S2 EP14: Omid Djalili

Podcasts, there are millions of them.

Some might say too many.

I have one already.

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.

But nobody is covering the most important topic of all.

Why is that?

Are they scared?

Too afraid of being censored by the man?

Possibly, but not us.

We're here to ask the only question that matters.

We'll try and say it at the same time, Max.

What did you do yesterday?

What did you do yesterday?

What did you do yesterday?

That's it.

All we're interested in is what the guests got up to yesterday, nothing more.

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.

I'm Max Rushton.

And I'm David O'Daugherty.

Welcome to What Did You Do Yesterday?

I like to have different mics like White Snake would have different guitars.

You know, they just hand you the same guitar.

It's no different that you just get a different guitar and go.

Hello, everybody.

And welcome to, I hope that stays in a nice sort of falling on air intro to today's episode of What Did You Do Yesterday.

Hi, David O'Doherty.

I mean, I guess we'll know we've made it when,

just for our benefit, because generally videos of this don't go out, when we we get spongy covers for the mics with the name of the podcast on it that's the sign Max I mean I have spongy mics for all my other broadcasting

you yeah I've got this spongy mic for talk sport I have this spongy mic for football weekly for all my endeavors but as yet I have no what did you do yesterday spongy mic yeah spongy mic does sound like a toast of London catch doesn't it

we must go and and tell Spongy Mike.

Of course.

Whenever one of our guests falls through, we'll have to ask Spongy Mike.

I don't want to get Spongy Mike on.

His day was boring.

We know the pods ended when Spongy Mike comes on.

Oh, God.

Anyway, today's guest is Ahmed Jalili.

And I booked him.

Not like in a jokey way.

I booked.

I'm on a run.

I'm on a run.

You would expect him to be in my Venn diagram more so than yours as a great comedian, but he is a brilliant footballer, which I guess moves into yours.

Having played with him a couple of times, he absolutely controlled the middle of the field.

In addition to that, his movie credits, I did have a look at his Wikipedia.

And

it is absolutely ridiculous.

It's half of the blockbusters from your gladiators to your bummies or whatever.

So many things.

He's just a tremendously tremendously interesting guy.

And we haven't recorded it yet.

So this isn't one of those intros where I talk about how excited I am.

And then you reveal that we've actually just recorded it.

And I tear it down fine.

I'm a big fan of his.

He's got great energy.

But you never know.

Maybe he has no energy for yesterday.

We don't know yet because we haven't done it.

But I feel full of optimism.

He's on tour.

I did check.

He's touring sort of endlessly, like amazing.

Yeah.

As I said, energy.

He's touring and touring and touring and touring.

So whenever he comes on the radio with me, he always always says, After I do a little bit on your radio show, he loses followers on all social media networks.

So, after a whole hour and a bit, who knows, he'll go down to zero on his Instagram.

That's our dream that we'll know this has worked.

But, anyway, this is what Ahmed Jalili did yesterday.

Ahmed Julili, welcome to What Did You Do Yesterday?

Very good to be here.

Lovely to see you both.

Great to see David O'Docherty, I haven't seen for a few years.

And like most Irish comedians, he's been on the sad solo tour.

I think I have to teach him a few things about how to enjoy yourself because when you're with people, you write more material, it's more joyous.

And every single Irish comic I know, however brilliant they are, they're just the saddest bastards I've ever met.

Sad bastards, all of them.

So, what you were saying is your tour, you go from sort of banquet to dance hall, and then you sort of appear on stage laughing joyously, whereas we cut ourselves off from everything.

So, the day is just misery.

I send people forward to turn my dressing room into a kind of like Moroccan opium dance.

We all enjoy ourselves.

We bring food, everyone brings their friends.

I mean, I'm actually in deficit at the end of the tour.

I've lost quite a bit of money, but I have actually grown spiritually, and that's the reason reason why I lose a lot of money doing it but it's great fun now the thing is unless of course you turned a room into an opium den yesterday we don't care yeah you're not interested yeah I get it not interested let's talk about yesterday sure so where do we start well where do you think when did you wake up Okay, I've been waking up very early these days because I realize there's lots of chores and things, lots of YouTube clips I've got to watch on the toilet.

So I take a green tea.

There's a green tea and I can recommend it's called Dietica Bibida.

It's like having a colonic.

I had a colonic quite a few years ago, and I love the feeling.

I said, there must be something out there that replicates this.

And someone said, work to the wise.

There's this stuff.

It's like a colonic every day.

But you've got to be very careful.

Make sure you don't leave the house for the first couple of hours.

Literally take a green tea, wait, just brew it for 10 minutes, drink it while it's hot.

And exactly 10 hours later, it's everything that you had.

comes out.

So while I'm screaming and emptying my bowels, I'm watching all the YouTube clips of the current discourses that I'm particularly interested in.

So I will wake up at five, maybe six o'clock these days.

Yeah, but not these days.

Yesterday.

Yesterday, yesterday, excuse me, yeah.

Yesterday I woke up at six in the morning.

I was probably watching YouTube clips for about an hour as I was emptying my bowels.

I will always talk about bowel movement because when you get to my age, I feel that joy is connected totally with having an empty bowel.

I feel I'm now totally empty.

I'm so happy to see both of you.

I'm radiant.

I'm shining.

And actually, I'm trying not to eat because as soon as I start eating, I'll feel that heavy feeling again.

So you're seeing peak ohmed right now.

I'm in love with both of you.

It's the joys of life right now.

This incredible green tea concoction.

Does it get to work immediately?

Yes.

How quickly do you need to get into the small room is what I'm saying.

Yes.

When I first took it, I took it at 10 o'clock at night.

And then at 6 o'clock in the morning, I was fast asleep.

And in my dream, people were pushing me saying, get up.

In my dream, I was going, what, get up?

And my eyes opened.

And if I hadn't got to the toilet within T minus 30 seconds, I would have shaped myself.

So it's one of those things, but the euphoria afterwards, and it wasn't just like I could see, I can even calculate.

That was breakfast coming out, that was lunch, and that was dinner.

And it was all within 10 minutes.

And I felt great.

Sorry to talk about you asking what happened to me yesterday, but this was my yesterday, which was glorious.

Can I just clarify?

So you wake up at six, you do the tea straight away.

The tea is the night before, or the tea is the night before.

The tea is is the night before yes right okay i understand more technical and no i'll wake up glass of water wait make a cup of coffee and it's usually about 10 15 minutes after i've had a coffee then i go off it's a bit more regulated it's not so desperate and running up and downstairs i had a coffee and then i went to the toilet and then i watched about an hour and i know that because whenever i wake up and if i am in the middle of changing my underwear my children can see how long i've been sat down by the rings around my that you've been on for 30 minutes or an hour and they stay on there for a long long time.

And they make me walk around with just a towel so they can see as the rings around my ass just settle.

How old are they?

They're in their 20s and they find it very funny.

But yeah, but I would say, like most people, on the toilet for a long time, that is a time I schedule now, about 40 minutes to an hour.

Wow.

That's not good.

You're not meant to do that.

Who says you're not meant to do that?

No, it encourages this euphoric feeling.

I have it.

I feel amazing.

It's good for you.

Don't stop it.

Okay, so you would do all of the YouTube stuff is on the toilet.

We leave the bathroom.

and where do we go now?

Then I go for a walk.

Around this time, it's between 6.45 and 7.

And I've been going for a walk most mornings.

I have joined in Ipswich, because I live in Ipswich for my sins.

And one of the joys is I've joined a men's group.

I went along and they said there's a men's group and it's mostly men in their kind of 30s to 40s.

So I'm probably one of only three people in their 50s.

who's joined this group.

And one of the lads said, hey, I'd love to go walking because I'd said that I want to start walking and start losing weight, get my steps up to to 10,000.

And he said, I'll walk with you.

So I had mentioned that I like dogs and I would like to have a dog.

And somebody foisted a dog on him.

I'm sure those of you aware of Kirby Enthusiasm season nine, it's called the foisting.

The foist means that something you don't want, you foist it on someone else.

Like in that episode, Larry David is given this assistant that's foisted on him by Jimmy Kimmel.

And now he realizes he's got to foist it on someone else.

So this guy had a dog.

A dog was foisted on him it was a husky so then i realized he's trying to foist the dog on me he doesn't want the dog and within the first seconds the dog shat himself four times and attacked five other dogs i could hear him whispering you're embarrassing me

do you think you could take on this dog do you the training skills to you know wrestle it into shape no i don't i'm watching him because he's really controlling it and he lets it go for a little bit but then other dogs come we have to go a different direction or he wheels the dog in he reins the dog in so I go for about 45 minute walk with him all the way around Christchurch Park which is a great park in the center of Ipswich so we go and he's a very you know a lot of the men's group are very it's interesting they're all Ipswich town fans but they're all very spiritually minded so they'll we did a little meditation Ipswich town as we're recording are nine points adrift with nine to go and I had mentioned that I'd done a documentary about King Richard III and Richard III if you remember was found underneath a car park in Leicester and he was found by a combination of archaeologists and mediums.

That was 2012 because remember, Richard III is the last king of England to be killed in battle.

The medium was saying, until I'm given a king's burial, nothing good will happen to the town.

So it is actually, this story I'm about to tell you is on the Leicester City website where they now

absolutely say that season before they won the Premier League, they were nine points adrift with nine games to go.

When King Richard III was given a proper king's burial and his casket went through the city, then he was buried.

Leicester went on a run where we thought they were definitely down.

They won.

Max will remember very clearly.

I don't know if you're big into football, David, but Leicester won seven of their last nine games.

And then Claudio Ranieri took over and they continued that form and went on to win the Premier League.

Because a lot of people give Nigel Pearson actually a lot of credit for keeping them up.

But actually, it was King Richard III.

And it is on the Leicester City website.

They totally say they were 5,000 to one shot to win the Premier League.

Leicester City won it.

Here's the kicker.

So the lads in the Ipswich group are doing a spiritual meditation invoking the memory of some saint in Bury St.

Edmunds, which is a nearby town, asking his person to help Ipswich Town with nine games to go to save themselves.

So that's what we did in the men's group.

I always imagine men's groups are a front for like a bank robbery plot or something like that.

Whenever I see the words men's group, they go in the shed and they're like, right, you're on lookout.

Who's got the fastest motor to drive us?

But it's good to hear that there's other stuff going on.

I think you're right, David, because it also the place where we meet fronts is a vape shop and vape shops, as we know, because banks are shutting down, vape shops are being, that's where you launder your money.

So yes, I think it's a front for something else.

You're absolutely right.

If you want to curry favor with the men's groups, especially the people who've lived in and around Barry St.

Edmonds for a long time, you can talk about Rollerberry, which used to be basically the, I would say, the zenith of roller skating arenas for those born within the Barry St.

Edmonds region, including Cambridge.

Yeah, I used to go to Rollerberry.

Did you have your own skates or would you rent the skates?

No, I think tragically, I had those skates that you just tied onto your shoes.

Oh, no.

You know, other people had roller boots.

Yeah.

So I was sort of knocked over occasionally and just left there to sort of fester while people did figures of eights around them.

That's brilliant.

Very much a rite of passage.

And actually, maybe the toughest arena, if you grew up in central Cambridge, you know, people think it's a twee life, but when you tell them about the reality of rollerberry, they realize that actually you're made of sterner stuff.

Is that where you were raised?

Because I was in Cambridge just on Friday and we actually went past the Cambridge United the first time I saw the floods on.

It's a big football town.

People love their football there.

I'd like to think it's true, but when we got to the quarterfinal of the FA Cup and the news reader went around the you know the town to say you're looking forward to the game most people said the what

anyway okay so you've done the spiritual so hang on do you actually do the meditation yourself yes yes okay so talk us through meditating for saint you know gary of bury sin edmunds to come alive and then ipswich town stay up well but we do a breathing technique where we breathe in and out 30 times 40 times or whatever and it's about a half hour thing we do at the end of our men's group but it's a really lovely thing when you just focus on your own stuff that you want to get done.

I mean, at the moment, we have a sitcom that we're trying to pitch the first Ipswich-based sitcom and we've shot it, but you know, it sounds crazy, I know.

Ipswich is such a place which is the butt of jokes, but there are so many funny people.

We've got Ed Sheeran now as not just going to be in it, he's going to do the theme tune for it.

So actually next week, Ed Sheeran's dropping a song called Azizam.

Azizam is a Persian word, which means my darling.

And I'm in the video where he gets sucked into an onodjalili vortex.

It's me and a, he just wants to have this thing where he goes i want to be you know overwhelmed by iranians so i'll get sucked into a vortex led by you it's like a persian wedding and it's i'm father of the bride and it's a very funny video so i'm focusing a lot on that and trying to get this off the ground so that's the thing i'm meditating about did the group meet at like 7 30 in the park then so excuse me we just got a slightly sidetracked i went for a walk at 6 45 with a member of the men's group right okay

but then in the evening we went to the men's group save that so we've had the walk we presumably you say goodbye to your friend yes and do you go home again i go home and then i will do some work but by that time it's around eight o'clock so i'll work on the sitcom i've got like an hour okay i had a zoom yesterday at midday so before that at nine o'clock i had a face time training session with my trainer his name is martin turk he was a good friend of sean beans i met him on the film the mummy he's from ilkley in yorkshire he's just such a great he's also bill bailey's trainer he's brian Cox's trainer, but he doesn't live in London anymore, neither do I.

So we do half-hour training sessions over FaceTime.

Wow.

Put the FaceTime up there.

And because I've had hip replacements, you know, knee operations, and I'm still struggling with my weight, there's a routine we do just for half an hour.

It's a routine we do while we catch up.

We catch up on things.

We talk.

He's a big football fan.

He's a big Leeds United fan.

So I like to talk football with people who get why we love the game so much.

Because I used to do this when I moved to Australia, I kept my personal trainer, Luke, and we just get on Zoom because I've got no willpower myself.

And I do it less now.

I've got two tiny kids.

I just don't have time to do it.

But I did quite like the, you know, the nostalgia of it as well.

And the fact that it's so weird that somebody on a tiny phone can say, do 10 durpees, and you would do it.

Whereas if he wasn't there, I just wouldn't do it.

How is that possible?

Max, this is the beauty of technology.

I met this guy 27 years ago on the set of the mummy just at the hotel had breakfast he looked like a nice guy we talked to him and he was there to train Brendan Fraser and he was doing a lot of work with Brendan Frazier and the guy Arnold Boss who played the mummy I said could you train me and he wasn't really interested in training me and in fact I don't think I'm even on his website because I haven't actually lost any weight and I said I'm really happy to give you a testimony because now you're all right mate so he's got all these people on there Tom Cruise and Sean B

I'm really happy to say because it's all right mate we don't need any testimonies from you I think he'd probably be upset that I've even mentioned his name he doesn't want to associate himself with me because over 27 years you've not lost an ounce of weight

i'm always amazed by people tell us what they're doing while they listen to this podcast and a lot of people work out to

what is very often the least motivational podcast that's ever existed

and yet some people are on that running machine and i guess they're like i'll just keep running till these gobshites stop talking about whatever they did.

It worked because I do that because when I finish with him, I then do a weight session for about 15 minutes.

And I've got Perez Hilton talking about what's the latest on Double Down Blakey.

And Ryla, Double Down Blakey is on her way out, guys.

To the most camp guy.

I'm like doing all my weights.

And it works because you're distracted and it's fantastic.

Okay, so we're building up to a Zoom now at 12.

So is that our next major landmark?

We've got to walk in.

You haven't eaten anything.

All you've done is a giant turd.

Yes.

So lunch will happen just before the zoom.

I'll go and I'll prepare lunch.

You didn't have breakfast.

I will always eat around 11, 11.30.

So what I've done, actually, I forgot to tell you that what I do to stop the hunger, in the coffee, I'll put a bit of MCT brain octane coconut oil, which is there.

If you put a little knob of butter and a little bit of this coconut oil, it's like a meal.

So your coffee just takes away your hunger, actually.

That's the thing.

So I have felt no hunger until 11.30.

About 11.30, I need to eat something.

Sorry, put butter and coconut oil in your coffee.

I mean, it may take away the hunger, but has it not taken away all the pleasure of the coffee?

Oh, it's delicious.

No, it makes the coffee gorgeous, actually.

Really?

Yeah, a little knob of butter.

Some people put cream.

I put a little knob of butter.

The coconut oil is tasteless, but it just makes it slightly thicker.

And that just sits in your stomach and it very just gently takes the hunger away.

And that's the one thing I appreciate because I'm hungry all the time.

And usually I would have stopped eating around six seven o'clock the night before so I would have had a little kind of intermittent fast so I usually eat at around 11 30 and it's usually something like a

massive blowout

I like sausages I kind of ruined the whole thing yeah ribs the extra five guys burger that i had ordered anyone want a third burger and there's a no

i'll have that for breakfast what did you have yesterday yeah a couple of eggs i got the five guys burger which i'd ordered the night before Amazing.

My son and I got three burgers between the two of us, and he didn't want the third burger.

So I said, I'll put this in the fridge.

So the Five Guys cheeseburger has two patties.

So I'll get rid of the bread and I'll fry the patties, some fried onions and a fried egg.

And that's it.

Oh, great.

That's good.

It feels good.

You feel great.

And I had that.

Then it's time for the Zoom.

And the Zoom is with my production company.

We're called Tiny Spec.

We've got somebody who comes in from Toronto who's our business manager, but also is quite creative.

And it's myself and my daughter.

My daughter lives in Muswell Hill and her husband Ara.

They're very creative people.

And have my son, who lives in Sicily, my son got married to a Sicilian, and he's it was made very clear to us that

he has to stay in Sicily.

There's no way their daughter is coming.

In fact, I actually told them at the wedding that I want you all to know to the Sicilian side of the family, my son is my heart.

But if he pisses you off, I want you to know, really, he's adopted, and I have the names and addresses of his real parents.

Was there a bit

at this wedding where the head of the Sicilian clan called you into a side office and said, I will do one favor for you, but I can call this favor back at any time, godfather style.

Yes, it does happen.

They're a very powerful family.

And in fact, it's interesting.

He made a joke about that.

He goes, I could call you in to have a private chat, but you know what's going to happen.

So we don't need to do that.

There's no need for it.

He goes, you just do the jokes and that'll be it.

In fact, they're quite sensitive about mafia jokes there.

So we're in Catania, the heart of mafia land.

This is really interesting.

When we were driving around, I'd see a restaurant and they say, Should we go there?

They go, No, no, no.

And they do this sign.

There's a hand movement from the top of the cheek down, which means it's a cut.

That's a mafia player.

I said, Really?

They go like that.

They go, What?

So there are these signs they have, which is very interesting.

So no one says the word mafia.

And the mafia, a bit like the Sopranos, they all deal in garbage.

They're all garbage removal.

They own most parts of Palermo and Catania.

And people don't have a problem with them them because there is very little crime in these places.

There's very little robberies.

I mean, it happens, but very little.

So nobody complains.

It's like the way your crew have Ipswich locked down.

You and the men's group, the front for the giant garbage collection.

Don't order from that five guys, people say.

Undo the hand motion.

So I was in Taomina with some friends and we were out one night.

And then I think two of us stayed out a bit later.

And this was in a, maybe a previous life, because I'm not the one to stay out.

But I think it was my friend Ian.

Absolutely shit faced.

I mean, completely gone.

And we ended up in this bar and one of Westlife was in it.

I think it was Nikki from Westlife,

like attractive blonde guy.

So like, that doesn't narrow it down, but I think it was Nikki from Westlife.

And weirdly, on A4 paper, someone had printed out the lyrics many times to Flying Without Wings, right?

Serious.

So we sort of stumbled into this bar and there's like a choir of people singing Flying Without Wings.

And so we sort of took a piece of paper and started singing Flying Without Wings.

But obviously, we're finding this slightly surreal because there's one of Westlife there and we're all singing a Westlife song.

And they've got one of those Irish drums.

What's it called?

You know, the diddle.

That's it.

So I find this and start hammering it.

So then Nikki from Westlife opens his wallet and produces a red card like he's got a referee's yellow and red card i think he's booked me earlier in the evening and he sends me off and because i know the language of this i just take it as the correct decision so i leave the bar because nikki from west life sends me off and that was in termina yeah you were obedient you just left with no there was no var in those days so i just

I didn't even complain.

I just left and went.

That's totally fair.

I'm probably being a twin.

Brilliant story.

i couldn't tell if he'd printed them out which would be amazing or if like somebody else in the bar was like oh someone from westlives here let's print out his songs do you think nikki whenever he goes out just he has got like a little satchel filled with printouts of his most famous song and whatever bar he goes into he just hands he hands them all out like let's get this over with come on let's just all get straight on it

anyway so you're on the zoom yes on the zoom and we were on the zoom for about an hour and 15 minutes just discussing, you know, production stuff.

There's some other projects we've got to discuss.

And we're discussing storylines.

So we're discussing storylines for our series ARC.

And that's the most fun bit.

So we've been doing this for a few days.

And yesterday was a particularly joyous one because we had some cracking ideas and we were all laughing.

A lot of people say you shouldn't really be working with family, but actually my family have been raised around comedy.

They all work in comedy.

The whole point of our production company is to do comedy through a hopeful lens.

So it's all, they're very idealistic, my kids.

They love to do things that are meaningful and they want to do things that make an impact in the world.

So they have a great sense of humor.

But there are times we do clash.

Like I say something and they say, that's not funny.

And they say, I say, what do you mean it's not funny?

Because this is not funny at all.

And I said, well, you know what?

Why don't you go and win a few comedy awards?

Why don't you go and win a Time Out Comedy Award 2001?

Why don't you get nominated for the Perrier?

And I start, I go on.

They said, all right, shut up, that's enough.

And then I'm also accompanying them because then they'll say something like this bit in the script is not funny how about we do something like and I said well do you want to give me a specific and they say

well you're the comedian and I say well guys no no you can't do that you have to come up with a you can't just put it all on me when you pitch an idea you can't trash an idea and this is a very important thing I'm teaching them as far as a company you can't trash an idea unless you have a better suggestion to make a suggestion which is a specific comedy thing you agree with that don't you David Yes, but my question is: this: This is the Ipswich sitcom, right?

Yes, I know it's how to comedy, but the wire is in some way capturing the essence of Baltimore.

Yes, I've been to Ipswich once.

I was cycling to Dungeon S with Richard Iowadi, right?

He lives there, yeah, yeah, who's from Ipswich.

What is the essence of Ipswich?

It sounds like you're going to beat someone up and you say, I'll give you the essence of Ipswich.

Okay, this is the essence of Ipswich.

Okay, I was asked to speak at Portman Road, Ipswich Town, when they were in League One.

This is a cold February night.

They're playing Cheltenham Town League One.

And I'm sat with the CEO and I'm sat, you know, having a dinner and everything.

And then they said, could you go down and speak to the crowd at halftime?

And I said, why would they want to speak to me?

No, no, but we've announced you're here and you're going to address the crowd.

I said, are you sure about this?

And I can see there's a guy on the pitch talking, but he doesn't have any mic technique.

He goes, you're welcome to.

So no one's listening.

He doesn't, he has no.

So then I come on standing.

No one's paying attention.

He goes, welcome.

And then he said, so, and amazingly, he suddenly became very lucid.

And he goes, why have you moved to Ipswich?

So I took the microphone and very clearly, I did two jokes.

This first joke, amazingly, my wife said, don't do the joke, but I did it, which is, we're talking to 21,000 fans.

It's still League One, 21,000 people there.

And they've all gone quiet.

I said, I moved here for a hip replacement.

It went so well.

I stayed.

I'm the only comedian to move to Ipswich for a hip switch.

And it got such a massive laugh.

And then, literally, it was so stupid.

And then, literally, I had the crowd in the palm of my hands.

I was doing Delia Smith Impressions.

Delia Smith, who, as you know, is chairperson of Norwich.

They hate Norwich.

I was going, let's be avenue.

Where are you?

I was doing all that stuff.

And then I went serious.

and i said as you know we lost paul mariner paul mariner was an ipswich town legend played for england and he just died six months before i'd like to pay tribute to paul mariner and there was a big round of applause and i said i would like to finish in honor of paul mariner i would like to do the shefki kuki dive shefki kuki was i believe an albanian heritage player who played for finland who had one season at Ipswich Town.

Oh, wow.

His name was Shefki Kuki.

And whenever he scored a goal, Max will remember, he used to do a swan dive.

So he used to throw himself up in the air and then land balletically.

So I thought I was in front of the, I'm at the Alf Ramsey stand.

I said, I'd like to finish off with the Shefki Kuki dive.

And so in a suit, I threw myself up in the air, but I hadn't noticed that he'd landed balletically.

I just face planted.

My face hit the turf and bounced off the turf.

And I was concussed.

There was mud on my nose.

And as I was waving with a person in a high-vis jacket, was leading me away.

This is the the essence of Ipswich.

Everyone was shouting, you fucking legend

as I was being taken away concussed by someone in a high-vis jacket.

And I think the essence of that town is that if you have forensic information about them,

they will love you to bits.

So there you go.

That's the essence of the town.

There's something delightfully Irish about it.

Yes, in that way, where you know, there's a general distrust of outsiders going back 800 years.

No disrespect, Max.

But if you show yourself to have done the work to understand the town, people are suddenly like, yes, now you are.

Oh, my God.

Now you're in.

Here we go.

In 2002, I was doing Kill Kenny and I was on a bill.

I was sandwiched between two Irish comedians.

Jim Owen, who's from the north, who's a very funny comedian.

Then there was me.

Then there was Tommy Tinn and who's like a rock star.

Okay, 500 people in the crowd.

Jim Owen goes on, storms it.

I go on, barely get a titter.

Tommy goes on, takes the roof off.

And then as I was walking back in my head, I was thinking, well, don't beat yourself up.

We're in Ireland.

It's a hometown gig for them, of course.

And as I got to the, I think, the court hotel, this guy goes, hey, Ahmed.

He goes, Ahmed, I just saw it with Tommy.

Tommy's up there.

You're done here, man.

You're nothing.

He had, yeah, take your old dad, but you're not.

And I said, excuse me, we are in Ireland.

I'd like to see tommy do kabul let's see tommy

and he goes nah he'll starmit he'd sats i'll shut up and i went to bed and then i had a dream that on the front page of the irish times there was tommy being held up by the taliban with the headline tommy storms kabul and i woke up in a sweat so yes everything they said that night both comedians did irish material and i had no irish material and i absolutely bombed i completely fell as died on my arse that night i saw you do one of the most sensational gigs that I've ever seen.

And, you know, I wouldn't have been in the game long.

And it was at that same festival.

It was a lineup show with Domerrera

and yourself.

And you talked about Iranian weddings.

Oh, yes, I remember that.

What I got at the time was, well, this is just Irish weddings.

He's obviously just taken the word Irish out of it and put in the word Iranian.

And so I don't know.

I feel like there's a lot of love there.

So, look, the Zoom, and I'm with you on family because, of course, there are, at one point, five Van Dykes in diagnosis murder, and you know, and TV doesn't get better than that.

And so, I think you're right to have included everybody related in the production company.

The Zoom finishes, what happens now?

So, we had the Zoom, the Zoom finished at 1.30.

And I have to tell you, this will disappoint many people.

But what I did next, I went for a lie-down.

Wonderful, wonderful.

A little siesta, and I think it's important.

This is something I schedule now because I've done my YouTube clips in the morning.

When we first go on Instagram reels and all that, I felt it was inappropriate for a man in his late 50s to just sit from midnight till three in the morning.

You can lose three hours just going through Instagram reels.

But I do enjoy it and I do learn quite a bit.

So I actually schedule it with a lie down.

I don't necessarily sleep.

I schedule half an hour of Instagram reels, in a lying down position.

Wow.

And I will send the things which I think are relevant to people to family members and friends I will schedule half an hour and then I will just shut my eyes and I don't always fall asleep but I will just rest my body between 1 30 and 2 30 I will schedule an hour of Instagram reels and lying down to rest my body David what's important here is Some people say that you know because we get lots of comedians and people in show business on that it's not relatable but I think people working full-time hard jobs will relate to somebody who has scheduled half an hour of just closing their eyes watching reels and going to sleep what i like about what amit said is that people do scroll and every episode we've done of this people have talked about their struggles whereas this guy just embraces it just builds it in as part of the skedge you know what i mean as opposed to people who just yeah oh it eats up this part of my day when i don't intend but whereas if you actually write it in and intend to do it, maybe that's what everyone else should be doing.

Yes, because David, during COVID, Harry Hill, who as you know was a doctor, he prescribed because if anyone has COVID, I really recommend you just stay in bed and scroll Instagram reels and TikTok, but go on the funny stuff because if you laugh, it has such a palliative effect.

It's actually my wife and I both got COVID.

I sat in bed, pissed myself laughing, just the funniest stuff.

I just kept scrolling until I saw stuff that was funny.

And then you will hit something that makes you cry with laughter.

And I'll watch that 40, 50 times so actually I learned during COVID that scrolling can have a palliative effect if you laugh that'll be my laughter time that's a thing that I think is very funny I've actually just shared from yesterday I saw this thing and I've shared on my Instagram stories today which is a guy who's had a nose job in Turkey and someone said bro you've gone from Greek god Then there was another picture of him with a smaller nose.

You've gone from Greek god to someone who listens to podcasts.

And it was so funny.

He just looked like like a kind of new man who listens to podcasts.

And it really made me laugh.

So people know when you follow me, I'll share the funny stuff that's made me laugh.

And that's come directly.

I usually put on my stories after 2.30.

So it's stuff that I see and then I'll share.

And it's just funny stuff that I think should be out there in the world because joy gives you wings.

And the more we can laugh, the better it is.

So that's the time I schedule to laugh.

Yeah, it's a really good idea.

I've sort of thought about that with social media before that.

Actually, you need to, well, you don't need to, but having a presence on social media is a good idea.

Should you actually put it in your diary?

Because I probably was addicted to Twitter.

Yes.

I've probably sent over 100,000 tweets.

Now, most of them were when I was single, right?

I'd like see a tomato on the floor and I'd just take a photo of them and go, has anyone lost a tomato?

And then when I was with my now wife, Jamie would be like, what are you doing?

We're going for a walk.

Why are you tweeting a picture of a tomato to these people you don't know?

But I was definitely, and I obviously X is a much shitter place than it was.

But I have always thought, and I've never quite got around to saying, right, I will check my blue sky Instagram, Twitter at 10 a.m.

and I'll do half an hour and then I'll delete the apps or close them.

I'm just, you know, it's definitely still in my life where I'll just sort of be idly checking them when I should be talking to my three-year-old, you know.

If you schedule it, I think it's fine.

Cause I remember all those things where the artists formerly known as Prince and David Bowie, they just said the internet will either save us or kill us.

And actually, it's all about having control.

Don't let the computer control you, you control it.

So I've taken that very seriously.

So moving on from that, because my two sons live in different parts of the world, yesterday I decided to connect with my sons.

They're both in their 20s.

We work at a time when we're all free so we can watch a film because we used to watch films together.

Wow.

And I said, well, where are we?

Let's just schedule a time where we watch a film and then we come on a Zoom and we discuss it for about 10, 15 minutes and see what we thought.

So it got to the point where we argued about what it was.

Doing comedy keeps your brain sharp and your heart young.

But actually, I find that my brain is, I can't think of the right word.

And I often say the wrong word because they wanted wanted to watch The Godfather.

And what I wanted to say was, I can't watch The Godfather.

I'm a bit of a nonce.

And they said, the what?

I said, I'm a nonce.

They said, is that the right word?

I said, sorry, wuss.

I mean, I'm wuss.

I can't see blood.

And then the thing was, later on in the day, I had a meeting.

Well, we'll get to that later, but I had a meeting with this producer who said, would you like some.

coffee.

I said, yeah, do you like milk in your coffee?

I said, no, I don't take milk.

I'm a necrophiliac.

And he said, a what?

I said, I'm a necrophiliac.

I don't take milk.

And he said, is that the right word?

I said, lactose intolerance.

Sorry, I got that wrong.

So it's a really difficult thing.

So we never actually, this was something that was going to be nice, but we never agreed on a film and we got into an argument and then we didn't do it.

So that was mostly between 2.30 and 3.30.

And then from 3.30 onwards, I was just walking around muttering things about my son.

Would you tend to watch classics?

Are we going back to the top 100?

Those sort of movies?

Yeah, the movies that they probably wouldn't have heard of that were big when I was younger, movies like Rollerball.

If you remember Rollerball 1974, we'll watch Death Race 2000 because they never understood that when I was a kid, they say, Dad, watch that person.

And then I would accelerate towards them.

And they said, What are you doing?

I said, Death Race 2000, that's 10 points.

And then I'd swerve out of the way.

They go, you're nuts.

I said, Have you not watched Death Race?

So then I'd watch it.

They go, now we understand, but you still, that's a very irresponsible thing to do.

I try and catch them up on films.

And actually, there was a time when they were quite young.

They remember that I said, look, your mum's out.

I've got big galaxy bars.

I've got the whole alien quadrilogy.

They went, yay.

And then my daughter, who was 13, says, Dad, Danny's six.

And this clearly says

eight to 18.

And I said, it's all right, your mum's not here.

They goes, no, I'm not saying because mum's not here, but he's six years old.

I'm not sure.

I said, it's fine.

I won't tell if you won't tell.

She goes, no, I'm 13.

He's six.

And I think it's irresponsible even for me to watch it.

I said, are you not going to watch this?

She goes, no, I'll just take the boys out.

So my daughter took the boys out of the garden.

I watched that.

And I watched Alien One and Two by myself.

So the movie discussion breaks down.

And what do you do next then?

Yeah.

And then around 3.30, walk in the garden just to get a few extra steps.

And then when I've, if the step count should be around 5,000, then I'll try and boost it.

I'll try and do a little step count.

So I'll go back into the park and do a little walk.

And And then yesterday I was then preparing for, I was invited to a new men's group, which is a younger group of people.

I had heard about this older group of people.

And it's a young group who were called, they're called Crips.

The Crips.

Is it Hansen?

Hansen, yeah.

Hansen.

So I went and I joined them at six o'clock before the men's group, which starts at seven, but I told the men's group the evening I'm going to be with these guys.

And of course, they were like, you're leaving us for younger men when, you know, all this kind of doing the WhatsApp group.

But I went along and it was very good.

There was a younger group of men who get speakers who come along, you speak for 10 minutes.

So I prepared a little short talk for 10 minutes.

And I opened it up and they just really wanted to talk comedy.

They wanted to talk about how this very short, quick capsule story was how as a kid, I always wanted to run away from my family.

My family had a guest house, but one thing I learned from my family, they always wanted to serve humanity.

They wanted to serve their people.

But I didn't want to be part of that as I grew up.

so i grew away from that and became very narcissistic and just wanted to be an actor and a comedian but then the penny dropped when i was being a comedian i realized when you watch the great people like sean lock bill bailey harry hill the comics who were doing really well and talking to them i understood how they became successful because it wasn't about their egos it was about them serving their crowd it was all about what's going to serve the crowd what's best for the crowd there's such a powerful i suppose symbol in that because as a comedian once you do win win the crowd, you do win your freedom, you do win your artistic freedom.

But the way to do that is to serve the crowd.

Yesterday, I had a profound moment when I talked about that in the young men's group.

And then my check-in for the older men's group was to honor my parents.

They did teach me that thing of serving people.

That's the secret.

And once you serve them, then that's when you become successful.

I always think it's a fascinating job doing stand-up comedy because the feedback is so instantaneous.

I don't think there's another job where you're literally aware how this is going from second to second because people are laughing and you can tell a million things from the way people laugh and if they don't laugh that's telling you something else.

So yeah, it's this incredibly symbiotic relationship whereby, sure, you can have bits where once you've gained their trust and been accepted by them where you can do whatever you want but that does involve making this initial breakthrough, I think.

Also, there's the text board at Talksport or any radio station, which is as immediate as it gets because they know that you can't even see them.

And so these messages of sort of bile, they're absolutely amazing.

I remember doing Talksport ages ago, and I was doing the late show.

And I just remember this text.

You know, I was quite young.

It was like before soccer AM and I was chatting away to the producer, whatever, and this text came in from Eric in Belfast.

Just says, remember

I don't know who you are mate but you've got the personality of a breeze block and we did an hour on whether a breeze block is the worst in animate objects because it's not even heavy like

it's such an amazing thing to have chosen a breeze block it's just like the worst yeah the worst thing it can be called yeah and there are some presenters who can't have that bored up i mean i love it i like i really absolutely embrace the abuse of daily or people seem to like this podcast like we get occasionally like a one-star of you with something going all through people.

And I love this shit.

I just love that people go to the effort of it.

He loves it.

He sends it to me straight away.

He's like, oh, isn't this just the best?

And I'm like, I generally try to stay away from this.

Oh, my God.

I love it.

You have to have a thick skin in this business.

Anyway, where are we now?

What's happening?

Ahmed, you haven't had any dinner.

You've gone into maybe three hours of evening groups with the dudes, but all you've had is is half of five guys at half 11.

Thank you.

You're absolutely right.

I did eat before the six o'clock.

I did make myself a very simple meal of two salmon steaks with some green beans and some spinach.

Oh, yeah.

What I do, just so you know, I chop up some fresh garlic and I put mayonnaise over it.

So it's like a garlic mayonnaise that I'll have with it with lots of lemon and olive oil.

And that seemed to fill me up for the rest of it, so much so that when I went to the young men's group, they had pizzas out there and I didn't touch it.

Normally, I would, if I see food, I eat it, but yes.

But so I went to the six o'clock one, which was about inspiring younger people to,

I suppose, fulfill their potential.

And then in the evening, I was half an hour late.

I went to the men's group.

That's when we did the invocation for Ipswich Town to stay.

Which sounds crazy, but we did do it.

Wow, we will follow it with interest.

So that was it.

So we went nine o'clock and then I'll look at my steps.

I'll say goodbye to the guys.

So what have we got?

What's the steps now from this day?

Around 9,000, 9,500.

And to get to 10,000, do a little walk around the marina.

There's an Ipswich Marina, which is a bit, it's not like a French Riviera, but there's a marina there where there's water and there's boats and things, and it's very pretty by the university.

Walk around there, little loop, which isn't a thousand steps.

I'll park far away, then I'll walk to my car, then I'll go home.

Ahmed, what I failed to ask.

Yes.

I presume it's the same weather as here.

This is the start of spring.

I see the sunlight streaming in behind you.

Is that the backdrop to this day?

Does that give a sort of positivity to it, or is it shit drizzle?

No, it was a very beautiful day.

It was sunny all day.

And then in the evening, it was enough to go out with a jacket and a scarf.

And it was one of those things where you don't feel cold, but you feel the cool breeze.

And it was enough to just go home and finish off the evening with the latest episode of White Lotus.

I've been trying to watch White Lotus, which is a good started off as a comedy.

I thought it was very funny, but it seems to be getting more and more dark.

And of course, there was an amazing speech in the episode before by Sam Rockwell.

I won't say much about it.

You just have to watch it.

But it's one of the most incredible monologues we've seen in television history.

So I've seen that.

So

I won't say much about it.

Sam Rockwell just sees a friend.

And I would recommend when you see Sam Rockwell do the speech, have a look at the actor's face who was reacting, who then says, I was actually just reacting.

to the story.

And he hadn't heard the story before.

He'd read it, but Sam Rockwell's acting was so amazing.

He was genuinely blown away by the performance and the story so it's worth watching that so then i watched white lotus and by about 10 30 i'm getting ready for bed so that is when i go and put the kettle on pop my green tea in the bag

put the hot water in leave it for 10 minutes i'll nick it down and get into bed and usually watch an episode of modern family or curb your enthusiasm i even like to have it on while i'm sleeping it's something familiar and it helps me sleep for some reason i don't get through the episode but i just have it on and i fall asleep i have have a question, Ahmed.

Yes.

Have you spoken to any women today?

No.

That's very interesting.

On the Zoom.

On the Zoom.

On the Zoom, yes.

No, my daughter was on the Zoom.

Daughter was on the Zoom.

And that was it.

No, there are no women in my life at the moment, so I'm not really speaking to anybody.

That's a very good observation, yes.

Do you think that was a good day, Ahmed?

It's something we tend not to do in life because you're relentlessly moving forward.

You seem in a good place at the moment.

Yes, I'm trying not to gig too much.

I gig about six times a month.

So I will be going on a short four-day Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.

I'll do that maybe twice a month.

So this was a very representative day.

It was very, I would say, spiritually enriching.

It was career-wise.

It was very good to accompany my kids.

And actually, some great things came out of the Zoom.

The men's groups were tremendously wonderful.

It's the other people feel it's a very enriching thing.

They keep saying, this is, I love this space.

It's wonderful to be here.

And I got to do my steps, I did my exercise, and I ate very healthily.

And you know, having tried to live like this, I did weigh myself at the beginning of the day yesterday.

I forgot to say this actually, they started off after the bowel evacuations.

That month, the end of this month, I've lost four kilos, so it won't show, but I feel it.

If you look at me and think you're looking different, but there's four kilos have gone off my body now.

What's the name of that tea again?

Who's today's podcast is brought to you by Dietica Bibidia?

Dietica Bibida.

It's fantastic.

Can I just check?

Does it evacuate you totally so you just do not have to evacuate again?

No, that's it.

I would stay around the toilet because then bits of residual things can come out suddenly.

You think I'm clear, then you go for a walk thing, woohoo, and you walk back home again.

But once the final bit is out, then you're good for the whole day.

So you feel great.

Ahmed, thank you so much for coming on.

This has been such a pleasure.

You're a joy, you guys.

Thank you.

It sounds like, David, you're going to get straight onto this tea.

You sounded really into the tea.

In the same way that I've always been scared of drugs,

I'm terrified of this tea just because I don't know what it would do to my sensitive, fragile little Irish body.

I foresee looking down into the loo and my pancreas is down there, various kidneys.

Who knows?

I had a colonoscopy once, and it sounds like the thing that you drink before that, so that everything is clear

for the camera.

But that was a day, wasn't it?

I like the scheduling of social media.

I think that is a good idea.

Yep, that's the lesson.

I didn't have him down for getting up at six.

No.

There was a very unexpected appearance of a cold five guys half-burger from the night before,

where the morning had been about generally spiritual self-discovery, awareness, then a purging of the body.

And then...

Oh, but it's half 11.

I'll get yesterday's bonus burger.

Yeah, yeah.

That's a good point.

It's incongruous there when you think about it.

Anyway, thank you, Ahmed.

He's out on tours.

Thanks, Ahmed.

If you order an extra burger every time you get a five, guys, leave it in the fridge for tomorrow.

Here's how you get in touch.

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

follow us on instagram at yesterday pod and please subscribe and leave a review if you liked it on your preferred podcast platform and if you didn't please don't

and that's how you get in touch hey thanks david we should do this again next week everything is showbiz although maybe your new catchphrase will be everything is clear which is what you said after your colonic

Hello, Max Rushton here.

You might remember me from Series 9, Episode 2 of Parenting Hell.

I'm here to tell you about Dog by the Bakery Door, the debut children's book by author Jamie Bruce.

Dog by the Bakery Door is a charming story of the magical things a little boy sees on a normal trip to get a coffee with his mum.

Perfect for newborns, three-year-olds, six-year-olds, all children.

Just Google Dog by the Bakery Door.

Here's a review from my three-year-old son.

Dog by the Bakery Door.

I have this book.

Full disclosure: the author might be his mother and my wife, but even more reason to buy it.

She is to live with us and a baby 24/7 and has sacrificed her career for mine while also being an amazing mum to two boys.

Thank you, goodbye.