Chris’s romance continues as Scott prepares for the desert
Chris and “Rimmer” returned as the show’s increasingly improbable romance continued. Their emails were staged as a proper musical drama, with the Posh Radio 4 voices reading Chris’s S Club 7 references, Rimmer’s declarations of love and the sudden demand for travel money. Scott made the situation deliberately grander by describing it as a story listeners could choose to believe in, even though the studio was clear that it was an obvious scam.
Chris had raised the stakes by inventing a flight to Armenia instead of agreeing to send €520. His response promised that he would arrive at 6pm, wanted to meet Rimmer’s parents and ended with the country’s supposed motto, “one for all and all for one”. The show enjoyed the mismatch between his earnestness and the increasingly transparent nature of the messages, but also explicitly warned listeners never to answer unsolicited romance emails or transfer money.
Scott’s attention was also firmly on the Comic Relief Red Nose Desert Trek, due to take place in northern Kenya. He had met the other trekkers, including Craig David, Kara Tointon, Olly Murs, Ronni Ancona, Nadia Sawalha and Dermot O’Leary, and was beginning to grasp what 100 kilometres in more than 40-degree heat would actually involve. The lack of shade and the prospect of sleeping outdoors were making him properly nervous.
Chris did not help. His research became a game of Name That Snake, illustrated with pictures of creatures Scott might encounter. A black mamba was said to be capable of moving at 14 miles an hour and killing a person within 20 minutes, while a green mamba was described as less aggressive but fatal if it bit. Scott correctly identified the African rock python, only to learn that it was non-venomous because it preferred to suffocate and swallow its prey whole.
That prompted further listener horror stories, including a warning about a tick spider and a supposed infestation emerging from a boil. Scott would have preferred reassurance, but the show was more interested in making the trek sound as alarming as possible. Elsewhere, a listener going to David Hasselhoff’s Oxford Union appearance asked for a question to put to him, and Scott’s instinct was to ask about the singer’s memorable leather-shirt-and-leather-trousers combination.
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