Triforce! - Triforce! #102 - JUST GIVE ME A BEER!

Episode Date: September 11, 2019

Triforce! Episode 102! Returning from their long holiday the guys are plagued with dad-camp, jobsworths and beer-induced panic attacks!   Support your favourite podcast on Patreon: https://bit.ly/2SMnzk6 Music courtesy of Epidemic Sound. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the Triforce podcast. That's right, I'm here, I'm joined by Pyroflax. Howdy. You don't even remember what number it is, do you? And also Sips, I don't have any idea, no. 102. It's 102. Yeah.

Feels like it should be like 106 or 107 by now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We've taken a little break over summer, haven't we? It was a summer break. You guys have had some little trips away. Yeah, I've had a really busy summer. It's been exciting. I went to Gamescom, went to Germany.

How was Gamescom? Gamescom was fine. I've been loads of times. I like Gamescom. I like Germany. I like the people. I like Cologne. I've not been to Cologne yet. It okay it doesn't seem like it's not doesn't seem like a busy mega sprawling city too much it's

like kind of fairly condensed in the center you know it's nice it's quite it's got quite a market really there's lots of nice little shops and stuff i enjoyed a cigar lounge at the hotel i stayed in last time i was in cologne it was nice they had a woman working in the cigar lounge there's nobody in there every time we went by so i guess she just stands around waits for people to sample some cigars and we went in and uh it was with hat films and they ordered a bunch of phies. They were like one euro each. What is a filly? A cheap-ass cigar. It's just like a cheap-ass cigar, yeah.

Oh, like fillies in Philadelphia. No, as in you eat it, and it fills you right up. Yeah, you eat it. But she had the little tool to cut the cigar, and it was great. It was all properly ventilated and everything. We were smoking cigars.

It was really nice. The only time you ever see that fucking cigar tool used is to threaten people to chop their fingers off in gangster movies. Yeah, that's it. It has two uses, finger threatening and cigar cutting. I feel like I've seen it more used for the finger thing than anything else. I do wonder if that was part of it. You don't see people smoking cigars much anymore because they're fucking gross like i mean even if you're when i was a big smoker

i'd have cigars occasionally because you know you thought it was cool yeah but you can't inhale them or anything you just oh you just you just get the smoke in your mouth for the flavor but if you inhale them like no no one can actually inhale a cigar it's far too toxic the flavor is so fucking it hurts your mouth yeah like it's so strong you can feel the the cancer in your mouth that's how bad it is it is like sucking on an exhaust pipe yeah yeah it's it's rough it's like i like i remember the first time i had a cigar i was really young you know and obviously you know what you're like when you're a kid you're fucking around with a cigar and you just breathe that stuff in and it was like oh boy i remember when i was a kid and we were like hanging out in the park we wanted to be all cool and like adults so we rolled up

some pieces of a4 paper and just lit the end and breathed in the smoke it was like that you know it was like it was like that just horrid i bet i bet it's instead of the a4 paper we used a aerosol can and uh just pierced the bottom oh my god we inhaled that i was yeah nice what was in the aerosol jesus christ just Africa yeah it was links i think is i bet if you were in a group of kids and you were smoking this fucking piece of a four paper that you'd lit and you were obviously about to be sick from inhaling pure smoke, someone would be like,

Hey, pass that round. You know, try it. Your turn. I remember the first time I, I, I,

uh, pinched some of my mom's cigarettes and, um, smoked one. And I thought I was going to die. The head rush was so intense. I just like took a big hit because you think you're cool. And my body was like, oh, my God, what is this?

And I literally was rolling around on the floor. I thought I was going to puke. It was so bad. Yeah, you get really dizzy and stuff. Like the very first cigarette you have is pretty rough. I remember the first time we ever smoked we managed to get somebody to buy us a pack of cigarettes because that used to be like the done thing yeah hang around outside a convenience store wait for people like wait for irresponsible

adults yeah yeah you're always looking for like uh like sort of like a disheveled looking dad who is on his own somebody that you could just be like hey man can you can you buy me a pack of cigarettes give him the money and he'd go in and buy you a pack so we managed to get a pack of cigarettes and we went out to this it was like behind a high school but it was it was wasn't a full forest it was kind of like a field with you know like a few trees and bushes and stuff like that and that's the kind of place you could have a portage well yeah kind of portage but that's the first place that we ever um smoked cigarettes and got drunk as well right um and it was just how did you refer to this area because it would have had a coded reference well we never we didn't really use it again it was just it was just this random

spot sort of out of the way where very clever couldn't be seen from like the road or anything like that once you've burnt a location you can't go back there was like there were like 20 of us too it was crazy it was just we i don't know like i guess the older you get you you sort of narrow your friends down into like a tighter knit group but at the time we just had this massive posse that and everybody was just going to this field with armed with alcohol that we managed to convince somebody to buy for us and cigarettes that we managed to convince somebody to buy for us and it was really fun uh everybody got sick and uh actually looking back was it's pretty miserable but we felt like real men it's one of those rites of passage things it's a thing you've got to do

having a giant posse is a problem because you don't trust anyone even if no one does tell on you you still don't trust everyone it's like once you've whittled your group down to a small enough gang

you can believe that they'll all stand behind you you know or whatever or at least they won't they won't like you know that like the rules the unwritten rules just like take shape you know whereas if you've got like a big bunch like 20 guys like god there's always gonna be that kid who's just like the mummy's boy or has to bring his little brother along or something like that you know yeah it's always gonna be like oh fucking snitch that one who will just you know is just gonna tell because he's like the kid of a teacher or something you know it's gonna get back to them you know yeah i think maybe that's part of the whittling process is knowing who you can trust because if you get you're gonna do stupid shit with your friends right but you don't you don't want to do stupid shit with 20

or 30 people because then it's mob rule you Even your own friends will have to throw you under the bus to save face in the face of the mob. Oh, yeah. It's mob rule. But once you're a small enough group, you know you can fuck up and it'll just be amongst your mates. They're not going to run off and tell all and sundry because they get enough fun out of teasing you in a small group of people, which is bearable. Being humiliated in front of 30 people is life--changingly humiliating i'm sure yeah so a small group you can deal with it because you're all gonna fuck up and it's a laugh you can laugh with and at each other but in a large group oh no you're that's it that's why i think that the

first few weeks of a new school such a crucial period because if you fuck up that's you for the rest of the six years of that school that's what you're going to be known for is whatever it is you did in that first week you're tired with that for life yeah yeah what could it be you're never you're never going to shake that like reputation god forbid you you accidentally pee in your pants oh my god you'll never live that one down and that one will follow you you'll be pdp pd piss pants in no time pdp they'll just call you piss oh piss that's it what's your nickname at school piss piss pants fucking stinky ass sometimes sometimes that stuff just sticks to you for your whole life though like you know pee re-inflex hey there was a kid in my school he was shunned purely because he lived on

the same road as the school once we found that out no one wanted to know him my god jeez there was always there was always a couple of people that sort of got had a raw deal at school right like they just didn't wear like the right clothes or they didn't fit in or you know they just had personality traits that people picked up on quickly and mocked and made fun of or whatever it's it's a really weird thing isn't it like being a child and growing up and going through school and stuff like i remember we had this friend he was like and looking back like you feel kind of bad but like at the time we were we were really mean to him like uh it was

his dad his dad had left his mom and moved away like far away or whatever and i guess he was taking it pretty bad right we didn't really like you know help him we were like 10 right so it's just like what like we didn't we didn't know like what to say or do or i don't even think it registered with most of us or whatever and uh so we turned up to school one day and we always like we walked to school so we turn up like pretty early and just like hang around in the playground or whatever waiting for like the bell to go to go in and i guess like he was taking it particularly bad this morning and like he'd made he'd written a song about how much he missed his dad and sang it to us yeah oh my god fuck it was so awkward even then really awkward god but man we fucking made fun of

him so much like for the rest of school like this went on for years like every time we saw him we'd start singing the song and stuff and it's like it's so tragic it's yeah it's pretty bad it's pretty bad but like how do you know how do you know like any different when you're 10 you're a kid yeah your your peers are just as stupid as you it's like um i don't know i guess like i guess we as humans we do it to sort of like i don't know like gain some social standing with other people or whatever like belittling one person like it's like the worst thing that you can do it's horrible but kids do it all the time every school and every kid does it it's true yeah yeah it's crazy it's

crazy my kids went back to school today which is a merciful break from six weeks of... I mean, honestly, they were pretty good. I mean, you know, I was away for quite a bit of time as well. We had YodCon and TI and stuff like that. So I was away for like half of the summer, I guess, more or less. But honestly, it is, you know, you can see that they're starting to lack structure in their days. And they need to socialize with other kids and yeah yeah they were all they were both really happy the sass

starts to build up right yeah they start to get stroppy and sort of like sassy a lot more sassy near the end of the very much vacation my son went back today too my daughter starts school so starts nursery on monday oh but she has they have like an open like stay and play thing right right on i think tomorrow uh so she's so technically i guess tomorrow is like her first day but i don't know man my one of the guys i uh i was hanging out with at ti um dakota he's got a young kid and he was like geez there's just so much work and they're just around all the time i was like look it does get better because school amazing. Like once once they start school, you've got so much more free time during the day, they've got stuff to talk about. And you've got stuff to work

on with on them. There's like so much more structure to just day to day stuff. Like you know, the weekends or in the evenings, like right now they've got homework, we've got projects to do. It's just things to do because it is it is surprisingly hard to think of stuff to do with kids um because you know they can't do anything really fun they can't go to the pub with you and get drunk they can't watch the cool movies you actually want to watch they can't go to strip clubs they can't smoke cigars you know some kids do there's some parents out there who are just like i don't fucking care i've got kids they're coming to the strip club with me yeah and they're gonna smoke cigars as well smoke cigars they've got their own pile of dollar bills to shove down the g-strings and everything bucks in her titties right in the titty son right

in the middle right in the middle break up break up with that piggy bank no he's okay he's with me he wants to put him right right in your titties there let's talk about my good boy so what did you get up to? What do you mean? I want to know. Were you like actively dad entertaining? Why didn't you like send them to summer camp or something? Because that's what my parents do. Well, I'll tell you what.

I know Mrs. Flax listens to the podcast. She straight up fucked up. She booked the wrong week. So we had summer camp booked. She booked it by the wrong month. So they were meant to spend a week of the holidays at summer camp, which is like 8 30 till 5 30 every day i was like awesome i'll stream all day it'll be great no problems

and the day that the day before she's like i i messed up the uh i booked it the previous month so i was like you're kidding me so i got back from china or i think it was or from yobcom maybe and i was expecting them to be going to camp and no no, I had them for the whole week. I was devastated. I was devastated. Man. Because I was looking forward to it so much. Do your kids like summer camp?

No. No. But they're fucking going. No. Yeah. Mine are petrified of it. It's like active threat. Like when, you know,

you get those days where you go out and stuff and they get more. Active threat. Yeah. They get more and more excited. It's like the US generals. We got an active threat coming. Summer are we gonna do they start listening less and less and like they're get they get carried away or whatever that that's when we bust out the summer camp oh well

summer camp you know they're not listening i'm just gonna have to phone up the summer camp and say do you have space for two more people because they're we're gonna have to put them in i mean here's the thing i would never put them in the one where they have to sleep over because i hated that when i was a kid i hated that and this was just like all day and it was great but yeah we've done it previous years but mrs f made a mistake it's all right it happens love yeah i i think i enjoyed it like initially but i think it got boring because it was the same old shit day after day well once they're there they love it

like I picked them up and I'm like daddy we did all this amazing stuff and they've made things they've been swimming they've been go-karting and it's like it's a really awesome camp

like it's really fun and they love it but before they go they're like because they just want to stay home and play video games they're my kids so you know

I can relate to that I think that's what I wanted to do when I was yeah you just want to stay home yeah did you want to try and put on Dad camp? Can you imagine if you were Scout leader type material Are you fucking kidding me?

And you just got your shorts on That's a fucking nightmare are you crazy? Why the fuck would you do that? And you were like alright kids welcome to dad camp Okay first thing we're going to do Is dig up this Old tree stump in the garden. Oh, give them jobs around the house, Jamie.

I can just about handle being around my own kids that I made with my own man syrup a couple years ago. I don't want to be around other people's kids at all. No, I'm not suggesting you bring in neighborhood kids. I'm suggesting it's just you, portage or like i don't know doing our own kids oh right do you but do you dream of like being like that that kind of outdoorsy dad is that a thing that you're keen to do or is that something you want to avoid at all costs it's actively avoid being that dad like the plague avoid avoid avoid it's a long game that you got to play you can't burn yourself out quickly.

Activities and stuff like that. Only if you're really, really pressed. Yeah. You're having like a especially difficult day. That's when you bust out like the paints or whatever. Yeah. You don't just bust out the paints first thing. That's crazy. You gotta be crazy.

You've got to have a backup. It's messy. You know, it requires you to like stand up and stuff. Fuck that. You know, Batman, he always has stashes of bat equipment around Gotham, right? It's messy. It requires you to stand up and stuff. Fuck that. You know Batman, he always has stashes of bat equipment around Gotham, right? He always has them stashed just in case he needs them. It's like a reserve.

Spider-Man does the same thing. He secures Spidey kits around New York just in case. Bad stuff is like that. I feel like I need a backup so that when they're really losing their minds, I'm like, right, let's make some bead necklaces. They it's like cool yeah you don't open with that you save your best material for when when you know the previous few jokes have bombed you go to that a material in the back of your pocket that's that's the plan there yeah we've got batman survival kits like all over our house there's always something like my wife's really

good she'll she'll she'll get something like we'll be on vacation or whatever and she'll buy something and i'll be like oh fuck why did you buy that like it's you know it's so much fucking hassle or super messy or whatever and she's like no no we're not they're not using it now i'm saving this for like you know when we do this or when we go here or whatever and oh yeah fuck that's a really good idea. You know what I mean? Like just to like, keep them,

keep them off your back for a bit or like, you know, for like a long plane journey or something. Can we just give a round of applause to moms everywhere? Cause dads don't think of that shit. I'm sorry. Dads are just like in like meltdown mode all the time. Right.

We're ready for the panic shit. You know, like a kid's broken a leg or something. Bam.'m ready to go but if it's like yeah how do you entertain them for two hours i don't know netflix you like yeah yeah i'm the same it's like here can you entertain the kids for two hours and you're like yeah okay sure that sounds great and then your wife leaves and you're like all right kids let's watch a movie and then they're like no no we want to play like a fort building with uh you know hybrid hide and seek and and this and you're oh what yeah geez you mean i have to be involved come on physical games that's that's not sitting

down and watching a movie kids yeah that's it yeah i mean that's like the kind of thing they did before movies right they did like the parlor games like i remember my parents used to have this old book um full of like parlor games that you could play and they were it was it was one of these kind of dusty old like it looked like a fucking antique but it was full of like no way to talk about your parents they're stupid these like like sardines and stuff like that you know things that and charades and like i don't know just weird little i think i think i remember seeing a book like this on a grandparent's shelf and half the games were fucking awful like really boring they're all really weird as well and speaking of

board games we bought uh while we were away we went to um center parks in longleat for like the 20th time uh for a week this summer it's really nice though like the kids really like it and stuff and like we're familiar with it so we know the kind of things that we want to do or whatever and uh it was raining one day and we picked up travel battleship okay i played i played travel battleship with my son i was really surprised at over the years how good i'd become at battleship because i have like i have a firing pattern i have strategy i've got like a layout strategy for my ships and stuff man my son does not have any of that okay like his his technique is he just clears row by row by row by row oh yeah so it's just like

and at first like the first game we played he got a hit on one row uh but he just kept going with the strategy he didn't even follow up the hit to try to sink the ship like a machine so i had to like explain to him like if you get a hit you gotta find the boat like you know you gotta sink ships in this game and then like a couple games later he was like you know he had like a better strategy and stuff but he still wasn't doing like the diagonal like uh firing pattern right leaving spaces in between because you got to find that little like pt boat right oh yeah the the two circle one like the the small one because that that's the fucker that's the one that always survives yeah so you got you got to start

off as you mean to go on with like a really tight firing pattern try to try to nail that bastard and again i was really really surprised at just how uh logical and dominating you were dominating yeah i let him win the first game though i felt bad so i. So I was like, I gave him a couple of hints. That must have taken fucking ages if he was doing the old scan and... Well, there was an element of that, too. It was late and it was approaching bedtime and everybody was tired. So I was like giving him hints. But it was his first game, so he wasn't following up the hits still.

That's so funny. So I was like, yeah, man. I mean, Battleship is of as a game possibly the simplest yeah it's a good introductory game for a small kid right i think so i feel like scrabble would be difficult you know for a four-year-old yeah yeah oh hungry hippos is i mean that's the physical game the problem with that is the balls get everywhere like you're gonna lose we had it for a week and then every single ball was lost

they're probably still in the house somewhere but it's frustrating it's frustrating we were gonna try to get Monopoly and Cluedo but I don't know I think it would've been

a stretch also Monopoly is like a bit of a Monopoly is the worst game of all time family breaker and Cluedo's just fucking sucks

Cluedo does suck I forgot like how how bad it sucked actually i recommend agricola that's a fun game yeah i don't know it's like a resource placement grindy yeah it's just farming you just get a little farm you get pigs you get sheep it's great everyone has fun and then in the end someone wins but it's not like you're losing along the way you're having fun building your farm up regardless and all right you know the other farm might be fancier and that person might win but you still got a sick little farm at the end of it with pigs and sheep and cows just saying there's lots of good games uh that you can play these days um like

small world's really good um stuff like that like stuff like stuff like you said though pflax where everyone is in it till the end that's the key with a board game like like not to knock people out along the way because that just sucks by Oh, by the way, my kids, I got a Steam account for my kids. Oh. They're playing House Flipper. I think you've played it, Sips, haven't you? Yeah.

They love it. So do I. Man, that game is awesome. If they like House Flipper, add that to the dad camp. Like, today, kids, we're going to tidy up the garage. We're going to flip the house.

We're going to lay a floor. Just like House Flipper. We're going to plaster the walls. But for real. Welcome to dad camp. And it's just in this shitty cockroach infested house that you're like, do you like playing House Flipper? Time to do it.

IRL, baby. Get to work. I bought the house across the way. It's a disaster zone. Get clean. They're going to love it. I want this wall knocked through, kids. All right?

I want this knocked through. Make sure it's not load bearing, though. Don't forget to put the steel in. That's very heavy. You're going to be staying over as well. And I'm going to go and play Dota. Good luck. Here's two cigars.

Speaking of Dota, I went, I went, I went to China, went to China for 10 days. That's right. Yeah. How did that go?

How was TI9? I heard that the next one's going to be in Stockholm. It's going to be in Stockholm, baby. That's crazy. It's going to be hype. We've got to go to that. So China is pretty much the last place I ever want to return to. It's not a fun place to be. And I'm honestly, TI was good, but China is just too much, man. It's just, it's not,

it's too different. It makes too little sense. They've got, you know, the government there is a bit questionable to say the least. And it's just weird, man, living under that kind of regime. You're not used to it in Britain. You're not used to being censored, having things denied you like the internet and stuff like that. There's a palpable lack of freedom and coming from the freedom loving West, it's very disconcerting to go there. So I found it quite difficult. They didn't have freedom fries or anything over there? It's very disconcerting to go there. So I found it quite difficult. They didn't have Freedom Fries or anything over there?

No Freedom Fries, censorship on the internet. I mean, you had a VPN, right? Yeah, but the fact is everybody has one. And you think, why am I living in a country where I need a VPN just to see the news? You know what I mean? Like Twitch is banned. You can't watch Twitch without a VPN.

And Google is banned. And you just think, Twitch without a VPN. And Google is banned. And you just think this isn't right. Like this isn't, it doesn't feel right. I'm not used to that in Europe or America. You're just not used to it. So when you go somewhere like that and spend that amount of time there, it messes with you and it really unsettles you.

And you realize how many people are probably living that way around the world. And it's disconcerting. It really is. And I'm just there for 10 days and then I'm going home. But it's troubling to be there and to think of all those billion plus people living like that. I mean, you know, they do all kinds of fucked up shit. It's just horrible.

So there was that. And there was also the fact that your average Chinese person doesn't understand queuing at all. Okay, now we're at the real crux of the issue. That isn't something specific to China. That is just human nature. No, but this is very China. Because my friend who I was there with, Ken, he's from China. And his parents, when they're in China, do the exact same thing.

They cut. They cut in line. Like nobody's business. So there was a queue of six people waiting to get ice cream. God, that drives me nuts. But it's so accepted. So we're queuing up there to get ice cream at the ice cream bit in the restaurant in the hotel. It was a big buffet restaurant.

You have everything you want. There was all different stations you could go to. We're queuing up for ice cream and this little old lady comes up, just cuts, steps straight in front, one chocolate ice cream, please. And the guy serving the ice cream just gives you the ice cream and off she goes nobody says a word and after 10 days of that you i was cutting i was just going fuck this i'm doing it so there'd be a line of people just straight up to the front one mint ice cream please they give it to you nobody's like sir there's a queue like there's just no concern i was just like

embrace the culture i go i go to my my fullest George Costanza when that happens, when somebody cuts. Because I just think it's so true. We fucking live in a society. What are you doing? Like, nobody got the memo that you were leaving your fucking house today and that everybody had to fucking clear the path for you to, like, get up to the counter first and everything.

Well, they all do it, buddy. What the fuck? It's crazy well they all do it what the fuck it's crazy they all do it and they just don't give a shit it's weird which says to me that's a lack of concern for other people like fundamentally that's what that means is i don't care about everybody else i mean i i got some respect for somebody who just doesn't give a shit and doesn't even try to hide it the ones that drive me the most nuts are the people who pretend to be completely oblivious to the fact that they're you know like there's there's quite clearly a massive fucking line and surprise somehow it's orderly as well yeah and and then you you just get that guy who's wearing like uh like red pants and like a fucking he's got red pants and like penny loafers and it has sunglasses and like a fucking straw hat or something on you know what i mean he's cutting

straight to the front of that and he he goes right up to the front of the line with that stupid fucking face where he's just like i've never i've never been out in public before. It's just like, what are you doing? Like, get in the fucking back of the line. You're not fucking Jesus. Like, what are you fucking doing up there? Jesus wouldn't cut. Jesus would wait.

Of course he wouldn't. He would not. Jesus would not. He would wait patiently. Here's another thing that would drive you crazy. Hold on. Is this about queuing? About cutting.

Yeah. No, go for it. Go for it. Okay. This is about jobs worths, which is another thing that will drive you crazy. Hold on. Is this about queuing? About cutting. Yeah. No, go for it. Go for it. Okay. This is about jobsworths, which is another thing I hate. And China is full of people who are jobsworths, right? What does that mean? It means they do their job to the letter.

And if you ask them to do anything outside it, they won't. And if they have a rule to follow, regardless of how inane that rule is, they will follow it to the letter because it's more than their jobsworth to do otherwise, right? Now, part of this must be about coming from communist China and that literally you did your job and nothing more, nothing less, because that was the way you did things to keep your head down and stay under the radar. It's like malicious compliance, isn't it? So for example, this is a prime example. We needed to get a shuttle from the hotel we were staying in to the place we were working. It was about a 20 minute shuttle right away. And they just waited outside the hotel and they went on the hour. We were going to get the nine o'clock shuttle, 9pm shuttle to go start work.

Because we tend to start after, you know, about 10, 10.30, sometimes later. Our show went on at the end of the day. So it's quarter to nine. We're like, cool, we haven't missed the last shuttle. We go downstairs. We say to the girl at the desk, is there a nine o'clock shuttle? She says, yes. So we go over to the shuttle place. There's the shuttle with the name of the hotel we're going

to on an Intercontinental. We say to the driver, Intercontinental? He says, yeah, yeah, yeah. So we get on, he turns on this bus, turns on the air conditioning. We sit on the bus, we're waiting. 15 minutes we're waiting on the bus. It gets to nine o'clock. He turns off the engine, stands up, waves his hands and gets off the bus. finished at nine that was it he finished at nine so there's no more shuttles why did he let us on the shuttle turn on the engine turn on the ac i'll tell you why because if he told us now i'm finishing at nine he it's then his problem to help us find another shuttle or to at least tell us where we're meant to go so he plays it right by chinese rules you wait until your time is up and you dust your hands and you get the fuck out of there that is exactly what he did he disappeared

as soon as it was nine o'clock gone so we went back into the lobby and said to the girl at the desk there they said there was like a desk for the the chinese production at ti we said to her the shuttle guy finished she went and she's putting on her coat and bag and she's like yeah it's nine o'clock he's finished i am too see you bam she's out the door so we go we go we go up to the ninth floor which is like the last remaining desk. It's like the 24 hour desk to support everyone in the hotel who's there for TI. We go to the Chinese girls up there and we're like, the shuttle that was meant to go at nine, the guy said it was finished. He goes, oh yeah, he's finished at nine. You need to go to the

first floor. I was like, no. I was like, I put my hands down the desk, like, no. I said, listen to me. She told us she'd finished. You need to get us to that hotel. We have to start work. We to start work we need help and she was like all right picked up her phone and reluctantly made a phone call and palmed us off onto someone else that was as much as she would do she was not going to help us she was going to get someone else to handle it and they do that in china all the time you ask someone for help and they'll say yeah i'll get right on that steve get right on that and they're like cool i helped you so that it's like that everywhere. It's a combination of it's not worth, it's not worth, you know, it's more than your job's worth,

but it's a combination of just fucking laziness as well. That is a glorious power move though, really. It's like someone comes to you with a problem and you say, don't worry. Yeah. Steve will help you with this problem. And then suddenly, you know, you can just smile and look at them placidly

while Steve, who is, Steve is like a dog. you know steve has no fucking idea steve gonna help me you know but they've alleviated themselves at the problem you get a lot of that in big companies like uh especially i find like most of the big companies i've worked for like banks and stuff like that you get a lot of that like you'll go over to a team and you'll be like and it's their responsibility like that you know this certain thing or team and you'll be like, and it's their responsibility, like that, you know, this certain thing or whatever. And you go over and you're like, yeah, this isn't working. It's not working for this reason.

You know, like what, what, what do we need to do about this? And then they're like, oh, well, we'll just ask, we'll get this person to sort it out. It's like, well, it's, you're meant to fucking sort it out. If you can't fucking sort it out, why are you in this fucking job? Just to say that somebody else is going fucking sort it out if you can't fucking sort it out why are you in this fucking job just to say that somebody else is gonna sort it out like i could have just gone to him directly i didn't need to come to you first you know what i mean yeah and it's just like i don't even know like fuck it amazes me like i know i say it a lot but fuck i don't i don't understand how these companies even make money like it's stupid they just have all of these

people that just don't do shit it's just a bureaucracy they're incapable of even doing their jobs like their job is to just get somebody else to do their job it's it's yeah it blows my mind every time it is crazy but so for another example is we had to when we went to the hotel restaurant we had to get a little voucher to say we were with um ti and you know it was paid for otherwise you need to pay we'd go to the ninth floor and we had to get a lunch voucher we got a little voucher we go we were with TI and that, you know, it was paid for. Otherwise you need to pay. We'd go to the ninth floor and we had to get a lunch voucher. We've got a little voucher. We go back down to the restaurant on the second floor, go for lunch. Now you had to get one for dinner as well, but they wouldn't give you the one for lunch and the one for dinner at the same time. You had to come up for lunch and you had to come up again for dinner. And there was no reason

at all, other than someone hadn't told them to just give the vouchers to people when they need them. You know, just give them lunch and dinner at the same time, no problem. So every single day, we'd be like, oh, let's go get some dinner. Like, fuck, we're gonna go up to the ninth floor. They would not deviate from this at all. Even if you're like, look, you see us every day. Can you just give us the two vouchers now so we don't have to come up here again? No. And then they brought in the system where you have to sign your name and tick a box to say that you've taken the lunch voucher and then do the same thing again when you come up for the dinner voucher. We were like, what is the point in this form? Who cares? They're like, we have to do it. They told us to do it. It's like, fine. So they were

keeping tabs on it, but they only did it for three days. And then that just went in the bin. So what was the point in the paperwork? What was the point in the ticking and writing and naming? And then there were like three different numbers on this ticket and it was stamped. Someone had put some official stamp on it they it's just pure bureaucracy and and nobody everybody washing their hands of any kind of responsibility no one thinks for themselves that that was my summary of what it was like in china i feel like that is experience that i've had at events loads of times too though right whenever you're going away with some kind of corporate thing there's always a load of corporate drones on there and they're all giving you all this exact same shit you know that you go you go and

fucking queue up and there's some you know asshole in a fucking looking like a dumbass who's who looks like just enough of a dumbass and behaves just enough of a dumbass that you could possibly forgive him for cutting in the front of that queue but there's a good there's a there's about 50 50 chance he is a dumbass and that he knows that he can get away with it because he's done it before and so he just sees a queue and he's like i'm just gonna chance this you know and if someone calls me on it i'll just act like a dumbass and you know but but that's a good chance they're not gonna call it you know i feel like that that don't you we we see those people in america we see those people in the uk but they they exist like like this same

bureaucracy bullshit exists in our country too like i don't think it's more or less bad in China. I think if you're staying in hotels with a corporate sponsor with people who are terrified of losing their job or being told off by someone, you know, up a ladder. I've done this in other places. Like, I've worked all over the place and I've never seen bureaucracy like it is in China. There's no reasonableness. There's no reasoning. There's no pleading, there's no could you just help me out

in none of it. If they have not been told specifically that this is a thing they can do, they will not do it. So for example, the bar that we were shooting in every night for the show, this little bar, it was the same barmaid every single night and the same bar manager. There were always like five of them behind the bar. Only one of them would ever serve drinks. I don't know what the other guys were there for. The girl was the only one to serve drinks. The rest of them just stood around.

Occasionally, she'd confer with them and then she'd get you your drink. I don't know what was going on. We were in there one day slightly early and there's a coffee machine and some water on the bar, right? For the people putting the shoot together if they want it. She will not serve drinks until after nine o'clock. Not for licensing reasons, but because they've been told that they serve coffee and water until nine and then drinks after that. I'm like, we need the beers for the show because we're going to go live. We need them as props because we start the show with a beer. She's

like, no, we can't do it till nine o'clock. I was like, why? She goes, because it's the coffee machine and the water until nine o'clock. I said, so it's not like a licensing thing or hotel rules or anything. She's like, no, but we do water and coffee till nine o'clock. I was like, right. I understand that, but I need a beer. She's like, no, I can't, not till nine o'clock. It was five to nine. So I'm like, cool. So we just stood there for five minutes. And then I said, can I have a beer, please? She goes, well, I've got to clear the coffee and the water stuff away first. I was like, can you just give us a bit? She was like, no, can't do it. So she had to take the coffee machine off and put that away, very slowly take all the bottles of water off and put them somewhere. And then she was able no can't do it so she had to take the coffee machine off and put that away very slowly take all the bottles of water off and put them somewhere and then she was able to serve

me my beer i've never seen anything like that it's such a minor thing it's not really important it doesn't really bother me but it's just it's so fucking petty that it feels personal you feel personally that does bother me actually that's like like a Karen just being a real... That is malicious compliance, though. Exactly. Do you know what I mean? But there's no reason. And also, she never recognized us. Me and Dakota were the same two people

at the bar every night, and they knew that we were on a tab. We were on Valve. I mean, you're fairly iconic looking. The only bald guy she sees all day, probably. Right? I mean, there were hardly any other bald people. You don't see many bald people in China.

I'm not being funny. There just aren't many bald people in china and i'm like glasses bold tall loud english bloke and she was like every single time she was like who are you i was like come on love you must come on i've ordered like 20 beers from you over the last five days surely you must realize it's me i still had to go and get the valve guy to just nod and then she would give me the beer on the tab i had to find a valve employee to go please just give me the beer on the tab. I had to find a Valve employee to go, please just give him the beer. They're like, yep, okay. I was like, come on. It was ridiculous.

Oh my God. Yeah, it was like that the whole time. Like one time I went to get my lunch voucher. I didn't have my badge with me. And it was this girl had given me lunch and dinner vouchers for 10 days. I go up there and she's like, you don't have your badge. I was like, yeah, but you know me.

Can I just have my lunch voucher? Sorry, you need your badge. I was like, what do you think? I've been fired or what? Why do you think I just forgot my badge? Can I please have my lunch voucher? Sorry, you need your badge. I was like, what do you think? I've been fired or what? Why do you think I just forgot my badge? Can I please have my lunch voucher? No, we have to get into badge holders. I was like, so you're just saying you don't know who the fuck I am.

There's 20 vouchers deep in our relationship and you refuse to give me a voucher. What's the worst that can happen? I get lunch. Come on. I'm so on board with this, actually. I could listen to you like rant mold you're molding that's what you are all day just i saw that word the other day i thought

it was quite it's a good word i i i i've got one okay listen to this one and this one didn't take place in china either this one took place in the beautiful country of fuents okay are you ready for this one yes sure so there i am at disneyland paris okay with my with my family my whole family is there my daughter was like pretty small at the time uh my son was like was much younger at the time as well me and my wife are there and we got uh regrettably and we'll never do it again we got the fucking we got the shuttle transfer bus from the airport to the disneyland resort it's like meant to be the start of your magical journey through disney yeah a bus from that from the airport it's got like mickey mouse on the side and that you can watch a disney movie like on the bus because it takes like an

hour to get there and stuff and like my kids were pretty excited they're like oh great you know take the bus whatever blah blah blah so we get there we do disney and everything um but when we booked it for whatever reason we were meant to be flying out of uh paris charles de gaulle the uh the airport right and then but of course in Paris, there's another airport. There's, there's Orly airport or, Oh, Oh, really? Like, you know, the stupid owl. So there's two airports, right? Yeah. We're, we're flying out of Charles de Gaulle. Okay. Uh, and, but for some reason on our, our shuttle ticket, it said Orly airport. Okay. Which we were not meant to be going to. Um, so this wasn't a problem coming in you know we got on the bus we were like oh hey um you know we're off to to disney but our ticket said that

we should be getting it from orly airport but we you know the the booking agent or whatever just said just to mention it to you so the guy was like yeah cool get on the bus like let's go sort of thing so off we go on the way back uh where we were waiting for the bus and we were kind of like pressed for time as well because we were a bit late getting out and everything and we had to get this like one specific bus so that we could get to the airport on time uh and it was this it was just just this woman who had that had just the face of a jobsworth you know you can you can almost see them from like a mile away like you could just tell like just by their demeanor and stuff that they're they're just like that that type of person or

whatever so she's like she lumbers over and she's you know she's barking at people and she's asking for tickets and stuff and so i go up and i say i say oh yeah we're going to charles de gaulle like give her give her the ticket she's like no no you're not that says orally on it so yeah i know but like it there's a booking problem or whatever or they they got it wrong and they said to just mention it to you guys and that it's not a problem you know it's just just another airport like who cares right she's like no no i can't take you your ticket says orally on it what's the difference like it's just it's just another airport like i had to so i had to like reason with her and everything and then she's like i have to call my my manager she was like all with her and everything. And then she's like, I have to call my, my manager.

She was like all in a big huff about it. She was like super annoyed and mad. And so she's on the phone for like 20 minutes and the whole bus is delayed and everything. And then she comes back and she doesn't even say anything. She just grabs the ticket and just starts stamping it. Because I guess her boss just said to her, like, the fuck is your problem? Like, who cares? It's just another airport.

Like just take them or whatever uh and i guess like i guess she lost that battle right um so it was it was our fault that she'd been vanquished uh in her weird fucking battle of principles or justice in the world or whatever um and then she wouldn't speak to us for like the rest of the the time and stuff good fucking riddance pal that's what i say how do you become how do you become such a piece of shit that's what i want to know what fucking happens in your stupid scummy life to make you such a cunt like what i think i mean if you hate your job i get it i've had jobs i hated but you don't take it out on other people yeah because that's not going to make you feel better

unless and this is why I don't regret calling these people pieces of shit unless the only way you can make yourself happy in a miserable job is by treating other people

like shit if that cheers you up fuck you I don't give a shit how bad your job is if your only release is torturing customers and being a cunt

fuck off get another job on the sun and burn to death if you're miserable in that job you fucking deserve it you piece of shit stay in it just be yeah stay in your miserable fucking shit staying on this planet you piece of shit fuck you yeah fuckers to like give a perspective though like imagine earlier in that day she'd like been shown a ticket to like you know all the airport right by another dumbass family red trouser wearing idiots pushing in they're annoying kids they're like fucking crying and yelling and spitting and

covered in like chocolate and just like all sticky fingered and they're sneezing your face and they're making it all gross you've got to put up with this the whole fucking day and your boss is being an asshole to you and you take him and imagine you they were like oh yes we need to go to this airport and so you look at their ticket and it says oh well no it says all the airport and they're like oh no no well you need to go to charles school so you take the charles to go and then they're like what are you doing this the ticket says all the airport why did you take us here and they were like well that's where you told me to take you and they were like no no you're an idiot you took us to the wrong one and then you get in trouble the dumb thing though is it's a big bus there was like five

people on it she could have just stopped and picked up anybody along the way and nobody would have cared or noticed or anything you know what i mean like like who fucking cares where you're going like if somebody wants to run on the bus just let them get on the fucking bus even if it's the wrong bus who cares it's up to them right like amen brother jesus amen i i i actually get it like i used to work in a bar and you know not for very long obviously when i was like 16 or something and i was just i was just giving people free drinks i was terrible you're the opposite of the problem we're saying that's cool yeah fight the power you know give people the free drinks except the wrong i was a terrible employee who cares yeah because in the in the arcane bureaucracy of whatever vast

corporation you're working for you're just a drop in the ocean man no one gives a shit it's not they're gonna say hang on a second someone gave someone a free free cider surely the karma bank alone is gonna come back and reward you at some point right like the more the more you just like are helpful towards people who are customers like you know just like hook them up or whatever like you know your limits right like you know like if your boss is like the kind of guy who comes in and weighs like every spirit bottle and you know compares that to his profits and stuff like that okay cool maybe don't give out free drinks or whatever but like most people like don't do that right so you can get away with it you might as well get away with it because amen

who knows you might hook up somebody who's like gonna turn around and be like oh fuck you're the best bartender here's a fucking thousand bucks or something you know what i mean like in the vino or something yeah and then you get a thousand bucks and you're like well fuck this job i'm a millionaire now i'm out of here because you can't do maths oh man oh all right uh so um i went i went to hospital a couple of nights ago right so oh shit yeah so i yeah yeah it was i was there for two hours a grand total of two hours before i got an uber home so it wasn't it wasn't that bad but it was fucking scary so here's what happened um you guys know i've talked about my heart thing before yeah right where my heart is crazy so i was this was two nights ago uh so it's tuesday night tuesday night just drifting off to sleep and i start to get this

feeling like if i go to sleep i'm gonna forget how to breathe like my body's like i keep feeling like i have to deliberately breathe like my body isn't naturally just doing it you know the way you're not thinking about it and you're breathing so every time i'm drifting off to sleep i'm catching myself awake like really suddenly not like that thing where you feel like you're falling, which is I can't remember what they call that reaction. There's a someone out there will instantly upset it, but it's there's a reaction. Sometimes when you fall in a seat, you'll wake up really with a start like you were falling. Have you ever had that before? Yeah, you just like to do like that, like weird, like you go like that in bed sort of

wakes you up enough to know that you've done it sort of thing. Exactly. So it was like that. But instead of feeling like I was falling, the feeling was, oh, my God, I'm not breathing. So I started to really freak out. And I started to feel my pulse rate going up. And it felt like it was fluttering all over the place. And I started to feel nauseous and dizzy.

And I thought, oh, my God. You're having a panic attack. Right. But I thought I was having a heart attack. So I've never had a panic attack in my life nothing even close and didn't have a stressful day nothing that's very textbook textbook panic attack right as i've subsequently found out so i said to mrs f i think i'm having a heart attack you better call the ambulance i actually thought my my vision was like tunneling i honestly thought i was about to fucking die well that's what that's what's

gonna happen yeah you're gonna work yourself up to to that exactly experience because of the fucking heart stuff i'd had before i thought it was i thought right third time's a charm instead of just sv like a svt attack it's gonna be a fucking full-on heart attack i thought this is it so i was really panicked i was terrified the ambulance turns up they put the ekg meter on me the shape i've got fucking shade patches on my chest again and the guy looks at me and he says what do you think your heart rate is right now I said god must be like a million and he said it's it's perfectly normal I was like what do you mean and they printed out some of the EKG and said look and I was like what the fuck I said I honestly thought he was going crazy he said look he said I'm not gonna say that it's not

nothing we're gonna take you in and they're gonna do blood tests but it looks like a panic attack i was like what do you mean a panic attack i've never had a panic attack in my life like what am i panicking maybe it was just like what maybe it was just residual like a rage panic from that woman in china and not serving you your your beers you were telling your wife about all the queuing yeah maybe it just caught up maybe it all subconsciously just caught up with you you know you're just like man i tell you what it's really it really shook me up like the whole yesterday i was like really oh no wobbly and then i i keep thinking about it and every time i think about it i think i'm gonna have another one and but now i know what it is i feel like i've got a bit more control over it and i told my mates on whatsapp i was like lads i went to hospital i had a fucking panic attack and two of them it's not a bit there's only eight of us in this chat two of

them have had them one of them has had several jeez like what and i a missus has told me another guy that she knows has had them i was like what is it with these things like is this something that happens and i guess maybe we just don't talk about it or people don't understand what it's like but it was it was fucking horrible it was fucking horrible. It was really horrible. Yeah, Jesus. I actually thought it was my final hours. It was so grim. Well, that feeling is very familiar to me as an asthma attack

and will be familiar to a lot of people as an asthma attack because an asthma attack is very similar. You feel like you can't breathe and that develops very quickly into a panic attack. They're very similar in the way they affect you. You feel like you're going to you know it's very stressful um and and a lot of the time you know sometimes if it's brought on by something that's not physical like aspirin attacks are brought on by this physical tightening in your chest and since the medication relieves that it's a very way to it's a very quick snap

out of it you know whereas like i think these these anxiety attacks like i definitely have had them over the last couple of years at various points um and i think everyone shouldn't be ashamed or it shouldn't be you shouldn't feel less macho because you've had one or whatever no i don't think of myself as macho anyway but now that you put it that way nice i am pretty macho no but you know i mean it does feel like you know you're you're obviously a strong dad i'm not i'm absolutely not ashamed of it. I'm happy to talk about it. It's just it's weird because I feel like the part for me is whenever I've heard the words panic attack in the past, I thought I'll fucking grow up. What are you panicking about? I didn't realize that it was literally an attack on your body. Like your mind and your body are fucking completely disunited and freaking out and your body is responding as if something awful is happening like i've never had that kind of it's like a complete psychosomatic breakdown

where your body is like oh my god i'm nauseous i'm dying i can't breathe it's a heart attack and the more you think about it and the more you panic about your symptoms the worse it gets so your brain is now fucking spiraling out of control your body unbelievably is doing the same thing normally your body is just perfectly chill and it's only external influences that cause it alarm but instead this is like your brain is making your body freak out and you have no control it's like an animal it's like an animal thing though what happens is like you are convinced that something is wrong in your mind like it's like the classic thing of if someone gave you like poison and said you've just eaten poison poison. You'd be like, oh, my fucking God, I feel sick. And then you'd puke.

Right. It'd be like a physiological response to something mental. Yeah. Okay. In the same way, even if they hadn't given you poison, you still feel nauseous and puke. And then they'd be like, well. Gotcha. It's the same thing with you think.

You think something's wrong with you and your body has the only reaction is that it's anxious fear, adrenaline thing leading you to run. It's like the flight response kind of thing that appears. And I think that you're, we're animals, really, who have been given this higher brain function that doesn't really gel with the primal brain. And so when you got told that your heart was fine, you were like, oh, okay, maybe there's nothing to, what am I panicking about? And that snaps you out i don't think that that there is always a way to

snap out of it um at all like i think some people have them for no reason my mom immediately said have you got a paper bag in the house she goes of course it's really hard to get paper bags these days like there was some breakdown of society you know modern life means there's no problem with paper bags anymore even though the paper bags are always that guy with the red pants and the fucking straw hat he's taking all the fucking paper we've outlawed paper bags in this country now she said you gotta breathe into that

my my my um my hands were going numb and like tingly and that's because i've massively over oxygenated my blood by taking these big heaving breaths which is making things even worse that's right and he said your oxygen level in your blood is like a hundred percent like you've got all the oxygen you need and your heart is fine what do you think the problem is i was like i have

no idea but yeah it was really fucking it was i felt like such an idiot but he was like don't feel stupid because everything that your body and your brain was telling you was this is bad and the doctor that looked at me said they did the blood test you're like you're fine but he said um never never hesitate to come in because like from their perspective what if i'm having a heart attack and i go oh it's just a panic attack bam dead you know what i mean like it's better to be safe than sorry oh totally totally yeah i think i think you you obviously got worked up about something and it spiraled out of control in the classic form. I mean, we'd won a couple.

We'd lost a game of CSGO. None of this is unusual to me. You know what I mean? I hadn't had a stressful day. Everything seemed fine. It might be something. Pardon me. Sorry.

God, the kids are back to school. I had to wake up really early this morning. Oh, no, no, dude. It's probably something like from way back that you just didn't deal with or something and subconsciously you're you're you're processing subconsciously you realized you were like in china and you were queuing up for some like hot pot and there was this asshole there and yeah who should have recognized you and you just wanted a beer you just wanted a fucking beer and they were fucking around with a coffee machine

and then the taxi turned up and it was going to take you to the other part listen you should do what my three-year-old daughter does okay maybe this will help you in your life my my three-year-old daughter while we were in center parks actually did a full curb stomp beat down uh and not even jokingly on a golf club oh wow yeah it was something else it was crazy we were playing mini putt and uh she didn't know how to hold the she didn't know how to hold the putter or or do anything or whatever so she lost her shit no no i did the dad i did the i did the dad thing i stood behind her held the putter with her helped her putt and stuff and she was like super happy we're doing great putts you know we were we were we weren't sinking balls but she was just happy to be able to get the ball away from like the start closer to the hole or whatever

away from her and then so the ball would get down close to the hole she'd run down like the green the mini putt green pick up the ball and put it in the hole and that was like to her this is how you play the game and i'm winning right she was happy so i was like cool so we get to hole number eight uh everybody's struggling with this hole so we do we do our move you know stand behind her lean over we're both holding the putter take the putt fucking travels down the green beautifully curves bam right in hole in one right my wife is like going crazy my son's like clapping where everybody's cheering and everything we're all so happy we managed to get this hole in one turn around and my daughter is fucking curb stomping beating down this golf club on the side of the green why like angry as anything because she wanted to run up pick up

the ball and put it into the hole oh my god she didn't want kids are nuts she didn't understand that a hole-in-one was a good thing she thought we'd failed and was fucking pissed about it too oh man i love the way she just destroyed the golf club yeah i don't know where she gets it from you see real sportsmen do that all the time i don't i i don't think i've ever been like that my wife isn't like that either like we're not we don't like you know have like any violent like lashing outs at objects or anything like that but maybe she's like brightburn dude did you see that movie that movie sucked it was like the office space you know when they do like that the gangster beatdown of the of the fax machine out in the field yeah it was like that she was fucking going for it she just like was so pissed off at

this golf club it was hilarious oh yeah can we very briefly say yogcom was fucking awesome and i loved it and we should do it again yeah i think we said it last time we'd had a podcast but it's fine you could say i just saw it on my calendar yeah i was looking back it was fun actually it's i've had a chance to process it all and stuff and i gotta say it was good it everything went well it was nice it was a really good one cool yeah all right well i think that's time to end the podcast thanks guys thanks for listening we've got patreon you can support us if you like you don't have to um otherwise see you next time peace