Podcast Updates and Closing Remarks

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Availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state This summer, Prime V videoide takes you back before legally blonde, before law school, and into the world of Elle Woods in high school. Set in nineteen ninety five, this Gemini vegetarian knows exactly who she is until her family moves from Bel Air to Seattle. packed with iconic fashion, nineties nostalgia, and a throwback soundtrack, Elle proves one thing Law school was hard. High school was harder. From the world of legally blonde, watch L, a new original series only on Prime videoide. Watch now Should I dresses be on sa for the Renaissance fair It's me, Margaret. God are you there? If you found this podcast due to a little video clip about lobsters pissing out of their faces as part of their sexy times, welcome. Unfortunately, we're not going to guarantee that we'll be doing different animals mating rituals in every episode So I'm so pleased that the biggest video I've ever been on was me recording myself on my laptop balanced under my chin. so flattering Actually, Helen, on the subject of last episode, I want to thank you personally. I want to thank her Because no sooner had we discussed MLMs, me not even knowing what one was until we recorded the last episode that I then actually found myself approached to join one and I knew what to say to the woman trying to get me to sign up. Oh. Obviously I didn't say those things because I felt too impolite. I sat there and took it for half an hour and then saidays, Oh, I'm not sure my listeners would like that We also talked about stockkebe variety packs last month It's the next biscoff I tells y. savory bisco off spread. Yum yum stock you I come to think of it u What's that stuff you use above real? That is basically the Bis off spread of stock, isn't it They were there decades before Chris has been in touch. He says, My wife is an executive in the food industry She says the production of stock cubes in mixed boxes would increase the final product cost because you would have to change the production line Oh Unlike Willy Wonka, you have to make one product in one zone. Two zones do not mix. I love the idea of Charlie in the stock cube factory. P your cards right kids and you too can be owner of Bertie Bunter's beef cubes. Children, dip your tubs in all the stock you can drink. Oh no, Augusta Sloof has gone down the chicken river Anyway Chris's wife says that it could have cross contamination basically if you had a stockkebe production line. Okay, so one zone one flavour But then how come any variety packs exist becausecause cross contamination is always going to be isn't I bet that's right. I mean you could have a nut allergy And yet crunchy nut corornflakes is in the same packet as the cocoa pops, isn't it? I think when you're making a premium product for the stock connoisseur, which is what we were suggesting, I think then cross contamination isn't really a concern because you'll risk death for stock. No,, you could assemble the stock at the end of the line So they could still be made in separate zones, fish over here, beef over here, Halal, vegetarian, whatever. But then at the end for the premium connoisseur product Someone manually puts the things together in a box collection for you That's not doing any contamination, It's an extra person's work, isn't it? I couldn't possibly say, Chris, please ask your wife. Thank you Hello, Helen, Ollie, and Martin the S manan This is Michael. I recently moved from Minnesota to Montana with my family, and you kept me company with your back catalog as we packed our entire house. We were excited to relocated to Western Montana and even more excited to have a guest bedroom We'd love to have our friends and family come visit us But I want to make sure that they feel at home So Answer me this, what kinds of things should we do to make sure our guests feel like they're at home and like they can have a good visit Make sure there is ample toilet roll. Y they't have to ask. They never have to ask and they never have to go hunting twwice as much as you think any human could possibly need. You know what's also quite fun is if you put some entertaining reading matter by the bed or in the bathroom if you have a specific bathroom for them We've got a little picture book of different bins of the world. That's great. Guest bathroom Yes, I do like a novelty toilet book as well actually. The Lubrary. I think that's good to furnish, isn't it? What is nice to do when you're receiving guests is to ask beforehand to say, are there any snacks or beverages or breakfast items that you like to have in For instance, like Martin and I never use milk, so we only get it guess. Okay, yeah, I would need milk. But also if you ask me that question, I'd think what a generous question and I wouldn't answer milk because I would assume that was there anyway. That's an essential In Britain, you assume milk and te bags, even over toilet paper Definitely can't assume teaabags outside of Britain. Yeah over. Yeah. I've learnnt full well. We've got guests coming in a few days and one of them said, could you have some like little packs of haribo because they have diabetes and they're like, if I have a hypo Those are really useful. Decent coffee would be the deal breaker for me If you've got coffee drinkers staying and you're not a coffee drinker getet some decent coffee in because it will make a substantial difference to whether or not they have a pleasant day When you say decent coffee just do you mean just not instant Not instant of any description, notot that supposedly posed slabour Eter shit. actuallyually coffee, like ground coffee. Ground coffee. Yeah ye. I had to get instant coffee and sweetener pellets when my momum came to stay because that is what she likes. That's her preference. She will drink a proper coffee, but that's her prefer. Yeah. I always ask them as well if there are any allergies they want us to be aware of because like if someone has celiac then you want to make sure there's not wh crumbs everywhere I hate to be too hot, like when the heating is on too high, I can't sleep. So that might be a considerate thing to ask your guests about, the temperature comfort. but also, I think, And I haven't really done this, but I think everyone should do if they can. Sleep in your guestroom first Yes. check if the beds comfortable. That's Alex Pality level tip Well, I've stayed in a lot of people's places and a lot of like whole daylets and stuff don't even have lamps. Yes. And they don't have bins. Yes. And you know that they're aspiring for that five star rating on Airbnb. and yet you're right. no one who owns the property has slept in that bed and thought, oh, you can't reach a light bulb from this bed. Like sometimes you get there and there's one pillow for the two people Have enough pillows. I'd say two per person and maybe different textures so that Yes. I'm not saying full hotel pillow menu, but It's nice if you can do it I feel guilty because we've had like quite a lot of shit pillows in the past to give to people on a shit inflatable bed that I didn't sleep in per my own advice. Yeah. Sorry, Ollie for all the times you stayed over an. I mean, I didn't want to say, I mean it was a different it was a different world, wasn't it It was different life? It was a different a pro of bed now I was in my twenties, I was okay sleeping on a naced sofa bed that was also actually your sofa and covered in crumbs from our dinner. Okay. I did enjoy it. It didnn't bother me. In fact, if anything as a guest, I was like, Uh, I don't want to leave any of my nightime to tryit us on there like sheets that they use as their sofa sheets I was always anxious that I was like, what if you can smell my body odor on the ear The other night I had a little nap in our spare room bed and discovered that there's an annoying light from outside coming in. Even though I don't mind outside light, I was still irritated by this. andn't been at pillow level with the window before us so I was like, okay, youve got to make a curtain before the guests come Write the WiFi on a piece of paper and put it in their bedroom. Yes. Yes, Yes. Yeah's probably agree. You don't to wake them up at midnight because you're checking an email, do you what I mean? Yeah. Al if you can have like an extension lead with multiple Yes. outlets available, mayaybe even a plug that they can put their charging cable into I think also offer them a lift. even if they are saying that they're quite prepared to take public transport. I realize that in Montana there's probably not that much public transport anyway, but if you're in a city where there is some Don't just assume because they're saying, oh yeah, we'll get this bus, we'll get this train, that that's what they want O often if you're traveling with luggage and family It's really nice to go for the lt, isn't it? What I quite like if I am sleeping on the sofa bed in someone's living room is if they treat me as like just a regular part of the furniture I used to stay on my friend Jen and Earon's sof Bll in Chicago And For some reason I slept in it really well every time, even though objectively it was a bad bed and was on an angles you always felt like the sofa was going to swallow you. But like one day their toddler came in and just like sat on me and watched Bluey the dog came, you know, Ive fes I've really enjoyed that. Feeling like the people around you aren't standing on ceremony for you, even though they may have constructed a special pillow menu beforehand is important too, isn't it? I mean, I think as well Think about what you do as hosts That's part of your usual routine that might be weird for someone else. For example Do you need to walk through their bedroom to have a shower in the morning? Oh Maybe warn them of that. Do you go round turning off all the lights at night to be quote unquote green, as my father in law does. likeike laudable effort. But when you're staying in his house, you will die by falling down the stairs because you can see nothing at all. Yeah, a little plug in night light is really useful I think And we live there for Six months whilst our house was being refurbished about eight years ago. And During that six months, there was this completely unspoken Battle of the lightights 'cause it's like I sort of knew the layout of the house, but they're all short and they had low hanging lamps It's like if there isn't a lamp on, I'm going to bang my head as I try and get to the toilet every night That's relatable. So I'm going to leave one lamp on downstairs when I go to bed so I can see when I go for a piss. and also I wear contact lenses, so I might be sort of minus seven point five plus as stigmatism blind, right? So I'd leave the lamp on and then even at two AM I know when he did it After I went to bed My father in law would get up He had like a long pole that he goes around turning off all of the plug sockets like under all the tables and everything, including my phone charger, which I could never raise with him because accepting his free hospitality So annoying I get up in the middle of the night, bang my head on the lamp, piss all over the floor, and then go down says f my phone was dead gu? Yeah Nailing it. Okay, here's a question from Eli who has recorded a voice note for us, which you can too, by the way. dear Helen, Martin and Ollie. I've taken to flying a lot because I work in one city and live in another. And a thing that comes up prettyly often is that airports these days tend to have these massage chairs that you can put in five bucks and they'll you awkwardly for fifteen minutes and that's a good a way of killing the time before my flight is any. But what tends to happen is they fill up with these people just sitting there digicging around on their phones, not actually getting the massages. I would like to pay the chair for a massage please I don't really know how I can broach the subject without seeming like a dick. I've just been sort of standing awkwardly near the row of them by my gate for the last ten minutes or so hoping to imply that there's a line otherther than avoiding eye contact with me fastidiously, no one seems to have noticed. So any advice would be great I wonder if this is more a lack of chairs an airports issue than an EI issue or a massage chair issue. When I've sat on those massage chairs, it's for lack anywhere else to sit. If someone came along and said I want an actual massage, could you get up? Would you get up? I suppose I'd have to defer to the person who wants the massage but it's like If there's nowhere else to sit it I sort of get Wh people are sitting there. and that's why they're ped to ignore him But then it is okay to ask, isn't it? Instead of standing awkwardly by a row of them, because people in airports are deliberately trying to not acknowledge the presence of other people in airports because other people in airports is what makes airports bad. I think you have to say Excuse me, I was hoping to get a massage. Is it okay v' massage chehef ten minutes. I mean, you just got me jumping out of the chair I wonder whether Eli is a parent because I've got a lot of experience doing this in the form of when a couple of olderids areimbing all over the Thomas the Tank engine machine and my younger son wants a go on Thomas the tank engine. Like it's the sort of unwritten rule of parenting. that the younger children at whom those things are aimed get priority. So you get to kick the nine year old off and I've never been Questioned What you do March up and go beat it, kid Basically, And I still think that like all the practice of doing that, You know, what I tend to do is teed up with my the coin in my hand Like your presence is stopping me from entering this coin into that slot is the implication of my physicality at that point And then that just scares them off So I feel like, although that's children, I feel like With grown upps, I'd be able to exude the same natural authority that would translate in this situation If Eli isn't a parent and hasn't had these scary scararying kids off the Thom of the tank engine on ramp By saying to someone you just want the massage and then they can resume the chair, mayaybe that will take. some of the awkwardness out of it, but I think I would still not feel that relaxed getting a massage in a chair with someone waiting to sit in it again. That's also true. I think I know what I would do in this situation. it might be a little specific to me I do like to go into a deep squat and I would go into a deep squat right in front of them. Right And then if they looked at me like they were upset, I'd be like, oh, I'm just checking out the action on this. L looks like it's got a really good suspension. How's it feeling for you? until they got creeped out and for Yeah they'd get creeped out immediatelyah, if you're facing them straight away. Yeah. Although even if you're reverse cowgling it, I think they'd still be prettyca good. Yeah, that'll be weird because I'd like to make eye contact. I didn't realise you were such a creepy I hope you not with close that? You've got a question Email in question to answer me this podcast at googlemail. com Answer me this podcast at googlemail. com Your summer weekends fill up fast, but Crocx has your back. 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My husband and I live in a smallish city and work in related fields We often find ourselves in professional meetings together Heelen answers me this How should I greet my husband in a business meeting? When I'm introducing myself and shaking hands with the meeting attendees I'm always stumped when I get to him, because if I shake his hand, that seems funny to the people at the meeting that know we're a couple. If I give him a more familiar greeting or skip shaking his hand, then that seems weird to the people who don't know we're a couple We don't share a lastast names, there isn't an obvious clue for those folks that we are married She's put the wedding photo the mantpiece, isn't she?'s car around her on her front with her lanyard. Like most other couples, our ordinary greeting is a kiss on the lips, but that seems way out of line for a business meeting. Also, I am a regulator and my husband is in the private sector. I don't want to give the impression that he gets preferential treatment Interesting. Yeah. Genuinely this is multif fasted and awkward, I think This actually comes up quite a lot for me and Martin because we do live shows together So we'll be doing the load in and like the tech rehearsal and the tech people usually don't know that we're married. Yeah. Things can probably seem a bit personal but I also don't wantan to be like, we're married ' that' such a cringe thing to say, isn't it? Sure. So do you think they'ressiping behind your back? like, Oh my god, she's such a bitch to him she was just bossing him around? No, I think they probably don't give a shit. They probably just want to get their jobs done Yeah, they dec care. But that's different to the scenario that Katie's painting, but I'm just saying I have have encountered some of it because we also have different last names. I was thinking instead of a handshake, how about like a little pout on the shouldoulder like, you know, the front shoulder If Patting a part of their body that is not a sexual part upper chest is more familiar than a handshake, you wouldn't do it with most colleagues, but it's not inappropriately intimate for a work setting I'll tell you actually the facet that makes this particularly awkward is the business about some people in the room know and some people don't. That's the thing. Be as he was talking and I was just spooling through my brain, remembering if I've ever been in a situation like this before. and actually I haven't with my wife, but I have with my mum. I directed a play at profestival in two thousand six in which she was a complete Nepo mum and got the part as one of the female leads. She was great though. Thank you. And I didn't want to undermine her place in the cast by telling the other actors that hey, I'd cast my mom Or B, make them feel like they couldn't be honest about me as a director with my mum as an actor But also I didn't want to hold back that information and be like, o, this is a secret. So I was just like, I'll treat her like everyone else. I literally just won't mention it. I feel like your mum would blab it within about four seconds. She didn't. Oh my God. It helped that the play was a series of interconnected monologues, so most rehearsals until the last week were with them as individuals. They weren't all together in the same room. We then thinking, Oh maybe I will get through the whole month of the Edinburgh Festival without anyone realizing I'm not sure I've got relevant experience, but I relate to that anxiety It only worked because nobody knew It wouldn't have worked if some people in the room knew and some didn't I think in that situation and with your specific mum and the contrast between your personal presentation and your characters, I would be so excited to learn that I was in that cast and I hadn't realizedd I'd be beside myself. Where Katie mentions that she's a regulator and her husband is in the private sector That feels like more of a complication for HR. The industry, I don't know Well, no, it's just straightforward conflict of interest stuff, isn't it? If it was someone Wh wasn't your husband, but you knew because you'd worked together on previous projects, you wouldn't be worried about that. It's the specific thing that there could be some kind of you know, family put up job. You could still be discussing this afterwards. You could have discussed this at home that morning. therefore is it really fair Would it be shit to do like a little bit of Domestic stuff in front them just be like, I was sorry to bring this into professional lives, but I just wanted to ask you, did you remember to turn the oven off this morning Do you remember to take the kids to school? That kind of shit Yeah, just so it's implied, but it doesn't have to be explicitly said. Yeah, I feel like that would help people catch up very quickly However awkward it is for the Npotism thing, it's probably the lesster of two evils. to just say He's my husband, as you greet. You just every time have to do the performative, awkward, kiss on the cheeks, turn to everyone else. He's my husband and then get on with it. Do it with everyone in the room. Hello, Hello. not my husband, not my husband. Yes my husband, notot my husband. Yeah you go. Let us know how that turns out. Here is another workplace question from Anonymous who says, if you have to give me a name, can it be Raphael Okay, Rapael Raphael says, My wife and I live in the U.S. and run a couple of art galleries for an artist of some renown He's being evasive, it must be Banksy We just opened up our second location a few months ago, and while it has entailed long hours, hard work and plenty of stress, all early signs point to it being a success for which we are very grateful. There you are, Husband and wife working together can often be for the good. There you go. Yeah. One of our regular collectors came to see our new location a couple of weeks ago He's spent a few thousand dollars with us over the years, and he's a nice guy. We've never been for drinks or dinner with him, but he is someone with whom I have a friendly professional relationship I mentioned it had been a lot of hard work getting everything set up, and we were eventually going to be looking for staff to help us out He texted me a couple of days later, saying he had been thinking about what I'd said, and he'd love to help us out. Oh dear, that's not what you wanted, is it H. He offered to catch a one hour flight to our location one weekend a month and stay with friends so he could work the gallery and to help us get some time off Okay. I mean, that's generous, sort of. I mean It is generous, it is generous while I appreciated his offer. I politely turned him down.. I'm only interested in you for the money, I said. I said that my wife and I have to invest a lot of time in training people, and we'd need someone to be able to do more hours for it to be really worth our time. I also said that going from being a customer to a coworker would be a somewhat tricky dynamic Yes. All of this is true He runs his own business, and I get the distinct impression that he thinks our job is easy, when there is actually a lot of work going on behind the scenes too. I think he would be telling us what to do, despite our years of experience in this arena, and and being consummate professionals Also, weekends. Fuck off mate. That's when I make the most commission. Come to a fucking Tuesday, you Bllnd Gosh. I think your language betrays your expat status there, Rfael. You're not anonymous as you think. Yeah, I haven't heard an American News blland. No, but I love that you are Anyway, Rapael says. He sent me a long email saying that he wasn't going to Let us get away that easily. End quote. Kind of forward considering you think you're talking to your potential manager He said that he was burned out in his current job. notot my fault, and he'd even be up for a career switch. A complete switch that involves relocating his young family on retail wages. I don't think so I understand his frustrations. But he's essentially applying for a job that doesn't exist, and that he wouldn't have a cat in hell's chance of getting even if it did. So Ollie and Martin the Soundbag. loveove that that is stuck with some listeners. Answer me this How do I tell this collector and his midlife crisis to politely fuck off while not aecting his love of the art? And presumably his expenditure upon the art, I'm getting from this. L if he became a poorly paid staff member, he would not be spending several thousand dollars on the art Indeed, you can't have it all Rafael. Like if you've groomed this person as a customer to the extent that they enjoy your company and your whole setu so much, they want to come and work for you and then you're going to say no, I don't want you to do that, then possibly you are going to ruin that relationship a bit And so in a sense, it is a commercial decision that you're making here L you may have to lose him as a client. by broaching the fact a bit more explicitly that you do not want him to help you with this You know, if you think of it in those terms as a commercial decision, then I feel like there is actually an equation you can do here. He is, to be fair, offering you some assistance. He's offering you some assistance for not very much money. You're being very dismissive, I would say, in this email of his entrepreneurial skills, given that you feel you know more about the subject area that you work in But maybe he would have something to offer and so it would be worth trying it out for a month and seeing what happened. But if in your head, I think you know the answer really is no. If in your head you think, no, it's not worth that and I'd rather lose him as a client Then to be honest you've just got to treat this conversation like you would with any awkward client. The fact that you've had a good relationship in the past You don't have to be a dick about it But I think you just have to be like, well, that's a shame He's done these things that mean that actually we're not going to be able to carry on the relationship as it was before, but we definitely don't want him hanging around and being weird. So however you say it, that's the conclusion, isn't it? didn't like in the email was this guy saying that he wasn't going to let us get away that easily. I imagine he meant that to be playful, but ye because he's asking you for something that felt very coercive. Yes, yeah, yeah But maybe he's Billy Big Dick in his world. Yeah, sounds it. Yeah. so that way of talking It like rubs you up the wrong way, but actually Yeah, he thinks it's such a great offer that he's making you to give give you part of his time. Yeah that it wouldn't occur to him that would be coercive. Yeah, I mean sorry to repeat myself, but as with the MLM's question we had before, I think you have to be firm. and say like, that's very generous of you to offer. I'm afraid we can't make it work and we're not in a position to hire at the moment If you want to scare him off properly, just tell him what the money would be But what this seems to be is like a fantasy of escape for him, right? Like the reality is not what he imagines obbviously makes no sense for him financially or practically So if you are friendly I know he's irritated you because you feel like he's not respecting what goes into your work. But I wonder if you wouldn't mind haaving a conversation with him where you essentially play job therapist, just like get him to spill about his current work frustrations. You don't need to offer solutions, just listen. What a therapist would say is something like, what I'm hearing is repeat back a summary of what they said. Is that right There's more to therapy than that. Helen's just cut through three years of training right there. I'm just say that is a technique you can use Maybe that will make him feel someone is being sympathetic. Maybe it will help clarify what he does want. You could also suggest if you can, to take some time off so that he defrazzles a bit and gets some space to think of next steps. So maybe that would make him think about other things he could do that would be an escape from this situation that he's not enjoying. There aren't this one, which is not a solution really. It just creates different problems, including for you You could also say, when I felt this way about work, I found getting therapy really helpful. impmlied, take your midlife crisis to a professional Or you could actually create the opportunity that he really wants that he's fishing around for, but isn't the reality of what you and your wife have set up working in a gallery What he wants, you reckon, is basically to invest a little bit of his time, maybe money, but then have some fun and some job satisfaction in return could I mean, it's extra work for you But it could bring in some money. You could create a side hustle, couldn't you like an art fair where he gets to talk to members of the public about his enthusiasm for the art And he gets a commission on whatever he sells, but it's not your business. It's not your main thing. It's an event that you create specially for him to participate in. that could end up with him managing to buy and manage some inventory that otherwise you would have to be doing yourself So wait, that is time consuming for Raphael. Rapfael's not getting commission And essentially setting up a rival business for this guy. This seems like a terrible solution, Ollie, Well done. Well, I'll tell you what it's based on. It's based on what worked for my dad. So one of his customers who bought a vintage bentley from him, so similar sort of thing, you know, expensive purchase. Yeah, wealthy guy. Rich clientele, exactly clientele that were wealthier than the actual proprietor. He basically the guy who talk about wanted buy the car not because he wanted the asset because he already had lots of assets because he was a wealthy person, what he really wanted was to buy a social life that went around the car What he wanted was to have a ticket to turn up to Silverstone effectively every weekend they ran a vintage race and chat to other vintage car enthusiasts And by buying the car, so, you know, my dad made money out of that He then did open up that world of other enthusiasts And ultimately I ended up actually investing in my dad's business and it worked really well. Like he was a silent partner for twenty years He did not offer my dad business advice in particular The only time as far as I could work out that they had sort of regular conference calls was when they were going to make a big purchase. My dad would be like, I need to take a pun on this thing that's going to cost half a million pounds. Obviously, he'd be part that conversation But on a daily basis, like, you know What should we be selling this for? Should we employ this person? He wasn't involved in any of that And it worked really well for both of them. Like he did it for a sort of social thing for him as a business to invest in, and they actually ended up being friends. So I have seen this work. But that's with the context of Hh Like there is already a community around What in the arrt market exactly is equivalent where you can invite him into a community because that's what he really wants. without encroaching on your actual business The other thing that I suggest based on my own experience where I get people asking me to hire them to do what I'm not so is just leave it quite a long time to write back to them so that their ardour has cooled couple of weeks minimum should do it. Well, I suppose the comparison there between art and What we do is we are doing something that other people do as a hobby. and actually making money at it is harder than it looks. that's the Yeah. Corollary, isn't it? And people don't think that work is involved Maybe you could just start moaning at him loads about what hell your job is. Oh my God, it's so hard So hard hard in a way that's not to be solved by hiring other people of course him off. Well so weirdly, it strikes me that the sort of instinct that you might have of like, well, the job to give this guy is cleaning the broom cupboard that'll sort him out would be wrong because it sounds like he'd probably enjoy that He probably wants a break from the executive world that he's part of. But I think actually, like if you made him your bookkeeper for a week then he'd run a mile Do you know what I mean? Like if he actually had to be involved in the under the hood tediousness of the kind of job he does, but at a much lower level completely separated from the art thenen he might think actually, this isn't so different and it's worse I don't know in the American market, particularly you might get people who like, sure, this is shit now, but I can use this to work my way up to the top then oh, this is terminally shit I think maybe better to misdirect him into aspiring to other careers like windsurfing instructor There's windsurfing instructors listening to this being like, It's a profession. I go. We haven't got time for these people just thinking it's a summer job, but that would make it someone else's problem I hired a twelve person web team to build and run my websites and realize my tech dream. Then the dot com bubble burst and I had to drown them in a stream. Why didn't I just sack them Now, thanks to Squarespace, you can do it alone And build a lovely website for tablet or smartphone. Enjoy it now because in ten years you'll be replaced by a drone. Just like Terminator three Yes. Thank you to Squarespace for sponsoring this episode of Answer me this. Legends upon this earth. They are. It sounds sardonic, but the emotions are true. It' so true Absolutely, yeah, British can't make it not sound sardonic, but I've got a squarespace website myself, ollimman d. comot Me too Theillusionist dot org I've laid out mine with graphic tiles. And, you know, replacing one of those tiles. likeike a real tile in a bathroom. Imagine how difficult that would be. Like there's grouting involved, you want a professional. Terrible. withith squarespace Changing a tile is so easy. You just double click the gallery icon, you upload a new image and a URL for it to linked to I use it basically like one of those social media biog landing pages, but it looks so much more professional. It is so easy to use Oh, if only all bathroom refurbs were so easy. Right. And changing the tiles means if I want to, I can just pivot my career in seconds. I could become a bicyclist. Really? Anything doesn't matter I think there'd be other work involved, but the website could look immediately toward de France level. That's what I'm saying. Go to squarespace d. com slash answer. Have a play around during the two week free trial and When you're ready to launch, save ten percent off your first purchase of a website or domain using our code Anwer Here's a question from Charlie from Leeds, who says, simply Helen, answer me this What the fuck was up with Delily boppers No Was this all like I love nineteen eighty TV clip show What was that actuallyually didn't know what a dealily bopper was. Helen has explained to me off mic. Delily boppers are those headbands that have like two antennae sort of springy antennae with things on top like maybe a little furry gonks or little mirrabables or like a cartoon character on each one. Yes. Did you know what they were, but didn't know the name I'm distantly aware of headwear shaped like that, but not really as a trend. What Charlie says is, I recall wearing them to parties as a child in the late nineties and early ninetyies. But how long had they been around for? Were they just a fad? Why did they disappear? I'd forgotten all about them until just now. fourour AM exclamation mark, exclamation mark and I can't stop thinking about them help. Oh my Godd, this is such an evocative email, thank you, Charlie. I love it Where do you want me to start? In nineteen eighty one when the Daily Bopper was invented by Stephen Askin I mean, James L. Jones doesn't ask where you want him to start, he just evocatively takes you back to the very beginning of the story and delivers with Gravitas Allen The year . The man, Stephen Askin, a marketer of novelties, like giant foam cowboy hats and at the height of the Iranian Revolution, a dartbard featuring a picture of the Ayatolla Komani. Sounds like my kind of guy. I like a novelty purchase. Inspiration struck one day as he watched the Killer Bees sketches on SNL where cast members wore be costumes with bouncy antennae on their heads. Right, I see. So actually it's the props depepartment of NBC really that created Dalily Boppers. He thought, I could market this shit and put different things on the antennae and he tried them out to various gift shows and fairs in LA in nineteen eighty one. First time out, he sold eight hundred of these at five dollars each. and They were so successful he took them to the Ace Novelty Company, which began selling them in the US in april nineteen eighty two and they sold like tens of thousands straight away. and people were even wearing Several pairs at once. It's interesting that something that started with John Belushci so quickly skipped into children's wear You know what I mean? Becauseuse he was quite edgy, really Yeah, well, I suppose you wouldn't necessarily look at a Deily Bopper and think John Belushci because there's a couple of steps in between The thing is it was a very big fad And then very, very quickly imitators sprang up and so they hadn't patented these things And then the fada stopped. They do still exist. It's just you only wear them at places where you'd expect someone to wear novelty headgear such as a Halloween party The only times I can remember wearing them is Christmas parties or a stag d I wore some with little penises on. We didn't have those at My stagdu, but my wife's kind of sort of quasi Hndu, my grandmother at the age of ninety two through a cocked straw and that's one of my most treured photographs of her Good for you, Terry I didn't know until today, thanks to Charlie that these things are actually called daily bobers. Oh that makes much more sense. It does make more sense. Why Be they b? Because they bop up and down, they bob up and down. yes, but also people bop at dance things and you're dancing in them. But it's not the daily that bops, it's the person. Yes. Gives you the opportunity to do different things in them other than Right. Yeah You just walk and that st b. The name was originally a patent for some building blocks sold by Parker Brothers, manufactured from nineteen sixty nine to nineteen seventy three. So I suppose Once Ace novelties got hold of it, they were like, well, those bricks are along in the rear view mirror In the UK, there were definitely Daily boppers already in nineteen eighty two because I saw the sun reporting on this craze under the headline Bonce bouncers and then talking about them called bonce boppers. I thought, are they doing this to launch their own to get around the trademark of the name because Ace novelties are trademarked Daily boppers. F head flappers It was on the front page of the sun. Not front page, it was page nine. With Linda Lusardi wearing a pair. It's just an excuse to run a photo of Linda Lusardi wearing party hat. Well, here's another question of fancy things you put on your head. It's from Madeeline in Eee Cambridgeshire, who says, Helen, answer me this. When and where were Tiaras usually worn Are they ever worn these days other than as part of children's dress up? We're all wearing one right now Aren't you, Madeeline I think it would improve the recording by five percent if we were all wearing Diaras. Come to think of it. I think I've really seen one in the wild apart from little girls pretending to be Anna and Elsa. New Year's Eve. Yeah with the The happy New Year. Yeah going is that Tia I guess it's type of TiRa. It' TiRa adjacent. Yeah Yeah pageants, some brides and bridesmaids. According to Tattler Tiar is only supposed to be worn by brides on their wedding day or by married women This is because of the Tiara's roots in classical antiquity. It was seen as the emblem of the loss of innocence to the crowning of love. I mean, a ring is easier, isn't it? I think peak Tiara was white tie events for very rich people in the late eighteen hundreds until World War O. And then after that There was a bit of a resurgence in between the wars, but such ostentatious signs of wealth were N seeming quite as tactful by that point. but also women's hairstyles were shorter. and cleaner So Tiaras didn't have enough hairirt to grip onto. And you know, like when you see historical photos of like women from the lateeenth, early twentieth century, there's an amazing kind of nest of hair and you can Plank a tiara on top of it. Yes, yeah, yeah,ah. There's also the fact that those people getting dressed, weren't they? As in like they had a dresser I mean that must have made a difference. L pututting a tiara on yourself so that it's perfectly balanced and perfectly in the centre of your head is probably harder than having your maid do it for you. I think it is pretty hard because also they're really heavy being made of jewels. And they often had ribbons to attach them and stuff, but it was still like they could start slipping down onto your face or off the back of your head They were also very big in nineteenth century Russia in both senses, like height and popularity. notot going to seem cool once the revolution comes So twentieth century not such a Tiarah time except for like grrung era Remember like Courtney love wearing them in the nineties That's not the style in which Kate Middleton wears them now. I was thinking about that thing that the late Queen used to say, isn't it, being seen to be believed. I suppose for famous princesses, it helps you to be seen. likeike it draws the attention of the eyes of the public to a big sparkly thing on your head, like a crown, but not a crown. Yeah in that context. Well also, I think the difference between tiaras and crowns, which is very important to make in this day and age for everyone, right?ure You don't have to be a royal to wear a tiara, but you do basically have to be a royal to wear a gown. Yes. They are one of the two women's accessories that I enjoy putting on when I'm at a wedding after party. You know, that kind of like one AM Everyone's like unloosened the top button of their shirt and they can take the cumberband off type time There's aiara lying around on a bar I will wear the Tiara or I'll wear the fascinator either. Tiaras evolved from pan gender glorifying headgeear, you know, like u metal or for jeweled bands.'ust like from the ancient world, right conferring status. I was reading an interview recently with Lil Nas X talking about how he loves to wear like flower crowns and tiaras and stuff that he gets from Party City. And he had one that says Mum to be But then he had to get some other ones because People just kept being like arere you going to be a mother And he's like, No, I just like the look of wearing this thing. He's like, now I have to get other people to buy them for me because I can't just go and browse for like plastic crowns in partarty City anymore. Oh Well here's another question of shit that the royals wear from Imogen, who says I've been watching Trooping the color Ollie answers me this. Why do King Charles' gloves look so grubby compared to everyone else's pristine white ones? I've noticed them on other occasions. It looks like he couldn't find his best ones, so he just grabbed a M ananky old bear from the washing basket on his way out of the palace Maybe he stopped to do some gardening. and he was like, o Oh dear, must can't hold people up Not everything is just about being shiny, you know, Owise you'd be like Why is he in that shitty barouge carriage? Why isn't he in a Ferrari? I mean, there is a reason for almost everything in royal ceremonies. See has he got gloves made out of ancestral leather from things hundred years ago? Oh really? I'm sure almost certainly I have tried to look, by the way, and this detail has not surfaced in an artle just speculation on Reddit and Mum's Nad. was a commonly observed It's commonly observed that he had slightly dirty gloves this year. Almost certainly, I would say the reason will be there is historical provenance to them. Because for example, there are other many other articles about other gloves that can Charles has worn. For example, it his coronation, that was quite a big deal. like which Savilroow suitmaker got to design his gloves or was he going to use the gloves that Queen Victoria wore and all this kind of thing Oviously cororonation is slightly more important than trooping the color, but still Big stately event, thought we'll have gone into it do think posossibly the dirt on the gloves, like the gloves looking a bit below par. That is an accident. And I think that does come from the fact that he's the king So I think they will be old gloves and they will be gloves with Provenance and there'll be a reason why he's wearing those gloves, but you're not supposed to notice they're dirty And I do think that actually is basically due to the fact that trooping the colour is all about being ceremonial to him, right? It's his birthday parade. Everyone else has to be perfectly turned out All the troops get dusted down for it, but actually Like who's telling the king like I can see a spot on your gloves. No one's having that conversation. They're just dealing with the big stuff. But then I think the queen would have had someone that everything looked perfect. The quQueen was always very well turned out. Charles, I know that he's ascended to the job at retirement age basically, and he's also had cancer. You know, a lot has been going on for him, but his suits are not great. littleittle rumpled, not sharp like the quQeen's garb was. Well, you say that, Helen. He's frequently named, I can't remember if it's GQ or Esquire, but best dressed man of the yearar or he is in those top ten s. It's fucking propaganda His suits, they look cheaper than they almost certainly are. What else you he wearing at trooping the colour though? Is it like the ceremonial military wear with all the gold ropes? Yeah. And actually in twenty twenty four, he was criticised for wearing the wrong ceremonial military wear Apparently he was wearing the sash of a general officer rather than the appropriate colonel sash for the regiment. An upgrade or downgrade that he gave himself. The palace said afterwards Owell he was wearing the sash that is appropriate for the military regime that he wanted to pay tribute to that means something to him But I mean, that's not how it's supped to work. Like he's supposed to be wearing the sash that's on parade that day I do you think that if you are picking up on the wrong sash that the king is wearing at trooping the color? You're missing the true problems in this whole scenario. Go on. I'll let you outline them briefly. Well, King A monarchy is corrupt and should not exist. Marchy Fancy military shit I'll leave it there I think even if you support the monarchy though, you can say that actually trooping the color, there's a lot of rationale behind everything that you're seeing. What's it for? I truly have never given a shit.. It's his birthday, but it's not his birthday. He, like the original king who had the first trooping the color George III, was born in November So they were like, let's not have your birthday party thenone's going to get wet Let do it in June And since seventeen sixty, for that reason, they've been having the king or quQeen's birthday party in June regardless of when their actual birthday was. Even though the quQueen was in late April Yeah, but by that point, they've been doing it for two hundred years in June. and The original purpose was actually, I mean, it is interesting. The original purpose was to teach the soldiers to recognize the different flags Trooping the color means like these are all the different regiments, right that you might see out in the field And then the kind of parading it before the King thing was obviously another bit of military paraphernalia to show that you're fighting for goen country and stuff, but actually it was just like England good, France, bad. Not everyone there was that educated So it's like an elaborate pub quiz where they're like, Wh country's flag is this? Yeah Well just like Again, in a world before imagery beyond, you know what you'd see in a church or a gallery, it was a way of making sure everyone had seen the full regalia of the army that it was supposed to be fighting for Nowadays, its main purpose is to give Giles Brandra the commentary gig Wow, that's a lot of money to spend on Garles Brandread. PowerPoint is available. But it is I think, a great vibe if you like that sort of thing. I mean, my son sat and watched it this year and it was interesting. I was watching it with him and trying to explain it all to him. I suppose it's literally still that, isn't it? It was an explainer to the soldiers in the eighteenth century. It's still sort of an explainer now because it comes with all these weird questions. Why is he wearing that? Why is he doing that? And then you sort of you inevitably startart explaining the royal familyily whilst you're watching it, which is you know what the royal familyam want you to do. Well, they've been doing this for four hundred years, and well, he's the head of the Army, but you know, that's the point of it Although it's strange that It's believed by anyone still that that's the best birthday present you can give the king And like you say, he's been in the public eye his whole life. He's got cancer. Clearly the best present for him would be to be left the fuck alone. Let him go and play twwister with Camilla. J Stuck him one of those musles's chairs and give him ten minutes of thisqu. Exactly. Take his gloves to Timpson's for him And bring them to him and leave them the fuck alone, fuck alone Speaking of gifts, We would like to give one to Rupert who says I'm so glad you're back Could you play the jingle that begins if you don't really know what a question is, then you're probably in the wrong place? The God Cast Jingle as we call it in the trades. By Gavin Osborne? Yes Rupert says It's my favorite and I sing it to myself at least once a week. Much obliged. That's nice. How could we resist such a request If you don't even know what a question is, then you're probably at the wrong place Religion's on goodcasts, doogs are on dogcasts. Fish are on roodcasts, but we don't do fish because on this podcast you answer me this. Gott a Sam's cafe pizz order up M. You know the best part about this spicy Italian sausage? I voted for this topping. Yeah, just another perk of being a member. Come join us. Sam's Club. I get so many headaches every month. It could be chronic migraine, fifteen or more headache days a month, each lasting four hours or more. Botoxs Autobotulinum toxin A prevents headaches in adults with chronic migraine It's not for those who have fourteen or fewer headache days a month Prescription Botox is injected by your doctor. Effects of Botox may spread hours to weeks after injection causing serious symptoms. Alert your doctor right away has difficulty swallowing, speaking, breathing, eye problems or muscle weakness can be signs of a life threatening condition. Patients with these conditions before injection are at highest risk. Side effects may include allergic reactions, neck and injection site pain, fatigue, and headache. Allergic reactions can include rash, welts, astma symptoms and dizziness. Don't receive Botox if there's a skin infection Tell your doctor your medical history, muscle or nerve conditions, including ALS Luar' disease, myasthenia Gravis or Lamberd Eaten syndrome, and medications, including botulinum toxins, as these may increase the risk of serious side effects Why wait? askk your doctor, visit Botoxchronicmigraine. com or call one eight hundred four four Botox to learn more Okay Here's a question from anonymous who says Ollie answer me this private investigators actually do in the UK If someone hired them to dig into a sprawling story with serious allegations And they did find something What happens then Are they obligated to go to the police Or, like in the movies, could their findings be quietly swept under the rug by whoever's footing the bill Well, their evidence can be presented to the police to help get somebody convicted or indeed to a defence team to get somebody exonerated Evidence that's been procured by a private investigator in the UK can only be used in a court if it wasn't obtained illegally Yes, frruit of the poison tree that's called when evidence is inadmissible because how it was got Right. Although there is that classic thing of like, if you're actually in a court scenario The jury are made aware that evidence exists even if then it's not like officially submitted, that's that thing if they can't unhear it I do wonder sometimes whether there's a bit of a Gay area there But in general terms, the PI who's obtained the evidence would have to stand there in court to defend how they'd got it legally And so therefore, a lot of reputable PIs are never going to in the first place do stuff that's illegal because they might have to go to court and stand up and be questioned about his accuracy and how it was obtained and risk a prison sentence themselves if they've done something illegal. Well, also, if they've done something illegal, they can lose their licenses. So in reality, it's often sort of background research and then someone else has to go and duplicate the research or whatever in ways that they can absolutely be sure. It's not going to be torn apart in court. Although of course there are lots of things you can do legally, like searching record. I mean being a PI Sounds sexy and exciting and you all think about the nineteen thirties kind of version of it through the films, but It's often just like knowing how to use Facebook URL's so that you can check, you know whether people's Friends of friends have said this or that, and it's all on the public record if you know where to look, but it's just doing the training so that you know how to do that kind of investigation And that's why a lot of them areX copers, they know exactly where the line is and they know what the techniques are will also do have access to some information that other people don't, like PIs are allowed to run number plates and things. They can't look into people's financial records, but I think a lot of jobs that PIs do is financial work like Checking on insurance fraud type stuff, chasing up tax payments, doing bailiff work and then finding people. Yeah. and how they go about collecting that information might be Dressing up as a homeless person and camping in a doorway to fool everybody at the building to see who lets you in Or it might be dressing up as a businessman to get just close enough to the target that you can rip the contents of their phone But that's ten seconds of the day The rest of the day sitting in that doorway all day on the cold up floor waiting for a thing to happen. It's actually just really boring. And the gig is just like Being the guy, or the lady, who will drive hundreds of miles to track somebody or who will sit outside a hotel for a week And in that sense, it's a bit like being an investigative journalist, It's a bit like being a police officer There's a lot of waiting around As one of the foremost experts on the TV show Veronica Mars, that's about daught to daddy private investigators. And some of the work as depicted in that is obviously very unrealistic. like they break the law so many times per episode. they use bugs and things, which is not legal But a lot of the time it is just like sitting outside a place for hours during the night waiting to see someone to come in or out and getting a picture of them doing that. because they're also not allowed, I think, to take pictures through windows and doors. like if you're trying to prove an infidelity or something Yeah, I was reading an interview with French private investigator in the Guardian who was saying that She's obsessed with all of the gadgets that you can like the stuff I used to look at in the spy store near Selfridgees when I was a kid, the pen recorders and the button cameras. We live pretty near a spy store now. Do you? Yeah, it's just got a sign that says in huge letters, the spy store So it's not trying to be subtle subtle. Yeah No But she was saying that as a result of using that stuff, I'm sure entirely legal settings She is now paranoid. so she be saying when she travels, she sweeps her hotel room. or Airbnbs for surveillance devices left by Voyeurs. because there are more of them than you think There are. I have heard that Gesh, you hear about the olddd person getting arrested for it Not to the extent that I'd think I'm going to have a quick sweep around What would I do if I found something? L Yeah. Hm, but The important thing is to have a specialism Bitcoin transactions or forensic genealogy orr there was even I read an expert on animal nose prints Got your thing then you're more likely to be able to get the work because lots of people set themselves up as a private investigator is an unregulated industry You've also got to have some discretion about who's hiring you and why. I think a lot of them end up doing corporate stuff because the paper trail is a bit more kosher, right? There's NDAs and there's lawyers and they can say, well, this is clearly what I was brief to do and it was all for a company, not an individual. There's also going to be more of that kind of work, I think than individuals. You also now in the UK could be at threat of the National Security Act, which came into force a year ago. Oh yeah which means you can now face fourteen years in jail if you're working inadvertently even for a hostile state like China, Russia or Iran Be what was happening was Iran, there have been examples of paying PIs stalk, dissidents or journalists So Iranians that now live in the UK who publish nasty things on their blogs about their country, and they're asking PIs to tell them where they live so that they can then use that information Probably just to intimidate them or blackmail them, but obviously potentially murder them and PIs were being employed to do that work and just saying they didn't understand Who it was for. they were just given a job, not my faultmate And now there's actually a law that says, no, you cannot work for a hostile state. Does that count if it's coming through an intermediaries so you genuinely didn't know It's not good enough, yeah, you need to know. Yeah., right, you's still on the hook. Yeah. That's the due diligence that's impossible to doough isn't it? Yeah, But if you're a priv investigor you probably got a better bet of doing it than most people. I mean, I guess so, but then you've got to do the work of you got to do two jobs, then, I guess. But you couldn't really argue in court, lookook, I just had no way of knowing who this person was. Anyway, listeners, we would love to have your questions for future episodes, seend them via voice note attached to an email or write an email. but please Don't get chat GPT to write your email because we don't like that. And we can tell because they've got those long dashes. Yeah You were on it right away the other day Ollie when we were going through our inbox. I was like, this feels weird, It's got an uncanny feel to it. Oh and it's got the long dashes. I know what's going on here. Yeah, you the clock it right away. But send us your human wrought questions to the contact details that are on our website. Answer me thispodcast d. com And also on there, all of our other episodes. from the last one thousand years. If you are looking for our first two hundred episodes, you can buy them at answerMehstore. com along with our special albums. Also, we are doing another edition of Petty Problems our live video streaming series, especially for our paid for members, on the twenty third of August Now that is bank holiday weekend here in the UK. So you can remember, you know when it's Reding Festival time, when it's the Notting Hill Carnival time, don't do that. Watch the answer mee this live stream instead. All you need to do is join us at patreon dot com slash answer me this for an hour of live streamed entertainment. It was great time last time because it's also lovely for answer me this listeners to get to interact with each other Yes. In the sidebar chat while we were talking and to give us feedback straight away about the problems of theirs that we were talking about. You can actually watch that if you missed it. Again, if you join our Patreon patreon. com slash answer me this and then just click on collollections, there is a collection called Petty probleroblems. It's only got one video in there now, but all our future episodes of that will go in there and you can watch them at leisure. If you have a petty probleblem, something unserious Something trivial can be still very annoying, send it to us in an email entitled Petty Problems. If you are patreonising us at patreon. com startart answer this You can messagejust there too If you want If you'd like to listen to other stuff that we've made, it's all over the internet. Mine is at olllyman. com I wanted to tell you actually this month about a guest lot that I've done because I'd love to guest on other people's shows. Absolutely. If you head to Olyman. com and click guest appearances on my website, then you'll see that I've I've been on my mate bought a toaster with Tom Price I've my teenage diary with Rufus Hounds, gummy Mummies, many more. This month. And answer me this fan actually reached out to me. He's called Darren Hill He does a show called The Story Pilgrim where he walks around different cities around the world And he asked me would I like to go for a walk with him and where it would be significant to walk around for me Of course I took him to Lechworth Garden City for the day. Oh, H he been there already He hadn't been there, he's been to places like Singapore and Riyadh. I essentially did a version of Welcome to the Paces of my life with Alan Partrge. We went to the Broadway cinema, we went to the world's first roundabout and many more places of interest. But as we walked around Lechworth, we talked about my childhood and my career, including meeting you both at University. But if you're interested in me as a guest talking about my life for an hour you will probably enjoy that interview. You can find it by going to oimman. com and clicking guest appearances F Helen, you've been on radio four. Yes, Martin and I. And they therefore I'm sure on BBC sounds, am I wrong? Oh God, I don't know because they've changed how you can access BBC stuff outside of the UK. Right So maybe. But Martin and I made a very beautiful one off piece called Souvenirs. which is the story of a friendship torn asunder by typefaces and some very petty shit happening as a result. and my mum called me at one forty five in the morning her time. to tell me how much she enjoyed it, which I thought was an incredible accolade because my family doesn't really dole out compliments. Yeah I feel like in most cases saying my mum liked it or my mum was at the gig is like a bit of a burn. Yeah, that's the low hanging fruit. But in this case, in Helen's case, forty five years it took for that. It's the first time she's got more attention than the dog. Well, the dogs are dead. The dogs be dead even after the dog died. That's the first time we've had more attention Thanks. That's available on the BBC website to listen to, depending where you are in the world. British people just type souvenirs into BBC sounds. Yeah, but it's not Joh Finnamal's souvenir programe. OkayK, fine. And I'll also link to it at the llusionist. org. And on there as well, I've had this four letter word season going for the last few weeks and the most recent word is Dino as in Dinosaur and Hannah McGregor for from Material Girls podcast and Long term Answere This Listener was on it because she's written a book about Jurassic Park. So it's very entertaining. Martin, what have you been up to? Oh, tons Lots of exciting things. Yeah. I mean, maybe just keep it pertinent to things that people can find on the internet with your voice in if that's okay Listen to souvenirs, I would say. Martin sings some beautiful refrains in it about the Spies girls. And yeah, if you want to find other music that I've done, you can go to paybir. bangcamp. com. Pale bird like a kind of like a goose. Oh, we got such a nice email from anunt mee this listener saying Oh yeah. How much they love one of your old songs ten thousand letters of love I'm going to prodlece new album hopefully this year, but that's not ready yet. so until then youve got the old sh. You can also hang out with M and Martin. In real life, there's an illusionist meet upp in August. How is that? Yes, there is we're going to the beach. Are we? And usually there's some answ M this listeners at illusionist events. Anyway, I can't remember what the date is, but it's the illusionist.ot org events And it's in Vancouver, BC And wherever you are in the world, for free you You can listen to the next episode of Answer me this. That'll be out on the last Thursday of August. We'll see you then unless of course, you pay us money at patreon. com dotash answer this. and we'll see for petty problems on the twenty third of August. Be Uncovered windows can make your home feel up to twenty degrees hotter. Stay cool, and save up to fifty percent off custom window treatments during the fourourth of July megaale at blinds dot com. From outdoor shades to room darkening blinds, finding the perfect fit is easy. Get free samples, expert design help, and professional measure and install services, or DIY with confidence and support every step of the way