(no music) #1159 - People I’d like to thank - Let Me Bore You To Sleep (17th July 2024)

Hello and welcome to Let Me Bore You To Sleep. My name is Jason Newland. Thank you for joining me.

Please only listen when you can safely close your eyes. Yeah. So, today is Wednesday, the 17th of July, 2024.

So, can we say 2012? 2022? 2020? 2020? The years have gone by. The years? Where's all the years gone? So, yeah, it's Wednesday. It's a Wednesday.

I was kind of looking forward to watching the first episode of Prime Minister's Question Time, which is on most Wednesdays, midday, on the Parliament channel. You can watch it online wherever you are in the world. I think you can watch it on YouTube.

But it wasn't on. It was some King's Speech thing going on. So, they're really milking this change of government.

How long does it take? The change of government, you're now in charge. You're the Prime Minister. Let's just get on with it.

Nope. Let's just walk around with weird dresses on, and swords, and horses, and I don't get it all. I don't get it.

I mean, it's fun for those that like it, I suppose. But I want to see what it's like. I want to see what Sir Sikir Starmer is like as a Prime Minister in Prime Minister's Question Time.

I just want to see what it's like now. Now, the roles have reversed. Now, this might be completely meaningless to if anyone's living in a country where if you, you know, you don't really look outside of your own country.

So, this might be meaningless, and it's not as exciting as a lot of political stuff that's going on around the world, to be honest. We've possibly got the least exciting leader that maybe there's ever been. But perhaps that's what we need.

Maybe. I don't know. Who knows? I'm not going to get into politics.

Luckily. Wow. It's quite weird, actually, because in England, the one thing we don't really do, I mean, there's a little bit of it during Brexit.

But we don't really do much in the way of extremism when it comes to election time. Or like political stuff. I mean, there's a little bit of it.

And you know, it's not it's not not never, never happened. But we're not really an extreme, we don't get that extremist. And it's, it's kind of against the English nature, really, to be extremist.

Maybe we're too lazy. I don't know. But it's just, I look around the world and I was like, oh, I've seen on TV or on, you know, YouTube, YouTube, I've seen parliamentary chambers around the world, different places, where they're going to punch, punch ups, actually, fist fight in each other, fist in each other.

And like, in in public, and it's like, what the heck? We don't have that said that the most you're going to get is a slight put down. I mean, here, in the in the English, or British rather you can you can United Kingdom Parliament chamber. If an MP, which is a Minister of Parliament, if an MP says something, like, for example, call calls the Prime Minister a liar.

Okay. They will get told off there and then. And they can't get away with it.

They'll instantly even if it's the Prime Minister or whatever, even if the Prime Minister, which is equivalent of a president, if you have a president in your country is equivalent of that here, and perhaps not quite as charismatic. But they are not allowed to call any member, any Member of Parliament, a liar. They can they can say it, but they have to retract it.

And if they don't verbally retract it there, and then they get kicked out of the house for a day or whatever. And it's, they get in trouble, they get they get told off, they basically be put on the naughty step. And I've seen this in the past where somebody's called a Prime Minister a liar.

You're a liar. That's my impression of the person. I don't I don't know who actually I do know is a member of the Scottish Parliament.

And this is a few years ago, actually. The Prime Minister's a liar. Very bad accent, but very bad Scottish accent.

And I think it was. What's his name? You know, we've had we once had three Prime Ministers within two months. Did you know that never happened before? Doesn't sound like a very stable government, does it? When I was in Thailand, the two big things happened in the UK.

There might be news stories that I didn't know about. But the two major things was the the Queen passed away, sadly. So and she was always a Queen all the way through my life.

Well, through probably a lot of people's lives, because she was very elderly, wasn't she? But she died. And that was a couple of days after we got a new Prime Minister. And then when I got back a couple of weeks later, they were getting ready to kick her out.

She'd only been in a job a couple of weeks and they started like the newspapers, I think they're calling it a turnip and saying that a turnip could do a better job than her, which is a bit rude. What do you got against turnips? And then it says all this whole thing and it went on and she's going to get kicked out. And she did eventually.

She got I think she had 48 days as a Premier in a Premiership. Not Premiership. That's royalty, isn't it? She got anyway, she she got she lost her job.

Sure, she had to quit. She got forced to quit. And then we had a new Prime Minister who we didn't vote for.

No one voted for. We didn't vote for him. And so we went from the.

What's his name? I can't remember all the different people's names. I don't know. So, yeah.

Johnston. Johnston, which is a euphemism for a part of the body in America, I do believe, Johnston, not in this country. It's not so.

So he he got. He was in and then he got kicked. Well, he had to resign.

Then she gets in after this big hoo-ha trying to get like going through all the different politicians and loads of people wanted to be the prime minister. And it whittled itself down to two ladies. And one of them pulled out.

Not quite sure why. I think it was Babinock. Was it Babinock anyway? And then what's the name got in? And then, yeah.

Blimey. So, yeah, it was. Why am I talking about that for? I don't know.

But it was. It's very strange. But then the whole thing is you can't call someone a liar.

And you have to apologize. Now, I've seen other politicians around the world like say some proper things about the other, that the opposition may be, for example. Wow, that just you wouldn't get away with that here.

It's just it's not allowed. We it it makes us just makes our politicians look like cardboard characters almost when it comes to personality. We don't have a huge range of personalities in our political spectrum.

There is still it seems like a very stuffy place still. The political landscape in this country, very, very stuffy. I still just I really don't think I've seen many people in suits, but in suits like I'm sitting in suits, but with any kind of something extra, you know, something something about them.

I mean, the only really the only two politicians that I've. There's not two, but there's there's obviously Boris Johnston. He was as you got character.

He's he's funny. And so he's very quirky. And then you had um Thatcher.

I mean, she definitely the character. I'm trying to think Tony Blair had a lot of charisma. I'd say Boris Johnston's got a lot of charisma as well.

And so did Margaret Thatcher, regardless if you like or not, she did have charisma. But a lot of the people now like this, there's not a lot of it around it for some reason. So Tony Blair did.

I tell you who my favourite politician ever. My favourite politician out of all the politicians, and he would have been Prime Minister. And you might think, what do you mean he would have been Prime Minister? I guarantee he would have been Prime Minister.

How can you guarantee this? Let me let me explain. Let me explain. Right.

John Smith was a summer look. Whoa. Right.

He was nice. I'm just looking at the picture of him there. So he was a leader of the opposition.

So he was a leader of the Labour Party opposite either Tony Blair or Gordon Brown. I don't know. I can't remember the exact time when Gordon Brown took over.

And he was he wasn't an old man. He passed away 55 and he passed away. But he was the you know, this was 1994.

And then three years later, I think Tony Blair took over then three years later, they won the election. Now, had he still been around, he would have won the election. Because I don't know what it was about him.

I used to see him on TV. I still remember him because it's a long time ago. I still remember seeing and thinking.

So nice. I know that it's not necessarily a reason to have someone because you know, in as a Prime Minister, because let's face it, I mean, they've all probably quite nice, I suppose in their own way. John, John.

Blimey, I'm losing track of the different John Major. John Major was a nice bloke. He seemed to be nice, friendly, gentle.

And he was a Prime Minister. And Tony Blair seemed to be a nice bloke. I think he lost his way a bit.

But you know, I don't know if he really had a lot of choice in that, to be honest. Don't tell us we don't want to talk about politics. We want to break from that.

Okay, sorry. I get carried away. But just John, if you look up John Smith, Labour Party leader, he used to go hiking and stuff like that.

And I don't know why I just liked him. I found him to be very charming, very, very just nice. I'm not quite sure why.

Just I just liked him. And so yeah, so Tony Blair was his successor as leader of the party, the Labour Party. And so yeah, so he was very, he was popular.

So I don't know quite what happened is his last speech, he was, he said the opportunity we want is the opportunity to serve our country. That's all we ask. That was the night before he Yeah.

Anyway, I just touched he was not saying he's I didn't want to cuddle him. But he was cuddly. Does that make sense? Like emotionally cuddly? Someone that just Oh, and he was balding.

So that's good. Don't trust anyone with hair. Don't trust anyone.

No, don't trust any men that don't have a ball patch like mine. You know, there was a time I saw my dad last week, saw my dad. And he's got more hair than me.

And I said to him, this is ridiculous. When I'm your age, I'm not gonna have. I'm not gonna have nowhere near as much hair as you, dad.

And he said, Yeah, probably not. And he like brushes hair back. And I said, But yeah, unfortunately, you won't be able to see it.

We should be dead by then. Kind of spoil the mood a little bit, to be honest. When I'm 80, he'll be 90 100.

He was 26 when I was born. So be me could do it. But 80 he's 79 now.

So 8999 100 101 and 203 and 405. We have to be 105 years old. Hopefully he will be but you know, it's he's got more hair than me now.

And he's got eyes. He had a beard. I probably talked about this.

So I don't know why this is such a beautiful beard. Might be weird that I'm using things like beautiful talk about my dad's beard. But honestly, it's just you just want to cuddle it.

You know, just want to cuddle the beard. And I think what it is, however weird it might sound, but my happiest memory with him was when he had a beard. Because he had a beard when we first met him.

So I didn't I first met him when I was born, but I didn't know him. You know, because I didn't see him after the age of like six months or something. So and then I saw him again when I just before I was seven.

But in that year 1977, he was born in 70. So he had this is a big strong man like he is now even now he is. But he to me I was tiny when I was seven, stunted growth.

Anyway, I was really little and massive head, but just tiny little body. And a bit like Stewie from Family Guy. That's, that's what I was like, it was just all head.

And eventually I grew into my head, but it took me 30 years to do that. So I'm still growing. The thing is, I carried on growing.

That's why I had to kind of like, wait a minute, need to get it back down. It's out of proportion now. Always been out of proportion.

Now I'm top heavy. But I've got, I haven't got skinny legs. I've got to explain my body to you because you don't know what it's like.

It's amazing. It's really honestly, you just be for I just, if you saw my body, you'd be like, wow, you would if you if you if you if I send you a picture of me and my body, not, you know, not like nothing weird, but just like in some shorts and a t shirt or something. And you'll tell you what you do.

You would burn the picture. He would rip it up into a million pieces and you would burn it. And then you take those ashes and you spread them in another part of the world.

Just never ever please just like get that out of my memory. Because I look so awful. So that.

Yeah, my dad's beard. So when I first saw him, he had this big beard. And it was just beautiful.

It was a big, strong giant of a man and he was beautiful. Again, it might sound weird that I'm saying call my dad beautiful. But he irradiated nothing but love.

And I knew because I didn't recognize it didn't recognize what it was. Because I hadn't really had much of it. So I was like, what is this? This person's being nice to us.

Because up to an end, the only people really been nice to me. Okay, I'm not saying no one had ever been nice. But there was a couple of the nuns that were nice to us.

At least one of them was really nice. But even the nice ones didn't get too close. You know, they had rules and they had to, they weren't really into cuddling and stuff.

But some of the care workers, which were civilians, they were non non. Well, I guess they were non nuns. Maybe they're training to be nuns.

I don't know. But they'd come in and some of them were absolutely brilliant. We even had kids, not kids, but like teenagers or very young people come and looking after us.

I think they may be volunteers. And yeah, so it was there was people that I like that. I can't remember the name of her and I really wish I wish I had access to finding out I probably there's probably no way of doing it, to be fair.

But there's a few people I'd like to meet from my past. Just for the simple reason of saying thank you. I genuinely just I never got a chance at the time.

Because I was so little, I didn't realize how important they were. So the first two people would be I'm guessing those two people was my foster parents for the ages of about six to two years old. So I don't know I don't remember anything about living with them.

There's no memory in my there might be a memory there but I don't remember the memory. If that makes sense. So I do not recall that period of living with their with them.

Just like I don't recall the six months previous either. So I'm assuming that possibly they wouldn't have let one person look after two kids as a foster parent back in the 70s. You know, this is like 70 19 Yeah, 1970.

So I wouldn't have even Yeah, I would have been no 1971 probably the beginning of 71 or middle of 71. So I don't know what the rules were for that at that time. So I'd really love to, I've talked about this before, but I think I'm talking in a positive way about this.

I'd love to meet them. Just to say thank you. Because there's part of me, the kind of wonders.

It might seem weird. I don't mean this in like an egotistical or on our great kind of way. But not ended up too bad.

All things considered. And I'm not going to give you a comparison. But I could give you a comparison of at least two other people that went through the same thing.

At the same time, who didn't do as well, maybe is me. I don't mean as well, but I've managed to hopefully they're doing okay, but they had problems as well. So it's maybe one of my benefits is because I was so young.

And the older you are, the more memories you can have, I guess of the different things that happened. So my oldest brother was four years older than me. So his memories, he's got a lot more.

You think about it, he was four when I was born, six when we all moved to Newcastle. So he's going to remember everything that happened at that time. Well, not everything, but he's going to remember.

I remember stuff that happened when I was six, loads of stuff, some stuff. I remember one thing. I don't remember that much when I was six, to be honest.

I wonder what year I started remembering things. No years, actually, I don't remember anything specifically from any, I do remember things, but there's no year where I can say, oh, this happened, then this happened, then this happened. I mean, that'd be a really boring story, wouldn't I? Well, this happened, then this happened, and this happened, like that.

That's a boring story. Vinnie's got a little bone, so he's happy. So what I did is I got into the petrol station today, got some milk, and then I went to the sweet shop, the pet shop, and I got him a treat, and I got him a little bone as well, like a little one, because I got something last week or the week before, but they were too big.

He still has a go on them, but he's such a little, he's such a little fella. He needs the little ones, and I thought they were the little ones, because it was from Amazon, and on the screen, you can't see how big they are, and my measurements aren't always, I mean, I just assumed that I'd purchased them before, so therefore they must be small ones, but they weren't.

I mean, as it is, what's weird about him is he loves the new ones.

There are one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve. There's about twelve of them, most of them are big ones, on the table, and a couple dotted around on the floor, because once he's chewed on them, he doesn't want to go back. He doesn't like them anymore.

That's weird. Try and figure him out, and then we went to, we came home, he had the treat, and then again about half twelve, we went out again, and we played ball. So I took the ball out, and on the way out, I heard, because he's, he's got a ball in his mouth, and I've got the other, the throw in stick thing, it's a blue thing.

There's a little video, I think, on YouTube, I posted throwing the ball, and so, so there's two colour balls, a blue ball, and a yellow ball. Yeah, the yellow one's down there. So he, basically, I have one ball, and he carries the other one, and he will carry it, but when he's got that in his mouth, he's trying to run to the park, because it's one of his favourite things.

He loves it. So we're on the way down, he's, he's using all the length he can possibly get from the lead, because he's almost trying to get out the front door downstairs, before I've even locked my door upstairs, because there's seven metres, I think, I've got on my, on the lead. So anyway, I try and like, come back, come back, and then I hear someone saying, hello, hello darling, or whatever to him, like, you talking to me, you talking to the dog, because Vinnie started, can Vinnie now talk?

I don't know what the hell, and it's the neighbour downstairs who's talking to him.

So I go down, and she says, oh, you're taking him, you're going to take him to chuck the ball at you? I said, nah, just, just going for a normal walk, I thought I'd just carry this stuff around with me, maybe go to the shop, you know, I just, just like to load myself up with stuff. I've got, you can see the backpack with a parachute in, always like to take stuff out of me for no reason.

And she punched me.

So she, I said, yeah, she said, oh, I'll come with you. So we went out to the park together. I chucked the first two balls, and he came back.

I said, you want to take a go? And she had, she was doing it the rest of the time. And he had so much fun with her, but more fun, because he just absolutely adores her. And she's lives directly below me.

And she's been here since December, I think it was, she moved in. And she, he loves her. Absolutely.

He hears her come in, and he's like, always like shouting, Auntie Elle, Auntie Elle, hey. And so he was in his element. It's just, just, you can see in his eyes, and he's just, just so happy.

So that's good. He's had quite a good day today. He's now got one of his bones, so he's happy.

They're doing that. When I've done this, we'll take him for w a l k out in the PA. Okay, I just realized I'm talking to one here, but they've got a machine downstairs and they're about to do some kind of floor.

They've got a floor machine. And it's really loud. I just forgot.

Because I started doing it yesterday night. She actually phoned me up and said, Oh, you're going to bed early tonight. I thought, what's it got to do with you? She said, I said, I go to bed early every night.

And but I just basically I'm in bed by that nine or 10. But then I get up, I get up early as well. So it's not really a, it's not like a huge deal.

But I said, Well, don't worry about it. I'm not bothered. Just do what you need to do.

And she said, Yeah, the machine's really loud. I said, Why are you whispering? She said, I don't know. I don't know.

But when I, when I want to be dramatic, I whisper. I said, Okay, cool. I said, Look, don't don't matter.

Because in my the way I see it is this. Vinnie, she's the one that hears Vinnie more than anyone else, because she's literally below me. And she's okay with him.

Doesn't bother him. She's not worried. And she knows him.

So she's got to know a bit. So and I'm not going to moan a bit of noise coming from her flat because she's going to hear a lot more coming from mine. Because him doesn't hear me though.

Because I'm pretty quiet. When I bark, I'm a quieter barker. So yeah, they started the machine.

It wasn't that loud. Honestly, wasn't that loud? Wow, but it broke. So something happened.

And so they got it fixed. And they're gonna get on it again. Early, early tonight, late afternoon, which is about now.

I just heard voices down there. So I think they might start it up. If they do, and it is loud.

It just means that this recording will be a little bit shorter than normal. That's all. Because I don't think a loud machine is necessarily useful for recording.

But saying that I don't know how much it will pick up. And it might vibrate through the floor. And because the microphone is attached to the desk, or the microphone stand attached to the desk, it might cause a degree of vibration.

So yeah, so there's the foster parents, I'd like to meet them. So say thank you. That's all really just thank you.

I mean, maybe I'll look at them and like, feel like I recognize them, which wouldn't really to me, it doesn't sound like a weird thing. If I was looking at their faces for a year and a half. I mean, to me, she was my mother, and he would have been my father for a year and a half.

You know, I wouldn't have known any different. So it's, I mean, I'm pretty sure if it wasn't, if he hadn't seen his mum, and she didn't live across the road. And he'd been with me for me from 10 months, I know 10 months is quite old for a dog, but I never saw it.

I said recognize when he saw her. But he'd start thinking of me as I've like, been here all the time, I guess, over eventually, it's like he's always been with me. But in December, he'll have been with me for two years.

With December is not that far away. It's five months. I mean, it's less than five months because I got him, we, we met.

And it was the first, I think it was the first week of December. And it's now the 17th of July, August, September, October, November. So it's just four months and three weeks.

And it's really weird. I mean, the kids are breaking up this week. I don't know if it's the same everywhere in the UK of England, but it's it got around this area, they break up on Friday for six weeks.

And it's just when I remember when I was a when I was a kid, the six weeks holiday apart from looking forward to it, which I did, especially the last was it the last week or just the last couple of days, but there was a little period of time when we didn't do anything. I don't know if it was the whole of the last week, but it's definitely the last day, maybe the last two days, did nothing, went to school, didn't have to do a single thing.

It really was a case of just doing nothing, like nothing, playing music, reading magazines, playing board games, whatever we wanted to do.

But we had to be at school. We didn't have to do anything. And yeah, that was quite cool.

And it would have been nicer to have that. Now, I'm not sure if we were allowed to just wander around. Maybe we was I don't know.

No, I'm not sure. My favorite time at school was, you know, the time when I had to be the days was when there was like a week or maybe it was two weeks when the it was the school trip. So the school went, like there'd be a school trip for the whole school.

And they go abroad or they go to another part of the country or and I never got to go on any trips. So for four or five years, or whatever it was. And those two weeks were the best because there was a group of us that never went on the trips.

And we had such a laugh. We just did whatever we wanted. There was no.

In fact, I don't even know if there was any teachers there. There probably was a couple of teachers. But we didn't have to do anything.

No schoolwork. I think if anything, they got us like do some painting and some they did like they were doing I'm working on deck, you know, getting the school back to normal again. So maybe I'm pretty sure it's like they were doing decorations and plumbing and add builders coming in and all those kinds of things that they couldn't really do during term time.

And so yeah, now just remember one particular time when must have been in the fourth year, I reckon, where I had a very good time. It was good. I don't know.

I'm not sure if it happened in the fifth year because the fifth year is a shorter year. Started the fifth year in September. But by April, I finished.

So I didn't have to go all the way to July. So it's three months shorter than the other years. Wow.

It's weird. I just got these memories. There's something that used to happen during the summer holidays.

Is because my two brothers went to a different school to me, the high school days. And never really understood why. Why couldn't I go to the same school as my brothers? It just seemed weird that I mean, my school was closer.

But you know, not. Yeah, it's closer. But what? Why not? Because the other school is better.

A better school. But I don't know that this kind of I suppose is advantages and disadvantages of having your older brothers at school with you. But I think the advantages probably would have outweighed the disadvantages.

But I didn't need. I mean, if I didn't needed help, I wouldn't have had any. But luckily, I didn't need any help.

So, you know, having a couple of older brothers would have because they were known, they were quite well known, I think. And one was four years older. So he was a giant compared to me as well.

So my other one was two years older, and everyone knew him. So he used to look out for me when I was at junior school. But I don't know, so I was on my own really, when I was in high school.

I mean, you could you could argue I didn't know any different. But I'd always been up to that point. Until, well, to be fair, I was, I was nine.

So up to the age of nine, I was at school with them, the same schools that they was at. And then I moved to a different school when I was nine. And they continued at the school they was at.

Wait a minute, nine, 10, 11. No, because that would have been I was starting new school at nine. My other brother was 11.

So he was starting high school. That's why. But because my other brother was already at high school, because he was 13.

And my other brother, the one that's two years older, he was moving from the old school I was at the old junior school into high school. And it probably wouldn't have been fair to move him to new high school, not knowing anybody. You know what I mean? So that my high, when I went to high school, I'd spent two years at the junior school.

So I knew I was going to school with them. So I knew the kids. And as well as the ones that had already gone, so I knew the kids.

And not the ones that already gone, but was some I guess when I got that nine, then it was ninth year 10. So the the year ahead of me went to high school before I did. And then the two the years below me went after me.

So I knew kind of my own year, but also knew some from the upper year and I knew some from the lower year. And I used to hang around with the little girls, which sounds weird to say that out loud. But you know, I used to be really, I used to like girls.

And there was a group of girls and me and my friend and we used to play with them. And, and I missed that. That's one of the things I missed when I went to high school.

Because that was weird. You know, for the first class of high school is that what do you miss from your last school? I'm the only one that said skipping. You know, it's I did though I missed spending time with the girls because it was fun.

And one of them was my best friend's sister, and her friends, I guess is probably how I got to know them. And they came to high school, probably, when I got to third year, so there was two years below me. And it was so weird to see them there.

Because there was one I really liked, just just always really liked as you're so friendly and everything. And, but they were too young to kind of date, if you know what I mean? It's like, because I was, I was a big man, you know, by the time I was in third year, because I was 13. And yeah, so I didn't really, I didn't get to see him that often.

But what weird thing happened is when I was about 16, or maybe, yeah, maybe 16, maybe 17, probably 16. I saw a couple of the girls, and they were still at school, I guess. So there was 14.

So they'd been in the fourth year, or third year, fourth year, and there was, and we were just like playing in the street like we used to at junior school. It's really weird. Not I wasn't skipping or anything.

But I did like we were like playing tag. And because you know, it's just really nice. It's like regressing, but I was a kid still anyway.

Really. I was very immature. Hard to believe.

Hard to believe that I was ever immature. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I was probably a little bit.

I don't know who else, you know, we used to go to the high school when my two brothers went to, during the summer holidays. Sometimes we'd go to the high school because it has stuff on there. Like games, badminton, tennis, just things like that.

And we'd go just to do something. Maybe the weather wasn't like great. So it wasn't really kind of like going onto the beach weather, but we'd go out and do something.

And because the six weeks lasted for, seemed to last for a long time. Now, I had the same, okay, I didn't, but for at least two years, I had a similar feeling. And where when it came to September, when it came to going back to school, I was determined I was going to do it different this year.

I think I did that for at least two years, maybe three years. I went in determined I can still, I can still get in touch with that feeling now. A real feeling of I'm going to behave.

I am going to be good. I'm going to learn. I'm going to study.

I'm going to work hard. And I'm going to do well academically. It lasted, I think the first time I was in that mindset, it lasted, actually it was the first year.

It wasn't so much I'm going to be good this year because it was the first year. So, but I was, my intention was to, I was excited to go to high school, big school, you know, I was excited. And I was going with my friends, I got my best friend was there.

And I knew some of the other kids because I've been in school with them for a couple of years. And I had my best friend Dean with me. So that was really all I needed.

And we were tiny. I mean, he was bigger than me, but I was, neither of us were very big. I was tiny.

I mean, he was probably a few inches, always a few inches taller than me. And I would be surprised if he's well over six foot now. And I can't remember how tall he was.

Last time I saw him, I was 19, a little while ago. It's weird, isn't it? How things work out because we were best friends for so many years. So many years, like, and then just weren't anymore.

It's, it's, I think he, he grew up and I didn't. And he's very, I want to use the word intelligent. I'm not saying he's not, but I don't know if that's the right word for this scenario.

But he was more adult. I guess that is that just another way of saying he grew up. But he knew, he knew what he wanted.

He knew where he was going. He knew what he wanted to do and why he wanted, well, I guess why he wanted to do it. And he, and he went for it and he succeeded.

Like the period that I knew him. So I knew him three years, four years after leaving school. I didn't see him very often, but I left school at 15.

Last time I saw him was when I was 19. And he was a qualified chef. He was at college with me.

So he was on a, like a full time, proper chef. I don't know what the course was, but to become a chef anyway at college. I was there part time one day a week.

It was a catering course. It was like chef and waiting as a mixture of both those things. But it wasn't, you know, on the same level as what my friend was doing, because he's, I don't know how long he was doing it for, but it's full time for however long it took to become a chef.

And he was working, I think he, I don't know if he was there for five days a week, because he, he was working in a hotel which is opposite, I think it was opposite where he lived in the same, same road, like opposite, literally walk across the road. And that was, that was where he worked. It's like he planned it.

I'm sure he planned it like he like really knew, planned it well. Because imagine being able to just walk across the road. I mean, not so good if you're skiving.

If you're like pretending you can't work and then you're like, well, how am I going to get out of? How am I going to get it to the pub without them seeing me? Especially if you're actually in the pub. You go, your local is actually the hotel as well. So that'd be weird.

Hmm. So good for him. That's why I think there was another one.

I didn't realize he was interested in catering. His name was Jason. I don't know why I remember his name.

Jason, I remember his surname as well. I'm not going to tell you, but I remember his surname. Wow.

I wonder why that is. So there was two Jasons, two other Jasons in my year that I can think of that I knew anyway. Maybe there was more.

One was the Jason, Jason, Jason. His dad was one of the sergeants in the sea cadets. And I remember him because I remember once.

This is a weird story. I don't know why. I just remember it.

I don't know. It's a bit of a thing, but I asked him if he liked me, which is kind of a strange thing. I think even then for someone to say to somebody, like not not a boy to say to a boy, I don't mean it in that way, but just it's something that boys, well, I've never had a boy say it to me when I was at school, but I couldn't, I didn't know if people liked me or not.

I just didn't know. I couldn't figure it out. It was just, it boggled my mind a bit.

I was like, there were some people that I thought, well, they seem to like me because they're spending time with me. And, but then after, when the school finished, I left school with pretty much no friends. I met up with a couple after school, like that used to maybe come into the chip shop and I kind of made a few friends, people that I didn't even really spend any time with when I was at school.

There's one a year above me who I became quite close to and another one, I was going to get him to move into my flat with me, but my boss wouldn't allow it. But, so we got on really well. And then the other one who was in the same year, but I never, I knew him to sort of, I knew him, I didn't know him, but I knew who he was because I spent five years with him in the same year, but I was in no classes with him.

So I didn't know him in that way, but I'm pretty sure the whole year would get together for PE. That's physical education. So when it came to football, all those different things, the whole, the whole year would get together, the boys and the girls separately.

Are the machines going? I don't know if you can hear that. Can you hear that? If you can, I apologize. You really can.

You don't care though, cause he's got his bone. So what I'm going to do, I'm going to go early because I don't, just in case you can hear it, I don't, I don't want it to disturb you. I can hear it, but it's not loud, loud, not loud, loud, you know, you know what I mean? Not, not loud, not loud, loud.

So the other person I'd like to meet is probably that lady or the girl, young, she might've been a young, she might've been like 16, 15, I don't know. But she was at the children's home and she was, she tickled me until I was laughing so much. And it's one of those memories that I'll always have.

Oh yes, I said to Jason, I said, do you like me? And he said, do I love you? I said, no. He said, you just said to me, do I love you? And he was like shouting it out. Do I love you? I said, I didn't ask you if you loved me.

I said, do you? I said, no. So what'd you say then? I said, do you like me? And then it sounded weird, me saying it out loud. And he pointed that out to me.

And I don't know if we ever really spoke to each other again after that, but we were in the sea cadets together. And I don't even know why I asked him. Maybe he's someone I wanted to be friends with, but I didn't really have a connection with.

Didn't know, you know. But anyway, so there's that girl that tickled me, or the lady that tickled me. It's just one of my happy memories of childhood.

Can't help it. That's just the way it is. And it was during Planet of the Apes movie when they were on horses.

So I don't know what that one was. One of the old Planet of the Apes ones. Which might have been from the 60s.

I don't know, maybe. And then, or very early 70s. Although, I quite liked to meet the maths teacher that left.

Because he was lovely. He had a big beard as well. I've got a thing for beards.

Maybe it's because two of the nicest, kindest men in later childhood or whatever had beards. Like the maths teacher had a big fluffy beard. And he's the only maths teacher, the only academic teacher that really took any kind of interest in attempting to teach me something.

But really was kind and gentle. Didn't understand a word of what he was saying. But it's after that, I realised I was in French lessons.

It wasn't maths at all. Oh dear, that was a really silly one. I mean, the only other two teachers that I really liked was both the RE teachers, that's the religious education.

And both of those teachers I got on really well with. One gave me a copy of the Joseph's Technicolor Dreamcoat tape of the concert, the What's It Musical or whatever. It was lovely.

And then the next one was lovely as well. And it's weird, it's strange because I don't know why, I didn't really class RE as like a proper subject. Just because it wasn't horrible.

All the other subjects I did were difficult. I didn't enjoy it, I didn't want to be there. With the RE, I didn't mind being there.

I don't really get it. It wasn't a chore. To be there was not a chore.

Both the teachers were kind. And I already knew about, I used to live, I basically lived next to a church. I was in a church every day, praying every day for a few years when I was at the children's home.

So I was very, I kind of knew about religion. So it's kind of, I guess it was quite inbuilt in me, I guess, you know, doctrinated, is that the right word? But it was interesting to learn about other religions, especially things like Buddhism and Hinduism and Sikhism. I just found that interesting.

So, yeah. But there's more to do with the teachers, I think. And it was that room.

It's always the same room. I remember the room. I do.

You come in on the side entrance. So you're facing the school, go in the right entrance. So you're going up to the right entrance and turn left, there's a door, go in there, turn right, and that's the first door on the right.

That was the RE room. Or if you go in, it's like, I just remember where it is. I remember it.

Or was it upstairs? Wait a minute. Or was it on the other side of the building? So, oh no, that was in my brother's school. That wasn't my school at all.

This isn't even my story. What am I talking about? So I actually asked my step, my dad's wife, to send me a picture of his beard, my dad's beard. This is after we'd been, just had lunch.

And I think it was the next day or later on in the day. And she did. She sent me a picture of his beard.

Not the rest of his face, just his beard. It's like, what I meant was him with his beard. But I didn't say nothing because I thought that was, it's like, I wanted to see, and maybe I'll use that picture and put me on top of it and mix us both together.

But it was just like, I want to see. I just like seeing pictures of him with his beard. But a beard's a beard.

It's nice because it's on him. Other than that, that's pretty much it. I'm trying to think of anyone else I'd like to meet.

There's probably a few people but I'm gonna bring this to a closure because I can, I'm very aware of the sound downstairs and I don't know if you can hear it so much. So if you can, I do apologize. But I'm gonna go so I will probably very likely do another recording tomorrow.

So thank you for listening. Remember to be kind to yourself. Remember to be gentle with yourself because you do deserve to be happy.

Lots of love. Bye.