S2 EP22: Cariad Lloyd

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Podcasts, there are millions of them. Some might say too many. I have one already.

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I don't have any, because there are enough. Politics, business, sport, you name it, there's a podcast about it, and they all ask the big questions and cover the hot topics of the day.

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But nobody is covering the most important topic of all. Why is that? Are they scared?

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Too afraid of being censored by the man? Possibly, but not us. We're here to ask the only question that matters.

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We try and say it at the same time, Max. What did you do yesterday?

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What did you do yesterday? That's it. All we're interested in is what the guests got up to yesterday, nothing more.

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Day before yesterday, Max? Nope. The greatest and most interesting day of your life? Unless it was yesterday, we don't want to know about it.

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I'm Max Rushden. And I'm David O'Doherty. Welcome to What Did You Do Yesterday? Hello, everybody.

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Welcome to today's episode of What Did You Do Yesterday? I'm Max Rushden. David O'Doherty is there.

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Hello, and welcome to What Did You Do Yesterday? With me, David O'Doherty. I've never got to say the first bit in this.

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Oh, would you like to do, at the start of the episode, I welcome the guest.

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Normally, it's someone that you've known for 50 years and I've never met. So, like, if you wanted to, I'm not precious about these things.

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I once heard, I won't name who it is. I won't name who it is, but Evander Holyfield was a guest on a TV program.

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The boxer. There were two presenters, the boxer, and one presenter, it was just like one of the hosts would bring them on.

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And it wasn't him. It was his co-presenter, just had the line and script. And he had a massive Barney Board account saying, I have to bring on Evander.

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I have to be the person to say, ladies and gentlemen, welcome Evander Holyfield. What difference does it make?

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It makes no difference to anybody. Someone's going to bring him on and then he's going to be sat there.

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Does it matter? I don't care. So, if you would like to, next episode, because Cariad Lloyd is our guest today, and I do begin, just for the tape, we have just done it.

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I do say welcome to What Did You Do Yesterday? So, if you'd like to, I don't mind.

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I'm not precious. I mean, there is the thorny issue then of, is this What Did You Do Yesterday?

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with Max Rushden and David O'Doherty? And on what basis is it that, or is it with David O'Doherty and Max Rushden?

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I don't mind. Alphabetically, it'd be me. In every way. There's no way alphabetically I can take it I can't take it alphabetically.

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There's nothing I can do. What's your middle name, David? Nicholas. No, Paul. So yeah, you alphabetically trumped me three times.

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But I do feel you're, you come first. In a, what do you call the people who present the stupid show where you go to the Australian outback?

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Ant and Dec. Yes, Ant and Dec. That is the longest anyone has taken to remember who Ant and Dec are.

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But we will get them both on the podcast because while I had my chest waxed once in my life when I did the six pack challenge and it was filmed by Declan Donnelly,

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then he emailed me all the files of my chest being waxed at a charity golf do.

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Yet another gem. My point is, I think Ant and Dec always have to stand with one of them on the left hand side, one on the right.

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Because if they swap over, people are just like, what the hell is this? They're like, who are these people?

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They just don't know who they are. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the same with us.

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You always have to be on my right. I start the podcast. Okay, well, I'll start this episode because we know I started it.

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So I'll start this one and then, but I don't mind if you dive in.

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Next guest, it's fine. Anyway, look, tell all the listeners about Cariad Lloyd. She's lovely.

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And it's a really fun episode. Cariad is a friend of mine for a long time.

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People may know her from Griefcast or Weirdos Book Club, two great podcasts. She's written a bunch of children's books now.

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I mean, I would know her best from Ostentatious, which is what comes up in the podcast, which is an improvised Jane Austen Regency type period show where they dress in splendiferous costumes and make up a new Jane Austen book every night.

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It's doing Monday nights in the West End at the moment and it tours around the whole time.

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I cannot recommend it highly enough, Max. And it is worth saying that it will become abundantly clear there is nothing I don't know about the world of improv.

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Oh my God. Anyway, here's what Cariad Lloyd did yesterday. Cariad Lloyd, welcome to What Did You Do Yesterday?

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Thank you for having me. Hello. How are you? I'm excellent. I can't speak for David, but I'm very well.

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To the listeners, the reason Cariad sounded shocked there is because obviously we were just having a boring chat about technically making sure everything is ship shape.

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But then presenter Max just becomes this. I come alive. Like the difference between Bruce, whatever his name is, and Batman.

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They're the two differences between the on-air light. Cariad, did you find it a bit too much?

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Should I have? It'd been a softer welcome. No, I was just still trying to shut all my, you know, I was just trying to shut all my, things down on my computer so that it worked better.

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So I was a bit like when the teacher's like, okay, but you're like, oh, I haven't got my pens up.

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Well, if you could focus now, Cariad. If you could focus now. Don't, that makes me feel like I'm back at school.

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I am listening, I am. I just, Susanna was asking me something, so I was telling her, sir, please, it's not my fault.

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Do you know the good thing about this is one of the only podcasts where at no point will we start talking about, you know, if your school days were terrible.

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Unless, of course, you are so remedial that you've been held back so many years that you are still in school yesterday.

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Otherwise, I think you're safe. I love one of the few podcasts that does not want to divulge into your history.

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One of the few these days. Tell me, how was that for you? How was that?

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I feel bad because I started that, you know, when I used to do the Griefcast.

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Yeah, it's your fault. I was all about people being sad, but now everyone's being sad on the podcast.

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This is nice. I need a break from it, guys. You're either being sad or you're being very high performance and telling people how they can achieve anything by just a really hot,

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ginger root at 4am shoved into an orifice. But also they do this thing where they go, like, I'm going to tell you three ways that you can change your life,

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but they don't tell you for like 10 minutes. So you're like, what are you going to say?

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What are you going to say the bit where, just tell me, this will change your life.

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Okay. When I was first married, no, no, just, what is it? Tell me what it is.

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Tell me what it is. Anyway, I wasn't at school yesterday, so don't worry. Okay, well, what time did you wake up, please, carried yesterday?

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Okay, it was bad yesterday. Now, Max, I know you have small children, so you appreciate this.

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I woke up at five and it was not by a child. Oh, wow. It was me.

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I woke myself up. That's not good, is it? Intentionally? No, like I just, I had an anxiety dream.

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I thought you'd appreciate this because I was having some dream about trying to get the kids to school when I was in the wrong place, you know, like this.

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Somebody went in the dream, Cariad Lloyd, and I went, and I woke up. So I woke myself up with someone, only my name.

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And I was like, oh God, what? Like, it felt like, ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for the Cariad Lloyd.

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It felt very grand. And I woke up and thought, fucking hell, it's five in the morning.

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There's no reason to be awake. My five-year-old is not down. I could have got, he normally comes down half five, six.

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I could have got an extra half an hour. And I didn't. So I was really annoyed.

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Is this Cariad because you weren't happy at school? I guess it was, it was hard, you know, my parents.

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I'm sorry. That's the bit where you see the podcast host be like, yes, they're going to cry.

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They're going to cry. So you wake up and with no chance of going back to sleep, you just sort of know that in your bones the second you wake up?

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Yeah, because my, so my son still gets up about like half five, six. So any time from five, my body will think, well, it's wake up time.

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And so I would normally try and give myself as long as possible before he gets in the bed and starts demanding breakfast.

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So to wake up half an hour before that was about to happen. It was a bitter pill.

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It was bitter because it was just me. Yeah, that was rough. But I didn't get up straight away.

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I did a bit of like lying there thinking, which doesn't normally happen because normally he's in the bed just chatting shit to me.

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So I actually thought, oh, well, I've got half an hour to have a think.

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So that's probably good, isn't it? I love the idea of your son just chatting shit, but actually like having a go at you, you know, first thing in the morning.

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A lot of your clothes, they're fine, but we've just seen a lot of those outfits before.

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If you're not far off, he'll come down and he'll be like, I want breakfast.

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Mum, do you think planes, do you think planes like flying? Well, and I was also thinking, I saw a worm.

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Do you remember? Mum, you don't remember? I told you about the worm. Like it's so, it doesn't stay on any topic.

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Very demanding. And then just when you're in the middle of a sort of quite nice chat about planes and how planes work and you think, oh, this is quite nice.

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And you explain, so let me tell you, I want breakfast. And you're like, oh, sorry, I thought we were having a...

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One of my most toxic traits is that... Talking about planes. He's a massive philanderer and he really keeps it on the down low.

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And so he mustn't talk about it. So when the Helen Copter wakes me up, she is one of these people with a job, Cariad.

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Right, yeah, normal job, yeah. So I'm in some deep sleep cycle. I have no idea who I am, what my name is, what is this planet but spontaneously I start singing songs about how great I am.

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Wow, that must be a lot. Like she's pointed this out as in like, David, you are so cool.

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That's a lot. You're a really good guy and everyone appreciates you. I'd be struggling with that in the morning.

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While we wait for the various aspects to load. But why aren't you singing songs about how great she is?

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I know. Like that's what you should be. That would be charming. Because I'm furious at her for having woken me up.

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Okay. But she has a normal job, which means she can provide like for her half of the household, right?

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Can I just check? Because maybe I've had quite a long day. That's not real, David.

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Just wanted to check. Yeah, it is. It is real. That felt real, yeah. Yeah, a lot of it will be me.

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So I'll be like, 18 bikes is a good number of bikes to have a very normal thing to have them all in the house.

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You know, that kind of stuff. Oh no. I'm stressed. Brady, I can see one behind you.

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There's not 18 in the house, is there? There's 18. This is like my five-year-old. It's like, oh, what is happening?

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What? The minute you're going to ask me to make you breakfast. His son, it was revealed recently, Max's son, brackets, three years old, has three bikes.

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Yeah, but that's common with kids because they grow out them so quickly or you get a secondhand one that's like a not good one that's for the park and then a better one that's for learning.

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But how old are you, David? I'm 18. I'm 18 years old. And I have 18 bikes. One for every year?

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Did you get one for each birthday and just kept going? Everyone was like, he likes bikes.

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He says, buy him another bike for his birthday. Don't know what to get him.

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Yeah, now he can go on, you bet, and cycle each one of them and they get progressively bigger until he's on one that he actually fits.

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Anyway, Karen, we're digressing. It happens occasionally on this. It's fine. What are you thinking about?

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You've got half an hour or a question. Where do your thoughts go? Is it life admin or is it something deeper?

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You don't really want to go in my head. It's not a good place to go.

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Sorry. And this is the light podcast. It's a lot of like, what have I got to do?

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What's happening? What did I forget? I need to email that person. Oh, I said I'd do that.

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And trying to think the best way to use my day because I had a gig.

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I had Ostentatious, the improv show I do in the evening, which is an improvised Jane Austen show at the Vaudeville Theatre.

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So I was trying to think, well, that's, you know what I mean? That's evening.

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So can I do that? What do I need to do? And also trying to, because I have two kids, an eight-year-old and a five-year-old.

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So there was a lot okay, they've got that today. They need to remember to bring that.

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I need to tell them that. I haven't done that. I forgot to say, yeah.

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It's just the mental load. It's an exhausting half hour. Yeah. Oh, I know. The mental load.

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Well, I look, you know, write a list of things to do. I get a Google Doc, I write things to do.

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And it's got so many things to do. The jabs for the newborn, you know, trying to get on a waiting list on some app that doesn't work.

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And I get paralysed by indecision. So I just do none of the things. Yeah, it's hard.

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I'm the same. My list, I like alphabetise my hats. Hoover out the car. A lot of really important...

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Dust each bike spoke. Yeah. Organise the bikes into favourite order, colour order, height order, day of the week preference order.

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You know what it's like. Yeah, it's just mostly, you know, normal. And I don't have my phone in the room.

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I'm like, that got banned years ago. So I, yeah, I'm just going through. And then actually my husband woke up as well because we were both fucking stressed all the time.

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We were like, yeah, I just think I need to do that. Yeah, I need to do that as well.

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Okay, let's just get out of bed. Did you ban the phone or did it get banned?

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It sounds like, like the police did it. Like a quarter. I stopped putting my phone in my bedroom 10 years ago because I knew.

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Yeah, well, I just knew it was, I could see it was bad. I was like, I'm looking at it as soon as I wake up.

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I'm not going to sleep. Playing snake the whole time. Just sending template text messages to people.

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MSN messaging people. Yeah, no, I'm a real, oh look, you're going to make me do a proper podcast here.

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Like, so I have ADHD. And I really need to not, just to monitor myself.

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So the phone, 10 years ago, I was like, this is a problem. I plug it in somewhere in a different room.

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And I also plug it in a plug where I have to stand. So like, there's no seat near where it's charging.

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So you stand there when you, you know, when you're like on the scroll before bed, you're like, oh, I'm so tired.

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My feet hurt. And you're like, go to bed. You hang it from the ceiling and it's so high you have to be on tiptoes.

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Well, look, I'm a very short woman, so it wouldn't be hard to do that.

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And my husband's really tall, so I could just get him to place it somewhere high and I couldn't get it.

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But yeah, I think that's better than you wake up and you're, you can do the mental download, can't you?

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Of like, rather than instantly looking at the world that's on, it is constantly on fire.

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So I do a little like, okay, what are the fires that I can deal with in my life until I get to the point where like, well, this is overwhelming.

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Go and have a shower. It's funny because it's such an obvious problem with an obvious solution yet me...

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Mine's under my pillow. Exactly. I would say everyone else. Yeah. You don't know, you know, it's so bad for you.

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Yeah, but I'm actually quite good at not looking at it because I'm up all night.

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My wife is looking at it all the time. Jamie, listen to this. You have a problem.

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Great way to intervene. Great way. Just live by other people. This is how they communicate.

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It's the only way they communicate. Fair. I know what that's like to be a podcast host.

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You can only reach out to the audience. Yeah, she did actually. We have a very small audience.

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Just Jamie. And she had to stop the Matthew Crosby episode for a bit because his parents and his partner's parents both look after the kids and we, you know, my grandparents are on their way away and we don't have any grandparents to just come and do

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a day's work. So she was furious with him. It's not really his fault. So I'll let you know if she's furious with you.

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Anyway, so we're waiting for 5.30. We're waiting for the 5.00. Are you waiting for the pitter-patter of little feet?

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He normally comes downstairs and then I thought, because my life is, morning's okay, like I can't, it's insane, such bad chaos in our house.

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And I had this moment, I thought, my God, you could get up and you could do stuff before he gets you and you have to deal with him.

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So actually, I didn't wait. I leapt out of bed and tried to get stuff done.

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And then that meant when he came down and began his, Mum, have you, what is fire made of?

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I was like, I was ready. Like I'd had a shower and I was, I'd dressed and I was like, boom, let's Google it.

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Here's some, here's some cereal. Like, so that was an unusual, normally I'm just like, yeah, that's all happening at the same time.

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But for once, we got ahead of the game. Oh, great. Yeah. Yes. That was quite handy.

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I mean, I'm not trying to click bait the rest of the day, but you have a gig in 15 to 16 hours time.

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Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Which is quite a long way in the future. It's long. You already use up all your beans at this time.

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No, but when you have kids, you get beans at different times. Like your rhythms are much longer so like you have to have beans in the morning because that's when they need them.

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And I crash one to two. I'm not here. But then come six to seven, I'm back up again because that's normally bedtime.

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So you actually get, I would say you get, you get more beans than you think once you've had kids.

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That's interesting. I feel like I never had any beans before I had kids. Oh, okay.

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Now I have fewer beans. It's totally beanless. Yeah, I can see that. I had too many beans.

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Like I was a full-on energy person. Right. And I'm now depleted. But yeah, I guess I started with 200 and now I'm at 100.

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So let that be a lesson, guys. Think about your beans. Okay. So you've had a nice, you've had a nice shower.

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You're ready. And then is it, how do you make fire? What was it yesterday?

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Oh God, it was an in-depth. Oh God. I'm sorry. It happens so much that I tune out a lot of what's happening.

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That's okay. Yeah, he did the other day. He was like, what is fire made of?

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And I was like, well, it's fire. And he was like, no, what is it?

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What is it made of? And me and my husband were like, shit, what is fire made of?

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It's like being on the weakest link as you wake up, isn't it? Yeah. And we Googled it and it's mostly water vapor.

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No. Yeah. And like, I guess it's the chemical reactions of, but that's what he wanted to know.

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He's very like, how do things work? So he was like, he's like, I know it's hot, but what's it made of?

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Anyway, we didn't have that yesterday. He's very into like how planes work and hovercrafts at the moment.

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I don't think I had to do any Googling. My dad is a piano player.

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And when I was little, he would play the wheels on the bus or whatever I wanted to hear.

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But he's a jazz pianist. And I once, in a really considered way, said to him, why do you ruin all the songs?

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That is such a child thing to say. Yeah, it's fair enough. Oh my God, that is so funny.

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My son won't let us sing. So if you do anything, he goes, no, just me.

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Yeah, I have a son. The wheels on the bus. And you're like, can I?

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And he's also, he's really into music. So like he likes, he's really into the Beatles and Elton John at the moment.

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And he'll just sing, but, but, but Benny and the Jets and you're not allowed to join in, which is hard when someone's like, Benny, Benny.

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You think, come on, let me just say the Benny bit. He's like, don't go breaking my heart.

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No, not you. If you try and sing the other way. Yeah. I couldn't if I tried.

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When he gets to 500 miles, I guess I can't do it. He wants you to, to hear, listen to him.

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So he'll just carry on singing really sincerely at you as if you were a one, you know, it's an Edinburgh show with one audience and you're just having to sit there and he's got no shame about it.

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No kind of like, this is embarrassing that I'm making you do this. He's really at peace with it.

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He's like, this is nice, isn't it? That's great. Carry out no judgment. What do you make for breakfast?

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For him or for me? Just generally. What are the, we need all the information.

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Both of them have individual mix of cereals, which is like a fucking debate about who's got more of the sweet stuff that we like put more less sweet stuff.

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I, this is quite bad. So I'm always on at them about the sugary cereal, but I have fruit and fiber, but then I mix it with crunchy nut cornflakes.

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Like I sneak in. You're feeling healthy, but occasionally you get a little crunchy nut.

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But you can't do 50-50. So the kids feed a crunchy nut. They didn't know what it was for ages.

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They thought it was just different cornflakes. And then he tried one. He was like, mum, that orange one is really nice.

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They are amazing, aren't they? For grown-ups. Oh, really? He's already got like this Rice Kiss crispy shapes thing.

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So, and I'm honestly, I would describe it as like my mix is 80-20. So it's like you just get a little bit of a hint of the crunchy nut.

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You can't be mixing 50-50. Basically, I have to feed him some of my cereal.

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They call it like the tax. I have to give him some so he'll leave me alone.

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Yeah. On this very podcast Carrie had recently, Max informed us that he had woken at 4.30 a.m.

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and done a massive dump. Which, a kind listener, Max has been really going for the chia seeds recently.

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Oh, yeah, that will do it. In his Weetabix slash Weetbix. Max, I've got, I think, six pieces of correspondence that I tell Max.

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It's because... It's the chia seeds. It's my hemp and my flax. Yeah, my chia.

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Yeah, you've got to be careful with the seeds. You can over... It's all about moderation.

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I understand. I was thinking if I can at least do a healthy breakfast by the end of the day when I'm totally broken and I'm just shoveling, you know, dairy lilt.

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Boiling lilt. I'm pouring lilt into my eyelids. Boiling lilt with a shot of lilt.

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Melted down lilt bar. Yeah, yeah. Lint and lilt diet. Lint and lilt. Not enough people connect the two actually but it's a taste sensation.

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It's a totally tropical chocolatey... Totally tropical Swiss sensation. So Cariad, has your partner got up yet?

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Yeah, yeah. He's up. He's normally up before me actually. He gets up and works which I just can't do.

21:53 - 21:57

He'll just get up and do extra work but my brain is like not... Yeah, he'll get up and write.

21:57 - 22:01

You're like, well, I woke up at five so I went and did some writing and I'm like, oh God.

22:01 - 22:09

My God, my writing would be of such a low quality. It would be like the man and the van got a tan.

22:09 - 22:17

That's pretty good. Hey, you knock it but that's an Edinburgh show title there. People would like to see it.

22:17 - 22:28

DOD does the rhyming. No, I'm not doing any work at that point but yes, my husband is definitely up and then I have to go and wake my daughter up at 7.30 so we have a long time where we're just wrangling him and then

22:28 - 22:35

I have to go and deal with the opposite which is someone who doesn't want to get out of bed like a proper teenager even though she's eight being like, please, please get out of bed.

22:35 - 22:39

Do you ever go, do you want to watch Blippi for like an hour and a half?

22:39 - 22:43

No, because we just it's not the situation where if you put the telly on it gets better.

22:43 - 22:47

Right. If you give them too much telly you're just doubling what you've already got.

22:47 - 23:00

It's like adding you know, the Mentos science experiment you're just like your ad is going to explode you're just delaying the explosion so unfortunately yeah, even a bit of telly in the morning because then the row will be about turning it off and that's worse.

23:00 - 23:12

So I'd rather he followed me around the house telling me you know what he recently learned about planes or cars or trains or the underground system than deal with an argument about the telly going off.

23:12 - 23:18

But don't don't be thinking they don't watch telly they watch it all afternoon but I'm saving myself for that.

23:18 - 23:25

No, no, no, that's fair and also there's a danger in there if he watches something on TV it might bring some questions and you don't want to have any more questions.

23:25 - 23:36

I can't. Try that, he's too inquisitive as it is. A woman knocked on the door to like when it must have been you know, local elections she was like, hello and he opened the door and he said, oh hi what do you have for breakfast?

23:36 - 23:42

And she was like she said cereal and he went, yeah and do you have telly?

23:42 - 23:48

Straight off the bat. Straight off the bat. And she was like it was so funny watching her go yeah, you like it?

23:48 - 23:51

It's a big telly? What do you think? Do you like your telly? Is it a good telly?

23:51 - 23:56

Sounds like the questions we ask. Yeah. You tell them to stay the heck away from this podcast.

23:57 - 24:04

He'd be a great podcaster. Honestly, he's like a five-year-old podcaster. I mean, this is directed at the listeners and not either of you.

24:04 - 24:21

There's a real contrast here in parenting because so often, you know, Max's parenting is just wakes him up, puts him in front of a big screen with like six McDonald's bags full of of chicken dippers whereas Cariad's like continue with your mosaic.

24:21 - 24:30

I wish. But the thing is, it's just different families, different kids. Like, if McDonald's and telly worked, we would probably be doing it but it doesn't work.

24:30 - 24:34

Can we just be clear that I do not though... Max, it's okay. No judgment.

24:34 - 24:39

No judgment. No. When he wasn't sleeping, I once took him to the McDonald's cafe.

24:39 - 24:42

How could... See, if I did that once, I would never hear the end of it.

24:42 - 24:54

No, but I bought him like the plastic, the apple, sliced apple in plastic. It's all he wanted but he was just so excited that there were construction workers there and he was called a construction cafe and it blew his mind and I haven't taken him back since.

24:54 - 24:59

It was five o'clock in the morning. It was like, my wife was just like, can you just take him out for a while?

24:59 - 25:09

Just go, just leave, yeah. Just go. Question, Carrier, do you get solace in the fact that in three years if the boy follows the same route as the girl, my daughter,

25:09 - 25:17

yeah, he too will then be like, oh, someone's got to wake him up at half seven as opposed to, yeah.

25:17 - 25:25

But what I know will happen, I fucking know, is he will go the other way and it'll be like half an hour of like dragging him out of that bed.

25:25 - 25:29

So I have some solace, but I also know it's just going to flip. It's not going to get easier.

25:29 - 25:32

It's just going to be a different set of problems. But hey, you know what?

25:32 - 25:41

That is parenting. It's just a different set of problems. So I, yeah, I know I'll get my mornings back one day and actually, I don't know, I'm so used to it.

25:41 - 25:47

I'm a real night owl as well. So it's had to be a complete change in my life because I used to like stay up to one or two.

25:47 - 25:51

But I also know when I've gone away, I can get back there like that.

25:51 - 25:54

It's coming back. Right, yeah. It doesn't bother me. I can go back to one and two

25:56 - 26:00

and just got to stop being happy for like, I don't know, 18 years. Yeah, something like that.

26:00 - 26:07

Just for the record, I am neither a night owl or a morning lark. Afternoon seagull?

26:07 - 26:13

What is this? Yeah, just an afternoon. I attack some bins at about 4pm and I'm like, that's me done.

26:13 - 26:18

Don't worry. Okay, so 7.30 is when you have to go in and... I have to get up at 7.30.

26:18 - 26:22

Big drag that takes forever. Keep going back in the room. Come on, come on, come on, come on, come on.

26:22 - 26:27

It's a lot of like, it's just hustle, hustle, hustle. You're just constantly have you eaten your breakfast?

26:27 - 26:30

Okay, you have to right now. Eat the toast. Okay, now you need to go to loop.

26:30 - 26:33

I should eat. Put your clothes. Why is your socks? You said you're going to...

26:33 - 26:39

And it's just that until like 10 to 9. I just follow people around the flat stopping them from...

26:39 - 26:44

They get back into bed. They hide. They put things against their door so I can't get in.

26:44 - 26:50

Yeah, like anything. They will start a jigsaw puzzle. They will decide they need to do their colouring right there, right now.

26:50 - 26:54

They'll be like, I need to build a train set right now and if you don't do that I'm going to lose my shit.

26:54 - 27:02

So you're just trying to like stop fun things happening, get the basics done and then get out the door and then hopefully by the time you're at the door you're like,

27:02 - 27:07

am I dressed? But I don't remember that bit happening. I don't remember. I'm just like, okay.

27:07 - 27:13

And then me and what will happen is that we both follow one of them around because they will not do what they're supposed to do.

27:13 - 27:16

It's so stressful. And then we get to the door. One of us will take them to school.

27:16 - 27:23

The other one will, you know, sort their life out. And we look at each other at the front door and we're like, hi, okay, bye.

27:23 - 27:35

And that's the only interaction we're having. I had the other day, I think it was yesterday, Ian, young Ian was going to kinder and Jamie had taken Willie Rushden on a nap walk.

27:35 - 27:46

And so I was left with Ian and he wasn't dressed. And then he was a bit fragile and he had a bogey and I went to clear up and he leant forward and it was like he headbutted my face.

27:46 - 27:49

I didn't punch him in the face. He was desolate. And then it was just like everything.

27:49 - 27:54

Then I wiped his nose with the wrong blanket. It was like everything. He was just like grieving about all this.

27:54 - 27:59

And then I was like, and then like sort of manna from heaven, the trash truck.

27:59 - 28:03

We heard it. He was like, trash truck. So I literally, I shoved any clothes that I could.

28:03 - 28:07

I threw him onto the bike and I literally just like ran out of the house.

28:07 - 28:11

I left the house probably on fire and I said, we can chase the trash truck.

28:11 - 28:19

And then we just accidentally ended up at kinder and he was totally fine. He was literally just like, oh, it was like, I need the bin lorry every morning and then it's fine.

28:19 - 28:25

Stuff like that. We had a, they were building something outside our block of flats for ages and it would be like, should we go and see what they're doing?

28:25 - 28:32

Literally all the construction guys were like, hi, hi, hi. And once the bin lorry was there and they let him press the button.

28:32 - 28:40

Oh my God. Then he said, does he want to press it? He was like, and that kept us going from just months.

28:40 - 28:46

So good. Deb takes the bins and moves them into position for the guys driving it.

28:46 - 28:51

And Ian has a sort of toy trash truck and he's like proudly showing it to Deb.

28:51 - 28:57

And I was thinking, is this what Deb wants to see at that 6.45am is like someone so excited about a rubbish truck.

28:57 - 29:03

I don't know. I think so. I think that's nice. That's nice. They must spend their lives being like they're noisy or this.

29:03 - 29:07

It's like, it's nice to celebrate the jobs that people don't celebrate enough. Yeah, it's beautiful.

29:07 - 29:13

It's like the way grownups go to football matches dressed as their favourite players. You know what I mean?

29:13 - 29:20

In the full kit. He's the same, but just holding the truck up to the men from the council.

29:20 - 29:27

Yeah, it's nice. Right, so it's 10 to 9. Are you taking the kids to school or have you won the lot and you are at home to do what you want?

29:27 - 29:32

No, I took them. I took them because we have a deal. So I knew I wasn't going to pick them up because I had my gig.

29:32 - 29:37

So I took them. And that was very easy. That was fine. Okay, drop-off is fine.

29:37 - 29:44

That's good. Yeah, for us, it's so difficult getting to the front door. But after that, they're like, yeah, great, we're going to school.

29:44 - 29:49

And then it's just breezy and the sun was shining and we saw lots of dogs.

29:49 - 29:53

They were very happy about that. Everyone went in fine. You count your blessings, they go in happy.

29:53 - 29:58

So you, Cariad, are not a source of embarrassment to them. That's good. Oh, I am.

29:58 - 30:05

To my daughter, yeah, definitely, 100%. She told me when she was about six, can you, when I'm talking to those older girls, can you just not stand near me?

30:05 - 30:11

Because it's, when you're six, can you not stand near me? Six. At six. So, wow.

30:11 - 30:15

That's when you've lost them. Yeah, girls in the year, like two years above, they were like, hi, hi.

30:15 - 30:18

And I was sort of standing there like, oh, well, you're six, so I'm not going to leave you.

30:18 - 30:26

And then we walked home. I said, you're right. She said, yeah, just when we were talking to those girls from like year four, next time that happens, can you just not be there?

30:26 - 30:31

So it was a bit of that. Also the fact that you kept using Gen Z lingo.

30:31 - 30:41

You kept saying go to and no cap. And whiz and lit, guys. Yeah. What's funny about primary school is they don't use cool lingo.

30:41 - 30:46

It's lingo for the primary school that's cool. So they would just come up with their own stuff.

30:46 - 30:49

Do you know what I mean? And so it's not like, I find it really sweet.

30:49 - 30:53

Skills is back in, in their primary school. Skills. Oh, yeah. Good to hear. With a Z.

30:53 - 30:59

Yeah, with a Z. But I don't think like any, you know, whatever they are, Gen Zs are using that.

30:59 - 31:04

It's just like, that's their cultural community. So they breathe their own stuff that they think, because the year sixes are using it.

31:04 - 31:11

That's cool. My brother's lot, they said gear. Gear. When something was good. Gear. So I was like, what does gear mean?

31:11 - 31:21

And he was like, it's a combination of great and rare. And like, wow, you can just smash these cool words together to make even cooler words.

31:21 - 31:25

So yeah. He didn't drugs when I was a teenager. Oh, maybe that's what he meant.

31:25 - 31:32

I was like, are you sure they're not dealing? He was also six, but he was actually pilled out of his mind.

31:32 - 31:39

And he had a limo. A cane and a fur coat. Okay. So it's nine o'clock.

31:39 - 31:47

You drop them off. You're free. Free. What's the day, Cariad? What's happening? So I came back home and then it's always like, you're like shell shocked.

31:47 - 31:54

Both of us are shell shocked because it's like, what just happened? And it means all of those thoughts you had at five, you haven't been allowed to think a single thing for a long time.

31:54 - 31:59

So then it takes a while to like decompress and be like, okay, what the fuck just happened?

31:59 - 32:05

And then I decided, which I thought, I don't normally do. It makes me sound like a lady of leisure.

32:05 - 32:14

I decided to make a crumble. Oh, that is delightful. I was like, I'm going to make a crumble because we had a load of, lots of rhubarb in the fridge and apples.

32:14 - 32:17

And I thought, and my kids love crumble. And I thought, because I've got a gig.

32:17 - 32:24

Normally, I don't want people to think that I'm a work shy writer performer, I would normally get onto the computer.

32:24 - 32:29

But I thought, I've got a gig. I don't want to be just stuck at the computer for ages.

32:29 - 32:33

So I decided to make an apple and rhubarb crumble and listen to a blockbuster.

32:33 - 32:42

Oh my goodness. So many things we have to go on to here. But does the ADHD brain, is it useful to write down a list and work your way through it?

32:42 - 32:46

Do you know what I mean? To try and get some of that, those gears to stop moving.

32:46 - 32:54

I keep saying gears now. Yeah, I do. And I have a list on my desk of like everything super urgent, but I'm in that weird bit where I'm waiting for notes on things.

32:54 - 33:01

So that means I'm sort of like paralyzed. I can't quite do anything because I'm waiting to be told about the thing.

33:01 - 33:06

So that's what I thought at five o'clock. I was like, oh, you should make sure you do this, this and this today.

33:06 - 33:10

And I thought, carry on. Don't just sit at that computer pretending to work and not doing anything.

33:10 - 33:17

Why don't you, let's do things. So if I was like, yeah, I'm going to make a crumble because that's a thing that I can look at and go, I did that.

33:17 - 33:30

It's tangible, yes. It's tangible. Because otherwise sometimes if I'm, yeah, super distracted, I sit at the laptop, like honestly, like looking like you think, wow, that person's getting so much done and I'm not rearranging my email folders.

33:30 - 33:40

So I mean, literally though, if you were to think of a word which represents impermanence, if that's a word, crumble would be.

33:40 - 33:51

And if I was thinking how to procrastinate from doing things I really needed to do, making an apple and rhubarb crumble would be quite near the top of the list.

33:51 - 33:58

This is the ADHD brain for me. And obviously everyone's completely different. I have learned, what I used to do is sit at the computer and have a go at myself for like six hours.

33:58 - 34:02

You're not doing anything. Why are you not doing anything? You're just fucking lazy. And that was so annoying.

34:02 - 34:09

And now I know what the problem is. I schedule in the procrastination. So I'm like, okay, we're not in the working mood.

34:09 - 34:15

We're waiting for this email about notes. So what can we do? So it's like, I do the procrastination consciously.

34:15 - 34:23

And then if you don't have a go at yourself, you're like, okay, instead of just pretending to do something, I'm actually going to do something no, it's not what I should be doing,

34:23 - 34:29

but it will end up with a crumble, which everyone's happy about. I was like, I can do something later.

34:29 - 34:32

But yesterday was not, I knew it wasn't going to be a good work day.

34:32 - 34:36

I've woken up at five. I was knackered. So I was like, I'm just going to write it off.

34:36 - 34:40

Tell us how you take, tell us your crumble. Make the crumble for us. Tell us your crumble.

34:40 - 34:43

I mean, that's your next podcast, right? Tell us your crumble. Yeah, it is. It is.

34:43 - 34:47

It's niche, but I'm into it. I feel like David already has that song in his repertoire.

34:47 - 34:55

Tell us your crumble. I'm only going to, I've talked to incredibly famous hip hop stars about crumbles they've made.

34:55 - 35:01

So like, I keep trying to book Drake. My tummy rumbles every time she makes a crumble.

35:01 - 35:06

Is that how it works, Didi? Have I done it for you? No, it should be about David.

35:06 - 35:12

You make the best crumble. You're astonishing at desserts of every kind. Look, I'm not awake.

35:12 - 35:18

It's like when you're improvising with ostentatious on the best possible day. You don't know where it's coming from.

35:18 - 35:23

You just don't stop the thoughts. However they are. You are all about how great I am.

35:23 - 35:30

You're a subconscious narcissist. I absolutely love it. Subconscious narcissist is a great name for the memoir.

35:30 - 35:39

That's great. So I love crumble hard, and I make a crumble. I use a recipe by Benjamina Ebue.

35:39 - 35:45

I think I'm saying that right, Ebue. She was on Bake Off, but then she's become an amazing, amazing chef in her own right.

35:45 - 35:50

And she has a recipe book called I'll Bring Dessert, which has a really good crumble recipe in it.

35:50 - 35:59

Okay. The key with this. This crumble, this changed my crumble making, is that you do some of the fruit raw, and you cook some of it, right?

35:59 - 36:05

So when you have your end crumble, some of it is like appley mush, but some of it's still got that nice bit of apple.

36:05 - 36:10

It's still like hasn't gone to baby food. Yes. So you're getting the two types of fruit together.

36:10 - 36:17

And in a bowl with the raw stuff, you put like sugar and cinnamon and nutmeg and vanilla paste.

36:17 - 36:21

And so you have some raw apples. So I do a bit of rhubarb. Hers is an apple recipe.

36:21 - 36:26

I've adapted it. And you mix that through. And then in a pan with a bit of sugar and lemon, you're cooking some apple and rhubarb.

36:26 - 36:31

So that cooks down and is soft. And then you're mixing the two together, putting your crumble on top.

36:31 - 36:36

And I want to, I literally do them. It's just a really good crumble. It's really good.

36:36 - 36:40

Isn't raw rhubarb dangerous? No, no, no, no, Max. Max, Max, no, no, no, no.

36:40 - 36:47

You're not listening. You're not thinking. So you have the- You can't stick a raw one in just like a stick at the end.

36:47 - 36:50

You're not a crumble man. That's what I can tell by that comment. No, I did.

36:50 - 36:54

I was being facetious. I understand. It's cooked, not as cooked. No, no, no, no, no.

36:54 - 36:58

You cook it in a pan, some of it. Yeah. Some of it's in a bowl, raw.

36:58 - 37:04

Yeah. You mix it all in your crumble dish. You put your crumble topping on top, which is just flour and butter basically mixed together.

37:04 - 37:08

Then you cook it. Then you put it in the oven. So some of the fruit has had more cooking.

37:08 - 37:18

So you're getting different levels of fruit tenderness. Yeah. I feel like you're not the audience for the crumble details, but trust me, it's really good.

37:18 - 37:23

Max only cooks food that comes in a box with precise instructions as to what to do.

37:23 - 37:29

But then intriguingly, he just deletes whatever. You would think from that, you would pick up some of the skills.

37:29 - 37:35

So it's possible he has made this. He just has no idea if he has at the best.

37:35 - 37:42

The HelloFresh rhubarb crumble. Oh, do you do HelloFresh? We do two boxes a week, like two meals a week.

37:42 - 37:50

Otherwise, I'd just make a bolognese every night. And we're time poor. And I'm never going to buy a barramundi fillet.

37:50 - 37:53

You have to justify it. I was being unnecessarily. No, no, no, you're allowed to.

37:53 - 37:58

And also, they sponsor podcasts. I love them. They're great. But we can't because David's called it Idiots in a Box from Idiot.com.

37:58 - 38:04

So we're just never going to get that money, which is a bit annoying. Mate, that's like not getting the mattress money.

38:04 - 38:09

Come on, that's what podcasts are made of. HelloFresh, Gusto, and mattresses. He's shat on mattresses as well.

38:09 - 38:15

He's rejected mattresses. So we are skimps, Carrie-Anne. Why are you a podcaster? Come on.

38:15 - 38:21

That's why we all got into the game for new mattresses. It's good because we don't eat any fish and then we order.

38:21 - 38:26

And we try and do one fish and then we get the fish and then we're sad we've got the fish, but we've paid for it so we eat the fish.

38:26 - 38:29

Yeah, okay, that's good. It's actually all right at the end. Anyway, tell me about the crumble.

38:29 - 38:33

What's on the topping? What's the topping of this crumble? That's the crumble topping. People who know crumble know crumble.

38:33 - 38:44

So you get flour and butter and sugar and I add oats and then you rub this together in a bowl and then you put that on top so it looks like a kind of floury mess and then you cook that.

38:44 - 38:50

That becomes crumble. Becomes the crumble. Underneath is just a fruit compote basically, but the top is the crumble bit.

38:50 - 38:54

I mean, I do know what crumble is. I do know what crumble is. I feel like now I've really reduced myself to this.

38:54 - 38:59

You've asked me what the crumble topping was, so I had to explain. We've established that I know nothing, but I can see some are sort of granolary.

38:59 - 39:04

Oh yeah, so you can add jumbo rolled oats and that will make it a little bit more crunchy.

39:04 - 39:08

Some people add flaked almonds, but sometimes that's a bit, you know, the flavour's too strong.

39:08 - 39:14

Do you eat a lot of the component parts while you're making it? I do bake a lot.

39:14 - 39:18

If it's cake, I will be, afterwards, I'll be eating the cake mixture with crumble.

39:18 - 39:22

Not so much because I know I'm going to get it. I know I'm going to eat that lovely crumble.

39:22 - 39:28

And when you've cooked it, it's so fucking hot, you're in danger of a burn.

39:28 - 39:35

So I didn't, no, I didn't help myself to anything particularly. I think I had some apple, like raw apple, because I was peeling it and I thought, actually, it looks quite nice.

39:35 - 39:41

But not raw rhubarb, let's be established. Not raw rhubarb, no. That's the point I was trying to make.

39:41 - 39:45

Thank you. Okay, so the crumble is out of the oven. It's cooling on the top.

39:45 - 39:54

You're happy with that. Carry out this domestic bliss. She has a half door and the crumble is like cooling on a windowsill.

39:54 - 39:59

Some neighborhood boys smell it and they're like, mmm, and they try to snatch it.

39:59 - 40:07

Is that what happens? No, normally if I speak to the neighborhood youth, it's asking them to stop smoking weed outside the block of flats.

40:07 - 40:12

That's normally, I do my mum job and I'm like, I'm sorry, guys, sorry. Can you, sorry.

40:12 - 40:16

It's just, it really is. I used to love this stuff, but could you just, you know.

40:16 - 40:19

I know what it's like to be high and I love it. And that's very cool.

40:19 - 40:23

But can you not do it? Can you not do it just below my children's window?

40:23 - 40:27

What's worse is, last time I did this, they were like, yeah, but you smoke weed, don't you?

40:27 - 40:32

And I actually, because of my many brains, don't. And I sort of didn't know what to say.

40:32 - 40:40

So I said, oh, and they went, she does, she does, she smokes it. And I was like, oh, this is weird because I'm not cool, but you think I'm cooler than I am.

40:40 - 40:45

Even though I haven't lied, I haven't tried to be cool. I've tried to be absolutely as straight and boring as I am.

40:45 - 41:01

They were like, oh yeah, yeah, you know, you know, she knows. Cariat, I've heard sometimes you, just light loads of weed all around your house and then hotbox through the leather box where you just put your mouth up to it and take giant hits off the whole house.

41:01 - 41:07

Why is my son asking so many questions? We're all, we're all on it. Yeah, I do hotbox my leather box.

41:07 - 41:13

Exactly. How do planes work? Can I have some Doritos? What's happening? Yeah. Yeah. It was very funny.

41:13 - 41:19

Anyway, so yes, the domestic bliss, you can imagine it floating on a stable door with a gingham curtain.

41:19 - 41:23

That is definitely not what happens, but sure, let's imagine that I have the life of an Instagram influencer.

41:23 - 41:34

Okay, so the crumble is on that door. Yeah. Where to now? Now I just went back to my desk and I just did, I did some work, but like I knew I wasn't going to get any writing done because I said, I'm waiting for these notes

41:34 - 41:44

and some of my brain is like, do, we're not in. So I was just doing very boring admin emails to all the many plates that I am spinning.

41:44 - 41:50

Yeah, that was it until my husband made me lunch. Can you just explain notes to listeners who don't know what?

41:51 - 41:54

Oh, sorry. So I, one of the things I do is I write kids books.

41:54 - 42:02

I've got a picture book that's just come out called Where Did She Go? Which is for four to seven year olds about how to talk to them about grief and death.

42:02 - 42:11

Cause that's a lot of the subject I work with. And I had a kid's picture book come out in December called Lydia Marmalade and the Christmas Wish, which was set in Jane Austen times.

42:11 - 42:20

It's like a mystery with magic for eight to 12 year olds. And I've written the second one of that and I'm waiting for notes back from my editor about that.

42:20 - 42:32

Version. So quite common thing for writers or people of certain brains is that if you're waiting for something, you can't start anything else cause you're just waiting like a dog for the next bit.

42:32 - 42:35

So every time I try and write something at the moment, I'm like, yeah, but I need the other notes.

42:35 - 42:46

That makes sense. Psst, carry out. My editor of children's books really has mastered the shit sandwich when giving me feedback.

42:46 - 42:54

So massive compliment at the start. Like I cannot believe. This book is going to make so many people happy.

42:54 - 43:00

Paragraph two. Did she sing it as well? David's so amazing. This is the worst thing I've ever read.

43:00 - 43:11

Please rethink everything from the title to the characters. Last paragraph. I cannot wait for the next time I get to read this.

43:11 - 43:14

I cannot wait for you to do the notes that you fucking need to do.

43:14 - 43:30

Yeah. And that works for you. You're happy with that. To be honest, because these things tend to take a while I have a slightly, it's a skill or a gift of some sort whereby I'm very good at forgetting a thing that I have written

43:30 - 43:42

and a month later reading it back like a stranger and then being able to criticize it as you would if an idiot had asked you to read their children's book.

43:42 - 43:50

And so with a bit of a help of a good editor and my editor Anthea realizes this so she'll be like, how about just this bit?

43:50 - 43:56

And I'm like, yes, of course. That's what I'm doing. Yes, absolutely. I agree. Whoever wrote draft one, what were they thinking?

43:56 - 44:03

That's really handy. Do you like writing kids books? There's times I like doing it.

44:03 - 44:10

I like finishing them more so. I still haven't sussed it. I've written seven books.

44:10 - 44:16

The last time I tried to do a sort of puke draft as it's known, where you just write, you write, you write.

44:16 - 44:21

And then when I got to the end of that, some part of my brain was like, great, you've done it.

44:21 - 44:27

And then I began to reread it again and honestly nearly abandoned the whole project.

44:27 - 44:36

So I still haven't sussed. I still don't have the little Roald Dahl shed that I go out to for two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening.

44:36 - 44:42

But I enjoy parts of it, let's just say. Yeah, I think it's like all things, isn't it?

44:42 - 44:46

Right to any writing, performing. Like I feel Edinburgh, do you know what I mean?

44:46 - 44:50

Like once it's finished, you're like, oh, well, I loved that. It was great. But I will say this.

44:50 - 45:00

Is that at least with a show in front of people, if you do a rewrite of it and do it tonight or next week, people will be like, this is what we think about that.

45:00 - 45:06

Whereas the deal with writing a book is it's sort of, oh, in two years time, I'll find out what people think about that.

45:06 - 45:11

Yeah, I don't know how you manage it. Like I have a column every other week in The Guardian.

45:11 - 45:18

So I have good week, bad week, basically. The week where I don't have to write a column, I'm like, oh, I don't have to think about anything.

45:18 - 45:24

I have to write it. But then I do like it when someone else says, oh, I like that thing you wrote about that thing.

45:24 - 45:29

Yeah, that's nice. That is good. I don't like sending it off because then they might publish it.

45:29 - 45:35

They tend to. And then I think, why are they publishing that? Fisher Price bollocks next to Marina Hyde's article.

45:35 - 45:42

This is a fucking disaster. People are going to look at Barney Ronay's article and they're going to look at mine and go, why have they let this person do it?

45:42 - 45:50

What is that? And I've just done My Favourite Goal again or Why I Love Cricket or Aren't Balls Round?

45:50 - 45:54

And I'm just thinking, oh, God. Try what it's fire made of. That's what you should do.

45:54 - 46:00

Yeah, you're probably right. Yeah, get on. Okay, so Mr. Cariad makes you lunch. This is exciting.

46:00 - 46:05

Does he ask what you want or does he just go and make it? Or is he making it while you're making the crumble?

46:05 - 46:10

No, no, we don't cross-kitchen because he gets a bit stressed. He's an amazing cook.

46:10 - 46:16

Amazing. And the way you saw the passion that I was talking about, pudding, that's how he feels about all the other courses.

46:16 - 46:20

It's a happy situation. This is a lunch made in heaven. And I'm a bit embarrassed about what.

46:20 - 46:25

I got for lunch yesterday. Toasted cheese sandwich. Please say a toasted cheese. Really undermined.

46:25 - 46:35

No, it's going to be foie gras with quince jus. Because I had ostentatious, I actually put, like normally we'd be like very cafe lunch, you know, like cheese on toast or scrambled eggs.

46:35 - 46:41

It's not easy. We're both working from home. We're both writers. He's a filmmaker. And so it's very like easy, easy breezy.

46:41 - 46:47

But because I knew I had ostentatious, I put in a request at the restaurant and said, can we have like a big lunch?

46:47 - 46:50

Because then I don't have to go and like, otherwise you end up, do you have this?

46:50 - 46:56

The gigs, like if you have like a sandwich lunch and then you're having a sandwich tea and then you've got the gig and you're like, I didn't get my big meal when I,

46:56 - 47:02

to power me through. So I had. At what time is this? Is it midday?

47:02 - 47:06

This is one o'clock, I think. No, about one, because by the time it took, because I requested such complicated.

47:06 - 47:14

I said I wanted something nice. So I had potato dauphinoise. I had sauteed chard, breaded place with a caper butter.

47:14 - 47:20

That is unusual. That is unusual. And was that all in the fridge? Was that all in the fridge?

47:20 - 47:23

Or did he have to go out and source the ingredients? All in the fridge.

47:23 - 47:26

He had to go fishing. He had to go and fish it out. It was all in the fridge.

47:26 - 47:33

But I can't, it's like living with like a 1950s, like farm housewife, like, because he's so loves cooking so much.

47:33 - 47:37

So I will open a fridge and I'll be like, there's nothing here. I can't see anything.

47:37 - 47:40

Cause I grew up with a very like freezer food. Do you know what I mean?

47:40 - 47:50

Like Finder's crispy pancakes, like chips, fruit corner. Like it was like, and he'll open the fridge and he'll be like, oh, well there's that vegetable and this vegetable and we could do this and I can do a couscous.

47:50 - 47:56

And I'm like, how do you see the, I can only just see there's green and there's a tub of Philadelphia, but those things don't go.

47:56 - 48:03

Pita and hummus. I guess I'm having pita and hummus, yeah. So he bought this breaded place, but he was like, oh, I was going to cook that like later in the week.

48:03 - 48:05

And I was like, well, I just want a big, can I have a big lunch?

48:05 - 48:12

And the potato dough from while I was left over from another meal. Like he's just, I'm so lucky.

48:12 - 48:17

I am so lucky that that's like his, his downtime is cooking. Like that's what he likes to do.

48:17 - 48:26

Instead of collecting 18 bikes, we have too much. ingredients in our house. Can still be stressful as a wife when you're like, can we just have pita and hummus, please?

48:26 - 48:37

Yeah. I like though that when you said he'd magicked it out of nothing, the fact that there was just some dauphinoise potato there.

48:37 - 48:49

You know what I mean? That's not exactly ready, steady cook either. Where he's got some washing up liquid, a pepper, a hammer, and he makes out of it some otolenghi soup.

48:49 - 48:54

Pardon me slightly. I'm disappointed he didn't bread the place himself. You know, now we're really getting into this.

48:54 - 49:01

Yeah, yeah. But he could do that. He's let himself down. He could. And he'll be annoyed, but he did make his own caper butter sauce.

49:01 - 49:06

That was him. That's good, yeah. Yeah. And was it delicious? Did he have it as well?

49:06 - 49:13

Did we eat together? We sat down and had lunch together. Because as I said, our mornings are so insane.

49:13 - 49:17

So then if we're both working from home, that's like the only chance we have to be like, oh, hello.

49:17 - 49:30

Oh, hi. Okay. Key question here. Do you eat it at a low table and has the table been set or do you just simply take a fork out from the drawer and then just start shoveling it into your faces?

49:30 - 49:35

Bit of a mix because we've got the table in the kitchen and our kitchen's like, we live in the flat, so the kitchen is small.

49:35 - 49:40

And so it's like we sit at the table, but then the drawer is behind you.

49:40 - 49:44

So all you have to do is like lean like this and you can get all the cutlery and then do like that.

49:44 - 49:48

So it's a mix. It's not like, it's a bit of decorum, sit at a table and chair.

49:48 - 49:52

It's really lovely. And what do you talk about at lunch? How insane was that morning?

49:52 - 50:01

Who's doing that? Are you getting them? It's all the fucking parent admin that's just like, and then you often get there because we're both freelancers, be like, and you're picking them up, right?

50:01 - 50:05

What? Yeah. And you're picking them up. No, I told you about the gig. You didn't put that gig in the calendar.

50:05 - 50:12

I put it in the calendar. No, you didn't. You can't go. Yeah, it's like there's lots of calendar checking and stuff.

50:12 - 50:20

And then, yeah, just had a nice chat. The local rude boys are outside the window and they're shouting up, smells like a caper and butter sauce.

50:20 - 50:27

You've made up there, Mrs. Lloyd. Are you having that with a spliff? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

50:27 - 50:32

So cool. I'm so cool, guys. I'm so cool. Yeah, so I had a very nice lunch.

50:32 - 50:36

Very nice lunch. Did you have a little dessert there? It sounds like you need a crisp white wine with this.

50:36 - 50:42

Guess what we did? Killipos. No. Guys, because I knew I was going out, I made a crumble.

50:42 - 50:46

We had half for our lunch, leaving half for them to have for their tea.

50:46 - 50:51

So I didn't miss out on fresh crumble. Oh, great. So I then had crumble and custard for my pudding.

50:51 - 50:56

I would say after that lunch, I'd need a two hour... I mean, it's a place.

50:56 - 50:59

It's not like you didn't have a leg of land, but I would have an hour's sleep.

50:59 - 51:07

Did you have a nap? Did you have a nap? So I want you to know I'm a very hardworking person, but yesterday was not a hardworking day.

51:07 - 51:11

And again, you know, it's like you've got a gig. You went to Champagne's for a spa break.

51:11 - 51:17

No, I went and did some more work. And then I saw, because I knew I was improvising tonight.

51:17 - 51:24

It's not even like, obviously it's still different if you're doing like material, you know, but with improvising, it's like you can't be complete zombie.

51:24 - 51:30

I actually went, because I'm also, I do a book podcast for Sara Pascoe and I have a book pile like this high.

51:30 - 51:35

And so I went and read some of the books that I needed to finish for next week's interview.

51:35 - 51:40

And then I was like, I'm going to have a cheeky 20 minutes. Only 20 minutes. Yeah.

51:40 - 51:45

I think I maybe did an extended snooze. I think I did 20. And then I was like, actually I could have another 10.

51:45 - 51:52

So then I did another 10. I mean, I think it's fair enough. You've got a gig in the evening, you're up at five, but I would want an hour.

51:52 - 51:59

And occasionally if I can get away with it, which is now I have two children and I can't, I'd just set it for another hour.

51:59 - 52:04

That'd be too much for me. I'd be stressed about that. I'd feel so guilty.

52:04 - 52:07

I feel guilty napping anyway. I'm like, oh my God, you've got so much to do.

52:07 - 52:15

I only did it because I was like, you won't be able to improvise as well as you should normally can do if you don't at least top it up a smidge.

52:15 - 52:19

You're going to be like, oh God, I'm so tired. So yeah, and I did finish the book as well.

52:19 - 52:29

Okay, so we wake up from the sleep. What time are we now? It was like half three, four and I had to like tidy up, get sorted, get all my ostentatious stuff together,

52:29 - 52:34

make sure I had what I needed and get out of the house. And that just took way too long.

52:34 - 52:47

To the listeners, when Cariad said, get all my ostentatious stuff together, she's referring to ostentatious the show and not her various fur coats that she wears to go down to.

52:47 - 52:54

I couldn't find my candelabra and so I didn't know what to do. Of course, the tiger rug didn't fit.

52:54 - 52:59

What stuff do you, because I'd have thought it would all be there at the theatre.

52:59 - 53:03

Yeah, most of it is there. We used to take our dresses home, but most of it's there.

53:03 - 53:08

It's like makeup, to be honest. It's makeup and hair stuff because you've got to do your regency hair.

53:08 - 53:11

That's why it's very, you can't see it's all tongued. Yeah, what else was there?

53:11 - 53:17

Yeah, it was just makeup yesterday, hair stuff, fake plaits, curling wands, the joy of being a regency.

53:17 - 53:22

And then, oh, some costumey bits. I had some costumey bits I just had to remember to bring back.

53:22 - 53:28

What time do you need to be? I mean, a gig looms. Yeah. Like even a really fun gig.

53:28 - 53:33

I'm doing a gig tonight. It's looming. To some extent, it's just there on the horizon for the whole day.

53:33 - 53:38

What time do you need to be at the theatre to put your plaits in, et cetera?

53:38 - 53:47

Yeah, so everyone gets there at different times. Soundcheck is like 6.15 and the show starts at 7.30 and we won't finish till 9.30 because it's like two big, you know, it's a full.

53:47 - 53:54

Yeah. Show. Proper show. So yeah, West End Improvise Show. But I decided to get there at like five-ish, which is early.

53:54 - 54:01

And I did that because, again, being ADHD, sometimes ADHD means you're late because your time management is bad.

54:01 - 54:05

But sometimes it means you're early because your time management is bad. So I left too early.

54:05 - 54:10

I had like some errands to do. I think I went to the post office and I had to get myself a snacky tea.

54:10 - 54:17

I went to M&S, got my prawn mayo sandwich and some mini whips, which is my ideal pre-authenticious snack.

54:18 - 54:23

Talk me through a mini whip. Oh, it's the M&S. They do a bag of mini whips, which are like a walnut whip without the walnuts.

54:23 - 54:27

Got it. And they're smaller. And you get, I don't know, you're getting about eight or nine in there.

54:27 - 54:33

Okay, and you have them all yourself? No, it's an interval snack. But let me say on the record, I'm the only one who ever fucking buys the whips.

54:33 - 54:42

So it's often me sharing my whips, basically. For our international listeners, I'm vaguely aware of what a walnut whip is.

54:42 - 54:47

If you imagine the emoji of a poo. Yes. Made of chocolate. And there's a marshmallow.

54:47 - 54:57

There's a marshmallow inside. Yes. Like marshmallow-y stuff inside. The old trick of putting a nut on top to make you think it's not as unhealthy as it actually is.

54:57 - 55:02

But what they've done is realised not everyone likes walnuts. They've taken the nuts off and it's just the chocolate and the marshmallow.

55:02 - 55:10

Okay, great. And you can get a bag of mini whips. So M&S do those bags of chocolate pretzels or cookie dough or mini whips.

55:10 - 55:14

They're about four quid and they're like a little bit more than you think. But there's like snacky.

55:14 - 55:20

You can share it with people. I need something. Really sweet in the halftime. Otherwise I can't get through the second half.

55:20 - 55:26

Question, carry out. Yeah. It's in a West End theatre. So it's a run in a West End theatre at the moment.

55:26 - 55:40

You're basically, you know, the producers or you're the stage goddess. It's incredible. It's on at the Vaudeville Theatre and we're on, we do like two Mondays a month and then I think we're going to three Mondays for June and July.

55:40 - 55:44

And we're touring as well. Oh, right. You're not doing eight nights a week. This is not fancy.

55:44 - 55:48

No, no. So Ostentatious, it's the theatre that sicks the musicals. The musical is on.

55:48 - 55:52

You know, look, hey, we're still an improv show. We know our place. So we're not doing eight nights a week.

55:52 - 55:58

We do like when the theatre is dark, which means it's closed. They don't do the musical on a Monday and that's when we jump in.

55:58 - 56:02

We put a huge drape over their set and we perform in front of that.

56:02 - 56:06

Fun. Like, you know, it's a huge three layers sold out. It was great. Yeah, it's amazing.

56:06 - 56:13

The only time I ever did a gig in a West End theatre was because Mondays, yes, they are available.

56:13 - 56:19

It's dark normally, yeah. I was in the theatre where the thriller, the Michael Jackson musical was on.

56:19 - 56:26

On Shaftesbury Avenue. Yes. I was just waiting to go on and I sat on a cabinet or a table at the side of the stage.

56:26 - 56:37

All of the props are around, single gloves, etc. Two mice shot out from under it and ran into my dressing room and I dislike mice.

56:37 - 56:43

It was the worst possible thing to happen a minute before I went on stage.

56:43 - 56:52

You can't really tell the audience. It's not a nice... Just to let you all know, there are mice in this theatre probably going up the leg of your trousers at this moment.

56:52 - 56:57

I don't think there's a Western theatre that doesn't have mice. They're all old Victorian buildings.

56:57 - 57:04

They all connect to each other. The vaudeville is actually not as micey as some of the ones we've played in because it's a bit...

57:04 - 57:12

I don't know, it feels... It's very... Well, I heard once, Cariad, that like once a week, a hawker, is that what it's called, comes in.

57:12 - 57:17

A falconer. A falconer stands on the stage and the falcon flies around... Around the auditorium.

57:17 - 57:22

In the theatre. Yeah. They do that at Trafalgar Square. They don't do that in theatres, I think.

57:22 - 57:29

They do it in theatres with a smaller falcon, with an indoor falcon. They definitely do it at Trafalgar Square and King's Cross.

57:29 - 57:35

Have you seen in King's Cross Station? There's a guy with the hawk who's going around to chase off pigeons and stuff like that.

57:35 - 57:39

We had a mouse in our flat in London and I caught it. It's common.

57:39 - 57:47

I used some Waitrose muesli, which I sprinkled on the floor. A classy mouse. Just under the handle of the fridge.

57:47 - 57:56

I had a colander upended with some string and I sat there for about an hour until the little mouse came along and I dropped the colander and it landed.

57:56 - 58:00

It was literally, it may be the most exciting moment of my house. Then I'd caught the mouse.

58:00 - 58:09

Obviously, I couldn't kill the mouse because I didn't want to. So I sort of ran down the street into sort of a back alley near someone else's house.

58:09 - 58:18

Someone else's house, basically. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Not my problem. And then when Max marketed it as the board game Mousetrap, he got rid of the muesli.

58:18 - 58:25

Famously, there's no muesli element to the board game Mousetrap. I took it to Dragon's Den and I was sat there for so long.

58:25 - 58:32

And then Tuca Silliman kicked me out because there were no mice. Famously, Deborah Meaden refuses to have mice there.

58:32 - 58:37

Yeah, no, it's a big problem, isn't it? I'd invested three quarter of a million pounds of my own money and Peter Jones looked sad.

58:37 - 58:41

And he said, I believe in you, but I don't believe in the product. Good luck.

58:41 - 58:46

Right, so we get in at five. What's the plan here? I had to make a video.

58:46 - 58:49

I had to make a video for my kids because my husband sent me a message saying they were being insane.

58:49 - 58:54

So I had to make a video to be like, hey, remember to be nice because the chaos of the morning continues in the afternoon.

58:54 - 58:58

Of course. And so this is interesting, isn't it? You've got like a proper show.

58:58 - 59:03

Yeah. I always say to Jamie, I've got to go to work. I'm sitting on a Zoom call with two nice people.

59:03 - 59:08

But you know, I know the kids are asleep now, but like quite often the podcasts I'm doing, it's like bath time, dinner time, bedtime.

59:08 - 59:12

And I'm definitely in the best place. I'm in the shed talking about Everton's form.

59:12 - 59:18

You're doing a proper show. It's improv. Yeah. The gig, do you think? Oh, him.

59:18 - 59:28

100% it's him. Putting them to bed is traumatising. It's easy breezy. I'm just going to improvise, make up a show for, you know, 800 people.

59:28 - 59:33

No idea what I'm going to say. I would 100% rather do that. It does seem stressful.

59:33 - 59:41

It does seem, as a non-improvising person, it seems I would prefer to be putting some children in a bath.

59:41 - 59:45

You know what? Please come around and put them in the bath. Because if you can, we can't.

59:45 - 59:50

Once you don't want, I would happily go and do improv. I'd be so shit, but I'd be like, I'm dying here, but I don't give a fuck.

59:50 - 59:55

I don't care. Yeah, so I sent them a video in an attempt to ease the madness.

59:55 - 59:59

And then, yeah, you go into the stage door, go to the dressing room, start getting ready.

59:59 - 1:00:03

And then one by one, everyone turns up. The girls turn up first because we take longer to get ready.

1:00:03 - 1:00:14

Because, you know, it's proper regency. We're enforcing the patriarchy. And then we have to get on stage, warm up, get the stage ready and warming up.

1:00:14 - 1:00:23

So as people might not know, with improv, you don't know what you're going to do, but there are exercises you can do to like wake up your brain and try and connect with the people that you're going to improvise with.

1:00:23 - 1:00:30

It sounds pretty pathetic when you stand up and always think improv's a bit, it's very much the not cool part of comedy.

1:00:30 - 1:00:37

Oh, it is. It's not cool. No, I've done cool improv shows and watched cool improv shows.

1:00:37 - 1:00:41

There are a few and it's definitely cooler than when I've been improvising for like 20 years.

1:00:41 - 1:00:45

And when I started, it was not cool. And it's definitely getting a little bit cooler.

1:00:45 - 1:00:49

Come on, Richard Rance at the piano, Ryan Stiles, this is the coolest thing. Which is my power.

1:00:49 - 1:00:53

I still do Comedy Store Players with Richard and Josie Lawrence and all of those guys.

1:00:53 - 1:01:05

They're still going. They're Comedy Store Players. Amazing. So you go on and you warm up, which means you're just doing stuff to get your brain, basically forgetting all the stuff that you have dealt with all day and all the other rubbish because you're putting that to the side

1:01:05 - 1:01:15

to connect with people and get your brain thinking and connecting and being quick. And it's like stretching before a run is basically what you do.

1:01:15 - 1:01:18

So you stand on stage, you do these different exercises, basically whatever we feel like doing.

1:01:18 - 1:01:23

And our violinist is there as well. So he's warming up, we're checking the lights and we're doing all of that.

1:01:23 - 1:01:31

And then we go backstage and then there's normally a mad, mad panic of getting everything together and forgetting bits and pieces.

1:01:31 - 1:01:38

And the way our sentience works is we have the musician is playing violin as everyone's coming in.

1:01:38 - 1:01:46

One of us goes out who last night was Rachel Paris just to introduce the show, explain it's improvised because we do get lots of people still who don't know that it's improvised.

1:01:46 - 1:01:53

It's a play. It's just a weird play. We've had people come up afterwards and go, well, you were just laughing.

1:01:53 - 1:02:00

None of you knew your lines. Oh, it's a comedy improv show. Like we were enjoying each other's company.

1:02:00 - 1:02:03

So we come out, we say, the show you're about to see is completely improvised.

1:02:03 - 1:02:08

We have no idea what's going to happen. We have no set plot, characters, structure, lines of dialogue.

1:02:08 - 1:02:12

All we know is we're telling a story in the style of Jane Austen based on one of your suggestions.

1:02:12 - 1:02:17

So I love Austentatious. And then one of us comes out as a professor character.

1:02:17 - 1:02:24

That's the next thing that happens. I've seen it in a, maybe the least appropriate venue for us, which I think was the...

1:02:24 - 1:02:30

Was it Box Park, Wembley? Was that it? Close. An inflatable upside down purple cow tent.

1:02:30 - 1:02:37

We used to do the other belly a lot. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so it really contrasted with the Regency vibes of the thing.

1:02:37 - 1:02:43

Yeah. That you were in a sort of a Banksy type venue. Yeah. Yeah, we played that at lots of venues.

1:02:43 - 1:02:51

So you don't even, you know, I don't know where you're going. It's like, there's no, like, can you sort of like, not shaft your, you know, someone comes out and you just say,

1:02:51 - 1:02:57

oh, welcome Lord Percy Dingbat, the man who murdered my mother. And they sort of go.

1:02:57 - 1:03:03

None of the listeners need to go and see the show now. Max has just absolutely figured it out.

1:03:03 - 1:03:12

Were you in last night? That's weird. Lord Percy Dingbat. Oh my God. Yeah. So do you remember the bit where I said we try and warm up and connect?

1:03:12 - 1:03:16

So the idea with improv is you're not trying to make it life harder for someone.

1:03:16 - 1:03:21

You're trying to work with them because the comedy comes from the two people in agreement.

1:03:21 - 1:03:25

And it's very different to stand up or sketch and stuff. It's a different form of laugh.

1:03:25 - 1:03:29

And the laugh is we surprise each other. The laugh isn't I take the piss out of you.

1:03:29 - 1:03:34

I mean, sometimes it's in there. So then next a professor character comes out, which we take in turns.

1:03:34 - 1:03:40

And it was my turn last night called Dr. Sam Patton. And basically they explain, you thought Jane Austen wrote six books.

1:03:40 - 1:03:50

She didn't. She wrote whatever number, 872, I said last night. And we're doing our best to bring these back to the theatre going public, these lost Austen novels.

1:03:50 - 1:03:56

And I know some of you are massive fans of Jane Austen. Some of you, you've got titles of your favourite lost Austen work that people didn't know was written.

1:03:56 - 1:04:01

And then they put up their hands. We normally pick the third titles. It's just random.

1:04:01 - 1:04:10

But because we've been going 14 years, we have a lot of repeats. So last night there was quite a few, like someone said, The Empire Line Strikes Back, which is a great title.

1:04:10 - 1:04:16

But we've had it before. We had it quite recently. And then we went with Of Mice and Mansfield because that was just the fourth one.

1:04:16 - 1:04:21

So people think we're planting, but it's not. We just get the title and then we start.

1:04:21 - 1:04:29

And all we know is we're going to do like a two-act play. So you've got the idea of what a structure of a two-act play feels like.

1:04:29 - 1:04:36

You know, you want to set stuff up. Who's who, what's happening. And then you just keep going with the story, but we have no idea what's going to happen.

1:04:36 - 1:04:46

Obviously we have the tropes of Austen. So, you know, if there's a cad or there's a young lady, perhaps that young lady might like that cad and that cad, might promise her things that he can't deliver,

1:04:46 - 1:04:55

but you don't know the ins and outs of it. So like, if you're not on the stage, you like going, you go on like, like, or someone caught like, these are good questions.

1:04:55 - 1:05:00

Cause you're all, you're on the side of the stage and this thing's going really well.

1:05:00 - 1:05:04

These two people are getting, you're like, well, maybe I'll just wander in and say, you know, yeah, yeah, you can do that.

1:05:04 - 1:05:09

And trust me, we do. And sometimes it's clear that you were not wanted to join that scene.

1:05:09 - 1:05:17

People can look at you like, oh, really? We're just having a moment here, but you normally get, eye contact with someone on the other side of the stage and you give them a look of like,

1:05:17 - 1:05:25

Hey, how are you like coming to the scene with me? And you might have an idea or you might, you might just be thinking, oh, you haven't had a scene lately,

1:05:25 - 1:05:30

or we need to know what your character has been doing. Cause they've been saying that your character is, you know, sad.

1:05:30 - 1:05:34

And then her mouse is, it was all about mice last night, that her mouse is not well.

1:05:34 - 1:05:39

And she's been to see the vet who she's in love with. So I want to do a scene where you talk to me about that so we can get more of that character.

1:05:39 - 1:05:44

But then something will happen where, you know, someone suggests something and we all pile on.

1:05:44 - 1:05:51

So we're like, that sounds fun. Last night there was like a fake game called Rumpkin, which was sort of like rugby football.

1:05:51 - 1:05:57

Lord Percy of Dingbat was absolutely brilliant at that. Yes. I'm sure he'd be a good Rumpkin player.

1:05:57 - 1:06:06

So there was lots of group scenes of Rumpkin games. And one of the main people who just come back from Saudi Arabia as a Rumpkin player was better than everyone else.

1:06:06 - 1:06:15

Just stupid, just stupid stuff. What I'm intrigued by is it's a two half show, which is almost unlike any other improv show ever.

1:06:15 - 1:06:29

So at halftime, is there ever a vibe of you are shit tonight? I mean, I'm not saying you because you've been up for 16 and 17 hours already, but some nights, some people are like,

1:06:29 - 1:06:34

I always noticed with improv shows, some nights, the audience are just like, we love this person.

1:06:34 - 1:06:43

This person can say nothing vaguely interesting. And it's completely by fluke. Yeah. No. So we do have an interval.

1:06:43 - 1:06:49

That's when I have my mini whip. What we do at the interval is we discuss names because everyone, you often forget names.

1:06:49 - 1:06:53

So we'll be like, okay, especially with girls' names. It's like, okay, which one's Cassandra?

1:06:53 - 1:06:57

Which one's Emily? Because you're the Marchmont sisters and I've forgotten which one is which.

1:06:57 - 1:07:02

And then, okay, you're Mr. Hardwick, but your dad is Lord Hardwick. I was Lady Hardwick last night.

1:07:02 - 1:07:09

And there was Gregory the weirdo at the men's club. Dr. Doolittle, who was a vet.

1:07:09 - 1:07:13

And then what we would do, you never, because again, you're trying to keep this vibe going, right?

1:07:13 - 1:07:18

Of like, Hey, we all love each other. This is great. So you would never say, Hey, pick up your game.

1:07:18 - 1:07:24

Like, it's fucking shit. I don't know what sports like, because I literally don't engage with sport.

1:07:24 - 1:07:28

I don't know. No one's throwing a teacup, going, you're fucking, you know, I'll sell you tomorrow.

1:07:28 - 1:07:36

No, it's all about encouragement. So what you might say, it's a bit passive aggressive, you might say, Oh, I feel like we all need to nail the story down.

1:07:36 - 1:07:42

Or I feel like let's make sure that we're giving a bit more space or the scenes are getting really long.

1:07:42 - 1:07:46

Let's make sure we're editing a bit quicker. So we edit, we edit the scene by walking across the stage.

1:07:46 - 1:07:54

So you give a kind of general vibe note, but we try after many years and many hurt feelings and arguments of like, you never discuss individuals.

1:07:54 - 1:07:59

If you're going to, if there's a problem, the only thing you're allowed to say is what you did wrong.

1:07:59 - 1:08:05

It's quite good relationship advice. So you could say, guys, I want to apologize. I should not have come into that scene.

1:08:05 - 1:08:09

Sorry. I thought you had set, called me on. And everyone goes, no, don't worry about it.

1:08:09 - 1:08:12

But you would never say, why did you come into that? Like, it was so annoying.

1:08:12 - 1:08:17

You always do that. You never listened to me. And I really know it's like, you're so stressed at the moment yet.

1:08:17 - 1:08:21

So you never say that. But do you afterwards, like WhatsApp your best friend in it and go, they were shit?

1:08:21 - 1:08:30

No, actually. Oh my God. You don't, but you would. There's definitely sometimes, because the thing with improv, it's like, I mean, look, I'm not making it cool.

1:08:30 - 1:08:35

It isn't cool. It's a family, but I've been performing with some of these guys for 14 years.

1:08:35 - 1:08:45

I've known some of them 20. So you can tell when people have got stuff going on, things are happening outside that, you know, they're stressing them or they're not, it's, it's not that they're top of the game.

1:08:45 - 1:08:50

You just know that stuff's going on. So you might, you might send a message to someone like, Oh, I hope you're okay.

1:08:50 - 1:08:54

Like, I hope that works out. Like it is that kind of collegiate thing. It's like, yeah.

1:08:54 - 1:09:04

Like you, you know, when people are like not at their a hundred percent happiness, because I can't think of anything harder, like in terms of performance and entertainment.

1:09:04 - 1:09:14

Yeah, it is Max. I mean, I'm literally talking over carry out who actually knows about this, but it does strike me as it is.

1:09:14 - 1:09:23

It's like play, you know, and if you try and get too serious about it and worried about it, obviously it's going to collapse into a pile of dust.

1:09:23 - 1:09:29

Whereas if you make it fun and you take all these lessons that you've learned from having done it for so long.

1:09:29 - 1:09:36

It's play. It's totally, it's adults playing. And that's why it's not cool. Cause when kids play, it's not cool thing to do.

1:09:36 - 1:09:39

You're not, you're not able to be like, I want you to think this about me.

1:09:39 - 1:09:50

You want the audience to see you're having fun. And the reason that ostentatious has existed for, for so long, the reason it survived 14 years, which is a long time for an improv group is when I'm at the side of that stage,

1:09:50 - 1:09:58

no one makes me laugh the way that group of people do. Like I will consistently be crying with laughter at something one of them has said.

1:09:58 - 1:10:06

And like the joy that you feel of being in this space with, we have six a show, but there's eight of us in the group.

1:10:06 - 1:10:12

Like, so six people you're, and you're a cog, you're part of this family, this machine, and there's no pressure.

1:10:12 - 1:10:17

You don't have to sell this show. You don't have to make fix everything. You are just one six of this show.

1:10:17 - 1:10:22

And if you drop something or you don't do it, that person is going to help you and encourage you and get you there.

1:10:22 - 1:10:29

And then you get to watch you're laughing the same as the audience are, you know, when they hear that joke for the first time, you hear it for the first time and it's,

1:10:29 - 1:10:34

you feel like the dopamine I get from it. That's the reason we all still do it.

1:10:34 - 1:10:38

Like, you know, you hear my life at home is quite stressful. People don't listen to me.

1:10:38 - 1:10:47

I have no control. Everyone's absolutely mashed on ganja. Everyone's mashed all the time. Do these annoying podcasts with these a-holes.

1:10:47 - 1:10:53

Yeah. And then you go on this stage and you're just like, yeah, this is so much fun.

1:10:53 - 1:11:00

It's so much fun. Such a good description. What was last night's show like? And you can really go in two footed here.

1:11:00 - 1:11:08

It was a good show. We had a guest player. So, so a guy called Rob, who has only done about five shows with us and he was brilliant, but that's also,

1:11:08 - 1:11:14

you're always trying to make sure they have a nice time because he's not like a full cast member, but it was called of mice and Mansfield.

1:11:14 - 1:11:18

It was about Cassandra and Emily and Rob was playing a real cad called Mr.

1:11:18 - 1:11:22

Hardwick, who basically got engaged to three women and promised them all to marry him.

1:11:22 - 1:11:29

Joseph Morpurgo was playing a very pathetic vet that no one wanted to marry, but he was the one who had to say, he's cheating on you all.

1:11:29 - 1:11:42

And then eventually Cassandra realized she did want to marry him. So last night was really fun, really stupid and ended with a live version of mousetrap, the game where Mr.

1:11:42 - 1:11:47

Hardwick, the cad was caught, by us miming the thing coming down on his head.

1:11:47 - 1:11:53

The colander, the giant colander that was there musely around his feet. Yeah. Yeah. The colander came down on his head.

1:11:53 - 1:12:03

All three women that held the colander were like, we know about you. And he was, he was sent back and he was fired from his rumpkin team and good prevailed.

1:12:03 - 1:12:06

So yeah, it was great. There was a lot of mousetrap references. Do you know what?

1:12:06 - 1:12:12

Once in the Soccer AM Glory Years, we did the final dance of Rock of Ages.

1:12:12 - 1:12:16

Oh, wow. We went into Rock of Ages and we did the full makeup of it.

1:12:16 - 1:12:24

We did the final synchronized dance. And then they stitched me up, but someone just, at the end, we were like, they got us out and we were chatting away.

1:12:24 - 1:12:28

I'd be banging on about saying, can I play Here I Go Again by Whitesnake on the electric guitar?

1:12:28 - 1:12:31

And then they brought out an electric guitar and I played it. Not very well.

1:12:31 - 1:12:37

I couldn't play it now and sang quite flat, but I must admit, and I didn't get a standing ovation because they were standing already.

1:12:37 - 1:12:43

It's important to say. Oh my goodness. But I have never come off anything. Yeah.

1:12:43 - 1:12:56

And been more excited. About just like the buzz of being on the stage. There's something about those West End theatres as well, because a lot of the time backstage, there's posters for Laurel and Hardy when they played there.

1:12:56 - 1:13:09

Amazing posters, amazing people that you're like, feel good. Yeah. Now, what I always find funny is since they've been done up in recent years, a lot of those, well, the regional theatres will have got rid of their references to Abbott and

1:13:09 - 1:13:19

Costello having played there. And instead there's just a big poster from a stereophonic, stereophonics gig in 1999, which does nothing to motivate you for the show.

1:13:19 - 1:13:23

We did a gig in Tunbridge Wells, maybe it was last week, like lovely, lovely venue.

1:13:23 - 1:13:28

But he was like, Oh, we've got Macy Gray here on Saturday. And all of us were just like, how weird that we're.

1:13:28 - 1:13:35

It's a good album. It's a good album. She's great. She's amazing. But what we did during a stage with Macy Gray's on afterwards, guys, it's an amazing feeling.

1:13:35 - 1:13:39

And it was sold out last night. So it was like full crowd, everyone very happy.

1:13:39 - 1:13:47

We're happy. Boom. And then the four, actually four girls, we all waited and we got the train, you know, and that was, you know, it's just not just doing stuff with your friends.

1:13:47 - 1:13:52

I never want that to end. I never want that feeling to end that you get to hang out with your friends and it's work.

1:13:52 - 1:14:00

Like that's just so nice. Great. So what time did you get in? I didn't get back to like gone 11, probably the time we'd sorted everything out.

1:14:00 - 1:14:05

It's a long day. It's a long day. Yeah, that's normal. That is normal for me.

1:14:05 - 1:14:13

Like I said, I had a lot of beans to start with. So, um, yeah, I got back at 11, had a cup of tea, herbal tea, and then I actually started reading.

1:14:14 - 1:14:24

Another book. I wish there'd been one really off brand thing where Carrie had said, and then I started playing Mortal Kombat seven and I played it for five hours.

1:14:24 - 1:14:31

I've one of those chairs, one of those red flag chairs that have the speakers at ear level.

1:14:31 - 1:14:35

You play against teenagers in South Dakota. And I went online and started my betting.

1:14:35 - 1:14:42

I normally bet for like three hours. I don't mind where I'm a big on the F1 circuit.

1:14:42 - 1:14:47

So I'll just start my racing. I wish I had more off brand stuff for you, but I'm very on brand.

1:14:47 - 1:14:53

I'm very, very dull. Mom of two brand. That's my vibe. And I'm just leaning into it these days.

1:14:53 - 1:14:57

The thing is, we can't know if you've got in at half 11, you're not asleep till midnight.

1:14:57 - 1:15:03

Gone midnight, half midnight. I went to sleep. Half midnight. I finished a book. 20 hour day.

1:15:03 - 1:15:08

Is that how long it was? I don't even count. That's really mad. That is a long day, isn't it?

1:15:08 - 1:15:13

It's like Thatcher, isn't it? Did you see him work area? Listen, research on Thatcher.

1:15:13 - 1:15:18

There's some other, stuff they didn't tell us. I know we all thought it was alright.

1:15:18 - 1:15:26

She doesn't sleep much at all. That's the main thing about her. That's the main thing about Thatcher.

1:15:26 - 1:15:31

Go to the valleys of Wales and the main thing they say is, and she didn't sleep that much.

1:15:31 - 1:15:35

That's what we remember. Did you know she didn't sleep that much? Not an ice cream.

1:15:35 - 1:15:45

Ice cream and milk. After that day, and to do that, and to get home and then finish a book, you have to, I have so many more beans than I have.

1:15:45 - 1:15:54

This is it. Then three years ago, I started reading stuff and I thought, oh, maybe I have ADHD because I do have a lot of energy.

1:15:54 - 1:16:02

You're meeting me at 60% energy. Before I had kids, me at 100% was, I could just keep going.

1:16:02 - 1:16:11

I just thought that was normal. My dad had ADHD as well. I grew up thinking it was perfectly normal to stay awake till four in the morning finishing work or doing something.

1:16:11 - 1:16:18

I try, I try not to, like tonight, I'm not going out. I'm not doing a gig.

1:16:18 - 1:16:25

I'm just going to try and relax. You crawl in beside Mr. Cariad. Does he notice?

1:16:25 - 1:16:33

He's holding a platter, a silver platter with a beef wellington. A duck breast actually with an orange juice.

1:16:33 - 1:16:38

He was awake, still working. We're both as bad as each other. So he was still working.

1:16:38 - 1:16:44

He was editing. He's trying to edit something at the moment. But I'm happy if he's awake because then I can go, I think this happened to someone.

1:16:44 - 1:16:46

I don't know about the show. You know what? It's nice to have a debrief.

1:16:46 - 1:16:50

And to be fair, the reason I set up reading is I don't know about you, David, but I can't go to sleep.

1:16:50 - 1:16:55

I'm too buzzing. So I have to like do something for a bit and it's not gaming or betting.

1:16:55 - 1:17:02

It's reading. So I read till half 12 and I didn't realize it was half 12. And I thought, oh shit.

1:17:02 - 1:17:07

Okay, probably should try and get some sleep now. What a day. Yeah, that was a good day.

1:17:07 - 1:17:09

Do you think that was a good day? It was a nice day yesterday. Yeah, it was nice.

1:17:09 - 1:17:14

And then I felt, even though I felt like I didn't achieve much in the day, the show was good.

1:17:14 - 1:17:19

And I was happy that I had been kind to myself, made a crumble, had a nap, done the things that made the show good.

1:17:19 - 1:17:24

Thanks for sharing it with us, Kerri-Ann. Thank you for listening to my random boring day.

1:17:24 - 1:17:31

It's very nice of you. Hey, I think you'll find that was one of the titles of this podcast that we decided not to use.

1:17:31 - 1:17:39

Please listen to my random boring day. I don't know, guys. It's something about it, isn't it?

1:17:39 - 1:17:44

Just something. Can't put my finger on it. What is missing? You've been very kind to me.

1:17:44 - 1:17:48

Very kind and made me feel like it was actually quite a long day, which I would not have counted that as a long day.

1:17:48 - 1:17:52

I would have just been that's normal. But now I'm like, yeah, that is why I was tired.

1:17:52 - 1:18:00

That makes sense. And if you do, you've seen what I can come up with on The Hoof for character names in presentations.

1:18:00 - 1:18:06

Yeah, Lord Percy Digfoot. Digfoot, yeah. Yeah, it's a bit of a journey for me, but you know.

1:18:06 - 1:18:13

A new bleakness. Whenever Max sees anything on the TV, like traitors or whatever, he's always like, I can present that.

1:18:14 - 1:18:20

I should be presenting that. And now we've moved into a new dark realm where whatever people- A new thing you can do ostentatious.

1:18:20 - 1:18:28

So many people come up and do that to us. We've had so many people say, I really like Jane Austen, I'm an actor, so can I join?

1:18:28 - 1:18:37

And we're like, it's just, I've been improvising for 20 years I've spent. We're finding this skill that's like, it's a skill, it's a hard skill.

1:18:37 - 1:18:43

I'm always like, there's improv classes, there's books, totally go and learn. I don't know what makes you think, you're just saying stuff.

1:18:44 - 1:18:48

We quite often on this podcast talk about, comedians talk about like a gig where they've died or whatever.

1:18:48 - 1:18:59

No one would die more than me. My knowledge of Jane Austen is almost, like literally the worst idea that anyone could ever have.

1:18:59 - 1:19:03

You don't have to have knowledge of Jane Austen. It's just that, so I will say that.

1:19:03 - 1:19:08

So we have a running joke because Graham Dixon, who is a brilliant improviser, but when he joined the group, he had never read Jane Austen.

1:19:08 - 1:19:13

And it was about six months before he admitted he'd never read one. We were like, oh, maybe read one.

1:19:14 - 1:19:20

It's ostentatious. You just need to look at the poster and you see a bunch of people standing there in those outfits.

1:19:20 - 1:19:24

And because it's such a part of our culture in this Simpsons episode. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:19:24 - 1:19:29

It's period drama spoof, basically, you know. Yeah, exactly. I know. It's a wonderful thing.

1:19:29 - 1:19:34

Yeah, I should have said that. We're in full Regency gear and the violinist is playing live and improvising with us at the same time.

1:19:34 - 1:19:39

And it was last night, it was Oliver Izod. And he, at one point, he knows every tune.

1:19:39 - 1:19:43

So when we were at the Vets and the mouse was ill, he just started playing the casualty theme tune.

1:19:44 - 1:19:52

Oh, so satisfying. You'll be like, I know that. That's Titanic. It's great. You don't need to have read any Jane Austen or even watched Bridgerton.

1:19:52 - 1:19:59

But if you have, you'll enjoy it more, obviously, to a different level. Cariad, thank you very much for sharing your day with us.

1:19:59 - 1:20:17

Thank you very much for listening to me waffle on. So Cariad Lloyd there. I think we, I don't think Lord Percy of Dingbat.

1:20:17 - 1:20:25

I mean, I would just, even when you thought of Lord Percy of Dingbat, there was such a pause between each part.

1:20:25 - 1:20:32

Lord Percy. This is, again, another reason why I would love to see you guesting on the show.

1:20:32 - 1:20:49

It would be the ultimate, could they carry this weight? It's a bit like I've thought a lot about how, even me in my prime sporting physique, how long could I get away with playing on the Barcelona 2010 team?

1:20:49 - 1:20:55

Right, I see. If I just played at left back and just shouted a lot and motioned people to do things.

1:20:55 - 1:21:03

Would Sergio Busquets just drop in enough just to like cover O'Doherty? Interesting signing from the League of Ireland.

1:21:03 - 1:21:12

Pep Guardiola signed David O'Doherty. Then a 35-year-old out of shape comedian. The way they played.

1:21:12 - 1:21:17

Honestly, I'd go for like a, Mourinho or Conte parked the bus low block. You could get away with it longer with them.

1:21:17 - 1:21:24

Listen, I don't think Lord Percy of Dingbat is a bad name for, I'm not a Jane Austen expert.

1:21:24 - 1:21:34

I think he's got a wildlife, you know, I reckon, you know, he's jilted a few seamstresses or, you know, whatever may be in that world.

1:21:34 - 1:21:38

Also, of Dingbat does imply that Dingbat is a place as well. Yeah, of course it is.

1:21:38 - 1:21:45

Back in those times it was. Spin-offs, series of novels about the people of Dingbat I want to know more about it.

1:21:45 - 1:21:55

It's important, we've established that of the two I'm the empty vessel here, David. And I think some listeners would want to know the answers to those questions that I asked.

1:21:55 - 1:22:01

I would also like, just in the interest of transparency, transparency, is that the right word?

1:22:01 - 1:22:14

Transparency. Whichever way you want to say it. I don't think that you place your child in front of a home IMAX screen and give it, give Willy Rush and Chicken Nuggets till midday.

1:22:14 - 1:22:23

16 Chicken Nuggets. But you do, to follow the tape, you do lie in bed asleep going, David O'Doherty's the best thing that's ever been.

1:22:23 - 1:22:30

David O'Doherty, he's such a legend. David O'Doherty, you've never seen a man like this before.

1:22:30 - 1:22:39

If you sing songs to yourself about how great you are, please get in touch with the podcast or if you've any other business, this is how to do it.

1:22:39 - 1:22:47

To get in touch with the show, you can email us at whatdidyoudoyesterdaypod at gmail.com.

1:22:47 - 1:22:54

Follow us on Instagram at yesterdaypod and please subscribe and leave a review if you liked it on your preferred podcast platform.

1:22:54 - 1:23:02

And if you didn't, please don't. And actually those songs that I just did about David, they were improv.

1:23:02 - 1:23:13

Yeah, they were. They were pretty good. You do yourself a disservice. What is the Guardian Football Podcast if not an improv show where you, you know, there's a bit of a plan,

1:23:13 - 1:23:24

but then you just go off and talk about football. Interestingly, recording it tomorrow and it is Barry Glendenning, Dan Bardell and Lord Percy of Dingbat, the panel.

1:23:24 - 1:23:34

So let's see what his thoughts are. What an out for this podcast. Thanks, David.

1:23:34 - 1:24:18

Thanks, Max.

WDWDY #74: Hoovered Under The Duvet

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The Great Christmas Bunny Emergency (Part 3)

The Great Christmas Bunny Emergency (Part 2 )

The Great Christmas Bunny Emergency (Part 1 )

S3 EP27: Rob Auton

WDWDY #51: In Fairness To Lube

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