1. Hello, hello and welcome to QI,
the programme originally entitled
Fry's Turkish Delight -Copy !req
2. it's pink and squashy and comes
immediately before a cigarette.Copy !req
3. Our panel are not merely
interesting, they're a world-class
medical curiosity. Alan Davies.Copy !req
4. Jo Brand.Copy !req
5. Jackie Clune, and Jimmy Carr.Copy !req
6. Interesting answers get points
and obvious answers get penalties.Copy !req
7. Anyone can butt in at any time.
Jo goes...Copy !req
8. Cashier number one, please.Copy !req
9. Jimmy goes...
Cashier number two, please.Copy !req
10. Jackie goes...
Cashier number three, please.Copy !req
11. Alan goes...Copy !req
12. 'I am sorry for the severe delay
to the 8.17 service...'Copy !req
13. Fingers on buzzers, please.
Who discovered Australia?Copy !req
14. James Cook.Copy !req
15. Oh, Jo, I'm so sorry.Copy !req
16. Apart from the Aborigines, the
Chinese reached it as early as 1432.Copy !req
17. When Cook arrived in 1770,
not only was he not first,
he wasn't a captain either.Copy !req
18. He was Lieutenant Cook. The Dutch
got there 150 years before that.Copy !req
19. He wasn't even the first Englishman.
That was William Dampier in 1688.Copy !req
20. What's wrong with the Dutch? They
discovered almost everything first.Copy !req
21. But they're just homosexuals
who smoke joints.Copy !req
22. There's a lot more to them than
that. What is it with the Chinese?Copy !req
23. They went everywhere, then just
stayed at home and bred ferociously.Copy !req
24. We're wandering happily round
the globe which is good.Copy !req
25. Australia has been inhabited
by Aborigines for 40,000 years,
possibly 60,000.Copy !req
26. So they get the credit,
but what nationality
were the original Aborigines?Copy !req
27. Yes?Copy !req
28. Um, they came...
They came across a land bridgeCopy !req
29. which was later separated
by the shifting of tectonic plates.Copy !req
30. Well... So, they would have come
from south-east Asia, probably.Copy !req
31. So I would say they were... Chinese.Copy !req
32. Australia certainly was connected.
Which is why they have marsupials.Copy !req
33. And all their own brands of lager.Copy !req
34. The first Aboriginals
were nothing to do with Australia.Copy !req
35. Where was the term first used?Copy !req
36. Was it in the Isle of Wight?Copy !req
37. A wild stab!
It could so easily have been right.Copy !req
38. It means "indigenous population".
The original Aborigines lived
in Italy, where Rome now stands.Copy !req
39. For some reason it's stuck most
with the original Australasians.Copy !req
40. But there are Canadian Aborigines.
You could call the American Indians
Aboriginals, if you wanted to.Copy !req
41. But it was more fun
to call them "redskins". Absolutely.Copy !req
42. I wouldn't try it. No. You'll have
your balls turned into a small
purse. You're doing very well.Copy !req
43. Now, what... A very big purse,
I think you'll find.Copy !req
44. What am I thinking of?
My balls would make a rucksack.Copy !req
45. Hmm, now... It is actually possible
for the ball sacCopy !req
46. to be stretched beyond recognition.Copy !req
47. By a woman scorned.Copy !req
48. The scrotum is quite interesting.Copy !req
49. I'm going to write that down.Copy !req
50. The temperature ambit in which
sperm can survive is quite narrow.Copy !req
51. Do sperms... Yeah? Feel pain?Copy !req
52. I think...Copy !req
53. Are they like fish?
Do they feel pain?Copy !req
54. I have it on good authority that
the sperm, outside the ball sac -
the ejaculatum -Copy !req
55. will survive for 18 hours.Copy !req
56. Flopping around. It depends on...
Billions of them die
one after the other.Copy !req
57. Being hit over the head.Copy !req
58. They prefer the quick death of
banging their head on the ceiling.Copy !req
59. It depends if they're male or female.Copy !req
60. Boys swim faster.
Are there male and female sperm?Copy !req
61. Girl sperm do the bloody hoovering
and the washing-up.Copy !req
62. I think testicles are perfect
for testing anti-ageing cream.Copy !req
63. What is "kangaroo" in the Aborigine
language of New South Wales?Copy !req
64. Yes? Skippy?Copy !req
65. Unless it's apocryphal. It might be
obvious. I'm nervous of saying it.Copy !req
66. Say it, say it! Doesn't it mean,
"I don't know"? Oh, dear, oh, dear!Copy !req
67. It is an apocryphal story -
tell it.Copy !req
68. When the white settlers went there,
they saw these enormous
jumping things - kangaroos.Copy !req
69. They went, "What's that?"
And the bloke went, "I don't know."
And they said "kang-AROO", yes.Copy !req
70. Is that the proper accent,
or is that...?Copy !req
71. Sorry... ..A random accent?Copy !req
72. My generic Aboriginal accent.
Do that again.Copy !req
73. Kang-AROO. It sounds authentic!Copy !req
74. Sounds like a minicab driver -
"But I want Stoke Newington"!Copy !req
75. The true story, in a strange way,
is less interesting.Copy !req
76. What it means is "horse"
because in 18th-century Australia,
there were 700 Aboriginal tribesCopy !req
77. speaking 250 separate languages
between them.Copy !req
78. "Kangaroo" comes from the language
spoken around Botany BayCopy !req
79. and was first heard by Europeans
on Cook's expedition in 1770.Copy !req
80. The first English settlers learnt
the word Kangaroo... Kang-AROO.Copy !req
81. They arrived in a completely
different part of Australia.Copy !req
82. They proudly used the word
"kangaroo"Copy !req
83. but the locals didn't know the word.Copy !req
84. So the locals thought it must mean
an animal they'd never heard of.Copy !req
85. When they saw a horse, they thought
that must be what it meant.Copy !req
86. Let me whisk you now
across the Indian Ocean to AfricaCopy !req
87. for this question -
what did human beings evolve from?Copy !req
88. Apes.Copy !req
89. Oh, Jo!Copy !req
90. Homo sapiens and apes evolved
from a common ancestor
we haven't yet discovered.Copy !req
91. The missing link. Exactly.Copy !req
92. Before that, we came from
squirrel-like tree shrewsCopy !req
93. and before that - starfish.Copy !req
94. Do you know why there
aren't any aspirins in the jungle?Copy !req
95. The parrots ate 'em all -
paracetamol.Copy !req
96. All right, I'll go home now. Are we
telling bad jungle-related jokes?Copy !req
97. Why did the lion get lost?
I don't know.Copy !req
98. Because the jungle is massive.Copy !req
99. How do monkeys make toast?Copy !req
100. They put it under a grilla.Copy !req
101. Another African question now -
how did the Hee Hee tribeCopy !req
102. of Tanzania get their name?Copy !req
103. Sent off a coupon in the paper.Copy !req
104. I think you've pronounced
that wrong. It's the "Hey Hey".Copy !req
105. They were an early boy band
and they used to sing
"Hey, hey, we're the Monkees."Copy !req
106. Are they the missing link?
They are the missing link.Copy !req
107. I'm sure Zaire isn't Zaire any more.
It's confusing.Copy !req
108. It's the Democratic Republic of
the Congo. It's not that democratic.Copy !req
109. No, they call it democratic.Copy !req
110. Anything with "democratic"
in the name tends not to be at all.Copy !req
111. If they called it The Fascist
Junta... You'd respect them!Copy !req
112. I'd let them in the UN.Copy !req
113. The biggest mountain in Africa is
in Tanzania - Mount Kilimanjaro.
It has a permanent snowy peak.Copy !req
114. This is quite interesting.
A friend was playing
Trivial Pursuit. The question was:Copy !req
115. "Which two countries can you see
from the top of Mount Kilimanjaro?"
She said "India and Spain".Copy !req
116. Can we have her on next week? Yes.
Fantastic.Copy !req
117. Here's one more of hers - "What's
another name for the Northern
Lights?" And she said "Blackpool"!Copy !req
118. There's a really good website -
true answers from Family Fortunes.Copy !req
119. Fantastic. One person was asked,
"Name a bird with a long neck."Copy !req
120. And they said "Naomi Campbell".Copy !req
121. I was very keen on the "Name
a dangerous race". The Arabs? Yeah.Copy !req
122. Oh, really? Yeah.Copy !req
123. I watched that Anne Robinson one.
The Weakest Link.Copy !req
124. The question was, "Which member
of the Royal Family appeared
on A Question Of Sport in 1979?"Copy !req
125. Princess Anne. Yes. The answer the
person gave was "Ricky Tomlinson".Copy !req
126. Quite appealing. There you are.
Isn't it good? Good old Britain.Copy !req
127. So, how did the Hee Hee tribe
get its name? It was its war cry.Copy !req
128. They were the dominant force
in the region
in the late 19th century,Copy !req
129. and the most successful
at resisting German colonisation -
not as amusing as they sound.Copy !req
130. In Swaziland, there is only
one museum and it is bad manners
to shield one's eyes from the sun,Copy !req
131. and forbidden to point
at the king's hut.Copy !req
132. National service means weeding his
millet fields for two weeks a year.Copy !req
133. The penalty for not showing up
is a fine of one cow.Copy !req
134. Very difficult to enforce -Copy !req
135. not pointing at the king's hut.Copy !req
136. How do you explain it? So I know
not to point at it. "Which one is
it?" They go, "That one. Oh! AGGGH!"Copy !req
137. I can't believe it. Terrible.Copy !req
138. Tell me why did the speaker
of the Swazi parliament
lose his job in June 2000?Copy !req
139. He shielded his eyes and went,
"That's the king's hut." The economy
is run on one thing alone - the cow.Copy !req
140. Did he steal the king's hut?
He didn't.Copy !req
141. He stole a cow pat belonging to
King Mswati III.Copy !req
142. Mr Dlamini took the item
to help him perform
a magic spell to benefitCopy !req
143. the country AND his majesty
in person.Copy !req
144. The king is an absolute monarch
who rules jointly with his mother,Copy !req
145. the "Great She-Elephant".Copy !req
146. On rising from his seat, he is
greeted with gasps of admiration.Copy !req
147. I know interesting facts about his
mum. The "Great She-Elephant"? Yeah.
She's got a really good memory.Copy !req
148. Jo, you're having a wonderful time!Copy !req
149. Anthropology is the study
of mankind.Copy !req
150. So, which hand did King Henry VIII
wipe his bottom with?
Anne Boleyn's.Copy !req
151. Lovely image.Copy !req
152. Jo. Can I suggest,
in the hope that I get a WAGGGHHH!
that he used a servant's.Copy !req
153. Five points - absolutely right.Copy !req
154. I bet thatCopy !req
155. it's a job that's so awful,
it's actually given high status.Copy !req
156. You are absolutely right!
To make it bearable,
you get all sorts of privileges.Copy !req
157. They'd fight over it. Would you be
"Keeper of the chocolate starfish"?Copy !req
158. No, you were
the "Groom of the Stool".Copy !req
159. Despite its disgusting nature,
it was a hugely important job
as Alan has intimated.Copy !req
160. The autocue says, "It was
a big job," but I won't read that.Copy !req
161. Incidentally, there is...
The Groom of the Stool.Copy !req
162. .. Sir Anthony Denny,
longest-running groom.Copy !req
163. Did he bend over or did he roll
on his back and put his knees back?Copy !req
164. Do you know,
I'd rather not think about it.Copy !req
165. Did they have a royal changing mat
for him to lie down on? Wipes?Copy !req
166. Bucket of water!Copy !req
167. It was a much-prized job
because of the amount of time
one spent with the king.Copy !req
168. A rather cushier task in the king's
chamber was warming his shirtCopy !req
169. before he put it on.Copy !req
170. Now to something completely other.Copy !req
171. In 1879, Dr James Murray began work
on the first Oxford English
Dictionary, a 400-page work,Copy !req
172. which he estimated would take
ten years to write.Copy !req
173. But five years later,
he'd got as far as "Ant".Copy !req
174. It took 45 years - 38 under Murray -
and was only completed
13 years after his death.Copy !req
175. The second volume - "Ant"
to "Baton" - appeared in 1885.Copy !req
176. It contained the word "Arthropod".
Does anyone have the faintest clue
what an arthropod might be?Copy !req
177. A character in EastEnders?
No, that is not "arthropod".Copy !req
178. The latest edition of the Oxford
English Dictionary does not contain
the word "Gullible". Is that true?Copy !req
179. I really, really fell for that.Copy !req
180. Brilliant. Such an enormous brain
but it's a bit like reversing
a car - there's a blind spot.Copy !req
181. Five points if you tell me the word
that takes up the most pages
in the OED.Copy !req
182. "The". No. There's only one meaning
for that. That wouldn't take long!Copy !req
183. I didn't mean to humiliate you.Copy !req
184. It's obviously a word that
has lots of different meanings.Copy !req
185. And "The" is not also a word
for a type of watering can or...Copy !req
186. This could be a verb,
a noun, an adjective. Bee.Copy !req
187. As in double 'E'?
Again, not many meanings.Copy !req
188. I'll tell you. It is interesting.
Tub. No.Copy !req
189. Tub? It's "Set" - S-E-T.
It goes on for pages and pages.Copy !req
190. Murray personally supervised the
word "Set" in a shed in his garden.Copy !req
191. Isn't an arthropod
some kind of creature with legs?Copy !req
192. We should know it -Copy !req
193. 85% of creatures - 84% at least -
of all creatures on Earth
are arthropods.Copy !req
194. "Arthro" is "joint",
so it's a jointed-leg thing.Copy !req
195. There are more than 1 million
species of arthropods -Copy !req
196. butterflies, lobsters, woodlice,
bees, spiders, scorpions, prawns,Copy !req
197. crabs, beetles,
centipedes, crayfish,Copy !req
198. mites, ticks, fleas,
earwigs and ants.Copy !req
199. You're not doing the whole list,
are you?Copy !req
200. What is distinguished
about a male, European earwig?Copy !req
201. Yes? The moustache.Copy !req
202. It is a part of the body
but not the moustache.Copy !req
203. Is he greying at the temples?Copy !req
204. No. Does he wear a monocle?Copy !req
205. No, it's neither of those things.
Is he very well-endowed? Immensely.Copy !req
206. The best of all the arthropods.
They all are.Copy !req
207. It goes all the way up their body
and along their sleeve? Almost.Copy !req
208. It's longer than it's body, which
is rather odd. Longer than the body!Copy !req
209. Not only does it have this
very long member - over 1cm long...
Over 1cm?Copy !req
210. But it has two of them.Copy !req
211. That is a bit showy-offy.Copy !req
212. In relation to...
Is that on the slack...?Copy !req
213. In relation to its size, I mean.Copy !req
214. It's extraordinary -
it has a spare one.Copy !req
215. A spare! A spare penis.
And that's...
In case it catches it in its fly.Copy !req
216. It is quite interesting.Copy !req
217. In case the first one snaps off.Copy !req
218. Japanese scientists were watching
two European earwigs copulating.Copy !req
219. Through a microscope. Yes.Copy !req
220. They wondered what would happen if
they pinched the back of the male,Copy !req
221. which is a rather cruel thing to do.Copy !req
222. The male earwig backed offCopy !req
223. and the onlookers were distressed
to see it had left its penis
behind in Mrs Earwig.Copy !req
224. And its penis was
instantly replaced. No-one knows
if that would happen with humans.Copy !req
225. Let's not try it. I have tried it.
Have you snapped off a willy?Copy !req
226. I snapped off my husband's
last night.Copy !req
227. Another one didn't appear,
but a sandwich did so that was OK.Copy !req
228. It's not a sentence I thought
I'd say when I woke up this morning,
but I'd like to see some earwig porn.Copy !req
229. That would even things out nicely.
I've seen one of those
on the interweb.Copy !req
230. Have you? A man with two knobs.
Really? Yeah.Copy !req
231. The girl had one in each hand
like that.Copy !req
232. She wasn't sitting on a Space Hopper?Copy !req
233. Very good, very good.Copy !req
234. Search "Space Hopper" on Google,
you never know!Copy !req
235. I have a girlfriend
who has two vaginas.Copy !req
236. At her smear test, the doctor said,
"Bad news -
you've got pre-cancerous cells.Copy !req
237. "But they're only
in one of your vaginas."Copy !req
238. And she said, "I'm saving
the other one for that special man."Copy !req
239. Did she have two clitorises?Copy !req
240. No, no, the clitoris
is on the outside, Stephen.Copy !req
241. Is it? Oh, sorry, this is
where I really do plead ignorance.Copy !req
242. You're not in the vagina business.Copy !req
243. You're expressing rather
an unnatural interest. Not like you.Copy !req
244. Well, I'm curious.
I'll press my nose into anything.Copy !req
245. What do you call an insect that
sucks?Ulrika Johnson.Copy !req
246. Miaow!Copy !req
247. Yes, Jimmy.Copy !req
248. A rubbish insect?Copy !req
249. Very good. It sucks. Oh, it sucks.Copy !req
250. The stingray sucks food up
from the sea bed.
Yes, more of a fish than an insect.Copy !req
251. It can suck up food from a foot
below the surface of the sea bed.Copy !req
252. It's what we gays
call a bottom-feeder.Copy !req
253. Yes? Can I be gay too?Copy !req
254. Oh, very well. An arthropod and gay.
Not my speciality, but I'm sure
there are websites devoted to it.Copy !req
255. The Gay Arthropods.
The Gay Arthropods.Copy !req
256. Sucks? The answer is surprising.Copy !req
257. The answer is a bug.Copy !req
258. All bugs have piercing
and sucking mouth-parts.Copy !req
259. It's not just a general name
for a creepy-crawly - a bug.Copy !req
260. You didn't know that.Copy !req
261. One last question on arthropods -
how many legs does a millipede have?Copy !req
262. 1,000.Copy !req
263. I don't believe it, Jo.
I do not believe it!Copy !req
264. Oh, dear, oh, dear. I'm so sorry.Copy !req
265. No millipede has ever been
discovered with that many legs.Copy !req
266. The one with the most has 710.Copy !req
267. Another mind-boggling demonstration
of general ignorance -Copy !req
268. what colour is water?Copy !req
269. No colour, it's clear.
My dear fellow!Copy !req
270. Oh, dear.Copy !req
271. No, water is... Blue. It is.
You lose your marks for that,
but I'll give you five back.Copy !req
272. You need a lot of it
to see that it's blue.Copy !req
273. It looks blue when it reflects
the sky. But it is, in fact, blue.Copy !req
274. Have more people been killed
by atomic bombs or by ducks?Copy !req
275. In the world ever, or Nagasaki, 1945?Copy !req
276. Um...Copy !req
277. I know the answer
if it's Nagasaki, 1945.Copy !req
278. No... It must be ducks or you
wouldn't ask. Exactly, it is ducks.Copy !req
279. I could tell you why. Tell me.
Recently, going into jet engines.
They've taken a few planes out.Copy !req
280. That wouldn't account for
the hundreds of thousands who died
in Nagasaki. Was it that many? Yes.Copy !req
281. Sorry about that. Nasty.
It was nasty.Copy !req
282. You see, ducks were responsibleCopy !req
283. for the outbreak of Spanish Flu
that killed 25 million in 1918-19.Copy !req
284. More than died from military causes
in WWI. 100 times more than those...Copy !req
285. How exactly were they responsible?
Well, they passed it on to man.Copy !req
286. They were the Typhoid Mary.
Do ducks sneeze?Copy !req
287. Yes.Copy !req
288. I did my best, Alan. It was
brilliant! - it was unexpected.Copy !req
289. What buries its head in the sand?Copy !req
290. Jo. I have to finish my triumph off
tonight and say the ostrich.Copy !req
291. Hurray!Copy !req
292. Goodness me.Copy !req
293. No, they would suffocate.Copy !req
294. It's a myth.
How do these myths get started?Copy !req
295. They do have a way of lowering
their necks, lowering their heads
to ground level and looking aroundCopy !req
296. for enemies.Copy !req
297. Their legs are back to front.Copy !req
298. An ostrich running backwards looks
like a person. They run at 40mph.
Like a person? Their legs do.Copy !req
299. You go out with some dodgy birds!Copy !req
300. Let's just move on.
Who invented rubber boots?Copy !req
301. Yes? The Duke of Wellington.
Oh, well done!Copy !req
302. Oh, well done. No, he didn't.Copy !req
303. I'll tell you the answer -
Amazonian Indians.Copy !req
304. The Duke of Wellington's boots
were leather.Copy !req
305. Rubber was a disaster at first -
it either melted in hot weather
or set as hard as granite in winter.Copy !req
306. It was Charles Goodyear -
not Dunlop -Copy !req
307. who invented the process
of volcanization by accident
in the 1840s.Copy !req
308. How does your father say "volvic"?
He says "vulvic - Vulvic Water".Copy !req
309. How does he pronounce "Volvo"?
He says "Vulvas".Copy !req
310. So it would be, "I scratched
my Vulvo". Yes, that's right.Copy !req
311. "It's recently gone in
for a cervix."Copy !req
312. Yes, it just means fierce heat,
like a volcano.Copy !req
313. Volcanization.
Volcanized rubber.Copy !req
314. Charles Goodyear invented it.
He was a terribly sad man.Copy !req
315. He lived in appalling poverty
and his one aim was to make rubber
the useful material it now is.Copy !req
316. He succeeded by accident,
supposedly,Copy !req
317. spilling this rubber he was playing
with on his wife's hot stove.Copy !req
318. And it had these amazing properties.
But he was ripped off by everybody.Copy !req
319. Volcanization was used
by somebody else.Copy !req
320. A little tableaux vivant of
Goodyear discovering volcanization.Copy !req
321. The Goodyear tyre company was
only named after him because they
admired him - he didn't get a cent.Copy !req
322. But we remember him and honour him
on this show.Copy !req
323. Harry Hill did a joke where...Copy !req
324. Amazonian Indians since time
immemorial have made gumboots by
standing knee-deep in liquid latex.Copy !req
325. So, it's time for the embarrassing
business of the final scores.Copy !req
326. In reverse order - tonight's winner
is Jackie Clunes with five points.Copy !req
327. Five?
Second, Alan Davies with zero.Copy !req
328. In third place with minus one,
Jimmy Carr.Copy !req
329. In fourth place with a staggering
minus 38, it's Jo Brand!Copy !req
330. So, that's it from QI for this week.Copy !req
331. My thanks to Alan, Jackie,
Jo and Jimmy.Copy !req
332. Something quite interesting to end
on - a letter from The Daily Mirror.Copy !req
333. "There were four of us," it goes,
"in the doctor's waiting room,Copy !req
334. "when in walked
a Pakistani gentleman.Copy !req
335. "He was about to go straight into
the surgery when a woman jumped up.Copy !req
336. "The Pakistani replied:Copy !req
337. Good night.Copy !req