London Is Savage (in Quarantine)

[MUSIC] >> Hello to everybody who's never seen Fleabag. >> It's beautiful and honest, one hour, one phone call. No names, no holds barred. [MUSIC] >> I'd rather go one on one. I think it'll be more fun and I'll get to know you and you'll get to know me. >> Hi everybody, Chris Getherd, it's beautiful and honest. It's Tuesday, so we got to have another one, even though a world is crazy. I am so genuinely hopeful that everyone who's a supporter of this show is doing well. And people who are not supporting this show, even people who hate this show. Hope you're all doing well too. I know a lot of people are social distancing, self-quarantining, I am as well. It's freaky stuff, man, and I know I'm seeing a lot of people. I'm seeing a lot of tweets and Instagram messages and stuff from people who are saying, I haven't caught up on podcast for a while and I'm diving into this one. Welcome back, happy to help distract you for an hour at a time in these very strange days. I'm having strange days myself. You'll hear in this call that I mention to the caller that I think I'm about to flee New York City. And I have since fled, I'm recording this on a Monday, March 23rd, about four in the morning last night stopped driving. I found myself in a very strange and tense situation where I bought a house and it's pretty remote. Certainly compared to where I live in Queens and I was trying to get out there. The house was a real fixer upper to the point where we couldn't really live in it. I'm telling everybody working on it just as soon as we can live in it, let us know. And unfortunately before we could get out there, everything hit in New York and shut down and our building told us we're not allowed to move. So we just said, all right, screw it, man, and we dropped everything. We just abandoned all our stuff and our apartment we left. I have a relative who has a house and we drove many hours to get there overnight, took my kid out of his crib when he was sleeping and took him from the only home he's known and I don't think he's going to go back there. I think we're going to ride this out until we can, you know, either we'll either stay up here and then we'll land on the new house, took my kid from the only house he ever knows. It was, it was sad, it was sad. But I'll tell you what, I say that not to complain, not to make it about me, actually the very opposite. Because even in hearing my own story, oh, I'm, I'm buying a house, oh, I have family who could help me, not everybody has those things. And I understand that I got a lot of advantages. I do, I've had a good couple of years financially with my TV show and the HBO special, like I got a little breathing room there. I'm a white guy, I'm married to a lady, I'm from the northeast of the United States. I have a college degree. My parents are still married. I have health insurance. I'm a member of two unions that protect me on that, like I got all the advantages and I'm fleeing. I can imagine there's other people out there listening right now who don't have all those advantages and who I just want to say, I'm with you, I am scared. And I know that it is really grim times, really grim. There's probably some people listening to me tell it, staring all, wow, you really overreacted. And there's other people going, what took you so long? And I think both of those things are co-existing right now and for so many of us. Like I said, there's people without insurance right now, there's people without family who can help. There's people who financially don't know how they're going to pay the bills. It goes on even a few more weeks. My heart's bleeding for everybody right now. Heart is bleeding for everybody. And like I said, if putting out a dumb podcast can help you forget for an hour at a time that I am very, very happy to be doing this from my remote mountainous location where I'm riding things out. There's the least surprising news in the world. Beautiful anonymous has been delayed by a year. We're canceling it. You'll get emails about your tickets. And if you want the refunds or you want to hold off till next May, May 2021, we're pushing it a full year. I know there were people coming from Portugal and Australia. I hope you guys can get the money back on those flights and I haven't even had a chance to file with everybody who's going to be participating in it. So this is where the news is breaking to you, sorry I haven't been in touch yet, but I'm sure you're also not surprised. And we all also want to stay safe. What else? I'm hosting a TV show about wrestling at the abuse on vice TV today. But if you're looking for more escapeism than that might be good. But I'm not sitting here trying to plug my wrestling show. Let's go ahead and get into that podcast. This week's episode talks with someone in London who's quarantining there. It turns out a lot of people can call when they're quarantined. There are people who are like, I'm not at work, so now I get a chance to call finally. And it's not all about quarantine. We talk a little bit about that. I'm happy to give the perspective on different areas of the world and how everybody's handling things. But it's not all about that. We also talk about what it's like to be raised by a bipolar mother and how that can actually be pretty hilarious at times. We talk about one of my favorite things. The Great British Bake Off, a truly fantastic show when you are feeling stressed out and troubled times. So again, we'll be coming at you every week one hour at a time. How can you get your mind off things, how can you sort things out, hash things out, hope all of you are safe and happy and healthy. And I hope that you get something out of this call. Thank you for calling beautiful anonymous. A beeping noise will indicate when you are on the show with the host. Hello? Hello? Hi. Hi. How are you? How am I? I'm alright. I mean, I'm thinking about actively making plans to flee New York City. But outside of that, you know, pretty good. Yeah. Navigating a world wide pen. What's that? I'm in London right now and I'm feeling very much the same. Yeah. All the charms of big cities wear off when a global pandemic hits. All of a sudden, you're like, I live in the same building as how many people? Maybe I need to go to the woods, flee to the forests. Yeah. I mean, I'm not from, I mean, if you're familiar with the British accent, I'm not from London. And I'm hopefully I don't sound like I'm from London because I'm from the northwest, just outside of Liverpool. And I've been down here now 11 years and we're just at that point where we're thinking about packing up and going back. Now, we've covered this on the show before a little bit. We did a live show in London where the idea of accents came up and I talked about how I'm aware that amongst the British accent, you can instantly tell a lot about a person from the accent as an American, they all just are vaguely British to me. When you say you said something on lines of, I hope it's clear I'm not from London. Do you have a little anti-London in you despite living there? Not necessarily anti-London, it's just where I come from. I get a lot of stick for my accents sounding different because living down here I've had to sort of slow how I speak and you know really pronounce my words properly, whereas where I come from, it's a sicker accent, it's quicker. And so when I go home I always get a lot of sticks and I find like I'm from London and when I come down here I get a lot of sticks and something like I'm from the north so I can't really win either way. So, so people from your hometown here and they hear the London affectations and they go, who's this person putting on airs? And then the Londoners go, "God forbid you slow down and pronounce your words correctly." And then the people at home are going, "Who do you think you are pronouncing your words correctly?" Exactly. And also because I'm from Medyside you come down here and everyone's like, "Protect your wheels, the stouses there." And then I go up not often because of this misconception that everyone that lives in London is really dirty rich and the streets are paved with gold, they also think you miss money bags and you go up north and neither, neither are collect. Well, I tell you, I've read, you know, I try to read a lot but being a fan of the Smiths, not so much a fan of Morrissey these days, but being a lifelong fan of the Smiths, I've read a lot about the North and the implications and the attitude of it and I feel like being from New Jersey, it makes sense to me that I felt a kinship with people from the North of England because it seems like they have a similar chip on the shoulder as people from New Jersey do. Yeah, with a tough working class out there. We claim to be, we claim to be. New Jersey also has many cushy parts. Like, shake in because I'm talking to a stranger on the phone. That's, I'm a very, I'd like to think an outright, unantimidating person. I can't tell you how often I'm in conversations in real life where people just actively interrupt to me because they have no inherent respect for me as a human because that's how unantimidating I am. Well, I respect you, so don't worry about that, it's just I have anxiety. Well, I do have anxiety, but then I get these weird terms of confidence like today calling you up. Other days I wouldn't even touch the phone even when my mum rings, I'm like, I'm not answering it. But today I thought, do you know what? I'm ringing. And here I am. Look at that. We're very similar and now I'm like, oh, very similar people it turns out. So yeah, if a number comes up that I don't recognize straight to voicemail and very often when a number comes up that I do recognize straight to voicemail because I look at it and I go, I just can't handle this right now. And then I think about the things pushing me to that edge and I'm like, I just can't handle this right now. I have half a load of dishes to do. How can I also be expected to talk on the phone? It takes very little for me to feel overwhelmed and like, I can't handle the world. Oh my God, you and I are so alike because that's exactly how I am. I was doing that all yesterday, I didn't want to talk to anybody. Well, that I will say, not trying to make light of something very scary, but when it's like, hey, you can't really go out in social situations right now and you should probably stay home. There is a part of me going, yeah, no problem. You know, we just found that, well, I've actually been off sick and you can probably tell to my wife, I'm not sounding too curly, but I have had a dry cough and our NHS guidelines are that if you have a dry, repetitive cough that you just stay away seven days, I'm actually in self isolation at the moment. You are. Um, yeah, yeah. That's scary. Are you freaked out? You know what? I'm not freaked out about myself, I freaked out about, my mum has a lot of underlining health issues and she's, she'll not thank me for saying this, but she's on the wrong side of 65. And so I'm really concerned for her, more than myself. But yeah, it's, I shouldn't really be watching the news because I don't think that really helps the situation, I don't know about you, but it's just constantly about people. Well, vice-jumps in yesterday was basically, I'm, I'm power of raising, um, basically look ones are going to die and that's how it was left. Cool, wait, who's going to die? Yes. Left. Some look ones are going to die. Um, before, before they're supposed to. That that's our prime minister there and I think I'd be birthday, I should do it. Um, you, your birthday might die, I don't know what we got yesterday. I thought you initially said that he said left wingers are going to die, which I was like, that just sounds like a threat unrelated to the coronavirus from him. I mean, he wishes, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, sorry, no, we don't like Tari, really? Look at that, look at that. So you're self-isolated and have you, have you been around your mother in recent, weeks to a degree where you're sitting there going, oh, come on, I hope I wasn't, didn't have some dormant stuff in my system then. Um, I was last hope about three weeks ago, so I should hope not. And she felt like the mask, like the rest of my family, I'm the only one that's down here now. So I have spoken to quite a, quite a fair bit and she's under a lot of pressure from my sister and I to stay in, but she's not, she's one lot to listen to people, so yeah, we'll see how that goes. Well, Northern women, Northern women notoriously, a stubborn, a stubborn group is what I've always read. Oh yes, oh yes, my mother, especially, and this, this is a nice little, like, tie into what I was going to talk to you about actually, because my mother's bipolar and so with that, comes from highs and the lows. And I know that usually on your podcast, everyone says, sort of the hard times, the sad times. And I just wanted to not make like it because it's very serious, but also being the child of a bipolar parent can actually be a little bit shyness or, well, as someone who's had some bipolar, she's myself, the, the, the manic times can be quite dangerous. Well, part of what's dangerous about them is they can be a hell of a good time. So I would imagine when you're a kid, every once in a while, you know, you might get woken up in the middle of the night and say, hey, I just decided right now we're going to Disney world. Let's book tickets and grab some clothes. Like, that's, you get those moments too. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm not making light of it at all. I also have depression and lifelong depression and we have gone through some really, really dark stuff. But the flip side of it with the manic episode is that you kind of tend to do a lot of stuff that's not quite the norms of families. And I never really realized this till I got a bit older, you start sharing childhood experiences and you realize, actually, my childhood wasn't quite standard. Yeah. And you tell stories and I remember having the therapy session and I was just talking about my life to the therapist and she said to me that it almost sounded too much to be true, which kind of put me on therapy for a little while because it could be long enough to get there and then when I got there, I was basically too lying, so like, well, I know that happened in my life and so you're not going to listen to me, then I'm just going to stop coming. But, yeah. I had a similar thing where I saw a shrink, this is a different shrink than one in my, one man show I mentioned a lot, I've seen multiple shrinks, that's where I met. And I was telling her some very funny stories about my childhood. And after about three or four of these stories that I found very hilarious, I noticed the look on her face and I stopped talking and she went, those are not normal ways for a child to behave. So why don't we drop the jokes and why don't you tell me what was going on in your day-to-day life during your upbringing because those stories you have are not the normal behavior of a three or four-year-old and I don't necessarily find them so funny and I said, well, she nailed it. This is why I became a comedian so I could make jokes about things that were quietly disturbing. You know, I think it makes it just such a dark sense of humor, doesn't it? I think when you've gone through so much, you kind of everything becomes for me. Well, look. Is that wrong with me to say? You know as well as anybody, the Irish have a notoriously great sense of humor. I don't know, I don't know how you're feeling, but whenever I visit Ireland, I go, everybody here has a funny story to tell and they want to share it. And who's had a, they've had some dark times, had some dark times and they're the funniest people in the world and then they, you know, root it in a culture where they almost starved to death on mass and then there were, you know, wars in the streets for a couple decades there. It's a story you'll ever hear. So I tell you one thing of my mother, this will probably give you an idea of the kind of child that I had so I was in secondary school, high school and it was our parent's union. I'd just give you a bit of background at the time so it was given my age right now. It was in the late '90s and in the UK, line dancing had become huge, but massive and I'm not a fan of line dancing and especially the teenager whose mother decided to open up a country and rest in the store right near the school. It was not a fun time. And that particular night she was supposed to be going to an event so that these events and she would take her stand and she would sell her where there were boots and belts and stuff. And she was like, "No, I kind of have to go to that straight after your parent's union song. I'm just going to have to go in my work clothes, work clothes being done in mini-step, gingon tops, boots, you know." Kind of country-western/fuck, you know, that kind of look and I was like, "Okay, look on my chemistry teacher." And I said, "I'm really sorry, but I'm going to come and guess this is a cowbell." He said, "Well, don't worry about it, if you've got the work, you know, I'm on the judge's fine. I went back to my mother's and then parents evening came along and she goes straight to science table, she strides over, puts her cowbell boot on the stool, slicks her hair, puts her hands on the hips and sort of guesses mother I am, but she'd gone to my biology teacher who had no idea. And he just looked at a dead tummy and said, "I don't know, but you're on a hell of a woman." And then he then proceeded to retell that story the next day, in his class while I was sat there in the back, came in and then he asked me what time was he supposed to come out for dinner. And I thought, "Oh, God, she's after the gang, she's, she's str. I mean, he told you a name and she's struck." But that's the kind of mother I'd have, there would always be a story. Showing up at your school address as a sexy cowgirl. Yeah. Yeah. Now can I tell you something? Yeah. Sure. The last thing I'm trying to do is come off like one of those posh Londoners, but I will say when you get excited and start speaking quickly, I can understand very little of what you say. Oh, I'm sorry. No, I got the story. I get the story and it's actually insanely charming because you mentioned when I start talking a little faster and let my guard down that Londoners can't understand me and it turns out Americans probably mostly have exposure to London accents in our media when it comes to the British world. And I get it now because I will speak nice and slowly. But that again, that's coming from someone whose roots, I visited Northern Ireland a couple of years ago because that's where my roots are and I went to my grandfather's village that you want to talk about an accent that's hard to woo. Up in County, I didn't know what was going on. You know what else I'd do if not Northern Ireland, but I still was a new couple accent. When they're in full flow, sometimes I have to kind of stop and think, oh, I don't actually know what they're saying. Speaking of accent, my other half is London born and bred. So here's the experience of the Northern accent is somewhat limited and when we first started dating, he got to Liverpool to see my family for the first time and we had gone shopping and there was a two cashier girls having a conversation and then I joined in completely normal. And then I was relaxed and I pulled me in and I didn't know you spoke Polish. I don't. That was a spell of access. And here I was like, yeah, it's so fast and like I just couldn't understand the word. These girls are saying something that I thought she's bilingual. So he perceives your accent within the same nation as Polish as an entirely different language? Yes. I mean, you only have to go through miles to have a completely different accent in the UK and people very territorial about where they're from as well. Yeah. Yes, I've noticed that in my travels. I was in the States, we do have a number of accents, but I feel like we can, we don't have to kind of stop and think to sort it out. Like there's Texas accents and there's the California surf accent and the New England or accent and the Southern accent and all of them, but I don't know, maybe because, maybe because we dominate like pop culture so much, things kind of meet in the middle a little bit more with us. But who knows? I'm no linguist. No, I just lucky people can understand me from time to time. Oh, you have the, you actually, I will say anyone listening to this. I feel like the comments are already going to be. These colors should never be self-conscious about our accent because it's the, for you to go, I'm just glad when they can understand me from time to time, which I know is a horrific rendition that I just did. Everybody listening is like, that's the best, that's the most charming thing we've heard. So yourself quarantined, you're thinking about getting out, are you thinking about getting out of London when you breathed that up? You said you and your partner thinking about it in up north. Is that because of coronavirus or is that just you need to change a pace in general in life? No. So I moved down here to be with him, so I met him whilst at university and he was in London working. And we met on a, again, showing my age now during the face party. Face party? Yes, those children. Yeah. It was like pre-my space. We had friendster pre-my space, maybe I don't know a face party ever made it over here. Who knows? Well, probably now we have 30 comments from people that are like, you idiot, of course you have face party. So you met on face party? And I must say, it was more like the my space and face books back then. It did have a bit of a dodgy reputation for a while, but I wasn't on there then. And we used to talk about our love of music when we were teenagers. So I like a bit of everything, but at the time I was very into deaf tones and so was me. And that was the thing that bonded us. It was about 40. And then we lost touch. When you were 40? Thank you. Yeah, we were 40. We're nearly 36 now, so we've known each other quite well. And then, yeah, I think we were 20, 21. He found my email address and popped it into my space and up I came and I said, oh, I spoke first, let me a message started talking and we've been together and I think that's how we met. And then I think London was a bit of a prospect in my town, so I came and stayed with him and I've been down here 11 years now. And it's just thought the point, it's hard living in London and friends have to move out of the area because they're cast for it, rents really expensive, with fortunate that we own our property, but we can't get any higher up the ladder than what we're at because it is just too expensive. And you know, you don't get to live the London life because you're too busy working to try and pay the mortgage to stay in London. And it just gets the point now we're in quality and life's really struggling. And I'd rather go up north where yes, the job's a little bit more stress and the money's not as great, but I could have a house with a garden and then have my family and my friends and I just had a better quality life and I think that's the feeling of a lot of people especially my age. You know, some of some of them shed houses, shed lots, you know, you think 5, 5, 5, 6, 6, you don't love your own place and a little bit more grown up. You and I, you and I are, we mentioned before, very similar people in very similar places. I'm actually, I'm actually heading out of New York City after all these 15 years and I'm in a position where I've been in a very weird, I've had a few years. Starting in 2016, where I had a couple of years that were really great professionally and now I'm on the other side and I don't anticipate that I'm going to have a stretch like that again. So what I'm doing is I'm taking all the money that I earned and I'm going to go buy a house somewhere that's not New York City where there's peace and quiet in space. Like you said, because I want my son to grow up like that because and it's the bulk of my savings is going to be dedicated towards getting my kid this life. And for the same amount of money in New York, I might be able to have a mortgage on a two bedroom apartment maybe, maybe, maybe a really nice, a really nice one bedroom, definitely. Maybe two bedrooms in New York City, whereas I can go have a house with a yard and some distance from people if I head out to where I'm heading out. Yeah, no, I don't blame you good on you, but yeah, if I could do it quicker, I'd be doing it, but next couple of years, I hope to be out of here, definitely. London is a trip. I feel like I think maybe I've mentioned some version on the show, say I have a lot of love for London and when I've gone and done shows over there, I've, you know, I once did a run at the Soho Theatre where I was there for the bulk of an entire month, which is, you know, a decent enough amount of time to feel like you can get the pace of things at least. And I've been in New Yorker over 15 years now and London's one of the only cities that intimidated me. That's one of the only cities that I've ever, as a New Yorker, usually when you hit the ground running in a city, even if you're trying to figure out the public transportation, as a New Yorker, I'm like, all right, I can handle most of what's thrown at me. London's one of the only places I can think of where I've gone there and just been like, I wish everybody would just slow down and help me a little bit more. And that says in New Yorker. Funny you should think, actually, I think I'm just so used to it now because I've worked in Central London for the last 10 years, so it becomes routine, you don't really notice, but I struggled when I first moved down here. And I remember one, I was, I think I was going to go home for the weekend, sort of a big case with me, not on the tube, and it was pretty busy, and sometimes the tubes sort of stalled, and so it stalled my cell over, and instead of helping me up, this person just walks over me. And that would happen in New York. New York somebody would help me. Yeah. Or at least they'd be like, you are right, like you'd at least get that. Most likely someone would help you out. But also a beautiful place, and also a place where there's so much tube-sorbent experience. So I'm not talking bad, but it's its own thing. Time for a break. Let me just say right now too, sometimes Londoners have felt like I'm talking smack about them on the show, not talking smack, one of them's the best. It's a tough town. Can't deny it. Anyway, enough justifications and caveats will be right back. Definitely, this is the element, and others, was a break. That was a break, and the break is done. So now we get to talking again with this quite charming caller, enjoy. Definitely, and there is loads in London, I'm not talking about people off London, but I'm at that point now where I'm not going out like you two, or not, you know. Yes, same. We're not making the most of the issue. Same. I'm in my late 30s. I'm not staying out all night, dancing in Brooklyn anymore. I feel ridiculous. And a lot of people, I wonder if London is the same. A lot of people who I'm friends with, oh, New York's changed so much anyway. And it's like, maybe we have, maybe we don't want to admit it, but who was it? Joan Didian who said this New York City at the end of the day, it's a city for the young. Maybe we just got old. Maybe we're old. Oh, god, yeah. I'm not even in any sort of denial about it. I know I've got old. Me too. I see my friends hanging onto the dream. We're going to be cool Brooklynites. Not. No. No. I've got a couple of friends that are hanging on, but now, me and my other half, we're very sad now. We make our own fun at home watching TV, laughing at rubbish, and those nights are coming in, you know, six in the morning, they're long gone. I'm like, look at them, they're like the odd night out, but it just drives me. I don't know how I managed it when I was younger, but I just can't do it now. What am I going to go? I'm going to go fall off the wagon into a bunch of MDMA again and then what, come home and change my son's diaper while I'm all tripping out. Can you imagine? Maybe you're like, oh, this diaper's so wet. Oh, the texture of this diaper. Oh, like, feel like a freak. Feel like a freak. Look my son in the eye. Anyway. Anyway. How are you enjoying fatherhood? Oh, it's, I wish people love to buy into this thing that it's so hard. And when people find out you're pregnant, oh, you're never going to sleep again. And it's all true. But one of the things that has made me shake my head the most with regret for all of us is I wish more people had told me how fun it was going to be. Because of course it's as hard as they say it's harder and there's no real way to describe it. But when I lay down on my floor and Cal sees me from across the room and he takes off crawling as fast as he can so he can come jump on my stomach and my chest. It's like, it's like I know a little bit closer of what happened is while I'm still here on earth. So that's how it is. That's how parent is. That's how parenthood is brings you a little closer to heaven. I don't have any children myself yet, but I do have two nieces. And yeah, they literally thought she could be an absolute horror when I was home a few weeks ago. I took them out for a day and she just screamed. She's terrible too. So she was just screaming blue murder everything. And I was probably the closest I've been to once to throw a child out of a window, but I didn't. That's good. That's good. That's good. It's really sweet to me. And then that was it then. Like every self was forgotten. And then my other niece, she's four, she ran me up the other day to tell me I was the best aunt in the world and I just melted. Look at that. And I was like, that was just my nieces. Like imagine your child's in that too. Oh, I can't wait. Now, when Cal was born, my brother and law and his wife had already, they had a two-year-old, and that's when I knew, like you said, man, being a aunt or uncle, that's the best gig in the world. Because you don't get the same connection to parenthoods, but you get to go in, be cool. Bring them a bunch of, you know, I brought you a bunch of chocolate. I didn't even ask your parents, and now what are they going to do? Are they going to take it away? They'll be villains. Get you a hopped up on sugar. Let's play with some toys. Get you all riled up. They up past your bedtime, so you're losing your mind, and then I go home. That's the best gig. Yep. Oh yeah. It is fun being the auntie, because you get away with murder, and you can do all the fun stuff, and there's not a lot of discipline. And yeah, I do love it. I absolutely adore them, the brilliance. Now what? You wouldn't understand them, though, because they got very sick of a pull accent. I'd love to talk to them someday, but I'd sit there and confusion. Now this has been a lovely, we're halfway through, and this has been lovely, and very chit-chatty, in a way I've always loved with this show, but I do want to just loop it around and say, so when it's March of 2020, and you come up with a dry cough, what's the thought process there? Well, I'm diabetic, so I'm a little, I do get little concerned. About my health and what's going on with the world. And my other half, he's self-employed, and so in the fact that everything's closing down, and people are not leaving their homes, I do worry financially how that's going to affect them. That's just on me. But I'm a bit of a worryer, and I've been told multiple times that I'm a bit of a mothering type of person. And so my mind starts to wonder about everybody else, and so at the minute, I'm really concerned about the little ladies that they're going to be able to get to the shops and get what they need to do, and what about the people that all the health conditions, they're going to be alright, and that just sets me off. So in March 2020, I'm trying to play it cool now because I'm on the phone with you, but I'm probably a bolander if I'm being completely honest. Mm-hmm, both for yourself and the world around you. Yeah. I know that's not the cool thing to say, because everyone else seems to be especially the UK for playing it down, but personally, I do worry for everybody. Yeah. And how do you feel? I feel like what most of us in the States are thinking is like that seems like our government was behind the curve, like now that we're all taking it seriously, it seems like you guys had this info a couple months ago, and we could have you softballed it, and now we all can't get toilet paper because the shelves are picked clean. How are you feeling about your government's response to all this stuff? We seem to be a bit slower than everybody else if I'm being honest. I mean, often to a couple of days ago, all we were getting is that to make sure you wash your hands for the time it takes a thing a half a birthday twice. Mm-hmm. But should I mean it's useful? I mean, you need to wash your hands, but apart from that, there wasn't really much being said. And while I don't think everyone needs to be shut down completely, they just don't know. I don't know if they're just trying not to worry people, or it just seems to be a slower response than everywhere else, I think. I mean, things might change in the next hour or two, who knows, but I don't know, the UK seems to be a bit slower behind everybody else, even though we're being told for a few weeks behind Italy and to be prepared, they're not actually given as much information. Next question. Why do you guys say Z? Why do you say Z? And we say Z, although I guess it is English. So, right. Don't you say WXYZ? Yeah. We say Z. We say Z. Did you know that? Yeah. What's up with that? Excuse me. I live on a main road. So if you can hear alarms, don't we? I'm just on the main road. Are they car alarms? Are you worried that people are starting to freak out? Oh, it's the police. Even better. Yeah. When I woke up, I lived not. I've probably lived three or four blocks from a hospital, and when I woke up this morning, there's about 10 minutes straight of ambulance. Ah, arms going off. I'm like, oh, this is not ideal. That doesn't sound like just one out. That's a fleet. That's a fleet of ambulances. Ambulance. What's the plural of ambulance? Who knows. This is the thought I'm having in the morning. I've never had that thought before. It's a good question, didn't it? I think you just, yeah. I'll tell you a story, actually, though, about my road. So, did you guys ever hear about the London riot a few years back? Did that make its way over to you guys? I should remind me. I bet I read about it then, and it's just slipping my memory now. Remind me. I think it was a 20-year-old effort. So, basically, there was a guy called Mark Duggan. And I don't know all the ins and outs of it. So, I don't want to say for certain, because I know I'll just get annihilated on the comment. But basically, there was something to do with the police in Mark Duggan, and he died. And the family then held a bit of a vigil in Pottenham, which is not too far from where I am. And I think people jumped on that vigil. A bit of a vigil, a bit of a protest. But it was all quite non-violent, and then suddenly it took a violent turn. And that road was smashed up, things was out of fire. And I think people jumped on it as an excuse to show how unhappy they were. And then it escalated around the capital, and then on to the rest of the country. So, day two of the riots actually ended up on my road. And I remember packing a bag, grabbing my cap, and heading off to the mothering laws. And then sat watch thirty-right, and go past my flat. Whilst they watched other people mash up my chemit, my local chemist, my local doctor's surgery, my high street. And the whole time, I'm panicking that my flat was going to go up and flames, and I was never going to see my home again. Which was quite, yeah. Especially the area that I live in. The area I live in is usually quite, I mean, it was a high street. And you can hear siren, but there's not usually a lot of trouble. And it was a really weird couple of days where suddenly we've gone from nice and peaceful. I live next door to Catholic nuns, and there's a school. And it's all very nice to people with masks and weapons, and the flat right bands, and things all turning up. Now I'm going to ask. Just so I'm clear, you said they smashed up your chemist. That's what we would call a pharmacy, yeah. And then you said they smashed up the doctor's surgery. What is that? So what we call doctor's surgery is GP, so general practitioner. So you'd have, yeah, these are your girls, you've got like a cover of cold. So a doctor, we just call that doctor. Yes. Because surgery, we think we're going to get cut open. Okay. And then you said they smashed up your high street. Is that just the name of the nearby street? Or is that a local business reference that I should know? So the high street is where all the local shops are. Oh, so like the main avenue. We might call that the main drag. Yeah. All right. Back on the same. I feel like they're going to be annoyed because I feel like for some reason, I've talked to people from so many different countries. And England, which we have the special bond, we have the special relationship. England is the one that consistently I'm most confused by. And what I have to imagine is getting annoying for the listener that I'm constantly sorting out. British reference, no, it's got nothing to do with you. I should just be smarter. Yeah. And then when people are coming by with masks, am I correct in thinking you call those balaclavas? Some balaclavas, some scarves carried around their faces, just anything just to not identify them. But it was quite scary. Yeah, that's nuts. That's wild. Yeah. That ain't good. And chaos runs over, overtakes the streets. This is what happens when abuses of power run rampant. This is what happens when you put your foot on the neck of whole classes of people. And we got, I feel like this is all over the world. And if you don't want people rampaging in the streets, then you got to, you got to take care of the people. Yeah. Yeah. Sucks when it's on your block, though. I can be missed. I can be Johnny working class. I, blah, blah, blah. That's much. If they all, if they came down, they came down, if that came down, my blocking queens, I might be talking a little bit less shit if I'm being honest. Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. I mean, I'm usually very much like, I'm a, I'm a member of the Labour Party. Admittingly, admittedly, not very active, active, but I'm definitely, I think, right up bringing in very much working class, look after your own socialist kind of mentality. But even I kind of, when it all keeps up, I'd be quiet and just go away, please. Yes. And a bit of a wash. We're all like me and you were like, the workers need to rise up. At least, at least half a mile away from my house, please. At least a couple of kilometers, so to speak away. But yes, we should all rise up somewhere else if you don't mind. Yeah, I know it's not so bad of me, but yeah. That's where I was at, but yeah, it's, it's not like that the moment around here. But I mean, I don't really want to listen to political conversation, but I mean, I'm sure you feel the same with your president. But our prime minister, the left side of my head, the better. And I'm sure there'll be a lot of upset between now and hopefully the time comes for him to leave. Well, what do you guys think of Boris? Some people might be going, oh, political talk here. Here's the thing. When the answer comes back, my answer is going to be mostly, I don't know much about the guy. But then I also have to do this because I always squeeze out opinions on everything because I'm Chris get there. And that's what I do. We'll be right back. I hope you enjoyed that break. I hope you were able to stretch. I hope you were able to hear some ants. I hope you were able to grab yourself a glass of water. And now we finish off this telephone call. Hopefully the time comes for him to leave. I think he's got a funny haircut. That's the first thing I'll say. It does have a funny haircut. And I mean, you know, it's always hard to sort out the politics of a country you're not in. But I get the sense that what would I say? I would say maybe one of the things that no matter where I try to be fair, especially on the show. So one of the things I think, you know, leaving out the actual policy of anything. One thing that I think is being proven to you right now is, okay, so now we're seeing a global crisis where every scientist is saying this virus is real. And what you need is leaders who are experienced and leaders who can see the whole playing field and aren't just dogmatic about a handful of things that are important to them. And it seems like maybe that's something to be fair. I'm not, you know, Donald Trump had never been in a political role or a leadership role. I mean, I guess business was, that's unfair to say. But I certainly wish there was someone who actually had experience in navigating politics right now at the wheel. And I don't know if Boris is the same, but I get the sense that maybe the ability to rattle the chains has taken him a little bit further than his job qualifications. And then his resume would have granted him. And that's scary right now to the most influential countries in the world, where maybe the leaders got there based on rhetoric instead of experience, not good, not safe feeling. No, it's scary time. It is a scary time. But I was like, I said earlier, I'm easily, I'm easily worry so try not to think about it too much for the moment and just do what I can continue just to be a nice person and be helpful where I can be because I can't change them. This is what I'm learning. I can't change things. I can't change, but I can change how I respond to them. And I can try and make things a bit lighter, a bit nicer for everybody else. Does that make sense? Well, that's all we can do, right? That's all we can do. I can't, I can't, as an individual, change anything about a government outside of my ability to vote every now and then. But what I can do is be kind to my fellow human beings and be respectful of the fact that people get worked up about things for reasons. And if I can respect the reasons, then I don't have to respect the results because start to see humans who are scared. The people with the most extreme opinions are either ignorant or scared. And I'm happy to disregard ignorant people. And I'm happy to feel compassion with scared people. Anyway, what's another funny story about your mom? Oh, yeah, no, you can say whatever you want. This conversation took a really weird turn. It's not how I would expect you miss to go. It's taken a number of weird turns. We've talked about line dancing. We've talked about Boris Johnson. We've talked about everything. Riots who knew. Have you ever had a guinea pig showing guinea pig showing? I mean, I know that flea bag. We're at flea bag, which is a great show. They had a nice running guinea pig gag, right? Wasn't it guinea pigs in that coffee shop? Yeah, who doesn't? Flea bag is the best. We all love flea bag Anita. Hold on. Anita aka the new happy Nelson. You're you haven't watched flea bag. It's two seasons in the first season. Wait, you haven't a caller. No, I haven't. You have or haven't? I have not. I thought you said you love flea bag. No, I didn't. I said I haven't. I've not seen it. Oh, my. I want. I mean, I tell you something. We got 16 minutes left. And in the four-year history of this show, I've never been tempted to hang up more. I was about to say, you know, just hang up now. We're done with it. Have I really upset you now? Is it like a cultural sensation in England? Are you just so tired of hearing the hype that you can't buckle down and watch it? I'm just I'm one of the people that just watch it eventually, but I don't generally watch things when they're in the midst of hype. I'm the same way. I just I'm just now going. Hey, maybe arcade fire is a good band. I'm just now saying that. You took your time with that one. Yeah, all right. From the from the England from the Londoner who's never seen flea bag. I'm not going to take that dig. I know. I think I great fuck jokes about foxes. They got jokes about foxes. There's foxes all over London. Yes. That's true, actually. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We get them all around as well. Is there? Is there a show like that? Sorry to interrupt. I would say right now. The the bake off and flea bag are the two English shows that Americans have just true love for. Are there American shows? What's that? I do love bake off. I love and grew up with tall Hollywood. Oh, wow. What's the scoop? Good guy. Good guy or raging dickhead. It's one or the other based on watching the show. You're either like this is an act or he's a raging dickhead and he has the eyes of a white walker from Game of Thrones. He's a raging dickhead. Really? Are we all kind of knew it, right? Yeah. I mean, yeah. I mean, she grew up with him. So he's probably grown up a bit since then. But she's really good bake out and refuse to go on the show because she knew him from her childhood. Oh, that would be fascinating for him to realize. Wait. Didn't we grow up together? And you know what? I said this during the course, I think of our London live show, but I'll reiterate. You want to hear something that people I have found that people from England hate me for saying this. Hate me. I like Nolan Sandi a lot better. No, so do I. You take I got boot out of the room. We did I did a show at the podcast festival in London. I got boot out of the room. People. I'm going to get some hate now than I was like, no, it's so effortlessly funny. Sandi's such a great woman. Melon suit was good, but what's that? I've heard that I love this call working class riots. How governments handle the global coronavirus pandemic and also can you believe Sandy's leaving? She's so little and cute. Yeah, she's leaving. I was so sad. Also another fact for you. I used to work with someone who'd been on that backup and I have tasted her cake. You tasted her cake. So that's a clue. It's her. I was. My favorite all time is Liam. I thought Liam was such a such a cute kid. I'm now old enough that I can see someone in his early 20s late teens and go, cute kid. I thought Liam was so trying. So some how bad it when you when you tasted these cakes, how bad is where these cakes? Really good. Really good. Oh, are you familiar with top chef? Um, you know what? I don't watch those kind of programs. Top chef is like I get it because it's relaxing. The brilliant part of bakeoff is they've made it so relaxing and easy and fun. Top chef is the American chef's compete and it's American, which means it's aggressive and any sign of drama they squeeze the most out of it. Where's bakeoff? There's been some dramatic moments they actually clearly dodge when that lady took that guy's thing out of the freezer and he flipped out. And then the lady wasn't there the next week and they never really explained it. But then she came back and there was no really. There was clearly some chicanery there that American producers would have made the whole thing about that. They would have told everybody else called home. We're just going to fuel the fire on this. But I once went to a restaurant me and my buddy Don who's a great cook and who loves food. I was giving him a ride home one night and we're like, man, we're both hungry and there wasn't much open. And we went to this bar and asked if there's still certain food. The guy goes, yeah, I'm just about to close down, but I'll cook for you guys. Turns out he was a chef from top chef and he locked the doors and he was me and my buddy Don getting food from this top chef guy. It was great. It was great. I'd love to get into those kind of programs, but I'm not good at cooking and I don't enjoy cooking to me. Why am I watching this? See, that's why I like it. I do like watching God of Ramsey and what's it called? Help the kitchen nightmares. You love a good nightmare. You don't want to be inspired to improve your cooking skills, but you'll sink your teeth into a nice nightmare. Yes, welcome to me. You and I got a lot going. I feel like people are probably loving this call. They're sitting here going, what are they going to talk about next? Are they going to talk about the collapse of the American economy? Or are they going to go ahead and talk about hurling and what hurling is? The Irish sport of hurling. Who knows where we're going to go. It could go anywhere. This is me to achieve to be honest. My interest go everything from like rugby league, I like USC, but I'm also into art. I love drug cleans. I love watching a good murder mystery, but then our real life murder kind of documentary. Or then I'll watch something nice and fluffy like British break off. There's never any sort of in-between with me. It's one of the other things. You and I would be best friends because everything you said, I'm into. Next time you're in London, you'll have to come and have a drink. I'll have a bitter lemon, England staple. I'll be drinking a diet coat. Don't you worry. I'm not going to take you and get you drunk. You can get drunk. I don't care if you get drunk. I'll just get a bitter lemon. I'll get a fever tree. Okay, that's all right. You like the UFC? I like the UFC. I don't keep up with it. Do you ever go back and watch the pride fighting championships? Yes. The best, the greatest thing. One of the greatest things that's ever happened in human history is the pride fighting championships. If you're not familiar, this was the big MMA league in the world before the UFC. They were Japanese. They lost all their influence because they got busted being heavily tied into the Yakuza. So they really fell apart. But it's amazing because they basically treat real fighting like pro wrestling. Big elaborate entrances. I can say it's a mix of the two really, isn't it? It's all the pomp and circumstance of pro wrestling and then real people fighting and an international flair. And they also didn't care about weight classes. So every once in a while, you'd see a fight where a seven foot tall giant would fight a five foot three man. And it was the best. What a great thing. It's kind of like the old school UFC. The early days were. This beautiful because the early UFC could sometimes be sad because you'd be like, so you got a Moitai guy who's really trained in an art that over the years has proven to be very effective versus some guy who they'll say this guy's a bar fight, a pit fighter. And that just means he gets in fights with bars. And you're watching someone who doesn't know what they're doing, get brutalized by someone who does. There's a lot of joy in that, but it's also disturbing. And now UFC now makes martial arts effectively its own style. You have to know a little bit of everything everybody knows things. Pride was this amazing middle ground where you had the best of the best at different styles, but not everybody trained everything, but it wasn't these mismatches. So you might see Crowcop who's a Croatian kickboxer of a high high level. Go against Mark Coleman, who's an American wrestler of a high level, but Crowcop doesn't know much wrestling and Coleman doesn't know much kickboxing and it was really great. And the Japanese didn't, that league didn't care about testing for steroids. So it was also at times scary is the best. They also introduced you to the world, which is I don't practice to do it to myself, but my other half used to teach it, and my brother does it as well, yeah, yeah, yeah. He got into it to sort of help with his anxiety and his confidence. Your brother or your other? Your brother, actually. My other half, he did it first, and I just saw a complete change in him. And it was the best thing that ever happened to him. And then he went on to teach it and he had to give it up for a while because he retrained in his work life and just didn't have the time to. But my brother the same, my brother is eight years younger than me. And would get into fights and all kinds of things. And you know, he's quite quick with his mouth and then we'd get a lumped for it. And I always would worry about it. And then we introduce him to the world. He's never looked back. He's in Australia now, so he's just joined a team over in Australia and started competing. Absolutely, he loves it. Lackling Giles and Craig Jones. Those are the Kittdale, Lackling Giles, Craig Jones. Those are the big Australian Giu-Jitsu fighters. Right. Now hearing the idea of. Well, hearing the idea of, I got a little brother who tends to run his mouth and get barf and barf fights. I don't know much about Liverpool. That strikes me as a very Liverpool sentence to say. I mean, yeah. I got a little brother who runs his mouth too much and he's scrapping out on the streets from what I've heard. Fits the image. Yeah, no, but I will in his defense. He doesn't go out looking for trouble. He just can't keep his mouth shut. Oh, they never do. They never do when they're you're sibling. Do they? It's true. I tell you if he was the wrong guy. No, he's just, he's quick. He's never been any different. He's really smart with his mouth and then he ends up getting lamped for it. And we were all worried that, you know, he's going to say the wrong thing to the wrong person and it's going to be lights out. So I was really pleased when he said he started to do Giu-Jitsu because it has really calmed him down. Because I love Giu-Jitsu because I didn't feel properly now as well. Here's one thing about martial arts. When you actually, when you actually experience martial arts, like you're someone out there fighting on bars, it's not going to teach. You're not going out there and learning. Oh, here's how I can really mess people up. What you learn right away is I better keep my mouth shut because sometimes the littlest guy in this gym is the one who whips the most ass. And that's what you'll learn. You learn how to walk away. Yeah. Now, I mean, this is one thing who doesn't even do it, but I completely get why people do it. I just can't get over the feeling of being claustrophobic. That's my whole thing. But what it does for people is just amazing. I think it's fantastic and I tell everybody that if they're looking for something to do, they'll probably be surprised, and they're like, "I'm going to do Jitsu." And what it does for people. Martial arts. There's a reason that they. I feel like the UFC has almost demystified them as a spiritual thing. Whereas when we grew up, it was almost like these mystical martial arts. And they've demystified that because they show what works and what doesn't. But there is still a spiritual side to pushing yourself past your physical limits and seeing what you got on the other side. And that comes from somebody who gets beat up all the time. Although here's something that might surprise a lot of the listeners to this show. You're talking about your little brother running his. You'd be shocked to hear about how many fist fights I got into growing up. My parents still will tell. Like they tell my wife the amount of times we had to go to school because we got to call that Chris got in a fight. The kid couldn't keep his mouth shut and he couldn't keep his fists in his pockets. I was that kid too. What's that? Sounds like my brother. As we would call it, where I'm from, you were a little bugger. A little bugger. A little bugger. So if you want to be. You'd be in a bit of a monkey, a bit of a terror. Right. You'd be called a bugger. Yes. Now we've got 30 seconds left. This call was clearly you being bored in a self-quarantine and that's just chitchatting. What's your final message to the world? I hope you understood me. Thank you for keeping me in the team for the last hour and this comes as you did not go how I expected it to. But it's been good. Thank you. Thank you. I didn't always understand you verbally but I'd like to think I always understood you emotionally and spiritually and I feel quite connected to you because of it. Thank you for calling. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Okay. Bye. I call it. Thank you so much for your charm and your stories and your accent and for being funny and for letting me be funny and forgiving me an hour of my day. That was quite pleasant and enjoyable. Thank you, Jared O'Connell. Thank you, Anita Floriance. Thank you, Shellshag. On the more about me, ChrisGeth.com, go to Apple Podcast Rate and if you subscribe it helps me a new view and check out the entire beautiful anonymous back catalog on Stitcher Premium. Visit StitcherPregion.com/Stories for more details. [Music]