#347 Let me bore you to sleep - Jason Newland (7th March 2020)

Hello and welcome to jasonnewland.com. My name is Jason Newland and this is Let Me Bore You To Sleep. Please only listen when you can safely close your eyes and please subscribe. So what have I been doing today or yesterday? Well what I've done is I think I mentioned in my recent recording that I have added, there's now four new podcasts that are available on my website.

They're new in the sense of they're basically the four most popular, four of the most popular podcasts I have. And they're advert free and continuous play. So there's the Let Me Bore You To Sleep one, Let Me Deep Sleep, Deep Sleep Whisper Hypnosis, the Relaxation Hypnosis for Stress, Anxiety and Panic Attacks and the last one is Sleep Hypnosis Weekly.

So they're the four. It's taken ages. It's taken quite a while because I've still been working on them.

They were uploaded yesterday but there was still work to do as far as posting on the other podcasts, the original podcasts with a link for people that want to listen, ad free. So I've done that on all of the podcasts. It took me, I was doing three hours solid between ten and one this morning, last night and one this morning.

And so I've managed to do that, just added a link to each podcast episode or recording. And what else? Yes, there's still some stuff to do around it because from the front of it or from the, you know, from the public perspective when you look at it, it looks like, you know, it's all working fine but there's some back-end work, if that's the right correct terminology. There's, you know, technical stuff and things that I need to do myself.

Behind the scenes. So I'm just watching the news is on. So there's Alexander Johnson, not Boris.

His name's Alexander, Prime Minister. Boris is his middle name. So and then you've got Priti Patel, Mrs Smirker.

She smirks, she's got this smirky face. It's a weird one, it's not a weird face, her face is fine but she's always smirky. And she talks under her breath during the parliament things.

She's like talking. So she's being rude about someone I think. And when this baby, she's just thinking, who shall I bully next? Those are just allegations, I'm sure they're not true.

Smirky, Smirky McPerkey. I think her parents must have been very optimistic, you know, to name a Priti. Just lucky she turned out being really pretty, wasn't it? I got out of that one.

So I generally have the television on while I'm doing these recordings, just on mute. In fact, what I should do is stick it on the QVC channel. But it's quite funny watching the House of Parliament and seeing talking, seeing their expressions on their faces when I can't hear their voices.

It's almost like they're acting. They're trying to portray something, I don't know. There was a lady on there, she looked really angry just now.

Like the way she was talking, her eyes looked like razor blades should have been shooting out of her eyeballs. Such venom towards Alexander Johnson, Prime Minister. Not Boris, Alexander.

Not Boris, not Boris, not Boris. Alexander. I thought he'd want to be known as Alexander.

After all, you know, Alexander the Great. Alexander's quite a, it's quite like a royal kind of name, isn't it? But yeah, chose Boris. What Boris's do you know? Boris Karloff, Frankenstein.

Boris Yeltsin. Oh, maybe that's it. Maybe he wanted to be like Boris Yeltsin, Russian.

What other Boris's was there in history? Boris, Boris, Boris, Boris. A tennis player was called Boris, wasn't there? Boris McEnroe. Boris, Boris.

I'm sure there was a Boris, because it's a German name, isn't it? Boris, I think. I'm sure it's a German player. What was his name? He was like a huge star.

I can't think of his name. Why can't he think of his name? Boris, Boris, Boris. Agassi? No.

Boris Connors? No. Boris, Boris. Boris Connors.

Boris, Boris. I'm stuck in the 80s, aren't I? Well, the 90s. Agassi was in the 90s, wasn't he? As well.

There have been a few players since him. I don't really follow tennis, if I'm honest with you. I used to watch it when I was a kid.

But I think part of that was, that's what was on the telly. And that was the only telly I had to watch. And that's what the other people living in my family home were watching.

So I kind of just went along with it. Because I think back then, I'd rather watch something I didn't want to watch, than watch nothing. And what else was there to do? I don't know.

Do shadow puppets on the wall? No, I don't know what. It's only so much fun you can have with a yo-yo. That's how old I was.

We had yo-yos, that's what we had. Sometimes a lot of really old people talk about, well we used to have two sticks and balance the sticks on each other and walk down the street to see how far we could go with those. Stick balancing on the end of the other stick.

Oh, that didn't get boring, did it? Oh dear. I was listening to a radio station earlier, and they were talking about, there's only one subject people were talking about at the moment, and that's the coronavirus. I say people, like the press and the news and radio.

In fact, I just had three hours of listening about it, between nine and ten and one. But it was funny, in the sense that the presenter's funny. So he was being rude to the guests, to the people talking to him.

Not all of them, but it was light-hearted. And then, come one o'clock, the next presenter, again, he wanted to talk about coronavirus. Like, no, I can't take any more.

I can't listen any more about this stuff. And it's, you know what, in a way, the way they're counting the number of people contracting or being diagnosed with coronavirus in England, you know, every hour they're saying, another one. It's gone up by one.

And the last time I ever counted in that way was when my pubes were growing. It was like, oh, I've got another pube. And I used to go on the way to work or school, rather than on the way to work.

I did have pubes before I went to work. Or maybe I didn't. I just let myself, I was a late developer.

I'm still waiting for everything to develop. And me and my friend, Dean, we used to walk to school, and we used to talk about how many pubes we get. And I'd say, I've got 32 and a half now.

It was funny. It was funny at the time. Teachers weren't always pleased.

My mum driving in the front of the car didn't really enjoy the conversation. Nah, we'd be walking. I remember once, I used to, I was quite unpopular at school with the parents.

I think, in my opinion, the kids, I don't know, a bit of both. There was this kid, he was younger than me, but only just, I think he was like the year below me. So I think I was probably in the second year.

And he played the violin, and he was really, he was lovely. I liked him. And we just, I got to know him because we were walking to school pretty much together every day.

Because he lived literally round the corner from me. And I'd walk up past his house, and he'd be coming out. Sometimes I'd have to hide behind the car waiting for him, so he didn't see that I was waiting.

But generally, we'd sort of accidentally meet each other. And then I kind of became friends with him, and we'd walk to school together. And I quite liked it because, I don't know, it was quite nice to have a, I don't know, even back then, I quite liked having intelligent friends.

He was intelligent. He wasn't like, he wasn't a neanderthal kind of act, nor macho, or any of that kind of stuff. I'm not saying that people that are macho are dumb or unintelligent.

They just act it, and I'm sure it's an act, some of them. And so, but he was really, really gentle and lovely, you know. So I kind of, I gravitated towards him.

Not stalked, but you know, I didn't, I just, so I used to walk to school with him. And I think one day, his mum was, I think she picked him up, and he said, oh, can you give, give, what's his name, a lift as well, a lift round the corner. And she said, oh, yeah, okay.

And we got to her house, and she said, oh, do you want to come in for a cup of tea or something? I said, okay. The next day, he said to me, my mum doesn't want you, doesn't want me seeing you again or walking with you anymore. I was like, what? He said, yeah, I'm not allowed to walk to school with you anymore.

I'm like, okay. I was like, what's that about? Now, I don't know if I overstayed my welcome, because I did invite myself to dinner. And, you know, turn the TV on and watch telly and use the toilet.

Apparently, it wouldn't have been so bad if I'd have used the main toilet, but not the en suite toilet in his mum and dad's bedroom. Apparently, you know, apparently, you need to be invited before you have a bath. I don't know.

Anyway, I was, you know, just doing my thing. And a few other things that you should really only do in your own bedroom. Anyway, apparently, I wasn't allowed back.

I wasn't. And that was weird, because he lived around the corner. We were both going to school at the same time.

And we basically never spoke to each other again. That's a shame, isn't it? And then there was another kid. He was in my year, and I went around his house.

And we were like play fighting or something, jumping off things on and like rolling around and stuff. And I wasn't allowed back there either. Apparently, I was too rough.

I was only little, but apparently, I wasn't allowed back. And then I had another friend who lived around the corner. His mum quite liked me, I think, but he didn't.

So I used to go around and see his mum. I got on all right, but I used to go around and just wait for him. He'd be out somewhere.

I don't know what he was up to. And I'd wait there and he had these cats that just used to stare at me. I actually thought they were statues for the first six months.

I remember once I said, I wish I had a house. Not a house, but I wish I had money. And I was with my friend, the same friend upstairs in our snooker room.

And that sounded more glamorous than it was. So we're playing snooker. And he says, what do you mean you wish you were rich, but you've got how many bedrooms? One, two, three, four.

Yeah, you've got a seven bedroom house, two living rooms, three living rooms, a kitchen, massive garden, and you've got a snooker table, a tennis table table. And you know what I said? I said, okay. And I patted my pockets.

I said, where's all the money then? How come there's no money in my pocket? How come I have packed lunches and I can't eat cooked food like everyone else? He said, you can't eat cooked food. I said, no, I don't mean literally can't eat cooked food. I have a cooked meal every night.

He said, well, I don't. I said, yes, you do. He said, yeah, no, you're right, I do.

The worst part about, for me, the worst part about growing up with a big family was all of it. It's the whole thing. I really, personally, I feel I'd have preferred to have been grown in a pod to the age of maybe 20.

A bit like Superman, you know, the original Superman film where he's traveling through space and he's being educated by the audio. There's an audio talking to him the whole time, explaining to him everything about the planet and the world and the earth and the universe. That would have been quite nice.

So I'd quite like to have traveled through the universe. But instead of arriving as a baby or as a small child, because he was about three, wasn't he, by the time he got here? Because he lifted up the cast, he was a toddler, or maybe four or five, I don't know. I'd quite like to have arrived at the age of 20, maybe.

Obviously, with all of Superman's powers, but I'm not really talking about the powers necessarily. But just to have skipped that whole childhood period, that would have been nice. Yeah, no family, none of that stuff.

That'd be so cool, wouldn't it? Just like, oh, okay, now I'm going to decide who's in my life. Everyone in my life is going to be someone that I actually like. And I've chosen them because I like them.

Yeah, that sounds like quite a good idea. So yeah, that's why I would like to have just appeared at the age of, I don't know, 20, maybe 21, 22. Because even those teenage years were just weird.

You know, there's very much a lot of, I don't know, I seem to attract older men, for some reason, who pretended to take me under their wing. But I think had ulterior motives, maybe, or clearly in some of the situations. Or maybe just wanted to, I don't know, I think some people, some people, not everyone, but there's a few people out there that I think they'd like to be around someone who they can feel superior to.

And I think that was what it was with me, because I was young, in some ways naive, in some ways, in many ways not, but in some ways, vulnerable, definitely, living on my own at the age of 16. Just, you know, people could take advantage, and they did sometimes. And the people I wanted to take advantage of me, but people I didn't want to did try.

And I don't know if it's quite, maybe there's something in that, maybe it's to be able to talk down to somebody. Maybe there's something nice about that. I don't know, because I've got no kids, so I haven't had the opportunity to play God with anybody.

So I don't have any children. I've never been an important person in anybody's life, really, apart from Andre, I guess. And even that is quite a responsibility, because, you know, there are times when I quite like to, well, just not get out of bed and not feed him.

Not not feed him, but just not clear up after him. I kind of have to, because he's a little monkey. But I can't play God with him, because he's the boss.

I'm, he's my landlord, honestly. He, this is his home. He just lets me stay here temporarily.

I think that's his mindset. Every room in this flat is his. And I'm just, I'm his lodger.

I'm a little bit of company. And he likes me to, I'm just here to do his bidding, really. Which is, yeah, it's all right.

I don't mind. A little bit. The only thing that annoys me about him at the moment is the scratching at the front door.

He just wants to go out, and the weather's been really, really rainy the last few days. And I don't want to go out on that. And I kind of don't really want to be around anybody at the moment, if they've got, who knows what's going around.

So I kind of, I'm happy just to be indoors for a couple of weeks. But he just wants to go out all the time. So right now, he's asleep.

And I took a picture of him about half hour ago. And he was leaning out of his little bit, the place that he sleeps. And he was, his little hand turned up, so cute, just looking at me.

So I took a picture and I stuck it on Facebook. He's just, I don't want him to be asleep all the time, you know, because there's no point in having him, is there? This is kind of just a pointless, from my perspective, a pointless exercise. For him, it's fine, because, you know, he just wants to do what he does.

So when he is awake, I want him to be able to have fun. And, you know, that's why I've got lots of toys for him. And I don't know if he's very stimulated, though.

So I don't know, maybe him scratching at the door is him getting stimulated. There's a degree of frustration there, but he's still physically active. He's scratching, scratching, like digging, really.

And he's, you know, he's definitely on high alert. Oh, by the way, here's a little trick. If you're, well, it's not a trick, really, but this is what happened the other day.

I was on the bus. And I really struggled to get out of bed, because I had a meeting. This is on, I don't know what day it was, Wednesday, was it? And really, really struggled to get out of bed.

But I did. I got up at 12, or I don't know whatever time it was. And then I went, you know, sitting on the bus, and I was tired.

Really tired. And then this small child at the front of the bus, I wasn't, you know, I think I had my eyes closed at the time, popped a balloon, like purposely popped the balloon that the kid was holding. And I was wide awake.

I mean, absolutely, I couldn't believe how that changed how I felt instantly. Here's another strange thing. I saw a neighbor as we, I was waiting for the bus.

And she, she's talking to me. And the bus takes off, you know, it doesn't take off, it's not a plane. Very windy day.

Bus drivers thinking, damn, I shouldn't, I should have took the wings off the plane today, off the train, off the plane, off the, whatever it was. Anyway, she's talking to me, and she's sitting, and she said, do you want to sit in front of me? And I said, no, you can't make me. And basically she didn't want me to sit next to her.

So I thought, okay, fair. So I sat opposite her, you know, parallel to where she was sitting on the other side of the bus. So we're just chatting and stuff, and probably about two minutes, two and a half, maybe three minutes into the conversation, she said, would you mind if I put my headphones in? I said, what? She said, yeah, I want to listen to some music.

Just didn't want to be rude. Okay. I said, all right, see you then.

So I sort of look away and I'm looking at her window. About a minute later, she starts asking me questions. She said, so how's your week been then? I looked at her and said, what? And she's basically untangling her headphones, the wire of her headphones, you know, the ones that plug into your ears.

They're all tangled up. And I said to her, don't start talking to me now, just because your headphones are tangled. Don't start bringing up a conversation and then you're going to stop as soon as they're untangled and put your headphones on, aren't you? She said, yeah.

I said, I'm not talking to you then. And I just left her to her headphones. Just tell me you don't want to talk to me.

And then, wait a minute, I've got a little gap. I've got a gap of 30 seconds. I don't want to use, I can't have silence in that gap.

Must be music or conversation. I'm sure it wasn't like that, but it's strange. I was actually late for my appointment because I bought so much stuff.

The trolley was overflowing. In fact, there wasn't enough room in the trolley for all the stuff that I purchased. Because I'd run out of lots of stuff.

I didn't have much things here. And I got paid on that day. And I basically decided to spend every penny I had on food and other bits.

So I bought a few bits of soap and mouthwash and toilet paper. Not huge amounts, but enough just to keep me bubbly. Just enough toilet paper for what's necessary.

Just enough to stop me leaking. And I just, apparently, due to the current health stuff that's been going around, apparently, according to the press, there's been panic buying. People have been buying excessive amounts of stuff and hoarding.

Is it hoarding? I don't know if that's the actual right word. Is it hoarding? Collecting? Stockpiling. Toilet roll and that sanitary hand wash stuff.

And lots of other things in case people, I guess, in case they need to self... Isolate, I think is the correct terminology. Now, I stockpile anyway. Usually.

Although I haven't done it for a while, until the other day. And I go through periods where I try and stockpile. Usually it's at the end of the year for the coming year.

So I try and get as many bottles of water, cans of deodorant, toothpaste, soap. So I buy, you know, 30, 40 packs of soap and, you know, just get lots of stuff all stored. So then I've got it.

Maybe 5, 10 packs of toilet paper and stuff. Although I've only got one on Wednesday. Because I'm not planning on using too much.

Not that I can't... I don't have a plan. It's not like a list of things, you know. It's sort of how many sheets of bog roll am I going to use tomorrow.

I don't know. I don't have that in my head. For anyone that says, oh, you shouldn't use the word bog.

Well, that's the name of the person that invented the toilet, isn't it? Mr. Bog. Mr. Bog. Okay, I'm just watching something here.

All right. I think this is in Japan. Might be China.

That sounds... I think, yeah, I think it's in China. I'm not sure because they've not said because I'm mute. So I can't hear what they're talking about.

But it's isolation. And they've got tutors. They're just basically shown a karate gym, like a dojo karate with the instructor wearing a mask.

And there's just a close-up of him. And he's doing like, you know, reading instructions. Punch with your left hand, punch with your right hand, you know, that stuff.

Hi-ya! And in front of him is a big screen. And loads of people watching live, doing it in their own homes, following. And yeah, and then for a second I thought, oh, he's doing online as well as training people in person.

The camera pans out. He's in the gym on his own. So they've isolated, self-isolated so that no one goes to the gym anymore.

The schools are closed. They're doing teaching via the internet. There's just a couple of people just there.

They had masks on and they were telling the cameras to go away. So they wouldn't be recognized. They've got masks on.

Oh dear. Go away. Go away camera.

Yeah, this is in China. I now know because they've shown the airport. It's Jingguan Airport.

Wow. The weird thing about it, well not weird, but of course I don't know. I'm not an expert on China.

But from the stuff I see on the news and TV, China, there's a lot of Chinese people walking around with masks on generally day to day anyway, which is something that we don't do in this country. In fact, you wouldn't be able to go into a bank if you had a mask on. Some shops would ask you to take the mask off.

Dentists wear masks, but they don't like you to wear a mask. Apparently it gets in the way of the dental treatment. And it's a weird old thing going on at the moment.

One of my friends, his dad didn't like me. That was it. That was the whole story there really.

I used to make fun of him. I used to, I could do a really good mimic of him. He was a really nice person, but he didn't like me, so he wasn't particularly friendly to me.

So I didn't feel huge love towards him, if I'm honest. But you know, that's the way it is. I used to be able to mimic his voice.

So I phoned up the bank and got a big loan and bought a sports car. Apparently that didn't go down too well. You know, when you watch the news without the sound, the images they show, it's almost like a horror movie.

It's kind of like a horror movie interspersed with documentary footage of people talking. A lot of them with stuff on their head, for some reason. I wonder why people wear scarfs on their head.

It's a cultural thing, isn't it, in some countries. I wonder where it came from. Maybe it's a desert thing, because of the sand.

Maybe there was actually a practical reason for it. And now the practical reasons got muddled up with, I don't know, culture. Because there's a thing, Buddhism has done that.

With Tibet, you've got Buddhism. You know, they've got all of the bells and the whistles and the praying cards and whatever, that kind of stuff. That's not Buddhism.

So basically, all that ritual stuff is not Buddhism. Buddhism was not ritual. Never was.

But basically, what the teachers of Buddhism did, they incorporated the teachings of the Buddha into the current religion that the people had. In order to make it easier to digest, easier to kind of, you know. But that seems to upset some people as well.

Especially people that like all the chanting. With Buddhists, they like the chanting and the ringing of bells and the incense and chanting and the rituals, you know, that kind of stuff. And it's got nothing to do with Buddhism.

It kind of has, because it's been going on for thousands of years. But originally, that's not what Buddhism was. Buddhism was not doing that stuff.

You know, it was about meditation and about breaking those ties and those bonds to the general day-to-day life. And what Buddhists do is, they take on new bonds, like rituals. But there's kind of a justification of it, is that they transfer their energy to those new rituals instead of focusing on the things that were maybe harmful to them.

And because the new rituals, there's less of it compared to, well, not necessarily things that are harmful, but you know, like drinking and gambling. I suppose that could be quite damaging, couldn't it? Gambling and smoking and all that stuff. But you know, gossiping and stealing and all the good stuff, that's kind of lying again.

I mean, imagine living without lying. That would be horrible. And moving away from that and focusing on the rituals, which is just again getting caught up in something else.

Bonding, you know, creating new bonds, but breaking the other bonds, breaking the other, whatever, let's say the rope that's connecting you to that. Un-sticking yourself away from that stuff by sticking yourself to something new. It's not new, but something new to you maybe.

But it's not, it's, I suppose, healthier, mentally healthier than some of the other stuff. But it's still being connected to something that, I don't know, I suppose in a sense, Buddha did, well, it wasn't a Buddha, but did he? I mean, the Dharma is the teachings of the Buddha. And there's, I'm not sure who says it, but they say the Dharma is the raft that takes you from ignorance to enlightenment.

And when you get to the other side of the river, sailing on the Dharma, Dharma is the teachings of the Buddha. So that's the raft that you travel across the river. And then you leave the teachings of the Buddha at the river's edge.

You don't, and you carry on traveling, you don't take the raft with you. So for me, it's the Buddha's teachings, which was what I was interested in. None of the other stuff.

And it's kind of a shame because what I did is, I know it's an old cliche and I don't like cliches much, but I did put all my elephants into one big shoe. When I stopped going to the Buddhist center, well, I didn't go as regularly, I pretty much lost contact with 98% of the people that I knew. People that I was seeing regularly, I was no longer seeing them.

Even those people that weren't particularly maybe bestest friends, but someone that I could chat to, have a cup of coffee or tea with and got on well with, suddenly I wasn't seeing them. And that's quite a strange, quite a strange situation to be in really. It's quite weird.

What I've just seen now on the news, I'm not going to say they're in Africa, because they might not be, but they're in a country of elephants. And they're feeding the baby elephants with bottles that look exactly the same as a bottle that you feed a little baby with, exactly the same shape, with a little nib, the big nipple thing at the end, is it a nib they call it? The difference is the size. She was holding it up, it was pretty much the size of most of her upper body, this bottle.

It was shaped just like a little baby's bottle. I've never been so happy. The only parents of friends, or friends' parents that actually seem to, and I don't know why they seem to get on with me, was the friend who I was just rude to.

Not rude to, but I was a bit of a handful, but mind you, he was as well. And we raided his dad's alcohol cabinet and I got very drunk and threw up all over his mum and dad's bed and stuff like that. But, here's the weird thing about it, like his mum, they were Scottish, and his mum and dad were lovely.

And his dad was really chilled out, really calm. His mum was really nice, I liked them both. And I thought I'd gladly swap parents if I'm honest with you, but got rid of him.

I want to be an only child, that's what I wanted. Mind you, I thought I'd keep his sisters, they were nice, I fancied his sisters. They were older.

They were twins, I think. But anyway, he was cool. And it was really weird because even though I must have been really annoying to his parents, to my friends' parents, and I'd stay for dinner and stuff, and thanks for the grub, I'd say as I walked out, or what's for dinner tonight? Because I didn't really like going home, so I kind of, at times, I preferred to stay out, which I think is kind of normal for teenagers to want to sort of spend more time out of the house.

And even though I was annoying, I must have been so annoying to them, overstaying my welcome, proper, not realising maybe at the time. And even though that, I did that, and they did tell me off a few times because I was naughty. When I moved into my flat when I was 16, above the chip shop, I had nothing.

I mean, I had, that's not totally true, I did have the bedroom furniture from when I was a kid that had been stored, well, I was still a kid, it was only a year earlier, but it was stored in somewhere. And my dad had stored it and he sort of brought it out to my bedroom in the flat that I was renting. And so I had a bed and, you know, whatever that was required.

And I didn't, I had a few little bits, like my nan gave me some bits and, but it was kind of just bits and bobs from here and there, you know. So I think I've got an ironing board from my nan and that. But my friend, to be fair, it was very lonely.

It was quite a lonely time in a sense of my then mother moved away. And she moved to another part of the country with her new-to-be husband. My little brother went and moved with her and the bloke that she was with didn't want me around.

So I stayed where I was. And I didn't, suddenly I kind of, both my older brothers had gone, they'd moved out of town. My little brother had gone, he'd moved out of town.

My mother for eight years that she'd been, had gone. And nine years I'd had, no, yeah, since the age of seven. So nine years I had her and she went.

The grandmother, her mum went, although I didn't like her anymore, she didn't like me. But that was just because I'd been sleeping on the floor of her living room, on her little camper bed for probably eight months, something like that, way too long. And we just ended up hating each other and never had contact again when she moved.

Which is a shame because, in all fairness, I used to get on really well with her, really well. Like really, I was very close to her. So that was a shame.

She's passed away now. But I just, yeah, it was a shame because I did get on really well with her. I used to, when I was a kid, like, it's going to be all sad, but yeah, I used to, she used to live in the seafront and on a big block of flats.

And we used to go and me and my brothers would go visit her, you know, every week. Every week we'd go visit her. She'd be around our house as well.

So I'd see her, you know, as often, if not more often, than my other nan. And she pretty much had her own room in the house when she needed to stay. So there was a spare room, but she stayed in that whenever she needed to or wanted to.

And, yeah, it was quite weird talking about her, really. But she's, yeah, we used to, see, we didn't always not get on. I mean, there was a time when I first moved in with her, I used to come home from the chip shop and I used to watch Sons and Daughters with her because she used to watch it.

And I got hooked. It's an Australian soap opera. And, I mean, this is 1986, so I've got no idea what it would be like to watch it now.

But it was brilliant. And what was brilliant about it is they knew how to do cliffhangers. And what I mean by cliffhangers, if you don't know the term, basically, most people probably do.

Why are you explaining cliffhangers to us? The whole thing is, you know, you get to the end of the episode and then you don't know what's going to happen next. And that's what used to happen with Doctor Who. Doctor Who would be about to be, it'd be, like, hanging upside down by a Dalek's testicle or something and just holding on.

And just, like, suddenly, like, is he going to escape? Is he going to suck the Dalek off? Whatever he's going to do. So what's going to happen here? And, well, well, well, well, well, well, well, well, well, well. And suddenly it would be, you know, oh, I have to wait a whole week.

And because I was a kid, you know, watching Doctor Who, you know, when I was like 10, 11 or whatever, it didn't enter my mind, the idea that, well, you know, how could he not survive it? There's another episode next week. And I know there's another 16 episodes or whatever coming up after that. You know, well, they're just going to have, well, what's it going to be? So it's kind of, I know, so I suppose because of the fantasy element of it, it's a lot more fun, I think, as a kid, to watch stuff like that, because when the logical brain's not active, or not active in that moment anyway, it makes it so much more fun.

And nowadays, I've noticed the idea of cliffhangers. They do the first part of the cliffhanger, where, you know, you'd see the person, you'd see Doctor Who, or you'd see, I don't know, the main character of the TV show in a really difficult situation. And then, at the end of the show, they say, tune in next week, and they show you a clip of next week.

And the person who was trapped in the cave is now sitting in a cafe drinking coffee, eating a banana. You know what I mean? It's like, well, it's not much of a cliffhanger, is it? Because we now know that, unless, of course, you know, it's like, oh, I wonder if the banana, I wonder if it's got a bomb in it. You know.

So, it's kind of, I think The Walking Dead are pretty good at that. They're good at cliffhangers. And Lost was brilliant at cliffhangers.

So maybe the American TV shows kind of hung on to it. Hung on to the cliffhangers. Hung on to the hangers.

I don't know, maybe. But it's a wonderful thing, and it used to be really good in TV shows, especially soaps. And it still kind of is a bit, actually.

And with the soaps, I'm pretty, still okay with that. But not on the same level. And maybe that's due to my age.

Maybe it does sometimes feel like I've seen everything. You know, please show me something that I can't predict before it happens. And I try not to get into that frame of mind where I'm going to predict what's going to happen.

Because it is a little bit like, oh, didn't I do well? Didn't I, didn't he do well? He predicted the outcome of this particular scene. And there's a lot of real predictable stuff out there. On telly, in the movies and stuff.

But occasionally, I come across something that's just like, wow, did not see that happening. And that happened with Lost. When I first watched Lost.

If no one's ever watched Lost, the television show, forget about any reviews, and forget what people might say about the last season or whatever. It's one of the greatest shows of all time. Trust me on this.

It is brilliant. And ideally, you know, don't watch it when it's on telly. You know, because they do, I'm sure they show reruns.

Watch the box set. You know, watch the stream it or something. And watch the episode after episode.

Not forever. I don't, you know, I'm telling you, I can't believe I'm telling you what to do. I'm not telling you to do that.

I'm just saying it's much more enjoyable when you haven't got to wait till the next day or the next week to watch the next episode. Because I never had to do that with Lost. Brilliant show.

It goes extra weird near the end. You know, the last season or two. But there's lots of seasons where it's just phenomenal.

And it's brilliant, really. And in all fairness, that kind of show can never ever have a satisfactory ending. It can't do.

Because it's too weird. Because ultimately, people that love shows like that never want to see it end. People that watched Games of Thrones were not going to be happy with the ending.

Because no real fans of that show didn't want to see it end. Real fans of The Living Dead don't want to see it end. Fans of The Sopranos did not want to see it end.

Which means they were never going to be satisfied with the ending. You know, Borderwalk Empire is another one. The Wire, Breaking Bad.

Mind you, The Wire was quite a good ending, actually. I think they were quite good with that ending. Breaking Bad.

Yeah, I don't know. Borderwalk Empire. Yeah, that was an okay ending, actually.

But I didn't want them to end. The Sons and Daughters. The Cliffhangers.

And I think they were showing it. Well, they were showing it. But it was on in the afternoon.

But they were showing it when it was at the same time as Neighbours and Home and Away just started. I think the previous year. Or maybe earlier that year.

And suddenly the Neighbours was the big thing. I'm not sure if Home and Away had started yet on UK TV. But Neighbours, definitely.

And Carly Minogue and Jason Donovan. You know, were just suddenly these big stars. And I think it was still a couple of years.

Or was it 87? When they started singing. Yeah. And they did a song, didn't they? Especially for you.

Do-de-do-de-do-de-do-de-do-de-do. And Too many broken hearts in the world. And too many dreams to become.

So that was then. And I like Neighbours. And I think the reason why Neighbours got taken to the to the the nesty bosom of the English nation was because it was bright.

It was scenically, it was lovely. It was based in, well it was in Australia. You know, it was sunny.

The houses were all nice. Big houses. Everyone was I suppose attractive, you know, I guess.

Walking around with their tops off. You know, it was the men. And it was just something really new.

Because before that we had the two main soaps. It was Coronation Street, which had been for about 600 years. And I think the Romans created that show.

And then the Eastenders, which started I think in 85, I think. Which had kind of become I think for a while it was more popular than Coronation Street. Possibly because it was new and it was a new thing.

But both the shows were set in quiet not downtrodden, but quite dull areas. There wasn't a lot of brightness. You know, like a blue sky and stuff like that.

It was very I suppose very English. I mean we it's quite a grey country, isn't it really? In England. In a sense.

Not always. We have beautiful days. As beautiful as anyone else.

But it's a great country, but it's just I'm not really one of those people that sort of slag off my country in that. I used to be when I was younger. But actually with education and knowledge and learning new things I actually have more appreciation of the country that I live in.

And I was born in. Because we've got so much here that many, many other countries don't have access to. And the health care service the NHS just alone is something that is probably the envy of a lot of countries.

They'd love to have that. In fact, a lot of people come to this country in order to use the service because they don't have the ability they don't have it where they are. And and I would as well.

I know this whole thing all shouldn't come in and use our health service. Well you wouldn't say that if it was your mum, would you? If it was your mum that needed an operation and you were living in another country that didn't offer that service. And, you know you'd bring her to England, wouldn't you? To get that service to save her life.

Yes, you would. Or if it was your child. People don't think that.

I have to think in my very, very very limited way. Yes. So that's good to have.

Every country's got its benefits. There just seems to be in this world the most beautiful countries scenically places with the most beautiful seas, the most beautiful wildlife, the most beautiful weather are the places that have the most poverty or have just a lot of you know like Thailand and Africa, India. Such wonderful weather sometimes and all this I don't know, I've never been there but apparently it's supposed to be quite nice.

But it's weird, isn't it? And you've got this little country here where I live and the weather is it's a very grey you know I think if you're going to say what's the average the average look of this country and I think it would be grey. Grey would be the correct colour in the sense of the clouds, the grey clouds. It's a very grey country on average and of course sometimes it's way worse than that sometimes it's beautiful it's really nice you know, very sunny blue skies shiny but you know I remember even when I was used to have just really really strange weather for years.

We basically go through different seasons in one day here. You can have all seasons of the year in one day. I know that not every country has a season have the same season or the same time but we have it all in one day.

Not every day but sometimes.

So it would be you wake up and it's beautiful outside it's like a beautiful autumn morning it's cold but it's beautiful autumn morning you know and to be fair autumn and spring are very similar kind of temperatures in a sense there's just different things going on instead of the leaves growing the leaves are falling off the trees and it's probably a bit windier in autumn than in spring and spring autumn fall yeah if you're in America you call it fall for some reason we call it autumn so we we say it's autumnal autumnal weather so

you do you say it's fall fally weather fall fall weather I don't know no one's got back to me yet I've been asking that question for years why do you call it fall you can't just be so that you can to match the little saying which you tell kids spring forward fall spring forward fall back when it comes to turning the clocks spring the clocks go forward fall the clocks go back spring forward fall back I don't know that doesn't make sense really because the daytime saving hours or whatever it's called can't have been in

practice forever because clocks haven't been around forever and I think there's daytime saving hour daytime saving daylight saving I don't know what it's called it's only been around probably 50 years maybe maybe a little bit longer maybe six months I didn't know record to someone on the radio this month March the clocks go forward at the end of this month it was the last Saturday of the month I think in yeah I think the clocks go back an hour at the end of October the only reason I remember that actually is because I had a

I met someone a lady on a Saturday night and I called her the next day oh I thought it was late enough to call her but I didn't realise the clocks had been gone back in the fall or the autumn because the clocks had gone back an hour so I didn't realise that so when I called her up the first thing she said is it's five o'clock in the and she said well she didn't say just hung up I think she might have been the one never mind so I'm gonna go now thank you very

much for listening remember remember to be kind to yourself because you deserve to be happy do something nice for yourself goodbye today bye