BudPod with Phil Wang & Pierre Novellie - Episode 126 - Corona and Lyme

Episode Date: August 4, 2021

Phil and Pierre chat painting, Olympics, being bitten by insects, Lyme disease, zombie film naivety, shoplifting, springboks and lions, nuclear power, milquetoast lil bitch, sticks vs staffs, underwater cities and Pierre goes to the hospital. Get bonus BudPod on Patreon! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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have you watched any Olympics? I haven't watched a single specific piece of Olympics have you? I've not sat down and watched I don't think I've ever in my life sat down and watched an entire event through maybe one badminton match that was a final between the Malaysian guy and the Chinese guy.

Because badminton is the only sport that Malaysia does well in. Yes, that's fair. Okay, and how was that? He lost. But he put up a hell of a fight. Well, this is the thing is that people talk about how inspiring it all is but what what i always struggle with is the fact that you only see like the top 10 you know what i what i would like is some way of understanding that like these 10 people i'm

looking at have like you know 10 million excellent competitors just behind them yeah it's hard to put that's the problem with the Olympics it's very hard to put the abilities of these athletes in context and I think

that's what was so amazing about Usain Bolt because even among the top in the world, he was like 50 meters ahead of them by the end of the race. And you could go, that guy's fast. But it's very hard for the other categories where people are quite close. And to the untrained eye,

to someone who doesn't know these events well, you just go, that's someone firing a bow. I also have absolutely zero faith in the events where it's scored by judges. Yes. Yeah. It's like, should this be in Olympics? Like subjectivity? I don't think there should be subjectivity in the Olympics.

subjectivity i don't think there should be subjectivity in the olympics if it's ever scored by judges i just think i i've seen i've seen too many like corruption spy thriller things i always just think well come on it's you've been bribed someone's been bribed like there's there's like for the entire cold war like the soviet union and america had all these like secret training programs and it was really really like influenced by international politics. So whenever it's just like, well, and we presume that the Taiwanese diver will be getting a fair score from the Chinese and Russian, like, you know, come on, come on. Surely not. Yeah, it's unbecoming of the Olympics.

For some events to essentially be strictly, it's not becoming. I mean, I understand that the people judging are also expert divers or whatever. So then I just have to... The trouble with me is that it demands my faith that they're completely unbiased. And secondly, my faith that their judgments are based on some sort of incredible understanding of what's happening. Because they will judge two, from what I can see, absolutely identical dives. And this is the thing, the reservation I always have when people talk about like this legendary gymnastics set. I don't know what you call it.

Is it a set, a performance, a routine? Yeah, I guess. And it's like, it was the first one to get five tens, tens from all the judges. And you just go, okay, all the judges were in a good mood that day. Is that the achievement?

Yeah. Their routine was right after lunch. Is that the achievement? That's exactly what I was going to say. Yeah, they had a big dinner and the half the gold medal goes to that hotel breakfast chef it was it was a sunny day outside maybe the judges listened to a good song in the radio on on in the taxi ride over to the stadium like it's so subjective i find it very hard yeah like like you say i find it very hard to get excited about something else just someone's

opinion yeah that's that that's it exactly but at the same time in our in our industry we go they got five stars so who are we to talk oh yeah but i mean we don't say that with um an inflection of full trust that's it that's true that's true if anything we say it depending on on who the five stars are for we say it with a great deal of cynicism yes or or in some cases even fury or if the good review is for me um a reassurance that the review industry is finally getting a grip well this guy seems nobody's talking about at last a reviewer who knows their stuff someone with a brain yeah absolutely apologies listeners for any slightly weird sound quality I've had to do some

some DIY which means that all my stuff is in a big pile and I can't find the cable for the better microphone so apologies if I sound roomy you're repainting your flat is that right yeah and just generally clearing out loads of old shit and and it's a whole thing it's a whole it's amazing the shit you find i was

clearing out my wardrobe yesterday just getting rid of like a few bits of clothes and you know there's a napoleon dynamite t-shirt in there that i had at university i had i took to university that's like um that's like a gag dated piece of clothing you pull out of a box on a sitcom go whoa what were we thinking back then i loved that t-shirt so much it's my favorite t-shirt there's probably loads of photographs of us back in the day when i'm wearing that t-shirt i think i remember that T-shirt. It's purple with like the yellow outline of Napoleon Dynamite on the front. Oh, yeah, I do remember it.

Yeah. And I mean, I was holding on to it for sentimental reasons. Yeah. There's so much stuff that you dig out where you sort of go, you look at it and you think, well, for fuck's sake. And then you remember the kind of, the last time you did a clear out, the fact, the only reason that the thing you're looking at was saved was a kind of feverish, but what if I want it later? Yeah, yeah, exactly.

I, more and more, I have more and more sympathy with hoarders. I sometimes generally get the thought of like, well, maybe next year i'll lose 80 pounds what if i what if i weigh the amount of child weighs then i could wear this i could catch a wasting disease and it would be bad but at least i get to wear this t-shirt again. So I'll actually really regret it if I don't save it now

and I get a sort of wasting disease. What if incredibly scuffed shoes come back in fashion? Are you painting the flat yourself? Yeah. Well, no. It's a whole thing. I'm doing a lot of it.

Oh, okay. That's impressive. It's impressive. I've never done that. I would say never, ever do it if you can get someone else who you trust to do it. Because it's fucking shit. Really? It's so shit. I don't

know if I've hated anything as much as I've hated all this painting. I hate painting. You're using the little roller thing? Oh, I've got rollers coming out my bum. I've missed a roller over here. I've got brushes. I've got rollers. I've over here and what do you hate I've got brushes I've got rollers

I've got trays huh what do you hate about it what's it's it's absolutely exhausting the amount of pressure you have to apply

with the roller to get make sure you get all the paint out you're like it's like huh I thought that shit

would just fly off no because you you you you end up just if it gets covered in paint and like the initial thing does you know paint comes off onto the wall but like those brushes are like there's like an inch of absorbent material there like that's where you got loaded up with paint so you don't have to keep dipping down and you're trying to paint towards the top of the ceiling and you it's like a fucking disco workout you've got to load it up with paint so you don't have to keep dipping down. And you're trying to paint towards the top of the ceiling. And it's like a fucking disco workout. You dip down to the floor, get some more paint. Go back up to the highest your arm can possibly reach.

And then at maximum arm extension, apply maximum arm pressure. Try not to get paint in your eye. And you've got more range than most. So actually you're doing fewer iterations than most people have to do of this act of this action yeah well it's and it's it's hellish as well because the new paint is the old paint was off white and the new paint is off white so the other reason that it fucking sucks is that unless you have daylight unless you have a certain like number of hours in the day you can look at the the paint in daylight you can't see if you've fucked up a bit right you can't see where the new paint starts and the old paint begins yeah because under under like like kind of yellowish internal light bulbs

like without daylight off-white just looks like off-white and then then like the sun comes up and it's like this patchy fuck nightmare you're gonna have to bring in like a uv light like they used to look for um jizz stains yeah i'm gonna i'm gonna be a i'm gonna have to be like a csi investigator and the crime is my own shit painting like it would have been so much easier if I was painting the wall brown yeah or like green because it's like well is that bit green

no well I'll put more green on whereas this is this kind of sort of mercurial nightmare where I just thought well maybe it is maybe so why are you repainting the same color just just to freshen it up it's not it's not the same color it's a different off wide oh okay that's that's the worst thing it wouldn't matter if it was the same color it is a different color but right okay okay but only so like so slightly different yeah so it's different enough that

in daylight looking now i can see patches where i've missed like easily see them and in other light you won't see that is the point so it's it's shit it's really shit and you've got to try and and you've got to put on everything. And that takes hours to tape everything. I would say almost everything about it is fucking wank. And I hate it. And as I was saying to you before we started recording, well, I didn't explain how, but I went to a friend's birthday thing on Saturday in their garden. And because their garden is a classic like

we don't own this garden london garden it's all overgrown and and you know long grass and and random bits of garden furniture and stuff yeah um and i got bitten by a bunch of midges and i think some ticks and i think i have to go to the doctor and get some antibiotics because i don't want to get lyme disease they're getting all infected now yeah yeah lyme disease is a fucking it's like it's like a myth this is like a fantasy disease i'll say to you it's like it's like something you catch in morrowind in the elder scroll series or something it's like you're like I lose one, I get minus one health point for the, forever. It's incurable.

You get minus one health forever. Yeah. Just because you got bitten by that rat in the King's Dungeons. That's it. Minus two energy, minus one mana. Yeah, yeah. And like Lyme disease is a crazy thing where if you don't catch it in time, it's permanent. Which is mad in the 21st century.

It is insane that there's this thing where you go, well, I was hanging out near some cows, and now I have a forever disease. It's so, yeah, it's peculiar. But yeah, so head down to that hospice, go check it out. Yeah, well, that's the thing as well is that I think I'm more... Well, I did that kind of like double think thing where the bites were i don't do well with midi bites anyway but these were getting pretty bad um and i thought well you know you're south african so you're like over sensitive to tick

bites because they're so dangerous in south africa or they can be and like my dad had tick bite fever and was really really sick with it isn't that when you're really into tick bites it's when you only want to have sex with tick bites yeah he's got tick bite fever he's got tick bite fever tick bite fever has taken taken control of london's fashionable west end yeah and then an interview with a tory member of the house of lords going has taken control of London's fashionable West End. Yeah, and then an interview with a Tory member of the House of Lords going, it's the corruption of our youth. It's immoral.

The music seems to drive them insane. It's really funny when you find all that stuff about jazz where people talk about it like it's fucking voodoo yeah yeah uh um yeah so it's been it's it's so basically it's it's yeah and then tonight uh it's it's it's a busy day got some bud pod and listeners that is how much bud pod means to me is that i will literally listen to this before seeking medical advice. That's right. Record this, rather. He will jeopardize his own HP

to make sure Budpod goes out on time. I will jeopardize my own health peers. Which is how I measure my health. Because neither rain nor snow nor sleep nor snow

nor dead of night or whatever it is yeah will stop this pod in its appointed bud midge bites are freaking horrible as well you never see them coming I swear the smaller

the bug the smaller the bug, the bigger the bite. In Malaysia, we get these things called horseflies. You get those in England. Oh, do you? Okay. Well, horseflies, it's like they actually take a little chunk out of your meat.

Well, they don't have a proboscis, like a needle-faced thing. They're horrible horseflies because they slash you like with they look like fucking scyther from pokemon they slash you open and drink the blood from like the wound jesus no they're real pricks yeah calm down horseflies yeah well we found um because you know i moved to the isle of man from south africa and there were a bunch of other south africans there well we found um because you know i moved to the isle of man from south africa and there were a bunch of other south africans there and we found that um the locals and like people who are from like scotland or whatever but they were kind of okay with midgie

bites because they grew up with them whereas the south africans broke out and like you know blisters like they had a really bad time so you can actually it was vice versa for mosquitoes sorry it was vice versa for mosquitoes so like you know so you can actually build a kind of immunity to them it seems like it i mean i don't know i don't do well with midi bites generally but these these have really these are these are bad enough that i'm willing to believe that they are something else. Hmm, yeah, well, get them checked out anyway. Oh, yes. Yeah, and so my life is sort of a bit chaotic. And, of course, tonight, and by the time you listen to this, it'll have been on for one night. This week, listeners, Tuesday to Saturday, I'm doing the Camden Fringe.

Saturday, I'm doing the Camden Fringe. Camden Town, my Camden Town, where Pierre does jokes. You should totally go down, PodBuzz. I'm going to go tonight for the big opening night. That's right. Every night at the Camden Comedy Club on Camden High Street. Man, I haven't been there for so long, Camden Comedy Club. It must be like two years plus now.

Yeah, I mean, it must be, mustn't it? It was illegal. Yeah, it was illegal for a long time. Yeah, like a speakeasy. I mean, hopefully people are going to come just generally, but we'll see. I've just... Sorry for being distracted. I think I've just seen two Tesco employees sprinting after a thief. Wow.

What? Yeah, it happens. It happens. Apparently it's always meat or booze. Meat or booze meat or booze i um in the m&s little m&s food near me i once saw a guy as i was coming in just as i was coming in there's a guy sort of walking towards uh the exit but with the food still in the basket so it wasn't in um a tray and it wasn't in a bag it was in a basket And so that looked a bit odd.

And so, and one of the employees caught this guy and which started being like, uh, sir, excuse me, sir. And once he knew the game was up, he put the basket down and picked up what was in it and just ran out.

Yeah. And, and the thing went, bah, bah, bah, bah, bah,

bah. And the guy, and the guy was like, ah, Hey, come back. Um, but what he had the guy was like, hey, come back. But what he had in there was genuinely... It was like a loaf of bread and an apple.

I mean, it was like fucking Aladdin. And it's like, let him have it. It's a loaf of... The guy can't afford a loaf of bread. He can have a bunch of them. Yeah, that must be like total... It could be less than two pounds. The guy can't afford a loaf of bread He can have a piece of That must be like total It could be less than two pounds

Yeah And it's not like it was five bottles of Smirnoff It was literally like bread and water But meat and booze You say is the most commonly Shoplifted item Certainly according to the Talkative guy who seems to run our tesco

i did see a lady expensive i guess they're relatively expensive in the supermarket yeah i did see a lady try and flee with sort of like more than one chicken i think that was more like that was less like aladdin and more like a thief in The Beano. Yeah. I'd love to see someone run out with a steaming apple pie. I'd love to see someone with frozen chickens, like throwing them to an accomplice, like really long great rugby passes

spinning it spinning through the air like when the fly half throws the rugby ball so hard that they have to like dive onto the floor to get that power behind it yeah whole fucking goose just

cannons through the entrance. I like your description of the guy as well. We're like, he's kind of going moving with the basket. And the guy's like, sir, sir. And it's like, as they turn around, you realize there is zombie. Yeah. Yeah. This gradual realization that something irregular is about to happen

i love how in zombie films they're so like before they realize there's been a zombie breakup they're so polite so they're like sir sir you can't bite people here sir sir you can't be moaning the word brains and biting people on the neck, sir. Sir, if you bite one more person, I'm going to have to call security. Sir. And then they turn around and they've got an eyeball missing and no teeth. And they're like, oh, my God, sir, are you okay? Yeah, they're still, sir, we're not going to get you to the hospital.

sir, are you okay? Yeah, they're still... Sir, we're not going to get you to the hospital. I guess in America, it's perfectly believable that someone would be in that state before they'd venture to the hospital. Yeah, it only makes sense when the guy who looks like that

with one eye hanging out and then goes, please, I don't have insurance, no. The lady goes, okay, sir. The lady goes, okay, sir Sir, cannibalism is frowned upon here Oh boy Speaking of rugby

There's been some important rugby recently, hasn't there? For South Africa Yeah, British and Irish Lions playing the Springboks. Wait, wait, wait. British and Irish? British and Irish Lions, yeah. Is that one team? Yeah.

What? There's a British and Irish joint team? Yes, yeah, yeah. They're like the Megazord from Power Rangers. They form. They're like the Megazord from Power Rangers. They form. It's Scotland, Ireland, Wales, and England's nominally best players into a special one-off touring squad.

Really? Yeah, and they rotate between South Africa, New Zealand, and Australia in terms of where they go on tour. Okay, I get so confused with rugby because there are like 48 permutations of leagues and tournaments and and like versions you just need to ignore rugby league in my opinion no no offense to any listeners from wigan or australia okay rugby league is the one where the scrum is only five dudes

and you don't like rock and maul and push each other over as much. Is it gentler? Yeah, kind of. It's faster. The one you've heard of and the biggest one is rugby union. Okay. The one you played at school or didn't

is rugby union. Okay. 100%. A hundred percent. Right, okay. But then only for this one particular tournament do... It's not even a tour. It's just a tour. They just play three test matches. It's like a touring test match thing like you get with cricket or whatever else.

So it's friendlies? Yeah. I mean, you try and win the test series, so they play best of three. Right. Gosh, okay. So the British and Irish Lions get a team together. They fly to South Africa and they play three games against the Springboks and a few other games against random club sides or whatever, and then they go home.

That's crackers. So they play an international team and a couple of club teams. Yeah, and they'll play the international team, B team. It's more of a... It's kind of like a... It's like a fucking summer camp. It started... God, maybe...

I mean, it was definitely happening in the 1930s. It's very old. That is weird. Yeah, it is. It's a bit of fun I suppose A bit of rugger Yes it has been happening The first match

South Africa lost And I watched that in the pub And I was annoyed And then the second match we won really decisively And I wasn't watching that in the pub I was getting bitten by diseased bugs in a garden do you do you support british lions against oh or if british lions british and irish lions play south africa who you're rooting for well it's funny because i mean i support it feels different to support the spring box you know because of 1995

and Mandela and the whole thing like there's an emotional and political element to it whereas I think if South Africa played England at football at soccer I think I might support England right okay and cricket I don't know

because of the meaning right yes I see what you mean Right, okay. And cricket, I don't know. Right, because of the meaning. Right, yes. Right, right, right. I see what you mean. There's a sort of historical, emotional significance to the Springboks. And similarly now, there's a similar kind of weight to the England football team. Yeah, that's it. And cricket, I'm ambivalent so far so you know yeah i'll i'll

that that's kind of neither here nor there yet yet we'll see but the springboks seem to be the springboks are their own thing in my head because of that history and um because it's like the one sporting phenomenon that i was even aware of growing up. So it hasn't got a lot of competitors in my head. Yeah. I guess it's a little bit like the All Blacks, right? You don't really think of the All Blacks as like New Zealand. You think of them as the All Blacks.

They're kind of their own thing, their own brand. Yes, that's it. Yeah, they've transcended something um and yeah and it's also like growing up it's one of the few things about south africa that people will talk about in a positive tone that isn't um nelson mandela yeah yeah yeah sure i get you yeah So that probably added to it over the years, I'd say. And it's funny. Sometimes a certain type of British person will be quite disappointed

if you don't support the Springboks. Why? Because they want a bit of fun of observing a South African person supporting the Springboks? No, not even like while a match is on. I mean, just if they ask you like they might just ask you oh oh did you support the spring works then and you go and sometimes you go oh you know they go oh like they want a bit of conflict they want a bit of you know hey oh right i get you i get you i get you they want you to be authentic enough that they can enjoy

talking to you i don't know yeah i, I get you. I totally get you. Yeah. Do you have any sports nostalgia memories of any kind from Malaysia? Not really. I mean, again, it's kind of like sort of part imported, part colonial support for England during the World Cups and stuff. Yeah, yeah. And in general, people were like, you know, they're rooted for England. But Malaysia is not, you know, aside from Badminton, Malaysia is not really a big sporting nation, really.

And it's not... not really a big sporting nation really and it's not I mean people play sport but it's not been that successful on the global stage with any particular sport aside from badminton and badminton is not something exactly

you don't go down the pub to watch badminton or anything, it's not something that really brings people together well you know I'm sure somewhere out there is an incredibly violent badminton firm yeah with like stainless steel shuttle cocks and they just throw at each other yeah that's it face tattoos oh man badminton is harder than it looks, I'll say that. Yeah.

Yeah, it can get really quick. And what's... Yeah, the weird thing about it is you go... And then the shuttlecock will go... And then slow down. And so it's much harder to track its trajectory, I think. Yeah, I think that's it. And it's a lot more tiring than I would have thought because you have to hit it quite hard

you have to hit it harder than you think yeah and from the outside it just looks like two people sort of doing wafty dancing at each other sort of oh thwack you know it's very casual and then you play a game and you're fucking dying

yeah which is very casual and then you play a game and you're fucking dying yeah what do you what do you think is the sport that's the opposite of that that like looks the most insanely hardcore but is actually like oh this is okay hmm that's a good question um shooting yeah because yeah I mean I'm sure you know getting the aim right is hard but you know you're picking up a gun you're pointing it at something and you're pulling the trigger I wonder what's

yeah what is the one that looks hardest but is the not the easiest but like you're right the smallest gap between is difficulty it's perceived difficulty and it's the not the easiest but like but you're right the smallest gap between his difficulty his perceived difficulty and his actual difficulty yeah maybe like discus or something I'm trying to think

discus is hard man like the technique is hard though yeah like javelin I could never get to point down

I could never get it to point down as far as I was concerned it's cool the javelin is some kind of prank. But there are people who just throw it and it'll fly up and fall down,

like I suppose, and stick in the ground. And then I'd throw it and it would just go and just point into the sky and just fall on its side like that. It just wouldn't go anywhere. Watching people try to do the javelin growing up was the the most filled with disappointment and doubt i've ever been about medieval warfare and how realistic

those video games like total war are that's exactly what i was thinking about yeah yeah man because i was like really they threw these like a heavier version of this after marching for a day non-stop in armor they then threw this better than i can now completely refreshed yeah and you sort of think well i hope that these were much smaller because i guess in those days you just needed to like hit someone in the arm and they'd just get infected and die or whatever yeah yeah it's. It's not like in medieval times, like in order to make sure you infected someone until they died with the arrow, you just had to stick it in the ground.

You just poke your arrow in the ground and the fire at someone and they just die of disease. Fucking crackers. Useless piece of shit human body. Yeah. I wonder how often like yeah if you just got a scratch or something and they were like well it's only a scratch so he might not die and then you just had a fever for like three days and then it was fine and you're

like ah phew another scratch defeated and people like wow you're you're lucky man like Another Scratch defeated. And people are like, wow, you're lucky, man. People start coming and giving you little gifts, like hoping the luck will rub off on them. Yeah, you become a god in your village for surviving the Scratch. Yeah, the great Scratch of 04 or whatever. Yeah, it just, I can't't I always wonder like

because we're talking about you know whatever let's say 1500 years ago I always wonder like what they'll look back 1500 years to now and be like can you can you imagine like what do you mean they had to repaint their own wall? Yeah, I don't know

Oh, right Like Right What someone from 1500 years ago Would find No, no 1500 years in the future Sorry

Oh, I see I see, I see So yeah What someone Yeah, in 1500 years Will think is barbaric now Maybe just something like Well, just like any disease

Maybe by then They'll just be like Yeah, no We have lasers for that. Yeah, you caught colds all the time. All the time. What do you mean yearly flu?

Yeah. Maybe that'd be it. I guess it's impossible to... Maybe it might be energy. It might be like you were burning things to get energy. Like a fireplace. You'd have it might be like you were burning things to get energy, like a fireplace. Like you'd have enormous fireplaces in the countryside.

Yeah. You had a building just for some fire. You fucking idiots. Of course it's going to make everything hotter. Fucking hell. Yeah, that's probably it But they had nuclear power And it's like yeah but it made them frightened

Because They made them frightened Because one nuclear power plant was Fucked up by a dictatorship And another one was fucked up because it was built On an earthquake line in a tsunami zone And they go And these things happen in quick succession

It's like no they're like 70 years apart on an earthquake line in a tsunami zone. And they go, and these things happen in quick succession. It's like, no, they're like 70 years apart. They're like, what? They could have had all the electricity they needed with zero emissions immediately. And they go, yeah, but they preferred the big fireplaces. Yeah, energy is a good call. I think that's probably going to be it

yeah yeah hopefully sometimes people are like it'll be meat and then nah it'll be energy no we'll figure out the meat thing yeah yeah it won't be it'll just be like um everyone's just going to be having meat that's grown in a lab. And if on like special occasions, they'll be like, we've, we've got it from an animal. And everyone like, Ooh.

Yeah. God, that, that is, I do think that sometimes like getting an actual chicken will be, you know, 500 pounds. Yeah.

Or it'll just be like something that it's like very pretentious. Yeah. It just be like something that's like very pretentious yeah it'll be like you can really taste that it's from a thing that was alive instead of the the bio chicken yeah you can you could really taste that this meat doesn't come from the dome yeah maybe be like buying raw milk or something like that. How that feels now. Yeah, it'd be as hard to find as unpasteurized milk. You can get it, but it's a pain. Yeah. I don't know why you'd want to.

I don't know what the appeal is. It's dangerous milk. Taking a sip of full fat pasteurized milk that's good but it's not dangerous I want my milk to have an element of jeopardy to it I want milk that can fight back not this milk toast milk I want milk with a punch Not this milk toast milk.

I want milk with a punch. When I have my milk and toast, I don't want milk toast milk. I want milk that could milk me back. Milk toast is surely the strangest word I've ever seen. Because it's spelled M-I-L-Q-U-E. Toast. Is it from a comic strip?

Oh, really? Milk toast? I'm half remembering this now. I think there might have been a character called, like, Lame-ass Milk Toast. Not there, you know, whatever. Alan Milk Toast. But it was like a character who was like a weak little bitch. Right.

I only ever encounter it in sort of slightly sassy political writing. Yes. Milktoast. Origin. Yes. Wow, well done. 1930s, from the name of a cartoon character Casper Milktoast. Ooh, and what's

Casper's deal? Is he a little bitch? Is he a little bitch? Is he a little bitch he's a little bitch he's a little bitch a timid or feeble person so Milktoast that's what it is so Caspar Milktoast oh yeah so he's got like glasses he's got a silly little hat

and it was in a he was the star of a cartoon series called The Timid Soul it described Caspar Milktoast as the man who speaks softly and and he was the star of a cartoon series called The Timid Soul. It described Casper Milquetoast as the man who speaks softly and gets hit with a big stick. That's good stuff. That's a good description of a person. What's he like?

I guess you could say he's the man who speaks softly and gets hit with a big stick. Or like Milquetoast. Yeah, he's a bit of a Mil he's a bit of a milk toast figure well i did not know that's i'm so glad because yeah when i saw the word milk toast it's like someone wanted to write milk and toast but changed the spelling of milk so this makes sense um do you know but you know the roosevelt quote about carrying a big stick not well enough so it's it's it's speak softly and carry a big stick

ah okay so that's a play on that yeah so that was that was like a way of describing his preferred version of america's foreign policy which is speak softly but at all times have the enormous power of the american military behind you yeah Yeah, okay, okay, okay. Right, that'll be it then. I think it was Roosevelt. As in Roosevelt, Teddy Roosevelt, I think. Big softling carrying a big stick. So milk toasters out there getting stick to pieces for being such a little

bitch. What would speaking softling carrying a big stick sound like? If it was me, I'd just be like, this stick is so heavy. I have such a heavy stick. Excuse me. Clunk. Could you clunk?

Help me with this. Clunk. Big stick. Sorry. Could you just move aside? Sorry. Can I just squeeze past? Yeah, I've just got a very big stick.

Sorry. Sorry. Sorry, sorry, sorry. I'm just calling to ask if my stick would fit in your overhead compartment. What is the widest? Could you look it up for me, please? Is the big stick too long for cabin? The people in the cabin don't have to pay extra for the big stick too long for cabin The people in the cabin To have to pay extra for the big stick

How big Would an old man's walking stick Be for you to have to start saying That's no stick, that's a staff Well I guess a staff Is about length, my mind instantly went to like How thick and round, you know How wide would it have to be before I go

That's a log Because sometimes you know how wide would have to be before i go that's a log because sometimes sometimes like there are these oldie styley walking sticks that are like you can tell they're a piece of wood they're from like a small tree yeah right or like they're from branch or something but yeah how thick can it be before you're like he's got an ant there. Your fingertips aren't even touching each other when you're holding that thing. But I guess like for staff-wise, I guess

it has to be below the shoulder, right? A walking stick. Once it gets to shoulder height, once it gets to shoulder height, that's a staff. Yeah, once it's going above your kind of parallel elbow, you're starting to look a bit like a wizard.

At a certain height, you are just a wizard. Yeah. I think that's also something that Roosevelt said. At a certain height, you are a wizard. With a big stick. Yeah, at a certain height, you are a wizard and

carry a big stick. Yeah. He was a weird guy, Roosevelt. How so? He was obsessed with... He was a war veteran a war veteran for one thing which is unusual for a modern president i guess um and he was a like an he was obsessed with like hunting and shooting things and he was kind of like um heming. He was like a Hemingway-flavored nutter, you know?

Right, right, right. It was also weird because he was a Republican, but he was progressive and smashed up all the trusts. He was the trust buster, all the railways and the monopolies. Because he was a proper capitalist Republican in the sense that he was like, but there can't be capitalism if there's no contest, as opposed to just I think Google is great or you know

Facebook or whatever yeah and they're talking about you know they're talking about similar antitrust laws coming in about them breaking them up like because yeah I mean Google is now

the fucking... What's the big American rich guy? Carnegie, you know, they're fucking... Yeah, man. Yeah. Just a complete domination of society and... Just history repeating itself. Yeah.

I think did he do I think he might have started National Parks as well Carnegie yeah he was a big old philanthropist as well

wasn't he no I mean I mean Roosevelt sorry oh Roosevelt right yeah he started

US National Parks um oh was he the parks guy I'm pretty sure he was like a state has to have so much parkland or something or like was he the

guy who started some protection laws and stuff um oh no actually it was older than that oh oh wow parklife

he was big speak softly carry a big stick Oh, wow. Park life. He was big. Speak softly and carry a big stick. National park life. National park life. National park life. It's a very, like, it's weird, isn't it, that all these people who were, like, as old-fashioned and rich and insane as the insane rich people we have now, even back then they were like,

well, of course there should be a nice big park for everyone. Yeah. The Overton window, as it's sometimes called, on parks has definitely shifted. Yeah. Yes. Yes, absolutely, yeah. Whereas these days it's like, well, I mean, in a way, a virtual reality park is better in your biopod. The Google Doodle is what we get now.

The Google Doodle is, that's their parks. We get a Google Doodle and we get Facebook memories. we get a google doodle and we get facebook memories yeah we we we are permitted to laugh at mark zuckerberg's insanely sun-creamed face and weird barbecue oh i mean do you remember the weird barbecue. Oh, I mean... Do you remember the weird barbecue? Where he was like... He looked like he was being... It looked like he was pale from fever and malaria

and being held at gunpoint. By big ribs. And he was talking about these sticky baby back ribs. I can't wait for these ribs. So weird. Your impression of Zuckerberg saying ribs is one of my favorite impressions in your arsenal. Ribs.

Ribs. You gotta try my ribs. The Napster guy has put in some seed funding for my ribs. He's so unsettling. He's a weird guy. He's a weird guy. There isn't a single normal billionaire, to be fair. Yeah, yeah.

I don't think it's possible. You have to be a weirdo. The closest you can get is maybe someone a bit kind of goofy like richard branson yeah we haven't talked about billionaires in space billionaires two in space the sequel to billionaires um yeah billionaires in space i i it's it says a lot about how fucked up and insane the american billionaires are that now we kind of kind of see richard branson as relatable a man who owns an island yeah branson's like the the everyman billionaire he's the people's billionaire he's

only has he got like a mere double digit number of billions or something? Yeah. He has so few billions that it would only take 10 million years for a normal person to make it, which is pathetic. As we all know it's pathetic. Yeah, they were just going to space, which is quite sinister. I

always wonder why. Have you run out of stuff to do on Earth? Is that it? Yeah. Is your life so good you've run out of stuff to do on Earth? Is that it? Yeah. Is your life so good, you've run out of stuff to do on Earth? Because space has never really appealed to me. I don't really care. There's nothing there. Yeah, the clue's kind of in the name.

It's space. It's true. It's literally some space. Well, my younger sister pointed out that it would actually be easier to colonize the ocean floor and sort of have an underwater city if we're worried about climate change than it would be to have a moon base. Right, is that true? Yeah.

Atlantis time. Atlantis. Facebook Atlantis. It'd be fucking terrifying though to live with all that water above you oh yeah I guess it's not as terrifying as living in space

either way you have to pick a billionaire to be the dystopian lifetime president of wherever it is I'd love an Atlantis. It'd be sick. It would be cool. Very fresh fish. Yeah, that's it. How would you go fishing? Would you just

open a valve and whatever flowed in? You'd have to open your window really quickly and try and snatch it before you killed everyone. I guess that is the... Sorry about that. I guess that is the sorry about that I guess that is the

advantage of the like underwater the ocean to land like you couldn't

like living just on land you can't just reach out of your window and and grab a lamb unless unless you live on a farm you can't just reach out and grab food and just grab an edible animal but in the sea you sort of can yeah yeah maybe not i would like to like you'd have to

eat those those weird like angler fish with the lanterns attached to their brains yeah it's either spiky goblins or blobfish blobfish yeah well it wasn't you who pointed out that they only look like that because they've been pulled out of the sea and yeah they were deep pressure for really high pressure so they're basically exploding when they come up to our level yeah yeah it's like if an alien looked at a human in space and they're like why are all their organs flopping around outside their face what What a stupid design. Yeah. Yeah, I think blobfish... I mean,

blobfish is never going to look good, but I think it looks more dignified in its natural habitat. Yeah, that was my first thought when I saw a picture of a blobfish with his big eyes and his big bulbous nose. I just thought, how undignified. For God's sake, blobfish, have some self-respect. Cover up, Blobfish.

If you want people to take you seriously as a fish, try some ribs. Some ribs. Well, I'm going to go seek medical attention, Phil. Yeah, I don't think we've ever finished a podcast yet with one of us going, well, time to go to the hospital. No, we haven't. But, you know, this is another box ticked off

after a live having COVID podcast. I can't wait for next week's episode live from the emergency ward yes the next the next week bud pods soon to be infamous gunshot episode um but we wish you well pierre um get those blood tests bless bless you get those antibiotics hopefully yeah is it a bacterial Lyme disease yes yeah you want the you want the anti-B's

you want that anti-B okay great well all the best good luck alright and good luck to you and I'll see you tonight hopefully yes yeah see you at the show bye everyone else and I'll be at the, hopefully. Yes, yeah, yeah. See you at the show. Bye, everyone else. See you at the show, Camden Fringe. And I'll be at the Edinburgh Fringe.

The Edinburgh Fringe. It's back! It's back, dammit. 13th to the 19th. It's back, baby. And it's more dystopian than ever. 13th to the 19th, Monkey Barrel, Edinburgh Fringe. Okay, thank you.

Bye. Bye-bye.