Tony Slattery- "It Might Be Confusing"

This is a very special meeting of Tony Slattery’s Rambling Club. It’s Christmas Day, and we find ourselves once again in the company of our much-loved and much-missed President, Tony Slattery. His absence is felt, of course — how could it not be? — but so is his presence: in the laughter, the mischief, the curious turns of thought, and the unmistakable warmth that shaped this club from the very beginning. Today’s ramble is offered with affection, gratitude, and a quiet smile, just as Tony would have wanted.

And so, gloves on, collars up, we set off as normal, guided by Tony’s enchanted bingo machine and the familiar rhythms of the club. The shed door swings open, Sir Stephen Fry’s omniscient voice settles in above us, and the ramble begins.

Our first destination is 702: Fine and Decorative Art. Almost immediately we’re into the strange and wonderful world of surreal bingo, followed by recollections of Tony breaking a priceless ornament on television — an act that somehow manages to be both horrifying and completely inevitable. From there, the conversation drifts into the long and symbiotic relationship between art and religion, before taking a diarist’s turn toward Samuel Pepys, proving once again that no subject is ever truly finished, only temporarily paused.

Next, the bingo machine whirs and delivers us to 621: Applied Physics — a category that sounds orderly enough until it isn’t. Before we quite realise what’s happened, we find ourselves stumbling into the Whose Line Is It Anyway? studio, encountering a dentist with an infamous skull structure, and grappling with the very real dangers of misremembering the words to the Lord’s Prayer. Physics, it turns out, is less about equations and more about consequences.

And then, as always, we drift back toward the shed — a little wiser, a little warmer, and grateful for the company. On Christmas Day especially, this feels like exactly where we’re meant to be.

Presented by Tony Slattery, Paul Carmichael & Allan Lear

Music composed and performed by Michael Livesley & Andy Frizell

The voice of Pwfthhh- Michael Livesley

www.michaellivesley.com

Series Researcher- Soula Carmichael

Series Producers- Erica Lear and Mark Hutchinson

Producers- Alan Dyebing & Stuart Morris

Series Executive Producer- Mark Strickson

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