The Unmade Podcast - 107: Minor Brushes with Fame

Episode Date: March 13, 2022

Hover - register your domain now and get 10% off by going to hover.com/unmade - https://www.hover.com/Unmade Go to Storyblocks for stock video, pictures and audio at storyblocks.com/unmade - https://www.storyblocks.com/unmade Support us on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/unmadeFM Join the discussion of this episode on our subreddit - https://redd.it/td3sby Catch this episode on YouTube where we include accompanying videos and pictures - https://youtu.be/vKttPKqVs48 USEFUL LINKS Pictures accompanying and discussed in this episode - https://www.unmade.fm/episode-107-pictures Rod Marsh - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rod_Marsh Shane Warne - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shane_Warne Tim's U2 Pictures - https://www.unmade.fm/episode-107-pictures The AutoGarth - https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5990824849fc2b4c4fe4211b/1647130536989-11NF4H21JCQRH2DDFCKM/Screen+Shot+2022-03-13+at+00.15.03.jpg?format=2500w Pictures of Spoon of the Week - https://www.unmade.fm/spoon-of-the-week Io - https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/moons/jupiter-moons/io/overview/ Io orbit animation in our video courtesy of Alexander Bock - https://youtu.be/vKttPKqVs48 See pictures from Tim's Secret Project - https://www.unmade.fm/episode-107-pictures NOW AVAILABLE - Tim '21 Waves' surf poster and sticker - https://the-unmade-podcast.creator-spring.com/listing/21-waves-poster Plus other '21 Waves' merchandise - https://the-unmade-podcast.creator-spring.com/listing/21-waves-logo

On three. One, two, three. You could host the British Bake Off with those one, two, three, go, form comments that you make, man. You really could. Those British Bake Off intros are terrible. They are cringeworthy. And like I said, you'd be perfect for them. You know how I always have like a last minute idea

just as we're about to start recording based on something that happens to me? Yes, which means you always sneak in two ideas into the episode, which I'm sure there's an outcry about, but anyway. Bonus, bonus. It's like two for the price of one. How's this for a podcast idea, right? People struggling with their printers.

You just record people trying to get their printers to work. Yes, nice. Paper jams, the Wi-Fi connections. Oh, every time. Oh, man, that's great. That's one that would have to have a warning sticker on it about some possible bad language, I think. Yes. Do you have a printer at home not no i made an in-principle decision saying no i'm going to print stuff at work i'm not i'm not dealing with that i'm not buying any more ink i'm not

it was around the time that my daughters got into sort of coloring in and computers so what they do they go online and like you know just google up black and white images you know to color in and then just print off like 60 pages of the same little pony and so i was like nah this is just this is a money pit i'm not you know or the what's the opposite is a money pit mean there's lots of money or spending lots of money? I felt like I was just. A money pit is like the money sinking into it. Yeah, it is a money pit.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just buying ink over and over and over. Those little cartridges, we were going through them. It was ridiculous. I just love the thought of 60 ponies. You just find them around the house with, you know, a bit of yellow texture on one and then, you know, bits of blue shading from a pencil another. And then there'd be one done perfectly on the fridge, but then there'd be all these others scattered around the house. So you're saying if your daughters were better at colouring in, you would have owned a printer.

at colouring in, you would have owned a printer. Yes, I think that, I think, I think, I think what I'm saying is if they were better at just printing one thing at a time, they might have had that particular pleasure for longer. All right. Was there a little incident today that, that, that prompted that particular? I just had a piece of paper get jammed as I was printing out my notes for today's episode and it just reminded me that I never ever print anything without at least one thing going wrong. Yeah. Using a printer is like typing these days. You know how you just like smash the keys and you just know

something's going to be spelt wrong, but you'll go back and fix it. Yeah. You don't even try to get things right. You just accept that you're going to make mistakes that you have to fix. Yeah. I find that with using my printer. If I need to print something, I just accept it's not going to work the first time. It never does. I'm going to have to fix at least one thing. Yeah.

It's just like, it's just part of the routine. The deals coming up on our church photocopier, you know, you have like a long-term lease deal and you pay for each piece of paper you use. It's like a complicated arrangement. Right. So, no one ever buys a photocopier you know you have like a long-term lease deal and you pay for each piece of paper you use it's a like a complicated arrangement so no one ever buys a photocopy you just lease it for several years and you pay as you use it with a certain fee and ours is coming up and so our admin person told me that the other day and my heart sank like oh now i'm gonna have to look at you know what i mean like what is this and the kit and and and and the paper and what's a good deal and look at it and it's just like i reckon this is something we can delegate this is not i was gonna say surely that's not the job of the minister no no no but just collectively it's like

oh we're gonna have to have conversations about this this is gonna be you know what i mean gonna get them in they're gonna try and get us this big souped up massive photocopy with extractors and promise lots of paper and whiz bang stuff and it's still good all we just need is to print a couple of newsletters off every week you're taking away a lot of the glamour of our religion for me here man i would have assumed you just hold a blank piece of paper in the air and pray for a copy to happen they just multiply like loaves and fishes. Tim goes up the front with one newsletter and everyone just forms a queue and he just hands everyone a newsletter.

And they're like, where did you get these newsletters from? He's only holding one. It's amazing. Imagine what Jesus could have done with a 3D printer, eh? He would have been... Anyway. All right, time for an idea and as we're recording there have been a couple of deaths famous deaths in the world of cricket don't panic people i'm not going to talk about cricket because i know a lot of people don't know what cricket is and

don't follow it the fact i'm talking about cricketers is tangential to my podcast idea. But there have been some famous deaths and it started last week. They happened on the same day, actually. First of all, there was a cricket player from the 1970s and 80s called Rod Marsh. He was a very famous cricketer and he was a wicketkeeper, which is the same position I played in cricket. So I had a particular interest in him. A wicketkeeper is a the same position i played in cricket so i had a particular interest in him a wicketkeeper is a bit like a catcher in baseball and he died he was in his 70s and he was going to a charity event and he had a heart attack and a few days later he died it was big news and very sad in the world of cricket and that gave me an idea for something i wanted to talk about on the podcast and i made a little note in my file about it but then

a few hours later coincidentally probably one of the greatest cricketers of all time a very famous cricketer from Australia he's been named one of the greatest cricketers of all time in all these famous lists a chap named Shane Warne died and he died quite young he was only 52 and it appears he may have had a heart attack as well while on holiday and that was really big news and suddenly it was like you know that was huge news in the world of cricket as we record now it remains really huge news not just the world of cricket australia generally he was part of the zeitgeist of australian culture oh yeah well and the world it's huge in england he was it's hard for people from non-cricket countries you know to explain how big someone is but this is like we're talking like michael jordan

level here in terms of uh transcending the sport and culture it's a really big deal really really famous famous guy and he died as well very young and all the tributes and things are still flowing in he's going to have a huge state funeral in australia it hasn't happened yet at the time we're recording but suffice to say it was a big deal but that also made me make another note in my little uh podcast idea notes so here's my podcast idea tim i'm not going to talk about shane warne and rod marsh as such as cricketers but i want to talk about my idea And it's not the obvious idea you may think of, which is, you know, podcasts about people who are dying and obituaries and who died this week. That's quite an obvious idea.

But the idea that it made me think of is minor brushes with fame. Right. This is a podcast about the time you had a very minor fleeting brush with someone who was very famous. Because I have a story about Rod Marsh because i have a story about rod marsh and i have a story about shane warren i've had minor brushes with both of them that are among my favorite stories to tell so i thought i would briefly tell my rod marsh story and then i would briefly tell my shane warren story as a as an example of minor brushes with famous people it

just so happens that these two people, these are my two favourite stories about me interacting with cricketers, and they both died on the same day, amazingly. But here we go. Are you ready? I guess. Brace yourselves, people. Cricket story's coming.

Here we go. No, these stories don't involve cricket. And also, they're probably stories you've heard both of them probably about 50 times. So I will appreciate your patience of pretending to hear them for the first time. People who usually like to doze off around the moon of the week get comfy early. But don't worry, you've got moon of the week coming as well. You could just sleep now. All right.

Rod Marsh. Now, as I said, Rod Marsh was this thing called a wicketkeeper, which is the position I played. So I have a particular interest in wicketkeepers. And I also have a particular interest in collecting signed memorabilia. And I decided I wanted to create this sort of framed piece of art on my wall with cricket cards of famous Australian wicket keepers and have them sign the cards. Wicket keepers from sort of my lifetime.

How old were you when you decided this? Is this like a childhood thing or? No, I'm in my 20s here. I'm in my 20s. All right. And I'd collected a few. I collected a few and I wanted to get Rod Marsh to sign a cricket card for me. And I knew his address. He was working at a cricket academy and I knew where it was. He was the head coach there. So, I knew how I could send something to him. So, I sent him a cricket card in the post and I put a little note with it saying,

Dear Mr. Marsh, big fan, would you mind signing this cricket card for me? And to kind of grease the wheels, he says in quotation marks, I put, I don't know, I think I put like $20 in there. Like, I've enclosed $20 for your time and your postage and stuff like that, which is, you know, wink, wink, here's to, you know, you could pocket 20 bucks out of this because I find you're more likely to get a response. So, anyway, a week or two later, I get a letter back and it's from Rod Marsh and I open it up and inside is the card and it's signed, but also in the envelope is the original $20. Nice. And there's a personal note from Rod Marsh saying, dear Brady, here's your card and here's your 20 bucks back, buy yourself a beer.

So, it was like Rod Marsh was buying me a beer. Rod Marsh is quite famous for a beer. So it was like Rod Marsh was buying me a beer. Rod Marsh is quite famous for liking beer. He actually used to hold the world record for the most number of beers drunk on a flight from Australia to England, which is a bit of a tradition among Australian cricketers when they used to fly to England. It was later broken by David Boone. But he used to hold, they call it the tinny drinking record. So, Rod Marsh is famous for drinking beer. So, getting a note from Rod Marsh and him buying me a beer, because I think the money became his. So, then when he gave the money back to me, he was buying me a beer. Yes, okay.

Yes. No, you're not buying it. He said, he wrote, buy yourself a beer. That's kind of Rod Marsh buying me a beer. I said it had to be a minor brush with fame. It's kind of buying you a beer. He was kind of, it was, he was, or maybe he was turning down you buying him a beer. You know what I mean?

Like, here, can I buy? And he's like, oh, no, thanks, Brady. You can take your money and stuff it. Your money's no good here. The part of that story I never tell because it ruins the story a bit is the cricket card, the way he'd packaged the cricket card back meant that it rubbed against the envelope or something and he used the wrong type of pen and his autograph got all smudged on the card and ruined.

So, I actually had to write back to him and say, oh, the signature didn't work. Can you sign me another one? Did you do that? Did you? Yeah. Anyway. But he did that too. Sorry, I spilled beer on it, Brady.

I apologise for that. Yeah. Anyway, so that was my minor brush with Rod Marsh, buying me a beer. I don't know anyone that's got an autograph and then gone back to the person and said, oh, sorry, can you just do it again? It's not quite up to standard. It's not going to help.

What was I supposed to do? It was completely unusable. But you weren't using it for anything except being from him. It was authentic. It's an authentic smudge, unlike anything else. The piece of paper with him saying, buy yourself a beer from Rod, was way more exciting to me than a signed credit card that was like way more precious yes yes that's true that's that's the yeah that's the real uh artifact did he did he return it again

with a second autograph yeah he did yeah he signed he signed the other card yeah i had to get i had to go and buy another card and he signed that one as well yeah right rod marsh so thank you rod marsh i never met him in person but he did he did sign two cards for me and and sent my 20 back do you remember him playing because he finished in the early very early 80s didn't he funnily enough no like what like he did play during my lifetime he played in the 70s and 80s but i didn't really get into watching cricket until probably just as he retired. Yeah. But the first cricket book I ever owned was called Caught Marsh, Biled Lily. It was bought for me by someone, and it was all about Rod Marsh

and this other cricketer called Dennis Lilly, who was sort of a tandem pair, like a pitcher-catcher combination. So I knew loads about him. I'd seen hundreds of photos of him. I knew all his stats because it was the first cricket book I had, so I had devoured it in every detail. So I knew everything about him, but I never actually watched him play. He retired just as I was getting into cricket.

I didn't know about him either until I knew his name much, much, much later, and I wasn't interested in cricket anywhere near as much as you were as a kid. But I probably had him on my wall because I had a tradition of getting those. Remember when you used to go to McDonald's and you'd get those placemats and they would be the three teams that are playing? No, you'd get them as posters. They would do them as posters at McDonald's. I remember getting it as a placemat and putting that on my wall,

but was it actually a separate poster as well? It was a glossy poster. Yeah,cdonald's i loved them and there were there were six panels three photos the australian team and the two international teams touring that year yeah and the other three panels were the autographs of all the players yeah yeah printed yeah mcdonald's do it again the international cricket series team poster for 1981 82 i had them year after year after year. I don't know when I started, but it may be as early as him. But anyway, I don't remember him from back then. Only from McDonald's and only 10 cents.

C, full-coloured photos of the West Indies, Pakistan and Aussie team. Real icon of Australian cricket. I had no idea you guys were such good friends. That's amazing. Yeah. Pen pals. The podcast idea is that it's supposed to be minor i don't want to hear stories of the time you spent you know some famous person who's your uncle and you know him really well i like i want these really inconsequential interactions

and i want all the people listening to share their inconsequential interactions as well because uh there's something precious about the yes banality of them anyway that brings us to shane warne who basically was you know the great cricketer of uh you know our lifetime tim our time watching cricket oh yeah for sure seen him play many times in obviously on tv but also in person you know yeah cricket grounds but my favorite story involving shane warne came when I was a journalist at the newspaper in Adelaide and the Australian cricket team was in town because they were about to play a game in Adelaide and wherever they go there's always a big circus around them

and all sorts of things happening and this thing that was happening this day in Adelaide was this was a time when sort of using computers and the internet was just kind of becoming a bigger and bigger thing. Like, it wasn't just something you knew from birth like it is now. It was, you know, you had to learn how to use computers and the internet because it was a new trendy thing. And this computer company in Adelaide had arranged to give the Australian cricket team players like a free training session how to use the internet and computers yeah right and they'd set up this classroom full of computers

wow and the Australian players were going to come there for an hour or two and get this free lesson but the computer company wanted to use it for a bit of free publicity so they invited myself and a photographer from the advertising newspaper so there would be something in the paper the next day saying look the Australian cricketers at computer industries 5000 here learning how to learning how to surf the web so i was sent along and i was waiting for the australian cricket team to arrive in this like coffee area coffee making area outside the computer room eventually a few of the players started coming in and they saw me and the photographer and they were a couple of them like oh bloody hell you know press again but they they're used to that you know everywhere

they turn up there's going to be interest because they're like you know these national heroes so uh one or two of the cricketers agreed to pose at a computer pretend they were using it and we took a we took a couple of photos and i got a couple of quotes from them and that was it and i was just waiting in this coffee area for them all to arrive and a few of them were making a couple of photos and I got a couple of quotes from them and that was it. And I was just waiting in this coffee area for them all to arrive. And a few of them were making a cup of tea and stuff like that. And then on the coffee table in this area was a huge big glass bowl, like a goldfish bowl, about the size of a goldfish bowl. It was quite big. And it was full to the brim with an Australian sweet that we've discussed before called minties. These are chewy little mint sweets wrapped in little pieces of paper.

And they're a real favourite of mine. And this bowl was full of minties. And you could grab one if you wanted to have a minty fresh in your breath. Nice, sweet little treat. And I'm waiting there in this room. And everyone's arrived. And then the last person in is like the one everyone wants to see, Shane Warne. He was already like the hero of the team. He was the most important cricketer in the world and he he walks in five minutes later than everyone else the other thing shane warden is famous for and

it's come out a lot in sort of the tributes to him is it was a kind of a bit uncouth he was very he was a real common man he was like you know know, there was no airs and graces with him. And he like, you know, he ate poorly and he was not like a refined person. He was a real kind of working class kind of guy. And that never went away. And that's what people loved about him. He was always like that. So, Shane Warne walks in and he's dressed like really casually in a t-shirt and a pair of tracksuit bottoms. And he looks really like he's just rolled out of bed and he walks into this room and he sees this bowl of minties on the table. And straight away his eyes light up and he goes, oh, minties, I love these.

And he walks up to this goldfish bowl and he sinks both hands into the bowl to it down to his wrists and grabs two of the biggest handfuls of minties you've ever seen, shoves them both in the pockets of his tracksuit trousers, and then gets his empty hands and shoves them in the bowl again and gets another two massive handfuls of minties. So he's, and he's Shane Warren's got big hands and shane warren takes four huge

handfuls of these minties because they're free and they're delicious and war and then walks straight into the computer room and just piles them in a huge pile next to his keyboard this mountain of minties so he can just eat free minties while he does this computer course all these other players are there having their cups of tea and being all refined and my body's a temple and that. And Shane Warne's just, oh, yeah, let's grab the free sweeties. I'll never forget. I'll never forget that. And, like, as I hear stories about Shane Warne now after he's died

and people paying tribute to him, I think that story sums him up as much as anything, how he was just, like, just really normal. He was like what a 10-year-old kid would do if they saw a big golf ball for the suites. I'm going to grab the free suites. He's a multimillionaire, you know, most famous sportsman. One of the most famous sportsmen in the world. Certainly the most famous in Australia.

Free minties. I'll have those. I love it. I met Shane Warren once and it was fleeting as well in that sense. And he was doing something quite common too i we'd heard that well you knew they were in town because they were playing a match but i remember being down heinley street and they were staying in the hotel in heinley street we watched the different players come out and meet them i think i was with you or i can't remember

no maybe not but it was around teenage age i was about 16 or something anyway do you remember just down heinle street there was a place like a pinny parlor downtown where you'd go and play pinball machines and computer games and stuff like that arcade games arcade games that's right yeah yeah but i say pinball because um we we saw a few players go out and walk in there and so we're like oh fantastic and we go over and there's shane warne um playing a pinball machine with merv hughes another famous cricketer fast bowler and they're they're playing against one another you know exchange ball after ball and you know bashing it and hitting it and complaining and talking and having good fun but it was just so

funny to think oh wow look this is how grown men come and have fun they come and play like a pinball machine of all the things they could be doing with their day this is what they do so i went and played the game right next to them and just like was barely concentrating on my own game just sort of looking over at these guys and was just amazed to be near them and close to them and it felt so special and then at the end i finished my game and i said something as i left it was something really dumb like typically you know young kid who's feeling a bit gaga something along the lines of like telling them like it's only it's just a game guys or something like that and then then looking over at me and i looked at them and then i just sort of hot footed it out of

there didn't even have um enough temerity to um ask for an autograph or anything like that but it was like a moment a connection you think oh well it's ridiculous after so many years you remember something like that you're fantastic at having interact like minor interactions with famous people i always think you're a bit lucky at bumping into these people around the place a bit jammy yeah i've got a bit of a radar for it. Or they turn up. There's a couple, but not many. Not many. They seem to seek me out, I think.

That's the thing. Yeah, well, they probably tell the story about when they met you. Well, that's true. That's true. Not everyone who, you know, goes to Reddit write that up. But, you know, a couple, that'd be nice. When Tim came to England one time to visit me, the whole time he was here with me, he would joke, when am I going to meet Bono?

When am I going to walk into a pub and is Bono going to be there? And I'd say, oh, do you want to go to this pub or something? He'd go, oh, yeah, do you think Bono will be there? It was like a big, it was your like joke the whole time you were in the country. I got sick of it. All the jokes about you meeting Bono. And then eventually you left me and went to London and you bloody met Bono. I went to Abbey Road. I just went to Abbey you bloody met Bono. I went to Abbey Road.

I just went to Abbey Road to have a look. Yeah, take your photo, go off on the crosswalk. Yeah, yeah, that whole thing, just to go and look at the, just seems like a place in London where you go. So I went along to have a look and there was a couple of people standing out in the front and I said, oh, what are you guys doing? And they said, oh, U2's about to arrive. And I was like, wow, okay, cool. And they did, one by one, they all rocked up differently the front and i said oh what are you guys doing and they said oh you two's about to arrive and i

was like wow okay cool and they did one by one they all rocked up differently and bono came over and shook my hand and i took a photo of the edge and i was just like wow okay it was sort of just before the era of selfies wasn't it so you didn't do like a selfie with him or anything no no no i just took a close-up photo of him and then he shook you know he shook my hand but you know you didn't i had like a proper digital camera so it's just sort of you sit back and take a shot you don't hold it and take selfies it's not you didn't you didn't get an autograph or anything yeah i got an autograph yeah i got the edge and and um adam clayton the bass player's autograph bono didn't do an autograph i don't think but he was he was being very quick but he shook my hand which was nice is. Is that why you never wash that hand?

That's right. If you watch closely now, you see that he holds the microphone in his left hand. You can just see that he's keeping that right hand special. He's a big civilian. Oh, yeah. What did you say to Bono? Did you just say like, you know Oh, I like the songs that you sing

No, it wasn't quite as literal and rational Right I can't remember what I said to him Like I held out my hand And like there's people calling Bono, Bono, Bono You know, this kind of thing going on And I just held out my hand

And he just shook it He just reached forward and shook my hand And he was saying something like i've got to go i can't stay very i'm sorry you know guys but just wanted to say it was kind enough to come over to you know to say he could have just gotten a car and drove away but he took the time to come over and say look i can't stay and do everyone's autograph but i just want to you know thanks for coming along hello have a good day and i just stuck my hand out and he just in the middle of talking reached forward and shook it and well done and uh said good day tim i'll catch you later and then he um headed tim do you mind coming down and laying down a few tracks for us adam clayton's just not landing him

that's right yeah so that was a bit surreal really because it was unexpected it wasn't like i'm going to stand outside his hotel room for a year or something like that it was just yeah out of the blue so that was um yeah so a big moment big moment for both of us i'd say yeah i think that's definitely yeah you do remember particularly when you're young i guess don't you but you remember older i've been with people in a restaurant and, you know what I mean? You just look at, oh, there's so-and-so across there. And suddenly it's like, oh, hello. You know what I mean?

Like you can't, there's something about, I guess it's just familiarity, isn't it? The patterns you pick up of familiarity. There's a well-known person. Hang on, is that them? Yes, I think it's them. Oh, yes, it's them. And suddenly it's captured your attention. Is there a famous person you really would love to meet?

Yeah, yeah. I'd really love to meet Nick Cave. I'd really love to meet Nick Cave. But I don't think so. Like, not for an autograph or shaking your hand or something fleeting. I feel like I'd like to have a conversation with him. Like, it's not enough anymore. But, of course, that's zero interest to him and has zero possibility of ever happening but he's probably someone i'd

really love to to meet in that in that rock star kind of world so if nick cave came up to you and held out a hand and said can i shake your hand would you say no that's not enough i'm sorry i'm sorry it's uh it's uh you're like one of those people That say hi how you going And you don't really mean it I want to tell you How I really am going What do you want to know From Nick Cave

What do you want to ask him Oh his favourite episode Of the podcast His favourite bit of merch From the podcast His idea for a podcast His idea for a podcast His thoughts on KFC

On different KFCs, you know, Mitchum compared to Henley. When is he going to cover the sofa shop? Oh, that would be great. A Nick Cave cover of the sofa shop. That'd be beautiful. The sofa shop is the only stop. Yes.

How would you feel if I met Nick Cave? I would feel jealous. That's what I would feel. Straight out. How would you feel if I met him and the one thing I did was played him your famous Money for Nothing guitar solo? I think he'd like it. It would be a good abstract rendition. But, yeah, no, that'd be heaps annoying.

That'd be a waste. Yeah. Yeah. I just asked him about space and stuff. Yeah, that's right. It'd be like that time when I spent the day with Neil Armstrong and forgot to tell you about it. You were all really annoyed.

Do you know what's even more fleeting? Remember the time when your dad met Garth Brooks and got his autograph for us? Yes. So we didn't even meet him, but gosh, that still felt exciting. Tim and I were going to go and see Garth Brooks in concert that night in Adelaide because he was in town. My dad worked at the newspaper and someone had to go

and interview Garth Brooks at a press conference, so my dad decided to do it even though it wasn't his field or anything just because he knew that we liked him. So my dad went off and met him, got his autograph. And he got his autograph for me and for Tim on two separate pages of his journalistic notebook. Then Tim came around that night to go to the concert with me. Tim was picking me up.

And I pulled out the piece of paper and said, look what my dad got and showed him the autograph to Brady from Garth Brooks. And Tim was like, oh, that's really nice. Lucky you. And I could tell he was a little bit broken. Yeah. And then I pulled out the second piece for Tim. All was forgiven.

Yes. I've still got that, you know. You won't be surprised to know. It's in an album. No. I'm sure I've got it somewhere. I've got no idea where. I dreamt about your dad last night really it was so real and surreal it was a long dream and we were going through selling furniture for some reason he had

all this furniture way more than you need for one house and we were going through he's like yep let's let's sell that one and that one and that one and there were all other rooms to this extra house we'll get rid of that so he and i were just planning how we're going to sell this furniture and it was a long and vivid dream and i woke up feeling like i'd caught up with mr harron it was so strange oh no and if you're a patreon supporter of the podcast we're going to have a special bonus version of this episode where you don't have to listen to tim talk about his dreams but if you're not a patreon supporter i'm afraid you just had to hear that a quick but important mention of hover who have supported today's episode yes yes hover hover the domain registrar company you go there you choose your domains you register them with hover

i use them for all my domains i know Tim's starting getting into it as well, registering domain names with Hover. Great prices, all the suffixes you could want, your.coms, your.ninjas, your.nets, I've got everything. Excellent interface, super easy to use. Huge fans of Hover, both of us. You know how last time we were talking about Hover, I said that I'd bought a bunch of domains for our church website and i was bringing the main one over from someone else and you told me it was really easy to do yeah well it was really easy to do i've done it and so i brought it over so it's all with hover now i feel so good and loyal about it but it was it was like super easy i was like oh he's right yeah we just yeah put that in there and now it's with us all done all done two other things that i don't really

mention very often with hover but i'll quickly mention them now because it's worth bearing in mind they're super good with all the privacy stuff like that that comes with domain registrar sometimes you know your information may not be kept private by default or you may be charged for privacy hover won't charge you for all the privacy you want and they do it as default that's really i think that's really important to most people these days with so much information floating around on the web good stuff hover and also their customer support is excellent if you do get yourself into a pickle which is pretty hard to do on hover but i remember once a couple of years ago now i had some problem or something i couldn't make work and i asked them for help and i was helped clearly and brilliantly like within minutes they were excellent so super super

company and super supporters of our podcast if you want to register a domain for whatever reason business personal whatever you're up to go to hover.com slash unmade hover.com slash unmade make sure you use the unmade not just because it covers tim and i and glory in the eyes of hover but it also will get you 10 off your first purchase hover.com slash unmade thanks hover good stuff and now it's time for Tim before we do your spoon I was just recently in Morocco last week I was there for a very brief holiday and it has now become standard operating procedure on any holiday I do to buy a spoon to uh probably end up sending you so I've bought buy a spoon to probably end up sending you. So I've bought you a spoon from Morocco.

Have you sort of got to the point now where you're choosing your holiday destinations based on where you want to get a spoon? It's getting a bit that way. So here's a kind of golden-y brass spoon. I actually bought one spoon and I was at the counter about to buy it and then I saw this better one out of the corner of my eye and made a last minute change. That is a nice spoon. It's got a little camel in the bowl, in the scoopy bit. That's sort of a three-dimensional relief

camel. Is it a camel? It looks like a turtle. I'm pretty sure that's a camel. Okay. There'll be a picture in the show notes and on screen for anyone who wants to see this particular spoon. Nice. How was Morocco? It was good? Nice? I'll be apart from the spoons. It was very relaxing.

Had a really good time. Love Morocco. A real favourite place to go. But look, Spoon of the Week isn't about my holidays and my spoons. It's about the Hein family collection. and my spoons it's about the Hein family collection the archive that's been accumulated by Mr and Mrs Hein over many years and now passed down to their son Timothy it's a legacy really isn't it I just feel so honored to be participating in in maintaining the legacy I mean you don't own it you're just a custodian for the next generation indeed merely a steward that's right for future

generations yes no well yes no absolutely Brady what we've got here tonight is sort of the Indeed, merely a steward, that's right, for future generations. Yes, no, well, yes, no, absolutely. Brady, what we've got here tonight is sort of the spoon equivalent of a double yoker. This is a double-headed spoon, which is, so that's, I mean, that's quite an investment really, isn't it? Twice the coloured enamel, beautiful picture of this boon which is from canberra which is the capital of uh australia people may have heard of canberra uh and specifically it's from a beautiful building there called the war memorial the war memorial

is is probably the largest war memorial in australia it's the national war memorial commemorating those who gave their lives in, lost their lives, gave their lives in war and other associated stuff to do with sort of like a museum as well for, of history for commemorating and remembering the different wars. Yeah, I mean the Australian War Memorial, when I first heard of the Australian War Memorial I thought of, you know that plate, like a statue or like a, you know, a big stone edifice with names on it where people go and pay their respects. But the Australian War Memorial is more than anything a huge museum.

I mean, it's a huge institution full of, it's got like, you know, tanks and things in it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's massive. You spend a whole day there looking at all the incredible stuff in australian warm bro it's a magnificent uh place and i think it's it's either currently or very recently had some further extensions as well um this spoon though is from i'm imagining it's from when we went when i was very young we went to canberra on a trip to it for a wedding i can't even remember whose wedding. It was sort of distant relatives or of someone that I've never seen since, but it was, I felt like we drove forever to get to Canberra

and we stayed with people in their home and we went and saw a few things. And this is one of the things that we picked up at the war memorial. I don't remember going inside the war memorial. I remember walking around the pool and areas like that, but not spending a lot of time inside. But typical to my parents' form, they did pick up a spoon, so we must have gone in to get one of those. Yeah. And it's pretty nice, pretty much of the era.

It has the words Canberra twice, and it has a coat of arms, which must be the Canberra coat of arms for the city because it's not the Australian. The stem is really quite short, and it goes to a very small scoopy bit with that nice slightly pointed bit, which would be good for pushing down into vanilla slices and cakes and so forth. So, of course, when Tim said it was a double yoke, he didn't mean it has two scoopy bits.

It has two handles, basically. It has two handles, basically. It has two round, ornate crests. They basically couldn't decide. They couldn't go with one crest, so they put two on the top, stacked on top of each other. Looks a bit like a figure eight, really. Hmm. Hmm.

Yeah, or the Moles Bowls. Indeed, indeed, yes. Yes, they are sort of small moles bowls in my hand. So I've been to the Australian War Memorial a few times. Obviously, I have a few associations with it. Many of you will know that my dad was a soldier. He fought in the Vietnam War. My stepfather was also a soldier.

So I've been there many times. In fact, there are at least two, possibly more, photographs of my dad in the Australian War Memorial archives taken by official war photographers. Let me send you these two, Tim. Both of which seem to feature him shirtless. Make of that what you will. It was very hot in Vietnam, I guess. I'm assured he did wear a top when he was out on patrols. He just took it off when the photographer came around. Is that right? Yeah. My dad was a dog tracker in the Vietnam War so one of these photographs you'll see he's with his dog Caesar and the other one he's being handed a big heavy box that he's loading

onto a helicopter oh yes oh look at that these are good photos oh yes I've seen this second one before this is with the dog Caesar and in fact on display at the War Memorial is also an artefact. As you said, my dad's tracking dog was called Caesar. And Caesar's actual dog tag that he wore around his collar with his registration number and name is also in the Australian War Memorial. Oh, that's great. There's a picture of that as well. Caesar's actual dog tag. Oh, good stuff wow man that's a lot of um follow-up photography yeah for a spoon that i've just sprung on you it'd be lovely to see your commitment to spoon

of the week being this strong every week i think more fuel for your dreams about my dad no doubt that's right tonight it'll be about helicopters in vietnam that's right now it's a it's about this time each episode that we do a giveaway we like to give away an unmade podcast commemorative spoon uh we also give away a sofa shop mixtape audio cassette one of our collectible items and five people will receive some spoon of the week collector cards tim do you want to do the honors this week sure? Sure, sure. So, Tim, who's winning the spoon? Who's got the spoon this week? It's going to Stefan R from the Netherlands. Congratulations, Stefan.

Yes, indeed. Do you have any associations with the Netherlands? It's near Germany, Belgium, somewhere there in Europe. I'm not exactly sure, actually. I don't know a lot about the Netherlands. Although I do know my hip-hop sells well in the Netherlands, so that's good. Dance of the shop.

Yeah, come and get long. Yeah, come and get long. Can I just say, speaking of hip-hop, you know how the last episode was called the Dubious Dolphin Story? Yeah. I have to say that if I ever did become a hip-hop artist dubious dolphin would be like my name i think that's a great and now the dubious dubious dolphin hey look i can have different names kanye changes his name in different markets yeah yeah that's

right dude dubious dolphin that can be for my kid hip-hop album. Who gets the audio? Speaking of cassettes, who gets the SofaShop mixtape this week? Greg B from Oklahoma. Nice. Oklahoma. There we go. So there's a Garth Brooks connection.

Garth comes from Oklahoma. Congratulations, Greg B. Could be Greg Brooks, like Garth Brooks. He could be a relative. Who knows? I know, and he's not. Just another fleeting touch of celebrity connection and fame there. And who gets the collector cards this week?

Collector cards. All right. Debbie H from Seattle. Timothy from Austin, Texas. Rob L from Enfield in England. Craig W from England also. And Jacob M from Sweden. Congratulations, everybody, for the collector card recipients.

Thank you, and thank you for your support. And now it's time for the segment that's sweeping the nation. I've had a lot of positive feedback about this, Tim, so I don't know if it's going anywhere. Sorry. Here it is. Cue the theme tune. It's time for...

Moon of the Moon. Now, I promised you a moon of Jupiter. You requested a moon of Jupiter. I did, yes. Lay it on me. Tim, let me take you back in time. Let me take you on a journey to the early 1600s. What?

This is a time when it's still pretty widely believed that the earth is at the center of everything everything in space is moving around the earth and a guy called galileo cobbles together a bit of a telescope and he points it at jupiter and jupiter is already known a known thing jupiter is a quite a bright point of light in the sky. And it's one of the few points of light in the sky that moves kind of the stars are all quite fixed in position. You know, these things called stars, every night you'll look up and they'll be in the same place relative to each other. But there are a handful of little points of light that move in relation to the stars. And they've been dubbed planets, which means wandering star, because these are the things that move the wandering stars. And he points his telescope at one of these wandering stars called Jupiter, and he sees something unexpected.

He sees initially three and later four small points of light around it, close to it. And then he looks night after night. And each night when he looks up, these four points are in different positions. And he realizes eventually they're moving around it. They're moving around Jupiter. These are things in space that clearly aren't moving around the Earth. They're moving around Jupiter. These are the first besides

our own moon these are the first this is the first time moons have been seen around planets these four moons around jupiter now are known as the galilean moons right he only saw these four because these are the four biggest moons around jupiter now we know there are actually about 80 moons around jup. But these four remain the biggest and they're still known as the Galilean moons. They're the famous moons around Jupiter. And I'm going to talk to you about one of these Galilean moons. I'll hold my questions until you've gone a little bit further. Now is a good time for questions about the Galilean moons. Oh, well, no. Is the one you're going to tell us about the biggest?

No, it is not. So those four moons, by the way, are called Ganymede. Ganymede is the one you're going to tell us about the biggest? No, it is not. So those four moons, by the way, are called Ganymede. Ganymede is the biggest. Ganymede is the biggest moon in the whole solar system. It's even bigger than Mercury, which is not a moon. It's bigger than the planet Mercury. So Ganymede is a really big moon. Callisto, Europa, and Io.

Some people like to call it Io, but I'm going to call it Io. And that's the one I'm going to talk about today, Io. What are they all named after? The four of them are named after the lovers of Zeus. Right, okay. Those four were all lovers of Zeus. Greek mythology, yeah. Did Galileo name them, or were they named... No, Galileo had other names for them,

but there was a German scientist who saw the moons around the same time. And there's a little bit of debate about who saw them first. I think Galileo got in first by a few days. But this other German guy named them. And those are the names that stuck. So Galileo did not name them. Don't you think it's just a sidebar comment here for a minute? We still haven't named our moon.

We just call it the moon. When are we going to name our moon? It's also called Luna. Some people call it Luna, like as a name, Luna. Like as a first name. It's actually kind of inaccurate. Although we call this segment Moon of the Week, it is a bit inaccurate to call them moons.

Moon is actually a name. Like the moon is the name of Earth's satellite. It's actually a satellite that goes around a planet. So Earth's satellite is called the moon is the name of earth's satellite it's actually a satellite that goes around a planet so earth's satellite is called the moon or luna jupiter's satellites are called you know ganymede callisto they're not actually calling the moons is bit of a shortcut and not technically correct it's a bit like that that new bat there's batman and then the new movie is called the batman but actually the batman is batman that's the name exactly like that exactly thank you for clearing that up let me tell you about io which is one of the four that i've arbitrarily chosen because i

think it's the most interesting it's a pretty it's a pretty sexy moon because io is the closest moon to jupiter there are actually four, tiny moons closer to Jupiter than Io, but we're not talking about those. Io is the closest to Jupiter of the Galilean moons. It's about the same size as our moon. That's how big it is. So it's quite a big moon. Its orbit around Jupiter is elliptical.

It's kind of like an oval. So sometimes it's closer to jupiter than other times and that has an interesting effect because jupiter is so massive jupiter is huge as it gets closer and further away from jupiter the amount of gravity that it's subjected to is constantly changing and can you it's kind of like if you imagine having a tennis ball and it's constantly being squeezed and released squeezed and released as more gravity is subjected to it and then less and then more and then less as it goes whirring around. And that constant squeezing of the planet land goes up and down by about 100 metres. Wow.

As the huge tide just rips the land towards Jupiter and then releases it and then rips it again. And all this upheaval and heat causes volcanoes to pop up all over Io. There's about 400 volcanoes on Io, and they're constantly spewing material hundreds and hundreds of miles into space off the surface of Io. So it's this huge volcanic world and all the sulfur that gets deposited on the planet sulfur can come in a few different colors depending on the type of sulfur

the allotrope of sulfur. So also results in this multi-colored uh planet as all the sulfur gets deposited all over io i'll send you a picture now so you can see what i looks like and in this picture you'll also see one of these eruptions happening and you went to io is that right and got a spoon i got you a spoon. Is it near Baroque? Oh, that's beautiful. Wow. And here's another picture of it. And in this picture, you can see a lot of the planet Jupiter and you can see Io going over the surface

and you can see Io's shadow projected down onto Jupiter. Oh, that's great. Wow. That's crazy. And one other cool thing about Io, it takes about two days to go around Jupiter. Oh, that's great. Wow. That's crazy. And one other cool thing about Io, it takes about two days to go around Jupiter. So when it's around the backside of Jupiter, it's obviously hidden from the sun and it gets a lot colder. Io, by the way, is incredibly cold. You're talking, you know, minus 200 degrees type thing. Although it's covered in volcanoes, it's incredibly cold

because it's so far from the sun. Yeah. When around the back of jupiter and the sun's blocked it's even colder yes so an interesting thing happens because io has like a very thin atmosphere of sort of sulfur dioxide very thin but it does have a bit of atmosphere because of all this stuff being pumped out of the volcanoes when it goes around the cold side it becomes so cold that for a few hours the atmosphere freezes into solid fall and falls onto the surface it just becomes powder on the surface of io and then when it comes back around the back side of jupiter and back into the sunlight it all warms up the powder again and that powder sublimes back into the atmosphere. So its atmosphere collapses onto the surface and then sublimes back above the planet a couple of times every two days.

Goodness gracious. This is an incredibly volatile place. And yet, of course, it's been doing that for millions of years. Yeah, yeah. And, of course, going to Io and visiting there would be very difficult, not just because it's super, super cold and because it's covered in volcanoes, but also because it's so close to Jupiter, the radiation and the magnetic fields that come out of Jupiter

would be, like, super, super deadly. Being that close to Jupiter is very, very dangerous. So not a place you would want to go for a holiday, but nonetheless a very cool moon of the week. That's, yeah, no, I'll pay it. Nice work. Good moon. You like it?

Good moon? Say it again. Iona? Is that right? Io. It's just Io, the letters Io. Io, right. Yep.

That's nice. That's a striking image and some good explanation there. I think you're getting the gist of it i think you're doing quite well with this segment just quietly um nice work yes okay i.o did you say that because saturn has moons doesn't it it has many satellites all right can i have one from saturn next time please okay i don't know how they don't bump into its rings though do they go around yeah well there are things there are actually things uh at saturn called shepherd moons that involve that involves sort of interacting with the rings and holding the rings in place

but uh yeah maybe we might come to that oh yeah i don't want to jump ahead shepherd moves this episode has been supported by storyblocks oh right yes good stuff go to storyblocks.com slash unmade check out their demand-driven library of entirely royalty-free 4k and hd footage they've also got after effects and premiere pro templates all that kind of stuff yeah music of course sound effects images anything you could want to put into your creations they've got subscriptions to fit any budget including their unlimited all access subscription giving you all the good stuff that you can use in your creations storyblocks.com slash unmade i'm a huge fan and a pretty much daily user of Storyblocks.

I cannot recommend it highly enough. Because we were talking about cricket earlier, I went onto Storyblocks and had a look at their cricket images. I thought it may have been a weakness for them, being, you know, North American. I thought maybe they weren't going to deliver the goods when it came to cricket. I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of excellent

stock video footage they had of cricket. People playing shots and taking catches and stuff in slow motion easily anything you could need for a cricket video you were making you would find in the storyblocks archive was there any in there of yourself playing some amateur cricket when you were young any no no they have not they have not yet secured that footage but uh you know deals may yet be struck. Yes, that's that rare archival footage. Yeah.

I wonder if they have anything of IO. Let me have a look. Storyblocks.com slash unmade. Oh, yes. Oh, and how. Very nice little piece of animation here of IO sweeping across the front of Jupiter. Several nice pieces of io related footage oh yeah gosh it's an io fest i knew they'd have it they've got everything imagine if io right was

hank with out with the other galilean moons and couldn't pay for something and the others wanted some sort of guarantee so he wrote an iou the storyblocks does not endorse that joke but they do support this episode storyblocks.com slash unmade just a just a fantastic resource for anyone who does anything creative you really should check them out you can go and check them all out without a subscription see what they've got and then if you like their stuff subscribe and then you can start downloading it all for your for unlimited use in your uh creations the other trouble that io would have is because uh io like it's the name io is i is capital because it's the start of his or her name its name people it looks a bit like an l so i can imagine if

they're being like at school when there's a substitute teacher and they mispronounce you know some kids names he'd get a lot of low hey low it's like no it's io oh okay sorry thanks for that again there's another version available without that story for those who are patron supporters episodes without tim stuff in it, yeah. Tonight's episode is very quick if you are a patron supporter. What have you got? What's your idea for a podcast, Tim?

All right. So this is an idea that I thought about doing a little bit further down the track, but I've decided to do tonight. And the reason is the idea is called my secret project do you remember a few weeks ago we were talking about the fact that when you get an idea for something you can invest some money in something that ends up being just used around the house to dry your clothes i I think you mentioned a piece of exercise equipment that in sheer motivation you purchased and set up

and then ends up being a place where you know there's a dry towel if you need it. My notorious rowing machine, yes. The rowing machine, that's right. Yeah, yeah. So as a bit of an antidote to that, I actually thought, what if you were to take on a project that instead of getting all excited and telling people and doing something on it you just secretly beavered away on it quietly and sort of if it worked out it worked out if it didn't work out it didn't work out

but then you come on the podcast and and walk through this little project that you've been doing in secret um and talk about how it came together and how it happened. And the benefit of doing that is, firstly, that if you decide not to do it, you kind of fail quietly. But also I think there's something really quite exciting about being on a little project yourself without anyone knowing, just slowly working away at something without it being a thing that you have to explain and update people on and all that kind

of stuff. I've also read research that telling people about these things can actually be counterproductive. Like I know there's accountability and that's a good thing, but the negative side of it, I read about it in the context of diets, sometimes telling people that you're going to go on a diet, the fact you've told people about it tickles the part of your brain. The reward centre or something. Yeah, the reward centre. It means you've done it. So just saying, oh, I'm going to go on a big health kick to your friends,

you feel like you've already done the health kick and you've been rewarded and your friends have said good on you and all the good stuff's happened and then you don't actually do the diet. So sometimes it's better to not tell people what you want to do and actually just do it that's a good point you don't you don't um you you uh you don't delay the gratification so you get the gratification so then you don't do the discipline involved in it yeah so give me an example of something that would fit into this podcast what's the kind of project you're talking

about either real or made up just so i've got a better idea. Well, I have a real one for you. I have been engaged in a secret project for the last few months, for the last three months or so. And I've been really, really enjoying it. And I feel like I've reached a point where I'm willing now to share it. A few months ago, very early in January, I was in the ocean and splashing around and having a fantastic time. And I was really enjoying it with the kids and stuff like that. And I was like, this is good. I love being out here. I love catching waves.

And we just had a bodyboard and all that kind of stuff. And I thought, you know what? I really want to learn to surf. And I had tried to learn to surf previously. A couple of years ago, my brother-in-law had taught me how to do a bit in Byron Bay. And I'd kind of stood up and was pretty proud of it and stuff, but then never went back to it. So, you know, never developed it to confidently be able to do it. So I was sort of back at square one again.

But I thought, ah, I'd really love to learn to surf, like properly surf. But I thought, ah, I'd really love to learn to surf, like properly surf. And immediately I was sort of thinking, you know, all these sort of thoughts came in like, ah, that's not really you. And, you know, that'll take a lot of work and a lot of time. And you've got to buy a surfboard and all these sorts of things. It just felt like another one of those hassles. And then I thought, nah, this is good for me. This is good for mental health. It's good physically.

It's good exercise. This is good to mental health it's good physically it's good exercise this is good to be out here i'm so i talked about it researched a little bit talked about it just with my wife and all that kind of stuff and then we were down there again and i was in a surf shop and she's just said buy it do it and so i just did i just spontaneously bought a surfboard which felt like the most ridiculously awkward thing to be doing. Awesome. This massive surfboard. Because when you're learning, you kind of need a real long one.

Like, it's nine foot. So I'm buying this massive surfboard, which is awkward to even get out of the shop, which I don't know how to use. So I'm like, this is definitely, definitely a secret project. Like, I'm not telling you. And so it was really cool because I had the two people people helping me one's the old guy that owns the shop showing me how to strap it onto the roof so it doesn't fall off and stuff properly and then i'm like okay i need you

know like just a couple of hints and stuff and um there was uh like a real young girl like really tiny short girl who's a little surfer girl working in the shop and she's just like startling launches into this massive speech about how you surf and how you're supposed to do it and she's sort of you know on the ground showing about paddling and then she stands up and shows the pose and i was just going i'm just standing there like middle-aged awkward guy you know just you know oh no this is why am i doing this? This is not good. But anyway, I went out and I watched some YouTube clips and I had a bit of a go that day. And then every weekend since, I've been down to the mid-coast

and I've been, you know, having a go and trying. And I finally, I got up a few fledgling times and then came off a heap of other times. I finally decided one day i'm gonna i'm gonna get up five times today and it's like you're out there sort of angry at the waves you know like it's like oh damn it it's a lot it's a long way to come out here and be doing this and all this so week after week i tried and tried and then i sort of got a few times and then to five times i just really really enjoyed it and got slowly better and i'd go home and watch youtube

clips and read up a little bit on oh i can see what i'm doing here i went back to the shop one time to buy another rashy and got another mini lecture from um my little helper half my age there who's very patient yeah it felt like just such an awkward you you know, funny guy. But in the end, just last weekend, I went out on the Saturday and I got five good rides and I felt confident. I was like, this is good. I can do this. I know what I'm doing here. I'm too far back and got up and got five good rides.

And I was so pumped about it. The next day, Sunday afternoon, I went down again and I got 21 waves. Wow. And it was just like this massive breakthrough day of and i felt like every every wave i went for i could just stand up and i knew what i was doing and i was this is not the sort of stuff that's going to end up in a surf magazine right but you know like standing up going up dolphins were like coming in and swarming around the surf board and high-fiving me and stuff like it was. Sorry, I might have got it carried away with the dolphins again.

The return of the dubious dolphin. They were applauding with their fins. Yeah, yeah. Do you have a single photo or video? Yeah, yeah, I've got some photos. Yeah? Not of me actually on the board because I'm out there by myself, but I do have photos of me taking a selfie afterwards

and sending it to my brother-in-law saying, 21 waves today. Let me send it to you. You need to get like a little GoPro or something on the front of the board. Oh, man. I'm just busy actually trying to surf at the moment without turning it into a production company. So that's a funny picture.

I was so elated on Saturday. It's coming through at the moment. On Sunday afternoon that I sent to him and I just wrote it on my hand. But I'll show you a picture. You can see in the background the board, and we've named the board. It's blue. So he's been named, the girls have named him Blue Lightning. Right.

So Blue Lightning's my best friend. I've been hugging onto him for dear life for months now. Out in the water, riding him all the way in. Looking pretty hot there, man. Now, you're not allowed to send these photos onto any surf magazines or anything like that. They are just for the unmade podcast use. Is it okay if i sell that second one as a poster on our website it's i'll speak to my uh

the one that i'm sending now is me just strapping the board to the car on the first day feeling like a big gumby and i have felt like a big gumby for most of the last couple of months but the other day catching 21 and i thought you know what i was driving home and i go if someone asked me today can you surf i think i would just about say yes just about say yes i can surf impressive so there you go if you want a surf poster on your wall of tim link in the show notes tim 21 waves heim so i gotta what i did was i was so excited about the big card all day is on the surfboard when i got home i got out a texter and I wrote 21 and the date on the surfboard itself. So I'm going to keep track of the waves that I catch.

All right. Secret projects. My secret project. You did. You kept that secret too, man. I didn't know. You're normally terrible at that. Well done.

I know. I know. You're normally terrible at that. Well done. I know. I know. But I felt enough of a Gumby that I wanted to keep it secret because I thought if I'm going to sell this surfboard again or if I'm going to be, you know, using it as a towel rack in a little while, but I'm like, but I have to say I'm loving it. Just absolutely, just really, really loving it. Congratulations. Mate, very jealous.

What bit are you jealous of? I think surfing's pretty cool and do you know what that's kind of half the problem it kind of felt like it was too cool for me to learn how to do you know what i mean like that's something that that you sort of i think when i was young i was sort of like oh you can't learn to surf that's what cool guys do and it kind of stays with you so i never got around to learning it and then i was just like hang on a sec this i can do what the hell i want with my life like i'm gonna surf i'm like that i've just taken up tennis like i'm just like why am i why not do this and i'm like i should have done this years ago love it yeah absolutely are you gonna start

like insufferably dropping like little surfing anecdotes and morals and lessons into all your sermons now oh it's so tempting i guess i've got so many stories there's so often i'll be out there and i go oh that's that's a great little you know metaphor for life isn't it you know that's a great little excuse to tell everyone that i'm surfing that's right that's right that's the thing that's the virtue of that's the virtue of having a secret project is you keep it secret and until you share it on your podcast we need it we need like a humble preach or a or a sermon brag or something for when a when a when a minister drops drops a story and just to make themselves look awesome yes absolutely oh that's a really good check.

Yeah, yeah. A sermon brag. It's just, oh, when I was pumping iron last night, reading my Bible, you know, like it's... Can I share a letter and an idea from a Patreon supporter, one of our stakeholders to see us out? This is from Alex. Hi, Tim and Brady. here's my Patreon shout out

I'm Alex from Sussex, England I'm currently working as a software developer at Google and before that I was studying for a PhD in computer science I work on computer programs called compilers which translate computer code into other computer code languages

In my spare time, I enjoy listening to folk music, making things out of leather, rock climbing, hiking, and occasionally wild camping, which is interesting in England since it's generally not allowed. I enjoy the challenge of finding a good spot to camp where I won't be spotted and enjoy the thrill of getting away with it. To put your mind at ease though, I never camp anywhere I'll do any damage to property or wildlife and I follow a

strict leave things as you found them rule. I generally listen to Unmade while I'm out for my morning walk before I start work. It's great to be able to start my day with a smile on my face from laughing at you and Tim and your crazy antics my idea for a podcast is a show about folk music i would review albums and have musicians on to talk about their work such podcasts do already exist but i think there's scope to do it better than it's been done yet thanks and i hope you read it out on the show best wishes alex ah nice alex so alex hasn't exactly pushed the boat out there with his idea for a podcast Thanks, and I hope you read it out on the show. Best wishes, Alex. Ah, nice, Alex. So, Alex hasn't exactly pushed the boat out there with his idea for a podcast.

With a show about folk music, reviewing albums and talking to artists. In fact, I think he's just reinvented pretty much every radio show on BBC Six Music. But nonetheless, he's chosen something close to his heart And I respect that Alex, why was your idea not about wild camping? What a way better idea for a podcast

And you could do the podcast While you're wild camping They'd have this whole Blair Witch Project feel to them Where you're whispering and saying I've just pitched my tent behind the hedge And this is where I am And you could have another wild camper with you.

And that'd be like a, every episode would be like an incredible adventure, a new location, a new skill. But no, your idea is a show about folk music. Which I have to say, I'm more likely to listen to. What about a show about leather, Alex? Even that would be a bit more out there. I mean, folk music's good. Don't get me wrong, you know.

And maybe, Alex, if you're going to do it better than everyone else, do it, mate. Do it. Let us know when you make it and we'll have a listen. I have a bit of a theory about folk music, actually, because it kind of freaks me out. Like, it's... Like like folk music is haunting. Like I admire it, but I don't listen to it

because there's something about a particular genre of 70s folk music that's so intensely sincere and with an acoustic guitar and a whispery voice that I'm just like, whoa, just give me some room, you know, give me a bit of irony and a bit of a few power chords or something. Some of those songs were so hauntingly intimate that. I don't even know how to define folk music. What is folk music?

I think it's generally defined along the lines, firstly, of acoustic music. So it's not electric, it's acoustic. And then secondly, it's often's not electric it's acoustic and then secondly it's often you know strong lyricism so very uh high poetry and um not high poetry but poetry and very lyrical and often about social justice causes but not exclusively so is bob dylan folk music yes his early albums are all folk music but then he very famously went electric and moved into rock and roll, and that was massively controversial at

the time. He was called Judas by someone at a concert because he pulled out an electric guitar and betrayed all the folk people and their little, you know, their cats and their scarves and kittens and stuff. Because you get kind of those musicians who are kind of still kind of indie rock, but have got like this folk folk influence and i don't know whether they're folk musicians and

yeah there's a little bit whenever they pull out a mandolin or you know like a fiddle a violin or something and it's not country but it's got a fiddle or something in it there's there's a little bit of that in it this is the bob dylan um and joan ba, you know, all those sorts of genre of people. Joni Mitchell, very famously. I admire them all and there's some amazing music, but I find it kind of creepy. Well, you stick to your Beach Boys surf culture, man. That's where you're at now.

I'm just getting waves, man. That's what I'm doing. Do you listen to any Beach Boys on the way there and on the way back? I do. I do. I have put the Beach Boys on often because there's something about heading down the coast. I love it. Yeah?

Yeah. Absolutely. All right. Well, I think we're done. Yep. All I need to do is say the word ballet and we can wrap it up.