#474 - The Shusher, Donning Donnington and Content: The Movie

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Speaker 3 Suffs, the new musical has made Tony award-winning history on Broadway. We the man to be home.
Winner, best score. We the man to be seen.

Speaker 4 Winner, best book. We the man to be quality.

Speaker 3 It's a theatrical masterpiece that's thrilling, inspiring, dazzlingly entertaining, and unquestionably the most emotionally stirring musical this season.

Speaker 5 Suffs.

Speaker 3 Playing the Orpheum Theater, October 22nd through November 9th. Tickets at BroadwaySF.com.

Speaker 6 Hello, everyone.

Speaker 11 As Ellis, Dave, and John traverse the country in a venture venture unrelated to the BBC, plaudits have rained down upon them from the regions.

Speaker 8 After the show in Manchester, Dave was granted the freedom of the town of Withenshaw, which entitles him to do 10 handbrake turns a year in the car park between home bargains and KFC.

Speaker 8 He also gets a 20% lifetime discount off non-meal deal items at any local co-op.

Speaker 20 Ellis was welcomed into the city of Cardiff with enormous pomp and ceremony.

Speaker 11 Druids from both Gwynedd and Powys put to rest a 20-year feud over over a disputed boundary fence to unveil a plaque in the Costa on St David's Way.

Speaker 8 It was to commemorate the moment in 2019 when Ellis poured Cardiff's first ever flat white,

Speaker 8 thus marking the drink's official introduction to Wales.

Speaker 12 And John?

Speaker 8 Well, despite not making bestofbristol.co's 29 most famous Bristolians, a list which, despite being put together just this month, contains a contestant from Big Brother 2010 and Justin Lee Collins,

Speaker 8 John has been bestowed more distinguished honours.

Speaker 8 After a ceremony at Bristol Town Hall, he is now Sheriff of the Mayor's Farthings, a title which gives him exclusive rights to interact with the city's historic coins.

Speaker 7 He also has accepted a new role as Bristol's Laureate of Silence, a ceremonial role to raise awareness of noise pollution, where, after donning specially commissioned robes from a local tapestrist, he may shush street revellers, stop people talking after the trailers have finished in cinemas, and remind HGV drivers that reversing alerts must be silenced after 10 p.m.

Speaker 22 Here to bring content in crown, cape, and kappa, it's Ellis James, John Robbins, and producer Dave.

Speaker 40 Incredible that you've actually discovered your dream job.

Speaker 39 Yes. The laureate of silence.

Speaker 38 Yeah, professional shusher.

Speaker 42 Oh my god, you'd be so good at it as well.

Speaker 35 Well, I only learned this week via Giles that you have to turn your reversing beeping sounds off if you're driving a van or an HGV after 10pm.

Speaker 46 I didn't know that.

Speaker 30 Yeah, because it's disturbing.

Speaker 11 If you go beep, beep, beep, vehicle reversing beep at like 2 in the morning.

Speaker 48 I didn't know he could turn them off though.

Speaker 25 He's got a little button day.

Speaker 38 Has he? Yes.

Speaker 25 Wow.

Speaker 49 Okay.

Speaker 50 This is good news though, because it's something to aim for.

Speaker 51 Because when you retire in 2032, you could become Bristol's laureate of silence.

Speaker 16 The Shush Patrol.

Speaker 53 The Shush Patrol.

Speaker 24 Yeah, like Neighbourhood Watch.

Speaker 55 Yeah, but more annoying.

Speaker 9 No, but it's not annoying, because if you're in the cinema and someone's talking, it might ruin your experience.

Speaker 12 What you want is an usher.

Speaker 30 A Shusher?

Speaker 8 Yeah. So I'm the Shusher.

Speaker 57 I went to watch Griff Reese on Tuesday at Stanley Halls in

Speaker 51 sort of in South London because Griff has got a new record out to improvs, which is great.

Speaker 42 And he's doing a strange sort of...

Speaker 50 He's doing a normal tour, but he's also doing a tour of like small village halls.

Speaker 42 So he's playing in places like Crummich in Pembrokeshire.

Speaker 64 And it's a really small gig.

Speaker 65 And it hadn't been, I think he put it in quite late.

Speaker 67 So the last time he was in London, he was at the Barbican in front of thousands of people, okay?

Speaker 42 But there was only a couple of hundred of us there, so it was a really, really hot ticket.

Speaker 43 Stanley Halls is a small, tiny little Edwardian theatre, and it's just him and an acoustic guitar, very intimate

Speaker 55 event.

Speaker 43 And there were two blocks at the back where I was sitting with my friend Lisa and Dan and Izzy.

Speaker 69 and they were just talking.

Speaker 65 They were like, Yeah, well, you would say that, wouldn't you?

Speaker 69 Because it's ever since Andy Boy's new barbecue.

Speaker 38 I thought,

Speaker 41 What do you think you're attending?

Speaker 7 Were they shushed?

Speaker 72 No,

Speaker 70 Dan moved because he couldn't handle it, and I just sat there clawing into my thighs with my fingers, thinking, What do these guys think is happening now?

Speaker 21 A video went viral.

Speaker 10 I can't remember what musician it is.

Speaker 16 It's a guy who stops his gig and just says, Why are you here?

Speaker 10 And it's such a good question.

Speaker 44 He says, Because I'm here, yeah, and I'm connecting with people who've taken time out of their day to be here.

Speaker 11 Yeah, why are you here?

Speaker 65 Yeah, it was really, it was really strange. And it was like

Speaker 51 they'd been reunited after about 25 years. So they were going through everything from like primary school through to secondary school through to what they were doing now.

Speaker 76 You've had kids, that's unbelievable. I've got two kids.

Speaker 41 Like, me, come on.

Speaker 63 He's doing his new single.

Speaker 10 Yes. So I'm now professional shusher

Speaker 62 for Bristol.

Speaker 7 I'm also sheriff of the farthings.

Speaker 46 It does sound like one of those rules where you're paid in a case of port, though.

Speaker 79 Could be a problem. Yeah.

Speaker 79 I'll have to give you the port, and you can sell it from your back door and give me the money.

Speaker 81 And then I'll give you the money. Okay.

Speaker 6 However, in other news,

Speaker 63 stop all the clocks.

Speaker 82 Ye, it is finished.

Speaker 54 Surrender unto Caesar all that is Caesar's. Okay.

Speaker 30 I thirst.

Speaker 25 What? I don't know.

Speaker 8 I'm sort of mixing.

Speaker 72 You've got a drink. No.

Speaker 12 I'm mixing in quotes from

Speaker 30 Christ on the Cross with

Speaker 33 them.

Speaker 25 I don't quite know why.

Speaker 38 And an Oasis best of album to actual was. What was that?

Speaker 63 Stop all the quotes.

Speaker 45 All right, well, that's from an Auden poem.

Speaker 59 It must have gone from Oasis and the Oasis album.

Speaker 56 So I am where Oasis,

Speaker 74 Christ on the Cross, and Auden meet because today

Speaker 63 I got the Wordle in one.

Speaker 59 Whoa.

Speaker 26 For the first time.

Speaker 31 Well, for the 14th time, but for the first time legit.

Speaker 84 What does that mean legit? You're not been cheating, have you?

Speaker 23 If I get into it.

Speaker 38 I'm actually holding my chest.

Speaker 7 If I get into it, if I get into it, it will muddy the waters.

Speaker 22 In the past,

Speaker 16 we showed our grids.

Speaker 80 So I could work out some people's sometimes.

Speaker 8 Right.

Speaker 18 I could reverse engineer it because

Speaker 8 my brain should be put to better use.

Speaker 8 Maybe in the aeronautics industry.

Speaker 48 Could you explain to the layman what you did?

Speaker 58 And by layman, I mean me.

Speaker 22 For the first time ever in my life,

Speaker 11 with no clues or hints or guessing other people's words, I got a genuine word Lynn one.

Speaker 48 So the usual word you use just happens to be the word.

Speaker 44 The word I've been using for nearly four years.

Speaker 50 Right.

Speaker 40 But how did that make you feel?

Speaker 50 Because

Speaker 53 there's no hard work or graft or skill in it.

Speaker 63 Well, no, pure luck.

Speaker 21 Yeah, I know, but it's the luck you get.

Speaker 11 If you keep the same word forever, it's the luck you are guaranteed.

Speaker 46 Okay.

Speaker 26 So, you know, every wordler will have this day.

Speaker 28 Okay. Eventually, yeah.

Speaker 38 Eventually.

Speaker 11 Well, only if the wordler has stuck with the same word ever.

Speaker 28 Exactly. Exactly.

Speaker 84 So, the big question here, John,

Speaker 84 it's gone. It's out there.

Speaker 49 It's out there.

Speaker 37 It's public.

Speaker 7 It's public.

Speaker 31 Share the word.

Speaker 46 The word

Speaker 25 was

Speaker 47 no longer is later.

Speaker 25 Wow.

Speaker 38 Okay, this is huge.

Speaker 59 So

Speaker 53 you're presumably not going to continue with later, even though you think later is excellent.

Speaker 8 Later is consigned to

Speaker 29 the retired cabinet of Wordle starter words.

Speaker 34 I did use raise for a couple of weeks, very early on in my Wordle career.

Speaker 49 You're still drinking. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 25 But

Speaker 16 all of the people, like some people on social media today because I put up a very moving post

Speaker 70 Like what do you mean? That's a crazy word.

Speaker 63 And you're like, no, it's not.

Speaker 82 It's one of the best words. It's not statistically the best word.

Speaker 50 Adieu is a big one, isn't it?

Speaker 8 Yeah, but it's not statistically of significance. Adieu.

Speaker 18 People just use it because they, yeah, let's not go down this road.

Speaker 62 Okay, anyway.

Speaker 35 But also.

Speaker 87 It's not just about your starting word.

Speaker 12 It's about your second word as well.

Speaker 35 It's about your pairing.

Speaker 21 Your elimination pairing.

Speaker 18 yeah so i would always go later and sonic

Speaker 80 and that was a very very strong um opening pairing i wouldn't always be sonic it's factor dependent where did you where did you get those two from did you work them out for yourselves yeah i worked them out in my mind okay well i have been on forums i've watched fifteen minute long youtube videos about how you can use coding to work out uh and um so what's it that that brand of maths called i can't remember anyway it's all above my head okay people talk about packets and buckets of information.

Speaker 53 You're watching 15-minute-long YouTube videos about Wordle.

Speaker 63 Well, now I've got makes me feel good.

Speaker 8 Well, now I've got to do it again because I have to select a new starter word and a new second word.

Speaker 7 Yes, but a problem is a lot of the words, because we're over halfway through the Wordle calendar, a lot of the words have been taken.

Speaker 47 So, the statistically best ones are either so obscure they're never going to come up, or they've already been taken.

Speaker 44 So, do I take a worse starter word to give me the chance of living the wordle in one again?

Speaker 16 Or do I take a word such as soar, S-O-A-R-E, which is statistically the best?

Speaker 16 Depending on whose blummin' code you go by.

Speaker 26 Or do I go for something like slate, which is one of the best, or crane, but they've already been used.

Speaker 38 These.

Speaker 25 It's all up in the air, man.

Speaker 24 These are the levels.

Speaker 64 These are the questions. These are the levels.

Speaker 48 I occasionally watch football coaching training videos on Instagram, and it'll be very in-depth, deep dives into a player's shape, like physical body shape as they receive the ball.

Speaker 43 They'll be like, that is why so-and-so is in the Premier League.

Speaker 78 They are the levels.

Speaker 46 Normal three times a year wordlers like myself are not working at this level.

Speaker 25 God, no.

Speaker 15 It happened in the van at eight minutes past midnight last night.

Speaker 42 You make it sound like it's the death of a monarch.

Speaker 60 It was announced across all radio stations. Simultaneously, the BBC had to press a play that had to press play on a special cassette.

Speaker 17 Yeah.

Speaker 13 Well, I think every Wordlin Oneer will know this.

Speaker 10 At the start, you're not quite sure what's happened because you've never seen it before.

Speaker 28 So you think there's something gone wrong?

Speaker 37 And then you're like, oh, wow, I got the Wordlin One.

Speaker 25 Wow.

Speaker 32 And how Giles?

Speaker 33 No, he was listening to his audiobook about, what's his name? Eddie Pepper.

Speaker 81 Eddie Pillar.

Speaker 27 Eddie Pillar.

Speaker 33 At that point, he was probably talking about, I don't know, Bin collection days in Croydon.

Speaker 68 No,

Speaker 46 he's a very famous East London mod, Dave, and Giles likes that culture. And

Speaker 16 the parts of the book feel like they are, just to hit a word count.

Speaker 46 That's John's particular review. I would disagree with that review personally.

Speaker 38 What's Eddie Pillar known for?

Speaker 42 He was a famous East London.

Speaker 16 He is a famous East London mod, so he used to CJ and stuff.

Speaker 48 He's very incredibly well turned up.

Speaker 33 Is he famous for doing a scuba diving course on holiday once?

Speaker 24 Because he talks about that a lot.

Speaker 60 No, I wouldn't say that's what I think of when I think of Eddie Pillar.

Speaker 50 No, um, so I suppose you had nothing to do then because you've done the whirdling one.

Speaker 27 I felt quite deflated, actually.

Speaker 23 I stared out of the window for a bit,

Speaker 12 then I lost a game of boggle,

Speaker 18 and then I planned how I was going to commemorate the moment on social media.

Speaker 8 I got all of my sort of story, I got this music together I wanted to play for Instagram, and then I thought, no, John, not

Speaker 5 Hoppy Poppola, but it's the garosse.

Speaker 86 Yeah, that'd be good.

Speaker 63 Yeah, elbow

Speaker 18 20 to 1 in the morning.

Speaker 10 Save it for the morning with fresh eyes.

Speaker 22 Yeah.

Speaker 21 So there you go.

Speaker 33 I then, I mean, here is the absolute nail in the coffin. I shared on the Wordle Willy What's Up group

Speaker 33 in the morning. They awake.

Speaker 16 Their results start to come in.

Speaker 38 Phil only gets it in one.

Speaker 72 No.

Speaker 8 He switched to that starter word two weeks ago.

Speaker 84 Did he know that that was your starter word?

Speaker 72 Wow.

Speaker 28 And that's when he was getting his two sevens in a row that we thought might warrant an investigation.

Speaker 7 So it's just been a real roller coaster.

Speaker 38 And all that with a mouth ulcer.

Speaker 62 So here I am,

Speaker 24 unaccommodated man without a word or starter word.

Speaker 65 So you need to get it by midnight.

Speaker 80 I'm basically like...

Speaker 21 I'm being let go on a free.

Speaker 24 Yeah,

Speaker 19 I'm a player without a contract.

Speaker 15 They tried to get me on loan at Galatasarai to work out.

Speaker 38 What do I do now?

Speaker 8 Do I go down to the championship?

Speaker 53 Yeah, you've gone until midnight, haven't you?

Speaker 31 I'm trying to get out to the States.

Speaker 26 You're the Dali Alley of Wordle.

Speaker 32 I'm the Dali Alley of Wordle, Dave.

Speaker 41 Oh, John, it's sad that you felt slightly deflated.

Speaker 25 Yeah, I did.

Speaker 79 After about 20 minutes, I smiled and thought, yeah, you needed to do that.

Speaker 8 Allow yourself a smile.

Speaker 20 You've been playing this for over a thousand days.

Speaker 28 Just remember that most of what you've thought about since the start of lockdown.

Speaker 26 Allow yourself a smile, man.

Speaker 65 Just remember, John, that there are so many facets of your life which mean that you're living your dream.

Speaker 42 Yeah. You're doing a rageous show with your friends.
You're on tour.

Speaker 63 You've got a wordling one.

Speaker 83 Yeah.

Speaker 78 Try and enjoy it, man.

Speaker 69 Yeah, you've got to enjoy it. You've got to enjoy it.

Speaker 16 Because when I'm lying on my deathbed, I'll be like, today's the last wordle you'll ever do.

Speaker 58 Yeah, you might think that.

Speaker 80 Imagine if you've got it in five on your deathbed.

Speaker 25 That would be awful.

Speaker 25 You'll have bigger fish to fry, i think i don't think i will i'll have fried all those fish years ago okay and eaten them and eaten them you'd have eaten your friends i'll have eaten my fish and i'll be just frying my tiny fish okay yeah

Speaker 65 if that is how it happens and i'm still around

Speaker 46 i will put that in the orbit oh thanks manal wordle was a five yeah no that's fine and he died as he lived doing the wordle but because of his illness he did it quite badly the end oh that's quite a sad thought that the wordle whatsapp group when one of us dies

Speaker 84 their scores will just stop yes i mean that is the sadness of

Speaker 92 the end of life in general really there's all sorts of things that people are doing that does just your last council tax direct debit yeah yeah all the big stuff have you considered microdosing ecstasy

Speaker 15 No, but I was watching a Ram Das lecture on psilocybin this morning.

Speaker 47 Okay.

Speaker 33 And he talks about it sort of opening

Speaker 80 the true consciousness that we're all currently like in self and you get to step behind self and just see our forms.

Speaker 83 Yeah.

Speaker 61 Like limitless with Bradley Cooper.

Speaker 16 To an extent.

Speaker 16 But I'm not going to start taking psilocybin. Okay.
No.

Speaker 33 Yet.

Speaker 83 All right, then.

Speaker 46 We'll see. Maybe the last gig in Portsmouth.

Speaker 35 Yes.

Speaker 16 Anyway, speaking of the van, Wordle in the van, staring sadly out of the window, we're now going to take a little trip into Ellis and John's Road to Nowhere.

Speaker 4 well it's high drama here in the sad van

Speaker 4 there was a long discussion about motorway service choices on the M1 which as everyone knows are poor

Speaker 4 The ideal scenario in terms of distance and timing was Watford Gap, but I'm not going to let that happen on my watch.

Speaker 4 Despite being a historic services with brutalist architecture features, the standard is so poor.

Speaker 4 That's been admitted by RoadChef.

Speaker 4 They've laid their cards on the table and said Watford Gap needs work. It needs a redesign.
It's not happened yet. So

Speaker 4 we opted for a choice of between Newport Pagnell and Leicester Forest East. I opted LFE.

Speaker 4 We've entered with a bladder emergency rating of I'm gonna say 65%

Speaker 4 unfortunately

Speaker 4 the signposting for coach parking in Leicester Forest East is so poor

Speaker 4 being that it runs out before you get there so you end up in a drive-through Starbucks

Speaker 4 which has height restrictions too low for our vehicle no ability to turn around and retrace your your steps, that we went back out onto the motorway. Everyone's done it.

Speaker 4 It's not a reflection on Giles.

Speaker 4 It's not something he needs to go away and work on. Perhaps familiarising himself with the car park layouts of all services in the UK.
That's not what needs to happen.

Speaker 4 What needs to happen is Leicester Forest East needs to buck up their ideas. Think about the consumer experience for those with vehicles in excess of six foot four.

Speaker 4 However, as so often is the case, it's Donington to the rescue. It's only, I think, a further eight to ten miles.

Speaker 4 So we will don Donington. We will wrap ourselves in its warm, comforting surrounds.
And I get to experience, well, who knows? Is it an M ⁇ S? Is it a Waitrose?

Speaker 4 If it's neither...

Speaker 4 Okay, the whole day's a write-off. It's going to be one of the worst days of my life.

Speaker 44 But I'm not even going to check.

Speaker 4 I'm not even going to go on motorway services online. I am going to roll the dice.
I'm going to play Russian roulette with services. Maybe I'll be eating a subway.

Speaker 4 Maybe I'll be eating a chopsticks noodle.

Speaker 36 I just don't know.

Speaker 4 So we've got a bit of spice in the sad van where I am alone because Alice and Dave are making their own way to the venue because of what great company I am.

Speaker 42 Wow, well, you join us backstage at the Leeds Grand Theatre, which is one of the most beautiful theatres I've ever seen in my life.

Speaker 7 Unfortunately, today the Leeds Grand Theatre is host to disaster.

Speaker 17 Crisis.

Speaker 80 After the debacle of Leicester Forest East and Donington, I thought my day might improve.

Speaker 97 Unfortunately, that's not been the case.

Speaker 42 I think we're seeing an enormous change or difference here in mentality.

Speaker 42 So I'm actually buzzing after what's happened.

Speaker 98 John, on the other hand, is at crisis point because he's actually had to step in and solve a crisis.

Speaker 101 So our banner stand, or more specifically my banner stand, the one that says E,

Speaker 94 about an hour ago broke.

Speaker 42 Giles, I think it's fair to say, went into free fall.

Speaker 38 He collapsed.

Speaker 101 The staff, all the staff here, I'm not criticising anyone, also collapsed.

Speaker 42 They say they froze, actually, more than collapsed.

Speaker 94 Completely dumbfounded.

Speaker 103 Silence.

Speaker 63 I went on my phone.

Speaker 42 And Dave went on his phone.

Speaker 101 I went, well, let's just do it without the banner stand. John was thinking, he went completely silent, total concentration.

Speaker 104 And then he said, I need some white gaffer and a bit of cardboard, please.

Speaker 104 Do you have white gaffer and maybe a sharp knife?

Speaker 5 The guy, the tech guy, was like, Yeah, I've got that.

Speaker 41 Yeah, yeah, yeah, I can get you white gaffer.

Speaker 68 Within 15 minutes, it was fixed. Yeah.

Speaker 75 He used stage weights, he made a kind of

Speaker 75 just a basic sort of pulley system using cardboard.

Speaker 75 It was very, very similar to you at your best/slash worst on Taskmaster.

Speaker 42 You were given a problem, you solved it with maximum efficiency, there was zero humour.

Speaker 97 It was reminiscent as Giles enters the dressing room after his mental collapse.

Speaker 40 Complete mental collapse.

Speaker 95 Looks like there's a bit of colour in his cheeks.

Speaker 66 Because his job's safe.

Speaker 22 His job's safe.

Speaker 48 His job was on the line, but it's safe.

Speaker 27 He's unseckable.

Speaker 19 It was reminiscent of a scene from A Beautiful Mind.

Speaker 73 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 96 And you could imagine

Speaker 27 in the film of our lives,

Speaker 99 when they do make content the movie,

Speaker 95 it will be like a time-lapse of me sat in front of the banner.

Speaker 65 It'll definitely be in the trailer.

Speaker 80 There'll be chalk sort of equations that I'll be just drawing on the stage, on the floor.

Speaker 95 People will be rushing around me, and I'll go into like a Zen space.

Speaker 51 It was really quite something to watch.

Speaker 40 There was about, I think it took John

Speaker 101 three minutes of deep concentration, concentration, at which point, if you said anything, you were reprimanded, and that was fine.

Speaker 43 Let me concentrate, he said.

Speaker 57 Dave checked them on city score. They kept their way up.

Speaker 75 Dave froze, John.

Speaker 95 I sensed a little bit of stepdad energy around me.

Speaker 99 People wanting to chip in,

Speaker 80 but aware that they're interrupting a train of thought which is the equal of some of the great Nobel Prize winners of our age.

Speaker 97 So can I hold anything?

Speaker 80 No, you can't.

Speaker 95 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 80 In fact, you can, but in four stages, time. Yeah.

Speaker 65 I will tell you when.

Speaker 63 Yeah, there was a bit. A bit of that.

Speaker 19 Yeah,

Speaker 95 it was a barbecue that hasn't been taken out of the box on the first hot day of summer.

Speaker 105 Yes,

Speaker 105 three guys

Speaker 74 stood around.

Speaker 95 One of them needs to be in charge.

Speaker 66 Yes.

Speaker 65 I will tell you when the John Robbins story.

Speaker 5 So you should have called the book.

Speaker 50 But, you know, here we go.

Speaker 103 I will tell you when, ten problems that changed my life.

Speaker 74 But if you give me a problem and I will solve it, if it's like a sort of brain quiz.

Speaker 95 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 87 Give me a day of nothing to do and I will fall to pieces in my living room in silence, just with my own memories.

Speaker 51 I loved the detail of asking for white guffa.

Speaker 48 It had to be white.

Speaker 94 I reckon

Speaker 57 if this was an Ellis James solo show, well actually I know what I would have done, I'd have done it without the banner stand.

Speaker 57 But if someone had said you've got to do it without the banner stand or we set the venue on fire, I would have used black gaffer.

Speaker 42 It was that little detail of making it white.

Speaker 80 Let me give you an insight into the thought process.

Speaker 73 Okay.

Speaker 27 I'm thinking.

Speaker 42 Sakalis.

Speaker 68 No, I'm thinking we've lost the clip.

Speaker 97 where the pole attaches to the top of the banner stand.

Speaker 106 I need to create a false top.

Speaker 94 Yeah.

Speaker 106 I need to protect that false top from puncture.

Speaker 81 Yeah.

Speaker 27 Gaffer is going to be involved, but gaffer's going to look bad.

Speaker 94 Yeah.

Speaker 95 This sign is orange and beige.

Speaker 33 Yeah.

Speaker 27 Gaffer comes in different

Speaker 38 colours.

Speaker 105 I then wheel through the different gaffer colours.

Speaker 80 Green, that's not orange or beige. Blue, that's not orange or beige.

Speaker 44 Red, okay.

Speaker 96 It's on the bench.

Speaker 7 I stumble on white, the perfect solution.

Speaker 22 You're going to be able to see it's been fixed, but you're not going to see it from a distance.

Speaker 94 No, no, no, definitely not.

Speaker 42 The, I would say, circle upper circle balcony are in the clear. Yeah.

Speaker 101 The stalls are going to see it.

Speaker 97 I then assess my options.

Speaker 27 Do I ask Giles White Gaffer? No, he's fallen apart.

Speaker 7 And he had. Do I ask Ellis White Gaffer?

Speaker 22 No, he's having his 43rd sip of water of the afternoon.

Speaker 87 Do I ask Dave for Gaffer?

Speaker 74 No, he's googling Kagouls.

Speaker 84 Yeah, I was looking at the city score.

Speaker 95 I asked the stagehand, I get gaffer.

Speaker 7 I asked the head of tech, she gets me scissors.

Speaker 105 Now we begin, step by step.

Speaker 105 We take off, we cut, we stick, we turn, we stick, we measure, we stick, we erect.

Speaker 78 Putting it on its back, the main erection, I loved.

Speaker 46 Yeah.

Speaker 42 And using the stage weights just to flatten it out.

Speaker 80 And here's the spiritual change in me.

Speaker 27 Right. Because after completing, after erecting, after solving,

Speaker 80 Ellis then said, what should we have for dinner?

Speaker 27 We've had a lot of Thai.

Speaker 94 Old John, himself,

Speaker 74 in egoic mind,

Speaker 80 would have said, I have solved the problem.

Speaker 74 I choose to

Speaker 84 get me Thai.

Speaker 80 Ellis says, I want a Pizza Express. I really enjoyed the Pizza Express we had the other day.

Speaker 34 Old John, in egoic self, says, I actually had pizza at Celia's birthday two days ago. Yeah.

Speaker 27 And

Speaker 27 I haven't run today.

Speaker 99 And I've somehow put put on three kilos since I started running which is bizarre I need to dig into that

Speaker 68 new John

Speaker 97 radical acceptance yeah

Speaker 101 old egoic John would have never got to that stage the way you disengaged from your ego when I when I asked if we could have pizza and you said yes it was just it was pretty absolutely it was amazing to watch brave considering you saved the show No, yeah.

Speaker 74 Well, because

Speaker 99 I mean, this is the thing about crises being opportunities.

Speaker 27 Because Giles missed the car park at Leicester Forest East,

Speaker 95 because I therefore ate 20 minutes later at Donington, I'm now in a better position to accept different foodstuffs because I'm not hungry when I'm making the decision.

Speaker 38 Oh yeah, yeah.

Speaker 74 And Donington had an M ⁇ S.

Speaker 87 Leicester Forest East didn't.

Speaker 12 So is my life a mistake or is my life a miracle that's yet to happen?

Speaker 7 these are the questions which i set myself

Speaker 55 yeah it's the big questions isn't it yes big stuff it's never small stuff it's never small stuff i've never had a small chat with john in my life

Speaker 94 it's true

Speaker 94 the big stuff

Speaker 106 i mean with the greatest of respect dave It's only small chats I have with you.

Speaker 94 King of the small talk.

Speaker 38 Me too.

Speaker 5 King of the small talk.

Speaker 94 Oh, are you?

Speaker 55 Yeah, it was wet yesterday.

Speaker 60 The three minutes where John was solving the problem,

Speaker 43 I felt so privileged to see that.

Speaker 78 Oh, people will ask you where you were.

Speaker 73 Yeah.

Speaker 63 Well, at Leeds.

Speaker 27 Yeah, you were there. Next, you stood next to him.

Speaker 62 I was in Leeds.

Speaker 106 Well, it's all go.

Speaker 98 This was the latest installment of Ellison John's Road to Norway.

Speaker 101 Let's go back to the studio, I think.

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Speaker 32 Right, it's time for a made-up game, Dave.

Speaker 84 It is time for a made-up game. Good news, we have a new jingle.

Speaker 83 Okay.

Speaker 84 And I genuinely get very excited when I know we have a new jingle because I haven't heard them either. It's from Dave and Kat with with a little note as well.

Speaker 84 Hello, I had a lovely afternoon putting this together for the Made Up Games intro. I even collared my wife when she got in from work for some BVs backing vocals.

Speaker 44 Oh, nice.

Speaker 84 Hope it gives you a giggle and you don't find the mang accent too offensive. I never do, if I'm honest.
Okay, so Dave and Kat with a brand new Made Up Games jingle.

Speaker 76 It's a game, it's a game, it's a made-up game. Here we go again with a made-up game.
Made up by you, for you the listener.

Speaker 76 Dave is Quiz Masterman, he's the mastermind with the master plan.

Speaker 76 Hey, Dave, you wanna make me far?

Speaker 76 John has got a massive brain. Don't tell him it's just a game, Ellis.
Remember, your name is the buzzer. How much is this called or a trader? Which US day is my neighbour Scotland, Notland?

Speaker 89 Where's the forklift?

Speaker 76 This man's face, horse or play, dragon's day, H2O.

Speaker 76 It's a made-up game.

Speaker 83 Wow, that was horrible.

Speaker 38 I loved that.

Speaker 94 I absolutely loved that.

Speaker 56 Elements of half man, half biscuit there, I felt.

Speaker 58 It reminded me of those

Speaker 48 films set in the 1930s about the sort of importance of baseball to America's national story.

Speaker 66 and it'll be like a blow

Speaker 63 films are there.

Speaker 53 Oh, there's like a Robert Redford film from the mid-80s, but nights, what's that one called?

Speaker 62 You've got to remember, I've watched an awful lot of sports films for another project.

Speaker 42 So, lots of there'll be like a pitcher chewing corn, and then he'll be getting the bust.

Speaker 35 So, about Field of Dreams.

Speaker 67 We have watched that for this other film.

Speaker 47 The Kevin Chelster film.

Speaker 14 Yes, it's actually Mike Bubbins' favourite film of all time.

Speaker 35 He needs help.

Speaker 37 What?

Speaker 62 He finds it very emotional.

Speaker 42 That and Rollerball, rollerball, I think, are his two films at the time.

Speaker 19 It's so strange that you've ended up doing your two podcasts with the two most different people on earth.

Speaker 90 I was talking to Dave about this last night.

Speaker 84 We had a lovely chat about this. Did you?

Speaker 49 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 84 And Alice is kind of in the middle of these

Speaker 58 Venn diagram that's about half a mile away from it.

Speaker 5 You know, each point is about half a mile away from each other.

Speaker 63 Yeah.

Speaker 55 It's very odd.

Speaker 94 Extraordinary.

Speaker 50 Field of Dreamer dreams of an unroller ball.

Speaker 46 There's another one. I can't remember what it is.
But yeah.

Speaker 38 He likes likes different stuff to you and that's fine yeah

Speaker 49 most extroverted man i've ever met in my life bobbins yeah really he once bought a round of drinks for 80 people i wouldn't be able to do that even if he gave me a year's notice i wouldn't be able to get enough people to get that

Speaker 7 I would have to do it over the course of a day traveling around the country and even then I'd be 50 short

Speaker 73 You were doing the gig in, was it in Cambridge?

Speaker 70 And you asked that guy and in the sort of quite near the front, you said, oh, are you my friend Dave?

Speaker 48 And he went, yeah, I'm one of your eight friends.

Speaker 62 Yeah, that was Chris.

Speaker 38 Right, Dave, what's the game, please?

Speaker 84 Oh, quick point of order. I mentioned a film where a flower blossomed and then wilted and everyone missed it because they were distracted by something else.
It was Dennis the Menace.

Speaker 35 Yeah. Of course.

Speaker 94 From the Beano.

Speaker 84 Well, there was a Dennis the Menace.

Speaker 10 That was in like three episodes ago in a Bureau de Change of the Mind.

Speaker 84 It was whilst we were at the remote recordings. Yeah.

Speaker 62 So last week.

Speaker 84 Okay.

Speaker 84 Dennis the Menace, in case you're wondering. Right.
Each week we play a made-up game that has been sent in by you, the listener. Scores on the doors.

Speaker 84 John has an advantage over Alice in our first ever Juice. So it's Advantage John.

Speaker 28 Oh, is it Advantage?

Speaker 37 Great.

Speaker 60 So it's Advantage, John.

Speaker 84 Yeah, so if you win, it just brings it back to juice.

Speaker 63 Okay, this could be fun.

Speaker 84 John, you're leading two loving games, one loving sets. Cool.
So I think it's our first advantage. And this week's game is from Rosie.

Speaker 84 Hello, team. I've always been a fan of all things Japanese.
The food, the culture, the wildlife. And specifically, I've always had a soft spot for haikus.

Speaker 36 Oh, lovely.

Speaker 58 Come on, Rosie.

Speaker 84 Do you know what?

Speaker 39 Is she a listener?

Speaker 84 It doesn't sound like it. If you weren't on on 45 minutes sleep, I think you'd be fine with this.

Speaker 84 No one could have predicted you couldn't sleep all night. So it's a tricky one.
If I knew that, I would have probably given you a little heads up, but here we are. I find it amazing.

Speaker 69 She's been in poetry groups. Yeah, but you were really good with the Tim Key poetry game last year.
Yeah, I was given a lot of notes, Dave.

Speaker 29 Complete mouth.

Speaker 37 Are you having a go at

Speaker 85 Rosie here?

Speaker 36 Yes.

Speaker 84 Because it's Rosie's game.

Speaker 69 I know it.

Speaker 72 I know it. Well done, Rosie.

Speaker 84 I find it amazing that haikus can say so much in three short lines.

Speaker 38 Pen stop working as well.

Speaker 49 That's all there ego.

Speaker 84 Get on your notes, on your

Speaker 54 haiku.

Speaker 84 I've also always been a fan of your good selves. So last week I got to thinking, I'm sure Ellis and John, the great writers that they are, will be able to write some great things.

Speaker 60 I write moving prose about football for The Guardian, Dave. They're not haikus.
They're thousand-word essays about Craig Bellamy.

Speaker 84 So I present to you a very simple game.

Speaker 59 Hey, you two, write me a haiku.

Speaker 84 If you don't know what a haiku is, it's a traditional Japanese form of poetry. In English, a haiku consists of 17 syllables across three lines of 5, 7, 5.

Speaker 84 To give you an example, here's a classic from the poet. Matsuo Basho, an old silent pond.
A frog jumps into the pond. Splash, silence again.

Speaker 40 Can it deviate from 575?

Speaker 84 I think the traditional...

Speaker 86 So it couldn't go 5-5-7 for instance.

Speaker 84 So the Japanese masters have written them. Ezra Pound has written them.

Speaker 84 And now Ellison John will write them. So I'll give you a subject.

Speaker 84 So I'll give you a subject. You then have 57.5 seconds to write a stick in the mick.

Speaker 45 Why 50? Oh, no.

Speaker 38 575.

Speaker 58 A haiku in a minute.

Speaker 49 Yeah.

Speaker 54 What if it doesn't

Speaker 50 match the syllables?

Speaker 31 It has to, otherwise it's not haiku.

Speaker 66 And then what do you do for fits if you can't get it to match?

Speaker 25 You just make it match.

Speaker 63 Okay, in 57 hours.

Speaker 25 It's not that difficult.

Speaker 84 We can give you a little bit longer if need be. He's on 45 minutes.

Speaker 29 Dave, it's 57.5 seconds.

Speaker 62 That's the game.

Speaker 84 Oh, no.

Speaker 84 I'm so sorry. That's all he's got.

Speaker 7 My name is Erlis James. I

Speaker 22 am a pain in thee.

Speaker 80 Are sometimes on low, and then you just don't put sleep in there.

Speaker 25 Okay.

Speaker 84 I think that was 7.55, wasn't it?

Speaker 47 That you did. Yeah, John.

Speaker 49 Anyway, yeah,

Speaker 84 it's 575. Can't be clear on that.

Speaker 84 I I will judge which one is the best. And there's three rounds in total.
Simple as that. Enjoy.
Ellis, best of luck.

Speaker 62 Well, John, best of luck as well.

Speaker 84 I think

Speaker 84 there should be some interesting answers.

Speaker 64 Why is he writing? He doesn't even know the topic yet.

Speaker 88 He's that good.

Speaker 38 He's that good.

Speaker 41 He can guess topics to icons.

Speaker 72 Okay.

Speaker 84 Round number one. I think John's just practicing.
Do you want a quick practice, Ellis?

Speaker 84 Do you think you would have been in a different frame of mind on more sleep? Or would this always been a trick?

Speaker 42 Well, actually, no, it's part of this stuff.

Speaker 55 Yeah, and I'm fine with that, actually.

Speaker 46 I've made my piece on it.

Speaker 84 Yeah, it's all right, isn't it? It's just a bit of fun.

Speaker 71 You've got a lot to offer.

Speaker 41 You have.

Speaker 84 You are fantastic as a person.

Speaker 57 My name is Ellis.

Speaker 29 On little sleep, I struggle to broadcast my best.

Speaker 66 That's good.

Speaker 84 Yeah, well, we're not doing it on that. Okay.
But that's the type of thing we're after.

Speaker 26 And they sort of historically have a

Speaker 47 sort of sense of wisdom or stillness or movement or some suggestion that you join the dots in your own head.

Speaker 84 I think we're at our limits here.

Speaker 88 And so I need to come up with wisdom in 57 and a half seconds.

Speaker 96 Well, it's something to sort of reflect on, almost like a sort of mantra of...

Speaker 53 I've never done that in 44 years.

Speaker 58 I've never said anything wise.

Speaker 40 Apart from my point that some...

Speaker 60 that some dramas,

Speaker 42 period dramas that are set in sort of the 80s, often have too much 80s furniture.

Speaker 41 Yeah, yes, you've made that point a few times.

Speaker 38 I listen to you.

Speaker 35 Okay, let's try and squeeze that.

Speaker 84 Let's do it. We might speed up the 57.5 in the edit just to get to the answers quicker.
So

Speaker 84 that's just an edit point. Okay, round one.
The medium of email.

Speaker 71 Okay.

Speaker 84 Have a think about what a reflective haiku might be around everyone's favorite method of communication: email.

Speaker 84 Ellis is counting on his digits.

Speaker 84 Alice is finished. It's bad.
This is like where you leave an exam room early because you're that confident.

Speaker 60 Yeah, I'm a friend, she's a se and I live to regret the tale.

Speaker 84 And we're there.

Speaker 84 57.5.

Speaker 16 Great. Okay.

Speaker 84 We've locked him in. It's on the magic of email.
I think broad enough to go in different directions.

Speaker 59 Ellis.

Speaker 84 We'll come to you first. 575 in terms of syllables for haikus.

Speaker 84 What is yours? What do you got?

Speaker 46 I want to send my

Speaker 46 finish.

Speaker 70 Love some messages to read.

Speaker 46 I choose email, please.

Speaker 8 i mean it's i like that i don't know in terms of the rules of haikus are you almost kind of meant to conclude at the end of each sentence no you can finish on like halfway through a sentence okay but in a way that is like so in the frog example yeah if you read the first line of that what was the first line of the frog one yeah you're right and yeah it's slightly different ellis is clear he's just ending a sentence curly there's no double meaning do i want to send my yeah there is I want to send my, what does he mean?

Speaker 69 You actually don't know. Yeah, go for it.

Speaker 58 His infinite meaning.

Speaker 17 Give it again, Alice.

Speaker 38 I don't want to read it again.

Speaker 53 No, I just want to.

Speaker 64 I want to send my

Speaker 43 love some messages to read.

Speaker 46 I choose email, please.

Speaker 11 I like i choose email, please.

Speaker 84 Yeah, it's really nice.

Speaker 38 It's positive.

Speaker 84 John.

Speaker 8 Lightning flashes words.

Speaker 41 For God's sake, come on.

Speaker 9 To you, my friend, in seconds.

Speaker 63 Open.

Speaker 25 Read.

Speaker 110 feel our love.

Speaker 41 Did you get that from a forum?

Speaker 71 No way did he come up with that.

Speaker 41 I got that from the forum of my mind.

Speaker 43 God's sake, well,

Speaker 84 I think we might be out on the old syllable counts here, John. Why?

Speaker 69 What was your final line?

Speaker 110 Open, read, feel our love.

Speaker 84 That's selling that six.

Speaker 31 How is that six?

Speaker 63 Open.

Speaker 81 Oh,

Speaker 102 read.

Speaker 42 You're joking.

Speaker 39 Surely that's a fourth thing.

Speaker 41 I think by default.

Speaker 25 Oh,

Speaker 36 he wins.

Speaker 25 Oh my god.

Speaker 102 Huge news.

Speaker 25 Huge.

Speaker 37 Huge if true.

Speaker 19 This is rocking the poetry world.

Speaker 49 Because it's good. It was really good.

Speaker 38 Oh, it was tough.

Speaker 23 I should have gone open read feel love.

Speaker 57 Huge news. I shook up.

Speaker 7 Ah, and that would also sound better.

Speaker 11 What should you have done?

Speaker 23 Open read, feel love.

Speaker 72 Yes.

Speaker 55 That's massive.

Speaker 84 Because the other two lines were bang on.

Speaker 90 You think that sounds better than iTunes Emo, please?

Speaker 89 You're mad.

Speaker 59 You're mad. Well, in a sh.

Speaker 13 1-0.

Speaker 84 In a sh, in an upset, in a cup-up.

Speaker 88 Don't say cup upset, Dave.

Speaker 71 You're meant to be impartial.

Speaker 84 Ellis is 1-0 up.

Speaker 84 Right, round two.

Speaker 84 Adrian Chiles.

Speaker 84 57.5 seconds to write a haiku about everyone's favourite man of the people, Chiles.

Speaker 29 Were you just taking my first line?

Speaker 80 Start the clock again.

Speaker 73 And time.

Speaker 84 Adrian Childs.

Speaker 84 John will come to you first.

Speaker 35 A word.

Speaker 29 A thousand.

Speaker 63 No matter the length or breadth.

Speaker 29 He spans worlds

Speaker 17 speaking.

Speaker 84 Well, you're in play for this round. Thank you.

Speaker 43 John's in play.

Speaker 84 Which is a bonus.

Speaker 57 It's good.

Speaker 84 It's good. Ellis.

Speaker 60 I think it would be a different competition if I had

Speaker 16 five minutes.

Speaker 68 Yeah. Yeah, we won we couldn't record.

Speaker 25 Yeah.

Speaker 25 But

Speaker 94 we would

Speaker 46 record it in a stadium.

Speaker 40 And as we were working on our wordles, the big screen could show, I don't know.

Speaker 46 But the time limit gives peril.

Speaker 22 It meant I didn't check the first one.

Speaker 108 Yeah, it gave you a point.

Speaker 84 And with five minutes, John would have probably come up with something different, although it was very good.

Speaker 71 Okay, Ellis.

Speaker 46 He tells me the news.

Speaker 38 He tells me my feelings.

Speaker 63 And.

Speaker 37 What is it with you?

Speaker 55 Dave, I wrote it in about 30 seconds.

Speaker 48 I need his show now.

Speaker 87 I like that.

Speaker 38 That's better than his first one.

Speaker 84 He tells me the news. He tells me my feelings.

Speaker 77 And.

Speaker 93 I need his show now.

Speaker 75 It's yes, because I don't know what I feel

Speaker 90 unless Adrian's telling me.

Speaker 42 I don't know what I know because I don't know what the news is. Because Adrian tells me, yeah, I don't know how I'm meant to respond to anything because Adrian tells me, so I need his show now.

Speaker 84 I'm giving it to John. What? I'm giving it to John.

Speaker 48 Come on, mate.

Speaker 84 But, but, but both, you both have a style which I like.

Speaker 48 Yeah, the style is trying to 575 in under a minute.

Speaker 69 Yeah.

Speaker 84 Right. Final round.

Speaker 38 Coffee.

Speaker 83 Hmm.

Speaker 83 You have to.

Speaker 83 He's got his little fingers out again.

Speaker 36 Well, how do you do it?

Speaker 84 Don't I would as well. It's just funny to watch.

Speaker 84 I just wonder if all the great Japanese poets are there going,

Speaker 38 probably.

Speaker 84 And time, 57.5. We might have abridged abridged for the edit, but here we are, 57.5 seconds later.
The final theme or subject was coffee.

Speaker 86 Ellis hit us with your haiku.

Speaker 81 Hot liquid awakes.

Speaker 84 I don't mind that at all. I don't mind that.

Speaker 57 Black drink stains my teeth, and so

Speaker 38 to the hygienist.

Speaker 38 That's very clever.

Speaker 41 That's good.

Speaker 51 Because I have to have more scale and polish

Speaker 25 points

Speaker 78 than usual because I drink a lot of black coffee.

Speaker 46 Hot liquid awakes.

Speaker 25 Yeah.

Speaker 43 Black drink stains my teeth and so.

Speaker 38 Yeah.

Speaker 66 To the hygienist.

Speaker 67 I wanted to go, I go, but that would have been seven.

Speaker 42 So to the hygienist, I'm just dangling that there for the reader to work out.

Speaker 35 That's the best, yeah.

Speaker 84 I think in terms of what is now clearly one of your traits of haikuism. my tropes, yeah, your tropes and traits is just cutting off sentence to go to the next line.

Speaker 84 That's the one that's felt the most natural with and so.

Speaker 84 It does, there's a bit of fluidity there.

Speaker 46 Hygienist. A bit of cohesion.

Speaker 48 I get told off for drinking black coffee and I say, sorry.

Speaker 84 John, coffee, what you got?

Speaker 29 Dark chestnut, hear me.

Speaker 44 Spring in my step.

Speaker 21 Move me now

Speaker 63 to vast scapes of day.

Speaker 83 Wow.

Speaker 25 Yeah.

Speaker 43 You could put that on a tea towel.

Speaker 42 You could put that on a tea towel. I mean, that to me.

Speaker 84 And it is about coffee, I suppose.

Speaker 42 To me, it feels like a meme.

Speaker 50 It's close, though.

Speaker 58 I think that would go viral.

Speaker 14 Hot liquid awakes.

Speaker 13 It's a shame because you both close.

Speaker 46 Trying to unduly influence you, John.

Speaker 61 A div. I actually think that's John's weakest when the first two were better i'll tell that to the vast scapes of day

Speaker 78 genuine tension genuine tension

Speaker 81 to the hygiene

Speaker 84 dark chestnut hearing me i'm giving it to ellis i thought you might and giving it to ellis

Speaker 84 which is hugely massive they do very different jobs john's is a thinker it's it's there are layers there i think mine's a warning

Speaker 71 Yeah.

Speaker 84 But there was just, there's an immediacy about that final one from Alice.

Speaker 7 I am ruining the extra syllable in round one.

Speaker 13 You probably should be.

Speaker 44 I really am.

Speaker 8 That's what's going to be on my mind tonight.

Speaker 8 As well as my new word or starter word.

Speaker 72 Yeah, of course.

Speaker 62 Of course. That's enormous.

Speaker 60 Rosie, I'd like to take back everything I said.

Speaker 64 If that stayed in the edit, sorry. Well done.
It's staying in the edge.

Speaker 11 At least little sleep is your key to avoiding cognitive decline.

Speaker 13 Yeah. Maybe you need to be a 45-minute a-night guy.

Speaker 74 That's not what the doctors are saying.

Speaker 8 But this is lived experience. This is lived experience.

Speaker 47 And that's real science.

Speaker 33 The go's done his own research, Steve.

Speaker 84 Yes, and that's what everyone says you should do.

Speaker 48 So we're... What is it?

Speaker 84 Advance to juice?

Speaker 17 Back to juice. Back to juice.

Speaker 37 Wow.

Speaker 84 Good game. Thank you, Rosie.

Speaker 93 Love that game.

Speaker 59 That was fun. And you were afraid of the game.

Speaker 30 I think we did a haiku game before on XFM.

Speaker 85 Did we? Yeah.

Speaker 54 I've got memories of that very familiar counting of syllables.

Speaker 54 I'm not sure if it's going to be a good one.

Speaker 36 Which we would have been doing live.

Speaker 79 Yeah.

Speaker 94 That's true. Deuce.

Speaker 14 Strong game.

Speaker 84 And that's today's made-up game.

Speaker 21 Right then, everyone.

Speaker 44 After that thrilling, poetic made-up game, we now move to more human quarters.

Speaker 45 The quarters of connection.

Speaker 8 the quarters of brotherhood, sisterhood, patronhood, Dave?

Speaker 37 If I could be so bold.

Speaker 72 You can.

Speaker 29 Can our Welsh hero Ellis James connect with a fellow country person in 60 seconds?

Speaker 34 Good question.

Speaker 33 We've been trying to answer it for over a year now.

Speaker 49 And the answer is yes and no.

Speaker 94 Yeah.

Speaker 17 It's time to find out in the Cymru connection.

Speaker 102 It's another Cymru connection. Ellis thinks his tactics are sheer perfection.

Speaker 102 But his questions have one direction.

Speaker 91 Where did you go to school?

Speaker 91 Do you know Daffy Evans?

Speaker 91 No.

Speaker 102 Come on, mate, you must do.

Speaker 102 And then often he will just list a name or three.

Speaker 102 Ignoring John's imploring think like us to

Speaker 102 listeners all are hoping if he can elevate his strategy to nifty,

Speaker 38 he'll achieve the magic 50

Speaker 38 Ellis go

Speaker 91 connect.

Speaker 53 I always forget we play the more uplifting one now.

Speaker 9 Well, we play that because it's lucky for you, because we played it last time and you got the connection.

Speaker 84 The minute you lose, we will return back to the audience. Oh, right, so this is one book.
Listener, Craig, again, thank you for doing the longer one. It's fantastic.

Speaker 6 And we've had an email from Ben.

Speaker 10 Ben says, Hi, Ellis, John, and Dave.

Speaker 10 Thought it might be worth suggesting, in light of having had an American on Cymru connection, that you look to the sport of baseball when considering whether or not Ellis's stats are acceptable.

Speaker 31 Hitting a baseball is so hard that even the best batters fail on two out of three attempts.

Speaker 49 The Yanks measure this, getting a hit without making an out, as a batting average.

Speaker 10 And the player with the highest ever batting averages for his career is Josh Gibson with 0.371.

Speaker 25 By comparison, Ellis with a Cymru batting average of around 0.4 is hitting better, relatively, than every baseball player who ever lives.

Speaker 46 One in the major leagues.

Speaker 9 And should therefore regard himself as a great success.

Speaker 35 Yeah.

Speaker 18 Also, we could take another lesson from baseball where they refer to the American Baseball League as the World League, the World Series, and say that Ellis, this is global.

Speaker 9 This is the World Series of Cymru Connection.

Speaker 7 And you're up against every other person in the world, even though it's just you.

Speaker 42 Well, the World Series was named after a newspaper called The Chicago World, I think, or The World.

Speaker 49 So that's it's not

Speaker 66 like a World Cup, like in football, which is what I thought it was.

Speaker 94 But still, I'd like to think that I'm connecting across the world as long as it's in Wales with Welsh people.

Speaker 89 Yeah,

Speaker 6 okay.

Speaker 7 A few weeks ago, Ellis managed to connect with caller Tim via the official Ellison John voice of Lenethle.

Speaker 7 Scott Quinnell, that success brought Ellis's connection rate up to 45% or his batting average up to 0.450,

Speaker 38 which is huge. Yeah.

Speaker 92 No baseball player can boast about.

Speaker 7 Can he build on his success? Let's find out.

Speaker 20 We have a caller on the line from Wales.

Speaker 108 Hello.

Speaker 83 Hello.

Speaker 11 The next voice you hear will be of Ellis James.

Speaker 96 He will be trying to connect with you.

Speaker 29 Your time starts now.

Speaker 69 Agent School?

Speaker 111 36 and Stanwell School in Pernath.

Speaker 86 In Pernath? Do you live in Cardiff?

Speaker 111 No, I live in Pernath.

Speaker 43 Okay, well, I want to say Tony Gray Thompson. Do you know Tony Gray?

Speaker 111 I don't know Tony Gray Thompson.

Speaker 14 Okay.

Speaker 53 Do you follow Cardiff City?

Speaker 111 Yeah.

Speaker 52 Do you know Hanson Dantite who works in marketing?

Speaker 111 No, I don't. I don't know anyone at the club.

Speaker 42 Okay, well, no, I mean, he's just a supporter.

Speaker 86 Okay, so do you have nights out in Cardiff?

Speaker 77 Yep.

Speaker 53 Do you go to Crubby Verbach?

Speaker 111 Occasionally, yeah.

Speaker 40 Okay, do you know Chill who works there, Richard Hawkins?

Speaker 111 No, I wouldn't know the staff there.

Speaker 42 Okay, do you go to gigs there?

Speaker 111 Again, occasionally, yeah.

Speaker 42 Occasionally, okay, do you like playing football?

Speaker 111 Yes.

Speaker 74 Oh, okay. Do you go to goal?

Speaker 60 Do you know Gwylen Bohr, who runs Gaul in Cardiff?

Speaker 111 Probably. I've been to Gaul a lot.

Speaker 66 Okay,

Speaker 67 what about John Rostron who puts gigs on in Cardiff?

Speaker 111 Yes, I do know John Rostron. No!

Speaker 25 Wow.

Speaker 22 I've got to say,

Speaker 22 it felt like you got that connection against the caller's wishes.

Speaker 56 There was a lot of shutting down there, but Ellis didn't keep walking into a closed door.

Speaker 66 Panath's a blind.

Speaker 42 My friend Simon's from Penarth, but he's older.

Speaker 52 So I was trying to get Simon out of my mind, which is difficult because I associate him so strongly with Penarth.

Speaker 10 He dominates your mind, he completely dominates my Penarth mind map.

Speaker 84 But I think what you did well there was you knew that you spotted quite early doors that Cardiff was the place to to be.

Speaker 17 And that's where you stayed.

Speaker 67 You're going to have most of your nights out there.

Speaker 92 Yeah.

Speaker 46 So I was doing some mental maths. I thought, what's your name?

Speaker 8 Sorry, Cola.

Speaker 111 Sam.

Speaker 14 I assumed Sam probably broadly likes the kind of music I like.

Speaker 77 Yeah,

Speaker 67 and Cardiff City was a blind alley because I know too many Cardiff fans.

Speaker 14 So Gwynnen Bohr and the Bohr brothers run Gaul, which is the fiberside center.

Speaker 29 Maybe actually, in a way, Sam was trying to help Ellis by saying, I don't know the staff.

Speaker 33 I don't know anyone who works for the club.

Speaker 8 He was actually steering Ellis with a firm hand.

Speaker 38 That's five, Ellis.

Speaker 65 John puts so many gigs on.

Speaker 62 Oh, really? Right.

Speaker 40 If you like, it has done for so long in Cardiff.

Speaker 5 I thought it's a matter of time.

Speaker 111 But I actually know John from Five Aside, though, at Garl.

Speaker 71 Oh, do you?

Speaker 111 Yeah, I used to play with John for about five years in the same... in the same group of people at Garl every week.

Speaker 46 I was with John and his wife on Tuesday night, in fact.

Speaker 38 Are you sure you want to be saying this?

Speaker 108 No, no, no. I mean,

Speaker 88 I went to the wedding, like, we're friends. Not by moment.

Speaker 38 No, no, no.

Speaker 64 Our friends are John and Lisa. Yeah.

Speaker 38 Okay. John trusts you with Lisa.
Yes,

Speaker 96 he trusts you and Lisa too.

Speaker 17 The wedding.

Speaker 39 There were more five of us. Izzy was there.

Speaker 35 Here's the perfect story.

Speaker 38 Riding in plain sight.

Speaker 102 I was at the wedding.

Speaker 71 I was at the wedding.

Speaker 70 It's the first time I ever attended a Kaylee.

Speaker 52 And I didn't like it, but I didn't say that on the day.

Speaker 74 I didn't want to ruin the fight.

Speaker 7 of course and then we had a kaylee at our wedding which i don't like but izzy wanted one so i just like accepted that yeah because wedding is about to compromise um

Speaker 111 sam are there any other connections uh yeah there's a few that i know of um so one of my good friends is jack egglestone the uh the drummer in mcclesky and future of the left who you might know as jack from music box yes so do you know bernie from music box and mark no i only know jack our uh our daughters are very good friends so i know him through uh through our daughters yeah um i was at uni with Nick Cudd.

Speaker 11 Were you?

Speaker 111 I was, yeah.

Speaker 64 He is my cousin's husband.

Speaker 111 I know you've mentioned him before.

Speaker 62 Yeah.

Speaker 5 Who used to play rugby for the Ospreys?

Speaker 111 Dragons.

Speaker 52 Dragons, I said, Zoe Coach for Tumble.

Speaker 48 I wouldn't have got Nick Cudd from you. No, it's tricky.

Speaker 46 Sam? It's tricky.

Speaker 111 That's from David Princip as well, you might know.

Speaker 63 It's from the BBC Will Sports Gen list.

Speaker 111 Sports Jane list, yeah.

Speaker 8 It's an absolute field of connections.

Speaker 38 David,

Speaker 40 in long enough, if you'd given me two minutes, I think I would have got to David.

Speaker 52 I saw him at the last wheels away. I did.
I can't remember which one it was.

Speaker 61 Where was I?

Speaker 43 That's cognitive decline again.

Speaker 63 It rained.

Speaker 41 I saw David at the airport.

Speaker 69 On a Belgium.

Speaker 25 Great God.

Speaker 38 There you go. It didn't rain.

Speaker 46 It didn't rain.

Speaker 5 This is okay.

Speaker 36 It's in the summer.

Speaker 17 It was in what? It was in the summer.

Speaker 108 So I think it rained in the summer.

Speaker 64 Because I went to one quite recently in the rain.

Speaker 14 Right.

Speaker 42 And that's in the same way that I'm always going down a Simon Blind Alley when I'm thinking of Pennath.

Speaker 111 Who's Simon from Penath, Ellis?

Speaker 67 He used to be the bassist in a band called King Alexander.

Speaker 25 And I can't remember his surname with my friend Laura.

Speaker 53 A lovely, lovely bloke, but he was from Penarth.

Speaker 46 But I'm afraid I can't do any more than that.

Speaker 14 Sam,

Speaker 14 we got there in the end.

Speaker 111 We got there quite quickly, I would say.

Speaker 96 No, no, how many seconds were left on the clock?

Speaker 38 59! 59!

Speaker 36 Oh, my God!

Speaker 90 John was a bit. It was.

Speaker 40 Because of your age, I went John rather than Mike Bubbins, who is my cardist stab in the dark.

Speaker 94 Do you know Mike Bubbins?

Speaker 111 I don't. I'm one of the few people who doesn't know Mike Bubbins.

Speaker 96 Okay, well, thank you so much for your call, Sam.

Speaker 10 That was one for the ages.

Speaker 111 Can I give a quick shout out to my niece?

Speaker 38 Absolutely.

Speaker 111 She's 15 and she's been a PCD since she's about 11.

Speaker 89 So she'd be

Speaker 111 happy to get her name on the show.

Speaker 63 What's her name?

Speaker 111 Esther Clark.

Speaker 108 Hello, Esther.

Speaker 56 Hello, Esther Clark.

Speaker 47 You are now, Esther, by degrees, a Cymru connection.

Speaker 29 That's because Ellis has chatted to your uncle.

Speaker 111 Yeah, and Ellis is, sorry, Esther's mum knows John Roster as well, funnily enough. They used to work together.

Speaker 43 This is massive. Strong.

Speaker 111 Massive.

Speaker 38 This is massive.

Speaker 14 All flies in the spider web.

Speaker 16 Yeah, sorry, Ellis.

Speaker 36 That's quite a sinister metaphor.

Speaker 10 No, all happy flies in a spider that likes them and is putting them up for the night.

Speaker 38 And then we'll let them

Speaker 36 set them free.

Speaker 56 Yeah, and isn't it evil or anything?

Speaker 8 The web that sets them free.

Speaker 62 Yes.

Speaker 46 That's Panaf.

Speaker 84 That non-sticky web.

Speaker 38 Great.

Speaker 49 Thank you, Sam. Thank you very much, Sam.

Speaker 47 Well, on that high,

Speaker 12 what a day it's been.

Speaker 108 We've had Wordles, we've had ulcers, we've had

Speaker 30 Poetra,

Speaker 28 LS1 Poetra,

Speaker 20 and LS1 Connectors.

Speaker 84 It's a big app for Al.

Speaker 45 He needed that on 45 minutes sleep.

Speaker 54 He did.

Speaker 33 I was just thinking during that, while Ellis was chatting, I was thinking, God, I'm tired. And I've got to go out shopping and I've got to go to a birthday party tonight.

Speaker 33 And I thought, come on, John, you had eight hours' sleep.

Speaker 23 So you're going to get me through the day.

Speaker 38 Thank you.

Speaker 55 That felt...

Speaker 42 Today has been a day of positives. And it started off badly, actually.

Speaker 41 Did it? With me at the breakfast party.

Speaker 58 Oh, no, but you know, I can feel the night time.

Speaker 38 I know you do. You were in Sheffield this morning, isn't that, Ma'am?

Speaker 84 It is, mad.

Speaker 71 He had steak for breakfast.

Speaker 41 That's because I've never seen it offered a breakfast before.

Speaker 25 Did I okay this hotel?

Speaker 84 It came.

Speaker 84 It was an odd.

Speaker 71 No, not odd.

Speaker 84 It's just a part of a restaurant. So you walk in and you think, Am I just in a restaurant or is this going to be a hotel?

Speaker 8 Next thing you know, he's got 24 oysters.

Speaker 93 Yeah, and on the breakfast menu, there was a steak offering.

Speaker 94 Yeah.

Speaker 25 Did you enjoy it?

Speaker 38 It was nice.

Speaker 51 It's a bit weird at 20 past eight in the morning. On 45 minutes.

Speaker 66 45 minutes.

Speaker 17 That's not on them.

Speaker 25 No. That's on you.

Speaker 46 It was a bit weird, but yeah, you know, that's why I'm still blaming buff because I eat steak in Sheffield at 8 a.m.

Speaker 26 Great.

Speaker 29 Well, keep sending your Shane Wells and your made-up games and your mad dads to ellisonjohn at bbc.co.uk and we bid you adieu.

Speaker 74 Goodbye.

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Speaker 3 Suffs, the new musical has made Tony award-winning history on Broadway. We the man to be home.
Winner, best score. We the man to be seen.

Speaker 4 Winner, best book. We the man to be quality.

Speaker 3 It's a theatrical masterpiece that's thrilling, inspiring, dazzlingly entertaining, and unquestionably the most emotionally stirring musical this season.

Speaker 3 Suffs, playing the Orpheum Theater, October 22nd through November 9th. Tickets at BroadwaySF.com.