xx (no music) #1096 - Q & A (part 2) - Let Me Bore You To Sleep - 11th April 2024)

Hello, hello and welcome. Welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome to Let Me Bore You To Sleep. My name's Jason Newland and this is number 1096.

Wow, 1096. And there is part two, so Q&A part two, questions and answers. And part two.

So it's recorded on the 11th of April 2020. So I did the first part. Admittedly, I posted on Facebook.

Let me just have a look. Let's get Facebook up. I posted on Facebook.

What was that I just missed? Do you ever see a picture and think, what? Oh, it's a cute picture of a doggy. That was funny. Right, okay, here we go.

What I posted last night was I this was 22 hours ago, I posted this. So it's now half past was 20 to five. So yeah, and there's about seven o'clock or something last night.

I'm now going to record a new Let Me Bore You To Sleep. It will be a Q&A or should that be an Q&A? I don't know. Ask me anything.

I will start recording in a few minutes. I should keep an eye on this page throughout. So feel free to ask me anything.

Two big juicy kisses. And then in brackets, the recording is not being streamed live. I put that just in case people thought that I was streaming it live, I suppose.

I only managed to to reply to, well, there was three comments. One was just a nice comment being nice. So I read that out.

And that was from so we'll read that in a minute. I'll read it out again. So the first got gas lovely.

The first message was from Ben question, what made you decide to become a sleep specialist? And if you won the lotto, would you still record? So I answered that one. So thanks, Ben for that. This is in yesterday's recording.

Jove asked me how would how would you spend a perfect day if money and time were no object? By the way, did I say please only listen when you can safely close your eyes? Okay, good. And the website is let me bore you.com. And so I answered that question as well. Thanks, Joe, for that.

And I had a message post from Barry, it wasn't a question. It was just just have to let you know, you're amazing. Feel like I know you like a best friend.

Listen every night. Old ones, new ones, I don't mind. You helped me forget a bedtime.

I just wish you could make a penny out of your work. So thanks, Barry. I did comment on that.

But obviously, it wasn't a question. So I didn't have an answer. And I've got more questions now.

So I've got one, two. So one, this is on that post. One from Rick, one from Robin, and one from Mike.

And then I put another post today saying today, I'll be making the second part of the q&a. Have a question. Have a question for me? Question mark.

Kissy kissy kissy. So I've got four comments. So I've got a couple of other messages, questions.

One from Diana, one from Matthew, one from Jen, and one from Christine. So this is like what 12345677. And all I think so what I'm going to do is get on with it and be as quick as I can.

And then you know, that's not going to happen, don't you? It's, it's practically impossible to do that. But I will give it a go. I'm not sure if I'll be able to answer all of the questions.

I'll try though. So Rick is the first one in line. He sent this 21 hours ago.

So I think this was probably posted just as I came to the end of recording. Yesterday's recording, recording the recording. So Rick, thanks for your message.

It says here. How are you able to keep talking about so many disjointed topics for so long? It seems a bit stream of consciousness, yet somehow, there is a coherence there. It always works where my mind is racing at night.

It's a balance in my mind between keeping my interest so my mind doesn't wander, yet not saying anything. I feel I really need to hear. What do you mean not saying something you need to hear you this is you telling me this isn't interesting.

Mind blowing stuff. What is I hope this makes sense. It works brilliantly.

Well, thank you, Rick. That's very kind of you to say that. How am I able to keep talking? I don't know.

I guess is the answer to that. It's when I started doing it is I kind of started doing this style. One of the main complaints I used to get for years, I mean, talking for years and years and years.

I got a lot of positive feedback on YouTube and podcasts, you know, for the first five, six years that I was doing it. But I also got a lot of negative stuff as well. On YouTube, sometimes it was about parents and then make you know, like, rude stuff like that.

I don't get that on the podcast because you can't see them on a podcast. But I've read and probably get now loads of abuse on on my podcast about what I look like. It's like it's not fair.

Stop it. And one of the main complaints people used to say one was, I talked too slowly, which is valid for that person that complained because if that's how they felt, then that's how they felt, you know, I wasn't I can't change the speed. I mean, I do I do talk fast sometimes when I'm talking about something that I'm particularly interested in.

Sometimes I trip over my own words come so excited. It's just unfortunate. It's never exciting to anyone else.

It's just always sometimes I surprise myself like why am I excited about this? It's only a loaf of bread. You know, it's like, but it smells and it's so fresh. Yum, yum, yum, yum.

Reminds me when I used to work in a bakery. Let me tell you all about that. What I actually worked in two or three bakeries.

Technically, I did some cleaning in one bakery. And I worked in two other bakeries. One part time when I was a kid, and one full time when I was in my 20s, early 20s.

Yeah, I need to Yeah, and then there was that part time. I was cleaning the man that hadn't cleaned the floor. Literally, I went in there.

Now I've worked in a bakery. And I've worked in a chip shop. I've worked in catering establishments.

And I know that the main thing you do is always clean the floor at the end of the shift. Because if you don't do that, it builds up and it becomes practically impossible to clean. So you have to do it.

Every time you end a shift, sometimes even before the shift starts as well, just if there's anything left over, but you just clean as you go. Make sure if there's a spillage, provide and you know, it's dangerous to leave it there anyway, because you could slip. But once that stuff gets crusty on the floor, and then more stuff gets on top, it becomes very difficult to move.

But just a normal mop is usually fine. Mop, hot water, detergent, whatever does the job. But if you leave the floor, and don't clean it for a few days or a few weeks or whatever, no amount of mopping is going to be enough.

You need a machine, a scrubber and all kinds of stuff to clean the floor. If it's an industrial catering establishment, such as a bakery. And with bakeries you get, there's a lot of dough and stuff, which I'm sure you might not know, you might know, becomes very hard.

It gets, you know, it's soft, but then it becomes hard. And it sticks to the floor like really and and it builds up and it's just, yes, you need a scraper. I can't believe it.

Vinnie's eating a pig's ear, right? And he's literally choking on it. But he's still trying to eat it as he's choking. Wasn't even giving himself a breath to like stop choking on it.

I knew someone like that, that used to do that with biscuits. Well, no, I used to make fun of him. I used to, he used to eat a lot, but he couldn't stop talking.

And so my joke was, here's an impression of whatever his name was, choking on a biscuit. So at first, I'd be eating a biscuit, choking, and then continue to continue to put biscuits in his mouth. And he didn't find it funny.

I was only young, I was rude back then. Would never do a thing like that now. I'd eat the biscuits, but you know, that's it.

Yeah, so this, this part time, basically, I had a cleaning job in a supermarket. When I was about, I don't know, 20, just turned 20. Well, it was between the ages of 16 and 20, various times I worked there.

And they said, Oh, do you want an extra shift? I said, okay, a bit of extra money. I said, where? They said, well, it's just the, it's the, the bakery, it's just in store. I said, there's a bakery there? He said, yeah, it's just behind the shutters.

Shutters are always closed. But they open up, do you remember, you see, you see them in there in the morning? Oh, okay. I didn't realize they actually made the bread in there.

He said, yeah, I just figured they got it delivered. And they said, we just need to clean the floor, everything else is clean. It's just the floor you need to clean.

Won't take long. I said, okay. So I turn up there about, I don't know, five o'clock, the place is closed.

So it would have been eight o'clock at night or something, seven o'clock, six o'clock, something like that. And the supermarket was open, I think, but the, the, the bakery had closed. So all the shutters were down.

So no one could see what I was doing. Not that I was doing anything that was dodgy or anything. I wasn't tap dancing or practicing karaoke.

Why would you practice karaoke in a bakery? That'd be weird. And I swear this floor, I mean, they had all the equipment, they had scrapers and everything, which they should have been using every day. They had not cleaned that floor for a long time.

A long time. It was thick. I mean, there's a certain degree of pleasure, but it was like a couple of inches worth of pastry stuck on the tiles.

So it took me about three hours to clean the floor. I was there till, I don't know, half nine, 10 o'clock. I was only supposed to be there for about an hour.

So I did that. I come in the next day for my early morning shift to do, because I was only there two hours a morning or one and a half hours or something, just cleaning the floors in the supermarket. It was easy because they were done every day, you know? And if there was a spillage, the floor was mopped up and cleaned straight away.

You know how it should be? Health and safety. Anyway, I come in and the woman says that my boss, my supervisor, the cleaning supervisor, comes and says to me, can I have a word, please, Jason? I don't know if she knew my name. And I said, yeah, what? She said, I had a complaint.

I said, is this the stealing? It's about stealing the sweets. She said, what? I said, nothing. She says, no, it's about the bakery.

The bakery? I haven't stolen anything from the bakery. She said, no, it's not about stealing. It's about the bakery.

It's last night. You cleaned the floor and they're saying that you didn't do a very good job of it. And it was subpar.

She didn't use the word subpar because no one had ever used that word at that time. The word subpar wasn't used until about 1992. I think it was February the 14th.

Somewhere in Canada, I do believe. A tavern. I don't know if that's true.

And I said, what? She said, yeah, it wasn't clean. The floor's not clean enough. I said, look, that floor.

The only reason they don't know how the floor should look, because they've never seen the floor before. They used to see it. It's like, oh, that's not the wrong color.

No, it used to be white. Of course, it was white because it was dough. White and brown, dirty dough.

Underneath is black tiles. That's why they think it's dirty, because it's black tile. That's the color of the floor.

That's the color of the floor. And she thought I was being rude. And like, do you not understand? I know about cleaning.

I've had lots of cleaning jobs. And it's a very basic, most basic thing in the world is it hadn't been cleaned. Unless literally there was just chucking stuff on the floor all the time from four in the morning till, I don't know, five in the afternoon, whatever time they close.

And literally all they did is had someone they employed standing on a table, just chucking dough on the floor. And someone else was just stamping it into the ground. In that case, yeah, maybe it had been there.

They probably have to cook it as well. So they probably have some kind of weird oven that they could like push over it to make it cooked onto the ground. Perhaps they had an underfloor heating.

That's the only way that that could have been there from the previous morning. You know, when I got there, there was weeks, weeks and weeks full of stuff, maybe a week's full of dirt. But that's way too much for any one person to clean in a short setting.

And I could not believe what I was hearing. Could not believe it. So it's quite weird, because afterwards, after hearing what they said, I didn't feel quite so guilty for urinating in their sink.

I didn't, I didn't. I'm joking. I did feel guilty.

I did a little bit. So I just kind of like still remembering this is forever ago. It's a long time ago.

And my my supervisor said, Well, they don't want you back. I said, Well, I don't and I don't want to pay you as well. I don't want to pay you because I don't think you did anything.

I said, What about the the five bin bags, black bin bags worth of muck that I collected? And they said, Well, they didn't mention that. So yeah, probably they put it back into the fresh dough, save themselves some money. She laughed.

So yeah. Okay, back to the question. How are you able to talk about so many disjointed topics for so long? It seems a bit absurd.

And I don't really know. Oh, yeah, I started doing this. I remember I did a recording.

I don't know if it was speaking out, thinking out loudly, or speaking out quietly, or I don't know, it was something called like something like that. It was kind of like along the lines of the Jason chats vlogs. But it wasn't a video.

It's a podcast. And one of my best friends at a time contacted me after listening to it. And he said that I was mental.

He said you're mental, you need help. You need sectioning. I just listened to you and you're all over the place.

And you're talking about stuff and you just there's something wrong with you. Which is a bit rude to be honest. And this was 2013 probably.

But what I did notice is I quite enjoyed doing it quite enjoyed making them. And I previously done the Jason, the hypno chats were kind of similar. But they were more focused because it was the idea is I talk like conversationally, which then led into an actual hypnosis session.

That was kind of the plan. And I don't know how successful I was with them. And they were never you know, people did list where they watched them on YouTube when I first released them.

But as podcasts, they've never had any interest. In fact, I think I've taken them off now. I don't bother with them.

I did about 30 or 40 of them, I think. And so another thing people used to say with the videos when I first started and for years and years, not only did I talk too slowly, I talk too much, too much waffle. Can't you just get on with it? This is supposed to be a relaxation session or a pain relief session or a sleep session.

Can't you just get on with it? Why just why are you waffling on for 20 minutes before doing the recording before actually, you know, and I didn't really have an answer. I felt a little bit I'll be honest, I probably felt like I let myself down a little bit because I was trying to accomplish something and for a certain amount of people, I wasn't doing it. I wasn't giving them what they wanted.

And even when I tried to cut down on the waffle, or the chatting, I'd still end up, you know, people used to say like, even in a really kind of fairly serious recording, I'd still, they'd still find themselves laughing at some of the stuff I said. And no one ever complained about that. That was more no one ever like they mentioned there, they would never was never a complaint, which is nice, I guess.

But I don't know. And I guess there's a degree of coherence, I suppose. I'm not just talking about nothing.

And I don't think once, I don't think it's just incoherent. You know, I'm not just going from one sentence to another, jumping from sentences, and none of them make sense. And it's impossible to follow.

I mean, it might not be easy to follow sometimes. But I'm not demanding that anyone follows what I'm saying. It's not that important.

You're not going to miss anything. You know, it's not like I'm giving you directions to the local off license or whatever local cinema. So you're in a town, you don't know where you are.

And you ask if you caught you asked me for directions. And then as soon as I start talking, your mind goes blank and you stop listening. You know, in that scenario, it's a wasted experience because that person's given put their energy into helping you.

And then you've like not listened, because maybe the person's bored you or you just, for some reason lost interest in the conversation. And then you have to ask someone else. In this situation, it's you can always listen back.

That's another thing about recordings. And I said this, someone said years ago, I fall asleep, I don't know what you said. Just listen back.

Nothing's hidden. It's all there. It's, you know, it's, it's just me just talking.

But, but so Rick, I don't know, don't know. Quite. I mean, my dad, I class myself as being very different from him.

Very different people, different values and different opinions and different, just different people. Everyone's different. But I do share 50% of his DNA or something, or 50% of my DNA is from him.

So this is going to be some similarities. But we had very different lives growing up. So the first seven years of our lives were very different, like very different.

And there was something that he did, which was kind of maybe a bit similar to me. And it was at one of the weddings. I don't know if it was my sister's or my brother's wedding.

And my little brother was with me. And we were just standing. And my dad was on the phone.

So he had his mobile phone. He didn't carry his home phone with him because the wire wouldn't reach. But he said, and he was having this conversation on the phone.

And I think my little brother was there. And I just kind of walked up and like what's going on. It took me a few minutes to realize that my dad was pretending to talk on the phone.

There was no one there. He was just having an imaginary conversation with someone on the phone. And he was including my little brother in with it.

And I'm probably not explaining it very well. But it was very funny. And it was yeah, he just he was just he was probably a bit drunk, to be honest.

My dad's a nice drunk. He is he's like a happy, happy drinker. He's he doesn't.

Does that make sense? He's it mellows him. Not that he's not mellow, but he's, you know, he's just he's a happy, happy drinker. He some people aren't and he is.

So not that I've ever really I've seen him drunk, like drunk drunk only a couple of times that I can maybe three times. There was one time that he he messed up. It was he didn't mean to do it, but he he just drunk too much before Christmas dinner.

This is a long this is like 20 odd years ago, I think. And his wife wasn't happy, but he didn't he didn't mean to. He just overdid it a little bit, you know, maybe he'd had too much the night before.

And then he started drinking a bit too early. And and he ended up having to go to bed. And he missed like half of the Christmas, like the afternoon.

He was up again in the evening. But bless him, you know, it's not the worst thing that someone could do, is it? And it wasn't like there was a bunch of kids there's we're all adults at that time. So it was didn't really matter.

And I got a chance to eat most of his chocolates, which is good. So maybe there's that and I don't know, because I don't know my mum, my biological mother. My auntie used to be best friends with my mum.

I do believe that's how my dad met her. Not my auntie, you know, brother and sister. And that'd be weird, wouldn't it? Me and a girlfriend and then she says to her, by the way, he's your sister.

No. So it was the other way around. And so she was best friends with my mum, my auntie, who was my dad's youngest, well younger sister, not youngest.

And I just suppose my mum, my dad and my mum fell in love and all that stuff. And but my auntie said that my mum was really funny, a really funny person. Like, so I'd have to take a word for that because I don't, I don't know.

But it's a. So, you know, I've got 50 percent, 50, I've got genes from both of them, so I'm, I guess I'm going to have, I mean, I haven't learned as far as, I mean, the short time I lived with my mum, maybe a couple of years, but I was too young to remember. I was like, I don't know, between the ages of two and a half and maybe four and a half, five, four, something like that.

So I was too young to really.

Of course, I was impressionable. I remember certain things that happened. I don't really remember her.

I have not seen her since I was seven. So it's it was and then between five and between four and a half or five and seven, I hadn't seen her either. So I just saw her one time before my dad took me.

So I just I don't know how much I'm like both of them. It's all like I found a bit of a blind spot when it comes to my dad and maybe I've got things in common with him that I'm not really aware of. Maybe my personality wise, I mean.

I don't know, I think he's got size nine feet, so my feet are bigger than his. Got size 10. He's taller than me than most people are.

He's stocky. He's a big bloke. And brilliant with his hands.

Great at craftsmanship, you know, things like plumbing, building electrical where he used to be electrician and anything again around that line of things he could do. So, yeah, so he's just he has the that kind of natural skill to be able to do stuff like that. And I don't really.

I mean, I broke my television, taking it out of the box. You know, I've the amount of things I've cracked and broken because I've been clumsy and I don't have. Because things like being an electrician or a plumber, even though it's a lot of hefty physical work and labor, sometimes you still have to be have a degree of finesse, a degree of being careful, you know, when you're doing stuff, especially with electronics and things like that.

So I don't seem to have that part of my brain operating. I don't know why. I just never found it particularly interesting.

Never. Or how to put a shelf up. Oh, no, I don't care.

I just want the shelf to be there. I want it just to just just appear on its own. If only life was like that.

Wow. I'm glad it just happened. Now, and so I don't know.

I don't know why. It's not difficult to be fair, though. Sometimes there have been times when I've been in a particularly rubbish mood and I've tried to make one of these recordings and I've had to stop after half an hour and just ditch it, delete it, because just haven't been in the right state of mind.

And I'm not always aware of how I am feeling until the moment, if you know what I mean. I try and be, but not always. Not always.

Sometimes, but not always. Now, I don't know if I've answered that question particularly well, but I don't know how else to answer it, because there was one time this was 1990s. I don't know what year.

I think it was 97 or 98. It was the Mike Tyson, Evander Holyfield fight number two, where he bit Evander Holyfield's ear. So it was after that fight.

We're all sitting around and I started talking. And everyone was just laughing. And I was just talking and talking and talking.

And I don't know why I was doing it. I was just talking. I just, I was probably maybe a little bit drunk or something, but I was just waffling on and on and everyone just found it funny.

So I don't know. Who knows? So yeah, I don't know how I'm able to do it. It's just talking.

I don't, I don't do this when I'm with people. Or maybe I do. I don't.

No, I don't. I don't just talk. I prefer to talk like this than talk with someone, because there's no interruptions there.

You know, I can just get out what I want to say. And I guess maybe, maybe it just takes me more words than a short sentence. And I do sometimes find, you know, if I ask someone a question, the answer is not always satisfactory to me.

Because I think it's natural and people do this. And maybe I also do this in a a conversational situation is, especially from a work or professional situation, I leave out information. But my natural tendency is to be correct.

And if I've missed something out, go back and correct myself and try and give the correct time and to not lie or not to, if I say something, I realized, I know that's not true. I come back and say, what I said there, that wasn't true. And if I'm actually given a serious answer to a question, and I'm being serious, you know what I'm saying? Other times, if I'm just talking absolute rubbish, then of course, I'm just gonna make stuff up.

But I like to think that people know, people that know me, know when I'm just being silly, as opposed to being serious. Hasn't always been the case. I think generally people do, I think.

Sometimes I ask people, you do know that I'm not really a hamster. Mike Mike says, Oh, no, wait a minute. Robin Robin is next.

Hi, Robin. Hi, Jason. What is your most hilarious memory? Most embarrassing moment? Okay, so two questions.

Most hilarious memory and most embarrassing moment. Love your podcasts. Thanks, Robin.

Um, did you did it do? I'm trying to think of hilarious moment. I can't think of one embarrassing moment. Okay, there's one.

I was getting in. I was getting Yeah, I was on the on the ferry coming back from Ireland. And this was 1995 around March time ish, you know, around that time.

So I was coming back from Ireland, I just visited Andre. I previously lived in Ireland for a little while before that. So I just went up there to visit him and and my friend and a couple of friends as well.

So I'm coming back to am I coming back on my actually going to Ireland? It might have actually been No, I think it was a journey to Ireland. Yes, it was. No, I remember now.

So it was the ferry to Ireland from Blimey, I can't remember where it was. Was it Wales? Because there was a coach trip that lasted for about a year to get to the ferry and then the ferry was overnight. Well, basically what happened? I'm on the ferry on the way to and where does it go to the capital? Ireland? Yeah, you know, the place in Ireland.

So the ferry went there's probably a to be fair, there's probably a coach from the ferry to the centre of the town. Anyway, I can't remember. But what on the ferry, I get talking to this, this lady, probably about the same kind of age, maybe a bit younger, maybe a bit older, I don't know.

But I got on really well with her and I really fancied her. I thought we would get on really well. We we watched the movie together everything.

Never mentioned she had a boyfriend or anything. We didn't really didn't come up. I thought I was doing quite well and doing quite well.

But you know, I mean, not ticking any boxes, but I just I felt like it was going quite good. And she and I saw some other people as well. I met a few people just chatting to them on during the time, you know, getting food and stuff.

And I'm quite when I sit down somewhere, I have a tendency of just sitting in one place. So sometimes I get I used to get chatting to people or just get to say hello to them or whatever. I don't know.

Or maybe sitting next to him on the coach for a few hours, you kind of get to know them a little bit. Anyway, but this this this female, we spent a good few hours together, chatting and having a laugh watching a movie. I don't think there was any alcohol on the on the ferry.

Maybe there was I can't remember. And and then we were just basically docking. And she said, Well, I'd better go and find my boyfriend.

He's waiting for me at the terminal or whatever. And I thought, Oh, lovely. Lovely.

Brilliant. Wonderful. Here's me thinking, you know, my soulmate gonna get married and all that crap.

I was just someone to pass the time with. Oh, well. So I said, I'll see you later.

And then then we went back to the same to went back to our coaches. So I think it was like you get to the coaches, the coaches were they might have gone on the ferry. I really don't remember such a long time ago.

So we get back and we get on the coaches all like the ones that we were allotted on my different coach to her. So I get into the I didn't know she was already there or not, but get into the terminal, which is in town in Ireland. And so I'm getting off the coach with a couple of blokes that I was I traveled up with all the way from London.

Was it a bus station in London anyway, from there, all the way up to Wales. So I kind of got to know them a little bit at a laugh and that, you know, everyone's in good spirits. And so I'm walking out of the out of off the coach with them to walking up and this bloke waves at these two men.

We waves at one of them because they're not together. I think they're separate, but they're just chatting to each other. So he waves to one of the blokes.

So we just walk over. We're chatting and this bloke says, Oh, you're right, mate. And and they were just chatting, saying, God is some beautiful women in there.

One of the blokes that I traveled up on. And I Ireland's greatest and beautiful women. And I said, beautiful women.

He should have seen the one on the ferry. So she's absolutely stunning. I just and I think I gave some physical descriptions that wouldn't be acceptable today.

But I was a young man. I didn't know any better back then. And they were laughing.

All of the blokes were laughing at stuff I was saying. I was I was just being cheeky, just being cheeky. Nothing bad.

Just be cheeky, young lad that I was. I was only I was only 47 at the time. No, it was a long time ago.

And they're laughing. And then I hear. And the bloke that was had waved to one of my people that I was with and we were talking.

He said, Oh, here's my girlfriend. And I look over and it's the woman that I spent the entire journey with. The one that I'd just been making fun of.

In a nice way, but you know, and her boyfriend was standing there waving to us saying, that's my girlfriend. And I've just been talking about his girlfriend and making him laugh about his own girlfriend. Being cheeky, I'm just gonna say cheeky.

It was nothing bad. But it was enough to it's just like lads just chatting and that. I don't know, I'm trying to make excuses.

I don't even remember what it was. I said it was just something silly. Anyway, it wasn't something that I'd want to say about his girlfriend.

Once he realized that that was his girlfriend, because, and I thought, Oh, I said, well, I'm off to see her. So I moved really quickly. And she shouts after me.

And I just like, I turned back and said, Oh, hello. And I carry on walking. And I see she starts talking to the boyfriend.

And he looks over at me. And I want to see all you can see is dust or fart residue probably. And I'm out of there.

And I'll say, Oh, this is embarrassing. Very, very embarrassing, because I just thought, I can't. I can't come back from that.

I can't really. I don't know what to do. So yeah, that was and I just took off and went to McDonald's, I think.

McDonald's mayonnaise at the time they had mayonnaise in their burgers in McDonald's burgers in Ireland. Mayonnaise, should I repeat it? Mayonnaise. That's wrong.

It's not just wrong. It should be illegal. Mayonnaise on a burger.

Absolutely horrific, honestly. Absolute Oh, I still like them because I was hungry. But it's just, I was kind of trying to scrape it out.

Oh, this is grim. Why would you have mayonnaise? I don't know why people have mayonnaise on anything. To be honest, I think is one of the disgusting things on the planet.

But I do like salad cream. Some would argue, but isn't salad cream very much like mayonnaise? And to me, it's not. But to some people, it might be.

But to me, it's not. And salad cream is phenomenally beautiful, especially with things that you shouldn't really have them with. It doesn't really mix.

But it's amazing, like with chips, or you might call them fries where you live. Chips with my hot chips and mayonnaise. What a great treat.

And there's been times when I've gone into a pub and had a burger and chips. And many, many years ago, blimey. And work, you know, go from work, have a meal and have a burger, chips, and then have mayonnaise.

I get the sachets, you know, the ones in a bag, little plastic thingy things. So yeah, a couple of tomato sauces, a couple of salad creams. And was there another one I'd get? No, I probably didn't bother with the brown sauce.

Maybe a vinegar, if there was no vinegar. Although once, our team at the call centre, we all went out for lunch every few months. And we went out for lunch and my friend, my so called friend, undid the vinegar pot top.

So when I got my meal, and I poured it in, it went all over everything. And I was close to crying. I really, I was, I wasn't, I didn't find it funny at all, because I'd waited most of my lunchtime.

It took us 10 minutes to get there. It was going to take us 10 minutes to get back. We'd already waited for 20 minutes for the food.

So there was no time for me to get another meal. So what I did is I ordered another meal. And so my team supervisor that was there, who witnessed it and knew that he'd done it before it went all over me, all over my food and ruined it.

But first I made him pay for my meal. Not my supervisor, but the bloke that did it. And I said to my team, to my team leader, I'm going to sit here till my food gets here and I'm going to eat it.

And I'm going to be back late. And he said, no, you're not. I said, yeah, I am.

He said, if you're back late, you're going to be in trouble. I said, watch me. Luckily, the food got cut, came quite quick.

And I was in, back in time. But I think I proved a point. Thinking about it, I'm not sure what the point was, but most embarrassing moment.

I should have thought about these. I should have read through them before I started the recording, because I can't think of anything. I've been alive long enough that there must have been loads, loads.

Most hilarious memory. There's weird memories. There's a couple of funny ones that just are stuck in my head and they're not necessarily funny to anyone else.

But there was a bloke called Terry who I worked with in a meat processing factory. And Andre, the original Andre, not my Andre, he was my best friend, but he was also the supervisor of the department at the time. So Terry came back, he'd just been on a break, came back and I said to Terry, have you seen Andre? I needed to ask him a question, work related or have you seen Andre?

He said, oh yeah, I just passed him in the toilet.

Now I just visualized Terry pooing out Andre. I passed him in the toilet. That's what I visualized and I could not stop laughing.

Terry didn't find it funny. Andre didn't find it funny when I told him. And for the last 30 years I've been telling people and no one finds it funny.

And I, okay, I don't find it particularly funny now, but it was hilarious at the time. And it's just, just, oh yeah, I passed him in the toilet. That's funny.

And another one was my friend downstairs. He had a neighbor staying with him for a while and he was sleeping on the, he was sleeping on the settee during the day. He was just sleeping on the settee and one of the other neighbors next door was doing the cutting the lawn, front lawn.

So my friend opened the window, the front window and called him over and said, excuse me mate, sorry, do us a favor, can you, can you not, not do that at the moment? Cause I've only just got him to sleep. I just got him off to sleep. So the neighbor looked in the window and see this grown man lying on the settee.

Now I just found that hilarious because the whole idea is I've only just got him to sleep. You'd think you're talking about a little kid, a little baby or something. And it's like a 40 year old man there.

So I found that hilarious. I don't know. I still, it's not so funny now to be honest, but it was at the time.

I just found it very funny at the time. And this is something I need to give some thought. Why is my right nipple so hard? That's weird.

I need to give it some thought. There is some, there's probably been loads and loads and loads. Something that really, really, really, really, really, I mean an embarrassing moment.

That was definitely one of them. I'm trying to think of another embarrassing moment. I suppose I've had a few, maybe times when I should have got embarrassed, but I didn't.

I, there's one time I was chatting, chatting a woman up in the nightclub and is she, I was a DJ, but she asked me a question as I was walking through. So I stopped and I'm like, she's eating her dinner. And she asked me a question, probably about the song choices and stuff that would be playing.

And I'm talking to her, I'm trying, she might've finished her dinner, but I was, I was kind of, I wasn't just chatting her up, but I was chatting to her. And I smiled and the chewing gum in my mouth fell on the floor and she saw it fall out of my mouth. She didn't come up to me later and ask for any songs.

So that was a little bit embarrassing. What other embarrassing things have happened? I can't think of anything off the top. Well, I'll give it a thought.

And if I can think of some other stuff, I'll come back to that. Maybe in a future recording, I'll try and think of, maybe I'll make a list of embarrassing things and talk about them, but, or hilarious memory. It's probably, oh, this, yeah, this is a good memory.

It's a funny memory. My friend owned a security company. Okay.

He was the boss. And he, so he was in the office, the head office, well, there was only one office, I think. But he was in the toilet.

His staff were in the office. He was in the toilet. He phoned me, bearing in mind he's the other side of the country to where I live.

He phoned me on his mobile to me on my mobile. And he said, can you please phone the office? I said, office? He said, yeah, can you phone my office, which is where he was, but he was in the toilet and asked him to bring me a toilet roll. And the reason he called me rather than them, you might think, why didn't he just phone them? His phone was about to run out any second.

So he wanted to make sure that he got through. So he knew I'd answer the phone. They were really busy.

So you might not get through until a few calls, which I think the same happened to me. And eventually I said, okay, and I just couldn't stop laughing. And I phoned them up.

And, you know, they're really busy, but eventually I got through to them. And I said, I've got a message from the boss. They said, what, really? I said, yeah, can you take him a toilet roll? He's in the toilet and he's run out of toilet roll and the laughter.

I mean, it wasn't an embarrassing moment for me, but it was for him. And it was a funny moment. It's very funny at the time.

And so that was, that was quite a funny one. Um, what other stuff trying to think? Oh, I still, even now I've talked about this recently, actually. I was in a car getting a lift with Andre into town in Ireland and the, uh, there was too many people in the car.

So Andre had to sit on my lap and his mom was driving and his auntie was in the front or his nan, grandmother was in the front. And I said to Andre, Oh, Andre, have you put on weight? And I just found it hilarious. And he did as well.

Cause the idea is like, well, it's been a while since you last sat on my lap. And it's just, I don't know. It was funny at the time.

It perhaps is not funny now, but it was funny at the time. It just, as I say, you had to be, yeah, well, I was silly things. I've done a lot of silly things in the past.

Yeah. I've said some silly things. I remember I was in a, my local pub.

It was a local, but I'd only been living there a little while. And I said something, I said something I shouldn't have done about the way the, the girl behind the bar, she'd been rude to me. And, uh, the next thing I've got the man behind the bar saying, that's my daughter.

I was like, Ooh, it's like, you know, cause she'd been rude to me and she was nice to Andre and she was rude to me. And she, I'd been in a nightclub and she was in there and she started saying, Oh, you're following me in the nightclub. And my other friend said, yeah, like he's got better things to do.

Go, you know, like he's hasn't got better things to do than follow you around. And I hadn't followed her. Well, I had, no, I didn't.

And she just, I mean, this is a little area, even though it's in London, it was a little area. There's very little going on in that part of London, like Forest gate. And she was in there, but like, I didn't speak to her and I didn't go in there and I wasn't in there on my own.

I was in there with Andre. And so, yeah, anyway, so that was embarrassing. Uh, what other things I can't think of anything else.

So I'll move on to the next one. So there you go, Robin. None of these answers seem very good.

I don't think I'm answering very well, but sorry about that. Mike asks me, if you were not a hypnotist podcaster or hypnotist slash podcaster, what other job profession would you likely be doing or slightly differently? What would be your dream job? Um, now I don't know. Um, when I was a kid, I'm talking from the age when I was a kid.

Yeah. Basically I wanted to be a singer. I want to be a singer songwriter.

And I used to write my own songs and I used to think that I had the ability to sing. And then as I got older, I didn't, I wasn't so sure. And then mid twenties, I realized that I could sing.

I did a bit of singing in my early nine, in the early twenties, karaoke, and I always had quite a good response, but you know, that's as far as it went. But then when I was about 26 to 30, I started doing some recordings and that I thought were pretty good. Started to write some songs, but nothing came of it and no one else liked them.

It was only me that liked them. But I think I'd have, um, I know it's not necessarily a job. I mean, it's, I'm not saying it's not hard work because it's incredibly hard work.

I imagine being a recording artist and stuff, but as far as that's something that I wanted to do. I also wanted to be a policeman when I was at school, but I wasn't tall enough. Now there's no height requirement, I don't think.

But when I was a kid, you had to be at least, I think, five, 10, five, 11, something like that. And even though I was only, oh, probably 10, 11, 12 at the time, it was clear that I wasn't going to be tall to everyone else for some reason. Like, you're not going to be tall, mate.

How do you know? Our biggest brother, my oldest brother is about 6'6". I was like, this was then, this is when he was about 12. He was about 6'1", but it's like, no, you're not, you're not going to be tall.

You don't know, I might be. No, you won't. You're not.

And I wasn't. I was the shortest out of everyone. The shortest.

I was the littlest kid in school when I first went to high school. There was no one smaller than me. I was the smallest, tiniest child.

And then as I got older, and, you know, I go into the high, the next year, and the year below, there'd still be kids much bigger than me. And then I go into the year higher, and the new year, the new year one, and I'll be in year three, third year, and there'd still be kids bigger than me. And I got to the fifth year, and the first year, there'd still be kids bigger than me.

It's like, this isn't fair. I was just so little, so just, late developer, late developer. And I would have loved to have had, not this body, because no one would love to have this body, but to have the, maybe the strength for the physical, I don't know, the size, maybe, this would have been quite cool to have this when I was at school.

Because not that, it wouldn't made a huge difference, to be honest, but I'd have preferred it. Although I think I might have got into a bit of trouble. To be honest, I might have.

Yeah, I might have. I might, I don't know. I don't know.

That wasn't the question, was it? What were you there for? I'd like, my dream job would be a radio presenter, I think. Not, not particularly doing music, but maybe, but like just a, and not even having callers. Just me talking.

Doing what I do here, really, but just doing that. Maybe, maybe daily for three hours. Talk, you know, go through the newspapers, go through what's online, let people send in messages so I can read them out.

And, you know, I think that would be something that I'd be quite good at, to be honest. But, you know, I don't think that's, unless anyone is listening, likes what I do and thinks, hey, that's a good idea. I'm a radio producer.

We'll get JC, JC, juicy JJ to do a radio show. We'll start off on a weekend, just test it out, maybe on a Sunday, see if you enjoy doing it. Maybe just do a two hour slot on a Sunday.

You travel up to London, stay in a top hotel and then just make your way to Leicester Square, which is just across the road. It's a little walk and you can do your show and then we'll show for you back home. And if you like it, then maybe we can extend it to maybe two days a week, Saturday and Sunday at the weekend, I mean, and then maybe a few days in the week.

So to have a regular slot. You know, maybe, I don't know, as an example, maybe four to seven in the morning, Monday to Friday. And it could be like something you can do into your, into your in your 70s or something, you could do it for the next 20 odd years.

And it just be the same as what you're doing now. But you can pay lots of money. Yes.

So yeah, I think a radio presenter, so not a DJ as such, although it is this this jockey is really music, isn't it? But a radio show, but like a professional on a professional radio station. You know, not not like just so I was actually getting so it's a proper job, proper well paid job where I was reaching a large audience. And the thing about it is because I've already established an audience around the world.

Yeah, only 15 people, but besides the point, it's not about quantity, it's about quality. I've been saying that to girlfriends for years, and none of them believe me. But it's, I could start a radio job here and have people from other countries tune in to listen, which would be I don't know if it'd be useful or not.

I don't know. I don't know. So that's my answer, Mike.

And because this what I'm doing here isn't a job. It's I'm not gonna say it's a calling. It's I don't know what it is, to be honest with you.

I'm not sure anymore, but I'm just doing it. So it's hard to read. It's hard to really explain what it is anymore.

Because I'm not sure. I'm not sure. But hopefully it's useful.

That's all I want it to be is useful. And if it's not, then I need to do something different. So there's those questions.

And now I come back to I haven't got many. Oh, okay. Okay.

So this is the questions from today that I've had. So I've only had, I've had four. So that's good.

Only four. I say good, because I probably don't have much time left to do loads. Before that, I'm going to have a little drink of water.

So back to this. Diana asks me, Do you smell really bad? No, I don't smell. Oh, do you sleep well? I do smell bad.

Yeah. Do I sleep well? Yeah, I don't have any problem sleeping. I sometimes have a little bit of an issue getting comfortable to start with.

Not like for a long time, but just for me, it's not about falling asleep. That's not really on my mind. I don't care about that.

It happens anyway. For me, it's more about just getting physically comfortable in the bed. It takes a little bit.

I'm on my right side and on my left side. You know, I'm not like tossing and turning or anything like that. And it's not.

But generally, it's about being comfortable. And it's also about Vinnie. How is he? Is it you know, if he's lying on the pillow next to me, or if he's at the bottom of the bed, or you know, I have to kind of be a little bit aware of where he is.

So I don't lay on him. He does like to take up a lot of the room. And and then I've got, I have to have music playing, not for me, but for him.

Because any sounds outside or anyone coming and going out of any of the flats, talking outside the building, a dog barking, anything like that, doesn't always but can set him off. And he starts barking and he can't seem to stop once he starts. So what I have is I play music.

Sometimes I have an audio book. Sometimes I listen to the radio. Last night, I listened to, I've got a prime.

What is it called music, unlimited music or whatever. So you know, you can choose what you have. Because with the normal music you get a prime.

You can choose some stuff, but then it puts you on to other stuff that you might not want to listen to. So I pay for the monthly thing. And I listen to classical music, nine hours of classical music.

So I just listen to that all night. It's not on loud, but it's on enough to, and I've got my door closed as well. And I prefer to have the door open because I like to have the air flowing.

But if the doors open, he can, if he hears the neighbor opposite coming out of their door, even if they're always quiet, but he hears them and he starts barking and that. So I have the music on or an audio book and that seems to be enough to distract him. And because I do go to bed quite early, generally, I'm in bed by nine or 10 every night, sometimes earlier, depends how I feel.

And I wake up early in the morning as well. And I will, there's a couple of radio shows I like to listen to the weekend. But generally, I'd be more inclined to listen to music.

Yeah, it's a classical music, something like that. And sleeping, I find quite easy, to be honest. I just fall asleep.

Provided I've had food. If I go to sleep hungry, it doesn't work. I can't sleep if I'm hungry.

I feel actually feel a bit ill, it makes me feel a bit dizzy, feel like just don't, doesn't feel right. I don't eat directly before going to bed. But I need to have eaten at least like maybe at least a couple of hours before going to sleep.

So that I'm not hungry. Otherwise, yeah, it just doesn't work. I can't do it.

But yeah, I do sleep well, I do sleep. I have to wake up to go do wee wees couple of times through the night. That's just an age thing, I think.

And it's also because I do drink quite a lot of water throughout the day. And it's probably the only healthy thing that I've done in my life is drink plenty of water. And it's still my favourite drink, really.

I drink tea as well. I don't drink any fizzy drinks anymore. I don't drink alcohol.

I have milk on my breakfast cereal and in my tea, but I don't drink milk like I used to. I used to have a pint of milk with my dinner every evening when I was in my 90s. In my 90s? During the 90s, in my 20s.

And yeah, so that's the answer to that. Yeah, I do. As long as I'm not hungry, I sleep fairly well.

I don't sleep so well if I'm really tired. Like, if I'm really, really, if I let it get too much. Sometimes I just need to have a nap.

You know, and then I'm all right. So if I'm tired, really tired during the day, or I need a nap, I'll have a nap. And sometimes that can be caused through eye strain.

If I'm spending a lot of time looking at the computer screen, it can be tiring. So yeah, so I do sleep. Sleep is quite easy for me, which is good.

Matthew asks, seems like you've lived all over the country. How did you end up where you are now? Well, the short answer to that is I went to university here in this town. I'm on the outskirts of the town now.

I'm in the countryside part of the town. It's a city, actually. It's a city.

It was a town, now it's a city. But I moved here to do my university degree in counselling studies. Back in 2007, I think it was end of October, beginning of November, I moved here.

Moved to this city. And I lived in student accommodation for three years. It was private rented, but they only rented to students.

There was a room, there was two rooms for students in a family home. Very weird situation for me being, I mean, I was in my late 30s at that point. And so yeah, it was a bit strange to be in a family home like that.

They were used to much younger people being there, as was the university staff, I would say. But not that many of them used to come into my bedroom. So, yeah, I've lived around chronologically.

Let's see. Born in North London. And forgetting all the times I've moved in the different areas I've lived.

But I was born in North London. And then I, about two years old, I moved to, I think, a different part of London. My oldest brother told me that at some point we were living in Scotland.

And then ended up in Newcastle, upon Tyne. And then from there moved to Southend. And then Southend from then, when I was seven, moved to Suffolk, which is a southeast.

Lived there until I was 19. And I moved, at the first opportunity I could, to London. And then I moved back again for a little while.

And then I moved back to London again in 1990, January. And I moved, I lived in different parts of London. So I lived in Stratford, East London.

And then I lived in, I might be wrong, but I think it was Leighton Stone, I think, or Leighton. Then I lived in Forest Gate. Then I moved to Butlins and Bognoregius, Bognoregia, Bognoregia, Bognorega, whatever, which is the southwest of the country, I think.

And so that was quite a long, big, quite a long way away from London. So I lived there for a while. Then I came back to London.

Oh no, wait a minute. Yeah, came back to London, lived in Stratford, different address. And then I lived in Upton Park, which is up near, used to be West Ham Football Ground, and it's East Ham.

West Ham Football Ground is now at Stratford, at the, I think it was the, it used to be called the Millennium, no, it's the, is it? Not the O2. It's, anyway, it's in Stratford anyway. I think it's at one of the places where they built for the Olympics, I think.

Unless they are actually at the O2. I'm a little bit confused. Just generally in life.

And then from there, I was in Upton Park, moved back to Stratford again. And then from there, moved to Suffolk, but a different town. Oh, in between that, I lived in Ireland for a little while.

And then I lived in a different town in Suffolk. And then I moved to a city. I think the other place is a city now as well.

I moved to a different place where a university is, and then ended up moving different places around there, and then ended up here, nine years ago, which is on the outskirts. I've missed out a lot of different moves, but there's kind of the areas that I've lived. There's places I don't know, to be honest, because I lived in Newcastle, I moved to Southend, and I might have lived in Scotland.

Again, I'm not 100% sure of that one. But I ended up here really just through circumstances. It's... I don't know, really.

You know, I had everything sorted. Everything was absolutely sorted for me when I started the university course. I had a part-time job that was just about to start in the supermarket.

I had somewhere to live, which I was happy living there, kind of. But that went to... that was the reason everything went wrong, because of that place. And then... but, you know, it turns out that the place was going to get sold anyway.

So that would have put a bit of a stinker on things, but that would have happened a bit sooner than it was going to happen. I didn't realise it was going to happen. I should have known when they got me to sign a contract, a form saying I waived my rights to live in there.

Maybe I should have seen something into that. Anyway, I had a girlfriend, I had voluntary work I was doing still at the drug rehab and the alcohol charity where I was doing relaxation sessions, and I was going to be doing my counselling training hours, you know, where I'd see clients. I was going to be doing it with them as part of the course.

So that was... everything was like... and I'd just travelled to a different town for the course, for the university course. Everything was all set, quite organised for me really, it was quite good. And everything... it all kind of went a little bit pooey and I couldn't... I was looking for somewhere to live in the town I was currently living in.

I couldn't find anywhere, first of all within my price range, which was a very small amount considering I was going to be a student on a student loan and a student grant, without any part-time... well I'd have been all right with a part-time job but even then it wasn't a lot. And in the end my girlfriend that I'd only been with for maybe a month or so, she said to me, why don't you call the university up and ask them if they can suggest any telephone numbers of landlords that are willing to rent to a student.

So I took her advice, phoned the university up, they gave me a few numbers, called them up.

One of them was where I ended up living and she let me move in without even paying the full amount of rent, knowing that it was because she was used to students and I thought yeah this is perfect. So I gave her some money and said I'd pay the rest when the student loan came through, because it was a little bit late getting through. And... but it was in a different town.

It was a town where the university was, not the town where I was currently living. Which meant I could no longer do the voluntary work, because the travelling was just wasn't really suitable really for the situation. I couldn't do the job either because I couldn't travel.

I did try and get it changed to the different town. I'd see if I could transfer it to the supermarket in the new town, but they couldn't do that. And ironically, my girlfriend left me because I'd moved.

I was like, yeah but it was your idea. I didn't think you'd move. I said well yeah that was the idea of moving, but you'd moved to a different town.

Yeah but I didn't move to get away from you, I just moved because I needed somewhere to live. And yes, that was like the last I spoke to her. So yeah, it was weird.

So everything went a bit weird and I moved in there. Lived there until the course finished. And it was 2010.

I got my... I think it was November 2010. I got my graduation. November I think it was.

And in 2011, I think it was probably March time, I got evicted. They gave me notice to get out. So I found somewhere else that was really £125 a week for a room with a... it was en-suite, own bathroom and stuff, but £125.

I think I was paying £70 or £65 a week for the room I had before. And it just, again, everything just went weird again for a while. And then I was there for a year.

I had to stay there for a year because I had a contract. Got out of there as soon as I could because loads of work dried up because of politics and stuff. The funding was taken out of the counselling services.

And I found a room a lot cheaper and I moved in there and stayed there until 2015, about March, April time when I moved in there. So yeah, that's kind of the... I've missed out all the different moves I've had before that. So I've only lived in one, two, three, four, four different places in this town.

In the other town, I lived in one, two, three, four, five different places. And in London, I lived in one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, eight or nine different places in London. And then before that, wow, before that, I lived in... So there was how many places? I'm trying to think how many times I moved when I was living in Suffolk before I left.

So I moved there when I was seven, moved once, then moved in a second place. There's a council house, then moved into the third place, which was a house. So what I lived in one, two, three, three different places in that Suffolk town between seven and 15.

Then I lived in one, two places until the age of 17. So I lived there when I was 17. Then I moved out above the co-ops.

I lived there. Then I moved again, kicked out of there, evicted. Then I moved to another place.

Then I moved to another place. Then I moved to another place. Wow.

So I probably... Yes, I'm trying to think there's at least 50, I've moved at least 50 times, probably different addresses that I've had since the age of seven. And I don't know how many before that, to be honest. There's only one, two, three, four, five moves that I know of, but there was multiple moves that I kind of vaguely remember moving around quite a bit.

There was times we even slept in the police station. So I remember that. That was kind of quite exciting, to be honest.

I was very young. So how did I end up where I am now? So yeah, that's how I ended up here. And I've been here nine years.

So this is the longest time I've ever lived anywhere, as far as an address. The longest time I lived anywhere since I was 15 years old. And so yeah, it's been kind of strange.

It's weird. It's very weird. So that's Matthew.

Thank you, Matthew. So I've answered Diana's question. I've answered Matthew's question.

Jen is the next one. Have you considered talking out loud without recording to try to get Vinnie used to it? Maybe reward him when he's quiet. I'm no expert, but it seems he always starts barking when you start recording, and he gets either rewarded with a bone or put into the bedroom.

Yeah, I do talk out loud. The thing is, that's something I do actually do. Anyway, I talk to him quite a lot.

And the weird thing about it, when I'm on the phone, because I have the phone on a loud speaker, not loud, but you know, so I don't have to put it to my ear. And he never barks when I'm on the phone. But as soon as the phone, as soon as I turn the phone off, and I stand up, he starts barking.

Like he thinks we're going to go somewhere. And yeah, I don't, I can't figure him out. When he started barking just then, a couple of minutes ago, but he heard something in the garden.

He's barking, you know, it's just, it's what he does. He's, whether it's because he's excited or because he's agitated, I don't know. Really don't know what the cause is.

And I do talk to him a lot. And I do talk out loud to myself funny enough. And but I don't sit here and talk to myself without recording.

Because let's face it, I don't want to miss the gold. I don't want to miss the moment, you know, just like what if I'd start talking to myself and something amazing comes out and I haven't recorded it, man. What would I do? I don't know.

I'm not sure what the answer to that is. Anyway, thanks for the question, Jen. I don't know.

He's, it's not so much he barks. Because he hasn't barked really hardly all the whole way through this recording. But he does have a tendency as soon as I press, push the machine on to record, I think it must let some kind of high pitched noise that only he can hear, or out of the two of us, only he can hear.

And he comes running in there like, what's going on? Maybe I should really discuss it with him. Christine says, Are you any further forward in moving? Well, no, is the answer to that really? No. I really don't know what's going on there, to be honest with you.

I went on to the, there's a website that the council has. And the only place that I'd probably consider moving to would be nearer to where my dad is, because my dad's getting on a bit and I probably pass. It would be good to spend a bit more time with him.

But there's just no, there was just no swapsies there. There's nothing that was available. And I just thought, Oh, this isn't good.

And the only other place that I'd like to live would be Torquay. But I don't know anybody in Torquay. And at least if I found if there was a place near where my dad lives, I can check the place out because I know the town.

And I can get a rough idea if it's a fairly decent place to live if it's okay. So I don't know. I'm really not sure what's going to go on with that.

Everything's gone a bit. Everything's got a bit topsy turvy the last few months, to be honest with you. So I don't know.

I don't know what's going to happen there. So Tammy says it's probably been asked before, but how did you get into what you're doing right now? You're right, I think I have gone through that. But I'll give you a little briefing as well.

This is literally the I started in the in the early 90s. When I was even when I even when I was like 14, 15, I went to a on a religious education trip. RE we used to they used to call it went on a trip to London and went around different religious sites.

I think there was a Catholic church, synagogue, mosque and Buddhist center. I was most interested in the Buddhist center. Because it I guess I equated it with martial arts, because I'd seen like Kung Fu and he used to never come through the TV show and he'd be meditating and Bruce Lee used to meditate and there was a lot of monasteries in the Kung Fu movies and you know, so I I kind of had a feeling about that.

I just thought, yeah, this is for me. And you might be thinking, what the hell is this got to do with anything? Why is he talking about this? Well, I'll get to it. So I went to this Buddhist center as part of the school trip.

And they mentioned that they do karate. Now I was doing karate at the time, not not right then, but in the evenings, and it piqued my interest even more. And I was asking question after question about the karate, which they didn't want to talk about.

They wanted to talk about the Buddhism. And we all did some meditation and I loved it. It was the London Buddhist center.

And I it always sort of stuck with me, really. I did end up getting involved in that organization, but not until 2002, November. So from 1985 or 84, you know, so 18 years before I actually got involved.

But in my early 90s, I became very interested in poetry, especially beat generation stuff. And, you know, Kerouac, Ginsberg. I don't know, trying to think of the different people off the road, that was Kerouac, wasn't it? Off the road, on the road, and Ginsberg.

My favorite, although technically not a beat generation, but kind of is Bukowski. But there's lots of different books and there's various movies made about these people as well. And there was like this Buddhist like a Buddhist vein, like going through the whole thing, including Bob Dylan as well.

I really fell in love with Bob Dylan and what the lyrics and stuff. So I kind of, it was very much a Buddhist vibe, like an Eastern vibe going on in the beat generation. It's very real, very real, gritty.

And I like that. I did, I really did. And I was right, I was buying every single book I could get, reading every book I could get.

And then about 90, probably about 92, 93, I started buying books on Buddhism. And tried to learn to meditate with audio tapes, and was very interested in Zen, and reading koans, I think they're called, koans or something. And reading about Tibetan Buddhism, and I forget the name of it, of course, it's not Buddhism, but it's kind of precursor to it.

I got into that a bit as well. And I like the philosophy of it. It was almost like it was educating me in something that I already felt that I believed.

It was almost like I was being reminded of something that felt correct. And I'm not talking from a religious perspective, just from a humanity perspective, being kind, being, just all that stuff, you know. And just all that stuff.

There's a lot of stuff. So I found it very fascinating. And I like to read the pithy stuff.

And just I don't know, I just just found it just fascinating. And it was like my guide into how to try and make sense of life, and the world. And because I was doing grotty jobs, low pay, and just trying to, you know, I'd be doing this kind of quite horrible job during the day.

And during a break time, I'd be sitting reading a book on Zen. And it just gave me an emotional boost, an emotional boost. So that idea of kind of that was, I guess, my first step into self development.

That's kind of what I mean. I think it was trying to figure out what's going on with me. And can I, can I, am I able to help myself to move away from how I was feeling, the mood swings and do whatever.

So I continued down that road a bit, up to about 95. And then I went a period, had a period when I really stepped away from it. So 96 to 97, there wasn't really much going on as far as Buddhism or reading anything inspirational, or anything like that.

And then 97, the summer, I have a bit of a difficult issues that happened. And late, late 97, I started buying, I started buying audio books, like Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway, and Seven Habits or whatever. And I don't know how to make friends and whatever, influence people.

So I had quite a few of those, and I'd be listening to them throughout the day, in the late 97, and then into 98. In January 98, I'd really got into the habit of looking for these audio tape, audio CDs, although tapes at the time, audio tapes. And I started looking at the book section, and I came across some hypnosis books, which were like part of that section.

Inspirational, self-help, spiritual, blah, blah, and that kind of area. And this is in London, so it's in the really, really good bookshops, Blackwell's, and there was Foils, is it? Books, etc. I don't, books, etc.

Even exist anymore. And I just, there's these two particular books, both introduction to hypnosis. And I visited the bookshop every week, because I'd be buying books and stuff every single week.

And for about three weeks in a row, I'd look at these two books. And they weren't side by side, there's a few books in between them, but they're in the same little collection. One was green, one was blue.

I think I've got at least one of them here. Not the exact copy, but a version of that book. Introduction to hypnosis or something.

And I think the third or fourth time I looked at these books, I thought, yeah, I'll get them. I wasn't sure why, but I just had a feeling. I'd already been skimming through them.

I probably already read like probably 10% of the books already by then. So I bought them, took them home, still didn't read them for a couple of weeks. And then I started reading them and really gauged my interest.

And then my friend, a friend of mine, gave me a leaflet, because I was still into the, you know, self-help stuff. And he was into the self-help stuff. And he got sent this leaflet and he gave it to me.

And it was for NLP. I thought, oh, what's that? And he said it was part, it's hypnosis as well, because it was hypnosis on there. So I thought, oh, so I just had a look at that.

And I thought, oh, well, this is, so I just did a little bit of research to see what it was. Very limited internet in those days. It was, it was around, but it was very, you know, it wasn't a lot of information.

And I saw that there was a course at City University, one evening a week, I think it was a Tuesday or Thursday evening. And it was three terms, three different terms, introduction to NLP, neurolinguistic programming. So I signed up, discovered that hypnosis is part of what they were doing.

Started buying books on NLP. Pretty much got all, most of the main books on the subject. And it kind of went from there, to be honest.

And I did, I discussed quite, quite detail yesterday, I think, about the process of getting into the, you know, 2006, when it all kind of kicked off, kicked off in a good way, where I sort of started to grow into the world of helping people, firstly, with chronic pain relief face to face, for free in the town I was living, and then doing group sessions at the alcohol and drug charities, two different charities, and then providing stuff online, videos and podcasts.

And I continued the videos and podcasts, or to this day, I guess, I suppose, it's been more podcasts the last five or six years. And since 2013, I think I got rid of my my previous YouTube channel.

And I started focusing on podcasts only really. Although I do have a YouTube channel again, and there is stuff on there. So that's kind of how it started.

We started, you know, pretty much, I would say it started when I was a little kid watching Kung Fu, David Carradine. And I remember once he got, he was locked in, locked inside a box by some cowboys. And his punishment was to be locked in this sweat box for 24 hours.

And when I opened it up the next day, thinking that he was going to be upset, or whatever, he just smiled because he'd been meditating the whole time. And that's when I thought, oh, he was always calm. No matter what happened, no matter what people tried to do to him, he was always able to keep it together and be calm.

And I like that. I like the idea of being able to do that because I wasn't able to do that. I didn't know how to do that.

And I admired that. Well, now, now I can pretty much do that. Not in all situations, but I've definitely improved over the years.

And that's it. That's kind of how I got started. Yeah, it's like a right away back.

Very much influenced by Bruce Lee, the martial arts, Buddhism, philosophy, and then self-help or self-development. So a lot of that stuff comes from Eastern philosophy. A lot of the self-development stuff comes from not just Eastern, like even Russian, Chinese, European places, various Hong Kong, Japan, all kinds of Africa.

There's lots of different places where these philosophies come into and get kind of mixed together a bit and used in a way that may be useful to people. So that was it. That's kind of how I got here.

Doesn't explain why I'm still here, does it really? Like, why are you still doing it? I don't know. I'm not 100% sure. I kind of am, but I'm not kind of, I don't know.

And so that's that question for Tammy. Thanks for the question. And Robin asks, what's your favorite movie and why? Okay, this is easy.

It doesn't have to be a long one. I've got two. Okay, my favorite all-time movie is It's a Wonderful World.

I'm going to do a couple of movies that I also love. The Wizard of Oz and The Wanderers. I also love the Gremlins, but I don't, I'm all Gremlins.

I haven't seen that for years. But as far as my favorite all-time movie, It's a Wonderful Life. That's it.

Number one. And I saw it for the first time that I remember. I might have seen it when I was a kid, but I saw it for the first time that I remember in 1987.

And I remember where I was. I was living above the co-op where I was working. It was in the summer.

Christmas movie, but it was in the summer. And I know that for a fact because I moved in probably June time. I was out of there by September.

So definitely wasn't a Christmas show in it, even though it's, it is a Christmas movie, really. It is. And I, I couldn't believe what I was watching.

And it's a really old movie. I don't, I suppose I don't need to explain what it is. Most people probably know what it is.

Jimmy Stewart, Donna Reed, Drew Barrymore's grandfather was the old man in the wheelchair. And yeah, it was just a great, is it, was he the old man in the wheelchair or was it his, uh, was it George Bailey's uncle? I lose track. But anyway, they, it was, they were really great movie.

In fact, when I started doing comedy in 1991, I considered calling myself George Bailey to have a stage name, George Bailey. And sometimes I kind of wish I had, even though it made no difference, zero difference to the outcome, I don't think. But, um, my favorite movie, why, why it's because probably the only movie I can watch over and over again, still love it.

I don't watch it regularly, but it is a certain feeling to it. It's a certain, um, there's something about that movie that I've not got from any other movie ever. A real life affirming movie.

It's not the only life affirming movie out there, but it's, for me, it's, uh, I guess it, the amount of times maybe when I was younger and I sort of wish I'd never been born. And I'm sure lots of people have said that over the years, whether they mean it or not. And this spade, this movie basically just covers that subject.

Okay. You've never been born. And this is what would have happened if you hadn't been born.

And this is how many people's lives would have been affected. And negatively, if you hadn't been born and it's powerful stuff, really. And Jimmy Stewart was just a dream to watch.

He just, just something about him. Um, I think if I could be anyone, I wouldn't want to be him now, but I'm saying if I could be something, not, not Jimmy Stewart, just the character that the person on the movie, just this person just seems so almost like a flawed, but something beautiful about him as well. Like everyone loved him.

Well, most people loved him. He was in just, yeah, I don't know. I'm probably not explaining myself very well, but I love the movie.

That's my favorite movie. So I've, I've answered the question. Let, um, it's a wonderful life by Capra.

Was it Capra who wrote it? I even know the book. I don't, um, yeah, I had the book on the, how it was all written and produced and everything. Uh, yeah, that's my favorite movie.

Yeah. It's a wonderful life. I suppose maybe that's, I don't know why, why, why, why it touched me.

It touched me. And that's all I can say had an effect. Um, I guess in a way I wanted to be George.

I wanted to be George Bailey. I wanted to be that kind person that devotes his life because he does in the movie, even though he's all set to go away to university because he wants to travel the world and he wants to do all these things, but he gives all that up to look after the building and loan company that his dad started because otherwise it was going to be sold to the, the local rich man who was not very nice and he'd end up being just a, a slum landlord.

So he wanted to make sure that the local people could live in his own words.

They work hard, isn't it? Is it too much to, for them to ask to be able to go home to a, a nice house with a bathroom and a kitchen and bedrooms. And yeah, he does his little speech. There's one good bit I like about it is when, um, he says to, I was trying to think who's, old man Gower is the pharmacist who accidentally sends, puts poison in the, in the capsules and gives it to young George when he's about 10 to go and deliver it to one of the patients.

And George doesn't know what to do because he's seen that the pharmacist has put the poison in, but the reason he's put the poison in, because he's upset about something and he doesn't realize what he's doing. I think he's drinking as well. So he goes, he sees a poster saying, ask dad, dad knows best or something.

One of the posters in the pharmacy. So he goes to see his dad and, uh, the old man in the wheelchair that's being horrible to his dad is having to go. His dad's saying, you don't make any money.

You're just a charity case. And you're, you know, you're just a small man. And George is in the office listening to this.

And he starts having to go at the old man saying, you can't say that to my dad. He's the biggest man in town. You can't talk to my dad like that.

So that kind of starts that. And then there's one point where George Bailey is a grown man. His dad's passed away and he, he offers him a job, a big money to work for him and to just give up the company.

And he's like, Oh, I might do that. And he shakes hands with the old man and the Potter. Is it Dennis Potter? Potter, old man Potter or something, they called him.

And, uh, no, it's old man Gower. It was Potter. Anyway, that was his name in the movie, the old bloke.

And I think that was Drew Barrymore's granddad, I think. Because John Barrymore was her dad, I think. Because the whole family were quite famous actors, weren't they? I don't know if any of her kids or she's got kids, if they're actors as well.

But they, yeah, he's shaking hands with Potter. And he's like, wait a minute. And he realizes that he doesn't, he kind of almost that spell of being getting paid huge amounts of money is suddenly broken when he, when he touches the skin of the, of Potter.

And he realized he remembers that he's just a bit of a snake, I guess. And then he walks away. I'd never worked for you.

He didn't go because that probably wouldn't have been very professional. Although Jimmy Stewart was what apparently one of the first actors to speak more naturally, you know, to stutter, or to like, instead of being word perfect, like a lot of the movies until he came around, he started like, oh, well, that's this, and it'd be more real. That was me acting, by the way.

And it's, he had a different style. And it's, he changed the way actors did things. I mean, some actors just still stuck to the script, that he was able to almost incorporate a script, but become the part, become, make it more realistic.

Because let's face it, in real life, people stutter, sometimes we say the wrong word, don't we, in conversations? It's not word perfect, is it, generally? Not with me, it's not anyway. Not with me. Not with me.

So that's it, Robin. I think I've answered all the questions. I've actually, I've only gone and answered all the questions.

Can you believe it? That is amazing. Few more comments. Christine, no, I've done Christine.

Jen, thanks, Jen. Matthew, thank you. Diana, thank you.

Tammy, thank you. Robin, thank you. And that's all of the comments on that one.

No, that's top comments, all of the comments. All of the comments, few previous comments. Christine, Jen, Robin, Tammy, Matthew, Diana.

And then if we go down, and that's both, yeah, that was it. I do believe, I do, do, do, do, do, do, do, I do, do believe that view all comments, all comments on the other one. Ben, Joe, Barry, Rick, Robin, Mike.

Yeah, that's everyone. I have answered everyone's questions. Thank you.

The ones on here that I didn't answer today, I answered yesterday. I think I answered about two questions yesterday. And this time I've answered all the rest.

So thank you. Thank you for asking the questions. And I do hope I've answered them proficiently.

That's a word, proficiently, proficiency, silly. And that's the end of the recording. So thank you for listening.

Blimey. I feel like I've rushed it. But is it does it feel rushed? I don't know.

I probably could have lasted an hour for each, each, each answer or each question. But some of it was kind of going over old ground in a way. And some of the questions I'd already answered, even though it wasn't, I wasn't answering the question that they'd asked anyway.

Previously, so it's kind of, I think I covered most of the stuff. I think. And yeah, I think you can always ask me more questions and I can incorporate it into the next recording.

It won't be a q&a or just be, you know, they say, Oh, you can just post a comment that you want me to include, you can post a message, whatever, really. And I'm happy to include it in the recording or shout out Happy Birthday. I've done a few of those over the years.

I haven't done any recently. And so yeah, whatever. I'm here to serve to serve everyone.

Rice Krispies. So Vinnie is fast asleep now. So he seems quite happy.

Oh, this is, I didn't tell you this, the light outside is working again. I don't know how or why, but it looks like someone's come along from the council and fixed it. So the hallway light at the top of the stairs is now on in the evenings.

Hasn't been on for about three weeks. And now it's on. It's like, wow.

Just what I'd like, you know, it's a bit of good news. It's good news to celebrate. It's all celebrate.

So that's it for me. Thank you very much. And remember to be kind to yourself because you do deserve to be happy.

Remember to be gentle with yourself. Lots of love. Bye.