1st January 2024

The speaker is recording his thoughts and plans for the year 2024. He mentions that he got married in 2023 and enjoyed his honeymoon. He and his wife are planning to leave London and embark on a journey through various destinations, including Wales, Edinburgh, the Mediterranean, Cuba, Costa Rica, Ecuador, and Rio. They plan to end up in Sydney and potentially settle there. He talks about the changes he has noticed in London and his desire to leave. He also mentions the challenges of living during the pandemic and his job at Lloyds Bank. He expresses excitement about the upcoming year and the opportunity to document his experiences. He also mentions the need to sell some belongings in preparation for the trip. Good afternoon, I'm just giving this a try. So I thought it's the 1st of January, 2024, I thought I'd wanted to start to see what it's like to start recording my voice and start noting some of these things down. So I want to start an hour timer, I want to speak for an hour, here we go. Timer starts now, yeah, 1st of January, it was New Year's Eve last night, really, really fun, I'm looking forward to 2024, it's going to be a big year, I'm looking forward to it. I don't know, I just thought I wanted to start recording what I think, I think it might be useful for me, and also it might be useful to kind of share it to others, so if you like it, let me know. So it's been an interesting year, 2023, got married last year, Crystal and I, we've been together for 13 years, and we got married in October of 2023, so it's something very, very new, it's going very well so far, I'm really liking being married. We eloped, we were thinking about doing a proper big wedding and everything, but we decided to elope, went to New York City, went to the registry office, in about 15 minutes, maybe a bit more, we were married, cost about $80 US, which is fantastic. We went and walked around all of Brooklyn, all of Central Park, taking photos, and then a couple of days later we were in Mexico for our honeymoon in Cancun, best wedding experience ever, I think, really enjoyed it. So 2024 is looking positive for me. We currently live in London, we've been living in London for the last seven, eight years, so 2024 is the year we're deciding to make a change, we're going to shift it up, we're going to leave London. And I think that London's a very, very hard place to leave, it's also a very, very hard place to live, to tell you the truth. Nothing bad has happened, touch wood, nothing terrible has happened, I know my experience is very different from everyone else's experiences, just like, you know, it's the way it is, but I'm ready to move on, we're ready to move on from here, it's been a long time. I'm excited to see where we want to end up next, so the plan roughly, the plan roughly is that of June this year, so six months from now, we're going to go to see Taylor Swift concert in Cardiff in Wales, and then from Wales we're going to drive up as far as Edinburgh, hang out in Edinburgh for a bit, see most of the UK, if not all of it, then we're going to head over to some parts of the Mediterranean, go to Turkey, going to do some sailing in Croatia, and then we're thinking about flying over to Cuba, going to fly over to Costa Rica, and then we're starting a tour in Ecuador, which goes for 65 days and finishes in Rio, so we're going to see all of South America as well this year. Like I said at the start, it's going to be a big year, man. I'm really excited. And like I said, like, we just want to do something different, so we're looking to leave London, but make our way on this massive journey and see where it takes us. Ultimately, after the tour ends in Rio, ultimately from there we're going to make our way to Sydney, so we have to fly to Chile, and then from Chile we're going to fly to Sydney. So we're going to go back home and see how it goes, you know. I might arrive in Sydney and think, fantastic, I'm home, I'm here, I've got a job, got a house, ready to go, there's the rest of my life, ready to go. I might also land in Sydney and think, you know what, Belgium's calling to me, let's go live in Belgium. The good thing is that before we leave London, Crystal, my wife, is going to have her UK passport. Fingers crossed. Everything goes according to plan. She'll have a UK passport, I'll have my UK passport, and we can come and go freely between London and Australia and, you know, see where else we want to try. But we know that definitely, we definitely want to leave London, and the first place we want to leave London to is Sydney. So I'm going to give it a crack. It should be fun. I'm excited, like I said. So I'll keep documenting our progress in terms of preparation for it. There's going to be a lot of planning involved, lots of bits and pieces to realise this dream. So it should be fun. How are you guys doing? I'm thinking for this thing, I want to start sending out an email address. And with that email address, I'm going to send it to people and say, hey, you know, ask me a question. Send an email asking me a question, and I'll answer that question in this recording. So I won't get to any today, but following this, I'll create an email account, send it out, see how it goes. I've thought of names for this thing. You could call them podcasts. I've thought of names for it. SoftG. It's a SoftG podcast. I won't explain the meaning of that yet, but if it becomes a thing, sure, I'll explain the meaning. Yeah. So we'll see how it goes. I listen to a few podcasts to get to sleep most of the time, and I've always thought, you know, sometimes I do love the chat, so why not start recording it? Do you know what, though, like realistically, even if this doesn't do anything podcast-wise, I think it will be useful just to start jotting down some kind of diary, some kind of journal like this. If I have kids in the future, if we choose to have kids in the future, we can, I think they'll get a kick out of listening to this. Hello, if you can hear me, children of the future. We are the children of the future. London's changed, man. London has changed. So we first got here in 2017, pre-pandemic. It was fantastic. We were young. We were partying, going out, meeting people, traveling, doing all the stuff that we wanted to do since the minute we got here, and it was great. We were meeting lots of people and hanging out and doing all sorts of fun stuff. And that pandemic was really hard here, man. 2020 was just really bad, and I think since then, since pandemic, since all this craziness, and all this world issues and stuff, the people here are different, man. Everyone's rough now. Everyone's harder edged. I get it. I'm not complaining. It's the truth. It's a lot harder to be here. It's not as fun as I remember. I also think we're getting older. I also think we're getting way too old to be out. Like New Year's Eve, yeah. We just had something at our place. Like three friends came over, and myself and Crystal hosted three friends. And the best part about this New Year's Eve was that the fact that I didn't have to leave my house. Yeah? I was in my strippers all night long. I love that. Where most people would probably want to go out clubbing, dancing, drinking, and that's fun, but I'm also a lot older now. Maybe I've changed. London has definitely changed, and also I think I've changed in eight years, and how could I not? Look at what's going on in the world. So yeah, big stuff coming this next year. 2023 was a big year. It was a better year, absolutely, and we'll see how it goes. I'm looking forward to spending time in Australia, of course, because my family's there. Both of our families are there. Even just to try a new place. When I lived in Sydney last, we lived in the western suburbs. I grew up there. And now, when I envision my life in Sydney, living in Sydney, I'm envisioning living in the city. I'm envisioning living on the beach. I'm envisioning living in the central coast, and it's a vast, very vastly, I don't want to use the word vastly. I sound like a jerk. It's a much more different experience living, what was I saying? Living in the western suburbs of Sydney is very different to living in Bondi, for example. So I think the places that I want to live in Sydney will be very different experience-wise to what I've experienced before there. It'll be a new thing for me. Just like it was coming to London, new city, new country, new people, it'll be the same going back. I don't see it as I'm moving back home. I see it as I'm moving to another country, which is how I want to keep it. We're very adventurous people. I don't know. I think Crystal and I lead very exciting and interesting lives. I love our life. I know she loves our life. I talk about her a lot. We love our lives, yeah? And we're very happy people. We do what we want. We do when we want. It'd be nice to be in Sydney again and actually, like if we buy a house, for example, it'd be nice to grow roots. Living in London, we always knew that it wouldn't be our forever place, so we wouldn't buy furniture, for example. It'd be nice to go back to Sydney and buy my own couch. Buy a couch that I like, not the one that comes with the flat. Buy my own mattress. Oh my God. I'm standing in my bedroom right now. The mattress that comes with this flat, although I appreciate it, because not many people have a mattress in the world, fair, this mattress sucks, man. It sucks. And I've been sleeping on it for the better part of two years. I can't wait to buy my own mattress. I'm going to get like some Tempur-Pedic bullshit, Tempur-Pedic, where I get up and there's still my shape of my body still in the mattress. London. London. I will come back here. I can see myself coming back here regularly. I urge anyone, any young person, any old person, any person, travel, man. Go on a holiday. Go to another country. Just quit your job. Quit your job, mate. Yeah. Yeah. Work's cool. I don't want to talk about my job in this thing, but I work for Lloyds Bank currently. They're okay. It's a big company. It's a big business. It's hard to find that motivating a lot of the time. You know? It's work. It's a job. At the end of the day, I just don't like working full stop, you know? What else? What else do I want to talk about here? Trying to sell stuff, you know? In order to make this trip a reality, I've got to get rid of a bit of things. I've got a bicycle. I've got gym equipment. I've got a treadmill. I need to sell them, you know? I need to make them ... And if they don't get sold, I need to give them away. I don't want to dump them. You know? That's not good. The environment's a mess. It's a mess. Are we even going to be able to be using this planet for the next 20 years? I don't know. Does anyone know? Let me know. Actually, that can be one of the emails. If anyone has any information about what's going to happen to this earth, tell me. I just want to know, just so I can prepare. I can't change anything. No one can change anything. We're too far gone. I'm all for the cause of ... Okay. Just Stop Oil, all those people, environmentalists. Yeah. 100%. You're not wrong. Okay? Well, fuck. We're doing irreparable, irreversible damage here to the planet we live on. To the planet that we use. Yeah? And no one's disputing the fact that you shouldn't be driving your car to work every day. No one's disputing that. But fuck me. This place is cooked, man. We're done here. It's too far gone. It was too far gone decades ago. Yeah? I don't see the point of standing in the middle of the road, gluing yourself to the street. I don't see how that's going to help the situation. It's just going to piss off people. And people are already pissed off. Why are you trying to piss them off more? You know? I don't know, man. By gluing yourself to the street and stopping fucking Jane from taking her kid to school, you're not effecting change here. Why don't you go glue yourself to the CEO of Megacorp? You know? Glue yourself to his face. Then that will be a big change. That will be impactful. He's the one who's actually making all these issues. Not Jane who's trying to drop her kid off to school. I don't know. It's a tough subject. It's a very tough subject. But, like I said at the start, I'm all for the cause, man. We're using this planet's resources. And soon enough they're going to go, because they haven't gone already. You know? Most of Australia is owned by China. And other parts of the world, of course. But most of Australia is owned by China. And they're using the resources to survive. They're drilling. That's why Australia has, well not just Australia, but that's why currently Australia has such bad disasters. Natural disasters. Flooding. Fires. All that shit. Because we're fracking, man. There's no, excuse me. There's no, um, there's nothing underneath the topsoil. So of course if it rains heavily in Queensland, of course it's going to flood. You know? I don't know. Planet's gone. I think the best thing, like, the best thing to do is to move to another one. But what are they going to do? I saw they were talking about blowing up parts of Mars to try and build an atmosphere. That's cool. That's cool. It's not going to be, like, if spots on Mars became available to go and live on and survive on, it won't be available to me. It won't be available to Jane driving her car, her kid to school every day. It won't be available to her. It'll be available to Mr. Megacorp. He's going to be chilling there for years before we even get a sniff of getting there. You know? And in that time we'll be killing each other over here. Oh well. What can you do? C'est la vie. I'm just, I'm just riding the, like, I'm just going to ride the motherfucking car until the wheels fall off, man. Ride this motherfucker until the wheels fall off. That's all you've got to do. London. I'm looking at, I'm in my bedroom right now looking at that stupid frickin' mattress. Crystal's out there trying to read. One of her resolutions was to read more and I really envy that. I wish I read more, man. I think we all do. I think we all wish we read more. I watch way too much content. As in, I'm on a screen all the time. I'm on a screen all the time and I'm just watching crap. Stuff I've seen. Do you know how many times I've seen the series The Office? The US one? So, like, it's just on. I just have it on. It's background, it's background noise to me now. I just put it on and keep doing shit. I put it on and wash dishes. You know? Anyway. Went out for a walk just earlier and it was like, all the shops are open on New Year's Day. That's surprising to me, you know? Aren't they, like, they're not quite like, they're getting a bit less strict on that. Christmas Day, yeah, everything was closed and whatever, but there's still stuff open on public holidays now. Has that always been the case? Like, has it always been, you know, a couple things will be open. Sainsbury's and Starbucks and whatever. But lately it's like, everything's open. I don't know. They must make money on these days, these companies. I don't know, I'm trying to think of other things to talk about. I'm sure I'll get better at doing this as I regularly do it. I want to try and do it weekly. So what's today? Monday, yeah? Monday the 1st. I'll try and do it every week. Once a week, just sit here for an hour, talk, see if it helps. And again, not for any reason, it just might be nice just to download my brain into this little laptop. Made a trifle for Christmas. Trifle is weird. Trifle is the weirdest thing. It's just a layer of sweet, sweet gelatinous stuff. And we're making this trifle. So bottom layer is that Swiss roll. So put that in the bottom of the bowl and then put some jelly, uncooked jelly, liquid version of jelly, jello, on top of that. And then chuck that in the fridge for two hours. So I've got my rolls in the bottom layer. I've got jelly on top of it. Away you go. One of my mates that was at Christmas is sober. He's been sober for almost a year. Shout out to Kent. And yeah, I wasn't able to so in order to make that proper trifle apparently you have to soak that roll, those Swiss rolls or whatever they are, in alcohol before you submerge them in this jam, before you set them in the jam. And I think the reason why they do that is, one, because it's booze. Secondly because I think it makes the rolls sink to the bottom of the jelly because I put them in the jelly dry. I didn't soak them in anything because I didn't want to make it alcoholic. And after two hours the jelly set but the rolls had floated. So it's these floating jelly rolls, Swiss rolls sorry, in jelly and that's my first layer. And two hours have gone by. Two and a half hours have gone by. So I'm like, alright, that's fine. Next layer. Custard. Out of a packet. Okay, custard's in. Got leftover custard. What the hell am I going to do with this now? Do you ever just buy crap for a recipe use a little bit and then it's in your cupboard for the rest of your life? What am I supposed to do with the leftover custard now? Like, I don't regularly eat custard. I don't know if it's something that gets eaten regularly. Do I now have to cook an apple pie for it to go with? Anyway. I've got leftover custard. Okay, just put that in the fridge. So I've got my layer of jelly. I've got custard on top of it. Okay, that's in the fridge. Another hour and a half. That needs to set a bit too. Okay, cool. Take it out of the fridge. Another layer of jelly. Okay, jelly's on. Swiss roll, submerged in jelly, floating in jelly. Layer of custard. Leftover custard in the fridge. Another layer of jelly. That goes back in the fridge for another two hours. Yeah. I've been working on this trifle for almost six hours. Sorry, I keep coughing. I was screaming and shouting last night, dancing. So I've got these layers of custard and I'm exhausted. It's 11.30 at night. Alright, last layer. Come on. We're almost there. Last layer of a trifle is typically the whipped cream. Yeah, delicious. Took it out. Okay, I've got my cream. Let's start whipping it. I haven't got a whipper. I haven't got an egg beater. An electric one. So I've got to do it manually by a whisk. And do you know what? Big whoop. It might be fun. It might be more well-earned to do it that way. Start whipping. Start whipping. Whipping, whipping, whipping. My arm's killing me. My shoulder's killing me. I'm switching hands. Crystal tags in. We're whipping this frickin' cream 45 minutes. Hasn't changed. It's getting a little bit thicker. Hasn't changed. Hasn't gotten to that whipped consistency. You know when you have that whipped cream that comes out of a can and you spray it in your mouth? I want it to look like that. Whipped cream. Not changing. So I'm like, fire out. What am I doing wrong here? I need to go out and buy a thing. It's Christmas Eve. It's 11.30 at night. Nothing's open. What am I going to do? Crystal Googles on her phone. Can you whip single cream? I bought single cream. I bought single cream. No. The first thing that comes up on Google once you type that in. No, you cannot whip single cream. If you continue beating single cream, it'll churn and turn into butter. Fantastic. So I'm going to have butter on top of the trifle. Great. So I was sitting there 45 minutes whipping this bastard and it wouldn't whip. So I'm like, okay, now we have to go get double cream. Shops are closed. Delivery's closed. Oh my god. What am I going to do for this top layer? Leftover custard in the fridge. So the trifle finished excuse me Trifle finished after seven hours. Floating Swiss rolls. Jelly. Custard. No leftovers. Another layer of jelly. Custard on top. Some berries and a crushed flake on top. So the dessert that I brought to Christmas was jelly and custard. Merry Christmas. It was all good though because the next day we had the cream in our oats. It was freaking awesome. I love cream though. I love cream. Christmas was good this year because we went into Christmas this year knowing that it was going to be our last one in London. So we went into it with a more festive spirit, I guess. We hung out with the friends. Actually the friends that were here last night went over to their place and we cooked a big dinner. A big Christmas dinner for all of us. It was fantastic. It was awesome. And my contribution was custard and jam. Sweet pudding. It's great. You hear the bloody like Winter Wonderland in London. For those that don't know, in Hyde Park they have like a fair fun fair, Christmas fair in Hyde Park and they set it up. It's called Winter Wonderland. It's massive, yeah. Notoriously expensive. Notoriously expensive. I found out this year that you have to pay to get in. Now I could have sworn that wasn't always the case. Right? Correct me if I'm wrong. Tell me if I'm wrong. Message me. Whatever. I thought it was always free entry. And yeah, you go in there and still pay like £6 for a hot chocolate. Whatever. At least I'm here. But now you've got to pay to get in? And pay £6 for a hot chocolate? And pay £5 for those stupid chips on a stick? That's so weird. It's such a money-grubbing thing. That's the other thing about London. It's getting expensive here, man. Yes, it's getting expensive everywhere. But sometimes London takes the piss, man. Chips on a stick. We didn't go this year. Thank God for that. We went when I'm pretty sure it was free to get in. That's great, you know. It's fine. I recommend it, but £6 for a hot chocolate? Then you have to go on some of the rides. You have to play those games. Carnival games. You have to have a bite to eat. My God, you've got to bring a lot of money to go to these things now. Winter Wonderland. Look online about people all around the world, but London in particular where people were going to watch the fireworks by the city. It's mental. I would never, ever, ever do that. People lining up in Times Square in New York. People lining up to go and look at fireworks that the city's put on. Yeah, it's beautiful. Yeah, it's magical, but damn, it looks like a nightmare, man. I was very comfortable being at home. I was very comfortable staying away from everyone, but God, if I was to go, let's say next year Sydney, we're going to go look at the fireworks. I'd rather book a hotel room nearby so I can have my own space. Times Square, people are wearing diapers to go and watch the fireworks. I don't think there's public toilets. You've got to shit yourself. You've got to shit yourself. That's crazy though, no? Is that just me that thinks that? I think that's absolutely insane, man. I don't know. New Year's Eve celebrations overrated, I think. I don't find them fun. As a kid, yeah, it was the best. Fireworks. We get to stay up late. We get to run around and play games and drink Coca-Cola all night long. It's the best night ever. After a while, it's just like, dude, I'm buggered, you know? One year, Crystal and I went to bed at like 10. We went to bed at 10am. 10pm, sorry. Some people are really into it, and I respect that, and that's all good, but it's just not for me. Tell me if I'm wrong. Tell me if you're like, nah man, here's why New Year's Eve is great, and I'll listen to you. Try and convince me. I always watch those YouTube videos about some guy goes to a campus at a university, writes something controversial on the front of his desk and says, change my mind. Whether or not you believe you agree or disagree with what he's saying, he always seems to win these arguments. He always seems to win these discussions, or the ones that are recorded anyway, the ones that are uploaded to YouTube. He always comes out looking like the winner, doesn't he? I think the people he argues with get so frustrated and just let their emotions take over that they lose an argument. They lose their debate. You can't do that. I can disagree with... I don't know. I don't know. It's weird, man. Some people are so woke that they're offended by everything. I don't know. Wear a helmet. Wear a helmet, man. That's my new phrase to someone who gets offended by something I say. Wear a helmet, man. I can't be responsible for your belief. It's true, though. I can't be held responsible for what you find offensive. Is that fair? If you find it offensive, don't listen to whatever the person is talking about. It's not my problem. Wear a helmet, man. Far out. Some people haven't got something to eat tonight. Some people in Ealing haven't got anywhere to sleep, and you're worried about something that I say about a group of people? Come on. So, yeah. I live in Ealing. That's a segue. I live in Ealing. Ealing's like if you're looking at a map of London or on the west side of London. W5. That's our postcode. We're roughly 40 minutes on the central line to the middle of London, but I can get there in 20. I can get there in 15, 20 minutes. I love this part of London. I've always lived west. We lived on the south side one time and it wasn't the best experience. I have to admit. West side. We've always lived in the west. I don't know why. Maybe it's because we live in the western suburbs of Sydney and it's sort of just drawn us, but I definitely live in the Fairfield of London for my Sydney people. Cabramatta. Canley. Remember Caramar? I remember going through the train station on the way to work in Sydney and there's Cabramatta and Caramar and no one seemed to get off at that station. Anania. Oh dear. But yeah, we're happy people. We've got a big year coming up. Big, big year. I just want to make sure everything goes according to plan and even if it doesn't, I want to be prepared. We need a change. We need a shift up. And given that this will be our first official year married, it's going to be a memorable one. Last year, as in 2023 and 2024 are going to be two years that we'll look back on as memorable. So much has happened. So much has happened this last year and this year. So much is going to happen, I should say. So we're going to look back at this always and think, man, awesome. That was a cracker year. Did so much. Heard about these earthquakes, man. Crystal's siblings are in Japan at the moment and I think they're in Tokyo, so on the east side of the country. And there's earthquakes and stuff and threats of tsunami around on the west side. So hoping everyone's alright there. Little worried. There always seems to be earthquakes and natural disasters in that part of the world. I think there's In terms of the plates, the tectonic plates, whatever the hell they are, I think that there's a lot of movement there. I don't know why, but it always seems to happen on that side of the world. You know? It'd be good to have, so like I said, Crystal's working on her UK citizenship, her UK passport. It would be nice to have both of us have dual citizenship for the same countries. You never know what's going to happen, man. Like if I need to flee to the UK, if I need to flee to Australia, I have that option legally as a citizen of both places. We both do. You know? That's a luxury that so many people would want and we're very, very lucky to be able to have eventually. Touch wood. Hopefully the application goes through. It'd be very nice to have. You just never know what's going to happen. You know? Look at Ukraine. Look at Israel, Palestine. Look at Japan. I don't know. I just want to be safe. I just want to have the luxury that I can move somewhere freely and make the best decision for my family. It really is. It really is lookout for number one. Yeah. Doggy dog, they call it. It really is lookout for number one, man. You have to look after yourself first. Yeah, you have to be a nice person, all that kind of stuff, of course. But when it comes to the punch, you've got to back number one. Love you. Dear. Yeah, man. So we're just going to see how this year goes and see what happens. I'm looking forward to not renting for, hang on, let me repeat that. I'm looking forward to not renting in the UK. It's way easier here but I think that there's more opportunity for bullshit. There's more risk of bullshit when you rent in the UK. You know? My landlord, I'm not going to name names, my current landlord, they were cutting power to this flat a while ago. They were doing some work on the outside or whatever and the freeholder said listen, I need to cut power to the building for two days, okay? There's going to be no electricity for two days. And, okay, fine. It means we can't, okay, what would be affected? The heating? Hot water? Fridge? Internet? Basically the stuff that a modern house needs, a modern couple needs to survive. Okay, so this is my landlord letting you know they're going to cut power to the building for two days. What are you going to do? We can't stay here. It's unlivable. We're both working from home. I'm going to need you to help me with some kind of, either finding a hotel or whatever. His response, well, because your rent is so far below what the area standard is, I'm not going to help you with a hotel or give you a discount. That was his actual response. Because you're paying so little rent than you should be, I'm not going to help you. What? So I replied, mate, even if I'm paying you one pound for my rent, that's the one pound that you've taken off of me to provide me a place to live. And for two days, I will not have a place to live. Sort it out. Sort it out. Long story short, I didn't pay rent for those two days. I deducted it from the rent payment for that month. Which was due that day that the electricity was going to be out. So imagine that. He was expecting me to pay rent for a flat that I wasn't even staying on that night. Arsehole. I get it, though. See what I mean? Like, there's so much opportunity for bullshit. The joke. But it's so easy to find flats, I think. If you reset your expectations, it's easier to find flats here than, I think, in Sydney. You know. Competitive. Very competitive. But you have to be prepared for some bullshit. Our last flight was covered in mould. My God, it was disgusting. Covered in mould. That's a very common thing here. In London. And I think in the UK. Because it's so wet outside. And the flats are all built to insulate heat. There's mould everywhere. Surely you can't be breeding that shit in. It can't be good for you. But a lot of the flats are like that. And it's just accepted. It's just like, oh yeah, there's mould in that corner. That's our mould corner. Yeah, we just spray it with some spray it with some sish. Spray it with some sish once a month and it's all good. Oh yeah, we'll just repaint. We'll just repaint. It's all good. I don't know. It'd be nice not to Look, there's going to be bullshit everywhere I go. Bullshit follows everyone. But I think there's particular bullshit here when it comes to renting. It'd be nice not to have that experience anymore. Plus, if I buy a house, it's my bullshit. It'd be nice to own my bullshit. You know? Do we rent a house or do we Sorry, do we rent a flat first or do we buy a place first? What's the best policy? Who's got, like, I don't know. I don't know. We can do either. Again, thank god, we're so lucky. We have the opportunity to be able to do either, wherever we want. Do we buy a place? Do we rent a place? Should that place be in the UK? Should that place be in Australia? I don't want to make the wrong decision because most of those decisions, if not all of them, involve time. If I buy a house in the UK, if I buy a house in London, which I can reasonably afford right now in some areas, I can afford a place in London, yeah. But that means I'm going to dedicate the next five, ten years here. Have I got the legs? I don't think so. Have I got the dedication to Sydney? I don't know. But I think I can get a bit more for my money there. I can get a backyard. I can have sunshine. You know? I don't know, man. Decisions, eh? Again, very, very lucky that I have the opportunity to even think about this stuff. But I don't want to make the wrong decision. I don't want to regret a decision ever in my life because that would ruin me, you know? I'm always in my own head, always, always in my own head about decisions I've made. I don't want that stress. You know? So who knows? So from June this year, yeah, so we're going to Taylor Swift. I bought those tickets. I know Crystal. She's a Swiftie. She likes Taylor Swift. She's a big fan, yeah? I'm not that interested. But I'll go to a concert. I like concerts. I like live music. The tickets were so hard to come by. She's making bank off of this Eras tour. She's touring around the whole world, man. Making bank. She's a billionaire. Credit. I respect that about her. Anyway, the concert we're going to is in Cardiff. Tickets I got from one of those reseller websites or whatever, StubHub, Ticketek, not Ticketek, the other ones, you know. They're expensive, man. They're expensive. But where our tickets are for the I call it the mosh pit area, standing area. So they're probably, arguably the most sought after tickets here. We got them. That concert marks the start of our journey to get back, to leave London, to get back to Sydney. Cardiff, all of UK, Wales, all of Scotland, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Inverness, all that. Go to all that. Fly to the Mediterranean. Italy, Turkey, Bulgaria's a potential, Croatia's a potential, Montenegro's on the list. Albania's on the list. Cheap places. We're going to try and do it cheaply. Hostels. I've never stayed in a hostel. I've been to a few, as a guest. Never stayed at one. It's going to be interesting, you know. I wouldn't say that when we go on holiday, we live it up. I wouldn't say that we stay at Five Star. No. But I've never stayed in a hostel before. You can get, and I didn't know that you could get hostels that have private rooms. I thought it was always like bunk beds. But apparently you can. You can get, a lot of hostels actually have private rooms. So, we're going to do that along the way. In the UK portion of this trip, we're going to stay in pubs. Pubs are actually a very, very good accommodation choice, if you're travelling in the UK. Fuck hotels, man. Why would you want to stay in Ibis? Why would you want to stay in whatever the other ones are? Remember Formula One Hotel in Australia? Like that. Why would you want to stay there? Stay in a pub. You know? They put a breakfast on in the morning. It's a fantastic fireplace, a little beer, all that stuff. It's great. Cheap. We considered doing a, like renting a camper van for the UK tour. I think that idea is going to disappear though. I don't know. It's a great idea. It's a great idea, but a tricky one. It's hard. You know? It would take a lot of commitment. But the benefits of doing it would be very, very good. Like, you can just park on a campsite and sleep there as long as you want. That's probably the most cheapest. I don't know. I wouldn't mind indoor plumbing. I wouldn't mind indoor plumbing. And a lot of those campsites have got toilets and whatnot, and yep, that's all great. But I don't know. I don't know. Did it as a kid. Did it as a kid. I remember having to wake up in the middle of the night and go to the toilet, and it was a fair walk away from the actual caravan we were sleeping in. I would never, ever look down at those climbs, but man, it was a pain in the ass. Walking to the toilets. Oh, dear. Good childhood, man. Real good childhood. We had fun. We had fun. It's about 2.30 in the afternoon here in the UK on New Year's Day. I'm going to work tomorrow. It's right back into it, hey. It feels like yesterday that we were logging off before Christmas. Now we're back into it. Christmas holidays go really, really fast I feel. And I know that I think a few of us, Crystal as well, I think a few of us are going to have very busy Januaries in terms of work. I'm not going to talk about my job in this recording. I don't want to talk about it. Some people, that's all they talk about, and I don't like that. There's got to be more to you than your job. If you identify with your career, that's fine, but it shouldn't dictate who you are. It shouldn't drive what you discuss and how you identify. I feel quite strongly about that. There's got to be more to a person than their job, right? Some people are just so dedicated. Fantastic. Good for you. You make a really good employee. I'm not that way. You know? Yeah. What else to discuss? My background. It's actually hard thinking of ideas to talk about for an hour. I've been waffling on. My background. My dad was born in Iraq, in Baghdad. My mum was born here in the UK, in somewhere. Lancashire? Blackpool? Somewhere like that? I can't remember. They met in Australia, in Sydney. I'm half Iraqi, half British, full Australian. I don't look like a typical Australian, whatever that looks like. If you ask someone from overseas what they think an Australian looks like, they wouldn't describe me. I love my culture. I'm very proud of my culture. I'm sure, I know that my family is very proud of their culture. Yeah. What else is there to talk about? Sports? Oh my god. It's so hard not to be consumed by football when you live in the UK. When I first moved here, I watched it occasionally. I wouldn't say I was massively into it. I watched it every now and then. Now, I watch it all the time. I talk about it all the time. I can hold full conversations with people that are so dedicated. I think that's what it is. There are some people that are so, so dedicated to these 11 men kicking around a ball. Why? I get it, but why? Sport is so consuming. I think it's definitely aimed at men. Most of the elite athletes are men. Sports as a hobby, as a thing people like, is definitely targeted to men, and men my age. It's hard not to get swept up in it, especially when it's all that's being discussed around you. I think it comes from somewhere like, it's a dream of mine to play for Manchester United. Some people have that vision. Whenever I play FIFA, I create myself, and I'm a seven-foot long-haired god who's just a beast at football. It's a fantasy. I think it's a fantasy element to watching sports. You envision yourself as the guy scoring a goal. How have they done that? Fantastic marketing, whatever they've done. Really, really good marketing. Speaking of marketing, in prep for Christmas, we were watching Christmas movies. We watched Home Alone. I'm sure a lot of you have seen Home Alone. I'm sure a lot of you have seen Home Alone recently. That's actually a very, very good movie. The thing that really got me, the wet bandits here, the two criminals in Home Alone, their scheme, their con was they go to a rich neighbourhood, dress up like a police officer, go around to all the houses, knock on the doors, say, you know, hello, Merry Christmas. Have you got any plans this Christmas? We're just going around the neighbourhood, just making sure that people have thought about safety and security. We as police officers also want to have Christmas with our families. We want to limit the amount of calls that are made to the police department. We also want to make sure that you've looked after and thought about your safety and security for your family. What kind of security have you got for your house? Then people, because the guy's in uniform, feel obliged. We've got cameras set up here, we've got cameras set up there. We'll be away for this period of time. We'll be away on these dates, you know. And this guy then goes, okay, I've got all this information about where you're going to be and what to look out for on your property. I'm going to come back when you're on holiday. I'm going to rob your house. What a con. Brilliant con. And if it wasn't for freaking Kevin McAllister, they would have got away with it too. No one had any idea they were there. Such a good con. Such a good movie. You know. Yeah. I remember watching it as a kid and thinking that this is fantastic. And watching it as an adult, it's actually like every little bit and piece contributes to them leaving Kevin at home by himself, you know. His airplane ticket gets lost in the garbage pile. The neighbour's kid gets his head counted when they're doing a head count to make sure that they're all there. All the kids are staying in an economy class while the parents are in first class. Everything went right for this to happen. What does Kevin McAllister's dad do for a job? Have you seen his house? Like, they take this annual trip and he pays first class all the way and he's just loaded, man. He's also got like fucking 20 kids. The McAllisters are no joke. He's the real deal. Yeah. Good movie. Definitely one that gives you the feels around Christmas. Yeah. So yeah. January, eh? 2024. Let's see what it does. Let's see if she's kind. She's got a kind face. The kind of face you want. Oh dear. It'd be good to see family again. Like my sisters have got their own kids and they're growing up way too fast. Crystal's siblings have kids. So it'd be good to just spend time with them, man. You know. For the longest time we've been the uncles and aunties that live overseas. And I remember when I was a kid having those relatives and thinking they were the coolest people ever. I'm going to lean on that. I'm going to lean into that idea. I want to be the cool person. I want to be the cool uncle. But I also want to hang out. You know. I just want to hang out. I don't want to go back to Australia and have big parties all the time and have to go and do things every weekend with family. I know that sounds sad and everything. But I just want to hang. When we last lived in Australia there was a lot of this weekend it's this person's birthday party. We've got to go there and help them set up. That's great. But not every weekend. You know. It'd be nice to spend time with just us two. You know. Even if it's on someone's birthday weekend. And that sounds sad to say. But it's the truth man. We have to prioritise ourselves. This time in London has been very very good for us I think. In the highs and lows ultimately it's been a very very good experience. So again. Young people. Old people. Whoever. If you haven't. Go on holiday. Quit your job. Quit your job man. Just try. Just try. There's loads of people that I went to school with that don't even have a passport. And that's again. Totally okay. But just try it man. It makes a massive difference. I'm enjoying this. I think I'm going to do this again next week. I'm going to try and keep to a schedule on this and do this recording once a week. I will upload it. I will upload it. I will share it. And I'll send around a link to every single one. I think it could be something very good for me. Just try it to be honest. You know when you talk about thinking of doing an idea and thinking of trying something new. I'm going to do that more. And a lot of people might think that because it's 1st of January you're like trying to knock over news resolution. Yeah that's true. But I also think this is going to be good. Because I've been thinking about doing this for a long time. Ask my wife. I've been thinking about doing this for a long time. Just to give it a crack. At least to figure out if it works for me. I'm going to save this to my machine. I'll create this email account to get some questions. I think that'll be fun. That'll be a good dead air filler. Because it is tricky to come up with ideas for an hour. But you know what? A lot can happen in a week. So next week I'm going to come back with a few more stories I think. A few more things to talk about. Not that I haven't had a lot to talk about today. I think right now I'm going to put the kettle on. I've got a nice green tea I think. And just chill. I'm going to have the last minute of chill before the chaos starts tomorrow. Before back to reality. Back to life starts. You know. We'll see how we go. 2024, eh? How much time have I got left on this little timer? Four minutes. Okay, let's use them. I'll tell you what I like about Chinese people. You know what I like about Chinese people. I'm stealing this joke by the way. The thing I like about Chinese people is they're really hanging in there with the chopsticks. You know. They've seen us use forks. They know we have forks. But they're hanging in there with the chopsticks, man. They don't give a shit. They're like, keep your fork. This is how you eat. And do you know what? I think I'm getting better at using chopsticks, man. I always try. I struggled at first. I get it. But sometimes I want to dig in with a spoon, man. Sometimes I'm like, look, this is fun. But my fingers are getting sore. And I need to eat this one grain of rice that's left in my bowl. That's what I like about Chinese people. If we're living in Australia, we haven't done much travel in Asia at all. So living in Oz, I think we're going to take a fair few trips to Asia and see what it's like around there. I haven't been to any parts of Asia. I think it'll be fun. You know? I think it'll be fun. I might do that when I'm a bit older. You know? I'm glad I came to Europe at the age I did. Not too old that it was that I was too tired, but not too young that I was too crazy. If I lived in London when I was 20, 21, yeah. Yeah. I wouldn't be myself. It's been fun, though. It's been very, very, very fun. No regrets about this decision ever. Best decision of my life. And it was one of those things where we were living in Sydney and we were like, OK, I'll either buy a house in Australia or I'll try living abroad. And we decided to live abroad. We kind of thought, look, OK, if we don't like it, we can always go back to Australia and still buy a house and it's all good. There's no penalty. And that was seven years ago. Yeah? Seven years ago. So, no looking back. It is hard here, but it's worth it. It's so worth it. You know? Yeah. I've got to sell these plants too, my God. Like, even little things, like just looking after my indoor plants. I've been slacking. I'm not connected here anymore. You know? I've got to sell these things. It'll be good. It'll be good to get the ball rolling for 2024. It'll be good to close off officially 2023. Fantastic year. We got married. It was a big one for that year. And yeah. You know, it's nice. 2024. Majority of 2024 is us not working. Starting with a Taylor Swift concert. I'm loving that. That's what's exciting me the most, is the fact that I don't have to work. You know? But I also am thinking that by the end of it, I'll get to a stage where I'm like, I have to earn something. I need money. I don't know. We'll see. There's a lot of the UK we haven't seen yet. So part of this tour is knocking over a lot of these places that we haven't seen. It's still a beautiful country, man. It's still nice here. You know? Explore. Green tea. I've got a couple of biscuits left over from last night. I'm going to smash that now. Oh, the alarm's going off. Did an hour, boys. Did an hour. That was cool. I really enjoyed that. So, as I said, I'm going to do another one next week. Talk for another hour. And I'll get an email out to start asking questions. I'm going to think about what I want to talk about for one week. So let's see. Like I said, a lot can happen in a week. Let's see if we can capture it and I'll talk to you guys then. Thanks for listening, man. Bye.