Oh.

483. So you might not get a longer holiday, the further away from... No.

484. And I think I'd need those things that go round your wrists,

485. so you don't get travel sick, if it's spinning like that.

486. That's right. Jupiter is also entirely gas,

487. which is not really very nice.

488. The shopping and the sightseeing opportunities are amazing.

489. A layer of black liquid hydrogen 27,000 miles thick

490. crushes carbon into diamonds that are literally the size of the Ritz.

491. So you could really get some serious bling from Jupiter.

492. Try to deal with that. Yeah.

493. Sort of that size - a diamond the size of a hotel.

494. And another thing that's rather exciting

495. is that it precipitates neon rather than water in the atmosphere,

496. which creates brilliant bright red rain.

497. Which is fabulous, that would be so pretty.

498. It would be lovely to go, wouldn't it?

499. That there... That and a certain death.

500. You don't want rain on holiday, though, do you, even if it's bonny?

501. That storm, that eye as they call it,

502. which is in the middle of Jupiter,

503. is about four times the size of the Earth, so that's, you know...

504. So, essentially, Jupiter's a nightmare,

505. because your annual holiday, not only is it a shorter fortnight,

506. it only happens once every ten years.

507. Yes, quite!

508. That is true.

509. A very bad choice.

510. Venus, on the other hand, rotates incredibly slowly.

511. A fortnight's break on Venus would last over 15 years.

512. That's how long the days are.

513. But you'd need factor 980 there, wouldn't you?

514. Oh, the weather is awful.

515. It's clouds of sulphuric acid,

516. the surface is hot enough to melt aluminium.

517. So you'd need really thick flip-flops.

518. And the atmospheric pressure

519. is equivalent to being half a mile under the sea on Earth.

520. The air isn't very fresh, it's mostly carbon dioxide.

521. So it really is a bit...

522. It's a bit like being in an Ibizan club at about six in the morning.

523. Yuck! But you'd only want a week there, wouldn't you?

524. You'd only want a week on Venus. You wouldn't want 15 years.

525. I think you're right.

526. So, it's time for a Jolly Jape, this time involving lasers and balloons.

527. What can be coming next?

528. Here we are.

529. And I've got my laser.

530. This is one of these things they use, you know,

531. I'm going to point it behind me.

532. And we're using the smoke because it shows up the laser line.

533. Can you see it there? Oh, yes. Yeah.

534. I'm deliberately, obviously... They keep shouting in my ear,

535. "Don't point it at people's eyes!" I'm not!

536. Don't point it at their fucking eyes! It's fucking dangerous!

537. The thing is, he knows he's the one who's going to be fired.

538. But there you are,

539. you can see reasonably well that there is a laser light there.

540. The lighting men are going, "Aaargh!"

541. This is ordinary laser light, the kind you'd use to...

542. At conferences to point on maps and all the rest of it.

543. And I'm just going to press the laser here and...

544. Oh! Ohh! And...

545. Oh! And...

546. Oh! And...

547. Green, wow, cool! Ooooh.

548. Nothing. It's not popping, though.

549. Weird. So, the black ones pop and the white one doesn't. Alan...

550. Racist. You should have a...

551. That doesn't even begin to make sense. It's just...

552. I want you...

553. Take your black marker, please,

554. and can you make a black target

555. roughly in the centre of the balloon,

556. and I'm going to let you press the button, as a reward, if you do it sensibly.

557. So, do a big...

558. The temptation to draw a cock and balls is overwhelming.

559. I know! A big black spot, so it'll work. Just there.

560. And fill it in as black as you can.

561. Talk amongst yourselves. That's right. Colouring in.

562. If you'd worked for Blue Peter, you'd know how to do that while presenting to camera.

563. Oh, yes, sorry. Yeah! There, you see, exactly.

564. I haven't done a cock and balls and I know you're disappointed.

565. They're not. This is the back of Stephen Fry's head.

566. Yeah, it is actually not unlike. OK. Will that do it, do you think?

567. I reckon that's black enough. Is that black enough?

568. We know that black absorbs light and heat and white we know reflects it.

569. And we saw that the laser had enough energy to burst the black balloon.

570. So all you have to do, just leave it there,

571. it should be pointing in the right direction.

572. Oh! Hooray!

573. There we are, well done.

574. Very enjoyable.

575. Victory.

576. So what was Darth Vader thinking with that?

577. You see, the dark side will always lose.

578. Yeah. Absolutely right. Well, that brings us to the scores!

579. Amazingly and finally, and there is no minus score.

580. Ooh. Ooh!

581. Wow! In first place...

582. In first place... Patronising bastards!

583. I've had points before!

584. In first place... In first place, aided by a first-class brain

585. and, of course, divine assistance,

586. with 23 points, is Richard Coles!

587. Yep. I'd like to give my points to the poor.

588. Oh, what a holy man of God. Yeah, boos from the atheists.

589. We know he's only teasing.

590. In second place, with plus 13, is David Mitchell.

591. In third place, with eight points, is Sarah.

592. Well done, Sarah Millican.

593. Thank you. Glad I'm not last.

594. And it's not minus! In last place, with zero, is Alan Davies.

595. Well, there you are... It's not a plus.

596. That's all from Sarah, David, Richard, Alan and me.

597. Thank you, good night and be excellent unto each other. Bye-bye.