(no music) IPad Error | LMBYTS #1372 | 12th June 2025

Hello and welcome to jasonnewland.com. I'm practicing my German. I'm not sure how that's going. That's for Sebastian.

Sebastian. Sebastian did a lovely thing earlier today. He actually posted a picture of my Nan, but what she possibly would look like when she was younger, did the like on chat GPT.

I didn't know you could do on chat GPT. I know there are AI things you can do. I think ancestry.com does it as well.

But that was nice. I have seen some pictures of my Nan when she was younger, but only from my Nan. I mean, you might say, well, it's hardly likely to see it when you go shopping.

No, no, I don't mean that. Random strangers are walking up to me. Hey, you want to see a That's not happening.

I'm not saying that would happen. But every now and then I'd visit me Nan every now and then, but every now and then she'd get the the boxes of photographs and the photograph albums, Dan would have a little good look. And yeah, she had very curly hair, always.

Always had curly hair. She had a picture of her and all her brothers and sisters. It took up half the wall.

It was like 12 of them. Honestly. And I remember saying, one of the one of my, one of her sisters was like, and I'm just saying it's just like phenomenally phenomenal.

As in, if you did this, this sounds weird. But if you this, this is going to sound weird. If you if you was to if someone said, Oh, this person here was a supermodel in the 1930s, or the 1950s or 40s.

You wouldn't you wouldn't question it. You might say who I've not heard of her. What was her name? Did she do any bikini shoots? That's not why I would say because she's my, my, my great aunt.

Great. Okay, let's move on. But she was Wow.

I remember saying that to my nan. She said, well, bikini shoots has been inappropriate. I said, sorry, man.

And she said, besides, what am I corned beef? I said, What do you mean? She said, What am I corned beef? My sister's so so attractive. But what am I? I said, Well, you're not corned beef. Why did you think why did you come up corned beef? She said, I'm hungry.

I thought, Yeah, I am as well. That time went and got some sandwiches. I wasn't it.

So she would should go and get the sandwiches and I'd wait. Sometimes I'd have to sort of say to show hurry up. Can you hurry up? Hurry up woman.

Yeah, get the food ready. We should look quicker before she broke her hip. And none of that's true.

She did break her hip. None of that. Like if I said that to my nan hurry up.

Well, she'd probably laugh to be honest. But I would never be rude. This is started weird.

So we start again. Welcome to jasonnewland.com. My name is Jason Newland. Please only listen when you can safely close your eyes.

This is Let Me Bore You To Sleep. It is a very therapeutic recording for you to fall asleep to. And I will be as boring as I can.

Yes. The secret is I've never once been boring. But not to me.

Not to me. Just to everyone else. Vinnie's got a bone.

One of these little bones got some got a new pack came through you yesterday. I tell you what, there's been some troubles. I've had some troubles.

No, nothing serious, but very disheartening. Oh, man. Right.

It's Thursday, the 12th of June 2000. And I nearly said 2012. Wow, weird.

I was a counselor. I was a full time counselor. I was helping people full time in 2012.

Now is a interesting period. You know, I'd like to talk more about what happened during that time. It's just I don't want to, you know, talk about other people.

You know, obviously people have become as, as clients. So that's, that's not really on. But I learned a lot.

And there's some very interesting, interesting experiences. And I think the one thing becomes very evident. If you ever, you know, as a counselor, as a training to become a counselor and start to see humans is there's a lot of stuff going on out there.

And people are, people can be quite complicated. Maybe always, I don't know. But just there's, it's just like next time you have someone who's grumpy or doesn't open the door for you, or doesn't say thank you when you open the door for them, or perhaps doesn't even acknowledge you.

Or perhaps is a little bit rude, not horrible, but just a little bit like short or a little bit. I've always been a little bit short. Maybe there's a reason for that.

I kind of, I started to learn that a little bit. I learned it earlier in life, but I kind of learned it a bit more. Realizing people, it's got heavy quick, isn't it? People are walking around with stuff.

And that's why I mean, even though it's quite heavy, I found it's useful, useful in a sense of, I'm not always able to get myself in that zone. Sometimes I don't, but if I can, I try and put myself into the zone. If someone's being rude to me, that at the very least, they're just having a bad day.

We're all allowed to have bad days. It's fine. Or if what they've done is really upset me, or I've reacted, then I try and look at the most extreme situation in order to sort of negate that feeling.

So for example, I had someone in the petrol station during lockdown actually it was he he was pretty much semi shouting. I love that word semi. I don't know.

Maybe it's because I'm five years old. I don't know. But it was sort of it was two or three, like two people behind me.

So because we had everyone had to stand six foot away. Am I supposed to know what six foot is? Five foot eight. I don't know what six foot is.

I can't gauge that. I can gauge it if you're standing up or lying down, but I can't not not. Yeah, just it's hard.

Anyway, I, this bloke started like moaning. And I was at the counter giving my money. The cashier was new.

So I don't know if he was, it was kind of a little bit slow. But then she was new. So he was just learning the job.

And every jobs can be hard when you first start. And I didn't react great, if I'm honest. Verbally, I mean, but internally, didn't, didn't respond.

And when I got back, I started thinking, well, I don't know anything about this person, maybe. I mean, bearing in mind the situation at the time, maybe they just lost someone, maybe they just been to hospital, and seeing someone they care about, you know, just and yeah, that seemed to semi neutralize it. Not completely, I just lost Andre, so I was not in a great space either.

But, you know, it was, there's a lot of people not only get great space during that period, you know. But I found it was something that helped. You know, I know some people just do it in a more smaller, less dramatic way, kind of just having a bad day.

That's fine. Which is cool. I see if you can do that.

That's really good. I'm not always able to do that. What am I talking about, though? I know what I'm talking about.

Why? What's this got to do with goldfish? I don't know. So I got no idea. Anyway, I got annoyed.

But it wasn't about it wasn't about a person. Here's what happened. I made yesterday morning, right, probably 1011.

I made a whisper Wednesday recording. There was a little bit of chitter chatter outside, but not much. It's fairly quiet.

And yes, I did it did the recording is about an hour and 15 minutes. And I never, generally, when I make a recording, I don't upload it straight away. Sometimes I do, but you know, generally, after I've made a recording, that's when I go and do something different.

I mean, technically, uploading and editing and all that stuff that is different from making a recording. But I kind of like to do something that's got nothing to do with this whole thing. So maybe take the little rabbit out for a run, you know? It's not euphemism.

I'm talking about Vinnie. What would that be? What would that be euphemism for? I'm just taking a rabbit out for a run. I'll be back in five minutes.

What you've been doing in the bedroom all that time? What was all that noise? What's happened to that sock? I was just taking a rabbit out for a run. I don't know. So that's the answer.

You know, so what happened? How come? How come the washing machine keeps eating all the socks? If you noticed, it's often male socks that go missing. Yep, there's a reason because the washing machine does not like one of them socks. I don't know where I'm going with this.

This has gone weird. Right, so on to the subject. So I was feeling okay.

I've done the you know, I've done the recording. I might have gone back to bed for a little nap. Then I came back out and started, you know, I sent the recording to the iPad.

And then I opened up to start editing. And the iPod, the iPad was not working. The iPod, the iPad was not working.

First of all, the file, the file app was missing. I don't know what the heck happened there. So I had no way to access the files.

I found a way in the end, but it was like a real weird place. And secondly, the touchscreen was not working properly. So I touch on one part and a different part would highlight.

And I used to touch screen when I edit my recordings. Now I realized that, you know, in the past, I used to edit without touching the screen. But I've been doing this this way for years.

I'd find it very difficult to go back to not touching the screen and also to not using the software that I use. I just, I'm used to using it and it works. Because it's nothing fancy, I don't need to do anything fancy.

There's no, you know, I'm not adding sound effects or anything like that. It's just editing it, maybe increasing the volume a bit to make it sound louder, I guess. And then add in background music or add in the stock, you know, five hour, 10 hour things to the recording, recording, recording.

And I used to be as comedian on the circuit. And every time he did a gig, he's like, Good evening. Good evening.

Seriously. It's not it's just, he was a brilliant compere. But it was just it's weird.

This is one of those things, right? Seeing someone for the first time can be amazing. If you because I used to see the same person week in, week in, I saw him for like, over 10 years. But for a four year period, it was intense.

I see him nearly every week. And, you know, you get to know every single joke in their act. And it's weird how someone that's so good, it just gets boring.

It's like, Oh, I'm not them again. Yeah. Some of them were kind of on TV.

And, you know, it's just be the same, lots of same stuff. They're doing the same act. And that's why they were so good, because they were doing all the time and they were practicing and you know, they, you know, they had an act.

That's what it is. It's weird, though, because sometimes it's the comedians that look like they're adlibbing. Some of them are, but a lot of them aren't.

They're just pre programmed adlibs almost. And that's weird as well, because I saw someone is one of the comedians from the Mighty Boosh, Noel Fielding. And I saw his stand up act.

I've never watched the Mighty Boosh. And I've never, you know, I never really knew what Noel Fielding was like. And I saw some of his early stand ups from the 90s.

So funny. Absolutely funny. It's like he's just basically, it was very surreal.

He's just making it's like he's making up is going along. Then I see him do another gig on a different show. Same material.

It wasn't made up. So these adlibs weren't made up. It's like, oh, then I see him again.

He's doing this. It's like maybe new material, but he's adding other stuff. But it's still kind of certain things that I thought was almost like he was just I don't know, just talking and coming up with stuff.

It I'm sure he did like, I guess you can't rely on it if you're doing a TV show, can you? You can't if you see a live gig, you can play around more. But I guess if you've only got five minutes on a comedy show, you gotta give it your best stuff. And there's no room for error, I suppose.

I wouldn't know, personally. Although I did do once I did do once I did once do a TV talent show. But it was for live TV in 1995.

Near the end of the year. And the only audience was the other acts and the production crew, which was a few camera people. And, you know, people in in the in that little space that there was there.

I really enjoyed it. I did get some laughs. I didn't win anything.

I didn't win. I literally didn't win anything. I never won anything.

And I got through, I got through to the Hackney Empire shows. So I don't know if they still do it, but it used to be a Hackney New Act of the Year, which was held at the Hackney Empire. And the they did the first we had to go to the pub, which was next door.

And they did gigs there. And it was like a contest talent contest. And those who got through that part, were then allowed that went on to the Hackney Empire show.

And I don't know if it was I think, just bang the microphone. I think there was that was kind of the semifinals. I think I don't think it was just no, yeah, it wasn't just one show.

I think there might be four shows. I got through to the to the semifinals, which was pretty cool. I think.

Funny enough, I didn't win it. And the reason you know, I didn't win it all I can is because I didn't. People win that show often go on to be well known.

Go on to be writers have their own radio show TV show. But you know, so yeah. So many people I could name off the top of my head.

People that may you might not know if you're not from this country. But celebrities being in TV shows, sitcoms, you know, panel shows and stuff like that. So many, I'm just thinking of Adelo Hanlon, he won that.

And he become he was in Father Ted. Probably the next year. He was a weird one.

Not weird as weird. He was great. He was great.

He was great, great. But he came over from Ireland. And he literally, he went from he was successful instantly.

But instantly, I don't I'm not even sure if he ever had a bad gig. He came here and he won every single talent contest on the circuit because a few around the BBC newcomer best whatever different things like that. He won everything.

And he became a headliner almost instantly. Probably within a year of being maybe less time of being on maybe a year. But it's very, very, very quick.

Never met him. Never on the same show as him. Because he actually went from he joined, you know, he got into the circuit.

And it was on television really quickly. And after that, he was famous. So he wasn't doing the small gigs.

Wow. He was just barking then someone slammed the door downstairs. I got my neighbor a mug, a coffee mug with his football team on it.

I don't know why. I just don't know why I just I was thinking I thought about getting it a few months ago. And I went to Amazon two days ago.

So I needed to order some food for him and order some Oh, yeah, the bones. And that mug came up. Are you sure you don't want to buy this mug? Do you see you mug? And I thought, Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.

So I just got it for him. So I give it to him later. Oh, yeah, the iPad.

So the iPad was not working properly. And I did not know what to do. So I spent all afternoon, all evening with breaks, trying to figure out how to fix it.

And then starting to focus on what can I do instead? What alternatives can I use to edit my audios? That does not involve my iPad. Now, there's loads to choose from. That's not really the issue.

The issue for me is what one is going to be compatible for me. What's what's going to suit my way of doing it. And I started trying out a few different apps and not really loving them.

And then some of the stuff was expensive as well. So I didn't really fancy doing that one. And there's one I think is it Hindenburg? And they know it's the Hindenburg was one of the sort of Yeah, no, I did Hindenburg.

And I signed up for the free trial and the download didn't work. The thing just wouldn't work. It's like, what's the point in this? And I got another one and it was like 200 pound one off payment.

Like no, it's free. Once you pay the 200 pound. It's not everything's free then, isn't it? You know, Mercedes is free once you pay the 90 grand.

It's free now. There you go. Your mortgage your house is free once you pay the mortgage off.

So I didn't know what to do. And I was getting I was going on chat GPT asking for help. Now, probably the problem I had, I thought I didn't realize it was the screen.

I thought it was the app. So I was asking for help to fix the app. I was doing that I was uploading that I was deleting that I was reuploading it.

I was trying to change the settings of the iPad. And I just thought the app had just for some reason it broken and maybe the iPad just didn't want to work with it anymore or I'm not I'm not sure it just got confusing. And then I went to bed.

So I would have made another recording yesterday. In fact, I wanted to make another recording. But there was no point if I if I couldn't upload I can edit that one.

There was a point in getting enough, you know, making another one. And I wanted to upload it on Wednesday. I'm not I know I sometimes I do upload the day after, you know, maybe make a recording in the evening, and then I upload it the next morning.

I'll do that sometimes but yeah, bear in mind, I recorded it in the morning. Then I would normally have it uploaded by the early afternoon, or edited and uploaded. So what I ended up doing is I did edit.

I'm not sure I don't think I did. I think I might have uploaded it yesterday, just one recording, the first one without music. And I edited that in CapCut, which is a video editing software.

But it was harder to do because the screen I was doing on a laptop, and it wasn't just I couldn't. It's weird, but I can see the screen, I can see the screen on the laptop, but with the iPad, the whole screen is just the audio, you know, spiky stuff. So I can see where all the spikes are, and I can see where to edit and where to listen.

And because I know it so well, having looked at it and used it for years. I've used it. I don't know hundreds and hundreds of times.

Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of times. So I kind of know my way around it quite easily. So it took a while to get it done using CapCut, got it done.

And then this, now if it was last, no, I'm losing track about whether it was last night or this morning. But yesterday, I'd had enough. I thought, oh, so I went to bed about nine o'clock.

I just, yeah, I was annoyed of it. So I thought, no. Plus, I've been watching Mobland, a TV show on Paramount+.

I just finished watching it today. It was 10 episodes. It's not so much a binge, binge watched it, but I did watch it in three days.

I guess, is that binging? It's only three episodes a day. But yeah, it's, yeah, it was interesting. I think Pierce Brosnan got a lot of hassle for having an Irish accent in that show.

And I saw something, someone saying he's been disrespectful by putting on that accent. Pierce Brosnan's Irish. Do people not know that? Pierce Brosnan is not American.

I know he was famous for being in an American TV show and then being in James Bond. But he, he wasn't, he was never English. He was Irish.

Unless, yeah, he was, he was Irish or unless, you know, he had an Irish accent. He was born with an Irish accent. He wasn't born with an Irish accent, but he, he definitely was born in Ireland.

Or was it, or was it Scotland? Nah. Oh no, what am I talking about? We all know who the Scottish James Bond is, don't we? Roger Moore. Some people, I should know my Bond, shouldn't I? Let's face it.

I mean, I grew up watching every single James Bond movie all day and night. Breakfast, dinner, tea. Honestly, just James Bond this, James Bond that.

None of this is true. It's, I did watch a lot of it. I think the James Bond movies of the last, I don't know, probably 20, 30 years.

I don't think they've really had the societal impact that the original ones did, or the ones in even the 80s. It's almost like no one, I can't think of anyone other than James Bond himself that really became a huge star from being in those movies, in any of the James Bond movies of recent years. And if I was to tell you, for those that are not old enough to remember, and those that are old enough to remember will actually agree with me, Jaws, not the shark, Jaws, Richard Kyl, for some reason I'm remembering names today, Richard Kyl was an absolute superstar.

So famous. There was action figures made of him, and James Bond in him, and his gold teeth, and he was like an anti-hero. And he'd be fighting Roger Moore, Roger Moore was about 95 then, and they'd be fighting on a ski lift, and although we didn't want to see, you know, the pensioner James Bond get hurt, at the same time, we kind of, we loved Jaws as well, because he had a lovely smile, a big smile, very big smile, very gold and shiny.

Yeah, there was one scene where he, I think he ends up in the ocean, I think it might be the second movie, because he's in two movies, at least two movies as Jaws. I think other than Blofeld, is it Blofeld, the one with the, with the one eye and the cat? Or is it, I think that, you know, there was a couple of, a couple of baddies that are in more than one movie, the James Bond franchise.

But there was a scene where Jaws was in the ocean, and he gets attacked by a shark, and everyone felt sorry for the shark, like you're doing it to the wrong person.

This shark was like, with his mouth open, and Jaws turned around, you know, to Richard Kill, the baddie, James Bond baddie, turned around and smiled, and the shark, you could see the shark's face like, uh-oh, I only got messed up now. I don't know what that accent was. He gone messed up.

You all right Finn? Yeah, that's good, just ignore me then. My little fox. If you saw him at night, in a field, running around, you'd think he was a fox, seriously.

I mean, you'd think he's probably a baby fox, because foxes have got quite long legs, haven't they? You'd think he was a baby, a really, a well-fed baby fox. But he's got this, he's, I'm not saying he's got exactly the same colouring, because fox is probably quite a bit redder, but he's definitely got that kind of foxy, foxy look in the ears, one of his ears, his ears are pricked up.

So he's listening for something, aren't you Vinnie? Yeah? You gonna behave? Yeah, you are, your little tail, his tail's wiggling.

Oh, you're so cute. You're such a cutie. Yes, you are.

Yes, you are. Bless him. Okay, so I didn't know what to do.

So I ended up doing, I made an image for the, or did I? I don't know if I did. I don't know if I did it last night or not. But I ended up doing the one without music and uploading that.

I think I did that last night. I'm not 100% sure it might be this morning. And then I got up this morning and I looked, because I've been resetting this and stuff on the iPad, I realised I'd lost all the background music stuff that I had saved, that I used to edit recordings to put them all together.

And I thought, no, what have I done? So I managed to find them. They just weren't in the same place that they had been before. I managed to find them, uploaded them to Spreaker, or edited them to be smaller, uploaded them to Spreaker.

And I went on to my laptop, downloaded them from Spreaker, all the different, because there's about six different background things, and then put them onto the, yeah, put them onto the laptop, onto the, what's it? The screen background, what do they call it? Whatever it's called, into a file, desktop, that's it. And I started to, oh, I also cleaned the screen thoroughly, because I've got these spectacle and lens wipes.

So they're specifically for that thing, for cleaning glass, and I use them for my phone, I use it for my glasses, and mainly my glasses, although my glasses are scratched now.

They're just so old, they're kind of, they got to the point where they're running out, they're running out. The prescription has nearly run out for these glasses, I think. And I'll tell you what's bad, my neighbour this morning, I was just bringing Vinnie back home from our WALK, and we were talking about whether or not he wanted to, if he could park his car there, or when he had to wait to park the car there, because there's a parking zone, you know, where you can't park a car between a certain time.

What are you doing Vinnie? Oh, he's found a fly to try and catch. It's either moving very, very fast, or it's invisible, because I can't see it. You know, dogs can hear things that we can't hear.

Can they see things that we can't see? That's interesting, because they can smell things we can't smell, hear things we can't hear. Can they see things we can't see? That's an interesting question, isn't it? Ah, I wonder what the answer is. Oh, my neighbour said, oh, I don't know if it's safe to park here, when it when it's okay to park, because it's like a school zone kind of block.

And I said, there's a sign over there. And you could, you're not allowed to park between 8.30 and I think nine. He said, no, it says 9.30. I said, no, it says nine.

It says it says 9.30. So he's like 70. No, he's about 81. And his eyesight, he doesn't wear, he wears glasses, didn't have his glasses on.

So without his glasses, he can see that it was a three, not a zero. And I couldn't, I could, I suppose if I kind of move my head, I could see how it could be a three. Especially once he told me it was, you know, once someone tells you what it is, it's hard to not, you almost see a three whether it is or not, really.

And I just thought, that's not fair. What is he? Why is he got a better eyes than me? And I had a tantrum. I did.

I stormed up the steps, came in, slammed the door. And I just, yeah, I didn't do any of that stuff. I don't know why I'm saying that.

I didn't. So, oh, I'm looking at the iPad and I'm starting to think, what I'll do. So I, I transferred, I said all this stuff over.

So I had that on the desktop on my computer. And I was going to start putting stuff together on there using CapCut as the editor. Because you can edit video and audio on there.

And I thought, I went on to ChatGPT to ask a question. And I can't remember what the question was. But I'd asked him, yeah, like, no, I went back on to last night's questions to try and help me to fix the editing software that I had problems with.

Because that's what I thought it was. Because when I wasn't in that editing software, the screen seemed to be working okay. And it then dawned on me, maybe, just maybe, it's not the screen.

No, maybe, maybe it's not the, the might not be the app, maybe it's the screen, not the app. If it's a screen, that means there's something going on with the iPad. So it took me a whole day to come up with this.

So I think, oh, you know, I do come up with solutions eventually, but it's not always quick. So I asked ChatGPT, instead of saying, oh, the editing software is not working. Have you got a fix for that, which I've done yesterday.

This morning, I said, I wrote down the iPads not working, the screen is not working on the touchscreen is not working on the iPad. Please help me went through a few different things that I'd already done previously. So I'd already cleaned the screen.

I'd already Oh, yeah, I'd already turned it on and off, or off and on. So I've done that I've done that stuff, you know, the basic stuff. And then it said, well, reset all settings, reset, put it back to factory settings, almost or maybe not factory settings, but reset the whole thing.

So it's basically the the knob that you press, or the button that you press, when you want to transfer all your stuff onto your new iPad. But it gives you two options, you can transfer or reset. So I resetted it.

So the whole thing turned off, I had to press yes, yes, yes, yes, a few times, not quite sure I was agreeing to. And it took a while for it to to power down and do what it needs to do, didn't it? I didn't realize it was actually come back on again. Because because it come back on to its factory settings, almost the screen was going off after two minutes.

I had to go that put that back to being on all the time. I don't want to keep going off. And it worked fine.

The screen, everything worked fine. So then I go to use the editor, the editor again, to open it up. And the Yeah, I had to open the file because the file, the file app still not there.

I'm thinking what's going on here. I have to go into our GPT and ask how to get the file back the file app. So I just went into the editing app, import file.

And I was able to find the file from now I had to download it first from the speaker and then get it open that up. And then I saved it. But then the problem is, I had none of the background music or sounds on my iPad anymore.

Which was, or they weren't there, they were there, but they just weren't like, there, you know, I mean, on the actual app, because the app stores recordings, unless you delete them, it stores it on there. So what I had to do is go and start looking in for files on the iPad, ones without music, background music, no music, 10 hours, 10 hours, whatever, background music, whisper. And that took a while to get all that stuff up.

Then what I was having problems with was, because of last night, I ended up uploading two versions, two different editors, the same editor, but two twice. So they kept swapping over to each other and canceling each other out. So I had to figure a way to get rid of one of them, which I did.

And eventually, I was able to, for a lot of hassle, keep like importing stuff, it was, it was not easy, but I managed to do all, all five, well, six versions, including the one that's already done. So to get all versions done, took quite a while to get them done. And I got them uploaded.

It took till this afternoon to do it. It was gone. Yeah, I think it's gone, gone midday, one o'clock, something like that.

Two o'clock. And then I took him out to the park. Oh, yeah.

And I thought, Oh, I've done this. Good, brilliant. They'll stay on there now.

So tomorrow, the next recording I do to be back to how I was doing it before. Everything's kind of stored and it's easy to use. The good thing I've now got backup on my laptop.

So that's cool. So you know, the the background stuff, the 10 hour versions, whatever, that's that's all stored. So that's good.

But now I'm thinking, I can't find the files on my iPad. Just generally, it's just this silly. Because, you know, I should be able to just have, it's always just to be at the bottom of the screen files, click on it.

And it shows me, you know, I've got a choice of iPad, iCloud, or if I've got a backup drive or SD card attached, you know, so I can choose which one I want. Didn't have that facility, facility, not just facility, but facility. When I said that, it reminded me of 1994.

For some reason, just ran a corner from the swimming pool. And that weird connections. Maybe I said that word facility.

And it meant something at the time, I don't know. So this was in Stratford. Well, Forest Gate, actually, that's where the swimming pool was.

Forest Gate. It was more East Ham College area, was it? Was it? I think so. East Ham College.

So Forest Gate, up to the end, turn left, joins on to the Romford Road, which also leads, if you turn right, goes all the way up to Stratford. Also, if you get towards Stratford, turn left, leads you to Mile End. Or if you turn right, rather than Stratford, leads you up to Leighton and Leighton Stone.

And then you can turn left again, which leads you to East 17. Traffic left, Forest Gate, that leads to, yeah, that's, I think that's where the swimming pool is, unless it was right. I think it's left.

And then on the, that's on the left hand side, there's, it was East Ham College. So I went there a couple of times. Yes.

Also had my counselling there as well. I did a course, I kind of miss those days. It's a little bit weird, isn't it? In 1998, I think it was 98.

I went to the Job Centre, and they had courses that I could go to, you know, to learn new skills. And I decided to go on a computer course. And it was really, it was very basic, but it was very thorough at the same time.

And it was learning words. What do you call it? Typing. It was kind of a typing course, really, but on a computer.

So I suppose learning to use word, like word, would be kind of the word processing app, wouldn't it, whatever, on laptop, one computers rather, PCs, back in the 90s. So I went along to this thing for, I don't know, I didn't stick at it. But I did go along.

I did another one actually, when I first moved in here, went to a computer course. I wonder if there's anything like that I could do. Something a little bit different.

I don't know. It's just the going out, isn't it? I was, I was fine back then, though, like, I wasn't fine, but I mean, I could go out and do stuff. Oh, so thing is, when I moved here, I was literally living in town.

Before I moved here, the previous two addresses, I was a very short walk from the town centre. So I was used to going to the supermarket every day, pretty much to buy my daily food. And meeting up with friends at coffee places, or going for a walk in the park to feed the squirrels.

So I had a degree of activity, which I don't have anymore, which I think was useful. Because I know I'd go out. I don't know what time I'd go out, but maybe I'd go out, you know, 10, 11, 12, whatever.

And I'd come back home about three. So I'd go and feed the squirrels, maybe I'll get something to eat. Go feed the squirrels.

Go and maybe go and chat to some friends in the evolution shop, which was the Buddhist shop. And potter around, go home, make myself some tea cakes. I think in them days, I was having a tea cake and a toasted tea cake.

Maybe a cup of tea, but I think it was possibly a can of Coke. And I'd watch something on TV that like it'd be an old 70s sitcom would be on at that time, like Terry and June or George and Mildred. You know, so it's and I just love it.

It's just a little bit of a little bit of pleasure time, you know. It'd only be like for half an hour, maybe an hour. And that would kind of be the day done.

Kind of, especially in the winter, because it'd be dark by then. I do sort of sometimes wish that I held out and found somewhere a bit closer to town, just so I could. But I don't know.

I don't know. It doesn't matter, does it? What if ifs and bits and bots and whatever? Yeah, this is where I moved. And this is where I is where I am.

And if I hadn't moved here, I wouldn't have had Andre. And I wouldn't have had this little one here, Vinnie. So those are two things that wouldn't have happened in my life.

And yeah, I'm not. Yeah, it is what it is, isn't it? So but then yeah, I remember when I first moved in there, I think I'd been there for about four weeks. And I remember I was sitting over there at the table, which was in the corner at the time, near the window.

The phone rang. The other end of the voice, the other end of the voice, the other end of the phone said, Hello, Mr. Newland. I said, Hello.

I said, just check you if you're available to come and come and have a viewing of the flat. I said, I said, I'm already here. I live here.

I've been here for about three weeks, four weeks. And she said, No, the the one and it was a flat that was in the same town as where my where my nan lived. No.

Where my dad lived, my nan was gone by that point. Sorry. It was.

But that's where my nan used to live. But as it was a town where my dad lives. And I kind of put that down as one of my areas on the housing list.

Because I thought maybe it would be good to be closer to the family, you know. And I'd had a phone call from them. Probably eight weeks earlier, seven weeks earlier, telling me that I was at the top of the list for a flat in that town.

But then I didn't hear anything from them. At all. And then I got another phone call saying, we've got you, we've got you a view in at this place.

So I just figured that the other one had gone. You know, I didn't realize I figured I was dealing with the same department, same people, even the same person, I don't know. And the place was gone.

So I just thought, okay, fair enough. And I knew that I couldn't, I wasn't in a position to turn down a property. Really.

I was very lucky to be at the top of the list. And they had a I don't know if they had a rule at the time. I think it was you're allowed to turn down two properties.

But not the third one. I think I think that was a rule back then. I might be wrong.

I've no idea what the rule is now. And so I jumped I mean, I just couldn't believe that I was I was literally being offered a flat, you know, it's yours. They said to me, you just got to come and look at it.

If you want it, it's yours. You got first refusal. Now, there were other people.

And there was like two other people that were waiting to see this flat that had appointments after me. Now, I was never in that position. I was there.

I never went to look at a property that I wasn't first in line for. And this is the only property I ever looked at. And I'm, I'm kind of, it's not that I'm glad I only got to look at one property.

But I just would have been I wouldn't have enjoyed that process of it's almost like going for a job interview, isn't it? It's like, right, I'm looking at this property, but I might not have it. And there's two more people ahead of me. I know, I just didn't fancy that.

Although I did say other people had turned it down. That's why it was still available. And I kind of find out I found out why when I when I moved in, why it was, I think people do they did a little bit of research, maybe more than I did.

I'd never even heard of the place before. So I was just super excited. The last time I was excited, I think I was excited at just the whole life transforming possibilities of for the first time, having my own home.

And I know I don't own it. Obviously, I don't own the place. But it is my home.

And the only way I can lose this home is by doing something ridiculously, really ridiculous. Yeah, not pay the rent for a long period of time, or not pay the council tax or, you know, I don't know. I don't I don't know what but it's it's pretty much the lady said to me, it's a home for life if you want it to be.

And I've actually been here longer than any other property ever in my life. Never lived anywhere for 10 years before, ever. Which, you know, if an eight year old said that to you, you wouldn't be surprised, would you? But 54 first place I've lived 10 years at.

So yeah, it's, it's weird. And I think Vinnie, I don't know if he likes living in now. I don't know.

I've had him for two years and two and a half years now. Does he like it? How would I know? I mean, he's cuddled up to my legs. I'm basically on the recliner.

And so I've got my my my legs up and he's lying to the left of me. And I'm just stroking him. And he seems very relaxed.

I think he's relatively happy. It's just I think it's just a bit boring for him. There's this very little stimulation.

Yeah, there's no other dogs for him to play with. There's no kids for him to play with. That he would have if he was in a family.

He'd love that if he was in a like a big family with adults and kids and maybe another dog, big garden, he'd love all that stuff. It's it just be I think you'd just be happy all the time. I just don't know.

I don't know. I can't figure him out. Because there's not one.

There's not one ounce of him not one part of his brain wants to please me. He doesn't he doesn't want to. He's not interested at all in doing what I want him to do.

Not one particle. It's all about he wants to do what he wants to do. And that's it.

And I kind of quite like that in a way. He just reminds me of Andre because Andre was the same. I was gonna say Andre was more affectionate.

Not the beginning. He wasn't blimey. But, but then I mean, Vinnie's line here right next to me, cut it up to me.

So that's kind of affection, isn't it? Possibly. I mean, if he didn't, if he didn't like me wouldn't be doing that. I just don't know if he likes me.

I don't know. It's a weird thing. It's just strange to think that he's lived there for two and a half years.

It just seems strange. With two and a half years, I fell down the stairs and fractured my spine, my spine, my back rather two and a half years ago. That's ages ago.

I remember the day I opened the door, the front door. You might think, well, you open the door every day, don't you? I said, yeah, but let me finish the story. I remember the first day that I opened the front door.

My friend from downstairs was standing there. His Logie was standing there as well. And this tiny little red thing just ran through my legs.

And my friend was laughing, really laughing loudly. I thought, what the hell was that? I actually for a second, I thought he'd got another ferret. Because it moved so quick and it was really little.

I mean, it wasn't much smaller than he is now at the time. He was 10 months old. So I guess it was still kind of a puppy, but it was still, he's filled out a bit since then.

And to give you an example, the railings in the school, there's a school nearby, he used to be able to get through those railings and run around the football pitch. Or I did actually, he, he did that in the past with the neighbor that had him before. He actually went into the school and ran around inside the school.

The kids loved it. The teachers weren't so happy. And when I first got him, I think I had him off the lead.

So I thought I could trust him. I was wrong. I was chucking the ball.

And the ball went over the fence of the school. And I'm thinking, Oh, that's it. I mean, technically.

I think that I'm not sure if this it might be a Saturday, there might be an open, I don't know. But either way, I can't climb over that fence. It's just I'm not.

It's not that I'm not from an illegal perspective. Because if it was a Saturday, I wouldn't do it if the school was open. If it was a Saturday, I could just zip over and get back and zip over back again.

But my body's not. My body doesn't go along with that stuff like that. My body's banned me from jumping over fences.

Ever since, I think it was about 2009. The last time I tried that I got stuck. I did actually get stuck in on a fence.

A couple of times in the past. And there was one time it was weird. 1994 was with Andre.

We went for a walk. And I wasn't living there at the time. But it's before I moved into that house, where my other friend and his girlfriend was there.

And we were all watching meet the feebles. And just having a really good time. It was really nice.

Probably one of my probably one of my most enjoyable evenings of the 90s with friends. Because I like both of those people, both of the blokes that is. So Andre, his girlfriend and his girlfriend's boyfriend.

Who was also best friends with Andre. And I ended up being really, really close friends with him as well. So I ended up living with him twice.

Twice, once, twice, twice. So it was such a good environment. And it was really funny.

The neighbors kept complaining. But there's someone else there as well. Yeah, there's someone else there, who we worked with.

And we were watching meet the feebles. And it was just, I've never seen it before. And in that circumstances, it was even funnier than perhaps it would have been.

The neighbors kept, kept knocking on the door complaining. And I'm not, I'm not a big fan of being noisy. Really, and I really, I'm, I pretty much do anything to avoid disturbing the neighbors.

Unless I'm on the toilet, then nothing I can do about it. And I see echo, it's hard to hide the echo, isn't it? I had a girlfriend once, we was in a hotel room. And she went in and she put the, she put the tap on.

Because she didn't want me to hear what she was doing. And she left and I went in there, I said, you know, you turn that tap on to cover up the, you know, she said, yeah, yes, it covers up the sounds. Yeah.

Didn't cover up the smell though. That seemed to ruin the romance though for that night. Yeah, I should have kept my mouth shut.

So what was I saying? Oh, yeah, they kept complaining. But the more they complained, the funnier it got. Honestly, I'm not like that now.

And I wasn't like that then either. It just, I suppose I got caught up in the moment, because I wasn't used to being around other young people of my own age doing what perhaps I should have been doing, which was enjoying myself. Not disturbing anyone, but just, I don't know how to explain it.

But I'd never done that before. I'd never done it before. Yeah, before 1994.

So let's go 96, 86. So 1994 was the first time I actually sat in a in a house with friends laughing. I'd never done that up to that point.

And just having fun, just being a young person. Yeah, so it was quite a special occasion. I didn't tell them that.

What was weird is Andre and another friend, different person, because I never had anything to do with anyone I worked with outside of work. That was my rule. I don't want nothing to do with you.

No, it's just it's all joy. Sometimes I'd go to the pub, I would. Or, you know, something like that.

But it wouldn't, I wouldn't, or I'd maybe meet them in the pub, but I would never generally get involved in their life. And then one day I'm walking home from work, this is probably 94. And 84, 94, 94.

And I'm only in for probably about a minute, talking to my landlady. I've lived there since 91. And the doorbell went.

And I said, Oh, I'll get that because she was, she had she was disabled. So I'd always get the door for if if if she could see me. You know, if she couldn't see me and I'd hide.

But because I don't like to help people. I did. So I let her, I said, Oh, I walked towards the door and all I hear is giggling.

So I look for the peephole. There's Andre, not my ferret, the other, the original Andre and the other fella. They'd followed me from home from from home.

I nearly said from school. They followed me from work, followed me all the way. I'm not sure it's 94 is one one year anyway.

And they'd followed me. So when I find out where I lived. And I just felt infringe upon, I felt almost not soiled, but just it just felt I just didn't like it.

The idea of someone knowing where I live. I wasn't wasn't best pleased with that. But yeah, so but I guess that was good because it ended up with me ended up with me being a little bit more open.

And spending a bit more having having more of a little bit more of a social life. Because up to that point, my social life involved going to comedy clubs or wandering around. Well, actually isn't a social life if you're on your own, is it? So I used to like to go up to the West End on my own.

One of my favourite things and often it would be after going to a comedy club, I go to Leicester Square, is it Leicester Square? Yeah, Leicester Square. Not Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square. And well, you got Covent Garden in Leicester Square, it's all seems to be within touch and distance.

I think I might have that wrong. But I used to go to Leicester Square, and it was amazing. I loved it.

Now everything was open, you'd be there at two in the morning, and it it looked like it could be two in the afternoon. You know, so light, all lights on, everyone around talking, eating, you know, chatting, there'd be people talking, like having discussions about stuff. Kind of like Speaker's Corner, but in Trafalgar Square, but in Leicester Square.

So I think Speaker's Corner is in Hyde Park. There'd be people discussing religion and discussing philosophy and I just found it interesting. And for whatever reason, it felt like the safest place ever.

Maybe it's because it's so well lit, maybe because there were so many people there. I think it gets to a point when there's so many people, it almost just feels safe. So it's a weird, maybe it's just the way I was at the time.

But it's when there's so many, it's a little bit like I used to live in Upton Park, which is, they used to be West End football ground in that same road that I lived in. So I'd walk up one part of the hill towards Upton Park train station. And if I caught it wrong, if I caught the wrong time, I would see thousands and thousands, maybe 10,000 or more people walking towards me, going to get onto the trains, to go back to where they came from, you know, wherever, whatever part of London or wherever they travel from.

And it was weird, if there'd been a couple of hundred people, it probably would have been more, almost more threatening. If there'd be like 40 or 50 people all standing together walking, because there was thousands and thousands. The only thing I was concerned about was getting squashed.

Like on the train, I mean, to try and get on the train before they got to the train station, so I could just, I'd go anywhere just to get away. Because it was never good. It was just, I mean, generally, it was just people singing.

But it was so many of them. So there was no way of really getting, it's quite hard to get a seat and not be squashed, you know. Oh, those were the days.

Irony, the irony of it is they didn't seem good at the time. I look back now and I think, oh, maybe they weren't too bad, I don't know. The one good thing about living in Upton Park was everything was there.

Supermarkets, there was a pub opposite the road, opposite where we lived, there was takeaways galore, anything you wanted. Chinese takeaway, Indian takeaway, pizzas, kebabs, chip shops. And literally turn right up the road, there was a Sainsbury's, there was an Iceland, everything.

There was a chemist, great little road and there was a market just up the road where the, like a big old market area which sold all this stuff that I didn't buy. It was just, yeah, it was a very interesting place to live. I didn't live there for a long time.

But yeah, I did live there for a little while. You know what, it might have been nearly a year, actually. No, would it be? Maybe nearly a year.

Yeah. Wow. Because I think I moved out, maybe, yeah, maybe a year.

That's, that's wow, I didn't realize that. I'm pretty sure I moved in about the summer, or the end of the summer, or the summer, maybe, to 1996 and I moved out again in the summer 1997. I don't know how I got onto that after talking about the iPad, but the iPad sorted.

Oh yeah, the flat. There isn't really a subject for this recording, I've got no idea. I'll probably just say something about the iPad.

I wonder if my toes need cutting? Why is it my toenails don't grow as quickly as my fingernails? So I had to cut my fingernails today, and I honestly, I think I only cut them a week ago, or a couple, a few days ago. I might be wrong. My finger, my toenails, I think that was about January.

But that doesn't sound right, because they're not long at all, they're just, they're not, they're still short. So maybe I've cut them. Oh, don't tell me I, I sleep toenail cut.

That'd be weird, wouldn't it? Cut my toenails in my sleep. No, maybe I have cut them. They're too short.

It's like they're not long at all. They're literally, some would argue, well, maybe not many people, but perfect length. They're not talons, they're not like massive, they're literally very, very, very tidy toenails.

I must have cut them, I just don't remember doing it. But to be fair, why would I want to remember that? It's not the most useful memory to keep, is it really? But on that note, I'm not gonna go, I'm not gonna go. So thank you for listening.

Remember to be kind to yourself, because you do deserve to be happy. Be gentle with yourself, because you do deserve to feel safe. Lots of love.

Bye. Transcribed by https://otter.ai