Triforce! - Triforce! Mailbag Special #28: An Unfiltered Sack

Episode Date: January 24, 2024

Triforce Mailbag Special 28! We're helping a guy with his dating profile so he can meet some females, Flax loves ants and Lewis meets the King! Go to http://expressvpn.com/triforce today and get an extra 3 months free on a 1-year package! 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

Pickaxe. Oh, yes, go on. Before we start, I just want to say I've got an announcement to make. I'm coming out of retirement. Oh. Actually, I've retired from retiring. That's good for you, mate. It's a bad time. Yeah, yeah. I just thought, you know, now's the time. That's fair.

Yeah, well, I'd like to announce that I'm retiring, except I'm going to carry on doing YouTube podcasts and streams and the Triforce podcast and all the stuff I did before. Right. Good. So you're just retiring from making those really awkward jack off videos that I've seen circling around on various hubs.

I know. I know everyone's broken up about it, but we're gonna get through this together. We gotta get through it. Yeah, we gotta get through it. Alright, do you guys want an email? Yeah, hit me, I'm ready. I've never been more ready, actually. Okay, this is from Josh.

Okay. Uh, hello! Does Sips have any family that live or work in a suburb of Vancouver, British Columbia? If so, ask him to tell that person, who looks exactly like him, that he was unhappy with the service he provided at the dealership. I'll tell you what, I don't have any family, but a guy that I grew up with, I think, lives in that knack of the woods, and we look eerily similar, even though we're not related. And I mean, it's a big place i doubt

it's him but it could be him i'm not in touch with him anymore though like it's been it's been a good long while but it'd be funny if that was the case i doubt it very highly that it is but you never know you never know that's true because he does live out that way for last i heard unless you never know you never know could have you here. You never know. You never know. Could have. You do indeed never know. Yeah. So this is an email about targeted ads, which we must have spoken about targeted ads at

some point. I've had about 15 emails about targeted ads. This is an interesting one. I work as an engineer for a broadcaster operated streaming service in Europe and deal with, among other things, targeted advertising. Last Mailbag episode, you had mail from someone who mentioned that they got worse advertising since they turned off targeting, and felt this might be on purpose by Google. That listener was totally right in the outcome, but wrong in the reasoning. Targeted ads are way more

valuable to advertisers and therefore generally fetch a premium. When you're buying premium ad space, you tend to see better production values, higher quality of the ads, and so on. Most reputable brands only want to target their demographic and are fine paying a premium for targeting. The only buyers of ad space that don't care about targeting are people who have very low budgets, are selling crap, or are often semi-scams or similar. This means that if you don't consent to targeted advertising, you are likely to receive much worse ads as a result i can also add hold on that if you are streaming live tv today from a broadcaster you are likely to get targeted ads in the ad break this is known as addressable tv or live ad replacement while this is often

transparent to the users it just looks like a normal ad break provides the broadcasters much higher revenue per ad sold so there you go we get a lot of localized ads like even google ads like i'll be on a i'll be on a website or whatever and then i'll get uh like an ad for a local place which i always find funny but like you know it's been like like i i get how it works i'm not like right blown away by the technology or whatever it's it but it is it it's kind of funny you know like you're on it is kind of funny because because we're sort of used to the TV. I mean, obviously, all ads throughout time have been targeted, inverted commas. Really?

Well, in a sense that if you choose to run your adverts during Home and Away or Neighbours or during the football, of course, there's going to be different ads, right? Yeah. And at the same time, if you put your billboard or put your bus advert, you know, they each have a slightly different audience, right? Slightly different, but like ITV over here has some target, like local ads, like instead of showing national ads, there'll be like a segment where they'll show local ads. And also when the news transitions from the national news to like the localized news or whatever we have like our own local news on on on the bbc and on itv that's

pretty standard stuff and it goes without saying that there are like you know that this is the internet has obviously got lots of different ways to track you and what you do and what you're interested in and you know oftentimes when you do a google search of course the google ads that you're going to get will be related to that you know i'll search up a flipping you know book or something that someone's recommended or move that you've recommended pflex you know and then the you know within a day i'll have an advert for that appearing or especially board games you know that's a very common one i found okay i think it's interesting as well um to think that when you watch ads during the daytime

they they are almost exclusively targeted at old people like if you watch actual live tv which i haven't done in a very long time but when you do like if i'm at my mom's or something she's got the telly on it's all adverts for funeral expenses although they don't call it funeral expenses they call them and of course helping our family out and alleviating worry about those final expenses. Yeah. They refer to them as those final expenses. Those final expenses, yeah. But it's all like health stuff and all that stuff.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know we come back to this a lot and it's somewhat related but with YouTube and the content that it serves up, I got another one for you guys. It's loosely related to this. So sorry, it's a little bit of a sidetrack. My recommended stuff is, because I've been playing Hearthstone Battlegrounds, I get a couple of Hearthstone videos. I get a couple of farming sim videos.

I get a couple of City Skylines videos. Dotted in there every once in a while, I'll have some videos of like live farming, you know, like they're doing a huge forage harvest for silage or whatever. It's always German. Very occasionally I get a couple of Top Gear videos, and I think it's because of the crossover with farming and Clarkson's Farm and stuff like that. Okay. But the, my recommended shorts are wild. Like, like it's nothing that, okay. I've just given you like a, an overview of the kind of videos it's recommending.

So why is shorts recommending in a club, fire emoji, first time shuffling in heels, fire emoji, thumbs up. And it's just a picture of a woman. But these are all like really short videos. And so the other day I was like, whatever, I'm going to click on one. Like I need to see why this is recommending. And it's just 10 seconds of a really hot babe looking good and that's it and it's got like millions and millions of views and i just thought well it's good that they recommend me this stuff you know every once in a while sure but i i still don't understand like are those just really popular videos and

that's why it's offering them to you there are millions of factors that go it's nothing related to what i'm i'm watching because it's it's i don't even watch content like this algorithmically driven all of this stuff and even things like watch time and how long you hover over it or whether your mouse goes over it you know like these types of things are very like i see like it's very kind of and it knows what areas of the screen people tend to look at and so it knows how long things that are it's it's it's, it, there's so many levels. I'll tell you what I get served up a lot as well. I get, I get served up a factorial speed runs, like world record speed runs.

That doesn't surprise me. I mean, you're into that stuff. And I always end up fucking watching them. And a factorial speed run is not something that like the world record is like a minute 30 or whatever. It's like three hours. I think the best time is like just over two hours or something. And I fucking watch them.

Did you see Spiff's Factorio one? No. You haven't seen it? I don't like Factorio. He got like 800 people to do it. Oh, like a mega server. Yeah, to try and do it. Oh, wow.

I should watch that. To do it real fast. Yeah, it's really interesting. All right, this one's called Canal Boat! So I felt a bit of shout out. Long time ago. Oh, wow. I should watch that. It actually sounds hilarious. To do it real fast. Yeah, it's really interesting. All right. This one's called Canal Boat! So I felt I'd better shout it. Long time fan. Oh, yeah. Fuck, I remember the canal.

I'm a 34-year-old woman, yeah, who lives on a canal boat. After hearing the last episode, I thought you might like to know what it's like for a full-time continuous cruiser boater. What would you refer to yourself as in that situation? A canal-er? I think they just did. She just did. A canalist.

No, she literally just did. A canalist. A cruiser boater. That's why she said that. First, some context. I live in London and only have to move my boat every two weeks, maybe a mile or half a mile down the canal. I could charge my laptop and my phone from my batteries, no problem. I don't really use anything like a hairdryer or microwave or anything that draws lots of power, which I honestly don't need or miss. It's also lovely and warm in winter with my diesel heater on. Are there downsides? Yes it takes some manual labor to keep the boat running with emptying toilets, filling water tanks, using locks but I

also stay fit and healthy doing it which in return improves my mental health. After paying my loan back I'll be living rent free in London in my own space and waking up to beautiful serene views. It's incredibly peaceful and I've learned so many new skills like electrics, mechanics, and woodworking. The community is also wonderful, which is something that is increasingly rare in housing. I'd also much prefer to put my money back into something that will increase in value

as I add more to it, rather than give my money renting to a landlord who, quite frankly, 99% of them are a stain of the society. And I'd love to see the day they're stripped of their assets and made to live like the rest of us. Just to add, Lewis, dating apps are trash.

If you want to meet someone properly, do it through your i also do it on a chanel i also think you should talk about your work with dates personally i wouldn't give you a second look on a dating app you are good looking but i'm queer so women just win every time sorry however uh as i know how chaotic funny and generous you can be and how you've dealt with serious issues within the Oxcast, I'd ride you until my boat capsizes. Best wishes, Amaya." There you go. Wow. Well, there you go. It's a great email and then it got really weird in the last sentence. It got really weird at the end, but maybe in a good way. Maybe Lewis will bank

that one, the weirdness of that one. Yeah, that's just for me, guys. Should have just forwarded that on people. Yeah, yeah. Good to know. Oh my gosh thank you amaya no i mean i don't know if you the person that i know who's got this boat has been freezing their ass off so i don't know i mean maybe it's what about like one of those little electric oil heaters you know it's got like the yeah because i didn't think because it's quite an

enclosed space but i guess it is you just have an exhaust and i think it's it might not be uh insulated very well i don't know if it is you know i guess it's water cooled i guess it is in the water and i think it might not be uh insulated very well i don't know if it is you know i guess it's water cooled i guess because the water keeps going by right i mean i don't think it's going to have the same level of insulation that a house is going to have um and if you've got like brick it bricks sort of like you know absorbs heat and retain it don't they i think if any heat that goes out the bottom of the boat which isn't going to be much it's mainly going to go out the top it's going to um it's going to be lost i imagine it's like a living in a car or a big big car that you know those get fucking freezing

i'm going to assume there's there's some kind of insulation in the walls of the boat and everything like that but it's not as much as a house you think how thick the walls maybe it gets hot quickly and cold quickly yeah probably but it has a little heater. Small space, so easy to heat. But yeah, either way. This is about... This is a throwback. This is a throwback email to several years.

How far back are we? Okay. Jeez. Let me see if you guys recognize this title. The King's Casino in Rozhvadov. Yes, I remember this. You were talking about playing poker in... Oh god, yes.

When you went to... Streaming table! ...Eastern Europe with a bunch of shady characters. Exactly. We got card table, we got blackjack table, we got streaming table. We had streaming table. This is from Jay, a tiny todger-haver. Just today, I was speaking to my brother-in-law about the Jungle Jam poker night, and the conversation

moved on to the fact that he was friends with quite a successful poker player in Europe. His friend has since stopped playing, to my knowledge, but instead has turned to commentating it. I asked where he was doing this, and my brother-in-law said somewhere on the border in Germany. This brought my mind straight back to an old podcast from 2017, where you were giving a trip report on your trip to the King's Casino in Rosvadov. After a bit of research, it turns out that is where he was talking about, and part of

the World Series of Poker is being held in the King's Casino this year. So maybe the streaming table didn't work out, but something must have. And yeah, you could look the town up on Google Maps, and it looks terrible. But yeah, the King's Casino in Rozhvadov. Rozhvadov. Oh, that's reminded me. I wanted to look something up, actually. What are you looking up?

I just want to do a street view of an area of interest for me. It's of no interest to you guys, so carry on. Oh, okay. I'm just gonna do it really quickly. Yeah, why not do it right now? Yeah, it's a good time. Good time to be ready, really. It does look pretty good, Gflax, like, visually.

Oh, really? Like, they've made a lot of effort to... What do you like about it? Well, I guess, like, the guy is, like, has done a good job of trying to attract people there, do you know what I mean? Like, they go, we're just doing the devil with the World Series of Poker here, look, we can't do anything! You know, you get the impression he's one of those guys who's kind of...

He's a real chancer. Yeah. But, right, but... I mean, the reason that King's Casino is so popular... I mean, if you look at the town, this is exactly what it looks like. If you go on Street View and go just outside King's Casino, Rozhvidov. The point is it's just across the border. So people want to go from Germany to Czech Republic to gamble.

So he's literally put it on a little E road, just sort of like a road, I guess. It's not far from Nuremberg. It's near Bavaria, so you've got a lot of big Southern German gents. Nice. And that's it. They just go... It's literally the first town when you get outside Germany. So it's not like he's done this as some kind of...

I mean, this is just... It's like a kind of a grift. Do you know what I mean? It's like, how can I suck in Germans to spend money here? And then all it is is surrounded by massage parlors. It's just a place for middle-aged dudes to go and gamble their hard-earned wages that their family are not going to get, and for the casino to do what casinos do and who've brought money. There's a place outside called Easy Money, which is a pawn shop. There are multiple- there's Chiquita Massage, there's one across the road, a massage place. It's not

a nice place. I'm sure if I lived in Rozhvadov, I would be pretty upset, genuinely. Do you think you would get held up with a- at gunpoint in some of these places? No. Oh, okay. Well then, they're probably not so bad. It definitely has the strip mall vibe, do you know what I mean? It's unpleasant. You know that American strip mall you see everywhere, you know, almost like that same... It's got that like, one single...

The parking lagoon. It's like two-story max. Like the one from Better Call Saul. Exactly like that. With the Thai massage parlour and stuff. All that. Yeah. Yeah, it's got that vibe about it.

That vibe about it. Alright, this one is called South Africa Wildlife Horror Stories. All that. Yeah. Yeah, it's got that vibe about it. It's got that vibe about it. All right. This one is called South Africa Wildlife Horror Stories. Oh, man. Okay. Hang on. So, hang on. Okay, you know you select the emails that get read out, right?

I do. You don't, like, you don't, you know, tailor them to your preference. You're not filtering them out, is what he's trying to say. So, you do know that i probably get between episodes about 60 emails 60 to 70 emails sometimes more sometimes less good that's good which is great can you imagine if we didn't get any that would be weird yeah yes so the ones that i save let me give you guys an example of one only mess no just this is for for transparency's sake so that you're aware of the ones i'm not reading out.

I had about 20 emails this week about beer prices. Some of them are just one sentence listing the beer price where they live and how much it costs in some other place they've been. That's not really, when they're all so similar, I'm not going to pick those ones. Some of them are just people saying they like the podcast, which is nice. But again, I'm not going to read those out. No. Some of them are just people saying they like the podcast, which is nice, but again, I'm not going to read those out. Some of them are much too long. Some of them are just saying, hi, found this joke really funny on the previous podcast. One of them is from a guy asking why I don't just change ISPs, which is fucking hilarious. Well done, mate. You've exceeded yourself there.

Do you ever get one where the title's really interesting and then you click into the email and it just says you're an ob? No, I haven't had that, but now I will. Thank you for that. My email didn't get through. It's going to waste a lot of my time. No. I mean, for instance, I've got one here. If you want, we can just read this out blind. I have no idea if it's good or not. No, don't do that. No, no, no, no. I'm just saying-

I'm perfectly happy with your vetting process. There was a pitch- This is based- Okay, this email is in response to, um, Pyrim basically saying that he wouldn't go to half of the world. There was a really funny Reddit post which was, um, you going on holiday, and it was like a map of the world, and every constant was like, crossed out. Yeah, but Europe was crossed out, which is, you know, I said, I've travelled very widely in Europe. I love going on holiday in Europe. Yeah, I don't want to.

I don't want to outwardly agree with flax, but inside I'm with flax as well. There are no snakes. There's a lot of places that I just, for various reasons, just I don't want to go to. I just don't think I'd enjoy them, you know? Because I have like some preconception that there's danger or something, you know? Or like in the back of my mind, I know my wife wouldn't want to go to some of these places as well, which is like, you know, is a factor in your decision making. But I'm pretty much there with you, Flex. Like, I don't

mind going around Europe, you know, like parts of North America or whatever, but I'm not really overly interested in going anywhere else. Like, I feel especially at the age i'm at now maybe when i was like in my 20s or whatever and more adventurous but now i'm just like i don't want to do anything i just want to be left alone i just want to stay home and i just want to be in places that are like you know home away from home you know i am well aware of that and i i'm never going to call you out and say like of like everyone calling me out you are exactly the same as me in that regard. Yeah. I mean, there's no way that you're going to fucking go.

I'm not going to the places that I'm not going to fucking deepest, darkest Peru and living and staying two weeks in a mud hut or whatever. Living under a log or something. Yeah. Yeah. With like tarantulas up my ass. There's no way I'm doing it. Exactly.

But it's like, I am perfectly happy to be the punching bag for the mailbag. And I suppose for the podcast, because I do talk a lot of shit. And I tend to be quite final in my decision and the way I state stuff. Because I've made up my mind. And generally, when I've made up my mind about doing or not doing something, that's it. I'm just not going to do it. I just want you to know you're not alone, okay? I appreciate that, brother.

I really do. No problem. So here's one just literally plucked from the mailbag, unread. If it's shit, we can just cut it. Okay. Right? The Sips Family Christmas Sickness. From the sounds of it, I think they had norovirus, aka the winter sickness bug.

As the name suggests, it's prevalent this time of year. Generally just makes you vomit and or have diarrhea, but it's very transmissible. Yeah, first of all, that's just not your family, is it? Either Sips, right? No, it's my wife and her boyfriend's family. So I'm not sure. The thing is, you can have genetic immunity and Sips may be one of the chosen ones blessed with such genes. The reason I know this is because when I was a young teen,

we went on a family holiday to Woolacombe and ended up getting a ferry to Lundy Island. After visiting, we went back to our lodge and decided to eat finger foods such as mini cheddars, cocktail sausages and cheese and pineapple sticks. That evening, my sister felt sick, our lodge and decided to eat finger foods such as mini cheddars, cocktail sausages, and cheese and pineapple sticks. That evening, my sister fell sick, threw up, and went to bed early. Shortly thereafter, my mother and I followed suit, but spent the whole evening throwing up and shitting ourselves while waiting for the others to be done in the bathroom.

I went through every pair of boxes I'd packed for the trip. My stepdad had thought this was completely fine and slept through it. Oh, sorry, my stepdad, though, was completely fine and slept through it all. It was on the local news a few days later that there'd been a norovirus outbreak on Lundy Island, and that the tourism company that runs the ferry and cafe knew but decided to operate as normal and keep shtum. Now you may be wondering why I mentioned the finger food. On the way home my stepdad decided we'd make a pit stop at Cheddar Gorge. Needless to say the smell of cheese emanating from the big cheddar cheese shop after vomiting cheesy food so recently was incredibly nauseating and we didn't eat cheese

for a few weeks after. Wait so you went to Cheddar Gorge, you didn't visit Wookiee Hall? Apparently not. So, I mean, that email might well have made the cut. Cut that. It was crap. Crap email.

No, we can't cut it. You can't just cut it. We could. Period said we could. It's a science experience. I'm saying you can if you like, but the point is, it's a lot of emails like

that. People sending in stories of when they've been sick or shit everywhere. Just making you aware that try not to be too period flax sided when you read i don't i don't think he is i think we get plenty of flax your your take is bad the anti-animal the anti-point the the the period flax global not traveler i think i think you're a global coward i'm not i'm not dodging those emails i've read a bunch of them out okay all right half the fucking emails that we read out are people calling me out for shit yeah it is honestly i don't think he i don't

think he shies away from the ones that call him out. In fact, I find he relishes having a fight with them through the podcast sometimes. Precisely. That's true. This is true. Okay, so go on. This is South Africa one. Go on then. All right, here we go.

I said nothing about South Africa, I believe. I just said I didn't fancy going to Africa because it's got similar wildlife issues. Yeah. This guy just says, I'm a 22-year-old British family who's lived in Southern Africa for upwards of 20 years. Here are some wildlife horror stories that are 100% real. Pick any you find interesting.

I'm going to read them all, Jack. When living near Cape Town, it was proper practice to bring your dogs in in the morning as tribes of wild baboons would descend from the mountains to eat dogs, cats, and sometimes unattended children.

Jesus Christ. My grandmother's garage got invaded by a cobra after it hid in her banana tree. The locals killed it and advised her to burn it, else the bigger, madder mother snake would appear. After cooking it, she fed it to the dog. Fucking hell. Butsy flies are flies that lay their eggs in unattended laundry

and then bury into your skin, mainly your scalp, when they hatch. You have to pull them out with tweezers. My uncle walked through a line of red ants. The soldier ants attacked him. They were roughly the size of like tablets and tens of ants latched onto him. While my grandmother had to boil them off, they invaded the house through the windows. And another scary creature are the white people.

Boil them off. Boil them off. I'm just reading the email, Lulu. You can ask questions afterwards. No, could you just give us a moment of process before moving on to the next horror story? No, the next one is also interesting, and then we can revisit. Dear sir slash madam, I'd like to cancel my trip to South Africa on the following on the following basis.

Okay, what was the first one? It was living near Cape Town the baboons that will eat dogs, cats and children. Ah, yes. Number one. Child eating baboons. Number two is the cobras hiding in the banana trees. Oh my god, cobra.

Cobras in banana trees. I gotta put together Oh my god, cobra... cobras in... Surprise cobras. Banana trees. I gotta put together a case to get all my money back for this trip. Putsi flies. P-U-T-S-Y flies. Oh, fucking hell, that sounds like a nightmare. I'm not sure that's... that's not how it's spelled, it's Z-I. Well, he said putsy flies.

Good lord. They're also known as mango flies. Oh yeah, there it is, the putsy. So on Africa Travel Resource, it's TSI. On Wikipedia, it's listed as the putsy with a Z-I, as Lewis said, and this guy spells it a different way again. They look revolting. Any bug looks pretty gross when it's zoomed in on.

But I don't want it to lay its eggs in my head. I think that's reasonable. I think that's a reasonable thing and the red ants was another one attacked a man had to be boiled off whatever that had to be boiled off i mean what does that even mean just what would you be boiled off i'm just reading the emails here it says boiled off so you need to jug him quick jug him i'm coming Jug him! Get me around to jug! I'm covered in ants and now I'm covered in sticky boiling water! How has this helped? Alright, I had a couple of dating app emails.

I get quite a few from people sending pictures. Listen, this is an audio podcast. Yeah, we'll only ever be able to audibly describe your image, which might not do it justice, especially if you're sending pictures of your well-oiled bellend or whatever. Yeah, you could describe the pictures to us, people. Well, alright, average-looking lad sends picture, what's wrong with my profile? Okay.

That sort of stuff. I mean, I can read you some of the stuff he's got. Let me see if I can find this one. I'm not the fucking guy to help here, my dude. Here we go. He wants his name to be anonymous right i'm writing to ask lewis if uh of all people for dating advice yeah um he's scraping the barrel he says maybe if he does the opposite of what i suggest now that might work well he's been on he's how he says how have you been getting dates on hinge

i've been on the app for a while and i've had no matches he's then sent me his profile he's a very normal looking lad but skinny post the picture in the chat so we can see this all right we need we need some context i know that i know that people listening won't be able to see but we'll do our best to describe how normal this guy looks yeah so he's just a regular looking guy he's a his posture is a little hunched he's got a bit of a nerd spine-chamber to get on. Oh, fucking hell! Oh my god, this guy's hideous! He looks like the Hunchback of Notre Dame! He looks like a young you, Sips! Yeah, he does actually, yeah.

He does look a little bit like me. I don't think I get any hits on the dating app either. He looks fine! He looks young, though! He looks like a kid. He is young. He's got a picture of him in front of- oh sorry, on a rock doing a thumbs up. He's got a picture of him doing a hang loose sign in front of a painting of a frog.

Well this picture that you just posted looks like his mom took it while he was on vacation with her so maybe- It looks like he's in Kew Gardens and someone's taking a picture of him. That is Kew Gardens I believe. He's also a picture of him wearing a jacket playing the guitar and it says a quick rant about and his answer is flat earthers seriously i mean come on i would not put that in your profile right and then there's a picture of him with giant clogs on leading to one side looking goofy and it says unusual skills i can cross one of my eyes

not both just one uh and he's had no hits. So listen, son, I know you wanted to keep your name anonymous, so I'm not going to say it. Jazz it up a bit. You look a little bit, maybe be a little more terse in your typing. Stop being so verbose. Don't try to be funny. Favorite line from a film is, I'm your father's brother's nephew's cousin's former roommate. It's just a bit, you know what I mean? Just keep it simple. I feel like that's the kind of thing that somebody who recites lines from Monty Python would put. And I think that's off-putting too.

People don't want to listen to people talking about Monty Python and redoing all the skits. Also, people might think that you actually are that, and they might think that they're going to be incestual if they go with you. It's hard to understand the quote. I would say simplify it. Some new pictures. Stop hunching and don't do the thumbs up all the time. He's not hunching.

He's a nice looking guy. He is, but I'm just saying. He's a really normal looking guy, though. I can see some gamer spine curvature there. I'm just saying. No. He looks fine. How is he going to fix that?

He's had no matches. Do you want help or do you want me to just say everything's fine the brother has had no matches so we can either say you're doing great keep it up champ and lie to him or we can give him some fucking help all right he's come to you for help and you're telling him everything is fine it's not fine the boys had no matches help the man say something okay okay um god get yourself pull yourself together there you go and you know don't give up don't try i don't like lower your standards i think that i think we might need to cover this from a different angle i think he might be have too high standards jermaine yeah i'm gonna i'm gonna send an email and say have you just tried meeting somebody in real life like Like the one that Flax got about trying to...

Have you tried changing your ISP? Like the most obvious one. Yeah, I just tried changing your ISP. I am a hot woman and I meet men all the time in real life. I know why people do it now. Because my knee-jerk reaction to all this was, well, just meet somebody in real life. That's the easiest way to solve this problem, right? Just meet somebody in real life. That's the easiest way to solve this problem, right? Just meet somebody in real life. But you've never done that in real life.

And I think the reason why people offer up these really obvious, simple solutions is because their brain just gets immediately overloaded with shit that's nothing to do with them. And they just think, I don't even really want to think about this. This is such a huge problem for someone else. So I'm just going to bow out of it by saying, oh, just get rich. See ya. You know what I mean? I see why people do it now. It's taken all of this to get me to this point, but I feel enlightened now. So bear in mind that this guy has asked for help, right? So he has specifically asked us. Well, yeah. We're not unsolicited messaging

him and saying, here's what you should do mate. He's asking for help from a dating god, Louis Brindley. Yeah, who gets like so many dates. Slaying! He's slaying folks left, right and centre. I feel like for me and Flax, our whole view of online dating is skewed because we're with Louis who gets dates all the damn time. Your phone must just be like pinging constantly, Lewis. Is it just on vibrate and it's like vibrating off the table and stuff all the time?

Because you're getting so many hits? Because you have a tremendous amount of luck on these things compared to some people. Wow. Well, I mean, I don't know whether that's true. You know you're game in the game out there, aren't you? You know how the algorithm works and you're, you're capitalizing off of it. I've been on it for a while now. So I have learned some things.

That is actually for sure. And especially going on dates with people. The first couple of dates I went on with people were just absolutely awful. Because I was just like shy and awkward and didn't really know what the hell was. But I think also I was worried about it a lot. I think there's this thing where because you get so few dates on these things, or you get so few matches, you get it into your head that you have this scarcity sort of mentality sets in, where you're like, oh, I have to make the most of this one.

Do you know what I mean? Or like, oh, I have to really impress this person at a date. Whereas like, it's not, therefore that kind of like taints it all a bit. It makes it all a bit weird and awkward and stressful and like unpleasant. Whereas I think if you don't care, like I kind of, if you don't say, if you don't actually, if you're not actually, I think it's worse if you're horny, basically. If you're going on there being like,

God, I need to find a woman right now. That's like the worst way to approach these things. Do you think that the majority of people on there are just really horny? Oh, yeah. Yes. Oh, my God. So many people are.

And they can't control it. But since I realized I hated the apps and stopped using them completely and turned off all notifications, turned off everything, I've gone on there like once every month or whatever and chatted to a few people. Being really horny is weird, though, isn't it? Have you ever just been like so out of control horny, like you just don't even know what to do with yourself?

Yeah. It's fucking- Every day. Right. Look, young fella, you may not want a date, because this is an email called, Comedy Show Date Disaster, from Sam. And this is, even if you get the date, you might end up with something like this. This is a reasonable story.

So here we go. This is not a first date, but a third date story. I'd recently broken up with my long-term girlfriend, was trying to get back into the dating scene, matched with a girl that seemed fun, showed quite a few red flags during the first two dates. But my thirsty arse decided to utterly barrel past these. For a third date she suggested going to a small pub to watch some up and coming comedy acts.

I was slightly anxious, as I'm not brilliant if I get picked on, but I'm sure I could just melt into the crowd, right? It was quite an intimate setting, 40 chairs packed in, tiny stage practically resting on the front row. And the date insisted that we sit at the front as she claimed, I am amazing at comedy shows because I always give as good as I get, which is not a good sign.

That is a bad, that's a huge red flag. This did not allay my anxiety. Each comedian only got a tight four minutes to do their set and the first few acts went by blessedly uneventfully. She did, however, seem to think there was an audience participation after every joke and would try to heckle the comedian much to the irritation of people around us luckily we're british so no one said anything and the tuts were easy to ignore cue the third to last act after his very first joke

and her inevitable comments he looked at her and said all right love calm down this must have touched a nerve as she squared up to him and said, don't come at me because I'll reply ten times funnier. They then proceeded to argue with each other while the rest of the audience and myself awkwardly sat there and stared daggers

her in my way. After some back and forth, the compere came out to let the comedian know he had a minute left. He tried to get on with his set, but whenever he talked she would add,

he'd say, go on, make me laugh. What seemed like decades later, his time was up and he forlornly walked off the stage. Oh my god. The last two acts were a blur, as I retreated into my happy place and pretended I was anywhere but there. Safe to say there wasn't a fourth date, and the icing on the cake, a week after I ended things, I started getting calls from random numbers claiming

they'd found my keys. out as her curtain call she'd put a large number of individual keys with my name and number on all across london so for the next few months i kept getting calls from good citizens trying to return them lewis please don't ignore red flags fucking hell what a nut oh my god this Everyone, be safe out there. Don't put your dick in crazy. That was the- Who said that? That was the old adage. Who said that?

That was the old- That's like the old wisdom. That's like- Is that Eddie Murphy or Chris Rock or someone said that? My mum told me that. No, it was Isaac Newton. Isaac Newton, of course, yes. One of the founding fathers.

Yeah, when he signed the Declaration of Independence. He wanted to put that in there. He wanted to get that in writing, yeah. Oh, shit. Before we continue, if you're going online without a VPN, it's like using your smartphone without a protective case. Most of the time, it's probably fine. But the other day, I did take my case off and drop my phone in the road.

So make of that what you will i use expressvpn at home i recommend it each time you connect to an unsecured or unencrypted network in cafes hotels airports your online data is vulnerable any hackers on that network can gain access to and steal your personal data your passwords your financial details it doesn't take much technical knowledge to get this and your data is valuable. Hackers can make up to $1,000 per person selling personal information on the dark web. That is a real thing. You can just use ExpressVPN. I do. I have it on my home computer. You can fire it up. It's one click. It works on laptops, phones. You can even put it on your router and they have supported Triforce Podcast for

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months for free. Get special VPN.com slash Triforce on with the show. This is from Ethan. Listen, this is an Australia email, but bear with me. This is not related to what the current topics of Australia have been. This is different. Hi, first of all, I want to say I've been listening since I was 14.

You shouldn't be doing that, young fella. Now 20. You three have instilled me with a lot of wisdom throughout the past seven years. Good God. Oh, no. I grew up in a small town in South Australia renowned for its opal mining industry and being one of the hottest places in the country. Yes.

Isn't this Alice Springs? Is that right? No, no, no. God, I saw someone go there on a Coober Pedy. I think it was Tom Scott, was it? Oh, Coober Pedy. Coober Pedy. It's 35 degrees Celsius average.

That's the average temperature. It's very arid. It's a mental place. And the majority of the locals live underground, including myself, when I was a child until I moved to Sydney. How would you feel about the idea of living underground for a significant part of your life? And what are your thoughts on embracing a subterranean lifestyle?

Well, you are talking to multiple people who've played video games for the largest part of their life. Yeah, I was basically in a basement in North America as well, so yeah, I think I'm qualified to sort of stride in here and say, it's not great, honestly. You develop deficiencies, for sure. You need some fresh air and sun every once in a while and and of course exercise and uh i i i don't i think i'd be miserable i i as much as i don't really go outside i do like being outside i like having the option of going outside like i like just being

like in my backyard and stuff you know like i wouldn't want to just be underground all the time that's fair that's that's all i gotta say this is this is an interesting one i i don't think i would mind it too much um as long as it was like an underground place that had tunnels i love ants so i could pretend to be an ant what if it had no internet well why would i live there so you'd love ants i love ants the idea of living in a big ant is this code or something are you trying to like speak to somebody? No, I like ants. Yeah, I get it, but like, what the fuck? What are you telling us? What am I telling you? They're a fascinating animal.

So one of those South African stories was actually good for you. I would have been interested to see the ants. I like ants. I'd love to be covered in ants. Something somewhere has exploded off the back of you saying that, hasn't it? I like ants. What can I say? Wait for the sign you'll know it when you hear it i do like i love them i i got into when i was in school i had to

in biology we had to study ants and i was like yeah i'd love it i think it's called a formicarium like a thing that you keep ants in some guy was complaining uh either in an email or a chat or a twitch chat the other day saying that he went to a zoo and all... You know British zoos are shit because all they have are ants. And I was like, I love ants. I love going to the exhibit where you watch them going about their work, collecting food, making the tunnels... In an ant farm, like the little side view ant farm.

Yeah, it's fascinating. Absolutely fascinating. No, I get it. Yeah, it is pretty cool, yeah. I watched them for ages. So yes, I do like ants. I know that's insane, but I do. What was the story? The guy that lived underground.

Oh, yeah. I mean, I think it's a lot like probably... It's fine. I think people... It's not like he's not aware that there's electricity and TVs and stuff. I mean, you have all that shit underground. You just live in a sort of... It's built into a cave in a slightly different way. Yeah. I think it would be nice. I feel, you have all that shit underground. You just live in a sort of, built into a cave in a slightly different way.

Yeah. I feel like it's not secure. I'd like that, you know. You would, but I think- Fire hazard is low. I think you'd occasionally feel like a sense of dread though as well, right? Like if you couldn't just get out once in a while.

Well, look, I do get claustrophobic. I hate the idea of being in really enclosed space. Really enclosed space. But I mean, if you're living underground- But a room underground, yeah. I don't idea of being in really enclosed space. Really enclosed space. But I mean, if you're living underground. Yeah, I don't have a problem with that at all. But what was that movie? I think I went to see it with you, Lewis. It was that one with John Goodman where he's a huge prepper.

Oh, it's like something. It's a follow up to that one about the giant monsters. Yeah. And they got to live in basically an underground house. And it's like cozy's like cozy enough right it's fine but like you would go stir crazy after a while i think the only way i'd survive down there is if i had access to games and i would just completely detach myself from reality and just play even more video games than i do at the moment right right well i do think about this i feel like there's enough books and movies and you know tv shows for the last in the last 40 years or whatever that i reckon we could just i could just keep going if i was like you know locked in i had as long as i

had a big enough shelf of um games and dvds i reckon i could you know it's because people say oh you know you get bored going to mars or whatever i reckon there's enough shit like it's a little bit like being in a bunker you know being stuck on a mars flight for 20 years or whatever six months and i think i think being in um how well well you know go to alpha centauri though you know in a big old generation oh god well so you spend your whole life on there how many light years away is alpha centauri i think alpha centauri is two and a half i could be wrong someone will write in i'm sure but i think it's two and a half oh that's proxima centauri is two and a half. I could be wrong. Someone will write in, I'm sure. But I think it's two and a half. That's Proxima Centauri, I think, which is the closest, right?

Is it Proxima that's close? No, I think Alpha Centauri is the closest. It's the triple star. It's the three-body problem. Have you seen the trailer for the three-body problem? No, I haven't. Have you seen the big ring in space and the big wall as well? I'm ready to be... I heard this this morning that there was some news that there's a megastructure

in space, and I looked it up, and it's like, well, it's not a structure, it's just a bunch of stars. They're in a slightly ring-shaped system. And I was like, oh, that's disappointing. I mean, for a start, this ring, along with the one that's called the... I don't know what it's called, like the blade or the line or whatever it's called, either way.

It's 1.5 or something like 2.5 billion light years across. These are not close together. They finally created a telescope that's able to capture my penis in its entirety. It's 12.5 billion light years across. It's huge. But it's interesting because it goes against what they assumed the universe would look like, right?

The rules are it should be spread out. Yeah, but everyone's constantly doing this, though. No, of course. But it's still interesting. It is still interesting. universe would look like right yeah but everyone's constantly everyone's constantly doing this though no of course but it's still interesting it is still interesting it's well not as interesting as an actual ring world or something right i mean when they call it a structure i guess that's the way cosmologists refer to the shape i don't think that's the proper term i don't think that's weird to me to use it's i'm uncomfortable with that term i think i've been playing too much stilaris right yeah this is a

this is advice for dating apps guy from a woman right this email comes from a woman stop calling us females we aren't animals i think that is a very very good piece of solid advice don't refer to women as females i don't think i've ever used i think that's a friday night dinner joke though females no people do it you you not been online lately? Any luck with the females? Any luck with the females? Yeah. No, they do refer to females.

It's ludicrous. I think it's dehumanising. And maybe that's what you want. Maybe that's what you want. Hello, ladies. Hello, ladies. I like dating ladies. I like girls.

I like bitches. I like dating women. You can try this. I like dating ladies I like dating women I don't know, where's the I think it's just the tone you say it in the sentence makes a difference What's the right word, sorry Not that I'm using females

I think you just generally want to refer to them as, I normally say ladies Alright ladies, maybe, or girls Alright girls, you know i don't think girls put on a funny voice depends how old they are how young they are girls i had this this guy was ahead of me i went to the grocery store the other day and this old guy with his wife this guy was like in his 80s but for sure like he was he was pretty damn old like uh and his wife was too. And the,

and the woman at the till was, was like fairly young, like probably, probably middle-aged. Um, I mean, in comparison to this guy and, you know, they were packing up their groceries and chatting and stuff. And he was just saying like, oh, the weather and, oh, you know, happy new year and stuff. And he's, and then he, he he he like linton got like right in this woman's face and was like oh if it wasn't so busy i'd give you your new year's kiss he was like really really laughing like uh but like it was creepy and his wife was also kind of laughing and it was creepy and i just thought god that is really fucking weird what a weird thing to say to somebody and you could tell just by how he was

that like he meant it he meant it yeah and it's just fucking weird man like uh i'd hate i'd hate to be a woman because i think the shit that they have to deal with is unbelievable yeah people like no i'll go through my whole life and never have an awkward encounter like that with another person, I'm sure of it. But if I was a woman, probably every day I would have an awkward encounter like that with a person. Oh god, yeah. Like, it's fucking awful.

Just meet people in real life. Yeah, I mean, that's it. Well, this is probably my favourite email of the week, from Sean. Um, I have an unusual job that means I worked on the Queen's funeral and the King's coronation. Wow. Despite not being a royalist at all. In autumn last year, me and some of the folks who worked on these events were invited to a reception at Buckingham Palace. I thought you'd like to know some stuff that happened. This is really interesting.

I love finding out stuff like this, thanks. Of course. So I got basically a royal summons with a fancy invitation with gold edging some people i know didn't receive their invitations despite them being delivered by the royal mail wow uh we went in through the front gate which meant the tourists kept trying to join the queue thinking it was for everyone yeah i love that from the cloakroom onwards you were not allowed to take your phone in under pain of death. So no phones, because people would like film Prince Andrew, I guess, being creepy. The fancy reception room was a mixture of people just talking and networking and try-hards desperate to meet a royal floating around them.

It was like at Comic-Con when someone vaguely famous is in the bar afterwards and people don't really want to go up and directly talk to them, so they kind of hover, hoping something will happen. Oh my God, this is so familiar. Yes. This is like Belle Delphine's i've always joked that if i met the king it would be great to just loudly go to try and scare them and see what happens turns out even i got kind of swept up in the excitement when i was corralled into my group's turn to meet the king i got so flustered by the pressure of the

situation that i involuntarily did a little bend of my knees and hoped no one noticed. Yeah. He shook my hand and asked my name and what I did, etc. The king was actually really nice and very knowledgeable about the field in which I worked. I was impressed. Fucking hell. Which annoyed me. And what do you do?

It was the classic fucking- What do you do? What do you do? It was a very interesting field, yes, I know lots of people that do that for living of course and he's had all kinds of follow-up questions i always feel like every time he walks away from someone in his mind he's saying what a ghastly person there were photographers in the room taking photos so they could charge 40 pound for a print of you with a royal after the event.

In my photos, I'm either necking champagne or have my mouth open like a yob. Nice. Oh, wow. I couldn't leave until I'd seen the toilets, of course. A full wooden bench slash seat with your typical toilet hole in it. Not a plastic ring like a normal toilet. Royal crest printed on the porcelain. Toilet paper? Andrex.

And when you pulled the handle to flush, it was akin to the fanciest airplane toilet ever, where the toilet water just kind of whooshes away from you almost instantly. It was like a reverse ejector seat. Bizarre. I wish I'd asked what the men's was like. We then went and got totally sloshed in a nearby pub, which is probably the best bit. Overall, nine out of 10 experience. What do you think you'd do if invited to the palace to meet the king? Probably the same as you. I would be nervous. I would be aware of people tryharding all around me. I probably think that because I was aware of other people tryharding and I wasn't tryharding, that somehow the king himself would come right up to me and want to be best friends, and then I'd be disappointed when that never happened and I would leave slightly drunk and feel awful about myself for a couple of minutes and go to bed. That would be me. I don't

know what that says about me, but I'm being honest here. That's how I would play the whole thing. Lewis? I've done things like this before. Fancy schmancy events in Londonondon with with people and and they're fine i'd rather be doing almost anything else but it's quite fun to get dressed up and go and look at this old building and stand on a carpet yeah i wouldn't mind going inside buckingham palace i think that'd be kind of cool yeah it's quite it's fine and and you know i've always always surprised myself how things tend to, like, turn out fine. I'd worry, though. I dread.

I'm, like, super, super nervous. You know, you're like, oh, my God, what if I... Because the dark urge is there in the background, you know. What if I did this really stupid thing, you know? What if I just pulled down my pants and waved my dick around? Well, I'm sure they have people whose entire job is to anticipate that. I want to be known as the dick waver of Buckingham Palace.

You look like a dick waver. Sorry, mate. You can't come in. The fucking beefies will be on you in a second. Yeah. But, you know, everyone always assumes the worst. It's weird when you're around people in a pecking order, though. Especially with something like that, that has such a strict hierarchy, depending on

what job you do and how high up and how much access you have to the people that own the property or whatever. People lose their minds around that kind of stuff, don't they? People just act really, really weird. It's odd, isn't it? I'll tell you what I've found. Okay, here's my thing. I have been fairly awkward to a lot of celebrities, right? Okay. Okay. Back in the day, the first main celebrity I met was, I think, back in the day, this is like 2011, 2010. people that i knew of and were fans of like dead mouse or like um chris metz and people like this right yeah and when i meet these people um and i

met lots of people over the years as well from you know various events you know because sometimes we're at comic con and someone comes to the back room it's like i don't know felicia day or someone else or someone who i who i've known for a long time other youtubers too um it it's how sometimes you will say something awkward to them and they will just look at you like you're the a piece of filth yeah um and you're like but that was funny like like like kyle walker for example like when i met him here we go do you mean like an unbelievable he was like he was a kind of a cunt about it and that kind of whereas other people make it make like kind of a cunt about it. Whereas other people make it, kind of like want to join in on the joke

or they want to make it awkward as well or they want to make light of it or they want to, they understand. Like they kind of, I don't know, like some people are better at putting you at ease.

And I've always felt like that's something that when I meet people, the last thing I want to do is leave them thinking they were awkward or they had they they'd embarrass themselves in some way. Or do you know what I mean? Like, if someone came over to me and like, I don't know, just fucking fell in the mud, the last thing I would be doing is like laughing at them or like staring them down. Yeah.

Do you know what I mean? Like, you know, it's just human nature. You don't want to see someone. If you're a perfectly decent person, the last thing you want to see is someone having a terrible time. When you see someone really struggling, whether it's with embarrassment or something, I mean, we've all had this.

You go to an event and someone's meeting someone there like a player. I've seen people meet pro players at Dota events and they can literally barely speak. They're so nervous. And you feel terrible for them. Like, you want to help them out, make this easier for them so it's a better experience, and just save them from this moment. I think that's a perfectly normal reaction.

Yeah, yeah. But the pecking order that I was talking about, it exists in that too, where I feel like with some of these people, they don't want to talk to people that they think are beneath them, right? They're looking to talk to people that they think, like, either they don't know or they think are beneath them, right? They're looking to talk to people that are, like, above them. So they're angling to get in with people that are bigger than them, you know? Because that's who they want to talk to. And that's who they'll open up with and be nice to or whatever.

And everyone else is just, like, scum, you know? Yeah, well, they're all souls, aren't they? Yeah. But I think this is a really common thing, though. I think it's like a human thing, right? We tend to gravitate towards people that we think are better than ourselves or whatever. Yeah, you want to see and meet cool people. And you don't want to waste your time talking to people that you think are not that.

When you meet someone that's famous or you know of, you are nervous, right? And certainly, if I met King Charles, there'd be no way my heart would be pounding. Oh, my God, yeah. And when that happens, you kind of just go into autopilot, right? And it might well be that you say something awkward or you don't really mean or whatever, or say something and it's like, oh, I didn't mean it like that. Do you know what I mean? And then suddenly, you know, it's up to that person that you're meeting, whether they decide to turn their nose up at you

or join you in the joke or move on immediately and shun you. Do you know what I mean? And I feel like I've had all of those different experiences. You know, I've had people, you know, grab my hand and laugh along with me and be like, I think what you mean is this, you know, or whatever. Or like, and I've had the other the opposite of that you know people be rude to me yeah or or you know aloof and and i get it like i i can see it from both sides and so i think i think deep down though everybody wants to feel somewhat important right and i think if you meet somebody you like i know like even myself like in this case like if i was gonna meet like prince uh sorry king charles you know i'd have a word with myself and i'd say just say nice to meet you or whatever but like i wouldn't

be able to just say nice to meet you i'd have to say like oh it's really nice to meet you or something like that you know like i'd always feel like i'd have to like push it a little bit sort of thing and it wouldn't make any difference whatsoever but yeah situationally it's weird at dinner where he's been invited to meet people, that's different to me crawling in in his bedroom. Yeah, well, that is very different. And being like, hello, King Charles, how are you doing? Hello.

He was really rude to me. He slithered in your window-y. Yeah, so I think there is a difference there. If someone's tried to flag me down in the street and I've not noticed you, it's because it doesn't happen enough and i've not blanked you or something because i'm not i'm not like two i'm too famous for you goodbye yeah it's it's not that it's it's that i didn't expect it or i wasn't i wasn't prepared for it you know um yeah i don't put my makeup on every day when i go out you know so no i'm not not always looking my best god i sometimes forget to wear my track pants

when i go this winter is clothes on entirely it's it's getting to the point where i'm like yeah like i don't want to don't even want to go outside it's weird though the whole like the whole celebrity thing i i'm trying to think i haven't really met anyone like met like like i met like i've met like youtube famous people but like i don't i still don't really class them the same i know they kind of are the same now i guess but um i've never like i don't think i've ever met like a big hollywood star or you know like like the king or somebody like really super mainstream well-known you know what i mean like like i've met i've met like different youtubers and stuff but like i don't know i've always feel like with YouTubers, they were normal people first,

whereas with some of these people, like the King, he's never been a normal person, really. Right. He completely just lives in a galaxy of his own. But also, I think it's true. You live in a bubble, a dutchy bubble. This bubble is made of gold. Gold is a crystal.

And it's the same to some extent with big Hollywood stars too. If you met somebody like Tom Cruise or something, you know what I mean? Somebody that's been famous for a really long time and been exceedingly wealthy for a very long time. It's different, right? Yeah, those people who've experienced it in a very different way. They're not really like us. Yeah, those people who've experienced it in a very different way. They're not really like us. But equally, it's about who's famous to you. I would certainly be very embarrassed around some of the smaller YouTubers or people that I've...

Maybe not so much nowadays, because it's been around for a while, but certainly back in the day, if you met somebody that was famous on YouTube, it was very much like, okay, five minutes ago, you were me. You were a basement dweller. And now you're famous, right? They were so freshly famous that it's different. It was different to meet them. They just still felt very much like normal people. But your PewDiePies and stuff probably are a lot different now that they've been famous and wealthy for the best part of a decade plus. Maybe it's a little bit i guess what i'm trying to do here is like turn the onus around so if you met someone

and you had a bad experience meeting them that's not your fault for being awkward or ruining it somehow that's kind of their fault for being i guarantee you the king knows how to make people feel comfortable well yeah he meets people for a living everyone that meets the king is like holy shit it's the king yeah like one of the most famous a living. Everyone that meets the king is like, holy shit, it's the king. Like one of the most famous people in the fucking world, the king. They kinda have to master the art of small talk as well, because they do it all the damn time. And also, I don't think it's possible to have an awkward conversation with someone

whose entire job is meeting new people. I really think they are experts at making you feel at ease and being polite and being knowledgeable. And they're very good at just saying like having this trivial knowledge about everybody's jobs. You can always ask a question about something and seem interested. And then people come away like Sean did saying, actually, he was really nice. It's like, that's his whole job. So of course he's going to be nice. I have a friend, like a childhood friend, like who I'm still in touch with who's always been like that since we were kids he's always been like that like he's just always so easy to talk to

and i think his trick is and i don't think this is something that he ever even thinks about it's just naturally the way he is but i think his trick is that he just i think he's genuinely interested to know the answer but he just asks a lot of questions but they're not prying questions you know people don't ask a lot of questions it's like the art of conversation you make it about the other person and you'll just get the best results right because everyone wants to talk about themselves it's true there is one problem with that i know quite a few people who do that and you think wow they're so easy to talk to but you don't know them no i think you need to balance it out yeah good friendship you should be asking as many questions as you're answering.

Really. You should both be interested in each other. And I think certainly, like, whenever we chat or hang out, I think we're always talking. Like, I mean, I know when I was down in Bristol, me and Lulu went out for lunch. It was a really good conversation. It wasn't like just one of us yapping away. Because just listening is also kind of frustrating. Sometimes people need that.

You just want to talk to you and you just listen. You're just there for them. But a lot of the time, you should both be talking and interested in each other because you're actual friends. So I think that's a big part of it for me. Yeah. Talking of awkward, let's finish with this one. This one made me laugh.

This is Funny Police Colleague. Sorry, I wasn't listening. It's all right. It's okay. This is called funny police colleague um so this guy he's worked as an officer for 12 years across london boroughs uh and this guy um sorry he's worked for seven years this this officer has worked for 12 years in various boroughs he's been moved teams at least four times we'll call him dave he's laughably

incompetent and lazy unintentionally comical and lives on a completely different planet to everyone else. Here are some stories of things Dave did at work as a police officer. So Dave is a copper, sat in the canteen with two kilograms of monkey nuts whilst everyone else ate hot food. He spent the time cracking the monkey nut shells into his police hat upside down on the desk. Nice. After finishing, he emptied the shells from the hat into the bin bin then just plonked the hat on his head and left he later took it off to reveal monkey nut detritus all over his bald head yes this is something that like you'd see on a on a telly on telly it's like a story like a comedy character they would add yeah they put that in brooklyn 99

wouldn't they? For sure. So this is things Dave did while I was giving a death message. So you have to go to the house. He was telling a mother that her adult son had died. So that's what this copper is there doing, and Dave is with him. So this is what Dave did whilst the guy was giving this appalling message. Interrupted me to ask what breed of dog they have.

Made himself a glass of orange juice from their fridge went out to the car and retrieved his tablet charger then asked a crying mother if he could be a bit cheeky and plug his tablet in fucking and stood up stood up and sat back down again seven times throughout the contribution though the conversation and his only vocal contribution was to repeat four times that life is unpredictable oh my god unbelievable life is unpredictable yeah can you imagine that do you mind if i'm a bit cheeky and just charge me tablet and your colleague is there telling this mother that her adult son has died like what kind of dog is that it's like dave shut the fuck up like what is wrong with this guy i think he should probably just be a traffic police officer just make him do traffic stuff don't get him to talk no yeah that's unbelievable isn't it funny though that i assume

people have training to go to go to to do this to break the bad news to yeah yeah you have to but we've seen it so much on telly right in tv shows and movies and things, right? I wonder how much that... I know movies have a big influence on the way people act and behave and feel they should in certain circumstances as well. And it almost can inform the way we do things like ceremonies and things. They're very inspired by this idea that we have from media, right, and drama and stories. And I wonder how good that actually is. You know, what is the best thing to do when breaking the bad news to someone?

Is it to do it in the same way of, I've got some bad news. Would you like to go sit down? Should I come through and sit down? And they're like, oh no, is it Michael? Is he dead? Would you like to take a seat and then we tried to get the answer

made it worse baboons finished him off they just love it the smell it smelled like just to make sure right on the knob yeah anyway can i charge I just love it the smell it smelled like and then a cobra came out of a banana tree and bit him just to make sure right on the knob

yeah anyway can I charge my tablet please if you don't mind what kind of dog is that so funny looking fucking dog

all over my sofa don't mind Dave don't mind Dave he loves a nut yeah it cuts cuts back to the sergeant's office

with Dave sitting there gonna need you I need your gun in your back, Dave. Dave. Oh, fine. I can manage one. All right. This is the final word on Australia.

Right. All right. I'm hoping this is a peaceful end to the conversation. Let's end this. Yeah. Let's bury this. This is from Macca. Extending the Australian olive branch.

Yeah. G'day, gentlemen. My name's Josh, but everyone is from Macca, extending the Australian olive branch. G'day, gentlemen. My name's Josh, but everyone calls me Macca down under. Being 22, the Young's Cast and Triforce podcast have always been there for me, with Flex being my favourite member for his unforgiving and hilarious takes on anything that dared get in his way. Oh, cheers, bud. Therefore, when Australia came in his sights,

I was in a bloody pickle. Initially, I wanted to suggest to him that the doctor performing his vasectomy must have cut his balls off completely but sound on mine's prevailed i must say i wasn't thrilled with the hateflex cop in its verbosity however i know he would have defended his home in a similar manner so fair's fair here's the deal is it dangerous yes but nine out of ten it's because you put yourself in a shitty situation spider sharks you name it we've got it but i'd argue as us us aussies either know how to deal with them or we just avoid them most often than not if someone is getting fucked sideways

by the wildlife on tv it's a foreigner or a complete idiot fucking around don't annoy them and they won't annoy you kind of like us i suppose if your mailbag is anything to go is it worth the 10 hour plus flights depends on. I'm obviously biased with being a lucky individual and having seen much of the world, I've never felt safer and more welcome than when I travel within Australia. And that's not just because I'm from here. Every city has something to offer

from the cultural urban hubs like Sydney, Melbourne and Tassie, while others have beaches, sun and fascinating glimpses of wildlife like Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. Also being a city built upon immigration from all over the world, each city is really an amazing place

for food, art and people and culture. Plus being so far away from the rest of you lot all over the world, each city is really an amazing place for food, art, and people, and culture. Plus, being so far away from the rest of you lot, the whole world, kind of gives me comfort when all the crazy wars and politics shit goes down. And 10 hours into the scheme of your thousands of gaming hours combined really shouldn't be a concern, for Christ's sake. True. Now that I'm here, in the email, I realize I'm not trying to convince you to come here, but rather, just trying to be a good bloke.

Standing up for my country and telling any Aussie flax haters that it's time to cool those bloody jets. I'm going to continue listening to the podcast from the place I'm proud to call home, and if that's not good enough for flax to consider coming down under, that's all good, my fellow Aussies. He'll just never know what he's missing, and we'll leave it at that. Cheers again. What a great fucking answer.

Great email. Great way to end it. We'll bury this one in a underground waterproof tarantula cave. Yeah. Yeah. Well, with the heating on full. Yeah. Yeah.

Thank you, everyone. That was some nice emails. It's nice to hope everyone's doing all right out there. Yeah. And I know this is a season where- Stay warm if you're in the UK. It's the worst time, if you hear it, honestly. It's going to be cold.

January and February suck. It is what it is. I've been feeling like shit lately, for sure. There's a lot of pressure this time of year with New Year's resolutions and other people saying you should do certain things or not do certain things. Have you guys failed all your resolutions yet? Yep.

Nice. Yeah, of course. Good job. I've ranked off 10 times today. Oh my god. Only 10? What a lightweight. You must have done some of those while we were recording the podcast. No wonder he wasn't listening. Oh god. Alright. You must have done some of those while we were recording the podcast. No wonder he wasn't listening. They're going to find me. Oh, God.

All right. I took the tone down. We were all wholesome for a second. We appreciated it. Nice. All right. Good stuff. Keep the emails coming.

Thank you. Thank you so much. Look after each other. Be good to each other. Peace. Goodbye. Bye. Bye.

Love you. Bye. Bye. Bye.