#244 Let me bore you to sleep - Jason Newland (23rd October 2019)

Hello, welcome to jasonnewland.com. My name is, my noon is, my name is Jason Newland. This is let me bore you to sleep. Please only listen when you can safely close your eyes.

Now, there may be a little background sound at times because I'm recording this in my living room and it's quite early in the day. Well, it's 5.37pm and there are people about. There are people awake outside in the world.

So, there's always a chance that you hear a bit of a garden activity. Also, by that I don't mean hedgehogs and stuff. I mean people.

The gate, the garden gate is broken. So, it's basically the hinge is gone or something. So, I've been hearing people banging it, trying to close it.

And they keep banging it and banging it. And I thought, oh, it must be really complicated to close. So, I don't use it.

I don't go out the back. I like the front entrance. And as I went out there just to have a look, just to see how complicated the closing the fence really is, closing the gate really is.

Because, you know, I've got a lot of sympathy for people who have problems with closing gates. It's one of my things, you know. I'm a compassionate gate closer.

Especially, you know, when it comes to fences and, you know, the gate. It's a door really, isn't it? It's a door and a fence. It's a fence.

It's the hole in the fence that's not a hole because it's a door. But then when it's open, there is a hole, kind of. But my, you know, huge amount of love and compassion filled my little toe.

So, I went out there to have a little check to see just how difficult it was to close it because I've been hearing people banging it for a few days now, like continuously. Almost sound like they're making a running jump, really, you know. And I looked at it.

I'm not a surveyor. I'm not a building expert. I've never built a fence or a gate.

It's a wooden fence gate. It's not like a gate that you have that's made of metal that you have maybe in the front garden that's not really any point of having it there other than just to wake up the neighbors when the postman delivers. And, you know, that squeaks.

Those kind of old age, I say old age, but I don't know if they're still about anymore. But I suppose some people still have gates for their front gardens. But it's kind of a bit pointless.

Well, apart from those people that like them, of course, then they're worth every penny. And I wish more people had them. I really do.

And in fact, just thinking about those little gates in front of people's houses, in front of the garden, I just feel excited thinking about it. It's weird, isn't it? Just get a real kind of weird sound that just came out my throat then, but magnified out by one. And I get that feeling of gratitude for life, really.

Those fences, the squeaky fences and the clicking, the clicking of the metal bit as you let it drop. Instead of just, you know, letting it go slowly, gently, letting it just click shut. Or yeah, that just letting it like bang shut.

Those fences, so every time someone comes with some milk delivery, parcel delivery, people just coming in and out of the house. Yeah, let the gate slam every single time. And then when it slams, it doesn't close, which means it's not actually secure.

It's as pointless having a gate because you could just walk in. You could just step over it, really. Anyway, the back gate, I went out there.

I thought, you know what? I'm going to go out there. Sometimes I think about doing something and I don't do it. Other times I think about doing something and I still don't do it.

But then there's those times, those times when I think about doing something and I actually go and do it. This is one of those times. So I waddled on down the steps and then rode across the river.

Well, it's a moat. I live on a castle. And then I got to the helicopter pad.

And because I've got a castle and I own a helicopter, got the helicopter to the gate. Because the gate is about, it's about three miles away. And that's why I need a helicopter to get to it.

Because my vast land that I own. So I got to the, got to the gate. Oh, got there.

I was, I wasn't ecstatic. I'll be honest with you. It wasn't, I didn't have a like a, didn't have a tummy full of bumblebees.

It wasn't that kind of a excitement. It was more of an excitement of, well, I've just eaten a kebab. I wonder whether or not I'll get, make it home in time to get to the toilet.

That kind of, the unknown kind of excitement, you know. So I went, I went to the bottom of the garden and got to the gate. And I looked at it and I could see that it was, it was wonky.

It was a wonky gate. And, but not hugely wonky. I mean, it wasn't upside down.

It wasn't like, it wasn't pointing towards me. It was, it was still relatively, I'm trying to say that word properly. Relatively, that's better.

They're still relatively in the position that it had once been previously to being manoeuvred, however wise it was, into a new position, whatever that might be called. And I, I looked at it and I pushed it closed. And all I had to do is just lift it up a little bit.

And then it clicked and it was closed. That was it. That was the whole thing.

I didn't need to stand out there for 20 minutes, pushing it and pushing it and pushing it and slamming it and slamming it. It's, to me, that would be like bashing the fridge, continuously shouting, why can't I get the BBC one? I want BBC one. And just keep banging it.

I want the BBC news, 40 standards. Keep bashing the fridge like this. It's a pointless, pointless act.

Or we're going into McDonald's and demanding a straw that works. You know, a plastic straw. You're not going to get one.

I just want a straw that works, no? Cardboard now, mate. Soggy, soggy, soggy cardboard. Yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum.

Soggy cardboard. That feeling like scraping on your teeth. Soggy, soggy cardboard in your mouth.

That's what your milkshake's coming through now. Lovely, lovely, lovely. I might actually start taking my own straw.

You shouldn't only get metal straws. I think you can actually buy metal straws, like long ones. So that's what I might do.

I might get a long metal straw and take that in. Or you know what could be good? Bear with me here. Do you know, you might not know this because you might not have pubs where you're from, but in, on the island of England, the island of England, on the continent of England, on the island of England, we have these things called pubs, which are public houses.

They were public houses. And often they were actually called free houses, which they never were. And it's like greenhouses.

They're not green, are they? They should be called white houses or well, is clear glass white? It's pretty much white, isn't it? It's not green. It's never green. Never was green.

Never will be green. Why was it called green? There's no reason for it. Oh, because, oh, we grow things.

Oh, so everything that grows is green, is it? No. Tomatoes? Oh, okay. At some point they're green, but then they turn red.

Cucumbers? Yeah. At some point they, okay. Forget cucumbers.

Radishes? Yeah. Radishes. Red.

What other things can you, can you grow out of the ground in a, a white house? Tomatoes? Yeah, I know I've already mentioned it, but it's worth, there's, I mean, people have always got more than one plant, haven't they? What other ones? Oranges? Citrus, citrus. Bananas? Bananas. They're not great.

Well, at some point they might be green, but then they turn yellow. But then yellow is green, isn't it? Isn't it green and, green and blue? Green and pink? Blue and pink? What's yellow? Was it white and orange that makes yellow? I always get muddled up. It's very similar to mathematics, isn't it? You know, certain things make different things, you know, and chemicals as well.

You know, certain chemicals mixed together can have a creative experience, which individually they do very little, very little. But I didn't used to really do much as colours. That's one of my things I'd like to have done.

I always liked the art, well I didn't always, but I love the idea, I've given up on the idea, but I like the idea of being able to be an artist. That's something that I would have really have been, I don't know if the word proud, let me do pride, but I'd be able to please with myself. I'd feel talented.

Yeah, I think that's the word. That's the word. I'd feel talented.

Because I think with something like art, if you're good at art, then the talent is obviously there, and you know you're talented. It doesn't mean you can necessarily be classed as the best artistic person in the world, but you don't have to be classed as that to be talented. Just like if you can play a musical instrument, you're talented.

You may not be touring the world on stage playing the piano, but if you can play the piano really well, then you're very, very talented. So I quite like the idea of being an artist, like being, like being a painter or a drawer, but I have zero interest in it, and it's because I've got no, I just don't have any talent in it, and that's the reason why I've got zero interest. Because if I'm unable to do something, or even if I can't imagine myself being able to do something, then I don't have any interest in it.

I don't know if that's weird. Is that weird? So no interest in football, because I could never imagine myself playing football, because I never played it at school. I never bothered with it.

I've got no interest in rugby or gymnastics, because, well no, rugby definitely not, because it's something that wasn't for me. Golf is another one that really didn't appeal to me, not something I could see myself doing. Gymnastics, possibly, not now, not right at this moment, maybe tomorrow, but not now.

I've got the body for it now, but when I was younger, I think had I had some training in, and had gymnastics been available at my school for the boys rather than for the girls, which seemed to be aimed at mainly, I possibly could have been quite good at something. I don't know what, but something. It was just this, you know those things that you put your hands on, those circles, handles or whatever, and you just twist around like a monkey.

I fancied the idea of doing that, because when I was very little, I've always been quite little, but when I was very little, I had a little monkey that did that. It wasn't a real monkey, but it was a, it was this monkey on these bars, these, that was holding onto the bars, and underneath, at the bottom of it, you pushed in, and the monkey twisted around and around. It was really good.

I mean, even now, I think I'd enjoy playing with it, and it wasn't that I saw myself as being like a little monkey, but I did have some characteristics of a little monkey. I was very quick, very agile, very unmoved, you know, very, very, I wasn't athletic, but very springy, you know, I wasn't really so much interested in like running, as opposed to, I think I'd been quite good at, I don't know, it was all kind of make-believe really. I never got the opportunity to really find out if I would be any good at it.

I liked the idea of it, but our school was very, well, the school I went to, our school, I mean, first of all, we didn't go to the same school, unless we did, of course. I can't call it my school, because I didn't own it. It's not there anymore.

It's now some kind of college for something. Weird. So I had these two schools, right, tiny little town, only about 500 people.

That's a lie, but it was a tiny little town, it wasn't big. You could live there without a car. I did, but you could literally walk from one side of the town to the other.

It took a while, but you could do it. So people in cars can be quite lazy. I've never driven, so I've not ever been like that, but I see some people and they'll just, they'll drive around the corner to the garage or to the shops just to buy a cream eclair, chocolate eclair or something, or a bag of tangerines.

Instead of walking around, no, let's get the car, let's drive around, because I've never had that luxury of a car, I've never been able to do that. So there, and oh, I've got an itchy ear. Sometimes I have itchy ears.

I remember once I had, I used to wear earplugs, earplugs, earplugs. It sounds like hair plugs, doesn't it? Earplugs. They weren't plugs.

Not like you're having a sink or bath. Do you have plugs in baths in other countries? Do other countries have baths? Or is it just showers? I honestly don't know. I'm trying to think.

What countries have I been to? I've been to Bulgaria and they had showers. That was in the hotel. So, but then I don't know if they have baths anywhere else.

Been to France. I don't know if I washed when I was there, so I can't remember. I really don't remember.

But I think that was a shower. I think I just pretended to have a wash. I might just, yeah, I think I just turned the shower top on and then just let it run for a few minutes and turned it off, wet my hair.

So, oh, that was refreshing. And went to Spain, but I was only there for the afternoon. I had a can of Coke and a Mars bar because I was warned about, you know, being careful what I ate when I was abroad.

So I figured a Mars bar and a can of Coke should be all right. I was being very, very careful apart from with plans. Could have had some paella.

Then I wouldn't have been able to afford my flight home. What other countries have I been to? So Bulgaria, France, and what was the other one? Spain. Been to Belgium.

Belgium just went for the day. I might have gone to the toilet somewhere. Might have gone to the toilet somewhere.

Don't know where. I don't remember that much detail about the trip to Belgium other than there is a riot on the ferry. Things got a little bit out of hand for some reason.

And the only other country I've been to is Ireland. The Ireland of Ireland, as the politicians like to call it. What used to be called Ireland, I remember.

All through my life it's been called Ireland. Now it's the Ireland of Ireland. So we should do that about every island, shouldn't we? The Ireland of the Isle of Man.

The Ireland of the Isle of Woman. No. Yeah, the Ireland of the Isle of Wight.

The Ireland of the Shetland Isles. The Ireland of the Falkland Islands. Or maybe that's the islands of the Falkland Islands.

I don't know if places are islands and not continentals. Africa, India, America, Europe. I'm trying to think how many different countries in Europe are separate from the continent.

There's got to be some, hasn't there? The Ireland of New Zealand. The Ireland of Australia. The Ireland of Thailand.

Thailand's separate, isn't it? The Ireland of... The... The icebergs. The Ireland of the icebergs. The Ireland of... Oh, Bermuda, I think.

And the Ireland of Bergerac. There's quite a few different ones. Yeah.

Yeah, so I've been to five different countries, Bulgaria, France, Spain, what's the other one? Belgium and Ireland. But Belgium, obviously Belgium is not the island of Belgium is it, but it is Belgium. And I think if I ever had disability issues, like physical issues with walking or anything, I'd definitely move to Belgium.

Just flat, so flat that you can just, you just need a sail, stick a sail on the back of your wheelchair and just aim it for where you want to go. Of course you'd need some wind, but it's just flat, there's no, it's like a really hilly place, but with all the hills filled in, or the valleys filled in rather, or it's like a place, a valley place with all the valleys filled in, that'd make sense wouldn't it? But it's completely flat, never been anywhere as flat as that. I've been to Amsterdam, is that a country? That's a country isn't it? Yeah, I've been to Amsterdam as well, so I've been to six countries, forgot about that, which is weird.

Oh, I remember I was never going to mention it to anyone ever, oh, never mind. So I've been to Amsterdam, never been to Germany, I mean Holland, Holland is a country, so is Amsterdam a town, because Amsterdam is in Holland isn't it? Or is Holland a city? Is Amsterdam a city in Holland, Holland land? So I've been to Holland, so that's six different places.

Went to the Anne Frank's Museum, see when I was reading that book, I thought to myself they're all squashed in this tiny little attic, the place is massive, it took about an hour to get around it, mind you, I mean I can imagine it being annoying, well, apart from everything else is, all these displays, and you're banging into all that stuff, that must have got in the way of everyone when they were living up there, it's amazing.

So many people on bikes, a lot of people on bikes, couldn't really work it out, I mean I'm talking about adults on pedal bikes, you know the things that children use, that we all kind of used when we were children, but there were adults on them, and I thought that maybe it was, I don't know, some kind of big prank on me, I thought it's gone to a lot of expense to make that many bikes just as a joke, but they were riding around on the bikes like it was almost normal, and I'd never seen

that before, you know, I lived in England for the majority of my life style, and you know, where I live now, there's the occasional person on a bike, and generally, generally people ride on the pavements, and the ones that do ride on the, what's the thing that is in the pavement, the road, that's it, those that do ride on the road, they only seem to go on a road when there's a bus, so they can ride right in front of the bus, and slow the bus down, and only when I'm on a bus, only the

bus that I'm on, it's almost like they're just waiting for me to get on a bus, needing to be somewhere, yeah, it's not that often that I see somebody riding on a bicycle, and in Amsterdam, I was a little bit taken back, because they also, I mean, it was like going back in time, they had these, well, I can say, trams, they had trams, something that we used to have in the 1800s, or like begin the 1900s, 1920s, or whatever, we used to have trams in this country, and there's a few old-fashioned places, I think

Manchester, Liverpool, I think they've still got trams, which I was very surprised, I went to Manchester, I didn't go to Manchester, I went through Manchester, and I had to get on a tram, it's like, honestly, it's like being in a time machine, going back to a place where it says a tram, a tram, and they're really good, they're really cool, they're kind of, they're like buses and trains mixed together, tram, train, tram, so they have the regularity of a bus, but they're on tracks like a train, and I don't know, it's, I don't know, it's

kind of like, like a little antique dream, I'm just watching something as I'm talking to you, and there's a bloke sweeping, it's the Sweeneys on a TV show called The Sweeney, and the man is brushing the steps, and the policeman's running towards him at the bottom of the steps, and the man with a brush starts brushing quicker and quicker as he moves up the steps, so he's kind of running, but he's still brushing the steps at the same time, I'm going to get arrested, but I want to make sure I'm still doing my job, very

strange, I've seen this episode before, but it's very, they're all old, very old programs from the 70s, The Sweeney, The, what's the other one, The Professionals, very gritty, very, not a huge amount of humour, very, just a bit, I don't know, probably good at the time, but I was too young to watch them because they were adult, but they seem to take themselves quite seriously, a little bit seriously, just a little bit, maybe, maybe not, I'm going to probably know more about it if I had the volume up, I'm just basing it on his quick

sweeping of the steps, and it's not a lot to go on really, I'll summarise all six episodes or seasons or whatever of the show, oh now he's run off, he's running, and as he's running, oh, Roy Kinnear's on there now, and Roy Kinnear, he was a very famous actor in the English dramatic, thespian, environmental, television, theatre world, and he did loads and loads of stuff, he was funny, he's this, kind of short, fat man, and he was got a big, got funny, he wasn't always funny, but he, even in serious things like this, he's still

quite, bit of humour, and this lady there with him, I don't know who she is, but I love her, you ever see somebody and just love them straight away, yeah, I love her right now, she's probably about 90 now, probably at least 30 then, that was in the 70s, let's say it was 75, so 75, let's say it was 79, 79, let's use 30, 79, 89, 99, 2009, 2019, so 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, yeah, should be 70, but I think this was probably 75, 1975-ish, possibly earlier, 70, what am I, 49, yeah, they had

trams in Amsterdam, but unlike with Manchester, the trams in Amsterdam are just, there's lots of them, all going in different directions, I've never seen that before in my life, I think it's quite cute really, holding on to sort of traditions, you know, I suppose that's why it's maybe quite nice that we still have things like the royalty, and, well the countries that still have it, I'm not sure if the French have, did they have royalty in France?

I'm sure they used to, I saw a film about it, they're all queuing up outside to have their pictures taken or something, I don't know, mind you, it'd have been hard work, imagine being a royalty in France times, with all those big wigs, those big white wigs, and what do they used to have, all that powder to make themselves look really pale, and in fact they still have the same wigs in courts, I think, that's another thing, they don't have that, I don't think, in America, and other countries that are a bit more ahead of

the times, but in our courts, we still have people with those silly wigs, and judges wearing a silly wig and a gavel, now I've never, well not since I was a kid, I've not been in a court, and I don't want to respect a judge, I would, I would, it's one of those things, just being brought up to do it, it's like saying sorry when you knock someone over, not knock them over, but I don't know, just a general thing, just pretending you didn't fart, things like that, it's just things that we're taught, what's that,

don't put your elbows on the table, maybe my brother did that, my niece, it wasn't his kid, it was someone else's kid, and I remember saying to her, oh don't put your elbows on the table when you're eating, now I didn't say anything, well I might have done, I can't remember, but what a ridiculous thing to say to a child, don't put your elbows on the table when you're eating, how's that going to change their life, how's that going to affect the world in a positive way, it's like, isn't there enough rules, aren't there enough

rules already for us not to need to invent even more stupider ones, that's my thinking, what other silly rules are there, they're not rules, they're not laws, they're just silly rules, like societal rules, oh is that when you're a new kid, look at me when I'm speaking to you, it's bad enough I've got to hear your voice, why have I got to look at your face, look at me so I know that you're hearing me, when I can close my eyes and I can still hear you, is something that I'd love to have been able

to say, but that was too little, plus I've only just thought of it, my dad used to say, use your loaf, basically use your brain, use your loaf, how do you, how did someone get from brain to loaf of bread, how did that even, it's not rhyming slang is it, I can't see how it could, brain, bread, loaf, head, bread, head, ah, use your head rhymes with bread, a loaf of bread, use your loaf, it's generally, that's where it came from, I generally just thought that up, head rhymes with bread, and a bread is a

loaf of bread, so use your loaf, now I almost feel sorry for children in the olden days, especially in a place where they had all these sayings, whether it's rhyming slang, or just, you know, wherever part of the country someone might come from, so they'd be at school, learning to speak English, or I suppose it could be the same way all over the world, learning to speak the language of the country of their origin, you know, wherever they live in, English, in Spain, Spanish, in America, English, in Australia, English, in New Zealand, English, you know,

in Canada, English, or French, and in Ireland, English, and perhaps Irish, anyway, the thing is, so if someone's in England, 100 years ago, or 80, 70 years ago, so they're at school, teachers are trying to teach them how to speak correctly, and the teacher's saying, so Joey, what does that word say?

Don't I miss? What does it say? Don't I miss? Well, it starts with, what does it start with? What's the first letter? S. Okay, what's the second letter? T. Okay, what's the third letter? A. Fourth letter? I. Miss. Okay, and the last letter? S. What does it say? What does it say? Don't I miss? How can you not know what it says? You can read the individual letters, but you don't know what it says. Don't I miss? Well, what does it say then? It says stairs.

Oh, miss, you mean apples and pears? Why didn't you say so? It must have been so confusing. They'd be at school learning to speak correctly, then they'd go home, and the parents, and their brothers and sisters, and we'll be talking this garbled, weird, rhyming slang, made up words, almost coded, coded words, in case someone they don't know comes about, and they can all talk secretly to each other. It's got to be complicated, I reckon.

Apples and pears, down the old Kent Road. Don't get too many of them to a dung. Use your loaf.

I would vanquish them. Vanquish all of that stuff. Just speak with words.

Now then, now we'll all get through. I saw an interview years ago. It was this man, he was in a pub, and I think it was a documentary about tough people, and literally every three words was, he said, you know what I mean? You know what I mean? I was going down the road, you know what I mean? And this happened, you know what I mean? And I said, no, I don't know what you mean.

Can you explain it a bit further? Well, I took one step, and then another step, and then I reached a door, you know what I mean? What kind of door was it? Well, it was green, but with a yellow outline, you know what I mean? Yeah, I do, yeah, I can picture that. How good, you know what I mean? When you say good, you know, do you mean good, you're happy with the door, or good that you're pleased that I know what you mean? Do I know what you mean, that you know what I mean? You know what I mean? He said, yeah, you know what I mean? I said, yeah, I do. Another one is, get me.

You get me, you get me. Every five words, you get me. I mean, in a way, that is quite a good communication tool.

It's biofeedback, isn't it? You're saying something to someone, communicating, and you're checking with the other person who's involved within that conversation, checking that they are on board with what you're saying, and are understanding the context and the content of the conversation, and the words that you are presenting. Therefore, dare thou. So in a way, you get me, is just a really annoying way of checking that the other person's understanding what you're saying.

You get me? So when I was in London, in it used to be something that people used to say, in it, in it, like that, in it. Not just on its own, it used to be part of a sentence. It's cold in here, in it.

And then in the 90s, 2000s, 2000s, a certain group of people started saying it, and they were trying to fit in. Some people, I say a group of people, just some people, I won't go into detail, but some people started using the language, using that in it, but out of context, so that it didn't fit at all. I don't know if it started off as a joke, and it just continued, and they forgot it was a joke, they forgot that it was irony, which can happen, can't it, in life.

And like swear down, that's something that my goddaughter's age started saying as a joke, making fun of, kind of rappers, making fun of that, that kind of sphere of society, who would be talking street, or you know, whatever, you get me? And saying things like swear down, and you'd see a lot on Jeremy Kyle, and, but that's the thing, people started using it for real. And it was used ironically, making fun of people that used it for real. And then those people that were using it ironically, just making fun of people that were using it for real, started using it for real.

Swear down. So it's quite funny. I knew things that got really bad when, not really bad, but I said something that I thought was quite funny to this person, and they said, didn't laugh, they said lol.

They actually said lol. And I knew that, I thought, the future of comedy clubs is in trouble. Can you imagine? You go to a comedy club, performing on stage, and all you hear is just lol, lol.

Lots of people going lol, and that'd be the end of comedy. Should be the beginning of really, but yeah, it'd be the end. Like it's the end of this recording.

Yes it is. So if you're still awake, I'm gonna make more recordings, because I'm feeling better now than I was. And I will be doing a deep sleep whisper recording very soon, and I'll be doing a sleep hypnosis weekly recording very soon, and some others very soon.

So thank you for listening. Take care of yourselves, and remember to be kind to yourself, because you deserve to be happy. Lots of love.

Bye.