#199 Let me bore you to sleep - Jason Newland (19th August 2019)

Hello and welcome to Let Me Bore You To Sleep. My name is Jason Newland and this is a sleep hypnosis, well no that's not hypnosis, it's a sleep recording but you know Boring, I'm trying to describe it, I don't know. It's basically me just talking so please only listen to this when you can safely close your eyes.

Now I don't usually have a topic to focus on before I press the record button. I don't normally know what I'm going to talk about but guarantee Andre will come out and start scratching and making noise. But today I have decided in my professionalism as a professional podcaster, I've decided to plan the podcast.

Very, very minute detail and when I say minute detail I mean very small amount of detail and I'm going to talk about my little brother which is something I don't think I've talked about, I don't think I've talked about him previously. I might have mentioned him but I don't think I've actually talked about him so I'm going to today and the reason I'm thinking about him is because I saw him on Saturday. I mean to me that was yesterday but it is it's now Monday morning.

It is in fact 1 59 a.m on Monday the... I don't know what date it is. So the 19th I think. Yeah I think it's the 19th of August.

Wow it's the 19th. So happy birthday to my other brother. If you're listening to this, happy birthday bruv and that means you'll be 51 because I'm 49 next week in one week's time because we're a week apart.

Two years apart but one week you know. So happy birthday and my little brother his birthday is the day before my birthday. So his birthday is in six days time but we're eight years apart.

So I thought that'd make a nice real really boring story. I'll talk about him. So let me have a look what I remember and I'm not going to say anything bad about him because there's nothing too bad to say about him really.

Just like I'm not going to say anything bad about any of my family. Just I will try and remember some stuff about him. Just some embarrassing stuff.

Um let's sort of think he's so he was born. Basically what happened, well okay I'm not going to go too far back, but his mum was pregnant. So that was my step-mum.

My first step-mum and I was seven years old and we lived in this house and if you listened to my podcast before I've mentioned this house because it's the house that I lived with with my two older brothers. And then we moved out into a bigger house because we needed the room. I don't know how long it was after my little brother was born and then my grandparents moved in and lived there for a long time.

And I would say out of the houses that I lived in that was my favourite. It's yeah pretty much. Um but there was also the aspect of it being where my Nana lived as well.

So I had the I suppose it's just a house that I had access to or I felt familiar with from the age of seven till I don't know 10 years ago. So what am I now 40? Yes probably for about 40 years. No 30, 30, over 30 years anyway because my Nan moved out and moved into a residential place I think about five years before she before she left.

So and now she left four years ago so yeah that's what it's about nine years isn't it? Anyway so that I like that house and I have described the house in quite a detailed description of the particular property in question and and I don't know why this is because these were new builds. These were when we moved in it was council, it was council house. When we moved in there were still houses being built and it was I guess it was a building site but a lot of it was built if that makes sense.

There was a but there's still houses were still being built around as it wasn't completed and I like that and maybe that's why I liked Fraggle Rock so much when I was a bit older when Fraggle Rock came on telly because it was always like they never stopped building did they? You know the little the little builders with little hats then the Fraggles would come along and start eating the bridges and the houses you know the roads and that and they'd have to start a game and they'd be going... I think that's that's what they used to say.

There was a time when I was younger and whenever the if I ever had a manager or a boss would come and tell us off you know wherever I worked there'd always be a moment when the manager would come in and say oh you you're not working hard enough and you need to you know Jason put your trouser back on and you're like you need to get back to work and we've got a deadline to reach and you know and on quite a few occasions when the person when the manager stopped talking I'd shout out the trash heap has spoken and they didn't like it.

Now not everyone's gonna to understand that reference but it's uh it's the Fraggle Rock reference.

There is this um basically the Fraggles would go to the trash heap for advice and the trash heap would be as wise basically it was just trash but with a big mouth like a big trashy trash trash thing and uh when he finished giving advice I think one of his the people within one of his like I don't know assistants would say the trash heap has spoken something like that. Yeah anyway I uh this house that I lived in with my family for some reason because they had a front door like most places they had a back door like I houses do but the back door was really high up off the ground.

I don't mean you know you need you didn't need binoculars to see the ground it wasn't that high up I didn't get sort of uh height sickness or anything like that but there was a big step a big concrete step and it was just I think it's quite poorly built really if you ask me.

He said why would you have the door so high up? I mean literally you could have a flood that would not be affected but we were nowhere near a river nowhere near water when there was water in the taps but you know it's just like I don't know what was going on.

I'm not sure if the neighbors had the same I guess they probably did because they were all pretty much identical houses and anyway there was this whenever I think about that garden um the couple of things I remember there's the memory of my granddad because when we moved out he he moved in with my nan and he really made that garden beautiful he you know he was retired and he spent a lot of time in the garden and doing the flowers and you know just making it lovely and although it wasn't a big garden it

wasn't a small garden if that makes sense and there wasn't there wasn't enough room for horses and cattle but it or a golf course but it was big enough to um we had a little pond and a washing line and you know he had um he had a shed there had you know it's lovely really um he spent a lot of time doing that and I think he was happy so I kind of remember that and I remember the garden as well because when my nan lived there on her own when my granddad left in

it was in 1991 so he left the planet and my nan was there living there on her own from 91 till yeah for at least 20 years and I used to go around and cut the lawn for about a while I suppose quite a while I used to do that 2001 to yeah so for quite a while I used to cut a lawn about just like once a week or something um or when I visited she'd have me getting out there she'd uh I remember I'd knock knock on a door and she'd stick a piece

of paper through the letterbox from inside saying you can come in when you've cut the lawn I'm like what that's a bit rude so I shout through the letterbox oh you open the door now or else she said or else put a letter put another piece of paper or else what so I shouted nothing really just I need the toilet another piece of paper one or two I said two another piece of paper comes out use the outside toilet so I started to walk away another another piece of paper comes out use the air freshener

oh what so yeah I ended up having to do the lawn and I remember because there used to be a tree in the front garden and I used to I've mowed the lawn there'd be a mow the lawn around the tree but then a tree got taken down got removed I don't know why I'm not sure but then I didn't have to didn't have to mow around it anymore yeah that's the front lawn story the other thing I remember is when we first moved in before my Nan and Grandad moved in there because it was

all a new build it was all you know basically the foundations hadn't settled not in the house and I don't not saying that we were kind of woke up and the house was upside down now I mean is the the garden wasn't settled it was basically like a just mud but sinking mud like some kind of quicksand swamp and literally it's probably up to my waist in mud which is quite good fun kind of it's it's fun if everybody else is also like up to their waist in mud it's less fun when you're the only

one who's in the garden up to mud up to your waist and you see your family eating their dinner in there through the kitchen window occasionally pointing and laughing so that that's yeah that wasn't quite as much fun and what I remember as well is we had a snowy time so the winter because I'm as far as I recall as far as I remember we were there for just one winter and so that would be the winter of 1978 I suppose I think and it was proper wintry I mean proper snow lots and lots and

lots of snow the schools were closed and but my school was closed I mean I don't remember listening to the radio or watching television to see if any other schools were closed because I had no interest I did kind of know because my brothers went to a different school in fact that's not true I mean after I was eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, yeah one of my brothers would have gone to a different school but the other one I think went to the same school as me my oldest one was four years older so he

would have gone to he would have been in high school by then because he'd have been 12 wouldn't he and I realize you might be listening to this and thinking I don't know I don't know how old he was how should I know he was he was 12 when I was eight he was four years older than me which still is and I remember the snow because we couldn't open the back door well we could open the back door because it opened inwards but it was it basically there was like a snow drift and it

filled the whole of the the alley at the back at the the back of the house so we couldn't actually get out of the back door but the front we could just about get out and I think I was about to my waist in snow which is fun unless of course you're the only one no I won't do that one no it was it was fun it's different it's better than being up to your waist in dirt and mud it just is it's I'm a big fan of snow I absolutely love snow love it it's

the most beautiful thing in the world okay I don't love it more than everything I'm just saying I really love snow there are other nicer things I'd rather look at but I'm just saying snow is I really there's something about it I think because I used to live in East London and it was grotty where I lived it was grey grotty just like a nothing place place in a sense of nothing it was just houses houses and roads and traffic where I lived that's all there was and a few corner shops and it was that

it was just in the houses had been there for probably since the war you know and there was there wasn't and all the streets had just got cars parked in them outside houses and there was nothing going on outside in the streets everyone was in their houses so it was just like a nothingness in a sense just people busy doing their thing so very grey very grey it was apart from the bits that weren't grey but you know it's just like but when it snowed it's like it transformed it into Narnia everything was just clean

it looked clean it smelt clean you know there was no there was practically no traffic so there's no car fumes there was there wasn't much in the way of planes going over because you know so that that was quite quiet there's a peacefulness around where I lived and I don't remember there being that many snowy winters when I lived in London though the biggest one I think was 1991 when I first went to London and that winter the snow was just massive massive amounts of snow that lasted for like a week or two brilliant absolutely

loved it there's been a few occasions over the years when it's been really like non-stop snow where I've lived now I don't remember much snow during my insurance days sort of between 2001 2007 I'm sure there was snow but I just don't have any memories of it however in 2007 I think it was November I just started in September I think it was the start of my degree my three-year full-time degree in counselling so I moved to a new town where the college was and the snow we had like proper full full snow really heavy

I mean technically snow's no heavier than anything else is it a kilo of snow is the same as a kilo of feathers but it just it fell fell heavily and I don't think I visited family for Christmas that year because of the weather I think I think because I have this recollection of standing outside possibly coming back from the garage which was just up the road the petrol station and I probably bought myself some lagers or something and another person was passing me I think he'd come from the pub and wished me a Merry Christmas

so I think it was Christmas Eve I think and I just remember that and then it snowed again I think the following year in 2008 Christmas I think it snowed the following year in 2009 but there's lots of snow like a lot like a real lot of snow but yeah so that was really cool and then I think it went a few years without much and then in 2011 I lived on a bit of a hill and it snowed again it was in fact I think it was 2012 beginning of the year like January or

February it really snowed and there was this car was trying to drive up the hill but it was basically traveling the wrong way I remember thinking to myself I wouldn't want to be in that car or behind it and it was just all these cars that had just been abandoned it was like some kind of zombie apocalypse but with snow and no zombies so it was I remember that because I had a new girlfriend who was from Romania I think somewhere like that and we just started dating and I'm not sure she'd ever seen snow

before but she might have done see back in 2009 or was it 2010 2010 2007 2008 2009 it might have been 2010 I don't know I lose track but there was this little I said little because she was really tiny lady that moved in to the place I was living she she had the other room and she was absolutely tiny and I think she was from Sudan or Africa or somewhere I don't know I didn't ask but her jeans she had I had to look because I was just curious they were on the radio and

I did wash them and they were just being dried and I was so little and I thought I've got to see what age these are because she was an adult she was I think about 22 23 I thought I've got to see what age what age clothes she wears because just and I think she had I think the size of like 10 year old or 11 year old for the for the jeans um but you know she's definitely a woman you know but it's just really to see someone so she couldn't have been more than

probably five foot maybe shorter but about five foot and that's not really relevant to the to the story but when it snowed I was indoors just keeping warm and I looked outside and she was out there making a snowman because she'd never seen snow before I mean like in in person I'm sure she's as she would understand the Narnia reference probably seen that film and very likely seen It's a Wonderful Life and many other films I guess the snowman I was going to say thinking of something that has snow in it there's lots of films

isn't there with snow but where she'd lived her life they didn't have snow so it was the first time that she'd seen it and she made a snowman and she was so happy she seemed to be very happy and I was quite pleased because the snow she used to make the snowman had cleared the path so I could get through without sort of getting myself too wet I'm trying to think of other times where it snowed oh there's one time back in 2013 or was it 2012 I think it was December 2012 I got a

job in insurance because the counseling just basically lost lots of work because of the the government cuts on the so I did a lot of work for charities so they got their funding reduced and stuff so I ended up going back to work in insurance full-time and still doing the counseling part-time and that year that's I got a job in December and I think it snowed November, December, January, February, March and April it snowed it not constantly the whole time but it's it snowed in every single one of those months so you had you know

had a little bit of snow in November had a bit more in December had even more in January but it kind of melted it kept melting and stuff but once I think it was February or mid end of January February and it was just constant it just seemed to snow every day for ages I actually thought the ice age had returned but it turned out it was just snow and I remember speaking to the customers on the phone and saying it's snowing where you are and because I want you know I was trying to build

up reports with them and the person sitting next to me started to get a bit annoyed with hearing me keep saying the same thing which encouraged me to say it even more often and make sure that he heard every time and I would I just talk about the weather oh is it snowing where you are have you built a snowman if they said yes I said well I used to live with someone that had never seen snow before and I was coming out of my bedroom and I saw that she was building a snowman and

she seemed really happy and I was happy too because the snow she'd used to make the snowman it's made a pathway so I could actually get out the out of the building through the garden and you won't believe what size jeans she used to wear so yeah it gave me an opportunity to talk to the people and sort of to build that that really close relationship with them you know it was good I was really strange about this well not strange just more my behavior really is I was used to living in that that part

of the house on my own because it was kind of like an extension so it was away from the family and it was just my room a room opposite that no one occasionally people moved in and moved out again and then it was the bathroom right next between the rooms not not between but next you know yeah kind of between so I used to be able just to get up go to the bathroom go to the toilet have a shower whenever I wanted and but then she moved in and she was doing night shift or

working till really early hours of the morning and I'd be in bed and she'd start the shower and it was a power shower so it'd be this it kind of almost sounded like a I don't know like a rocket taking off I'd like shake the shake the room and I moaned at her I complained complained to the landlady and I made no effort to befriend I wasn't rude to her but I just I didn't really put much effort in and because I'm yeah I can be a bit shy myself but I was grumpy as well

which was a bit silly in hindsight she was just having a shower and it's it's a good thing isn't it really but anyway I get out one day and I look out the window and there's a van out there and I hear this like voices outside my bedroom door so I kind of open it up I listen have a and when I open my door her door's open and her bedroom's empty pretty much there's there's like boxes and stuff like that and I said oi what are you doing she said I'm moving out I'm going

to go live in London and she hadn't been there for more than probably a month and I said why and she said at which this she said I've got no friends because she'd only been in the country I didn't realize I thought she'd been here for a while but she's apparently she's only just moved to the country and I felt bad then it's like oh oh okay this is funny I just made a bit more effort so I can't so I have I've learned from that I do when I moved here I put a bit

of effort in and say hello to people but it was weird because she gave me a big hug and it was really nice but it was too late I think if we'd had that hug two weeks earlier I don't think she'd have moved because we I don't know I just think we could have got on quite well and if I'd known that she was that way if I'd got lonely and I would have I could have sat and talked to her for hours and bored her and imagine now how good that would be so instead

of doing it to a a recorder and recording it I could actually have a human subject sitting in a chair in front of me and I could be talking at them for a long period of time now that is a dream come true anyway she left she she moved out and part of me was sad the part I thought I won't get woken up by that shower anymore then so yes it kind of worked out plus I think she's I think it's a good idea to move to London you know it's it's it's quite a

good place to meet people there's a lot more it's a lot more people there you know it's the busiest part of the of the country a lot of you know 10 million people condensed into a short to a small area the size of a the size of a giant's toenail so going back to the house that I used to live in and there's all that snow and the snow is really not really relevant to the story but but I remember I actually when I was eight I built an igloo I built an igloo I properly

um made little bricks out of snow and mixed the ice dirt together to make cement and with stones as well and I made this igloo I spent hours to making it I think the first one my brother um trod on but I think the second one I did he didn't and I built this igloo it was brilliant I absolutely loved it and when all the snow melted the last thing to melt was the igloo which just shows how well it was built in fact it's still there still there today right now it's still there yes

it is so we had this big step outside the back door of this house and my my little brother's mum had he was inside her as a little baby oblivious to the world you know just asleep I imagine just planning all the things he was going to do to me how many things he was going to do to annoy me when he was born and I was in the garden and I have a memory and I and this has just come to me now I have a memory that was really windy maybe even really rainy

and I slipped over off of the concrete step onto the floor and bashed my little knee and so why did I say little knee obviously I was eight it was little now what I mean is I've actually got three knees I've got an extra little one um it's just it's just how my left shoulder just sticks out it's a little knee that's a bit weird but you know so I hurt my little knee and my step-mom she uh at that time she was concerned about me and she came she picked me up as I guess

she would do and uh a water broke I nearly drowned no a water broke and uh see I didn't know about all this stuff I did I knew she was pregnant didn't know about the water breaking bit and I don't know I kind of because it was like all over the kitchen floor I think I was just this everywhere but it was slipping and sliding but it was I just I just felt a bit peeved off about it because I thought okay so you're going to do that in the kitchen you complain when I wet

the bed you know double standards but anyway she went to the hospital I had a baby well I had my little brother and that was one of my better birthdays well all my birthdays when I was a kid were pretty good but I got a golf court a golf set and what happened is my nan and granddad came down to look after us because in those days when someone had a baby they actually stayed in hospital for more than four hours and nowadays you know try and try and get it to give birth in the

ambulance on the way so then you can kind of leave you outside the hospital not even take you in I don't like to give up bed space for the patients oh no precious beds so she she was in hospital for maybe a couple of days it might have just been overnight it was at least one or two nights so I had my birthday I got some golf like a putting set with these golf clubs that were really heavy so that was fun I remember getting told off by my nan because I think me and my

brothers were arguing but that's what kind of brothers are supposed to do I think it's kind of natural really and then he came home and I think he was I think the person that wrote the book and the screenplay for the gremlin was based on my brother you know brought him home he was this little cute little thing big eyes just like just smiling and everyone fell in love with him I knew what he was really really about I knew but he'd say anything and he just turned into this little gremlin over time just terrorizing

me and he could get away with anything I mean once this is totally true he bit my cheek he had teeth so it wasn't when he was a baby but it was like I don't know two or three he bit my cheek and he wouldn't let go and I'm walking around with him for about five days you know I was in class at school like just Jason when he'd like come to the blackboard and write down the answer to his question I said no I can't it's just he's too heavy I can't keep walking around

and you know so so he was stuck to my cheek teeth embedded in my cheek and I'm I'm to say I wasn't enjoying it is an understatement he seemed to be having fun but I wasn't and what was weird about it is when I actually I was like yelling at him my dad came into the room and he told me off at this point my brother let go in about two seconds as soon as he had my dad turned back into that little cute little creature that everyone adores and there's me with this bite mark

in my cheek I mean literally it was there it was just how on earth he didn't go all the way through the skin probably got chubby cheeks I suppose I was quite lucky but he is this and I got in trouble all right okay so he basically could get away with anything anything at all so he was very annoying but on the same side or on the opposite side I did love him and I did I spent quite a lot of time with him and then when he was how old would he be when I

was 13 so how old would he be then 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 so he'd be 5 when he was 5 or 6 I started teaching him karate and he so I was going to a karate club twice a week two evenings Tuesday and a Thursday I think but they didn't allow anyone under the age of 12 I think to go to attend and I kept on at the at my teacher the karate teacher said come please can you let my brother come along start having younger people come because he's five but he's you

know he you know I've been teaching him how to kick and you know he's got um punch bags and nunchucks and all kinds of stuff that I was like they'd hit me with basically so in the end he said okay it took a took a few weeks of me like hounding him but in the end he said okay and my little brother was the first young person ever to be taught in that karate club that particular karate club the first the youngest ever and they did it on a like a Saturday morning I think so

he actually went in and did a special day like a special and I used to go in and teach because they were little and because my brother was there the I kind of oh I wasn't teaching the class I was just like assisting kind of because they were all they were all white belts there was no one with any any belt grades or anything and then eventually eventually my brother um he stopped going but he did get his first belt I think he got a yellow belt because he got his first grade in but I

think he lost interest but then he moved away as well but that was quite cool so I've got him into into that and there was uh there's one occasion where he was being a kid who might have actually been older than him but he was a neighbor and he was picking on my brother or he attempted to pick on my brother and my brother did some karate on him and that never happened again and I said to my brother I think that that gave him confidence after that you know at a very early age it

gave him confidence to know that he could deal with anything in that situation he never had to do that again I don't think but then I think he'd grown up to the age of eight with three older brothers he was used to the the rough and tumble of having older brothers and so yeah I think I think that I should ask him I don't know I think it must have been quite fun for him for the first eight years I don't know yeah so really considering this was going to be a story about him the

only thing I've really said is that he's annoying which wasn't my intention I've tried to think of um guys I was always getting hurt by him was it I remember once I think I was I had my my leg and it was stretching and he jumped on it I thought he broke my leg anyway that's the end of this one I'll speak to you very soon bye