Inflation is biting and the RBA is breathing down our necks. So to help out, Andrew Hansen has put together a musical guide to surviving skyrocketing prices.
The Chaser veteran’s new comedy hour, Andrew Hansen Is Cheap, will teach you how to save a buck – for the (modest) cost of entry, of course. It’s running as part of the Melbourne international comedy festival until 23 April.
Hansen is visiting from his home in Sydney, but there is one item you can be sure he’s brought with him: his knee pillow. That special cushion was recommended by a physiotherapist and he hasn’t travelled without it since.
Here, Hansen sings the praises of that frugal Target purchase and shares the story of two other important personal belongings.
What I’d save from my house in a fire
There is one precious object I would heroically carry from my burning house, cradling it in slow motion like a rescued baby: a Japanese fibre drink. It’s called a Fibe-Mini and is a sort of cross between a Berocca and a Metamucil.
This cute bottle dates from a trip to Japan, which my wife, Jess, surprised me with for my 40th birthday. We rode a sleeper train with a gorgeous blue locomotive from Sapporo to Tokyo. We stopped for soup on the many steps under Kotohira-gu temple and we washed in the labyrinthine Dogo onsen. Most memorably, we fell even more deeply in love while bonding over the astonishing range of snacks and drinks on offer in the konbini [Japapanese convenience store].
We smuggled a swag of these goodies home and began to polish them off. When the Fibe-Mini happened to be the last remaining item, we looked at each other and realised we could not bear to part with the adorable little digestive aid. Eight years on, it has passed its expiry date. But I like to think it’s ageing like a fine whisky.
Whenever I spot it in the fridge, I wonder: how did I deserve such a wonderful life partner? Jess, I mean, not the Fibe-Mini.
My most useful object
My knee pillow. A physiotherapist once told my especially knobbly knees that they needed one and my knees have never looked back. A knee pillow is the definition of luxury. I tour with it. I holiday with it. I have taken out insurance for it.
Your own knees deserve one, trust me. But do not buy a professional knee pillow – all of those are sweaty and uncomfortable and shaped like peanuts or toilet seats. Instead, I recommend shoving a $4 cushion from Target inside a cotton T-shirt. Comfortable and stylish!
The item I most regret losing
I used to have a cassette tape of myself at age three or so reading a book aloud. One of my brothers recorded it. I highly regret losing that cassette, as I had a completely different accent from my present-day self. I spoke in a broad, ocker way, which was later erased by watching far too many niche British shows. So I feel I’ve lost a bit of myself.
The book was Ant and Bee by Angela Banner. My main memory of the tape is that I pronounced Asia as “Assa”. Dramatically, too. I think that particular sentence was broken across two pages, so I built up towards the Asia, paused for effect while turning the leaf, then proudly declared that And and Bee were headed to the exotic land of “Assa”.
Gone forever, that little Andrew Hansen.
