Question Time - Part EIGHT!

[SiHart]

I like a good barbecue myself.

Will you be listening to the first episode of Invaders From Oxford this evening?

[Anthony Williams]

Yes - once the wife has gone to bed

Manchester City won the Premier League today. Do you care?

[Rob McCow]

I can try to care. But I'd only be trying.

What has been the best sporting event you've ever seen?

[Stuart Wallis]

Offhand, possibly the England cricket team winning a Test against the previously unbeatable West Indies inside two days.

What would you like to be doing now?

[SiHart]

I'm not really sure. It's very odd here at the moment, as Steve is working nights this week, so there's no routine.

Have you ever visited Oxford?

[Richard Brinck-Johnsen]

No, but I'd like to out of interest. even though the railway station was very non-descript when I passed through on Friday and Sunday last weekend.
Plus I might be writing something else set there before too long!

Do you have a preference between Oxford and Cambridge?

[Anthony Williams]

Definitely Oxford

Automated phone lines - does anyone like them?

[SiHart]

I've never met anyone who does.

How are you?

[Si Hunt]

I'm feeling like the weather - sunny with cloudy intervals.

When you are happy do you listen to happy songs, and when you are sad to you listen to sad songs, or do you listen to happy songs when you are sad to try and cheer yourself up? What I mean is, do you indulge your moods with music and revel in it or do you use music as a medium for escaping the mood you are in as a form of music escapism DO YOU?

Si.

[Rob McCow]

As a teen, I listened to sad songs when I was sad. Nowadays I want to get a more positive feel off music, so I tend to avoid those songs (i.e. Radiohead). I prefer to be excited by music.

Does listening to a lot of sad music make you less happy as a person? Can listening to Radiohead actually make you depressed?

[Anthony Williams]

Listening to Radiohead certainly makes me depressed!

Do you have any tips for falling asleep on an airplane?

[Stuart Wallis]

How much duty free can you manage?

Do you have a favourite author?

[SiHart]

I do, Iain Banks.

Well do you, do you, do you wanna?

[Stuart Wallis]

With you, anytime!

Are you doing anything for the Jubilee celebrations that by rights should have been in February but for the better weather then than we're having at the moment?

[Mike Saville]

The only thing I'll be doing for the Jubilee is cutting the plug off the telly. I'm almost as sick of it as I am the Olympics. And that's not an insignificant amount.

Do you get fed up of overhype?

[Rob McCow]

When I worked at Basingstoke there was an Olympic countdown clock on the wall. That was over TWO YEARS AGO!!!!!

So yes.

Would you stand for the National Anthem?

[Stuart Wallis]

If Prince Philip were holding a shotgun to my head...

If everyone else was, I would. Much as I'm used to looking like a berk... I see nothing wrong with it in principal though. The line for republicans forms on the right.

Do you suffer from hay fever?

[SiHart]

No.

Does your hair worry you?

[Stuart Wallis]

Well I'd like some...

Is there anyone from history that you'd like to meet?

[Richard Brinck-Johnsen]

So many answers to that but I suppose I shall have to go with the obvious choice - Richard III

Is 9.17am too early to have a tea break when you've only been in the office for half an hour?

[Si Hunt]

Possibly, but the world didn't end so I'm sure it's alright.

Would you call yourself a spiritual person?

Si.

[Richard Brinck-Johnsen]

Yes, although possibly not as much as I like to think I am.

Do you like to take the bull by the horns or wait and see what happens?

[Jon Masters]

Wait and see - never do today something you could put off until tomorrow (by which time it might have gone away)

Did you find revising for exams easy or very boring ?

[Si Hunt]

It was hard. Often very boring. I managed it, I think, I was good at note taking, and if I got bored I just took more and more notes. I didn't have much else at that time, and my Father encouraged me to study from an early age, so I had sort of trained myself. I was quite a good student.

Do you have much of an ego and how important do you think this is?

Si.

[Stuart Wallis]

Egomaniacs tend to be bores and bullies in my experience. Now wake up or I'll thrash the lot of you!

I prefer being quiet and unassuming; people seem to like me that way. (Which is not to say that people who have large personalities and no ego can't be enjoyable.)

How would you spend your time if the world ender tomorow lunchtime?