THE ADAM BUXTON PODCAST - EP.193 - MAEVE HIGGINS

Episode Date: November 8, 2022

Adam enjoys a conversational ramble with Irish writer and comedian Maeve Higgins.This episode was recorded remotely on Monday 31st October, 2022Thanks to Séamus Murphy-Mitchell for production support.Podcast artwork by Helen GreenRELATED LINKSMAEVE ON INSTAGRAMMOTHERS OF INVENTION PODCAST'TELL EVERYONE ON THIS TRAIN I LOVE THEM' THE MEANING OF A HERO'S FINAL WORDS by Maeve Higgins - 2022 (GUARDIAN)A FRIEND OF TALIESIN MECHE WRITES ABOUT HIS DEATH - 2017 (QUARTZ WEBSITE)MAEVE HIGGINS' FANCY VITTLES EPISODE 1 PART 1 - 2009 (YOUTUBE)EXTRA ORDINARY (TRAILER) - 2020 (YOUTUBE)EXTRA ORDINARY INTERVIEW WITH STAR MAEVE HIGGINS AND DIRECTORS MIKE AHERN, ENDA LOUGHMAN - 2020 (YOUTUBE)MAEVE HIGGINS STAND UP ON PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION - 2016 (YOUTUBE)NAKED CAMERA - HONEYMOONGARTH MERENGHI'S TERRORTOME - 2022 (WATERSOTNES) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I added one more podcast to the giant podcast bin. Now you have plucked that podcast out and started listening. I took my microphone and found some human folk. Then I recorded all the noises while we spoke. My name is Adam Buxton, I'm a man. I want you to enjoy this, that's the plan. Hey, how are you doing, podcats? I hope you're well.

It's Adam Buxton here. I'm reporting to you from a rainy field in Norfolk County, UK, towards the beginning of November 2022. I came out on this walk about half an hour ago to record my podcast intro this week, and it was glorious and sunny, a bit blustery, but very beautiful, incredible autumnal colours. Anyway, I should have taken that bluster a bit more seriously. If I was more in tune with nature, I would have known that rain was on its way.

I suppose I also could have figured that out from the giant bank of dark cloud that was coming my way. But then when I went to press the record button on my dictaphone, I got the no battery symbol. Had to walk back to the house, get some new batteries, and by the time I was ready to come back out again, the weather had gone inclement. Also, Rosie decided that she no longer wanted to go out. Maybe she had figured out that the weather wasn't going to be that nice. And the prospect of curling up in front of the fire with my wife, my wife, in my wife's study, was more attractive to Rosie. So she's not with me this week again, I'm sorry to tell you.

I'm just climbing over a stile. Thank you so much, I really hope you're well. Just talking to the stile there, I'm very stile conscious. But yeah, Rosie didn't want to come out. Also, I got a message this week from Stuart Taylor. Hi, Stuart. Thanks for your message. He said, Hi, Adam. I just wanted to say that it's worth bearing in mind, you may already know, that dogs are crepuscular and that you will more likely get the best behaviors from Rosie at these times of day. Rosie at these times of day. Well, I had a vague idea what crepuscular meant, but I googled it, and it means appearing or active in Twilight, which is a series of five vampire-themed romance fantasy films based on four novels published by author Stephanie Meyer. But as far as I'm aware, Rosie hasn't been in any of those films, so I'm assuming that

crepuscular refers to creatures that are most comfortable being active in the light from the sky between full night and sunrise, or between sunset and full night. So yes, that might explain why Rosie's reluctant to come for walks during the day. However, she always used to, and most dogs, as far as I'm aware, are quite happy going out more or less any time for a walk. So I googled crepuscular animals and found a website called Crepuscular Stuff for all your crepuscular needs.

Sorry, I'm saying crepuscular a lot, and it's not really a very nice word, is it? So I apologise for that. But it says here, It's interesting to note how many crepuscular animals end up being domesticated by humans. Animals such as cats, dogs, rabbits and more are all domesticated to varying degrees. Much like these other animals, feral dogs are crepuscular when they are on their own in the wild. Domesticated animals, however, tend to shift their activity habits to match their human owners

and dogs are no exception. Domestic dogs will shift their sleeping patterns to whatever is most convenient for its social environment quoting there from crepuscular stuff website and careful pheasant there's men with guns out there at this time of year but yeah rosie i don't think has ever been especially crepuscular crapuscular different story but yeah maybe now that she's getting a bit older her ancient urges are taking hold once again problem is at this time of year it's not really convenient i've got to get these intros and outros recorded before the sun starts to set because my daughter's got a netball match this evening.

This is interesting stuff, isn't it? Well, I mean, it's a very detailed insight into the process of making this podcast, which you didn't ask for. And I apologize if you just want me to get on with it. I suppose you could just skip forward a few minutes to the beginning of my conversation with this week's guest for podcast 193, who is the Irish writer, actor, comedian, Maeve Higgins.

Here's some Higgins facts for you. Maeve Anna Higgins, born in 1981, grew up in County Cork, Ireland, but now lives in New York, America. From 2005 to 2007, Maeve was one of the main performers and writers on the Irish RTE Network's hidden camera show, Naked Camera, along with Patrick MacDonald and PJ Gallagher. Maeve's own sketch show, Maeve Higgins' Fancy Vittles, aired on Ireland's RTE2 in 2009. To date, Maeve has written four books filled with essays and autobiographical bits and pieces that are mainly humorous, but sometimes more serious. Her latest book, Tell Everyone on This Train I Love Them, was published earlier this year, 2022, and we talk about it a little bit in our conversation, or at least about the title. Maeve's writing also appears in the New York Times, the New Yorker, and the Guardian in the US, where she writes a regular

column. Maeve is also co-host of the climate justice podcast Mothers of Invention, which we also spoke about in this ramble. In 2020, Maeve starred in the supernatural comedy film Extraordinary from Irish directors Enda Luckman. Now, I did Google how to pronounce that name. Loughman, Loughman, L-O-U-G-H, Mann. Enda Loughman. Sorry, it's not a name I'm familiar with. I apologise for any offence caused. And Michael Ahern.

And in that film, Maeve played a driving instructor with supernatural talents who resolves to save a girl from a washed-up rock star trying to regain his success by sacrificing the girl to evil forces. Check it out. Lots of funny stuff. Meanwhile, Maeve continues with her stand-up comedy, which is how she started out, and she still hosts a live comedy show each week in Brooklyn, New York, which is called Butter Boy.

Her new live comedy album is out on the 16th of November, and it's called A Very Special Woman. My conversation with Maeve, who I've never met in real life before, but I've been aware of her work for a while, was recorded remotely with me in a room in East London, where, as you will hear, I was staying over to attend a Halloween party. So this was recorded last week. Maeve was talking to me from her home in Brooklyn,

though I only saw her for about 20 seconds, before broadband issues, mine as ever, forced us to go audio only. Anyway, aside from one or two dropouts and technical breakdowns, we were able to have a good conversational ramble that touched on Halloween costumes, childhood adventures, Elon Musk dealing with climate crisis anxiety,

and the last time that we were both offended. I'll be back at the end for a bit more waffle, but right now with Maeve Higgins. Here we go. Ramble chat, let's have a ramble chat. We'll focus first on this, then concentrate on that. Come on, let's chew the fat and have a ramble chat. Put on your conversation coat and find your talking hat. how was the death of the queen received in new york city it was funny because you know lots of

my like arab friends were you know checking in with me like laughing and I was like I know I get it former colonies of Britain obviously we were all remarking on it but I didn't feel any anything really you know it's just like a thing that what you uh I don't know if this conversation's gonna work out everyone was talking about like oh black twitter and irish twitter like combined forces for the day but i just was so unbothered by the whole thing you know i don't know my sister lives in london and she got a day off so that was nice for her yeah you didn't hear about the inevitably excuse me i've got a frog in my throat just from the emotion of it all yeah it's choked me up a little bit but you didn't hear presumably about the scandals of people jumping the eight hour queue

in order to walk past the coffin as she lay in state certain media people doing reports on the coffin lying in state yeah and you know the tv station had arranged for them to do the report and so they for practical reasons they didn't queue for nine or twelve hours or whatever it was and people got very upset because they said you know oh yeah just because you're on tv and you host this morning and it's such an incredible morning show, you think you can just swan in there and barge the queue? The problem was that David Beckham, super footballer, had joined the queue and he waited for the full nine or 12 hours or whatever it was with everybody else. Yeah, but sure, he has nothing else to do. Well, exactly. Isn't he unemployed now?

Exactly. But it's just the brazenness. Like, could you, like, front it out? Like, I've been late to my own show because I didn't want to, like, be that person who, like, bustles to the front and, and like winks at the security guard or whatever. Yeah. You know, isn't it brazen? Even if it is like for your job, it just feels, oh, I'd be mortified. Yeah, it is mortifying. I know exactly what you mean. So presumably you've never said, don't you know who I am?

I mean, that's mainly what I have to say because people don't. So I have to say, more rare for me, you do know who I am yeah exactly I just don't understand anyone who would I mean if you're in a position where people obviously don't know who you are and then you have to say to them I can't believe you don't know who I am then that's just as sad as life gets isn't it I mean it's the worst I mean it would be a fun thing to do if you were kind of a i don't know like a really good plumber or something and then you show up but you know someone's in real dire straits there's been you know their pipes froze and then they

defrosted and that you know don't you know who i am and then they obviously don't know you because you're not on tv or whatever but they're so glad to see that you're the plumber. You know, like I could see using it in that kind of, oh my God, the plumber's here. That's my celebrity right there. Yeah. Everybody needs a plumber. Have you got a plumber friend? Oh God.

I don't know. I mean, there's like a guy who does our building maintenance and he does a bit of everything badly. He does everything badly sounds like me I do know a guy you know if the worst comes to the worst but like it's not like if I was home in Ireland I just have such a wide network of of tradesmen I really do there I've said it has such a wide network of of tradesmen i really do there i've said it i've shown my cards adam it's the dream yeah i mean we're out in the middle of east anglia yeah we've got a few friendly tradesmen but they're quite grudging because we live close to um this farm that is owned by my wife's family so we sometimes okay lord of the manor well

it is sort of like that and um so we're sometimes able to use some of the people that work on the farm some of their plumbers and things like that yeah the um the serfs that you own that's right yes but i i do sometimes sense a little bit of resentment from them. Like, you know, I actually have a job and now I'm expected to come around and do a favor for you because you're part of the family. I know. I know. But that's, that's livable. I mean, the thing with me is I'm like my, my brother-in-law is a carpenter. My brother-in-law is an electrician so like they actually are my family yeah that's perfect how about doctors everyone needs a tame doctor i'd love that now no i have another brother-in-law

who's a pharmacist and that's really handy oh yeah um for the club life you know if you're gonna get what i mean free condoms i actually don't even know what i mean free condoms i think i meant like ecstasy or something but then i was like oh i don't even know what the pharmaceutical name for that is we have just started waffling away here but you mave are in new york i call it the big apple oh where'd you get that name from? You just come up with this? It's based on the Roald Dahl story. And there, there was a peach that lands on the top of the Empire State Building, but I don't like peaches. So I call it... You just changed it.

Yeah, I think of it as the Big Apple. You moved there around 2015. Is that right? You know, I have to work that out, actually. I think next year is actually my 10th anniversary. is that right? You know I have to work that out actually I think next year is actually my 10th anniversary so I think I moved here in either 2013 or 14 but I've been here for roughly 10 years and hence my strong strong Brooklyn accent. You start your latest stand-up record with quite a good American accent. Yeah I feel like I can do an American accent. I don't think it's that hard. It's certainly harder for them to do an Irish accent. Right. And also there's like, they all kind of sound the same over here.

Whereas like in the UK and in Ireland, we have these like regional accents that vary from, you know, three miles away. Some can sound totally different. But here it's kind of, you know, there's like the southern accent and like maybe cajuns and stuff but generally people all strive to sound the same even though it's such a big country right okay Maeve Higgins says Americans all sound the same

oh dear it's not going to go well for you whereabouts in new york do you live i live in brooklyn and i just found out recently there's all these cool like pigeons on a building near me like on kind of a former housing project roof they keep pigeons and not like no offense like not like london scraggly like one-eyed dying filthy pigeons beautiful not rats with wings yeah there's all these gorgeous pigeons who fly and they make those murmurations in the sky they're really gorgeous and I was looking at them the other day and some guy told me they belong to Mike Tyson so that's my neighborhood I guess he's Mike Tyson was born in Bed-Stuy I don't think he lives here anymore but he still keeps his pigeons near where I live.

Oh my God, that sounds like a setup for some kind of joke that has an appalling punchline that I can't think of. Yeah, it really does. But I will end the story there. That's where it ends, thank goodness. So that's, yeah, that's where I live, you know, pretty far from where I grew up,

which is Cove in Ireland, which is just an, you know, island on the south coast of Ireland. It's very pretty and it's the last place Titanic stopped. It's kind of a nautical, sad, tragic history. That's where I come from. Yeah. And Cove is spelt C-O-B-H. Is that right? That's right. Yeah. I mean, that's just nonsense come from yeah and cove is spelt c-o-b-h is that right that's right yeah i mean that's just nonsense look at you it actually is adam cove is actually a made-up word and it's

because there was a slight panic when when ireland you know fought and got its independence from britain there was this rush on to change all the English names like street names town names everything um and so Cove was called Queenstown because Queen Victoria had like sailed past it once and so they were like we have to change we have to change it like it is you know it's an island in a cove like c-o-v-e like the english word cove yeah they're like okay but we can't use an english word so they're okay we'll just we'll just spell it like this like c-o-v-a-d-a-b-h which is not an irish word it just sounds kind of irish so it isn't a real word good one so i wasn't being as offensive as uh no you weren't you were you were bang on the money all right good and how are things in Brooklyn New York tonight Halloween 2022 what's it looking like

well it's the afternoon over there it's the afternoon I'm already yeah psyched I love it it's it is actually the I don't know it's the biggest holiday it's the most popular holiday here I think because we all have different holidays in New don't know it's the biggest holiday it's the most popular holiday here I think because we all have different holidays in New York you know there's like we just had Diwali and there's the Jewish holidays and Thanksgiving Christmas you know there's such a range of people but everybody seems to go for Halloween everyone loves Satan I mean it's what we've got in common the dark you know the darkness is inside all of us. So yeah, it's cool.

Like I'm going to my friend's house later to give out sweets to kids. Oh no, the connection's dropped. Oh, Adam, are you there? I can't hear you. Why isn't anything easy? Are back now connect yes i'm back oh great okay mave i apologize for these technical problems i thank you for your patience i mean don't you think it's because it's halloween but satan likes podcasts doesn he? I think he invented them. Or she. Yeah, I think Satan definitely came up with the idea of podcasts.

And Satan is the one who puts it into people's minds. Hey, why don't you start a podcast? And you think, oh yeah, it's a good idea. But yeah, I think as well, it's not just Satan. It's all the dead contacting each other. I assume they're using Zoom as well. So it's just very busy. Yeah, the network's overloaded. All the ghosts. Hello.

So you're doing stand up, you're handing out sweets to the children of your community. And are they respectful generally, the kids when they come around for sweets in Brooklyn? Yes, very much so. I mean, they're terrifying. Like I don't don't you know I don't know how there's such a generational difference but there really is they're so confident and like clever and you know respectful yeah they're incredible like you get you know they get into these big conversations and they're so sort of I don't't know, they play the violin and yeah, I think the kids are amazing. I just love them.

And I don't have any kids, you know, that I know of. But I just like find them very interesting. Like as people, I really like children, you know, some children,

not all of them, obviously. Yeah. Some of them. So yeah, I think it's really, it's really fun fun and they've thought so much about their costumes that i think my favorite age is about like eight eight to ten maybe yeah good call you know um because they're also they really listen to you like i feel like grown-ups are just you know we're like busy and we have all these

like other spinning wheels of thoughts going around in our heads like always but kids are just more receptive and they're like what do you mean and they actually mean that well they're all infused with the wonder of not knowing and the desire to discover at least some of them are. Sometimes my children are remarkably incurious. Because I used to live in the country for a while when I was younger. I used to live in Wales, out in the middle of nowhere. And in those days, I was allowed to just wander around and do whatever I wanted. My dad was away most of the time. My mom was stressed out. So she just let me go and my mom was stressed out so she just let me go and explore and i'd go wandering around in the woods occasionally set fire to things yeah luckily nothing bad ever happened with that because

it's so damp probably probably and i would find haystacks and do all the things you're not supposed to do especially if you're a child around haystacks, like go to the very top of this giant pile of hay bales and then sort of surf down the cracks to the very bottom. And somehow I survived. And they also had big, long storm drains that would run for miles under these fields. And I would crawl down the storm drains. It was wicked. Yeah, like this is now it does sound like a farm safety ad like your voiceover would be at the start and then they'd just be like a little white coffin like but of course that's so that's so brilliant and yeah I had a rural childhood as well and And, you know, not a lot of money.

And we used to just, like, sometimes I think I'm romanticizing it. But we really did spend a lot of time just outside or inside reading or, like, making concrete blocks with my dad. Which you're not, you're definitely not supposed to do that because, like, lime and the concrete, you know, we know that now. But it was really fun. Did your dad just like making concrete blocks or was that his job it was his job yeah no he he did it i guess for work and for building around the house and stuff yeah and i mean i think when kids show curiosity i guess they're trying to figure out like am i going to be like you or am i going to be like you? Or am I going to be like somebody else? You know, and I love that, that you can kind of introduce them to, like, you can be like a writer who lives in a city, because like, I didn't know

anybody like that when I was small. And so now when I spend time with my nieces, I don't like force it on them or anything. But if they ask me it I kind of say like yeah like I love libraries and you know I love being on stage and like I think what I've got to say is important you know I try and say it more like subtly than that but I do feel some kind of urgency about you know showing kids like alternative ways of life because I feel like I didn't realize that until I was much older. What would you say is your number one bit of advice or top tip or word of wisdom for a young person that you regularly trot out? I know I've got a few. If I've had a drink and I'm out with my family. Can you tell me yours? I can't think. What kind of things do you tell them? I tell them things like, you know, it's like embellishments of adages like if you don't

ask you don't get but it's it's things like you know you wouldn't believe the stuff you can do in life if you just bluff your way through things if you act like you know what you're doing if you pretend that you deserve something if you you know you can you can get a long way like not in a malicious way but in a positive way you can really just bluff your way through things most people are too timid or they feel that they don't deserve things and so they don't bother yeah that's a really good tip like actually saying you know especially to like gentler people or quieter people um just you know force yourself to speak first force yourself to ask for things and also maybe like don't worry if someone tells you no like you can yeah I think I try and say to younger

people and this would be like people I'm mentoring, like not just like random family members, you know, to emphasize to them that their point of view is just as important as the next person's. It's not more important than, and it's not less important than the next person's, you know, especially when it comes to something creative, because obviously if you're a medical doctor, then what I think about vaccines is not as relevant as what you think but when it comes to like comedy or opinion writing or any of the other stuff that I do then it's absolutely essential to to remind yourself oh what I think

is worth saying and I'll find a home to say it in you know even if this is the wrong one at the moment because nobody's going to ask you really Adam sure they're not like a lot of us anyway they're not going to ask us what do you think about this or do you have anything to add here they they're not going to ask so you have to really push it you know yeah you have to I mean you find that out as a comedian when you go on a panel show and you suddenly see what it takes to be successful on those kinds of shows. And it's really not about being polite. That's the last thing you need. You know, in normal life, I like polite people. I like people who listen and wait until you've finished speaking before they start speaking. But those skills don't really wash on a panel show, especially a TV panel show.

Yeah, I mean, personally, I don't like TV panel shows, like watching them or doing them. But I do this radio show over here called Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. And it's this really long-running kind of institution that's on every Saturday morning oh that's the NPR news quiz yeah that's right I find it so fun I mean it's in front of a live audience so that's really um you know that makes you sharper and faster but the other thing is like what you said you can't just like wait for the host to say Maeve do you have thoughts on that yeah you have to get in early and you have to get in strong and a lot of what you say won't even make it but that's fine that just means you have to say more and I cannot tell you how like

against my instincts that is but I can tell you how much better it makes me at that show by just definitely forcing myself but I what I don't think is right is that you you're not polite because what I really like doing on that show is also like building off of what other people say or even maybe like repeating it if there's a new panelist or I think you can combine being humane and being like dominant and funny i think yeah i'm sure you're right i am right you piece of shit sorry just just kidding i like the way i like the way you feel you have to say i'm just kidding yeah shit. I thought you suddenly got angry with me and called me a piece of shit. Just kidding.

I'm sorry. I send you flowers tomorrow. I'm so sorry about that. I don't know what came over me. What you don't know is that I like being called a piece of shit. I deserve it. I am a piece of shit. It's my special Halloween kink.

Tonight I'm going to go out and ask people to call me a piece of shit. It's my special Halloween kink. Tonight I'm going to go out and ask people to call me a piece of shit. It's a compulsion that leads you to explore that leading edge of income. Yeah. I'm still a curiosity seeker. I'm looking at the idiosyncrasies of things. a mountain or a tree is the manifestation of forces that we are not capable of dealing with i'm very drunk in this is the manifestation of forces that we are not capable of dealing with. I'm very drunk in this. To circle back to the wonderful world of Halloween,

later tonight I am going to a Halloween costume party. I haven't been to one for several years. There's a couple of friends of mine over here who always have an extremely elaborate costume party invite loads and loads of people many comedy people that i know from back in the day but since we've been living out in the country i've only been like a couple of times in the last 10 years and i always find it quite overwhelming the whole business of what I'm going to wear. Like I'll give you an example of some of the costumes. That you've worn or they're wearing?

No, that other people have worn. Oh, yeah, that's hard. Because it's a lot of people from film and television. So sometimes they get professional makeup jobs. One guy turned up at the last party that I went to and he was Kiefer Sutherland in The Lost Boys, the vampire movie. And he'd had professionally applied prosthetics. Prosthetics. Yeah. To build up his forehead with weird Lost Boy bumps. And he had

the teeth and makeup and he had a professional wig. And it was very good. But at the same time, not something that you could realistically compete with or even approximate. Even if you just went as, you know, Kiefer Sutherland. Yeah. Just a kind of a shirt. Yeah. And a guitar. And you could say, you know, I've got a band.

It's not all about 24 that's still my keith sutherland frame of reference there's more to me than that yeah so what donald was my dad so what i'm an old man look at my guitar yeah exactly but you're not going to do that right you're not going to like hire somebody especially not tonight because i've just come from norwich so i couldn't put an elaborate costume on the back of my bike even if I wanted to so tonight well I'm not sure exactly what I am dressing up as I was hoping that you might be able to give me a funny line to describe the

costume that I've cobbled together so what it is basically is just a lab coat that I've sprayed some red paint over. So it looks blood spattered. And I've had it for years and years. I used it for a music video I made about 15 years ago or something. Yeah. So I thought, oh, I could use that. And then I kind of retrofitted the rest of the costume around it. And I thought, well, okay, I've got a bowler hat.

I'll wear the bowler hat i'll wear a white shirt and a black tie and sort of smart trousers with this blood spattered lab coat over the top it feels like a thing yeah but i don't know what thing it is and i was imagining like what are you going to say if people come up to you and say, what are you? So initial thoughts, I could say, I work at the treasury. What about like I cut inflation, you know? Yes. I cut inflation. This is good. You know, because I don't know what that means really, but like it's like cutting and there's blood.

Because it sounds like you're a butcher banker. Exactly. Because you have the hat from Mary Poppins. Yeah. it's like cutting and there's blood because it sounds like you're a butcher banker exactly because you have the the hat from mary poppins and yeah and then you have the lab or like you're an economist or something that's right i was thinking i could say i'm an economist but you know it's not the economist's fault is it the financial crisis over here it's not their fault but they're they're so bad at their jobs that is their fault that they chose to be economists in the first place well i'm imagining when i say economist i'm imagining someone who observes the economy and explains it to other

people rather than someone who is in control of it yeah but don't you think even the ones that explain it like they're always like like all that can happen in in capitalism is like a series of crises so why do you need to be an economist like just go and do something useful please so i so i don't want you to be in it maybe you could be a dead economist that would be fine or you could be I think a butcher banker you know like I carved up the world kind of thing but Adam this is very dark like if especially if this is like you know a fun party with like comedy people they probably just want you to be I don't know like the Easter bunny that died or something no but it's not that kind of thing there's always people who turn up in edgy costumes a few a few years ago someone was kim jong un or ill or whichever one was the being called the

rocket man by donald trump wait was it a korean person no it wasn't a korean person and yes it did cause some consternation on social media oh my god um i don't know well you you could just go is this really mean to like you to go as that costume and then when people say like who hey adam who are you supposed to be then you're like you're like what do you mean you don't know oh yes sorry you're talking about my bowler hat and blood spattered jacket right okay i thought i thought you were going next level meta and you were suggesting that i go as kim jong il and then when people ask me what the hell i'm doing i say i'm going as that other comedian who dressed up as kim jong il because it Because it was horrific, the appropriation.

That's really funny, yeah. I mean, you could also just wear whatever you want and then be like, what, I'm Muhammad Ali, and just like, get the feedback. That would confuse them. What is the best costume that you ever wore to a fancy dress party? What is the best costume that you ever wore to a fancy dress party? I remember when we were kids, we went as like Alice in Wonderland, the whole lot of us. And I was the card, like I was the playing card.

Yeah. And I remember like I had to get into the car and lie across like my sisters because there was like eight of us in that there was eight kids in the family so we were you know the cat the teacup Alice like we could all of us had you know a pretty big role but somehow ended up being a card but what I liked about that is that it was a group effort you know I did like all of us being this gang that was a visual of Alice in Wonderland which is a book that I really loved when I was small. I think that was probably the best one. But I don't think we won anything.

That's good. A card. Did you ever do like a group thing with your kids or anything where you all went as, you know, like a host of bumblebees or something like that? Oh, I wish we had. But no, we never did anything like that. I always, I could never really take halloween seriously i

think i was just a bit of a grouch about the whole thing i just thought this ridiculous we don't do halloween in this country just an excuse to make a lot of money selling more tat and pass around more bloody sweets we don't need more sweets for the children for crying out loud. So no, is the short answer. We never did anything like that because we're miserable. I mean, I suppose in Ireland it came from Samhain, like old pagan festivals. But here in America, I mean, there's the Day of the Dead, I guess. And there's a few different cultures that go to making it something kind of real you know things actually connected to people's true rituals and stuff like that but yeah I mean it's obscene

just there's so much like plastic and sugar flying around and stuff but I do like it and it's a real um spooky time i really do spooky like i'm like fully prepared for spooky stuff to happen all the time do you believe in spooky things i think i do yeah i mean i definitely think there's sometimes when you know this idea of thin places or like times when things are you're just a little bit closer to other realms I feel that sometimes and I used to be way more like I guess I read like bloody Richard Dawkins when I was a teenager or something and I was like yeah that's all nonsense and then like I met him and did a podcast with him and I was like not sure about this guy and you know now I'm just like yes I'm gonna be rational but I'm also gonna be respectful of like my heritage and other people's rituals and traditions and I'm going to be more open to understanding that there's more

to life than meets the eye. Yeah, exactly. It's nice to leave yourself a little bit open to the possibility. Like, I think some of the more fundamentalist atheist factions are especially contemptuous for people who call themselves, what's the word if you're somewhere in the middle? Agnostic. Agnostic. They're like, well, the believers, you're somewhere in the middle agnostic agnostic they're like well the believers you know good for them at least they believe in something but what is worse than an agnostic right and i always think like well i don't mind people who occupy the center ground or say

i don't know i'm not sure yeah i mean that's actually like more true to what science is than them saying we know for sure yeah that this is not possible that's like not good science to be like we have the exact answer and you know because it should be always changing and being investigated and yeah speaking of science you are occasionally or always a co-host of a podcast with the astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Is that right? neil degrasse tyson is you know the real deal he's this amazing astrophysicist and he makes a podcast where it's comedians and scientists um just a bit like the infinite monkey cage over here i think it is like that yeah um yeah in more recent years i've been co-hosting a climate podcast which is pretty sciencey too um but it definitely had more emphasis on the kind of I don't know the indigenous sciences and more ancient wisdom that's really helpful

in dealing with the climate crisis today oh yeah and that that was more my speed is that the one you present with the former Irish prime minister? Yeah, she's the former president of Ireland. President! Mary Robinson. Oh, I've revealed my ignorance again. Damn it. I apologize, Irish folks.

It's totally fine. Yeah, the former queen of Ireland. There you go. Yeah, I mean, she was president when I was a child. She was the first woman president and she went on then to be human rights commissioner at the un she's wonderful and um and i've been mentoring her that whole time and we did this you know she basically wanted to make a documentary about climate justice because she's obsessed with it's really important to her

it's kind of the I mean you know what it is I'm sure but like it's the human rights and the climate crisis and where those things intersect so she wants to make a film and then like I guess people said to her oh the film takes ages and it's expensive and you know it's not easy to get people to watch films so she made a podcast so we made three series of this podcast where i'm kind of her sidekick you know i'm just asking questions and this is called mothers of invention and her name is mary robinson yeah and my name is bill cosby so yeah that's been cool because i had i mean like so many of us really bad climate anxiety yes you know i mean i still i still do but it definitely helps a bit when you get stuck in and

you learn and you start taking actions you know and so i found that like as you know like when we do comedy you you're kind of just tinkering around the edges but I found this was kind of a useful practical thing to do yeah what were the most practical things for you as far as things you learned or different ways of thinking about it all well I mean I did small things with my own resources and like my own behaviors you know like I changed the bank I use and because I was with Chase Bank and I found out just through the podcast that they're really big bankers of the fossil fuel industry so I just like moved banks like really small things Adam and as you know it's not like on an individual level there really is only so much

we can do and what I really learned about was I think I was very anxious about climate because I was angry with the way the world is and the way it looks now and the way it's going to be like for the children I know but it wasn't I wasn't really expressing that anger it was more like it turned inward like a sadness anxiety so I think being angry and being active it was helpful for me you know um and for lots of people I mean you see it now with everyone throwing stuff at the paintings and you know but there's tons of ways of doing it people going on strike or people suing their government and talking to people who do that stuff on the podcast was really helpful. And then something that I never did before that is really helpful to me now is instead of focusing on what we're losing, which is obviously so, so much, you know, it's kind of imagining what the world could be like yeah

so using your imagination and and coupling that with evidence you know you can start to start picturing oh well here's a better way of doing it like here's a way of sharing cooperating that will actually lead to a safer fairer future because there are these feelings of like anger and despair and maybe you get a bit frozen about what we're headed into or what we're already in for some of us but um if you can kind of picture like oh things actually could be much better then i think that's really helpful yes absolutely i mean it's oh's, apparently it's quite a big question. And it's, it's. Yeah.

Oh, it hurts. Wait, what are you thinking when you're going like, oh. Just that, as you say, you're losing so many things. And I mean, well, this is not about climate change. But when ISIS were rampaging around the terror organization don't know if you know them you know there were so many appalling things that they did and so many sad things that came out of that but um not least the destruction of all the ancient landmarks and these places that had been around for thousands

of years in Syria and you just thought oh man that that is sad to see that stuff being blown up it is really sad and I absolutely get why you mention sorry like ancient monuments and like beautiful thousands of years of kind of you know human endeavor and human accomplishment and artistry I see why your mind links those things I had such a strange experience I was like this is gonna sound like such a boast I've only done it once but like I was performing in Carnegie Hall oh yeah and for some reason in rehearsal I had this where you know there was no audience there I think we were just sound checking really and um I felt this really like intense wave of sadness when I was looking out at the it's very pretty you know it's like

plush velvet and gilt-edged boxes and for some reason there doing soundcheck I was like oh god like humans have come so far like we really have like look what we've created like this city and this space for art and music and it's just so elegant and um and at the same time what we're capable of you know all of this progress also can cause such destruction. So I think those things do make sense together because, you know, it's the, it's almost like at the peak of human achievement that we're causing our own undoing and, and the, the planet will probably be fine, you know, it will exist in some way, but we won't so I think that's the sadness that um that I feel something when I see like destruction of kind of the best parts of humanity I think it does go hand in hand with this like addiction to to growth but I think that's why it's important

as well to hang on to well those people thousands of years ago were building these fabulous temples and it wasn't a utopia back then but it was a lot you know it was a lot more um sustainable and they were maybe working more cooperatively and i do think it's interesting to look back at the past for for clues about the future you know because it's only been like the last 200 years that we've really started to mess things up yes although you know if you're one of the steven pinkers of the world or or people who look on the positive side you know along with those destructive bits of progress there's some incredible stuff that has just transformed people's lives people who 300 years ago wouldn't have made it beyond

40 if they were lucky are now living you know yeah they're now living in and and working in supermarkets until they're 79 they're now living incredibly lonely lives until they're in their 90s. That is, that's quite a bleak way of looking at it. I know. And there's me then. You got to imagine a brighter future. Were you disappointed that the COVID pandemic wasn't a bit more severe

we need a mass die-off because people are just living too long and no absolutely not and i'm not a population you know i'm not no that's not my thing but i'm also not like a steven pinker fan because i feel like he's just covering for capitalism honestly and like I don't think that's fully honest way of um appraising you know what's happening in the world so yeah I think like I don't know I I read a lot about medieval Ireland and I really think it was I mean this is a long time ago it's like 8th century 9th century and you know it wasn't again not a utopia at all as you said people you know there was deprivation i don't think people lived very long so not a utopia but the wi-fi was incredibly slow incredibly slow i mean they didn't have reels yeah you were on instagram

but it wasn't even real but just what i what i liked about it is they respected each other you know they didn't like treat each other like objects the way I think we do sometimes I joke all the time about like oh I live in New York and I'm used to exploiting others and being exploited myself but then when I get a manicure it's like awkward because I'm like holding hands with the person I'm exploiting and you're suddenly like oh there's like a human being behind every app but I feel like back back in the day when Ireland was just you know a woodland people were like okay there's wolves in the woods so we're not going to go and cut down all the woods because like we the wolves will eat us and and they were kind of like okay well we all have to mind each other's kids because like it wasn't like a man and a woman living together with a

baby you know it was big groups family groups maybe and they didn't really have cities and it was different but it was sustainable you know they weren't actually causing their own destruction. Yeah. But would you, the question is, would you go back to those times and give up medical advances and give up all the other bonuses that have come with progress? in that position if you suddenly found yourself living 300 years ago with a serious health affliction either for yourself or for your children yeah imagine if and and can you tell me what one it would be it would have to be something really intense like boils then i'll have to be truthful and say okay I want to be covered in boils looking at the woods afraid of the wolves no but I think we can just remember that we used to be able to yes exactly it's got to be possible to cherry pick the best bits and not throw the baby out with the bath water that's the thing isn't it yeah and also like listen to know, people who still hold that insight and not listen to people that are just, I don't know, like rich and want to move to Mars or something.

That's insane. You're talking about Elon. If you want to be mean about Elon, just come out and say it. Yeah, I'm so passive aggressive in case he's listening. But yeah, yeah, of course, Elon Musk. I mean, I think people just like in case he's listening um but yeah yeah of course elon musk i mean i think people just like him because he's really rich like he's not that clever you know he's just good at making money i don't really understand what he does because people are always saying like oh the guy's a genius he's imagining all this as far as i can tell he's just got a big

company and he goes around going okay you guys what about make me some driverless cars now i think we should go to mars i don't like when does he sit down and do the work he's invented a couple of like i think small things like you know he he's a capitalist he goes around he spots gaps in the market he exploits workers like there's no secret to what he does. And he also is a real, you know, he's a showman. But like the wild thing about him is he wants so much to be funny. He's not funny. And like, you know, people like that are trouble. Yeah, he's not a great showman, is he?

If his idea of a great show is walking in with the sink and he said, what did he say? The line was like, let that sink in but surely it would be like let this sink in because he's carrying the sink anyway whatever i was just thinking is that definitely the best joke and you know it's like very easy to mock him he seems to have like some issues with like how you know i don't know what's going on with him but he's so respected like people like tech people have like you know what would el know what's going on with him but he's so respected like people like tech people have like you know what would elon do and it's like he's a destructive force actually and like just because he has a lot of money you think he's smart no that isn't how it works anymore like we're

in deep trouble and like we don't need to listen to him i think you're going a bit hard on elon now that's the thing if he did something practical like he like managed to get rid of period pain or like if he managed to like you know solve world hunger which literally oxfam gave him a plan to do that or one ngo gave him a plan to do that but he doesn't do any of that stuff he just is so loud and throws his weight around and ruins everything he made a submarine to save those boys in the caves and he was ridiculed by the caving man because the caving man said the submarine is not even going to fit around corners it's too long and then that's when elon started abusing him on twitter he started yeah he's calling him names and everything yeah very rude boy but i thought

like do you so in that case do you think i can't believe we're talking about elon musk in that case do you think that it was purely just him trying to get attention sending his submarine there so you know what i've this is like a new way that i don't care about his intentions i just care about his actions oh hello watch out stand back oh she's on the warpath i just think i just think like yeah i'm sure it came from everybody wanted to save those children you know like in you know instinctively you're like yeah let's not let like the children die in the cave we all felt that he shouldn't be rewarded for just having a human

instinct to like protect others like what he did was use up a lot of space you know media space and i don't know if the family's new or whatever you know and then he literally like mocked a person who was helping so those are his actions so that's what i'm like judging him on yeah yeah fair enough you know and as for you you piece of shit i didn't do anything i just sat there and i wrung my hands and i felt pretty worried terrible and worried for a little worrier I know yeah I wonder if worrying does anything if it puts out

any little beams of help I don't think it does actually well it's better than being totally indifferent I think it's how about this it's better than laughing it's better than

it's better than sitting there going haha you're in a cave no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no now you've written a book as well as having a new comedy album coming out this year a very special

woman it's called which i enjoyed by the way i listened to that last week got an advanced copy and uh there was a lot of relatable stuff in there and that's how i judge things is this relatable no not relatable can't enjoy it but you've also got a book which i only just realized uh is coming out your fourth i think it came out in the US in February yeah it's called tell everyone on this train I love them and it's collection of essays and where does the title come from I know but I'm pretending I don't know I want you to tell me well the title came from really a terrible moment which turned into something quite beautiful which, I think this story really was all over the world, Adam, when these men stepped in to protect some girls

from a white supremacist attack in Portland in Oregon a few years ago. This was an individual, Jeremy Christian, whose name was, who got on a train and started verbally abusing two women, one black woman, one woman in hijab. Young, they were young women and a few men on the train just strangers kind of jumped in to protect the girls because he was acting fairly dangerously and then unfortunately he did have a knife and he he killed two of the men who helped and then and he badly injured a third one was called Ricky Best and then another

one was called Taliesin Briden Namkai and he as he was dying there was two other passengers who were who were helping him you know they were trying to staunch his wounds and he said to them tell everybody on this train that I love them and that's what made me really remember the story because like you said there's these attacks are way too common and they can kind of form this kind of horrible cloud but as he was dying you know his instinct was to tell people that he loved them yeah um and I couldn't believe that I was absolutely bowled over by that and since then you know I've been in touch with his mom and she and and his father too were they were not surprised that those were his last words it was

the type of person he was you know but um so that that like living living under Trump and living in America, like at this moment, I kind of held on to his words as a sort of a touchstone, you know, to remember the good and the courageous and the love that's there, as well as all of the difficult things that are happening at the moment. So that's why I wanted to make it the title of my book yeah even though the book is sort of like it's like funny and it's sad and it's memoristic and it's it's journalism it's a blend of things but that that phrase just really like shines out to me still you know it really does yeah it's amazing isn't it amazing i mean like if you think well it's a horrible exercise but like you know something so traumatizing is happening you're being murdered and that's your instinct like that's where you go yeah um is to tell everyone on the train i love them it's just

amazing and um you know that he did die defending those women that he didn't know yes i know i i it sort of makes you wonder how you might face your last moments as well you know in addition to thinking about what he did and that whole incident your mind or my mind then goes to what am i gonna say what what are my last words gonna be right and could it be anything approximating that level of kind of equanimity and love i suppose it's like i don't remember who said it but i loved it about how you never know the story of a person's life really until their obituary and that's actually really hopeful because that means that you could be like you could be 85 years old and you say well my life has been like this and that's the end of it it's not the end of it

until you actually die like you still can change you can grow you can do something new you know it's there's so much potential really in the last five years of their life they moved to the far right that kind of thing finally they got fox news and that really changed their outlook yeah i mean you can absolutely get worse as you get older for sure we're coming towards the end of our conversation but i would like to ask you when the last time was that you were personally offended and i ask this because you know as a straight white man of yeah not inconsiderable privilege i am seldom in a position to take genuine offense oh but occasionally you know occasionally i find myself offensive

but on the weekend, I got offended. And I was like, wow, I'm offended. And it was the first time I'd been properly offended. Because, you know, mainly you're sort of reading about other people taking offense at stuff and thinking, oh, yeah, okay, I understand why you might be offended by that. Or sometimes you think, well, maybe you're being a bit oversensitive there. Come on, everyone. Don't get offended so easily. Whatever.

But suddenly I was like, I'm offended. And what happened was I was at a funeral. It was my auntie's funeral. Oh. And I read. Oh, sorry about that. Yeah. That's okay.

She had a good innings. I don't think you're supposed to say that about people when they die. But she did. And we had a nice funeral for her and i read a poem that her son my cousin had asked me to read and it was my pleasure to do so and if i say so myself i think i nailed it and afterwards we were coming out of the church and there was an older man there. He must have been in his 80s or even 90s. And he came out and he said to me, you read that poem very well.

And I said, thanks very much. He said, yes, it was. I could hear every word. Usually I'm a bit deaf and sometimes I can't really hear what people are saying. but I could hear every word of it when you were reading that. So that was good. But maybe it's because you were quite close to the microphone because you're only a little fella. Well, you didn't need to bring my height into it, but fine. I'll be fine with the compliment. And then we go to the reception and I'm over by the cake and sandwich table. And this, again, an older bloke bumps into me, turns around.

Oh, sorry. I was like, that's okay. Don't worry. And then he turns around to talk to someone else, but he's still within earshot. And he says to this other person, I thought it would be rude to say, sorry, I didn't see you down there. I was like, what? What is it with these people thinking I'm, like, tiny? And what would happen if there was a real genuine person of restricted growth wandering around in the, you know, they would have. Oh, they'd have a field day. They'd go be like colin farrell in in bruges but yeah i i was like okay once is

sort of excusable but twice it's like i'm a bit offended i'm not that small come on and it suddenly gave me a weird little you know obviously i was not very offended and I got over it but but it was a funny thing to suddenly feel like fuck off I don't normally have that experience you know what I mean how about you um that's really funny I mean yeah people saying things about your body is just so difficult it's triggering it definitely is especially if it's like I mean not especially but like even if it's something you don't care about and you're not like worried about and you're not even thinking about that is yeah that's that's really rude people you should just not

talk about what anybody looks like yeah I tend to agree I think that's the simplest solution no I mean I don't know I had a bit of a like I don't normally read the comments right but um I wrote a piece it just came out earlier today about knitting like about like how it's like a funny piece about like how I love knitting but um the comments are like from hardcore like people in the fiber arts community. Oh God. I don't really care. I've never heard that expression before, the fiber arts community. And there's loads of really lovely comments.

And then I kind of knew, cause like they're very intense bunch of people, you know? And then I mentioned frogging in the piece, which is when you rip up your knitting. It's just like undoing your knitting, right? Yeah. And then this one comment is like, oh oh I hate the way Americans say frogging oh why can't they just say unpick your knitting the way we do in the UK and it was just like what like again this is like a comment

on a on the internet you know so it definitely shouldn't it didn't really get to me but I was a bit like oh my goodness I'm bringing you know like I'm talking about we all love knitting that's why we're here yeah like we love knitting because it's like good for anxiety you're making something yourself like there's like a million reasons that I listed why like we love knitting and you feel so moved that you like I think you have to like log into the Guardian I think if you remember or something to actually make a comment and the and the comment they made was they didn't like the word I think of remember or something to actually make a comment and the and the comment they made was they didn't like the word I used for unpicking my knitting because it was like

too American you know so yeah offense I didn't take offense but I was like Jesus Christ and I also like I mentioned you have to like bring a certain ant energy to your knitting you know like it's like there's something just intrinsically ant like about knitting yes you mean a-u-n-t rather than a-n-t a-u-n-t yeah yeah and then of course it's like two different men are like well well well I'm not an aunt now I'm going to be nervous about doing my knitting on the train and it's like no I didn't say you had to be an aunt I just said like you have to bring an aunt energy anybody could bring an aunt energy like you're the one putting words so um yeah I've been having kind of a um internal dialogue with like my fellow um yeah my fellow Wait, this is an advert for Squarespace.

Every time I visit your website, I see success. Yes, success. The way that you look at the world makes the world want to say yes. It looks very professional. world want to say yes it looks very professional I love browsing your videos and pics and I don't want to stop and I'd like to access your members area and spend in your shop these are the kinds of comments people will say about your website if you build it with Squarespace. Just visit squarespace.com slash Buxton for a free trial.

And when you're ready to launch, because you will want to launch, use the offer code Buxton to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. So put the smile of success on your face with Squarespace. Yes. Continue. Hey, welcome back, podcats. That was Maeve Higgins there, talking to me using modern technology just last week as I speak. I'm very grateful to Maeve for making the time. It was lovely to meet her, albeit

down the line and without video. There's lots of Maeve-related links in the description of today's podcast, so you can explore her world further. Another recommendation, which you will also find a link to in the description, is for a book that I confess I have not read, but it is from someone I like and admire very much. That is Matt Holness, a.k.a. Garth Marenghi. And Garth has written a book called Terratome. Says the blurb on the Waterstones website, the mercurial horror maestro and star of Darkplace delivers a trio of blood-curdling tales from his long-lost opus in this side-splittingly spot-on parody of grisly supernatural blockbusters. Sci-fi bulletin says beautifully bonkers with a razor sharp understanding of the genre

Garth Marenghi's prose is schlocky, corny, cliche ridden and overwritten full of dread and deliberately dreadful in other words, addictive and quite perfect there's also an audio book which I am going to download as soon as I get back. And I see that it features Colin Holt as the voice of Liam Neeson, as the voice of Bruford, the psychedelic dugong. I love Colin Holt. Garth Marenghi's Terratome.

Link in the description okay I'm gonna head back now before it starts raining again check on Rosie she's very well by the way thanks Stuart once again for your message Stuart also says in his message last thing I have good experience of poodles and know how sensitive they can be. I mean, Rosie is not a pure poodle, obviously. She's a whippet poodle cross. But Stuart says, with this in mind, I'd just like to mention you're shouted, Bye!

And that Rosie may be associating that with times you might have shouted in anger. That would potentially make her less enthusiastic about walkies. Poodle types are so weird. Well, that gave me pause when I read that, no pun intended. And I tried to think, like, is that possible? Could I be triggering Rosie by shouting, Bye! at the end of each podcast episode? Is that possible? Could I be triggering Rosie by shouting,

Bye! at the end of each podcast episode? She never seems anxious about it. I suppose it's possible, but the thing is, Stuart, I'm happy to say I very seldom, if ever, shout at Rosie. Certainly haven't done for a long time. We don't have that kind of relationship. If I'm annoyed with her her i'm just very passive aggressive the way i am with my wife my wife there's not too much actual shouting unless i mean i'm not saying it's never happened but anyway not with rosie you know sometimes i'll

call her if she's run off or whatever but but not in anger. However, I will bear that in mind. Perhaps sit down and talk with Rosie about it this week. I have had messages in the past from people saying, God, I wish you wouldn't shout at the end of the podcast. Although mainly that's because some people like to go to sleep listening to the podcast. And when I start shouting, it wakes them up. But yeah, maybe it's time for a new era of a slightly more mellow sign-off. Perhaps I'll try it out today.

But before I do, I just want to say thanks very much. First of all, to Maeve Higgins, once again. Thank you, Maeveve for talking to me thanks as ever to seamus murphy mitchell for his enthusiasm and good nature and hard work which he does to help me make this podcast couldn't do it without him. Thank you, Seamus. And thanks to ACAST and all there who helped bring in the sponsors and keep the show on the road. Thanks to Helen Green. She does the artwork for the podcast.

And thanks most of all to you for coming back, listening right to the end. You're great. And that's why I'm going to give you an only slightly soggy hug. Come here. Okay. Until next time, take care out there. And for what it's worth, for what it's worth, I love you.

Bye. That's rubbish, isn't it? OK, I won't do that one again, but I'll try and think of some other alternative to shouting at you, at least now and then. See ya. Like and subscribe. Like and subscribe.

Like and subscribe. Please like and subscribe. Like and subscribe. Like and subscribe. Please like and subscribe. Give me like a smile and a thumbs up. Nice like a pat when me bums up. Give me like a smile and a thumbs up. Nice like a pat when me bums up. Like and subscribe. Like and subscribe.

Like and subscribe. Please like and subscribe. Give me like a smile and a thumbs up. Nice like a pat when me bums up. Bye. Thank you. Bye.