A suspicious Valentine’s delivery
Scott wished listeners a happy Valentine’s Day and presented Chris with flowers, while both carefully avoided saying where they had come from. After the previous day’s Tap End, the only permitted explanation was “maybe” followed by as many winks as possible. Chris’s attempt looked more like a facial twitch.
Later, Scott received cakes delivered through reception. They were not from Chris, the person carrying them could not identify the sender and nobody knew whether they were genuine or some sort of joke. Around the office, deliveries were causing their own embarrassment: one colleague opened an enormous box of balloons while everybody stopped to watch, and listeners reported people arriving at the gym in full make-up in the hope of meeting another single person.
Gary Lucy plays Innuendo Bingo
Gary Lucy joined Chris for a Valentine’s Innuendo Bingo, using what Scott claimed was the cloudy bathwater from Rihanna’s “Stay” video. The explanation also allowed him to note that Rihanna sat at the tap end for part of the video, giving her at least one thing in common with Chris.
The game became the wettest edition yet. Flog It! went to a glory hole, Formula 1 discussed Lewis Hamilton’s helmets and football commentary said a team would have to come from behind and do it the hard way. A maritime forecast described something exploding in every direction, Rachel Riley waited to be instructed and Radio 4 mentioned hairy crabs.
Phil Spencer wanted to know whether Ian had followed through, The Cube placed somebody between the balls and a hole, and Doctors included a confession about blowing somebody off. Hadrian’s Wall completed the game as a place to meet gays rather than a barrier. Water had flown beyond the bin and across the studio, leaving both men looking as though they had showered fully clothed. Gary still had to catch a train back to Manchester in his soaking clothes.
The instrumental karaoke choice
A listener in Los Angeles found Madeon’s “Finale” in a karaoke catalogue despite the track offering almost nothing obvious to sing. Scott imagined somebody selecting it, taking the microphone and standing silently through an extended instrumental section while the rest of the bar waited.
Gonzo remembered a friend who solved the same problem by reading the stage direction aloud whenever “instrumental” appeared on screen. Scott approved of announcing the word rather than awkwardly looking around, and Chris suggested it could improve television talent shows as well.
Rihanna’s bathwater and Dear Scott
Listeners began offering money for the cloudy water left after Innuendo Bingo. Scott briefly considered whether it could become a Deborah Meaden business pitch before admitting it had never come from Rihanna’s bath. It was ordinary tap water which happened to look murky, with the “Stay” video providing a convenient story.
In Dear Scott, an American visitor asked for an advance timetable showing when Chris or Greg James would be travelling through Broadcasting House’s glass lifts in their underwear. Another listener said her great-aunt had spent 78 years “at the tap end”, although she meant sleeping at the tap end of a bath rather than building an autobiography around it.
Chris also discovered that his Wikipedia page credited him with 6,059,140.2 Danny Howard points and contained an unnerving amount of detail about his friends and family. The total was quickly edited down to zero, demonstrating how little control he had over the page.
Charlie Sloth and Ruby play Real or No Real
Charlie Sloth made a last-minute appearance with his daughter Ruby for another presenter edition of Real or No Real. Daniel P Carter had not co-written Cascada’s “Evacuate the Dancefloor”, and Sara Cox had never filled a nine-minute technical breakdown by talking about antiseptic hand wipes.
Zane Lowe really had belonged to the New Zealand hip-hop group Urban Disturbance and used the spelling Zhayne. Edith Bowman did not secretly call late-night phone-ins as “Judith Cro-man”, while Gemma Cairney had not walked through a park dressed as a Second World War evacuee. Scott and Charlie finished level on 20 points, bringing the Valentine’s show to a close.
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