Do Go On - 433 - The Hunt For The Spy Who Betrayed Australia

Episode Date: February 7, 2024

This week we're joined by award winning investigative journalist, Joey Watson, to tell us the tale of his three year hunt for the spy who betrayed Australia. Full of intrigue and mystery, strap in for a wild ride! This is a comedy/history podcast, the report begins at approximately 11:30 (though as always, we go off on tangents throughout the report).Check out Joey's podcast 'Secrets We Keep: Nest of Traitors'Support the show and get rewards like bonus episodes: patreon.com/DoGoOnPodSupport the show on Apple podcasts and get bonus episodes in the app: http://apple.co/dogoon Live show tickets: https://dogoonpod.com/live-shows/ Submit a topic idea directly to the hat: dogoonpod.com/suggest-a-topic/Check out our merch: https://do-go-on-podcast.creator-spring.com/ Check out our AACTA nominated web series: http://bit.ly/DGOWebSeries​ Twitter: @DoGoOnPodInstagram: @DoGoOnPodFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/DoGoOnPod/Email us: [e-mail] Check out our other podcasts:Book Cheat: https://play.acast.com/s/book-cheatPrime Mates: https://play.acast.com/s/prime-mates/Listen Now: https://play.acast.com/s/listen-now/Who Knew It with Matt Stewart: https://play.acast.com/s/who-knew-it-with-matt-stewart/ Our awesome theme song by Evan Munro-Smith and logo by Peader ThomasDo Go On acknowledges the traditional owners of the land we record on, the Wurundjeri people, in the Kulin nation. We pay our respects to elders, past and present. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Melbourne and Canada, we got exciting news for you. And we should also say this is 2026. Jess, what year is it? 2026. Thank God you're here. Right now, I'm in Melbourne doing my show with Serenjai Amarna, 630 each night at the Cooper's Inn Hotel, having so much fun. We'd love to see you there.

Canada, we are visiting you in September this year. If you've somehow missed the news, we are heading up Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto for shows. That's going to be so much fun. Tickets for all this stuff, I believe, are online. And I'm here too. And welcome to another episode of Do Go On. My name is Jess Perkins.

And as always, I'm joined by Matt Stewart. Oh, Jess. What a pleasure it is to be here. That seemed so genuine. It really is. Very genuine. I'm worried that Dave is missing. But, you know.

Missing assumed alive. Yeah. I always like to assume alive. I've got optimism bias. and I choose to believe he's alive. I think he's just dropped his phone somewhere and that's why he's not replying to us. But don't worry.

If he was here, I'd ask him the question, how good is it to be alive? Yeah. Great. Because I am. Yes, exactly. I definitely am. I'm definitely alive.

Don't look into it, he'd say. Don't look into it, yeah. Matt and Jess are fine and, yeah, do not look into it. Don't look into it. They're not suspicious. They're not, they've done nothing wrong. They've done nothing wrong. And you can't prove it.

How dare you accuse them? Oh, yeah, where's your proof? he'd say, where's your proof? That's what he'd say. Prove it. You can't because I'm alive. And lots of people are already concerned that it's just going to be the two of us, which always descends into chaos, but they don't need to be worried because we are joined by an investigative journalist and podcaster, Joey Watson. Joey, welcome. Oh, hey, Jess. Hey, Matt. Thanks so much for allowing me to play the role of Dave. You are. Yeah, I've searched high and low for someone.

who is worthy to fit in his tiny shorts and you're that man. Now, Jess, she probably undersold you a little bit there, said you're an investigative journalist, sure, but forgot to mention you're an award-winning investigative journalist. Thanks for bringing a bit of class to do go on, because we haven't won any awards. Oh, get out of here. I did once get a trophy for mum, so that was nice. That's nice, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's harder to win prizes as an adult.

Yes. What we do, what you should do is what we do. And every year we have the Dogo Honors. It's an awards show entirely based around this podcast where we then just give ourselves a bunch of awards. So that's nice. You should try that. Yeah, okay, that's really, really good. We got a team of three here as well, my executive producer, Ellen, and Jake who's hovering around outside somewhere. So, yeah, maybe we could do something similar. You don't need to, Joey, you won a Walkley Awards. A Walkley Awards like a proper, that's the top journalism award in Australia.

That's a good one. Isn't it? It's also one of those awards that was named after a bad person so that he could sort of whitewash his legacy or something. Is that right? Yes, yes. I do believe Mr. Walkley, he was involved in the oil business maybe. Oh, you know.

Okay. I mean, ever, well, like, yeah, I didn't, that's not that bad. Oil business, I put essential oils on every other day. Do you? Is that a thing? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. That's why your skin is burning off. Oh, that's right.

Pure essential oil. Yeah, I put, yeah, crude oil on my skin every other day. I find that to be, that's one of my essential oils, crude. But Joey, you have a brand new podcast. Before we get stuck into today's episode, you've got brand new podcast. By the time this comes out, it launched last week. So congratulations. Do you want to tell us a little bit about the podcast?

Yeah, I'd love to, Jess. Thanks so much. So for as long as I've been a journalist, indeed, for as long as I've been a human life form, I've been obsessed with spy stories. Of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, growing up, it started with James Bond and the last. like, but you are Dave.

I was like, you're the perfect Dave filling. Oh, shit. And then when I became a journalist, I wanted to start kind of taking on espionage-related stories and intelligence agencies as my kind of line of inquiry, but partly because, you know, these are very powerful institutions. They hold a lot of power in our democracy and they are worthy of scrutiny and and public inquiry, but also because these are really cool stories, like they're full of mystery and intrigue and strangers, everything you'd see in a spy movie, but in real life,

it's even more bat shit in some ways, as I've kind of found. So over the last few years, I have endeavored it to tell a bunch of Australian spy stories through radio features and the like, some good. some bad. But as I did so, I started to notice a patent. And that was that a lot of Australian spy operations, particularly during the Cold War, which is the period mainly in which this podcast is set, ended in failure. There was a pattern of failure. And as I started to probe around for a theory as to why that might have been, I was presented with one. That was that during the Cold War, Australia's main spy agency, Azeo, had been penetrated by a Russian mole.

One of their own spies had turned to work for the enemy, sabotaging the agency from the inside. I also learned that they had never been identified. They'd never been found. The truth might have been buried. And so about three years ago... That's what moles do best. They bury. They bury.

They love to bury. Yeah. So I said how to find this little critter. And when I started, people said it's a terrible idea. It will send you round the bend. And I'm fine. Everything's fine. That's great news.

Everything's good. Isn't that like a sign that you're on the right path when people start warning you off? Don't look into this. Actually, unless it's Jess and I saying don't look. look into Dave, then that's... That's true. Don't look into it because he's fine. He's just dropped his phone in a puddle.

He's okay. Yeah. In other circumstances, though, it's normally like, oh, what are we on to here? People are telling me not to look into it. It makes me want to look into it. I imagine as an investigative journalist, that'd be just get you all barred up when someone tells you to avoid looking into something. I like that idea.

Yeah, there was, as the investigation goes on, in particular in the later episodes, people do start to get a little bit upset and they start doing some funny things that maybe we can talk about when they do to kind of shut the story down. And because they were getting upset, I also got a little bit upset. And people were saying to me, no, Joey, you're doing a great job. If you're upsetting people, that means you're doing the right thing. And I wonder how far that you can take that logic. I wonder how many jobs that applies to. I don't think there's many other than journalists. If people are really, really upset, you're doing the right thing.

Yeah, imagine, yeah. No, but I just feel like if I carried that to its full extent, it could take me to some terrible places. Like I just defame the whole country and step on everyone. And get every single fact wrong. But I'll say to myself, oh, I've upset you, but that's because I'm doing a great job. I'm doing a great job.

Ooh, I've really upset this judge. He's sending me away for love. I must be on the right path. I'm doing the right thing. That's, yeah, good, good on me. Yeah, no, but that, so you get the idea. Yeah, you get the idea. But anyway, we, we, I think, on balanced,

perspective upset maybe the right people. Okay. Yeah. At the right time. And so, Putin. We've upset Putin. Oh, he's so, he's so, because, you know, he's all the release. Yeah.

Oh, God, he's just, no. This is it. Oh, could my day get any worse? He said. First, I spill coffee on my jeans. Now jeans. He's wearing jeans, obviously. No shirt, though.

He's on horseback. Sipping on his coffee. The horse is gone. horse has bucked a little bit. Oh, good. What a day. And wait till Lee here's I've been on do-go-on. Yeah. That'll really, oh, that'll really do it for him. He'll be really upset. He's having a bad time. Um, all right, well, this sounds really intriguing and exciting. The podcast is called Secrets We Keep. If people want to go check it out. Yeah. Yeah. Secrets we keep nest of traitors. Love that. Nest of traitors. Because this is season two. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Season one was a different

presenter, Amelia Oberhardt. This is about forced adoptions. It's excellent. It's really, really good. And this is a different time of season. Well, if it was so good, would they have gotten the ass for season two? Matt really understands how things work. You know, so.

Or is it, was it a budget? It was like Brendan Fraser on Georgia the Jungle too. They just couldn't afford them for the second season. Matt only knows podcasts that run for 400 plus. episodes and never end. It doesn't quite understand that some stories can be contained to, you know, only a number of episodes. Well, yeah, yeah. What are you two talking about? Is it about me? Yeah. Let's just hope for another mole, right, so that I can get commissioned again.

Yeah. God. I found one, but there's another one. Fingers and toes crossed for you that there's another mole. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or another, yeah, yeah. So let's get, like, let's get stuck in. I'm excited by this. We normally start with a question. I don't know if you have a question for us or if you just want to get stuck right into the story. Yeah, we can get into it.

Yeah, get stuck in. Yeah, because you guys, you know a bit about spy stuff because you've done quite a few espionage related episodes. So you kind of set the scene and maybe you're listeners too for the world that this exists in. Yeah, they love a spy story. listeners, so they're going to gobble this up, they're going to love it. Yeah, especially war, most of them are wartime spies, which I guess that is most spies, aren't they? Yeah. They're probably out of work in peacetime. Yeah. They're just, they become gossips. Oh, yeah? The Cold War, Matt. Yeah, that, oh, that, that, that, you think of the

Cold War as being peacetime? Oh, sorry, it's in the title. Yeah, okay, so it's 1992 and We're not starting in Australia. We're starting in the fine city of Riga in Latvia. The Soviet Union has just collapsed. Europe is awash with uncertainty. New nations are forming that were formerly in the eastern block. Latvair is one of them. And this bloke, older bloke, kind of spotted beard, comes in wearing an overcoat to the British Embassy.

He's carrying a bag of groceries, some salami. He asked for an audience with a diplomatic staffer, which he gets, and from below the groceries, he retrieves a sheaf of documents. Those documents were just one little taste of what was probably the biggest intelligence coup that the West got during the whole Cold War. This guy's name was Vasily Matroken, He had been an archivist for the KGB, the KGB being the feared spy agency of the Soviet Union. And he'd become pretty disillusioned with the system that he was serving.

And over about 30 years, he had put documents, KGB documents into his shoe, and smuggled them out of the KGB archives and hid them under the floor of his suburban log cabin in the outer suburb. of Moscow. Is he wearing clown shoes to work? And nobody's picking up of this guy's suss. Wow. Yeah. Some stinky documents.

I do like that he's walked in with a bag of groceries. Yeah, I was thinking the document might have been his shopping list. Yeah, and he's like, oh, wrong one. Hang on. Milk, eggs. Salami. Don't tell anyone. That's what the Russians are after.

Wow. Even KGB spies are going to do their groceries. Yeah, they've got to eat. You know? There's still people. Hello. It's a great cover, though. No, one suspects a shopper.

No, they don't. No, but these documents, they were good. There was good stuff in there. Like, for example, it gave the clues to the locations of hidden caches, caches. I know the word. I've never known how to say it, cach. I think both are accepted. Cache.

Hidden stashes. You've got caches. How, content. Continental that were like hidden throughout Europe. And they went and they dug in the forests in Europe like in Belgium and stuff and they found them. Anyway, so there was good material. But amongst the pages which were smuggled out of Latvia to the UK, 11,000 documents or something like that. There was a section on Australia.

And in that section on Australia. Oh, man, what a thrill. That would have been. What a thrill. What a thrill. What a thrill. What a thrill. They're talking about us.

We love it when they talk about us. Where are it? Really? This is a real world stage coup for the Aussies. Look at us go. They're talking about us up there at the KGB. Isn't that where the Ramones play? Woo!

Yeah, that's the... Yeah, crazy, right? Yeah. So a little section on Australia. So, yeah, the good folks at ASIO, when they found out about this, would have reacted exactly like that. They would have been...

so stoked. Holy shit. Yahoo. Honestly, they would have been freaked out. Yeah. They know about us? I reckon the guy, like, what are the three guys in there? Kevin would have pulled up his pants, I reckon.

Pulled up his pants. He would have pulled up his pants. He was that excited? Where were they? Oh, Randy's uncle. I think we might have a different kind of understanding of Aesio than you probably do, Joey, but... I just see. That's how relaxed he was.

He has a pants down. He was like, oh God, I've got to get into gear here. That's actually wildly accurate, almost suspiciously accurate, Kevin with the pants. And there's a good chance that if he was there during the Cold War, he probably would be pissed. Right. Yes. Which we talk about in the podcast, but we can get to that. So anyway, in this section of Australia.

Big drinking culture during the Cold War, was it? It did. And so when we start to ask the questions of how could this have happened, one answer, is grog. They were drunk at the wheel. You know who I would have been most suspicious of? The guy I drinking the vodka. Everyone else has got Bundy and Coke.

Yep. And so one guy's got vodka. Yeah, he's drinking lemon rushkes. He's like, mate. Some little sauce going on here, mate. Got it's have a vodka with the lads? No. Yeah, so there's a document that mentions Australia.

and in it it says that provides pretty comprehensive evidence that Australia, that Azeo, you know, with Kev and the lads, had been penetrated by a Russian mole. One of the Kebs, well, he was able to his pants on. Matthew. Yeah, he'd been working for the other side. And potentially sabotaging Aesiodic.

you from within. Wow. Right? Sorry, Joe. I'm just starting to worry that they're going to take your Walkley Award off you after this. Can I do that? Yeah, if this is the thing that does it, I would be more than happy. I think, yeah, as far as my friends are concerned, this is the most prestigious thing I've done.

Thank you. The Walkley's for mum. This is for the mates. And when you brought that up, is it because of the Kev with his pants down? Is that the one? Is that what they put in the document? I think it's just sort of the general. I think, you know, the general vibe so far. And who's mostly been contributing to that? Well, I don't want to point fingers. Well, I'm going to say it's neither of the J's.

I will not name names. I think Joey and I have been very professional so far. Well, you are the two journalists in the room, so that makes sense. Do you know that, Joey Jess, is a qualified journalist? What's the qualification? A degree. Oh! Yeah.

Yeah, okay, maybe not qualified. From like 10 plus years ago, never actually did anything in journalism, but do have the piece of paper. So if you have any questions, mate, you just come straight to me, bud, don't you worry, I'll look after you. How was it? What did they tell you? They said, P's get degrees.

That was the big one. If it bleeds, it leads. Obviously, you'd know that. You probably have that tattooed somewhere on you. Who, what, where, when, when? Who what, when, where, when? Two when. Two whims.

It's important to reiterate when it happened. And don't defame anyone. That's sort of the main things I took away from the degree. All right, let's hold them closely as we go forth. So I don't have to relinquish said Walkley. Exactly. But there's a mole. What was the one about bleeding?

If it bleeds, it leads. If it bleeds, it leads. If it leads, it bleeds is very different. That's all of a sudden anyone who's on the front page of the paper is meeting an accident. Yeah. Very different. So what they do, right, is it's figured after this realization from Matroken, who had the documents in his shoe, that Azo couldn't be in a position. to be accused of investigating itself.

So the AFP are brought in to conduct an investigation. The Australian Federal Police brought in some 200 officers, one of the best resource investigations in AFP history. Wow. Comes in, and they call it Operation Liver, liver being the organ that cleanses the blood supply of the body. Someone spent a lot of time coming up. that one. Or it was a completely accidental, perfect title for the operation and the first

episode of the podcast that I'm sure they anticipated being made about it by a boy journalists some decades into the future. They said, one day, a boy journalist will talk about us. So they need to give it a really good name. So it's a good title, right? And yes, and so the AFP came in. They set up in Asia's headquarters. This is like cops, investigating spies. I'm told that they drunk the ASEO office bar dry on the first day that they came in. They led to lots of funny encounters. I got told by one AFP cop that he kept a like a joke book, you know, like I'm just writing down funny things.

And I don't know. That guy's name was posh. But I feel like, yeah, I don't know if it was cop humor, but he, I got to ask him to tell me one. And one of them was like, oh, well, there was one ASIO spy that came over to the desk and introduced himself. And he said, oh, good a mate. What's your job here? And he said, oh, my job is to keep Russian spies out of ASIO. And then they said, oh, well, you're fucked then.

And he told me this joke like, like it was the funniest thing like he'd ever heard. I was just like sort of looking at him. Anyway. That's a good joke and that's worth writing down. I like it. What you just did is exactly what I did. Like I looked at him in silence. And then when I realized that that was the joke, I sort of started with the, like one of those ones.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's a think of that one. Yeah. Took me a sick to get it. That's good stuff. Yeah. So, anyway, that didn't end up getting in the podcast, so I'm glad I got to tell it to someone. Yeah, so they come in and they create a profile from the mole around two clues.

One is that the mall had a five-letter surname. This is based on other information that they had coming out of Russia in the year previous that I kind of go into a bit later in the podcast. But they had a five-letter so name and had a wife who worked in Azeo. Oh, wow. So they whittled down a list and they start to focus on one guy. And his name was George S-A-D-L, S-A-D-I-L. Yeah, we're both counting. Okay. I was going to say George is at six.

Surname, sirname, this is why you'll never be a spy. You've got no attention to detail. Well, this is, this was the cops, though, right? The spies are the ones getting done. I hope the cops had set up a custom guess who board for this. Yeah. Got a wife in the thing. Yes, yes, yes, yes.

Because you actually studied criminology. That's right. So I assume this. We're a good pair for this episode. We used, really? guess who was a big part. Dave studied drama. He would have been useless here right now, but you got a journalist,

well, we've got a proper journalist, a backup journalist, if you need, and we've got a criminologist. And if you think your degree's stale, Bob. You're 100 years old. Yeah, yeah, I'm hoping. Because when you go five-letter surname, sure, A-ZO's got a lot of people in it. That's probably a lot of people. I'm seven letters.

I'm out. I'm safe. W-A-T-S-S-E. Yeah, it was Sun, Watson, hello. W-A-T-S-O. That's six. That's six. Yeah, yeah, you're right.

Never mind. Ah, he's good. He is very good. Never mind. You set him up in a beautiful chap there. I've deflected that one before. Yeah, no, God, that would be a great episode seven reveal if I was the mole. You've done a whole podcast on yourself.

And then I realized it was me. No. But five-letter surname would be a lot of people I would imagine, but I don't think there'd be that many couples. So surely that narrows the list down a fair bit. George was not a spy, but a translator. He'd been recruited to ASEO in the late 60s. So at the time, ASEO did phone taps and buggings on KGB spies

or suspected KGB spies that were scattered. around Australia, usually in the diplomatic staff, like, you know, under the ambassador level of Soviet people in Australia. And they needed someone to translate the doc, like all of these phone conversations because it was a very white Australian organization at the time, much like Australia itself at the time. And so George was what they call a white Russian. He wasn't like an anti-communist Russian. His dad had fought the his dad had fought in World War I, his uncle had died trying to fight against the Bolshevik Revolution back in 1917.

He'd ended up in Sydney via Shanghai. Anyway, like I've kind of a fierce anti-communist his whole life and it worked for ASEO for 30 years and didn't really care that much about spy stuff, but was sort of like, you know, it was an honest job. He'd been a cop when he got recruited in the 60s. Anyway, so George is also, I will say now, a sort of friend of mine. I originally, I found him at a Russian Orthodox nursing home, and I originally contacted the

receptionist who said that they wouldn't get me in touch because it would upset him. But then I wrote him a letter. I got a nice stamp, and I put it on there and shipped it off. And we met for Parashki and coffee, and we've done so many times over the last year. He's a very sweet older man. So you're friends with the spy. You're in bed with a Russian spy. Okay.

This has all been a sting operation, mate. And you're on tape. How old is George now? You won't believe this, but I am wearing a wire. He's in his late 80s. Yeah, wow, cool. So what happened to George was they started to surveil him. They focused, the AFB moved into a house across the road from where he lived in suburban Canberra.

They cleared the bushes so that they could install cameras in their front window and film him in his living room. They started tailing him. They put another camera in an air conditioning event above his desk at ASIO headquarters. And what they found was that what they found was something that was quite strange. So for a long time, George had been listening in to the conversations of a particular Soviet diplomat. His name was Vaiserslav to Taranov. and he had been a trade official. And he'd done two postings in Australia in the 80s,

and George had spent those postings listening into his conversations. But in the early 90s, when the Soviet Union fell, and communism, the Russian Federation was formed, religion was no longer banned, this dude to Taranov started coming to George's church and attending church services, and him and George became really, really good friends. Like, you know, Sunday lunches, despite the fact that George had been listening into his personal conversations for the last 10 years.

George says he never told to Taranov that. But yeah, but they became really good mates. What a great advantage. Right? In terms of starting up a friendship, you know his likes, you know his wants. I know, but what if you accidentally let that slip? Oh, that's true. What if you were going to go like, oh, what are you telling me you're allergic to that?

And he's like, I've never, I've never told you that before. I never told anyone that. I think it's a slippery slope. It's dangerous. It takes the Instagram stalk to the next level, right? It's a whole other thing. Yes. Yeah.

But yeah, they became mates. And he even became godfather to Taranov's son when he wanted to be baptized into the church. So it was very... Yeah, you're right, Bob. It's so stressful. I think about any of those, you know, like Donnie Brasco or any of those movies where someone's undercover in the mafia or anywhere. I'm like just on edge and they make you think all these moments

you're about to be uncovered. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's his life. Jeez. Yeah. But he thought of himself as a genuine friend as well. Genuine friend. Yeah, yeah.

And I asked George, so you got like your new best mate and friends with the family and everything and you never mentioned to him that you'd been listening. to his conversations for the last 10 years. And George said, no, it doesn't come up. Wow. He didn't ask me directly. I never lied about it. Yeah, if he said, hey, have you been listening to my phone conversations?

I would have said, yes. But he never asked. So why would I tell? I've never thought to ask like, just a couple of quick questions. Joey, Jess. Have you been listening to my conversations privately? Yes. Yes, I have tapped your phone.

Okay. You are very dull. That's just a lot of me not answering Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a lot of you not answering And a lot of just like logistics chats You know, like, oh, he's under the bank again Yeah Begging for more money

Please It's so sad I'm good for it Oh god, I can't get listening to this It's so embarrassing Yeah, wow, that's fascinating So they became good mates Yeah

They became really good friends, right? And so that was really, really suss for Asio and for the AFP who were investigating George. And so after a period of close surveillance, they came in for the arrest. George was arrested in late 1992. And when the AFP got to his house, they found a... a whole bunch of classified ASIO documents laid out in his living room, which didn't look good for George. No, I don't think.

It's not the kind of job you should be taking homework with you. Yeah, I think you're supposed to leave the files at home. I mean, at work. Okay, that's where you get mixed up. Yeah, okay. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it didn't look good for George because he didn't have a good work-life balance. Yeah, exactly.

That's why it's good for George. George, at 5 o'clock, mate, you've got to just leave it. behind. Go spend time with the kids. Yeah, otherwise it was completely fine. That's the end of the story. The moral is... Have a bit of a balance. Switch off at the end of the day.

Go hang out with your Russian friends some more. Get some hobbies, yeah. Wow, okay. All right, so this isn't looking good for George, if I can be honest. It's not looking good for George, right? So the George is arrested and over the like, A few months later, the investigation, sorry, the committal trial, the committal hearings get underway, it goes to court.

And what the AFP basically needed to prove was firstly, so they'd found evidence that George had taken documents home, that was illegal. But in order to prove that George was a traitor, they firstly needed to prove that he'd been passing those documents to Tatarinov, that to Taranov was a KGB spy and that this KGB spy to Taranov because his cover was just being a trade official and that that KGB spy to Taranov was therefore like taking the documents back to the Soviet Union and sabotaging the national security of Australia.

To do this, they brought in what might be one of the strangest witnesses I've ever heard in the, history of Australian courts, which I don't know that much about. I'm not really qualified to make that statement, but it's certainly strange. It's a dog. Please tell me it's a dog. Okay, so I tried to get the court documents for this committal hearing, and it was a bit of a hassle. We had, we kind of had to go through Canberra Magistrate's Court, you had to pay a researcher in within the court for their time. And, you know, we wanted transcripts. We wanted stuff like that to be able to tell it properly. I did it with my editor, Claire. And when they came back, the file was empty. There was nothing there. There was no record in Canberra other than in, like, newspaper reporting from the time.

That this ever happened. Like, this, you know, what I'm about to say ever happen. So I had to kind of reconstruct it by talking to the people that were involved or like the prosecution, the lawyers, all this sort of people. Again, this must feel like you're getting, you're onto something big when you're finding evidence deleted. Right? That's right. Well, there's that old like, you know, conspiracy or cock up.

But let's just say this isn't the only time that documents seem to have mysteriously disappeared over the course of this investigation. So there you go. Yeah. So basically what happened is they bring in this guy who they refer to only as Witness A. Witness A is a ex-KGB spy Russian defector. I'm told that he had to wear a mask.

George says that he had to have his nails painted. And they built a kind of circus tent. What George described is as a circus tent, I think it was just a screen, in the court. so that he couldn't be identified. So he was like a voice appearing from behind a screen in court, which is strange. It's just a strange thing to happen in an otherwise, like, relatively open court setting.

That was really weird. Also a bit of a sad reflection on what George thinks of as a circus. Yeah. Just a screen. A screen. Yeah. He goes to the doctor. there's like a privacy screen, he's like, oh, the body circus in here.

Here we go. This is just from my childhood. Here we go. Fun and games. Here we go. Yeah. But think about the joy that that would bring to everyday life. That's true.

Everything is possibly a circus. Anytime you see a curtain. Every wall, every screen. Whoa. You'll be taken back. Can I just go back one minute there as well? Why did he have to paint his nails? Yeah, that's what I was interested in too.

maybe a really identifiable nails. I didn't interrogate that one. Maybe that's for another podcast series. But look, that's just what George said. George said he had to play in his nails and wear a wig. But the reporting at the time definitely says that there was a screen. But I don't know. Anyway, there's some inconsistencies there around that particular detail.

But like, the takeaways, they didn't want people to know who this guy was. Yeah. They really didn't want people to know that. Anyway, so he was the guy that could, because he was some KGB, apparacea, he'd been at the KGB headquarters in the Lubyanka in Moscow, and he could say that to Taranov, George's mate, was a KGB spy. And so he came to the stand. It was kind of a big deal. and they started interrogating him.

George's defense lawyers started interrogating him, cross-examining him. And he said, well, if you know to Taranov so well, what does he look like? And he's like, normal. And then he's like, you know, he looks like a little guy. Normal guy. Normal guy. Average-ish. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, and then the defense lawyers say, you know, can you say anything more? Does he have glasses, a beard? What color is his nails? Yeah. What color is his nails? What color is his nails? I stand by that question. Yeah, and then he's like, normal.

He was normal looking, right? So you kind of get where they're going here, right? it didn't really sound like he knew him, at least in the eyes of the court that day. And so that evidence, which was pretty crucial, was dismissed. So to Taranov, I mean, at least in the eyes of the court, was probably not a KGB spy. Although in the following year, six diplomats, Russian diplomats, were very quietly expelled from Australia, and I'm told that Tatarinov was one of them. I'd heard theories. I tried to track Tatarinov down so that I could kind of try and investigate this a bit further.

I had heard one story that he had been in L.A. after the Cold War. and tried to make it big in Hollywood. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I'd been approached by a studio. No, he'd been approached by the Russian mob. Oh, wow. He'd been approached by the mafia.

And when he declined to work, they were, he was sort of knocked. I couldn't prove it. I'd heard that theory from a few different sources, but I couldn't prove that to be true. I did find a number for his daughter and called her, but she didn't want to relive this episode. So, yeah, so we don't. know whether he was a KGB spy or not. But to use that to try and pin George for treason, it didn't really cut it.

Yeah, but, okay, yeah. So, so there was no, yeah, okay, there's nothing sort of tying. If that guy didn't know what this supposed spy looked like, he's probably maybe not a spy. Oh, it's very interesting. But then why did George have all the documents? Yeah, so he's still in trouble for that, right? That's still illegal.

Yeah, he did. So he was convicted for that in the end. Wow. But he was let off for being the mole in Azeo for being the traitor. It was ultimately decided that he didn't fit the profile. Yeah, because he didn't meet one of the two things they needed him to meet. He didn't have a wife in there. Yeah. Like that was what they had two boxes to tick.

And they ticked half of them. And I'm not convinced that it's surname being five letters anyway. I reckon Kevin's the guy. K-E-V-I-N. Yeah. Kevin's over there with his pants down. Why are we investigating Kevin? Yeah, I don't know.

He's a loogey. I've just blown this thing white open. I think I'm going to have to re-script some of the later episodes. Yeah, yeah. Oh, shit. I hope Kevin doesn't go to ground when he hears this podcast. We've scooped ourselves. George contends to this day over Poroschki and coffee, by the way.

My friend, George. So you're in this too deep, to be honest. Is that, I mean, is that ethical for you to become friends with the key player in this story? Yeah, it's a kind of professional friendship. He's very charming. How suspicious. He seems to have a way of kind of, yeah, he sort of charms the Russian ladies at the Poroshti stand at his nursing home.

It's very warm. Anyway, yeah, so, but George sort of contends to this day that the documents on his living room floor were just documents he needed to try and plan his retirement and that they weren't classified national security documents. I still haven't been able to confirm that. But ultimately, in the eyes of the court, he was not the mole. And in the eyes of me, he was certainly not the mole. And as I get towards the end of episode one,

I start to think that maybe George Shadil was just a patsy, a cover up for a much bigger story that then consumes the last. few years of my life. And yeah, that's, that's sort of where, that, that's what I came to think, that, that, that, that, that, he was sort of hung out. And after that, it was a very public embarrassment. It was very embarrassing for ASIO. It was sort of like quite a highly publicized trial, got attention from overseas. And it, the trial itself was like kind of an advertisement. We have a mole. And then not being out of pinned George to deal was an advertisement for, we haven't been able to find them.

And so after that, ASEO took the mole investigation to ground. They did everything that happened after that point. Don't take it to ground. Now you're playing on the mole's home. They've got the home advantage. If anything, you want to take the mole investigation of the skies. Yeah. They should.

They went in the opposite direction. Yeah, that's a good point. That's a good point. Yeah. Yeah. I reckon, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Asia started digging. Yeah. So that's what, that's what happened after that. And that's sort of where I followed it from there on. You're not leaving us with a hangover, a hangover. A cliffhanger. Cliffhanger. Tell me you're not leaving us with a cliffhanger.

So George Siddell, he's not our guy. He's not, he's a good guy. He's your friend. I feel he's my friend. I'm still not sold on him. Matt takes longer to warm to people. Where do ASEO go from here? What do they do now?

Okay, so they've got a bit of a dilemma on their hands, right? There's sort of a lot of pressure from overseas. Part of the story here is that ASEO has access to all sorts of material from the CIA and MI6 because of our intelligence sharing networks called Five Eyes. And so there's a lot of pressure on ASEO to kind of do something. thing, right? And it's really actually political pressure. So the prime minister at the time is Paul Keating and it falls to him to act. Paul Keating appoints a guy named Michael Cook to conduct a top secret investigation into ASEO's moral problem. Michael Cook had been

Australia's ambassador to the USA. He'd also worked in intelligence briefly, so he kind of knew that well. It was extremely well connected. His daughter had dated Obama at one stage. Oh, okay. Bracca. Yeah, Barack. That's well connected. The Obama. Yeah, it apparently went on to become quite successful. I've heard, it's definitely a name I know, but I'm not super politically engaged. So, but yeah, I've heard the name, heard the name. Yeah, he played, he played AFL in the 80s, I think. Yeah. That's right. That's right. Couldn't quite place him. That's right.

Yes, yes, yes, yes. It's like the demons or something, I think. Barack Obama. Yeah, the big O. It's a center half forward or something. Yeah, that's right. Is that a footy position? I don't know.

Definitely a center half forward. Yeah. From that guy. Yeah, so Michael Cook comes in and he gets to kind of hand pick who he's going to work with because by this stage, Asio has no idea who can be trusted. There's possibilities after the failed trial of George Cedill and possibilities that I find out in the podcast kind of go way back into the Cold War that the mole probably wasn't working alone and that there was probably more than one. Wow. And so Michael Cook starts getting into it, uses his contacts overseas to get access to all the intelligence that they got over in the US and especially stuff that might help with Australia's mole hunt like Russians that are defected to the US. from the KGB guys who defected to the US and might be able to tell him something about Australia

that would help to build more of a profile. And he produces a report and it's called the Cook Report. And it might be one of the most secretive documents in Australian history. Everything is redacted. Because more, more, more. it's never seen the even briefly the light of day. I'm told that only one copy was made and it was circulated with Keating and some of his senior staff. And like under the Archives Act should have been public 2014 or something.

I think it's 20 years after it was created. So 2014 would be 20 years. It wasn't. There had been legal cases mounted to try and have it released. It's such a funny name for a secret report by a guy called Mike Cook. Yeah. I'm called it the Cook Report. Yeah.

You can call it anything you want. Cook Report. Cook Report. Yeah, so people have made legal action to try and get this, like, public as it should be and still nothing. That's right. And so I'm kind of like over here being like, what's in the cook report and what's it going to say about Azeo's mole problem? and you've got to listen to the phone. No, no.

And I'll tell you what I think it says. So there are kind of theories out there and I centered down, I whittled them down to one source. And I can't say who that source was, but he's a guy that worked in intelligence. And in the podcast, he has the code name, Wasp. That's a good code name. Which is great.

And he lives in Melbourne, not completely unlike yourselves. Holy shit. Yeah, okay. Let's not give any more details. I can't say who he is, but he has a red beard and is known to wear hats. Yeah. What does Wasp Sam for again? White Anglo-Saxon Protestant?

Protestant. I grew up Catholic, so born. You're fine. You're fine. I'm a wask. He's also got an apartment full of orchids. Oh, okay. Orchids have a special place in the spy world. They are, in some ways, a spy's favorite flower.

This goes back to a CIA intelligence chief who kind of lost his mind in the early 60s named James Jesus Angleton, not part of the podcast. but they love orchids because orchids rely on deception to survive. What do you mean? How does a flower rely on deception? Yes, indeed, sexual deception. Oh, no. So the wasp, the orchid gives off false fragrances to that mimic the pheromes of,

a female wasp and then the male wasp is attracted to it comes and starts to get kind of tries to to get it on with the flower and gets pollen sacks stuck to its feet and then flies to another orchid and deposits the pollen there because pollen because they don't like it's not like with other flowers where the wind can do it because they're kind of separate to each other. Whoa. Yeah, and there's an orchid. You can look it up. I think it's native to the UK.

It's called a bee orchid, and it's got like this petal in the middle of it that looks exactly like a bee. And bees, they try and... You got it? I've looked it up, and it does look like a bee. Wow! Yeah, and so they're coming in...

The male bees are coming in trying to stoop it, and then they end up just accidentally. repollinating. Wow. This is the most interested I've ever been in a flower. Yeah, me too. Yeah, and it's made orchids like one of the most

successful flowers in the world. Like they exist on every continent except Antarctica. So the good old fashioned like pollination through wind. And the guy code named Wasp. Loves orchards.

He's got an apartment full of them. Yes, yes. Yes. And he's fucking him. He's tricked by him. And he can't stop fucking lose orchids. I wish he'd warn me before I take sips of water that you're about to say stuff like that. No, that would be ridiculous.

Yeah, okay, so now we know where he gets his nickname from. Yeah. Fucking orchids. Yeah. No, he's good. But anyway, so a lot of the reporting around what's in the Cook report, I kind of trace back to him. and he is an eccentric fellow, if that's not already apparent, and has been described in many ways as a conspiracist of sorts.

So I met him and the orchids and his cat, and he told me that the Cook Report contains the name of four suspected moles. And when Michael Cook identified them and handed it to ASIO, instead of trying to prosecute them, because they'd seen how messy that had been with our collective friend George Sadil, they instead retired them.

They kind of let them go out of the organisation with full pensions. And as one former intelligence officer puts it, dispersed them around the Commonwealth. which made the investigation even more difficult than I think it was going to be. Jeez, that sounds like the way to go. Can you accuse me of something so I can retire on a full pension? You don't want to know what I'd accuse you of, mate. Okay.

Is it orchid related? I would ruin it. Yeah, it's orchid related. You get home and there's just hundreds of orchids at your place. Oh, no. And a knock at the door? I. And I've paid for the orchids on your card.

Yeah. And my pants happened to be down. This was a setup. I know the second you walk in your front door, the pants are down. Pants are down. It's all I can do in public to keep them up. Honestly, this belt's not too good. So they find four moles and just they don't, they don't punish them in any way.

they're just like, off you go. They're like, we failed once. We can't. Yeah. It's embarrassing. We can't do that again. Okay, okay. So, so, so, but, but here's the thing.

This is coming from a conspiracist, right? Sure. Okay. So when you say a conspiracy theorist, that's like a conspiracy theorist. Yeah, yeah, sorry. Sorry, yeah, conspiracy theorists. Like people have sort of said, you know, I, I have much affection for Wasp. He reminds me of members of my own family.

And we both, like, um, Bob Dylan sure say no more I have affection for him too but anyway but I can't obviously

just sort of take everything he says because of because of his eccentricities yeah yeah exactly so you're taking it

with a bit of a granite so then I go on a quest to try and prove this theory and what I do is I I try and contact, for example, Michael Cook is dead. Okay.

I try and contact Paul Keating. He is alive, but he still hasn't called me back. Okay. Good as dead. Dead to you. I've saved my number. Dead to me. Dead to me.

I'm dead to him. I've saved his number in my phone with a brain emoji, and I hope that it will ring. Wouldn't it be good if it rang now? That would be sick, actually. I'd be like, I'm sorry. You're going to have done to answer that. speaker. You're live on here.

Yeah, so poor Keating not willing to talk. Imagine you get to talk to him and he gives you one of his classic put-downs. He was the king of Zing in question time. Imagine being on the end of one of those. Yeah. I want to do you slowly. That was one of them. Called John Howard.

Something like is, yeah, the spine of death. desiccated coconut or something. That is pretty good. If you just cover up with that on the spot, that's pretty good. Yeah, yeah. It's good. No, it is good. Yeah, but not, alas, no response.

So Keating's in a circle. I kind of speak to them. One of them says, give me the older. I can tell you, but I'd have to kill you. I think it was joking, mostly. And then, so then I have to get creative to try and confirm what this wasp has told me. Please tell me you catfish someone.

I don't think ethically as a journalist you can, but tell me you try. You found out the kind of ladies poor catering likes. That was some horrendous storytelling for me. I literally just like maximum intrigue to tell you the most boring thing I could possibly tell you. It was like, so I did something unbelievable, but you'll never, you'll never expect. It was to read Azeo's official history. How does his mind work?

God, he's good. That is creative. Look, it's what I would call a particularly, it's quite dense. It's three volumes, they're quite dense, and they were vetted by Azeo. So there are kind of allusions to the mole question, which even I'm told was controversial in the last chapter. of the last volume. They have a chapter called Looking for Moles, but it doesn't really give me anything that I had already known.

But when it came out, when these chapters came out, these volumes came out maybe like five or six years ago, they were promoted by the authors saying that they had unfettered access to Azeo's vault and all of the documents that Aesio had.

And I wondered if that included the Cook Report. So you catfished the author As Michael Cook I said hey Did you read my report My name did you read my report Why did you think

Would love some feedback Did you try that The ghost of Michael Cook Oh that's right he's dead I went full Hamlet Oh you read my obituary Yeah that was a work of fiction That was a sire

Avenge me Avenge me Yeah go full Hamlet I love this What a sire op man Did I use that anywhere near correctly? I don't know. Yeah, psychological operation.

Okay. Say no more. That is in the podcast. It was very stressful, that part of it. It's in the, the siops are in the podcast. Disinformation. Oy, yo, yeah. It's bad.

But anyway, this particular part that I'm telling about now is true. And it remains true right to the end of the podcast. Yeah, it's true. So I contact one of the authors. a man named Professor John Blacksland, a fine professor at the ANU of international relations and history. He's ex-military, which is why he was allowed to have the security clearance. It allowed him to go into the vault to write the history. And he gives me an hour to come and interview him at his office in Canberra.

And I, lovely guy. another friend. You're just making friends everywhere you go. Honestly, is this, are you? You're too trusting. You're not jaded yet, are you? I reckon there's... Young and fresh still.

There's Walkley Award winners who are like 60 years old and they're grizzled. They're not making any new friends with their interview subjects, but you're making friends with everyone you meet. We've got to catch up and. We have to do this again. Follow me on Instagram. Let's get lunch. Love you.

Yeah, I'm not sure if John Blackson thinks the same way. I message him a lot. He's often traveling. Right, okay. Yeah, yeah, that's what he says. I messaged him to catch up a lot. He's often traveling. Let's just say that.

I'm traveling. But I love John Blackson. I think he's an austere professor. I listened to him on all his pod when he speaks to different podcasts. I heard him on a podcast last week. I loved it very much. He's smart. And so I go.

to see Professor John Blacksland and I ask him the question have you seen the Cook report? And John Blackson says, yes. And I say I say, what does it look like? And he says, it's a hefty tone.

And I say, it's a comprehensive work. He says, it's a, he says, Michael Cook was a fastidious officer. And then I say, to him, I've heard that Michael Cook identified four ASIO offices, and that they had to be, there was four ASO officers that were suspected moles,

suspected of working for the KGB, and instead of going after them, they let them go quietly. And Joe Blacksland says, more. More. This is like a movie. They never just give straight answers.

It's always like a riddle or, you know, yeah, you're looking in the right direction. Well, why don't you just tell me the exact direction? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, he says more. He says, he says, they had to get the tentacles. They had to go after the circles of influence.

And so there was more than four that were quietly retired. And then I said, why didn't they try and prosecute them? And he said, the evidence wasn't there. They suspected them. they had a bunch of evidence that suggested that that would have been them, but they were worried that it wouldn't stack up in court. And so they covered it up. And he's gone on the record saying this.

It's in the podcast until this comes out, until this comes out before the podcast and then we get an injunction from ASIO. Wow, so we've got the scoop here. We've actually scooped your podcast. You've scooped your own podcast. podcast here. That's awesome. Oh man, I'm quite literally on the edge of my seat here.

I'm loving this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love. That's good. Oh, man. The drama of him saying more. Yeah. That's exciting.

And then him actually like filling in more details. I'm like, oh, that's so good. Don't tease us. Yeah. What's his name, John? Don't tease us, John. Yeah. The use of the word tentacles.

I love it. Yes. And then circles of influence. Is he talking about the little circle plungers on the the tentacles? Yes. Yes, that's what he's talking about. And there's heaps on his tentacles.

There's heaps. They get a lot of work to do. Whoa. A lot of complicated animal metaphors going on. It's a bit of a theme. We got wasps and orchids and tentacles and circles. Yeah, there's a lot happening. Ah, the beautiful circle.

My favour of the animal kingdom. Yeah. Yes. So that, yeah, and so then I kind of think even more that we're going on back to George Cedill, that that was not the real story. Yeah. That was more going on there. And so then I go and I hunt for names. That's absolutely freaking wild. So great. So then I guess you go, you go on the hunt. You go looking, did you find any, any moles? Or friend, more friends. Or more friends. Did you make any more friends? Okay, okay. So I realized, mole friends, I realized that that was the extent of like my

lines of inquiry had ran dry in Australia, in our country that is for a democracy, very secretive. And so I felt like I had enough ammunition to kind of like paint where I saw the story sitting. It was a bit of a nightmare. I thought one was hard, but multiple. extremely hard. Also, Ayo didn't have enough evidence to prosecute them. They also probably thought it would look a bit ugly. You know, I'm just a boy. What am I going to do? Like, how am I going to find evidence? We should tell listeners that Joey is 13. Sorry, have we not mentioned that. Yeah, this is a school project. Joey is a little boy. He won the schoolboy Walkley Award.

I have a, like, a Scooby-Doo complex. I don't know, like, I've just, I've like, identify with mystery ink. Yeah. I would be if I wasn't chasing spies. It's a great way to keep me off the grass. Wait, no, but you're that damn kid. Yes. They would have got away with the two or not for you.

His damn kid. Yeah, yeah, but like as I'm, you know, like, I'm, I feel like, yeah, that's going to start. Like, I'm going to keep using it. I'm just a boy, but as I, you know, get older. You'll be 52 going, well, just a little boy. I don't know. I'm just a little boy looking for friends. I'm just a boy journalist.

If it wasn't for you meddling man. Yeah. Passage of time. Okay. So, so, so, so. So then I think, well, I've got to try a different line of inquiry. I need to go overseas. I need to speak to people who have worked for the enemy.

People who have worked for the KGB. Very different. to get into Russia these days. That's tricky. A lot of those sources had tried up. We do try. We have quite a bizarre experience in episode seven trying to do that. It involves the Honey Badger. Sure. Nick Cummins, the former Bachelor contestant. Anyway, I just drop that one there. Was it, and did he, he played Rugby Union for Australia or not quite? Yeah. He did. No, he did. Yeah. Yeah. What an interesting story he is.

Should we do a report on him? He ended up as the bachelor and now a jock salesman. He's done it all. Yeah, in the non-rugby states, he's more known for his jocks, I think, than his playing. It was a wallaby. But yeah, I'll remember that. I forgot he was also a bachelor. Yeah.

He's done it all. The big three. He really has. Triple three. The egot. It's the egot of Australia. That's right. That's right.

So, wait, how was the honey badger involved? in this story. Oh, well, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a sideline to what happens to me next. But I'll tell you just quickly, the Honey Badger comes into it because my leads tend to focus, start to narrow in on a particular former KGB spy who'd been stationed in Australia in the 80s. His name's Lev Koshlovov, and he was quite a fierce operator for one of I understand around Canberra.

And he was KGB residents. So he was like the head KGB guy in Australia in the 80s. And he became quite successful when he went back to Russia. He became the deputy director of Ereflot, the Russian airline, you know, kind of oligarch vibes, if you will. What was his cover story in Australia? He wasn't here like in his own little KGB office. He was a press attaché.

Right. This is his cover story. Yeah, so he was a media guy. But he wasn't really. He was a spy. So there you go. Anyway, I sort of see that he's talking to Russian opposition media, which there's this one guy. The echo of Moscow was a big radio station, and that's been shut down by Putin,

but some of the podcasts still exists. And I see that he's talking on some of those podcasts, including kind of dropping some hints about his time. Australia and then I find his Facebook, Western Facebook, not Vietam Tucker, the Russian Facebook, the Mark Zuckerberg stuff. And he, and he's posting a bunch of kind of subtle dissent, like, about Putin, like, very subtle. And because he's like living in Moscow. Putin's a great president, I guess. Very subtle, but I'm picking up on it. I don't think he does think Putin's a great president. would do great in Moscow.

Have you considered... No. Anyway, I'm going through his Facebook and there's a post about his Labrador that has to wear little booties in winter. He posts like odes to his Labrador. And then I'm just like scrolling down. And then there's just like a post like the shared

of the Honey Badger. Jock salesman, Bachelor rugby player. Rescuing a baby lamb. Okay. And you're like, okay, I'm making a note of this. I've seen that video. This feels relevant.

Yes. The honeybag. Quadriple threat. That's where it's the ear got. Yes. Yeah, yeah. Like, this is pretty late in the story. And by this stage, I've like started to kind of lose it a little bit.

Sure. Because I have been existing in a world of deception for quite some time. And, um, uh, and I decide that that's the bat. signal to me. You're in deep. Yeah. Gee. Yeah.

I did not expect the Honey Badger to be getting involved. No. Neither did I. I went down that tangent though. That felt right. That felt good. Yeah. So anyway, to go after the names, back to the Cook report, to go after the names, I go

overseas, I contact some KGB sources who are defected to the West. Most of them don't reply because, you know, you know, Putin's resurrected an old KGB tradition of poisoning people in the West, and he's gotten kind of even more intense since the invasion. And so a lot of them don't reply, but one of them, you know, I won't take it personally, but one of them does. And he's anonymous, but he points me to a former British parliamentarian, a retired Tory MP named Nigel West.

It's not his real name. His real name is Rupert Allison. And he says you should look into an upcoming book of his. And Nigel West, so Rupert Allison was a politician. His name now is Nigel West, and he publishes novels about Spycraft. They're kind of very dense. They're dense academic reads. But buried in an upcoming book, which is now no longer upcoming,

I find some name. and I sort of of suspects and he then kind of gives me some more names and I get a very neat list of four that kind of corresponds and corresponds with what I've heard about the Cook Report and then I start tracking down those four names and I find out that at least one of them is still alive and I go to speak and I go to speak. to them to try and find out more. You met the moles? I met a mole who was suspected, I met a former ASIO officer who was suspected in Nigel Westbrook of being a mock. But I can't name them, and this is something else that I have to navigate, because under Section 92 of the ASIO Act, it's illegal to name a former ASIO officer without the authorization.

We're fine on George because he's your friend for his name to be released. He's my mate. But yeah, but I can't name them. And so that becomes the sort of, yeah, that's sort of where the investigation goes to see where I can, what I can find out. Look, I can imagine that at the end of like, you know, this series of podcasts, seven parts, there's still a lot of like things that we don't know. A lot of like, there's still things that aren't quite tied up neatly in a little bow. Yeah.

Surely. But. Yeah, well, real life really does. Yeah, that's right. Tie up neatly. But, wow. And what a, how did it feel? How did it feel every, I imagine there were times of super frustration, but really

exciting moments, highs and lows. Yeah, absolutely. And times I wondered what I'd gotten myself into. Yeah. Yeah, I've used the words, world of deception too many times in this episode. Thank you for allowing me to do that. But it is, it is because... World of deception and dense reads.

Yeah, it's been a couple of those too. That's what journalism's all about. But that's good. I should get both of those tattooed somewhere. Yes. And it is. It's like it is a... Spies are masters of disinformation. The KGB is masters of disinformation. At one stage, I have to

engage with the possibility that the mole question itself might, maybe, maybe it was a KGB tactic to paralyzeo. Because if ASEO thinks that it's penetrated, then everyone inside ASEO becomes a suspects and people just victimize people that they don't like and it makes them makes it very hard to conduct their spy business. I do not, I do not think that that is the case, but I am kind of confronted with that possibility at least once in the podcast. And so, yeah, so, so definitely unresolved questions, but we definitely like sort of speak to people that are never spoken before and kind of find out things that. And these interviews you're talking about...

Otherwise known. Sorry. And those interviews you're talking about, you've been talking about, they're on tape in your show? Oh, yeah. We got spies in the podcast, yeah. Do you have to make their voices like... Or are they happy just to sound like they sound?

We go voice actors. We got voice distortion. We got that. Yes. Yeah, we got a great voice actor for one of the... The spy's a former spy name Swamp. His name is Swamp. If you need...

Swamp's not as good a name as Wasp. I like Swamp. It's got a lot of similar letters. Huh. I thought it... Yeah, I thought it was an anagram. I thought it was a clue. It wasn't.

It's not the same. The M. But the swamp... Yeah, I thought it reminded me a bit of Shrek. Yeah, yeah. Of course. That's what we all think of swamps now. And draining the swamp.

And draining the swamp. Isn't that what Trump's going to do? Oh. If he gets in. Drain the swamp. In 2018 or whatever it was. I think that was all about draining the swamp, I think. The swamp is Washington DC, I believe.

I see. Okay. I don't know. I've read a couple of headlines. I'm not reading dense texts. I'm not even reading brief texts. Unless you count headlines. Then, yes, I am reading those.

Thank you. Thank you. headline riders. No more questions. That will not be taking further questions at this time. Look, this sounds absolutely wild and I really want to listen to the whole podcast now. I do two and Joey can Jess and I'll be voice actors on the next one. Yeah, let us know if you need voice actors. I can do really deep. I can do deep, I can do high. I can do average, real average.

Yeah, I can do very somewhere in the middle. You know, if you need that guy in the tent saying, oh, just average looking. Yeah, we need that. Yeah, real average. Speaking, like, if you're doing, if you want somebody to sound like they're an announcer for the Bachelor, for the Honey Badger. Oh, yeah, great. I can do that a bit like, this week on The Bachelor, you know, stuff like that. And I could be the Honey Badger.

Hey, check out my balls. They're nice and tight in these jocks. Yeah. So you let us know if you need us. You've got our email now. That was uncanny. Yeah. Here if you need at any time.

second there I thought I was talking to the honey badger himself we are mimics yeah you're that good many talents many talents yeah well we had a bit even like some some chats amongst the team about voice distortion because I'm of the opinion that voice distortion very cool yes agree and

my my supervising producer Jake you know who I love very much Would you call him a friend? God, no. Absolutely. He, not as close as George, but, you know, he said that when he hears voice distortion, he laughed so hard that he spat his tea.

Right. So I, but I surveyed, I surveyed a bit. I think like, you know, it's a spy podcast, right? Yeah, you've got to have a bit of it, I reckon. It's not about cyberbullying or, you know, it's good. It's good. You want to close your eyes and picture them as a silhouette. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, the magic of audio. So the podcast is called Secrets We Keep, Nest of Traders. It's out now. There's seven episodes coming out. Joey, is there anything else you want our listeners to know, anywhere else they can find you, follow you online, anything else you want to tell them? Yes, I want to tell them.

tell them that it's called a nest of traitors with a tea because I've been like speaking to a lot of people about it and it's become a bit of a thing in the team that people think it's nest of traders because of the Australian accent. Yes. And like people that have like actually worked closely on the project have kind of been like how's nest of traders going? And, it was just something I picked up on. Okay, good call, yeah. And we have a lot of American listeners as well, so it's good to make that clear to them. Traytors.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's something I've been working on. I've been working on that tea. Anyway, that was, what else have I have to say? No, I think I just have to say, thank you so much. This has been a really, really fun time. You guys, you guys are funny. Thanks. That's what we contribute.

While you do all the work, you do three years of investigations, and we sit here going, this guy probably has sex with an orchid, and that's how we get paid to the big bucks. So happy to help. Yeah. With your... Yeah, I'll make sure I'll put that in my allegations to ASIO. Joey, was your Walkley Award for your Everyone wants to be Fuhrer? Is that what it won for?

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And that was about what? What? It was about a guy's journey to radicalisation in and out of the far right. Right. I'm going to say it.

I'm going to say it. He's my friend. Joey, you've got to be a little less trusting, mate. But that said, let's catch up for lunch. Yes. Add another friend to the list. Sorry, Joey, I'm travelling. No, but Joey Watson, thank you so much for being on Dingo on, bringing us this story.

It's, yeah, like we were saying, it's really unique to have the person who's done all the investigation telling us the story. It's really exciting. There's some cliffhangers, but I reckon our listeners will have loved that. So thank you so much. Please come back after your next three-year investigation concludes. Yeah, we'll see you in three years. Yes, I'm going to try. and find out what happened to Dave.

Yeah. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. There's nothing that happened to him. He's just, he's just, he's just at home. He's just in his home. He's just in his home, Joe. We wouldn't want to want you to waste your time, mate. Don't waste your time, mate.

That's three minutes. You just, and it's open shut. It's not really worth. Wait, actually, here he is now. Oh, I'm Dave and I'm fine. Don't look into it. There you go. There you go.

There you go. So, no need on that. He was actually here all along. I think we're losing you. I think we're losing you now. All right. We've said goodbye to Joey. We just had a brief pause then to really cement our friendship with him.

Yeah, we exchanged phone numbers. We had lunch. It was fantastic. It was beautiful. I did joke during the episode at some point that it was 13. I was exaggerating there. Yeah. But I forget the listeners can't.

They can't see him. And he did keep referring to himself as the boy journalist. Yeah, we want to clarify that he's an adult. A young one. Yes. But an adult. Y.A. He's reading young adult.

Fiction. He's a YA, for sure. He's reading dense YA. At what point, am I middle age yet? Well, I think that all depends on what you see is your endpoint. But I think technically you're on the cusp. Do you reckon? Yeah, I think I would think late 30s to 50 is probably middle aged.

Yeah, okay. You can't say 50s is old age. No. And that's the next step, right? Yeah. I think 65 is what they do as like, you know, elderly insurance, seniors insurance. Right. Which to me, my folks, at least my dad has crossed that line.

I think my mum, no, actually, mum has as well. Yeah, dad got kicked off his life insurance because he was too old now. So, wait, what? Yeah, yeah. They're like, you know, you don't need life insurance anymore because you're definitely going to die. Yeah, you need death insurance, mate. And I'm giving you a death assurance right now. Now, it's happening soon.

Clock's ticking. Sooner rather than later. People younger than you, technology might catch up and they might live forever. But you, no, no, no, no, no. But you, too late, my friend. I don't know why I asked if I was middle age. I think because we were saying that Joey was Y-A. And to him, he looks at you and me as both being old, and that must be brutal.

That hurts. Because there is a difference between us. Yeah. A big one. Yeah, yeah. Canonically and non-canonically. If you count centuries as being. A lot of time.

But I think non-canonically, we are of the same generation. Yes, yeah, non-canonically, not that far, but enough. Well, you know, I'm an elder. You're a younger. Our ages start with different numbers now. Yes. So. Well, mine has three digits and yours has two.

I think that's enough said. Nuff said. Anyway, what, I really enjoy that episode a lot. I think it was different to what we normally have. But I think that's really fun. Yeah, I thought that was really fun. I think people will enjoy that. And, you know, it, like, gave it.

It was a lot messier than a normal episode in the way that it didn't all tie up neatly. Yeah. But things rarely do when you're directly digging it up. Exactly right. Like, we usually are picking a story that has a, not always, there are mysteries, but usually have some sort of satisfying ending. But I was satisfied at the end of that. It was really fun.

It was a really intriguing story. I can't wait to listen. Yeah, I'm actually really, I'm keen to listen as well. I want to hear this John guy say more. Yeah, that chills. Yeah. Full body chills. I was like, oh, I also, I meant to ask Joey when he was at A&U if he saw my uncle Jeff.

Oh, Jeff Perkins? No. Oh, my God, that would be too good. Mom's side of the fan. What's your mother's maddenham? I nearly said his full name. I was like, he probably doesn't want me to docks him. Yeah, because we...

And Jeff's a very common name. We have a new listeners for sure. Down to. Anyway. But if you do bump into a Jeff... If you do you have to say, you got a niece, and then see how it goes from there. And he says more. He does have two.

He does have two nieces. Do you have a niece? More. More. Two nieces? Yes. Why do you ask? Jeff, I think...

I don't know. No reason, Jeff. Sorry. So, for always you're done, run away. Jeff is a great name. I forget about Jeff, but I'm going to put that in my list. Jeff.

Have I been building that on this show? Bruce, Frank, yeah. Brian. Jeff is in there. Yep. Greg. Gary, of course.

Fuck, these are good dad names. Maybe that's what it is. They're dad names. Which I think to Joey's generation, they're granddad names. Yes. Oh, got a granddad called Jeff. What the fuck?

Heck, Joey, what? It's crazy. What? What? When I was a kid, not when I was a kid, when you were a kid, there was a show called Joey. Was there? No, I was thinking of Joey Lawrence, but no, it was Joey. There was a spin-off from Friends called Joey.

Oh, yes. I was confusing my Joey's. Joey's back, obviously. What are we doing? What we're doing? We need Dave. We need Dave. Even Joey was probably keeping us more on track than this.

Joe was like, oh, these guys are a bit tedious, aren't they? And yes, correct. So, what we do here is of the final 30 to 40 minutes of the episode, we thank some of our great Patreon supporters, because they're the ones who make this all happen. We're so thankful for all of them. And each week we take a little bit of time out to get to know them a little better. Yeah. And shout them out, give them their moment in the sun. Yeah. And this is why it's everyone's favorite section as a show, I know probably most listeners just skip to this bit. Anyway, the first thing we like to do, oh, I should say if you want to get involved, go to patreon.com slash do you go on pod.

Yep. This is the first episode we've recorded since 2023. So we are rusty. We're a little rusty. Anyway, so if you sign up there, there's a bunch of different levels. You can get three bonus episodes a month, soon to be four bonus episodes, I reckon, sometime this year. We're getting so close to our target.

And there's also the nicest. corner of the internet in our Facebook group. You also get to vote on topics. Your episode next week, Bob, is just the votes on. It's been voted on right now. It's already been, oh, it's been run and won. Because sometimes you put up a vote and it drags on so long. Yeah. Because it's level for ages, but this one's got a definitive winner. Yeah. And this one as well, it's like anybody can vote from like $2 onwards. So you get a lot of votes. So those ones tend to have a A blowout. Yes.

Or it's clear quickly who's going to win there. But the Schoenberg level, obviously, it's a more exclusive. Smaller pool. They consider it more. They think about it. Or you think of them as a higher quality of voter. They go, hmm. You love the 1%.

No, essentially a lot of them ignore it because they're just really generous people who just want to give us money. We should change the name of that level to the 1%. The 1%. That'd be good. Anyway, so yes, your point. Point is, my next topic's been voted on. Yeah, that's right.

And so there's a bunch of different things you get involved with. You also are the first time about live shows. There's discounts to tickets and all sorts of stuff as well. And we've always got live shows coming up anyway. The reason I bring it up is because people on the Sydney-Shaunberg level or above, they're involved in this section of the show we call Fact Quote or Question. Has a little jingle go something like this. Fact quote or question.

Ding. Oh, I always remember the ding. Oh. Oh. Surprised even me. And she always remembers the jingle and the sing. Mm-hmm. Cool. Goal.

So for this one, if you're on the Sydney-Shonberg level or above, you get to give us a factor quota or a question or a brag or a suggestion or really whatever you like. And then I'll read them out on the show for the first time. So they haven't been vetted at all. So far, no one's really taken advantage of that to make me say anything libelous because, of course, our fantastic editor, AJ. We'd just beep it all out. Yeah.

And maybe even cut it. No, I just beeped the whole thing. It's just minutes of beep. It's just AJ and his awesome Kiwi accent saying, redacted. That was not a good Kiwi accent on it. I would love that. Redacted. That's redacted.

All right. So the first one this week comes from Pete Holburton. Oh, one of the many lovely Patreon supporters. Yes. We love Pete. Catch up with Pete at a lot. of live shows. The man loves to party. And now, Pete has given himself the title of President of Being Happy. I never have to do that again. Ooh. That's intriguing. I,

I know what this is going to be about. Right. And I'll explain after you've read it how I know. Okay. That's interesting. I wonder if it is the thing you never has to do it again is telling me he doesn't work for NASA because whenever I bring it, in my head he works for NASA. He's a rocket scientist. Right. But apparently he's told me at the last live show I saw him. He's like, I don't actually work for NASA.

I just have a, it's my big interest. I love. And I said, oh, sorry. So what's your job? And he goes, I'm a robotics engineer or something like that. I'm like, okay. You work for NASA. Like, it's the same thing.

I understand. You know something I don't understand. You work for NASA. I thought he was going to say it was a butcher or something. I'm a primary school teacher. They're like, okay, we're about a good at him. So what you say it to me is you work for NASA. Anything that sounds like kind of interesting to you, you're like, I'm hearing NASA.

I'm hearing NASA. Am I saying the right? Naysa. Okay, so he's offering us a brag. Yep, we love a brag. Writing. On Newsday, I ticked off something. that's been on my bucket list for years. I climbed Mount Kilimanjaro. It's the highest mountain in Africa

at 5,895 metres or 19,341 feet for our American friends, which is more than two and a half times as high as our highest mountain, Mount Kosciuszko. Wow. It felt it. There's less than half as much oxygen in the air at the summit as there is at sea level. It was pretty tough, but exhilarating to get it done. and I made some great friends in the process. I wonder if Jelmy was there. Imagine. I met this boy journalist. We're doing lunch next week.

A great friend now. He says, Matt, I wore my primates beanie for the climb. Yes. I'll post some photos about it in the Facebook group when this goes out. So cool. Primates has been to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro. Very cool. Amazing.

Pete, love that so much. That's a great brag. It's a great brag. And last week we came back into the office, and I had some mail here at the studio from Pete. Oh. And he sent me a letter and a little Mount Kilimanjaro magnet. Oh, man. And he said, I don't remember if you want to collect them of just places you've been or if you like them, people send you ones.

But here's one. And he said, and it just might have something to do with an upcoming. Back to the question. And I was like, hmm, I wonder what it might be. That's fine. So I have a Kilimanjaro magnet on my fridge, courtesy of Pete. And Dave mysteriously, because he's still definitely a lot of in kicking, dropped off a couple of magnets for us today as well.

From the Bahamas where he was, what, six months ago? Yeah. Was that where he swam with pigs? Yeah. The only thing I took out of his whole trip is he swam with pigs. The thing is Dave travelled so much in the last couple of years that I lost interest at his holidays. Like, you know, normally you come back And I'm like, tell me all about it, where'd you go?

What was the highlight? With this trip? The most reason I was like, I don't care. I don't care, mate. Whatever, just get back to work. So I think you went to the Bahamas. You might have gone to New York. I don't care about the rest.

I wonder, because he is missing, presumed a lot. I wonder if we can start the, a new version of the classic old saying, he's sleeping with the piggies. is swimming with the piggies. Swimming with the piggies. Let's start that, yeah, I like it. On this week's episode of Who Knew It? I wrote, I accidentally wrote, Greg Larson was on and he called me out on it

because I accidentally wrote for one of my fake answers that the guy ended up swimming with the fishes. And he's like, the saying's actually, that just sounds like a nice time. It just seems like he went for a swim. Yeah. In an open water swim. And that broke me when I realised the mistake I'd made.

That's very good. Pete finishes by saying, as always, thanks for all the joy and the various do-go-on pods bring. Hey, Pete, thanks for all the joy you bring us. Yeah, thank you, Pete. Thank you for the magnet. And that was not, I wasn't fishing for people to send me magnets. Don't do that. Shipping's simply not worth it.

But that was a nice little treat to get from Pete, who we know quite well. We see him at all of our Melbourne shows. He's a friend of ours. Bring Jess magnets. Bring me anything you want. Skittles? Yeah, snacks. In a sealed pack.

In anything you want in a sealed pack. Nothing home-baked. No Tylenol. No Tylenol. I've got enough. Yeah. Oh, it looks like all four this week are people I've met at live shows. Ooh.

The next one comes from Swibsy himself. Swipesy. Andy Swabs. Who's got the title of Newest Footy fan in Chicago. Wow. Anathed is. I hope you're mean of the Saints. And Swabsie has an appreciation.

Oh, that's cute. Is that a new one? Yeah, I don't think we've had an appreciation before. Fantastic. That's nice. Swabsie writes, hey all. So sorry, kind of long. Don't apologize.

Swabsie. Don't you dare apologize. We have so much time for you. And then he writes. Now that Matt has done all his Matt remember series on the Patreon bonus feed, He says in brackets, join to listen, it's worth it. I mean, we've done like over 200 bonus episodes. I wouldn't be joining just to listen to an old man talk about a holiday.

There's a lot of good stuff on there, including an old man talking about his holiday. Over two episodes. And I say at the start of it, now let's just stick to the highlights here, Matt. We don't need to hear what you had for lunch. I said that as a joke. And then he goes on to say, yeah, and then that night had dinner at a Mexican restaurant. And then, oh, is that the Mexican restaurant? And I was ready to stab myself in the eyes.

And it's a show about an old man remembering. You don't think it'll meander a bit? It's, you know, it is what it says on the package. So, he says, I can tell a little more about our hat swap we did. Oh, great. I think I probably talked about about half an hour, the fact that outside Guinness in Chicago swabs, and I swapped hats. And honestly, I reckon Swibsy maybe got a raw deal there because the hat you got from Swibsey

is possibly one of the coolest hats I've ever seen in my life. It's so cool. Featuring Seattle Mountain. Beautiful. Great colour scheme on it. Yeah. It's all good. Browns and greens.

Yeah. Who would have thought? Beautiful. Just works. But the one he got off me was at the time my favourite hat. Okay. So I think it was a fair swap. Quareroy retro Saints hat.

It was pretty good. Oh, that is a good one actually. Yeah. All right. That's a fair swap, I reckon. But anyway, he says, first off, when Matt and I swapped hats, I was so pumped because me and Hoogsie, my wife, which at Hoogsie was such a legend. Hoogsy.

So it was just, in the end, it was just the three of us there. And we did a hat swap, which is a classic thing when a couple of guys and his wife for ever a drink. And I said to him, what do you think about doing a swab? And I winked a lot. and he took off his hat. And he took up and said, yeah, yeah, yeah. Hats, yeah, of course.

Hats, yeah, of course. Hatsy. Uh, but he said, me and my wife, Hoogsy were chatting about how cool it was all night. Getting this stick man, Saints hat has for sure pushed me over the edge, and I've been watching highlights and downloaded the team app to keep up to date. Might even get a membership next year. Love to you that, Swabsy. But I did, oh, I should say Swabs. If you want to learn more about the club, there is about a five and a half.

episode of this show that you could tune into. No pressure, but... If you want, if you wanted to, like, really immerse yourself in it. Yeah, nominated for a Do Go On award, but... Yeah, for longest episode. I don't know. Best episode, I think. But I did want to talk about how...

About the hat Matt has now. Oh, great. Love this. Great. I got that... It's cursed. Sucked in, Matt. I shattered that hat.

It'd be so funny. I'm like, oh my God. So many things make sense. I took on your curse. I got that hat on a solo trip to Seattle and Tacuma, Tacoma, Tacoma, in 2019 when I was really confused of what my next steps in my life were going to be. That trip was the first step in finding out who I really wanted to be. That trip and hat always served as a memory for that first step and process for me.

Oh no, I've taken away this important part of your... But that's so nice! Now I just wear it, you know, wandering about. God, you're a piece of shit. I wonder if it'll help me figure out my next step. Yeah, all right. Yeah, there's a magic hat, isn't it? You'll be on help, mate.

No hat can help you. Fast forward when Hoogsie and I were at Guinness with Matt, those few hours kind of felt like the true end to that, who am I and what do I stand for process? Because months after that Seattle trip, I met Hooggyzie and she introduced me to do go on, and this pod has been a constant in my life this whole time. and the three of you and the Patreon community

has shown me all the good people in the world that are out there and that I know I'm doing the right things in my life. So I could not be happier for Matt to have that hat that meant so much to me and my growth over the past few years. It truly feels full circle. What a lovely message.

Swibsy, that is so nice. Swabsie and Hoogsy. What a great reflection to have on your own life and have this thing that's a marker of a really transformative time for you. That is so lovely. You're such a valued person in our community swipesie, and that hat is really cool. I don't think it can help Matt.

He's beyond help. Even therapists have given up on him. It can't hurt. He can't hurt. Right? He's not going to make anything worse. Right? That is so lovely. So glad it wasn't a cursed hat.

Imagine. That hat is actually cursed. Yes, you can only get rid of it if someone offers you to swap with the hat they're currently wearing. Thank you so much, Andy. What a lovely message. That's so beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. That's so nice.

The next one comes from our great friend Murray Somerville. Murray? Oh my God, yeah, this is just a who's who of people we know personally. People who follow us on social media will know him as MuzzDoodles. He designed. my ding poster for my stand-up show last year and also the Who Knewett artwork. He's done a Christmas card for us before. That's right.

Yeah, we love Muzz-Doodle. Yeah, I met him after a Brisbane show last year, I think. Maybe after Who Knewit even. Anyway, Murray has the title of Triptitch Club Glassy, keeping tables clean, one glass at a time. That's an important job. Thank you. Thank you so much, Murray. and Murray's asking a question.

Also, isn't Murray the one who kicked off the agony arts bonus episode? Because he asked the question about his neighbour and the rubbish. Yes, you're right. Anyway, I wonder if it'll be an update on that. Let's see. He's asking a question writing, confession time. I mastered the art of riding a motorbike many, many years ago, but a car, nope. I never went for my driver's license.

Oh, I never went for my driver's license. Let's just get my intonation right there. Got it. Without a car license, I sometimes feel like the only penguin in a flock of flamingos. What a beautiful image. That's beautiful. But to me, both, they're two of the top birds. Agreed.

Yeah. Is there a basic life skill that you've mysteriously managed to avoid learning while everyone else seems to have gotten the memo? Jesus, it would have been a great one for Dave to have been here for. Because he can't do anything. I think he's surprisingly, yeah, hasn't. But he started, he's really, he's really started. He's cooked a few meals.

Yeah, that was honestly, partnering up with his now wife. She really fixed him up. Yeah, yeah. She saw a fixer-upper. And she said, she bought him for bug and placed some prizes. She got him cheap and she's done him up. She's done him up. He was the worst house on the best street.

That's right. And now she's made him, you know, average. Yeah. An average house on a nice street. Yeah. When asked, what does her husband look like? She said, I don't know, average. Normal.

Normal. It's just a normal looking guy. I don't know what to, you know, it's like a normal guy. Yeah. I've never met him. He's a normal looking guy. I'm a real, I'm a real woman. I'm a real woman.

I'm not a broom. And he is normal. Things, well, I can't drive a manual, which is sort of related. Yeah. Because I think anyone can drive an auto pretty much. Yeah, that's really easy. Can't drive a manual. No idea how to.

Okay, what are other sort of basic skills? There's some basic skills. I'll tell you if I can do it or not. Doing your taxes? Nah, can't do that. I have an accountant for that. What about, you know, programming the VCR? Have to get the manual out.

Yep. Have to get the VCR out. Yeah, have to get the VCR out. I don't have one anymore. No, neither. I held on one for ages. I only got rid of maybe a couple of years. years ago, amazingly.

Because I occasionally brought what I'd tape out to look at very, very occasionally and realise that it's hard to watch. Yeah. The quality is, like, we've gotten so used to the quality being better now that you can't, it's hard to watch them. I can't cook an egg. Can't cook an egg. Because I don't eat them.

Yeah, yeah. I think that makes sense. So I don't know how to cook them. I can't ride a motorbike. No, I can't ride a motorbike. I mean, I probably, I feel like I could. I can ride a bike. I don't have a license.

Yeah, I don't have a license. to. I could give it a crack, but I can ride a bike, but I don't anymore for I thought obvious reasons, but yesterday my partner suggested a bike ride and I said, no, thanks. And he went, why? And then I had to remind him that a couple months ago I was hit by a car and he had forgotten. He had forgotten. I still have bruised ribs he'd forgotten. Yeah. I thought that were from someone else. He was like, wait, were you, not rugby injury? I thought I could have sworn that was a rugby injury. Can't play rugby? Can't play rugby? Can't play rugby? My old man had a similar-ish thing.

He was taken down by a car riding a bike. And he had to have his face reconstructed and stuff. Jesus. Yeah, his nose was ruined and stuff. You can't tell now. No. It must have been a long time ago. It must have been, yeah, it feels time over the last of a while has lost all me.

But I feel like maybe eight, ten years ago. Yeah, right. Shit, no, I didn't know that. You'd never know. Beautiful handsome man. If anything, looks better. before. No, he looks, he looks the same. But he, yeah, there was quite a while where he, he's become, he's got right back into riding again. But yeah, there was quite a while

where it's just like, I mean, you can understand it. Yeah. It's not nice. I'll say that. Yeah. Being hit by a car isn't nice. And it just, all of a sudden, you would feel like, the, the things that are nice about riding. Yeah. They're taken away. It doesn't feel like a, you're nervous, though, what I'm saying? That's what he told. me, you just start to feel very self-aware. It's, you're not like a nice free thing, riding down the road, wind in your hair, but all of a sudden it's like, it's terrifying. Every car you notice, he's hyper aware of everything.

Yeah. Skills we can't do. Skills we can't do. Rain it in. Yeah, we can't do that. I know what you mean? Like, when you've left it so long, not being able to drive, it must be hard to sort of pick it up later in life.

Like, it's normal to be learning in your teens or early 20s, but then letting it go beyond that. It must feel strange to have to like learn a skill then. Yeah. I can't speak another language. No. Which I would love to be able to do. Yeah. Can't play an instrument.

I could play the most basic, like, bass guitar riffs. Yeah, I can't read music anymore. So, yeah, there's a lot of things I'd like to be able to do. I think most of the sort of standard day-to-day skills I can do. I can't do anything car-related. I really tried to be, I tried to pay attention when dad showed me how to do stuff because I wanted to be capable. And I just have so little interest that it just is in one or another.

I don't care. Yeah, yeah. Is it running? Cool. If not, there's people that can fix that for me. I don't know. RECV. Yeah.

Yeah, I think I can do the very basic car things. I wouldn't be out of fix a problem, you know? Yeah. Apart from oil checks, changing ties and stuff. I can put water in the windscreen wipers. Yeah, so there are the things in it, it is a day-to-day things. And if not, YouTube, there's a tutorial for everything on YouTube. Yeah.

Yeah, no, I don't know. There's got to be, there's got to be heaps. Oh, of course, yeah, yeah. And it's what do you consider like a basic skill too? I'm not, yeah, yeah, I can't. I don't think I, because I don't really drink tea either. So I find it a bit stressful if I'm making a cup of tea for somebody else because I know tea is something that people are very particular about.

Oh, yeah. So I find that a bit stressful because I'm not really a tea drinker. I'm an herbal tea, if anything. They have a, and I never look at it until recently, but my folks were around last week and we were drinking tea. And I just noticed on the on the packet that it had steeping. Is it seeping or steeping? Steeping.

Steeping. I'm like, oh, I said set a timer and steeped them for the right amount. And they're like, oh, this is really nice. I'm like, you know what? It's possibly because I read the instructions. I actually made it how it's intended to be made. Yeah, yeah. Not just sort of dunk it for a bit, leave it in too long or not long enough.

Yeah. Yeah. Great question though, Murray. Geez, I wish Dave was here. And never too late to learn to drive if you want to. But if you don't want to, you don't have to. I mean... I feel like if you can ride a motorbike, you know how the roads work.

Yeah, exactly. It's got to be easier than that. I think I could learn to drive a manual now because when I was learning to drive, you're learning how to navigate, how to move a car, how to read the road. You're learning everything at once. It was too overwhelming. Now I know how to drive. I think I could pick up manual.

I just don't have the opportunity or the care. I taught myself, because my parents' car was an auto. Their first one when I started learning was manual, so I learned for the first couple of months in a manual, but then that was when I was 16, but by the time I went for my license, I didn't get to it was 20. I'd only learnt in autos.

So I just got an auto license, but you're illegally allowed to drive a manual, I want you off your P's. Yeah, so I got a full license. So I got a manual car all of a sudden. And I'm like, you know, it was just, it was my, I think I got it for my sister real cheap. My younger sister. Is this the car that you had until recently?

Yeah, the one? Yeah, yeah. And so I took it to a car park and I just taught myself sort of just, and it didn't take very long. Yeah. But yeah, I don't have a manual car anymore. So I don't know. I'd probably have to relearn. But I think it's still in there somewhere.

It's going to be. Geez, Dave would have moved to some by now. Yeah. Thank you so much for that question, Murray. Yeah, I hope everything's going well with your neighbour in the rubbish. Final one this week comes from Nathan Damon. Okay, group dad. Jess, I want to say sorry to Dave.

I want you to say sorry to Dave. No, like you mean it. Dad! Well, he's not here. So, p. Can't say sorry to a dead man. I mean, a live man. who's just not here, that's all.

Yeah. He's just not here. Just not here. And Nathan's got a quote writing, Hi guys, I've come to realize that this segment has been missing something lately, and that's hearing from everyone's favorite Gary. So I reached out, and the following is a quote from Gary J from the UK. Wow.

And Gary says, Question, is it okay to teach your child to speak a different accent? because when I play with our little girl, all the soft toys, puppets and dolls have different accents. And also, sometimes I need amusing, so I say some words in different accents, like down in Scottish, doon. Doon.

Nats not that happy about it, but we're exploring the world in play. So Gary's, Gary hasn't been writing into the facts, crudal questions lately because he's gone full dad mode. He's saying, Dune to a child. But it's great to hear from your Gatti J from the UK. Gary, it feels fine to me.

That feels fine to me, but you've got such a great accent. Yeah. It'd be a shame. Look, you do you. But also, once a kid goes to school, they'll just pick that accent up anyway. Apparently, when I was little, because when we were going to the US when I was like seven or eight years old, I asked my mum one time, like, what do they sound like there? How do they speak?

And she was like, well, they speak the same as you do when you're playing makebelieve. So, like, if I was playing pretend with friends, we would speak in American accents. Right, because you would have learned it from TV. Exactly. And now I don't speak with an American accent other than wider. So, I think it's fine, it's fun. I was reading with my ears Bill Bryson book at the moment about this summer of 1927. You know, there are other authors.

I just want to blow your mind for a second that other people write. Great of disagree. But at one point, he's talking about how movies went for. from silent to talkies. And he basically said, and with that, all of a sudden, America basically just quietly took over the world, like culture-wise, because they made, you know, Hollywood movies, all of a sudden, they were all silent, so people would put their own accents into their head.

But all of a sudden, American culture was just spread around the world. I'm like, that's a really interesting way to think about it. Yeah. Because it's, like, it's, yeah, we'd consume probably more American than Australian media hear. Yep. And yeah, it's so fun having a bunch of American listeners listening to this. It's wild. It's like bloody bizarro land. Bluey's the same. Bluey is a big, like one of the big kids shows overseas apparently. Apparently, like people, particularly in the States, have started like buying Bunnings merch. Oh, that's funny. Because of Bluey. Yeah, right. Because of, yeah,

they have bunnings in it. Like they're really into our hardware store bunnings. That's funny. Because it features in bluey, which I think is so funny. And yeah, I've heard they take, there's some American kids are starting to say stuff like doney and different, probably using thongs in the correct ways and the footwear. That's right. Correct way. Not the G-banggers.

Anyway, Nathan ends by saying, and to answer Gary's question, I think it's fine. I think it's fine. Whatever makes them laugh. Well, until next time, it's bye from me and Gary Jay. Thank you so much, Nathan. Nice, Nathan. I think Gary, you could be potentially raising a world-class actor. You don't know. And so, great to get them started early on accent work. Yeah. You know, you look at your Margot Robbies. She's great with an accent. And she's, I would argue, quite successful. Yeah. So get them doing accents early. I think that's right. I think, yeah, get them in the Margot Robbie slip stream. Yeah. Yeah. You hear Margot Robbie talk out of Carrie. She's like going to the darnie there. Yeah, hey again. Potsarrea.

Yeah, stuff like that. Stuff like that. Thank you so much to Nathan, Murray, Andy and Pete. Hopefully see you all at a live show soon. All from Perth, Brisbane, Chicago and Melbourne. Yeah, all from Perth, Brisbane, Chicago and Melbourne. That's crazy. Well, if you'd let me finish.

Or they're all from a different place. Yes. Next thing we like to do, oh my God, this one's going to go really old. I said 30 to 40 minutes. This one's going to be pushing it. I reckon. Anyway. Hey, I'm having fun.

I'm having fun. I got nowhere to be. She got her money. I got my rocks off. How good is this? I don't know what that is. That's a Rex Hunt quote that a small percentage of our audience will remember from get this. It was really weird.

He genuinely said that? Yeah. There was some controversy because I think he was married and it came out that he was having a relationship with a sex worker. Right. And he was like, you know, I got my rocks off, she got her money. How good is this? Yeah, no, we understand how it works, Rex.

Tony Martin played it a lot on get this. And another one from him was about, he was talking, he got really rolled up. He did this address to the nation and he talked about the thugs and the scallop industry. And he's just played. What? Yeah. Do it funny stuff. What a character.

Get this. I mean, talking about great Australian media. You can still podcast it. Anyway, now we like to shout out to a few of other great supporters. You normally come up with a bit of a game based on, has it got to be something like WASP, you know, their code name? Oh, yeah, okay, yep. I like that, but don't make me come up with convoluted backstories

as to why it's a code name. Because I'll get lost in that. Should I read out the names and you give the code name? I'm going to see if there's a code name generator. ought to be, KGB. KGB? Code name generator. Oh my God, I missed generators. Let's go on fantasy name generators.

Yeah, great. All right, well, here are nine of the best. Firstly, if I could thank from Eugene Oregon in the United States. Eugene, another fantastic name. Piper Galaher. Piper Galaher, aka shiny satin. Oh, my God, that's so good. How good is that?

Yeah. Saturn's obviously the best planet. Yeah. Oh, I thought he said satin. Saturn. That's even better. I love Saturn. Yep.

Piper, because on a recent episode, I'll let people know, if you feel like you should have had a shout and you've missed it, please DM me on Patreon. Yeah. And a bunch of people did, and a lot of them I had just, they'd slip through the crack. So be like Papa, get in contact. Everyone was very apologetic. You don't have to apologise. It's our mistake. And also, if it's not a mistake and we haven't missed you and you're coming up,

that's still okay. You're still okay to ask. I'll let you know. Yeah. But ask. Yeah. Give me a few days or sometimes, depending on what I'm up to, it won't be that quick.

But sometimes I'll be so quick. You're like, Maddie, all right? What are you doing? What are you doing? I've checked the time and it's 3 a.m. in Melbourne. Yeah. What's going on? 100% that I will do that sometimes.

Anyway, Piper, Galaher, shiny satin. I love that. Shiny Saturn. Next up, I'd love to thank from Colorado Springs in, I believe, Colorado in the United States. It's Lisa Olson. Critical Maple. Critical Maple. Maybe I'll just go, should we go one words?

One words. Or are you liking the two? Oh, I think you've got the keys. Okay, great. Because Maple could be kind of fun there too, I reckon. This is an automatic car. You can drive it. Oh, okay.

I think Maple is fantastic. Maple's good. Let's go with just maple on that one. Okay, great. I like that's quite cute too. It's cute and sweet, but it'll kill you. And Lisa as well, she got in contact. Just a lazy 15 months after she should have got her shout out for that one.

Wow. That is patient. She's like, I wasn't going to message, but you said I. Oh, Lisa. Love that for me, Lisa. Very patient of you. And so sorry that you slipped through the cracks. It's, it happens.

and we're not entirely sure how sometimes. Yeah, it's just the Patreon system. It's a little clunky at times. It's a little clunky for what we need it for, but it caters to a lot of different kinds of things. So it can't be perfect for everyone. But yeah, that's why I kind of, in some case, I'm relying on you to remind me, and I apologize for that.

But that's probably like 1%, 99% of the people get read out. Every now and then we miss some people. So thank you for letting us know. From Roseville in California, it's Kelly Zacherson. Ooh, Kelly Zacherson, aka Stinger. Oh, yes. How good sir? Stinger's so good.

Because isn't the show Stingers, the Melbourne cop show, that was about undercover cops. I think so. I never watched Stingers. With Phelpsie. Oh, yeah? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don't think I watched Stingers. Did I?

What's the one where they were, um, they were, oh, never mind. It was a rescue show. Was it police rescue? Probably. With Angel? Was Angel in that? Oh, it was with... Gary Sweet?

Gary Sweet. Yeah, that was it. Yeah, Gary Sweet. There was a character called Angel. His last name was Angelopolis. As a kid, again, I didn't realize what a great name Gary Sweet is until right now. I grew up, it's just a normal name. It's just Gary Sweet.

Gary Sweet. Gary Sweet. But now I'm like, that is one of the most perfect names ever. Gary Sweet? Holy shit. Incredible stuff. And then when he released an album covering, including the cover of most people, I know, I think that I'm crazy. I'm like, could this guy get any cooler?

You full on swooned. I did. I had sweet fever. Next up, I'd love to thank from Empire Bay in New South Wales. Here in Australia, it's Riley Giffon. Riley Giffon's codename is Bagpipe. I love it. Singular.

How good is that? Yeah, that's great. Bagpipe. Bagpipe. That's another standard skill I don't have. Can't play the bagpipe. Can't play that. And I don't know if you know this about any.

Stuart, that's a Scottish name. Yeah. Thank you so much, Riley. Riley the bagpipe Giffon. Oh, that's so good. From Cramlington in NBL, the National Basketball League in Great Britain. It's Maddie Renton. Maddie Mustang Renton.

Oh, that's really good. West, that is so great. It is funny because we are starting to lose the reason for a code name. Like, imagine this like, what's your code name? What's your secret code name? Well, it's my full name with a cool nickname in the middle. And that puts you right off the scent. Good point.

You'll never know that I'm Maddie Renton. I'm not Maddie Renton. Mattie Renton. No, no, I'm Maddie Mustang Renton. Totally different person. Very different. I can see why you got confused. Yeah, it happens, but you're wrong.

Should I thank some people? Oh, yeah, if you want. And you want me to come up with some. I can, here, I'll send you the code names. I'm just going to what I'm going to do is I'm going to Google a random word. I'm going to Google horse. Maybe I'll just keep doing them then. And I'm going to just, and I'm just going to look at the page here.

And I'm just going to, off this about horses page, I'm going to pick out random words. Cool words, okay? I've just sent you the code names generator if you want to use that. I've got some great. I've got a great one to you. All right. Well, sorry to everybody coming up. I'd love to thank from Oklahoma City in Oklahoma, would you believe it? Joshua Midgley. Hoof.

Yes. Hoof. Joshua, hoof. No, no, no, just hoof. Just hoof, sorry. Remember you just explained why we shouldn't be doing that format? Hoof. Hoof.

I don't mind whoof. Yeah. It actually reminds me a bit of. of like, like all of these remind me of code names in like Top Gun. Yeah. You know how just last week I was telling you how much I love Top Gun. Top Gun Maverick specifically. As in the episode that came out last week, it was recorded last year?

Oh no, on who knew it? This week, was it? No, it was on a bonus episode. Yes, I remember it well. It was on phrasing the bar. That's right. Because we didn't want to talk about the movie because it sucked. So we just started talking about other stuff.

Anyway. Wait a lot. Publicly, we always support the work of the movie. Loved it. It's only people who were listening to the bonuses that know. Some of the movies, never him. Some of the movies aren't that good. Brendan perfect.

Movies very bad. Sometimes. More often than not. Unfortunately, yeah, more often than not. Buddies, that's all changing. It's all changing. Apparently, we haven't got that fire yet. We're so close.

Thank you to Joshua. I would also love to thank from Provo in Utah. Give me two. Is that Utah? Sure. How could it not be? I would love to thank Eve Johnson. The veterinarian. Oh, that's good. That is good. That sounds like a serial killer name. Like, that's kind of menacing. Yeah, yeah. That sounds like the torturous for the, you know, like the mafia boss or whatever. I want to ask Americans as well. Sorry, I'm off on something here.

Yeah, no. I only ever really hear Americans refer to veterinarians as veterinarians, whereas in Australia, we'd never say the full word. No, it's felt weird out of my mouth. I hate it. I would say, I'm taking the dog to the vet, which they must say to, no, think about it. But they use vet a lot over there for army vets. Exactly, right, which isn't really a word we use.

And that must become quite, um, so. Yeah, we'd say veteran. I reckon you would probably say, I'm taking the dog to the vet. But if somebody says, what do you do for work, you would say I'm a veterinarian, because if you say I'm a vet, they might think army vet. Please let me know if I'm right there. And that actually reminds me, Bob. We had a similar thing like this recently where we're asking Americans.

And you know how sometimes we're asking a question and then the answer will come so far later that we'll forget the context of. We have no idea what they're talking about. But one of our great patrons, QJK said, I was just listening to the Nutshell Studies episode. and you all were asking what we dumb Americans call electricians. I work in construction. I don't think we were saying dumb Americans. That's why I replied to him.

Ha ha, not dumb Americans. I think just the fact that we call electricians sparkies, which is fantastic. And we thought, do you have, do you shorten it at all? I don't think of Americans as dumb at all. No. I love America. Not publicly. Well, you've put a little doubt in their mind.

What do you mean? What I think in my own head? He goes on to say, I work in construction and we do use Sparky, mostly guys in the field, but I would say we more commonly say EC, which is electrical contractor. Ah. I bet non-trades people would just say electrician or the name of the EC they work with. Yeah. And I don't need to read this bit out, but I will.

Also, you guys are super funny, never change. Nice to just put it a little bit of praise for ourselves there. Yeah, so yeah. Let us know about vet and veterinarian. Thank you. And please give context like that person did because we will forget, even though we've only recorded this less than a week ago when this comes out. Yes.

But our brains, nothing stays. So thank you to Eve, the veterinarian. I'd also love to thank from Concord in North Carolina, Cortney. Oh, yeah? Old Billy. Old Billy, who was a 19th century horse that lived to the age of 62. Wow.

I wonder if I was born old Billy. Too out nominative determinism. That's amazing. It's funny. Thank you, Courtney. This horse Wikipedia page, I've got too many options here. I'm loving these. Yeah, you should have gone for the code name generator.

No, that's not enough options. And finally, I would love to thank from Santa Rosa in California, A, Tracy scarf Blade Blade That rules That's really great That's from the sentence

And ligaments that attach the shoulder blade to the torso Oh you could have gone for shoulder Shoulder But blade was a good call So thank you to Tracy Courtney Eve Joshua Maddie Riley Kelly Lisa and

Piper And again If you think If you've been a Patreon for like What's this What should it be roughly, the wait time? At the moment, the wait time is about five months. Oh, right, okay.

So if you've been a Patreon for longer than that and you think maybe we've missed you, please get in touch. Send us a DM on Patreon. That's the best place. And Matt will double check it for you. Yeah, that's the one place that I can methodically go through a whole. It can get lost in the wash on social media and stuff. Yeah, so send it there and don't feel like you have to apologize.

it's not you, it's us. Yes, and we appreciate you. So sorry this has taken forever. We do have one more thing we need to do. The last thing we like to do is open up the Triptitch Club and welcome in a few new inductees. We've got three this week, which is appropriate for episode 433, is it? And Jess, can you explain what's going on? What is this?

Well, the Triptitch Club is an exclusive club for people who have supported us at Patreon for three consecutive. of years. On the shoutout level or above, which is the ass prod or above. And when you're in, you're in. You're here for life. You're a lifetime member. Matt's behind the velvet rope. He checks your name off the door list.

That's right. He lifts the rope. He lets you in. I'm behind the bar. Dave's usually booking a band. Well, I'll do that this week. And I'll also be the MC. You're going to welcome the people in?

I'm welcome. I'll welcome him in. Oh, hang on, no. I got to, you'll welcome him in. You hype them up. I'll hype them up. Because you're much better. Oh, hang on the other way around.

All right. And yeah, I have booked a band. Well, not a band. And you'll never believe it is sort of coincidental that we've got a double header tonight. You won't believe this. Yeah. Because this is pure coincidental. Dave booked these bands a long, long time ago.

Before he disappeared. But it's a double header. We have a snow playing his hit song Informer. Oh, yes. And also Azeo. Yeah. And they're not a well-known band. No, 19 monthly listeners on Spotify.

But their name is Azeo. Looks like they have one song. And so I assume they'll be playing that a few times. But I look forward to it. I cannot wait. I cannot wait. I cannot wait. Red gum have a song called Azeo.

I know. I just saw that as well. How about that? Hmm. And Jess, what have you whipped up behind the bar there? Vodka. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, that's great. Was there other stuff I was supposed to? Well, I was just wondering what temperature it was at. It's actually a little too hot. I thought it might be nice like a mulled wine type, because I thought, hey, it's summer here in Australia. What more do you want on a hot day? A hot drink.

A hot drink, yeah. So I thought mulled wine is nice. Maybe vodka could work. in that way as well, but I didn't actually add anything to the vodka. I just heated it up. Yeah, mild vodka. And it's very hot. Oh, right. It's quite bad. Okay. Well, let it cool. I'll try. I've left it out for about eight hours now and it's somehow getting hotter. What? What have you done? I don't know. It's like a, some sort of a, like a nuclear reactor going off. Honestly, I think, I think we might need to do some renaos to the kitchen in the

Trip Ditch Club because this stove, it's making everything too hot. It's like it's got zero to 100. Yeah. And there's nothing in between. You look stressed. You cannot simmer anything in this kitchen. Are you okay? No.

I've got hot vodka everywhere. Oh, no, it's it burning. It's everywhere. Oh my God. What do we do? I don't know. We need Dave. We need Dave and a mop.

His wife. All right. So I think that's everything we need to do now. All we have to do is bring him in. Yes. I'll bring him in. Okay. You hype them up. Okay. Because you always have a go at day for this and so... And I'm regretting it right now. Now you have to show him how incredibly easy this is. So, please welcome in to the trip ditch club. From Round Rock in Texas, it's Melissa Shook. Oh, Melissa shook me all night long and rocked my world. Welcome in, Melissa Shook. Okay. That's not bad. That was a lot.

actually. It's not bad. It shook and rock in there, but I'm so stoked with you, Melissa. Where is this place? This is exciting. I should say Melissa also should have been in the Tripditch Club years ago. I'm trying to find where this place is because... I think it's Indonesia.

Ooh, is it? Yeah. From... Yeah, okay. It says from Bogor Barat in... In Jawa Barat in Indonesia, it's Riz Azaf. Riz Azaf. We're going to laugh at Azzaf when we have the time of our lives.

Welcome in Riz. You're the biz. That's very good. How dare you? Dave, never come home. And finally, welcoming into the Tripitch Club this week from location unknown so we can only assume deep within the fortress of the moles. It's Kirsten E! Kirsten E!

I'm so excited to see you! E. Welcome in, Kirsten E. Well, good stuff. Kirsten Riz and Melissa, what a beautiful triptych of triptage inductees. Yeah, we welcome them, we love them. Please have some hot vodka. Have some hot vodka.

Take it out of our hands. Please. Please, if you know away, I know it doesn't, vodka can't freeze. I didn't realize I could boil. I didn't think it could boil either. I just wanted to warm. But it is boiling. You assume if it can't freeze, it can't boil.

That's what I thought. safely assumed. I thought, it's a middle man. It doesn't, it's an average thing. What does it look like average? You can't do it! Anyway, I'm in a lot of trouble. I think that, we really need to wrap up and see what we can do about this.

We've got to get out of here. Thank you so much for tuning in. What do we need to tell me before we go? That we love them, that they can suggest a topic. Anybody can. You don't have to be a Patreon. There's a link in the show notes. It's also on our website, which is do go onpod.com, which is also where you can find

information about the other podcasts we do. any live shows coming up and merch, if merch is available. That changes every now and then. Yes. Can we say, I don't know if we say it on pod enough, but thanks so much for maybe the last year or something. We've had AJ from Colt Popcher editing our shows and he's so lovely to work with. And yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, you're right. I don't think we have really given him many shoutouts on the pod. He's, yeah, he's just, yeah, the best. We're a big fan and he's at him. important part of our team. Yes, you'd know him from the Barbie episode, but also, yeah, you can check out his podcast as well. Yeah. Popcha. But don't like make him too successful so that he's like, I don't, I don't need to do this anymore. Yeah, that, because we've actually become quite used to

having an end up. Yeah, we're very dependent on him now. We're very dependent on AJ. Okay, we can't do do this without it. I won't live without AJ. Okay. That's what Dave said. And AJ had a short break. And all of a sudden, we don't, we've lost Dave. We don't know where it is. No, we do. No, we do. No, we do. Call us. We know where he is. He's fine with Dave. He's fine. Don't worry about it.

Don't look into it. Please. But yes, anybody can suggest the topic. You can find us on social media at Do Go On Pod. And as always, remember to wash your butt. Great advice. Do you want to do what Dave usually does and boot at home? What does?

Yeah, sure. Until next week. Until next week. Thanks so much for tuning in. This has been Do Go On. I'm Dave Warnikey. Goodbye. Later's.

Bye. Don't forget to sign up to our tour. mailing this so we know where in the world you are and we can come and tell you when we're coming there. Wherever we go, we always hear six months later, oh, you should come to Manchester. We were just in Manchester. But this way you'll never, will never miss out. And don't forget to sign up, go to our Instagram, click our link tree.

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