Radio 1 had started Christmas far too early
Scott knew people would object to Mariah Carey in September.
He underestimated how much.
Messages accused him of ruining the season, confusing children and turning Christmas into something which lasted a quarter of the year.
One listener said anybody allowing Christmas songs in September deserved to be sacked.
Another had been forced to switch Radio 1 off.
Then came the phrase which gave the episode its title:
“You big, soppy, custard cruncher.”
Scott and the team searched dictionaries and slang sites to establish whether custard cruncher was secretly offensive.
They could not find anything.
It simply sounded magnificent.
Scott accepted full responsibility for playing the song rather than blaming Emma.
He also maintained a slightly provocative defence.
It was, technically, just a song.
The listeners who had spent the previous 24 hours sending furious messages did not agree.
America had competitive husband calling
The programme discovered a contest at an American state fair where women competed to call their husbands.
This was not a casual novelty.
There were judges, placings and experienced competitors.
Scott and Chris played examples.
Women shouted names including Bob, Daryl and Roy with the kind of volume normally associated with calling somebody across several fields.
The winning competitor, 89-year-old Bonnie, had been entering for years.
Her husband had apparently objected when she first started.
Winning changed his mind.
Scott immediately wanted a British version.
Listeners phoned in and demonstrated how they normally summoned partners from elsewhere in the house.
Emma called for Jim.
Lisa produced a particularly forceful Dave.
Karen had her own call for Richard.
What sounded ridiculous when described as an American fair competition suddenly sounded extremely familiar once British partners did it too.
Georgia had become a FIFA widow
Chris was excited because the new FIFA was about to arrive.
Scott could not understand why anybody needed to buy a new football game every year when the previous one already contained football.
Chris explained transfers, player ratings, visual improvements and yearly updates.
He also admitted he had previously taken days off work specifically to play a new release.
That introduced Georgia.
The previous year she had tried to become the ideal football-game girlfriend.
She bought FIFA for her boyfriend.
She filled the fridge with beer.
Then she was largely ignored while he played it.
Georgia had spent about £50 to engineer her own abandonment.
This year she was not doing it.
Her boyfriend appeared to assume the gesture had become an annual tradition.
Georgia planned to let him come home on launch day and discover there was no game and no fridge full of beer.
Once he eventually bought it himself, she had another plan.
She wanted to wait until he scored an important goal and, during the celebration, turn the television off.
Scott approved of the pettiness.
Chris understood the pain it would cause.
Funny Business still had unfinished business
The business-name game from Monday continued to provide clips and listener suggestions.
Tony’s Tackle had already become an instant favourite.
Scott and Chris were now being sent businesses from around the country which listeners believed could make one of them laugh before completing a normal telephone enquiry.
The programme had successfully discovered a feature where answering your own company phone correctly could become the joke.
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