Bill Bailey quotes from QI

Bill Bailey

How many amoebas does it takes to change a lightbulb? One. No, two. No, four. No, eight …

Bill Bailey

I was in Brazil, and I went into an enclosure with a Jaguar. And this Brazilian handler said "It's very important: always approach from the front". And I went, right, okay, and I was just getting closer to the front of it. And then he said "Oh no, sorry, never. Sorry! My English..."

Bill Bailey

You can freeze them and then, er, hit them over a wall with a cricket bat.

Bill Bailey

I dressed as Hitler once. I did a school play, I played Arturo Ui in The resistible rise of Arturo Ui. And I was Ui. I actually dyed my hair black and cut it in the Hitler style for the authenticity of the role, not cause I'm a Nazi, and my mum said "Oh, now that does look nice.".

Bill Bailey

UKIP are like Top Gear for people who don't like cars.

Alan Davies

I nearly injured myself the other day.

Stephen Fry

Oh yes?

Alan Davies

I was standing...

Stephen Fry

This is a not quite interesting?

Alan Davies

I was standing at the urinal and it was so high I had to stand on tip toe, and I nearly pulled a muscle in the hamstring area. It must have been a really really lanky plumber who put it up.

Stephen Fry

It must have been.

Bill Bailey

You were in a giant’s toilet.

Alan Davies

Stumbled into a giant's loo.

Jeremy Hardy

Might have been a fountain.

Bill Bailey

It was a font in a church.

Alan Davies

It was outdoors... [Realising what Bill said.] I was not weeing in a font! I resent that.

Bill Bailey

I baptise you... oh, stop that. Distguting.

Rich Hall

Who comes up with this shit? So you're telling me there's a second moon?

Stephen Fry

There... I am!

Jeremy Hardy

"Blue moon, I saw you standing alone." Not "with a small friend."

Rich Hall

So why is there, uh... why is there not one romantic song with the word "Cruithne" in it? Why not "Blue Cruithne of Kentucky," or "Cruithne River," or--

Alan Davies

No one can see it--

Stephen Fry

BECAUSE IT WAS DISCOVERED IN NINETEEN-NINETY-[bleep]-FOUR!

Rich Hall

9 years! 9 years to write a romantic song with the word ‘Cruithne’ in it.

Stephen Fry

In the last 9 years, no romantic songs, as far as I know, have been written at all. Have they?

Alan Davies

Bryan Adams wrote one.

Stephen Fry

Oh, please!

Bill Bailey

‘Everything I Do, I Do It For Cruithne?’

Stephen Fry

How many planets are there in the solar system?

Alan Davies

Nine.

Stephen Fry

Oh, sorry. Not again. [He holds up the ‘nine’ card.] Nine. Not the right answer, another forfeit of 10, I’m afraid. I’m afraid the answer is actually eight.

Alan Davies

I’m gonna write them down. You carry on.

Stephen Fry

Alright. Okay.

Alan Davies

Mars.

Stephen Fry

Yes, Mars is one.

Alan Davies

Pluto.

Stephen Fry

No.

Rich Hall

Here we go again.

Alan Davies

Pluto is a planet! It was discovered in the 1930s. It was the most recent planet to be discovered.

Stephen Fry

It was discovered by Clive Tombaugh in 1930 exactly, yes.

Bill Bailey

It’s a collection of gasses, it’s not actually...

Stephen Fry

It’s not a planet. By no criterion by which planets are judged could Pluto be said...

Alan Davies

It’s really, really big and it goes around the sun!

Stephen Fry

Yes, but it’s not really that big at all. It’s tiny.

Alan Davies

Well, that’s why it took so long to find! Don’t be hard on it cos it’s small!

Stephen Fry

Beetle-fanciers, as you probably know, are called—

Bill Bailey

Coleopterists.

Stephen Fry

Very good! Coleopterists. I'll give you five points for that.

Alan Davies

Press him on how the hell he knows that.

Bill Bailey

Well, when I was a child, I—

Stephen Fry

In Alan's world, knowing something is a kind of freakish, weird thing.

Bill Bailey

Welcome to my world of knowing! The wonderful world of looking up things in books!

Stephen Fry

What has large teeth and only one facial expression?

Bill Bailey

Janet Street-Porter.

Stephen Fry

It just meant an expression of surprise—"Hullo, what have we got here?" "Hullo, what's this?" And we still use it in that sense.

Bill Bailey

Do we?

Stephen Fry

… Don't we, Bill?

Bill Bailey

Yes, when we live our lives like 1950s detective films, yes. I often go to my fridge, "Hullo, we're out of milk. I say, mother, where's the milk?"

Stephen Fry

You beast, you beast, you utter, utter, beast.

Stephen Fry

I don’t know, it’s like occupational therapy in an old people’s home. Oh, hello, what have you got here?

Jimmy Carr

[Reading his board.] ‘Put smarties tubes on cats legs make them walk like a robot’.

Stephen Fry

Brilliant. That is absolutely wonderful. He’s used all his letters.

Alan Davies

That is unbe-fucking-lievable. It makes sense. They would walk like a robot. It’s an idea. It’s like giving people an idea.

Bill Bailey

It puts this completely to shame. [He holds his board up. It says, ‘gay elf romp’.]

Alan Davies

I can’t even imagine how you managed to do that!

Stephen Fry

No, I’m sure you can’t, Alan.

Jimmy Carr

It does work, actually. It’s a lovely way to spend an afternoon.

Alan Davies

Did you know all the rats in England all face the same direction at any given time?

Stephen Fry

Oh, come on.

Bill Bailey

No, that's right. Because they're magnetic, aren't they, rats?

Alan Davies

They spent so long in lead lined sewage pipes, that they move with the curvature of the earth.

Bill Bailey

Hence the phrase "there's rat, and true rat. And absolute rat."

Stephen Fry

So, the question is, how does the U.S. government look after its sequoia groves?

Bill Bailey

Er … lions … and tigers are let loose to roam the surrounding areas …

Alan Davies

Do they try to win the hearts and minds of the sequoia?

Stephen Fry

The Chinese also invented the loo roll. Name 3 other Chinese inventions

Alan Davies

Pot Noodles

Bill Bailey

Whispers