Life Uncut - Britt's A Quake Girly, Laura's Clucky and *More Conscious Dating

Episode Date: September 23, 2024

Hey Lifers, PLEASE VOTE FOR US IN THE AUS PODCAST AWARDS Britt's jet lagged after her trip to Romania. It was somewhat eventful and she's now an experienced quake girly. Laura's daughter Marlie is about to graduate from preschool and we're curious to know what your graduation song was. Was it Green Day or... eye of the tiger?Now that Laura has had a week off and Marlie Mae is about to go to school, she's back considering having another child. Britt is strongly considering blackmail! If you already have kids and you’ve thought about having another, did you mention it to your kids? Did you want their thoughts on whether they’d like an extra sibling?A dating app has brought in a new feature to try and reduce dating fatigue and avoid analysis paralysis. Hinge will now stop you from matching with someone new if you have 8 or more messages waiting for a response from you. The idea is to make it a more conscious effort and only have a few conversations going at a time. If you're in the dating world, is this good news for you?Do you think it will cut down on people 'window shopping' or just swiping for validation? We spoke about the episode we did with Therapy Jeff - Why Is Dating So Hard These Days? You can watch us on Youtube Find us on Instagram Join us on tiktok Or join the Facebook Discussion Group Tell your mum, tell your dad, tell your dog, tell your friend and share the love because WE LOVE LOVE! xx  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Life Uncut acknowledges the traditional custodians of country whose lands were never ceded. We pay our respects to their elders past and present. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. This episode was recorded on Camaragal land. Girlfriend, you have really dry knees. Thanks Laura. Need some moisturiser. Thanks. I had the heated blanket on last night.

The jute's dried you out. And it sucked me dry. I found out yesterday. Like Ben did. Yuck. Hey, guys, and welcome back to another episode of Life Uncut. I'm Brittany. I'm fucking traumatised.

Okay, mate. It was behind the scenes. It's not going to make the cut. Yes, it will. No, it's not. Yes, it will. No, it's not. Well, good thing I edit that podcast with Keisha,

so we will make sure that it is at the start. My knees are not dry. They're just a normal knee. Laura's just said, oh, your knees are so dry. It's because she's been spending a lot of time on them. I wish. I wish. I'm too old for that.

Welcome back to, I mean, welcome back from Romania. Welcome back to Romania. Brittany's jet lagged and I also feel jet lagged. You feel jet lagged because you've got kids, but you're perpetually jet lagged. I am so jet lagged. Probably the most jet lagged I have ever been in all of my time traveling. I was pinging wide awake the entire night. I fell asleep an hour before I had to get up.

I couldn't turn my brain off. I was like trying everything under the sun that I've ever remembered to try and fall asleep. So you know when like, I don't know if you've ever heard jet lag cures. It's like if you're ever struggling to fall asleep, they say that you shouldn't try and force yourself. Like don't just lay in bed and be like, come on, you can do it. Oh, it's the worst thing.

Because if you do that, you then get paralysis because you just lay in bed looking at the ceiling. Paralysis? Well, you're like trying to will yourself to sleep and then your brain's just like overthinking and over everything. I got up and I was like, okay, I'll get up and watch some TV for a bit. So I watched some TV and I was like, but then I was like, oh, but then I remembered watching the screen is the worst thing.

So I turned that screen off, went back to bed. Then I got up an hour later and I was like, I'll have something to eat. Like that was some milk, you know, milk will like calm. Yeah, well, I had Weet-Bix with brown sugar and milk. Went back to bed, didn't work. Then I started like thinking about every single thing you could possibly think about. like the anxiety have I done my tax yet is that you I paid my tax last night I woke up did I pay my phone bill yeah a hundred percent then the funniest thing was I was like I know I'll meditate

but I don't meditate on my own I get like one of those you know like you go into Spotify and you're like 45 minute meditation or something have you ever done it I am the exact person who says that they can't meditate but probably needs meditation I can't do it I have no interest in trying I know all the people who do meditate will say, and this is the thing, if you say, I'm not someone who can meditate, everyone who does do it says, you're the person that should meditate. It'll be really good for you. Once you start doing it, you get into good practice. It'll change your life. And I'm quite happy to be highly strong. I'm happy for you not to be highly strong. No. So, but I just put on sleep music or a meditation on Spotify, like a guided meditation.

And then I just roll over, try and go to sleep and it'll play for 25 minutes and turn off. So I'm like really getting into it. And it's like hands up and feel the energy, relax, breathe. But then I don't. 4 a.m. in the morning. Yeah, but then I don't have the Spotify version of no ads. So then an ad comes in. And I was like, motherfucker.

Then it keeps playing. I'm like, man, that's how I spend four to five minutes. Like get out of my slumber, put it forward like five seconds, go back to sleep. And then I hear him say, it would really help if you could leave five stars in review so that I could continue to grow. And I'm like, I need to upgrade my Spotify. I'm like getting deep into my slumber.

And then this guy's telling me to like swipe up. No, you can't be mad about that because it's literally what we do after every episode. We've just told you how to improve your sex life. And then we're like, hey guys, we're not a meditation. Click the link, five stars. The heading is sleep meditation in the middle of the sleep meditation. That's okay. It's all right.

People have got to hustle. It's because you don't sleep. Speaking of hustle, this is a perfect segue. There is something that I am going to ask you to do. something that we ask you to do every year rolls around, drags itself out of the gutter, and that is it's the Australian Podcast Awards. Pew, pew, pew, pew.

Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo. Explosion. Love it. I mean fireworks, not explosion. Pew, pew, pew. We would love it if you would go on. We're going to put the link in the show notes. Stop what you're doing.

Drop stop and vote. Go to the website and go and vote for Life Uncut in the Australian Listener's Choice Podcast Awards. Yeah. I mean there's loads of different awards, but this is the Listener's Choice. So this is the one. I don't want to say the one that matters.

They all matter. But it's the only award in the podcast awards that is voted by you guys, the listeners. Well, it's the only one that's not a stitch-up. It's political, as all award ceremonies always are, because there's always a subjective nature to it, but not when it comes to the listener's choice because that's you guys choosing the podcast that you want to listen to.

Well, it's the only way to know that it's not political. So we have no proof it's political for every other award. And anyone, because if we won an award, we wouldn't say it was political. would be like, but this is the one that we, yeah, it's like the one we really want you to take two seconds. You just click the link and it will say, what podcast do you want to vote for? Just in case you forgot, it's live on cut, press enter. I've just done it myself this morning. And it's for us, it's like the bee's knees. It's the Logies. It's the Oscar. It's like the, for our industry, it's the, the be all and end all. No, but the thing is, if you go on and you vote,

you have to do your vote you put in your email and then you have to verify the vote by your email it does only take a minute all up it's very quick it's very snappy i kind of feel like the podcast awards now feels a little bit akin to mariah carey at christmas time like every year we kind of relating me to mariah carey what i mean is is that you know like christmas is coming and then everyone drags out the mariah carey song this is us it's this time of year we drag out the hey guys please vote for us in the Australian Podcast Awards. To be fair, it's the only thing we ask. It's the only thing we ask all year. So that's it. We've asked. I was going to say we're not going to ask again. We will. We'll probably ask next week. It's only open for two more weeks. So

we did leave it a little bit late, which means we're probably going to ham it down your throat for two weeks. Britt, I want to know since you're back and we kind of just skimmed over it by talking about weird meditation and also sleep deprivation. How was Romania? Oh yeah. Forgot I even went because I'm so jet lag Romania Romania it was so good to see Ben like it was it was he was at the airport for me I didn't arrive until 2 a.m in the morning so he drove to the airport and waited for me because I have it in my head that I always had it in my head that Romania is the most dangerous place in the world that hasn't come from anywhere except like a preconceived idea I've had my whole life just things I've read growing up and I don't know what

it was about. So he was waiting at the airport for me, which was uneventful first night. I mean, to be fair, Keisha reminded me of this in the car. The reason why Romania has been making it on the news recently is because it's where Andrew Tate got arrested and it was where a whole lot of human trafficking was happening. So like, I mean, I understand why one might get the impression that there are some dangerous things that could happen there. A hundred percent. But the thing is that happens all over Europe. That happens everywhere, right? It's just that it hit the news because of Andrew Tate. He was under house arrest

there but everything that I looked up and so many people had written to me saying that they were like female solo travelers or not even just solo but females that had traveled there and they loved it and they like raved about it and I am a essentially half my time there I am a solo female traveler because I spend half my time there by myself Ben goes away for a night and two days at a time to play he's gone all day training and playing so I like to go and do stuff on my own it was the first time in all my travels in the last 15 years which is like nearly 60 countries I've done I've been lucky to do a lot and all of them either by myself or with Sherry so as females it's the first time that I felt like real unease alone but that's not based on anything no one made

me feel like that like I just normally I feel I'm just gonna go for a wander get lost go to a park whatever but I just felt this something deep in me that was just like I don't feel entirely comfortable doing that. So I still got out and about, but I went straight to like hardcore tourist areas. Do you also think that maybe it comes with age a little bit as well? Because I think about traveling when I was in my early twenties and I've been to India and it's the most incredible country to go to. Like I have only wonderful things to say about it. But when I was in my twenties, I look back at how I traveled at that age and I was so careless. And I, I think how the fuck did nothing bad ever happen to me? Whereas when I went recently this time, this year

with my sister it's the first time that I've been in my 30s and it's the first time that I've been since having kids specifically and I was so cautious and it was the first time that I ever felt a little bit more like just aware of my safety yeah I think of the things that I used to do traveling and I would never do them now I think it's an age thing for sure but it's also like Romania I don't have a bad thing to say about it either I want to say that that's just this feeling that I got but so you're in districts district one two three four five six and there are districts that you just wouldn't go to so people are like oh you're in district one definitely don't go past issue four you don't know what happens past district four so like I think I

had it in my head too as I was walking I was like what district am I in it's an invisible border like how do I know if I'm crossing it but everyone I encountered was nice it had really beautiful areas we went to see Dracula's castle sorry bucket list saw Dracula's castle growing up that was like a huge part of our life right i mean not no dracula's castle i can't say that i grew up with like a real sort of impression of dracula's castle as being like a fundamental part of my childhood well maybe i denied that maybe when ben moved to romania i just googled it and got in my head that's what i wanted to do tick do you tick dracula's castle yeah i mean yes you've been there right dracula's not real but like he if he was real he would have been there too yes i thought

Transylvania was part of a fabricated story of Dracula. It's not. It's an entire place and it's stunning. Wow. Dracula's got taste. And full of bears. Anyway, so it was really like an uneventful week. Oh, no, it wasn't.

There was an earthquake. I was in an earthquake. Oh, my God. It wasn't uneventful at all. There was a full-blown, my first ever earthquake. Have you been in an earthquake? Pretty. What?

You sound like you're on speed. Because I was like. Then there was Dracula's castle and castle was this and then the earthquake and then there was a bear and then. because I'm in my head I'm like no one actually cares about my trip to Romania so I'm trying to think of the highlights so I'm not an earthquake girl and when I say earthquake girl what I mean is some people grow up slay earthquake slay no some people hashtag I'm not an earthquake girl quaker no quakers are real things Laura what's a quaker a quaker is like the religious oh am I

going to get cancelled by the quakers okay she's coming in okay it says quaker member of the society of friends or friends church a christian group that stresses the guidance of the holy spirit that rejects outward rights and an ordained ministry yeah and it has a long tradition of actively working for peace and opposing war they sound as bad as we thought no they're very they're a peaceful community we're also anti-war they sound lovely but what is the likelihood that we have a lot of quakers listening zero if you're a quaker you are not pro-life on gut or maybe you are prove me wrong anyway quake away no what I'm saying when I say I'm not an earthquake girl and I said this on Instagram at the time I'm glad you think it's so funny are you an earthquake girl

probably not I've been in one earthquake yes I've been an earthquake in Indonesia but it was very mild. Everything just rattled around for a bit. And I was like, oh, sorry. You got off. That feels great. I was like, don't throw now. Oh my God, it's only a three magnitude. Where's the rest? Where's the button? How do I turn it up? Laura does the splits on the ground as it's earthquake-y. I'm just going to throw my leg over this metal chair. And just lean against a wall. i'm not an earthquake girl and what i mean by that is some people grow up in places countries cities that have them all the time so when they hear the earthquake their first response isn't to do the splits on the ground and try and get off like you laura but a lot of people don't get

bothered by it because they grow up with it for me it was wild like startling it was great in fact darling it was quite startling i was by myself ben was away and ben lives in a huge apartment the building. So I was six floors up or something. And I felt this vibration through the floor. I was laying down in the lounge, almost asleep. And the vibration woke me up and I sat bolt upright and I was like, what was that? And then it stopped for a few seconds, which is the pre-tremor apparently. And then full blown, I thought I was going to die. The entire building was swaying, moving. Like I was moving stationary in the building I could feel it and see it and the everything on it started rattling like hectically rattling everything on the kitchen fell off I was like oh my god and

I didn't realize it was an earthquake straight away I genuinely and because you're not a Quaker I'm not a Quaker no but I thought we might have been being attacked and I'm being serious what I and I say that because Romania has the biggest NATO base in the world and it's also like bordering Ukraine Russia so and they're very pro-Ukraine so obviously there is a war going over on in Ukraine Russia that's been going on for a very long time there's been fighter jets and drones that have been recorded coming over Romanian land and then like the border and then going back so my immediate thought wasn't to go to earthquake my immediate thought was like oh my god is that we're being attacked so I call Ben straight away and I'm like something's happening and I don't

know what to do he's like it's an earthquake there's an earthquake so I was like what do I do and apparently you just stand under a door. Don't you remember this? So I just stood under a door and I was like, is this what I'm supposed to be doing? And I was like, how long do I stay here for? I was Googling how long there are after tremors. Am I supposed to go downstairs and get onto the street?

Will the whole building fall on me? Fire escapes. Don't you remember being at school and learning all of these random facts about like, okay, so when I was at school, I remember like, what do you do in a fire? Obviously that's not that random. Really important. What do you do in an earthquake?

Get in a bathtub, stand under a doorframe. And I lived my life thinking that that was an imminent threat, that I was going to be in earthquakes and I would need to know the tools. Like there were so many. We learn about tsunamis. What do you do when a tsunami is coming? What are the warning signs of a tsunami?

What are they? Very happy to say that I have never witnessed yet a tsunami. The water retracts and it's the retraction of the water and often people are so like mesmerised because it's quite an unusual thing to see that people go down to the beach to be like, wow, that's a really low tide and then the tsunami hits and that's what we learnt in school. We learnt so many things I've never had to implement.

But if I was there with you, I would have told you, get under that doorframe, girlfriend. Mate, I know what to do in an earthquake now and I also know what to do if I see a bear. Like I have learnt so much from going to Rain Mania. St. Therese, they really didn't teach me how, like they didn't teach me what a vow was. They learnt that in high school.

They didn't teach me how to read properly but fuck, I'd be good in an earthquake or some sort of. What do you mean? They didn't teach you how to read. We were that weird year. Some people who are my age, 38, might remember this. There was like a curriculum change that happened. What, when they stopped teaching you?

No, when we were in primary school. So when we were in primary school, there was a weird curriculum change that happened where they changed the year that you learned, like what is a syllable? What is a noun? What is a verb? Like those actual, like the constructs of what they are. They changed the year that you learned it in. but it meant that that somebody fucked up and there was a gap we just didn't learn about we

got to year seven and i remember our teachers being like oh you motherfuckers don't know what a verb is or you don't know what a verb is laura gets here seven and she's like i still can't sometimes i still do this with my lefts and rights for starters might have been in that gap as well because we're the same age whatever i digress hey speaking of i have a very cute life update that i want to tell you guys about and i just don't know how I got here already because I feel like Marley just came out of my womb. Dude, me too. I feel like she just came out of my womb. She just came out of our womb, Brittany, and now she's five and next year she starts school. So at the moment we're kind of like gearing up to do orientation

with the school that she's going to and kind of like doing all the little things to get her prepared for the fact that she's leaving daycare where she's been at for ages now to go to this new school. And also the new school that she's going to is a bit of a distance away from where she currently does preschool. So she's not going to school with anyone that she knows. It's like going to be a really big transition for her. And yesterday she was standing in the kitchen and she was singing this song. And I was like, sweetie, what are you singing? Like, where did you learn that song? And she goes, mommy, it's my graduation song. She's singing her graduation song that she's learning for when she graduates preschool. Is it Green Day? Like every person in the world's

graduation song graduation song yeah no i just whistled as well when i said graduation what is green day song i hope you have the time of your life it's every person i know for the last 20 years graduation song why can't i say graduation graduation song you know it was yours wasn't it surely oh no you couldn't spell so you can sing i have the tiger I have the tiger I did a dance to that Do you want to know it? I have the tiger

It's the king of the night That was it We had to be tiger And not over the island That'll be great for socials later Please do the whole thing I have the tiger It's the king of the night

This is Marley's graduation song everyone It's S Club 7 It's a real banger Reach for the stars Climb every mountain high and reach for the stars. Oh, she's got a backup singer. Lola's in there. Follow your heart start by and reach for the stars.

Wow. Follow that rainbow shining over you. That's when your dreams will all come true. Let's do it again. That's when your dreams will all come true. Let's follow the rainbow shining over you. I can't even think of what song that is. No offence to them.

It's S Club 7. It is a banger, but you're not expected to know that. Reach for the stars. I know S Club 7, but I just think she's turned it. Climb every mountain higher. We've done a lot of singing in this episode and I feel I'm concerned that people are going to be offended by this. Sorry, guys.

I'll stop singing. She's been practising all her dance moves and she was singing in the kitchen and I didn't expect to feel as emotional as I felt and I honestly just like burst out crying. I was so overcome by the fact that we're at this stage. And Matt turned and looked at me and he was like, Laura, she's not graduating high school. She's not graduating to be a doctor. She's just finishing preschool.

This explains it, Laura. It's just made sense to me because Laura walks in this morning. I don't know if I'm supposed to share this. She goes, I'm thinking of having another baby. I am. Now it makes sense because you feel like your baby's flying the coop and going off to big school and now you're having those thoughts. How's me telling you what you're thinking?

You're having those thoughts of like, am I never going to have a newborn again? Am I out of that stage? I'm going to go again. And I can tell you, it's a bad idea. I'm going to do it. You are emotional and you never make decisions when you're emotional. I am going to have another baby. Try to.

Anyway, I said to Marley in the car yesterday, Marley and Lola, I said, guys, how do you feel? Oh, God. How would you feel if mommy and daddy had another baby? And Marley, in all serious, deadpan, was like, her and her sister were both like, yes, we would love a baby. We love babies. And then Molly goes, sorry, Mom, you're too old.

You're too old. Wow. What the fuck? Tell me what you really think. You little turd. And she goes, go reach for the stars, Mom. She goes, you might want one. You just got us.

That was literally the tone that she said. I also don't think you ask your four and five-year-olds if they want a baby. I don't think you ask them, do you? No, no, no. I care about what they think. Look, no one said I'm doing a good job of this parenting thing. I'm just doing my best. If they said no, I'd probably do it anyway.

But at least they've had a bit of input. So you're actually going to have a baby? Well, I'm going to try. Not right this second. Maybe next year. Your face. Sorry, Brittany. Sorry.

Will you be okay if I have a third child? Fuck no! You barely make it to work. You don't message me back for five days at a time. No, it would be a disaster. Fucking disaster. Like, love you, support you, hashtag friends for life, whatever. But your real friend's going to tell you the truth.

And you give me wild anxiety. Wait, you know what Laura's favourite thing to do is? Keisha will back me up. I will message Laura, and I actually have this. This is a very specific example. I messaged Laura. Here we go. What have I done wrong now?

Fuck, here I am just trying to procreate. Everything I do is not good enough. This is a specific example. and you'll know it as soon as I say it. I messaged Laura 19 times in a row on iMessage, 19, not one response, and asking very specific questions. Please, hun, need to follow up. Hey, hun, can you just look back at this?

19, I counted them. Then Laura messaged me, right, unrelated. She didn't answer one thing. Then she messaged me one question and 45 minutes she went, hello, question mark, and I was like, is this bitch kidding me? I think I even screenshot it and sent it to Keisha and I was like, bro, So I was like, can you deal? And I even wrote back.

Laura's like, I need you to answer. And I bribed her. And I said, I'll answer you when you answer my 19 messages above. That did happen. I think 19 is an exaggeration. No, I counted them. Nah. 19, Laura.

So this is why you having a third child thrown into the mix gives me anxiety. I'm moving to Romania before you have a child. You hate Romania. If you have a child, I'm out of here. We're long distance. I don't mean to blackmail you. I'm aware that is how awkward is it going to be if I get pregnant and I'm like, hey, guys, I've got some really good news.

And I'm like, pretend like you're happy for me. I'm crying but, like, it's actually I'm distraught. I'm like, oh, I'm so happy. Also, guys, I feel like we need to put the preface in here because someone's going to be like, Brittany's really mean to Laura. We're friends. We're friends. We're friends and we're business partners.

And, fuck, having kids and trying to run businesses is a real pain in the ass. Of course. I get it. I'd be happy for you. Same way that every time you say you're moving overseas, I'm like, fucking hell, that's going to be real tough. But, like, you know, we make do. We love each other.

Oh, my gosh. Okay, last thing before we move on. No wonder I have so much anxiety about this wedding. Trying to plan this wedding long distance is so hard. But the hardest thing is trying to do our first dance. So I don't know if you saw or if you're following me on social media, I did post it. I did see, and I have one question.

I don't understand why you've lost all ability to hold your head up. Like you're like a rag doll. Yeah, it's next level. So Ben and I are trying to learn our first dance, which I'm not exaggerating. I don't think we're going to have one. It's impossible. He is such a bad dancer. Well, you didn't look very good yourself.

People in glass houses shouldn't be throwing stones, Brittany. I was really good, but you're only as good as your surroundings, and my surrounding was terrible so not only can he not dance but part of my migraine botox if you're new here i get migraines and i'm on a migraine botox protocol it's the only reason why britney gets botox everyone yeah i also had to get fake boobs no i'm joking um so part of this migraine protocol is you get all this botox in your head your skull the base of your skull and your neck now the last time i went to see my neurologist which was only two weeks before i went to see Ben she's like oh I think we need to add it to these new places so I got it because I

was still getting some migraines so I ended up getting this Botox in the front of my neck here if you're watching you'll see I'm but if you're not watching I'm holding the front of my neck the platysma bands no it's called sternocleidomastoid sure pull whatever you want to so I got it in the front of my neck and I got extras in the back of my neck and what it means is, and I'm not exaggerating, I can't hold my neck up. It's like one of those things that go in the front of the car, the bobbleheads, you know, that wobble their head around. If I'm laying down in bed, I have to hold the back of my head with my hand and sit up. I have to push my, my neck has no strength anymore because every muscle is literally paralyzed by Botox. That is the weirdest

thing I've ever heard. But I don't get migraines. So it's like, what do I weigh up? Can't hold my head up and don't get migraines. So anyway, Ben would be dipping me in our dance and I couldn't physically get back up. I could not. And even if he pulled me up, my head was dangling and my body would flap up. I was like a rag doll. It was so funny, but I was like, between the two of us, it's going to be a disaster. Imagine having just the visual image of someone having so much Botox that they can't lift their head up. Well, it's not like it's in my forehead and my forehead's Wait, you're making it sound like my forehead's so heavy of Botox that I'm dragging my head along the ground.

Anything to be wrinkled free. But, yeah, so now I've got to weigh up what's more important. I think you just do what, you know, what most people do and that is that you just put on a nice song and then you just kind of hold each other and you sway from side to side. Laura, you choreographed a whole dance. You can't say just go and sway. We were both on Dancing With The Stars, thank you very much.

Had you done dancing then? Yeah. No. No, you hadn't. No. I was angling to get on Dancing With The Stars, guys. Something that's come out over the weekend are some advances in the world of online dating.

Do we call them advances? I think it is. A technological improvement, one might say. A dating app advance. Yeah, specifically on Hinge. If you are in the world of online dating at the moment, and this has been something that I think every single person who is online dating has experienced. It's when you send a message and you get no reply. The

feeling of dissatisfaction, the feeling of exhaustion, the lack of encouragement that comes when you are matching with people online, but you're getting absolutely no response from them. And I feel like that's the core of online dating. Well, is it the core of online dating? Yeah. I'm not saying it should be, but like, I mean, I was on the dating apps for like 10, 12 years. And yet the number of times that you write to someone and they just don't write back, even though you've matched. Having said that, I did the same thing. People would write to me and I'd be like, meh, and just leave them on unread. So you guys might remember, we just did an episode recently with Therapy Jeff. It was called Why is Dating So Hard Right Now? And we really got into

the nitty gritty of dating. If you are single, please go and listen to that episode. We have also done multiple episodes with Logan Urie. She is the director and relationship scientist behind Hinge. So she's worked with Hinge for a very, very long time. And this advancement that's been brought in with Hinge is specifically to deter people and stop them from leaving people on read and not answering messages and just kind of like collecting matches without actually engaging with those matches. So you guys might know that in 2017, they brought in a feature, which was your turn to remind you to write back to the people that you've matched with. Yeah. So you would have been out of the dating game when they brought that in Laura, but I unfortunately wasn't. So it was

annoying because you'd be on your matches and you could have you could have a hundred no you're not swiping you've matched right so you're in your like catalog of matches and you could have a hundred matches that you've just ignored that have written to you that you haven't written back so this little it's like a message alert this alert used to come down and say your turn like your turn to write back as in like hey they're still way it was a nice way to be like they're still waiting for you but you could just ignore it so you could leave a match there for three years if you want yeah like you like for any amount of time well they've brought in a new change so this is it's called your turn limits and what that's going to do is it's going to prevent users from

matching with new people if you have eight or more unanswered messages in your queue so if you are somebody who uses online dating as a way of basically like people shopping or window shopping but you don't have any intention of actually messaging those people, if you have eight or more messages that are left unread, you will be blocked from being able to continue to swipe until you either write back to one or more of those people in the queue, or you go through and delete those matches that you have left unread. So when you hear about this, I mean, there's definitely pros and cons and we'll get into it, but it also sounds like it's going to slow down that kind of like swipe, swipe, swipe rhythm that a lot of people get into. And it's going to create

a lot more admin for people to actually go in and do something with the matches that they've received. I actually think it's great. That is as someone who, like I said, I had like a hundred people sitting there at a time. A multiple matcher. Well, yeah, it's because you want the options, right? And sometimes you're bored. Sometimes you want to talk to people. Sometimes you're like, oh, I'll keep them there as a backup. But at the end of the day, like you're on there wasting people's time as much as you're wasting your own time. And Logan said something that I think is brilliant. It makes so much sense. So psychology research shows that when we are presented with too many options, we often experience analysis paralysis and decide to

make no decision at all. Your turn limits nudges you to make the decision and help get you closer to finding your person. But it's so true. Think of how overwhelming it is when you have so many options presented to you. The easiest thing is to throw your hands up and be like, it's a too hard basket but if you limit your options or your your basket of people to five or six people chances are you are going to make stronger connections and you're going to want to say hey I actually do have the time to get to know you and I do have the time to meet you but when there's a hundred people saying hey how are you how was your weekend what are you up to what's your favorite color like you're like I couldn't be bothered and also I mean we've spoken about it

so much this idea of dating fatigue if you're having the same small talk with 50 people at one time, the fatigue is going to hit you a lot faster. But what I think is so interesting about this is, and we've spoken about Hinge quite a while ago, this idea and their brand slogan is designed to be deleted. And at the time when we were talking about this, I think we kind of took the stance a little bit of, well, that sounds like bullshit because at the end of the day, it is a company that makes its money on having you continuously swipe. So this new limit that they're imposing does seem contradictory to it being just like this machine of wanting people to keep being in the endless dating world. It actually feels like it's an app with a little

bit more of a conscience behind it. But I don't think, is it going to make a big difference to the way that people engage with online dating? No, I think people are still going to window shop. They're still going to swipe for validation. They're still going to accrue loads of matches. I don't think that this is going to stop them from doing that. Well, Hinge has done some trials and they actually have some stats. Almost half, 48% of users with your turn limits said the feature helps increase people's ability to focus on quality over quantity. Meanwhile, 45% said the feature helps focus on current matches and the same amount said

that feature helps them be more thoughtful with current matches. So I think it is going in the right direction, but this is why I think it's brilliant. I remember, and I remember this one specific example. I remember going on one day and being like, I'm so bored. Like I'm just going to go and scroll my matches and see who's out there. Go back. I'll dip back into the pool that I never went to. I went back two years.

There was a match from two, a conversation from two years that I hadn't written back to. And this poor guy, I hadn't written back. I reckon he was probably fine. So I wrote back to him. I said, hey, sorry for the slow response. Been busy, last decade, got married. I was like, sorry for the slow response.

Would you want to catch up still? It was two years later. Was he like, yes? I've never had a quick, he was like, yeah, sure. And I was like, tonight? He's like, yeah, all right. Anyway, realized why I stopped talking to him. It was the worst day of my life.

He was so boring. And I was like, this is why we stopped talking. This is why you should unmatch people. You should unmatch them. But once again, admin, that's the problem. Look, I think that this is a hot person problem. that's all this is what do you mean it's a hot person problem no it's not it is it is this is hear me out only hot people accrue that many matches no they don't they do no they don't

spoken by a hot person jono's over there in the corner you're also a hot person just fyi but jono's over there in the corner nodding away like yep it's true no it's not because online dating as much as it is the base of superficial that we judge people based on the way they look in their photos. People who have good profiles, who also have aesthetically pleasing photos of themselves are going to accrue more matches. Like I understand that that is unfair, but it is the way that the world works. So people who are more attractive, I mean, look at the most swiped on people on dating apps. You can literally go on and search and be like, who are the top 10 most swiped on profiles in Australia? They'll come up. They're all fucking hot. All of them.

Of course, because it's a look space, but that doesn't mean that people that are not a 10 aren't accruing a lot of matches as well like every category is accruing matches like every person still accrues them but of course the supermodel is getting the super hot people and the 10 out of 10s everyone's swiping right on them but at the end of the day have you seen how people online date now they don't even look at their screen they're out talking to friends they just swipe right they just match people because then they're like i'll go through it later which is half the problem which comes back full circle to why i think hinge is like okay well you're wasting people's time. So let's say eight at a time. And now it's like a tag team. You have to

tag someone in to allow a new match or like keep responding. I think it's great. It's cutting the bullshit. I definitely agree. I definitely think it is a great feature, but I do think that a lot of people who use online dating are guilty of matching with people and not replying to them. And I know it's frustrating when you've matched with someone who you actually felt excited about matching, but I would also put money on the fact that you've done it to someone as well, right? I think we've all done it where we've matched with people and then haven't really been that invested or you know who knows it doesn't even come down to being invested it's got to do with like where you're at in your own life and what you've got going on some people genuinely just

need the ego boost but I kind of look at online like online dating as very superficial to start with because I think it only you only owe someone something once you've actually met up with them in real life and you've actually invested time into them I don't I don't think you owe someone a reply just because you match with them do you like I don't think that every single person you've matched with you owe a reply to we have had this discussion before a few times actually we disagree with it if you've just matched someone you had 200 unmessaged matches no but what I'm saying no that's what I'm saying if you just match with someone then no you don't owe them anything but if you have invested time and they have invested time and you've been speaking if you have been

speaking for two weeks and you have built this connection you've got this rapport you've got this banter you've been making plans then if you don't want to see them or speak to them anymore I do think you owe them something because you've invested a lot of yourself emotionally and mentally and physically your time even if you haven't met them I totally agree with that though I just don't agree with if you match with someone that you owe them a reply I think you know this idea of having an eight match limit to stop people from just matching with people willy-nilly I wonder if are we as you know as people who are on there swiping not me specifically but you know i will know i can i can relate to this i spent many years online dating before i met matt like

i fucking dated everyone in sydney to the point where you i would be out i would be walking the bondi promenade and i'd be like i know that guy no i don't i've just seen him on tinder four times you know like that would happen on the reg yeah so i have matched with people who haven't replied to me and I have matched people who I haven't replied to, but I kind of don't feel like I owed them anything. I don't feel like they owed me anything. I wasn't so emotionally invested in a match that I expected them to reply. Obviously it was exciting when someone who I kind of was like, well, he's hot. And like, that could be, you know, something. Yeah. I guess like I didn't feel the level of disappointment from not being replied to. And I wonder if most people, and I

would love to ask it as a poll, like, how do you feel when you match with people and you don't get the replies is there a level of disappointment does this affect you in a way that you are happy that this has been implemented I think there is for sure because I mean like it can be really soul-crushing online dating a hundred percent and if you've matched with someone that you thought was a vibe then you've written to them you still match they haven't unmatched you but they can't be bothered to write back it plays with your mind it plays with your confidence and your self-esteem and if that's happened to you 50 times then you're like well what's wrong with me like why are you matching me, not talking to me. You start to get in your head, right? Have you matched me and then

seen something you don't like? Have you gone onto my Instagram? I just think Hinge is trying to position itself with this as a more serious dating site. And that is what this Your Turn Limits is doing because it's saying like, if you actually want to make a connection, then you've got to pick carefully because you've got eight people that you can talk to. I think it's really, really good. The only other stat I want to throw in here because I found this really, really fascinating is that in 2023, there was a research study that was done on online dating. And when matches where one person responded to the other person's first message within a day was 72% more likely to result in a date. So if you get a response from someone within 24 hours of sending a message, then that

is like such a significant impact in you actually getting it out of the text and into real life dating, which I feel like people realize that anyway. But I think if you haven't received a response in 48 hours like the likelihood of getting a committed and excited response from that person is pretty fucking slim it's because we're smarter daters now from the we have the benefit of education in in relationships and dating like all the podcasts and the books you read the specialists we hear from we are so much more educated now about what we want and what it means so back in the day you would sit on a match for if someone didn't write back to you for two weeks you'd make these excuses right like they're probably busy which they could be but now it

doesn't fly. We're like, we know what we want. We're confident in ourself. I want someone that knows what they want. I want someone who's going to write back to me. So I feel like with how much information we're given from podcasts like this, specialists like Logan Urie, we know now what's going to fly and what's not going to fly. And I think we cut the shit a lot quicker than we used to. Maybe that also comes with age and experience. Like maybe it's just that comes back to that dating fatigue where you've done it for 10 years and now you're like, I don't want to wait for two weeks anymore because I don't have time to wait for two weeks anymore. Yeah, but that's specifically you Brit in terms of like dating. There's loads of people who are at different phases of their dating. I just think that there's this level of excitement. Like if you haven't received a message back from someone for multiple days slash weeks or two fucking years, you're like, you're not actually that excited about me. I'm just like the bottom of the barrel in terms of messages. Like you've obviously worked your way through all the people that you've matched with. And then I'm kind of like the last person you've sent that to.

I think I've just had a bit of an epiphany because most of the dating apps other than Bumble are all owned by the same people, yeah, Match Group. Maybe they're trying to rebrand so that they're more distinguished. To me, it seems as though they're trying to make Hinge this more like conscious dating, like you're actually trying to find a relationship because they've only brought the limits in on this one. Like the Bumble of Match Group. Yeah, but I mean, Bumble is the only one who's owned separately.

So if you compare it to like Tinder or Plenty of Fish or some of the other ones that they own. Because you know how people are like, oh, you know, all the apps are the same and blah, blah, blah. Well, maybe because they do have control over the large majority of them. They're just trying to distinguish that if you're after a relationship, you should go on Hinge. If you're after a hookup, you should go on Tinder. I mean, I don't really know what the difference between all of them are, but maybe it's actually just their way of trying to distinguish a bit more of a brand around Hinge. Yeah, I agree. But I also think it'd be very interesting to hear from people who are like on the ground and in the trenches of online dating and see if this actually

makes any significant change or whether it's just a little bit more of a PR stunt to get people excited about the possibilities of finding a relationship on Hinge. It's time for Suck and Sweet, our highlight and our low light of the week. I'm going to kick it off on my way home from Romania. I was about to start like this 30 hour journey home, multiple flights and five-hour layovers and whatever and the wheel of my luggage broke off as as I was leaving Ben's house just flung off so I had three wheels left so I had a 30-hour journey with three wheels so I was trying to like every time it kicks something it falls over and I was like this is fucking the worst timing so dumb but it was very annoying also it wasn't leaving your fiancee to come back

it wasn't leaving him in a foreign country that's obvious it was a broken wheel well also I bought the sorry very expensive luggage i bought it six months ago like that's really bad what happened to the luggage you had before the luggage that was my luggage well yeah but you had like really nice luggage from luggage guy luggage guy was only a small carry-on a shame shame yeah it was tight didn't give me the big one um that's when you know that you're not really you're not like the girl you're just a girl he gave you carry-on no i was the girl at the time i don't even think You had big luggage then. Whatever.

My sweet is very obviously Ben. I got to see Ben for five days in six months. I cried my eyes out when I left. So that should have been my suck your right, not the broken wheel. Yeah. So my sweet was spending five or six wonderful sex-filled, beautiful love-filled days with my fiancé. It's why your knees are so dry.

My knees are just dry because it was winter. Leave my knees out of this. My knees aren't dry. I have, like, moisturising shea butter on. I don't know why you're so offended by dry knees. I don't know why you're so offended by dry knees. You're the one that can't stop looking at them. Guys, you should see my toenails at the moment.

It's out of control. Yeah, they're offensive. Like, it looks like I don't have it, but it looks like I've got, like, a fungal infection on all my toenails. You probably do have a fungal infection. I think they're fine. I think they're just dry. All right.

What's your sock? Probably my toes. Okay, great. my suck for the week is it all sorted itself out you guys know that we're doing this big renovation down south in Ulladulla and we had a tiler booked we are moving at like a rapid speed pace on this place and we had a tiler booked to do the downstairs bathroom and we received all the tiles for the downstairs bathroom opened up the boxes and we were accidentally sent the wrong tiles for the flooring which was a real fucking kick in the dick because

it meant that we had to we had to pay the tiler we had to reschedule so it's like the never-ending thing about renovations is that you have a budget and then things just blow the budget because shit goes wrong especially when you're trying to move quickly so we ended up which can actually be a suite as well so the guy that we have who's doing the build one of his workers randomly was up in Sydney on the Friday and he was like oh I can pick up some tiles at least enough for you to be able to do the floors of the bathroom so he went and he picked them up for us just in his ute like nice Aussie guy picking up our tiles I mean he's getting paid he works it no he did that yeah but he just he works he's getting paid three hours and picked up tiles it was really nice

and he got paid yeah okay he's just a nice guy all right so look that was my suck is just I feel like at the moment it's really rewarding and it's been really challenging but there's a lot of small things that have gone wrong there's been termites there has been white ants they're not small things dead fucking animals in the roof. The tiles didn't arrive. It's been pretty chaotic and very stressful, but also fine. And then my sweet for the week is, as you guys know, last week was our radio week off. Like it was survey week, which means that we got to have a week off podcasting, Brit being away. But that also meant that I was able to spend heaps of time with the girls and also loads of time on Tony May. And I just really came out of last week

feeling like I have my shit together. That's why you weren't a kid. You had one good week. Honestly, I was like, I am ovulating and I will have baby number three right now. She's like, I can do this. I can do this. That's because you weren't doing radio podcasting. It's true. Let's see how I am in a week's time. I'll give you an update on Tuesday's episode.

But we had a really awesome time with the kids. On Friday night, we went out and had like a family dinner. Life is good. We're in a good spot. And I was very, very happy. That's it. That's my suck and my sweet for the week. I love that you are having a really lovely time with all the people you love.

As I said goodbye to my love. I'm so sorry. Also, I feel like I've been saying the same suck and sweet over the last couple of weeks where like every time I get solid family time, like that is my sweet. It's a good sweet. But it's, yeah, it's a byproduct of just kind of doing the juggle at the moment between work and being a mum. And so every time when I do get to have it,

it really is like the best part of my week. And that's it from us, guys. Just a little reminder to go and vote for us in the Mariah Carey of the Podcast Awards, which are happening very soon. It is, the links are in the show notes. Go. Listener's Choice. Life Uncut.

We are here for you. your virtual besties in your ears every week pew pew pew go vote yeah if you've ever liked even just one episode

just do us a solid like one episode you didn't have to love it just like it if it was just okay if you got a chuckle if you learnt something that is it from us guys

you know the drill tell your mum tell your dad tell your dog tell your friends and share the love because we love love

We'll be right back.