Speaker 1: Ridiculous Crime is a production of My Heart Radio. What's up,
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Done? You know it's ridiculous. Oh, I've been waiting
Speaker 1: to tell you this. I was looking up some retro
Speaker 1: board games, don't ask, and I had no idea how
Speaker 1: wild old games were. Like, my sister and I were
Speaker 1: talking about it, and then she was telling me once
Speaker 1: she found, so I looked up some. Okay, these are
Speaker 1: the favorites that I found. I just want to tell
Speaker 1: you about them. Right. The board game called Capital Punishment. No, no, no, yeah,
Speaker 1: the kid, it's worse than you think. The object of
Speaker 1: the game is to get all of your criminals to
Speaker 1: be scheduled for the electric chair, get them parked on
Speaker 1: death row or at least be given a life imprisonment sentence.
Speaker 1: And that's it. That's the game. That's how you win. Now.
Speaker 1: The other thing is you do is you take your
Speaker 1: opponents and you basically saddle them with criminals who are
Speaker 1: able to get through to the path of justice. So
Speaker 1: if they can get their criminals paroled and presumably back
Speaker 1: on the street criming again, they lose. At least it's
Speaker 1: not like a cranium style you have to participate game. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: it's not one of those, uh, the person to Death. No.
Speaker 1: The other one that I liked was Bigfoot, the board
Speaker 1: game Bigfoot. It was a game that allowed you as
Speaker 1: the person just kind of like I don't know, like
Speaker 1: Monopoly or life, where you're going around a board on
Speaker 1: these spaces, right, and you have this plastic bigfoot and
Speaker 1: there are ten discs, and you want to advance your
Speaker 1: big foot around the board. Right. If you land on
Speaker 1: an opponent space and they have a disk there and
Speaker 1: they flip it over and it's a foot, you lose.
Speaker 1: I do not get it. I think the Bigfoot thing
Speaker 1: was just kind of throwing in on top like seventies
Speaker 1: style that the game just doesn't exist because it's no
Speaker 1: I see what you did. That that's the game. See
Speaker 1: that picture the game. That's the paporite. Wait, let me
Speaker 1: see it again. It's like Harry and the Henderson's abducted.
Speaker 1: Play a game with me kids. Lastly, though, this is
Speaker 1: the one I want to tell you most about. My
Speaker 1: favorite of all three that I found was the Crazy
Speaker 1: Cat Lady board game. Don't like an Archie McPhee game.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you know it. I only know it's our
Speaker 1: she McPhee from the front cover. Yeah, so you compete
Speaker 1: to rescue cats. You move around the board and like
Speaker 1: once again, you land on spaces that are marked things
Speaker 1: like rescue grumpy old cat from pound or as I
Speaker 1: like to call it, the zoo. And eventually you win
Speaker 1: the game by saving so many cats that your house
Speaker 1: is now overrun by cats and you go crazy from
Speaker 1: all the cat poop everywhere. I think, I think that's
Speaker 1: how you win. I don't know, crazy cat lady, that
Speaker 1: you you win. I have a confession to make. You've
Speaker 1: played the game, No, someone gave it to and never
Speaker 1: I was like, I bet Elizabeth would love this game. Thanks,
Speaker 1: and I'm not the only one. Thanks did Yeah? No,
Speaker 1: someone was like they saw it and thought, Elizabeth, I
Speaker 1: don't own a freaking cat. No, not right now? Right
Speaker 1: I own a freaking cat? Is No, I don't know
Speaker 1: a cat? And then I mean I did at the time.
Speaker 1: You have in the past, right, the same you have
Speaker 1: cat owner. I'm a crazy dog lady, though that thing
Speaker 1: be both right. They don't make the don't limit yourself. No,
Speaker 1: I'm never going to. So, yeah, that's super ridiculous. Waiting
Speaker 1: to tell you. You know what else is ridiculous rich
Speaker 1: people and then more specifically rich people thinking they're clever.
Speaker 1: Oh no, this is Ridiculous Crime, a podcast about absurd
Speaker 1: and outrageous capers, heists and cons. It's always murder free
Speaker 1: and ridiculous. Damn right. Remember Zarin, when I told you
Speaker 1: about that gold turlet that got stolen, Yes, the gold turlet. Yes,
Speaker 1: you remember that toilet, the commode from Baltimore turlet. By
Speaker 1: the end of the story, I was beyond irritated with
Speaker 1: the wealthy folks. Yeah, I was. There's so much power
Speaker 1: tied up in money. So when like a wealthy person
Speaker 1: wants to do some sort of prank, it's always larger
Speaker 1: than life. It doesn't fly under the radar. You know,
Speaker 1: they can outsize it and why sometimes it's not always
Speaker 1: at the expense of the rest of us. Right, But
Speaker 1: there's this just like disregard for ordinary people that rubs
Speaker 1: me the wrong way. And it's kind of like that
Speaker 1: of the little people. You little people enjoy what I'm
Speaker 1: because like maybe the prank bleeds over into like actual crime.
Speaker 1: Laudi da, what does it matter to me? It's a lark.
Speaker 1: Everyone just chill out. You know, most people, we don't
Speaker 1: get to We don't get to have that outlook on it,
Speaker 1: you know. And there there are ramifications when we do stuff. Yes,
Speaker 1: the rest of us who do not have like big
Speaker 1: white cho law forms. So the story I have for
Speaker 1: you today is about fraud. It's a hoax. It's done
Speaker 1: as sort of a prank. I originally thought to make
Speaker 1: fun of excessive war spending. But it's not a political
Speaker 1: prank direct it's not like with it intended to be directed. No, no,
Speaker 1: I have no idea. It wasted time and effort, made
Speaker 1: the perpetrators look like a holes in my point, if
Speaker 1: I'm going to use strong language, I'm over here just blushing.
Speaker 1: But go on. So I want you to get ready
Speaker 1: to be way hazing. Um, I want you to be
Speaker 1: irritated by rich people again, I can do that, right.
Speaker 1: This is the Dreadnought hoax. So let me give you
Speaker 1: some background. So the HMS Dreadnought was yeah, completed in
Speaker 1: nineteen o six. So the New York Times called it
Speaker 1: quote a fast, heavily armed behemoth that changed naval warfare.
Speaker 1: It's awesome power was the focus of attention abroad, just
Speaker 1: as its shocking expense was a point of debate. At
Speaker 1: home now. I mean at the time things were going
Speaker 1: swimmingly in the UK in England. Uh. I just like
Speaker 1: the term going swimming, like the economy wise well for them,
Speaker 1: So they and you know, maybe good planning. They're doing
Speaker 1: some military spending the Victoriana era, right, like oh big
Speaker 1: idea of like still the empires. So they're like, we
Speaker 1: need ships to control the sea. Rule Britannia. The Dreadnought
Speaker 1: was called the most powerful, complex and aggressive machine in
Speaker 1: the world. Yeah. Uh. The ship was a quote potent
Speaker 1: and expensive symbol of state power and authoritarianism. So there's
Speaker 1: this historian Peter Stansky. I'm going to be doing so
Speaker 1: many quotes today. I'm pulling his errand like it. The
Speaker 1: Dreadnought was not only a particular ship, but also the
Speaker 1: first of a new class of powerful battleship, the very
Speaker 1: symbol of the British Navy's assertion of its continuing superiority
Speaker 1: over the German Navy and its determination to maintain its
Speaker 1: position as the most powerful navy in the world. So
Speaker 1: the Royal Navy full of fun times, Oh from what
Speaker 1: I've heard. Yes, if it's not just the buggery, it's
Speaker 1: the scurvy barrel laughs. Um, the ships in the fleet,
Speaker 1: they would play pranks on each other, okay, you know
Speaker 1: while having trying to avoid scurvy, um and so at
Speaker 1: around n the h MS Hawk and the HMS Dreadnought
Speaker 1: were in a hoaxing feud. So they're pranking it up.
Speaker 1: Enter English irishman Horace Dever Cole. Now English irishman. Does
Speaker 1: this mean he's like North Irish, He's like he's not
Speaker 1: from the county county. I mean he's like landowner, Yes,
Speaker 1: a man of privilege. She was most likely probably beholding
Speaker 1: to the craft. Well, I mean his Okay, so his
Speaker 1: maternal great grandfather is the Irish poet Sir Aubrey de
Speaker 1: Vere But you're not you know that's an English title, sir,
Speaker 1: So you know where I'm going to that. His paternal
Speaker 1: grandfather was William Henry Cole, and he was a British
Speaker 1: businessman who made a fortune in the coinine mark it
Speaker 1: and fighting. And you know, of course the other one
Speaker 1: that probably the more prolific one for them. Horace's dad
Speaker 1: died of cholera in India in Inja when Horace was
Speaker 1: a little boy, and Horace almost died of diph theory
Speaker 1: when he was ten and surgeries, Yeah, surgeries were required
Speaker 1: to save his life, but that meant that he couldn't
Speaker 1: really hear very well about like one ear um. He
Speaker 1: couldn't join the army because of that, so instead he
Speaker 1: enlisted in a volunteer cavalry and he went to South
Speaker 1: Africa during the Boer War. He was shot in the
Speaker 1: back by Boer snipers, narrowly avoiding death. So he was
Speaker 1: running from I'm pretty much it's better being shot in
Speaker 1: the back by your own men. Yeah. Well, he returns
Speaker 1: to the UK in rolls in Cambridge and he was
Speaker 1: like known for his pranking, his hoaxing, and then he
Speaker 1: oftentimes did this with his best friend Adrian Stephen. So
Speaker 1: Horace and Adrian they met at Cambridge when they're undergrads.
Speaker 1: One time they dressed up as the Sultan of Zanzibar's uncle,
Speaker 1: and then Adrian, well that was what Horrace dressed up as.
Speaker 1: Adrian dressed up as the Grand Vizier part of the entourage,
Speaker 1: and so the Sultan. At the time, the Sultan of
Speaker 1: Zanzibar was touring England and was going to be at
Speaker 1: Cambridge at the same time, so he's just like, no,
Speaker 1: I'm the Sultan, and he and Adrian, Horace and Adrian,
Speaker 1: they get escorted around Cambridge. They get a formal reception. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they were able to con people because people knew that
Speaker 1: this guy was coming the Sultan. Dad's of r be
Speaker 1: here and then they said, oh, I've got a funny
Speaker 1: hating some robes. Totally there you are, yeah, and so
Speaker 1: like Horace then later tells the Daily Mail about what
Speaker 1: he did, and there's all this publicity around this what
Speaker 1: they're calling a joke, and he gets a book deal
Speaker 1: off of it. He's like an offer for a book deal, like,
Speaker 1: please tell us more. He's never he's never punished. He's
Speaker 1: never I gave it thirty seconds. He's never punished for this,
Speaker 1: but it builds this reputation that he has. He's like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: what a clown. So someone on the h MS Hawk
Speaker 1: reaches out to him like we need an expert. They're like,
Speaker 1: Captain prank Er, Hi, this is the h MS Hawk, Um,
Speaker 1: I need you to help us in our prank war
Speaker 1: and it's against the h m MR and that He's like,
Speaker 1: guess what, I'm on it? So he like the back
Speaker 1: the background A team music starts playing, he's going to
Speaker 1: assemble his group. Number one, Adrian Stephen his bestie. He said,
Speaker 1: come on, dude, atrians sister Virginia. So she's like, she's
Speaker 1: an unpublished author at the time. You'll know her later
Speaker 1: as a Virginia Wolf. Yes, that that Virginia will so
Speaker 1: a clever last clever one. By the way, Adrian and
Speaker 1: Virginia's cousin was this guy named Leie Fisher, and he
Speaker 1: was an officer on the dreadnought um so maybe that
Speaker 1: kind of is why they wanted to do this either way. Now,
Speaker 1: this like early Bloomsberry group. Yes, it is artist Duncan Grant,
Speaker 1: who was a paramore of Adrian's and then two friends
Speaker 1: of their's, Guy Ridley and Anthony Buxton, and so I
Speaker 1: think it was Duncan Grant is the one who's in
Speaker 1: the Bloomsberry. This is the very beginning of it. Interesting.
Speaker 1: So you've got this group of people. They're wealthy, worldly educated,
Speaker 1: and apparently they love pranking, and they about the world
Speaker 1: at their feet and they could do whatever they want
Speaker 1: and they choose to prank you. Well and yeah, so okay,
Speaker 1: what kind of prank do we do? We want? To
Speaker 1: prank the Dreadnought for pranking a whole ship. What we
Speaker 1: could do anything, It's so cool. Oh, I know, another
Speaker 1: fake African or African adjacent royal visit. There's not a
Speaker 1: lot in the repertoire with these clowns. So I'm really
Speaker 1: worried about this. This is like screaming great British bake
Speaker 1: off Mexican Week totally. It's like, I know, I'm going
Speaker 1: to be pushing buttons of some of our English listeners,
Speaker 1: but I'm not pushing your buttons. None of the rich,
Speaker 1: like you know, aristocracy or like high falutin types are
Speaker 1: listening to us. My family called it the pink toes, right,
Speaker 1: they got better stuff to do. They don't. They don't
Speaker 1: know what we do down here the cool thing. So
Speaker 1: you know whatever, but if you my feeling, if you
Speaker 1: can't take it, don't dish it. And so Mexican Week
Speaker 1: has laid it out like guess what here the target?
Speaker 1: Now it sucks to be a caricature, doesn't it England?
Speaker 1: Um So anyway, so this group they decided to pose
Speaker 1: as an Abyssinian nobleman named ross Al Mala Ken Machelen
Speaker 1: ross Al Maclen Ethiopians. Yeah, well, I mean that's the thing.
Speaker 1: Absinia Empire located in what is now Ethiopia and Eritrea.
Speaker 1: That empire lasted from twelve seventy into what seventy four.
Speaker 1: It's one of the great African empires. Yeah, highly. Selassie
Speaker 1: gets deposed by a Soviet backed military, a punta, and
Speaker 1: that they've ruled until ninety one. So anyway, so they're
Speaker 1: saying they're these Abyssinians, um like an uncle maybe a
Speaker 1: cousin of the emperor and and then his whole entourage.
Speaker 1: So Horace says that like they're Abyssinian royals. They're in England.
Speaker 1: They're visiting Eaton. Oh that's where Horace went. So this
Speaker 1: is basically like the equivalent of for now, like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm a Saudi prince like you everybody knows this means
Speaker 1: you're well exactly. And they say, oh, we're coming to
Speaker 1: look at Eaton's, like we may send our kids there.
Speaker 1: So Horace gets in touch with a costumer named Willie
Speaker 1: Clarkson and he talks to him a bunch of times.
Speaker 1: They have all these meetings like let's talk wardrobe and
Speaker 1: they go and they drink tea. How do you feel
Speaker 1: about sequence? Bring me some swatches. Clarkson had done costumes
Speaker 1: for all these like major theater productions in Paris and
Speaker 1: in New York. Um in one of these books that
Speaker 1: says he quote provided wigs to all the leading ladies
Speaker 1: of the Aedwardian age, from Marie Lloyd to Sarah Bernhardt.
Speaker 1: He's like, whig masters, I do know who Sarah Bernhard is.
Speaker 1: That's a theater lady. Yeah, yeah, something like that. In
Speaker 1: the eighties, he also quote assisted Scotland Yard in their
Speaker 1: attempts to catch Jack the Ripper by disguising officers as prostitutes.
Speaker 1: Oh that's so he's dressing him up as tarts. He's like,
Speaker 1: all right, look, here's what we need. We need some
Speaker 1: cops dressed as sex workers. I happened to be really
Speaker 1: good at that. I've got all the best makeup. I
Speaker 1: happened a game. Yeah, don't ask me about the questions.
Speaker 1: You know how I got this stuff. Just it. Horace
Speaker 1: and his whole group they meet at Adrian and Virginia's
Speaker 1: house on early in the morning of Monday, February seven,
Speaker 1: nineteen ten, and Clarkson and brings some assistance. They show up. Um,
Speaker 1: he kind of had figured out what they were up
Speaker 1: to by this point and keeps his mouth shut. He's like,
Speaker 1: you know what I can do it, I can keep
Speaker 1: you see grid. So Anthony Buckston, he dresses up as
Speaker 1: a nobleman, like the one who's got leading this whole crew,
Speaker 1: ros L Mackelin. Oh like yeah, like I like the
Speaker 1: ross L because it's like the Rastafari you can actually hear,
Speaker 1: you can hear it. So he's going to be this
Speaker 1: nobleman ross El, Russell MacLean and then which kind of
Speaker 1: sounds like McCallan, but we're gonna let that go. Virginia,
Speaker 1: Duncan and Ridley. They dress up as princes in full
Speaker 1: black face and robes. Yeah, they're calling themselves Ross I'll
Speaker 1: sing Anya, ros L Mendax and Roz Michel Gallan. L.
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, so they do black face, which I'm
Speaker 1: assuming they only did the paint. They didn't do anything
Speaker 1: to just change their look, like you know, no, no, See,
Speaker 1: there's a book called The Sultan of Zanzibar, The Bizarre
Speaker 1: World and Spectacular Hoaxes of Horace de air cole And
Speaker 1: by a man named Martin Downer. He Marty details the
Speaker 1: entire thing. It's a it's a slog um. He talks
Speaker 1: about their makeup, and the names of the colors and
Speaker 1: such that they use are so offensive that I will
Speaker 1: not repeat them. Is it like and word name of
Speaker 1: h Yeah, and so they just they're painting, they're painting
Speaker 1: the faces. It's yeah. I just always love the idea.
Speaker 1: As a black person, I find it really amusing that
Speaker 1: people think, oh, you know what I can do blackness,
Speaker 1: I'll just paint my skin. And I'm like, for so
Speaker 1: many reasons, I will say you're wrong, but I just
Speaker 1: like that you think that's all that there is, and
Speaker 1: like anybody else is going to see that going there
Speaker 1: it is it's not all the historical oppression or anything that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I love that for them anyway. So they're worried that
Speaker 1: the makeup is going to run, and so Clark's in
Speaker 1: the costume where he says, don't eat or drink anything
Speaker 1: while you're there. But they had forgotten to eat breakfast.
Speaker 1: So in all the accounts that I was reading, oh,
Speaker 1: we were so hungry the whole time, I have at
Speaker 1: no point did I feel sorry for them being hungry.
Speaker 1: But okay, okay, so they're going to dress up as
Speaker 1: Abyssinian Royalty and I'm gonna go hoax a ship. What
Speaker 1: the Abyssinian Royalty has to do with hoaxing the ship?
Speaker 1: Like what is it? What we fooled you by letting
Speaker 1: these fake Abyssinians on, Like we got over on you
Speaker 1: that we're not really black. Okay, who's to say I'm
Speaker 1: trying to catch us to say? So? Adrian is his
Speaker 1: job is to play the official translator. And then Horace
Speaker 1: plays someone named Chamandalay from the Foreign Office, now like
Speaker 1: an Indian. Well, remember Horace's maternal great grandfather the Irish poems,
Speaker 1: Sir Aubrey de Vere Chamandalay was the name of the
Speaker 1: family who replaced the Deviers as the Lord Great Chamberlain
Speaker 1: in England, and so that was the title that the
Speaker 1: Deviers believed they still laid claim to. So it's like
Speaker 1: a rival family. He's just their name is really sticking
Speaker 1: it to the man over wo get them guys, Horace
Speaker 1: and Adrian, they're not in black face because they're playing
Speaker 1: white folks. Umslat Yeah, Adrian did wear a fake beard
Speaker 1: and a mustache. And then what's referred to in the
Speaker 1: book as a little sunburn powder sunburned powder. You know
Speaker 1: what that means? That like like a rust colored ready
Speaker 1: ready thing I've never even heard so, But because of that,
Speaker 1: they could eat whatever they wanted, you know. So they
Speaker 1: took a couple of portraits for posterity sake. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: then after the costume and the black face are done,
Speaker 1: they go to Paddington Stations. Good question, so Horace. He
Speaker 1: requests a special V I P rail coach take them
Speaker 1: to Weymouth where the fleet is docked. About an hour
Speaker 1: after they leave the station, they have this friend who's
Speaker 1: named Tudor Castle Tu d o R. Castle. He sends
Speaker 1: a having a friend named Glass Skyscraper basically or why
Speaker 1: eight house. Uh. He sends a forged telegram to the
Speaker 1: under from the Under Secretary of State Charles Hardinge to
Speaker 1: the Commander in Chief of the Home Fleet, Admiral May,
Speaker 1: saying that Prince Macalan will arrive around four twenty to
Speaker 1: meet them on a ride PM and meet him on
Speaker 1: arrival meet them there at So there's this tight timeline.
Speaker 1: The Admiral doesn't send a telegram back for confirmation because
Speaker 1: he's like, oh snap, like okay, we're doing Yeah. So
Speaker 1: on the train ride, Horace and Adrian. They're like, they're
Speaker 1: trying to learn Swahili on the train ride and they
Speaker 1: get say, of this book, Adrian says, Swahili is I
Speaker 1: believe spoken in some parts of East Africa. Whether it's
Speaker 1: spoken in Abyssinia or not, I don't know. But we
Speaker 1: thought it might be as well for me to know
Speaker 1: a few phrases. And to that end, we had bought
Speaker 1: a grammar from the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel.
Speaker 1: Do you know what language is not spoken in Ethiopia,
Speaker 1: Eritrea or the former Abyssinia. It's banned to so nice try.
Speaker 1: It's like, you're like, I gotta teach myself some Greek
Speaker 1: phrases because I'm going to France or I'm going to
Speaker 1: North America, so I should probably learn some Spanish. And
Speaker 1: you land in Canada. Yeah, pretty much. I need to
Speaker 1: take a break. These people are irritating me. Um when
Speaker 1: we get back, I'm gonna tell you about all these
Speaker 1: softies and black face flouncing around on a warship. I
Speaker 1: just want to know what they what they're gonna do
Speaker 1: on this ship. Yeah, okay, Zaron. When we left off,
Speaker 1: Horace and this gang of pranksters they're on their way
Speaker 1: to pull off an epic prank on board of a
Speaker 1: navy ship. They got on the train. They're making their
Speaker 1: way all in what they think is Abyssinian garb zaren.
Speaker 1: I want you to close your eyes. No, no, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna leave my eyes open. Then open your eyes and
Speaker 1: pictures eyes. It's February seventh, nineteen ten. You're a traveling doctor.
Speaker 1: You're on your way from your clinic in Dorchester, headed
Speaker 1: to see some patients in Weymouth on the southern coast
Speaker 1: of England, and the train pulls into Dorchester. You see
Speaker 1: through the windows a group of people dressed in weird
Speaker 1: costumes and face paint, well, let's be specific, black face.
Speaker 1: It's you know, some of them, it's pretty obvious that
Speaker 1: it's face paint. I think all of them the right.
Speaker 1: So you get in the carriage and you see that
Speaker 1: they're wearing these like flowing silk robes and then calftands
Speaker 1: over slacks they have on turbans. You know, they have
Speaker 1: really suspicious facial hair, suspicious and that it looks fake
Speaker 1: as hell. So you take a seat at the end
Speaker 1: the other end of the carriage. You're like, just you
Speaker 1: know what, I just want to think about trains. Just
Speaker 1: love train. Have we talked about training? I've been here
Speaker 1: and I just want to be with the trains. Is sar,
Speaker 1: and I want to talk to you about trains, but
Speaker 1: instead I want to keep telling you this story. So
Speaker 1: the group, they're whispering and giggling to themselves, and you
Speaker 1: think these are just some like well to do Oxbridge
Speaker 1: types out on like a theater trip of some sort?
Speaker 1: Is that like new avant garde data? Is M performance
Speaker 1: stuff that I've been reading about doing. Train pulls up
Speaker 1: at its terminus, Weymouth station. You get out of the
Speaker 1: train before the troop of goofballs. You see a red
Speaker 1: carpet and a naval officer in full dress uniform and
Speaker 1: they're like, oh hey, hey, is there someone famous on
Speaker 1: this train? Is it I don't know, H G. Wells,
Speaker 1: I Forced or some other person that goes by two initials. Uh,
Speaker 1: You're shocked j G bo J G Wentworth. You're shocked
Speaker 1: when you see this. Sorry, please go on em C
Speaker 1: wren light. Uh. The group gets off the train and
Speaker 1: that's who the officers waiting for leads him down a
Speaker 1: red carpet. You are shocked, shocked, I tell you. So
Speaker 1: the group gets taken to the dock where Admiral May
Speaker 1: and the rest of the ship's staff are all waiting
Speaker 1: on the Dreadnought, all in full dress regalia. No one
Speaker 1: is suspicious of the face paint in the costumes. Apparently really,
Speaker 1: I just can't, I cannot get my head around this.
Speaker 1: These are adults, these are grown folks, okay. So the
Speaker 1: Royal Marines Band starts to play to greet them, and
Speaker 1: they play the national anthem of Zanzibar No, and they
Speaker 1: apologize to like, you know what, we don't have the
Speaker 1: Abyssinian one any port and storm it's African. Hey close enough.
Speaker 1: So Horace then introduces everyone. He like misspells his own name,
Speaker 1: he gets the names wrong. He introduces Adrian as hair Hoffman,
Speaker 1: a German translator, and they're both kind of like surprised
Speaker 1: German accent on the and then and the thing is,
Speaker 1: it's like Germans aren't really welcome on worships at nineteen
Speaker 1: ten in England. So Adrian was like later explained, I
Speaker 1: had picked an English name that sounded kind of like Coffin,
Speaker 1: but I guess he didn't hear me, and he just
Speaker 1: went with Harry Kaufman, so they also, he, like Horace,
Speaker 1: switches up the names of the princess. Princess. He calls Buxton,
Speaker 1: who was playing the character for whom the visit had
Speaker 1: been arranged, Yeah, Rosal Macalen. He calls him russ L Mendex.
Speaker 1: And then don't you feel like Horace is one of
Speaker 1: those reckless people who just wants to get caught. And
Speaker 1: it's like either because he knows because of who his
Speaker 1: family is, in his station in life, that nothing's going
Speaker 1: to happen to him, or then there's also like a
Speaker 1: little bit of a high of like, you know what
Speaker 1: I can get out of this, Like I can use
Speaker 1: all out of this. I think it actually goes both ways.
Speaker 1: I think he exactly what you say. He has the
Speaker 1: hive knowing he can get out of it, but also
Speaker 1: he kind of likes being caught and shamed because he
Speaker 1: has never really had that, and he's a naughty boy.
Speaker 1: He craves. Yes, He's like, tell me I'm a naughty boy,
Speaker 1: thank you so much. Okay, So Adrian gets worried right
Speaker 1: because don't forget cousin Willie's on the boat. Oh not
Speaker 1: old cousin Willie, and there's also he recognizes a guy
Speaker 1: who's part of his Sunday walking club and we all
Speaker 1: have Sunday walking clubs. Yeah, I got a Monday. He
Speaker 1: sees Willie, he sees Sunday Walker Man, and uh, he
Speaker 1: doesn't know Sunday Walker Man is a captain on this
Speaker 1: ship until that morning. That morning he's standing there, He's like,
Speaker 1: they're going to recognize me. They don't. They don't recognize them.
Speaker 1: They see what they want to see. And like Virginia,
Speaker 1: she really loves cousin Willie, but Adrian and the Stephen
Speaker 1: family kind of looked down on Willie because he was
Speaker 1: very conformist and came from like a middle class part
Speaker 1: of the family. Okay, so maybe they're just they're kind
Speaker 1: of like getting the kick out of face. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: the officers they get invited to a party and have
Speaker 1: a drink. Adrian says, no, we don't consume alcohol, partly
Speaker 1: because they are all in they'll have their face start running,
Speaker 1: and so the officers are like, well, can we get
Speaker 1: you food tea? And then Virginia she said that no
Speaker 1: on behalf of this group. No, we must decline because
Speaker 1: we have to have our food prepared in a special way. Now,
Speaker 1: is Virginia wolf in black face? Yeah? I think so, right.
Speaker 1: I was just assuming because you said the only people
Speaker 1: who weren't were the two people who are the white
Speaker 1: dudes translators. So everyone else I'm picturing in black face
Speaker 1: black wolves, and they're going no, no, ill. And I'm
Speaker 1: not sure how she expresses. She says that later she
Speaker 1: did that, but like you'll, you'll find out, Okay. So
Speaker 1: then they said, oh, you know, oh, I'm sorry. It
Speaker 1: wasn't Virginia who declined. It was Adrian who said, no,
Speaker 1: we can't eat because it has to be prepared to
Speaker 1: especial away. Yeah, Virginia's and black faces, but they don't
Speaker 1: know the word for it. So um, he said at sunset,
Speaker 1: we have to pray towards Mecca, but he forgets that
Speaker 1: they're all wearing crucifixes because they're pretending to be Coptic
Speaker 1: Christians exactly exactly, but you know, hey, it's just somewhere
Speaker 1: over there. Um. So then to accommodate the prayer, Admiral
Speaker 1: may quote officially delayed sunset, meaning that the buglers across
Speaker 1: all the boats in the fleet. They stood waiting for
Speaker 1: the dreadnought to give the sign for sunset, and he
Speaker 1: had to coordinate whether it was really sunset, what was
Speaker 1: the sun doing. I don't know. The whole thing is
Speaker 1: just this British military, like we ignore the reality. We're
Speaker 1: waiting for the whistle exactly. So Horace though, he's like,
Speaker 1: you know what, I'll have some of that tea. And
Speaker 1: then Adrian and the princess they go on a tour.
Speaker 1: They get shown around the ship for forty minutes. They're there,
Speaker 1: marched all over the ship. Yeah, Adrian, he needs to
Speaker 1: disguise his voice, so he spoken quote a most unnatural
Speaker 1: deep base and an accent that was meant to be German.
Speaker 1: And then he forgot all the Swahili that he learned
Speaker 1: over He couldn't remember what to like translate, so to
Speaker 1: compensate when he's translate when he's speaking to the group,
Speaker 1: he's using like Latin and Greek that he remembered from
Speaker 1: studying Homer. Oh God. And so this is a British navy.
Speaker 1: A bunch of them speak Latin and Greek too. I
Speaker 1: bet so they're catching some of them. Well. He's also
Speaker 1: throwing in nonsense words, so it's just a mishmash. Here's
Speaker 1: what Adrian Stephen said about it later, quote, I don't
Speaker 1: find it easy to speak fluent Gibberish impromptu. I must
Speaker 1: somehow produce something that would not be too jerky, too implausible.
Speaker 1: I had to take care that neither the Latin nor
Speaker 1: the Greek should be recognized, of course, but I felt
Speaker 1: that probably few naval officers had suffered an education like mine.
Speaker 1: And in any case I so broke up the words
Speaker 1: and so mispronounced, and that probably they would have escaped
Speaker 1: notice even of the best scholar naval officers not knowing Latin?
Speaker 1: Does he not know anything about British naval officers, Like
Speaker 1: he's like the poorest don't know these things? Like I'm
Speaker 1: with him on Like maybe your average sailor doesn't know Latin.
Speaker 1: But a British naval officer, so Buxton as the press,
Speaker 1: he would repeat some of the words that he heard
Speaker 1: Adrian use in his responses back to him, and like
Speaker 1: a couple of the officers apparently remarked on the quote
Speaker 1: oddness of their lingo. Um, but so and there was
Speaker 1: there was an officer on the ship who spoke Abyssinian,
Speaker 1: but he was away on leave damn. Oh, this is
Speaker 1: all pre Vatican too, so every Catholic pretty much a
Speaker 1: whole lot of Catholics on that good back. For Virginia,
Speaker 1: she's worried that her voice is going to sound too feminine,
Speaker 1: so she just grunts and tending to be a man. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I forgot about that. Yeah, she's one of the p right,
Speaker 1: So she's just grunting and laughing. Ho ho ho um.
Speaker 1: Then she says later she admitted, quote, it is very difficult,
Speaker 1: I found, to look perfectly blank when you hear English spoken,
Speaker 1: and then to show great interest and intelligence when you
Speaker 1: hear pure gibberish. I'm sorry, decided to keep saying, oh wow,
Speaker 1: I really cannot say other without cussing. So this is me,
Speaker 1: This is me researching this, reading that book and going oh,
Speaker 1: closing the book and taking a deep breath and then
Speaker 1: opening it back up and being like, do I really
Speaker 1: want to get mad again? Um. So at one point
Speaker 1: they're up on the mass like admiring what they're calling
Speaker 1: the new wireless equipment like videos. Duncan's mustache starts to
Speaker 1: lift in the wind. So Virginia sees this. She motions
Speaker 1: to her brother Adrian, and she's and he says something
Speaker 1: to Duncan in quote Abyssinian um, and then takes him
Speaker 1: over to a dark corner to fix it. How does
Speaker 1: one say in Abyssinian you're giving free mustache rides away.
Speaker 1: I don't know. We're gonna have to have a good friend.
Speaker 1: Is Ethiopian, I'll ask her, um so uh. Adrian later
Speaker 1: wrote quote I did what I could with an umbrella,
Speaker 1: but there were five people to cover. And then I
Speaker 1: saw the obvious solution. I spoke to the captain of
Speaker 1: the heat of the Abyssinian climate and the chill of England,
Speaker 1: and he saw my point at once and took us below.
Speaker 1: For a moment or two. I had to separate Duncan
Speaker 1: from the rest and dab hastily at his upper lip.
Speaker 1: But I was able to be quick enough to escape notice.
Speaker 1: So they're just they think they're so clever, they're getting
Speaker 1: one over on me. I'm a stinker, so Adrian like.
Speaker 1: He then later goes on pedantically speaking, I must admit
Speaker 1: myself capable of deception when I took part in the hoax.
Speaker 1: But I but once the telegram had been sent off
Speaker 1: and we arrived and had been received, it would not
Speaker 1: have been an easy matter to tell the truth, and
Speaker 1: we almost, i think, believed in the hoax ourselves. He's like, guys,
Speaker 1: I'm Abyssinian. Now I got the black on me, and
Speaker 1: now it's that's it. I mean, this just maybe my future.
Speaker 1: Yeah it is. So the tour wraps up and then
Speaker 1: they they you know, bid their farewells auslamacum, I guess
Speaker 1: they said. And so they go back to the station,
Speaker 1: Horace Uh. As they're going to the station, the guy
Speaker 1: that's accompanying them, Horace, tries to give him, uh the
Speaker 1: Order of the Star of Ethiopia, which is like a
Speaker 1: brooch that had been hanging around Buxton's neck. Where did
Speaker 1: they get it? Where did this train from? An army
Speaker 1: Navy store? They got it off a guy Ridley's mother's hat,
Speaker 1: and the officers like, no, you know what, I that's okay.
Speaker 1: He didn't take it. He's like, that's good. I'm good.
Speaker 1: I don't need that. And then I'm wondering, is he
Speaker 1: onto them? He said he has to be. So then
Speaker 1: on the train back, Anthony Buxton he sneezes and half
Speaker 1: his mustache flies off. But luckily no one from the
Speaker 1: navy's with them, so their hoaxes done. Their hoax is done.
Speaker 1: They have fooled the navy. Yeah, and they look at me,
Speaker 1: what away, what's the point. So they're all starving, right
Speaker 1: because I haven't eaten all day. But Horace, he delays
Speaker 1: the meal and the train because of sunset because he
Speaker 1: demands that the waiters serve them wearing white gloves, and
Speaker 1: they didn't have any, and they had to go out
Speaker 1: and purchase white gloves before the train left so that
Speaker 1: they could have proper service for these jerks. And there
Speaker 1: you are trying to get back to your clinic on
Speaker 1: the return trip, and you're delayed while they go out
Speaker 1: and buy white gloves. My patients, my patients, and I
Speaker 1: don't mean the ones in my hospital. They decided the
Speaker 1: group was like, you know what, you guys, this went
Speaker 1: so well and the officers were so nice to us.
Speaker 1: We don't want to embarrass them, so let's not tell
Speaker 1: the press. Don't tell anybody what your whole point? Oh
Speaker 1: my god, okay, whatever, Yeah, you know what. Fine? Rich
Speaker 1: kids just like, yeah, we had fine. It was a lark.
Speaker 1: Wasn't that a great afternoon? Guy? It's like, I don't
Speaker 1: you don't understand it. For this last week when I've
Speaker 1: been reading up on these things, I've been clenching my
Speaker 1: fists so tightly. When we come back, we need to
Speaker 1: take a deep breath. Let's stretch, arms up, down, stretch,
Speaker 1: Let's get some I think I pulled the buffle in
Speaker 1: my head. When we come back, I'm going to tell
Speaker 1: you how that all worked out. About keeping it a
Speaker 1: big secret. Spoiler alert did not work out? All right, Saren?
Speaker 1: Did you get good breathing in? No? No, okay? This
Speaker 1: only the story reminds me of those kids recently who
Speaker 1: threw paint on the van Go painting in the museum,
Speaker 1: And it was to protest climate change and to say like,
Speaker 1: look if you ruin these nice things and you care
Speaker 1: more about that than the whole planet being ruined. And girl,
Speaker 1: you know, I am a big I want us to
Speaker 1: do something about what we've done with the climate and
Speaker 1: to be smart about this. I'm supporting we are at
Speaker 1: the point of emergence. Can I am totally on side
Speaker 1: of their argument, But I do not see how throwing
Speaker 1: paint on a van Go painting. Who I one of
Speaker 1: the pores, one of the little people enjoys in the
Speaker 1: common sphere that we share how that is making me
Speaker 1: or anybody else go, you know what, you're right, we
Speaker 1: should save the planet. I don't know, if you're a
Speaker 1: rich kid and you want to be doing direct and
Speaker 1: activism or get involved in some sending some message, I
Speaker 1: don't know, maybe try doing it from a material standpoint,
Speaker 1: since like use money or time as opposed to look
Speaker 1: at my theatrics. But they didn't even these these guys
Speaker 1: that not hoax. They didn't. They weren't even trying to
Speaker 1: make a point. They weren't saying like they weren't saying
Speaker 1: like all this money spent on this warship is it
Speaker 1: should be spent on you know, education, feeding the babies?
Speaker 1: I don't know, something, something that has life. It's the
Speaker 1: Ain't I a stinker? Like the whole break? And maybe
Speaker 1: I get a little bit irritated because I come from
Speaker 1: a navy family, and it's just like this has taken
Speaker 1: up a lot of time and resources, and don't clown them,
Speaker 1: come on, I don't know, it's just a full unawareness
Speaker 1: of what you're dealing with. And because it's like, look
Speaker 1: if you're gonna okay whatever, how did they so we
Speaker 1: left off? These fancy lads they'd like pulled off their hoax.
Speaker 1: Prancing around the ship, rode home on the training black
Speaker 1: black face, speaking the Gibberish, with their mustaches flapping around.
Speaker 1: They made the promise don't breathe a word. That night,
Speaker 1: Horace tells his friends he's my favorite party. He tells
Speaker 1: some of his ends. Some of them turned around and
Speaker 1: told the Foreign Office, and then Horace had to confess
Speaker 1: for snitches. It is worth noting that at the time
Speaker 1: of this hoax his sister, Horace's sister Anne Cole, was
Speaker 1: engaged to her future husband, Tory leader and future British
Speaker 1: Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain. What my God, ain't I a stinker? Um?
Speaker 1: So February twelve, the story comes out on the first
Speaker 1: page of the Express. The headline was amazing naval hoax
Speaker 1: sham Abyssinian princes visit the Dreadnought. And then the Globe
Speaker 1: came out with the same story the same day. So
Speaker 1: either the Express of the Globe or both reported. It's
Speaker 1: really hard to find these particular papers at that time.
Speaker 1: I was all over newspapers dot com great resource for this,
Speaker 1: not these specific ones. This is from that that book. Um.
Speaker 1: They reported that the group would say bunga bunga as
Speaker 1: they were admiring different parts of the ship. I'm getting there,
Speaker 1: meaning apparently, isn't it lovely? Like oh, bunka bunka that
Speaker 1: was there? Like made up turn when they'd see something
Speaker 1: that they like. And so then the real Emperor of
Speaker 1: Abyssinia comes to London a few weeks later, and it's
Speaker 1: reported that street boys ran after him yelling bunga bunga. Okay.
Speaker 1: Then the boys also, all these kids would go and
Speaker 1: like yell this at the ship's officers when they were
Speaker 1: in Weymouth. And then towards the end of World War One,
Speaker 1: the Dreadnought, he looks so scared. The Dreadnought sunk a
Speaker 1: German submarine really stuck it to the jerry Uh. The
Speaker 1: ship got a congratulatory telegram that just read bunga bunga.
Speaker 1: And then there was a song that came out of
Speaker 1: it that was sung in a music hall nearby that
Speaker 1: went when I went on board a dreadnot ship, though
Speaker 1: I looked just like a costermonger, they said I was
Speaker 1: an Abyssinian prince because I shouted bunga bunga. What a
Speaker 1: produced dealer on the street with a car. Thank you.
Speaker 1: I never heard that one. Yeah. So they're saying, like
Speaker 1: the layers on this so many so they're like I
Speaker 1: looked like a costermonger, but they said I said I
Speaker 1: was an Abyssinian prince. So it's like, okay, so our
Speaker 1: conception of what the Abyssinians look like is like a
Speaker 1: street vendor. Like, okay, I gotta step back on that one.
Speaker 1: I just keep thinking of and saying, saying bong bong
Speaker 1: all the time, and I'm like, please, connections. Well, it's
Speaker 1: you mentioned burl Asconi, right, former Italian prime minister. It's
Speaker 1: probably because of this association with the quote exotic and
Speaker 1: quote racist, and that later Ethiopia was a colony of Egypt,
Speaker 1: so they could have likely heard the story from that.
Speaker 1: That's why Burlasconi called his sex parties bunga bunga parties.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. Not so we have Virginia Wolf to
Speaker 1: thank for bunga bunga party. There's a direct line between
Speaker 1: Virginia Wolf and black face and Sylvio Berlascon's naked bunga
Speaker 1: bunga party. Put put the red pieces of string on
Speaker 1: your on your bullet board. Charlie Date losing my head.
Speaker 1: February sixteenth, The Daily Mirror puts a photo of the
Speaker 1: group in its front page story called how the officers
Speaker 1: of HMS Dreadnought were hoaxed photographs of the Abyssinian princes
Speaker 1: who made all England laugh. You see, this is what
Speaker 1: it was. I didn't understand the British culture enough because
Speaker 1: they're like, oh, we all love this. I'm like, where's
Speaker 1: the hoax? Like, well, they love it well. And the
Speaker 1: thing is when they when the Daily Mirror ran the pictures,
Speaker 1: they first ran it on February fourteen, and the photos
Speaker 1: that they used were actually from Horace and Adrian's Zanzibar hoax.
Speaker 1: They're just like black face whatever, we got some. So yeah,
Speaker 1: two days later they had to rerun it with the
Speaker 1: oopsies and they Horace gave the pictures to the paper.
Speaker 1: They weren't there was that portrait. Horace wants to ride
Speaker 1: any wave he can. I'm assuming who's the most mad
Speaker 1: about this? Um, See who's besides me back then, who
Speaker 1: was most mad about it? Jeez, I'm hoping some abbest
Speaker 1: it's got a little Oh no, it doesn't mean no one.
Speaker 1: No one consulted them Admiral May, Oh, yeah, there we go,
Speaker 1: and like others in the Navy just wanted to let it. Golomsberry,
Speaker 1: he he just would not let up. He wanted them punished.
Speaker 1: But then it was determined that the only crime committed
Speaker 1: was sending that forged telegraph. Technically, that's that is our
Speaker 1: ridiculous crime here in terms of actual criminality from crimes
Speaker 1: against culture and taste. We could make a whole other
Speaker 1: podcast about various crimes against culture and taste, but in
Speaker 1: this case it all winds up being just just a
Speaker 1: forged telegram. So um it did though. This whole thing
Speaker 1: makes its way to Parliament, of course, and it resulted
Speaker 1: in quote a tightening of regulations for ceremonial parties. Did
Speaker 1: it help get Neville Chamberlain elected him? Probably? And then
Speaker 1: so like after a month of this, May is like
Speaker 1: all right, Admiral May's like okay, fine, Um, it's not
Speaker 1: going to help if we punish the forger Mr. Tudor Castle,
Speaker 1: which again like come on, um, we're not going to
Speaker 1: get anything out of that, and it's only gonna draw
Speaker 1: attention to how we bungled this if we really keep up.
Speaker 1: So Admiral May's like, fine, whatever, but there's one more
Speaker 1: person who is still mad. Cousin Willie. Cousin Willie He.
Speaker 1: A couple of weeks later, he shows up at Virginia
Speaker 1: and Adrian's house and just just screaming at Adrian, laying
Speaker 1: into him. But because of archaic British naval custom uh
Speaker 1: he because they had an no, because Adrian's aunt was
Speaker 1: Willie's mother, Willie himself could not physically punish Adrian, like
Speaker 1: as a direct family line. So he can't physically punish him.
Speaker 1: Why not? I don't know, and I find that very
Speaker 1: hard to believe, based on the British Navy's love of punisunishment. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're be like, hey, spread this round now, so and
Speaker 1: said he just yells, right, But then Adrian gives up
Speaker 1: the addresses of the other hoaxers. That's kind of what
Speaker 1: he really wants. He's like, if I can't beat you
Speaker 1: and beat somebody anymore, so um Fisher, Like cousin Willie,
Speaker 1: some of his navy friends, they go to Duncan's house.
Speaker 1: He Duncans sitting there having breakfast with his parents. They
Speaker 1: lure him out and they take him in a car
Speaker 1: and they drive him off. They take him to a
Speaker 1: remote area where they plan to beat him up good. However,
Speaker 1: they saw that he was terrified and not fighting back.
Speaker 1: He's basically just like whimpering and peeing a little bit.
Speaker 1: And so they're like, you know what, instead of beating him,
Speaker 1: we're going to give him two ceremonial taps with a cane.
Speaker 1: They're going to wrap him on the knuckles. The just
Speaker 1: tap tap that is enough to avenge the Royal Navy,
Speaker 1: apparently the honor. Avenge the honor, it's more symbolism. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So then Willie and then another naval officer they found Horace.
Speaker 1: That's the gold mine right there. Horace is sick in bed,
Speaker 1: they don't care. They go into his house. Boom, the makeup.
Speaker 1: Horace was the Horis is the ring leader. So they
Speaker 1: break in. They're like, guess what we need to avenge
Speaker 1: the honor of Admiral May. Admiral May has no idea.
Speaker 1: They're there. So Horace later tells the Daily Mirror quote,
Speaker 1: I want you to take a deep breath first, you're ready. Finally,
Speaker 1: I said jokingly that if the Principal officer would allow
Speaker 1: me to inflict on him six strokes with a cane,
Speaker 1: I would receive a corresponding number from him. To my astonishment,
Speaker 1: he was so serious that he readily accepted the offer.
Speaker 1: We then retired to a neighboring muse and there we
Speaker 1: found a rubbish box which served as a sort of triangle.
Speaker 1: And here I gave the naval officers six strokes with
Speaker 1: the cane, not very hard ones, as I treated the
Speaker 1: matter as a joke and did not want to hurt.
Speaker 1: Then I in turn received six strokes from the officer, who,
Speaker 1: with his colleague, was very serious the whole time. Then
Speaker 1: we all shook hands, and the naval officers left, apparently satisfied,
Speaker 1: for they said they did not intend to cane other
Speaker 1: members of the hoaxing party. I don't even He's like,
Speaker 1: look you want to be let me beat you. Even
Speaker 1: Stevens He's like, that sounds totally fair to me. And
Speaker 1: they go out in the woods together and bend them
Speaker 1: over something. Then okay, now my turn, and then they
Speaker 1: shake hands. I will never understand British called I'm sorry, uh.
Speaker 1: And with that the whole thing concludes. I'm just so
Speaker 1: glad that you did not dry. I was so worried
Speaker 1: that there was going to be a direct line between
Speaker 1: Virginia Wolf and black face and the election of Prime
Speaker 1: Minister Nevill Chamberlain, which leads to the appeasement of Hitler.
Speaker 1: So basically, Hitler could come to power because Virginia Wolf
Speaker 1: was in black face. I was really worried that you're
Speaker 1: gonna draw that line. May I still do all the events?
Speaker 1: I just can't do, don't you know. Don't give me
Speaker 1: too much time to ruminate. You can find the facts
Speaker 1: in here. Yeah, so that. Yeah, what's your takeaway, dude?
Speaker 1: I don't I keep it. That's my takeaways. I don't
Speaker 1: want any you know, you can keep it all. I
Speaker 1: just keep thinking about what would have happened if it
Speaker 1: was just regular working class young people who did this.
Speaker 1: They would have been destroying, Their lives have been ruined,
Speaker 1: they would have had to pay severe consequences because people
Speaker 1: would have wanted to punish her. They would have not
Speaker 1: have had the money and therefore the social esteem to
Speaker 1: ignore to have their crimes be ignored. And that's the thing,
Speaker 1: among many other things, that is insane to me, is
Speaker 1: that the damage that can be done just because you
Speaker 1: were lucky that your parents were wealthy. It's like, can't
Speaker 1: you have a little perspective on this one that like
Speaker 1: you did nothing, this is you just got lucky, Like
Speaker 1: that was it? Like there are a lot of people
Speaker 1: who I've known who are wealthy and they would actually
Speaker 1: say this to me. It's like, look, I get that,
Speaker 1: I just got lucky. And I was like so cool
Speaker 1: with that, because it's like you're acknowledging your human moment
Speaker 1: maybe like no, no, yes, the British Royal, the British Navy,
Speaker 1: like oh, we're gonna ignore this actual sunset and we're
Speaker 1: gonna wait for the whistle. That level of ignoring reality
Speaker 1: I find humorous. The rich kid's level of ignoring reality
Speaker 1: is just patently offensive because the damage that they do.
Speaker 1: I mean, look look at all this. I mean, this
Speaker 1: is one little let's go down to the boat and
Speaker 1: like literally British history and Sylvia burs are all affected
Speaker 1: by this. I just exactly. I keep thinking about how, um,
Speaker 1: there wasn't a point to what they do. I'm all
Speaker 1: for fun and I'm all for being I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: I take absolutely nothing seriously totally, and I like, I
Speaker 1: like messing with people, my friends in particular especially British Navy.
Speaker 1: But I just that's the whole thing is so self
Speaker 1: congratulatory and not really funny. It's not a funny prank.
Speaker 1: It's not funny stupid. If someone were to witness it,
Speaker 1: it's not like, oh, look, you got over on them.
Speaker 1: I mean maybe this is like that embarrassment humor. I
Speaker 1: don't get, like I didn't watch The Office. I don't
Speaker 1: know why this is funny. I look at it. Remember
Speaker 1: how I told you once about how I want to
Speaker 1: go to like a presentation and say boring in the crowd. Well,
Speaker 1: like I would love to be there and just have
Speaker 1: them like, oh we're so cool and just be alt lame.
Speaker 1: It was lame there, it wasn't. Yeah, So anyway, that's
Speaker 1: funny takeaway. I'm sorry I've done that to you and everybody. Um,
Speaker 1: you can find us online at Ridiculous Crime on both
Speaker 1: Twitter and Instagram. I'm going to put the photos up
Speaker 1: mostly of the big Foot board game. It may just
Speaker 1: be a make sure of the big pot Dad work
Speaker 1: got that one for you? Okay, cool, I'll just go
Speaker 1: take a picture of it in the pleasant. Um. You
Speaker 1: can email us if you want to at ridiculous Crime
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com. Otherwise, tune in next time. Ridiculous
Speaker 1: Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Zarin Burnett, produced
Speaker 1: and edited by Dave Kusten. The Natty Dreadnought researches by
Speaker 1: The Bloomsbury Group director Marissa Brown. The theme song is
Speaker 1: by facial hair engineer Thomas Lee and wig technician Travis Dutton.
Speaker 1: Executive producers are Admiral Ben Bollen and Cabinet member Noel Brown.
Speaker 1: Say It One More Time. Ridiculous Crime is a production
Speaker 1: of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts to my heart Radio,
Speaker 1: visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows.