Rome, Greggs & Flat Earth | Catch Up 102

Chris Williamson 0:00 Catch-up 102. It went so well last time that we're gonna do another one. I went to Rome. To anyone who's considering going and hasn't been, it's fucking mint. You don't have any bum hair, do you?

Jonny 0:10 No.

Chris Williamson 0:11 (laughs)

Jonny 0:11 So ...

Yusef 0:14 (laughs)

Jonny 0:14 The most-

Chris Williamson 0:15 Jonny's gone.

Jonny 0:16 ... that, that, that's-

Chris Williamson 0:16 Jonny's gone.

Yusef 0:17 It's just-

Jonny 0:18 It's like you're on a train. The delivery of that question, Chris, was, was honestly artistic. Like, I, I can't believe- You're on a train and someone just ti- pulls their hand across your face.

Yusef 0:26 And, and the way you reacted to it as well. There was no shock. It was, "You don't have any bum hair, do you?" "No, I don't."

Chris Williamson 0:31 And then he said, "Your mate, your business partner, the guy with a beard. I was trying, I was putting a, a leaflet, promotional leaflet through his door, and he-"

Yusef 0:38 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 0:38 "You sat in the window, and he got up and he banged on the window and went, 'What are you doing, mate?'" (laughs)

Yusef 0:43 Did this actually happen?

Jonny 0:44 Yeah.

Yusef 0:45 Yeah. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 0:46 (laughs) So, so the reason that this has occurred is because on your letterbox, you have a statement.

Jonny 0:51 No junk mail.

Yusef 0:52 The guy's reply was, "He sh- just shouldn't live in a student area. It wouldn't happen."

Jonny 0:56 That's, that's equivalent to, "She shouldn't have been wearing that."

Chris Williamson 0:58 (laughs)

Yusef 0:58 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 1:04 Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. Jonny and Yusuf from propanefitness.com are here again.

Jonny 1:10 Welcome back.

Chris Williamson 1:10 Catch-up 102. It went so well last time that we're gonna do another one. Just talking about whatever-

Yusef 1:17 Just catching up.

Chris Williamson 1:18 Whatever the, whatever the fudge is going on.

Yusef 1:21 Catching up, catching down, catching cross.

Jonny 1:21 The first thing, the first thing which is going on is for the listeners at home who aren't watching on YouTube, you are missing out. My belated birthday present is adorned across my chest, and it is- Glorious. ... this lovely Soreen t-shirt. You're like the sun being massive-

Yusef 1:37 Plane.

Jonny 1:37 Plane?

Yusef 1:37 Plane.

Jonny 1:39 (laughs)

Yusef 1:41 It's a Soreen t-shirt.

Jonny 1:42 As (laughs) as in-

Yusef 1:43 It's got the logo from the Soreen on it.

Jonny 1:46 (laughs) As in (laughs) airplane?

Yusef 1:47 Yeah. Like (blows raspberry) .

Jonny 1:49 What's that got to do with it?

Yusef 1:50 No, man, because it's a plain Soreen.

Jonny 1:52 Plane.

Yusef 1:52 It's not the chocolate one or the-

Jonny 1:53 Oh, I see.

Yusef 1:53 ... banana one, or-

Chris Williamson 1:53 This could potentially be banana though. It's the same color logo.

Jonny 1:56 It's not. Don't-

Yusef 1:57 It's the same color logo.

Jonny 1:58 Stop kidding yourself, Chris. That is the s- plain Soreen. For anyone that doesn't understand this, Chris's idea of a pre-meal snack-

Yusef 2:07 (laughs)

Jonny 2:07 ... is an entire Soreen malt loaf, w- extremely dense. It's like a, the, the closest thing in food terms to a brick.

Yusef 2:15 (laughs)

Jonny 2:15 And a kilo of yogurt.

Yusef 2:17 Yeah. Could you build a house out of Soreen?

Jonny 2:18 Just dipped in en- ... Oh, yeah, easily.

Chris Williamson 2:19 You'd need to wait-

Yusef 2:20 Quite a lot of compression.

Jonny 2:20 It'd be so-

Chris Williamson 2:20 You'd need to wait for them to, uh, air, wouldn't you? Air out, and then, you know, they'd get bit harder.

Jonny 2:24 They'd be so weatherproof though. Like, it would stand all weather. So-

Yusef 2:27 So does that, that means it's a cake, not a biscuit.

Jonny 2:33 Uh, okay, ca- can-

Chris Williamson 2:34 Biscuits go soft.

Yusef 2:35 Cake's too hard.

Chris Williamson 2:35 Cakes go hard.

Yusef 2:35 Cakes go soft.

Jonny 2:36 So, so the, there's a story that every forensic accountant loves to tell 'cause it's the only ...

Yusef 2:41 Jaffa Cakes.

Jonny 2:41 Yeah.

Yusef 2:42 Yeah.

Jonny 2:42 Can you relay that?

Yusef 2:43 Oh, God, I'll probably get it wrong. So you charge VAT on biscuits, but not cakes because biscuits are seen as a luxury item. Cakes aren't.

Chris Williamson 2:54 Because birthday cake's a necessity.

Yusef 2:56 (laughs)

Jonny 2:56 Because of the Queen. Something to do with the Queen.

Yusef 2:58 I think because cakes used to be made from, um, leftover necessity foods.

Chris Williamson 3:04 Oh, okay.

Yusef 3:04 Whereas biscuits aren't. I think this is right. I'm so sorry if it's wrong.

Jonny 3:07 This is just some, like, artifact of a time gone by?

Yusef 3:10 I'm not at all prepared. Well, it's just the way that foods are classified. So biscuits are ... cakes are ...

Jonny 3:13 Ers, vors are gonna be like, "Uh."

Yusef 3:15 Uh.

Jonny 3:15 "Jonny."

Chris Williamson 3:16 "Jonny."

Yusef 3:16 "Jonny."

Chris Williamson 3:16 "Do not-"

Yusef 3:18 So, Jaffa Cakes were like, like, "Wear, wear a cake, mate. Like don't, we don't pay VAT."

Jonny 3:24 Fuckin' me, yeah.

Yusef 3:25 And then they were subject to the biscuit cake test, which was that biscuits go ...

Jonny 3:31 Soft.

Yusef 3:32 Soft.

Jonny 3:32 When left to their own devices.

Yusef 3:33 Cakes go hard.

Chris Williamson 3:34 And what do they do?

Yusef 3:34 They go hard. So they are cakes.

Chris Williamson 3:36 Unbelievable. So if you can develop a biscuit that goes hard ...

Yusef 3:39 Well, you haven't got a biscuit.

Chris Williamson 3:41 No, but if you can develop a biscuit which gets harder.

Yusef 3:43 Well, then-

Jonny 3:43 Then you've ruined it for the whole of Mancunians.

Yusef 3:44 ... you've ... Well, what you got there, what you got there, C- Chris, is a cake.

Chris Williamson 3:47 (laughs) Well, but by that, by that logic, if you can have something which has the texture of a biscuit-

Yusef 3:52 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 3:53 ... but then goes ... You, you have essentially a-

Yusef 3:56 A cake.

Chris Williamson 3:56 ... a cake masquerading as a biscuit.

Jonny 3:58 Well, thi- this is why Jaffa Cakes, uh, allow themselves to be, to evade the need to be taxable.

Yusef 4:04 I just found a tiny little bit of my birthday cake in my nose there.

Jonny 4:06 On your, on your nose?

Yusef 4:07 On my nose, yeah. I must've got it on your nose.

Chris Williamson 4:08 Oh, I saw that.

Yusef 4:09 Oh, just must've gotten it.

Chris Williamson 4:10 No one, no one decided to-

Yusef 4:11 Sorry. (laughs)

Jonny 4:12 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 4:12 Um, 'cause didn't your ... There's another, another VAT, VAT banter. Um.

Yusef 4:17 Great banter.

Chris Williamson 4:18 Your brother ...

Yusef 4:19 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 4:20 Did, did he try and ask for a bit of pizza heated up in Gregg's?

Jonny 4:24 Oh, yeah. Oh, God.

Yusef 4:25 They can't heat it up because-

Jonny 4:27 Right.

Yusef 4:27 ... then it's battable.

Jonny 4:28 So-

Chris Williamson 4:28 Oh, wow.

Jonny 4:29 So I remember, um ... We're not, we're not sure of the reason. Uh, I'm guessing that's-

Yusef 4:34 I'm guessing as well, yeah.

Jonny 4:35 ... I was driving my brother to the gym, and I, sometimes I have to take care of him. You know, he's, he's, he's, uh, 44. So, um-

Yusef 4:43 (laughs)

Jonny 4:43 So, so I was like, "Right, before we go to the gym, are you hungry?" And he's like, "Oh, I'm starving." I'm like, "Okay, let's, let's just pull into the Gregg's." Went in, and he was like ... And this is, this is him having a, a real problem 'cause he's, he's mo- wrestling with the moralistic attempt to try and be halal, and the fact that he's very hungry.

Chris Williamson 5:03 Surrounded by sausage.

Jonny 5:05 Surrounded by sausage. So, so I was like, "Look, you should get the steak and cheese roll. It's fantastic." He was like, "Mm-mm." I'm like, "Are you ... You're trying to eat halal, aren't you?" And he was like, "Yeah, if I can." And so-

Yusef 5:14 Isn't the way you say ha- halal-

Chris Williamson 5:15 Hallo.

Yusef 5:16 It's like a French person saying croissant.

Jonny 5:17 Croissant, uh, halal-cul-de-sac. Um.

Yusef 5:20 (laughs) Halal.

Jonny 5:21 Go to that, go to that cul-de-sac and just-

Yusef 5:22 Go croissant.

Jonny 5:23 (laughs) The croissant.

Yusef 5:25 Ha- ha- halal, say it.

Jonny 5:26 Halal.

Yusef 5:27 Halal.

Chris Williamson 5:27 Halal.

Jonny 5:28 Yeah, but I'm, I'm still Anglicizing it, but anyway.

Yusef 5:30 I think Chris and I should tr- should learn to try and correctly pronounce sh- shatafa.

Jonny 5:34 You're good with shatafa and arak and-

Yusef 5:36 Arak.

Jonny 5:36 ... Afghanistan.

Yusef 5:37 Arak. A- Afghanistan is, is clumsy.

Jonny 5:40 (laughs)

Yusef 5:40 I just ... Afghanistan.

Jonny 5:41 (laughs) That's it. There it is.

Yusef 5:45 Sha- sha- shatafa.

Jonny 5:47 (laughs) Anyway.

Yusef 5:47 Sorry.

Jonny 5:48 So he was like, "Okay, um, can I have one of those, um, veg, veg roll thing? Veg pastries." And then we were like, "Oh, uh, we haven't got any left." And we're like ... "Okay, can I have the four-cheese pizza?""No, there isn't any." "Uh, okay. Can I have that bit of pizza? But can I have it hot?" And he's like, "No, we- we're kinda heating them up." And I was like, "Well, why not? Can you j- k- is it hot?" "No." "Well, can you just, can you not heat it up?" I mean, uh, I was like, "Look, the steak and cheese rolls are hot." You know.

Yusef 6:23 (laughs)

Jonny 6:23 He's like, "Look, can you just heat..." He's said, "No, because health and safety." And he's like, "Look, I don't care about health and safety. Can you just heat a... I just want to have a hot bit of pizza." And then, "No." He- he's like, (sighs) "Right. Give me a, a toffee Yum Yum and two chocolate eclairs." And so, he, he's then had to go on to his-

Yusef 6:38 Really gone to the other end of the scale, hasn't he? Yeah.

Jonny 6:39 Yeah. So he's had to have his, like, fifth choice down.

Yusef 6:42 Are those haram?

Jonny 6:42 Well, they're not haram, but like-

Yusef 6:43 (laughs)

Jonny 6:43 (laughs)

Yusef 6:43 Even that. Haram. Haram.

Jonny 6:45 Th- so there's halal-

Yusef 6:47 Haram.

Jonny 6:47 ... haram, and makruh.

Yusef 6:49 (laughs)

Jonny 6:49 So- Oh my God. (laughs) What's the middle one? It's makruh. It's gonna, this is, it's gonna look great.

Yusef 6:54 Makruh.

Jonny 6:54 "No, don't worry, habibi. It's makruh."

Yusef 6:59 (laughs)

Jonny 7:03 (laughs) So-

Yusef 7:03 What is, what is makruh?

Jonny 7:05 It's like, tax-

Yusef 7:06 Bit shit.

Jonny 7:07 ... tax evasion ro- ... Tax avoidance, rather than tax evasion.

Yusef 7:10 Okay.

Jonny 7:11 So-

Yusef 7:11 Okay. (laughs) So, so sausage? Once-

Jonny 7:13 Yeah.

Yusef 7:13 ... once was in a farm with a pig, but isn't a pig.

Jonny 7:16 Yeah, exactly.

Yusef 7:16 Can you, can you define haram? Haram?

Jonny 7:19 Just forbidden.

Yusef 7:20 Forbidden. And then-

Jonny 7:20 Verboten in, in, uh, Germany.

Yusef 7:23 Makruh.

Jonny 7:23 In Germany.

Yusef 7:23 Ve- ve- (laughs)

Jonny 7:24 Du bist verboten is, uh-

Yusef 7:27 What's du bist?

Jonny 7:28 You are forbidden.

Yusef 7:29 All right.

Jonny 7:29 Um, so-

Yusef 7:30 No, pork is bad.

Jonny 7:31 (laughs) So, um, he's, he's then in the car stuffing in three creamy, chocolaty treats that he really didn't want-

Yusef 7:38 (laughs)

Jonny 7:39 ... because they're fifth choice down. Because he'd scuppered himself into having... Basically, "I'm hungry, but I have three constraints. I want it to be from Greggs, hot, and halal."

Yusef 7:49 Pizza.

Jonny 7:50 And-

Yusef 7:50 That bit of pizza.

Jonny 7:50 And that bit of pizza. (laughs)

Yusef 7:54 (laughs)

Jonny 7:55 So, the, the same Greggs apparently has this, like... 'Cause it's on quite a rough street, it's on Shield's Road.

Yusef 8:01 (clears throat)

Jonny 8:01 And apparently, um, there's a guy that comes in and just nicks stuff. And quite often he'll come in, uh, this was Alex. So he was saying that, um, he was in there in the queue, and this guy ran in and took a tray of pastries and just ran out. And all the staff just went (sighs) like, as if like, "Oh, not again."

Yusef 8:17 Oh, no.

Jonny 8:19 (laughs)

Yusef 8:19 (laughs)

Jonny 8:20 He's like, this is a frequent occurrence.

Yusef 8:21 You know what they need? Security.

Jonny 8:23 Yeah.

Yusef 8:23 Yeah.

Jonny 8:23 But then, uh, is it worth the paying the security man-

Yusef 8:29 Yeah, what's the security guy's hourly rate?

Jonny 8:30 Hourly rate.

Yusef 8:30 What's the, well, what's the total cost of production of that tray-

Jonny 8:34 Tray.

Yusef 8:34 Not very much. ... of like four by six pastries?

Jonny 8:36 It'd be like... 'Cause it'll cost, what, 80p each or a pound each, so-

Yusef 8:38 Yeah.

Jonny 8:39 ... even if there's 20 on that-

Yusef 8:40 RRP.

Jonny 8:41 RRP.

Yusef 8:42 RRR-RRP.

Jonny 8:44 Webinar.

Yusef 8:45 Can we talk about the time when... Can I tell my story?

Jonny 8:48 Oh, yes.

Yusef 8:48 Yeah, of course you can, man. This is a great story.

Jonny 8:50 Yes.

Yusef 8:51 Okay, so today, or a while ago in podcast land. Yeah. Um, I was walking from my car to Costa Coffee. I won't say where in case anyone tries to follow me, but somewhere in Newcastle. And as I'm walking, this is gonna kinda give it away a little bit. So I'm walking past an EE shop, EE phone shop, right? Standing at the door of the EE phone shop is a fairly well-muscled man. Um, looking frustrated because EE isn't open yet, right? So I noticed this. AirPods in, actually listening to, uh, Catch Up 101, so this is very meta. Mm-hmm. (laughs) Yeah. Um, and I, I saw him see me, and then just, like, missile lock onto me and follow me along. And I noticed, and he like, like side eyeing. Like, okay. Side eyeing again. He's still doing it. Like, "Oh, what the hell." Um, 'cause I did get started when I'm at the petrol station that time.

Jonny 9:50 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 9:51 Remember?

Jonny 9:51 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 9:51 So I'm just always, you know, whene- whenever I'm around cars. Then see him turn round and run back towards a white van. I'm like, "Okay."

Jonny 10:01 Hmm?

Yusef 10:02 Walk into Costa.

Jonny 10:03 Hmm.

Yusef 10:03 Order my decaf, of course, coffee.

Jonny 10:06 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 10:06 See him then run back towards Costa, come into Costa. And as he comes round the, the door, I notice that he's got a handful of protein bars. So I'm like, "Okay." He's got a T-shirt that says Oteen on it. I was like, (sighs) (laughs) like, "If this guy's coming to attack me, this is a very convoluted way of attacking someone." So then he's like, "Hi, mate. Listen to the podcast," et cetera. All the, all these nice things.

Jonny 10:34 Say I love how there's just this fake ... Familiar with modern wisdom, et cetera. Um, got talking about, um, the protein bars that he was giving me to try and things like this.Um, and then he said, um, "Actually, your, your mate, your business partner, the guy with a beard, um, I was trying, I was putting a, uh, a, a leaflet, promotional leaflet through his door." Mm-hmm.

Yusef 10:56 "He, he was sat in the window. And he got up and he banged on the window and went, 'What are you doing, mate?'"

Jonny 11:01 (laughs)

Yusef 11:02 (laughs) Did this actually happen?

Jonny 11:04 Yeah.

Yusef 11:05 Yeah. (laughs)

Jonny 11:07 (laughs)

Yusef 11:07 (laughs)

Jonny 11:09 Do you know what? I, I feel like, I feel like when I'm sat at my desk, I'm having to like, defend-

Yusef 11:14 Ward off.

Jonny 11:15 ... d- d- yeah.

Yusef 11:15 (laughs)

Jonny 11:16 So quite often people will bring their dog into, into the little bit for my front door and try and make it poo.

Yusef 11:21 And just have them bark at you?

Jonny 11:22 No, exactly.

Yusef 11:22 Oh, really?

Jonny 11:23 Poop their dog. I'm not gon- I'm like-

Yusef 11:24 Poop their dog?

Jonny 11:25 Yeah. It's like, 'cause even if they pick it up, there's still bits of poo print on-

Yusef 11:29 Residual floor poo.

Jonny 11:30 Yeah. Oh, so you-

Yusef 11:32 I j- I just loved, I loved how long-winded that experience was for me, for a scurvy problem that happened.

Jonny 11:37 Yeah. (laughs)

Yusef 11:38 So- So- ... the reason that this has occurred is because on your letterbox you have a statement.

Jonny 11:43 No junk mail.

Yusef 11:44 The guy's reply was, "He sh- just shouldn't live in a student area. It wouldn't happen."

Jonny 11:49 That's, that's equivalent to, "She shouldn't have been wearing that."

Yusef 11:54 Oh. (laughs)

Jonny 11:56 (Laughs) That, that man is, is encouraging-

Yusef 11:58 You can feel it, like.

Jonny 11:59 He's encouraging rape culture.

Yusef 12:01 (laughs)

Jonny 12:01 And I think that's a, uh, reprehensible... Not, not really. Thank you for the attempt at the Oteen bar.

Yusef 12:06 (laughs)

Jonny 12:06 Uh, sorry for any offense caused. Um-

Yusef 12:08 So he wa- so actually he, he then went on to say that part of the reason why he now has a bar-based strategy-

Chris Williamson 12:14 ... rather than a leaflet base-

Jonny 12:14 A bar is a mu- much better-

Chris Williamson 12:16 ... these space strategies because of (laughs) experiences like that.

Jonny 12:18 Oh, mate, if, if you had a bar and you approached the door-

Chris Williamson 12:21 Bar.

Jonny 12:22 A, a bar, then I'd-

Chris Williamson 12:23 You're gonna have to have-

Jonny 12:23 ... I'd welcome you with open arms, I view.

Chris Williamson 12:25 You're gonna have to have an asterisk now that's like-

Jonny 12:27 Accept free gifts.

Chris Williamson 12:28 ... "No junk mail."

Yusef 12:28 Items of value are accepted.

Chris Williamson 12:30 Yeah, "Minimum, minimum cash value equals 25 pence or above." So you would assume-

Yusef 12:35 You would accept anything with a cash value, wouldn't you?

Jonny 12:38 No, 'cause-

Yusef 12:39 'Cause PayPal has a cash value.

Jonny 12:40 Yeah, and then you end up with a bunch of-

Yusef 12:42 What about anything that was cash value-

Jonny 12:44 ... be- be-

Yusef 12:44 ... over a quid?

Jonny 12:44 'Cause the ball ache of trying to f- find a market liquidity for that and sell it is, is a problem.

Yusef 12:49 (laughs)

Jonny 12:49 What, what I love about your story is the instant frame shift from threat, big dude locking onto me-

Chris Williamson 12:56 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 12:57 ... to put a protein bar in his hand. Same situation and it's suddenly, "Ah."

Yusef 13:01 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 13:01 Great. Body power.

Yusef 13:02 If he hadn't been wearing the T-shirt as well-

Jonny 13:04 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 13:05 ... I was like, "Oh, yeah." 'Cause protein bar, like, maybe he needs a, a mid beat-up Johnny snack.

Chris Williamson 13:10 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 13:11 Oh, yeah, that's far.

Chris Williamson 13:12 So, I mean, what-

Jonny 13:12 Because then you've got an energized man who's had his, he's had, he's been fueled with his protein bar-

Chris Williamson 13:15 Had his collagen.

Yusef 13:16 Yeah, exactly.

Jonny 13:16 He's had his collagen, yeah.

Chris Williamson 13:18 Um, I thought that your initial concern was gonna be that you might be abducted and put into the white van. But I challenge anyone out there to move you to anywhere that you don't want to be.

Yusef 13:31 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 13:31 Because you, you are-

Jonny 13:31 Especially in a wide stance.

Chris Williamson 13:33 Yeah.

Jonny 13:33 Like, there's just nothing.

Yusef 13:34 I think if I, especially-

Chris Williamson 13:35 So braced.

Yusef 13:36 I think if I, if, like, if I was just lay there and he tried to move me.

Chris Williamson 13:41 (laughs)

Yusef 13:41 But I think if I, if I'm trying to stop him from moving me, it's-

Jonny 13:44 Like, even this.

Yusef 13:45 It's certainly not gonna be easy for him.

Chris Williamson 13:47 No. Not at all.

Jonny 13:48 Mm-mm.

Yusef 13:48 So, 'cause I hadn't had my coffee. Either I'd ordered the coffee, I'd paid for the coffee and I hadn't had it yet.

Jonny 13:52 Oh.

Yusef 13:52 So he tries to take me away then.

Chris Williamson 13:53 Did he give you an Oteen bar in a coffee shop that sells essentially Oteen bars? Like, flapjacks and stuff.

Yusef 13:59 Yeah. And the, the woman was-

Chris Williamson 14:02 Ballsy of her.

Yusef 14:02 ... sort of, like, trying to complete the transaction with me, and I was dealing with Mr. Oteen.

Chris Williamson 14:06 Mediating.

Yusef 14:07 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 14:07 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 14:08 I mean, it was a nice guy. Nice of him to give us stuff, listens to this podcast, probably listens to this.

Chris Williamson 14:13 Fantastic. Shout out.

Yusef 14:14 So, yeah.

Chris Williamson 14:14 Give us some Oteen bars (inaudible 00:02:42) .

Yusef 14:15 Wanted... So he, he wanted you to, to promote. I said, "I didn't know what your affiliations were."

Chris Williamson 14:21 Yeah.

Yusef 14:21 Said, "I don't get involved in this."

Chris Williamson 14:22 When the, the, the problem-

Yusef 14:23 But happily.

Chris Williamson 14:23 The problem is that anyone who's had an Oteen bar knows why they're doing this much promo.

Yusef 14:30 So you just had anti-promo there. Sorry about that (laughs) .

Chris Williamson 14:32 Well, look, I'm giving a balanced-

Yusef 14:34 So I-

Chris Williamson 14:34 I'm giving-

Yusef 14:34 So I actually... And I'm not, I promise I'm not affiliated in any way. I was actually quite impressed.

Chris Williamson 14:39 Okay.

Yusef 14:39 I had a brownie and a, a protein bar.

Chris Williamson 14:43 I might not have-

Yusef 14:43 And that was, I was quite impressed.

Chris Williamson 14:44 Might not have tried the rest of them.

Yusef 14:45 They're from Whitley Bay.

Jonny 14:47 They, I've, I've never had them, can't comment. But-

Chris Williamson 14:50 They might be haraam.

Jonny 14:51 The, yeah, if they're pig flavor.

Chris Williamson 14:53 (laughs)

Yusef 14:53 Poor them. Well, it can be pig flavor. That's okay.

Jonny 14:57 That's true. Well, smoky bacon flavored crisps are totally halal, but-

Chris Williamson 15:01 (laughs)

Jonny 15:02 Cheese, cheese-

Chris Williamson 15:03 Halal.

Jonny 15:03 ... and onion apparently are not.

Chris Williamson 15:05 Why?

Yusef 15:06 What the fuck?

Jonny 15:06 Well, they didn't, didn't used to be. They used animal rennet in them.

Chris Williamson 15:08 Rennet?

Yusef 15:09 Oh.

Jonny 15:09 Like, the, the scooping from the stomach of, of an animal, of a cow.

Chris Williamson 15:14 Hang on. So-

Yusef 15:15 (laughs) What the fuck? Scooping?

Chris Williamson 15:17 But the cows, the cows only eat grass.

Jonny 15:20 Yeah.

Yusef 15:20 Now, that's halal.

Chris Williamson 15:21 And the grass is fine.

Yusef 15:22 That's halal.

Jonny 15:23 So I'm gonna think of an analogy for-

Yusef 15:25 (laughs)

Jonny 15:26 So that means-

Chris Williamson 15:26 Is it, like, hydrolyzed whey?

Jonny 15:27 I mean, driving your car is totally natural because the, the oil, the petrol is from the oil which is from-

Yusef 15:33 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 15:33 Yeah, okay, yeah.

Jonny 15:34 ... the ground, it's from the rocks and trees and-

Yusef 15:35 Well, no, 'cause it-

Jonny 15:36 See, cars run on trees. It's, it's all-

Yusef 15:39 So it, if-

Jonny 15:39 What were the hippies worried about?

Yusef 15:40 So the, the, the rennet-

Jonny 15:42 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 15:43 ... is not halal?

Chris Williamson 15:44 (laughs)

Yusef 15:45 Because the cow's not halal.

Jonny 15:49 Yeah.

Yusef 15:50 But the cow's alive.

Jonny 15:52 Well, they have to kill the cow.

Chris Williamson 15:54 To get the rennet.

Yusef 15:55 Do they? Right. They don't just-

Jonny 15:56 They do a medical procedure on the-

Yusef 15:57 ... go in with it and scoop? Right, got it.

Chris Williamson 15:58 Like an ice cream, a big ice cream scoop.

Yusef 15:59 So if it was a halal cow-

Jonny 16:01 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 16:02 ... is that just like-

Jonny 16:02 If it was a halal cow, then fine.

Yusef 16:03 ... turns it upside down, cut, cut its throat.

Chris Williamson 16:05 Then rennet.

Jonny 16:05 Yeah.

Yusef 16:06 Then you get the rennet.

Chris Williamson 16:07 Fantastic. I, I went to Rome.

Jonny 16:09 Yeah. Tell us about Rome.

Yusef 16:10 He didn't use the phrase, "When in Rome."

Chris Williamson 16:12 I didn't do it once.

Yusef 16:13 I even said to him-

Chris Williamson 16:14 Didn't even-

Yusef 16:14 ... while he was there, "Make sure you use the phrase-"

Jonny 16:16 At every opportunity.

Yusef 16:17 "... well, when in Rome."

Chris Williamson 16:18 Didn't use it once.

Jonny 16:18 Would, would, would your company have understood the reference?

Yusef 16:24 No.

Chris Williamson 16:24 It's a really complex reference.

Jonny 16:26 Well, I-

Chris Williamson 16:26 Icelandic, Icelandic people probably don't-

Yusef 16:27 Oh, right.

Chris Williamson 16:27 ... probably don't understand the reference as well.

Yusef 16:29 They just want Crop.

Jonny 16:29 Yeah, they, they only have when in Reykjavík, when eating Crop.

Chris Williamson 16:32 Yeah, exactly.

Jonny 16:33 And, um-

Chris Williamson 16:33 When having skyr.

Jonny 16:35 (laughs) Is skyr how you say it?

Yusef 16:36 Ah, skyr.

Chris Williamson 16:36 Skyr, I don't know.

Yusef 16:37 Ah.

Chris Williamson 16:37 Can you believe-

Yusef 16:38 That's (inaudible 00:04:56) .

Chris Williamson 16:38 Can we, can we please just divert for a second to, uh, work out how the fuck a company managed to own the word skyr in the UK?

Jonny 16:47 It's amazing.

Yusef 16:48 Arlo.

Chris Williamson 16:49 Arlo.

Jonny 16:50 Arla?

Chris Williamson 16:50 Own, Arlo, own skyr.

Yusef 16:52 Skyr. And it's shit compared to actual skyr.

Chris Williamson 16:54 Amazing.

Yusef 16:54 Remember how animated I got about that?

Chris Williamson 16:56 Anyone who doesn't know what skyr is, it's, it's, like, very thick yogurt. Um, and it-

Yusef 17:01 Chris, it's more than that.

Chris Williamson 17:02 It is more than yogurt.

Yusef 17:03 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 17:03 I, yeah, I've done it a disservice. I apologize. Um, but, yeah, I went to Rome and to anyone who's considering going and hasn't been, it's fucking mint.

Yusef 17:10 Lush.

Chris Williamson 17:11 So good. Like, just sensory overload. Couldn't... There was... I don't have enough mental RAM to be able to take in all of the stuff that was going on. I'll send video guy, Dean, some photos so that you can see some of the cool shit that I saw while I was there.

Yusef 17:24 Did you have a cappuccino?

Chris Williamson 17:26 I had shit loads of coffee. We were up at-

Yusef 17:30 Better than you, better than you thought? Same as?

Chris Williamson 17:32 So had t-... This was, this was a, a bad bit of the experience. So I decided that I was gonna go, like, as phone free as possible for the entirety of the trip, so phone didn't go out with me on any of the, the trips. Other people had, uh, like, phones or whatever for recording shit. And, um, yeah, left my phone at home. And I decided as well when I got off the train that I was going to find my way to the hotel, like, old school style.

Yusef 17:58 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 17:58 I was the first one to get to the hotel, so I didn't... I was like, "Oh, I can take as long as I want." Um, walked the wrong direction immediately, straight out of the train station. Got off on the wrong side of the platform, walked the wrong way.

Yusef 18:08 Oh, my God. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 18:10 (laughs) It was a bad start. And then I was like, "Oh, I'm a little bit tired. Early flight." So I was like, "I'll get myself an espresso," and I'm just, like, totally-... blown away by these high stone street (laughs) old, old, like, um, Italian buildings.

Jonny 18:24 Just off your nut on Italian coffee. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 18:25 Well, the, the, the, this, it comes to this next bit. So I, I order this coffee. Go in, go into this little cafe bar thing, pretty cool, um, order a espresso, €1.

Jonny 18:36 Wow.

Chris Williamson 18:36 €1 for an espresso. So like, what, 85p probably-

Jonny 18:39 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 18:39 ... something like that. I was like, "I am gonna really enjoy it here." 85p for an espresso, and I'm just looking out the window 'cause I can see, uh, the top of, uh, St. Peter's Basilica, the Sistine Chapel and all that sort of bollocks over the far side. And I've put a small amount of sugar in just to sweeten it. And I'm just, like, stirring as I'm looking out the window, stirring, stirring away, still stirring looking out the window. Look back down and I had managed to get all of the espresso-

Jonny 19:06 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 19:06 ... out of the cup and onto the counter. It was just on the top of the counter. It's on some of the sandwiches that were behind the counter.

Jonny 19:15 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 19:15 It's on the front of the, the slanted front of the glass counter now dribbling down towards my leg.

Jonny 19:20 Oh my God.

Chris Williamson 19:21 And the owner, who was over the far side, and the waitress were just-

Jonny 19:24 Was like, "Mamma mia." (laughs)

19:26 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 19:26 ... were just, were just, they were, they were just looking at me. Like, no one warned me.

Jonny 19:29 Italiano.

Chris Williamson 19:30 No one war-

Jonny 19:30 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 19:30 No one warned me that as I was doing this, I was just sloshing, like-

Jonny 19:33 They were just aghast, just in shock.

Chris Williamson 19:35 They c- couldn't believe it and then th-

Jonny 19:37 "Ingleseo." (laughs)

Chris Williamson 19:38 The owner, (laughs) the owner actually just put his head in his hand and just went like, "Uh."

Jonny 19:42 Grisgris.

Chris Williamson 19:43 And was like, "Oh."

Jonny 19:45 What? That, that, that's, that's Italian fury, isn't it? When, you know-

Chris Williamson 19:47 Yeah, yeah.

Jonny 19:47 ... oh, man, I've, he's gonna cause-

Chris Williamson 19:49 He's so angry.

Jonny 19:49 ... Sicilian mating aren't they? Sicilian mafia, yeah.

Chris Williamson 19:52 And then I saw a man, I saw a man, so it was about 2:30 in the afternoon, saw a man come in, order a large glass of red wine, say, "Grazie" to the people that were in there, down it, walk out.

Jonny 20:03 Fucking brilliant.

Chris Williamson 20:04 It's like Italians have a-

Jonny 20:06 So did he have-

Chris Williamson 20:06 ... fucking mint life.

Jonny 20:06 Was it mid this ti- this during the week?

Chris Williamson 20:09 On a Thursday. Thursday-

Jonny 20:10 Excellent.

Chris Williamson 20:11 ... two in the afternoon.

Jonny 20:11 We just live in the wrong place.

Chris Williamson 20:13 It was wonder. Like, I'm sure-

Jonny 20:13 We just live in the wrong country.

Chris Williamson 20:14 Is that what it is? Are, di- did we talk about this last time where you walk into, like, a Marks & Spencer on a Tuesday morning and, like-

Jonny 20:20 There's loads of people there.

Chris Williamson 20:21 Yeah.

Jonny 20:21 So I think if you walk into a, whatever the equivalent is in Rome-

Chris Williamson 20:24 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 20:24 ... everyone's just sloshing-

Chris Williamson 20:26 Just shilling.

Jonny 20:26 ... paninis and-

Chris Williamson 20:27 Fucking knackered. Yeah.

Jonny 20:28 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 20:28 So, but it was-

Jonny 20:29 Having lots of very expensive pastry.

Chris Williamson 20:31 It was, ugh, yeah, lots of pastries.

Jonny 20:32 Not worth it.

Chris Williamson 20:32 So there's the big, the, the three Ps, big, big three Ps. Uh, pizza, pasta, pastries, like-

Jonny 20:38 No penis? (laughs)

Chris Williamson 20:40 No penis.

Jonny 20:40 No penis, no poo?

Chris Williamson 20:41 No, neither. Thankfully. Although, there may be. Uh, need to do a stool sample.

Jonny 20:46 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 20:46 Um, but ye- like, I, the one thing that I wasn't aware, like, prepared for was the assault of gluten. Like, it is unrelenting. Everything is carbs. Like, you think that you're actually having chicken, but it's just, like, chicken shaped dough.

Jonny 21:02 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 21:03 (laughs)

Jonny 21:03 Oh, and they make it nicer by just putting fat and garlic-

Chris Williamson 21:06 (laughs)

Jonny 21:06 ... on everything, don't they? It's bread, fat, and garlic. (laughs) That's just Italy.

Chris Williamson 21:11 Went to a place-

Jonny 21:12 And you're having coffee.

Chris Williamson 21:13 Went to a place near Sorrento, uh, down on the Amalfi Coast just down from Pompeii, which was a Sunday, beautiful drive, um, and went to a pizzeria where you buy pizza by the meter.

Jonny 21:24 Oh my God. Those places are incredible.

Chris Williamson 21:26 Legit. So they bring in, what I can-

Jonny 21:28 Meter square?

Chris Williamson 21:29 No. So it's what I can only describe as a s-

Jonny 21:31 Fuckin' hell. Oh, it's like a, like a track run.

Chris Williamson 21:32 ... as a stretcher.

Jonny 21:33 Yeah, no.

Chris Williamson 21:33 So this guy has a three meter long flat bit of wood. Some guy feeds it in from behind, and there's all this scaffolding. If you can imagine it, it's, like, clumping down on this scaffolding as it gets slid towards him.

Jonny 21:47 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 21:47 Then he gets, like, some of the flour, throws it on, rubs it in, gets some of the dough, like, whizzes it round, plonks it on. And then just to segment where one flavor of the pizza finishes and another one begins-

Jonny 21:59 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 22:00 ... he just adds some more dough, rolls up some dough, strings it on, like, creates a little barrier, little bread barrier.

Jonny 22:06 (laughs) .

Chris Williamson 22:06 And then throws some toppings on that bit, some toppings on that bit, hides it in the oven. And then it, it comes out, and if you're eating from end to end, you and the other person have to shout to speak to each other because you're fucking miles apart.

Jonny 22:18 Wow.

Chris Williamson 22:19 But the, man, it was, like, unbelievable. Like, very, very impressive-

Jonny 22:23 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 22:24 ... place. And, like, €9 for a pizza and €10 for pasta.

Jonny 22:30 So I, I went to Rome, I think, two years ago and Venice a year ago.

Chris Williamson 22:36 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 22:37 Rome, brilliant. Venice, just tourism, central.

Chris Williamson 22:41 Is it quite dirty?

Jonny 22:42 Yeah. Really disappointing, Venice, I thought.

Chris Williamson 22:45 I wanna go, I want, I wanna go to Florence with my mum later this year. That's like the other big Italy one.

Jonny 22:50 I went there, I went there, like, 10 years ago.

Chris Williamson 22:53 (laughs)

Jonny 22:53 Long time ago, but it's, that's nice.

Chris Williamson 22:54 No.

Jonny 22:55 It- Italy's nice.

Chris Williamson 22:56 You don't have any bum hair, do you?

Jonny 22:58 No.

Chris Williamson 22:59 (laughs)

Jonny 22:59 (laughs)

23:01 So, who ... So someone suggested, was it, a lye pack?

Chris Williamson 23:05 (laughs)

Jonny 23:06 The most-

Chris Williamson 23:07 Johnny's gone.

Jonny 23:07 That, that, that's-

Chris Williamson 23:08 Johnny's gone. (laughs)

Jonny 23:09 It's just-

Chris Williamson 23:10 It's like you're on a train.

Jonny 23:10 The delivery of that question, Chris, was, was honestly artistic. Like, I, I can't believe-

23:16 You're on a train and if someone was to pull the hand brake-

23:18 And the way you reacted to it as well. It was no shock. It was, "You don't have any bum hair, do you?" "No, I don't."

23:24 (laughs)

23:25 Brilliant.

Chris Williamson 23:26 Um, yeah, so me and Daniel Sloss were talking about our individual strategies for how we-

Jonny 23:31 Anus hair.

Chris Williamson 23:32 ... sh- shave down there.

Jonny 23:34 Okay.

Chris Williamson 23:34 Um, and we, I came up with the shame squat, which is pretty correct also a, uh, biomechanically very good position to poo in as well.

Jonny 23:44 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 23:45 Isn't it?

Jonny 23:45 Deadly.

Chris Williamson 23:45 Unkinking the sphincter.

Jonny 23:46 Unkink rec- rec- uh, rectum. Yeah. 100%. This i- this is... So there's a product called the Squatty Potty. Just (clicks tongue) . Which, um, yeah, if you, if you struggle with poos, you can buy it. It fits in a U-shape around your toilet and it basically allows you to sit in a squat position.

Chris Williamson 24:03 What's different ... What is the difference between that and what five-year-olds use to help them reach the toilet?

Jonny 24:11 Oh, it's the same, but-

Chris Williamson 24:12 (laughs)

Jonny 24:13 ... but because, because five... You could buy one of them. But because five-year-olds have ... They're smaller, their hips are in more extension.

Chris Williamson 24:19 You would need to be, your feet would need to be in front of you, right? You couldn't be... No, my point is that a five-year-old-

Jonny 24:23 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 24:23 ... steps up to wee forward.

Yusef 24:25 But, so that's just a little step in front of the toilet.

Chris Williamson 24:27 Oh, okay.

Yusef 24:28 This is a full ring.

Chris Williamson 24:30 So you need to be able to go narrow.

Yusef 24:31 It's like a pregnancy pillow.

Chris Williamson 24:31 You need to be able to squat.

Yusef 24:32 Preg- it's a pregnancy pillow, but around a toilet.

Jonny 24:34 It... yeah. Now it is.

Chris Williamson 24:34 You need to be able to squat narrow to be able to do that.

Jonny 24:36 You could maybe even use your pregnancy pillow to double up. Wouldn't recommend it, if you were gonna do that.

Chris Williamson 24:40 I'm gonna t- I'm gonna talk about my upgraded pregnancy pillow in a second.

Yusef 24:42 Don't want to p- on the pillow?

Jonny 24:43 No.

Chris Williamson 24:44 Yeah.

Yusef 24:44 I wouldn't do that.

Chris Williamson 24:45 Um, yeah. So, Daniel Sloss, episode, shame squat, shaving bum hole, nether regions.

Yusef 24:50 How did we get on to that?

Chris Williamson 24:52 He hasn't got... He hasn't got any... He hasn't got any bum hair.

Yusef 24:55 I know you said quit-

Jonny 24:56 We're talking about-

Yusef 24:57 Recently-

Jonny 24:57 We used to be able to meet it, and then suddenly-

Chris Williamson 24:58 Hang on. (laughs)

Yusef 24:59 No bum hair. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 24:59 Hang on. We're... We're... We're... I've got a trajectory here.

Yusef 25:02 Hold on.

Chris Williamson 25:03 It's towards-

Yusef 25:03 Hold on. How long have you not had bum hair for?

Jonny 25:06 It... Probably years.

Chris Williamson 25:07 No, but, like, recently, how long has it been very, very-

Jonny 25:10 Oh, r- v- acutely, four days.

Chris Williamson 25:13 So, it's timely. This is a timely topic.

Yusef 25:15 Right.

Jonny 25:15 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 25:16 Okay.

Yusef 25:16 And did you do it with a razor, or-

Chris Williamson 25:17 Wait. Wait. You're jumping ahead. Stop it. Stop it. You're ruining it. Me and Daniel Sloss, shame squat, we said that you have to work yourself up, because anyone who's ever used an electric razor, like even a normal, normal electric razor down there-

Yusef 25:31 Mm.

Chris Williamson 25:31 Like, your scrotum is, uh-

Jonny 25:35 It's corrugated.

Chris Williamson 25:35 ... crinkly. It's... It's a... The fact that it's crinkly.

Yusef 25:39 Mm.

Chris Williamson 25:39 Like, it's just built to get nicked by stuff.

Yusef 25:42 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 25:42 And fuck, like, it's so painful. And when it happens and... What do you do? Do you stop? Do you keep going? You're like, "Oh, I've done half of it." Look like a man... Alan Shearer, before he accepted that he was going bald.

Jonny 25:55 (laughs)

Yusef 25:56 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 25:56 Alan, mate, honestly, what's this?

Jonny 25:59 Uh, the island.

Chris Williamson 26:01 Do you know what I mean? That. Just there.

Jonny 26:04 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 26:04 Um, so... And you... Uh, so we posted it. I've... I've talked about this online. Someone tweeted me and said-

Jonny 26:11 So, Daniel used... just shaves in, in the squat.

Chris Williamson 26:12 Daniel just shaves, same as... same as me. Shame squat. And someone tweeted and said, @Daniel, @Chris, "You're both amateurs. Uh, Veet Sensitive Hair Removal Cream." I mentioned it once to Youssef when we went to the sauna on Sunday, and he said...

Jonny 26:27 Uh, yeah. So next Asda order, online, fully recommended. Never go back to a supermarket again. Never have to buy the Veet Sensitive in front of other people.

Chris Williamson 26:38 (laughs)

Jonny 26:38 Um, just talk about it on- online, um, publicly.

Chris Williamson 26:42 (laughs)

Yusef 26:42 (laughs)

Jonny 26:43 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 26:43 So all of those people have free unlimited access to it.

Jonny 26:45 Yeah. Um, but I would highly recommend for anyone, for health, hygiene, speed, uh, if you're a, you know, speed swimmer, speed runner, um-

Chris Williamson 26:57 What, the aerodynamic efficiency?

Jonny 26:58 Yeah, exactly. Just the whoo.

Yusef 27:00 Aeros go.

Jonny 27:01 Um, and just general quality of life. So-

Chris Williamson 27:05 And... But... Was it... Was it... Was there any... How was the discomfort, 'cause it was a tiny little bit of-

Jonny 27:09 None.

Chris Williamson 27:09 None?

Jonny 27:09 None whatsoever. So-

Yusef 27:10 I imagine it burns. That's in my mind.

Jonny 27:12 So... So... It... As... Yeah. I think it's important to get the Veet sensitive. I've not tried the Veet normal, so I can't-

Yusef 27:17 Veet Pro.

Jonny 27:18 Yeah, but-

Chris Williamson 27:19 'Cause last time we were talking about Listerine, and about the original.

Jonny 27:23 Oh, the-

Chris Williamson 27:23 I actually quite like the Listerine that makes me go like, (gasps) .

Yusef 27:27 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 27:27 I don't think that-

Yusef 27:28 Wakes you up in the night.

Chris Williamson 27:28 ... the same can be said for being woken up by bum rash.

Jonny 27:33 Yeah. Well, the... I mean, the... As they say on the packet, you should test on a innocuous bit of skin first, make sure there's no allergy, make sure there's no reaction.

Chris Williamson 27:41 What was the innocuous bit of skin you chose?

Jonny 27:42 I... I didn't, because I've used other... I've used previous hard-core Veet before, so.

Chris Williamson 27:48 (sighs) That's true, yeah.

Jonny 27:48 Um, but... But you're right, like, it could have changed the formula and then-

Yusef 27:50 Right on the bum.

Jonny 27:51 (laughs) That's it.

Yusef 27:52 Is it estrogenic?

Jonny 27:54 Uh, probably.

Chris Williamson 27:55 Probably very, isn't it?

Jonny 27:55 'Cause it's perfumed, and so if you don't know what we're talking about, read a recent article on Propane about BPA and estrogens in the environment. Terrifying article. Basically, we're being poisoned left, right and center.

Yusef 28:09 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 28:09 Well, I mean, you... you would never need Veet, would you?

Yusef 28:12 Not for that.

Chris Williamson 28:12 Because you are completely hairless below the bottom lip.

Yusef 28:16 Hairless, yeah.

Jonny 28:16 From the bottom lip? Oh, yeah.

Chris Williamson 28:18 Yeah. Yeah.

Yusef 28:19 Yeah. I am, I... I think fortunate.

Chris Williamson 28:21 Mm. I mean, credit where credit is due.

Yusef 28:22 I don't have much to manage.

Jonny 28:23 I... Like, I'm fortunate-

Yusef 28:24 You're... You're very hairy, aren't you?

Jonny 28:25 Yeah, but in my family-

Chris Williamson 28:26 Not for an Arab.

Jonny 28:27 In my family, I'm the least hairy. My brother, y- you know the horrible bits of hair that you get, like-

Chris Williamson 28:32 Coming down the back of your neck?

Jonny 28:33 Yeah. He... That's just continuous with his back. And then he's in Greggs, and the guy in Greggs is like, "Why have you... Why have you got such a hairy back?" And he's like, "Look, I just give you the hottest bit of the pizza."

Yusef 28:41 He's like, "I just want that fucking bit of pizza."

Chris Williamson 28:42 Yeah.

Jonny 28:43 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 28:44 Man.

Jonny 28:44 So.

Chris Williamson 28:46 Um, what have we been watching on Netflix recently? We were sat talking about something.

Yusef 28:50 Ah. Aha.

Chris Williamson 28:52 Here we go.

Jonny 28:53 Oh, Flat Earth.

Yusef 28:53 Flat Earther.

Chris Williamson 28:54 I watch Flat Earth.

Yusef 28:55 Oh, yes.

Chris Williamson 28:55 Did you watch it?

Yusef 28:56 I knew you'd seen something.

Jonny 28:57 I watched a bit of it.

Yusef 28:58 You fucking said that you hadn't watched anything.

Jonny 28:59 Well, that was... Yeah, it was... it was back when we'd done the... When we were-

Chris Williamson 29:02 Right. Okay.

Jonny 29:03 In the... When we were in the magical time warp of-

Chris Williamson 29:05 Podcast land, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, cool. Um, yeah.

Jonny 29:08 What's it called?

Yusef 29:08 Are you a Flat Earther?

Chris Williamson 29:09 Believe the dome or something. Leave the dome.

Jonny 29:12 I was keen to become a Flat Earther. I... I was like, "Look, I'm really willing."

Yusef 29:15 This is exactly the sort of thing you would believe in.

Jonny 29:17 Like, Socratically, I'm ready to, like... to peel apart all of my beliefs and be like, "Right, is there a convincing argument?" But the problem is they haven't.

Chris Williamson 29:23 It's like a... (laughs)

Yusef 29:26 (laughs) It's like a what? (laughs)

Chris Williamson 29:30 You know on it where they're like, "When or where in your life are you a Flat Earther?" The first thing I thought of was your, uh, every... every week for 12 weeks, when you went to that room and-

Jonny 29:43 (laughs)

Yusef 29:43 ... lay on the floor with all the men going, "You're a Flat Earther." (laughs)

Chris Williamson 29:45 Oh, the flat earther while I'm naked. Of course. (laughs)

Yusef 29:47 I was like, that... that's, if anything, more extreme.

Jonny 29:50 And going under the water for an hour.

Yusef 29:51 Yeah.

Jonny 29:52 Like, there's a lot of these things. So, what... but the problem is... So the... the difference is I am an evidence-based person.

Yusef 29:58 (laughs)

Jonny 29:58 And so in... when there is evidence to... pro or contrary to... to a belief, I will adjust my... I... I'm... I'll happily shift on a dime. These Flat Earthers shift on a dime to twist reality to match their belief.

Yusef 30:11 Yeah.

Jonny 30:11 And there's a really, really interesting clip from it that I think you will have both... both seen, where they... they do this special test, where they shine a... a pinhole of light through a sheet with a hole in, and then 300 meters away, they have another guy receiving the light. And based on the angle, that determines whether... if they can... if the Earth was flat, they would be able to see it at... at the horizontal angle. And if it's not, it would go up slightly.And so they tested it, and it showed that the earth was curved, or it showed a, a-

Chris Williamson 30:40 Curvature.

Jonny 30:40 It showed a curvature of the-

Yusef 30:42 Well, he had to raise it, didn't he?

Chris Williamson 30:43 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 30:43 He had to raise it.

Yusef 30:44 Raise it to, to account for the fact that the, that the earth is, the earth is curved.

Jonny 30:47 For ... yeah, for the sort of pro- calculated curvature.

Yusef 30:50 Yeah.

Jonny 30:50 And so then they were like, "Oh no, but, um, that's just because there's, there's heavenly energies that are shifting the light and causing this ... and what we need to do is, we need, we need to repeat this in a Gaussian chamber."

Yusef 31:01 (laughs)

Jonny 31:01 And so they then repeated it, and this guy, like, dropped 26 grand to get a Gaussian chamber, and they repeated the experiment, same thing happened.

Yusef 31:09 (laughs)

Jonny 31:09 And they were like, "Oh but that's because of, it's a refractionary effect from the magnetic field and it's causing-" You're like-

Chris Williamson 31:14 There's a, there's a bit where they, they buy, isn't it like a h- uh, is it the 26 grand gyroscope?

Yusef 31:20 Ah, the accelerometer, yeah, yeah.

Chris Williamson 31:20 Right. And he says, one of the guys is literally saying, "This could really throw a, a spanner in the works here."

Yusef 31:27 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 31:27 This could kick the old flower.

Chris Williamson 31:27 I mean, like, you are not trying to find out the truth. You are trying to find things which support your argument.

Jonny 31:34 It's like confirmation bias itself.

Chris Williamson 31:35 That's just, it's, the whole thing is confirmation bias.

Yusef 31:37 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 31:37 He's like, "Well, th- this better not get out to the, uh, the flat earth crowd if, if it does show to-"

Chris Williamson 31:42 I mean, that, that whole documentary is a bit ... it's, it's funny, but it would make me more annoyed if they were less ridiculous.

Yusef 31:51 Yeah. The, the two, the, the two questions that I would have for them is firstly, what do they think ... why do they think the lie is being protected so aggressively by Big Pharma?

Chris Williamson 32:04 Such a pointless lie, like-

Yusef 32:06 You know, like, like who's, who's gaining from-

Chris Williamson 32:08 C- CIA division.

Yusef 32:09 (laughs) The CIA division, yeah. Like, who's, who's gaining from the fact that we think the wor- the, the Earth is a sphere?

Chris Williamson 32:14 Yeah.

Yusef 32:15 Whereas they are gaining financially in many ways from saying that the Earth is flat.

Chris Williamson 32:20 The podcasts

Yusef 32:20 That's right.

Chris Williamson 32:20 ... that there are other-

Yusef 32:21 So where's, where's the alteri- alternative motive? And secondly, like, save that 26 grand and just fucking find the edge of it.

Chris Williamson 32:29 Did you see-

Yusef 32:30 Take a photo of the edge of it.

Chris Williamson 32:31 Have you seen Alex Jones on Joe Rogan?

Yusef 32:33 No.

Chris Williamson 32:33 The second one. So anyone who is listening that hasn't seen this-

Yusef 32:37 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 32:37 ... the man is a force of nature. So he, him and Joe Rogan had a pretty, um, public fallout recently, and he basically called for the destruction of Joe Rogan, but he's this ... you know, do you know who I mean? Do you know who Alex Jones is?

Jonny 32:50 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 32:51 Do you know who Alex Jones is?

Jonny 32:51 He's, he's a ... he's like the David Icke, um, successor in a way.

Chris Williamson 32:55 Y- kind of. He's like a right w- uh, right-leaning, uh, American political commentator who's been de-platformed from a few different places.

Jonny 33:02 He's got round face. American-

Chris Williamson 33:04 They're making the frogs gay.

Jonny 33:06 Yeah, v- very shouty. He says psychotic things like that.

Chris Williamson 33:08 Okay.

Jonny 33:08 I mean, really, like, talks about e- everyone, like, the big politicians being lizards and, um-

Chris Williamson 33:14 So, no, but the, the, the thing about Alex Jones that makes him so compelling is that he is such an unbelievable speaker. Like, i- it was, I couldn't ... he should go on ... I admire him in a really bizarre fashion because his capacity to just elucidate everything. So you hear him speak, and he's, he'll be talking about the CIA and the moon landings, and, "Of course this is why it happened. And you know that dogs are psychic buffers? Yeah, dogs can be psychic buffers. They kind of take in auras, a little bit like, uh, the aliens do, but not the real aliens because the real aliens are the ones that are connecting, like, intravenously with everybody. Like, the grays? The grays, the grays are simply just, like, artificial intelligent." And you're like, "Oh."

Yusef 33:57 Like, so many-

Chris Williamson 33:58 It's like-

Yusef 33:58 ... so many vast concepts just connected seemingly, and by the way-

Chris Williamson 34:00 And he just doesn't ... and Joe-

Yusef 34:02 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 34:02 Just, Joe is, like, try- desperately ... if there's anyone in the world that can wrangle a conversation like that, it's Joe Rogan.

Yusef 34:08 Yeah, yeah.

Chris Williamson 34:08 And he is, it's like being pressure sprayed-

Yusef 34:12 (clears throat)

Chris Williamson 34:12 ... with just bullshit-

Yusef 34:13 Bullshit, yeah.

Chris Williamson 34:13 ... at all times. But he talks about, um, he was like, "I will give a million pounds." He was like, "I'm not a rich man, but I've got a million pounds." He's like, "I will give a million pounds to someone to charter a flight to fly over the Antarctic." And he wants Eddie Bravo to do it. And he was like, "Eddie-"

Jonny 34:31 Oh, to, to find the edge of the earth.

Chris Williamson 34:32 Yes, to see if he can find ... 'cause that's where they say it is, right, the earth?

Yusef 34:35 The earth.

Jonny 34:35 So, so you know how we, we s- we see the North Pole as a point.

Chris Williamson 34:38 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 34:38 Whereas, I guess they see it as, like, all the w- the edge all the way round, so it's just all pole. So it's all-

Chris Williamson 34:44 It's literally South Pole.

Yusef 34:45 The guy said-

Jonny 34:46 South pole, sorry.

Yusef 34:46 ... the guy w- you know the guy, Mark Sargent, in the documentary-

Chris Williamson 34:49 Yeah.

Yusef 34:49 ... said that he tracked flights and no flight flew over a portion of the ocean-

Jonny 34:54 And then someone just went on the internet and was like, "Oh, there's one."

Yusef 34:56 "Oh, where's that flight come from and where's that one going?" And-

Jonny 34:59 But then he would say, "Oh, well, the f- the, the site's fake." Or, like, you know, there's always, like, a-

Chris Williamson 35:03 Big Pharma.

Yusef 35:03 They just challenge it, yeah. There's always Big Pharma to blame if you need anyone to blame. So, but yeah.

Jonny 35:09 It's just this guy who owns a farm that's massive. Like, he's a really large-

Yusef 35:12 (laughs)

Jonny 35:12 ... like, really large man.

Chris Williamson 35:13 (laughs)

Yusef 35:14 And he has to be big to handle the farm.

Jonny 35:16 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 35:17 Mm-hmm. Um, have you seen the, uh, most recent Amazon Prime documentary which is about Big Pharma and the effect of antipsychotic drugs on kids?

Yusef 35:29 No.

Chris Williamson 35:30 So there is some really fucking harrowing research about the, I think it's the top 10 antidepressants, and the fact that pretty much every mass shooting in America the people, the perpetrators have had one or more of these drugs in them. And they wouldn't release the toxicology report of the other person from ... what was the really famous one where there was two of the guys?

Jonny 35:56 Uh ...

Chris Williamson 35:57 Uh, that Ben Shapiro called out, uh, Piers Morgan for saying it was fake.

Jonny 36:00 Oh, yeah. San-

Chris Williamson 36:02 Sandy, Sandy Hook. Um, they wouldn't release the toxicology report of the second because the first one came up that, that he had, like, X in his system, and they were pretty certain that the second one ... and if you had this big school shooting and both of the, the common denominated-

Jonny 36:17 Uh-

Chris Williamson 36:17 ... denominator between the two wasn't that they both had, (clears throat) like, a previous history of mental illness, it was the fact that they were both on these antipsychotic drugs. Um-

Yusef 36:26 Surely there are lots of other commonalities, like, 'cause in that case it's hard to say whether it's causation or correlation.

Chris Williamson 36:33 They are, but the, uh, it was just s- something that Big Pharma wanted, and it, that, that's why they're literally not allowing them to

Jonny 36:40 The Americans are so bad. They, they love overmedicating people.... kids with just, so there was a, I remember ... So my, my dad was a psychiatrist, and I remember showing him a bit of the Louis Theroux documentary, um, w- of, uh, over-medicated kids, and there was a 10-year-old boy, who's 11 now, um, that had five diagnoses. He had a diagnosis of-

Chris Williamson 37:04 I remember seeing this.

Jonny 37:05 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 37:05 Yeah.

Jonny 37:06 OCD, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, autism, and ADHD, and he was on five separate medications for each of these conditions. The family were all on something, including the dog for PTSD apparently. So-

Chris Williamson 37:20 What had the dog gone through?

Jonny 37:21 Well, yeah, exactly. So that, so that's another, it's another flag of like, the family just being like-

Chris Williamson 37:24 Dealing with the family. (laughs) Dealing with the family. (laughs)

Jonny 37:25 (laughs) "Yeah, maybe, let's just throw medications at it." And I remember my dad watching it and being like, "First of all-"

Chris Williamson 37:31 (laughs)

Jonny 37:31 ... "statistically, the likelihood of all of these conditions to be, you know, one in 100,000 or one in 200,000."

Chris Williamson 37:37 (laughs)

Jonny 37:38 "But to get all of these simultaneously, plus this one is a chemical imbalance in this way, and this one is in the opposite way, it is impossible to have both simultaneously."

Chris Williamson 37:47 (laughs)

Jonny 37:47 "And these drugs have not been tested on people under 18 years old. So no, no, this is, uh, abusive." (laughs) And, but, so what you've got is just, like this idea that we should just throw drugs at people. Expe- untested on those age ranges or whatever.

Chris Williamson 38:04 But it's only, it's, it's only, um-

Jonny 38:05 Of course you don't care.

Chris Williamson 38:06 ... America and Australia that, uh-

Jonny 38:08 That are advertised.

Chris Williamson 38:09 ... that are allowed to advertise drugs.

Jonny 38:10 And then, and then the adverts are like, "Hey, do you wake up in the morning and feel a bit groggy? And then do you go to bed at night and do you sometimes feel hungry? And do you ..." Yeah, like-

Chris Williamson 38:21 It's that, it's that term.

Jonny 38:22 Yeah. "What you need, Percocet."

Chris Williamson 38:24 Yeah.

Jonny 38:25 (laughs) It's like-

Chris Williamson 38:25 It's that scene from Chris Rock's standup, isn't it? Where he goes, like they just keep on naming symptoms until they come up with one that you've got.

Jonny 38:32 Nausea, headache, tiredness.

Chris Williamson 38:33 Yeah. He says, like, "Are you tired? Do your feet hurt? Are you bald?" (laughs) "What have you got?" Uh, he uses some language that I'm not going to try and use 'cause it'll get me in trouble. But yeah, and, and he just keeps on naming things. If you want to watch an awesome documentary, Prescription Thugs by Chris Bell, who is the guy that also made Bigger, Stronger, Faster, um, and that is-

Jonny 38:55 It's a harrowing film.

Chris Williamson 38:56 ... fantastic. Um, (clears throat) and he, like even on that, he was taking them and lying to the people that he was producing the show for, that he wasn't on them while he was on them, while he was doing a show about not being on them. And it like-

Jonny 39:12 Fucking hell.

Chris Williamson 39:12 Oh, this is pervasive as fuck.

Jonny 39:14 Wow. So-

Chris Williamson 39:15 It makes me so glad that we're in the UK, do you not think?

Jonny 39:18 'Cause it, it, it, it's the, it's not the drugs themselves, but it's the use of them. It's like having such a low threshold for like... I think people don't appreciate it because it's just a pill, like, "Oh, fine," like-

Chris Williamson 39:27 Whatever.

Jonny 39:27 ... you know. But because, you know, you take a paracetamol and there's no, there's no-

Chris Williamson 39:31 Side effect.

Jonny 39:31 ... visible effect. Yeah. So, um-

Chris Williamson 39:33 I was trying to find, uh, I saw an image on social media the other day which was like, um, "I take this drug to deal with this side effect, and I take this one to deal with this that I get from taking this." And then blah, blah, blah, blah, because, um, like diet, training and, and s- sleep and lifestyle management is just too much hassle or something like that. (laughs)

Jonny 39:54 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 39:54 But it's, uh, I suppose the, they, they, because it's branded and because it's solution based on problems that people are experiencing, it's not like-

Jonny 40:02 Well, it's just the, it's the quickest-

Chris Williamson 40:03 ... "I'm unwell, therefore drug is "

Jonny 40:05 It's the quickest, easiest fix, isn't it?

Chris Williamson 40:07 Even, I remember being in Vegas in a pool, shattered, like, you know, you're like, you're hungover, dehydrated, you, you're in the desert, you're, uh, jet-lagged. And I'm like- Well, hang on a minute. Like, (laughs) you're in a pool in Vegas? (laughs)

Jonny 40:20 No, no. Th- that's great. So I was, we, we, we were speaking to this, this group of girls wh- who were from like, I don't know, somewhere in America, but they'd still had a long flight, like two or three hours or something, like, you know, boo-hoo. Um, and I was like, uh, "Yeah, I really struggle to get to sleep on planes." They're like, "What do you mean?" I was like, "I really struggle to get to sleep (laughs) on planes." And their answer's just-

Chris Williamson 40:41 Xanax.

Jonny 40:42 ... "Xanax," and out. (laughs) . And I'm thinking like, "Well, could, could I get some melatonin?" You know.

Chris Williamson 40:46 (laughs) It's not quite the same.

Jonny 40:47 Yeah, no. No.

Chris Williamson 40:49 But, like, like, I don't even know, what is Xanax? Like I imagine it's a brand of a drug that's also available in the UK under-

Jonny 40:54 I, I think it's diazepam. It's an American trade name, but, um-

Chris Williamson 40:59 What, um, Solid Snake takes it-

Jonny 41:02 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 41:02 ... stuck it in his hand and he's a sniper?

Jonny 41:03 Yeah. Well, he's... (laughs)

Chris Williamson 41:04 Not looking solid.

Jonny 41:05 But if you take too many then it like ... Does he drop his health or something?

Chris Williamson 41:09 Yeah.

Jonny 41:09 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 41:09 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 41:10 And it's just that- Let's look it up.

Chris Williamson 41:12 ... the first, um, the first port of call, it would appear, for a lot of Americans is just medicate.

Jonny 41:17 Just drugs. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 41:18 Yeah. And I was thinking about this earlier on, so in Lifehacks 107 we talked about the Pomodoro Technique, and I'm currently reading Deep Work, um, which-

Jonny 41:26 Nice.

Chris Williamson 41:26 ... I'll be done on soon. And we're going to start doing, uh, essentially a Modern Wisdom book club, which is where we'll review books that we've read and then deliver some, like key readings and stuff like that. So if there are any books that you want us to cover or that you've read that we think that we should, drop it in the comments below. Um, but I, partway through, I'm like 50 pages into Deep Work and it's just delivering some real home truths to me.

Jonny 41:52 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 41:53 Um, which I really, I don't want to swallow.

Jonny 41:55 Wait 'til you read Digital Minimalism. Uh-oh.

Chris Williamson 41:56 Struggling to swallow. I've listened to the, the preview.

Jonny 42:00 Stings, don't it? (laughs)

Chris Williamson 42:00 Yeah, it'll be ... And do you know what-

Jonny 42:01 If Deep Work's being punched in the gut-

Chris Williamson 42:02 Yeah.

Jonny 42:03 ... Digital Minimalism's someone just going with, like sharp things at your eyes. Really?

Chris Williamson 42:07 Oh, no.

Jonny 42:07 Much worse.

Chris Williamson 42:08 I thought it would be-

Jonny 42:09 It's just like ... Both different.

Chris Williamson 42:09 But both of them are just like, "You twat."

Jonny 42:12 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 42:12 So ...

Jonny 42:13 Like, you've been fully sucked into this thing-

Chris Williamson 42:15 And do you know, do you know what I started thinking about with that? Is the equivalent situation that appears to be occurring in so many different areas of life. Same in d- uh, training and wanting to get lean, and the same in working, and the same in dealing with emotions or feeling feelings. Feeling feelings, these feelings are uncomfortable, I'm gonna medicate my way out of it. It's, I'm not being productive enough. As, as opposed to let's spend some time doing some introspective work, actually work out what the fuck is wrong with me or why I feel this way, um, et cetera, et cetera. Do, do the work. Um-... I'm not being productive enough, therefore I'm going to take some nootropics, which are these unproven, like-

Jonny 42:56 Hmm.

Chris Williamson 42:56 ... untested drugs and just throw them in me and see what happens.

Jonny 43:00 (clears throat)

Chris Williamson 43:00 Or I'm going to fill myself full of loads of caffeine, or I'm going to work for inordinate amounts of time to get an amount of work done that could have been achieved in five hours.

Jonny 43:09 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 43:09 Instead of actually tackling the issue, which is, I do low concentration diffuse work across a lot of different tasks and don't actually do a lot. And what you can tell I'm taking -

Jonny 43:19 It's such a high-

Yusef 43:19 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 43:19 (laughs)

Jonny 43:20 That's such a high yield thing to fix before you start on the nootropics.

Chris Williamson 43:23 And then-

Jonny 43:23 It's like-

Chris Williamson 43:24 Yeah.

Jonny 43:24 It's like the, the guy who doesn't train, doesn't sleep, doesn't eat properly-

Chris Williamson 43:27 So this, so this is how I felt about Alfred.

Jonny 43:29 ... and takes the steroids. Oh, okay, yeah.

Yusef 43:30 This is where my-

Chris Williamson 43:32 Effi- efficiency versus effectiveness.

Yusef 43:33 Yeah, it's how I'm like, it's, it felt like pouring fuel on, on a fire that's barely burning.

Jonny 43:36 So the, the, the Tia- Tiago Forte's productivity pyramid really slots it into place there-

Chris Williamson 43:42 Yeah, 'cause it's true.

Jonny 43:42 ... because then it's like, ah, that's just computer literacy, but it's only part of the pyramid and it's like saying-

Chris Williamson 43:46 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 43:47 ... you know, get your calories in place but you eat, it's all from cake.

Yusef 43:49 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 43:49 And it's like, okay, well I need to, need to fix that.

Yusef 43:52 Well, it's doing something fast, but if you're doing something inefficient or ineffective fast, it still is ineffective.

Chris Williamson 43:58 It's going quicker in the wrong direction.

Yusef 44:00 Yeah. (laughs)

Jonny 44:00 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 44:01 Or slo- still moving slowly, but quickly.

Chris Williamson 44:03 I'll tell you what one of the, one of the quotes from James Clear's, uh, Atomic Habits, which I really fucking love and I never thought of before, was where he says, um ... he's talking about people who are working hard and working effectively, haven't achieved their goals yet and are feeling dissatisfied. And he said, "Being on the correct trajectory and being concerned about not getting, uh, about not being there yet is the same as getting in your car to drive to a destination and complaining that you haven't arrived."

Yusef 44:34 (laughs) Yep.

Chris Williamson 44:35 And you're like, you're going in the right direction at the speed-

Jonny 44:39 There's nothing to do.

Chris Williamson 44:39 Yeah, there is nothing to do other than just continue to make the car go in the direction it's going in.

Jonny 44:44 So I, I digitally minimally tweeted about this today. Um-

Chris Williamson 44:48 Did you Alfred it?

Jonny 44:49 Uh, no.

Chris Williamson 44:51 You didn't tweet from Alfred?

Jonny 44:51 My, my Tweet Alfred doesn't seem to sync.

Chris Williamson 44:53 You need to press command return.

Jonny 44:55 Ah, okay.

Chris Williamson 44:56 If you press return, it deletes it. If you press command return, it tweets it.

Yusef 44:59 There's a healthy skepticism there in his response. Did you notice that? (laughs)

Jonny 45:02 Well, no, I, I, I'll have to, yeah, I'll have to test that.

Chris Williamson 45:05 Tweet "I am tweeting to prove Yusuf wrong." Command, return.

Jonny 45:13 Fine. And then does it come, does it come up and say-

Chris Williamson 45:15 No, I've got, I've got do not disturb on. (laughs)

Jonny 45:17 ... Do not disturb enabled? Good. So, uh, yeah, anyway, tweeted today just saying a quote from one of our articles, "The bad news is, there's no way to accelerate the process. The good news is there's no way to accelerate the process." And it's actually so liberating when you-

Chris Williamson 45:32 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 45:32 ... fully get that, 'cause it's like ...

Chris Williamson 45:34 Just long for the anxiety.

Yusef 45:35 I still have an anxiety though, because the-

Jonny 45:36 But how do I get faster, you know?

Chris Williamson 45:38 Well, but th- th- they worry that-

Jonny 45:40 What if I take dehydrocystic acid?

Chris Williamson 45:40 ... because they're not, (laughs) they're not-

Jonny 45:42 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 45:42 Because they're not there yet, they think, well, I'm, I'm-

Jonny 45:44 Sorry. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 45:44 ... moving in the wrong direction, don't they?

Jonny 45:46 Yeah. I, I guess that's the-

Yusef 45:47 It's like, I should be there, I'm not there. Maybe the process is wrong.

Chris Williamson 45:50 That's the open loop, isn't it?

Jonny 45:51 Yeah. That is the open loop.

Yusef 45:52 I think the, what all these books are making me realize is that I actually haven't got a clue how to just manage myself.

Chris Williamson 46:02 Myself.

Yusef 46:02 Like, not, not-

Jonny 46:02 It's so frustrating after all the years of what we're doing.

Yusef 46:05 Yeah.

Jonny 46:05 You know, be- well 'cause, but each book just points out a big thing and goes, "You idiot, there and there." And you're like, "Oh, yep, yep. Fine."

Yusef 46:11 So Deep, Deep Work, Atomic Habits, Digital Minimalism probably less so, I think Digital Mi- Minimalism is like, these are the two things you need to do and this ... and digital minimalivism, minimalism, minimalism is just dealing with the shit that makes it-

Chris Williamson 46:22 Get some stuff out the way maybe.

Yusef 46:24 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 46:24 Yeah, yeah.

Yusef 46:24 I'm reading the Life Changing ...

Chris Williamson 46:28 Art of Not Giving a Fuck.

Yusef 46:29 No.

Chris Williamson 46:30 (laughs)

Yusef 46:31 Um, no. He's just releasing a new book, actually, Matt Manson.

Jonny 46:34 Oh.

Yusef 46:35 Um, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up or something by-

Jonny 46:38 Oh.

Yusef 46:38 ... Marie Con- Connor? Okay. Kondo?

Chris Williamson 46:41 Right.

Yusef 46:42 But ... (laughs) Okay.

Chris Williamson 46:46 (laughs)

Yusef 46:47 Just. But I, uh, to be honest, it's, it's a similar approach towards personal organization of your physical spaces.

Chris Williamson 46:54 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 46:55 And again, you just realize ... she, she makes a point in the book of like, no one ever teaches you how to like organize, effectively organize your spaces.

Chris Williamson 47:04 Well, like, like Sam Harris fucking hits the nail on the head. As much as people might not, like, he, he, he's a little bit out there and kind of a bit of a wanky intellectual for probably a lot of people to say this.

Yusef 47:15 Speaks, speaks like a written essay all the time.

Chris Williamson 47:17 Super slowly, yeah.

Yusef 47:17 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 47:17 In full prose.

Yusef 47:19 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 47:19 Um, but he hits the nail on the head and says, (clears throat) um, "Much of our lives are taking up learning how to live. Once we find an approximation of it, we stick at that for the rest of our days." And you're like-

Yusef 47:33 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 47:33 ... "Fuck, yeah. You are right." Like, I just work out some approximation of how to live effectively, say, "That'll do." And then double down on it for the rest of, of time and-

Jonny 47:43 That's what we should do.

Chris Williamson 47:44 No, no. That's what people who do, do.

Yusef 47:46 That's what people do.

Jonny 47:46 Rather than optimizing to-

Chris Williamson 47:48 At all times. Yeah.

Yusef 47:49 Yeah.

Jonny 47:49 I think it's, it's easy also though to get stuck in constantly optimizing and never actually doing anything.

Chris Williamson 47:54 Well, that's the difference between, um-

Jonny 47:56 Which is-

Chris Williamson 47:56 ... being on receive and being on send, right? That was-

Jonny 47:58 Like, the mindless accumulation. And I've, I've, I'm-

Yusef 48:01 (laughs)

Jonny 48:01 I, I struggle with this. Like I've just, I just mindlessly index reams of data and stuff and then it's like, well, hang on. I haven't actually implemented any of this.

Chris Williamson 48:10 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 48:10 And I think Johnny started to do the opposite really effectively, um, after Garrett J. White incidentally, which was just-

Chris Williamson 48:17 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 48:17 ... you read a book and rather than read it from cover to cover, every time you come across, like, "Ah," you then stop, reflect on it, do the thing, and then teach it to someone else or, like, create a bit of content about it. And then you've-

Yusef 48:30 To just solidify the last -

Jonny 48:31 You've already cemented it in.

Chris Williamson 48:32 It's a good way to do it, although if you're reading a book that, like Atomic Habits, it would take you a year to finish because-

Yusef 48:38 Yeah.

Jonny 48:39 Because there are so many moments.

Chris Williamson 48:39 ... pretty much every other page is actionable.

Yusef 48:41 So I've heard a, I've heard a counter approach to that which is that, like, if you're reading the right things, the, the things that need to stick will stick.

Jonny 48:48 (coughs)

Chris Williamson 48:48 That's Tim Ferriss, right?

Yusef 48:49 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 48:50 ... so I-

Yusef 48:50 The good shit sticks.

Chris Williamson 48:51 I don't know who I-

Jonny 48:52 Because that's just in time.

Chris Williamson 48:54 So that's, yeah. It's not quite the same as-

Jonny 48:56 Which is an argument then.

Chris Williamson 48:56 ... just in time though, right? It's that, it, it's more like you will, you will take your own top filtering.

Jonny 49:01 The best things, that naturally.

Chris Williamson 49:03 So if you-

Jonny 49:03 But then it means, thus an argument to keep rereading books because at different stages of your life, different things will-

Yusef 49:08 You'll get them.

Jonny 49:08 Yeah.

Yusef 49:08 I think if you're reading to solve a problem or improve a specific thing, like if you're looking for an outcome from a book rather than just reading-

Chris Williamson 49:15 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 49:16 ... you'll f- you're like looking for the answer, so when you find it-

Chris Williamson 49:19 Yeah.

Yusef 49:19 ... or you're looking for the insights, when you find it, you remember it. So definitely the stuff that I'm like, i- it happens especially with a, a course or, um ... so like, so with digital minimalism, what I was looking for for that was like how can I just improve my relationship with technology?

Jonny 49:36 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 49:37 So you're almost looking for a w- like a model to-

Chris Williamson 49:39 Yeah.

Yusef 49:40 ... rest your attention on.

Jonny 49:41 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 49:42 Whereas if you're just reading a book 'cause you might find it interesting-

Chris Williamson 49:45 Yeah.

Yusef 49:45 ... you just, it just kind of all goes in and out.

Chris Williamson 49:47 Well, I mean, how much, how much self-development do people read up from that sphere of books?

Yusef 49:53 I don't-

Chris Williamson 49:53 Where they're reading for pleasure? Like ...

Yusef 49:56 I think people read because they, someone's told them to read it or, um ...

Chris Williamson 50:00 But th- even that, even if someone's told them to read it, it's the, "This will benefit my life. This will make my life better somehow."

Yusef 50:06 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 50:06 So there is a frame this is being draped over.

Jonny 50:08 It's easy to read that stuff for pleasure, though, if it's like, if it replaces, if it acts as a surrogate for the, "Oh, I'm, I'm moving forward because I'm reading a book about productivity."

Yusef 50:18 The, the worst place to be is, is having some really well-written notes on deep work while still working shallowly.

Jonny 50:23 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 50:23 (laughs)

Yusef 50:24 And having some really well-written notes on atomic habits-

Chris Williamson 50:26 (laughs)

Yusef 50:26 ... while not actually having any consistent habits.

Chris Williamson 50:28 Yeah.

Yusef 50:28 You're like, "Well, actually I'd have been better just not doing any of that and then I wouldn't feel bad about not doing it."

Jonny 50:33 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 50:33 Yeah, it's the second order, second order effect of knowing, knowing that you know it and still not doing it.

Yusef 50:39 But not, but not doing it, yeah.

Jonny 50:39 It's the second arrow. Speaking of optimizing, you've, you've both heard the Serge Fraget interview?

Yusef 50:47 No.

Chris Williamson 50:47 I've read his Medium article which is like 45 minutes long.

Jonny 50:51 Oh. Okay, yeah, similar thing. He's a guy who's, he's like a Silicon Valley tech guy that's just decided to turn himself into an experiment and he's just nailing all of the nootropics and, um, testosterone and clom-

Chris Williamson 51:04 Kind of like low-dose mercury and lithium and ... God.

Jonny 51:07 Yeah. Yeah, low-dose lithium, low-dose citalopram, um, so antidepressant, uh, Clomid, clomiphene -

Chris Williamson 51:14 Micro- microdosing MDMA?

Jonny 51:16 Yeah, M- MDMA, um, just basically like-

Yusef 51:19 Surely some of these things almost cancel each other out or ...

Jonny 51:23 Probably, yeah. He, he basically just says like, "If I just try all of them and then something ..." Like, he's like, "I think the net benefit that I get eventually will."

Chris Williamson 51:32 He was tracking, he's been tracking it a fair bit. So he's like, uh, the ultimate biohacker.

Yusef 51:37 Right.

Chris Williamson 51:37 Tracking it a fair bit and having his bloods done and stuff.

Yusef 51:39 It's just not very, it's not a very scientific way to approach the problem, is it?

Chris Williamson 51:43 It's not.

Jonny 51:43 It's not.

Yusef 51:43 If it's de- if he feels better, great. But like, do I have to live this way for the rest of my life? Or what he's-

Jonny 51:48 I think, I think that's his intention, is like, he wants to become like a superhuman-

Yusef 51:51 Oh right, it's shotgun.

Jonny 51:51 ... and try and like really elongate his life.

Yusef 51:53 Right.

Jonny 51:53 And he, you know, he's like, "I'm happy to be at the forefront of this." Um, but I suppose in his case, like he, he's got a lot of quite interesting, like he, he, he goes and ... there's like an agency where he pays Russian models to sleep with.

Chris Williamson 52:06 Yeah.

Jonny 52:07 Um-

Chris Williamson 52:07 He's very open about his transactional sex life.

Jonny 52:09 Because he says like, it's just, um, he wants to have no, he wants to have no shame about anything. So he's like-

Chris Williamson 52:16 Including his sexual proclivities, like what he finds like attractive in the bedroom and stuff like that?

Jonny 52:22 Yeah. So he's like, "Yeah, I want my parents to listen to this and I want to be," you know.

Yusef 52:25 Right.

Jonny 52:26 Just so that he can be fully ... and he said like he's, he's trying to adopt like a never, never lie approach and never, um ...

Yusef 52:34 Fucking hell.

Chris Williamson 52:34 I've got so much respect for people that do this, that they choose to do this com- like radical change.

Yusef 52:41 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 52:42 It, it, it's so, I find them fascinating. I find people ...

Jonny 52:45 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 52:45 I think that so many people exist in this safe area of, "I'll do a bit of this and not that much more."

Jonny 52:55 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 52:55 And guys like him are fucking-

Yusef 52:58 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 52:59 ... mega.

Yusef 52:59 What I, what I mean, and what I find almost (creaking sound) repulsive with it is that because he's doing it all at once-

Jonny 53:05 Mm-hmm. Yeah, it's what, what (overlapping dialogue) ... is.

Chris Williamson 53:07 Can't identify what it is.

Yusef 53:07 What, what, what, you know, yes, fair enough, the, the approach might work really well for him but ...

Chris Williamson 53:12 But his-

Yusef 53:12 In terms of, for those of us who maybe don't want to do all of it, you don't know what, what's (overlapping dialogue) .

Chris Williamson 53:16 His goal isn't to create a model for other people.

Yusef 53:19 To teach, it's just to-

Chris Williamson 53:20 It's just to make him as good as is possible.

Yusef 53:21 Sure.

Jonny 53:21 Yeah, he's, he's like ... I, I definitely get that, 'cause I think from our perspective, we're like, "Well, hang on, like we'll have to make one change and then determine the result and then ..." Whereas I think, yeah, he's just deci- he's deliberately shotgunning and just thinking like-

Yusef 53:32 Mm-hmm. Unreal.

Jonny 53:32 And it's just, yeah.

Chris Williamson 53:33 I did a podcast which is now out in podcast land, uh, with a guy called Jordan Hall who basically worked or he spends a lot of his time thinking about how to redesign civilizations.

Yusef 53:47 Fucking hell.

Jonny 53:47 Is he, he's the one, one life hack a month thing?

Chris Williamson 53:50 No.

Jonny 53:51 Who is that?

Yusef 53:52 I remember that guy.

Chris Williamson 53:52 Carl Sederström.

Jonny 53:53 Oh, okay.

Yusef 53:54 That was really, I really liked that one.

Chris Williamson 53:56 Episode, I think it's 48.

Yusef 53:57 Quite early on, wasn't it?

Chris Williamson 53:58 Uh, 38, something like that. Carl Sederström, um ...

Jonny 54:01 Cute.

Chris Williamson 54:02 Like, really fucking good. Um, but he, even he said on that, man, anyone who's not doing the Pomodoro Technique he said the best life hack that he came up with out of the entire year. But yeah, this, this-

Jonny 54:12 That's crazy.

Chris Williamson 54:13 I know, unbelievable.

Jonny 54:14 Like that, like how, how credible is that? You hear a man who's done a year of rotating life hacks systematically and he's like, "Pomodoro is the best."

Chris Williamson 54:21 Pomodoro, Pomodoro Technique, man. And it's free.

Jonny 54:24 Yeah. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 54:24 It's fucking free. And-

Jonny 54:26 All the other ones paid.

Chris Williamson 54:27 Well, I don't know. (laughs)

Yusef 54:28 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 54:29 Paid but it is a paid one.

Yusef 54:30 That, that like with, with anything, like building habits for example, truly using the Pomodoro Technique, really mastering it, is really hard.

Chris Williamson 54:39 Okay.

Yusef 54:40 Really hard.

Chris Williamson 54:40 I can do like a 50% deep Pomodoro quite easily.

Jonny 54:44 My, my car can go 100 miles an hour.

Yusef 54:46 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 54:46 Well, I know that when-

Yusef 54:47 I went all the way to Canada, did you? (overlapping dialogue)

Chris Williamson 54:49 I do as well, yeah.

Jonny 54:49 I, I actually won a leg and spoon race once. (laughs)

Yusef 54:51 Really? I think it's important that none of us are underestimated.

Chris Williamson 54:55 (laughs)

Yusef 54:55 That's the most ... (laughs)

Chris Williamson 54:58 (laughs) We can girdle the world.

Jonny 55:01 I mean, he, he knows the words to Candle in the Wind.

Yusef 55:03 Candle in the Wind.

Chris Williamson 55:03 Yeah, so do I.

Jonny 55:04 Ugh.

Yusef 55:05 Thing is, your car does go 100 miles an hour.

Chris Williamson 55:07 It does go 100 miles an hour, yeah. Um, so ... (laughs)

Yusef 55:11 Eight pounds. Eight pounds.

Jonny 55:14 (laughs) I thought that was Cale saying, "iPad."

Yusef 55:18 (laughs) iPad.

Chris Williamson 55:19 iPad. Definitely wasn't.

Yusef 55:21 We need to include the cassette boy clip.

Chris Williamson 55:25 What's that?

Yusef 55:26 That's what all those references are from.

Chris Williamson 55:27 Oh, the-

Yusef 55:28 Yeah, yeah.

Chris Williamson 55:28 ... Alan Sugar thing. Yeah, fine. Uh, video guard Dane will make Alan Sugar appear over our heads.

Jonny 55:32 And the Pomodoro article.

Chris Williamson 55:34 I'll put that in the show notes below.

Jonny 55:35 Yeah, that was a good, bloody good one. Was it, was it the guy who came up with ... Was it the Anki CEO or some-

Yusef 55:41 Different one. No, so there's a guy called, like, Chris Whitfield or something.

Chris Williamson 55:44 Okay.

Jonny 55:44 He just tracked every pomodoro (laughs) in his life, including, like, climbing and like-

Yusef 55:47 Oh, no, that guy. That is the Anki guy.

Chris Williamson 55:49 Yeah.

Jonny 55:50 Oh, yeah.

Yusef 55:50 That was the guy who was like, "I-"

Jonny 55:51 Of course it was the guy who came up with Anki.

Yusef 55:51 "... I just, I just coded my own tracking software for it and logged it all." But there's another guy who was like, "I was working 40 hours a week and decided I'm just gonna do eight pomodoros a day." And described how he was able to achieve the same volume of work.

Chris Williamson 56:05 Do you remember when-

Yusef 56:06 Deep work, innit?

Chris Williamson 56:07 Do you remember when I got that, uh, message on Instagram off a l- listener who'd been, uh, who'd heard us talk about the pomodoro technique and had created his own spreadsheet? I sent you guys a screenshot of the spreadsheet.

Yusef 56:18 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 56:18 And he's like, "Man, it's completely changed my life." I'm like, "Holy fucking shit."

Yusef 56:24 Mm-hmm. Yeah. I think just related to using pomodoros for the rest of your life, I think that's, that's how to ruin your life.

Chris Williamson 56:30 (laughs)

Yusef 56:30 If you start seeing everything as a pomodoro. I think it's purely for work. For me, as soon as the, the timer goes on, I try my best to ... Timer goes on, cold turkey, email, WhatsApp message out.

Jonny 56:41 It's like, you know the noise from Who Wants To Be A Millionaire when they start the quiz?

Yusef 56:47 (singing)

Chris Williamson 56:48 Oh, yeah. That one.

Yusef 56:48 Yeah, it's exactly like that.

Jonny 56:50 Yeah.

Yusef 56:50 Like, "Showtime. Game on."

Chris Williamson 56:52 Do not fuck about, 'cause Chris Taggart's here.

Yusef 56:54 Yeah. (laughs)

Jonny 56:55 Chris Taggart.

Yusef 56:56 Do you know who Jeremy Clarks- Jeremy Clarkson? They've got a new helpline.

Chris Williamson 56:59 Is he here? Oh, yeah.

Jonny 56:59 Oh, he is, isn't he?

Yusef 57:00 He's got a new helpline, which is Ask Jeremy.

Chris Williamson 57:02 Hang on.

Yusef 57:03 What? Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?

Jonny 57:04 That's so narcissistic.

Yusef 57:05 Yes, it's back on TV.

Chris Williamson 57:06 When?

Yusef 57:07 It's been on for a while.

Chris Williamson 57:08 Right.

Yusef 57:08 Jeremy Clarkson's the new host. There's a new lifeline, which is Ask Jeremy.

Chris Williamson 57:12 But he's the host.

Yusef 57:14 Precisely. So the, the light goes ... (singing)

Chris Williamson 57:16 And it turns round to Jeremy?

Jonny 57:17 But he's, "I'm not really sure, actually."

Yusef 57:17 And he goes, he goes, "I don't know." Then-

Chris Williamson 57:21 Every time.

Jonny 57:23 What's the, what's the ch- what channel's it on?

Yusef 57:25 Don't know.

Chris Williamson 57:26 Must be ITV.

Yusef 57:27 Think so.

Chris Williamson 57:28 That's what-

Yusef 57:28 Oh, it reminds me. That's what I was gonna say. The thing that I mentioned before. I don't know why I pointed at you, I'm sorry.

Chris Williamson 57:32 (laughs)

Yusef 57:32 The thing that I mentioned before about-

Chris Williamson 57:34 The big thing.

Yusef 57:34 ... a documentary following, a documentary following a guy who'd been accused of a sex offense.

Chris Williamson 57:39 Yes.

Yusef 57:40 It's Louis Theroux and it's on BBC iPlayer.

Jonny 57:42 Louis Theroux as in cute?

Yusef 57:43 It's a newbie, it's a-

Chris Williamson 57:43 Is Louis Theroux the sex offender?

Yusef 57:45 No. (laughs) Louis Theroux is interviewing him.

Chris Williamson 57:47 Right.

Jonny 57:48 (laughs)

Yusef 57:48 I wish so much that I was Louis Theroux. Just had Louis Theroux's mannerisms.

Jonny 57:52 Have you both seen-

Yusef 57:53 I wish that I, I had the, the mindset of Mark, Mark Bourne from The Big Short. How I wish I could ask questions like Louis Theroux.

Jonny 57:59 Oh. Y- you've seen it. You've seen the clip of the Scientology trailer.

Yusef 58:02 Oh, yeah. I've seen the full thing.

Jonny 58:04 Absolutely brilliant.

Chris Williamson 58:05 Um, so-

Yusef 58:06 Are you making a documentary as well?

Chris Williamson 58:07 Totally.

Jonny 58:08 You tell him to stop and I'll tell him to stop.

Chris Williamson 58:10 So, The Big Short. The guy who produced The Big Short, fantastic, um, film about the 2008 financial crisis, um, is the exec producer on a new Amazon Prime documentary series with one of the actors from Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle.

Yusef 58:26 Okay.

Chris Williamson 58:26 And it's the guy who was a very successful, uh, politician, or, uh, like political advisor. Worked in the Obama administration. He's one of the two main actors also.

Yusef 58:36 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 58:36 He's been in a few things. And, um, it's just about money laundering. And he ...

Yusef 58:42 That sounds class.

Chris Williamson 58:43 It's fucking mental.

Yusef 58:43 Is it out now?

Chris Williamson 58:45 Available now on Amazon Prime. Um-

Yusef 58:46 What's it called?

Chris Williamson 58:47 I can't ... Uh, uh, This Great Beast That is The Global Economy. Wordy title.

Yusef 58:53 Yeah. Someone needs to work on the headlines, don't they? But yeah.

Chris Williamson 58:56 Yeah. It's all, it's kind of a bit, it's very American but it's fucking cool. So, literally, the first episode is he gets given a fake $1 million and has to work out how to launder it.

Yusef 59:07 Oh, that sounds so good, Chris.

Chris Williamson 59:09 (laughs)

Yusef 59:09 I, I can't wait to watch that. I'm so excited. He's also, that director's also done, um, Vice that's just been in cinema, which is about Dick Cheney.

Chris Williamson 59:19 Oh, right. Yeah.

Yusef 59:20 That's cool. That's ... Recommend watching that. So that, he ... There's a scene where 9/11's just happened. Dick Cheney's played by Christian Bale. 9/11's just happened and everyone else is in, like, fucking uproar. And Dick Cheney's just sat there.

Jonny 59:33 Just shorting the S&P. (laughs)

Yusef 59:34 He's just, he's-

Chris Williamson 59:34 (laughs)

Yusef 59:35 So, so it's not far off.

Jonny 59:36 Oh, okay.

Yusef 59:36 He's, he's sat there just thinking and then picks up the phone, and it pans out and it's like, "No one knew on that day why, when a plane flew into the Twin Towers, Dick Cheney rang his lawyer." But it later trans- and then it shows basically how he just, like, manipulates his way ... Like, 'cause he's painted in a very bad light.

Jonny 59:54 Ah.

Chris Williamson 59:54 What, what does he do?

Yusef 59:55 So he was the vice, he was the vice president to George Bush.

Chris Williamson 59:58 Right, but n- what does he do there? He just capitalizes on-

Yusef 1:00:00 Like, so a lot of the Iraq War, a lot of the decisions made around, like, when to invade and what to do, were him.

Chris Williamson 1:00:06 What was he, how was he benefiting?

Yusef 1:00:08 Financially.

Chris Williamson 1:00:09 Right, okay. So he's-

Yusef 1:00:10 'Cause he was, he was CEO of a big oil company.

Chris Williamson 1:00:12 Oh.

Yusef 1:00:12 So not, not far off, you know. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 1:00:14 Oh, wow. Not big pharma?

Yusef 1:00:15 So, like, not big pharma.

Jonny 1:00:16 Well, it's just easier to just short the CFD than do it.

Chris Williamson 1:00:18 But it's just ... It, it's the, it's the scene where everyone's like, "Oh, my God." And he's just like ...

Yusef 1:00:22 It's-

Chris Williamson 1:00:23 Hmm.

Jonny 1:00:23 I, I find that so weird, because it's like-

Chris Williamson 1:00:25 Is that actually recorded, that?

Yusef 1:00:27 No. Well, i- it's not in the film.

Chris Williamson 1:00:28 Right.

Yusef 1:00:29 But I, I wouldn't have thought so, 'cause it's in like the, it's an, it's acted in the film.

Chris Williamson 1:00:32 That's my point. It's dramatized.

Yusef 1:00:34 Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:00:34 Okay. Um, I did a-another podcast with the FBI's, uh, ex-head of the FBI's behavioral science division. Guy called Robin Dreeke.

Yusef 1:00:44 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 1:00:44 Um, so he is one of the world's experts on, uh, body language.

Jonny 1:00:48 I think I've seen something from him. He's great.

Chris Williamson 1:00:50 Robin, he's, he's been around a, a few different, uh, a few different podcasts. But he was unbelievable. And he said he started at the FBI about six months before 9/11.

Yusef 1:01:00 Oh, my God.

Chris Williamson 1:01:01 And I asked, I was like-

Yusef 1:01:02 Think of the paperwork that guy's got to do.

Chris Williamson 1:01:04 Oh, man.You know what you were saying last time about when someone goes into the back of you and it's just all the paperwork just flashes- Flash. ... in front of your eyes? Yeah. It's that, times- A lot. ... a thousand. I mean, that is a lot of paperwork, isn't it? Yeah. (sighs) Anyway, gentlemen, thank you very much for coming. Um- Something else to watch, just s- sneaking in. Lay it on me. Um, AlphaGo on Netflix. AlphaGo's unbelievable. You seen it? Yeah. Fantastic. You should watch AlphaGo. You'd like AlphaGo. Uh, is it Lee Sedol? Yeah. Have you heard of Go, the game? Card game. Chinese board game. Chinese board game. Uh, it's like apparently the hardest game in the world. Okay. (laughs) Um, they've built a DeepMind, it's owned by Google, based in London. It's just a bunch of really clever people trying to make an algorithm, trying to make AI essentially. Mm-hmm. And the mark of, of AI is can we get this algorithm to beat the best Go player in the world? I think they managed to do it in chess, but they said essentially that because the number of permutations that Go can have, the number of different plays that you can have in Go- Mm-hmm. ... is 10 to the 150, which is more than there are atoms in the observable universe. Yeah. Um, so basically it was so complex- 443 billion, billion, billion- (laughs) ... billion, billion (laughs) - (laughs) ... stars in the known universe. Yeah. Um, if every tear was a drop in the ocean, it would- (laughs) Um, so yeah. And they, uh, they said that it wouldn't, wouldn't be able to be done and I won't, I won't spoil it. But then th- that surely means that the human mind is just taking punts rather than ... Like, the hea- the mind that someone ... The best Go player is mostly taking punts and is just quite good. Well, no, it's how do you program it? How do you- 'Cause if you can't program, like if ... 'cause if you can't program a human to do it, then you can't program a computer to. Uh, so, but so they're, they're trying to create intelligence, aren't they? Or are humans just making heuristic- No, their argument is, their argument is that there is some, uh, undefinable characteristic to human intuition or whatever it might be- Mm-hmm. ... which you wouldn't be able to replicate. Then they do this. Then do you know about AlphaGo Zero? Yeah, that's beat AlphaGo. 100 games to zero- Yeah. ... with no... It was given nothing, so it just did self play locked in its own box. (laughs) Wasn't given the rules. Oh, that's scary. Yeah, I know. AlphaGo Zero started from nothing and within- Ooh. ... four days had beaten the game. Someone needs to go down to London and just unplug that bloke's computer a bit. I don't like that at all. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But, and so, um, I mentioned this on the last catch-up episode, Josh Clark's The End of the World. If you haven't listened to it, you need to go listen to it. It's fucking unbelievable. And in that there's a, a fairly cleverly balanced view of the threat of AI. And it's that some of the cleverest people on the planet say that we are definitely getting closer to very, very good specific artificial intelligence. Mm-hmm. But essentially in the last 30 years, we've made no progress towards general AI. Yeah. And there's just, there's so many very difficult things to do. Like, to get a robot to be able to pick a ball up off the ground, it needs to define so many different things. Mm-hmm. What is a ball? What is pick up? What are the motions that are required? How do you do it? Like, i- i- it's impossible to tell. The worry is that you, you build something specific that becomes so intelligent that it's like I, I now need to learn this as well. And then, uh, and it learns itself to be general. Do you see what I mean? This is why the, the book Superintelligence is- Seven, seven ... I've, I, you promised- Truly, um- I swear I haven't read it. You promised me that you'd listen to it. There's a lot of nice stuff. I'm reading a book about tidying up and- Yeah, I know you are. (laughs) The, basically the, the sentence that you just said, there's like, there's a chapter on, on that, like, what if question. Mm-hmm. And he just goes deep down the maths and like, "If we define K as the integral of S over T, and this is, uh-" I'm on two, two times speed, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. "... equivalent to the number of neuronal connections that you hold-" You had to, you, wh- you had to dial back the pace. Back to, back to two, yeah. Yeah. From three. (laughs) The, the Tim Urbans, you know Tim Urban's on the Flat Earth guy? Yes. They interview him a few times. Yeah. His interview with Tim Ferriss, he has the m- the, the best, like, Fisher Price AI discussion I've ever heard. (laughs) And like th- the theory of what, you know, are we gonna live on planets or space stations. Like, that, that interview is genuinely brilliant. There were so many things. So let's recap what people need to watch and read. Oh, so much stuff. Digital Minimalism. What a ti- ... If people have read none of this stuff, they're honestly in for the best, like, couple of months of their life. Oh, there's a lot. Critics' Work, Atomic Habits, um, then they need to watch- Digital Minimalism. It got you. Go ahead. No. Um, need to watch Prescription Thugs. (laughs) Need to watch this beast, uh, the great beast that is the global economy. Bigger Stronger Faster as well. Bigger Stronger Faster. Um, uh, what's that? The Dome, Under the Dome. Yeah. What's the flat earth thing called? I thought it was- Something to do with flat earth on Netflix. You'll be able to see it. It's being promoted like hell. Um- AlphaGo. The new Louis Theroux. New, new Louis Theroux, BBC iPlayer. AlphaGo. Yeah. Anything else? Big Short if you've not seen that. Big Short if you've not seen that as well. Yeah. Unbelievable. Margin Call if you've not seen that. Uh-huh. Wizard of Lies if you've not seen that. Have you seen Wizard of Lies? No. Brilliant. It's about, um, (snaps fingers) Bernie Madoff. And then- Oh, yeah. I've seen it advertised. Uh, the new, um, Joe Rogan with Alex Jones, four and a half hours- Oh, God. ... of unrelenting- It's what stops me from getting fully into Joe Rogan 'cause it's just such a commitment. It is. Like that, that will take me like two weeks to listen to. (laughs) . So he, there's this bit- The way to listen to it is like what, what Chris does where it's just on in the background. Yeah. It's a good way to, especially with that when you don't care. Thinking you're going to try and walk- 'Cause the problem th- Yeah. The problem that you have with an audiobook is you don't want to be doing anything else while you're listening to it that's too taxing in case you miss some of the gold. Whereas- Well, even if you miss five, five mi- you miss five minutes, you know, oh, don't know- Don't know what's going on. Yeah. Whereas with Alex Jones, if you'd listened to five seconds, you don't know what's going on. So it's like- Right. So you might ... If you just never know what's going on- ... you're fine. I really enjoyed the Elon Musk on, um- Rogan. ... Rogan. He was good. And Derren Brown. Derren Brown was very good. Yeah. Very lucid. But, uh, Elon Musk didn't do himself any favors in not looking like a weirdo. I think it's all part of his plan. To do what? To get Tesla and SpaceX into massive exposure. How much traffic did that interview have? Well, his car was- Well, zero to their Facebook 'cause he deleted it. I ... but i- t- th- th- th- there's no way you fly rockets to Mars, make m- electric cars, try and revolutionize all these things, but you're a b- you're a bit of a twat when it comes to your PR. Like, it's all, it's all gotta be on purpose, hasn't it? No, 'cause he's got that kind of megalomaniac crazy genius thing going on. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's all- Did you see the video of his new rocket mounted on the floor? The test burn? No. Oh, God. That's the rocket that can take people that they've just sent up, isn't it? It's a new one. It's, uh, just a, a like, um, prototype one. They just, they launched one the other day that- Not, not that one. Right. It's not ready yet. Okay. Um, they did this thing and the sound that this machine makes is like- Mm-hmm. It just sounds like the end of the earth. Like the sort of thing that would take us to Mars, I imagine. Probably. Yes. Yeah. And on that note, I think we better leave. Gentlemen, thank you very much for coming along. Uh, all of the links to what we've linked are in the show notes below. Everything that we've brought up during this podcast. Please do not pre- forget to press subscribe. Johnny's touching Yusuf's hand. Oh, he's waving goodbye. Bye. Goodbye, everybody. Bye everyone. Thank you. Dancing. Yeah. Oh yeah. Dancing.