Brooke: Hi! I’m Babbling Brooke, the producer of "Sam & Ted's Famous Last Words". Welcome to the Babbel Sound Studio, where we’re sitting in on an American and a Brit twisting each others words, getting tongue tied and generally reflecting upon the strange beauty of that majestic, rather odd thing we call the English Language…

You're listening to "Sam and Ted's Famous Last Words".

Ted: Hey, Sam!

Sam: Hello, Ted!

Ted: Why are we here, Sam?

Sam: Well… It's a good question. So, we're the Babbel Boys, right? We're the guys that write the English-language courses. So, someone upstairs said we have to make a podcast. 

Ted: Right, ok. 

Sam: An English language podcast. 

Ted: Yes!

Sam: And we're not allowed to leave this room until we do.

Ted: And they've got us in this creepy dungeon at the Tower of Babbel.

Sam: Yep, yep, that's right, yeah, this is the Tower of Babbel. Babbel HQ. The Babbel Burg. 

Ted: Burg? Burg? The Babbel Bird? 

Sam: Burg - Burg - it's a German word. 

Ted: Oh, what does it mean?

Sam: Yeah, well because we're in Berlin, right? It means fortress. Babbel HQ. Babbel Burg. 

Ted: Alright, great. Ok. 

Sam: Yeah, so it's a funny place to have a recording studio but I do like what they've done with all the chains and cobwebs. Very Berlin. 

Ted: Very Berlin.

Sam: Anyway, moving on, because we got to get this thing started, right? Our brief is "joyful". Does that say something to you?

Ted: What does that it? Joyful?

Sam: Joyful is actually a word that comes from 13th century French - "joie" - and it's also, this is a good illustration of English, right, so it's French and it's German. Because the last part "ful" comes from Old Norse and Old Germanic "voll". But, in terms of today, I think, you know "entertaining"! 

Ted: Ok, great, we can do that. 

Sam: Yeah, I think so, I mean, I think, you know, you in that cheese hat -  

Ted: Oh yes. 

Sam: It's saying "joyful". It's screaming "joyful".  

Ted: It's part of my traditional Wisconsin garb, everyone has one. 

Sam: I knew it was Wisconsin, yes. 

Ted: Alright.

Sam: Yeah, umm, who's that guy in the corner there? 

Ted: Oh, that's our Producer Magic Tom.

Sam: Magic Tom! Hi, Magic Tom! Hi! 

Ted: Hey guys!

Sam: Nice to have you here. 

I guess we need to come up with a name for the show. Any ideas? 

Ted: Yeah, I've got a couple bouncing around in my head. This is one I really like, "The Most Amazing English Show You Ever Heard Presented By Language Heros Sam and Ted". It's quick, snappy, rolls off the tongue, easy to remember -

Sam: Yeah, yeah, yeah… I've forgotten it already. 

Ted: It's "The Most Amazing English Show You Ever Heard Presented By Language Heros Sam and Ted".

Sam: Yeah, ok ok. Right, what about, I had another idea, "The Wrong End Of The Stick: A Podcast of Confusion". 

Ted: The wrong end of which stick? 

Sam: Oh, right, well, it's a metaphor, right, it's an idiom, I guess actually. Yeah, if you take the wrong end of the stick, you're in the wrong place. I guess maybe a burning stick, if you took the wrong end of a burning stick? 

Ted: Yeah, that would hurt, yeah. 

Sam: It would hurt, yeah. Something like that. 

Ted: And would lead to some confusion. 

Sam: Uh yeah, I think I'm confused already so… Any others?

Ted: Yeah, ummm, "Sam and Ted's Charmingly Old-Fashioned Elocution Podcast"

Sam: Hmm, that's nice but what's "elocution"? 

Ted: Well, elocution is the practice of speaking correctly, formally, enunciating, using the correct words, not so much slang, things like that.

How about this one, "Frenetic Phonetics"?

Sam: Ouf! I can't even say that! 

What about… Oh, I've got one, I've got one! "Casting Aspersions: A Podcast of Blame".

Ted: What is an "aspersion"?

Sam: Oh, an aspersion? Ummm, well… so, "casting" is to sort of throw or spread about, you know like seeds, you cast seeds, you cast light. And then "aspersion" is, well, it's a rumor or blame, so you're sort of criticising people negatively. 

Ted: Are we going to be criticising lots of people negatively in this podcast?

Sam: Hahah maybe not! Or maybe we are! Maybe we are… 

Ted: I guess we'll see where we take it! Alright, I like having "Sam" and "Ted"s in there. 

Sam: Makes sense, right?

Ted: Right? Yeah, people should know it's us giving the podcast. 

Sam: Oh my God!! I think I have it, I've got it, I've got it, "Sam and Ted's Famous Last Words".

Ted: Ah yes, that's perfect, I love it.

Sam: Yeah, because these are probably the last words we're ever going to speak on the radio - 

Ted: Right, exactly, we're going to get cancelled, for sure. 

Alright, well, now we've got a title and I thought that we could also have a jingle for our podcast. 

Sam: A what?

Ted: A jingle. Like a musical intro. 

Sam: Oh, a theme tune! You mean a theme tune - 

Ted: Yeah, a theme song! Exactly! 

Sam: Well, it is a fact that you're a musical genius, right?

Ted: That's correct. I was in the marching band at my university actually. 

Sam: You play every instrument - 

Ted: Every instrument known to man. 

Sam: Amazing. Or woman!

Ted: And look! Over here in the corner, there's a guitar! It's right here. 

Sam: Wow! It's amazing! Oh, oh, and I happen to have a pocket piano. 

Ted: A pocket piano! 

Sam: To hand.

Ted: Alright, let's do it. Let's jam! 

You're listening to "Sam and Ted's Famous Last Words".

Ted: So I thought for the first segment here, I found something really interesting the other day, this segment we're going to call "Anglish for Dwildmen".

Sam: Right, ok. Umm, sorry can I stop you for a second? What is "Anglish"?

Ted: "Anglish", to give you a little bit of historical background is actually a register of English in which all of the foreign, loan words have been taken out, all the Greek, Latin and French, and have been replaced with words of only Germanic or English origin. So for example, a "dwildmen" literally translates as "error-man", so it's someone who is wrong, I guess. I'm not sure how we would translate that in the Latinate form - 

Sam: An idiot. 

Ted: Probably, yes! Yeah, I would say idiot, yeah, so anyway, the way that this register was developed, it goes all the way back to the 1100s and at this time there was a lot of French and Latin entering the language of the upper classes, of course, French was the language of the nobility and Latin was the language of the church, but the common person didn't really have any knowledge of these other languages. So, at that time there was movement of people wanting to write in the language of the people. 

Sam: When you say movement, how many people were involved? 

Ted: Probably about three or four. 

Sam: Oh right, ok. More of a club than a movement. Yeah. A group of hobbyists. 

Ted: Right, exactly. 

Sam: Medieval hobbyists. 

Ted: Yeah! So today, it's a little bit more of a novelty than anything. Yeah, it's interesting to see what our language could look like without the influence of the Romance languages and Greek. 

Sam: Can I stop you for a second, I was using this famous search engine, Goggle, and I’ve been goggling around - 

Ted: Goggling? I think you might be confused. 

Sam: Probably… but I was goggling around and I found something about this idea of "cleansing" the English language of foreign influences and I think it's a little bit dubious, don't you think? My perception of language is it's something that's always changing and it's always - we're always borrowing words from other languages and it's sort of constantly evolving and also, who decides - when does English begin?

Ted: Of course, and I agree with you, I love all our loan words, I love all the Romance language stuff, however, if you read on the Anglish website that I found, I found the goal of this and it is specifically "to foster a greater love for one's own tongue". In fact, the name, Anglish, originated in the 1960s from a satirical magazine, so it's more of a joke than anything. 

Sam: So it's a joke, yeah, right. Can you give me some examples of Anglish?

Ted: Yeah! Sure, of course! First example we have is the word "nameling" - 

Sam: Namelings. I love it. Namelings. 

Ted: Namelings. You know what a nameling is?

Sam: A nameling? I don't but I really like it.

Ted: A nameling is - people who share the same name.

Sam: Crazy. 

Ted: Yeah! 

Sam: If you, for example, if you bumped into another Ted on the street, another Theodore, you and he or she, could be namelings! 

Ted: Right! Yeah, exactly. 

Sam: Or would be namelings, actually. 

Ted: We would be namelings.

Sam: That's amazing, have you got any other examples of this fascinating language? 

Ted: Yeah, yeah I've got a couple. So, most words that end in "-ology" in English, these are changed to end with the word "-lore" in Anglish. So, for instance, geology in Anglish is "stonelore". 

Sam: STONELORE! 

Ted: STONELORE! 

It sounds like something a dwarf would study, like a Lord of the Rings dwarf. 

Sam: Yeah, yeah, sure, what are you doing there? I'm study a bit of stonelore! 

Ted: Right? Exactly! Where on the other hand, the elves would probably be studying "skylore" or meteorology.

Sam: Elven weather-forecasters! Any others?

Ted: Yeah, I've got another one, "fulsome", fulsome - 

Sam: Meaning? 

Ted: Which means abundant. 

Sam: A Bun? What? Bum, bum, bumlore.

Ted: Bumlore? 

Sam: Bundant.

Ted: What would "bumlore" - bumlore would be proctology? 

Sam: Eh, maybe, yes! The reading of one's bum. 

Ted: Oh, ok! Alright! 

Sam: Like a sort of… fortune telling. 

Ted: Great… and like doesn't Sylvester Stallone's mom do that? 

Sam: I think she does, yeah, I think she calls it rumpology though.

Ted: Rumpology? Or Asstrology? 

Yeah, ok. My personal favourite one, the word for American is "Nightlander".  

Sam: Nightlander? Is that hyphenated? 

Ted: No it's not. It's a single compound word. 

Sam: Great, ok! Let's move to the second segment, which is "Dead Interesting".

Dead Interesting. 

Ted: Dead Interesting.

Sam: This segment is about dead or ageing phrases, things your granny might have said or things you remember from watching the goggle box as a kid. 

Ted: The goggle box?

Sam: Yeah, the TV, you know.  

Ted: Ah… Ok, my parents used to call it the boob tube, because it turns you into a boob. A stupid person.

Sam: A booby.

Ted: A blue-footed booby.

Sam: Yeah, well in Britain, as far as I'm aware, the boob tube is something else entirely, it's a strapless women’s top. So we call - umm - what do you call that actually? 

Ted: A tube top. 

Sam: A tube top? I'm getting confused with the boobs and the tubes now - hahah! 

Any other examples?

Ted: Yeah, I've got some examples, I asked my Dad about this, and he said that his father used to call people “Daddy-O” and he used to say “groovy” a lot.

Sam: Was he some kind of - like a - some kind of jazz musician or something? 

Ted: He was a farmer. 

Sam: He was a farmer? He used to go around the fields saying "Daddy-O" and "groovy" as he was ploughing his field?

Ted: I guess so! Groovy, groovy farmer man! 

Sam: Groovy farmer, Ted's granddad.

Umm yeah, my friend's granny called her attic the "glory hole". 

Ted: Ah hahah! Alright! 

Sam: Which I think in German they call a "wunderkammer". Same idea, that you put all your treasures in some kind of chamber.

Ted: A dusty chamber. 

Sam: Well, anyway, since this is a poddy-podcast we thought we'd ask our listeners to write in with phrases they remember from days of yore, Ye Olde English, so to speak. 

Ted: Alright

Sam: Ted, do you want to read one of them out for us? 

Ted: Yeah, sure, umm, we have Matt from Lancashire wrote in, and we have an example sentence here, it says: "Ajax on back of treble bus but that ain't where it's going". What does that even mean?

Sam: I have no idea, I can't tell you, you'll have to write back to Matt and ask him. 

Ted: Alright, thank you, Matt! 

Sam: Ok, thank you Matt, that was great. 

Ok, I've got one here from Lucy from Derby and she says: "Can we give a shout out to Grandma Kate? 

Ted: Hey, Grandma Kate! 

Sam: Hey, Grandma Kate! Nice to have you with us, and Grandma Kate would say: "It's a bit black over Bill's mother's getting", which Lucy says is a nice South Derbyshire phrase for when you can see bad weather approaching. 

Ted: I think Grandma Kate needs to work on her syntax. 

Sam: She does, yeah - hahah! I know, I wouldn't understand that if someone said that to me. 

Ted: Ummm, our colleague Sophie has a contribution here, and she says: "Super awkward but my mum always used to say “keep dick” when she meant “keep watch” or “keep an eye out” and also her aunt used to say “beau” instead of “boyfriend”.

Sam: Beau?

Ted: Beau. 

Sam: Beau. Do you say beau in America? 

Ted: Yeah, sometimes, like in the 1950s maybe. Yeah.

Sam: Yeah, you don't hear it much anymore. 

Ted: The last ones we have are from Sam from Liverpool, and we have: “You’d make a better door than a window!” to someone who is blocking the view and “Were ye born in a barn?”

Sam: Can you do that in a Liverpool accent? 

Ted: I couldn't but maybe you could? 

Sam: Hahah! I think I'd get into trouble if I tried to do a Liverpool accent… "Were you born in a barn?" 

Apologies now to everyone in Liverpool. 

Ted: Sounds good to me. 

Sam: That was my best Liverpudlian. We don't - I've never heard "You'd make a better door than a window" to be honest. Do you say that in America? 

Ted: Oh yeah! I had an English teacher that used to say that all the time. 

Sam: To you, in particular? 

Ted: Yeah, uh-huh. 

Sam: Great. 

Ted: I was a little bit bigger when I lived back in Wisconsin. 

Sam: Oh right, ok. 

Ted: Blocked lots of views. 

Sam: Yeah, ok, haha. Right, should we move on?

Ted: Yeah, I’m feeling a little deaded out. Do you think we could liven it up a little bit and invite a real, live, other human being in to join us? 

Sam: Oh, like a celebrity? 

Ted: Yes, a celebrity. 

Sam: What should we call this segment? 

Ted: I think we should call it "Celebrity Bites", like a sound bite.

Sam: Yeah, for those who don't know what a sound bite is it's, well according to the Oxford Dictionary, a sound bite is a short extract from a recorded interview or speech. So let's hope our guest is succinct and concise today! And who do we have actually, Ted, in the studio with us today?

Ted: Today, we have invited the woman who writes the - does the blackboard arts in reception, Kitty McTwirk. Welcome! 

Sam: Wow, hi, Kitty! 

Kitty: Hello, thank you for the warm welcome! 

Sam: You're very welcome! 

Kitty: Taking some time off from chalking to be here today. 

Sam: "Chalking", is that the verb for what you do? 

Kitty: I believe so.

Sam: "Chalk one off", that's a phrase isn't it? 

Ted: Do you mean, like, to tick something off? 

Sam: Ahh, yeah, maybe. 

Ted: We'll look it up! We'll get back to you on that one! Ok. 

Kitty, I hear a little… something when you speak - 

Kitty: A twang? 

Ted: A little twang, yeah, where is that twang from?

Kitty: The twang is from Scotland. It's good, isn't it, when you're from Scotland, everyone feels the need to repeat your accent back at you when you start talking. 

Ted: I'm sure that's fun for you! 

Sam: I used to live in Scotland.

Kitty: It's allowed then! 

Ted: Getting back to the chalking, we were just wondering if you have any favourite chalkboard arts that you've done recently that you'd like to share with us?

Sam: Maybe just one, actually - 

Kitty: Just one? Just one is tough for me and I feel like they've all been of a pretty high standard over the years. 

Sam: I'd say it's a rollercoaster, you know, quality goes up and down, doesn't it? 

Kitty: So do the complaints! Umm, probably one of the best ones more recently was "oomancy". I don't know if you've ever heard the word "oomancy"?

Sam: Oomancy! 

Kitty: Oomancy! Any guesses? 

Sam: No idea! 

Ted: Is it the study of Uma Thurman?

Kitty: Hahaha it's not! But I could imagine she would do this, it's reading the future with a poached egg… Don't ask me how you do it, but I - 

Sam: Well that in Anglish, I guess that would be "egglore" -  

Ted: Egglore!

Kitty: Egglore! 

Sam: Egglore! 

Actually, while you're here, do you have any examples of sort of old phrases from your childhood? 

Kitty: I do have a few! I remember my great aunt used to be keen on the "Hush child Harold". Yeah, I used to be told if was whining or whingeing or complaining as a child, I would often be told "Hush child Harold". 

Sam: I can't imagine you complaining! I can't imagine that! But I guess you had it a lot, you know what I mean, it's stuck with you! 

Kitty: I did hear it quite often, yeah! 

Sam: And it must have been a bit confusing to be called Harold or were you called Harold as a child? 

Kitty: It is confusing! I think it comes from Lord Byron, but it's not even a direct quote, so not really sure if that was just a my family or if it was a Scotland wide thing but - 

Sam: What else? Anything else? 

Kitty: We often - I mean, I use this myself so it's not really old but I think it's maybe a Scotland based thing but we don't really "go to the shops", we "do the messages". 

Sam: You do the messages? 

Kitty: Yeah, so if you have to pop out to the shops to get something, you're doing the messages. 

Sam: Sounds very… secretive. 

Kitty: Yeah, maybe! I feel like it makes sense, you've got a list of things to do, you're just doing the messages! 

Yeah, we have phrases from Glasgow such as "Yer aff yer heid!" 

Sam: Yer aff yer heid!! 

Kitty: OK, Miss Jean Brodie! 

Ted: Aff yer heid!? Was does "yer aff yer heid!" mean? 

Kitty: That you're crazy, or mad, you've sort of lost it. 

Sam: Oh! You're off your head! Yeah we say that - 

Kitty: So, "heid" is "head" 

Sam: Great! Any others?

Kitty: Umm "yer bum's oot the windae", which means - 

Sam: Your bum's out the what?!!

Kitty: The windae! The windae is the window. So yer bum's oot the windae just means that you're talking rubbish. 

Ted: I think if your bum's out the windae, you might need a bumlorist! 

Sam: It's true! A rumpologist! Sounds cold… especially in Scotland! 

Ummm, yeah great, ok now, I've got a question actually, and it's been plaguing me for years, and it's regards something called the "Glasgow salad", which is some kind of mythological dish. Can you enlighten us as to what a Glasgow salad is? 

Kitty: Well I do think it exists, I don't think that it's a mythological dish, I think it's just a portion of chips with whatever you're having. 

Sam: Oh really?

Ted: Oh, I thought it was a deep-fried Mars bar! 

Kitty: They're probably deep-fried chips! But I would imagine - I think Glasgow salad is just extra chips with whatever you're having. 

Sam: Glasgow especially does have a reputation for deep-frying anything it can get its hands on. 

Kitty: It does! I think in Glasgow you can take anything you want to a fish and chip shop and they deep fat fry for free! 

Sam: That is a service! 

Kitty: Shout out to Glasgow! 

Ted: You know we also deep fry a lot of things in Wisconsin! 

Kitty: That is true! 

Sam: Really? Like what?

Ted: I mean the standard one, I mean we eat cheese all the time, and so, of course, we deep fry cheese - deep fried cheese curds. They're pretty delicious but they're kind of nothing special, they're not surprising to anybody. 

Sam: Cheese isn't fatty enough is it? 

Ted: Yeah, if you want to get real fatty, probably the fattiest thing that we deep fry is just butter. 

Sam: What?

Ted: Just a stick of butter. You freeze it and then you batter it and then you flash fry it super fast and then you eat it - just slurp it up! 

Sam: That sounds awful…

Kitty: In competition with Glasgow for the lowest life expectancy! 

Ted: You might put a bit of little sugar or something on it, give it a little bit more of flavour but yeah - 

Sam: Crazy… So you batter your butter?

Ted: We batter our butter! Exactly. 

Sam: Ok, I think it's time for our last segment of this podcast, which is "You Must Be Joking!" 

Ted: Alright, so here we are with "You Must Be Joking", which is, of course, the segment where we tell some jokes and these are language-related jokes -

Sam: Oh we're going to dabble in a bit of English word play, are we? 

Ted: Exactly, right, and so once again we have a little bit of a challenge here, I'm going to tell a couple jokes, you're going to tell a couple jokes -  

Sam: Joke tennis! 

Ted: Joke tennis, exactly, and Kitty McTwirk is going to then be judge and decide who's the champion of this round of "You Must be Joking". 

Kitty: The laughometer! 

Ted: Ok, you ready?

Sam: I'm ready! 

Ted: Here's my first one, why do seagulls fly over the sea? 

Sam: I don't know, Ted, why do seagulls fly over the sea? 

Ted: Because if they flew over the bay, they’d be bagels!

Sam: Hahah that's actually very good! 

Ok, right, I'm ready - What sport do you play with a wombat?

Ted: What?

Sam: Wom… Silence in the studio there. In case anyone doesn't know, a wombat is small, is it a marsupial? Or a mammal? 

Ted: I believe it's a marsupial! 

Sam: Right. Swiftly moving on, Ted, you're on! 

Ted: Alright, why can’t you run through a campsite? 

Sam: I don't know, Ted, why can't you run through a campsite?

Ted: You can only ran because it’s past tents. 

Sam: Hahah! That's great. You can tell Ted used to be a teacher! 

Ok, what did the buffalo say to his son when he left for college?

Ted: What?

Sam: Bison!! Bye son, you get it? 

Ted: Yeah, I get it! Bison! 

Sam: Bison. Buffalo. Bye son! 

Ok, ok, Kitty! What do you think? Who won the - 

Kitty: I mean, all horrifically awful but I feel like since it is the only one you didn't have to explain to make it funny, I'll go with "why can't you run through a campsite?" 

Ted: Yes!! I win! Champion! 

Sam: You won this time! 

Ok, well I think our time's up for today. Yeah, it's been great, it's been great having you in the studio with us Kitty - 

Ted: Yeah, someone else needs the dungeon. 

Sam: Oh yeah, I can hear someone banging on the door. 

Ted: Right, yeah, some chains rattling out there and some groaning and moaning. 

Sam: We do have a lot of podcasts about, so - 

Ted: If you have any questions, comments, concerns, you want to tell us something, you want to give us some ideas for another segment for our podcast, something like that, you can contact us on Twitter @Babbel or you can write us an email and the email address is podcasting@babbel.com. 

This has been "Famous Last Words" with Ted and Sam! 

Sam: This has been, this has been "Famous Last Words" with Ted and Sam. Thank you very much!