Episode Details

Broadcasts live every Thursday at 8:00p.m. uk time on Radio Soapbox: http://radiosoapbox.com

In tonight’s wide‑ranging live show we eased in with blue‑skies-and-shorts weather chat before diving into flying lore and “the right stuff” — from test pilots and Chuck Yeager to Tom Wolfe’s classic and its 1983 film. We pulled on the daylight saving thread (Hannah Fry’s case against clock changes, Franklin’s satire, and William Willett’s campaign), weighed up preparedness and simple food stores, and swapped practical foraging tips (nettles, dandelions, cleavers) and old‑school sundials. In hour two, my friend Helen joined us from southern Brazil to describe building Terra Nova — a small, self‑reliant hamlet of orchards, beans, fish ponds and flocks — and her therapeutic work tackling trauma and (as she frames it) demonic attachments. We closed with Graham Linehan’s “werewolf” game analogy for informed minorities, a nudge toward peaceful non‑compliance and community action, and a pair of musical palate cleansers: Slim Gaillard’s Selling Out from Absolute Beginners and a fresh cut from Manchester’s David Rybka. As ever, we skipped the sponsor guff and kept it practical: skills, food, gardens, and the right people around you. If you’ve views on binning the clock change or want to share your best five long‑life pantry staples, drop them in for next week.

• 'The Right Stuff' (book) by Tom Wolfe — Penguin UK: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/331187/the-right-stuff-by-tom-wolfe/9781784873714
• 'The Right Stuff' (1983 film) — Warner Bros official page: https://www.warnerbros.com/movies/right-stuff
• Chuck Yeager — official U.S. Air Force biography (Air University AFEHRI): https://www.airuniversity.af.edu/Portals/10/AFEHRI/documents/WallofAchievers/Yeager.pdf
• UK military low‑flying (incl. Mach Loop area context) — GOV.UK guidance: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/military-low-flying
• William Willett’s pamphlet ‘The Waste of Daylight’ (full text): https://www.webexhibits.org/daylightsaving/willett.html
• Benjamin Franklin’s ‘An Economical Project’ (1784) — full text: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Works_of_the_late_Doctor_Benjamin_Franklin/An_economical_Project
• Food for Free (50th anniversary edition) — overview via Penguin (Richard Mabey reading guide): https://www.penguin.co.uk/discover/articles/richard-mabey-reading-guide-books-order
• The Victorian Kitchen Garden (BBC Two, 1987) — series information: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0482150/
• Absolute Beginners (1986 film) — overview (Britannica): https://www.britannica.com/topic/Absolute-Beginners
• Absolute Beginners — soundtrack personnel incl. Slim Gaillard ‘Selling Out’ (Library of Congress jazz filmography excerpt): https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/master/music/jots/200028017/0001.pdf
• TRIGGERnometry — official YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.c