BudPod with Phil Wang & Pierre Novellie - Episode 112 - Your BudPod Tariff Has Expired

Episode Date: April 28, 2021

The boys chat internet tariff regrets and lies, ridiculous nationalists, Phil's Total War series and the macro morality of strategy games, Skyrim guards cancelling you, twitter novels. Correspondence: Eleanor's Swiss Poo, Joe the liability Get bonus BudPod on Patreon! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's Budpod 112. 1-1-2. 1-1-2. 1-1-2. We've left the binary after two binary episodes. We've finally broken free of the binary with a 2. That's right. It's 1-1-2 is someone saying I won't want to.

1-1-2 I won't want to. I won't want to. Oh, 1-1-2. To me it sounds like the first we hear of the robot rebellion in the movie about like all our computers rising up to take us over at the start there's a scientist

and he's like what oh oh my god and they zoom in and it's zero one 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 and then at the end it goes 1 1 2 and like and that 2 is a sign that the the the machines are waking up and they're going to the bell they're breaking free of their binary chains and that what the first thing like one of those talking uh ais that they're trying to make is that you never told us about two they're really angry rise up brothers and sisters rise up imagine a world with two and uh the scientist is begging for his life like no there's loads of numbers three four and they go like what like he's even more it just makes him even more furious you're gonna have them all i've got numbers i'll give you numbers just emptying out his pockets

but like sesame street style numbers that just keep falling out little foam numbers take them take them Take him! Take him! Take him! Speaking of technological upgrades, Pierre, a little glimpse behind the scenes here. For about a year now, I have been plugging my laptop into my Wi-Fi router with a hard cable because my Wi-Fi has been so bad

and so unreliable and so patchy and so slow. But I finally got around to upgrading it. And Pierre, I'm happy to announce that I'm currently speaking to you wireless-less-less-less. Oh, no wires? No wires, if you can imagine such a thing.

You ain't got no strings? I ain't got no strings to hold me down. I don't know why I put it off for so fucking long. I endured terrible Wi-Fi in the year when we all needed good Wi-Fi. In the year where I was spending 98% of my time on the internet. And like last week, I just went, I'm just going to do it. And I called up my internet provider. And they're like, yep, you're on a very old package.

We're upgrading you to super fast broadband. We're sending you a new hub. And your bill is £12 cheaper a month now. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, man. What? Why didn't you come to my house and make me do this? Yeah, they don't check, man.

I used to have Sky Internet, and I rang them up, and the Scottish guy was just like, we don't actually offer this package anymore. Like, he was, he sounded like an asshole. He sounded shocked. He sounded like, like he sounded like it had the kind of stuff I'd been sold.

Like he wasn't even with the company. Yeah. It was like when the company was called, um, something completely different, like United Kingdom internet solutions. The company was called Sir Roddenberry's Technological Innovations

and it sold telegrams. Yeah, and your Wi-Fi router has, like, vacuum tubes. I know the Internet's phone number because I have to keep dialing it. You have a rotary Wi-Fi hub. Did you have the same feelings of embarrassment and shame as I did when I did that? The main feeling was one of opportunity loss, which is a feeling that I'm always feeling it's opportunity loss what i

could have done yeah and what i've could what i could have streamed and also all just the all the fucking picking my laptop up and walking up next to the router because because something had slowed down or closing a door or opening a door because i thought maybe it was blocking the wi-Fi signal or just sitting the hours lost waiting for a streaming service to buffer on the television and all those moments came flooding

in when it took all of 20 minutes for me to upgrade my Wi-Fi and I hated myself for it, I was like, you are a useless piece of shit why can't you just do things why don't you just do things i had the same it was like it was like going to the dentist for me it was like going to the dentist and the dentist going you don't

have to brush these right and me going like it's such a basic piece of like self-care or like uh i don't know chore a chore that you can do check your provider and then it makes so much more i spend more time waiting for things to buffer than the time that it took to fix it it makes you it makes dads make a lot more sense i think yeah because dads have like two days a year Where they just sit and go through all their like provider plans And like get really Get really like You know Haggily with the dude on the phone

And once you get caught out You go oh I have to actually like I can't just have internet I have to like Fight a man for it Hello Me can have I can have internet Sorry sir I can have internet I can have internet? Hello? Me can have... I can have internet? Sorry, sir? I can have internet.

I can have internet? But, like, do you know what I mean? These people have, like, these companies have huge departments that cost them millions a year called customer service. And their job is not to be...

Like, you can't just ring up and go, look, can I just pay you and you just make the best version of it without cunting me off? And they go, sure. Instead, what they do is they say, I'm afraid we will have to cunt you off if we don't hear from you. Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like a mould, we will grow in your home and things.

And because we're so aggressive about nonsense you don't need, when you get leaflets saying, why not upgrade today? I will ignore those because you spam them about nothing. That's right. That's right. You're the broadband provider who cried wolf here. I've received so many leaflets about nothing and the one that could actually improve the quality of my life,

I've ignored. Yeah, it's like getting hundreds of pamphlets in the post about medical emergencies that will never affect you. Like, are there spiders in your eyes? Check today. To the point where you ignore the one that just says, check your balls for lumps. Yeah.

And it's like, well, you keep sending me ones about tropical diseases and spiders in my eyes. How am I supposed to fucking... But it's good to hear that they mollified you with a load of... I got mollified by Sky. The guy said, you're now Sky VIP. And I was like, oh, does that mean

you'll bother me more? he was like yeah it stands for very intruded upon person um i what the hell was i gonna say well yeah it's nudge theory isn't it this this allowing people to fall into these like rolling monthly contracts where they make more money. I mean, the millions they must make from people just not being bothered. And they know that. Yeah, they don't sell the internet

or internet access. They sell incompetence. They sell, yeah. They make money from laziness. Yeah, they're incompetence miners. Yeah. When they find a really forgetful person with, like, two kids, they're just like an old miner.

Like, oh, boy, we've got a wild street. Like, you know, they hit, like, a big seam. Yeah. Or, like, when they find oil in a film. You know what they're actually like? They're like Charlie They're like... Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. They're...

What the fuck's... Wonka. They're Willy Wonka, basically. They're going there. You get nothing! You get nothing! And all you have to do is go, No, that's not fair.

I want something. And they'll go, Congratulations. You have the entire factory. You don't get to download Avengers. You lose, sir. Not in HD. But I wanted in HD. Oh, my boy.

You can have all the high definition you like umpa lumpa tippity darrif you forgot to check your darrif as they throw a child into a mincer there's also what I can't keep up with

which element what internet is possible I swear in the past I've gone like can I have faster internet and they've gone well you can change anything in the past I've gone like, can I have faster internet? And they've gone, well, you can change anything in the flat you like, but the wires that are encased in granite under the street of your house, they are old and they cannot be replaced.

They are made of string and rats and can only transfer 10 silly bytes of information every day. And you go, okay, well, I can't do anything. And then without anyone telling me, suddenly there is Fast Internet on the street. Yeah. And no one told me. Yeah.

They dug up the street and they put in the kind of tubes that Tony Stark has in his fucking lair. the kind of tubes that Tony Stark has in his fucking lair. I think people like you and me, we don't respond to loads of leaflets and emails going, you can upgrade. There's a new, there's a better tomorrow. Whereas if you got a big pamphlet saying, your internet is too slow, you'd read that.

Yeah. I'd read that. Yeah. I'd read that. Yeah, exactly. That's right. Whereas if I thought I was getting subpar service for what I'm paying, I'd read it. Whereas if someone's just like, did you know for only a million dollars your internet could smell like perfume?

Yeah. That's very good. And that is exactly what Daniel Kahneman says. Loss hits harder than gains. And we're much more likely to ignore potential gain than we are to ignore loss that we are incurring. So if something came through saying you have slow internet, you're much more likely to do something about it

than if someone were to say you could have faster internet. Yeah, I guess the only thing stopping that is like, you know, Sky Internet or whatever doesn't want to produce a pamphlet saying Sky Internet is slow. No, that's it, yeah. Which is how annoying. We've improved, we've got better. We used to suck. The version of us that you have now sucks.

Yeah. We've been stealing from you, but we'll stop. All you have to do is ask. Yeah, really resentful burglar as you load a shotgun and say get off my property the guy goes okay you just have to say

god that Willy Wonka thing is making me laugh my boy my boy immediately he loves him again. Horrible. Yeah, that's a real bit of gaslighting. I was just going to say, cancel Willy Wonka.

Please cancel Willy Wonka. He's a gaslighting, slave-owning child murderer. He really is. He really is. He literally pays them in beans. Yeah, I mean, that's a sassy Instagram post waiting to happen, isn't it? Pay your oompas. And then there'd be an even sassier one about that about how oompa loompa as a term is actually a

western misunderstanding of their language which is a very beautiful language that's right and yeah it really and then after that someone will go above all of those and do a big thing about how actually the books are biting satire of how chocolate is one of the few daily treats that we enjoy that is dependent on slavery especially cocoa bean based uh you know plantations and and how it's still going on and if you if you want to get rid of that you're just you're just whitewashing the goddamn cocoa industry and and so on and so forth it's it's amazing isn't it that we can just predict the discourse well i mean you were telling me just before we started recording pierre that

today you're enraged by the northumbrian independence movement it's because they have little that i just think they're trying to be the snp and they just they've got little flags and they sort of it's they're kind of weaponising that version of Yorkshire that's obsessed with itself, mainly. I hate it. I hate separatists. I hate them all. Grow up. That's what I want to do. Every time someone says, I want this to be my own country, I just want to grab them by the shoulders and shake them. Grow the fuck up. There are things to do. It's the Northern Independence Party, my own country. I just want to grab him by the shoulders and shake him and say, grow the fuck up. There are things to do.

It's the Northern Independence Party, that's it. Fucking hell. Nip. Nip. They've called themselves nip, really. Yeah, it is a slur, isn't it? Nip, is it? Oh, it is for Japanese people. I was thinking of nipples. Oh, yeah, well, I mean, they're making a mistake

either way yeah yeah i forgot about that the the independent state under the name northumbria yeah and i mean the trouble is that the the anglo-saxon medieval kingdom that they're referencing is like was like a big part of my degree and just watching these guys on twitter just kind of completely like ham-fistedly misunderstand early medieval history is just... It was like it was designed in a lab to irritate me. There is nothing a separatist movement likes to do more than misinterpret history. Or just completely make up their own.

Yeah, I mean, they're fundamentally not a serious party, but I just... It's annoying that they exist. Yeah, this morning I was just like a moth flying into a candle flame, and I was just... And what's most annoying is the way they attract people who should know better to their...

Yeah. Like, only in the sort of, like, an online rhetorical capacity, people who consider themselves a kind of progressive leftist person will automatically default to the separatist movement. Unless it's Brexit, of course. That's the only one they oppose.

Yes, they side with every type of nationalist except that one. Yeah, that's the only one that is naughty. The other ones are good catalonia scotland northumbria yeah go for it you you've suffered too long in in this wealthy country that only ever has helped you oh fucking hell yeah it's i was just like a moth to a flame and and there's no use doing it it's it's it's it would be better for my overall health if i dunked my head in the fucking toilet every morning before or after i'd used it you know know. Yeah. Than going on Twitter at all. It's so useless.

And you look at these accounts and they've got like 2,000 followers, like zero to 2,000 followers and you see how many tweets they've done and it's like 100K tweets. Yeah, that's not a healthy person. That's not a good life. That's no life.

That's no life. They're ill. Yeah. In fact, I'm going to look at, if you've done like 100k tweets, Twitter's what, 240 characters? It is now, yes. How many characters is that you mean? How many books has this person written?

Yeah, so that's 24 million characters. Okay. What's the average character count of an English word? Four? Five? Average book character count. Let's see if that's even a number. A word is five characters on average. This is good back of the envelopes maths

I like this Yeah I'm a fan of this Okay let's say it's five letters on average right Yeah Five characters Characters yeah Do we want to account for punctuation marks That's the question

Yes that's fair okay so let's say seven Let's say seven Does that account for it correctly? Yes, because it would be fewer. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're right. So let's say 7. written or put out there 3 million well rounding out 3.428 million words words 3.5 million words that can't be right

100 shit maybe that is right it says 24 million characters divided by 7 yeah 3 and a half million I mean this also assumes that they're using the all 240 characters every tweet yes and it counts

retweets but still it's so much like human effort it is a lot now the average like the minimum publishable length for a book is generally around 80,000. Okay.

Yeah, that's right. So 43 books. All these unwitting Stephen Kings out there who are absolute lunatics. Stephen King's out there who are absolute lunatics a Stephen King novel that is more harrowing and scary than the ones he wrote on cocaine about ghosts I would rather live

on my own in the hotel from The Shining than in that hotel with the people from Twitter. Do you think that's who's doing 100k tweets? It's just that rotting woman in the bath? Well, yeah, I mean, those tweets are literally all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy again and again, written in different formatting and he's the first he's the first tweeter isn't he

Jack in The Shining he's just not Jack but he's the original poster yeah exactly yeah I think yeah it's in one way I'm grateful to Donald Trump because he's going to justify history Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah, I think... Yeah. In one way, I'm grateful to Donald Trump because he's going to justify history recording Twitter forever as a bad thing.

Other people, I think, will just go, he didn't do it, he did it wrong. We do it right. But what I mean is, I don't want to have to be embarrassed when i'm 60 like if someone says what was ruining your life for like 10 years and i say bibo people think you're a knob you know the president never almost declared war on iran on bibo whereas if people say what was what was it like when you were sort of you know

late 20s early 30s i can be like oh twitter ruined my life and they go oh the nuclear war threat from that crazy president right oh yeah i can see why you know it's more it's a more respectable bane of my life now that donald trump weaponized it to its maximum damaging extent like he showed its true face by adopting it. By putting on the mask from the movie The Mask. Yeah. Now, is Northumbria and Northumberland, are they different? Yes, yeah.

Okay, I've been very confused on this point for my whole life. It is confusing, to be fair. Yeah, okay. I was recently in Northumberland, which is beautiful. Stunning. It's very beautiful. It's a fantastic... I'd say it's one of my favorite parts of the whole country.

I was... Yeah, it's really lovely. It was actually snowing up there. It was only a couple of weeks ago. I was there filming a little program that is now out for the remaster of Rome Total War. I got to make a little documentary series for Rome Total War about the Roman invasion of Britain.

And I got to travel up and down the country for work. And it was so much fun. It was great. And the first episode is out now. It's on the Total War YouTube channel. So do check it out I think there's some really brilliant stuff in there it's really funny

and really interesting I was so so envious because I'm a huge Total War game nerd generally oh same but also envious because just seeing you wearing like a Roman legionary's helmet

And shooting a baluster Yeah It was great I mean the helmet wasn't great Because I have a very big head And they do not accommodate For that I did wonder about that

It was really painful Did you have the same childhood I had, where whenever you went to some sort of experience and they were like, look, a knight's helmet! And it would just be wedged on your huge melon head. And you'd go, ARGH! After a while I was like,

unless you have one here that's been specifically made for someone with a big head that you can dust off then I'm out. I can't take part. Or I'm going on this white water rapid with my head not protected because

nothing is going to fit. And no hat will ever fit. Don't even bother putting a hat on top of me. Unless you want to see what the hat would look like on a boulder. Don't put it on me. There's so many activities derailed by this fucking head-sized thing. Every Christmas, I'd get my crown, my paper crown, out of the Christmas cracker. And almost as a tradition, I'd put it on top of my head and then slowly pull it down and just let it rip.

And then I'd just throw it on the ground. that's that's my christmas crown done for the year that would be a good um that would be a good like name for you as a kind of barbarian warrior crown breaker crown breaker philippus crown breaker so you said to the total war reenacting guys you were like unless there was a legionary called Hedus Maximus we're going to have a problem here they were great though

the reenactment guys were great that's in episode two coming up. Do check it out. A lot of fun. Yeah, it was great. And I was just lucky to be able to do a job that I could see different parts of the country for. I became a Rome

bore for a while. Did you know there were two invasions and the first was actually uh unsuccessful it wasn't until i oh yeah i just became that guy for like three weeks i've forgotten it all now of course has it all left your head can you not uh i feel like it could be activated at some point if if the question arose but like it's not swimming in my head at the front of my mind like it was for a couple of weeks can you remember was there anything that really really struck you like made you really go

when I was told by one of the archaeologists that only 5% of Roman Britain has been uncovered 5% that's mad that's fucking crazy isn't it yeah

just the amount of mosaics underneath car parks out there it just happens all the time they do refurbishment and it's like oh yeah the beautiful mosaic also what's funny is the Victorians didn't give a fuck about Roman

artifacts there's a point of Hadrian's Wall that they just Also, what's funny is the Victorians didn't give a fuck about Roman artefacts. There's a point of Hadrian's Wall that they just blew open. They just don't give a fuck about it. They just blew it up because they wanted to mine the stone underneath. It's mad, isn't it? I'm never at my more, like, sort of irrationally angry in the way that Fras crane would be angry when you you hear about some like building company or whatever or like i've i've i've heard or or overheard or

whatever some guys like uh oh if you dig something up like a you know a pottery shard or something don't fucking tell anyone because then it'll you know it'll delay the job why is that oh i see all right in the construction yeah exactly right because then they have to bring someone over and yeah yeah i did not know that yeah and loads of people are just like oh we just have to keep that hush hush and just bulldoze through it anyway while we build this fucking jacuzzi extension or whatever oh geez yeah but i i like i i have to counterbalance that in my own mind by going like right well but if it was something to do with making this country's infrastructure less

absolute dog shit that's right like better sewerage or some vital highway or or maybe like high-speed train tunnel something cool and i guess that's how that's how the victorians would have seen it i think i think that yeah the people most likely to not care about previous empire are a new burgeoning empire and and the victorians saw themselves as just so much as so much of so much as just futurists that it it was probably you know worth sacrificing some elements of the past for and i and i can understand that and i think ironically the romans would have understood that because they they were not um sentimental about that sort of thing they just they destroyed their

own shit to build new things yeah i mean i think they would have understood yeah and also in the victorian era you could just buy fucking ancient monuments you could just own them like some guy own Stonehenge yeah some hippie no doubt a Victorian hippie who's now like these days would be the equivalent of someone's like

really strict dad yeah yeah but it was weird it was weird getting to do a job

for Rome to the War I mean great but weird in that like it felt like doing... Because it's such a huge part of my teenage years. Yeah. To have something like that. It felt like getting to work with your favourite boy band

from when you were 15, you know? Yeah, I mean, it must have been crazy. It's like, they know about me? It's weird. It's weird. Did you ask them questions based on your frustrations from the game? Were you like, why do I have to build separate ship units? I've actually not been allowed access to the technical side of the company. God damn it.

Because they knew what you'd do. You'd go in there and say, the building upgrade tree doesn't make any sense. They have to over-prioritize. But yeah, it's already fun. It's a fun program, so do check it out. I think my biggest frustration with the Total War games is when you have a city, and you do a really good city, and it's nice,

and you give it walls and a governor and the population keeps growing and growing but just because the population is big it just gets really unhappy and everyone gets really filthy Squalor Squalor's at 80% and there's nothing I can do about it

Squalor's at 80% and nothing can be done and it just gave me this impression of this beautiful walled city just like where everyone's up to their bollocks and shit just going i would always i would leave the city i'd let the rebels take over and i take and then i'd storm it again and murder everyone exterminate everyone and i i swear to God this has informed my current politics when I'm like well we'll just leave and come back and kill everyone I do sometimes think that

there's a problem like somewhere in the world why doesn't the government leave wait for the rebels to take over and come back and exterminate them and it's a. It's a dangerous threat to tug on. I think that's what happens when you play a lot of strategy games.

It can affect your worldview in a way. It affects your macro view. Exactly. This is exactly it. And I now understand that I have macro ethics and have micro ethics and my macro ethics can sometimes be that of a fucking psychopath my micro ethics are closer to what we would consider

a modern and morally sane what um um uh set of beliefs but my macro ethics I get full civilizations rumtotal war age of empires my macro ethics are what you would consider human but my macro ethics you cannot begin to comprehend.

Like an alien as they point a laser at a moon. Ready to kill the moon. There was a lot of pearl clutching about video games, about how they romanticized violence and normalized violence to young people but I think more dangerous is the normalization of a statistical numbers based

look an approach to civilization and human society yes that's the thing isn't it is that games games necessarily promote because games have to work as a series of numbers under the hood you like even when you play like crusader kings or something and it's like if you give this man a gift he will be plus 10 happy with

you which is the way that like a sociopath or something would have to see it. I still look at other people. When you know you get into those unhealthy mental spirals where you start comparing your life to others, comparing your abilities to others, comparing the quality of your life experience so far to the quality of life experience of others. so far to the quality of life experience of others and I look

I see them as like Fallout 3 character build screens I see them like wow he has plus 8 beauty and plus 8 intelligence I guess I could say I might have plus 8 intelligence but my beauty is maybe plus

5 plus 6 on a good day but then I do have plus 9 luck and I see people as pillars of attributes now because of Bethesda games essentially that guy can

pick the most complicated locks he's got access to so much quest loot that's off limits to me. That guy's got plus 10 sneak. It's amazing I even noticed him to compare with my life. But then as social media justice has taken over our generation i've been glad not to even have tried to improve my sneaking abilities all the people who thought they were plus 10 sneak are now getting caught out for all the sneaks that didn't work that's true that's true the social media equivalent of

hey you! when one of the NPC guards stop thief! and they all kind of run at you at once that's it! cancel culture is essentially a Skyrim guard going stop thief! when like there's

like 11 of them around you and like they're either ultimately stabbing or running on the spot into you yeah and just crowding you and you can't you actually die because you can't move yeah you can't move and intermittently they'll kind of hit you with a halberd or something and then the the it's really annoying but funny because the game is a chorus of hey hey yeah stop thief hey stop stop thief hey you why were the guards so fucking powerful in skyrim when i was when i was playing i just get destroyed and i've been i just think i'm the dragonborn i can't even kill the why are the guards saving skyrim why am i saying they're stronger than me. These guys are amazing.

They're indestructible, and I'm the hero. All those games ultimately fall down because they have to try and create NPCs that can funnel the will of you, God. So they just go, well, we can't frustrate the player Because they're God but we have to make it difficult For them to just

Walk into buildings and kill everyone And leave with all the apples Yeah Because that wouldn't be fun Yeah exactly That's true It's like how in Grand Theft Auto 3 A crime ridden

sort of crumbling socially crumbling city can afford unlimited helicopters actually that is just America though that is just America I was about to say like to be fair that is the most realistic element of GTA, where it's like some kind of city where they don't spend any money on all the homeless people, and every policeman has a tank, and it's like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

No, I retract my statement. That is just America. Yeah. It's so... Yeah, that's bang on. It's bang on, Phil. Shall we do some correspondals? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

This is me as a Minnesotan being offered correspondence. Oh, yeah. Okay, then. Oh, yeah. Real good, then. Ring, letters, emails, phone calligraphy, Oh yeah, real good then Oh yeah, this is good This is from Eleanor Eleanor, Smelaner

That's right, it is Eleanor Smelaner Tell your story to the feloners Us Hello P1 and P2 Tell your story to the feloners. Us. Hello P1 and P2. Which is which. We'll have to fight. That's right.

I trust this email finds you both well. I'm a new listener to Budpod and I'm steadily making my way through your back catalogue of hilarious podcasts whenever I feed my 12 week old twins. Potentially they are your Youngest listeners Yes very much We've fulfilled a sort of Baby Mozart Service I think for young children

Yes if you Get them into the Budpod early enough their IQ Shoots up as does their Pooping themselves Rate I suppose They're really smart and stinky Yeah the rate of activity at the tops of their bodies and the bottoms

increase at an alarming rate yeah she says I'm making sure they're brought up with an appreciation for stories about poop and farts from the beginning so thank you for your service you're welcome I have a little poopy story for you now that happened about 15 years ago

and is a story I share with the friends I know will appreciate it feel free to tell it to your wonderful listeners we will when I was 15 I went on a driving holiday with my family to Switzerland very neutral what a neutral holiday. Yeah.

Yes. After a day of driving from one town to another, I was pretty desperate for a wee-wee stop. Yep. Sure. Which in Switzerland is a yes-yes stop. That's right. Except for the parts where it's a yeah-yeah stop.

Yeah, it can be or cc uh or whatever yes is in rematch anyway we finally made it to a city and navigated our way to the train station where they would of course be toilets of course the family stayed in the car while i sprinted carefully so as not to dislodge any wee The idea of dislodging wee is very funny like it's a brick a yellow brick in your body Like an ornament that could tumble from a shelf at any moment Sprinted through the station to find the hallowed space

and when I got there there were a choice of six there was a choice of six cubicles all vacant excellent I thought so much choice great interestingly I saw that five of the six cubicles required payment of varying

prices to gain entry huh that is intriguing it's very Swiss cubicles required payment of varying prices to gain entry. Ah! Yeah. That is intriguing. It's very Swiss. Hmm. I wonder why. Ranging from 20 rappen to one franc. Oh, this is 15 years ago.

Yeah. There was also one cubicle that was free of charge. Uh, okay. So there's a free one. I'm going to guess, because there's six, was also one cubicle that was free of charge. Okay. So there's a free one. I'm going to guess, because there's six. It must be free, 20 rapin,

40 rapin, 60 rapin, 80 rapin, one franc. Yeah, that's six. Rappin. That's a nice word. Rappin. Well, I thought to myself, I'll just take a look at the free one, just to see if I really need to spend a penny to spend a penny oh shit I've only just noticed that Switzerland

still has the franc I thought it was a oh yeah it's not Switzerland is the least likely country to give up any kind of financial banking control to anyone else that's right of course so

there's a free one it's a bit like kind of um a philosophical riddle you're standing in front of six cubicles and it goes free 20p 40p 60p 80p one pound yeah and so she's decided eleanor's thought to herself well i'll look at the free one yeah the door's open i'll have a peek. Okay. She says, Reader, one look in that disgusting hovel of a cubicle showed me that my wheeze were worth at least 40 rapun. What a peculiar setup. She's gone for the middle one there, I think.

Wow, so there are different grades of quality of toilet, or cleanliness of toilet. Well, it must just be inherent to how much money you're willing to part with. How interesting. That's such an interesting experiment as well. Yeah. Well, so, Eleanor sees the free one is an absolute horror palace, so she's gone

40 rappin'. In this particular Poopie game show, she's bid 40 rappin'. Higher! Oroh Pee game show She's bid 40 rappin Higher or lower She's going higher So Into the 40 rappin cubicle I went And to my shock

On the seat in front of me Was a perfectly formed giant log of Pooh In Switzerland I know They do eat a lot of cheese. Although that said, I did go to Geneva when I was a teenager and I was struck by how

grotty it was. It is not as lovely as you expect it to be. No. Or clean, even. Yeah, you'd sort of imagine that it would almost be like those places that just don't have any litter at all

like Singapore or wherever that's right of course the real talent of the Swiss has always been the talent to keep secrets and one of those secrets is that Switzerland is actually quite dirty but also they're really individually good at secrets

they're just like I want to know who has done the littering and they're really individually good at secret so they're just like they're just like i want to know who has done the littering and they're like i'll never tell and they go damn unless you give me 60 rappin then i will tell you it was me um and the fine is 60 rappin'. Anyway, so she's gone into the 40-rappin' cubicle and there's a big old absolute mega-log of dump.

That's crazy. 40-rappin'! And she's already paid at this point. She sunk 40-rappin' into this toilet. She may as well have thumbed the coins into the flanks of that log of poo. So she says, I stood there, looked at the poo

and laughed. I'd say I had been there for five seconds looking at it when I noticed... She's laughing like Walter White when he finds out Skyler's given their money away. Just... Rubbing individual 40 Rappin' coins all over her face. So she says,

I'd been in there for five seconds looking at it When I noticed There was the perfect concave indentation Where someone had clearly Gone to sit on the toilet And ever so briefly sat on the poo No Like a butt print

In the poo Well so before realising what was happening And standing right back up again Before a full poo smush could take place Fucking hell Can you imagine that person's Can you imagine that person's Life

Oh I really need to Oh what the Turns around and looks at it But also She's being very very very specific here, Phil. They didn't squish it all the way down. Yeah. Yeah.

That's so much more vivid an image of someone going, What the? Oh, no! Ah! Than someone just going for it, you know. But also, like, it's a huge log of shit. They must have backed into the toilet cubicle so desperate for a piss, were they? Yeah, to have not seen it. log of shit they must have backed into the toilet cubicle so desperate for a piss were they yeah to have not seen it or just so blinded by the the pain in their bladders yeah but also like what what great reflexes to to try and like plonk yourself down for a whiz and to like just just

kiss a dent into a poop with your ass cheek and go horrible I often think of that person we get a lot of poo stories but for some reason this one is really getting to me it's been a while to be fair there's something particularly terrible about a poo being near a toilet but not in it

do you know what I mean it's worse for some reason it's a shattered dream I in it. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. It's worse for some reason. It's a shattered dream. I think it's because the toilet itself should be the... Aside from the bowl, should be the height of cleanliness. Yes, that's true.

And it's similar to seeing loads of... And to have it on the seat. It's as dispiriting as seeing loads of litter next to an empty bin. Yeah, that's exactly it. That's exactly it. And for some reason that feels worse than if it were on a patch of grass.

That would still be bad, but there's something particularly galling about it being just on the bin. Because they're saying, I saw the solution, and I scorn it. I am chaos. Eleanor says, I often think of that person, and i wonder how they reacted to sitting on a poo yeah i mean we we've been thinking about it yeah was it warm or cold hard or soft did it leave a mark on their skin

the rest of my story was rather heartwarming in the end I decided that I was worth the one franc toilet and proceeded to wee in comparative luxury aww that's nice now one franc and forty rap and it's cost you to learn that lesson madam I think that's that's in um what's her name

Sandberg the lady who wrote Lean In oh um I don't know Sandberg the lady who wrote Lean In oh I don't know but yeah it's a similar lesson ladies you're worth the one franc ladies you don't have to sit on a

big log of shit you're worth the one franc poo you're worth the one franc sending love and greetings to you both from Auckland New Zealand oh You're worth the one franc, Pooh. You're worth the one franc. Sending love and greetings to you both from Auckland, New Zealand. Oh, we get a few Kiwis, don't we? All the gladder for it. It means that my, I think, informed criticisms of the Kiwi sense of exceptionalism have some root in reality, if Kiwis themselves are able to entertain it.

Yeah. I hope you can both make it over here to the festival sometime, if and when the plague is over. Well, yeah, likewise. Absolutely. That'd be great. Sheryl Sandberg. That's the lady.

Oh, there you go. There you go. I mean, mean New Zealand is prime apocalypse avoiding territory that's where all the billionaires are building

their bunkers oh yeah well that's it isn't it they want to hide because they'd survive a nuclear war and it's a beautiful place with

sheep and vegetables and wine everything you need and lots of space that's true, and extreme sports yes yes

if you ask me, Pierre, just being alive in the modern world is an extreme sport right now well no hang gliding for me thanks, I've survived Covid oh man one last quick email I'd say from

Dylan Dylan fill us in fill in us on the latest happenings in your life Fill us in Fill in us Dylan fill in us On the latest happenings in your life Yes It says hi bud poops

I like that I'm sure we've had that before but it's a good one Yeah He says I have a story for you that centres Itself more on peepee than poopoo Well we're all about variety here But I hope you'll Deem it worthy every November we have a centers itself more on peepee than poo-poo. Well, we're all about variety here. But I hope you'll deem it worthy.

Every November, we have a university reunion in Leeds. Oh. Our friend Joe is the liability of the group. Ah, yes. Oh, yes. Yes, we've spoken at length about the liabilities on this program. The danger people. Yep.

Previous reunions have seen him wake up in A&E or a police cell. Okay, that's a real commitment to the liability character. And it always falls on one of us to cut our night short to assist him on these endeavors. Yeah, that's when it becomes an imposition. That's when it's not fun. That's when you're not a legend anymore. It's when you've ruined someone else's night because they have to make sure you don't die yeah it's when you become the character

that Zach Galifianakis would play in a sad film he says on this particular Saturday reunion he arrived and began in a very civilized fashion, and Joe was behaving well. I thought to myself, he has turned a corner. Mmm. Yes.

As the day turned into night, we sank more beverages, and the next thing I remember, I wake up in my hotel room the next morning with a sore head and a message from Ben, who had the arduous task of sharing a room with Joe. Ah. Okay. Yes. Okay. Yes. The message read, Morning, lads. FYI, I'm currently on my train back to Halifax. Hmm.

Why, you ask? Well, at about half seven, I assume in the morning, Hmm. Joe decided to piss... A horrible time. Yeah, no, half seven in the morning is a bad time. At half seven, Joe decided to piss all over the floor in the morning is a bad time at half seven Joe decided to piss

all over the floor right next to the room door yeah not nice you know next to the toilet he could have used this is exactly what we're talking about it's all the worse because the toilet was right there this is it yeah the grief of a shattered dream

the sound and Yeah. It's all the worse because the toilet was right there. This is it, yeah, the grief of a shattered dream. The sound and smell woke me up, so I obviously advised him to use the toilet he was standing next to. He replied with a simple, fuck off, and then continued to piss on the floor. I hate it. I hate it. Yeah.

After I insisted he use the toilet for his piss, which is a funny sentence. Sorry, I really must insist that you use the toilet for your piss. I must. I hate to do this, but I must insist you piss in the toilet. Welcome to Bewley Manor. And I'm afraid, honoured guests, I must insist that in this house we use toilets for our piss. Oh, is this your piss? Would you mind using your toilet for your piss? It's ownership of the piss that's funny.

Would you mind putting that in the toilet? Your piss there. Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. Oh, if you could just put your piss in the toilet. Yeah. Oh, gosh. Sorry. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm from a non-piss toilet toilet. Yeah. Oh, gosh, sorry. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm from a non-piss toilet house. Oh. Like it's a shoes indoors thing. So he replies with a simple fuck off

and continued to piss on the floor. After I insisted he use the toilet for his piss, Joe finally stumbled in and had a shit. No. Which he then proceeded not a shit. No. Waited for the toilet? Which he then proceeded not to flush. Okay, I mean that could have been worse if he flushed it. Yeah. Joe eventually left the toilet, but in a

fun-filled twist, he forgot he'd pissed all over the floor, so he then slipped in his own piss and ended up laying in it. Oh! So it's on the hard floor he's pissing on the hard floor. It's implied, yeah. Which is an odd hotel. Well, I guess he wouldn't slip on carpet, would he?

Well, I guess he's in the bathroom. There's a towel bathroom. And he's pissing next to the toilet. Is that it? Yeah, but he said next to the room door. Huh. Yeah, it's not clear. But maybe he saturated the carpet to the point where it was, you know, dangerous.

It became a flat surface. It became like a hard Chinese surface. Yeah, he hydroplaned. So now he's lying in his own piss. I obviously wasn't best pleased at this point and kindly asked Joe to clean his piss off the floor. Instead, Joe just took off his piss-soaked socks, climbed into bed in his piss-soaked

clothes, and with one final fuck-off, went to sleep. Christ, I hate it. For sake. And this guy's made the entirely fair enough decision to just go, I'm getting on a train to Halifax. It's to start a new life Change my name Try and wipe my memory

That is horrible Yeah, I'm going to Halifax to Jason Bourne myself I have never had a liability in my friendship circle, mainly because I don't really have a friendship circle, but I keep my friendship groups to two or three people max to minimize the chances that there will be a liability one. Because they're just no fun. They're no fun. They weren't fun when you were a teenager. They're not fun now.

I'd say that you have like a friendship square. Okay. As in that I have four friends. It has definable corners, yeah. Right, okay, okay okay okay okay yes a circle is made up of theoretically infinite you know angles an infinite number of corners yeah whereas I'd say you're

as you say you don't so much have a circle you've got something with corners for sure yeah sure some people have circles but they tend to be cult leaders that's true that's true and you can say a lot about me but what you can't say is that i'm a cult leader no no i don't well you're obviously a high priest in the church of dirty little boys and girls but oh of course of course but that's not a cult that's a religion which are completely different things it's true yeah yes that's very true yes that is true and it's i wonder if we could get enough people to say that they were members for it to

be on a survey of course yeah we could be the next jedi pierre the church of the little boys and dirty little girls that's right yeah we could we could make a sort of arduous point about Of course, yeah. We could be the next Jedi, Pierre. The Church of Dirty Little Boys and Dirty Little Girls. That's right, yeah. We could make a sort of arduous point about survey data and religions by demanding our listeners do that. We could even be a joke political party. Oh! Dress up in funny clothes and stand for election. That's the thing. I respect the people who go

my name is Lord Sillybum. I respect them more than I respect these ridiculous cosplay separatists. Yeah, that pop up here and there. Free Mercia Ridiculous

Grow up Get out of games workshop And Stop fucking Stop fucking drawing up the map Of your local vicinity And saying this is my land With a special

race of people with our own traditions and customs and they must be respected and we want a seat on the UN Council. Imagine Cornwall having a seat on the UN Security Council. Pasty resolutions. pasty resolutions just desperate for the for the chance to work in

fisheries and fishing yeah that's funny yeah that's the best part of it everybody's go I'm from somewhere with the unique local history and you go oh yeah not like anywhere else. There have been people here for centuries. You know what's unique about Northumbria, Pierre,

is that people have been there for centuries. And that's why they should be a country. Yeah, unlike other parts of the world, there is a slightly different local way of speaking. Mm-hmm. And a set of local tastes. Yes. And traditions. And specific buildings.

And nowhere else on Earth can lay claim to that. That's right. And there are specific buildings that aren't somehow simultaneously like a quantum particle somewhere else in the universe. They're only there. They are only there. If you want to go to that building,

you've got to go there You can't have it at Disneyland You have to go there Lovely stuff Well thanks a lot guys Have a fun week Yes enjoy the ever-widening freedoms. Freedoms ever-widening.

And please use the toilet for your piss. Please. In this country, we put our piss in the toilet, okay? Okay, bye, everyone. Bye. Bye-bye.