(music) #1433 Let me bore you to sleep Trivia Tuesday Jason Newland 16th September 2025

Hello and welcome to Let Me Bore You To Sleep. My name is Jason Newland and this is Trivia Tuesday. Now to be honest, I don't like being honest as you know, but to be honest I'm doing this on Wednesday because yesterday I couldn't be bothered and I couldn't do it.

I just, I was busy. Not busy, but a neighbour knocked and had a chat and time went by and before I knew it, it was time to go buh-byes. So I didn't do it and the weather's changed.

Not that that should really be a reason but it's 9.22 in the morning and really I need the light on. It's like early evening here, light-wise, inside that is. Now if I was going to read a book, I would need the light on or a paper or something, you know, something like that.

Luckily with computers, you know, there's a light on in the behind the screen, isn't there? So I ain't got to worry about that but if I was sitting here writing stuff down, I would need to have the light on at 9.23 in the morning. It's kind of weird honestly and I haven't even got the curtains drawn. So the curtains are open, the windows are open because it's, it was cold.

I put the heating on and now it's too hot so I had to open the windows. Weird time. It's, I mean, it's only, what is it? The 17th of September, 2025.

That's kind of, I think that's the thing about this time of year, not this time of year but like between now and March, October, November, December, January, February. It's only six months. And between, you get a lot of these days and, you know, during any, in England or where I live anyway, this is kind of standard sort of lighting during the day for a good couple of months like December, January, maybe part of November.

I don't remember it normally being quite like this in September. It's just really, I can't, can't really show you because if I took a picture, it doesn't give you a gauge really. I mean it's never like super bright inside here anyway because there is a tree that's blocking a fair bit of like sunlight when the sun's out.

Yeah, it's a little bit dull. Please only listen when you can safely close your eyes. My website is letmeboreyoutosleep.com. What else can I tell you? Not really much.

I just, yeah, everything's okay. I slept last night and then I got up. I dreamt, Vinnie is now in my dreams with me, which I don't know if that's normal or weird.

I don't know. But yeah, he's in my dreams. So he accompanies me wherever I go, just like in real life.

By the way, I've got Q&A Friday coming up this week, which is in two days. It's Wednesday today. So I have posted on my Facebook group, which is Jason Newland's Boring Group, but I haven't had any questions yet.

Had two people like it, the post I put, but no questions. So please go to the page, Jason Newland's Boring Group on Facebook and ask me some questions if you'd like to. And I should also say welcome to the newest members of the group, which would be Andy, Sue, Brooke, Janice, Patrick, Camilla, Milenis, Marina, Mary, Forge, Vivek, Fari, Bada, and Peter.

So yeah, and Andy. So this like the last few that have joined. So thank you for being part of this Shopah Grove group.

The link is on my website if you want to find it, if you can't find it, that is. I think it should be quite easy to find. So here we go.

So this is time for Trivia Tuesday. I need to figure out a... For some reason, I'm very focused on light today. So what are the shortest days, longest days? Or should I do weather? Because really weird, because I just like what's the shortest days of the year? There's one short day.

Then there's one longest day, longest days in the summer, shortest days in, I suppose, probably probably December or beginning of January. Let's just check this. I can just go through countries for the shortest and longest days.

Please give me shortest, shortest. If I could spell and longest days, days of the year by country. Got it.

The shortest and longest days of the year depended on latitude, not the country itself. No, by country. Oh, it is.

Oh, okay. So it has example by country, list all countries. The thing is, it's probably going to be a lot of them.

That's a huge list, almost 200 countries, but I can absolutely create it for you before I dive in. I want to check list all countries. Yes, I just asked you just just do it, man.

I'm a proper taskmaster, mask tasker. Right, I'll start off with the general rules. It says equator, equator, zero latitude, equator, sorry.

Day length barely changes after 12 hours of daylight all year. 12 hours of daylight all year in the equator. So it's like 12 hours daylight, 12 hours night.

And the kind of stays the same length. I am kind of adlibbing, but fair enough. Tropics.

Up to I don't know what that means. Variation is small. The longest 13 hours shortest is 11 hours.

So it's not a lot of difference, is there? Mid latitudes, which would be UK, USA, Europe, China. Bigger swings, so longest days 16 to 17 hours, shortest days 7 to 8 hours. Arctic, Antarctic Circle.

At least one day with 24 hour daylight. Midnight Sunday. OK, specific and one with 24 hour darkness.

Polar night. Does that mean continuous? So 24 hours of light, 24 hours of darkness, 24 hours of light, 24 hours of darkness. See, if that's the case, that must have been really weird for people that were traveling up there to kind of try and climb a mountain or something.

And thinking, wow. Time just slows down when we're here. This is brilliant.

It seems to have been light for ages. The days we've got so much done. And then I go to sleep and think, God, it's light again.

I feel so refreshed. I feel like I've been asleep forever. So poles, one continuous six month day.

And one continuous six month night each year. Yeah, I've heard about that. That's got to be very, very strange.

So that's a North and South Pole or North-South Pole, is it? One continuous six month day, one continuous six month night. I'd like to visit that just to see what that's like. It's got to be weird because... So that means the moon never comes out.

Where does the moon go? Where does the sun go? After the six months, the sun just goes on holiday. I mean, what? It wouldn't go somewhere hot, would it? I mean, the moon, what happens to the moon? So can you literally, during the night, where does the sun go for six months? That's strange, isn't it? Unless it's literally because of the mountains are so... Maybe it's because the mountains are so big that the sun can't penetrate them.

That's a problem.

The sun's been trying to penetrate the mountains for years, but it can't. So it just doesn't get on. Examples by country.

So let's have a look. Here's a complete. That's what I'm using, ChatGPT, right? There's a huge list, almost 200 countries, but I can actually, absolutely create it for you.

List all countries alphabetically with their shortest and longest day lengths. It's not giving it to me. It's just given me loads and loads of countries.

Yes, I'm going to see if they can do that. Yes, please. Because it's offered me, maybe to tell me ones that can give me the shortest and longest days.

But before that, it has given me a list of some. And so Ecuador. Longest day, 12 hours, seven minutes.

So that's Ecuador, Kenya, near Ecuador, Equator. Now, Ecuador. Yeah.

Near Equator. Kenya. Kenya's near the Equator.

Okay. Didn't know that. Longest day.

12 hours, seven minutes. Shortest day, 11 hours, 53 minutes. So they have long days.

It's basically like pretty much 12, 12, isn't it? 12 hours of dark, 12 hours of sun. Kind of all year round with a few minutes in between. Literally, I mean, that's seven minutes either way.

So, wow. It is 14 minutes. So there can be 14 minutes difference in the entire year between the longest day and the shortest day.

That's absolutely crazy. And then you got UK, London. So I was going to give me the actual date.

That's nice. Around June 21st, London, the longest day is 16 hours, 40 minutes. The shortest day around the 21st of December.

I thought it was around December time, seven hours, 50 minutes. The good thing about the shortest day is knowing that every single day afterwards, the day is going to get longer. And I don't know, just there's something quite nice about that.

I mean, it takes a while. It does. But, you know, there was a time when I'd be up till four in the morning, sometimes eight in the morning.

I'd be awake all night for years and years and years. And what I noticed in the summer, like, well, in the spring, rather really, so once you get to March, April, kind of those kind of months, it's light so early in the morning and it really gets early quick. It's like the time seems to just, I don't know, it's quite nice.

And the birds are up and singing and, you know, you can look out, see them having a shower, brushing their teeth, you know, tucking into their cornflakes. They're all really getting ready. Okay, they're worm flakes.

New York, longest day is 15 hours. Shortest day is nine hours. So, so far, UK has got the shortest day out of anyone.

Also, the longest day. Oh, no. Yeah, just by 10 minutes.

Australia. Longest day, December 21st. It's the summer solstice.

14 hours, 20 minutes. So it's not as long as we have. Well, so we're doing all right, aren't we really? Shortest days, June 21st, nine hours, 50 minutes.

So it's literally the exact opposite of us in the UK, in Australia. It's like the mirror image. 16 hours, well, the opposite image rather.

That's not really a mirror image, is it? But then if you look at a mirror, it's back to front, isn't it? We people use the word in the mirage, in the mirage, mirror image in the wrong way, don't they really? I think because when I say it's like a mirror image, looking at someone's like a mirror image, which technically, if someone looks right like you, and you're facing them, and if they were your doppelganger or whatever, or your twin, then that would be like looking in the mirror.

And that'd be in a mirage. Can't say that my words are all back to front these days.

So in a mirage, and but at the same time, it's also back to front, isn't it? So it's not really a mirror image. Wonder where image came from? Why? You think words, sentences would be quite easy for me, wouldn't you really? Considering the amount of talking I've done over the years. That's got to be weird.

How do people in Australia get used to it being warm in the winter? How do you get used to that? Can you imagine like it's warm in the winter. But you know what Australia do? They do it wrong. They they do it back to front.

They say, oh, the summertime is their winter. No, it's still summer. It's just you're getting bad weather.

December, November, December, January, February, whatever, or January, that's winter still. Just because you're getting nice weather, it's still winter. Don't call it summer.

You got it wrong. Canada, longest day, 16 hours, 30 minutes, shortest day, seven hours, 30 minutes. So we're still ahead.

Looks like we're still ahead. UK still ahead for the longest day. We so far have all these countries.

Nope. Just got to Iceland. Iceland.

Wow. Longest day, 21 hours. Daylight.

Shortest day, three to four hours daylight. But then if you look at the UK, where are we? Okay. Seven hours, 50 minutes, eight.

So it's double, but okay. Fair enough. We don't have the shortest day, but Iceland do three to four hours.

So literally what time does it get light in Iceland? That's got to be really weird. Just to think that you've got to get, you pretty much got to get everything done. So if you live in Iceland, maybe let us know.

Do you, I mean, do the shops open outside of those four hours or does everything open and close? Because there's a lot of polar bears and stuff around, isn't there? In Iceland. I don't know. I might be, was that Denmark or was that Greenland or I'm sure there's polar bears somewhere walking around.

I don't mean like walking around doing their shopping, but walking around not like fully clothed and gossiping about each other, but you know, there's polar bears, but then 21 hours daylight sometimes. So how does that regulate mood? And how does that, how does that affect sleep? Because I'm just going back to where is it? Ecuador, not Ecuador. The poles.

So the North Pole, South Pole, one continuous six month day and one continuous six month night. So how does that affect people's sleeping habits? I mean, technically, I suppose if you're born there, you're acclimatized and you don't know any different. And, but I don't know, because I thought that the moon, the lunar kind of sequence and stuff had an effect.

And that's as much as I know. I suppose you've just got to get thick curtains, haven't you? Although I can sleep in daylight. I never used to be able to, but I can now.

I can just go to bed in the middle of summer. You know, 11 o'clock in the morning or two in the afternoon and I can, I can go to sleep. Just not like full eight hours sleep, but have a nap and fall asleep.

Fine. As long as Vinnie don't bark, nothing else really bothers me. And I can have the curtains open, windows open.

It's fine. I don't need it to be dark anymore. But there was a time back in 1991.

No, 1990. I had this part time, no, I had a full time job, two jobs actually, but I moved away from London in, I think it was March, 1990. Might be in February.

It was around that time. And then I got a job. I was, I was going back to doing, by the way, unless you, in case you're wondering what the sound is in the background, it's Vinnie chewing on one of these bony things.

Okay. So I, I still remember that conversation. It's weird because where I was living, there was a phone at the bottom of the stairs, I think, and it was a pay phone.

So I phoned up my, actually, I don't know if I phoned them up or they phoned me up, but it was basically to let me know that there was a job if I wanted it. I might have just phoned them up just to see how they are. And this person I used to work with, they said, Oh, there's a job.

Jeff has taken on people again to do canvassing. And he was the bot, he's no longer with us, but he was sort of in charge of the canvassing for double glazing. Because that's what I was doing in 89, 1989, and then lost that job because the company, the main company we were working for decided to invest their money in advertising on radio instead of canvassing.

But then, and that was kind of late summer, end of the summer sort of autumn time in 1989. And then 1990, the same man had found another company to work for, or maybe more than one actually. And we went out between, I think about four o'clock in the afternoon till about eight.

So it's four hours work. And I think it was like 120 pound a week. So which is pretty good back then.

So I was told there's a job if you want it. So I called up Jeff, and he said, Yeah, if you can get back here, we can start Monday. And so I phoned my dad up and told him and my dad said, Well, you can move in here for a little while.

You can stay here for a little while. So I did. I packed my bags, didn't have much stuff.

Literally just probably a couple of black bags of stuff, bin bags of stuff, and then got on the train came back, or went back to my dad's. And I started working at this, doing the canvassing. And then I started thinking, it's not really I mean, it was more than what I was earning before I was earning less than 100 pound a week before during that period.

But 120 pounds still wasn't like lots of money. But it was still, you know, 20 quid more than what I was getting. But I wanted to, I was looking maybe a job like a proper job.

And I applied to go and work at this meter factory that I'd already I'd already worked at twice before. So I knew people that worked there, I knew some supervisors. And I kind of, I didn't worm my way back, but I managed to get a job interview and they took me on.

But this time it was night shift, which is what I wanted. Because then I could continue to work do the canvassing job. Not really thinking too much about how much work that would be.

That's a heck of a nice, it's a long day. So I was starting work at 10 in the evening. And then I was finishing at six in the morning.

And then I was, yeah, then I did, I'd go to bed, be in bed by seven. And I'd be up by two. And I start work at four, finish at eight.

I'd normally get dropped off at home, so I wouldn't have to travel. And then I'd get ready, maybe have something to eat and then just head off to work. So that's what my my week was like for, I don't know, a couple of months.

Until I just, it was too much. It was, it was. It's a shame because I think I was doing Saturday mornings as well in the canvassing.

A lot extra overtime and when they needed me. So it was, it was a little bit too much. In retrospect, I kind of wish I'd just stuck at it and saved some money, which I didn't.

Because as soon as I started earning some money, I decided that I wanted to move back to London and do stand up comedy. And instead of saving money, which is what I would need to do that. I, every time I got paid, I would go to London and I would buy comedy albums and comedy videos.

And I suppose in a way, trying to learn the craft without doing it, you know, maybe if I could learn something from watching the greats performing. And I didn't learn nothing. But that kind of became my hobby.

So I didn't save a penny. However, I think it was December time. I did sell my entire collection of comedy stuff for about £250.

And I had loads of albums, tapes, videotapes, lots of stuff. So I sold it all for £250. And that did help me to move back to London.

So it kind of worked, but it didn't. I mean, there was probably thousands of pounds worth of stuff there. But never mind.

And I sort of, the bloke who bought the stuff was a, he did stand up comedy, but as a, like for charity. So he was a policeman, but at the charity gig, he did charity gigs where he did stand up. And he just wanted the albums just to get new jokes for his stand up show.

So yeah, it all worked out. I think he was a friend of my dad, actually. Unless my dad just gave him money.

So just, I don't care how much it costs. Just pay him what he wants, so that he'll move away. That might be, like, if you want him to move to London, just come on.

The whole of the town got together and put a pound in each. There's more than 250 people living in that town. But you know, you get the idea.

Everyone wanted me out of there. They are. But then I remember I'm staying at my dad's.

This was quite good. Like, this was the best time that we kind of lived together. Because during a week, he was at home.

During a week, I was at work, like nearly all the time. Every night. So literally, he'd get home, he'd go to work.

We sometimes cross swords, cross swords. Sometimes I'd see him in the morning, I'd be having my breakfast when he was getting up. And then I'll be going to bed.

So sometimes I see him before he went to work. And I'd be gone before he got home. I might see him briefly for a few minutes at eight o'clock when I got back.

But you know, that was kind of sometimes. And then he spent most of his weekends at his girlfriend's, who ended up being his wife. So it was quite a good situation.

We didn't really sort of annoy each other too much. Yeah, so that was quite cool. So it was nice, especially at the weekend, I kind of had the house to myself.

Not that I needed the whole house, but it was just nice to have the TV in the living room and instead of my black and white TV upstairs, which I could have got myself a colour TV. I didn't, but I could have done. Unless I did.

Maybe I did have a colour TV. Because I'm thinking, you know, if I had, because I've got this, yeah, this is a thing. When I lived in 1989, I lived in a house, like in a room in a house.

And I watched Eddie Murphy's Delirious on videotape, which meant I must have had a video recorder. There's no way I would have a video recorder with a black and white TV. That doesn't make sense.

So I must have had a TV, unless there was just one in the room that I was renting as possible. It is possible, but I rented that Delirious out from the video shop or borrowed it off someone. I can't really remember.

It's a long time ago now, I suppose. I do remember the turning up for the job interview and if nothing else, I was kind of having to explain why I had worked there twice already in the meter, the meter factory, not meat, but meter, like electric meters, factory, and why I had left twice without even telling them. I just, I had a habit of not telling people when I left.

And because I've had like 50 odd jobs or something, so I think I had one, I had three jobs in one week once. I think this is like 1988. So what I did is I told the lady who was interviewing me the story of me going to Spain for the afternoon.

And she found it so hilarious that she just gave me the job. I don't think she felt sorry for me, but I just, you know, did the facts. I got ripped off by a taxi driver and I was left with no money and I just couldn't, just had to come back, had no choice.

And she, I don't know, however, whatever it was, the way I told her the story, she found it very funny. I don't quite know what I said, but she found it humorous. And if I remember, she was almost crying.

I don't know if it's because she was crying from boredom or, I mean, she was sitting there, maybe she had piles, I don't know, but she just, it could have been hemorrhoid induced tears, but she, yeah, she gave me the job and I started working. I had to be trained. So I think I had a week of days, so I wasn't able to do the canvassing.

Or was I? I worked nine till five. Maybe I was able to, maybe they, I don't know. I think I had to have a week off.

But a problem I had at that time was, I'd be going to sleep at seven in the morning and, because I'd get home probably, I'd probably get home about half six, have something to eat and then go to bed. So maybe it was half past seven, just trying to think, would I normally go to bed after eating? Who knows? But I really, I struggled a little bit because of the light coming in.

And I think my dad put some extra thick curtains up and he, he, he made it, he put these curtains up, but it was like, he made it from a big sign.

So he put, he pushed them over, so I had to put them over the thing, but it was this big, like, like fabricated sign, like stitched to it as well. So when the curtains are open or closed rather, and it was covering the whole window, it was completely black. What you could see, a luminous is, please leave.

So I'm not quite sure what that was about. Please move out. And I got used to it after a while.

The hardest bit was the weekends really, because I'd be finishing at six on a Friday and I wouldn't be going back to 10 on a Monday, an evening on a Monday. So you could say technically I had three days off every week. I didn't, but I kind of did.

I had all day Friday, all day Saturday. No. Monday, night, Tuesday, night, Wednesday night, Thursday night, Friday night to Saturday, Sunday.

We'll talk about two days. Why was it saying three days? Oh no, three days, because then you got the whole of Monday. So yeah, technically three days off, but it's not, you know, it's three whole days.

But it's, you know, I kind of wasn't sure what to do. I mean, when I first started, I thought, no, I'll just go to bed. Go to bed like normal, wake up at two or three in the afternoon.

And then go back to bed, maybe try and just have the normal sleep pattern and wake pattern as I normally do, you know, like night shift. But that was a little bit hard because, you know, back then there was no night television really to speak of. There was a few bits and bobs on at night, but there wasn't a lot going on.

There wasn't really anything to do or anywhere to go. Unlike when I moved to London, there was always stuff to do, you know, providing I could afford to get there and afford a bottle of Coke or whatever while I was there and entrance fee, I could just, there's always be somewhere like in the West End or somewhere like that. But where I was living at the time, there was nothing there.

There was, it was, it's a nice little town, but there was nothing to do really other than maybe going into pubs and stuff. And that's at the time that really wasn't me. I wasn't really a pubby person.

I'm still not really, but I definitely wasn't then. Didn't like pubs. I liked pubs when I was 16, but I didn't as well.

I just liked it because I wasn't supposed to be in there. But it wasn't, yeah, I never really, never really got the point of it. I never really saw the point of pubs.

I can see the point of them in the past, you know, the community getting together and, but I didn't, I was never really part of any kind of community as in like a lots and lots of different people all living together in a house, in a room, not in a room, in a road rather. I suppose I lived in houses where there was like community of people living, not together, but separately, but kind of get to know them a bit.

But that going into a pub and say hello to your car mechanic or the person who delivers your milk or your post or the local electrician or never really kind of had that.

I suppose the only close thing I got was maybe seeing people that I worked with. That would be probably the closest thing. And even when I moved to London, really, I would say the only time I went to a pub is with people that I worked with, outside of when I was going to comedy clubs or when I was dating, if I dated someone and go to a pub.

Hmm. But I became accustomed to being able to sleep during the day. And it wasn't the last time I did night shift either.

So I did night shift in 1990. I finished, I think October 1990. Because what they did is they got rid of the night shift.

And they moved me on to a double shift of one week being six in the morning till two at night, six in the morning till two in the afternoon rather. And then the following week, two in the afternoon till 10 at night. And I said, I don't want to do that.

And they said, that's your new hours. I said, I don't want to do it. And they're also making people redundant as well.

And I just, I wasn't pleased. I wasn't happy with it. So I left, just didn't go in.

Because I only took the job on because it was night shift. I never liked the double shifts. I did that two previous times I worked there.

Didn't like it because it's hard to get really, I found it was hard to get into any kind of routine. If the hours are the same every day, then that's a routine I can get my head around. I mean, I, what are you doing Vinnie? There you go, there's your dinner there.

Do you want it here? What is it? He's standing on the side of the settee looking at me. He doesn't normally do that. He's on the arm rest, but on this side of where I don't sit.

Do you want to get on my lap? Vinnie, do you want to get on my lap? Come on, hey, it's all right. One of the problems he has, he loves to cuddle, but he doesn't like cuddling. Which is a weird one.

And it's hard to explain. It's like, if he is like he's, he doesn't know whether to do it or not. If I go to pick him up, he'll run away.

But actually what he really wants is probably to lay on my lap. And he was, looked like he was trying to get onto my lap from over there. But as soon as I went to reach out to help him, he ran off, jumped off the chair.

Didn't you? Whether it's just that he wants attention and I wasn't giving it to him. Hey, you get my attention now, aren't you? You definitely get my attention when you bark. That's not the kind of attention you want though, is it? No, no, it's not.

He's been a little bit more affectionate these days to me. Maybe he's, he's just succumbed to the idea that he's stuck with me. Perhaps that's what it is.

Maybe all his dreams have just faded and he's given up the hope of getting out of here. And he's just accepted his fate. They stuck with this old man.

Is that what it is then? If you just accepted your fate, it doesn't have it too bad. He can't, I mean, he gets out at least three times a day. I mean, it sounds like a prison, doesn't it? Like he's, he's released.

He has a exercise three times a day. I think he has it okay. I don't know.

It's hard to tell, isn't it? But he seems, he seems okay. He seems fairly, fairly content. All right.

So I've had night shift jobs. So I had the one at the factory making meters, but I was doing a different job this time. I was actually, instead of packing the meters, which is what I did the last two previous times I worked there, I was doing more meter work, as in testing meters, putting meters together, you know, building them, taking them apart, fixing and stuff like that.

So there's a lot more technical stuff and there's a lot more interesting as well. But then sometimes I'd be on the conveyor belt where all I was doing was just putting a screw in. You know, there's the conveyor belt would be huge.

It start off with like an empty, an empty case. And then by the end of it, there'd be a meter, you know, complete meter put together. Now, I'm pretty sure that that wouldn't be done by hand anymore.

Probably hasn't been done for a long time. But it was weird, because at the time, so when I moved, and because I've lived around a lot, every time I saw electric meter, I look at it and think that could have been one of the ones that I touched. You could argue, well, why just touch it now, then you know it is.

But no, I mean, it's something nice. I suppose, you know, if you make toilet seats, and you visit someone, you sit down on toilet seat, instead of thinking about all the different people who sat down on that toilet seat doing poos, you can think, oh, I might have helped make that seat when it was clean. It's, I don't know, it's just I kind of looked at the meters and thinking, ah, because you imagine I saw 1000s and 1000s and 1000s and 1000s of these electric meters.

They were all black. They all look the same. And I've seen loads of them since opening up back in the past.

Not so much recently. But I used to have used to have the little logo on it and stuff. But I think they were the main provider of electric meters in Europe.

Maybe not the world, but in Europe. And they had more than one factory. But they were big.

That was pretty much the main place to get employment in that town outside of the docks. So sec, it was the I think it was the biggest port in Europe for a while. So you know, it's sort of that was doing quite well.

Or maybe the second maybe Dover was high up, you know, higher up. But it is at loads and loads of jobs from trawling, you know, trawling the seas and stuff or whatever. And I think what do they do? They take the ships out to the sea.

They call trawlers to working in the export agencies to I mean, I worked on the docks 11234 at least four times. Three of those times were for cleaning jobs. And the other time was in a what was it? Oh, it was a haulage company for chemicals.

So liquid chemicals and these big tankers would that that was what my job was working in the office. I remember that I remember because my I had a lot Well, I knew quite a few people that worked on the docks, because that was the main place really to get jobs outside of retail or in the factory. Unless you was, I suppose, delivering post or milk or a builder or you know, just other kind of things.

But as far as condensed jobs, like lots of jobs in one place, they were the two main ones in that town. But then if you go to the next town, there was a sugar factory. And so that employed huge amounts of people.

I'm not sure what else they had there. It turned into being the pretty much the capital of insurance, like nearly every insurance company was held there as well in the 90s in the 2000s. I met like so many different companies in one place.

So yeah, I worked in two. And in both those companies, I I actually worked with, I think I had three, possibly three or four people came in from the previous company. One was already there.

So Jody, he I remember Jody, like he was the number one salesperson in Churchill. When I worked at Churchill, I was kind of number two. Sometimes Jody was number two, but that was rare.

He was overall number one. And I didn't really, I did not talk to him, but I didn't really kind of get to know him because he was in a different team to me. And we didn't really have an opportunity to just wander around and talk to each other.

And, you know, so I didn't really, I knew him to sort of say hello to, and he knew me because we were on the leaderboard and, you know, on the wall, so everyone kind of knew who we were. And he'd been there for a long time, I think. So he left, and I didn't see him for probably a couple of years, maybe a year.

And this is in 2004. I'm working in the, it's like a gift shop, a Buddhist gift shop, selling some nice stuff, some absolute, just, yeah, it depends on what you like. But there was incest, you could buy, there was ornaments, cushions, curtains.

They did have, I mean, I can't remember, they had like these hairy curtains that you could buy. It's like, wow, it's really weird. And I remember this one time, because I worked in the same shop in a different town when I was doing my degree.

And the manager at the shop had spent about five hours putting together this curtain display, like really put a lot of energy into it and time. And he said, What do you think? I said, I think it's lovely. However, he said, What do you mean, however? I said, You put it right in front of the fire exit.

And he said, So? Now, what I got to explain is what I noticed with some of my Buddhist friends, it wasn't that they didn't care about stuff like that. They were so focused on the moment that he just didn't really have, I would, in some ways, I'm a bit too prepared for things like that. You know, hopefully, nothing like that happens.

But I'm kind of, if I get on a ship, I know where the lifeboats are. And, you know, I'm ready. I've got a dress.

I walk around with a full dress underneath my clothes, in case they go, you know, like only women and children. I'm on there. None of that stuff.

I'm getting out of there. I'm going to stand there because I've got a willy. No, you don't get to go on a ship because you've got a willy.

No, it doesn't work like that. Sorry. In fact, on the Titanic.

I can't believe I just, I understand children that get, I understand that. Well, you go against women then, eh? Are you a misogynist? Are you sexist? Well, sometimes when I brush my hair and have a bath, I would say that I'm pretty sexist. Sometimes get attention.

No, that's not what it means. So I, I like to be fairly prepared. And when I said that to him, he's like, oh, it's all right.

Don't matter. And he went upstairs. And I thought, it does matter.

But at the same time, he just spent about five hours putting it together. And I did feel for him. Because it was a lovely display.

And he's very artistic. And he'd been doing that job for a long time. Also in the other, the other shop that I used to work in.

Because that's, he got me that job. Originally in the other shop, back in 2000, November 2002. And I, yeah, I felt bad.

But like, you know what? A fire exit's there for a reason. And you don't need it till you need it. I was going to say like a condom, but it's not really a good analogy, is it? But, you know, generally, you know, but anyway, he went upstairs.

He had the up, he did have the up with me. He was like, then he came down and he started taking the stuff down. And I helped him.

I said, look, we'll just move it to a different part of the part of the shop. And he said, yeah, I suppose. And he probably didn't say that.

I did feel a bit bad because that, where the fire exit was, was really, you couldn't kind of have anything there. And it looked out of place. It was very kind of bare area.

And there was like a little courtyard outside. So, although a fire exit, if, yeah, I wouldn't want to be stuck in that courtyard, to be fair, although you could get onto the roofs, which I sometimes did. There was one member of staff that I didn't get on with.

And she used to pick on me, basically. She used to be to say rude things to me for no reason. And she, I think there was that safety of working with Buddhists.

And she wasn't a Buddhist, but she, she felt safe that she could probably get away with more stuff than she would normally. And in the end, I just had to let the management know that I wouldn't work with her anymore. It's weird, isn't it? It's like, this is supposed to be a peaceful environment.

But that was my opinion. It should, it should be peaceful. And I wasn't out to cause trouble.

I was just unfortunately being criticized every time by her for no reason. And then every now and I thought, no, I'm not talking to her anymore. She'd draw me in by asking me a question about myself, knowing that I love to talk about myself.

And she'd draw me in being friendly. And then she'd criticize something I just said, or she'd pull apart what I just said. It's like, oh.

And then she said, she kept going about, I'm angry. What is it? I'm at Cambridge. I'm at Cambridge University.

I'm at Cambridge. She used to love saying that. It turned out she was at Anglia Ruskin in Cambridge, which is not the same as being at Cambridge.

There's an Anglia Ruskin at Chelmsford. Anglia Ruskin University is not the same as going to Cambridge, just because it's in Cambridge. It's like me working in McDonald's in Cambridge and saying, yeah, I'm at Cambridge.

It's not exactly the same. But she really was acting like she was at Cambridge University campus. And she wasn't.

I found that funny. I laughed for about an hour. Solid.

She didn't enjoy that. Because someone asked her, because she said something, her car broke down. And I think she was on the phone saying, yeah, have you picked the car up yet? And because she had to get, I think she got a lift back.

And she was saying, she was saying to the address, it's in the car park at the university in Cambridge. And I think they were asking, like, what Cambridge University? And she's like, yeah. Well, we're in it now.

We can't see it. Then she says, Anglia Ruskin. And they laugh for about 10 minutes.

And there's nothing wrong with Anglia Ruskin, by the way, it's a really good place. But pretending you're somewhere that you're not. I could go to Anglia Ruskin.

But I couldn't go to Cambridge. I could go to Anglia Ruskin in Cambridge, potentially. I say I could, I don't know if I could, but I, you know, I mean, I'm qualified probably enough to go and do that.

However, there's no way on this planet I would get into Cambridge University because I'm not of that ilk. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not in that, on that level of education, just not. Oh, but Jason, I'm sure you could do it if you really tried.

No, not even if I tried. Well, if you tried really hard. No, not even if I gave it at least 10%, I couldn't.

Why don't you give it more than 10%? Because I'm lazy. Where have you been? Have you not been observing? Okay, don't got to be rude. You're rude.

I think the next time I did night shift. Oh, yeah. So I went back to London.

This is how cheeky I was. I went back to the job that I had before in London, that I didn't give them notice. I didn't go back.

And I went back to him and said, is there any chance of another job? And I suppose rightly so. They said, no, we're full now. Sorry.

Bye. So I just like, okay. And this is January 1991.

So I've moved there. I paid rent, probably two weeks in advance or something like that. I was in this grotty room.

I lived for four years, believe it or not. Nearly four years was it all the way through 91, 92, 93, and up to the summer 94. So three and over three and a half years.

And there was this, when I moved in there, no central heating. And there was a little bathroom heater on the wall, the other side of the room to where I was, my bed was. A draft come in the window.

And there was a meter, an electric meter. So I wasn't even getting that heating for free. Electric meter, 50 pence pieces.

So I pretty much had that. Eventually it broke. But it was like a little bathroom.

You know, there's ones, I don't know if they still exist. But I think it was like two bars. And it shouldn't have been on a bedroom wall.

Why would you not have central heating? I mean, central heating is not a new thing. It wasn't like in 1991. Oh, we don't like that central heating.

No, that's the devil's work, that is. No, if God had wanted me to be warm, he'd have made me warm. I don't know what the answer would be.

It's like, we're supposed to be cold. That's why we're born in a cold country. Yes, it builds character, shivering in your bed, builds character.

Yeah, it builds an attitude. I tell you, that's that's for sure. After decades of that, living in places that were cold, I won't be cold anymore.

Seriously, I won't. The heating goes on, if it's cold, the heating goes on. I don't care what time of the year it is.

I'm not going to sit here being cold. I know some people are. Nope, the heating goes off in March, and it comes back on at the end of September.

That's it. No heating throughout that whole time, regardless of how cold it is. I don't do that.

I know a lot of people do do that because I've done it a few times. I've done a survey. I haven't done a survey, but I've just known a lot of people that have said that.

And they were literally, well if it's cold, put an extra pair, put another jumper on if it's cold. No, the way I see it is, I don't put a jumper on if I'm cold. I put a jumper on if I'm not warm enough.

There's a difference there to me. There's a difference between, like I've got a little cardigan on now. If I don't have this on, it's a little bit too cool.

It's not cold. It's a little bit too cool. I'm not shivering.

That's what I mean. I don't put a jumper on and then have cold hands and a cold face. When I'm indoors, I just don't allow that to happen.

Because I had decades of it. That's why. I mean, even when I was a kid, it was the same.

So really from up to the age of 44. So I had 44 years of living in places that I had no control over the heating, pretty much. 44 years where I couldn't decide whether or not I could be warm.

It's a long time. So now I have the heating on all summer. It's like a greenhouse in here.

I've got tomatoes growing out of my ears. It's brilliant. No, I feel he's turned into a cactus.

No, I don't have the heating on. If it's cold, if it's like a really cold night, which we do have in this country, we have really cold nights in the summer sometimes. If I need the heating on, I'll put the heating on for a little while.

I've got no issue. I mean, most of the summer, the heating is turned off, like off, off. So I don't leave it on automatic so it can't come on.

If it's cold, I'll decide. In the winter, I've got it on automatic. So if it gets below a certain temperature, it comes on.

In the summer, I don't do that. But sometimes it's cold, you know, just because it's July or June, which is pretty much the hottest months of the year in this country. And we have had some really hot days this year.

But only, I would say, only a few hot nights. There's been a few nights where it's been like, oh, a little bit, a little bit stuffy. But the real heat, I didn't really experience the real heat at home this year because I was visiting Uncle Sausage's.

So I experienced the heat as in, you know, going there in a taxi or on the bus, mainly taxis to start with. And then, but then at the, I'd get inside the hospital and it wasn't warm inside the hospital because there's air conditioning everywhere. It wasn't cold everywhere, but it wasn't, you know, it's definitely a different temperature to being outside.

So I didn't, yeah, I didn't really get the full extent of the summer because I spent what, six weeks or something going backward and forward. So I can't, I spent most of the summer pretty much from the end of June, the end of June. That's it.

You come to me. Good boy. Good boy.

We don't do that, do we? No, we don't. We don't bark. We don't bark because you're a good boy.

You're not just a good boy. You're a clever boy. You're very clever.

You're the most beautifulest boy in the whole wide world. Yes, you are. Yes, you are.

Yes, you are. Yes, you are. Yes, you are.

Give me kisses. Give me kisses. Yeah, good boy.

Come on then. Vinnie's decided he wants to come and sit on my lap. So he's doing that.

He put his paw out literally to try and get onto my knee. So he's not, I've let him get on my lap and he's not trying to get down. So it's clearly where he wants to be, isn't it? You're happy.

Yeah. I can't reach him. I hurt my neck.

The other times, so yeah, when I couldn't get that job in the place when I moved back to London, I said to my landlady, I said, oh, excuse me, landlady. She said, yes, tenant. I said, not sure what I'm going to do.

She said, what do you mean? I said, well, you know, that job I told you I had. She said, yeah. I said, I lied.

There's no job there. There never was. She said, does it not exist? I said, yeah, it exists, but I just thought I could go back there, but I was wrong.

I misinformed you. Please forgive me. Can you ever forgive me? And she said, probably not.

I said, okay, thanks. She said, why are you thanking me? I just said, I won't forgive you. I said, I know, but I just, it's a new thing I'm trying out.

I just like to say thanks to people. Just I'm trying to make new friends, you see. So if I say thanks to everyone, maybe it'll cause a more peaceful society and catch on and end up with some kind of world stability, politically and emotionally, maybe.

She said, so you didn't get the job. What, can you pay the rent next week? I said, um, well, and she said, you're joking me. I said, I wish I was.

Not very funny joke, is it? She said, no. She said, what are you going to do? I said, I don't know. I guess I'm just gonna have to move back.

And she said, what would your dad say? I said, what do you mean? She said, nothing, don't worry. I said, what do you mean? What would my dad say? What do you know about my dad? She said nothing. And then she looked away and started humming and whistling, which I thought quite weird behavior.

And I said, have you spoken to my dad? She said, no. I said, come on. Have you spoken to my dad? She said, well, I said, come on.

This is taking ages. Have you spoken to my dad? She did. Yes, I have.

I said, how? She said, well, when he helped you move, he said, no. I said, wait a minute. Someone else helped me move.

Okay. Well, you gave him the telephone number for the house, didn't you? I said, yes. Well, he phoned me up.

Why? To warn me about you. What do you mean, warn you about me? Just to let me know how annoying you were. I said, what? That's all it was.

Nothing rude, nothing bad. He just wanted to let me know, warn me ahead of time that you're just a bit of annoying, a bit of a pain to live with. I said, I'm not really living with you, am I? You're downstairs.

I'm upstairs. I've got my own room. She said, yeah, but we have to share a kitchen and a bathroom.

I said, yeah. And she said, well, he just warned me. What do you mean, warned you? She said, it doesn't matter.

All I can tell you is that you might not want to tell him you're coming back. What do you mean, tell him I'm going back? What? I think he's moved. Moved? Yeah, he waited till you left and came back to London.

And he moved. Did he give you an address? No. And she looked away and started whistling and humming.

I said, look, I've kind of figured out that when you do that, you're lying. And she said, wow, you are clever. I wasn't sure she was being sarcastic or not.

And I said to her, well, where's he moved to? She said, I can't tell you. I said, why not? Swore me to secrecy. Okay.

Well, I guess I have to stay here. She said, it's okay. It's okay, actually.

I said, why? I said, well, he said that when you lose your job, he'll pay for the first month. And then I can kick you out if you haven't found anything. So you're telling me that you're going to be phoning him up tomorrow or whatever to let him know that I haven't got myself a job so that he pays rent for the next month? She said, no.

I said, good. I said, no, I've already spoke to him. He's already sent the money.

He sent a check. It's going to be here tomorrow, probably. I was like, so you've basically, he sent you £160.

She said, yeah, it was £40 a week back then. And she said, is that why there was such a pause between you talking just then? Because you had to try and add it up in your head. I said, yeah, I was going to say £120.

And then I realized that's three fours. So I thought how else can I work it out? And I realized if I do 80 times by two, it's £160. She said, yeah.

I said, thanks. She said, yeah. I wasn't really congratulating you.

I'm just, you know, acknowledging what you said. And I said to her, look, instead of just being a little bit gnarly, a little bit, ugh, a little bit, you know, looking down at me, a little bit judgmental, perhaps you could be helpful, caring, kind. Hello baby.

He just gives me kisses. And she said, well, okay, I suppose I could try and help. I said, that'd be nice.

She said, are you any good at cleaning toilets? I said, what? She said, I could give you like £2 discount a week if you clean the bog. I said, no one's called it a bog for years. She said, I do.

I love calling it a bog. Makes you feel really down to earth. Should we call it a toilet? She said, no, I want to call it a bog.

And I was like, okay, fair enough. No. I said, I'm not cleaning the toilet for £2.

How's that going to make a difference to my rent? Just £2 off a week, off of £40. She said, well, that'll mean you'll only owe £38. It wasn't a literal question.

I know it'd leave me with £38 to pay. She said, well, that's what you just asked me. And obviously I've done her accent different because she was Italian.

So she had a very, very strong Italian accent, but I didn't do her accent there. I hope you're pleased. I hope, I hope you appreciate me.

Thank you very much. Yeah. Um, what else? Yeah.

Anyway, she came through and she, she gave me a shout, Jason, Jason, Jason. So I go down and I say, yeah, well, she said, come down the stairs, please. So I went downstairs and there was this other lady there and I said, Oh, I said, hello.

She said, yeah. And this is my friend Cantabella. I said, she wants to talk to you.

And I said, okay, fair enough. So I'm talking to her. She ends up, it ends up that she's the HR.

She's in charge of the HR department in a bakery, huge bakery in London, East London. And she said to me, um, there's a job going in a canteen and you can work there or you can apply to work there. I said, okay.

Told me the hours, told me the right, the wages. And so she was helping me out, but she was helping a friend out so that she got a rent, but at the same time helping me out. And I went along for the job interview, got the job, turned out the chef who was in charge of the kitchen didn't have a choice about whether I worked there or not.

And he told me that he wouldn't have employed me, which is nice. How lovely. And that's on me that he told me that after we become friends.

Yeah. He still, he liked me at that point when he said he wouldn't have employed me and he still wouldn't. So Hey, nice.

And he sold me a dodgy video player that didn't work, but I've forgiven him. 25 pound that cost me. I'll get that money back.

Well, I mean, how could you do that to someone? Admittedly, he'd stopped working there. So he'd left and I was still working at the factory. So he, yeah, I guess he was just trying to make a little bit of money in that, but it seemed a bit rude.

So Vinnie's still lying on my lap and cuddling up to me. Normally it might do it and I'd hold him and he'd like want to get down, but he doesn't want to get down. He seems happy to just be cuddling.

It's weird. It's almost like he's become an affectionate. He's turning into a dog.

Like a nice friendly doggy. Hey, I don't understand. But anyway, I ended up working after that.

I worked in the actual factory, the bakery itself, not the canteen. And I was doing. What was I doing? I was doing all kinds of shifts, including night shift.

So, yeah, I did a night shift. Was I doing night shift? Yeah, I'm pretty certain I was doing night shift. And then sometimes a night shift led me to do days as well.

Yeah. Yeah. So it's, it was kind of all over the place, but that was my second night shift job.

My third night shift job would be working in security in 1996. And I had one, two, three, four, five. I'm just trying to think at least five different places that I did night shift on.

I did day shift on a few places, but predominantly night shift. I don't think I did night shift again after that. I think that was it.

That was the last time I did night shift. But I did that for a while. It was okay if there was people around.

If I was on my own the whole time, I'd end up having to go to sleep, even though I was sleeping during the day. Now, the problem is back then there was no internet, nothing. There was reading, but I struggled to read when I was still tired at night.

But I could have built websites and stuff. And, you know, if it had been 10 years later, I could have really made use of that time. Let me just have a look and see what the... I was supposed to be talking about longest days and shortest days.

And I'll be honest, I've lost interest in that. Never mind. So thank you for listening.

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

Bye.