July 8, 2025

(no music) KARATE | Monday’s Boring Objects | LMBYTS #1389 | Jason Newland | 7th July 2025

(no music) KARATE | Monday’s Boring Objects | LMBYTS #1389 | Jason Newland | 7th July 2025
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Hello, and welcome to jasonnew Land dot com. My name's

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Jason new Land. Please only listen when you can safely

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close shop eyes. I'm here with little Vinnie. It's laying

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by my side and I'm sitting in my well on

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my sofa. But it's basically it's it's a reclining sofa,

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but there's two parts that recline. I'm in one part

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that reclines, and he's next to me. So I'll give

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you I mean, this is going to be my days

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boring objects, but I'll give you an ud give you

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a little bit of an update on Uncle Sausages, my neighbor.

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Just let you know, I won't you know, I'm not

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going to talk about it for any length of time,

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but I'll just give you a basic update. So I'm

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still visiting him in hospital. He is now awaiting to

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find out if he's able to come home with some

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kind of care plan or whether he needs to go

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into a nursing home. So it's going to just you know,

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we're going to see I'm going to start clearing up

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his flat, not tidying up and cleaning it, making it

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a bit more ready if he does get the opportunity

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to return, and yeah, that's it. Really. I went there today,

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spoke to the palliative palliative nurse or palliative care nurse,

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spoke to the Oh do they call them therapist? Not universal,

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not unisex, you not ambilical. I'm trying to think what

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the name is. But basically, what they do is they

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check him, see what he's capable of physically, and to

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get a layer of the land. Really, I suppose, so

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hopefully he's been had those meetings today. I spoke to

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them this morning, but they're going to come back and

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see him later on in the day and I left

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just before one o'clock. So I'll give him a call

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tomorrow find out how he's getting on. It's not always

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easy to actually hear what he's saying because he wants

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to be private. So when he's talking to me about

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I guess serious things, he whispers and I can't hear

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him even in the hospital. I have to get really

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close to him because he talks so so quietly. So yeah,

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just just see, just wait and see tomorrow. Oh God,

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I will stop you ordering in a minute, don't I.

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Tomorrow I'll do a little bit on his flat just

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I want to organize some of his stuff. He's got

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lots of diaries from years ago. Some can put them

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into one draw important stuff. Put all his letters into

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another place, you know, because there's things like darted all

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around the place. And might have to get rid of

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his chair in the setti. He needs a new chair.

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He needs a new bed. He hasn't slept in his

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bed for years, I don't think because it's I think

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it's broken, but he's been sleeping in his chair, which

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is also really really just it needs to be removed.

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He also needs a fridge because he hasn't got fridge.

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So there's a few little bits I need to try

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and organize for him. But I'll do it with him.

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I'm not just going to do it, you know myself.

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I'm gonna just confirm that that's what he wants as

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I go along. So I need to try and find

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him a fridge freezer, a cheap one to put in

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his kitchen, and then once I've kind of tied it up,

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I'll then look at maybe trying to find him a chair,

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some kind of yeah, just some kind of chair that

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will be comfortable for him. Hmmm. It's going to be

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a bit weird though, because I don't know what he's

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gonna find comfortable, because it's not all not all chairs.

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It's nice to sit in the chair, isn't it first

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before buying it or you know, And it won't be

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a new chair, well it it liven be a new

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chair which is cheap, like from Amazon or something. But

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then the problem with that is getting it into the flat.

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Well though the one he's got now, I'm not sure

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how he got it in cause it's quite a big thing.

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So I'm probably what I'll do is perhaps measure that

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chair and try and get one the same kind of size,

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perhaps from second hand shop or something. And it's it's

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not gonna it's it's weird to say this, but it's

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it's not gonna be needed for long. It's it's weird

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to say that out loud. But and I'll ask him

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what he wants to do. He might want to buy

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a brand new chair, and I would, you know. Just

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one thinking of doing is if he does come out

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moving my TV into his flat so he has a

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big TV to watch because he loves watching sport, and

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I'll get all the sports packages that he wants that

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he needs, so that he can pretty much watch whatever

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he wants, and he can still have his other TV

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there as well, which is very quite small, so he

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can watch I'd be like Granddad from Only Fools and

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Horses more than one TV at the same time, So

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that might be something that he'd like. But I am

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thinking of doing that to moving my TV temporarily into

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his flat so he can watch the big TV. Get

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him a new chair or a second end chair, get

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him a new bed. Outside of that, it it's you know,

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it also depends what kind of bed he's gonna need,

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because at some point they're gonna need to have equipment

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in their hoists and he might have to have a

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special bed, you know. So it really I don't know

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at this point it's gonna it's it's just it's a

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it's a guessing game at this point really. But if

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he does come home rather than into a care home,

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then I'm gonna do everything I can to make it

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as comfortable and enjoyable, I suppose as possible so that

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he can have the best time. If that makes any sense,

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I don't know it It kind of makes sense when

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I say it out loud, but at the same time,

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it also seems like a ridiculous thing to say, just

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bearing considering the circumstances. I mean, but anyway, I'll do

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whatever I can to help. He did buy me. He

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bought me a sausage roll and a drink. Today we

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went into Costers and he brought his card down with

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him and he bought He sort of treated me, and

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he really felt good about it. He seemed to really

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be happy about that. And he brought me some chocolates,

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a couple of crunchy bars in wh Smith and he

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got himself a couple of chocolate bars. And he seemed

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in really good spirits today, really quite more energetic. Hm.

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And another thing is we I said to him, well,

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you're gonna want to if you want to come home,

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then we've got to stop taking the lift and I

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have to start using the stairs now, because you need

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to prove to yourself as well as the people here, really,

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but you definitely need to prove to yourself that you

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can do the stairs. So we did walk up and

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down the stairs. It's only two little sets of stairs.

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I mean, there's probably there's more stairs here than it

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is in each little set, so there's probably one and

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a half the amount of stairs steps. So yeah, i'd

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say maybe fifty percent more steps than here. There's not

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a lot there's not a lot of steps here either,

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And he was cool and he did it fine. He's

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a little bit I think he's a bit unsteady on

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his feet anyway, just generally with age. It's a little bit.

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He's a little bit more careful than he used to be.

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But at the same time, I think because he's been

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off his feet pretty much nearly solidly for over two weeks,

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he's you know, he hasn't had that circulation, that blood

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circulation and his legs that we all kind of get

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used to us, suppose when we're walking around a bit,

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and he's and plus he's on medication now, so yeah,

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it's just okay. I don't know how that's going to

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affect him, but it was. It was weird, weird figure

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we figured about it. It was pulling me out the

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way of people that were walking through. So he was.

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He was in a bit of a bossy mood today.

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It was funny. So yeah, that was quite good. I

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just figured, though, if you want to come home, you're

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gonna have to deal with the stairs, so we might

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as well do the stairs now, So when I see

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him next time I see him, we'll do the stairs again.

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If he's able to. I mean, I'm not I'm not

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forcing him. He can't force him to do anything. He

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only does what he wants to do. It just made sense,

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really to test it out for him. And I was

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there with him anyways, who wasn't going to fall And

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there's there's a banister all the way around. So yeah,

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he had signed for dinner today that was awful. It

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was really bad. It was just mush with it was

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supposed to be chicken and potatoes with gravy, and all

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you could see this is white stuff with gravy. And

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he'd had a hot sausage roll about an hour earlier,

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and he fowed me up later on, said I'm so

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thankful we had that sausage roll, because at dinner was awful.

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And even the lady that delivered the sausage roll up

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the nights that delivered the meal, she bought the tray

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in put it on to take the bedside table thing

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you know that they have, and and she she said,

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to uncle's sausages, She said, right, I don't know what

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you're going to think about this really, and she pulled

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the lid off because of a lot of metal lid

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thing pulled that off, the kind of things you see

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in like expensive restaurants that you pull it off. And

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she was on my laughing at the at the plate

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of the contents because she knew it was just wrong.

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She said, well, I'm allowed to be honest, like, wow,

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it was Yeah, it really wasn't good. I mean, I

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don't know what it tastes likes. I didn't eat it.

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It might have been fine, but if you yeah, it

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didn't look great. But then really, he's eating better than

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I am. He's getting he's eating four times a day,

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and they do have the calorie intake in the vitamins.

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They have it all very very well balanced meals as

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I don't know what they taste like. It's been a

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long time since I had a hospital food. I was

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twelve the last time. But yeah, it I'd probably end

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up putting weight on if I was eating four times

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a day cooked food. Well, I suppose breakfast is like cereal,

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but other than that it's cooked, and I was just

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sitting around or in bed, I'd probably put weight on. Yeah, probably,

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which in some situations is possibly needed. With some people.

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Perhaps putting a bit of weight on is a good thing,

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but it wouldn't be a good thing for me. I

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don't need extra weight. Of all the things I need,

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that's not at the top of the list right now,

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what else? Yeah, So that I sit. Really, I'm just

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waiting to see what happens, to find out what's happening

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with him. So at the moment, Uncle Sausages is still

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in hospital, he's I realize this is going to sound weird,

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Like most things I say probably sound weird, but I

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kind of realized what it is about him that kind

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of grabs me a little bit emotionally. And I noticed this.

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I noticed this before, long before he was unwell, but

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I kind of ignored it. But what it is, he's

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got the same smile as my name. His eyes have

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the same smiling eyes as my name had. It's a weird,

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weird thing. I know they say smiling Irish eyes, smiling

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and that, but technically he's Scottish, but he's got the

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same kind of eyes as my name. It's it's weird,

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just as my name had. So maybe that's what it is.

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I kind of just hte it looks at me the

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way my name used to look at me. You know

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that look was at of like, please leave me alone?

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Who are you? How did you get into my house?

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You know that that look? Stop eating all my biscuits? Right,

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So that's an update on there. I did a Q

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and A Friday, and I don't know if you realize

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if you've listened to it or not, it was four

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four and a half hours long. The longest, Yeah, the

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longest recording I've ever done, I think, as in it

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was the whole episode was I think four nineteen minutes,

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nothing else added, just me doing the Q and A Friday.

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It's a long recording very much, so this will not

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be that. This will be a standard standard length recording. Oh,

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I think my I just did some laundry, did some

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laundry yesterday. I did some laundry, all my T shirts

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and my shirts and because I just kind of ran

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out because I didn't go in on Sunday, so I

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did them on Sunday. So I did my laundry. I've

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done my tracksuit bottoms because I've got seven pairs and underwear.

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I've done that now. So it's from the sounds of it,

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it's done. But it's weird because I'm sure I only

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only put it on about an hour ago. It normally

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tastes longer than an hour to finish, but maybe not.

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Maybe it was longer. Maybe Yeah, ah, because I think

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it's eight o'clock now and I put it on about

234
00:19:25.400 --> 00:19:28.440
quarter past six, so that I guess that would make sense.

235
00:19:28.920 --> 00:19:34.799
It's finished now, so I hang them up when I've

236
00:19:34.799 --> 00:19:40.279
done this, and that would pretty much be all the

237
00:19:40.359 --> 00:19:44.599
laundrydone now. And I told Uncle's Sausages that I was

238
00:19:44.680 --> 00:19:49.720
gonna to get some like start washing some of his

239
00:19:49.839 --> 00:19:52.640
stuff because he's got some clothes that have been in

240
00:19:52.680 --> 00:19:56.759
the closet for I don't know how long. So what

241
00:19:56.799 --> 00:20:01.319
I do is I sought through it and maybe wash

242
00:20:01.400 --> 00:20:04.440
it and just so it's there so when he comes

243
00:20:04.480 --> 00:20:08.039
back he can just choose to, you know, wear what

244
00:20:08.079 --> 00:20:11.200
he wants and it will be clean. So that's that's

245
00:20:11.240 --> 00:20:14.000
another thing I'll do. If we do that last, though,

246
00:20:14.480 --> 00:20:22.359
I'll leave that to the last last thing to do. Yeah. Yeah,

247
00:20:23.839 --> 00:20:25.759
he's got a brand new kitchen and they've got a

248
00:20:25.759 --> 00:20:29.759
brand new bathroom that he hasn't even seen yet, and

249
00:20:29.920 --> 00:20:31.880
he saw part of it because they were in the

250
00:20:31.920 --> 00:20:36.599
middle of doing it. I think they just finished the

251
00:20:36.599 --> 00:20:39.039
the first week he had the first week of doing

252
00:20:39.200 --> 00:20:44.839
the bathroom because they started on Tuesday and the Fridays

253
00:20:44.880 --> 00:20:47.440
when he went into hospital, and then he came back

254
00:20:47.480 --> 00:20:50.920
the next week doing stuff and they might have yeah,

255
00:20:51.279 --> 00:20:56.039
so they finished it last week. He didn't get to

256
00:20:56.079 --> 00:21:03.440
see the finished result. And he had a brand new

257
00:21:03.519 --> 00:21:11.799
kitchen done about two months ago, three months ago, and

258
00:21:11.880 --> 00:21:14.160
he's got new windows coming as well in the next

259
00:21:14.200 --> 00:21:24.480
few months. So it's hmmm, you need to get rid

260
00:21:24.480 --> 00:21:27.799
of that wallpaper. I'm not going to, but it's the

261
00:21:27.839 --> 00:21:32.079
wall papers. I think the war paper was there before

262
00:21:32.119 --> 00:21:37.359
he moved in, because I think back in them days

263
00:21:37.480 --> 00:21:41.960
they didn't because when I moved in there everything was bare.

264
00:21:43.880 --> 00:21:45.920
You know, there's nothing in the walls. It was just

265
00:21:46.000 --> 00:21:53.359
white walls, no carpet, no furniture, which I think is

266
00:21:53.400 --> 00:21:57.720
standard anyway. But I think when he moved in, there

267
00:21:57.759 --> 00:22:00.200
was war paper already there and they just left the

268
00:22:00.240 --> 00:22:07.920
wallpaper as it was. And he's lived here for thirty years.

269
00:22:09.000 --> 00:22:14.240
I just thinking, imagine if that's me in twenty five

270
00:22:14.319 --> 00:22:19.119
years and I got a neighbor coming into my flat

271
00:22:20.559 --> 00:22:23.039
looking for my stuff. I mean, I'm not looking for

272
00:22:23.160 --> 00:22:25.680
his stuff, but I had to look for something because

273
00:22:25.680 --> 00:22:29.279
he asked me to look for something. Put money in

274
00:22:29.319 --> 00:22:32.680
there because he asked me, I don't go into people's

275
00:22:32.720 --> 00:22:36.960
homes without them, actually wanted me to do it. And

276
00:22:37.000 --> 00:22:39.559
I told him anytime I goes in, I goes in there,

277
00:22:39.599 --> 00:22:42.839
anytime I go in now and tell him and why.

278
00:22:42.960 --> 00:22:46.319
And he wanted me to look for some money because

279
00:22:46.319 --> 00:22:51.680
he had forty pound in cash. You wanted me to

280
00:22:51.680 --> 00:22:54.759
get through him. It was in a I don't know

281
00:22:54.799 --> 00:22:56.400
where it was. I found. I did find it in

282
00:22:56.440 --> 00:23:04.680
the end. But oh, I can hear a washing machine.

283
00:23:04.759 --> 00:23:11.680
It's doing the old tumble bit, you know, the like

284
00:23:11.720 --> 00:23:16.960
that is that the draining, draining the water out something

285
00:23:17.039 --> 00:23:29.400
like that. Oh, I don't know, summit simula. Raining today

286
00:23:29.680 --> 00:23:36.319
was raining, proper raining. So I got a taxi there

287
00:23:38.240 --> 00:23:40.359
because it was raining. I just didn't want to get wet.

288
00:23:40.839 --> 00:23:46.279
But I got two buses back. So I got the

289
00:23:46.279 --> 00:23:51.400
busses back because I fortnight. This is just getting This

290
00:23:51.480 --> 00:23:54.799
is weird, Okay, this is this is just in trudding myself.

291
00:23:54.880 --> 00:24:01.039
Then the cost of a taxi to the hospital from

292
00:24:01.079 --> 00:24:05.200
where I live and back again, you know, so each

293
00:24:05.359 --> 00:24:15.799
journey either there or the journey back is around seventeen pound.

294
00:24:16.440 --> 00:24:20.559
At the weekend, it was more it's a Saturday, seventeen

295
00:24:20.839 --> 00:24:24.599
sixty and the other person wanted eighteen pound forty or something,

296
00:24:24.680 --> 00:24:28.920
so it varies on a Saturday. But I've just been

297
00:24:28.920 --> 00:24:32.720
given them twenty pound, you know, with a tip, twenty pound.

298
00:24:34.039 --> 00:24:39.680
And I've done that with every single taxi driver up

299
00:24:39.720 --> 00:24:48.839
till today. But today's taxi driver didn't want it. He

300
00:24:48.880 --> 00:24:50.839
wouldn't take it because I was paying on a card

301
00:24:52.400 --> 00:24:57.359
and he said, no, it's seventeen pound and he wouldn't

302
00:24:57.359 --> 00:25:02.440
take a tip. He wasn't. He was like really friendly

303
00:25:02.519 --> 00:25:04.960
taxi driver, but he said he didn't want a tip.

304
00:25:05.200 --> 00:25:11.480
He didn't didn't. It's like, wow, okay, that was surprising

305
00:25:13.720 --> 00:25:16.720
because I've just automatically just said just take twenty pounds

306
00:25:17.559 --> 00:25:21.960
because just I don't know, it just seems the right

307
00:25:22.000 --> 00:25:28.839
thing to do. I'm not even going to work out

308
00:25:28.920 --> 00:25:32.480
how much. Oh Christine, just a big thank you to

309
00:25:32.599 --> 00:25:35.799
Christine for your PayPal gift. Thank you, thank you very much.

310
00:25:37.599 --> 00:25:42.279
I did send a message to you. Thank you. Well.

311
00:25:46.599 --> 00:25:51.200
Oh you know, as we again, a taxi towards the

312
00:25:51.240 --> 00:25:56.119
hospital went round a corner from where I lived, and

313
00:25:56.359 --> 00:25:58.759
the taxi slowed down, and this pigeon was in the

314
00:25:58.759 --> 00:26:01.799
middle of the road, just standing there looking at us.

315
00:26:03.119 --> 00:26:08.240
Had a right attitude, honestly, just like walked very slowly

316
00:26:08.319 --> 00:26:12.720
to the curb. Nothing wrong with it. It was just

317
00:26:15.119 --> 00:26:19.759
really like driver around me, Who do you think you are?

318
00:26:20.960 --> 00:26:26.599
I always here first. This is my manner, real, real

319
00:26:26.720 --> 00:26:31.240
attitude on it. This pigeon, It's like the King of

320
00:26:31.279 --> 00:26:42.400
the Pigeons or something. Yeah, all right, I should do

321
00:26:43.079 --> 00:26:47.720
Monday's boring objects. I've only been talking for half an hour.

322
00:26:48.039 --> 00:26:50.160
I should get on with it, really shouldn't. I you

323
00:26:53.359 --> 00:26:56.839
what have I not talked about though, because I've done

324
00:26:56.960 --> 00:27:00.680
so many of these, is there was so object that

325
00:27:00.759 --> 00:27:05.759
I've not talked about that maybe I could talk about.

326
00:27:10.000 --> 00:27:12.960
I'm going to talk about karate. I know I've talked

327
00:27:12.960 --> 00:27:16.039
about martial arts and different things I've done, but I

328
00:27:16.039 --> 00:27:18.880
want to talk about you. We'll talk about karate, specifically

329
00:27:19.480 --> 00:27:22.640
the karate I did when I was at school and

330
00:27:22.759 --> 00:27:27.480
how I ended up doing it, and because I didn't

331
00:27:27.480 --> 00:27:30.400
do it for long, only a few years or cup

332
00:27:30.480 --> 00:27:33.039
two and a half years or something. But yeah, I'll

333
00:27:33.039 --> 00:27:35.440
go through that. Let's do that. Because I've never really

334
00:27:35.519 --> 00:27:38.920
I don't think I ever well, I probably have, but

335
00:27:39.000 --> 00:27:48.359
I don't recall going in depth into the karate situation,

336
00:27:50.160 --> 00:27:52.319
but saying that I probably have. But I'll do it

337
00:27:52.319 --> 00:27:58.920
again anyway. It'll be different this time. I'll be better.

338
00:28:00.160 --> 00:28:03.319
It'll be different this time. It will work out. Okay,

339
00:28:04.240 --> 00:28:13.960
I've looked for my mistakes, so I don't actually remember

340
00:28:15.599 --> 00:28:20.680
which particularly year it was, but I'm guessing I was

341
00:28:20.799 --> 00:28:27.359
probably thirty. Yeah, thirty would be probably the age where

342
00:28:28.119 --> 00:28:34.680
I because I was in the Secredets from eleven to

343
00:28:35.400 --> 00:28:40.839
for about about twelve and a half in fact, before

344
00:28:40.880 --> 00:28:44.279
I was eleven, and then I left there because I

345
00:28:44.279 --> 00:28:52.039
didn't like it, I started doing karate. So basically what

346
00:28:52.160 --> 00:28:58.039
happened is I was at school with my friend Stephan,

347
00:29:00.079 --> 00:29:03.279
and he was just saying, Oh, I'm going to go

348
00:29:03.319 --> 00:29:05.559
in tonight. I'm going to go and see the karate

349
00:29:06.319 --> 00:29:11.039
because his brother had started doing karate and loved it

350
00:29:11.400 --> 00:29:15.640
so and because his brother was so excited. I think

351
00:29:15.680 --> 00:29:17.920
it's Paul his name was. Because his brother was so

352
00:29:18.000 --> 00:29:22.640
excited enthusiastic in that, Stephan became a little bit interested

353
00:29:23.440 --> 00:29:26.640
because it was his younger brother that was doing it,

354
00:29:26.799 --> 00:29:33.359
like a year younger pretty much. So he said, I'm

355
00:29:33.400 --> 00:29:36.160
going to go because it was in a different high

356
00:29:36.200 --> 00:29:39.519
school to the one that we were going to. There

357
00:29:39.559 --> 00:29:43.039
was two high schools in that town. There was nothing

358
00:29:43.079 --> 00:29:46.000
at our high school those kind of sports or anything.

359
00:29:46.039 --> 00:29:50.079
I don't think, unless, of course there was. I don't

360
00:29:50.119 --> 00:29:52.920
think there was. There might have been. No. I think

361
00:29:52.920 --> 00:29:57.599
that they might have had judo there. I kind of

362
00:29:57.640 --> 00:30:02.000
wish i'd done judo as well. But hey, so it

363
00:30:02.039 --> 00:30:05.480
was on different nights of the week because karate was

364
00:30:05.480 --> 00:30:08.160
a Tuesday Thursday, and I think they had judo on

365
00:30:08.240 --> 00:30:21.559
Monday and Wednesday. So I said to Stephanie, stephan can

366
00:30:21.640 --> 00:30:25.519
I come along. All he was going to do is

367
00:30:25.599 --> 00:30:29.519
go there and just watch the evening. So his brother

368
00:30:29.640 --> 00:30:35.000
was already there. We rolled up. Unless we went I

369
00:30:35.079 --> 00:30:40.160
might have got a lift. I don't even know. I

370
00:30:40.240 --> 00:30:43.440
might got a lift with him with his family and

371
00:30:44.920 --> 00:30:47.359
got dropped off there. Or I might have walked up

372
00:30:47.359 --> 00:30:51.079
there with him and his brother. I really am not sure.

373
00:30:51.400 --> 00:30:53.799
Or I might just rolled up on my own and

374
00:30:53.880 --> 00:30:57.519
him and his brother was already there. It's a little bit,

375
00:30:57.759 --> 00:30:59.880
but he did say it's okay for me to come along.

376
00:31:00.720 --> 00:31:02.720
I know, technically I could do what I wanted, but

377
00:31:03.240 --> 00:31:05.200
you know, it just seems a nice thing to dude,

378
00:31:05.279 --> 00:31:07.519
just to say, you don't mind if I hang along,

379
00:31:09.440 --> 00:31:15.839
because I didn't. The thing is right, I wanted to

380
00:31:15.880 --> 00:31:18.319
do karate when I was a young kid, when I

381
00:31:18.359 --> 00:31:21.200
was younger, when I was like, I asked my dad

382
00:31:21.200 --> 00:31:25.240
and he said no, basically, and this is when I

383
00:31:25.279 --> 00:31:33.799
was twelve eleven. He said no. There was no ifs

384
00:31:33.880 --> 00:31:36.559
or buts, like nope. I don't know why, because he

385
00:31:36.599 --> 00:31:40.039
did judo when he was at school, so I don't

386
00:31:40.079 --> 00:31:44.440
know why he didn't want me to do martial arts. Anyway,

387
00:31:44.559 --> 00:31:47.519
at thirteen, I just did it. I didn't ask him.

388
00:31:47.559 --> 00:31:54.400
I just went along and he so. My friend Stephen

389
00:31:54.599 --> 00:31:59.000
was there. I still kind of remember it. We sat

390
00:32:00.079 --> 00:32:03.079
on these long do you know those long benches they're

391
00:32:03.119 --> 00:32:10.119
having gym gymnasiums. There are long seats like wooden, and

392
00:32:10.200 --> 00:32:14.039
maybe people sit on them when they're watching other people

393
00:32:14.880 --> 00:32:18.960
performing or whatever, doing football or whatever. I don't know,

394
00:32:20.039 --> 00:32:22.880
and sometimes you use them to jump over and stuff.

395
00:32:26.440 --> 00:32:30.640
I kind of can I know what I'm imagining in

396
00:32:30.680 --> 00:32:33.039
my head. I just don't know what the correct term

397
00:32:33.200 --> 00:32:37.920
is for them. Just benches probably probably they call them benches.

398
00:32:39.359 --> 00:32:45.039
And they were all stacked up on the well as

399
00:32:45.079 --> 00:32:50.720
you go into the door of the of the gym,

400
00:32:50.920 --> 00:32:53.880
because it was the big gym in the school. As

401
00:32:53.920 --> 00:32:58.039
you go into the doorway, on the left hand side

402
00:32:58.240 --> 00:33:02.079
was all the benches and the rest of the room,

403
00:33:02.359 --> 00:33:09.160
big old room was used for the karate. So me

404
00:33:09.200 --> 00:33:14.480
and Stephane were sitting on this on the benches, watching

405
00:33:15.440 --> 00:33:17.200
but I didn't even know whose brother was. I don't

406
00:33:17.240 --> 00:33:20.720
think i'd ever met him before, even though I'd been

407
00:33:20.759 --> 00:33:24.839
to school with Stefann right from junior school, so I'd

408
00:33:24.880 --> 00:33:33.119
spent two years at junior school and then well was

409
00:33:33.160 --> 00:33:36.920
it what year would it be? Two thousand and No,

410
00:33:36.960 --> 00:33:50.440
not two thousand, well nineteen eighty No, nineteen seventy nine.

411
00:33:51.119 --> 00:33:55.400
So from nineteen seventy nine to nineteen eighty six I

412
00:33:55.480 --> 00:33:58.039
was at school with Stephan so I knew him that

413
00:33:58.079 --> 00:34:03.279
whole time, and I would say I was pretty good friends.

414
00:34:03.559 --> 00:34:05.880
We never hung out outside of school, but we always

415
00:34:05.920 --> 00:34:09.960
got on really well in school. It's just one of

416
00:34:10.000 --> 00:34:15.639
those things. So anyway, I went along with him. He

417
00:34:15.760 --> 00:34:18.000
was one of the toughest kids in the school in

418
00:34:18.320 --> 00:34:22.880
the year well, in fact, he probably I was best friends.

419
00:34:23.079 --> 00:34:25.960
I was good friends with two of the toughest kids,

420
00:34:26.639 --> 00:34:30.679
Carl and Stephan. They just happened to be I wasn't

421
00:34:30.679 --> 00:34:34.039
friends with him for that reason. They just one. I

422
00:34:34.119 --> 00:34:36.960
was one I was friends with because he was also

423
00:34:37.039 --> 00:34:42.360
in the I guess they used to call it the

424
00:34:42.480 --> 00:34:46.960
dances class, which was wrong. They shouldn't have done that.

425
00:34:47.039 --> 00:34:52.000
But we were taken out. Anyone that was disruptive or

426
00:34:52.320 --> 00:34:56.719
didn't do what they were supposed to do, or showed

427
00:34:56.800 --> 00:35:02.840
no sign of intelligence. In my case, was taken out

428
00:35:02.880 --> 00:35:06.239
of the normal classes and put into this special room

429
00:35:06.280 --> 00:35:10.000
with toys and stuff and we could just do whatever

430
00:35:10.039 --> 00:35:13.920
we wanted for a few hours, and we did do

431
00:35:14.039 --> 00:35:17.880
whatever we wanted. I mean, it's probably fair to say

432
00:35:17.920 --> 00:35:19.800
that we were going to do whatever we wanted anyway,

433
00:35:20.480 --> 00:35:23.880
but we got free reign to do that. And there

434
00:35:23.960 --> 00:35:31.639
was a probably about out of the whole year, yeah,

435
00:35:31.639 --> 00:35:33.480
because I did it by year. Didn't have anyone in

436
00:35:33.519 --> 00:35:36.440
other years in now I don't think so. There's probably

437
00:35:40.119 --> 00:35:42.159
there might have been other people from other years, but

438
00:35:42.559 --> 00:35:46.360
this is in the first year. I think it only

439
00:35:46.400 --> 00:35:50.400
happened in the first year, so we had probably about

440
00:35:54.239 --> 00:36:08.559
I'm trying to remember the people mer Her eight at

441
00:36:08.639 --> 00:36:11.719
least eight people that I could remember. There may have

442
00:36:11.800 --> 00:36:18.920
been sore. There's me. There was a pretty about eight

443
00:36:19.519 --> 00:36:26.079
maybe more of us, three girls and five boys, one

444
00:36:26.119 --> 00:36:28.960
two I don't know, maybe four boys. So there was

445
00:36:29.000 --> 00:36:37.039
about eight, maybe a little bit more. And so I

446
00:36:37.079 --> 00:36:41.760
got to know these people separately from the rest of

447
00:36:41.800 --> 00:36:46.280
the year. And because they were the well I say they,

448
00:36:46.360 --> 00:36:49.800
but they kind of were the most the biggest trouble makers.

449
00:36:50.320 --> 00:36:53.960
Technically they're all okay actually, but they because they didn't

450
00:36:54.320 --> 00:36:56.360
go along with what they were supposed to go along with.

451
00:37:00.159 --> 00:37:05.920
They were classes the rough kids and but they weren't

452
00:37:05.960 --> 00:37:09.840
really they were tough, but they were just just kids

453
00:37:10.719 --> 00:37:13.320
just like me. And so I was in that group.

454
00:37:13.360 --> 00:37:15.159
So I got to know that I kind of became

455
00:37:15.199 --> 00:37:19.840
part of that group. It's the only group I really

456
00:37:19.880 --> 00:37:22.599
became part of. But that was just for the first year,

457
00:37:22.639 --> 00:37:26.920
and after that we all kind of separated, but still,

458
00:37:27.079 --> 00:37:30.360
you know, knew each other and I knew them, and

459
00:37:30.480 --> 00:37:41.480
some of them had known from junior school. Anyway, Anyway,

460
00:37:41.880 --> 00:37:47.199
what was my point mentioning that? Oh yeah, just there

461
00:37:47.239 --> 00:37:52.559
was a point too, I can't remember. So I went

462
00:37:52.639 --> 00:37:57.239
to anyway, Stephan, I went to this to the Crier Club.

463
00:37:58.039 --> 00:38:03.719
It was either Tuesday or or a Thursday evening, and

464
00:38:03.800 --> 00:38:09.920
I think it was seven till nine. I think, or

465
00:38:10.000 --> 00:38:15.920
it might have been seven point thirty till nine. I

466
00:38:15.960 --> 00:38:21.239
don't recall if it was summer or winter, or spring

467
00:38:21.480 --> 00:38:26.639
or autumn. I don't know. It wouldn't have been summer

468
00:38:26.679 --> 00:38:29.840
because they closed during the summer. When the school was closed,

469
00:38:30.559 --> 00:38:35.480
no karate, which meant we would train in a park.

470
00:38:36.159 --> 00:38:38.679
We'd all meet up and train in the park and stuff.

471
00:38:39.760 --> 00:38:46.719
And also half term it was always nice to have

472
00:38:46.760 --> 00:38:50.000
a break, you know, have a bit of a break

473
00:38:50.039 --> 00:39:02.000
from it all. Yeah, so I was there. What was

474
00:39:02.039 --> 00:39:06.480
weird is, first of all, I was impressed. I mean

475
00:39:06.559 --> 00:39:09.400
I spoke. It's obvious cause I I went back, but

476
00:39:10.719 --> 00:39:13.679
I was really impressed at what I saw. But I

477
00:39:13.719 --> 00:39:18.280
also found it funny because there was a really tough

478
00:39:18.360 --> 00:39:23.599
kid there who was the toughest kid in the year

479
00:39:23.599 --> 00:39:27.840
below us, but he was known for every everyone was

480
00:39:27.960 --> 00:39:34.079
kind of he It was. It was like a little

481
00:39:34.159 --> 00:39:38.840
Mike Tyson. That's before Mike Tyson was even famous, you know,

482
00:39:39.000 --> 00:39:43.239
so he was he was doing that. It was basically

483
00:39:43.280 --> 00:39:50.960
a little bit of a terror. And so this would

484
00:39:50.960 --> 00:39:53.480
be in probably the third year school, so I'd known

485
00:39:53.559 --> 00:40:02.880
him for a couple of years or whatever, and he

486
00:40:02.960 --> 00:40:06.880
was there and he looked silly because he was just

487
00:40:06.920 --> 00:40:08.880
starting out, so we didn't know what he was doing.

488
00:40:09.599 --> 00:40:12.159
So I so used to him walking around flexing his

489
00:40:12.280 --> 00:40:19.039
muscles and trying to be a bully boy. And I

490
00:40:19.119 --> 00:40:26.039
saw him and he couldn't even punch properly in karate.

491
00:40:26.360 --> 00:40:28.440
I knew he could punch properly because I'd seen him,

492
00:40:28.679 --> 00:40:30.840
but he was more of a boxer. But the fact

493
00:40:30.880 --> 00:40:34.360
he was doing that, and I just it was quite amusing.

494
00:40:36.000 --> 00:40:37.639
And there's no reason why he would be any good

495
00:40:37.679 --> 00:40:40.920
because he was just starting, and no one's any good

496
00:40:40.920 --> 00:40:44.599
when they just start unless they've done it before. But

497
00:40:44.679 --> 00:40:48.559
it was quite I don't know, just I found it.

498
00:40:48.559 --> 00:40:51.559
It tickled me a little bit. I didn't tell him

499
00:40:51.800 --> 00:41:00.440
because because I'm not silly anyway, he didn't say it,

500
00:41:01.760 --> 00:41:07.239
but he went along. He was best friends with Stephan's brother,

501
00:41:07.800 --> 00:41:12.679
who was also one of the tough kids. The thing

502
00:41:12.800 --> 00:41:15.920
is with Stephan and his brother, they were tough, but

503
00:41:16.000 --> 00:41:23.239
they didn't act tough. They were almost like adults around kids,

504
00:41:24.199 --> 00:41:29.000
you know. They just didn't take any rubbish, and they

505
00:41:28.840 --> 00:41:34.280
they were very physically mature. They were literally like physically

506
00:41:34.320 --> 00:41:39.360
adults before most of the other kids were. And they

507
00:41:39.360 --> 00:41:47.840
were both be glad and they had their mentality was

508
00:41:47.880 --> 00:41:52.679
also quite adult as well, so they weren't really like kids.

509
00:41:52.760 --> 00:41:55.679
He was never Stephan was never like a kid really.

510
00:41:56.360 --> 00:41:59.199
He was also really always had his head on his shoulders,

511
00:42:00.079 --> 00:42:02.880
was very mature. We used to have a good old laugh.

512
00:42:04.159 --> 00:42:08.800
But at the same time he was very intelligent, as

513
00:42:08.840 --> 00:42:12.559
his brother was as well. They sort of they knew

514
00:42:12.559 --> 00:42:17.760
what they wanted to do. And yeah, I remember one once.

515
00:42:17.920 --> 00:42:24.039
I was in the school yard and the year below

516
00:42:25.760 --> 00:42:29.719
so not the year below me, but the year below him.

517
00:42:29.840 --> 00:42:33.079
So two years below this kid who was the toughest

518
00:42:33.119 --> 00:42:35.599
kid in that year and also one of the toughest

519
00:42:35.679 --> 00:42:38.480
kids in the school, they gained another big one and

520
00:42:38.480 --> 00:42:41.679
grew bigger than everyone else in that he jumped on

521
00:42:41.800 --> 00:42:48.159
me and pinned me to the ground. To the ground. Now,

522
00:42:48.199 --> 00:42:51.760
this is when me and Stephan's brother and Stephan we

523
00:42:51.760 --> 00:42:55.960
were doing karate. At this point, Stephane had left, so

524
00:42:56.119 --> 00:42:59.280
I got to know his brother really well from the karate.

525
00:43:01.159 --> 00:43:04.760
So this lad jumped on me and pinned my arms

526
00:43:04.800 --> 00:43:11.719
down and like I probably didn't weigh more than eight

527
00:43:11.840 --> 00:43:15.800
stone at the time, if that, he probably weighed about

528
00:43:18.920 --> 00:43:26.599
twelve thirteen stone. Probably he was a big, big, strong lad. Yeah,

529
00:43:26.679 --> 00:43:29.760
but at least twelve stone, at least four stone heavy

530
00:43:29.840 --> 00:43:35.079
than me. And I didn't know what to do. I mean,

531
00:43:35.119 --> 00:43:37.679
I could like because I was in shock, because I

532
00:43:37.679 --> 00:43:40.039
didn't know who was going to do it. No one

533
00:43:40.079 --> 00:43:42.039
had ever done that to me before, I don't think,

534
00:43:43.400 --> 00:43:51.480
not recently anyway, And I'm like, oh, and then out

535
00:43:51.480 --> 00:43:53.559
of the corner of my eye, well, actually I was

536
00:43:53.599 --> 00:43:55.159
gonna say, I heard out the corner of my eye.

537
00:43:55.159 --> 00:43:57.599
You can't hear how of your eye? Can you? Not

538
00:43:57.639 --> 00:44:02.559
even the corner his voice And it was Stephan's brother

539
00:44:03.280 --> 00:44:05.840
that I was at crete with. He just shouted out,

540
00:44:06.360 --> 00:44:10.119
get off him now, and he did. He just stood up,

541
00:44:10.280 --> 00:44:14.639
sorry and ran off. And that was the toughest kid

542
00:44:14.760 --> 00:44:19.039
in the whole of his year. But as soon as

543
00:44:19.840 --> 00:44:25.039
Paul said get off him, he did. It was weird,

544
00:44:25.400 --> 00:44:28.599
It's like, and both of them were younger than me,

545
00:44:30.280 --> 00:44:34.920
but I was like a little kid. I was so

546
00:44:37.599 --> 00:44:42.639
underdeveloped in a sense. When I left school at fifteen,

547
00:44:42.880 --> 00:44:46.599
I was eight and a half stone. I don't know

548
00:44:46.639 --> 00:44:51.639
what that is in pounds or kilos, but I do

549
00:44:51.760 --> 00:44:54.400
know what it is, Roughly in kilos, it's about fifty

550
00:44:54.480 --> 00:45:02.800
kilos ish. Sixteen stone is around one hundred kilos ish.

551
00:45:03.000 --> 00:45:06.440
So I was around like, I don't know, forty eight kilos,

552
00:45:06.480 --> 00:45:13.800
maybe fifty kilos, which burned in mind. Technically I was

553
00:45:13.800 --> 00:45:16.800
an adult, and I was probably the same weight when

554
00:45:16.840 --> 00:45:23.800
I was sixteen seventeen. I might got I think I

555
00:45:23.840 --> 00:45:27.360
went up to about nine stone when I was about eighteen,

556
00:45:28.400 --> 00:45:34.800
like you know, so I was very light, really reached

557
00:45:35.000 --> 00:45:40.079
super slim, but naturally didn't matter. Whatever I ate didn't

558
00:45:40.079 --> 00:45:44.360
make a difference. I just was slim, you know, just

559
00:45:44.360 --> 00:45:49.280
the way it was. And I looked nothing like my

560
00:45:49.360 --> 00:45:57.000
dad physically, because my dad's strong, broad, big bloke always was.

561
00:45:59.239 --> 00:46:06.199
But then in older age, once I hit thirty, I

562
00:46:06.280 --> 00:46:10.800
kind of almost grew into my father, and now I

563
00:46:10.840 --> 00:46:14.519
got the same and shape body as him. It's weird,

564
00:46:14.519 --> 00:46:16.760
isn't it. I don't quite show how. It's like it

565
00:46:16.800 --> 00:46:21.079
was always there. I just didn't like the bones were there,

566
00:46:21.079 --> 00:46:24.239
but there was no There was no fat. I didn't

567
00:46:24.239 --> 00:46:26.519
have any fat on me at all when I was

568
00:46:26.559 --> 00:46:30.079
in my twenties, which is probably a good thing. You know.

569
00:46:30.320 --> 00:46:43.480
My BMI was probably like minus zero fat and then thirty. Yeah,

570
00:46:43.559 --> 00:46:52.320
well that's that's a whole new ball game. Yeah. Anyway,

571
00:46:52.480 --> 00:46:54.760
so that was weird. So so I went to it.

572
00:46:54.800 --> 00:46:57.280
So I went there the very first night of karate.

573
00:46:58.760 --> 00:47:00.440
I fell in love with the place. I fell in

574
00:47:00.519 --> 00:47:06.519
love with everything about it. Bearing in mind, I've loved

575
00:47:06.559 --> 00:47:12.320
martial arts since I was a little kid, from age

576
00:47:12.360 --> 00:47:18.400
of seven, having that picture of Bruce Lee on my

577
00:47:18.559 --> 00:47:21.519
wall in my little room, my very first room I

578
00:47:21.559 --> 00:47:24.559
ever had of my own, and a picture of Bruce

579
00:47:24.639 --> 00:47:30.920
Lee from Met a Dragon. From that, you know, from

580
00:47:30.920 --> 00:47:34.000
that moment on, I had to discover who he was.

581
00:47:34.079 --> 00:47:41.079
And I loved martial arts and kung fu the TV

582
00:47:41.199 --> 00:47:45.400
show was on. I mean, that was probably the closest

583
00:47:45.400 --> 00:47:47.800
thing I really got to see martial arts at that time,

584
00:47:49.360 --> 00:47:51.840
and there was very little kung fu in it, but

585
00:47:52.199 --> 00:47:54.840
when it was in it, it was the most exciting

586
00:47:54.840 --> 00:48:01.840
thing in the world. I loved it, absolutely loved it.

587
00:48:02.000 --> 00:48:07.679
So I kind of just you know this, this was

588
00:48:07.719 --> 00:48:13.920
like I'm home, I'm home, baby. But at the same time,

589
00:48:14.079 --> 00:48:20.079
I was nervous because it's new, But I was less

590
00:48:20.159 --> 00:48:25.519
nervous because I was with Stephan and he was joining

591
00:48:25.559 --> 00:48:28.880
with me, so I was kind of okay with that

592
00:48:28.920 --> 00:48:31.920
because I wasn't on my own. So we both went

593
00:48:32.000 --> 00:48:34.960
back the next even if it was if it was

594
00:48:35.000 --> 00:48:37.599
a Tuesday that we went, then we both went back

595
00:48:37.639 --> 00:48:41.719
on a Thursday night. If it was a Thursday night

596
00:48:41.800 --> 00:48:44.159
that we went to watch that, we both went back

597
00:48:44.360 --> 00:48:49.800
on the following Tuesday night. And we just had some

598
00:48:49.880 --> 00:48:53.840
tracksuit bottoms and a T shirt. Because I don't give you.

599
00:48:53.840 --> 00:48:57.079
You don't get a gee straight away. You kind of

600
00:48:57.639 --> 00:48:59.480
see how you get on and if you do like it,

601
00:48:59.519 --> 00:49:05.000
then you pay. We paid Paul was his name, the

602
00:49:05.039 --> 00:49:13.119
sense at the teacher. He got the gey's and across

603
00:49:13.199 --> 00:49:16.039
like twenty quid or fifteen cred or twelve quid, I

604
00:49:16.039 --> 00:49:19.440
don't know how much it was back then. And there'd

605
00:49:19.440 --> 00:49:23.000
be a white belt and a gee which was a

606
00:49:23.119 --> 00:49:27.440
white like white trousers and a white top made of

607
00:49:28.320 --> 00:49:33.280
flannel kind of material. I think it might not be flannel,

608
00:49:33.280 --> 00:49:39.079
but it was white. And I do actually, I do

609
00:49:39.920 --> 00:49:43.239
have a picture of myself in my g my karate

610
00:49:43.320 --> 00:49:54.119
costume from when I was fourteen. It's in a photograph

611
00:49:54.239 --> 00:50:00.719
album that my dad and stepmom put together few years

612
00:50:00.719 --> 00:50:04.880
back just before just yeah, about two thousand and twenty

613
00:50:04.920 --> 00:50:10.800
two and there's a picture of me. I might have

614
00:50:10.840 --> 00:50:22.559
even have my nunchucks on me possibly, wow, So it's strange.

615
00:50:22.679 --> 00:50:24.519
There's also a picture of me and my SI Caredet

616
00:50:24.599 --> 00:50:30.360
costume as well. So that's the kind of I think

617
00:50:30.440 --> 00:50:35.199
my dad was. He liked me being in the CIC Caredets.

618
00:50:37.239 --> 00:50:40.000
I don't think he was interested in me being in karate.

619
00:50:40.920 --> 00:50:43.960
It didn't really suit what he wanted for me. I don't.

620
00:50:44.239 --> 00:50:47.599
I don't quite know why. Actually, even as an adult,

621
00:50:47.920 --> 00:50:51.320
when I told him I started doing kung fu or

622
00:50:52.000 --> 00:50:59.559
boxing or what did I do? Kind of remember what

623
00:50:59.559 --> 00:51:09.239
I've done? What did I do? Another thing I did?

624
00:51:09.239 --> 00:51:11.119
Like it's got out of my head now, but I've

625
00:51:11.119 --> 00:51:14.079
done a few different martial arts and stuff, and every

626
00:51:14.119 --> 00:51:15.480
time I told him, he's like, oh, what are you

627
00:51:15.480 --> 00:51:18.360
doing that for? Can you find something else a bit

628
00:51:18.440 --> 00:51:24.840
less violent? Like it's not violent, it's it's just fun

629
00:51:25.880 --> 00:51:30.400
kicking and punching is it's a sport. It's just controlled.

630
00:51:31.480 --> 00:51:34.880
And although I can't do it anymore, I can't do

631
00:51:34.960 --> 00:51:38.159
the kicking taekwon do. That's what I was trying to

632
00:51:38.199 --> 00:51:41.440
think of. That's the last thing I did, or I

633
00:51:41.440 --> 00:51:44.880
did try and give jiu jitsu a go. I just

634
00:51:44.920 --> 00:51:52.199
don't have the bending capacity to do that anymore. It's yeah,

635
00:51:52.239 --> 00:51:59.320
it's just not physically up my road anymore, unfortunately. But

636
00:52:00.440 --> 00:52:02.320
there still know a few little moves that I can

637
00:52:02.360 --> 00:52:06.840
do if needed. So I think, if anything, i'd like

638
00:52:06.960 --> 00:52:11.519
to if I was going to go back to something boxing.

639
00:52:13.159 --> 00:52:16.159
The problem is because of my age. It's not a

640
00:52:16.199 --> 00:52:19.760
problem for me because I know I can. I can't

641
00:52:19.800 --> 00:52:29.039
do all like the super exercisey bit cardiovascular. I could

642
00:52:29.079 --> 00:52:31.719
do some of it, but you know, that's something I

643
00:52:31.800 --> 00:52:34.639
kind of have to be careful with. Just take it easy,

644
00:52:34.880 --> 00:52:40.880
take it slowly. But punching a bag or punching someone

645
00:52:40.920 --> 00:52:43.960
with their holding the midst up and punching the pads

646
00:52:44.000 --> 00:52:50.440
and stuff is something that would be fun. But unfortunately,

647
00:52:51.159 --> 00:52:54.719
when I went to the the amateur boxing club in

648
00:52:54.760 --> 00:52:57.840
about two thousand and nine, when I was at university,

649
00:52:58.639 --> 00:53:01.119
I went along to the local AID, which is the

650
00:53:01.159 --> 00:53:08.039
Amateur Boxing Association. They let me go. I was pretty

651
00:53:08.119 --> 00:53:12.360
much the oldest person there. I was pretty much one

652
00:53:12.400 --> 00:53:15.519
of the only adults there, so that wasn't I didn't

653
00:53:15.599 --> 00:53:20.440
like that. Actually, I wanted to be around, not bothered

654
00:53:20.440 --> 00:53:23.639
that there was kids there, but I'd rather have adults

655
00:53:23.639 --> 00:53:29.239
around me, just because I just don't look so silly,

656
00:53:30.119 --> 00:53:34.719
you know, because if you've got adults doing martial arts,

657
00:53:34.800 --> 00:53:38.440
you don't have people watching, you don't have families watching.

658
00:53:40.480 --> 00:53:43.320
But because there's so many kids there, a lot of

659
00:53:43.320 --> 00:53:46.440
their parents were sitting in the sidelines watching, and I'm

660
00:53:46.480 --> 00:53:49.599
sure they were laughing at me. If they weren't, they

661
00:53:49.599 --> 00:53:53.159
should have been, because I'd have a T shirt on

662
00:53:53.360 --> 00:53:58.840
and within about five minutes it would be soaked through.

663
00:54:00.599 --> 00:54:02.840
I lost a bit away of doing it. I did

664
00:54:02.840 --> 00:54:09.400
put on some muscle in that, but I just absolutely soaked.

665
00:54:10.559 --> 00:54:16.320
But I enjoyed it. But I kept injuring myself they

666
00:54:16.360 --> 00:54:19.639
wouldn't let me spa. That's the thing that kind of

667
00:54:19.639 --> 00:54:22.320
annoyed me a little bit. And I understand, of course

668
00:54:22.320 --> 00:54:25.760
I'm not going to spire a little kid, but a

669
00:54:25.760 --> 00:54:28.400
lot of those kids, especially some of them were as

670
00:54:28.400 --> 00:54:32.000
big as I was or tall wise, anyway, they would

671
00:54:32.039 --> 00:54:33.880
have just boxed my head off. I wouldn't have stood

672
00:54:33.920 --> 00:54:37.360
a chance because they would have just out boxed me.

673
00:54:37.519 --> 00:54:43.360
I wouldn't be able to catch them, even though because

674
00:54:43.400 --> 00:54:47.960
I was too old, I wasn't allowed legally for them

675
00:54:48.360 --> 00:54:52.599
to be sparring, and I'd been okay just to stand

676
00:54:52.639 --> 00:54:57.119
there and not do anything, just move around the ring

677
00:54:57.480 --> 00:54:59.920
and block the punches if I could, and not throw

678
00:55:00.039 --> 00:55:03.920
any punches, just to be a target almost. That would

679
00:55:03.920 --> 00:55:07.360
have been fun for me. But they didn't even do that.

680
00:55:08.599 --> 00:55:11.280
And that's quite a good opportunity, isn't it to have

681
00:55:11.280 --> 00:55:14.559
have someone running jumping around. Because there was some lads

682
00:55:14.639 --> 00:55:17.159
there that were a much bigger than me, like six

683
00:55:17.320 --> 00:55:25.480
six two six three on five eight, so you know, technically,

684
00:55:25.880 --> 00:55:29.280
and they add something with young sort of late teens

685
00:55:29.320 --> 00:55:34.880
that were you know, really well adults really, so I

686
00:55:34.920 --> 00:55:37.719
could have happily just got in the ring with them

687
00:55:37.760 --> 00:55:41.119
and danced around a little bit and tried to avoid

688
00:55:41.119 --> 00:55:44.159
them punching me. I don't I'm not saying I wanted

689
00:55:44.159 --> 00:55:46.760
to be a punch bag, but it would have been

690
00:55:47.440 --> 00:55:55.039
a bit of fun, I don't know, just stuff. But

691
00:55:55.079 --> 00:56:00.760
they wouldn't wouldn't let me, And that's really I mean.

692
00:56:03.239 --> 00:56:07.079
I think if anyone goes to boxing, anyone starts boxing,

693
00:56:07.679 --> 00:56:10.719
I think they're probably telling FIBs if they say that

694
00:56:10.800 --> 00:56:12.639
they don't care whether or not they get to spa.

695
00:56:15.639 --> 00:56:18.639
I think most people that go to boxing want to spa.

696
00:56:19.159 --> 00:56:21.920
It's kind of the point of the whole thing is

697
00:56:25.280 --> 00:56:28.559
being able to put it into action in a safe environment.

698
00:56:33.400 --> 00:56:37.519
And I didn't get a chance, mind you. I did

699
00:56:37.599 --> 00:56:39.760
do boxing when I was at school for the thing.

700
00:56:39.840 --> 00:56:45.119
I went once or twice, and they didn't have any rules.

701
00:56:45.440 --> 00:56:49.079
There was like few sit ups, few press ups, go

702
00:56:49.239 --> 00:56:51.840
on the punch bag, and then start sparring with each other.

703
00:56:52.840 --> 00:56:55.039
And I ended up with this. Bearing in mind, I

704
00:56:55.079 --> 00:56:58.480
was like quite little. I ended up with someone that

705
00:56:58.679 --> 00:57:05.039
was probably a good six six for six two and

706
00:57:05.519 --> 00:57:10.239
twice twice my height and twice my weight rather and

707
00:57:10.320 --> 00:57:12.920
it just kept punching me in the head like I

708
00:57:12.960 --> 00:57:17.960
couldn't like, can you just stop punching me please, which

709
00:57:18.000 --> 00:57:20.199
of course you can't really say when it comes down

710
00:57:20.239 --> 00:57:23.760
to boxing, please stop that. Could you just stop, give

711
00:57:23.760 --> 00:57:26.400
me a chance let me punch you, because it wouldn't

712
00:57:27.960 --> 00:57:32.639
so it can't put me off a little bit. Why

713
00:57:32.679 --> 00:57:41.559
did you stop doing boxing? Kept punching me? Yeah, pretty much. So.

714
00:57:41.679 --> 00:57:44.880
I can't remember the first time I went to karate

715
00:57:45.360 --> 00:57:50.679
as in the first lesson, but I know that I

716
00:57:50.719 --> 00:57:56.039
went every single Tuesday and Thursday. I had a pay

717
00:57:56.159 --> 00:58:00.960
per round. I think I had an early morning paper

718
00:58:01.039 --> 00:58:05.400
round at this point, so that's what paid for the

719
00:58:05.480 --> 00:58:15.760
karate and a few things, a few standout moments of

720
00:58:15.920 --> 00:58:20.880
going to that create club during those years. The first

721
00:58:20.920 --> 00:58:26.320
thing is every single grading I attended, I got a

722
00:58:26.360 --> 00:58:32.199
first class pass. That isn't the highest you can skip

723
00:58:32.199 --> 00:58:36.760
a grade. That's what Stephan's brother because we both had

724
00:58:36.760 --> 00:58:42.440
our first Yeah, we both had our first grade in

725
00:58:42.519 --> 00:58:45.239
at the same time because he had literally just started

726
00:58:45.679 --> 00:58:50.639
I think the week before I did, and he skipped

727
00:58:50.760 --> 00:58:52.960
right away through to the next belt because he was

728
00:58:53.000 --> 00:58:56.400
so good straight away. But I did get a first

729
00:58:56.400 --> 00:59:01.880
class passed, so that was okay. The weird thing about

730
00:59:01.920 --> 00:59:04.440
it though, because we did I did I think two

731
00:59:04.679 --> 00:59:11.480
possibly three contests competitions, and I didn't win. I I

732
00:59:11.519 --> 00:59:15.760
didn't win any awards or any prizes, but I did

733
00:59:15.800 --> 00:59:24.079
win a couple of fights. The like Stephan's brother, he

734
00:59:24.280 --> 00:59:29.440
was bearing in mind he was yeah, he was fourteen,

735
00:59:29.679 --> 00:59:33.079
so it was younger than me, so thirteen, let's say

736
00:59:33.800 --> 00:59:37.800
it's thirteen years old. They put him in with another

737
00:59:37.840 --> 00:59:48.239
thirteen year old. The size difference was ridiculous, and the

738
00:59:49.079 --> 00:59:53.639
other kid just started crying and there was a lot

739
00:59:53.639 --> 00:59:58.599
of cafore before kafore whatever about it. Parents saying, what

740
00:59:58.679 --> 01:00:00.599
have you put my kid in with a adult for

741
01:00:01.519 --> 01:00:03.599
and all this stuff, and they said, he's not an adult.

742
01:00:03.599 --> 01:00:08.519
It's thirteen. He can't be thirteen. He's bigger than me,

743
01:00:09.800 --> 01:00:14.880
and there was all that, but he was thirteen. I

744
01:00:14.920 --> 01:00:18.599
think it's a little They should have weight categories. They

745
01:00:18.599 --> 01:00:22.039
were just doing it by age. But with adults they

746
01:00:22.119 --> 01:00:24.280
do it by weight. With the kids, they were just

747
01:00:24.280 --> 01:00:27.440
doing it by age. That was a little bit didn't

748
01:00:27.440 --> 01:00:32.719
really seem very fair to put someone who probably weighed well,

749
01:00:34.719 --> 01:00:38.000
this thirteen year old he probably it was about my

750
01:00:38.119 --> 01:00:41.280
size because I was about the size of a thirteen

751
01:00:41.320 --> 01:00:45.280
year old, so it's about my size. So it's a

752
01:00:45.280 --> 01:00:49.159
lot littler than this other kid who was probably at

753
01:00:49.199 --> 01:00:57.559
that time twelve stone if not more. So. Yeah, he won,

754
01:00:57.800 --> 01:01:00.119
he won his category, but there was a lot of

755
01:01:02.599 --> 01:01:11.800
a lot of neshing of teeth. He won a trophy.

756
01:01:12.559 --> 01:01:15.000
He was just naturally good. He just he took to

757
01:01:15.079 --> 01:01:23.960
it so quickly. It was, yeah, very very good. Stephan.

758
01:01:25.599 --> 01:01:27.639
He stayed for a while and then he stopped going.

759
01:01:28.800 --> 01:01:31.079
I never really he just I don't think he didn't

760
01:01:31.079 --> 01:01:34.559
want to do it anymore. He'd lost interest, which is

761
01:01:34.639 --> 01:01:36.360
you know, I was still friends with him, I just

762
01:01:37.119 --> 01:01:40.320
but I liked it when he was coming because during

763
01:01:40.360 --> 01:01:43.079
break times we were practiced doing karate with each other,

764
01:01:43.559 --> 01:01:46.639
going down the hallway. And a good thing about it

765
01:01:46.719 --> 01:01:49.559
is if I'd done it, if anyone else, I could

766
01:01:49.599 --> 01:01:51.679
have had other lads coming up to me and give

767
01:01:51.760 --> 01:01:54.000
me a hard time. Because I was doing it the

768
01:01:54.079 --> 01:01:56.599
toughest kid in one of the toughest kids in the school,

769
01:01:56.719 --> 01:01:59.400
and the toughest kid in the year. No one gave

770
01:01:59.440 --> 01:02:02.239
us a hard time, so it was quite cool. So

771
01:02:02.280 --> 01:02:05.920
we were like kicking each other and blocking and running

772
01:02:05.960 --> 01:02:09.760
around and it was brilliant. And then he stopped. He

773
01:02:09.840 --> 01:02:14.320
stopped going. It's not about being me embarrassing him or something.

774
01:02:14.400 --> 01:02:19.960
I don't know, so, but you know, we're still still friends.

775
01:02:19.960 --> 01:02:22.480
He just he didn't want to go anymore. So I

776
01:02:22.599 --> 01:02:29.000
continued because I loved karate. It was my life. Within

777
01:02:29.039 --> 01:02:35.199
a week, it was my entire life. There was nothing

778
01:02:36.440 --> 01:02:40.760
more important than karate to me in the entire world.

779
01:02:41.880 --> 01:02:46.039
Everything else was just in the background, a bit of

780
01:02:46.039 --> 01:02:55.239
a blur. And it was my new special interest above

781
01:02:55.280 --> 01:03:05.559
everything else. My previous special interest was I was very

782
01:03:05.679 --> 01:03:08.280
very into This is going to sound a bit weird.

783
01:03:08.440 --> 01:03:12.920
Bearing in mind I was like eleven, I didn't I

784
01:03:12.960 --> 01:03:17.519
never liked the see Caredets. I just went there when

785
01:03:17.559 --> 01:03:20.719
I was ten because I was there before. I wasn't

786
01:03:20.760 --> 01:03:22.639
even old enough to be there, but they let me

787
01:03:22.679 --> 01:03:25.079
go along because there was only a couple of months

788
01:03:25.079 --> 01:03:30.840
before my eleventh birthday, and I just didn't want to

789
01:03:30.880 --> 01:03:34.599
go home. I just wanted to go somewhere else. So

790
01:03:35.280 --> 01:03:37.199
me and my friend went there and we joined up,

791
01:03:37.239 --> 01:03:41.320
and it was just nice to I was never really

792
01:03:41.440 --> 01:03:47.000
particularly good at fitting in, and I think when you

793
01:03:47.239 --> 01:03:52.639
join a group, even if you don't fit in, you

794
01:03:52.760 --> 01:03:55.360
are still part of the group. So you might be

795
01:03:55.960 --> 01:03:58.199
like an odd ball in the group, or made they

796
01:03:58.239 --> 01:04:00.760
say me, I talk about myself. I was an odd

797
01:04:00.800 --> 01:04:06.280
ball in the Cycadets, but I was still one of them.

798
01:04:06.480 --> 01:04:13.000
I still wore the CC uniform. Yeah, that motorbike is

799
01:04:13.039 --> 01:04:18.119
in the garden just behind us. Way too late. Was

800
01:04:18.159 --> 01:04:23.119
it nearly nine o'clock? It's quarter past nine a motorbike.

801
01:04:25.280 --> 01:04:27.800
I never used to be this moning, you know, I didn't,

802
01:04:30.079 --> 01:04:34.679
So I think that's part of the reason. Another reason

803
01:04:34.679 --> 01:04:36.800
I kind of I didn't like it, but I felt

804
01:04:38.400 --> 01:04:41.360
a part of something when I was in the cy Caredets,

805
01:04:41.599 --> 01:04:45.800
as I did want to join the karate club. I

806
01:04:45.880 --> 01:04:52.679
preferred the karate club membership side of it because I

807
01:04:52.760 --> 01:04:57.360
was around adults as well as kids, and I respected

808
01:04:57.400 --> 01:05:01.199
all of the adults well, apart from one who he

809
01:05:01.280 --> 01:05:04.480
wasn't he was an adult. He was probably eighteen, but

810
01:05:04.559 --> 01:05:10.280
he was. It was a bit of a div really,

811
01:05:10.599 --> 01:05:13.480
that's a nice word for him. He used to try

812
01:05:13.519 --> 01:05:16.679
and bully me when we were sparring. He'd kicked me,

813
01:05:16.800 --> 01:05:20.719
and he was like good six foot five, like really tall,

814
01:05:21.679 --> 01:05:24.559
and he was a brown belt, so he got his

815
01:05:24.599 --> 01:05:27.639
black belt as well, so he was very really good

816
01:05:28.400 --> 01:05:30.079
at what he did. He was one of the top

817
01:05:30.639 --> 01:05:33.800
karate people in there. But for some reason he enjoyed

818
01:05:35.159 --> 01:05:39.079
kicking me over on the floor and I got a

819
01:05:39.079 --> 01:05:43.559
bit fed up with it, so I just I started

820
01:05:43.599 --> 01:05:47.760
hurting him. What do you mean you hurt him? I

821
01:05:47.800 --> 01:05:51.119
mean he was so big. So the good thing about

822
01:05:51.119 --> 01:05:54.800
it is I could punch him in the stomach and

823
01:05:55.039 --> 01:05:58.760
accidentally miss his stomach and he'd be on the floor.

824
01:05:59.800 --> 01:06:02.800
So I did that a few times, or i'd hurt

825
01:06:02.800 --> 01:06:06.639
his leg and he started to kind of back down

826
01:06:06.679 --> 01:06:09.280
a little bit with me. He didn't sort of take

827
01:06:09.360 --> 01:06:13.360
so many liberties, as it were, but he seemed to

828
01:06:13.400 --> 01:06:16.079
really enjoy just tripping me up and kicking me over,

829
01:06:16.159 --> 01:06:18.519
and no one else did that. It was the only

830
01:06:18.599 --> 01:06:21.920
person who did it. Everyone else treated me with respect,

831
01:06:22.920 --> 01:06:30.239
including the adults. They always like the the instructor. He

832
01:06:30.280 --> 01:06:34.159
seemed to really like me, and it pushed me, but

833
01:06:34.239 --> 01:06:37.840
it would never ever hurt me. Let's face it, he

834
01:06:37.880 --> 01:06:40.480
could in a second have hurt me, but he didn't.

835
01:06:42.679 --> 01:06:46.000
And that's I respected that because that's kind of what

836
01:06:46.039 --> 01:06:48.679
I think the other lad should have done because he

837
01:06:48.719 --> 01:06:52.719
was an adult compared to me. It was eighteen, so

838
01:06:52.840 --> 01:06:55.760
technic key, I suppose he was an adult. He was

839
01:06:55.800 --> 01:06:59.559
in sixth form college, I think, or maybe left left

840
01:06:59.599 --> 01:07:04.679
his left sixth form college. I don't know, but he

841
01:07:04.800 --> 01:07:07.480
was just yeah, but I don't think he did it

842
01:07:07.519 --> 01:07:11.280
with anyone else. I don't know. Maybe he fancied me,

843
01:07:11.360 --> 01:07:16.239
I don't know, who knows. Maybe he's a way of flirting.

844
01:07:18.000 --> 01:07:21.119
But yeah, that's a few low punches and that kind

845
01:07:21.119 --> 01:07:24.800
of sort of downt I'd say a few, quite a few.

846
01:07:28.079 --> 01:07:38.280
Oh I did it again? Sorry, hmmm. I A few

847
01:07:38.320 --> 01:07:47.639
standout moments. Nice memories would be when one of the

848
01:07:47.679 --> 01:07:50.840
older men, I say older, it was old to me,

849
01:07:51.039 --> 01:07:57.280
probably in his twenties, to be fair, it's probably yeah, twenties. Yeah,

850
01:07:57.320 --> 01:08:03.039
in his twenties. I thought he was like old. Maybe

851
01:08:03.079 --> 01:08:08.000
he was late twenties. He was getting married, and he

852
01:08:08.119 --> 01:08:12.760
asked me and another of the young ones like me

853
01:08:13.639 --> 01:08:19.520
to go to his wedding in our geese cos you know,

854
01:08:19.600 --> 01:08:24.479
karate uniforms and stand as they walked out of the

855
01:08:24.560 --> 01:08:31.399
church after getting married. So we were standing outside. They

856
01:08:31.439 --> 01:08:37.680
had a cameraman filming or yeah, or taking pictures or whatever.

857
01:08:38.319 --> 01:08:43.520
As the newly married couple came out, and me and

858
01:08:43.560 --> 01:08:49.079
another lad were holding the swords above basically at the

859
01:08:49.239 --> 01:08:53.279
entrance or the exit of the church, just high enough

860
01:08:53.279 --> 01:08:57.800
so they could just walk through, of course, And I

861
01:08:58.319 --> 01:09:01.359
found it funny. For all, if I slip cut his

862
01:09:01.439 --> 01:09:04.600
head off, that would be funny. It won't go down

863
01:09:04.720 --> 01:09:09.279
very well. But it didn't happen, clearly, Otherwise I probably wouldn't.

864
01:09:09.880 --> 01:09:14.680
My whole life would have been different, wouldn't it. But

865
01:09:15.279 --> 01:09:18.359
how amazing. I'd love to see that picture. I never

866
01:09:18.399 --> 01:09:20.760
got to see the picture unless I did, and I

867
01:09:20.800 --> 01:09:26.079
forgot and I got to see it. How cool is that?

868
01:09:27.960 --> 01:09:32.079
Got to just be a how many people get married

869
01:09:32.079 --> 01:09:36.119
and walk out to two people holding swords? I mean,

870
01:09:36.119 --> 01:09:39.239
I suppose the royal family do. But yeah, it was

871
01:09:39.479 --> 01:09:45.680
really cool and it was just really It was also

872
01:09:45.760 --> 01:09:50.039
cool that he asked me and the other lad I

873
01:09:50.920 --> 01:09:56.000
forget who was, but just like, out of all of us,

874
01:09:56.560 --> 01:10:00.640
I got to do it. So cool. Honestly, that was brilliant.

875
01:10:01.640 --> 01:10:05.960
And I think I used to go up to the

876
01:10:06.039 --> 01:10:08.840
cry contests with him, so I suppose you got to

877
01:10:08.880 --> 01:10:16.439
know me a little bit. What else? I used to

878
01:10:16.479 --> 01:10:19.600
love the sparring Apart from with that, you know, the

879
01:10:20.079 --> 01:10:26.279
big lanky, six foot nine bully boy. I didn't enjoy that,

880
01:10:26.520 --> 01:10:31.920
but everyone else I enjoyed sparring with. It was fun.

881
01:10:32.000 --> 01:10:34.279
I loved the spirring. That was kind of the whole

882
01:10:34.279 --> 01:10:38.840
point really is to practice what you're learning, is practice

883
01:10:38.880 --> 01:10:40.920
the blocking and the kicking and a punch in the

884
01:10:41.880 --> 01:10:51.680
sweeping and all that stuff. And we sparred every single time.

885
01:10:52.760 --> 01:10:55.680
So half the night or half the evening was based

886
01:10:55.720 --> 01:11:01.319
on practicing drills, practicing not drills as in not that

887
01:11:01.479 --> 01:11:06.640
kind of drill, and practicing the form, practicing kicks, punches,

888
01:11:06.680 --> 01:11:10.479
stuff like that. And then the next part of the

889
01:11:10.520 --> 01:11:13.720
evening was spiring, so it would all stand up in

890
01:11:13.760 --> 01:11:16.760
a line facing each other, so that if there was

891
01:11:16.840 --> 01:11:20.840
like there's twenty of us, there'd be one line of

892
01:11:21.600 --> 01:11:26.199
ten people all facing each other, and then they would

893
01:11:26.199 --> 01:11:29.359
spile with that person. We'd have pads on her hands,

894
01:11:29.479 --> 01:11:33.680
pads on her feet. I didn't have any pads on

895
01:11:33.720 --> 01:11:37.319
the head, didn't have a gum shield or anything like that.

896
01:11:37.439 --> 01:11:40.199
Oh yeah, pads on the groin. I probably didn't really

897
01:11:40.239 --> 01:11:43.880
need it, but you know, I had it anyway. And

898
01:11:44.880 --> 01:11:48.319
if you get a good old punch, it doesn't stop it,

899
01:11:48.439 --> 01:11:54.239
as I found out when I did the Punch Days,

900
01:11:54.319 --> 01:12:02.119
and it was so much fun, just punching and kicking

901
01:12:02.159 --> 01:12:04.479
each other. It was great. And the thing is I

902
01:12:04.479 --> 01:12:07.760
could hardly reach anyone's head anyway, because everyone everyone was

903
01:12:07.800 --> 01:12:13.239
taller than me, apart from those that weren't, and they

904
01:12:13.359 --> 01:12:18.880
generally were a fair bit younger. Because I started, Yeah,

905
01:12:18.880 --> 01:12:23.880
I think you could start twelve in the Create Club.

906
01:12:23.920 --> 01:12:27.880
That was their limit, that was their oldest was twelve.

907
01:12:31.119 --> 01:12:34.399
So I remember the spa and that was great, which

908
01:12:34.399 --> 01:12:37.319
brings me on to my next thing. Of the most

909
01:12:38.039 --> 01:12:44.760
I actually changed the Create Club, and I'm never going

910
01:12:44.840 --> 01:12:47.640
to be remembered for it, that's the funny thing about it.

911
01:12:47.680 --> 01:12:53.159
But I changed the direction of that club because my

912
01:12:53.239 --> 01:13:04.960
little brother was Burh would be eighty five, so he

913
01:13:05.000 --> 01:13:11.960
would have been seven. My little brother was interested in

914
01:13:12.000 --> 01:13:16.119
doing karate, and I kept asking if he could come along,

915
01:13:16.560 --> 01:13:21.720
and Paul, the instructor, said no, not till he's twelve.

916
01:13:22.720 --> 01:13:25.800
Can't do it. Won't do it, can't do it, won't

917
01:13:25.840 --> 01:13:29.920
do it. And then I said to him one night

918
01:13:29.920 --> 01:13:34.319
and said, well, why don't we do a separate one,

919
01:13:34.640 --> 01:13:41.000
like on a Saturday, like a completely separate thing. You

920
01:13:41.000 --> 01:13:42.800
can have you, you know, coming on a Saturday and

921
01:13:42.840 --> 01:13:46.439
have like an extra spiring session for the adults. But

922
01:13:48.079 --> 01:13:52.000
I have allowed some kids to come along under the

923
01:13:52.039 --> 01:13:55.880
age of twelve. Yeah, you can have a limit, maybe

924
01:13:55.560 --> 01:14:02.840
no one under five or something. And eventually I was

925
01:14:04.279 --> 01:14:07.079
I'm not saying I was hasslimit every day. I wasn't

926
01:14:07.119 --> 01:14:09.560
phoning them up in the middle of the night. It's

927
01:14:09.640 --> 01:14:15.279
me again, Please come my little brother, come on, please,

928
01:14:16.560 --> 01:14:20.680
just the kids please. So eventually he gave up and

929
01:14:20.720 --> 01:14:27.840
he said, okay, we'll try it. So, I mean, he

930
01:14:27.960 --> 01:14:31.439
gave up his own time to come in. And I

931
01:14:31.439 --> 01:14:34.560
don't know if they even charge the kids. So they

932
01:14:35.039 --> 01:14:43.239
we came in on a Saturday, and he got me

933
01:14:44.279 --> 01:14:49.800
to teach the kids because it was just basically teaching

934
01:14:49.800 --> 01:14:53.600
them a little bit disciplined to line up, how to kick,

935
01:14:53.760 --> 01:14:58.199
how to punch, how none of it was like hard stuff.

936
01:14:58.239 --> 01:15:01.560
It's very basic stuff. So he got me to teach

937
01:15:01.600 --> 01:15:10.039
them and it went from there. So that's where it started,

938
01:15:10.600 --> 01:15:14.960
and then they progressed to doing it on having like

939
01:15:15.039 --> 01:15:18.199
a separate group on a Tuesday and Thursday night at

940
01:15:18.239 --> 01:15:22.159
the back of the of the gym, so they wouldn't

941
01:15:22.199 --> 01:15:24.600
be part of the main thing, but they'd be doing

942
01:15:24.640 --> 01:15:28.760
they'd be taught by like me, and then when I left,

943
01:15:29.159 --> 01:15:35.960
someone else taught. And so it went from that doing

944
01:15:35.960 --> 01:15:40.319
it every Saturday morning to then do it then including

945
01:15:40.359 --> 01:15:45.560
it on a Tuesday and a Thursday evening, and that

946
01:15:45.840 --> 01:15:52.279
was blood how many block how many years ago? Is

947
01:15:52.319 --> 01:16:01.600
that forty years ago? And the amount of blot belts

948
01:16:02.920 --> 01:16:04.840
that have come out of those kids. They still do

949
01:16:04.920 --> 01:16:09.039
it now. I still got little kids training, not to

950
01:16:09.079 --> 01:16:12.159
say not the same little kids, but they've still got

951
01:16:12.199 --> 01:16:18.840
little kids training. So that was my idea, and it

952
01:16:18.920 --> 01:16:21.079
might be the greatest thing I've ever done in my life,

953
01:16:21.119 --> 01:16:25.840
which is kind of sad maybe, but it was my

954
01:16:26.000 --> 01:16:28.960
idea because I wanted my little brother to come along

955
01:16:29.079 --> 01:16:32.960
and do cry and because I've already taught him some karate,

956
01:16:34.199 --> 01:16:37.399
which came in handy because it's a little local. Bully

957
01:16:37.439 --> 01:16:43.119
started on him, and he sorted the bully out and

958
01:16:43.159 --> 01:16:45.239
it set him up for the rest of his school

959
01:16:45.960 --> 01:16:48.159
because he had confidence and he knew that he could

960
01:16:48.199 --> 01:16:55.720
deal with, you know, situations like that. And it was

961
01:16:56.560 --> 01:17:01.199
my little brother lost interest. He went for probably two months,

962
01:17:02.560 --> 01:17:05.279
three months. I don't know how long. He got his

963
01:17:05.359 --> 01:17:07.520
first grade in I know that, so he must have

964
01:17:07.600 --> 01:17:10.479
been there for at least three months because the gradings

965
01:17:10.640 --> 01:17:16.880
every three months, so he got his yellow belt. It

966
01:17:16.960 --> 01:17:19.000
might it might have been there six months, but then

967
01:17:19.239 --> 01:17:24.079
he left. He lost interest, but they kept the thing

968
01:17:24.159 --> 01:17:28.600
going because by then they had more kids joining. It

969
01:17:28.680 --> 01:17:32.640
started off. I think I kind of got some of

970
01:17:32.640 --> 01:17:36.039
the neighbors' kids to come along, and it started off

971
01:17:36.079 --> 01:17:40.520
with maybe three kids, and then it grew to five,

972
01:17:40.800 --> 01:17:42.720
and then there was seven, and then there was ten,

973
01:17:43.640 --> 01:17:49.039
and ten's all you need, really, it's a good number.

974
01:17:50.560 --> 01:17:53.119
And then it grew and it just continued from nineteen

975
01:17:53.199 --> 01:18:01.720
eighty five to today, so tomorrow, tomorrow evening, Tuesday evening,

976
01:18:03.640 --> 01:18:09.279
pretty much guaranteed that someone will walk into that gym,

977
01:18:09.680 --> 01:18:16.520
a kid maybe ten years old, for example, nine years old.

978
01:18:16.880 --> 01:18:20.199
We'll walk in there for the first time with their

979
01:18:20.239 --> 01:18:26.239
parents or older brother or sister or whatever, and we'll,

980
01:18:26.399 --> 01:18:31.760
you know, learn to start kicking and punching for the

981
01:18:31.800 --> 01:18:35.560
first time, and by the time they leave school, there

982
01:18:35.560 --> 01:18:42.399
will be a black belt. And that's all thanks to me.

983
01:18:43.600 --> 01:18:48.039
I'm responsible for the success of every single black belt ever. No,

984
01:18:48.119 --> 01:18:51.159
that's not what I'm saying. But it was quite a

985
01:18:51.279 --> 01:18:56.359
nice a nice memory, quite a nice thing, that a

986
01:18:56.439 --> 01:19:03.479
positive thing that I probably created because it was it

987
01:19:03.520 --> 01:19:09.359
wasn't allowed, not allowed, not allowed. But in the end

988
01:19:09.359 --> 01:19:11.239
he gave up and he said okay, because I kept

989
01:19:11.279 --> 01:19:16.039
going on about it, and he clearly must the instructor

990
01:19:16.119 --> 01:19:20.159
must have liked me because he didn't tell me to

991
01:19:20.199 --> 01:19:22.560
stop hassling him, or he might have done, actually, but

992
01:19:22.600 --> 01:19:28.199
I just didn't give up. I was quite insistent because

993
01:19:28.199 --> 01:19:31.800
I wanted my little brother to go to I think,

994
01:19:31.880 --> 01:19:33.960
if I'm honest, I probably didn't care about the other kids.

995
01:19:34.039 --> 01:19:38.800
I was just focusing on my little brother. But because

996
01:19:39.720 --> 01:19:41.439
there had to be other kids as well. I kind

997
01:19:41.439 --> 01:19:44.159
of got a few other kids from the neighborhood to

998
01:19:44.239 --> 01:19:47.000
go along with some of his friends. Probably it's thinking

999
01:19:47.000 --> 01:19:49.399
about it, Yeah, I think it was. And maybe some

1000
01:19:49.479 --> 01:19:52.479
of the kids of the adults that were going there,

1001
01:19:53.760 --> 01:19:56.600
they brought them along just to kind of support that

1002
01:19:56.760 --> 01:20:07.720
new venture. Yeah, yeah, groovy. So I'm not going to remember.

1003
01:20:07.920 --> 01:20:10.359
I won't be remembered for it. I bet you. Not

1004
01:20:10.399 --> 01:20:14.800
one person remembers me ever, not even Paul, who was

1005
01:20:14.880 --> 01:20:18.000
my hero, he was the instructor. He won't remember me.

1006
01:20:19.000 --> 01:20:21.520
I mean, last time I saw him was probably about

1007
01:20:21.560 --> 01:20:24.560
nineteen eighty seven, and he said, when you're coming back?

1008
01:20:25.199 --> 01:20:33.520
I said soon. I never did, never went back. Yeah,

1009
01:20:33.560 --> 01:20:36.680
that's weird. It's at one of less school. I was

1010
01:20:36.720 --> 01:20:43.439
working in the evenings and I'd lost interest anyway. At

1011
01:20:43.439 --> 01:20:46.760
that point in everything, I had no interest in anything.

1012
01:20:47.319 --> 01:20:51.800
So karate was gone everything. I was just working in

1013
01:20:51.840 --> 01:20:55.479
a chip shop and that's it. That's what I did

1014
01:20:55.560 --> 01:20:58.119
for two years. There was nothing really else going on

1015
01:20:58.159 --> 01:21:05.119
in my life and what else. So with the karate,

1016
01:21:05.640 --> 01:21:15.039
I have nice memories of getting together equipment. So I

1017
01:21:15.239 --> 01:21:20.880
had the so yeah, I got some gym stuff like

1018
01:21:21.000 --> 01:21:26.840
you know, weights, and my dad had this big studio

1019
01:21:27.119 --> 01:21:29.800
thing at the bottom of the garden, which was his

1020
01:21:29.920 --> 01:21:33.079
office because he was self employed, so his office but

1021
01:21:33.199 --> 01:21:37.239
also kept his equipment in part of it as well,

1022
01:21:37.840 --> 01:21:39.640
and there was a toilet down there, and I think

1023
01:21:39.640 --> 01:21:43.960
it was this his safe space, probably to be on

1024
01:21:44.000 --> 01:21:46.079
his own, have a bit of quiet piece and quiet

1025
01:21:46.079 --> 01:21:49.640
from all of us. But what he did, he did

1026
01:21:49.720 --> 01:21:51.479
he took a bit of interest in what I was doing,

1027
01:21:52.199 --> 01:21:55.760
and because he he let me put my weights down there.

1028
01:21:56.520 --> 01:21:59.319
So I was buying. I was buying weights bit by bits.

1029
01:21:59.399 --> 01:22:02.159
I was buying a bell one week. Then I was

1030
01:22:02.239 --> 01:22:04.760
buying the you know, the weights to put on the

1031
01:22:04.800 --> 01:22:07.640
bar bell. Then I got a curl bar, put some

1032
01:22:07.640 --> 01:22:11.079
weights for the curl bar, got some dumb bells, a

1033
01:22:11.079 --> 01:22:13.640
little dumb bell set, and then I got another dumb

1034
01:22:13.640 --> 01:22:16.520
bell set, you know, to sort of match it. And

1035
01:22:21.039 --> 01:22:24.760
I can't think of any other things weights wise I had.

1036
01:22:26.000 --> 01:22:29.479
But I had like a you know, a varied weight collection.

1037
01:22:31.680 --> 01:22:34.000
And then I told my dad that I wanted to

1038
01:22:34.000 --> 01:22:38.680
get a punch bag. So what he did is he

1039
01:22:39.960 --> 01:22:44.760
found me a kit bag and he filled it with sawdust.

1040
01:22:45.880 --> 01:22:51.800
It's really heavy, really heavy, and he attached it to

1041
01:22:51.840 --> 01:22:55.880
the ceiling. And then I got another punch bag, which

1042
01:22:55.920 --> 01:22:59.399
was already I think it was full of We put

1043
01:22:59.479 --> 01:23:01.560
just cloth in it, so I had a light bag

1044
01:23:02.399 --> 01:23:09.119
and a really heavy bag. I imagine the one full

1045
01:23:09.159 --> 01:23:12.279
of swordust was probably as heavy as me nearly anyway,

1046
01:23:12.279 --> 01:23:16.720
it was pretty sturdy stuff and a kit bag. If

1047
01:23:16.760 --> 01:23:18.920
you've don't know what that is, it's the kind of

1048
01:23:18.960 --> 01:23:23.680
thing that people in the forces used to use, and

1049
01:23:23.720 --> 01:23:29.119
it's a big, long thing and they would just basically

1050
01:23:29.159 --> 01:23:33.119
have all their belongings in it. But it didn't have

1051
01:23:33.199 --> 01:23:39.760
handles for some reason, or maybe the handles had fallen off,

1052
01:23:40.399 --> 01:23:44.560
but it was just like a big punch bag. I'm

1053
01:23:44.600 --> 01:23:47.000
thinking it might have belonged to my granddad because he

1054
01:23:47.119 --> 01:23:52.119
used to be a boxer, and I think I might

1055
01:23:52.159 --> 01:23:55.760
have had my granddad's boxing gloves, but I did buy

1056
01:23:55.760 --> 01:24:02.159
some boxing gloves as well, and some bag gloves. But

1057
01:24:02.239 --> 01:24:05.399
I also like to punch without any gloves on as well,

1058
01:24:06.399 --> 01:24:10.600
so yeah, so so my dad helped me put all

1059
01:24:10.600 --> 01:24:15.520
that stuff up, so that was nice. I got all

1060
01:24:15.600 --> 01:24:21.640
happy memories of practicing karate in the garden, say happy memories,

1061
01:24:21.640 --> 01:24:24.680
but they're very vague memories. But I do remember I

1062
01:24:24.760 --> 01:24:27.720
used to practice my kicks and my punches and my forms.

1063
01:24:28.439 --> 01:24:32.239
That's when it's as a sequence of different moves. Some

1064
01:24:32.279 --> 01:24:36.359
people call it the carter, some people call it form.

1065
01:24:36.560 --> 01:24:42.079
But it's just like practicing kicks and punches and blocks

1066
01:24:42.119 --> 01:24:48.800
and stuff. And in the evenings, I used to go

1067
01:24:48.840 --> 01:24:54.119
and really really go on that punch bag proper, the

1068
01:24:54.159 --> 01:25:00.800
heavy one. More than anything, I loved it. I just

1069
01:25:00.880 --> 01:25:04.680
really loved it. Especially if one of my brothers was

1070
01:25:04.720 --> 01:25:10.239
annoying me, I'd go down the garden and just punch

1071
01:25:10.319 --> 01:25:18.520
the punch, punch the bag as it were. And yeah,

1072
01:25:18.560 --> 01:25:25.840
it was useful, really useful. Yeah. I like that punch bag,

1073
01:25:26.319 --> 01:25:31.520
the one that was heavy like that. The heavier the better,

1074
01:25:32.560 --> 01:25:36.560
Like a big, big, heavy punch bag. That's kind of

1075
01:25:36.600 --> 01:25:40.159
the perfect thing. You know, something that doesn't even move

1076
01:25:40.239 --> 01:25:44.279
when you punch it. That's like perfect. I don't want

1077
01:25:44.319 --> 01:25:48.680
something to start moving and swaying around, you know, something

1078
01:25:48.880 --> 01:25:55.079
really heavy like twenty stone or something that that'd be nice,

1079
01:25:55.800 --> 01:26:00.039
although my ceiling wouldn't take that. I do have a

1080
01:26:00.039 --> 01:26:03.840
punch bag in my bedroom. There's one that's on a

1081
01:26:03.920 --> 01:26:06.920
it's got like got a water base with water. You

1082
01:26:06.920 --> 01:26:09.000
can put concrete or sand in there, but I just

1083
01:26:09.039 --> 01:26:12.520
put water in so I can punch you. It does

1084
01:26:12.600 --> 01:26:16.079
move around, and I just feel a little bit self

1085
01:26:16.119 --> 01:26:22.640
conscious that I'm gonna disrupt my neighbor downstairs because they're

1086
01:26:22.680 --> 01:26:27.720
going to hear it. How could they not hear it?

1087
01:26:27.720 --> 01:26:36.520
It's quite loud, you know what I mean. So ooh, ooh,

1088
01:26:36.680 --> 01:26:44.279
ooh ooh. Trying to think of some other Yeah, in

1089
01:26:44.319 --> 01:26:47.560
the summers we used to well in. Wasn't that many summers,

1090
01:26:47.680 --> 01:26:51.560
was there, But I remember one summer we met up

1091
01:26:51.600 --> 01:26:53.680
in this park around the corner from where I lived

1092
01:26:54.479 --> 01:26:57.680
and would run around and then we'd spar and stuff.

1093
01:26:57.720 --> 01:27:02.680
It's brilliant. It wouldn't be something I would do myself.

1094
01:27:03.439 --> 01:27:06.439
I wouldn't go to a park and start practicing karate.

1095
01:27:07.720 --> 01:27:12.159
But when you've got a bunch of black belts with you, adults,

1096
01:27:12.279 --> 01:27:14.000
it's kind of you can do what you want, really,

1097
01:27:14.800 --> 01:27:21.920
so it was nice. I'm trying to think other moments

1098
01:27:22.000 --> 01:27:25.880
of the karate. Getting my Yeah, getting my gradings was nice,

1099
01:27:26.000 --> 01:27:30.720
getting my first class gradings and getting the new belt.

1100
01:27:30.800 --> 01:27:39.119
That was always good feeling part of something that for

1101
01:27:39.199 --> 01:27:42.439
the first time I was quite good at. I'm not

1102
01:27:42.479 --> 01:27:46.560
saying I was, but for the okay. For the first time,

1103
01:27:46.640 --> 01:27:53.760
I felt I wasn't really bad at something because previously

1104
01:27:53.800 --> 01:27:59.560
that I'd been in the cecredets. And it took me

1105
01:28:00.520 --> 01:28:07.640
over two years to get my first badge, and most

1106
01:28:07.640 --> 01:28:13.680
people get it within two or three months. And every Friday,

1107
01:28:13.880 --> 01:28:17.319
where every other Friday, they would read out who's got

1108
01:28:17.359 --> 01:28:20.439
the next badge? Sometimes people would get it in a

1109
01:28:20.479 --> 01:28:26.079
month or six weeks, and I got passed over every

1110
01:28:26.119 --> 01:28:30.840
single time. It got to the point where I was

1111
01:28:30.880 --> 01:28:36.399
a laughing stock they'd actually read out and not Newlan,

1112
01:28:38.319 --> 01:28:40.239
and it became a joke, like a running joke that

1113
01:28:40.319 --> 01:28:44.920
I didn't get promoted. I was like at the lowest

1114
01:28:45.000 --> 01:28:49.720
level for the whole time, pretty much. And then one

1115
01:28:49.840 --> 01:28:56.159
night they read my name out and the whole place

1116
01:28:56.399 --> 01:29:02.199
erupted because it was such a build up over a

1117
01:29:02.239 --> 01:29:05.960
long period of time, the fact that I finally got

1118
01:29:06.000 --> 01:29:10.279
my first was it junior seamen or something. I forget

1119
01:29:10.560 --> 01:29:15.279
the first badge, and I think I got demoted the

1120
01:29:15.319 --> 01:29:17.439
next week, but it still had it for a little while.

1121
01:29:18.880 --> 01:29:23.960
I was always getting in trouble, always in trouble at school,

1122
01:29:24.000 --> 01:29:27.119
in trouble at the ciccredets, because I just didn't I

1123
01:29:27.159 --> 01:29:31.119
wasn't good with wasn't a big fan of people telling

1124
01:29:31.159 --> 01:29:40.239
me what to do really, and it was weird. It's

1125
01:29:40.319 --> 01:29:43.199
kind of such a weird thing because my dad wouldn't

1126
01:29:43.239 --> 01:29:48.279
let me leave the Ciccredets because there was a point

1127
01:29:48.319 --> 01:29:51.239
where I'm like, when I first got there, I found

1128
01:29:51.279 --> 01:29:54.159
it funny because they'd be shouting at me. And I

1129
01:29:54.239 --> 01:29:56.159
find it funny because I knew that I could just

1130
01:29:56.239 --> 01:30:01.800
walk out and I didn't have to do it, you know,

1131
01:30:01.880 --> 01:30:06.039
it is a choice. And then when I said I

1132
01:30:06.039 --> 01:30:12.319
wanted to leave, I was told no, and I got

1133
01:30:12.319 --> 01:30:18.399
this some weird man adult shouting in my face. I

1134
01:30:18.439 --> 01:30:22.840
was like, okay, I can't. This is not funny anymore.

1135
01:30:24.840 --> 01:30:28.479
So yeah, I left my first opportunity, I got out

1136
01:30:28.479 --> 01:30:34.439
of there, and there was a family, a family thing,

1137
01:30:34.800 --> 01:30:39.479
a little family adventure between the parents, and that gave

1138
01:30:39.560 --> 01:30:43.560
me the opportunity to get out of the Cecretets. And

1139
01:30:43.600 --> 01:30:50.800
then I started doing karate, so yeah, well loved karates

1140
01:30:50.840 --> 01:30:56.359
so much. And I remember I had oh yeah, I'd

1141
01:30:56.359 --> 01:30:58.960
also had to really, I used to buy stuff and

1142
01:30:59.000 --> 01:31:02.399
I had the like the gym stuff, the bags, punch bags,

1143
01:31:02.479 --> 01:31:08.960
the weights, but I also had martial arts weapons as well,

1144
01:31:09.319 --> 01:31:12.720
because next to the way to do my grade, which

1145
01:31:12.720 --> 01:31:15.720
was in the next town, they had a martial arts

1146
01:31:15.760 --> 01:31:22.199
shop next to the karate center the club. Because our

1147
01:31:22.239 --> 01:31:25.000
club was just in a gym, they actually had a

1148
01:31:25.039 --> 01:31:30.640
purpose built club, so I went into the I used

1149
01:31:30.680 --> 01:31:33.760
to go into the martial arts shop and I'd buy

1150
01:31:35.000 --> 01:31:43.079
Bruce Lee magazines, nunchucks, throwing stars, stuff like that, or

1151
01:31:43.119 --> 01:31:45.239
i'd buy them. I was going to say buy them online,

1152
01:31:45.279 --> 01:31:48.159
but obviously you can't do that, but I would there.

1153
01:31:48.239 --> 01:31:52.680
Used to be like with the martial arts magazines. I

1154
01:31:52.720 --> 01:31:56.319
don't even remember what it's called, probably Martial Arts Monthly

1155
01:31:56.439 --> 01:32:01.039
or something, and you could order stuff through the post.

1156
01:32:02.239 --> 01:32:05.520
So that's what I would do from these martial arts

1157
01:32:05.560 --> 01:32:11.880
shops in London. So I had so I've got some nunchucks.

1158
01:32:13.319 --> 01:32:15.640
I might have had two pairs of nunchucks. I also

1159
01:32:15.640 --> 01:32:18.439
had a plastic pair of nunchucks, which is good for

1160
01:32:18.520 --> 01:32:23.920
practicing multiple throwing stars, which I used to play with

1161
01:32:23.960 --> 01:32:27.399
in the garden, which is weird because probably not a

1162
01:32:27.399 --> 01:32:29.760
good idea to let a kid play with throwing stars.

1163
01:32:32.000 --> 01:32:40.800
And what else did I have? I think it was

1164
01:32:40.920 --> 01:32:45.159
mainly books. So I had books on different kung fu styles.

1165
01:32:45.800 --> 01:32:48.680
Teaching different kung fu moves, and I used to practice

1166
01:32:48.720 --> 01:32:55.800
all that stuff and exercise books martial art exercises to

1167
01:32:55.880 --> 01:32:58.960
help strengthen the body, and yeah, I had lots of

1168
01:32:58.960 --> 01:33:05.039
stuff like that to buy, and the regular monthly weekly

1169
01:33:05.600 --> 01:33:11.520
kung fu martial arts magazines Karate Monthly. I was also

1170
01:33:11.560 --> 01:33:15.359
got into boxing as well. Kind of a little bit

1171
01:33:15.439 --> 01:33:19.479
later than that, but I started buying ko which is

1172
01:33:19.520 --> 01:33:24.159
a knockout monthly, I think, and it kind of led

1173
01:33:24.199 --> 01:33:28.239
me towards the fitness side of things. I got into bodybuilding.

1174
01:33:30.079 --> 01:33:33.159
Never worked with me because my body would not build,

1175
01:33:35.159 --> 01:33:37.399
but I got interested in it and started to learn

1176
01:33:37.439 --> 01:33:41.159
all that bodybuilding die at because I was into going

1177
01:33:41.159 --> 01:33:43.840
to the gym because the gym around the corners used

1178
01:33:43.840 --> 01:33:49.960
to go there as well. And the thing is, when

1179
01:33:50.000 --> 01:33:54.279
I was fifteen, I had a really good body, but

1180
01:33:54.319 --> 01:33:55.920
no one knew I had a good body because I

1181
01:33:55.960 --> 01:33:59.960
was so little. That might sound like a weird stay.

1182
01:34:01.760 --> 01:34:08.760
I kind of looked it was very muscular, but I

1183
01:34:08.800 --> 01:34:13.159
was little. It's hard to explain so because I'm obviously

1184
01:34:13.279 --> 01:34:16.600
not explaining it very well. When I started working at

1185
01:34:16.600 --> 01:34:21.640
a chip shop, I remember my my boss laughing at me.

1186
01:34:21.800 --> 01:34:24.680
I was fifteen, and I said I got muscles, and

1187
01:34:24.680 --> 01:34:29.560
he said he started laughing. So I pulled my top off,

1188
01:34:30.079 --> 01:34:33.880
my sleeve up and showed them like, oh wow, so

1189
01:34:34.000 --> 01:34:37.520
I did. I had muscles. I had biceps because I've

1190
01:34:37.560 --> 01:34:40.319
been working out for a couple of years. I'm not

1191
01:34:40.359 --> 01:34:43.920
saying that they were big, but they were fern you know,

1192
01:34:44.680 --> 01:34:49.439
ferm muscles. Chest I had six pack and all that stuff.

1193
01:34:50.159 --> 01:34:55.600
I was just one big, very sinewy muscle though, because

1194
01:34:56.000 --> 01:35:01.920
I was so little, so so light, and not particularly

1195
01:35:01.960 --> 01:35:07.960
strong either. But no faut on me at all. But

1196
01:35:08.000 --> 01:35:10.000
I never used to walk around the top off or

1197
01:35:10.000 --> 01:35:13.279
anything because if I had it done, people might have

1198
01:35:13.359 --> 01:35:17.680
thought that I looked okay, But I was embarrassed with

1199
01:35:17.720 --> 01:35:24.199
how slim I was, so I never did that. A

1200
01:35:24.319 --> 01:35:31.800
strange one, really, Hmm. What say? I used to love

1201
01:35:31.880 --> 01:35:34.800
doing I used to love sort of having the magazines

1202
01:35:34.840 --> 01:35:38.760
and the books. That's all. It seems to be how

1203
01:35:38.760 --> 01:35:41.079
I do things, or I have done things over the years.

1204
01:35:42.079 --> 01:35:44.800
When I get a special interest, so before it used

1205
01:35:44.800 --> 01:35:51.560
to be before karate, it was it's really interested in

1206
01:35:55.359 --> 01:36:01.159
like Werewes and vampires and that kind of stuff. I

1207
01:36:01.239 --> 01:36:05.279
just got really interested in it just became something that

1208
01:36:05.359 --> 01:36:10.319
I was passionate about, and I'd go to the library

1209
01:36:10.520 --> 01:36:13.159
on my day, on my days off of the weekend,

1210
01:36:13.640 --> 01:36:16.920
on a Saturday, and I'd study look through these big

1211
01:36:17.119 --> 01:36:23.319
textbooks and encyclopedias and copy stuff down. And I learned

1212
01:36:23.319 --> 01:36:27.960
so much about it. There was no reason for it

1213
01:36:28.000 --> 01:36:31.840
other than I just became interested and I learned more

1214
01:36:31.880 --> 01:36:35.840
than I needed to about the subject, and I started

1215
01:36:35.840 --> 01:36:40.840
buying books about it, and I learned quite a little bit,

1216
01:36:41.119 --> 01:36:45.399
quite a lot about all that whole thing. And then

1217
01:36:45.960 --> 01:36:52.159
then I got obsessed with karate. Yeah, so that was

1218
01:36:52.199 --> 01:36:57.000
when I was about eleven twelve, sort of same time,

1219
01:36:57.159 --> 01:37:01.920
possibly as a secredets, but I had no interest in

1220
01:37:01.920 --> 01:37:06.079
the see cadets, didn't even like it. I had to

1221
01:37:06.159 --> 01:37:13.319
laugh while I was there, but didn't enjoy being there.

1222
01:37:14.039 --> 01:37:17.760
Really had to start with it was a nice relief

1223
01:37:17.800 --> 01:37:21.279
and being at home, and then it became a chore.

1224
01:37:24.199 --> 01:37:26.439
And then once I did karate, that was nice because

1225
01:37:26.439 --> 01:37:28.680
I was out of the house. I was also doing

1226
01:37:28.720 --> 01:37:32.920
something I enjoyed, and for the first time in my childhood,

1227
01:37:32.960 --> 01:37:37.640
I had something to look forward to, which was going

1228
01:37:37.640 --> 01:37:43.239
to karate, and it's all I talked about to anyone

1229
01:37:43.359 --> 01:37:47.680
I didn't talk about anything else, just karate. Seriously, it

1230
01:37:48.279 --> 01:37:52.000
must have been really boring for people. I mean, you're

1231
01:37:52.000 --> 01:37:53.760
probably going to get an idea of how boring it

1232
01:37:53.800 --> 01:37:57.720
is because you just listened to me talking about it

1233
01:37:57.800 --> 01:38:07.720
for the last and a half. Also, I love the karate.

1234
01:38:09.159 --> 01:38:12.479
I'm just trying to think, is there any other aspects

1235
01:38:12.680 --> 01:38:24.520
of karate that I remember that stand out? Hmmm? So

1236
01:38:24.680 --> 01:38:39.399
my little brother going no, Oh, I'll tell you what

1237
01:38:39.439 --> 01:38:44.079
I did do. There's another one of the black belts

1238
01:38:44.920 --> 01:38:47.359
that like the young Black belts in the Create club.

1239
01:38:48.119 --> 01:38:50.279
He left to start his own club on a Friday

1240
01:38:50.359 --> 01:38:59.000
night somewhere else, and I basically talked him into having

1241
01:38:59.119 --> 01:39:04.000
kids go straight way as well as adults. So I

1242
01:39:04.079 --> 01:39:06.840
got my little brother to go and he was seven,

1243
01:39:08.159 --> 01:39:12.119
so that whole his club started off with little kids

1244
01:39:12.159 --> 01:39:19.079
straight away and adults. I don't know if he I

1245
01:39:19.119 --> 01:39:22.720
don't think he continued in that town, but he might

1246
01:39:22.800 --> 01:39:25.520
have moved somewhere else and did it. But he was

1247
01:39:25.880 --> 01:39:29.720
It was a really cool He was a cool dude. Dude,

1248
01:39:30.000 --> 01:39:37.000
cool dude. He was about eighteen nineteen, and he was

1249
01:39:37.159 --> 01:39:41.600
just the kind of person that I'd want to be

1250
01:39:41.840 --> 01:39:44.439
the kind of person I'd still want to be now

1251
01:39:44.640 --> 01:39:47.720
and never was, never could be, never will be. He

1252
01:39:47.960 --> 01:39:55.359
just almost like the perfect person. He had everything, but

1253
01:39:55.439 --> 01:39:59.199
I say, obviously didn't have everything, but from the outside

1254
01:39:59.199 --> 01:40:02.600
it looked like he had everything. You know, he was

1255
01:40:04.079 --> 01:40:10.640
clearly very tough, he was brilliant at karate. It was

1256
01:40:11.359 --> 01:40:20.119
a good looking bloke. He was person great personality, extremely confident.

1257
01:40:20.560 --> 01:40:23.600
But it's hard not to be confident. I think if

1258
01:40:23.600 --> 01:40:26.279
you're a black belt when you're a teenager, you're going

1259
01:40:26.319 --> 01:40:33.000
to have confidence there and you So that's the one

1260
01:40:33.039 --> 01:40:36.359
thing I would say to any any parent that's got

1261
01:40:36.359 --> 01:40:40.600
a kid, get him down to some kind of martial

1262
01:40:40.720 --> 01:40:48.760
arts because the confidence that comes from it is pretty cool.

1263
01:40:49.880 --> 01:40:55.319
And whether it's karate, judo, jiu jitsu, whatever, it's just

1264
01:40:55.399 --> 01:40:59.000
something so you know that they can take care of themselves.

1265
01:40:59.000 --> 01:41:02.800
But more than that, it's people are confident quite often

1266
01:41:02.880 --> 01:41:07.399
never ever need to use it. The higher they get

1267
01:41:09.199 --> 01:41:11.760
in the training, the less chance they're ever going to

1268
01:41:11.840 --> 01:41:15.159
need to use it, because it's almost like an aura

1269
01:41:15.239 --> 01:41:22.760
comes often the confidence. Maybe now I know people have

1270
01:41:22.800 --> 01:41:26.439
done martial arts for decades and never ever had to

1271
01:41:26.560 --> 01:41:36.439
use it. Yeah, man, what else? What else? What else? What? Else,

1272
01:41:42.399 --> 01:41:44.960
because I'm only talking about karates. I'm not talking about

1273
01:41:44.960 --> 01:41:47.239
any of the other martial arts I've done, so just

1274
01:41:47.319 --> 01:41:51.199
about the karate when I was at school. I'm trying

1275
01:41:51.239 --> 01:41:56.840
to think of anything else that happened they are in

1276
01:41:57.000 --> 01:42:10.720
that environment. M No, I can't think of anything. Now.

1277
01:42:10.800 --> 01:42:19.119
It's pretty much it. Yeah, I mean, I've got to

1278
01:42:20.039 --> 01:42:24.000
I quite like getting to know a few adults, because

1279
01:42:26.880 --> 01:42:28.399
I'll tell you, Okay, one of the things I liked

1280
01:42:28.439 --> 01:42:31.640
about the Charate Club I got to know some adults

1281
01:42:32.399 --> 01:42:34.880
that I would generally didn't know any adults other than

1282
01:42:35.279 --> 01:42:39.000
I suppose friends of the family and teachers, and I

1283
01:42:39.039 --> 01:42:43.640
didn't want to know them. So I got to know

1284
01:42:43.680 --> 01:42:45.479
a few adults that I could say he loo too.

1285
01:42:46.359 --> 01:42:48.920
And I was getting to the point of leaving school anyway,

1286
01:42:49.000 --> 01:43:00.279
you know, I was fourteen, less school at fifteen, and yeah,

1287
01:43:00.319 --> 01:43:02.920
that was quite cool. Kind of go around and had

1288
01:43:02.920 --> 01:43:06.479
a neighbor and I'd go around his and would train

1289
01:43:06.560 --> 01:43:16.840
together sometimes because he was also doing judo. And another

1290
01:43:17.399 --> 01:43:22.039
good thing is I made some new friends. And there

1291
01:43:22.079 --> 01:43:29.319
was this rivalry between the two high schools, and there

1292
01:43:29.359 --> 01:43:36.000
was less rivalry for me because everything I did from

1293
01:43:36.039 --> 01:43:43.640
the age of eleven to leaving school, I did with

1294
01:43:43.720 --> 01:43:47.159
people from the other school as well, So in the Cycadets,

1295
01:43:48.119 --> 01:43:50.359
probably half of the kids in the Ciccudettes were from

1296
01:43:50.359 --> 01:43:53.680
the other school as well as my school, so I

1297
01:43:54.159 --> 01:43:57.760
knew them. And then when I did karate, the karate

1298
01:43:57.840 --> 01:44:01.039
club was actually at the other school, and so there

1299
01:44:01.079 --> 01:44:03.239
was more kids from that school than there was from

1300
01:44:03.239 --> 01:44:07.000
my own school, so I got to know them. So

1301
01:44:07.479 --> 01:44:10.399
it was kind of quite good because then that rivalry

1302
01:44:10.520 --> 01:44:13.840
wasn't there for me. I got to meet different people

1303
01:44:14.359 --> 01:44:18.039
from both the schools and there wasn't so much of

1304
01:44:18.079 --> 01:44:24.600
that like them and us when it came to me. Yeah,

1305
01:44:24.920 --> 01:44:30.239
I liked that. It was nice. Yeah, I made a

1306
01:44:30.239 --> 01:44:33.479
few friends that I used to hang out with. It

1307
01:44:33.600 --> 01:44:36.439
was one friend I thought he was a girl when

1308
01:44:36.439 --> 01:44:43.520
he first started, and there was a boy and his

1309
01:44:43.640 --> 01:44:46.560
mum was also there, and yeah, I just ended up

1310
01:44:46.920 --> 01:44:49.640
hanging around with room for a little bit. He was

1311
01:44:51.680 --> 01:44:54.680
probably about a year younger than me, I think, but

1312
01:44:54.720 --> 01:44:56.840
his mum was really cool and I'd go around and

1313
01:44:57.760 --> 01:45:08.239
she'd give me dinner and stuff. Trying to think what else. Yeah,

1314
01:45:08.239 --> 01:45:10.640
I didn't have any friends at my school they did

1315
01:45:10.720 --> 01:45:17.520
karate other than Stephen's brother. I think nearly everyone else

1316
01:45:17.840 --> 01:45:20.079
that went to karate with me was from the other school,

1317
01:45:20.920 --> 01:45:22.920
which is for some reason, I don't know why that was.

1318
01:45:24.640 --> 01:45:27.520
I suppose it's I guess if you've got karate in

1319
01:45:27.560 --> 01:45:34.479
your school, you'd more like to go there. But yeah, so,

1320
01:45:34.960 --> 01:45:43.800
I mean there was a couple, there was two, three, three,

1321
01:45:44.239 --> 01:45:47.119
three and me, so it was about four of us

1322
01:45:47.560 --> 01:45:52.439
were actually from my school, and everyone else was from

1323
01:45:52.680 --> 01:45:55.439
the school. It was in other than you know, the

1324
01:45:55.560 --> 01:45:59.399
kids up there and rather than adults. So there was

1325
01:45:59.399 --> 01:46:13.680
probably i'd say ten percent adults, like adult adults. Mmm,

1326
01:46:14.600 --> 01:46:21.399
maybe twenty percent adults, so people in their twenties plus,

1327
01:46:22.039 --> 01:46:28.159
and then maybe twenty percent of older teens you're like,

1328
01:46:28.319 --> 01:46:38.600
maybe seventeen to twenty kind of, and then maybe I

1329
01:46:38.640 --> 01:46:51.600
don't know, I would say the majority was hmmm, yeah,

1330
01:46:51.600 --> 01:46:59.319
I'd say probably thirteen or twelve. Thirteen to sixteen there

1331
01:46:59.359 --> 01:47:02.079
seemed to be the main age group, but there was

1332
01:47:02.119 --> 01:47:04.319
a few older and a few even older than that.

1333
01:47:08.079 --> 01:47:12.159
When I started, and then when I left, there was

1334
01:47:12.159 --> 01:47:19.239
probably another ten percent of under under eleven or on

1335
01:47:19.520 --> 01:47:23.720
the other twelve whatever the rest of you know. The

1336
01:47:23.760 --> 01:47:32.079
former age limit was until my pestern allowed open the

1337
01:47:32.119 --> 01:47:35.159
gates for kids to go along, like really young kids

1338
01:47:35.800 --> 01:47:42.479
like my little brother. Yeah. I never realized that that

1339
01:47:42.600 --> 01:47:45.600
was the proudest moment in my life until this moment.

1340
01:47:47.760 --> 01:47:56.960
It's the only thing I've done my whole life. I'll

1341
01:47:56.960 --> 01:48:01.319
tell you. What's weird is it's now starting to get dark.

1342
01:48:03.880 --> 01:48:14.039
It's nearly ten o'clock, it's nine fifty six. It's dark inside,

1343
01:48:14.279 --> 01:48:19.039
not like dark dark as in like I can't see

1344
01:48:19.079 --> 01:48:25.159
anything dark, but it's still light outside. It's not light

1345
01:48:25.279 --> 01:48:29.720
light so you can see everything, but it's light enough

1346
01:48:29.800 --> 01:48:34.000
to go out and not need a torch, if that

1347
01:48:34.079 --> 01:48:39.840
makes sense. And what's weird is this is now the time,

1348
01:48:40.279 --> 01:48:45.960
even though this is technically probably the peak of the summer,

1349
01:48:46.760 --> 01:48:53.640
like beginning of July. Well maybe June is, but you know, roughly,

1350
01:48:54.079 --> 01:48:57.760
this is kind of a peak time. Last week is

1351
01:48:57.880 --> 01:49:00.680
very hot, This coming week e'sposed to be very hot.

1352
01:49:03.119 --> 01:49:06.399
But now we've already had the longest stay, so it's

1353
01:49:06.439 --> 01:49:14.520
starting to get darker earlier and get lighter later. That

1354
01:49:14.720 --> 01:49:20.760
might it's only maybe, I don't know, a few minutes

1355
01:49:20.800 --> 01:49:28.680
a week, but it's really weird how quickly it starts

1356
01:49:28.720 --> 01:49:34.000
to get darker because in a month's time it'll be

1357
01:49:34.039 --> 01:49:42.680
completely pitch black by now at ten o'clock, and then

1358
01:49:42.720 --> 01:49:51.239
in September it'll be dark probably by eight o'clock, if

1359
01:49:51.279 --> 01:50:04.840
not earlier, possibly seven o'clock, and then by November December

1360
01:50:05.119 --> 01:50:09.119
is just dark all the time. It feels like it

1361
01:50:09.239 --> 01:50:13.239
sometimes like it never. There are days when it just

1362
01:50:13.239 --> 01:50:16.199
doesn't seem to get much brighter than this how it

1363
01:50:16.239 --> 01:50:21.600
is now. I mean, it's this kind of light at

1364
01:50:21.600 --> 01:50:29.279
three in the afternoon sometimes in December, especially in like

1365
01:50:29.319 --> 01:50:32.159
a cloudy day. You know, I have to have the

1366
01:50:32.239 --> 01:50:38.199
light on and look outside. It's just, yeah, weird dark

1367
01:50:38.239 --> 01:50:44.720
at four in the afternoon in January. So we're not

1368
01:50:44.760 --> 01:50:49.800
there yet, but it's kind of weird that this is

1369
01:50:49.840 --> 01:50:53.680
the kind of the peak, the peak of the summer.

1370
01:50:55.760 --> 01:50:58.600
It's a bit windy today. Someone's put a brick in

1371
01:50:58.680 --> 01:51:04.560
front of the the gate that keeps slamming shut, so

1372
01:51:04.640 --> 01:51:09.000
I'm guessing someone's been a little bit mildly annoyed by it.

1373
01:51:09.079 --> 01:51:15.600
So that was a good idea. I'm surprised someone hasn't

1374
01:51:15.640 --> 01:51:20.119
moved it. There's always there's always like one person wants

1375
01:51:20.159 --> 01:51:23.159
one thing and then another person wants another thing. So

1376
01:51:23.479 --> 01:51:27.119
someone wants it left open. Another postus wants it left closed.

1377
01:51:27.760 --> 01:51:33.399
It's like, just leave it be, man, Just chill out,

1378
01:51:34.520 --> 01:51:37.640
chill out, and just enjoy all the chocolate. That's what

1379
01:51:37.800 --> 01:51:42.640
my name used to say. That's before the diabetes. But

1380
01:51:45.520 --> 01:51:49.520
I can't think of any other things connected to karate

1381
01:51:50.000 --> 01:51:59.600
that I can talk about. I can't. Hm, you'd think

1382
01:51:59.640 --> 01:52:07.079
that's something else, wouldn't you. What else? What else? What else?

1383
01:52:07.199 --> 01:52:13.239
What else? Gadaday kada tay I was the Karate Kid.

1384
01:52:14.319 --> 01:52:18.960
I remember watching that and there was I think it's

1385
01:52:19.000 --> 01:52:23.319
the first time I was in tune with what was

1386
01:52:23.359 --> 01:52:31.840
going on. Like the Karate Kid was so popular in

1387
01:52:31.880 --> 01:52:35.520
the Western world, and loads of people wanted to do

1388
01:52:35.600 --> 01:52:41.239
karate because they wanted to be a karate man. And

1389
01:52:44.359 --> 01:52:46.920
I think at that time I was already doing it.

1390
01:52:47.640 --> 01:52:50.159
So I think the karate called was eighty five, so

1391
01:52:50.239 --> 01:52:52.720
I was already a karate kid before the Karate Kid

1392
01:52:52.800 --> 01:52:56.840
came out. It's like, yeah, I was ahead of the curve,

1393
01:52:58.039 --> 01:53:04.680
head of the curve, which is cool. But there was

1394
01:53:04.720 --> 01:53:07.520
a dream I'd had for years, you know, ever since

1395
01:53:07.560 --> 01:53:10.039
I was a little kid. Wanted to do martial arts.

1396
01:53:10.520 --> 01:53:13.279
I wanted to be kung fu from a TV show

1397
01:53:13.359 --> 01:53:17.640
Kung Fu. Technically his name was Kane. But you know,

1398
01:53:18.319 --> 01:53:20.039
that's why I wanted to be. I wanted to be

1399
01:53:20.960 --> 01:53:23.159
not just to be able to do the moves, but

1400
01:53:23.199 --> 01:53:33.000
also to be calm and peaceful and not not react

1401
01:53:34.960 --> 01:53:38.560
because he was so calmly just he did what he

1402
01:53:38.680 --> 01:53:43.840
needed to do, but he didn't overreact to people trying to,

1403
01:53:44.000 --> 01:53:48.920
you know, get him agitated. I never learned that bit.

1404
01:53:49.199 --> 01:53:51.760
That's a bit I never learned. I kind of learned

1405
01:53:51.800 --> 01:53:57.319
it now. It's taken me a little while. I'm better

1406
01:53:57.359 --> 01:54:03.720
than I used to be. Yeah, but I did. I

1407
01:54:03.880 --> 01:54:08.399
like the spiritual side of it as well, and I

1408
01:54:08.439 --> 01:54:12.199
guess I found that with maybe Buddhism when I was older,

1409
01:54:12.600 --> 01:54:15.840
reading Buddhism when I was in my twenties and studying

1410
01:54:15.880 --> 01:54:20.680
it and Taoism as well, and as well as what's

1411
01:54:20.720 --> 01:54:29.359
the other thing I forget? And that's it? Really that

1412
01:54:30.039 --> 01:54:35.960
was my little karate career when I was at school.

1413
01:54:38.239 --> 01:54:51.000
As I got older, like moving towards leaving school, I

1414
01:54:51.039 --> 01:54:55.760
started if you can hear that someone's doing it in

1415
01:54:55.760 --> 01:55:00.880
the garden, I started kind of going out and doing

1416
01:55:00.920 --> 01:55:04.000
stuff and kind of moved away from it a bit,

1417
01:55:04.399 --> 01:55:19.000
but that's kind of standard. I think sounds like the

1418
01:55:19.000 --> 01:55:22.399
motorbike's gone. Now what a silly time to be riding

1419
01:55:22.399 --> 01:55:27.119
a motorbike in a garden three minutes past ten in

1420
01:55:27.159 --> 01:55:34.920
the evening, My goodness. So I started to move away

1421
01:55:34.960 --> 01:55:39.680
from it, started to do things with my friends, go

1422
01:55:39.800 --> 01:55:46.960
to the cinema, hang out, do things instead of going

1423
01:55:46.960 --> 01:55:52.479
to karate. You know this, It was just pretty much

1424
01:55:53.439 --> 01:55:56.279
just before I left school, and then after I left school.

1425
01:55:56.359 --> 01:56:02.279
That was kind of it because I was working in

1426
01:56:02.279 --> 01:56:06.279
a chip shop. For some reason, I chose the job

1427
01:56:06.960 --> 01:56:14.159
which didn't allow me to continue doing karate. Possibly wasn't

1428
01:56:14.159 --> 01:56:17.359
the best career move I ever made, but it is

1429
01:56:18.199 --> 01:56:22.000
what I did and I can't change that. So there

1430
01:56:22.039 --> 01:56:27.800
you go. But I'm glad I did the karate. I'm

1431
01:56:27.840 --> 01:56:32.359
glad I did that at school. I wish i'd started earlier,

1432
01:56:32.720 --> 01:56:37.119
but I wasn't allowed to say. Hey. I also I

1433
01:56:37.159 --> 01:56:40.960
wish i'd done boxing. The thing is, boxing was in

1434
01:56:41.000 --> 01:56:43.359
a different town, so I did go. So I had

1435
01:56:43.399 --> 01:56:48.039
a friend that went, but it was a lot of

1436
01:56:48.159 --> 01:56:50.960
I mean, it was expensive, the bus, I was getting

1437
01:56:51.000 --> 01:56:56.079
home late, and it just wasn't really practical, so I

1438
01:56:56.119 --> 01:56:59.399
didn't go. I did sort of stop going. I did

1439
01:56:59.399 --> 01:57:01.880
a bit of kick boxing before I did the karate

1440
01:57:02.039 --> 01:57:05.479
as well. That was with a neighbor opposite who was

1441
01:57:05.840 --> 01:57:12.000
in the American Forces, and the kid next door to

1442
01:57:12.039 --> 01:57:17.399
me wanted he wanted to teach him kickboxing, but needed

1443
01:57:17.399 --> 01:57:21.800
someone else to teach him with. He needed an opponent

1444
01:57:23.159 --> 01:57:26.560
and someone to spar with. So the kid asked me

1445
01:57:26.640 --> 01:57:29.439
if I had come along, So I did. There'd been

1446
01:57:29.439 --> 01:57:33.600
my next door neighbor for a few years. The thing

1447
01:57:33.640 --> 01:57:35.600
I didn't like about that is a couple of things. First,

1448
01:57:35.640 --> 01:57:39.920
I didn't like the stretching. I never stretched before. It

1449
01:57:40.119 --> 01:57:44.560
was not fun and I felt it for days afterwards.

1450
01:57:45.840 --> 01:57:48.319
I know he still did stretching in karate, but it

1451
01:57:48.439 --> 01:57:52.520
was stretching in the kickboxing. It was really full on.

1452
01:57:53.840 --> 01:57:57.199
And the other thing I didn't like is but I

1453
01:57:57.239 --> 01:58:05.439
didn't really appreciate, was the man teaching us was so

1454
01:58:05.479 --> 01:58:08.880
he had. It was only two of us training, and

1455
01:58:09.119 --> 01:58:11.720
he talked to us. He had taughts the basic punches,

1456
01:58:11.840 --> 01:58:16.600
kicks and stuff, and then he got a sparring, but

1457
01:58:16.720 --> 01:58:20.520
he was shouting in like support of the other kid,

1458
01:58:21.119 --> 01:58:26.600
not me. I didn't like that. It bugged me, still

1459
01:58:27.000 --> 01:58:29.840
still bucks me today. It's just like what you're doing

1460
01:58:30.159 --> 01:58:36.319
is he can't invite two kids to come along and

1461
01:58:36.399 --> 01:58:40.079
train them and then side with one over the other,

1462
01:58:41.439 --> 01:58:45.680
especially as neither of us were really we were just neighbors.

1463
01:58:46.760 --> 01:58:49.199
He hadn't known he'd known us all the same length

1464
01:58:49.239 --> 01:58:54.720
for time. He knew my parents, the bloke he knew

1465
01:58:54.760 --> 01:59:02.399
the parents next door, so very strange. I knew his.

1466
01:59:02.600 --> 01:59:08.039
I knew his his son because his son was Yeah,

1467
01:59:08.039 --> 01:59:10.439
I used to go up in there and I used

1468
01:59:10.439 --> 01:59:13.960
to hang around with his son sometimes, so I'd been

1469
01:59:14.000 --> 01:59:17.279
in his house a few times, so he knew me.

1470
01:59:18.800 --> 01:59:22.840
So I don't know but decide maybe that's why, because

1471
01:59:22.840 --> 01:59:24.720
he kind of got to know me a bit, and

1472
01:59:24.760 --> 01:59:29.960
he thought, you know, try and teach the other kid

1473
01:59:30.039 --> 01:59:35.119
to to win. But neither of us won because we

1474
01:59:35.159 --> 01:59:39.159
were both both the same size, because he was younger

1475
01:59:39.199 --> 01:59:42.319
than me, both pretty much the same size. That's why

1476
01:59:42.319 --> 01:59:46.560
I was picked to do it, you know, probably the

1477
01:59:46.560 --> 01:59:51.880
same kind of strength level, and we couldn't hurt each

1478
01:59:51.880 --> 01:59:56.600
other if we tried. We couldn't. It was just we

1479
01:59:56.600 --> 02:00:04.199
were padded up, really properly padded up body, legs, feet, hands,

1480
02:00:05.479 --> 02:00:09.520
maybe even elbows and head. So there is almost like

1481
02:00:14.319 --> 02:00:22.279
it's yeah, it be a little bit like getting a

1482
02:00:22.279 --> 02:00:28.800
little glass thimble, wrapping it up in bubble rap, like

1483
02:00:28.880 --> 02:00:34.159
a whole two hundred foot bit of bubble rap, and

1484
02:00:34.279 --> 02:00:38.479
tying it all together all around, and then covering it

1485
02:00:38.520 --> 02:00:42.640
in foam. So the ball is probably about, you know,

1486
02:00:42.840 --> 02:00:47.239
the size of a house, and then just dropping it

1487
02:00:47.399 --> 02:00:52.199
two inches. You're you're not going to make any difference

1488
02:00:52.239 --> 02:00:58.520
to the little the little glass thimble, the little glass

1489
02:00:58.720 --> 02:01:01.239
the little tiny little glass thing. It's not going to

1490
02:01:01.279 --> 02:01:04.239
break because it's you know, it's so protected. That's a

1491
02:01:04.279 --> 02:01:06.399
little bit like what we were, like, we've all a

1492
02:01:06.399 --> 02:01:14.039
padding on. That seemed like a good analogy until I

1493
02:01:14.119 --> 02:01:16.960
started and I realized it was going on a bit

1494
02:01:17.000 --> 02:01:21.560
too far. And I also thought, I'm saying glass thimble.

1495
02:01:21.840 --> 02:01:24.600
Does anyone know what I mean when I say glass thimble?

1496
02:01:26.199 --> 02:01:28.880
And I'll explain what I meant is because you can

1497
02:01:28.920 --> 02:01:32.000
get metal thimbles. It's basically what people use when they

1498
02:01:32.039 --> 02:01:36.479
do sewing, because they use it to push the needle

1499
02:01:36.560 --> 02:01:40.840
through through the cotton or whatever. So it's kind of

1500
02:01:41.000 --> 02:01:45.199
it just protects the thumb. But you can also get

1501
02:01:45.199 --> 02:01:47.119
glass ones, or at least you used to be able

1502
02:01:47.119 --> 02:01:49.640
to and I have little dents in them so that

1503
02:01:50.319 --> 02:01:54.479
it would it would catch the needle, the end of

1504
02:01:54.479 --> 02:01:59.119
the needle as you pushed it in. So yeah, anyway,

1505
02:01:59.800 --> 02:02:08.439
just what'd explain that? So this brings me to the

1506
02:02:08.600 --> 02:02:15.199
end of the recording again, La la la la la,

1507
02:02:15.760 --> 02:02:18.800
So thank you for listening. Remember to be kind to

1508
02:02:18.880 --> 02:02:24.279
yourself because you do deserve to feel happy and be

1509
02:02:24.439 --> 02:02:31.159
gentle with yourself. You deserve to feel safe. Lots of love,

1510
02:02:33.520 --> 02:02:35.840
Bye bye bye