It's a programme I've enjoyed since the days of Willie Rushton, and praised several times on this very blog as being, by and large, an oasis of old-fashioned, funny, BBC comedy - rather than the usual humour-deficient, over-politicised stuff the BBC now churns out.
(I've even transcribed some of Jack Dee's funnier introductions for your delectation (assuming he wrote them)).
So what's happened?
Well, yes, ISIHAC has always dropped in the odd political joke, but this week's programme began with what can only be described as a string of bog-standard, predictable, left-wing, Radio 4-style political jokes.
I'll quote a tweet about it that is absolutely spot-on in describing what you missed, if you didn't hear it:
Mike Yardley: Just listening to BBC Radio 4's I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue in the car. Switched it off. Ridiculous anti Brexit and anti Tory bias. No balance whatsoever. No jokes about Corbyn and McDonnell. Just spite about Farage & Boris & public schools and an effort to link Mosley to Tories.
Replies say:
Peter Charles: Yes I am afraid that the BBC's social engineering agenda has even infected ISIHAC. The changes in panel members is all part of that.
Mark Lees: I am a huge fan of the BBC but unfortunately this is correct, a lot BBC produced humour is the same. Remain-centric jokes, written by Remainers for Remainers at the expense of Leavers.
Should I transcribe the 'offending' jokes? Yes!:
Shropshire is famous for its rich folklore. A favourite story is that of the Magic Princess who found a toad in her garden that was very sad because he was very ugly. So she granted him a wish. The toad's wish was to have a human body. So the Princess kissed the toad and, sure enough, his body turned into human form. But not his head. So the Princess offered him a second wish and he said he wanted to be leader of The Brexit Party.
Shrewsbury School is one of those public schools targeted for abolition under a Labour government as they are deemed elitist. But Shrewsbury protests the school is open to any pupil who can pass the entrance exam. Question 1: how many offshore investment funds does Father have? Question 2: List them, using both sides of the paper.
Sir Oswald Mosley was brought up near Market Drayton, became a Conservative MP and in 1920 married Lady Cynthia Curzon. And during the marriage Mosley conducted affairs with his wife's younger sister Lady Alexandra and with her mother Marchioness Curzon. As an MP back then this would have made Mosley the object of severe party disapproval. Today it'll make him Prime Minister.
Couldn't they have left us ISIHAC? Is that too much to ask?
I rarely tweet myself but I did actually send someone a 'Merry Christmas!' via Twitter on Christmas Eve and received a reply saying, "I think it's been a good year", to which I replied saying, "So do I. Here's to 2017!" (We were talking politics, of course).
Stephen Pollard has a fine piece in The Times today expressing much the same sentiment, headlined "For me, it’s been an annus mirabilis". It begins:
I barely seem to have had a conversation this past week without it ending in a cheery “Let’s hope 2017 is better!” — as if it’s a statement of the blindingly obvious with which any stranger would agree that this has been a terrible year.
Which presents me with a dilemma. Do I treat it as a pre-new-year version of “How are you?” No one in their right mind would reply to that greeting with a genuine answer. “Oh, you know: too many headaches, my back hurts and the cancer isn’t going away.”
Or do I point out that not all of us think 2016 was a disaster? For some of us — the majority, in fact — 2016 was a wonderful year.
Believe me, I’m tempted. Because it’s precisely the cosy, smug idea that “we” all think 2016 has been horrendous that led to the very developments that “we” all so deplore. By which, of course, “we” mean above all Brexit and the election of Donald Trump.
I did hear quite a lot of Radio 4 yesterday and enjoyed much of it but, curiously, that "cosy, smug idea" that "we" all think 2016 has been "horrendous" kept cropping up in one form or another - along with other related "cosy, smug ideas" of the kind Radio 4 listeners are so often 'treated to'.
Among the things I heard, for example, was Mark Tully onSomething Understoodasking (re the angels promise of good will on earth to the shepherds), "Where is 'good will' in the politics of hatred unleashed this year?", and Sheila Hancock on Just a Minute's panto special saying that her 'one wish' would be "that 2016 never happened". (The audience laughed, clapped and whooped, and she then clarified that she was talking about Brexit - which they'd evidently already guessed!)
Then there was Marina Warner on From Our Home Correspondentusing another panto-related piece to wax indignant about "headlines against Poles and Romanians and refugees or other stock figures of the new populism"- plus the inevitable anti-Murdoch, anti-Tory-governments jokes from Jeremy Hardy on I'm Sorry, I Haven't a Clue, and Sheila Dillon on The Food Programme's 'Wild Boar' Christmas special suggesting that wild boar "does seem to embody a kind of masculinity that seems kind of old-fashioned".
Plus there was Sunday's Christmas special from Hampton Court Palace on the state of religion in England in 1516, with Ed Stourton saying, "Listening to you describe the tide of nationalistic feeling at the time [of Henry VIII's split from Rome], I couldn't help be reminded of our own recent referendum campaign", andMariella Frostrup beginning Open Bookby announcing, "Bolstering borders has been a frequent topic of debate of late so today we've decided to abandon them altogether" and end the programme by announcing, "We're looking forward to another 12 months of transcending borders to bring you the best of books, near and far, in 2017".
Now, much of what I heard on these programmes was interesting and enjoyable but the messages sent out by them - often incidentally, often far from incidentally - were almost always of this "cosy, smug" variety.
2016 certainly was a "terrible" year when it came to BBC bias (the worst for years, in my opinion). In that respect, yes, here's to a better 2017! Much improvement is needed.
Here's a selection of classic jokes from the one Radio 4 comedy programme that even the Prophet Mohammad would find funny, I'm Sorry, I Haven't a Clue.
Enjoy them while you can as rumour has it that Samantha is to be replaced next series by...Nabila Ramdani.
(My source say that the kindly old archivists have already met her, but they haven't been very welcoming, claiming Nabila has already begun rubbing them up the wrong way. She says she had to give them a good mouthful, and that soon put them straight.)
Samantha tells me she has to nip out now as she's been invited to an exclusive club to meet a group of aristocrats. She's very excited to see where all the big knobs hang out. She says at such a posh function she and the other girls will probably end up trying to speak with plums in their mouths.
Samantha is a qualified croupier and often works at an exclusive Soho club where gamblers pay top money to pay roulette all day and poker all night.
Samantha has to nip out now as she's off to see her new American gentleman friend. He's a cattle trader, and as Samantha is keen to buy a prime example, she's been saving up. Excitingly, she'll soon be in a position to receive her first Texan Longhorn.
Samantha is off on a dinner date with a gentleman friend from Moscow who's brought over a variety of caviars and an array of vodka-based aperitifs. She says he's going to offer her delicious food in his hotel room and then liquor out on the balcony.
Samantha has to leave now as she's hosting a traditional Cockney music and dance night with a pearly king and queen at a nearby pub. All the locals are saying they can't wait to see her knees up round the King's Head.
Samantha tells me that she has to nip off to a special Welsh Conservative Association dinner for their most senior MP, who's name is said to be almost impossible to pronounce. She's certainly found the longest standing Welsh member a bit of a mouthful.
Samantha tells me she has to go now as she needs to nip out and see her local pharmacist. He keeps a wide range of tanning cream for her legs and he's always happy to spread them out for her on the counter.
Samantha has to nip out to meet a nice old colonel who's promised to show her his parade ground, and might even let her inspect his privates.
Our resident IT expert, Samantha, tells me she has to nip out to meet a young man who's having problems configuring his new PC. She says he's just called to say his zip is down, his floppy keeps popping out and he feels he needs more bytes on it.
Samantha has to go now as she's off to meet her Italian gentleman friend who's taking her out for an ice cream. She says she likes nothing better than to spend the evening licking the nuts off a large Neapolitan.
With nothing much going on in the world at the moment, I think I can safely sneak in another frivolous post in anticipation of another delightful week.
It has to be said that my own jokes at 'Is' this past week have been little better than Marcus Brigstocke's.
[Exhibit A, this joke from last Wednesday: "Q. What do you get if you cross Jon Donnison with a camel? A. A biased reporter'".
[Can you believe I actually received a tweet from Jeremy Bowen complaining, in less than 140 characters, that he should have been the punchline of that joke. So much for BBC collegiality, eh?].
Still, who needs me and Marcus when you've got I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue, broadcast this week from (the Holy City of Karbala) Bradford?
A visit to Bradford's fine museum will reveal that the early history of the city is inextricably tied up with wool, so you can't read it.
The Brontes were the 19th Century literary family from the nearby village of Haworth. Most famous is Emily, who wrote 'Wuthering Heights', with the other Bronte sisters, Charlotte and Anne, providing backing vocals.
Their brother was called Bramwell, which was his mother's maiden name. He later changed it after his bank account was cleaned out by someone who guessed his security question.
There are many diverse products that originated in Yorkshire. The drug Prozac was developed here when clinical trials raised volunteers' spirits to a euphoric level of mild grumpiness.
And coming from Tadcaster, John Smith's Bitter. And who can blame him?
The area known as Little Germany is of particular historical and architectural in central Bradford. The name comes from the German cloth merchants who arrived in the 19th Century. But the area is best known now for its budget stores. However, the people of Little Germany like to keep up traditions and every September they invade Poundland.
The city is rightly proud of its rugby league team, known as Bradford Bulls, who did pretty well in Europe until they came up against Malaga Matadors, when they were slaughtered.
During the 1990s West Yorkshire Police launched a campaign to rid Bradford of organised crime. Within a year the number of serious crimes had reduced by half and West Yorkshire Police celebrated by taking a week off. At which point the other half stopped.
And we are today guests of Bradford's fine Victorian theatre, St. George's Hall. It was constructed by the same architect who build London's Apollo Theatre. The Apollo's ceiling famously collapsed last year - a disaster which was discovered to have been caused by old, weak material...so protect your heads as I say, let's meet the teams!
Read and learn, Marcus. Read and learn.
We even heard the latest about the programme's lovely scorer, Samantha. (Yes, she's still there, thank goodness).
Samantha has to leave now as she's off to meet her zoo-keeper gentleman friend. He's a bit of an expert with monkeys but occasionally has trouble with them when they get out of their pen. Samantha says he was delighted last week to see her as she arrived just in time to help him beat one off behind the penguin house.
Another old Radio 4 comedy favourite returned after a long absence this week. No, not Libya. Yes, Dead Ringers was back after seven years (or after seven hours if you'd been listening to Radio 4 Extra).
Jon Culshaw clearly wasn't going to let William Hague's atrocious timing (leaving office just before the programme's return) get in the way of him doing his trademark William Hague impression, and Jan Ravens was still doing all the women, and Diane Abbott.
No one on the team can really do Nigel Farage or Nick Clegg yet, and no one even tried doing David Cameron (said to be very tricky to impersonate well. Not even he can quite manage it), but someone did do a decent Ed Miliband impersonation:
Jim Naughtie: Now, Mr Miliband, you have also unveiled plans that, should you become prime minister, you will go round the country answering questions from the public. How will you resist resorting to rambling disjointed soundbites?
Ed Miliband: Well, Jim, I'm leave disjointed soundbites to other people. Let me say this. Look, the government is in a race to the bottom and that is a status quo I do not accept. There is a squeezed middle out there sandwiched by debt and the cost of living. And when I go on the doorstep I find that people up and down the country say to me, 'Look, we need a fair shot', and I believe passionately that I listen to them.
Hopefully, next week's edition will tackle Ed's opportunistic party political point-scoring over Gaza. The Graudinad quotes him as saying:
Look, today isn't the day for playing party politics. You can trust me, you can trust the Labour Party, not to play party politics with issues as important as this.
David Cameron and the Tories are wrong over Gaza.
I will be completely honest with you and say, look, yes, there is a squeezed middle out there and David Cameron is failing to help them. He should be playing a leading role in the efforts to secure peace. He should fly to Gaza and personally take out Hamas. Hamas are predators not producers.
But the prime minister is also wrong not to have jumped on the bandwagon in opposing Israel's incursion into Gaza. His refusal to jump on that bandwagon will be inexplicable to people across Britain and internationally. I am proud to say that I, on behalf of the Labour Party, am fully committed to jumping on that bandwagon. I believe passionately that it's no use prevaricating about the bush.
(Marcus Brigstocke is free to borrow that for next week's The Brig Society).
The guests on this morning's Broadcasting Housepress review focused on the brighter side of life, which, given all the depressing news there's been in the past couple of weeks or so, is pretty understandable. An entertaining romp through the Sunday papers ensued (more about which later).
I'm guessing that some of you might just be feeling the same way too, so this post will laugh and smile and dance and sing, for as the song says...
When you're feeling in the dumps Don't be silly chumps Just purse your lips and whistle - that's the thing. And...
To the strains of John Coltrane, we heard a list Iowa State University's Department of Linguistics and Language which shows how easy it is to make mistakes, even in simple translations. Well, it made me laugh:
In a Copenhagen airline ticket office: We take your bags and send them in all directions.
In a Rhodes tailor's shop: Order your summer's suit because if there's a big rush we will execute customers in strict rotation.
In a Bucharest hotel lobby: The lift is being fixed for the next day. During that time we regret you will be unbearable.
In a Zurich hotel: Because of the impropriety of entertaining guests of the opposite sex in the bedroom it is suggested that the lobby be used for this purpose.
In a Paris hotel lift: Please leave your values at the front desk.
Detour sign in Kyushu, Japan: Stop. Drive sideways.
In an advertisement by a Hong Kong dentist: Teeth extracted by the latest methodists.
On the menu of a Swiss restaurant: Our wines leave you nothing to hope for.
On the menu of a Polish hotel: Salad of firm's own make. Limpid red beet soup. Cheesy dumplings in the form of a finger. Roasted duck let loose. Beef rashers beaten up in the country people's fashion.
Mark Tully also read out part of the preface to the King James Bible, something so lovely that it needs passing on for those of you do not know it:
Translation it is that openeth the window, to let in the light; that breaketh the shell, that we may eat the kernel; that putteth aside the curtain, that we may look into the most Holy place; that removeth the cover of the well, that we may come by the water...
Famous as a retirement destination for gentlefolk, Worthing has a population of just over 105,000 people. Or just under, if you're listening to the repeat.
This part of Sussex is famous for producing some of England's finest white wines. We were treated to a tasting earlier at a local branch of Lidl and tried a 2011 Chardonnay which had a fine nose. Just like the pork pie that came with it.
Oddly enough, that repeat of ISIHAC from Worthing (population, just under 105,000) was followed by an edition of the Food Programme on the subject of English wine - one of the smaller triumphs of English business in recent years, becoming ever more renowned for its quality and growing in quantity, despite the occasional bad harvest. (I'm sure I read James Delingpole somewhere putting it all down to global warming, but I could be wrong about that).
We learned that homegrown wines account for less than 1% of sales here. In my household it's 0% of all wine purchases at the moment, though in my childhood we did make potato wine - illicit stills of the heady stuff stinking out our basement. Thank God Al Capone wasn't around in Morecambe at the time! (He apparently hated potato wine).
The growth of the English wine industry is cheering news, and it's news I feel close too as there's even a small vineyard near Morecambe (yes, really).
If Eric Morecambe had still been around I'd have asked him to wangle me a bottle of their finest sauv blanc. I suppose I could ask Gail from Coronation Street instead. (Yes, she's from Morecambe too. All the greats come from Morecambe).
One thing we don't have in Morecambe (AFAIAA) is pygmy boa constrictors (subject of today's The Living World), a cousin of the anaconda (to which they are proportionally identical) native to - and specific to - the Turks and Caicos Islands in the Caribbean. No house mouse could eat an anaconda - it's eyes would be truly bigger than its stomach if it tried - but a house mouse can, apparently, eat a pygmy boa constrictor. The p.b.c. (as I like to call it) is about 25cm long, "not more than half a little finger" according to presenter Tom Heap (though, from the looks of it, you'd have to have an abnormally long little finger!). What do they eat? Electrons? No, they eat things like new-born froglets, reef geckos and freshly-hatched lizards. Its main meal, however, is the Caicos Island round-toed gecko, whose Latin name, written down (according to local naturalist Bryan Naqqi Manco), is actually about twice as long as the lizard itself.
Now back to ISIHAC, and some new dictionary definitions that tickled my fancy:
alter ego - a priest who's full of himself (Barry Cryer) permits - cat-skin gloves (Graeme Garden) tamper - what you take on a Yorkshire picnic (Barry Cryer) shoddy - Big Ears' unkempt friend (Graeme Garden) stifle - a home for a pig designed along the lines of a Paris landmark (Harry Hill) gladiator - an unrepentant cannibal (Barry Cryer) transcendental - to receive false teeth through the post from a drag act (Harry Hill)
Returning to Broadcasting House, and remembering why I don't actually hate the BBC (at least most of the time), Paddy O'Connell was in the New Forest and gave us one of those radio moments that radio listeners tend to treasure, however absurdly. The report was about some parliamentary-related fluff about the frivolous use of mobile phones, but Paddy was suddenly seized by a moment of beauty in the New Forest.
To the entrancing accompaniment of many untalked-over recordings of the natural sounds he was hearing (running water, hoofs, ponies neighing), Paddy said (on location):
Four wild ponies are approaching the stream. The hoofs are crunching on the pebbles of this small stream, which is the colour of stewed tea. Four chestnut ponies, one, two, making their way through the stream. There's the third. They're all on the gravel now. The foal has a flash of white on his nose. It has one more to cross. Ears up, it's looking. Here we go. And there's a log across the stream and I'm going to try and cross it...scaring away two tiny fish...
He fell in.
"The hoofs are crunching on the pebbles of this small stream, which is the colour of stewed tea." Now, that's good, isn't it? (Any passing English teachers, what would you grade that?)
BH also featured a profile of Vladimir Putin (featuring Ben Judah, European Stability Initiative; Sir Roderic Lyne, Chatham House; Lord Browne, former head of BP; and Angus Roxburgh, former PR advisor to the Russian government). It wasn't a particularly sympathetic portrait (to put it mildly), but we learned certain fascinating things about Bad Vlad (if true):
He always has cottage cheese for breakfast.
He once brought his dog, Connie, into a meeting with Angela Merkel, knowing that Frau Merkel is scared of dogs in order to intimidate her.
He rarely uses computers and the internet, preferring paper. (Safer).
Russian ministers have to wait for three to four hours to see him. No one dares to contradict him.
His daughters are a state secret, living far from Moscow, probably abroad.
He never forgets a slight, such as that by former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili, who (because of his height) used to call him 'LiliPutin'. (It didn't end well for Georgia).
When he stood next to much taller foreign leaders (like Tony Blair), he'd have the lecterns put far apart to avoid comparison.
He's isolated, trapped.
As Mr Putin never forgets a slight (according to this profile), a polonium-tipped umbrella might well be wending its way to Broadcasting House as we speak.
The paper review featured booted-out Radio 5 Live presenter Shelagh Fogarty, booted-out Tory MP Giles Brandreth and unbooted-out Artistic Director of the Petworth Arts Festival Stewart Collins.
We heard about apps relaying WW1 poet Wilfred Owen's verses (the most famous being written in hospital whilst suffering from shell-shock), which prompted Giles to read some other poetry, concerning the 4/5 of couples apparently seeking financial contributions to their weddings:
Do come to our wedding bash.
Show your love in cheques and cash.
Just use the bank details at the end of this ditty,
And you can still contribute to our kitchen kitty.
Giles, in the event of the death of a pet poet, wrote his own verse - "the shortest poem in the history of world literature":
O,
Wet
Pet.
Stewart rejoindered with a short family grace before meals:
Heavenly Pa,
Ta.
Now, that's my kind of paper review!
Finally, before I down a late-evening salad full of rocket (freshly supplied by Hamas), some suggestions for titles of films like to prove popular with an audience of dog-lovers from the cast of ISIHAC:
Tales of King Arthur and his knights in 'Winalot' (Graeme Garden) Hawaii Fi-Do (Barry Cryer) When Harry Sniffed Sally (Tim Brooke-Taylor) The Postman Always Tastes Nice (Barry Cryer) Five Easy Faeces (Tim Brooke-Taylor) Arselick and Old Lace (Barry Cryer) Bring Me the Lead of Alfredo Garcia (Barry Cryer Graeme Garden)
