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Hello my finest friends welcome to more Ruhullistepers

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or whatever it is you're listening to on this feed There's

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so many different choices powered by

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wish to get some extras the

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Ruhullistepur tour is Selling

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well in most places if you're

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in Tumbridge Wells, take your time You're

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going to be able to get tickets But some

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of the places are selling fast So please

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head to richhane.com slash Ruhullistepur and

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see if i'm coming near to you And if I am buy

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some tickets even if it's not selling very well, that's

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probably a better time to buy the tickets for

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me We are announcing guests

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as we get them. There are a few out there richhane.com

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slash Ruhullistepur

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We are also doing a few Ruhullistepur

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gigs this coming weekend That's

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the Saturday the 22nd and Sunday the 23rd

0:46

of July at the Bill Murray pub We're

0:49

doing four separate Ruhullistepurs,

0:51

which will go out during the Edinburgh Fringe It's me

0:53

going to the Edinburgh Fringe without going to the Edinburgh Fringe

0:55

So if you're in north london

0:57

in the afternoon come along and see those they're

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only 10 pounds a shot Anyway,

1:01

let's sit back relax and enjoy Ruhullistepur

1:08

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Cedars Hall

1:10

in Wells Please welcome a man who

1:12

once sang a solo in Wells Cathedral.

1:15

It's Richard Herry Thank

1:22

you

1:27

How lovely to be here, thank you

1:31

Wonderful, thank you very much. Lovely to be here in

1:33

Wells Um though

1:36

when I was at school in cheddar, uh, if

1:38

you said someone's gone to Wells it meant they were mentally

1:40

ill so

1:43

Uh, but it's good you've changed that graveyard

1:45

into a tourist attraction. Well done. Well done. Well

1:48

done. Well done

1:50

It's the top 10 tourist attraction

1:53

in Wells Welcome

1:56

it's lovely to be here. Uh, welcome to Richard

1:59

Herring's lovely summer

1:59

set town podcast because Wells is a

2:02

town. Get

2:05

over yourselves. Just got a big

2:07

church. There

2:10

was Hang Round in Wells Town Hall in the 1980s

2:13

as part of the Highway Code competition.

2:15

Anyone else take part in that?

2:18

We had a Kings of West Six team doing very

2:20

well then Tina Cavell put B to all the answers

2:22

in the final section and we got knocked out. All

2:26

the kids there call it Rallister, but I said I don't know that's going to that

2:28

might catch

2:31

on. It is lovely to be here. Let's

2:33

give you some I looked up some well Wells facts. I've

2:35

got you know I've got a lot of memories of

2:37

Wells the Town Hall

2:39

Highway Code competition singing

2:41

in I think I sang in Wells Cathedral

2:43

I might be just making it up. I

2:46

looked up the latest news for Wells

2:49

on the internet and the latest

2:51

news is boiler replacement for primary school

2:54

as part of countywide decarbonisation

2:56

scheme.

2:58

That's from

3:01

December 2022. That is that's now

3:07

nearly June six months have

3:09

passed that's still up there and top news happening.

3:12

It's not even from Wells. It's

3:15

not news and it's not Wells.

3:18

But there we go. I

3:20

should say this is going to be part of my

3:23

Edinburgh Fringe podcast series. As any

3:25

any guests I've got in the next few months that are at the Edinburgh

3:27

which I guess is this will go out during August.

3:30

So I've decided rather than going to Edinburgh

3:32

and spending 30,000 pounds I'm just going

3:34

to do it from home or places

3:36

that are convenient to me and then pay myself 10,000 pounds

3:39

to live wherever I'm living.

3:41

I found a way through it and still sort of appear

3:43

at the Edinburgh Fringe. We're staying

3:46

in a we're having

3:48

a week in Cheddar with

3:50

my folks but we're staying in a really horrible

3:52

lodge on the ask we

3:56

stayed there a few months ago and it was beautiful

3:58

and really big lodge we thought we're going upgrade

4:00

and we thought we'd upgrade it but we went into it. Literally

4:03

three bedrooms wouldn't fit on this

4:05

stage. I slept in

4:07

a child's

4:08

bed last night, not with a child's bed. It's not

4:10

the next Philips-Gofield

4:14

scandal.

4:17

That was topical when we

4:19

recorded this and to

4:21

be honest probably still is in August, let's face it. Who

4:24

knows what's come out by now? So I won't

4:27

mess

4:30

around too much but yes I'll be doing

4:33

this fantastic lovely to be Edinburgh without

4:35

being Edinburgh and being in

4:37

Wells which is you should do a comedy festival here. Oh you are

4:39

that's what we're here. On

4:42

the drive here I saw

4:44

this sign and I've seen this sign very rarely on

4:47

the road but it

4:47

always confuses me. It says picking

4:50

up litter puts road workers at risk.

4:52

Have you seen that sign? And every time I see

4:54

it I think what so

4:55

what you ask me not to pick up my litter and

4:58

how does me picking up my litter

5:00

put road workers at risk and of course it's

5:03

I'm sort of thinking if something falls out the car I'm not

5:05

meant to stop and pick it up. It means that

5:07

if you if they have to pick up the litter it puts

5:09

their lives at risk. It's a very poorly written sign no.

5:13

Every I'm so confused I think the

5:15

number of crashes that must cause by people trying to solve

5:18

the riddle of what what the fuck does

5:20

that mean?

5:22

So nearly nearly luckily we were going very slowly

5:25

on the bank holiday way to Wells. I

5:27

think that's probably enough to be getting on with. Yeah

5:30

I

5:31

was just thinking I once snogged a flute

5:34

player in the Wells Cathedral as well. I've

5:39

already talked about the many times the Wells the

5:42

Wells cinema where I saw the Kentucky

5:44

Fried movie and the other Cinderella and

5:47

probably dead now Somerset man shouted

5:49

out purr at nipples. That's

5:54

gone everything's gone the West even the Western super mayor

5:56

Odian's closing down now. It's

5:59

all changing. I'm

6:02

glad I'm going to die soon. Right, so I don't

6:04

have to see these changes. Right, we will

6:07

crack on. We have got an absolutely fantastic guest

6:09

for you this evening in the

6:11

morning afternoon. He's

6:13

probably best known for being a program

6:16

associate on 8 out of 10 Cats

6:18

Does Countdown, and this is his ninth appearance,

6:20

so it's getting quite hard to come up with those for him.

6:23

Will you please welcome the incredible John Robbins, ladies

6:25

and gentlemen.

6:27

Hopefully, there he is. John

6:31

Robbins. Hello,

6:36

John Robbins.

6:39

Nine times, nine times. Nine

6:41

times. You must have used every single

6:44

reference on IMDB.

6:46

Luckily, a couple of times. You

6:49

interviewed me, so I didn't have to do one for that, but yeah, pretty

6:51

much. Program associate, do

6:53

you enjoy your program associate on both 8 out

6:56

of 10 Cats Does Countdown and 8 out of 10 Cats?

6:58

Do you want to tell me what program associate means? It

7:00

means writer. Okay. What,

7:03

they have writers on those shows? Yes,

7:05

to sort of come up with little

7:08

zingers, sort of set in the atmos,

7:10

set the mood. Yeah.

7:13

All those little bits and bobs in between

7:16

the comedians riffing. Yes.

7:19

You know, those are all written by people, which

7:21

is no

7:22

big secret. It is no big secret, but they could

7:24

call them writers. Why not call them writers? It's

7:27

not your fault, John. No. You should

7:29

have stood up and go, I refuse to be called a brand.

7:32

Presumably, you've been on those shows on

7:34

your own right. No. No.

7:39

A me and Ellis did 8 out of 10 Cats

7:42

Does Countdown, and I think we

7:44

both feel it wasn't our finest

7:46

hour.

7:49

But mostly

7:51

when you're a program associate, it's a

7:53

lot of sort of eating

7:55

snacks in offices and reassuring

7:59

very talented. comedians that it's going to be fine.

8:01

OK. And then you go home. So

8:03

you're sort of paid as almost like a sort of mental

8:05

health coach. Yes. To kind of

8:07

go, I'm going to have another

8:09

box of choco-libnits

8:12

and tell you it's going to be fine. The stuff

8:14

you've written is great.

8:15

Can I get the last train? Yeah. I'd

8:18

really like to do, again, I've never

8:20

done those shows. There's a lot of the panel shows I haven't

8:22

done. But I would like to do the countdown one just because

8:24

I'd really like to play countdown very

8:27

seriously. I wouldn't do anything in between. Well, you

8:29

should do countdown. No, I don't want to go on eight. Because

8:33

there's no cure us of being taking countdown seriously.

8:35

You have to do that. But to literally just ask

8:37

people to shut up and stop messing about and

8:40

say, I'm trying to do as well as I can here

8:42

and get the maths right. Get the

8:44

longest word. That's what I'm going to do if they ever have

8:47

me on.

8:47

Yeah, I think that, well, you should do that. They're not

8:49

going to have me on. I don't know

8:51

why. I don't know what I've done. But anyway, well

8:54

done on being there. Buxton is on Adam

8:56

Buxton eight appearances. Yeah. Versus

8:58

your nine. You've done a lot in Edinburgh. This is

9:00

actually an Edinburgh one as well. Well, this is quite a sort

9:02

of searing indictment of the current climate

9:04

in Edinburgh that Edinburgh shows are no longer

9:07

being recorded or produced or performed

9:09

in Edinburgh. It'll

9:11

be an entirely remote festival. I'd

9:14

rather go to Welsh. Yeah.

9:17

So this, yeah, I mean, we

9:20

spoke about this in

9:20

the last one I was on. But my accommodation

9:23

this year, I was quoted

9:25

for a three bedroom flat for

9:28

the month, £8,000. And

9:31

that's, I mean, that is not

9:33

viable. But they go for that.

9:35

You don't really need a three bedroom flat there, Jon. I

9:39

like to sleep in a different bed every other day

9:42

and then just have a spare bed. It's

9:44

something tired in the day. That's my

9:46

day bed. You like the three little bed, the three beds. Got

9:49

three beds. Days of golden locks turns up.

9:51

But you get into this ridiculous sort of situation

9:55

where everyone you speak to involved in

9:57

that process of accommodation is sort of passing

9:59

the books.

9:59

So you say to the person who's letting

10:02

it, the letting agent, you go, this is

10:04

insane. I can't afford that. And they're

10:07

like, well, yeah, the market is pretty competitive

10:10

right now, but I'm afraid it's out of our hands. And

10:12

you're like,

10:13

what, you, the person who's advertising and setting

10:16

the, how is it out of your, surely it's only

10:18

in your hands. And

10:20

then they're like, but then if you're a landlord and they say

10:22

you can get that, I guess we, you

10:25

do, I guess you do have to take the money

10:27

if it's there. But it's a shame because it just means

10:29

it's out of reach for so, so many

10:31

people. Well, I, well, Edinburgh,

10:34

I'm not coming this year. We've served that.

10:37

So yeah, think, think, think

10:40

about what you've done. Think on it. There'll

10:43

be a lot of people crying in the streets when they, when that

10:46

hits them, when they realize. But then it

10:48

won't be until everyone goes up that they realize how

10:50

many people that has been the case

10:52

with. There'll be lots of holes, lots

10:55

of Richard Herring shaped hole in Edinburgh. There'll

10:57

be as, you know, X, Y and Z shaped hole,

10:59

which hopefully means I might sell a few

11:02

more tickets. So

11:04

the ideal situation is no one goes up apart

11:06

from me and I

11:08

become the best and worst reviewed

11:11

show of the fringe. Amazing. It's

11:13

a bizarre sort of sell out run for a show

11:15

that got hugely mixed reviews. So

11:19

what are you doing to show? Let's talk about the same with this.

11:21

Let's talk about Edinburgh and then we'll talk about this. Yeah.

11:24

So what are your Edinburgh shows? It's called Howl, which

11:26

is also my tour show. That is the

11:29

work

11:29

in progress I did last year, sort of

11:32

fiddled with and buffed up. And

11:34

then I'm doing another work in progress, which

11:37

then will become another part

11:39

of the tour show, which begins after Edinburgh. So

11:41

it's quite a sort of structurally

11:43

and logistically complex process

11:46

of creating something

11:49

that works on tour,

11:50

but breaking it in half. So it works in Edinburgh.

11:52

Yes. And then we'll be bringing it back

11:54

together to go on tour. So I'm

11:58

trying to manage feelings.

11:59

of anxiety, dread and fear at the minute. But

12:03

I just have to hope it'll be an awful lot of fun. Yes, I'm sure

12:05

it will be. So what's Howl... What's

12:09

the... It sounds like

12:12

existential dread from the title. Yeah,

12:15

that's it. You nailed it. Well,

12:17

it was the first bit last year... The

12:19

bit last year, the show that will be called Howl

12:22

in Edinburgh is written by a very... unwell

12:24

man...

12:25

who

12:28

was drinking an awful lot of alcohol and

12:31

wondering why things went wrong all the time. And

12:34

then the second part of the show is written

12:36

by still a rather

12:39

unwell man, but who hasn't had a drink for 205 days

12:41

at time of going to press. And

12:46

so it's...

12:47

It's... It

12:50

is sort of a show of two halves and

12:54

an awful lot has gone on in between

12:57

those two parts of the show. So

12:59

it's quite a challenge to write, but it's also very

13:01

interesting to write. But you do

13:04

start to question the

13:06

sort of the basic

13:08

essentials of what stand-up is, because

13:10

you're writing it thinking, why on earth would anyone

13:13

want to sit and listen to you talk about

13:15

yourself for an hour and a half? And

13:17

then you're like... You're

13:21

about to blow the whole gap. Yes. Because,

13:25

spoiler alert, that is what stand-up is. Incredibly

13:28

self-absorbed people talking about themselves for an hour

13:31

and charging. Imagine

13:35

your most annoying friend who's

13:37

always going

13:38

on about themselves. You suddenly turn up at

13:40

their house for coffee and they're like, that's 22.50 plus... plus

13:44

a restoration levy for the house. But

13:48

that's what it is. And that's forever what it

13:50

shall be. So,

13:52

isn't... Well, I've given up drinking

13:54

as well, but sort of accidentally. And

13:57

mine's two years and...

14:00

I mean, see, I don't even count it in days anymore. That's

14:02

how much it's become part of my life. Yeah. I'm

14:04

sort of near... I mean, I'm approaching a thousand

14:06

days later in the year. So I've done two and a half

14:08

years, basically, nearly two years to five months.

14:11

But I didn't really intend to

14:14

give up. I just stopped and then

14:16

haven't really started again. Yeah. I

14:18

was...partly

14:19

because it was more... I wasn't drinking loads. I'd

14:22

given up a bit and then in lockdown, I started drinking

14:24

like a couple of whiskeys every night. Yeah. And I

14:26

would just wake up in the middle of the night, feeling a bit

14:28

weird and confused and full of existential

14:31

dread and panic

14:33

attacks. And then I stopped drinking and that more

14:35

or less stopped happening. Unless

14:38

I eat hot food late at night. So

14:42

it's very much a digestive problem. Yeah, yeah,

14:44

yeah. But you wake

14:46

up feeling terrified and disconnected

14:49

from the world. And it

14:51

felt a bit like this was the only true moment

14:54

where I really understood how terrifying the world was

14:56

for these two hours in the middle of the night and then everything else was a

14:58

dream.

15:00

Is that...was that anything... What was

15:02

your reason for... Stop...because you

15:04

love a drink. Yeah, I'm an alcoholic.

15:06

Yes. That's right. That's

15:14

another definition. And

15:18

I don't think I am an alcoholic, but I have drunk a

15:20

lot of alcohol. So it's hard. But I'm

15:22

not... I miss it a little bit, but I'm

15:24

not missing it loads. Yeah, well, that's been

15:26

an interesting part of the process for me is

15:29

I've always had

15:32

problems with alcohol. And it's

15:34

always been special

15:35

to me in a way which

15:38

I began to realize it wasn't special to other

15:40

people. Yeah. And began

15:42

to realize that other people's

15:44

relationship with alcohol was different

15:46

to mine.

15:48

And that

15:52

I was, I think, born this

15:54

way. Because my first

15:57

interactions with alcohol were...

16:00

slightly weird. Like not

16:04

in context of where I'm at now,

16:07

when you sort of reverse engineer the experiences

16:09

you think, there was always something about

16:12

it that was special to you. Yeah. And

16:14

it became really the

16:17

sole focus of my life

16:19

was drinking. And what

16:22

that does, I realize now

16:24

is it makes you very

16:27

in self.

16:28

And what I mean by that is it means you become very,

16:30

very controlling of everything,

16:34

because

16:35

you are trying to direct

16:38

your whole day, your

16:39

interactions with people, your work, your

16:42

relationships,

16:43

everything in order to facilitate

16:45

you drinking in the way you want to

16:47

drink. And

16:50

the anxiety it causes,

16:52

my anxiety was so bad, that

16:56

I began to be unable to do

16:58

quite basic tasks.

17:01

And when you're that anxious, and

17:03

also very controlling, because the booze

17:06

is sort of directing you.

17:08

What that means is that happiness for me became

17:10

a day when everything went to plan.

17:12

So

17:13

the train was on time, I got to the place in the right

17:15

time, people behaved in the way I wanted them to,

17:18

there was the food I wanted to eat was available

17:20

at the time, the work got done,

17:23

nothing delayed me, I got to the

17:25

right pub at the right time, they had the

17:27

right alcohol, or I got home at the

17:29

right time, increasingly the drinking was at home

17:31

on my own.

17:33

Everything had to be like machine

17:36

tooled for me to feel that

17:38

day had gone well.

17:40

And that never happens. So

17:43

you're in this constant fight against

17:46

a world you feel is against you, people

17:49

who are against you.

17:51

Fate is against you somehow. And

17:54

what I had, what I came to realize was

17:57

is that I was, I could not be

17:59

in control of everything.

17:59

I wasn't in control of my drinking.

18:02

I wasn't in... I couldn't be in control

18:04

of other people. And that was my

18:06

moment of waking up in the middle of the night was

18:08

very much, I cannot

18:11

go on like this.

18:12

I can't do this anymore. It's...

18:14

I felt like I

18:17

was losing my mind. Yeah. And

18:19

I was. I couldn't hold information in

18:21

my head. Um... I... My

18:24

relationships were just falling apart. I

18:27

would be out with friends. And

18:29

in my head, this is like, this is what you want to do. You want

18:31

to go to the pub and drink. But I would

18:33

get so anxious that I would leave and go home.

18:36

I was very tearful a lot

18:38

of the time. Uh...

18:39

people would ask me how I was. I would... I

18:41

would just not be able to speak.

18:44

And you're thinking, fuck, you're 40. You've

18:47

got a pretty good life. You're

18:50

a nice person. And

18:52

you're feeling absolutely

18:55

horrendous all the time. And I woke

18:57

up at two in the morning and I just... I

19:00

was chatting to Ellis

19:02

about it and he said, was it a light bulb moment? And

19:08

I realised when he said that, it was, but

19:10

the light went off. The

19:12

last light bulb in

19:14

my whole life went off. It was a big thing

19:16

saying beer. And the last... The

19:19

last one went off. Yeah. So

19:21

since that... Because

19:23

I would wake up at two, three, four

19:25

in the morning, heart racing, panic,

19:29

dread,

19:30

you know, just sort of

19:32

self loathing. And

19:36

the only way to turn that off is alcohol or

19:39

beginning a lifetime's work

19:42

of personal development. But

19:44

it's interesting that a lot of people

19:46

go through all those things you're saying and don't stop. So

19:48

it's kind of... I mean, it's still fairly early days, I have to say, John.

19:51

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's impressive to be able to...

19:55

Especially

19:56

if you are... I don't consider myself

19:58

an alcoholic, so giving up...

19:59

drinking, I tried

20:02

to do a lot through my youth, but

20:04

I think like our society in the

20:06

UK especially, and more for people

20:08

my age, a little bit your age, were so

20:11

geared around drinking that if you were single

20:14

or if you just wanted to go out, there wasn't

20:16

really an option other than going out and getting drunk

20:18

with people. So you'd think, oh, I'll stop,

20:20

but then you're going, but then how will I ever have sex

20:22

again? How will

20:25

I ever meet someone to go out with? I'll

20:28

just be stuck at home, which obviously when you're 55

20:29

and have kids, you're

20:32

stuck at home anyway. Well, they say

20:35

if you want to know why you drink, stop drinking.

20:38

And it will become clear to you what part

20:40

alcohol plays in your life. I've

20:42

just had a lot of unravelling to do

20:44

of the impact it's had. And

20:47

there's this weird process of like going

20:50

back and thinking all of the things

20:52

that I thought was me or other people or

20:55

institutions or things that were wrong and it

20:57

was alcohol. But on the other hand, I was having

20:59

to grieve it.

21:00

It's how I've coped for 20 years.

21:03

Actually, it's how I've coped for 34 years

21:06

since my first

21:08

ever drink.

21:11

And it's scary. I mean,

21:13

it's at times terrifying, at times incredibly

21:18

enlightening and

21:20

moving and powerful

21:23

to

21:24

process feelings, which

21:26

I haven't really done in a normal

21:29

way, inverted commas

21:31

normal, I don't think many of us

21:33

or ever will get to a point where we're totally

21:36

processing feelings at face value and learning from

21:38

them. But

21:39

it's interesting how when I get cravings for

21:41

alcohol now,

21:43

I get through them using the tools I've learned,

21:46

and then suddenly feel

21:47

overwhelming sadness. It's

21:50

like, oh, right. That's because you've taken

21:52

alcohol out. That was the barrier between

21:54

you and feelings. So now you you're

21:56

now you're having feelings. This is what

21:58

feelings are like.

22:00

They're terrifying, but

22:02

they can also be wonderful and

22:05

fulfilling. And I went to the cathedral today.

22:09

Wells Cathedral was one

22:11

of my stepdad's favorite cathedrals. He loved photographing

22:13

it and he passed away this month. And I went there

22:15

and just sat in the back of the

22:18

cathedral and just had two

22:20

minutes of peace. And

22:24

that was amazing. And

22:27

I can live off that today, that

22:29

feeling

22:32

of a tiny little bit of just sort of serenity.

22:35

That's enough for me now today. I can

22:37

now go about my business where I was

22:39

drinking. I mean, crikey

22:41

Moses, I would have been lashed last night. I

22:44

would have been hungover this morning. I would

22:46

have been absolutely hating myself.

22:51

And for today,

22:53

because I can't say I've given up forever, because

22:55

if I get that far in my head

22:58

it gets too stressful. But today

23:00

I should hopefully be okay, because I've had a

23:02

little bit of peace

23:04

of mind. It's

23:09

not hugely amusing. The

23:12

people of Wells are rapt. When

23:15

the people of Edinburgh hear this, they're going to be furious with

23:17

me. But luckily they'll forget,

23:19

because what I'm saying is they're all drunk.

23:22

That's

23:25

why I'm not going back to Edinburgh, because I just make

23:27

comments like that. But

23:29

being a comedian is you

23:32

can live your whole life, you can live your whole short life.

23:35

You know, you can be a functioning alcoholic as a comedian.

23:37

There are several. There are several comedians

23:40

who have drunk themselves to death.

23:41

Sean Hughes is a prime example that's

23:43

very much at the top of my mind, very

23:46

sadly, kind of

23:48

gave up for a while but went back. So it's

23:50

fantastic that you've, and there's loads

23:52

of people I could mention who are functioning alcoholics,

23:54

but I'll wait for them to die and then I'll tell you.

23:59

It's so it's

24:02

really tough man because it's I

24:06

Know I'm sick and

24:09

that's a challenge, but it's also

24:12

Such I'm so lucky

24:15

To know what the problem is and know this what the solution

24:17

is and if I choose not to take those that solution

24:20

That's on me, but I kind

24:22

of hopefully get to live two

24:24

lives Yeah, you know I've been

24:26

I think I've got

24:29

Everything that was good out of alcohol out of alcohol

24:31

Yeah But it stops working

24:33

it just stops working and then it

24:35

starts to work against you and

24:37

the worst bit is

24:39

When you get into a state

24:41

I was in for about a year Where

24:44

you are as afraid of drinking as you

24:46

are of not drinking

24:47

and that's hell. Yeah, and

24:49

That's where I never want to go back

24:51

to

24:52

But

24:55

You know the first challenging as it may be

24:58

I'm lucky to have the challenge

25:00

and to know what the problem is Yeah And

25:03

I was you know what I've always admired by you and Ellis

25:05

and and a lot of that your generation

25:08

of comedians is you do Talk about these things

25:10

and I think this is incredibly helpful to talk about

25:12

this and it's very nice for you You don't open of you to

25:14

talk about it because I think it will help other people I think

25:17

there's a little switch that can that

25:19

can go in you at everyone's head of oh I

25:22

don't actually have to do that. You know if you're drinking

25:24

and you're enjoying it like please carry on It's

25:27

fantastic But if you're

25:29

not enjoying it, you don't have to do it, you know and actually Stop,

25:32

you know, I've even stopped in this time and I've stopped loads of

25:34

times and I've stopped for a year at time And but

25:36

this time I can't really went. Yeah, look it doesn't you know, sometimes

25:38

if you're at a party At the end of the night

25:41

it gets a bit boring when everyone else is really pissed But

25:43

it's actually you can completely

25:45

Cope with it and I think I've I always thought

25:47

I was always socially awkward and nervous and

25:50

didn't want to go to parties and drinking Was the way

25:52

to get parties?

25:53

But you can do it and it's still fine

25:55

and you know, there's other things to do. So it's great So

25:58

that you're well openly about it

25:59

Thanks man. I'd say one thing that like

26:02

not drinking

26:04

is the

26:06

worst,

26:07

whereas being sober is

26:09

great or challenging or

26:12

you know is

26:13

an opportunity for growth.

26:15

When I was, because I had about seven years of trying

26:17

to control my drinking in a way that

26:20

I think you would understand I had spreadsheets,

26:23

I had calendars with days ticked off, I had average,

26:26

I had nuts, mad, mad, mad behaviour,

26:28

I thought that was me being in control

26:30

of alcohol and that was the excuse I

26:33

used to say you don't have an alcohol problem because you

26:35

only averaged 39 units

26:38

a week over the last two weeks or whatever

26:40

or you had 100 days off this year

26:44

and

26:45

Adrian Charles wrote a book about

26:47

alcohol which is really interesting

26:49

and I wrote a chapter

26:52

for that about how I control my drinking and

26:54

it came out, it's coming

26:57

out in paperback and I had to say

26:59

to him I need to edit

27:01

this because it's all

27:04

complete bullshit. It's

27:07

not bullshit if you

27:09

have a normal relationship with alcohol and you want to

27:11

be aware of how much you're drinking and cut back, that's

27:14

different but if you are an alcoholic that

27:17

sort of behaviour will drive you insane. It

27:19

drove me mad. I was much worse

27:21

company when I wasn't drinking, i.e.

27:24

I have to not drink tonight

27:26

so I go into the day tense and

27:29

short-tempered and the more

27:32

controlling than even if I was drinking that day

27:34

so Adrian very kindly let me write a little

27:37

sort of PS to say this

27:40

is all good advice unless,

27:44

so that I hope when the paperback comes out there's a

27:46

little sort of extra chapter. I used to have

27:48

a little counter like that on my wall

27:50

like then how many days since we last

27:52

had an accident you know. Yeah yeah yeah yeah. 100 days

27:55

since I last had a drink and

27:56

everyone used to take the piss out all my friends used

27:58

to take the piss out but go days since I committed

28:00

murder. Well,

28:03

my drinking was like a building site where

28:05

every day it says two days since our

28:07

last accident. I

28:10

should say as a counterpoint, though, 24 days

28:13

after I gave up drinking, I discovered

28:15

I had testicular cancer. So

28:17

draw your own conclusions. That's

28:20

how quickly you'll get you. So

28:25

girls, keep on drinking. Fellas, think

28:27

on. That is science. That

28:30

is science. Well, thank you for talking about that, sir. And

28:32

presumably, the

28:33

moon on the... You're about to ask me whether I can suck

28:35

my own cock, aren't you? I'm

28:38

definitely getting there. I was amazed. I

28:41

looked you up. Given how many times you've been on, I was amazed

28:43

how few emergency questions I've asked you. So

28:45

I'm very happy to have this dull, boring,

28:48

with, oh, I'm just being alcoholic

28:50

bit. Because I know,

28:53

I know what's coming up.

28:55

Look at me. Come and see my

28:57

show about it.

29:02

I'm sorry. No, I don't

29:05

really think that. It's funny. It's

29:07

funny. Sometimes it's funny to say bad things, isn't it,

29:09

John? You notice that? It's funny because you get to think

29:11

both things.

29:13

You get to completely believe both things

29:15

you just said.

29:20

Hey, I'm Ryan Reynolds. At Mint Mobile, we

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mintmobile.com for full terms.

29:51

Thanks very much to John and Ryan for

29:52

that helpful activity. The

29:55

rest of you, be cool. I'll see you in the next one.

29:59

Now, forgive me if I'm wrong,

30:02

but I don't think I've asked you nearly

30:04

any of the major and major questions, but

30:06

I haven't asked you if all the art galleries

30:09

and museums in the world have I asked you this? I can't

30:11

believe this is such a good question, and I'm interested to hear your answer

30:13

in this one. If they all got together and said, we love

30:15

John Robbins, we're amazed he stopped drinking for like

30:18

two days. It's

30:21

incredible. It's like we want to reward

30:23

him, and he can take one thing out of any of

30:25

the museums or art galleries in the world and keep it.

30:27

Which thing would you like to own?

30:30

It can be an artifact, it can be a painting, it can

30:32

be anything from a museum or art.

30:34

What a great question. There's

30:36

two. Okay, so I'm going to allow you to.

30:41

Francis Bacon

30:42

picture

30:44

of, it's a kind of screaming

30:46

head.

30:47

It's a judge, it's a picture of a judge

30:50

in a sort of clear, it almost

30:53

looks like a glass box,

30:55

and if the face is all distorted, I

30:58

think it's absolutely incredible.

31:01

So

31:03

that's like, old John wants that.

31:07

How? And there's a

31:11

Dali painting

31:13

of the crucifixion with

31:17

a rose on a sort

31:20

of cuboid cross. Does

31:22

anyone know what the name of that painting is? Broken

31:26

Britain, what the fuck? Come

31:29

on. I mean, Wells has all its heirs and graces. They go,

31:31

oh, look at that beautiful cathedral, look at that little

31:33

peasant's passage, we can go through.

31:36

I think it might be called St. John of the Cross or

31:38

something, but it's a Dali painting of

31:40

the crucifixion with a rose. Oh my God.

31:42

Okay. Yeah, those two. I

31:45

mean, then I don't have to do any shows. If

31:47

I've got those two paintings. It'd be nice, wouldn't

31:49

it? I mean, I kind of want all of humanity to die

31:51

out

31:52

and just leave me so I can go and have my pick of

31:54

paintings. Well, that's it. Oh man,

31:57

I went through a mad... Thank

31:59

you, madam. Everyone else

32:01

goes, I see Rich Sharon's backing

32:04

genocide. Doesn't

32:06

surprise me for his own selfishness. Thank you,

32:08

madam, for understanding that there was a joke

32:10

in there. Thank you. Well, before

32:13

COVID, I had all of these fantasies

32:15

of isolation, you know, so

32:17

end of the world fantasies. I'd play it and my head

32:19

helped me get to sleep. And there's

32:22

a, I did.

32:23

I did,

32:25

I would, this is how I would get to sleep.

32:27

I would imagine opening my door to my house

32:30

and there being no one in the street

32:32

and walking down to Tesco

32:35

and being able to get whatever I wanted from Tesco.

32:38

And I pushed the trolley all the way home.

32:41

And then I would just, and then I would

32:43

start to think about how long the alcohol

32:45

would last before it went off. So

32:48

I've got like a year before all the cans

32:50

of beer and cider go off. And then I move on to the

32:52

wine. And then the wine's got about two

32:54

years because 90% of wine

32:56

is meant to be drunk within two years. Wow. So,

33:00

and then I'm have to sort of drink spirits

33:02

for the rest of my life. So

33:05

you could see why the fantasy wasn't actually

33:07

about, it was just, I

33:10

just wanted to

33:11

have a drink. But

33:14

I got into this genre

33:16

of literature called the cozy catastrophe. So

33:19

an example of that would be the Omega Man,

33:22

which was remade into I Am Legend

33:25

film or the Day of the Triffids, where

33:27

it's basically people in very

33:29

stressful sort of disaster scenarios,

33:32

but they have a base level of comfort.

33:35

So in Omega Man, the original

33:37

with Charlton Heston, he's drinking like sort

33:39

of Napoleonic brandy in

33:41

his fort with all the vampires outside and

33:43

the Mona Lisa is hanging on his wall. And

33:46

it's that idea that everyone's gone. I mean, it's such

33:48

a self-absorbed fantasy. It's literally

33:51

everyone else on earth

33:52

dies apart from me. And

33:54

I get to do whatever I want. But

33:57

it is a thread that runs through a lot

33:59

of. very popular

34:01

sort of Netflix shows, like The Last of Us is

34:03

essentially that thing. You know, the hideout

34:07

that the couple have in The Last

34:09

of Us is that fantasy,

34:12

the bunker in the

34:14

road that's full of all the tinned

34:16

food. That is that feeling of warmth

34:19

and comfort you get. But it does require

34:21

everyone else on earth to die. Whenever I watch

34:24

those shows, like when I'm watching The Walking Dead, I just want

34:26

a series where they just are all okay

34:28

and they've got it all sorted out and they just build

34:30

the city again and there's no problem from bad

34:33

men or zombies. But that's

34:35

what happens in The Last of Us, that those guys that

34:37

run Swanson and the guy from

34:39

the White Lotus get together and

34:42

then they live a very happy life. I think

34:44

that's the two best episodes of The Last of Us, are

34:46

their episode and the episode with

34:49

the girl and her childhood sort of friend,

34:51

where they've got that sort of, you know, youthful

34:55

crush kind of tension between us. I think it's

34:57

absolutely amazing. But

35:00

then the main character I thought was just, I don't believe anyone's

35:03

that grizzled. I don't believe you

35:05

can be that grizzled full time. So

35:07

I didn't quite believe him.

35:09

Fair enough. Right, I'll ask you more

35:11

and more interesting questions. I don't think

35:13

I've asked you. I've got to wait, I've got to time them all carefully.

35:16

This is a bit similar. And again,

35:18

I'll ask you a stupid one in a second. If,

35:20

like a catapult, have you ever done this one? If

35:22

you go into a chrysalis

35:24

and you see this a bit too, we've

35:27

already done this, you go

35:29

into a chrysalis and emerges anything

35:31

you want. So a catapult dissolves and turns into

35:33

a butterfly. You go into a chrysalis, John Robbins, you

35:35

dissolve and you come out as anything you want.

35:38

What would you like to come out of the chrysalis as? A

35:43

pint of beer. No. Well,

35:46

okay, you've just added an extra layer

35:49

to my fantasy. I would like to

35:51

emerge as a top 50 PGA professional

35:54

golfer,

35:55

who

35:57

can have a normal relationship with alcohol.

36:01

I think if you are an elite

36:04

level sports person,

36:07

but not so elite that it kind

36:09

of ruins your life because

36:10

if you were 50th best golfer

36:13

in the world, you're probably earning four or five,

36:15

maybe 10 million a year. But

36:18

you can walk down the street, golf fans

36:20

will know who you are, but you're not like Tiger

36:22

Woods or Rory McElroy to live

36:24

that life.

36:26

And then to sort of have your retirement

36:29

or post-career world sorted

36:31

out, maybe you could go into commentary or maybe

36:33

you could, but you don't need to because you've made enough money

36:35

but it's not ruined your life, it's just so nice. But

36:38

I would have to be able to have a sort of

36:40

healthy relationship with alcohol for that to work. Fine.

36:43

I mean I think playing golf is worse than being an alcoholic.

36:51

And more damaging. That's

36:55

just my opinion. That's your opinion. Yeah.

36:59

It's my, I'm not going

37:01

to say it's my happy place, but it

37:04

was my first accidental

37:07

mindfulness of the only

37:09

thing that

37:10

actually worked even at my absolute

37:13

worst. I could switch off my brain for four hours

37:16

and just think about

37:17

the shot I was about to play. And there

37:19

is a lot of correlation between like

37:21

the mental side of golf and the mental side of

37:24

life, but

37:25

it does require you sort of enjoying

37:27

golf to really have any interest in

37:30

that Venn diagram.

37:31

But sort of acceptance, accepting

37:34

on the

37:37

one hand, the fact your ball

37:39

has ended up in the bunker or

37:41

accepting. Thanks for pointing that out. Very

37:49

sensitive. And

37:53

then, well, that's the hope that you've absolutely

37:55

got to the heart of it. And then accepting

37:58

that someone, you know,

37:59

You had to get your testicle taken away. Yes. Accepting

38:02

those two things. Because your

38:05

attitude is what changes the impact

38:07

that those two situations have on you, how happy

38:10

you are. You know,

38:12

I mean, at the center of absolutely everything

38:14

I've read and I'm reading and doing is the

38:16

only thing we can control is our reactions, right?

38:19

I can't control how people behave to me. I can't

38:22

control whether, you know, I

38:24

get offered this work or I

38:26

can't control whether this relationship works out. I

38:28

can control how I respond

38:30

to those things. And that's the lifetime's

38:32

work.

38:34

Because the same thing could ruin my

38:36

life and be a huge

38:40

sort of moment of change and

38:42

acceptance for you. Yeah. But

38:45

it's us that control that. Yeah, it's true. Again,

38:48

not very amusing. We've

38:52

got to laugh on the way there and that's all that matters. I've got some,

38:55

you know, emergency questions. People

38:57

send them in, adults write them to

38:59

me and they're all shit, so stop doing it. Only

39:03

I can do it, children can do it,

39:05

and occasionally, AI can

39:07

do it. But there's

39:09

some missing ones. But this is

39:11

a very good question that

39:14

AI came up with.

39:16

What is the most ludicrous thing you've ever done in the

39:18

name of love?

39:19

I mean, there must be a lot for you to... Fuck.

39:23

So far, everyone who's answered

39:26

this question has done an absolute banker

39:28

of an answer. No pressure. I

39:31

think it's a brilliant question. Thank you, artificial

39:33

intelligence. One day, I can be

39:35

replaced. You're looking forward to being replaced? I

39:38

mean, I'm up to 1994 in my head. OK.

39:44

Oh, God. Just...

39:53

I'm just dealing with an awful lot of poems

39:56

I wrote. LAUGHTER

39:59

dealing now 1998 what

40:02

we 98 bought a girl seven Valentine's

40:05

Day presents weren't even going out

40:07

including

40:11

a biography of sheg of our CD single of Paul

40:18

well as you do something to me the

40:22

favor book of love poetry oh fuck

40:24

me

40:25

have

40:28

you got any booze flowers

40:35

delivered to the school oh

40:37

my god were you a child

40:40

as well at the same time what were you

40:42

were you at school at the time that that happened

40:44

because it's not less

40:47

we could cut it out John I don't want to I

40:50

don't want to wreck your career we all make mistakes

40:55

it was I it

40:57

was an unwise but not

41:00

illegal

41:03

what was the terms of the question most ludicrous

41:05

yeah most of what this is what AI says the most ludicrous

41:08

thing you've done in the name of love one

41:10

relationship when it began I

41:14

printed out all the texts we'd ever sent

41:16

each other into a sort of book and

41:25

got it published but in book shops you

41:29

do for merch actually oh god just

41:34

driving

41:40

quite worrying distances

41:43

for very small gestures

41:46

yeah

41:47

like just rocking up

41:50

I'm here I think that's what

41:54

the unannounced visits I mean

41:56

they see these are kind of a lot of things happening in films

41:59

a lot of things happening old-fashioned

41:59

that are

42:01

borderline, well not even borderline, absolutely

42:04

over-aligned. But that happens in films

42:07

a lot where someone turns up unannounced and it's sort

42:09

of often,

42:10

sometimes it's a terrible thing, but often it's a,

42:12

oh how romantic. A lot of things that are considered

42:15

romantic are, in reality,

42:17

that is a terrible thing to do to someone.

42:19

Yeah, a lot of things that

42:21

we're told, or certainly

42:24

I was told growing up were romantic, are actually quite controlling

42:27

and quite based in need. Yes.

42:30

Whereas actually I think I would

42:32

be much, I mean, I am over the

42:34

last 10, 15 years or whatever. I

42:37

think it's the teenage stuff because

42:39

when you're a teenager, everything just feels

42:42

so intense, so vivid,

42:44

and you think you're so right. I

42:48

was thinking the other day about like how pretentious

42:50

I was as a teenager, but then that's what being

42:52

teenage is. It's believing 100%

42:54

in the thing you've only

42:56

just learned about. That's

42:59

me! The thing my teacher

43:01

just told me, oh I'm really into this thing now, and going back

43:03

to your mum and saying, oh I'm

43:05

into this thing now. She's like, oh right, oh wait.

43:07

And then the next day you find another thing. But that's

43:10

what life is when you're that age, is just

43:12

sort of trying to assimilate the entire world

43:14

of music

43:14

and art and poetry and sport

43:17

and girls and boys and

43:20

just feeling so like obsessed

43:23

with it immediately.

43:24

And then you do

43:26

eventually chill out. If there's any

43:28

teenagers listening to this, you will eventually

43:31

just chill out. But

43:33

just being so grateful, so

43:35

grateful that none of that

43:37

took place on social media for me. I

43:40

mean, fuck me. Christ,

43:45

if I got flowers to deliver to the school,

43:47

imagine what my TikTok account would have been

43:50

like. I feel so, I drive

43:53

past kids

43:55

as part of my, as

43:59

long as you're driving. pass that so gay as if you're

44:01

stopping offering them sweets.

44:04

I drive past kids by accident

44:07

on my regular route and I

44:09

see them like, I know this is such a

44:12

sort of

44:13

everyday thing to say, I see them

44:15

on their phones and I just think you poor, poor

44:17

people. I cannot imagine what

44:20

your life is like. To add to

44:22

that, you know, my friendship group

44:24

when I was at school was, you know, six.

44:27

The year I was in was maybe two hundred.

44:29

The school itself was a big one but it was

44:31

a thousand. Imagine that's,

44:34

you know, eight million. I

44:37

just can't bear it. And I

44:39

still struggle with social media now because I just

44:41

feel too, I feel quite shy. Like I don't

44:45

want to, but I do want to. But

44:47

oh God, I haven't even fucking, I haven't mentioned

44:50

I'm doing Edinburgh on social media. Can you believe

44:52

that? It's insane. I

44:54

will have done by the time this podcast goes out. I'm

44:58

in real trouble. Yes,

45:01

not all the AI questions are good.

45:04

If I were to give a cat a human voice, what

45:07

would it sound like if it sang the national anthem?

45:12

I think it would sound like Her Majesty

45:14

the Queen. I can imagine a

45:16

cat sounding like that. I mean, but also you're

45:18

giving the cat a human voice. It's not saying

45:20

what would a cat sound like if it could speak

45:23

and sang the national anthem. Saying what if

45:25

a cat had a human voice. It would sound like whatever

45:27

human voice you'd chosen to give it. So the Queen is

45:29

an excellent answer. And you know, and I think

45:32

a fitting tribute to her life that

45:35

she in cat

45:37

form is singing God Save

45:39

Me. God Save Me. God

45:41

Save Myself. Yeah. Oh, it's too

45:44

late. You fucker. What

45:47

all that singing? Why do you do what have, what about the song

45:49

God? What about the song? Are

45:52

you really worried about AI?

45:54

Not too worried. Every

45:56

time I hear a fact about it, I get

45:58

immediately incredibly worried and

46:00

then stop thinking about it until the next time I

46:02

hear a fact about it. Are you worried about it destroying

46:05

the world or destroying the job of a writer comedian?

46:07

Oh, the world. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I

46:09

mean, is that more important?

46:11

I don't think

46:14

AI can do comedy and like it

46:17

can try. Oh, it will do. It

46:19

will learn. I don't think it will. Someone

46:21

said, so the producer of our

46:23

radio show, Dave, writes very

46:26

basic

46:27

slash awful slash good

46:30

poetry, depending

46:32

on your relationship with poetry and Dave. Someone

46:36

said to an AI bot, write a poem

46:38

in the style of Dave Masterman about

46:41

this thing, and it was bang on. So

46:45

I think by this time next year,

46:47

I'll be able to say, write an Edinburgh show

46:50

in the style of John Robbins

46:52

about alcohol and self-loathing, but in

46:54

a way that's not too self-absorbed and needy,

46:57

has enough jokes and will sell out a moderately

46:59

sized arts centre, and

47:02

it'll be able to do it. Yeah, I don't

47:04

think it will.

47:05

Okay, I'll see you next year. I think

47:07

there's a human

47:09

element to most art

47:11

that I think

47:12

AI won't quite

47:15

get to, but

47:16

we'll see. We'll see. I don't

47:18

think it'll destroy the world. Hmm.

47:22

Oh, if it does, just turn it off. I

47:24

think it's more... That's the mistake AI's made,

47:27

to live inside a computer. Oh,

47:29

there we go. Oh, yeah, it's fine.

47:35

But we haven't done

47:37

that with social media. We are

47:39

all... I was chatting about this to my pal the other day.

47:42

All of us, deep down, the secret

47:44

we're keeping from ourselves is that we want to switch

47:46

off our social media, but can't. We

47:48

know it's the problem. We know that it's

47:51

damaging our lives, our friendships, politics.

47:53

We know it has ruined our politics.

47:55

You know, everyone who subscribes to

47:57

the rest is politics thinks, oh, the reason I love this show is because it's going to

47:59

be a because this is what politics should be about. It's

48:01

about people disagreeing agreeably. It's about

48:04

pragmatism and being sort of center left

48:07

or center right. And we know this is the solution and we love

48:09

it. And this is what we want politics to be. Well,

48:11

okay, turn off your social media

48:13

and you'll have that.

48:15

And we are embarrassed that we can't. And

48:17

I'm embarrassed that I can't.

48:19

And it's the same with AI. We won't

48:21

turn it off because we won't know what's real

48:23

and what's not real. That's what's

48:25

scary. Oh God, now I'm getting

48:28

scared again. So I need to go through a period of not thinking

48:30

about it again, please. In this

48:32

case, I'll ask you, have you ever tried to suck your own cock? That

48:36

should cheer you up. I can't

48:38

believe I've never. I mean, how have I interviewed

48:41

you this many times and never asked you that? Especially

48:43

some of the positions you found me in when you walk into the dressing

48:45

room. Exactly. I,

48:48

at a very young age, was,

48:52

I've got, have a back problems.

48:56

My lumbar spine, which

48:58

is any self-congratulators

49:00

will know,

49:02

the lumbar spine has got to be the most flexible

49:04

area. I've got a lumbosacral

49:08

L4 vertebrae, which means my lowest

49:10

vertebrae on one side is fused to my

49:12

pelvis. A few people have it. It

49:15

can give you back problems. It gives you sciatica sometimes,

49:17

because it puts too much pressure on the,

49:21

what do you call them? A vertebrae above

49:24

it. So it means,

49:26

so if I were to, if I were to, I've been going to

49:28

the gym for the last two years, right? Just so you can

49:30

suck your own cock. I'll

49:33

try and touch my toes now. Right? This

49:36

is up to two years of going to the gym, as

49:38

far as I can get,

49:39

if there. Yeah, you're nowhere near my. Were

49:46

I to do yoga for an hour a day

49:48

for the rest of my life, I still wouldn't be able to touch my toes, because

49:51

my back just doesn't hinge. So I've been

49:53

saved.

49:56

The, the

49:59

practical discipline.

49:59

of attempting it,

50:02

but I'm sure I did have a bloody good go

50:04

at one point. Yeah, for sure. It's good, you know,

50:06

I thought that question, we'd heard every possible answer,

50:09

but it's open. Another exciting avenue

50:11

into the life of John Robinson, a potential

50:14

show down the line when

50:16

you've really run out of ideas. I

50:18

have my fused vertebrae.

50:21

I've never asked you about the human centipedes. Have

50:23

I asked you that? That you might have done.

50:27

Is it who's in front of his body? Yeah. I

50:29

was just worried I hadn't asked. As

50:34

long as it's on record somewhere, then that's

50:37

all that matters. I've been listening to

50:39

some

50:40

podcasts and I listened to your last... I love

50:42

your show with Ellis on Five Life. I've

50:45

started listening to Five Life all the time.

50:47

Really? Yeah. It's the voice of the UK. I love Colin Murray.

50:51

I've got more into sport, I have to

50:53

say, so I kind of enjoy just... I listened to women's football yesterday

50:55

on The Way, and

50:58

I kind of... It was great. Yeah. But

51:01

there's some very good presenters, and you

51:03

guys are good. I

51:05

learnt that you've been having your skin lasered.

51:09

Yeah. I've

51:12

always had quite bad

51:13

skin on my face,

51:15

and

51:16

I always thought it was booze. Right.

51:18

Because I would... You know, two

51:22

weeks drinking,

51:23

face would go all red, and then I would stop

51:26

drinking, it would disappear. So I was like,

51:28

well, this is just the life of someone who drinks

51:30

too much. And then I stopped

51:32

and it got a bit better, and then it got really bad. Right.

51:35

Sort of flared up like red,

51:37

really burny bits. So

51:39

I got into a mad world. And anyone

51:41

who's had skin problems, I think it's

51:43

fucking horrible.

51:45

It's horrible, because you feel so

51:47

self-conscious and so confused because you

51:49

don't know what the problem is, because as my GP

51:52

said, you can be allergic to anything. Well, thanks.

51:55

So I've gone from thinking, well, maybe it's wheat.

51:58

Maybe it's, you know...

51:59

lactose to maybe it's something that exists

52:02

in the world. And then

52:05

you end up, you know, you hear people say I had

52:07

bad skin, I use this, so you buy that thing and you put

52:10

it on and it gets worse or it gets better. And then you're chasing

52:12

your tail. And I realized I was putting like eight different

52:14

creams on my face. And this is all for

52:16

something that you probably wouldn't have noticed.

52:19

You know, you probably wouldn't have ever thought

52:21

of me as someone who had bad skin, but it was I

52:23

was very in my head. So anyway,

52:26

I went to my GP, I went to a dermatologist,

52:28

I went to a skin expert, and

52:30

they all gave me slightly different advice, but I kind

52:32

of simplified what I was doing. And then I went

52:35

to a laser lady

52:37

who was very enthusiastic started lasering

52:39

my face while I still holding the brochure about the machine

52:41

she was using. I

52:44

was thinking, fuck it, it can't make it any worse. So

52:47

I'm going for my first appointment next week.

52:49

But that's just to get rid of like, I've got

52:51

boozers veins on my face. I thought

52:53

you'd already bit so you know, I can't see anything. Oh, you've

52:55

done it. And it looks, it looks good today.

52:58

But yes, I think dermatology

53:01

is a real they make a huge must have a huge

53:03

impact on people's mental health. Because

53:05

if you

53:06

especially when it's on your face, it's

53:08

really difficult. I mean, I am talking about I've got the

53:10

mildest fucking problem is a bit is probably

53:13

a bit of rosacea. It's not anywhere

53:16

near as bad as it can be. But I do really feel for people,

53:19

because it's not knowing what's causing it and how

53:21

you can control it. One, they said that it could

53:23

be it could be made

53:26

worse by heat, cold or wind. Like,

53:33

can you imagine thinking, oh, it's fine now, because

53:35

as long as I avoid heat, cold or wind,

53:38

it'll be fine. I mean, it's nuts. So

53:41

anyway, if you've seen this guy, this 45 year

53:43

old guy, he's, he's trying to become 18

53:46

years old using science. And he, he

53:49

does things like inject himself with his son's blood. I

53:51

just feel so sad for him. Something about

53:53

salmon semen or something he's been

53:56

drinking. So that is part of it. It's just a bit

53:58

of fun. He

54:00

was already doing that. That's his report.

54:03

You could move it out from booze to salmon semen.

54:05

Yeah. Well, you do get just

54:07

some salmon semen. But I

54:10

think it's such a privilege to grow old.

54:13

You know, you think of people who haven't

54:15

lived as long as me. Yeah. You know,

54:17

and especially when

54:19

you factor in stuff like booze. I mean, even the stuff

54:21

I remember, like, I once jumped across

54:24

two second-story balconies at uni, and

54:27

the balcony sort of moved beneath me, I

54:29

managed to grab on to something. I could

54:31

easily have died. I could have been, you know,

54:33

the 19-year-old kid, he read about in the news,

54:35

who fell off a balcony. You know, I

54:37

feel really lucky to be 41. And,

54:40

you know, I might, I don't know how long

54:42

I'm going to live, but

54:43

I've never really had

54:45

a problem with aging apart from when it's

54:47

sort of like, you know, you should have done this

54:49

by now, you should have done that by now. But I don't

54:51

really mind about, you know, gray hairs

54:54

and that sort of thing. Yeah. Because

54:57

I, you know, when I get to 90,

54:59

if, you know, big if, but say I

55:01

got to 90, I would think what an enormous privilege

55:03

it is to

55:04

have survived, and to have seen so

55:07

much. I mean, 90, that's another 25 Ryder

55:09

Cups I get to watch. Excites

55:13

me, 25 Ryder Cups, think of all the drama.

55:16

It's incredible. It starts going faster, Jon, I have to

55:18

say. From about your age to my age, it feels

55:21

in my brain like, well, I still feel

55:23

like I'm 35, so

55:24

it's good. 35 is where I feel

55:27

like my

55:28

sort of, I always thought I would feel 17 forever,

55:31

and that wasn't the case, and thank Christ it wasn't.

55:34

I think I'll probably always feel 35, but

55:36

I will always feel like I've, you know,

55:38

I've been very, very lucky. Gratitude

55:41

is the opposite of resentment, you see. Yes. That's

55:44

what I'm learning.

55:44

And the opposite of

55:47

anxiety is acceptance and all this kind of stuff. So just

55:49

feeling grateful for

55:51

life is good. So if you

55:53

ever do try and look the same

55:55

as your own 18-year-old son as a 45-year-old,

55:58

which is going to be tricky for you. Yeah.

56:00

don't have loads of photos taken standing next to him.

56:03

That's why I would say so there's this 45 year

56:05

old guy, he looks a bit, his chest

56:08

looks like he's got like little moves

56:10

put in, you know like, strong man moves

56:13

though.

56:13

He looks very white and pale

56:16

and then he stands next to his perfectly normal looking

56:18

handsome 18 year old son, you go, yeah mate,

56:21

you're really nowhere near. You're nowhere near

56:23

that, you're about as near as I am if

56:25

I stood next. But it's odd because

56:27

you'd think of like, if we were to think in our heads

56:29

of the people, the older people we most

56:32

admire or sort of

56:34

most aspire to be, they

56:36

tend to be people who sort of are their age, who

56:39

embrace that age, doesn't that mean you can't sort

56:41

of be youthful, but they sort of have

56:43

a sort of vitality about them. I

56:45

think he's trying to live forever, you

56:47

know, I think that's the idea.

56:49

Why? I know, it'd be tedious. Just

56:52

for longer, but you know, if you go get to 90, it'd be nice

56:54

to get to 90 and still feel more

56:57

or less. So I'm with my folks this

56:59

weekend and my mum's 86 this year, she's

57:02

still playing badminton with the kids and running

57:04

around. My dad is 87, is not

57:07

playing badminton and running around. I'm sure he would say it'd be

57:09

nice to be running around. We

57:11

all want to be in

57:14

mobile and in good health at that age, but

57:16

we know the solution to that is diet and exercise.

57:19

Yeah.

57:19

It's that simple. There's no need to fucking

57:22

inject your son's blood on you. You

57:25

need to walk every day. You need

57:27

to have three periods of pretty

57:30

sort of pretty energetic work

57:33

every week. You've got to eat, you know,

57:35

what is it? Because I'm doing a lot of CrossFit, so

57:38

I'm completely indoctrinated into this, but it's meat,

57:40

veg, nuts and seeds, a little starch,

57:43

no sugar, a little fruit,

57:45

exercise three times a week, and that will

57:48

get rid of 70% of the things that

57:50

kill us. I mean that

57:52

when you're in older age, you'll have the mobility,

57:54

you'll be used to the sort of lifting and moving,

57:56

so you're not going to have a fall because most people who die

57:59

in hospital, it starts with a...

57:59

fall whether it's the fall that kills

58:02

them or not it might be an infection they get it might be losing

58:04

mobility because of the fall so don't fall

58:06

over just

58:09

walk around with a big rubber ring round to you. There

58:11

must be something there might be a dragon's denting there.

58:13

That might be a good dragon's dent like a sort of

58:16

like a car thing but it just comes

58:18

out if you fall low that was there must be able to do that. Airbags

58:21

there are you can get them for motorbike riders

58:23

yeah you get airbags in the suit yeah

58:25

so walking around

58:27

just a big yeah

58:29

whichever way it would have to surround you

58:32

it must be doable yeah like the Michelin man like

58:34

being a zorb all we need

58:36

is to live in zorbs yeah we just live in

58:38

if you well and also your allergies if you lived

58:40

in a zorb you could just gradually start putting

58:43

things in

58:44

and then when one of them makes you go blotchy

58:46

we found what you're allergic to. Well a zorb

58:49

is the only way you can control hot cold

58:51

and wind. It is. So

58:54

I could have an air-conditioned zorb and

58:57

and you know if someone paints do

58:59

not give booze I

59:02

no longer have to do any of the personal development stuff because

59:04

no one's gonna give me booze so we

59:07

can write all of our list of stuff on the outside

59:09

of the zorb yeah

59:10

sex would be a problem but I'm sure your

59:14

brain will somehow somehow

59:16

come up with a way around that. Sex could be amazing with

59:18

two zorbs.

59:20

How would you? We're

59:23

both in a zorb. Yeah nude. Yeah.

59:26

So it would be quite a pornographic experience.

59:29

I mean it'd be a lot just wanking at each other waving.

59:33

Again careful if you're near school. Don't

59:37

go to a school.

59:42

Our vision of a perfect

59:44

future has been now

59:46

given the Richard Herring treatment and it is

59:48

people wanking in zorbs. Very

59:52

happy and no beautiful skin. Tell

59:56

us where you're on at the Edinburgh Fringe for people who are

59:58

the rich, the men.

59:59

very rich people who are traveling up

1:00:02

to the Edinburgh Fringe this year in their gold

1:00:04

carriages. So my

1:00:07

work in progress is, I won't

1:00:11

even

1:00:12

worry about the

1:00:13

dates because they're all different days, but

1:00:16

the work in progress is 3.10 at

1:00:18

a room called the Subatomic in

1:00:20

Just the Tonics Nucleus venue

1:00:23

and the main show is at 8.50

1:00:26

which is in the main room at the Nucleus

1:00:29

venue and the Nucleus venue is about 200

1:00:31

yards up from the Pleasance courtyard and

1:00:34

it's not the main Just the Tonic venue

1:00:36

on Cowgate so please don't come to the wrong one even

1:00:38

though they are quite close. And for the rest of the time just

1:00:40

be wanking in the Zorb for anyone

1:00:42

who wants to look at that. On the meadows. That's

1:00:46

lovely, lovely to talk to you. I'll just say to the people here in Wells

1:00:48

I will be out in the foyer after the show

1:00:51

and I've got loads of all my books. I've

1:00:53

got my ball book and lots of

1:00:55

other books that you can buy if you want. If you want

1:00:56

to say hello, get a selfie, you're very welcome to

1:00:59

say hello. Sorry can I just plug my tour? Yes please

1:01:01

do. Because I've yet to do that in public. Yes

1:01:03

do it, redo it. Which starts on

1:01:05

the 13th of September

1:01:07

in Norwich and then it's about

1:01:10

50-ish dates until

1:01:13

December and there's

1:01:15

lots of tickets still available and I'm

1:01:17

really, really looking forward to doing it.

1:01:20

And the tour is called Howl and you can get tickets

1:01:22

at johnrobbins.com. Good, please

1:01:24

do that. John is an absolutely fantastic

1:01:27

award-winning, comedy award-winning

1:01:29

though Hannah Gadsby's the one who remembers. Comedian.

1:01:35

I've let go Richard, I've let go.

1:01:37

I'm absolutely, I'm so

1:01:39

pleased for everyone.

1:01:41

I have an attitude. Why did I get depressed right

1:01:43

at the end? It was just going so well. Why

1:01:46

could I not resist that? I'm doing a gig

1:01:48

in Wales at five o'clock but I think it might be sold out but it's

1:01:50

at the Little Theatre but do come along and I'm trying out material

1:01:52

about

1:01:53

my testicle if you haven't heard enough about that

1:01:55

already. But for the moment please

1:01:57

give it up ladies and gentlemen, the amazing John Robbins.

1:02:01

Thank you so much to Wells for having us. Your

1:02:03

team please. Thank you. Bye.

1:02:08

You have been listening to The

1:02:10

Hollister Bow with me, Richard Herring, and my guest,

1:02:12

John Robbins. The music, as ever,

1:02:15

is provided by Scantregard. I

1:02:18

am indebted to everyone

1:02:20

at the Wells Comedy Festival, everyone at Cedars

1:02:22

Hall, to my director and friend, Chris

1:02:25

Evans, not that one, to Ben Evans, not

1:02:27

that one, to Kathleen McEgan, and

1:02:33

my wife and children, let's say, as well. This

1:02:36

is a Sky Protector and Go Faster Stripe.com

1:02:39

production.

1:02:48

Thanks

1:02:59

very much.

1:03:00

See you next time.