The James Donald Forbes McCann Catamaran Plan - all the way up it

Episode Date: July 31, 2023

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I'm Jessie Cruikshank, and on my podcast, Phone a Friend, I break down the biggest stories in pop culture. But when I have questions, I get to phone a friend. I phone my old friend, Dan Levy. You will not die hosting the Hills after show. I get thirsty for the hot wiggle. I didn't even know what thirsty meant until there was all these headlines and i get schooled by a tween facebook is like a no that's what my grandma's on thank god phone a friend with jesse crookshank is not available on facebook it's out

now wherever you get your podcasts a cast helps creators launch grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere a cast.com Acast helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com Guess who's back? Back again. The James Donald Forbes McCann catamaran plan is back. Tell a friend, because that's how more people find out about the show. And that's how I raise enough money to buy a boat. I've been very sick, and I've had to cancel a trip to America.

It was a difficult call to cancel the trip to America. It was actually a series of difficult calls to budget airlines that I had booked tickets through, and I wasn't able to get all the money back. Sadly, I just received some credit from Jetstar, which for international listeners is our crappiest airline. And they say, hello, sir. Hello. We cannot refund this ultralight fare. But because you are sick, we can give you a compassionate credit to fly Jetstar again. Let me tell you, there's nothing compassionate about giving someone a credit to fly Jetstar again. Getting a credit to fly Jetstar again is a punishment

for recovering. But I've taken the credit. I will use that in the future. Air New Zealand. Well, you can have a full refund if you like. You can also walk around on my back and give me a couple kicks in the head. Much love and respect to Air New Zealand. I'm very sad to not go to America. It's probably the right thing. I was coughing a lot. It was a flu and it devolved into a chest infection, possibly pneumonia. I'm being treated for pneumonia, but I haven't done an x-ray, so we can't say I have pneumonia. And I wouldn't want to because that would probably be overdramatic, but I'm on the pneumonia drugs, feeling much better. And boy, boy, it was horrible because

I started taking the antibiotics and then I had a few days before the flight, but I'd cancelled the flight by that point because I felt so bad. And then I started to feel a bit better and I thought, I've made a huge mistake. I'll be healthy enough to go. But thankfully, there was a health crisis. After all, the antibiotics have turned my insides to mush and absolutely destroyed my gut bacteria.

I don't know how much detail to go into. It's like there's a second urethra back there. Do you know what I mean? Great to be with you here on this episode of the James Donald Forbes McCann Catamaran Plan. I've been endeavouring to take it a bit easier, which is challenging because we've got the three young kids and my sweet, lovely wife is doing a wonderful job and I'm trying to be involved and be helpful but I am sleeping a lot.

I'm sleeping a lot, I'm drinking a lot of Yakult and I'm managing to do about one activity a day which usually would drive me insane but at the moment I don't care. I'm not drinking because I'm on the antibiotics. I had been smoking before I got sick. I have now given up smoking with no serious effort. I've been back on the darts for, I don't know, one or two months.

Maybe that's why you got super sick, James. Hey, maybe. What do I know? What am I, a doctor? Ah, no. Quitting was always really hard but uh for me but only the first three days and i just slept through it i haven't desired a cigarette at all maybe my body is so enfeebled disgusting the quadrant of my brain that usually cries out for nicotine is going

not this time buddy it is uh it's a it's just horrible being sick and mending and not being able to go to America. I really, yes, as soon as I'm well again, I'm sure I'll start feeling very bad about it. But currently, I just feel very grateful to be home and to be putting myself together. I am trying to take it as easy as I can. That said, I'm writing a screenplay. I'm managing about two hours a day on the screenplay. And we're planning this big art auction. It's coming up in October.

And I have finished a book of poems. So I wouldn't say it was total inactivity. Man, I tell you, I read a book at sort of the worst of my illness. I read Sam Talent's Running the Light. I read Sam Talent's Running the Light, and it was not a soothing book to read while feverish and fluey. It's a great read. I recommend it, and I hope to be able to interview Sam Talent on the show soon. But it's basically about an unhinged cocaine addict comedian, and he lives a fevered life, and I was literally fevered, and it just, it was all, it was a wonderful read, it was a wild ride, and just really an uncomfortable space in my brain to be reading it, but I've finished it, I'm now, I've

almost now, oh boy, I was, man, I'm audio booking a George Orwell book called Keep the Aspidistra Flying. And it too, George Orwell is just unrelentingly bleak and his books don't end positively, as far as I can tell. You know, people talk about his wicked sense of humour, but it's like, how about you give me something a bit, just every now and again yeah instead of a sardonic uh boot instead of a boot stomping down on a face for a thousand years

or whatever it is can we can we can we just have it can we have a smile george well why not just go through all of the things that i've watched and read since we've been apart. I watched Heat for the first time. I'd never seen the movie Heat before. I'd never seen anything by Michael Mann. It's what a movie. I loved it. She's got a great ass. And so many other wonderful lines from Heat.

A really wonderful movie. I loved it. I saw Oppenheimer. I thought that was great too. I didn't realize until I saw Heat how indebted Christopher Nolan was to the movie Heat. And then I've just made frantic calls to a lot of my friends going, have you seen Heat?

And, of course, many of them have seen Heat, and many of them do remember the scene where Al Pacino says that she has a great ass. It's a great movie. I don't want to spoil too much of it, but you may have picked up that there's a scene where Al Pacino says the woman has a great ass. Resting is a strange... Yes. Trying not to feel anxious. I've never seen a study that having a

convalescent disposition is helpful to a convalescent result. Do you know what I mean? People say, hey, take it easy. I say, well, where's the proof that taking it easy is going to help my health? Even if there was proof, I wouldn't believe it. I tell you, there was one moment about three days ago where I felt just great joy because I could breathe properly from my lungs for the first time. I'm supposed to breathe in somewhere else. I certainly don't breathe out of my ass, my great ass. It would be a very great skill for an ass to have, is to breathe from. Honestly, this may not be the best episode of the podcast.

I just thought it was important to come back and make an episode. And well, let's start on the right foot. The Book of Poems is the next plan, I do believe. Now, the first Book of Po sold just shy of 100 copies. So I think if the next book of poems, which currently doesn't have a name, it's either called Mumbo No. 6 or My Monkey and I Have Got Something to Hide

or Spanish or Woman Football. And it needs a cover and a marketing strategy. I've got to talk to Sam Clark, first mate, about how we're getting that out. But I think, seriously, as I work on my screenplay, I believe this screenplay, if we make it into a picture, could generate half a million dollars. It's that good. I won't go into too much detail

about it now, but honestly, call it delusion. It is delusion. If you must. I must call it delusion. I think we genuinely, if my health comes back. Delusion. If I finish this screenplay and if we can raise enough money to make the screenplay into a picture, I think we're going to be all right. We're going to get that boat by the end of the year or whenever the movie comes out. I mean, at the moment, I don't have the energy to put on a pair of jeans. I'm so sick of wearing comfortable pants. It's been comfortable pants.

I want to wear a full suit and be in an office, live up to a decorum and dignity, but instead I'm comfortable all the time in my wretchedness. Number one, the Book of Poems. The Book of Poems is done. We bring the Book of Poems out. We sell the Book of Poems online. We make something like $8 per Book of Poem. Who knows how many we sell? Last time we sold 100. Maybe this time we sell 1,000. And that could be $8,000.

And with that $8,000, then we do this art auction. Maybe last time we made $2,500 in the art auction. This time we make $25,000, then we do this art auction. Maybe last time we made $2,500 in the art auction. This time we make $25,000. These are just numbers coming straight out of my great ass. But I mean, the podcast has more listeners now than it did this time last year when we were getting ready for our first book of poems. And it has way, way more listeners than back for the first art auction. So who knows what the multiplier effect will be.

Book of Poems, art auction, raising money from other places and other people who want to get involved and help out with this film. And then we make the feature film. And then, excuse me, I feel dizzy even talking about it. I think there might be something to that. I'm going to take it more easy. I'm going to take it more easy. I'm going to try not to get too excited, but then we make the feature film. I have a small complaint about having a family and recovering from illness. If you're looking for flexible workouts, Peloton's got you covered. Summer runs or playoff season meditations, whatever your vibe,

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CBC News. I buy this Yakult, right? I buy this Yakult, right? I need the Yakult because I can't take a solid defecation. So I buy the Yakult to improve the gut health. If I want to have Yakult three days in a row, I can't buy three Yakults, you understand? I can't buy three Yakults, you understand? I have to buy 40 because I've got five people in this.

Everybody wants a Yakult. And the Yakult people know this. You know, they know that, you know, this is a yogurt drink and children enjoy it. And so it's written all over it. My wife says, look, but it's called the family drink. And I'm saying, honey, I need the occult. This is not an inexpensive family drink.

So I just buy huge quantities of occult for everybody. One thing I've noticed how you can get away with buying very little with a family is Indian dinners. I've finally, finally calibrated the right amount of curry to buy for two adults and three children, which it's been a long road to get there. It's one large rice and one large curry from this place and three garlic naan. I get a naan. My wife gets a naan. We split up a naan between the four-year-old, the two-year-old and the six-month-old. And they all have their naan.

I have never before this evening ordered the correct amount of curry before. It was always too much. And then once at a party with some neighbours, it was too little. And it was very embarrassing and everyone was, frankly, on edge. But now, $36 feeding the whole family. Pretty mediocre, but good enough for my family, Indian dinner. I hear you saying, James, you didn't mention the mango lassi. Lassi, the mango, whatever they're called.

You didn't mention the mango beverage that everybody gets with the Indian. That's because I didn't get it this time. All right? I'm sorry. In my enfeebled state, I did not want to risk trying to get that home in the car. It's hard to... Sometimes they'll do you right and they'll glad wrap over the top of the lassie.

Lassie! But at this place, they just give it to you and they give you your straw and you're on your own in the car mate but so this time there was no mango lassi that would probably get it up towards close to the 50 because then i've got to get three i got to get one it's like it's like any yogurt drink whether it be your cult or a mango lassi you can't just get you one i gotta get one for me i gotta get one for the wife i gotta get one for the kids to. I've got to get one for me. I've got to get one for the wife. I've got to get one for the kids to split.

I've got to do it in such a way that they're not upset that it's being split between them, even though they are like a quarter of my size. And so proportionally, they're getting twice as much lassie as me. Excuse me. Let me put that resentment back in the cage. So many things to be grateful for. Just before I became unwell, we were on this road trip. We went to Melbourne.

I got to do a week of gigs at the Comics Lounge. I was the emcee. I got some great new bits. I was very happy with that. Got to see some friends and do some podcasts. I got to do the Phone Hacks podcast. And I got to do the Confessions podcast. So many lovely people in Melbourne.

So many lovely opportunities to promote my podcast. And then it was off to Castlemaine. We drove up and I got to open for Kieran J. Callinan. He's an incredible performer and the new album is stunning. And that was in Castlemaine and that was beautiful and we came over to Mildura and we did a walking tour of Mildura. And there was one afternoon where I didn't have comedy that night, and we went to a playground with the children and my wife

and with Anna Freer, who was on the trip with us. And it was so good. It was just... so good. It was just, I felt easy and relaxed in a way that I haven't felt relaxed and happy. Yes, I guess I'd thought that if I wasn't constantly busying myself with something to do, that I would fall apart or that there would be a great angst or depression behind that. But what was quite nice was that I found that when I did take a break, it was just filled with love and joy. And that the thing that I'd been working and running away from was joy. And that perhaps joy is the scariest thing of all. So I look forward to having more of that as I relax and that sort of thing.

I'm making music. It's the worst music I've ever made. Surely that's not true. It's all shit. I feel like David Bowie must have felt in the mid-90s, you know? I think I'm the person who used to make good things, but I can't tell anymore. It's always a bad sign when you start working in a non-Western scale. When a Western artist starts to move into Eastern scales for inspiration, very rarely does that turn out well. Man, I take it back.

This is pretty good. This is excellent. Oh, yeah. I love it very much. My name is James and I'm here to say I'm going to do rap in an oriental way. Everybody getting down at the party. Everybody raise their hands. Everybody say yeah.

Woo! Everybody moving in and shaking. You know what? We party. Everybody raise their hands. Everybody say yeah. Woo! Everybody moving in a shaker. You know what? We are going to leave it a few. We are going to convalesce for a few weeks before we decide whether or not we're starting the rap career up again. Now is not the time to be making any life-changing decisions about whether or not we uh...

Oh, that might be lit. I think that might be litty. I think I'm the new Claude Debussy. Getting that Japanese scale and putting it to fine Western music use. I should probably stop the podcast. Hey, thank you for joining me on this first episode back of the James Donald Forbes McCann Catamaran plan. I'm very sorry for my long absence. I'm very sorry for the delay in getting those plates to everybody. I just feel very sorry.

You know when you get in a spiral of self-abnegation. I just lie in bed with my sweat and my recovery. And thinking, oh, everything I've ever done is bad and wrong. Just remembering things from the second grade. Where you go, man, I was socially awkward. Or year two, as we call it in this country. What a funny thing it is the way that language differs from place to place. Boy, I love you. I miss you.

I need you. It's good to be back. Man, it actually does feel good to be back. Sitting in the Volvo. Excuse me. First cough of the episode. It's good to be back. Man, it actually does feel good to be back. Sitting in the Volvo. Excuse me. First cough of the episode. It was not. Back in the Volvo.

Doing the podcast. Exciting things coming. I cannot wait to be off these antibiotics and to get my poops back to some sort of regular pace. Can't wait to, I don't know. It feels like good things are coming. Good times are coming. I'm very sad not to be in America. I think we will potentially still get to be there early next year, and that would be a very sweet treat indeed to come and see you all. I have my eye on Canada. I can't believe how many fans we have in Austin

and Houston. Just as I was getting ready to go to Austin and Houston, quite randomly, we've got all these fans in Austin and Houston. All these Austinian and Houstonistan listeners. So I want to say a big, a special apology to all the Texans. All of the Texans listening to the James Donald Forbes McCann catamaran plan, really as many as 30 Texans. I could have done a show, but I will in the future. I will one day, and I'm sorry that it wasn't able to happen. All the Americans were so good about me not being able to go,

man, don't worry about it, you rest up. Thank you, all the Americans, for your kindness. Man, don't worry about it, you raster. Thank you all the Americans for your kindness. Now I'm very proud to say I just have 50 seconds more time to fill. Man, almost got it up to the 20 minutes. Sometimes I've got so much to say. Well, do we want to hear another song?

Because it's got to go for at least 20 minutes this episode. I think you might want to hear another song. She got up. What's she got up? She got up, she got up, she got up, she got up. I'm cheating with the movie. She got up. Great ass. And you got your head all the way up it.

What? All the way up it. Yeah, what? All the way up it. When I think of ass, a woman's ass. All the way up it! When I think of asses, a woman's ass... Something comes out of me. Acast powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend.

I'm Jessi Kirkshank, and on my podcast, Phone a Friend, I break down the biggest stories in pop culture. But when I have questions, I get to phone a friend. I phone my old friend, Dan Levy. You will not die hosting the Hills after show. I get thirsty for the hot wiggle. I didn't even know what thirsty meant until there was all these headlines. And I get schooled by a tween. Facebook is like a no. That's what my grandma's on.

Thank God Phone a Friend with Jessie Crookshank is not available on Facebook. It's out now wherever you get your podcasts. Acast helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com.