#201 Let me bore you to sleep - Jason Newland (21st August 2019)

Hello and welcome to Let Me Bore You To Sleep. My name is Jason Newland. Please only listen to this when you can safely close your eyes.

It is 1.27am on this, yeah, Wednesday morning. I'm not sure what day it is, what date rather. It's the 21st, yeah, 21st of August 2019.

So, I've got, what, six days until my 49th birthday, which is on Monday. So, 49? Really? I think I might be going through a, I don't know, midlife, not so much midlife crisis as a midlife, just contemplation really, I think, if anything else. Just contemplating the situation, my life and where I am now and where I was and where on earth am I going? I don't know.

And it's been a weird day, been a weird couple of days really. It's been a weird, I don't know, I had a really, really lovely day on Saturday. Visited family, saw my aunt I haven't seen since my nan's funeral, saw my little brother that I haven't seen probably for maybe a year and a half, two years even.

And I didn't even see him on his 40th birthday, which was last year, last August, so it may well be nearly two years since I saw him. And so that was really nice. This week I've been, just had a bit of a financial struggle.

And it's bugged me a little bit, just this bugged me, it's been bugging me. And Andre got fleas, which isn't quite as awful as it sounds, because they're kind of sticking to him. They're not spreading, I'm not getting bitten, they're not gone onto the carpets or anything.

He's basically, they're just on him and he hasn't got many. So yesterday I tried to get some, well, over the weekend, I think Sunday, I gave him, or Saturday, I gave him tablets, like a little tablet for the fleas. And that seemed to have done the trick, but then they came back, so it didn't do the trick.

And then on Monday, I was trying to find, I went to the pet shop and they gave me some tablets that weren't the right ones. But they did say, you know, not tablets, like liquid stuff, but spot check or spot something. They said, do call the number on the box first before using it, which I did.

They said, we'll call you back because we're not sure. They called me back, they said, we are sure now, don't use it because we haven't ever tested it on ferrets. And so the lady in the pet shop did say that I could take it back, which, and get the money back if it wasn't usable, which was good.

And then yesterday I went into the pet shop and I went to the, I was going to go into town to another pet shop. But I spoke to the person on the phone first and they said, yeah, I've got this liquid stuff, but it's the best in the world. And you can only get it here.

And like, I don't know, it sounded a little bit, just I wasn't sure. I've never heard of the name of it either. But I headed up to get it.

And on the way, I saw the vets and I thought, I don't know what I'll do. I'll go in there. I'm sure they've got the flea stuff, you know, stuff to help him.

And the lady in there said, no, we haven't. But we can get it for you tomorrow. I said, okay, cool.

So I just come back tomorrow. She said, yeah, but you have to have an appointment first because it can only be prescribed to a patient. I said, I'm not a ferret.

She said, I know you're not a ferret. I don't mean you. I said, okay.

And she said, you need to have an appointment. I said, how much did that cost? She said, nothing, it's free. But the treatment will cost, I said, how much is the treatment? And she said, she looked at the computer and she said, it's £10.91 or something like that.

I said, fine. I just spent £12 or £13 on the other stuff. So it's fine.

I'll get that money back and I'll cover the cost of the treatment at the vets. So I go back this morning, or this afternoon rather, struggled to get out of bed, set my alarm for two o'clock. And I was like going, it's like just, I had my phone in my room and I woke up about half 12 or one o'clock, something like that.

And I thought, no, I'm just going to lay on the bed. And this is what I did. In every 10 minutes, I was waking up and looking at the phone.

And eventually I was woken up by the alarm. It's like, sort of just got up when I woke up. But, and I was in bed by three, I'd say.

I think so. And so I got up, had a bath, had my breakfast and I headed down with Andre. I took him in his bag and I took him.

I went to the pet shop where I bought the initial liquid thing for the fleas, but that didn't have any, um, yeah, I couldn't use it. So I took it back and they gave me the money back, which is groovy. I then walked up and got the bus and I got to the bus stop just as the bus was pulling out.

So I managed to catch it. And as I was getting on the bus, the lady who was driving it was giving me some looks and I thought, oh no, she's not going to not let me on because I've had an Andre. But she wasn't, she was just interested.

She said, oh, is that a ferret? Which is weird because you can't, well, there's a bit of material at the top that you can see through, but I'm surprised that people could like know what it was, but know what he is. And, uh, she was like really, really friendly. So that was good.

I got on the bus. So everything was kind of going to plan, I suppose. And I went into the, I also had a donate, I had a gift, a PayPal gift from my friend Susan in Canada.

Canada? Yeah. Don't know why I keep thinking Australia, but it's Canada. And I went into, so I up, yeah, so I did that to my account, but it takes a while for it to go through.

And I went on the way on the bus to the vets. There was a couple, well, no, three people and a little kid, a little baby. And they were just giving Andre a lot of fuss.

I didn't let him out of the bag, but I opened the bag up so he could stick his head out. And, you know, he was just, oh, he was sniffing. He was like proper, cause he's got a real, uh, strong sense of smell.

So he was taking in all the different smells of, uh, I guess the bus and the people and everything. He seemed to be really enjoying himself, but he was, you know, struggling to get out of the bag. And I kind of had to keep him in there.

And then I got off the bus and he was still struggling to get out of bag. So I was just going to carry him to the vets. So in the end, I let him out and I'm kind of pulling him.

And it's, I seem to be dragging him and look over, he's just done the biggest poo and wee. So basically he was, he was desperate to go to the toilet, but he would never, he would never go in his bag. But, you know, I can't let him, I can't just put him onto the floor in the bus and let him go to the toilet.

I mean, that's, I just can't do that. So, but I mean, the thing is even the biggest poo for him, it's only tiny, it's not like a dog or a cat poo. It's just, but anyway, he did that.

And he was, when he does that, suddenly he has energy. He sort of jumps around and he's like, it's weird. It's like he celebrates.

I'm glad that's out of me. And this, and then we walked to the pet shop, but the vets, and I thought I'd better stick him in the, in the bag now. So I put him in the bag.

I go into the vets and I go up to the lady that I saw yesterday. And I said, how much does it cost to, how much would it cost me to put this thing down? She said, what? I said, yeah, it's ruined my carpet. And she looked at me, horrified.

And I said, I've got an appointment. I saw you yesterday. And I said, oh, okay.

I kind of thought she'd remember me. It was like just a silly, silly joke, but she took it seriously, I think. I think it ruined our relationship.

But she said, oh yeah, the thing is I thought she'd remember me because I was talking to her for about 15 minutes about medication, how much it was going to cost. And she had to order it and take my details and all that stuff. So I don't know.

But she didn't remember me. And she said, oh, so I got in there early, probably about 20 minutes earlier than I needed to. And she said, well, the, the, the vets here, well, I kind of expected them to be there.

I mean, I didn't think he'd just come in for that one appointment. And after about three or four minutes, a young bloke came out and he said, Andre? I thought, I love that. I love that.

The fact that, because Andre's the patient, it should be him, shouldn't it? His name should be called out. And so I brought, I took him into the, he led me into the room where there's like a table, you know, standard benchy table, chair thing, whatever it is. It's like, it's kind of like a, kind of like a massage table really.

But that kind of, yeah, I don't know. But anyway, I got him out of the bag. I took his collar off the lead off of him and I put him down and he started sniffing around and, and just having a good look and like moving around a lot.

And he, he got a hor, not a horoscope, not a telescope, cephas, tephas, telus, tephascope, hephascope, mephis. You know that thing you use to, well not you, unless you're a doctor or a nurse, you used to hear the heartbeat, stethoscope, yeah, stethoscope. And he had one of those, but it's like a little one.

And there's a lot of little, yeah, you know, very little one. I thought it is, I thought it'd be bigger. But I guess if it's a small animal, they have a, use a small one.

I mean, I suppose it's the same as if it was a, if it was a lion, you wouldn't use a tiny one. You'd probably use a much bigger one than you would for a human. I don't know.

I mean, I'm not, I'm not an expert on stethoscopes, but every time we went to sort of put it onto Andre, Andre's wiggling about and moving about and getting away. So I basically said, I'll hold him for you. So I hold him on his back, well in my arms, but I hold him so that the, the vet could listen to his heart and check that.

And then he checked his stomach, felt around his stomach to make sure he was fine. And then he checked his coat and had a look and he said, yeah, I could see the fleas, but there's not many. And so he's, he hasn't got a lot there.

And he had the medication and I said, is it alright if you stick it on for me? Because I'm just lazy. I don't, if I can avoid doing anything, I will. Seriously, I'll, I'll go 10 miles out of my way.

If a shop has like automatic doors, it's terrible, isn't it? But he did that, put the liquid on, has to go between Andre's shoulder blades because he can't get to that. He can't lick his shoulder blades. And Andre was so good.

Really, he was just, just so good. He just, just took it. He didn't like it because he doesn't like having stuff like that done, but I was holding him and he behaved himself.

He didn't bite or anything because sometimes if you do something to him he doesn't like, he might bite, not hard, but just like a warning really. Or he'll scratch, usually just to get away. He does that when I bathe him.

And he didn't do any of that stuff with the vet, probably because I was holding him and he felt safe. Because even though a lot of the time he acts like he doesn't care whether I'm there or not, if someone else comes along, he clings to me. That's weird, isn't it? He'll actually cling to me.

So if I'm talking to somebody at the front door or outside, he will cling to me, literally. And he'll wiggle about, sometimes he'll just lay there or just be still or quiet, maybe go to sleep even, but he clings to me. Doesn't do that generally any other situation.

So it's not that he's scared, I think he just is a bit, I don't know, maybe just a bit of a baby, maybe, I don't know. But I do quite like it. So everything was going really well.

Andre had his little medication and the vet said, I think he took the box and he took it out and he said, go around, I'll meet you at the reception, which I did. And so I was getting ready to pay. I said to the vet, do I need any other appointments or anything? And he said, well, give the medication once a month.

And then in a year's time, come back and have another flu check. And if he has any lumps in his stomach, come and see us as well, because that's something that ferrets can sometimes have, which should be treated by the medication he's got. And I'm always like feeling him, touching him and massaging him and just touching his stomach just to make sure that he's okay, make sure he doesn't flinch or that he's not in pain or anything like that.

So I'm always kind of keeping check of him. That's how I noticed the fleas, because he doesn't have fleas normally. I'm constantly checking his coat, going through it.

I brush his coat quite regularly. So I always, and he's at the moment, especially with the summer, his coat's very fair. In the winter, it gets a lot darker.

But at the moment, it's quite fair. So it's quite easy to see little black things creeling about, crawling about. And then, so I said, okay, so I couldn't remember if it was £10.91 or £10.99, I forget.

And so I'm kind of going to get £10. I think I have, I wasn't sure how much I had on me, but I knew I had at least £13. And I said, how much is it? And lady said, oh, it's £28.30. I said, what? She said, yeah, £28.30. I said, yesterday, you said it was going to be £10 something.

She said, it's £28.30. Something like, it might not have been, it might be £28.80. I don't know. It was over £28. I thought, what? It was confusing me.

Plus, there were some people waiting to be seen as well. So I kind of had that little bit of added pressure to publicly converse about quite small amounts of money, really, but still annoying. And she said, yeah, it's £28.

I said, well, you said it was £10 yesterday. She said, oh, don't you want all three tablets? I said, what? She said, no, it's £10.80 or whatever per tablet or per capsule of liquid that you put on. It's not £10 for the box of three.

It's £28 for the box of three. And I said, well, I suppose I'll just have to take one then. And she handed me one and I said, no, it's all right.

The vet's already given me one of the capsules. He's already put it on him. So I was honest.

And you know what I mean? I didn't sort of try and sort of take advantage of the situation. I thought, you know, it's already been paid. I've already done, I've already taken what I'm paying for.

And I said, can you hold the other two capsules in the box for me? And I'll come and get them when I get my next bit of money. And she said, no, I can't do that. So I felt a little bit silly, a little bit.

Admittedly, I was balancing a jar of jam on my head. So that probably didn't help. But I just, I kind of said, I don't know if, you know, the idea of having to go through the whole process again and, you know, ordering and waiting for it to turn up and stuff.

I said, let's see if I've got enough to pay for it. The money hadn't gone through into the account yet. So I couldn't use that.

But I did just have enough cash. So I had £28. I had £29 altogether.

And I gave that and I got like a little bit of change. That's like, oh great. Yay.

And then I went to, I did that. I went and waited at the bus stop. So I'm just holding in and I don't really want to let him on the street.

I let him down a little bit, but there's a lot of traffic going past. So I'm just waiting with him, holding him up and letting him go into his bag every now and then. And a young lady stops and she's got her kids with her and she's like saying hello to him and how beautiful he is and how she wanted to take him home with her.

And then the bus came. I got on the bus. It was the same lady as the bus that I'd gone to before.

So she'd literally gone to town and turned around and come back. And she said to me, oh, that was quick. And I thought, well, at least someone remembers me.

And I get on and I get off again opposite the garage. Go to the garage. I get what I needed to get in the garage.

And I had, it came to, I can't forget what it was. What did it come to? £16.20. And I said, wait a sec, because I didn't know how much I had in the bank. So I have to check if it's gone through.

It should have done. And I had £16.24 in the bank. So I paid on my card while I was getting from the garage.

And I started laughing. I said, you realize, because I'm getting quite well with the lady that works there. I said, it's taken me 49 years to save up four pence.

I've saved up four pence in 49 years. And she said, have a good day. So I left.

And it was kind of a surreal moment. And the last time really, I felt that was 2011, 2012, 2013, 2012, I don't know, one of those, where I owed rent. So I was behind on my rent.

And I didn't really have any money at all. And I had, I think, 12 pence in the bank. And I just was walking down the street laughing.

But the difference is then, I had no money for food, I had no money for anything. This is different, because I've got everything I need. You know, technically, so I've got a home.

So it's a different situation. But still, I still find it quite amusing to be, you know, getting on to 50 and having four pence in the bank. It's been a strange financial week.

And I've just got, I've just got my fortnightly money today. So I had to pay back 50 pound that I borrowed at the weekend, that enabled me to travel to see my family. I had to pay off 50 pounds to the catalogue, and then another 30 pound to, for the electric gas bill, that I just got a reminder for.

And I never get reminders. I always pay them. The whole time I've lived here, I've always paid them straight away.

And I got my first, I don't know if that would be a red warning or what. It's like, wow. It was only for a small amount.

But that's now done. Very strange, just, just a bit strange times. I started thinking, what am I going to do? What should I do now? I don't know.

I don't know what to do. So that was today. Since I got home, Andre has been asleep.

I mean, solidly asleep. And we must have been home since five, pretty much for the whole, the last eight hours, or nearly nine hours, he's been asleep. So maybe that, that medication that he had from the vets, it kind of causes sleepiness.

I don't know. He was happy. I took a picture of him earlier and he was on his back, smiling, fast asleep.

And I put a picture and stuck it on Facebook. So he's a happy little boy. So yeah, good for him.

I suppose getting out was nice as well, because he got to go somewhere new. Because I rarely take him out anywhere other than just the local park or around the block. So to take him on the bus, to take him to the vets, to walk down that road that he rarely gets to walk down, and to meet new people on the bus and also at the bus stop.

That was probably just a really nice experience for him. To just do something a little bit different, you know. So maybe he wore himself out.

Maybe he got very excited and now he's dreaming about it. Got something to dream about, something new, something stimulating, perhaps. So yeah, I was really surprised he hasn't sort of come into the living room yet, because he's just... this is the third recording I've made.

Not in a row, but as in I made two at the end of the evening. And the last one finished about half hour ago, or maybe half an hour before I started this one. So I did Deep Sleep Whisperer, number 131.

I did Relaxation Hypnosis for Stress, Anxiety and Panic Attacks, number 47. This is number 201 of the Let Me Bore You To Sleep podcast. So kind of feeling quite tired, quite tired.

More than a bit. I did have a little bit of sleep earlier, for about an hour. I had a little lay down, about half seven, quarter to eight, something like that, till about nine.

Just a little sleep, just a little, you know, a little... Ah, it's quite nice. And then tomorrow, I'm dealing with the double glazing people. They're measuring my door, and probably going to get a new front door, which is good.

Thursday, I've got an appointment. Friday, no, I've got nothing planned Friday. Saturday, Sunday, it's the bank holiday weekend.

And Monday, also part of the bank holiday weekend, so it's a bank holiday Monday, is my 49th birthday. So I'm not sure what, yeah, I'm probably not going to do anything, just, the thing is, on a bank holiday, the bus service is pretty awful, which is fair enough. It's just, you know, it's not that often, but it's a Sunday service.

So the buses are every two hours. Now, if a bus doesn't turn up every, well, it's every half hour, it's not so bad. But if they're every two hours, and they don't turn up, or if they turn up early, too early, or too, you know, it's a little bit, it's never, yeah, I basically don't travel on a Sunday.

Because I waited once, for an hour for a bus. I was there half an hour before it was supposed to be there, and I was there half an hour after it was supposed to be there. And I vowed never, never to get a bus on a Sunday again.

I thought, no. And I think it was raining, but it might have been nice. And what made it more, just to use a word, interesting, when I got there, there were some people there already, and they were waiting with me for about half an hour, maybe 40 minutes, and then the car turns up, and they get into the car.

So they weren't waiting for the bus, they were just waiting to get picked up by someone in the car. And it was me thinking, not that I had company on the bus, I didn't need that, but just that I was kind of waiting for something that was going to be turning up. Because others also were participating in that particular activity of waiting for said bus, but no, the bussy bus was not coming.

No, not at all. No bus, no bus at all. So I went home, and I thought, I was growling.

During the week, so when I first moved here, the buses were every 20 minutes, which I think is a pretty good service. And the Saturdays was every half an hour, and Sundays every three weeks, every two hours apparently. And then they changed the timetable so that the weekly buses were every half an hour, like the Saturday one, which means if a bus comes early, you know, maybe a little bit too early or go past, and might have to wait for half an hour for the next one.

When it was 20 minutes, just didn't seem as long as half an hour, which is probably because it wasn't. Yeah, that makes sense, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah, makes absolute sense. I got the heating on.

It was chilly in here, so I thought I'd put the heating on, and I did. And now it's a little bit too warm, so I might have to go and turn the heating off, or maybe open a window, because I like having a window open all year round, and even if they're not wide open, they'll be on the hinges, so they're, you know, you can't open them from outside, because they're kind of locked. They're locked, but they're locked in an open position, so that the air can get in and out, causing a, I guess, a fresher breathing environment for myself, and possibly for Andre, and maybe any subsequent visitors that may visit my home at some point.

And I do like the, just having a bit of air flowing around the place. I do, and I've, I've been doing that since I moved in. I've been getting up and opening the windows, and letting in the fresh air, and letting out the stale air, and just letting the air flow, and it's nice.

However, when it's a bit chilly, it can get a bit cold, so it's not always a perfect environment, temperature-wise, which sometimes requires the central heating being activated for a while, not forever, for enough time for the temperature of this place I call home to reach a comfortable, comfortable temperature, comfortable level, a comfortable level of comfort physically, which then probably improves my emotional comfort, which can be affected affected somewhat by the temperature of the room, if it's a little bit, a little bit too cold, or a little bit too warm.

So that's why I like to keep it at a pleasant level of temperature, so that I can relax and just be able to let go, and if I wish to drift off, then I can, and it feels really nice, feels nice and comfortable, and I've been thinking about the future, so 49 in a few days time, I like how that rhymed, and I'm not sure about the year ahead. As I've already said, I'll probably continue eating bread, and I don't know, I think I'll just continue making recordings, because this year, 2019, or this year between my last birthday, at the end of August last year, when I turned 48, and this coming Monday, when I turn 49, has, I reckon, been my most prolific year recording-wise.

I must have made, August, September, October, November, December, I must have made about 450, maybe 500 recordings, but I'd say probably about at least 400 recordings during that time. It's a guess, it's very much a guess, but that's what I would say. I reckon about 400 recordings in the last year.

I think I've done about 270 just this year alone, 200 in 2019, I think. And next year, I'm planning to make at least a thousand recordings during 2020. That's what I foresee.

That was what I was aiming for this year, but it's still been, yeah, 2019 has still been the year where I've made the most recordings, I think, since I started doing this in 2006. So I would say that that was the busiest year. 2019 will be even busier than, yeah, 2020 will be even busier than 2019.

2018 was busy as well. So, yeah, I'd like to do some courses, do something a bit different, but I don't know what. Maybe sort of driving lessons, not driving lessons, but driving, you know, hypnosis-y course of driving.

And I suppose realistically, the list is pretty much endless of all the things that I could do, all the different issues I could make a recording about. So there's definitely a lot of opportunities there to hopefully make a difference in some people's lives. And I suppose I didn't, I did know this, but I wasn't, I guess, as knowledgeable about myself as I am now, in the past.

I don't think I realised that I like to do things, let's say it's a subject, let's say sleep. For example, I like to do lots and lots of different recordings based on the same subject, the Relaxation Hypnosis for Stress, Anxiety and Panic Attacks podcast. So I've done 47 different episodes, 47 different recordings, but all aimed at the same purpose, pretty much.

And I've probably got another 500 to go, maybe another 1000, maybe another 5000 of those recordings to do. And there's something about repetition being one of the best ways to change, to learn, to, you know, to get out of old habits, to learn new habits, to change old ways of thinking, to create new ways and embed those new ways into your life. Repetition is one of the great ways to do that.

I've always just woken up, wide awake. So what I like to do is, there's the repetition, but there's also different types of repetition. So you can listen to 10 different recordings, all on the same subject, but it's still repetition, yet presented maybe from a different angle, maybe focusing on a specific thing that the other recordings didn't focus on as much.

Yet there's still that repetition, and that repetition spreads throughout, I guess all of my recordings in a way, you know, the repetition of feeling relaxed, letting go, being kind to yourself, speaking gently to yourself. Those ideas and thoughts are embedded in everything that I do, I would say. So that is repetition, even if each recording is very different in some ways, there's also that similarity, even if it's just, you know, because it's the same voice.

I get so relaxed when I make these recordings. I'm actually really tired. So calm, just to let go, not needing to do or say anything at all.

Even listening to the background, a train in the distance, going past, it's miles away. I just hear it on a clear evening like this. Even that feels relaxing, so relaxing.

I don't even feel like I could open my eyes. I almost feel stuck, closed. Say goodbye for now, and I will speak to you very soon.

Remember to be kind and gentle to yourself. Lots of love. Bye.