leading britain's conversation this is a podcast from lbc james o'brien a little private conversation there that you may have stumbled upon us

i kept no you weren't i was just contemplating that most of the contributors to our conversation about drugs legislation

would have actually been under the age of 10 when i first started having phone ins about drugs legislation on this radio station.

And producer ludicrously tried to claim that she was only two.

I probably should stop talking about my age.

I used to mention my age a lot on the show because I was quite young for this job.

And I thought it gave an added sort of sheen of interest to the notion that someone in his early 30s when I started

was presenting a phone-in show, a format in the British media that's normally reserved for elderly men,

possessed of pungent views. But now that I am elderly, or at least 46, I should probably stop mentioning

because no one's going to go, wow, God, cute. It's only 46.

Yeah, that may be the last time I ever mentioned my age. Anyway, it's time for Mystery Hour.

If you don't know how it works, you're in for a treat. If you do know how it works, you're also in for a treat, but you knew that already, so I didn't feel I needed to point it out.

It is the radio equivalent of those newspaper and magazine features

wherein somebody writes to a newspaper or a magazine with a mystery.

And by mystery, I just mean something you don't know the answer to,

but which you know there must be an answer.

You could probably look it up, but you don't because life's too short.

Well, no, actually, that's the wrong explanation.

Life's long enough not to.

Education, illumination, knowledge, these are good things. So if you hear somebody ask a question

to which you know the answer, you can ring in and frankly get a pat on the back, proverbially speaking,

and a round of applause, literally speaking, for, as a reward for your knowledge.

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