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No-one can fail to notice how many statues of Great Men there are around London: stern politicians, military generals, imperial adventurers . . . But what about women? As shown by Juliet Rix in London's Statues of Women (SafeHaven Books, 2025), women are surprisingly well represented amongst London's statues. Recent years have seen new statues of Virginia Woolf in Richmond, Mary Wollstonecraft in Stoke Newington, even boxer Nicola Adams in Brent. But there are also groundbreaking statues commemorating the Black community, notably the two of Brixton resident Joy Battick on its railway station platforms. And you'll find historical figures from Florence Nightingale to Joan of Arc and Edith Cavell – as well as Twiggy. And how many ballet dancers are commemorated, and where? And which famous tennis player was the unlikely model for the young girl with dolphin by Tower Bridge? This is a book that really will make you see London in a new way. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies
No-one can fail to notice how many statues of Great Men there are around London: stern politicians, military generals, imperial adventurers . . . But what about women? As shown by Juliet Rix in London's Statues of Women (SafeHaven Books, 2025), women are surprisingly well represented amongst London's statues. Recent years have seen new statues of Virginia Woolf in Richmond, Mary Wollstonecraft in Stoke Newington, even boxer Nicola Adams in Brent. But there are also groundbreaking statues commemorating the Black community, notably the two of Brixton resident Joy Battick on its railway station platforms. And you'll find historical figures from Florence Nightingale to Joan of Arc and Edith Cavell – as well as Twiggy. And how many ballet dancers are commemorated, and where? And which famous tennis player was the unlikely model for the young girl with dolphin by Tower Bridge? This is a book that really will make you see London in a new way. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art
No-one can fail to notice how many statues of Great Men there are around London: stern politicians, military generals, imperial adventurers . . . But what about women? As shown by Juliet Rix in London's Statues of Women (SafeHaven Books, 2025), women are surprisingly well represented amongst London's statues. Recent years have seen new statues of Virginia Woolf in Richmond, Mary Wollstonecraft in Stoke Newington, even boxer Nicola Adams in Brent. But there are also groundbreaking statues commemorating the Black community, notably the two of Brixton resident Joy Battick on its railway station platforms. And you'll find historical figures from Florence Nightingale to Joan of Arc and Edith Cavell – as well as Twiggy. And how many ballet dancers are commemorated, and where? And which famous tennis player was the unlikely model for the young girl with dolphin by Tower Bridge? This is a book that really will make you see London in a new way. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/european-studies
No-one can fail to notice how many statues of Great Men there are around London: stern politicians, military generals, imperial adventurers . . . But what about women? As shown by Juliet Rix in London's Statues of Women (SafeHaven Books, 2025), women are surprisingly well represented amongst London's statues. Recent years have seen new statues of Virginia Woolf in Richmond, Mary Wollstonecraft in Stoke Newington, even boxer Nicola Adams in Brent. But there are also groundbreaking statues commemorating the Black community, notably the two of Brixton resident Joy Battick on its railway station platforms. And you'll find historical figures from Florence Nightingale to Joan of Arc and Edith Cavell – as well as Twiggy. And how many ballet dancers are commemorated, and where? And which famous tennis player was the unlikely model for the young girl with dolphin by Tower Bridge? This is a book that really will make you see London in a new way. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/british-studies
No-one can fail to notice how many statues of Great Men there are around London: stern politicians, military generals, imperial adventurers . . . But what about women? As shown by Juliet Rix in London's Statues of Women (SafeHaven Books, 2025), women are surprisingly well represented amongst London's statues. Recent years have seen new statues of Virginia Woolf in Richmond, Mary Wollstonecraft in Stoke Newington, even boxer Nicola Adams in Brent. But there are also groundbreaking statues commemorating the Black community, notably the two of Brixton resident Joy Battick on its railway station platforms. And you'll find historical figures from Florence Nightingale to Joan of Arc and Edith Cavell – as well as Twiggy. And how many ballet dancers are commemorated, and where? And which famous tennis player was the unlikely model for the young girl with dolphin by Tower Bridge? This is a book that really will make you see London in a new way. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/british-studies
Duncan Titmarsh became the UK's Lego Certified Professional in 2010, building models and creating tours, including a huge model of Tower Bridge which could carry a real Land Rover. This fully functioning set was made from 5,805,846 individual LEGO bricks, breaking the previous Guinness World Record by 470,646 pieces. Laid end to end, the bricks would stretch for almost 200 miles, or from Tower Bridge in London to Paris. He then formed his own company, Iconic Bricks, which has built dinosaur trails and pirate spectaculars. Duncan also collects Lego and runs a Vintage shop within the company. Mark Simpson visited Duncan and his team in Bordon, to find out about his passion for toy bricks and experience the wonder of their latest 38 model trail - Extinction - which includes Dodos, gigantic woolly mammoth and a spectacular Sabre Toothed Tiger. Extinction debuts at Marwell Zoo this summer. It runs from Saturday 19th July until Sun 7th September.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
The opening ceremony was attended by the Lord Chamberlain and the Home Secretary, H. H. Asquith, who watched the Prince of Wales formally declare the bridge open while a parade of vessels passed underneath the raised ...
Die Tower Bridge in London zählt zu den berühmtesten Bauwerken der Welt. Sie hat eine bewegte Geschichte und sogar ein eigenes Museum.
Hello, London obsessives and armchair adventurers! I'm Sascha, your certified London geek, and guess what? Season 2 of London Asked & Answered is stomping down the cobblestones straight into your ears—only on See you in London!Think you know London? We're about to flip that notion upside-down, shake out the souvenir keychains, and refill the world-class tea. We're delving deep through subterranean graffiti tunnels at Waterloo We're scaling secret Shoreditch rooftops for skyline selfies that'll make your followers green with envy. We're sneaking into late-night Tate Modern raves -- just try not to spill your Pimm's on the Picasso.Forget the usual tourist checklist. Season 2 is your VIP pass to hidden pop up food carnivals in Trafalgar Square—think dumplings doing the tango with tacos — and smoke-and-mirror speakeasies so undercover even your GPS throws up its hands. We'll teach you the Oyster Card ninja flick: one swift tap and you're through the turnstile before Mum's the word. And when that 3 a.m. snack craving hits? We'll point you to the best late-night street-food stalls and kebab joints that never close—because midnight munchies should never go unsatisfied. Every episode is packed with cheeky tips and untold tales. We'll wander the cold, echoing corridors of Whitehall's secret bunkers, and chase spectral whispers beneath Tower Bridge . Art fans, prepare for off-the-grid masterpieces: century-old Shoreditch murals that have more stories than your uncle's holiday slideshow.Seasons change, and so do we. Catch spring's cherry blossom rain in Hyde Park, summer's kaleidoscopic Notting Hill Carnival, autumn's Borough Market spice-dusted leaves, and winter's Winter Wonderland—warts-and-all Christmas magic without that freezing queue for a mulled wine.You'll hear bite-sized segments like Hidden Gems and Curious Finds your weekly compass to cloak and dagger courtyards and clandestine bookshops — and “Events & Excitement”, your insider's ticket to everything from midnight films in abandoned tube tunnels to secret salsa nights behind neon locked doors.Don't worry, we still tip our bowler hats to the icons: we'll salute Buckingham Palace in all its glory, strut across Tower Bridge, and decode Westminster Abbey's coolest stained glass. But we'll also reveal the hush hush garden gates at Buckingham and the engineers' secret tea route under the bridge, history with a wink!Season 2 is for everyone: the whirlwind weekender, penny-pinching backpacker, and the bona fide London lifer who swears “I've seen it all” (spoiler: you haven't). We're dishing out mini-series like “London on a Shoestring” (budget thrills guaranteed) and “Luxury London” (when your bank account is feeling *fancy*).So, what are you waiting for? Jab that subscribe button on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Then dash over to Seeyouin.London and sign up for our newsletter—it comes with bonus walking tour maps, weather-proof packing lists, and a lot more. Bookmark this show—Season 2 explodes onto the airwaves faster than a double-decker hurtling through Oxford Circus. London never sleeps, and neither do we. Grab your headphones, lace up those trainers, and prepare to rediscover the city in all its glorious madness. Adventure—and a bit of mischief—awaits… are you in? Then lets'go - See you in London!Website: seeyouin.london Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
In this interview, Lamorna Ash, author of Don't Forget We're Here Forever: A New Generation's Search for Religion, and one of my favourite modern writers, talked about working at the Times Literary Supplement, netball, M. John Harrison, AI and the future of religion, why we should be suspicious of therapy, the Anatomy of Melancholy, the future of writing, what surprised her in the Bible, the Simpsons, the joy of Reddit, the new Pope, Harold Bloom, New Atheism's mistakes, reading J.S. Mill. I have already recommended her new book Don't Forget We're Here Forever, which Lamorna reads aloud from at the end. Full transcript below.Uploading videos onto Substack is too complicated for me (it affects podcast downloads somehow, and the instructions to avoid this problem are complicated, so I have stopped doing it), and to upload to YouTube I have to verify my account but they told me that after I tried to upload it and my phone is dead, so… here is the video embedded on this page. I could quote the whole thing. Here's one good section.Lamorna: Which one would you say I should do first after The Sea, The Sea?Henry: Maybe The Black Prince.Lamorna: The Black Prince. Great.Henry: Which is the one she wrote before The Sea, The Sea and is just a massive masterpiece.Lamorna: I'll read it. Where do you stand on therapy? Do you have a position?Henry: I think on net, it might be a bad thing, even if it is individually useful for people.Lamorna: Why is that?Henry: [laughs] I didn't expect to have to answer the question. Basically two reasons. I think it doesn't take enough account of the moral aspect of the decisions being made very often. This is all very anecdotal and you can find yourself feeling better in the short term, but not necessarily in the long-- If you make a decision that's not outrageously immoral, but which has not had enough weight placed on the moral considerations.There was an article about how lots of people cut out relatives now and the role that therapy plays in that. What I was struck by in the article that was-- Obviously, a lot of those people are justified and their relatives have been abusive or nasty, of course, but there are a lot of cases where you were like, "Well, this is a long-term decision that's been made on a short-term basis." I think in 10 years people may feel very differently. There wasn't enough consideration in the article, at least I felt, given to how any children involved would be affected later on. I think it's a good thing and a bad thing.Lamorna: I'm so with you. I think that's why, because also the fact of it being so private and it being about the individual, and I think, again, there are certain things if you're really struggling with that, it's helpful for, but I think I'm always more into the idea of communal things, like AAA and NA, which obviously a very particular. Something about doing that together, that it's collaborative and therefore there is someone else in the room if you say, "I want to cut out my parent."There's someone else who said that happened to me and it was really hard. It means that you are making those decisions together a little bit more. Therapy, I can feel that in friends and stuff that it does make us, even more, think that we are these bounded individuals when we're not.Henry: I should say, I have known people who've gone to therapy and it's worked really well.Lamorna: I'm doing therapy right now and it is good. TranscriptHenry: Today I am talking to Lamorna Ash. Lamorna is one of the rising stars of her generation. She has written a book about a fishing village in Cornwall. She's written columns for the New Statesman, of which I'm a great admirer. She works for a publisher and now she's written a book called, Don't Forget, We're Here Forever: A New Generation's Search for Religion. I found this book really compelling and I hope you will go and read it right now. Lamorna, welcome.Lamorna Ash: Thank you for having me.Henry: What was it like when you worked at the Times Literary Supplement?Lamorna: It was an amazing introduction to mostly contemporary fiction, but also so many other forms of writing I didn't know about. I went there, I actually wrote a letter, handwritten letter after my finals, saying that I'd really enjoyed this particular piece that somehow linked the anatomy of melancholy to infinite jest, and being deeply, deeply, deeply pretentious, those were my two favorite books. I thought, well, I'll apply for this magazine. I turned up there as an intern. They happened to have a space going.My job was Christmas in that I just spent my entire time unwrapping books and putting them out for editors to swoop by and take away. I'd take on people's corrections. I'd start to see how the editorial process worked. I started reading. I somehow had missed contemporary fiction. I hadn't read people like Rachel Kask or Nausgaard. I was reading them through going to the fiction pages. It made me very excited. Also, my other job whilst I was there, was I had the queries email. You'd get loads of incredibly random emails, including things like, you are cordially invited to go on the Joseph Conrad cycle tour of London. I'd ask the office, "Does anyone want to do this?" Obviously, no one ever said yes.I had this amazing year of doing really weird stuff, like going on Joseph Conrad cycling tour or going to a big talk at the comic book museum or the new advertising museum of London. I loved it. I really loved it.Henry: What was the Joseph Conrad cycling tour of London like? That sounds-Lamorna: Oh, it was so good. I remember at one point we stopped on maybe it was Blackfriars Bridge or perhaps it was Tower Bridge and just read a passage from the secret agent about the boats passing underneath. Then we'd go to parts of the docks where they believe that Conrad stayed for a while, but instead it would be some fancy youth hostel instead.It was run by the Polish Society of London, I believe-- the Polish Society of England, I believe. Again, each time it was like an excuse then to get into that writer and then write a little piece about it for the TLS. I guess, it was also, I was slightly cutting my teeth on how to do that kind of journalism as well.Henry: What do you like about The Anatomy of Melancholy?Lamorna: Almost everything. I think the prologue, Democritus Junior to the Reader is just so much fun and naughty. He says, "I'm writing about melancholy in order to try and avoid melancholy myself." There's six editions of it. He spent basically his entire life writing this book. When he made new additions to the book, rather than adding another chapter, he would often be making insertions within sentences themselves, so it becomes more and more bloated. There's something about the, what's the word for it, the ambition that I find so remarkable of every single possible version of melancholy they could talk about.Then, maybe my favorite bit, and I think about this as a writer a lot, is there's a bit called the digression of air, or perhaps it's digression on the air, where he just suddenly takes the reader soaring upwards to think about air and you sort of travel up like a hawk. It's this sort of breathing moment for a reader where you go in a slightly different direction. I think in my own writing, I always think about digression as this really valuable bit of nonfiction, this sense of, I'm not just taking you straight the way along. I think it'd be useful to go sideways a bit too.Henry: That was Samuel Johnson's favorite book as well. It's a good choice.Lamorna: Was it?Henry: Yes. He said that it was the only book that would get him out of bed in the morning.Lamorna: Really?Henry: Because he was obviously quite depressive. I think he found it useful as well as entertaining, as it were. Should netball be an Olympic sport?Lamorna: [laughs] Oh, it's already going to be my favorite interview. I think the reason it isn't an Olympic-- yes, I have a vested interest in netball and I play netball once a week. I'm not very good, but I am very enthusiastic because it's only played mostly in the Commonwealth. It was invented a year after basketball as a woman-friendly version because women should not run with the ball in case they get overexerted and we shouldn't get too close to contacting each other in case we touch, and that's awful.It really is only played in the Commonwealth. I think the reason it won't become an Olympic sport is because it's not worldwide enough, which I think is a reasonable reason. I'm not, of all the my big things that I want to protest about and care about right now, making that an Olympic sport is a-- it's reasonably low on my list.Henry: Okay, fair enough. You are an admirer of M. John Harrison's fiction, is that right?Lamorna: Yes.Henry: Tell us what should we read and why should we read him?Lamorna: You Should Come With Me Now, is that what it's called? I know I reviewed one of his books years ago and thought it was-- because he's part of that weird sci-fi group that I find really interesting and they've all got a bit of Samuel Delany to them as well. I just remember there was this one particular story in that collection, I think in general, he's a master at sci-fi that doesn't feel in that Dune way of just like, lists of names of places. It somehow has this, it's very literary, it's very odd, it's deeply imaginative. It is like what I wanted adult fiction to be when I was 12 or something, that there's the way the fantasy and imagination works.I remember there was one about all these men, married men who were disappearing into their attics and their wives thought they were just tinkering. What they were doing was building these sort of translucent tubes that were taking them off out of the world. I remember just thinking it was great. His conceits are brilliant and make so much sense, whilst also always being at an interesting slant from reality. Then, I haven't read his memoir, but I hear again and again this anti-memoir he's written. Have you read that?Henry: No.Lamorna: Apparently that's really brilliant too. Then he also, writes those about climbing. He's actually got this one foot in the slightly travel nature writing sports camp. I just always thought he was magic. I remember on Twitter, he was really magic as well. I spent a lot of time following him.Henry: Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future of writing and literature and books and this whole debate that's going on?Lamorna: It's hard to. I don't want to say anything fast and snappy because it's such a complicated thing. I could just start by saying personally, I'm worried about me and writing because I'm worried about my concentration span. I am so aware that in the same way that a piano player has to be practising the pieces they're going to play all the time. I think partly that's writing and writing, I seem to be able to do even with this broken, distracted form of attention I've got. My reading, I don't feel like I'm getting enough in. I think that means that what I produce will necessarily be less good if I can't solve that.I've just bought a dumb phone on the internet and I hope that's going to help me by no longer having Instagram and things like that. I think, yes, I suppose we do read a bit less. The generation below us is reading less. That's a shame. There's so much more possibility to go out and meet people from different places. On an anthropological level, I think anthropology has had this brilliant turn of becoming more subjective. The places you go, you have to think about your own relationship to them. I think that can make really interesting writing. It's so different from early colonial anthropology.The fact that, I guess, through, although even as I'm saying this, I don't know enough to say it, but I was going to say something about the fact that people, because we can do things like substacks and people can do short form content, maybe that means that more people's voices are getting heard and then they can, if they want to, transfer over and write books as well.I still get excited by books all the time. There's still so much good contemporary stuff that's thrilling me from all over the place. I don't feel that concerned yet. If we all do stop writing books entirely for a year and just read all the extraordinary books that have been happening for the last couple of thousand, we'd be okay.Henry: I simultaneously see the same people complaining that everything's dying and literature is over and that we have an oversupply of books and that capitalism is giving us too many books and that's the problem. I'm like, "Guys, I think you should pick one."Lamorna: [laughs] You're not allowed both those arguments. My one is that I do think it's gross, the bit of publishing that the way that some of these books get so oddly inflated in terms of the sales around them. Then, someone is getting a million pounds for a debut, which is enormous pressure on them. Then, someone else is getting 2K. I feel like there should be, obviously, there should be a massive cap on how large an advance anyone should get, and then more people will actually be able to stay in the world of writing because they won't have to survive on pitiful advances. I think that would actually have a huge impact and we should not be giving, love David Beckham as much as I do, we shouldn't be giving him five million pounds for someone else to go to write his books. It's just crazy.Henry: Don't the sales of books like that subsidize those of us who are not getting such a big advance?Lamorna: I don't think they always do. I think that's the problem is that they do have this wealth of funds to give to celebrities and often those books don't sell either. I still think even if those books sell a huge amount of money, those people still shouldn't be getting ridiculous advances like that. They still should be thinking about young people who are important to the literary, who are going to produce books that are different and surprising and whose voices we need to hear. That feels much more important.Henry: What do you think about the idea that maybe Anglo fiction isn't at a peak? I don't necessarily agree with that, but maybe we can agree that these are not the days of George Eliot and Charles Dickens, but the essay nonfiction periodicals and writing online, this is huge now. Right? Actually, our pessimism is sort of because we're looking in the wrong area and there are other forms of writing that flourish, actually doing great on the internet.Lamorna: Yes, I think so too. Again, I don't think I'm internet worldly enough to know this, but I still find these extraordinary, super weird substats that feel exciting. I also get an enormous amount of pleasure in reading Reddit now, which I only just got into many, many years late, but so many fun, odd things. Like little essays that people write and the way that people respond to each other, which is quick and sharp, and I suppose it fills the gap of what Twitter was.I think nonfiction, I was talking about this morning, because I'm staying with some writers, because we're sort of Cornish, book talk thing together and how much exciting nonfiction has come out this year that we want to read from the UK that is hybrid-y nature travel. Then internationally, I still think there's-- I just read, Perfection by Vincenzo, but there's enough translated fiction that's on the international book list this year that gets me delighted as well. To me, I just don't feel worried about that kind of thing at all when there's so much exciting stuff happening.I love Reddit. I think they really understand things that other people don't on there. I think it's the relief now that when you type in something to Google, you get the AI response. It's something like, it's so nice to feel on Reddit that someone sat down and answered you. Maybe that's such a shame that that's what makes me happy now, that we're in that space. It does feel like someone will tell you not just the answer, but then give you a bit about their life. Then, the particular tool that was passed down by their grandparents. That's so nice.Henry: What do you think of the new Pope?Lamorna: I thought it was because I'd heard all the thing around fat Pope, thin Pope, and obviously, our new Pope is maybe a sort of middle Pope, or at least is closer to Francis, but maybe a bit more palatable to some people. I guess, I'm excited that he's going to do, or it seems like he's also taking time to think, but he's good on migration on supporting the rights of immigrants. I think there's value in the fact of him being American as this being this counterpoint to what's happening in America right now. If feels always feels pointless to say because they're almost the idea of a Pope.I guess, Francis said that, who am I to judge about people being gay, but I think this Pope has so far has been more outly against gay people, but he stood up against JD Vance and his stupid thoughts on theology. I'm quietly optimistic. I guess I'm also waiting for Robert Harris's prophecy to come true and we get an intersex Pope next. Because I think that was prophecy, right? What he wrote.Henry: That would be interesting.Lamorna: Yes.Henry: The religious revival that people say is happening, particularly among young people, how is AI going to make it different than previous religious revivals?Lamorna: Oh, that's so interesting. Maybe first of all, question, sorry, I choked on my coffee. I was slightly questioned the idea if there is a religious revival, it's not actually an argument that I made in the book. When I started writing the book, there wasn't this quiet revival or this Bible studies and survey that suggests that more young people are going to church hadn't come out yet. I was just more, I guess, aware that there were a few people around me who were converting and I thought it'd be interesting if there's a few, there'll be more, which I think probably happens in every single generation, right? Is that that's one way to deal with the longing for meaning we all experience and the struggles in our lives.I was speaking to a New York Times journalist who was questioning the stats that have been coming out because first it's incredibly small pool. It's quite self-selecting that possibly there are people who might have gone to church already. It's still such a small uptick because it makes it hard to say anything definitive. I guess in general, what will the relationship be between AI and religion?I guess, there are so many ways you could go with that. One is that those spaces, religious spaces, are nicely insulated from technology. Not everywhere. Obviously, in some places they aren't, but often it's a space in which you put your phone away. In my head, the desire to go to church is as against having to deal with AI or having to deal with technology being integrated to every other aspect of my life.I guess maybe people will start worshiping the idea of the singularity. Maybe we'll get the singularity and Terminator, or the Matrix is going to happen, and we'll call them our gods because they will feel like gods. That's maybe one option. I don't know how AI-- I guess I don't know enough about AI that maybe you'll have AI, or does this happen? Maybe this has happened already that you could have an AI confession and you'd have an AI priest and they tell you--Henry: Sure. It's huge for therapy, right?Lamorna: Yes.Henry: Which is that adjacent thing.Lamorna: That's a good point. It does feel something about-- I'm sure, theologically, it's not supposed to work if you haven't been ordained, but can an AI be ordained, become a priest?Henry: IndeedLamorna: Could they do communion? I don't know. It's fascinating.Henry: I can see a situation where a young person lives in a secular environment or culture and is interested in things and the AI is the, in some ways, easiest place for them to turn to say, "I need to talk about-- I have these weird semi-religious feelings, or I'm interested." The AI's not going to be like, "Oh, really? That's weird." There's the question of will we worship AI or whatever, but also will we get people's conversions being shaped by their therapy/confessors/whatever chat with their LLM?Lamorna: Oh, it's so interesting. I read a piece recently in the LRB by James Vincent. It was about AI relationships, our relationship with AI, and he looked at AI girlfriends. There was this incredible case, maybe you read about it, about a guy who tried to kill the Queen some years back. His defense was that his AI girlfriend had really encouraged him to do that. Then, you can see the transcripts of the text, and he says, "I'm thinking about killing the Queen." His AI girlfriend is like, "Go for it, baby."It's that thing there of like, at the moment, AI is still reflecting back our own desires or refracting almost like shifting how they're expressed. I'm trying to imagine that in the same case of me saying, "I feel really lonely, and I'm thinking about Christianity." My friend would speak with all of their context and background, and whatever they've got going on for them. Whereas an AI would feel my desire there and go, "That's a good idea. It says online this." It's very straight. It would definitely lead us in directions that feel less than human or other than human.Henry: I also have this thought, you used to, I think you still do, but you see it less. You used to get a Samaritan's Bible in every hotel. The Samaritans, will they start trying to install a religious chatbot in places where people--? There are lots of ways in which you could use it as a distribution mechanism.Lamorna: Which does feel so far from the point. Not to think about the gospels, but that feeling of something I talk about in the book is that, so much of it is human contact. Is that this factor of being changed in the moment, person to person. If I have any philosophy for life at the moment is this sense of desperately needing contact that we are saved by each other all the time, not by our telephones and things that aren't real. It's the surprise.I quote it in the book, but Iris Murdoch describes love is the very difficult realization that someone other than yourself is real. I think that's the thing that makes us all survive, is that reminder that if you're feeling deeply depressed, being like, there is someone else that is real, and they have a struggle that matters as much as mine. I think that's something that you are never going to get through a conversation with a chatbot, because it's like a therapeutic thing. You are not having to ask it the same questions, or you are not having to extend yourself to think about someone else in those conversations.Henry: Which Iris Murdoch novels do you like?Lamorna: I've only read The Sea, The Sea, but I really enjoyed it. Which ones do you like?Henry: I love The Sea, The Sea, and The Black Prince. I like the late books, like The Good Apprentice and The Philosopher's Pupil, as well. Some people tell you, "Don't read those. They're late works and they're no good," but I was obsessed. I was absolutely compelled, and they're still all in my head. They're insane.Lamorna: Oh, I must, because I've got a big collection of her essays. I'm thinking is so beautiful, her philosophical thought. It's that feeling, I know I'm going the wrong-- starting in the wrong place, but I do feel that she's someone I'd really love to explore next, kind of books.Henry: I think you'd like her because she's very interested in the question of, can therapy help, can philosophy help, can religion help? She's very dubious about therapy and philosophy, and she is mystic. There are queer characters and neurodivergent characters. For a novelist in the '70s, you read her now and you're like, "Well, this is all just happening now."Lamorna: Cool.Henry: Maybe we should be passing these books out. People need this right now.Lamorna: Which one would you say I should do first after The Sea, The Sea?Henry: Maybe The Black Prince.Lamorna: The Black Prince. Great.Henry: Which is the one she wrote before The Sea, The Sea and is just a massive masterpiece.Lamorna: I'll read it. Where do you stand on therapy? Do you have a position?Henry: I think on net, it might be a bad thing, even if it is individually useful for people.Lamorna: Why is that?Henry: [laughs] I didn't expect to have to answer the question. Basically two reasons. I think it doesn't take enough account of the moral aspect of the decisions being made very often. This is all very anecdotal and you can find yourself feeling better in the short term, but not necessarily in the long-- If you make a decision that's not outrageously immoral, but which has not had enough weight placed on the moral considerations.There was an article about how lots of people cut out relatives now and the role that therapy plays in that. What I was struck by in the article that was-- Obviously, a lot of those people are justified and their relatives have been abusive or nasty, of course, but there are a lot of cases where you were like, "Well, this is a long-term decision that's been made on a short-term basis." I think in 10 years people may feel very differently. There wasn't enough consideration in the article, at least I felt, given to how any children involved would be affected later on. I think it's a good thing and a bad thing.Lamorna: I'm so with you. I think that's why, because also the fact of it being so private and it being about the individual, and I think, again, there are certain things if you're really struggling with that, it's helpful for, but I think I'm always more into the idea of communal things, like AAA and NA, which obviously a very particular. Something about doing that together, that it's collaborative and therefore there is someone else in the room if you say, "I want to cut out my parent."There's someone else who said that happened to me and it was really hard. It means that you are making those decisions together a little bit more. Therapy, I can feel that in friends and stuff that it does make us, even more, think that we are these bounded individuals when we're not.Henry: I should say, I have known people who've gone to therapy and it's worked really well.Lamorna: I'm doing therapy right now and it is good. I think, in my head, it's like it should be one among many and I still question it whilst doing it.Henry: To the extent that there is a religious revival among "Gen Z," how much is it because they have phones? Because you wrote something like, in fact, I have the quote, "There's a sense of terrible tragedy. How can you hold this constant grief that we feel, whether it's the genocide in Gaza or climate collapse? Where do I put all the misery that I receive every single second through my phone? Church can then be a space where I can quietly go and light a candle." Is it that these young people are going to religion because the phone has really pushed a version of the world into their faces that was not present when I was young or people are older than me?Lamorna: I think it's one of, or that the phone is the symptom because the phone, whatever you call it, technology, the internet, is the thing that draws the world closer to us in so many different ways. One being that this sense of being aware of what's happening around in other places in the world, which maybe means that you become more tolerant of other religions because you're hearing about it more. That, on TikTok, there's loads of kids all across the world talking about their particular faiths and their background and which aspera they're in, and all that kind of thing.Then, this sense of horror being very unavoidable that you wake up and it is there and you wake up and you think, "What am I doing? What am I doing here? I feel completely useless." Perhaps then you end up in a church, but I'm not sure.I think a bigger player in my head is the fact that we are more pluralistic as societies. That you are more likely to encounter other religions in schools. I think then the question is, well then maybe that'll be valuable for me as well. I think also, not having parents pushing religion on you makes kids, the fact of the generation above the British people, your parents' generations, not saying religion is important, you go to church, then it becomes something people can become more curious about in their own right as adults. I think that plays into it.I think isolation plays into it and that's just not about technology and the phone, but that's the sense of-- and again, I'm thinking about early 20s, mid 20s, so adults who are moving from place to place, who maybe feel very isolated and alone, who are doing jobs that make them feel isolated and alone, and there are this dearth of community spaces and then thinking, well, didn't people used to go to churches, it would be so nice to know someone older than me.I don't know how this fits in, but I was thinking about, I saw this documentary, The Encampments, like two days ago, which is about the Columbia University encampments and within that, Mahmood Khalil, who's the one who's imprisoned at the moment, who was this amazing leader within the movement and is from Palestine. The phone in that, the sense about how it was used to gather and collect people and keep people aware of what's happening and mean that everyone is more conscious and there's a point when they need more people in the encampments because the police are going to come. It's like, "Everyone, use your phone, call people now." I think I can often be like, "Oh no, phones are terrible," but this sense within protest, within communal activity, how valuable they can be as well.I haven't quite gotten into that thought. I don't know, basically. I think it's so hard. I've grown up with a phone. I have no sense of how much it plays a part in everything about me, but obviously, it is a huge amount. I do think it's something that we all think about and are horrified by whilst also seeing it as like this weird extension of ourselves. That definitely plays into then culturally, the decisions we make to either try and avoid them, find spaces where you can be without them.Henry: How old do you think a child should be when they're first given a phone? A smartphone, like an iPhone type thing?Lamorna: I think, 21.Henry: Yes?Lamorna: No, I don't know. I obviously wouldn't know that about a child.Henry: I might.Lamorna: I'd love to. I would really love to because, I don't know, I have a few friends who weren't allowed to watch TV until they were 18 and they are eminently smarter than me and lots of my other friends. There's something about, I don't know, I hate the idea that as I'm getting older, I'm becoming more scaremongering like, "Oh no, when I was young--" because I think my generation was backed in loads of ways. This thing of kids spending so much less time outside and so much less time being able to imagine things, I think I am quite happy to say that feels like a terrible loss.I read a piece recently about kids in New York and I think they were quite sort of middle-class Brooklyn-y kids, but they choose to go days without their phones and they all go off into the forest together. There is this sense of saying giving kids autonomy, but at the same time, their relationship with a phone is not one of agency. It's them versus tech bros who have designed things that are so deeply addictive, that no adult can let go of it. Let alone a child who's still forming how to work out self-control, discipline and stuff. I think a good parenting thing would be to limit massively these completely non-neutral objects that they're given, that are made like crack and impossible to let go of.Henry: Do you think religious education in schools should be different or should there be more of it?Lamorna: Yes, I think it should be much better. I don't know about you, but I just remember doing loads of diagrams of different religious spaces like, "This is what a mosque looks like," and then I'd draw the diagram. I knew nothing. I barely knew the difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament. In fact, I probably didn't as a teenager.I remember actually in sixth form, having this great philosophy teacher who was talking about the idea of proto antisemitism within the gospels. I was like, "Wait, what?" Because I just didn't really understand. I didn't know that it was in Greek, that the Old Testament was in Hebrew. I just didn't know. I think all these holy texts that we've been carrying with us for thousands of years across the world have so much in them that's worth reading and knowing.If I was in charge of our R.E., I would get kids to write on all holy texts, but really think about them and try and answer moral problems. You'd put philosophy back with religion and really connect them and think, what is Nietzsche reacting against? What does Freud about how is this form of Christianity different like this? I think that my sense is that since Gove, but also I'm sure way before that as well, the sense of just not taking young people seriously, when actually they're thoughtful, intelligent and able to wrestle with these things, it's good for them to have know what they're choosing against, if they're not interested in religion.Also, at base, those texts are beautiful, all of them are, and are foundational and if you want to be able to study English or history to know things about religious texts and the practices of religion and how those rituals came about and how it's changed over thousands of years, feels important.Henry: Which religious poets do you like other than Hopkins? Because you write very nicely about Hopkins in the book.Lamorna: He's my favorite. I like John Donne a lot. I remember reading lots of his sermons and Lancelot Andrews' sermons at university and thinking they were just astonishingly beautiful. There are certain John Donne sermons and it's this feeling of when he takes just maybe a line from one of Paul's letters and then is able to extend it and extend it, and it's like he's making it grow in material or it's like it's a root where suddenly all these branches are coming off it.Who else do I like? I like George Herbert. Gosh, my brain is going in terms of who else was useful when I was thinking about. Oh it's gone.Henry: Do you like W.H. Auden?Lamorna: Oh yes. I love Auden, yes. I was rereading his poems about, oh what's it called? The one about Spain?Henry: Oh yes.Lamorna: About the idea of tomorrow.Henry: I don't have a memory either, but I know the poem you mean, yes.Lamorna: Okay. Then I'm trying to think of earlier religious poets. I suppose things like The Dream of the Rood and fun ways of getting into it and if you're looking at medieval poetry.Henry: I also think Betjeman is underrated for this.Lamorna: I've barely read any Betjeman.Henry: There's a poem called Christmas. You might like it.Lamorna: Okay.Henry: It's this famous line and is it true and is it true? He really gets into this thing of, "We're all unwrapping tinsely presents and I'm sitting here trying to work out if God became man." It's really good. It's really good. The other one is called Norfolk and again, another famous line, "When did the devil first attack?" It talks about puberty as the arrival of the awareness of sin and so forth.Lamorna: Oh, yes.Henry: It's great. Really, really good stuff. Do you personally believe in the resurrection?Lamorna: [chuckles] I keep being asked this.Henry: I know. I'm sorry.Lamorna: My best answer is sometimes. Because I do sometimes in that way that-- someone I interviewed who's absolutely brilliant in the book, Robert, and he's a Cambridge professor. He's a pragmatist and he talks about the idea of saying I'm a disciplined person means nothing unless you're enacting that discipline daily or it falls away. For him, that belief in a Kierkegaardian leap way is something that needs to be reenacted in every moment to say, I believe and mean it.I think there are moments when my church attendance is better and I'm listening to a reading that's from Acts or whatever and understanding the sense of those moments, Paul traveling around Europe and Asia Minor, only because he fully believed that this is what's happened. Those letters and as you're reading those letters, the way I read literature or biblical writing is to believe in that moment because for that person, they believe too. I think there are points at which the resurrection can feel true to me, but it does feel like I'm accessing that idea of truth in a different way than I am accessing truth about-- it's close to how I think about love as something that's very, very real, but very different from experiential feelings.I had something else I wanted to say about that and it's just gone. Oh yes. I was at Hay Festival a couple of weeks ago. Do you know the Philosopher Agnes Callard?Henry: Oh, sure.Lamorna: She gave a really great talk about Socrates and her love of Socrates, but she also came to my talk and she and her husband, who I think met through arguing about Aristotle, told me they argued for about half a day about a line I'd said, which was that during writing the book, I'd learned to believe in the belief of other people, her husband was like, "You can't believe in the belief of other people if you don't believe it too. That doesn't work. That doesn't make sense." I was like, "That's so interesting." I can so feel that if we're taking that analytically, that if I say I don't believe in the resurrection, not just that I believe you believe it, but I believe in your belief in the resurrection. At what point is that any different from saying, I believe in the resurrection. I feel like I need to spend more time with it. What the slight gap is there that I don't have that someone else does, or as I say it, do I then believe in the resurrection that moment? I'm not sure.I think also what I'm doing right now is trying to sound all clever with it, whereas for other people it's this deep ingrained truth that governs every moment of their life and that they can feel everywhere, or perhaps they can't. Perhaps there's more doubt than they suggest, which I think is the case with lots of us. Say on the deathbed, someone saying that they fully believe in the resurrection because that means there's eternal salvation, and their family believe in that too. I don't think I have that kind of certainty, but I admire it.Henry: Tell me how you got the title for this book from an episode of The Simpsons.Lamorna: It's really good app. It's from When Maggie Makes Three, which is my favorite episode. I think titles are horribly hard. I really struck my first book. I would have these sleepless nights just thinking about words related to the sea, and be like, blue something. I don't know. There was a point where my editor wanted to call it Trawler Girl. I said, "We mustn't. That's awful. That's so bad. It makes me sound like a terrible superhero. I'm not a girl, I'm a woman."With this one, I think it was my fun title for ages. Yes, it's this plaque that Homer has put-- Mr. Burns puts up this plaque to remind him that he will never get to leave the power plant, "Don't forget you're here forever."I just think it's a strong and bonkers line. I think it had this element of play or silliness that I wanted, that I didn't think about too hard. I guess that's an evangelical Christian underneath what they're actually saying is saying-- not all evangelicals, but often is this sense of no, no, no, we are here forever. You are going to live forever. That is what heaven means.That sense of then saying it in this jokey way. I think church is often very funny spaces, and funny things happen. They make good comedy series when you talk about faith.Someone's saying she don't forget we're here forever. The don't forget makes it so colloquial and silly. I just thought it was a funny line for that reason.Then also that question people always ask, "Is religion going to die out?" I thought that played into it. This feeling that, yes, I write about it. There was a point when I was going to an Extinction Rebellion protest, and everyone was marching along with that symbol of the hourglass inside a circle next to a man who had a huge sign saying, "Stop, look, hell is real, the end of the world is coming." This sense of different forms of apocalyptic thinking that are everywhere at the moment. I felt like the title worked for that as well.Henry: I like that episode of The Simpsons because it's an expression of an old idea where he's doing something boring and his life is going to slip away bit by bit. The don't forget you're here forever is supposed to make that worse, but he turns it round into the live like you're going to die tomorrow philosophy and makes his own kind of meaning out of it.Lamorna: By papering it over here with pictures of Maggie. They love wordplay, the writers of The Simpsons, and so that it reads, "Do it for her," instead. That feeling of-- I think that with faith as well of, don't forget we're here forever, think about heaven when actually so much of our life is about papering it over with humanity and being like, "Does it matter? I'm with you right now, and that's what matters." That immediacy of human contact that church is also really about, that joy in the moment. Where it doesn't really matter in that second if you're going to heaven or hell, or if that exists. You're there together, and it's euphoric, or at least it's a relief or comforting.Henry: You did a lot of Bible study and bible reading to write this book. What were the big surprises for you?Lamorna: [chuckles] This is really the ending, but revelation, I don't really think it's very well written at all. It shouldn't be in there, possibly. It's just not [unintelligible 00:39:20] It got added right in the last minute. I guess it should be in there. I just don't know. What can I say?So much of it was a surprise. I think slowly reading the Psalms was a lovely surprise for me because they contain so much uncertainty and anguish, and doubt. Imagining those being read aloud to me always felt like a very exciting thing.Henry: Did you read them aloud?Lamorna: When I go to more Anglo Catholic services, they tend to do them-- I never know how to pronounce this. Antiphonally.Henry: Oh yes.Lamorna: Back and forth between you. It's very reverential, lovely experience to do that. I really think I was surprised by almost everything I was reading. At the start of Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling, he does this amazing thing where he does four different versions of what could be happening in the Isaac and Abraham story underneath.There's this sense of in the Bible, and I'm going to get this wrong, but in Mimesis, Auerbach talks about the way that you're not given the psychological understanding within the Bible. There's so much space for readers to think with, because you're just being told things that happened, and the story moves on quickly, moment by moment. With Isaac and Abraham, what it would mean if Isaac actually had seen the fact that his father was planning to kill him. Would he then lose his faith? All these different scenarios.I suddenly realised that the Bible was not just a fixed text, but there was space to play with it as well. In the book, I use the story of Jacob and the angel and play around with the meaning of that and what would happen after this encounter between Jacob and an angel for both of them.Bits in the Gospels, I love the story of the Gerasene Demoniac. He was a knight. He was very unwell, and no one knew what to do with him. He was ostracised from his community. He would sit in this cave and scream and lacerate himself against the cave walls. Then Jesus comes to him and speaks to him and speaks to the demons inside him. There's this thing in Mark's Gospel that Harold Bloom talks about, where only demons are actually able to perceive. Most people have to ask Christ who he really is, but demons can perceive him immediately and know he's the son of God.The demons say that they are legion. Then Jesus puts them into 1,000 pigs. Is it more? I can't remember. Then they're sent off over the cliff edge. Then the man is made whole and is able to go back to his community. I just think there's just so much in that. It's so rich and strange. I think, yes, there's something about knowing you could sit down and just read a tiny bit of the Bible and find something strange and unusual that also might speak to something you've read that's from thousands of years later.I also didn't know that in Mark's Gospel, the last part of it is addended, added on to it. Before that, it ended with the women being afraid, seeing the empty tomb, but there's no resolution. There's no sense of Christ coming back as spirit. It ended in this deep uncertainty and fear. I thought that was so fascinating because then again, it reminds you that those texts have been played around with and thought with, and meddled with, and changed over time. It takes away from the idea that it's fixed and certain, the Bible.Henry: What did you think of Harold Bloom's book The Shadow of a Great Rock?Lamorna: I really loved it. He says that he treats Shakespeare more religiously and the Bible more like literature, which I found a funny, irreverent thing to say. There's lovely stuff in there where, I think it was Ruth, he was like, maybe it was written by a woman. He takes you through the different Hebrew writers for Genesis. Which again, becoming at this as such a novice in so many ways, realising that, okay, so when it's Yahweh, it's one particular writer, there's the priestly source for particular kinds of writing. The Yahwist is more ironic, or the God you get is more playful.That was this key into thinking about how each person trying to write about God, it's still them and their sense of the world, which is particular and idiosyncratic is forming the messages that they believe they're receiving from God. I found that exciting.Yes, he's got this line. He's talking about the blessings that God gives to men in Genesis. He's trying to understand, Bloom, what the meaning of a blessing is. He describes it as more life into a time without boundaries. That's a line that I just found so beautiful, and always think about what the meaning of that is. I write it in the book.My best friend, Sammy, who's just the most game person in the world, that you tell them anything, they're like, "Cool." I told them that line. They were like, "I'm getting it tattooed on my arm next week." Then got me to write in my handwriting. I can only write in my handwriting, but write down, "More time into life without boundaries." Now they've just got it on their arm.Henry: Nice.Lamorna: I really like. They're Jewish, non-practicing. They're not that really interested in it. They were like, "That's a good line to keep somewhere."Henry: I think it's actually one of Bloom's best books. There's a lot of discussion about, is he good? Is he not good? I love that book because it really just introduces people to the Bible and to different versions of the Bible. He does all that Harold Bloom stuff where he's like, "These are the only good lines in this particular translation of this section. The rest is so much dross.He's really attentive to the differences between the translations, both theologically but also aesthetically. I think a lot of people don't know the Bible. It's a really good way to get started on a-- sitting down and reading the Bible in order. It's going to fail for a lot of people. Harold Bloom is a good introduction that actually gives you a lot of the Bible itself.Lamorna: For sure, because it's got that midrash feeling of being like someone else working around it, which then helps you get inside it. I was reading that book whilst going to these Bible studies at a conservative evangelical church called All Souls. I wasn't understanding what on earth was going on in Mark through the way that we're being told to read it, which is kids' comprehension.Maybe it was useful to think about why would the people have been afraid when Christ quelled the storms? It was doing something, but there was no sense of getting inside the text. Then, to read alongside that, Bloom saying that the Christ in Mark is the most unknowable of all the versions of Christ. Then again, just thinking, "Oh, hang on." There's an author. The author of Mark's gospel is perceiving Christ in a particular way. This is the first of the gospels writing about Christ. What does it mean? He's unknowable. Suddenly thinking of him as a character, and therefore thinking about how people are relating to him. It totally cracks the text open for you.Henry: Do you think denominational differences are still important? Do most people have actual differences in dogma, or are they just more cultural distinctions?Lamorna: They're ritual distinctions. There really is little that you could compare between a Quaker meeting and a Catholic service. That silence is the fundamental aspect of all of it. There's a sense of enlighten.My Quaker mate, Lawrence, he's an atheist, but he wouldn't go to another church service because he's so against the idea of hierarchy and someone speaking from a pulpit. He's like, honestly, the reincarnated spirit of George Fox in many ways, in lots of ways he's not.I guess it becomes more blurry because, yes, there's this big thing in the early 20th century in Britain anyway, where the line that becomes more significant is conservative liberal. It's very strange that that's how our world gets divided. There's real simplification that perhaps then, a liberal Anglican church and a liberal Catholic church have more in relationship than a conservative Catholic church and a conservative evangelical church. The line that is often thinking about sexuality and marriage.I was interested, people have suddenly was called up in my book that I talk about sex a lot. I think it's because sex comes up so much, it feels hard not to. That does seem to be more important than denominational differences in some ways. I do think there's something really interesting in this idea of-- Oh, [unintelligible 00:48:17] got stung. God, this is a bit dramatic. Sorry, I choked on coffee earlier. Now I'm going to get stung by a bee.Henry: This is good. This is what makes a podcast fun. What next?Lamorna: You don't get this in the BBC studios. Maybe you do. Oh, what was I about to say? Oh, yes. I like the idea of church shopping. People saying that often it speaks to the person they are, what they're looking for in a church. I think it's delightful to me that there's such a broad church, and there's so many different spaces that you can go into to discover the church that's right for you. Sorry. I'm really distracted by this wasp or bee. Anyway.Henry: How easy was it to get people to be honest with you?Lamorna: I don't know. I think that there's certain questions that do tunnel right through to the heart of things. Faith seems to be one of them. When you talk about faith with people, you're getting rid of quite a lot of the chaff around with the politeness or whatever niceties that you'd usually speak about.I was talking about this with another friend who's been doing this. He's doing a play about Grindr. He was talking about how strange it is that when you ask to interview someone and you have a dictaphone there, you do get a deeper instant conversation. Again, it's a bit like a therapeutic conversation where someone has said to you, "I'm just going to sit and listen." You've already agreed, and you know it's going to be in a book. "Do you mind talking about this thing?"That just allows this opportunity for people to be more honest because they're aware that the person there is actually wanting to listen. It's so hard to create spaces. I create a cordon and say, "We're going to have a serious conversation now." Often, that feels very artificial. I think yes, the beauty of getting to sit there with a dictaphone on your notebook is you are like, "I really am interested in this. It really matters to me." I guess it feels easy in that way to get honesty.Obviously, we're all constructing a version of ourselves for each other all the time. It's hard for me to know to what extent they're responding to what they're getting from me, and what they think I want to hear. If someone else interviewed them, they would probably get something quite different. I don't know. I think if you come to be with openness, and you talk a bit about your journey, then often people want to speak about it as well.I'm trying to think. I've rarely interviewed someone where I haven't felt this slightly glowy, shimmery sense of it, or what I'm learning feels new and feels very true. I felt the same with Cornish Fisherman, that there was this real honesty in these conversations. Many years ago, I remember I got really obsessed with interviewing my mom. I think I was just always wanting to practice interviewing. The same thing that if there's this object between you, it shifts the dimensions of the conversation and tends towards seriousness.Henry: How sudden are most people's conversions?Lamorna: Really depends. I was in this conversation with someone the other day. When she was 14, 15, she got caught shoplifting. She literally went, "Oh, if there's a God up there, can you help get me out of the situation?" The guy let her go, and she's been a Christian ever since. She had an instantaneous conversion. Someone I interviewed in the book, and he was a really thoughtful card-carrying atheist. He had his [unintelligible 00:51:58] in his back pocket.He hated the Christians and would always have a go at them at school because he thought it was silly, their belief. Then he had this instant conversion that feels very charismatic in form, where he was just walking down an avenue of trees at school, and he felt the entire universe smiling at him and went, "Oh s**t, I better become a Christian."Again, I wonder if it depends. I could say it depends on the person you are, whether you are capable of having an instant conversion. Perhaps if I were in a religious frame of mind, I'd say it depends on what God would want from you. Do you need an instant conversion, or do you need to very slowly have the well filling up?I really liked when a priest said to me that people often go to church and expect to be changed in a moment. He's like, "No, you have to go for 20 years before anything happens." Something about that slow incremental conversion to me is more satisfying. It's funny, I was having a conversation with someone about if they believe in ghosts, and they were like, "Well, if I saw one, then I believe in ghosts." For some people, transcendental things happen instantaneously, and it does change them ultimately instantly.I don't know, I would love to see some stats about which kinds of conversions are more popular, probably more instant ones. I love, and I use it in the book, but William James' Varieties of Religious Experience. He talks about there's some people who are sick-souled or who are also more porous bordered people for whom strange things can more easily cross the borders of their person. They're more likely to convert and more likely to see things.I really like him describing it that way because often someone who's like that, it might just be described as well, you have a mental illness. That some people are-- I don't know, they've got sharper antennae than the rest of us. I think that is an interesting thought for why some people can convert instantly.Henry: I think all conversions take a long time. At the moment, there's often a pivotal moment, but there's something a long time before or after that, that may or may not look a conversion, but which is an inevitable part of the process. I'm slightly obsessed with the idea of quests, but I think all conversions are a quest or a pilgrimage. Your book is basically a quest narrative. As you go around in your Toyota, visiting these places. I'm suspicious, I think the immediate moment is bundled up with a longer-term thing very often, but it's not easy to see it.Lamorna: I love that. I've thought about the long tail afterwards, but I hadn't thought about the lead-up, the idea of that. Of what little things are changing. That's such a lovely thought. Their conversions began from birth, maybe.Henry: The shoplifter, it doesn't look like that's where they're heading. In retrospect, you can see that there weren't that many ways out of this path that they're on. Malcolm X is like this. One way of reading his autobiography is as a coming-of-age story. Another way of reading it is, when is this guy going to convert? This is going to happen.Lamorna: I really like that. Then there's also that sense of how fixed the conversion is, as well, from moment to moment. That Adam Phillips' book on wanting to change, he talks about our desire for change often outstrips our capacity for change. That sense of how changed am I afterwards? How much does my conversion last in every moment? It goes back to the do you believe in the resurrection thing.I find that that really weird thing about writing a book is, it is partly a construction. You've got the eye in there. You're creating something that is different from your reality and fixed, and you're in charge of it. It's stable, it remains, and you come to an ending. Then your life continues to divert and deviate in loads of different ways. It's such a strange thing in that way. Every conversion narrative we have fixed in writing, be it Augustine or Paul, whatever, is so far from the reality of that person's experience.Henry: What did the new atheists get wrong?Lamorna: Arrogance. They were arrogant. Although I wonder, I guess it was such a cultural moment, and perhaps in the same way that everyone is in the media, very excitedly talking about revival now. There was something that was created around them as well, which was delight in this sense of the end of something. I wonder how much of that was them and how much of it was, they were being carried along by this cultural media movement.I suppose the thing that always gets said, and I haven't read enough Dawkins to say this with any authority, but is that the form of religion that he was attempting to denigrate was a very basic form of Christianity, a real, simplified sense. That he did that with all forms of religion. Scientific progress shows us we've progressed beyond this point, and we don't need this, and it's silly and foolish.I guess he underestimated the depth and richness of religion, and also the fact of this idea of historical progress, when the people in the past were foolish, when they were as bright and stupid as we are now.Henry: I think they believed in the secularization idea. People like Rodney Stark and others were pointing out that it's not really true that we secularized a lot more consistency. John Gray, the whole world is actually very religious. This led them away from John Stuart Mill-type thinking about theism. I think everyone should read more John Stuart Mill, but they particularly should have read the theism essays. That would have been--Lamorna: I've only just got into him because I love the LRB Close Reading podcast. It's Jonathan Rée and James Wood. They did one on John Stuart Mill's autobiography, which I've since been reading. It's an-Henry: It's a great book.Lamorna: -amazing book. His crisis is one of-- He says, "The question of religion is not something that has been a part of my life, but the sense of being so deeply learned." His dad was like, "No poetry." In his crisis moment, suddenly realizing that that's what he needed. He was missing feeling, or he was missing a way of looking at the world that had questioning and doubt within it through poetry.There was a bit in the autobiography, and he talks about when he was in this deep depression, whenever he was at 19 or something. That he was so depressed that he thought if there's a certain number of musical notes, one day there will be no more new music because every single combination will have been done. The sense of, it's so sweetly awful thinking, but without the sense-- I'm not sure what I'm trying to say here.I found his crisis so fascinating to read about and how he comes out of that through this care and attention of beautiful literature and thinking, and through his love of-- What was his wife called again?Henry: Harriet.Lamorna: Harriet. He credits her for almost all his thinking. He wouldn't have moved towards socialism without her. Suddenly, humans are deeply important to him. He feels sorry for the fact that his dad could not express love or take love from him, and that that was such a terrible deficiency in his life.Henry: Mill's interesting on religion because he looks very secular. In fact, if you read his letters, he's often going into churches.Lamorna: Oh, really?Henry: Yes, when he's in Italy, because he had tuberculosis. He had to be abroad a lot. He's always going to services at Easter and going into the churches. For a secular person, he really appreciates all these aspects of religion. His stepdaughter was-- there's a diary of hers in their archives. She was very religious, very intense. As a young woman, when she's 16, 17, intensely Catholic or Anglo-Catholic. Really, it's quite startling.I was reading this thing, and I was like, "Wait, who in the Mill household is writing this? This is insane." There are actually references in his letters where he says, "Oh, we'll have to arrive in time for Good Friday so that she can go to church." He's very attentive to it. Then he writes these theism essays, right at the end of his life. He's very open-minded and very interrogatory of the idea. He really wants to understand. He's not a new atheist at all.Lamorna: Oh, okay. I need to read the deism essays.Henry: You're going to love it. It's very aligned. What hymns do you like?Lamorna: Oh, no.Henry: You can be not a hymn person.Lamorna: No. I'm not a massive hymn person. When I'm in church, the Anglican church that I go to in London now, I always think, "Remember that. That was a really nice one." I like to be a pilgrim. I really don't have the brain that can do this off the cuff. I'm not very musically. I'm deeply unmusical.There was one that I was thinking of. I think it's an Irish one. I feel like I wrote this down at one point, because I thought I might be asked in another interview. I had to write down what I thought in case a hymn that I liked. Which sounds a bit like a politician, when they're asked a question, they're like, "I love football." I actually can't think of any. I'm sorry.Henry: No, that's fine.Lamorna: What are your best? Maybe that will spark something in me.Henry: I like Tell Out My Soul. Do you know that one?Lamorna: Oh, [sings] Tell Out My Soul. That's a good one.Henry: If you have a full church and people are really going for it, that can be amazing. I like all the classics. I don't have any unusual choices. Tell Out My Soul, it's a great one. Lamorna Ash, this has been great. Thank you very much.Lamorna: Thank you.Henry: To close, I think you're going to read us a passage from your book.Lamorna: I am.Henry: This is near the end. It's about the Bible.Lamorna: Yes. Thank you so much. This has definitely been my favourite interview.Henry: Oh, good.Lamorna: I really enjoyed it. It's really fun.Henry: Thank you.Lamorna: Yes, this is right near the end. This is when I ended up at a church, St Luke's, West Holloway. It was a very small 9:00 AM service. Whilst the priest who'd stepped in to read because the actual priest had left, was reading, I just kept thinking about all the stories that I'd heard and wondering about the Bible and how the choices behind where it ends, where it ends.I don't think I understand why the Bible ends where it does. The final lines of the book of Revelation are, "He who testifies to these things says, Yes, I am coming soon. Amen. Come, Lord Jesus, the grace of the Lord Jesus be with God's people. Amen." Which does sound like a to-be-continued. I don't mean the Bible feels incomplete because it ends with Revelation. What I mean is, if we have continued to hear God and wrestle with him and his emissaries ever since the first overtures of the Christian faith sounded.Why do we not treat these encounters with the same reverence as the works assembled in the New Testament? Why have we let our holy text grow so antique and untouchable instead of allowing them to expand like a divine Wikipedia updated in perpetuity? That way, each angelic struggle and Damascene conversion that has ever occurred or one day will, would become part of its fabric.In this Borgesian Bible, we would have the Gospel of Mary, not a fictitious biography constructed by a man a century after her death, but her true words. We would have the conversion of the Ethiopian eunuch on the road between Jerusalem and Gaza from Acts, but this time given in the first person. We would have descriptions from the Picts on Iona of the Irish Saint Columba appearing in a rowboat over the horizon.We would have the Gospels of those from the early Eastern Orthodox churches, Assyrian Gospels, Syriac Orthodox Gospels. We would have records of the crusades from the Christian soldiers sent out through Europe to Jerusalem in order to massacre those of other faiths, both Muslim and Jewish. In reading these accounts, we would be forced to confront the ways in which scripture can be interpreted
ONE OF THE BEST ACTION COMEDY SEQUELS OF ALL TIME?? Shanghai Knights Full Reaction Watch Along: / thereelrejects Download the PrizePicks today at https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/RE... & use code REJECTS to get $50 instantly when you play $5! Having finally seen Shanghai Noon & with Jackie Chan back in theatres with Karate Kid: Legends, Aaron & Tara REUNITE for a trip to Merry Olde England with their Shanghai Knights Reaction, Recap, Commentary, Analysis, & Spoiler Review!! Join Aaron Alexander & Roxy Striar as they return to the Wild West–meets–Victorian London antics of Shanghai Knights, where Chon Wang (Jackie Chan, Rush Hour, Drunken Master) and Roy O'Bannon (Owen Wilson, Wedding Crashers, Zoolander) continue their globe-trotting duo's misadventures. When Chon's father is murdered by anarchist Lord Edgar Lytton (Aidan Gillen, Game of Thrones, The Wire), the mismatched pair cross the ocean to chase justice—and stumble into Buckingham Palace intrigue, Jack the Ripper lore, and a horse-drawn carriage chase that has become one of the most searched-for sequences in action comedies. The film also features Fann Wong (Singaporean superstar of The Disappeared, Shanghai Dawn) as Chon Lin, Chon's resourceful sister who reluctantly joins the chaos; martial-arts legend Donnie Yen (star of Ip Man, Rogue One) as enigmatic swordsman Wu Chow, whose electrifying duel atop Big Ben delivers a knockout punch; Tom Fisher (known for Coraline, The Young Victoria) as Lord Robin Loth, Lytton's scheming servant; and a young Aaron Taylor-Johnson (breakout roles in Kick-Ass, Avengers: Age of Ultron) as a street urchin whose quick wit aids our heroes. Aaron & Roxy break down every unforgettable moment—from Chon's gravity-defying assault on Buckingham Palace spies to Roy's reluctant sword-fighting lessons, and the film's iconic Royal Guards fight atop the Tower Bridge. Don't miss their take on the frenetic dockside brawl, Chon's nail-biting balcony rescue, and the climactic showdown where past and present collide in a blaze of brass and blade. Follow Aaron On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/therealaaronalexander/?hl=en Follow Roxy Striar YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@TheWhirlGirls Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/roxystriar/?hl=en Twitter: https://twitter.com/roxystriar Intense Suspense by Audionautix is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/... Support The Channel By Getting Some REEL REJECTS Apparel! https://www.rejectnationshop.com/ Follow Us On Socials: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/reelrejects/ Tik-Tok: https://www.tiktok.com/@reelrejects?lang=en Twitter: https://x.com/reelrejects Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheReelRejects/ Music Used In Ad: Hat the Jazz by Twin Musicom is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Happy Alley by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/... POWERED BY @GFUEL Visit https://gfuel.ly/3wD5Ygo and use code REJECTNATION for 20% off select tubs!! Head Editor: https://www.instagram.com/praperhq/?hl=en Co-Editor: Greg Alba Co-Editor: John Humphrey Music In Video: Airport Lounge - Disco Ultralounge by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Ask Us A QUESTION On CAMEO: https://www.cameo.com/thereelrejects Follow TheReelRejects On FACEBOOK, TWITTER, & INSTAGRAM: FB: https://www.facebook.com/TheReelRejects/ INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/reelrejects/ TWITTER: https://twitter.com/thereelrejects Follow GREG ON INSTAGRAM & TWITTER: INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/thegregalba/ TWITTER: https://twitter.com/thegregalba Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In episode 152 of the UK Travel Planning Podcast, guest Kristen Gonzalez shares her eight-day family adventure through England with her husband and parents in their late 70s, highlighting their experiences in London and the Cotswolds during April. She details their thoughtful planning process, excellent transportation arrangements with XFA Cars, and memorable tours including Go Cotswolds excursions (enter code UKTAVPLAN for a 5% discount for our UKTP community) and a Seven Sisters coastal day trip from London.• Choosing the Cotswolds and London combination to showcase diverse aspects of England• Using private transfers instead of driving or navigating train connections• Taking two different Go Cotswolds tours to maximise exploration of picturesque villages• Staying in Covent Garden as the perfect London base with excellent dining and entertainment options• Finding the ideal balance between scheduled tours and free time for spontaneous exploration• Enjoying unique experiences like a historic Royal Pub tour, afternoon tea on a bus, and Tower Bridge's glass floor walkways• Discovering Mr. Fogg's Society of Exploration for cocktails and small plates in London• Visiting the Seven Sisters cliffs and Brighton on a well-organised day trip from LondonKristen also offers invaluable tips for travel planning, particularly on booking ahead. Tune in for practical advice, inspiring stories, and plenty of laughs to help you plan your own perfect UK getaway!⭐️ Guest - Kristen Gonzalez
The boys are making up for lost time and banging out two episodes in a week!We reached out to Cole before he dropped a 2:16 marathon debut and London, and finally got a chance to sit down and have a chat!It was never going to be all about London, and we chart Cole's rise from anchoring the school relay team in year 5 for his first taste of running right through to right now, and what's next.We also spoke about rice pudding, obviously. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Am 5. April 1722 entdeckte Jakob Roggeveen im Südpazifik Rapa Nui, das die Einwohner „Te Pito o Te Henua“, den „Nabel der Welt“, nannten. Die Insel sollte allerdings unter dem Namen bekannt werden, den Roggeveen ihr gab: die Osterinsel. Wer waren die Einwohner*innen und warum erschufen sie rund 1.000 riesige Steingesichter, die sogenannten Moai, und stellten sie mit dem Rücken zum Ozean auf? Warum fand die Cook-Expedition, die nur gut 50 Jahre nach Roggeveen stattfand, viele Statuen umgestürzt und beschädigt? Und warum stand das Volk der Rapa Nui gegen Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts kurz vor der Auslöschung? Was war in den knapp 200 Jahren seit der Entdeckung der Insel durch Europäer geschehen? Wir haben den aktuellen Stand der wissenschaftlichen Forschung zu Rapa Nui zusammengetragen. Vielen Dank an Lars von Auf Distanz für die Glückwünsche. Wie man uns unterstützen kann, könnt ihr hier nachlesen. Zum HOAXILLA Merchandise geht es hier QUELLEN Story der Woche: Der Tage an dem ein Bus über die Tower Bridge sprang Thema der Woche: Rapa Nui (die Osterinsel) in der dt. wikipedia Moai in der dt. wikipedia Jakob Roggeveen in der dt. wikipedia Der Bericht von Carl Friedrich Behrens National Geographic: Die riesigen Steinfiguren der Osterinsel National Geographic: Rapa Nui: Die bewegte Geschichte der „Osterinsel“ Scinexx.de: Osterinsel: DNA schreibt Geschichte um SZ: Wie die Entdeckung der Osterinsel vor 300 Jahren zum Fiasko wurde Die Honigpalme in der dt. wikipedia LA Times: Does ‘Rapa Nui’ Take Artistic License Too Far? Video - BBC: Easter Island - Mysteries of a Lost World Schwurbelalarm!!! Video - Erich von Däniken: The Alien Theories Behind Easter Island's Giant Statues
Discover powerful strategies to maximize your rental property returns and minimize costly vacancies. Learn how top investors are transforming their approach to property management, from tenant retention techniques to smart staffing solutions. Key Insights: Master the art of keeping great tenants and reducing turnover Understand when to scale your property management approach Explore innovative investment opportunities beyond traditional real estate Market Trends Spotlight: Rental demand is on the rise Emerging investment options offer unique wealth-building potential Strategic diversification is key to long-term financial success Explore alternative investment opportunities like sustainable teak forestry - a generational wealth strategy that offers: Low entry point Long-term growth potential International diversification Whether you're a seasoned investor or just starting out, these insights will help you make more informed, profitable real estate decisions. Resources: Learn more about the teak tree investment opportunity at Gremarketplace.com/teak Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/555 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments. You get paid first: Text FAMILY to 66866 Will you please leave a review for the show? I'd be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review” For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE' to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript: Automatically Transcribed With Otter.ai Keith Weinhold 0:01 Welcome to GRE. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, learn how to reduce a giant operational expense that you'll have over time your tenant vacancy and turnover, including how many units you must own before you hire your own on site property manager as your employee. Whatever happened to agent commissions in light of last year's NAR settlement, then a timely update on teak tree investing today on Get Rich Education. Mid South home buyers. I mean, they're total pros, with over two decades as the nation's highest rated turnkey provider. Their empathetic property managers use your ROI as their North Star. So it's no wonder that smart investors just keep lining up to get their completely renovated income properties like it's the newest iPhone. They're headquartered in Memphis and have globally attractive cash flows and A plus rating with the Better Business Bureau and now over 5000 houses renovated their zero markup on maintenance. Let that sink in, and they average a 98.9% occupancy rate, while their average renter stays more than three and a half years. Every home they offer has brand new components, a bumper to bumper, one year warranty, new 30 year roofs. And wait for it, a high quality renter. Remember that part and in an astounding price range, 100 to 180k I've personally toured their office and their properties in person in Memphis. Get to know Mid South. Enjoy cash flow from day one. Start yourself right now at mid southhomebuyers.com that's mid south homebuyers.com You're listening to the show that has created more financial freedom than nearly any show in the world. This is get rich education. Welcome to GRE from Manchester, New Hampshire to Manchester, England and across 188 nations worldwide, I'm Keith Weinhold, and you are back inside one of America's longest running and most listened to shows on real estate investing. This is get rich education. What's all that stuff really mean? I'm just another slack jawed and snaggletooth podcaster, a shaved mammal with a microphone. I'm joining you from here in London, England this week for the first time ever on the show. More on that later. Let's talk about reducing the biggest operational expense that you're ever going to have as a real estate investor, at least the one that you can exert a good measure of control over. That is reducing your tenant vacancy and turnover, that constant menace. Now, I suppose you might say that property tax is your biggest ongoing ops expense, but you've got less control over your property tax rate. So yeah, we're talking about increasing your net income by lowering your VIMTUM operating expenses. Vacancy is the V in that acronym. This is big because this can make or break your ability to have your property create positive cash flow and getting tenant turnover right both increases your income and reduces your expenses. It is springtime currently, and it's soon going to be summer, so it is the right time to talk about this. It's when there is more tenant turnover. The goal here is for you to really move the dial in increase the likelihood that your tenant is going to renew their lease. Now, sure if your tenant gets a new job out of town, they're going to move out. But if they're moving because of too many maintenance issues, well then that's something that you could have fixed. The average tenancy duration in the US over time is two to three years. And of course, that's going to be longer in single family rentals and shorter in apartments. And how long your tenant stays is driven by three factors, the price of your unit, the quality of your maintenance and the quality of your management. Let's say that your tenant moves out. To be conservative, that your vacancy period is two months between tenants. Okay, that's the turnover and the time to lease. It two months is a somewhat longish vacancy period. But come on, it happens sometimes, especially if you're going to make upgrades between tenancies and you're busy with other things in your life, if you have a move out every year at that rate, well, that is too often. That would amount. To a vacancy percentage of 14% you might think it's 17% but it isn't, because it's a 12 month vacancy plus two vacant months, all right, but if instead that tenant moves out every two years, that's just 8% vacancy, and every three years that's just 5% vacancy. Of course, if you keep your vacancy period to only one month rather than two, you can have all those numbers. You can really see how you are increasing your income by retaining the tenant. The most vital thing for you to keep in mind is that fast quality maintenance and good communication are by far the best forms of customer service that a property manager can provide, so prompt, quality maintenance. That's a retention strategy. Being a proactive helps. One strategy you can engage in is to reach out to the tenants two months before their lease is set to renew, and that's the time to give them the new lease price and ask them if they intend to stay. If they say, No, they're not, ask them why. And occasionally, you can sway them if there's been a misunderstanding in your relationship, for example, a lingering maintenance issue that hasn't been addressed, and perhaps they didn't bother to contact you about that, if nothing else, I think I mentioned this to you one time before offering a small reward, like a gift card helps. I mean, creating this sense of reciprocation is really one of the best retention tactics out there, even if the items being reciprocated aren't anywhere near equal value, like the value of a 12 month lease versus you giving them, say, a $50 gift card now, say you've tried those strategies, and none of that works, and your tenant does decide to leave, perhaps 45 days from now, but you know that you've got time in your life to turn over the unit now, and You know that you're going to be really busy with other things in 45 days. One thing that you can do then is shift your strategy to pay the tenant. Say you can pay them as little as 10 or 20 bucks a day to leave early. This way they'll vacate during a period where you've got the time to devote to the vacancy and the turnover and the showings to prospective new tenants, and that way, it's not going to linger vacant as long now, a technique like this is a little similar to an eviction, where if a tenant has violated their lease or becomes non paying, without you having to go through the length of Your court driven formal eviction process, you can pay them a lump sum to leave early. Hopefully that's not your situation, but that can come up. And I think you've heard of it before. This is known as the Cash for Keys strategy. That means to get a tenant that's made some violation against their lease, and you want to have them vacate the unit sooner. This means that you get the keys in your hand and the right to enter when you pay them to leave, rather than having to go through the not so fun eviction process and see a tenant wants to avoid a formal eviction as well, because that goes on their record, and then it can make it tough for that tenant to get rental housing elsewhere. But I dislike the Cash for Keys strategy in order to hold off from a formal eviction, because what that does is that rewards a person that violated a lease, although we know that that might also shorten your economic vacancy period, and it could actually be economically beneficial to you, Cash for Keys. It's just not ethical, though. I know it might be tempting for you, the landlord, the cash for key strategy. It rewards societally immoral behavior. Now, of course, you might be using a professional property manager that does all of this stuff for you, like I do today, but still, these are often the best practices for your manager. And I started out self managing, just like a lot of real estate investors do in the beginning, and that's where I learned strategies and techniques like this for reducing your tenant vacancy and turnover. Now, here's a really interesting question that you may not have had to ask yourself yet, but you may down the road, if you've grown your portfolio to a certain size and you're serious about reducing your vacancy and turnover expense, it might be time to ask yourself one big question, and that is for your management and maintenance. Should you use contractors, or should you start to hire your own employees? Now, if you have a small portfolio, it won't be enough work for you to keep an employee busy, so you should go with contract. Contractors. On the other hand, if you have an apartment complex with on site property management, I would definitely recommend having a make ready crew on site, because it's just so easy for them to get to and from a job site. Now, you should still maintain relationships with contractors as a backup, of course, and you should also have specialists like plumbers, electricians and HVAC people ready to call now, most investors are small and they use off site management, but if you grow big enough someday, or maybe it's two day, the important point about employees is that you really need to stay on them, because every extra hour costs you. You don't want anyone out there who's thinking that speed isn't essential, because they're like, ah, you know, I get paid by the hour. Contractors, on the other hand, they quote you or your manager a job up front. So while an extra day hurts because it's one more day you can't lease the unit, it hurts less than it does if you have your own employees. One problem with contractors is they often can't start right away, and this tends to be more true if you're self managing. See if you use a professional manager. They might have their own in house people so you can leverage their employees without having to manage employees yourself, even if your manager brings in an off site contractor, like an electrician or a plumber. Well, that contractor probably gets a lot of business from your property manager, and they have some sense of loyalty to your property manager, therefore, they're incentivized to show up on time faster than if you're trying to self manage, say, your small portfolio of five properties, and you or your tenant are the ones that call the electrician or the plumber. Well, those contractors are going to be less likely to prioritize you and your infrequent requests, and this is just another reason that I like to employ professional management and not self manage. Now, virtually no new real estate investor is going to hire their own employees, and most are never going to at all. All right, but how do you know? How would you know when it's time to hire your own property manager or your own contractor, and have them on your own payroll and you are their boss, if you've got under 20 to 30 units, all right, typically third party property management or self management with contractors, that's going to make more sense, because having a full time, dedicated employee, it's just not financially justifiable. Below 20 or 30 units, you're not going to be able to keep that employee busy. And I'm generally talking about if you have one apartment building here, or a bunch of single family rentals, only if they're in small, close proximity to each other. What about if you grow up to 30 to 60 units? All right now you're in a gray area. If the property is something that's pretty management intensive, like high turnover, or you own an older building, or you generate a lot of work orders, or you're in a challenging area. Well, at 30 to 60 units, you might justify a part time on site person. So how that could practically work in this 30 to 60 unit gray area, what you can do is have a resident manager that gets free rent, plus perhaps a small stipend from you. Okay, so that's a strategy that you can play in this gray area zone. That way they can be responsive to tenant requests, and you can keep your vacancy and turnover costs down. All right, how about when you're going even bigger and you reach 60 to 100 units. Now you're in the range where a full time on site manager or a maintenance person, starts to make financial and operational sense, because here it's 60 to 100 units. Your staffing model, it might be that you have one full time manager, they do the leasing, the tenant relations, in the admin stuff, and you'll also have a second person, a full time maintenance tech if they're needed, all right? And the final tier here, if you reach more than 100 units, oh, okay, now it is standard for you to have a full on site team. You could be in the hundreds of units. So we're talking about a property manager, a leasing agent, a maintenance lead, a groundskeeper and sometimes also a part time assistant manager. So that's it. That's the hierarchy of how, based on your portfolio size and where they're located, how you can serve tenants well and reduce your vacancy and turnover expense. Yes. All right now, what are some things that can shift those thresholds, those unit counts? Well, high rent or luxury buildings, they often need on site staff at a smaller unit count, very low rent or section eight properties, they may need more intensive oversight, buildings that have amenities, like some of these newer apartment buildings that have a pool and a gym, okay, that can trigger some more staffing needs. And if you own multiple properties that are nearby to each other, well, then you can share employees across those properties. And you've got to look at local labor costs in places like New York City, northeastern New Jersey, parts of New England, Miami or LA, those high cost places. Then breaking even on staffing. That probably takes a bigger property than those numbers that I talked about. But here, we tend to invest in those investor advantage areas, the inland northeast, the South, in the southeast, in the Midwest. Now, if you've got, say, even 50 smaller properties, but they're scattered all over the place, in multiple states, well then of course, you're not going to hire employees. A good general metric to leave you with here is that one on site employee for every 50 to 80 units that you own in the same area, that is common, that is a common industry practice in market rate multifamily apartments right now, these are pretty timeless strategies I've been talking about with you here. As for what's happening in The market lately, I continue to slowly get more optimistic about the long beleaguered apartment market. A few weeks ago, I talked about how there's finally been greater apartment rent increases, although those rent increases are still historically low. What recently we learned that apartments are seeing a longer duration of tenancy and today, per real page, every single one of the 50 largest apartment markets has posted month over month occupancy gains, and then that's somewhat commensurate with what we're seeing on the one to four unit side, because the home ownership rate has fallen. It just fell from 65.7% down to 65.1 quarter over quarter. Now that doesn't sound like much, but that's actually a substantial drop in the home ownership rate in just one quarter. And fewer homeowners means more renters. So this basically means that the percent of Americans, renting has gone up because you just take the flip side of those numbers. So the rentership rate has essentially risen from 34.3 up to 34.9 in just one quarter. Something that completely makes sense, because we all know that home ownership affordability, especially for that first time, home buyer is lower, more renters. Is good for rental property owners. It's bringing more rental demand, more occupancy and more future pressure on rising rents. Now I want to follow up with you on a story from last year that made a lot of waves in the larger real estate world, but not so much for real estate investors. You surely remember this. That is the NAR settlement that a lot of people thought would result in lower real estate agent fees. Lowered commissions were coming. That's what everybody thought last year. Stories about that were all over the place that realtor fees are about to shrink. What's happened since then? Well, not much realtor fees, they still haven't fallen in any significant way, although the settlement was more than a year ago and this went into effect nine months ago. So to back up for a moment, in case you missed it, what happened is that a group of sellers accused the NAR, the National Association of Realtors, of inflating home costs by letting buyer side and seller side agents communicate about commission rates on the MLS home database, which only agents can see. And a jury agreed, so the NAR settled the lawsuit for over $400 million in damages, and it barred agents from sharing commission rates on those MLS databases. So that was a huge change that was expected to extinguish the globally high five to 6% realtor fee in the United States, because global averages are between one and 3% so as a result, the US real estate industry, they were bracing themselves for up to a 30% drop in the commissions that Americans pay annually in fees. But the new rules. Things have been nothing other than a big nothing burger. It only took a matter of weeks, really, for most agents to realize, you know, what did the agents do? They just simply moved their conversations off the NAR website and over to phone, text and email. That's it. Yes, that's all they did. So since that time, the average commission for buyers agents has barely budged. It ticked down less than 110 of 1% so for example, it ticked down less than 500 bucks on a 500k home that's per Redfin. So agents still expect sellers to pay five to 6% now I'm not against agents. Not only can an agent guide you through the process, what they can do is get you a higher sale price than they could have otherwise, because they really know how to market and advertise your property and reach a greater pool of buyers, but their commission rates have hardly budged. And of course, here at GRE marketplace, we typically use a direct model where agent compensation isn't priced into your properties anyway. To review what you've learned so far today, being proactive can help reduce your tenant vacancy and turnover expense and increase your income. Prompt, quality maintenance, that is a retention strategy in itself, as can having one on site employee for every 50 to 80 apartment units. And one year later, changes at the NIR really haven't reduced aging commissions appreciably. I'm coming to you from London, England today, taking in all the top sites, Buckingham Palace and watching the changing of the guard over there, Big Ben a Thames river cruise and the London Bridge, which is actually called Tower Bridge. The real estate transaction that I'm currently involved in here is paying $550 a night to stay here at a nice hotel in the center of the city. It's right near the Thames, kind of a steep rate, and I sure didn't have to stay right in the city center, where everything is more pricey. But that's the experience that I want to have. Next week, I'll bring you the show from Edinburgh, Scotland, where I'll be paying even more for a well located hotel right on the Royal Mile, and I'll tell you how much more then I am here to boost their economies, I suppose more next, including a really timely update. I'm Keith Weinhold. You're listening to Episode 555, of get rich education. The same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours Ridge lending group NMLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your pre qual and even chat with President Chaley Ridge personally while it's on your mind, start at Ridge lendinggroup.com. That's Ridge lendinggroup.com. You know what's crazy? Your bank is getting rich off of you. The average savings account pays less than 1% it's like laughable. Meanwhile, if your money isn't making at least 4% you're losing to inflation. That's why I started putting my own money into the FFI liquidity fund. It's super simple. Your cash can pull in up to 8% returns and it compounds. It's not some high risk gamble like digital or AI stock trading. It's pretty low risk because they've got a 10 plus year track record of paying investors on time in full every time. I mean, I wouldn't be talking about it if I wasn't invested myself. You can invest as little as 25k and you keep earning until you decide you want your money back. No weird lockups or anything like that. So if you're like me and tired of your liquid funds just sitting there doing nothing. Check it out. Text family to 66866, to learn about freedom. Family investments, liquidity fund again. Text family to 66866. Tom Wheelwright 24:21 this is Rich Dad advisor, Tom wheelwright. Listen to get rich education with Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream. Keith Weinhold 24:37 Welcome back to Episode 555, of get rich Education. I'm your host, Keith Weinhold, with an episode number like 555, you would expect me to go deep with you on real estate pays five ways, but we did that five weeks ago on episode 550 with your audio masterclass right here on the show today, we're talking about something with less upside. Than say that or the inflation triple crown, and instead on reducing your downside, vacancy and turnover expense, next week here on the show, I expect to sit down with a guest that's a highly regarded financier and author of a fairly hot new finance book, Christopher Whelan, and next week's show could get really interesting, because I've heard Chris say something about how real estate prices could fall back to 2020 levels. In my opinion, that is so many levels of unlikely that happening is about as likely as your grocery bills falling back to 2020 levels. So we'll see it could turn into a debate next week with Christopher Whelan and I. He is a sharp, well informed guy that also used to work at the New York Fed. That's next week down the road, longtime and former co host of the real estate guys radio show, Russell gray will join us again here, and we'll see what he's been up to in his post real estate guys, radio life that's coming up in a few weeks. Lots of great future content here, monologs, yes, those slack jawed monologs For me, repeat guests and new guests joining in as well. Back to this week now, there's an intriguing and potentially lucrative investment that we've discussed on the show here before, and I do have a timely and crucial update about it. A little while back, I sat down with the teak operations principle when we were in New Orleans together. These are yes, those Panama teak tree plantations that so many of you have already invested in. Yes. So as it is here. I am an American in London today talking about teak trees in Panama and I interviewed our upcoming guest here when we were in New Orleans together, the teak investment has a long time horizon, because trees have to grow. There's also a low cost of entry and no loans available. This is a real estate investment. You can own the land with the title to it and the trees that grow on top of them. Historically, teak returns have been five and a half percent, which doesn't sound like much, but see it grows in board foot volume at the same time that the unit price grows. And if inflation runs high over the next 25 years, your return might be higher. But the reason that we're discussing this now is because the principal, Mike Cobb here meeting with me, he is going to mention a price, and this is key two weeks from today, on June 9, the price for the teak parcels increases substantially. I'll tell you about that shortly. So for GRE followers, you can get locked into the lower price for just two more weeks. Here's my chat from a little while back with the teak tree investment principle, and then I'll return to bring you more. Hey, did you know that you can own a quarter acre parcel of a producing teak plantation, you own the title to the land, and you get the growth in the trees. On top of that, this is something that you can do as an investor. And teak trees are a valuable hardwood that you own, typically in Central America. So there's a very low cost of entry to this investment, and that's what attracts a lot of people to it. And I am with Mike Cobb, the CEO. He's also the author of the new book how to buy your home overseas and get it right the first time. But Mike, a lot of people are interested in the teak investment because it is so approachable. Tell us about it. Give us a general overview. Mike Cobb 28:42 absolutely, you know, thanks for having me on. It's always nice to be with you. We're, we're having some fun here in New Orleans, which is terrific, you know, yeah, the teak plantation is something that I envisioned back in 1998 so what's that like 26 years ago? Right? And in 1999 we planted our very first 100 Acre teak plantation. Because what we thought about at the time, which has now proven true 25 years later, is that, you know, I was either going to need the money in 25 years and be really glad I did this, or I wasn't going to need the money in 25 years and I was going to be really glad I did this. You know what? I don't really need the money now, but I'm really glad I did this. And 25 years comes. And I think that's been really the challenge for a lot of people looking at teak. They're just like, ah, 25 years. It's too long, but 25 years comes. 25 years will come, and you can either have planted the trees and be ready to take this huge windfall of return, or you won't be getting a windfall return. So I think that's the challenge, the mental challenge, I think maybe an average investor has, but I know you work with superior investors because they're paying attention to what you're writing, they're watching your podcast, they're reading your newsletter. You have far superior investors than I would say, the average investor. So I think this is a great thing for folks to check out. Keith Weinhold 30:00 All right, so you're talking about the investment timeline, from the time a tea tree seed is planted until the harvest time that can feel like quite a while. You have been doing this over 25 years, and that is key when you as an investor go offshore or go overseas to have trust in a stable company that's been around for a long time. That's why, really, you're one of the few people that I work with who are outside of the United States real estate like the teak trees. Mike Cobb 30:25 Thank you. Yeah, we've been around for 31 years. I've been working in the region. 31 our development company is 28 years old. Our plantation is now 26 years old. 25 with the trees, but we bought the land 26 years ago. But the bottom line, you're right and and the other thing that we should care about. And you brought this up earlier, when we're kind of chatting, is country, what country are you planting trees in that you got to wait 25 years for them to mature and harvest? By the way, the Panama. By the way, Panama, and of all the countries in the region where I feel the most comfortable as an investor, Panama's yet, because Panama's got the canal. And I know people say, oh, yeah, that's right. It's a vital strategic US interest. It's a vital world interest. The Chinese care about it as much as we do. The Europeans care about it. Anybody who wants commerce to happen cares about that canal being open. And so you've got this country, Panama, that has the canal stable, economically stable, politically stable. And when starting to talk about 2550 7500, year time frames, because you own the land, you get the harvest in 25 years, you replant, and then your children get the next harvest, and your grandchildren get the next harvest. It is truly generational wealth. Stewardship Keith Weinhold 31:41 Panama is a little bit like investing overseas with training wheels on their well developed, first Central American nation. They even use the United States dollars. They do is that familiar? Absolutely well. But as the investors thinking about investing in teak plantations, just tell us about the properties of teak wood, of all wood types. Why teak? Tell us about the value there. Mike Cobb 32:00 Yeah, teak has been grown in plantations, starting with the British back about 400 years ago. And so you've got centuries of plantation growing of teak as a crop, right? And so you've got this incredible longevity of information and things like that. And I know some of the stats off the top of my head, since 1972 the average price of teak lumber has has risen about five and a half percent a year over a 52 year period. Talk about track record, centuries of growing as a crop, right? 52 years as a lumber commodity. Look, people been using it to make ships. Its hardness is its most valuable characteristic is an extremely hard wood. It's resistant to rot fungus, so it's used in outdoor furniture, for example, right? Some of the stuff on the Titanic they pulled up from the bottom of the ocean, you know, chairs made a teak, right? Teak. But ship builders fine furniture, outdoor furniture and and they're cutting teak down. This is so important, they are cutting teak down eight to 10 times faster than anybody in the world is replanting it. So just imagine what that does to supply and demand and prices based on just basic economics, right? Keith Weinhold 33:13 Yeah, that is some scarcity. That is a really good point. Tell us about what you're surely interested in. What do the investor returns look like. Mike Cobb 33:21 Yeah. So you know, to own one of these quarter acre parcels, by the way, you said it before you own the land, you get title to the land you own the trees. $6,880 that's your that's your entry. Gosh. So for less than $7,000 you own a quarter acre of teeth trees that in 25 years projected returns. We all projections right about $94,000 a little over $94,000 so 7000 turns into $90,000 over 25 years, harvest, plant the trees again, and in 25 years, your kids or your grandkids will get the next harvest, and so on and so on. It is a powerful generational wealth stewardship. In fact, right now we have what we call give the gift of teak because look, you know, you got kids, you got grandkids. What are you gonna get them? Right? I mean, they got everything they want, presumably, right? You buy them a teak parcel, right? Buy that kid, buy that grandkid, a teak parcel. What a cool idea. Oh my gosh, in 25 years, you might be gone, right, but they're gonna get this big windfall, and they're gonna thank grandma or grandpa, right for for thinking of them 25 years into the future? Keith Weinhold 34:27 Yeah? Oh, I love that. And you're so proud about what you do. You regularly offer investor tour so that they come and see the teak. But maybe you know, for you, the investor, you're wondering, okay, if you're used to investing in us real estate, you might be making two leaps here. You'd be going from residential real estate to agricultural, and you'd also be investing in a nation outside your home country. And when it comes to those sort of questions, I think any savvy investor asks, okay, what are the risks involved with this investment? Can you tell us about that? Mike Cobb 34:59 Yeah, sure. Look, you've got political risk, country risk, political risk, which, I think again, of all the countries in the region, Panama, dollar, economy, canal, safe, stable. So the political risk is minimal. It's there. It's real. You know, fire risk is an issue, right? Trees burn. The good thing about teak is that after about year three, they're up. And you keep them trimmed, trim all the low branches off. So fire risk really drops incredibly low after about year three or four. But ultimately, it's about professional management. We have a company called Heyo Forrestal that we hired 25 years ago, 26 years ago, actually, to help us find the land, do the analysis of the land, make sure it was good for teak. And when you hire professionals, you get professional results. I mean, we stayed with this company for 26 years now, and the guy that we met early on, a little forestry engineer, is now General Manager and partner in the business. So we've watched that business grow up alongside ours at the same time. Those relationships, you know, Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers have a song you can't make old friends. So here we are with Jacobo and some of the Luis that we've worked with for, you know, 26 years, and the relationships matter, especially in that part of the world, but professionalism and professional management is the key, and you have that alongside the relationships. Both are important. Keith Weinhold 36:20 yes. So we're talking about how the property manager is such an important part of your team, and you think about your single family homes or your apartment buildings. And Mike here is talking about the importance of professional management, because teak trees need a little management and pruning, and sometimes there are thinnings which can give you some income so that you don't have to wait 25 years. Correct another way in which you might not have to wait 25 years for the full harvest cycle is at times you can buy trees that are, say, already seven years old, so you can only be waiting 18 years, or that are teens, so you might only be waiting 10 years, or some things about that, those are some of the options. But Mike, before I ask you if you have any last word, if you want to learn more about this, get some information, learn more about it, and learn how to connect with Mike's team. He is one of our GRE marketplace providers, and he's the owner of that company. You can do that at gre marketplace.com/teak, any last thing someone should know about teak before they consider investing? Mike? Mike Cobb 37:16 Yeah, well, two things you mentioned the tour. So we do run discovery tours. We have one coming up in January, end of January, two days, we go out to the plantation, the teenage teat plantation, by the way, oak, which is eight or nine more years to harvest. Then we're going to the sawmill, because all of our logs go through a sawmill to convert to lumber, which enhances the return to the investor. Keith Weinhold 37:36 Do the teens sleep until noon? Or can we visit them Mike Cobb 37:38 and then they're on their phones all day If we're gonna go visit them. We'll wake them up and, like, get on their phones. But here's, here's the last parting word. I think it's scary for a lot of people. It is scary. You're going overseas, you're outside of, you know, residential you're going into a new industry. You're going to a new country. The reason this works for so many people, over 1000 now, have done this, is it's such a small bite, $7,000 and if that's maybe one or 2% of your portfolio, what I hate to say, put it on the table and roll the dice, but you'll be happy you did. I'm happy I did. It's a small bite, but that international diversification is so important. And then you put it in something that's absolutely not correlated to the market. It's not correlated to us real estate. I mean, in 2008 to 2012 when real estate was dying in the US, our trees just kept growing. So non correlated, non US, right? And non residential. I think that's the reason you want to take a little tiny piece of your portfolio and put it overseas in something like teak. Keith Weinhold 38:42 We know over the long term that it has grown in value 5.5% a year, but at the same time, it grows in volume, in the amount of board fees you're getting a crease, an increase in both unit value and volume. It's really growing a couple ways. At the same time, you've had over 1000 different individual investors invest in the teak now, several dozen, maybe even more than 100 of those have been you the get rich education follower. So again, thanks for joining me, Mike. If you want to learn more, start at gre marketplace.com/teak. I'm Keith Weinhold. I'll see you next time. Yeah, good information from Mike there again for GRE followers, that 6880 price deadline is Monday, June 9, and then it goes to 8680, that is a 26% price increase, and this is because land and planting costs have skyrocketed. And you know, I have long wondered about when they were going to change that same lower price that they've had for a lot of years. The provider recently added a sawmill to convert logs to lumber, and that enhances investment returns. So when you inquire for more info, you can ask about that, and that could very well put them above the 94k per part. Possible projected payout. Teak, hardwood, it just has some amazing physical properties. It's not your run of the mill. Backyard. Maple, it is a real asset. Think of it as a forest that fights back against Fiat and the provider reputation and continuity are almost impeccable. They've even had the same forestry manager, yeah, sort of like a property manager for trees, because trees take things like prunings and thinnings, the same manager for all 26 years of the teak operation. In the future, I might join one of their teak investor tours in Panama, and if I do, I'll be sure to let you know so that we can meet up that might even be a GRE exclusive tour. What you really need to know now is that, again, the lower price is good until Monday, June 9, to get started or simply learn more, visit gre marketplace.com/teak, that's t, e, a, k, until next week, I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, don't quit your Daydream. Unknown Speaker 41:10 Nothing on this show should be considered specific, personal or professional advice. Please consult an appropriate tax, legal, real estate, financial or business professional for individualized advice. Opinions of guests are their own. Information is not guaranteed. All investment strategies have the potential for profit or loss. The host is operating on behalf of get rich Education LLC exclusively. Keith Weinhold 41:34 You know, whenever you want the best written real estate and finance info, oh, geez, today's experience limits your free articles access and it's got pay walls and pop ups and push notifications and cookies disclaimers. It's not so great. So then it's vital to place nice, clean, free content into your hands that adds no hype value to your life. That's why this is the golden age of quality newsletters. And I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor, and it's to the point because even the word abbreviation is too long, my letter usually takes less than three minutes to read, and when you start the letter. You also get my one hour fast real estate video. Of course, it's all completely free. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be easier for you to get it right now. Just text gre 266, 866, while it's on your mind, take a moment to do it right now. Text, GRE to 66866. The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth, building, getricheducation.com
What if injuries aren't inevitable, but predictable events with upstream warning signs we can actually address? Henry Abbott, award-winning journalist and founder of True Hoop, joins us to discuss his groundbreaking book "Ballistic: The New Science of Injury-Free Athletic Performance" that challenges everything we thought we knew about athletic durability.Abbott shares fascinating insights from his research at P3 (Peak Performance Project), where cutting-edge biomechanics analysis is revolutionizing how athletes train. Most surprisingly, he reveals how mental limitations often precede physical ones. Through a remarkable personal anecdote about holding his breath for over four minutes after minimal instruction, Abbott demonstrates how our brains frequently create barriers our bodies haven't actually reached.For runners specifically, Abbott provides practical wisdom on proper landing mechanics, identifying injury risk factors, and strengthening the often-neglected muscles beneath the knee that create efficient "bouncy" movement. Rather than obsessing over form while running, he suggests building capability through targeted training, then allowing your body to naturally implement improvements.In the Race Report Spotlight, we hear from 11 runners across four countries who completed the London Marathon. They share their experiences with punishing heat and incredible crowd support. They also describe the emotional highs of crossing Tower Bridge and finishing near Buckingham Palace. Their stories capture both the challenge and the magic of completing a World Major Marathon. Whether you're battling recurring injuries, seeking performance improvements, or simply wanting to run with less pain, this episode offers invaluable insights that might just transform your relationship with running. Subscribe now and join our Rise and Run community as we explore the cutting-edge science of injury-free athletic performance.Henry Abbott's LinksBallistic Book @henryabbott.comTrue Hoop WebsitePeak Performance ProjectRise and Run LinksRise and Run Podcast Facebook PageRise and Run Podcast InstagramRise and Run Podcast Website and ShopRise and Run PatreonPassport to RunRunningwithalysha Alysha's Run Coaching (Mention Rise And Run and get $10 off)Send us a textSupport the showRise and Run Podcast is supported by our audience. When you make a purchase through one of our affiliate links, we may earn a commission. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.Sponsor LinksMagic Bound Travel Stoked Metabolic CoachingRise and Run Podcast Cruise Interest Form with Magic Bound Travel Affiliate LinksRise and Run Amazon Affiliate Web Page Kawaiian Pizza ApparelGoGuarded
Baz Richards and Michelle Ford chat with Michelle Vellacott and Tom Carradine of Tower Bridge Studios. Michelle's music hall name is Michelle Grant and Tom performs amedley of wartime hits.
On Nick Ferrari at Breakfast,Youth Demand have claimed that the activists who disrupted the London Marathon on Tower Bridge have made 'a massive sacrifice'.London are at the centre of a knife crime epidemic with more attacks than the whole of Germany.11 killed as car ploughs into Vancouver festival crowd.All of this and more on Nick Ferrari - The Whole Show podcast.
Oil tycoon Robert P. McCulloch purchased London Bridge for $2,460,000 on 17th April, 1968. The Victorian structure, which had been sinking into the River Thames at a rate of one inch every eight years, was then dismantled stone by stone and shipped to the USA, where it now bestrides Lake Havasu City, Arizona. The wheeze was the work of advertising executive-turned-London councilor Ivan Luckin, who convinced his colleagues that it might be possible to sell the bridge to pay for the costs of building a new one, and set about a marketing blitz including a press conference in New York in which he invoked the crossing's illustrious Roman history. In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly revisit the gaudy launch ceremony; debunk the myth that McCulloch thought he was buying Tower Bridge instead; and reveal that buying the bridge wasn't even this eccentric entrepreneur's wackiest idea… Further Reading: • ‘How London Bridge Ended Up In Arizona' (HISTORY, 2016): https://www.history.com/news/how-london-bridge-ended-up-in-arizona • Inside Arizona's London Bridge (BBC, 2018): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnHy4_P8SCE • ‘London Bridge in America - The Tall Story of a Transatlantic Crossing, By Travis Elborough' (Jonathan Cape, 2013): https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/London_Bridge_in_America/n96uDvKN3ioC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Ivan+Luckin&pg=PA271&printsec=frontcover Love the show? Support us! Join
Interactive Brokers UK turns 25—and we're celebrating with CEO Gerry Perez inside the Tower of London. From humble beginnings to a global powerhouse, hear the untold stories, customer moments, and what's next for IBKR in a post-Brexit world.
I've been talking to Sean Collins, chief executive of Uber Boat by Thames Clippers, about his shiny new ferry – and how it will transform travel across the river downstream of Tower Bridge in London.This podcast is free, as is Independent Travel's weekly newsletter. Sign up here to get it delivered to your inbox. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Join us as we share highlights from our unforgettable winter trip to London! From navigating the iconic Tube to staying at one of the city's best hotels, this episode is packed with tips and stories:
Today we discuss replacement Daves, Tower Bridge, lava, the Terminator, worms, processed foods and terroir. The specific replacement Daves are Meat Dave, Skin Dave, Cheese Dave and Wasp Dave.We also discuss cheese. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
There are a few things everyone seems to believe about the layout of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride--but none of them are true. On this episode of Distory, we're merrily on our way to nowhere in particular to understand the English countryside in Mr. Toad's Wild Ride in a greater historical context. After we encounter a few bobbies (and discuss their manners and wardrobe), we dig deep into the context of Wind in the Willows and how it inspired the art we see for Ratty's House. As we fly around the corner toward the farmer and his sheep, Kate gets on her soapbox and debunks one of the biggest lies ever told about Mr. Toad. Kirk shares some portside foreshadowing, Kate explains why the Tower Bridge is included in this attraction, Kirk sings some AC/DC, and Kate gets nerdy with typography as this episode goes out with a bang. Join us LIVE on YouTube most Thursdays at 10:30am Pacific/1:30pm Eastern for more Distory!Kate's Youtube: @disneyciceroneYou can also find us on Instagram, Facebook, and at disneycicerone.com & walruscarp.comView full video versions of each episode at Disney Cicerone's YouTube channel HERE OR on the Spotify version of our podcast.Distory T-shirts and StickersKate's SubstackKate's books on AmazonWalrusCarp T-shirts & MerchMOWD app
Este domingo 2 de febrero Un buen día para viajar no falta a su cita radiofónica con las horas más viajeras de la radio asturiana… Alberto Campa inicia el trayecto con un viaje a la capital inglesa, la siempre atractiva Londres; Tower Bridge, Torre de Londres, Picadilly Circus, Westminster, Buckingham, Sant Paul o el mítico Big Ben serán protagonistas en este recorrido londinense… A continuación será otra capital, la de España, la protagonista de nuestras salidas porque la guía oficial Leticia Cuenca nos hace un recorrido fantástico por la historia de Madrid, desde su raiz árabe como Mayrit hasta la actualidad siguiendo las huellas que la historia nos legó… En Grandes Personajes de la Historia la catedrática emérita de la Universidad Carlos III y mediavalista María Jesús Fuente nos traslada al siglo XIV y nos habla de una mujer muy destacada, Leonor de Guzmán, que fue amante de Alfonso XI y madre del que sería iniciador de la dinastía Trastamara!!!... Y fin de trayecto visitando San Esteban de Pravia, porque la historia de esta población es apasionante y no solo por el periodo industrial, los investigadores Manuel Ruiz de Bucesta y Juan José Escudero, ambos del Instituto de Estudios Históricos Bances y Valdés , han escrito una ‘brevisima’ historia de San Esteban de Pravia , que como veréis poco tiene de brevísima, dos horas de viaje y radio en Rpa!!
Today in 1952, a double decker bus driver in London had to make a split second decision to protect his passengers… and realized the safest option was to gun it and jump a city landmark. Plus: today in 1999, the passing of Sarah Knauss, who at age 119 was the longest-lived American ever. The day a bus jumped Tower Bridge (TowerBridge.org) World's oldest person misses millennium (BBC) Jump on over to our Facebook page and support our show
Wandering Works for Us PodcastDate: 21 December 2024Title: Christmas in London (our first trip!)Summary of EpisodeWe went to London to catch the Christmas Markets and hang with our niece Katey. London was definitely “Giving Christmas.”The Christmas decorations and markets were great but we also got to see the London Tower, Tower Bridge, Buckingham Palace, the changing of the guard and King Charles!!We also enjoyed the pubs and afternoon tea at the Dalloway Terrace. Find out what else we did on our first trip to London (together).Key Topics[02:30] Christmas Markets in London and everywhere [7:45] Christmas lights tour[11:00] Fortnam and Mason (Yikes)[13:00] Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace[16:00] Tower of London and Tower Bridge[10:00] The British Museum[21:50] Big Ben, St. James Park, pelicans, Royal Opera House, and other fun stuff[24:00] Evensong in Westminster[27:00] Pubs–George Inn and Blackfriars (we've listed more on the blog)[31:15] Cahoots bar[33:00] Afternoon Tea [35:00] Things we will do next time Important Links To follow all our antics and adventures, please visit our social media pages and website at wwforus.com! You can send us a message at any of these places and feel free to email us at wandering@wwforus.comLike what we are doing? Buy us a gin and tonic and help us keep going!InstagramFacebookTiktokYouTubeLooking for a tour guide in Portugal? I have a whole list!Blog post for this episode: Christmas in London--will link as soon as it is finished!Thanks to Everyone who has been so supportive!Special thanks to all of you who have listened, subscribed, followed us on social media and just took the time to say hello and tell us how much you enjoy our podcast and blog. YOU GUYS ARE THE BEST!!Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/wandering-works-for-us/donations
The UN climate summit is opening in Azerbaijan with 2024 set to be the first year to breach the 1.5C global warming limit. But could President-elect Donald Trump's energy policies undermine the goal of reducing carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions? Also on the programme: Russia and Ukraine attack each other with drones in their heaviest assault of the war; and Dutch police use a hologram of a sex worker murdered 15 years ago in a fresh bid to find her killer.(Photo: Climate activists project a message onto Tower Bridge ahead of COP29 climate talks in London. Credit: Reuters)
Rising tensions in the Middle East are adding new global economic uncertainties. The pound, while recovering slightly on Friday, remained set for its worst week in more than a year - as oil heads for the biggest weekly price increase since 2023.It came as Israel intensified strikes on Lebanon following Iran's missile barrage and ongoing Hezbollah rocket attacks. The Standard podcast is joined by Dr James Meadway, economist at the Progressive Economy Forum, to examine the financial forecast.In part two, hear some of the soundscapes visitors to a high-tech immersive art installation at Lumen Studios close to Tower Bridge can experience.Spanning over 1,000 square metres, the ticketed Eclipse show by French-Japanese visual art duo Nonotak explore the boundary between art and technology as visitors step into a show filled with darkness, light beams and sound. Jen Roebuck, chief executive of Bermondsey's Lumen Studios, discusses the installation and our growing appetite for IRL immersive art. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
How do you prepare for the project of a lifetime? In this episode we're bringing you into the minds of Marco Fürst and Marco Waltenspiel, the two Wings through Tower Bridge skydivers who pulled off their dream project by flying through London's iconic landmark. Listen in to the live show as they reveal the lengths they went to to prepare for the project, including building their own life sized replica of the Tower Bridge in London.
How do you prepare for the project of a lifetime? In this episode we're bringing you into the minds of Marco Fürst & Marco Waltenspiel, the two 'Wings through Tower Bridge' skydivers who pulled off their dream project by flying through London's iconic landmark. Listen in to the live show as they reveal the lengths they went to to prepare for the project, including building their own life sized replica of the Tower Bridge in London.
How World Relief Sacramento helps refugees adapt to their new homes. A new original play gives voice to incarcerated individuals at Folsom State Prison. Finally, artist Jennifer Peart reimagines iconic Sacramento landmarks. World Refugee Day in Sacramento June 20 is World Refugee Day, which was declared by the United Nations to honor refugees around the world. Sacramento itself has become a major destination for refugee populations, especially from Afghanistan and Ukraine in recent years. Svitlana Iotko, the Cultural Orientation Coordinator for World Relief Sacramento joins Insight to share her own experiences as a Ukrainian refugee, and how World Relief helps new arrivals adapt to their surroundings. New Play at Folsom State Prison For the past several months, a series of theater classes at Folsom State Prison have been giving a voice and creative outlet to those incarcerated inside. The classes were organized through a collaboration between the Prison Arts Collective and Sacramento State. Dr. Erin Kaplan, Professor of Critical Theory, Drama, Literature and Practice at Sac State and Ginny Oshiro, Training Coordinator for the Prison Arts Collective talk about the project, and about the performance in Folsom which debuted last week. Artist Jennifer Peart A contemporary landscape painter envisions some of our most iconic places - Sacramento's Tower Bridge, Half Dome in Yosemite - in an entirely new way, drawing inspiration from nature and science fiction. We'll meet artist Jennifer Peart and hear how she's brought her passion to life.
Skip the Queue is brought to you by Rubber Cheese, a digital agency that builds remarkable systems and websites for attractions that helps them increase their visitor numbers. Your host is Paul Marden, CEO of Rubber Cheese.Fill in the Rubber Cheese 2024 Visitor Attraction Website Survey - the annual benchmark statistics for the attractions sector.If you like what you hear, you can subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, and all the usual channels by searching Skip the Queue or visit our website rubbercheese.com/podcast.If you've enjoyed this podcast, please leave us a five star review, it really helps others find us. And remember to follow us on Twitter for your chance to win the books that have been mentioned in this podcast.Competition ends on 3rd July 2024. The winner will be contacted via Twitter. Show references:Lego House in BillundSutton Hoo (National Trust)Sutton Hoo at the British MuseumThe Dig on NetflixSutton Hoo mask on Lego IdeasThe Dig: Lego version of Sutton Hoo treasure 'amazing' (BBC News)Events at The Hold IpswitchAndrew Webb is a LEGO enthusiast who uses bricks in outreach programmes for teams and organisations as diverse at Arm, Pinset Mason, The National Trust, English Heritage, and the Scouts. During the UK's second Lockdown in early 2021, He made the 1500 year old Sutton Hoo Helmet out of LEGO bricks and submitted it to LEGO Ideas. The build achieved international media coverage, and has since been donated to the National Trust. Andrew continues to help attractions and institutions with LEGO programmes. By day, he works as a global head of content marketing for a B2B tech company. Find out more at http://teambuildingwithbricks.com Transcription: Paul Marden: Welcome to Skip the Queue, a podcast for people working in and working with Mister attractions. I'm your host, Paul Marden. Today I'm talking to Andrew Webb. By day, Andrew is a content marketer for a tech firm, but in his spare time helps attractions to use Lego as a tool to attract and engage diverse audiences and enable them to interpret history and culture. We're going to talk about what it means to be an building, a model of anglo saxon helmet, and the 24 skills that are used when building with Lego. Paul Marden: So welcome to the podcast. Andrew Webb: Thank you. Paul Marden: On Skip the Queue, we always start with some icebreaker questions that you know nothing about. So let's launch into a couple of those. Book and a pool or museums and galleries for your city break. Andrew Webb: Museum and galleries.Paul Marden: Yeah. I'd expect nothing less given what we're about to talk about. This is one from one of my colleagues, actually, who is really good at icebreakers whenever we do a team building eventually. So he said, “Would you rather have it and lose it or never have it at all?”Andrew Webb: Oh, gosh, I'll have it and lose it for sure. Paul Marden: Yeah, gotta be. That one's from miles. Say thank you, Myles. That was a cracker. Andrew Webb: Do you remember the word there was a great one. Would you rather eat ten donuts or raw onion? Paul Marden: Oh, ten donuts, hand down. I could easily do that. Andrew Webb: I'd get onion. I'd get onion. Every time I would take an onion over ten donuts. I'd be sick after ten donuts. Paul Marden: Oh, no, I reckon I could take that. No problem. Andrew Webb: Okay. Paul Marden: Okay. So we're going to talk a little bit about your adventures in Lego over the last few years. So why don't we kick off and talk a little bit about your original interest in Lego? Because I know it goes back not a long way, because that would be rude. But it goes back to a few years ago, doesn't it? Andrew Webb: It does. I mean, like most people growing up in what we might loosely term the west, I had like, I was a kid, you know, I think most of us grew up with it like that. And then like, you know, growing up in that first age of plastics with Heman, Transformers, Lego, Star wars, all of that sort of stuff. Paul Marden: You're just describing my childhood. Andrew Webb: It's funny because that was. It was all sort of ephemeral, right? I mean, the idea was that the reason why that boom happened, just to dwell on why they're going plastic things. Before that, toys were made out of either tin or wood. So, you know, they were very labour intensive produce there's certainly injection moulding comes along and we could just have anything coupled with the tv shows and the films and all this sort of stuff. So we all grew up in this sort of first age of disposable plastic, and then it all just gets passed down as kids grow up. It gets given away, gets put in the loft and forgotten about. There's a moment when a return of the Jedi bedspread doesn't look cool anymore, right? You hit about 13, 14 and you're like, “Mom, I really want some regular stuff there.”Andrew Webb: So like everybody, you know, I gave it all away, sold it and whatever, but I kept onto my lego and then fast forward, you know, I become a parent and Lego starts to come back into my life. So I'm sort of at a stage where I'm working for a travel startup and I get a press release to go to the Lego House, which if no one has heard about it, where have you been? But also it is a fantastic home of the brick, which Lego built in, opened in 2016. And it is a phenomenal temple to Lego. Not in terms of like a Legoland style approach with rides and things like that, but it's all about the brick and activities that you can do in a brick. Andrew Webb: There is great pools and huge pits of Lego to play with there, as well as displays and all this sort of stuff. They've actually got a Lego duplo waterfall.Paul Marden: Really? Andrew Webb: Oh, I mean, it's a fantastic attraction. And the way they've done it is just incredible. So they blend a lot of digital things. So if you make a small fish and insert it into this thing, it appears in the tank and swims around and this sort of stuff and the way you can imprint your designs on things. I should just quickly tell you about the cafeteria there as well, just really quickly. So the cafeteria at the Lego House, everyone gets a little bag of Lego and then whatever you build and insert into this sort of iPad sort of slots type thing, and that's what you're. Andrew Webb: So a pink brick might be salmon, a yellow brick might be chicken, whatever, and you put it all in and it recognises it all and then it comes down a giant conveyor belt in a Lego. Giant Lego box and is handed to you by robots. I mean, mind blowing stuff. This is not like with a tray at the National Trust place or somewhere like that for us to come. It is a technological marvel. Absolutely fascinating. So, of course, on the day went, it was a press preview, so there was no canteen workers, so there was no food in the box when me and my daughter, so went without that data, was a bit disappointed. Andrew Webb: But that started that whole reappreciation of Lego, both as a toy to play with my daughter, but also as a way of using Lego in different ways. And that manifests itself in lots of different things. So currently, now, you know, fast forward a little bit. I use Lego for team building exercises, for workshops, for problem solving with organisations, and also just for having fun with adult groups as well as kids. And I think one of the biggest things we've seen since this kind of started around 2000s with the sort of adults reading Harry Potter, do you remember that was like, why are you reading this children's book type of thing? Paul Marden: Yeah. Andrew Webb: And then all the prequel Star wars films came out and Lego made sets about both those two things. And it kind of. I mean, Bionicle saved the company, as only AFOL will know, but it started that whole merchandising thing and adding Lego into that firmament of IP. Right. And we fast forward now, and it's Marvel and Star wars and everything. Paul Marden: You just said AFOL. I know what an AFOL is, but many of our listeners may not know what AFOL is.Andrew Webb: Just to go for acronyms here. So an AFOL is an Adult Fan of Lego. And we've seen actually Lego in the past five years, even earlier. I mean, Lego always had an adult element to it. And one of the original founders used to use it for designing his own house. And there was a whole architectural system called Molodux. So it's always had that element to it. But just recently we've seen, you know, almost retro sets. So we see the Lego Atari 2600 video game system from 1976, which, yeah. Paul Marden: An original NES wasn't there. Andrew Webb: Exactly. NES that's come out. I've got a Lego Optimus prime back here for transformers, you know, all that kind of stuff. So with what's been really interesting is this kidault or whatever, however, call it. And I think that's really fascinating, because if we think about Lego as a toy, we are rapidly approaching the age where we might have three generations of people that have grown up with Lego. Lego first came around in the very late ‘60s, early '70s. And so it's not inconceivable that you might have three generations that had Lego as a child, especially if you grew up in Denmark. A little bit different when it would come to the rest of Europe as they expanded out. So I get to this point, and I'm getting into Lego and doing all this sort of stuff. Andrew Webb: And then, of course, COVID happens and then lockdown happens and we all think the world's going to end and no one knows. Everyone's looking for hobbies, aren't they? They say you were either hunk, drunk or chunk after lockdown. You either got fit, got fat or got alcoholic. So try to avoid those three things. And, you know, everyone's looking for stuff to do, so you have so much banana bread you can bake. And so I stupidly, with my daughter's help, decided to make the Lego Sutton Hoo helmet, the 1500 year old Sutton Hoo helmet found at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk, now in the British Museum. Out of Lego, as you do. Paul Marden: I mean, just exactly. Just as you do. So just a slight segue. I was at the National Attractions Marketing Conference yesterday and there were two people presenting who both talked about their experiences of wacky things that they did during lockdown. There was one person that opened a theatre in her back garden and had various different stars just randomly turn up in her backyard up in North Yorkshire. And you choose to build a Lego Sutton Hoo helmet.Andrew Webb: Lockdown, there will be a time, I think, as we look back, tragic though it was, and, you know, a lot of people died, but it was that moment when society sort of shuffled around a bit and people sort of thought, “Well, if I don't do it now, why not?” People were launching bakeries in their kitchens and serving their community and like. And that element of it. And so people have that. The good side of that, I suppose, is that people did find new outlets of creativity. And Joe Wick's yoga class is in their front row walking groups, you know, all this sort of stuff and beating beaten horsemans and learning to play the violin and dust and stuff. Suddenly we all had to find hobbies because we're all just in. Andrew Webb: No one was going to restaurants, no one's going to bars, no one's going to gigs, nightclubs, theatres. We like to make entertainment at home. It was like the middle ages. So I decided to build the Lego Sutton Hoo helmet, as you do. And so I start this in lockdown, and then, like, I get wind that Netflix is making a film called The Dig. And The Dig is all about, I think it's Lily James and Ray Fiennes in it, and it's all those other people. And it's all about when they found theSutton Hoo helmet. And the guy who found it was called Basil Brown, and he was asked by Edith Pretty, who owned the land, to excavate these humps in the ground that were on her estate. Paul Marden: Okay, so she owns this big estate, in Suffolk, right? And, so she can clearly see there's burial mounds in the back garden, but doesn't know what's in them. Doesn't have any clue that there's treasure locked up inside this. Andrew Webb: I'm not even sure she knew there were anglo saxon burial maps since it was. Paul Marden: They were just lumps of ground in the garden. Andrew Webb: Yeah. I mean, she may have had inkling and other stuff I've turned up over the years and whatever. And some of them were robbed sort of georgian times around then. So some people knew what they were and they were somewhere excavated and gold was taken to fund the polynomial wars and whatnot. But she asked Basil Branson, he was like an amateur archaeologist, right? And so he was just like this local guy would cycle over and do. And the film goes into all that, and the film kind of portrays it as working class. Basil Brown should know his place against the sort of British Museum who are sort of the baddies in this film who think they know what. And of course, this is all set against the backdrop of war. So they escalated it all, then they had to rebury it. Andrew Webb: And then it was used as a tank training ground, so lots of tanks rolled over it. So it's a miracle anything was ever found. But when he did find the Sutton Hoo, who told me and a bunch of other things, clasp brooches, shields, weapons and whatever, when he did find it, so people think it kind of popped out the ground as a helmet, but it didn't. And if you look at the photos, it came out the ground in hundreds of pieces. Paul Marden: Oh, really? So you look at this reconstructed mask that's now in the British Museum, and you think, “Oh, so they just found that in one piece,” lifted out as if it was a Lego hat, you know, for a minifig. In one piece? No, not at all. Andrew Webb: It was actually more like a big parlour Lego in the fact that it was just in hundreds of thousands of pieces. And so there was the first guy to have a go at it was an elderly architect at the British Museum who was, I think, blind in one eye. And he had a go at putting it all together. And he used an armature and clay and pins and whatever, put it all together and said, “Yes, I think it was this.” And then actually it wasn't. He got it all wrong. Lots of different pieces after some more research, and then it falls to this. Nigel Williams is another sub architect, and he was famous for. Andrew Webb: There was a famous Portland vase that was broken in a museum by someone pushing it over as a sort of what you might call, like a just stop oil type of protest now, I can't remember what the call was, but someone smashed an exhibit. And he had painstakingly pieced all this together. He was a total dapper dude. Three piece suit, Chelsea boots, proper swinging sixties, and he had to go and put it all together. His version is the one that's in the British Museum, but he was a massive jigsaw fan. And if you think about Lego, what it is a 3d jigsaw. You get a bunch of pieces and you have to make. Make it into a 3d sculpture. So that was one reason, the dig was the other reason. Andrew Webb: The third reason was that the relationship between East Anglia and essentially Denmark and Billand and Anglo Saxon and Jutland and all that area, I'm talking like Vikings and Anglo Saxons and invasions and all this kind of stuff against the native British, there is essentially a relationship between East Anglia, a trade relationship and a conquest relationship between them. So I built this thing and I frantically put it together and I'm late nights and just losing my marbles trying to get this thing to work. Because Lego is not designed to make, like, spherical shapes, necessarily. It's quite blocky. Right. Everyone knows this. It's the square. Paul Marden: Really easy to make a car, really easy to make a house. A spaceship. Andrew Webb: Houses. Brilliant. Yeah. Square stuff is fantastic. But baking, not only a sort of a semicircle, but a hemisphere, which is what essentially a helmet is. Is even harder because you have to get the Lego to bend in two directions. And so a lot of work went into that just to get the actual face piece came together quite easy. And there was once I had the scale of the pieces under the eyes that formed that sort of thing, and then I could build the nose and face. Ideally, it was going to be so that I could put it on my head. I've actually got a massive head. So in the end, I had to realign that and sort of make it into this sort of child sized head. Paul Marden: But it's a wearable thing, right? Andrew Webb: It is. It is wearable. I mean, at one point, it was probably more fragile than the one in the British Museum because it just kept dropping to pieces. So there's a lot of sub plates that are holding together the outer plate. So it's actually sort of. So just quick Lego terminology here. So bricks, obviously are bricks. The flat things with bubbles on are called plates and then the smoother ones are called tiles. Okay. And used a combination of these to create. There's also a technique called SNOT, which stands for Studs Not On Top. We love acronyms in the Lego community. Right? Paul Marden: Completely.Andrew Webb: So if you say, “Oh, man, I'm an AFOL covered in SNOT,” people know what you want to know what you mean. So after a night in the tiles, I got covered. Yeah. Andrew Webb: Anyway, so I make the helmet, I make the thing, and then, you know, I get a lot of support from the National Trust, specifically East of England National Trust and Sutton, who site itself because it's there. It's their crown jewels. The British Museum, not so much, because they was like, we've got a billion exhibits here. No, it's just one of them. When you've got the Tippecar moon and the Rosetta stone, it kind of pales into significant. But actually, they were helpful. And one of the curators there, who was on Twitter, who sent me a link to some 3d photos, because if you. If you google it's all pictures at the front. That's fantastic. But what does the back look like? Paul Marden: Oh, right, okay. Andrew Webb: So actually, buried deep in the British Museum's website, in their research department, under a filing cabinet, in the back of a server somewhere, are some quite technical photographic images of it, turning every sort of 30 degrees so that. That it's documented as to what it looks. Because you got to remember that everything on the helmet is symbolic of various different things. There is symbols that mean there's a guy on a horse who's sort of fighting and all this sort of stuff. And it all has quite a lot of meaning. I can occur from different parts of history as well. So there's some sort of roman influencing things there and symbols. And so this whole thing is designed to be not only a battle helmet, but it is also because, remember, crowns haven't been invented yet. Crowns are a later mediaeval sort of invention. Andrew Webb: So this is both a symbol of authority, headwear, like a crown, but also a weapon or a piece of defensive armour and equipment. So it has several functions in its life. So it's quite a complex piece of equipment, that this symbol of authority. So I make all this and then I also submit it to a thing called Lego Ideas. So Lego Ideas is a fantastic programme where anybody in the world, members of the public, can submit Lego Ideas, right? And they go onto a website. There's certain criteria, they have to meet a certain checklist, but then the rest of the public can vote for them. So, I mean, if Taylor Swift just stuck together a load of blocks and said, “Vote for this,” she probably hit the 10,000 threshold instantly. Andrew Webb: But I'm not sure Lego would necessarily take that forward as a build. So there is a judging panel that. But actually, some of the most recent really fantastic sets have come out of Lego Ideas. Members of the public, and they're designing things that the Lego designers wouldn't have thought of themselves. So I think that's been kind of interesting. Sadly, Paul, we didn't make the 10,000 threshold. We did a lot of media coverage. By then, lockdown was over and were sort of getting back to our lives and all this sort of stuff. And my daughter was entering her dark ages. And so it sat in my studio for another sort of year and a half and I thought, “What am I going to do with this?” And so in the end, I thought, “Well, you know what? It's gathering dust here. I'm fed up with it, dustin it.”Andrew Webb: And so I actually approached Josh Ward at the National Trust at Sutton Hoo, who has been a fantastic advocate for Lego and for this particular project, and I have to thank him immensely for that. And they got some money and some funding to build a cabinet and also to house it. So I donated it to National Trust and it is now on display there as part of their firmament of interpretational trail. Paul Marden: That must feel pretty good fow you. Andrew Webb: Yeah, it is quite good looking in there and watching kids go, “Wow.” Because Lego is one of those things instantly recognisable for kids. But certain hill as a site is quite complex for children to contextualise because essentially it's several mounds in the ground. And the helmet itself is at the British Museum. Right. They've got a replica built by the royal armouries. There were several of those. They've got those. They have loads of dress up, they have great explainers and videos and they do a lot of work to show the size and shape and things as a cast iron sculpture, to represent the boat, to show just how big it was when it was pulled up from the sea, because he's buried in a boat. So do a lot of that work, sort of that sort of work as well. Andrew Webb: But having this extra funding in the. They opened up Edith's pretty's house now, and having this room where we've got some other things as well, like crayons and paper and other tools and drawings and colouring in and Lego and big chest of Lego just helps, particularly smaller children who, by the time they've walked from the car park around the site, and it has probably flagged it a little bit. And so just providing that little support for them, it's been a fantastic way to contextualise and another way to interpret that. And I think more and more venues could look into that. When you think, well, how else can we add stuff, particularly for children to help tell the story of this place? Paul Marden: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. We went to. It was half term last week and went to the City Museum in Winchester. So they've got some mediaeval, they've got some Roman finds there, and there was lots of fun, but they had. It was full of lots of ways for kids to engage, so there was trails to go around, there was colouring in, make your own mediaeval shield. And all of these things are ways that, you know, my ten year old could engage with it because there's only so many glass cabinets of stuff dug up from the ground that she actually wants to look at. Andrew Webb: I mean, I love. I love pit rivers, right, in Oxford, my favourite museum. Paul Marden: It's crazy, isn't it? I love it. Andrew Webb: But basically, he just went around the world nicking stuff. Right, but as a collection of objects, It's fantastic. Paul Marden: It's deeply unnerving. Andrew Webb: Sorry, sorry if any pit rivers curators are listening there, nick, and stuff about it, but, it is my favourite museum because it's just for kids. It's probably really kind of like, how do you tell that story? I also think there was an article in the garden recently that, you know, the cost of living crisis as well. Parents are looking for value solutions now and so I think it wasn't Peppa Pig World, it was Paddington World. And a family ticket is 170 pounds. That is a huge dent in the family finances for a 70 minutes experience. If you are watching the pennies, if you can afford that and save up for it, whatever. And I know these things are, you know, memory making and all that sort of stuff, and I've been to Harry Potter with my daughter. Andrew Webb: That is not cheap, but it's a fantastic day out because once you're in, you spend the whole day there. If you take a packed lunch, you can save a lot of money on that, on the thing. But I suppose what I'm saying is that, you know, our museums and galleries, particularly traditionally, the what you might call free spaces, public spaces, are facing unprecedented demand in terms of parents looking for cost effective value days out, as well as funding being cut from central government and that sort of. So they have to do a huge amount with less and less for a bigger audience. And that is a strain on any institution and things like that. Other examples of places that get this. Andrew Webb: So obviously with the Sutton Hoo helmet, the hold in Ipswich, which is Suffolk Council's kind of flagship museum in the county town of Ipswich, but instead of calling it, you know, the Museum of Suffolk, they've called it The Hold, which is a reference to the fact it's on, I think it's either because it's on the shore or it's doing sheep, I'm not sure anyway. But a fantastic space, contemporary modern space had a Lego exhibition a few years ago, borrowed my helmet, had some Lego exhibition stuff to do. And the good thing about that is when these teams have to do quite a lot of comms marketing and, you know, that has a cost as well, but often you see different demographics than perhaps would normally go to a stones and bones museum, if you know what I mean. Right. Andrew Webb: You'll see that it makes it more accessible to the community and to different people who don't like going and looking at the Magna Carta or whatever. For some kids, a day at the British Library is fantastic. Look at all these old books for more, maybe more boisterous children. That's probably not a really great idea. So I think galleries can take a leaf out of this and think, or museums or any institution really can take a leap out of this and think, “How can we do more for less? And what tools can we have that perhaps we haven't considered before, like Lego, as a way to open up our interpretation and our offering?” So this could work in Museum of Docklands, for example. This could work in the royal armouries. Andrew Webb: There's lots of places where if you looking to improve your children's offering that some form of lego, I mean, it ends up all over the floor, it ends up being taken away. Sometimes you've got to watch out for things like that. But that's why I always recommend, like, just the basic blocks and plates, not minifigures and stuff like that, because, you know, they just end up in kids' pockets and trousers. But I do think it is a fantastic tool for developing that interpretation piece. Paul Marden: So I run a coding club using Lego. Okay. So I work with years four, five and six, typically. And we normally start off by the end of two terms, we will be building robotics, programming things, doing amazing things. But we start at the very beginning with just open up a box, and it is amazing what a bunch of seven, eight and nine year olds can do with a two by four red brick just given bricks. Yeah. And they will build amazing things. Yeah. And they will tell you amazing stories. And you also see real diversity in the behaviours of children, because some children, in that free play context, they do not have the skills to do that. And I had one girl recently who hasn't played with Lego, and free play just blew her mind, and she was in tears because she couldn't embrace the creativity of it.Paul Marden: But then the following week, when we were following instructions, she was great at building from a set of instructions, You can do that from a limited palette and give them a mission. Sutton Hoo, build a, I don't know, a sword, build a shield, build something to interpret what you have seen. You're in the transport museum. Build, build. How did you get to the museum this morning? Give them something to do and then let them go. And half an hour later, you will be amazed by what they will have built. Andrew Webb: I actually did something this at the National Archives down in Kew, where they had a kids exhibition. Well, an exhibition in the summer about wacky inventions, because obviously the National Archives holds the patents for all these things, and they've got things like Victorian top hats with umbrellas in, and, you know, all this kind of crazy Heath Robinson style stuff that, you know, forks with four sets of tines, so you can eat four times as much. It just bonkers. Really interesting things. The curators had gone through and found this wacky world, sort of. What's his name? The guy that illustrates Roald Dahl. They got illustrations and all that. Paul Marden: Quentin Blake. Andrew Webb: Yeah, Quentin Blake, yeah. So they had this Quentin Blake sort of stuff, and, like, there was activities. And I came down for some special stuff because they had the first Lego brick patent in the UK. When it was first launched in the UK, 1963, I think it was. That's when they filed the patent. Paul Marden: And I bet. So that patent would be exactly the same as a two by four brick, now, won't it? Andrew Webb: The patent was for a one by four brick. Isometrically dawn. Just three diets. Just three views with what? It was a construction toy. And then the page. Sorry. And the address was just Railway Station Billund. There wasn't like, just all the mail just went to the railway station in Billund just addressed for attention of Lego. And it's only like. I mean, it's not even a sheet of A4, It's a piece like this. And after it is something like a lamp that won't blow out on a thing, and before it's like some special kind of horse comb, but it's kind of this bonkers catalogue of just these things. But again, it was about, “Right. We did some work. The curators and interpreters looked, you know, had kids analyse the painting to think, what could it be? And look at the dates and structure. Look at that.” Andrew Webb: And then I came out and, like, did some Lego. So we did things like, who can build the longest bridge? Who can build the tallest tower out of a single colour? Those sorts of exercises. But then also the free play was build your own wacky invention. And kids are building automatically dog washers, where the dog ran on a thing and it scrubbed its back. And one kid built something that was like a thing for removing getting pips out of apples. It was just like this sort of like this crazy little tool. They like some sort of problem that he had. Andrew Webb: And I think what this also speaks to is developing those stem skills in children and adults and building that engineering, because I've also ran Lego workshops with explorers who I used to, I thought were between Cubs and scouts, but are actually after scouts. So I did this in my local town, here in Saffron Walden, and was like, “Oh, my God, these kids are like, 15, 16. They're not going to want to play Lego. Some of them are in my daughter's year at school, so. Hello, Amy.” And it was really interesting because we did a series of challenges with them. So the egg drop challenge, can you protect an egg and drop it from the floor? And can you build this and work together? Another good one is looker, runner, builder. Andrew Webb: So you give everybody two sets of the same bricks, and one person is the looker, one person is the runner, one person is the builder. So the looker can't touch, but he can tell the runner. The runner can't look at the model, he can only tell the builder, and the builder can't speak back. And so this is a really useful exercise. And I've done this with teams where, because this is exactly what businesses see, engineering will build a product. Sales or their marketing are like, what the hell is, you know, or whatever it might be. Paul Marden: It's that. It's that classic cartoon of a Swing, yeah. Andrew Webb: Yeah. So it's that, you know, this is what the brief said. Engineering interpreter does this. Marketing saw it. So it's a great tool for things like that. Especially when you put people like the C Suite or CEO's or leaders at the end, because all they're getting is the information and it. It's there and it's how to build communications. Because in life, the fluctuations reverse. A CEO says, “Let's do this.” And by the time it's cascaded down to engineering, who don't get a say, it's not at all what he imagined so, or they imagined so, it's. It's an interesting case of using tools like that. So I did that with these kids and it was fascinating because they're 14, 15, 16.Andrew Webb: A group of three girls won two out of the three challenges and probably could have won a third one if I felt that I couldn't award it to them again because it would just look weird. And they were smashing the looker runner builder thing. They were working together as a team, they were concentrating, they were solving problems, they were being creative, they took some time to prototype, they refined and iterated their design. They were doing all this sort of work. And it's brilliant because 15 year old girls don't often take engineering related STEM subjects at GCSE. Certainly, probably don't take them at a level and more than enough. And I think that I once interviewed Eben Upton, who invented Raspberry Pi, and he said, “We think about the eighties as this sort of like golden age of computing, but actually it was terrible. It was terrible for diversity, it was terrible for inclusion.“Andrew Webb: And he said, “Like growing up, there was one other kid in his town that had a computer, you know, so there was no sort of way to sort of getting other people involved and make this accessible.” And part of the reason now computers have got smaller. Some of the work I did at Pytop was like trying to make technology more accessible and seeing it not just video games and things like that, but actually I can use this in a fashion show, or I can make music, or I can use this to power some lights to do a theatre production, and trying to bring the, I guess, the creative arts into technology. And that's when we start to see the interest application of technology. Andrew Webb: And Lego plays a part in that, in the fact that it is a tool, a rapid prototyping tool that everybody is familiar with. And it is also, you know, clean, safe. There's no, you don't need blow torches and saws and those sorts of things to kind of prototype anything. You don't even need a pair of scissors, you know, it's completely tool free, unless you're using that little mini separator to get your bricks apart. And so I think that just circle back on, like, how the Science Museum or what's the one down there? Isabel Kingdom Brunel Museum and things like that. I can see those guys could be and should be thinking about, “How could we have a Lego programme?“Andrew Webb: You don't have to have a permanent deployment like they've got at Sutton Hoo although that is great because they've got the mast there as the head piece of it. But certainly a programme of events or summer camps or summer events, because I did this with English Heritage at Kenilworth Castle as well. They were having, like, a big Lego build and the public were invited in 15-minute shifts into a big marquee and everyone got given a tile. And the idea was to build the gardens because the gardens at Kenilworth Castle were laid out to impress Elizabeth the first. And so everybody got there was like bunches of stuff and regular bricks, also flowers and this sort of stuff. And it was like, “Come on, we've got to build something to impress a queen.” Andrew Webb: He said to kids, like, “Yeah, you've got to impress. Bling it up, like, dial it to ten.” And were just getting these enormous, like, avatar sized trees with just incredible bits hanging off it. And like, “There she has a teapot because she might want a cup of tea.” And you're like, “Brilliant, excellent. Of course she does.” And so I think that. And then they moved through. Some of the Legos were selected to be displayed and things like that. So there's different ways you can do it. You can either do it as like. And I'm a big fan of the drop in sessions because kids and parents can just naturally build it into their day rather than the pre built. My child was. We were rubbish at, like, organising things. Andrew Webb: People like, “Oh, great. Half term, it's a chocolate thing, sold out ". And you're like, yeah, because there's 30 spaces for three and a half thousand kids who want to do it. Whereas if it's like a walkthrough or a. In groups phase through and then the activity, small kids kind of conk out after about 20 minutes, half an hour anyway. You get much more people through and much more people get to enjoy the experience rather than the 30 organised people who got up early and booked. So that's my other top tip to any institution, because it's heavily weather dependent as well. Sun comes out, everyone piles pass into the nearest sort of stately home, national attraction. All of those places can definitely benefit English Heritage. Did a really big push this half term, just gone on Lego at several events. Andrew Webb: We had one here at Audley End, there was one at Kenilworth that I was at. There's been pairs of the ones all around the country, because again, you just need a marquee, which most venues have access to because they use them for other things or some sort of space in case it rains. And you just see someone like me and a whole massive tub of Lego and you're off to the races. Paul Marden: Exactly. So we were talking about this at the conference yesterday about ways in which. So for many attractions, people turning up is a literal flip of a coin. Is the weather good or is the weather bad? What can you do to adapt your attraction to be able to deal with when it's bad? And then what can you do to bring people when you have made that adaptation? So, you know, you've now got a marquee and you have a Lego exhibit that you can put into there. So it's just dumping a pile of Lego and a bunch of well trained volunteers or visitor experienced people who can facilitate that, police it, little Johnny sticking minifigs in his pocket. Paul Marden: And then you turn on your Google Adwords and show that you've got this, you know, bad weather reason to go to a stately home that my daughter would turn her nose up to all of a sudden, “Okay, we're going to go and do that. We're going to go and have afternoon tea and you're going to go and play with some Lego and see some animals, maybe.” Yeah, what can you do to attract that extra audience and adapt to the bad weather and service different sorts of people? Andrew Webb: I think that comes down to a bear in mind. I convert some of my Lego lens rather than a venue lens. But I think speaking as a parent and someone who does this is you need a reason to go back to somewhere that you already know. Okay, so you go to Stonehenge, you go and look at the stones, you go, “Wow.” You look at the visitor centre and then it's ticked off. I mean, you see busloads of tourists. Stonehenge is at Cambridge, maybe, or Oxford people, when people do England, Lambeth, Heathrow, London Crown Jewels, Tower Bridge, West End, day trip out on a coach to Stonehenge, maybe to Cambridge, and that's it, off to Paris. Right? So parents like British people like that too. Like why go to Stonehenge four times a year? Or why go to any venue when you're familiar with it? Andrew Webb: It's always about offering something new and something different. Audley End up near where I live, I think, is English Heritage. All through July, every Sunday, they're just doing music. So there's a string quartet or someone with a harp or maybe someone with a guitar or whatever. And you've got a book, but it's. It's not like there's 30 places and it's a bonfight. It's just like, “Oh, wow, they've done something different.” They do a really great thing. Like, they do victorian falconry, for example. So they get someone in who talks about how Victorians use falconry for hunting as a sport, but also for the kitchen table, and they're flying falcons around and doing the whole bit of meat on a string and all this sort of stuff. And everyone, like, “They do a world war two one.”Andrew Webb: I mean, the editorial calendar for any venue's got to look like, “Go and make Christmas food. January, we're closed to kind of dust and clean everything. Valentine's Day, chocolate make you put. It's daffodils”, it's whatever it might be. And then you just build that. Build that programme in and you need. This is why I think that venues now, again, I'll just come back to that. You talk about AdWords, but that, again, is more spend. It's like, how'd you build that mail list? How do you drop into the local Facebook groups and Mumsnet and all that kind of stuff? You know, that's where you can do it organically rather than. Because people don't sit in front of Google necessarily, or think, like, what should we do? Paul Marden: You sit on the sofa on a Thursday night trying to figure out what on earth are we going to do this weekend? Yeah, so you're completely right. The mum's net, the content marketing, is hugely important, isn't it? Andrew Webb: Which is my job. But also it's kind of like how can institutions become part of that? When I say community, if you think about most people travel a thin hour to go somewhere. I mean, people go further afield, you know, but. But basically it's like, what? My mom turns, like, a tea and a pee. So you've got to go somewhere. You've got to have a cup of tea, visit the loos. It's all about tea. It's all about canteens and loos, basically. You could have a World Heritage Site, UNESCO World Heritage site. And it's like, how good's the caf? And are the toilets clean? Yeah, that's what people remember. Gar went hens at dawn. I was awed by the majestic. But that Looney D cleaning, you know, it's not good. It's all that people come home with. Andrew Webb: So, you know, institutions go into place that they are trying to offer different things. Like late nights. We've talked about that. How can we use this space after hours? Because if you think about it, if your institution's open 10 till 6, most people are at work five days a week, you're gonna have students and pensioners who are gonna be not great spenders, either of those two groups. So, late nights, I went to a great one in the National Gallery when the James Bond film. I was kind of sitting royale or whatever. He's still on the top of the National Gallery overlooking Trafalgar Square, and they've got the national dining rooms there and they had Vesper Martini, everyone got a cocktail. Andrew Webb: And then went to look at the fighting Temeraire, which is the bit where he's standing with Q, the new Q, who voices Paddington, whose name escapes me and gives him, like, a gun and a radio, but they're like the fighting Temeraire by Turner is this little thing. And so, you know, you've got to make hay out of that, right? You've got to sort of, like, do a late night, various ones. And so all it was a few cocktails in the cafe next door and are taught by the curator and stuff like that. But 30 people just looking for an experience. And so if venues are clever, of course, the dark side of this is when you get Willy Wonka world up in Scotland. Andrew Webb: Or interestingly, some of the Lego events that have been happening at NEC have caused a massive online backslash in the community for just being exceptionally bad value for money. And so you read about these things that people have said, “Come and visit Santa's grotto, and it's just a muddy field with a tree in it,” so you've got to be careful. But I think those events, those sort of fly by night kind of institutions, don't really work. But how galleries can leverage the creativity of what they're doing? Whether they are come and paint in our, you know, our local gallery, come and have an art class, come and do that. People are looking for stuff to do that is value for money. That isn't always drink lead, you know, it's not always cocktail making or things like that. Andrew Webb: And that comes with a whole heap of other things and dietary requirements for cookery courses and just clean up and the mess and all that kind of stuff. So I think that, yeah, canning organisations, the ones that can really think about that, and I'm happy to help organisations who want to think about this, especially through the life of Lego. They will be the ones that will start to add and build out and develop their. What you might term this whole sector needs a name. The kind of extracurricular offering, we might say, above and beyond their collection and then their traditional interpretation and if they're. Paul Marden: Thinking of doing this. So there's a good why. Yeah, the why is you can reach diverse audiences, helps people with interpretation. Andrew Webb: Quite cheap. Paul Marden: Yeah, absolutely. It's a cheap way of extending your offering and diversifying what you do. You can bring in event elements to this, but how do they do it? Apart from engaging with somebody like you? And I'm going to guess there's not many people like you. So that's going to be a tricky thing for some people to do. But if they were starting from scratch, how would they go about doing this? You said earlier, “Don't go mad with buying the bricks and spending a fortune on.”Andrew Webb: There are people like me that can do all this as well as myself. I think that the first thing is plan it. Plan what you need to do. You can't throw this stuff together. You might be looking at. Already the hold have been contacting me for a late night they're doing in September. They contacted me April. Paul Marden: Okay. Andrew Webb: Because if you're a creator, you're planning exhibitions, you are thinking on that long term cycle. Paul Marden: Yeah, completely. Andrew Webb: And so what you need to do is bake this in as part of that curational process or part of the interpretation of things at the start, rather than like, “Right, we're doing exhibit on Peter Rabbit, let's chuck in a load of fluffy bunnies or whatever.” You know, it's got to be. You've got to think about it and have it contextualised. I think the best things are. What success looks like is, first of all, you need a space. Now you can hire a marquee that comes with a cost. If you're a venue and you've got your own or you've got a hall or a stables or interpretational room or something like that, often spaces, specifically bigger ones, will have classroom spaces for school groups anyway. So that's often that can be where you can host these sorts of events. Kids are very familiar. Andrew Webb: The chairs are all small wall colour, you know, etc. Industrial strength carpet in case stuff gets built. So locations like where you're going to stage this? Paul Marden: Yeah. Andrew Webb: Secondly, I think you need to think about, what do we want people to do? What is the experience? What is the narrative piece? Because you can't just say, here's a big part of Lego. Kids will just build cars and houses, right? You know, they need context. You know, if you give a kid a sheet of paper, you could draw anything. They're like, well, what? And so you need to give them a mission almost. They need a task, I think. Also think about, as I said before, keeping the tasks around 20 minutes, because actually adding the time running out jeopardy element is quite fun for kids because they'll go, “Well, I've only got five minutes left.” And often that's when it all falls apart and then they have to iterate the design. Andrew Webb: So think about that kind of moving people through in 15 to 20 minutes cycles. We had kids at Kenilworth, that would go out the exit and just walk back around and come in the front like that. Like four or five times. One boy came in, he was loving it. So think about that. Think about how you're going to move people through the space. Think about what you need to envisage it. So the Kenilworth, for example, there was me hosting it from dawn toward dusk. We had another builder there who was helping take break it all down and put them against the model that we built. There were two members of staff who were letting people through, so just monitoring it from an entry exit point of view, walkie talkies, in case people had issues and things like that. Andrew Webb: And think about when you're going to do it. Okay, so half term is a good one. It's a good thing to do. We saw a lot of this at Kenilworth, but I've seen other places as well, particularly half terms and things like that. You often see grandparents caring for grandchildren, right? Because parents are at work and grandparents can only walk around the site so much before they want to sit down. So sometimes have it, like, think about where they can. And when I was at Kenilworth, grandparents came in with their two grandkids, and the kids started playing and I was like, you could join in, too. Oh, no, I don't want it. You know, they were almost like, “I can't do this. It's like, come on, get in, get in. Come on, grandma. Come on. I'll show you how it works. “Andrew Webb: By the end of that session, they were memory making. I then took their photo with their phones, they'd have this sort of grandparent. But, you know, you always say it like, my grandfather taught me to fish. Like Sean Connery says in the hunt for red October. This sort of moment where sort of, it's a Hollywood trope that grandfather knowledge is sort of passed on type of thing. Right. And so you can see that where you could have this, almost either the reverse of that, of kids showing grandparents, but also they're all having this event outside of the parental unit. So it's a new type of experience. It adds value, it gets people to play with their grandkids. Paul Marden: Priceless. Andrew Webb: So I think that's kind of an interesting way. So think about when, think about where and think about what will be my three sort of tips for any institution looking to put this together. Paul Marden: You gave one the other day which I thought was priceless, which was, don't give them wheels. Andrew Webb: Oh, yes. Paul Marden: Don't include the wheels. Andrew Webb: Take the wheels out of any sets, unless you are the Transport Museum or the, you know, a car based museum, because kids will do wings as well. I'd probably suggest taking those out because kids have just built cars. Some kids have just built cars, you know, even if you give them a mission. Unless that is the mission. The other thing that I would think that venues could do as well as sort of all day events, because it's quite a time drain, you know, on staff and this sort of stuff, but it is a value. The other thing you can think about is one off evening events for adults. Yes, I've done this. I did this at my local add them shops. Bricks, beers and bubbles challenges supercompass teams. Think of it like a pub quiz with brick is the answer. Andrew Webb: So build me a thing that does that kind of thing. Teams all get together, you can race them, you can see who goes the furthest. You can do all this stuff. And the hold is what I'm doing at the hold in September. I did it at the hold a couple of years ago. And what was interesting was that we had quite diverse groups of adults. We had just couples who were clearly AFOLs and were like, “Yeah, I'm going to go to that.” We had a group of friends. One of them had just come back from years travelling and they didn't want to go sort of straight to the pub and just interrogate him about his travelling, whatever. Andrew Webb: They kind of like, “Well, we wanted something to do where we could have a beer and have a chat, but were doing something else whilst we're doing that.” And that's the joy of Lego. Your hands are doing the work and you're almost like the back of your brain is doing the work and you're like, “Oh, yeah, yeah. Before you kick them.” And the concentration levels are there and then you can kind of get into that state of flow. And so they were just having this lovely chat, had a beer, talking about stuff, but also memory making in terms of when he came back from his travelling. So I think that's really important. Andrew Webb: Did you know that this is your brain, right? And then your brain on Lego, there are 24 discrete skills that are happening in your brain. So Lego research this, things like fine motor skills, cognitive sort of thinking about things, future planning, my favourite emotional regulation that is not going, “Oh, my God, it's not working. And smashing all to pieces.” So I've seen this as well with children, is that when you give them a Lego, if you gave them jelly and a football, they'll all just. They're a high energy kind of things, right? And that's fine, great outdoors, kids want to burn off energy. Here's a load of balls. Go crazy, right? Or ball pits, trampolines, bouncy castles, those sorts of things. When you get on Lego, what actually happens is it's very hard to be anarchic, to use a wrong word, but a word. It's very hard to be anarchic with Lego because you can't really do it. Andrew Webb: And so you can get a group of kids together and they'll almost self invigilate. And at one point, I ran it at a local toy shop and the parents are all hanging about and like, “I've never seen them so quiet.” They were just in the state of flow. And so, I think, you know, again, back to the. Back to the explorers and the scouts, that was one of the best sessions that those kids had done as teenagers because the reason was they were given permission to play with Lego. They still had the muscle memory from when they were smaller children. They were solving. They weren't just being told to play with Lego, they were actually solving engineering challenges. How can you design a bridge that will take this weight? How can you protect an egg? How can you think about this? Andrew Webb: And so you need to think about the challenge and the what. You need to think about that, the where and you think about the when, as I said, and get those right. You can have a very exceptional visitor experience for not a huge amount of effort. It's not highly costly, it's not highly technical, it's just a bit of elbow grease and a bit of forward thinking in terms of what we might need. And I think that parents appreciate just that minute away where they can. It's almost like a 20 minute babysitter, right, where they can just go, “Don't touch that.” You know, you're walking around a stately home, “Don't sit there, don't touch. Mind the lady.” All that kind of no data that parents give out institutions, they can just take a breather and check their phones and whatever. Paul Marden: And the kids are just having an amazing time. Andrew Webb: Yeah. And the kids are happy. And at the end of the day, as a parent, we all do our best and you just want, you know, them to be playing with something screen free, getting along and learning something. And, you know, that is the win. That is the ultimate takeout. You can layer on your own institution in context and rev up the visitor experience, bring in new visitors, attract a more diverse group of people that perhaps wouldn't normally come to a Regency Rococo style villa or whatever it might be, then that's all to the better, because, you know, you can start to use this in your planning and you can do what Suntton Hoo did? And go, right, well, we've done this and it's really worked. Andrew Webb: And then I can apply for funding for it and I can expand and I can make it permanent and then I can sort of say, well, this now becomes a tool and a string and arbo for our educational. It doesn't have to be split between visitor attractions and development. It can, you know, you can split it between several parts of the institution and use it in different ways, use it for educational purposes as well as visitor experience. So the world's your oyster with a bit of thinking. Paul Marden: With a bit of Lego and a bit of thinking. Andrew Webb: Bit of Lego, yeah. A few bricks and a couple of tricks and you're off to the races. Paul Marden: Andrew, this has been brilliant. Thank you ever so much. Andrew Webb: You're welcome. Paul Marden: I've got one more question for you before we finish. Now, you bottled this earlier on when I said we always have a book recommendation from our guests. And in spite of having the fullest bookshelf I've seen in quite a long time, you've bottled it on a book. But you did offer me a favourite movie. And so what would be your movie recommendation of choice? Andrew Webb: My go to movie would probably be Withnail and I, Richard E. Grant's first film. Every line has came down from God on a tablet. I mean, it is just. Yeah. Richard Griffiths as Uncle Monty, Paul McGann. It's just one of my favourite films and, you know, cult classic that no one's really. Well, people have heard of it now, but again, they even make stuff out with Alan Eyright. So you can go and watch a screening of it at the farm at Crow Crag up in Penrith, you know, and everyone dresses up and everyone comes with Mister blathering sets tea and I come on holiday by mistake and Jessie says, Danny. Andrew Webb: And, you know, fortunately, for better or for worse, I know these are tough times, but people try and find the fun in things. They try and at the end of the day, everyone's looking for a good time, whether we're children or an adult. You want something to just have a laugh and take you away for a moment. And if films and culture but also experiences can do that, then that's all for the good. Paul Marden: Well, look, this is going to be a challenge, but listeners, if you would like a copy of Andrew's film recommendation, then when we release the show message on X, if you can retweet that and say, “Give me Andrew's movie”, then the first person that does that, somehow I will get the movie to you. It might be on VHS, it might be on DVD, but somehow we will get you a movie. Andrew Webb: I found a CD the other day from a bar I used to go to in Clapham in the noughties and late ‘90s. I said to my mate, look, I'm great, put it on. And I went, “I can't.” I haven't got a CD player anymore. I had to go dig through a box somewhere in the study to find a portable CD player that plugged into my computer that could. By the end of it, we're just laugh. Forget it. Paul Marden: Andrew, this has been wonderful. Thank you ever so much. Andrew Webb: You're welcome. Cheers. Paul Marden: Thanks for listening to Skip the Queue. If you've enjoyed this podcast, please leave us a five star review. It really helps others find us. And remember to follow us on Twitter for your chance to win the books that have been mentioned. Skip The Queue is brought to you by Rubber Cheese, a digital agency that builds remarkable systems and websites for attractions that helps them increase their visitor numbers. You can find show notes and transcriptions from this episode and more over on our website, SkiptheQueue.fm. The 2024 Visitor Attraction Website Survey is now LIVE! Help the entire sector:Dive into groundbreaking benchmarks for the industryGain a better understanding of how to achieve the highest conversion ratesExplore the "why" behind visitor attraction site performanceLearn the impact of website optimisation and visitor engagement on conversion ratesUncover key steps to enhance user experience for greater conversionsFill in your data now (opens in new tab)
Welcome to the PRmoment June 2024 iteration of the Global Creativity Review collection. In this series, founder of PRmoment Ben Smith joins a host of PR industry creatives to discuss, and sometimes dissect, the standout creative moments of the month. This is the audio version of the Global Creativity Review: you can watch the video version, with all the campaign/work films on PRmoment's YouTube Channel.The Global Creativity Review is produced In partnership with our sister title Creative Moment.The only catch? Guests are not allowed to choose their own work. Speaking on this review:Kat Thomas, founder and chief creative officer at One Green Bean Lora Martyr, executive creative director at Taylor HerringOlivia Mushigo, senior creative at Good Relations Not got time for a whole podcast? Don't worry, here is the TL/DR discussion points for time-pressed listeners:1 mins: Sweethearts - Situationships by Tombras 5 mins: Heineken - Pub Museums (Ireland) 13 mins: NUFC x Sela - Unsilence The Crowd21 mins: Red Bull - Flying Through London's Tower Bridge 29 mins: Burger King - 70th Anniversary, Old Flames 32 mins: Heinz - Reviews For Naturalisation in Brazil 39 mins: Just Eat - More Beef Than Kendrick and Kanye 40 mins: Dove - Mom Experience Translator ToolThis is part of our regular series of creativity reviews, so if you like what you hear, look back at the PRmoment Podcast archive on iTunes or Spotify to listen to more creative ideas.You can watch previous episode of The Global Creativity Review on PRmoment's YouTube channel.
Každé město má svůj symbol – Praha má staroměstský orloj, Londýn most Tower Bridge a Dublin sochu dívky jménem Molly Malone. I když není vůbec jisté, jestli se jedná o historickou postavu, nebo jen o legendu, její socha v centru přitahuje davy turistů a návštěvníků města. Mnozí se ale k soše chovají poněkud nevhodně, a tak radnice zvažuje co dál. Prozatím vyzývá návštěvníky města: Nesahejte Molly do výstřihu.
S10:E2 – Monsoon season? Not ideal for hiking. But Bryce Canyon National Park has a lot to offer year-round, and Jamin and Hilarie didn't miss a beat. From Sunrise Point to Queen's Trail, Tower Bridge and Inspiration Point, they saw the beauty of the Utah canyon's orange hoodoos from top to bottom. They also finally figured out who Ruby is; If you've been to Bryce, you know who we're talking about. For more context, check out the video that accompanies this podcast (S10:E2 Bryce Canyon National Park | What's all the fuss about?) on YouTube (https://youtu.be/Ldl-4bjBboo). Send us your feedback and thoughts via email at travelfomopodcast@gmail.com. Have your own travel story? Attach a voice memo to your email, and you could hear your own voice in a future episode of the podcast. ____ Travel FOMO is hosted by a husband and wife duo, Jamin and Hilarie Houghton. Learn more about them at www.travelfomopodcast.com. Subscribe to Travel FOMO in two different ways: (1) Watch their adventures on YouTube and (2) Follow audibly from wherever you listen to podcasts. Follow Travel FOMO on social media: Instagram: www.instagram.com/travelfomopodcast Facebook: www.facebook.com/travelfomopodcast TikTok: www.tiktok.com/@travelfomopodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/@travelfomopodcast
Back in 1952, Albert Gunter pulled off one heck of a stunt by jumping his bus over Tower Bridge in London. I mean, talk about nerve! He revved up that double-decker and sent it flying over the open drawbridge, with passengers on board and everything. It was like a scene straight out of an action movie! The whole city was buzzing about it afterward, and Gunter became a bit of a local legend. Can you imagine being on that ride? Talk about an adrenaline rush! #brightside Credit: St Pancras Nose: Warden, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/..., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:St... Animation is created by Bright Side. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Music by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com Check our Bright Side podcast on Spotify and leave a positive review! https://open.spotify.com/show/0hUkPxD... Subscribe to Bright Side: https://goo.gl/rQTJZz ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Our Social Media: Facebook: / brightside Instagram: / brightside.official TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@brightside.of... Stock materials (photos, footages and other): https://www.depositphotos.com https://www.shutterstock.com https://www.eastnews.ru ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In episode 94 of the UK Travel Planning Podcast, host Tracy Collins is joined by Domi of Scalens Studio to discuss London's top 10 photography locations. Domi shares her expertise as a professional photographer and provides insider tips on the best spots for capturing iconic images. From the famous Tower Bridge to hidden gems in Notting Hill and beautiful views over London, this episode is a must-listen for anyone planning a visit to the UK's capital.Tracy and Domi also discuss the etiquette of taking photos at hotels and popular tourist spots and offer listeners a special discount code. Join them in exploring the stunning photography opportunities that London has to offer.⭐️ Guest - Domi of Scalens Studio
Today, we have both a returning guest and a returning show…although not what you'd expect. Listeners of this podcast will remember Jonathan Andrew Hume from the original London Cast of the Olivier Award winning best musical “Come From Away” as one of the Kevins. He was brilliant in that show…and when I was offered a chance to speak to the incoming cast for the revival of Guys and Dolls at The Bridge Theatre right near Tower Bridge in London…I jumped at the chance and asked if I could speak to Jonathan. He's just one of the loveliest guys in the business…pun intended. Guys and Dolls Official Website (and Tickets) Jonathan Andrew Home on Insta Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Londoners will tell you that London Bridge was once sold to a man who thought he was buying Tower Bridge. That man was Robert Paxton McCulloch, who in 1964 bought London Bridge and had it shipped to Arizona. But did he really think he was buying Tower Bridge, or is that just a fantastical myth spun for a bit of a laugh? This week we delve into the story of how one of London's most famous landmarks ended up across the sea in the United States, what record it set when it went there, and why - WHY - was it even sold in the first place? Find out this week! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
March 25, 1993. London, England. After getting off a train at the Acton Town tube station, 47-year old Jean Bradley heads towards her parked car, but is attacked and murdered by a man who stabs her eight times. A witness chases after the assailant for several blocks before losing him, but manages to provide a detailed description to the police. Five months later, a suspect named Frank Marnell is charged with Jean's murder after this witness identifies him, but since a magistrate does not feel the evidence against Marnell is strong enough to bring him to trial, the charges against him are dropped. Was Frank Marnell actually responsible for killing Jean Bradley or could someone else have been the perpetrator? And what could the motive for this crime have been? On this week's episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore one of the most disturbing unsolved murders in the history of the United Kingdom. Additional Reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Jean_Bradley https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business-woman-stabbed-to-death-murder-near-station-similar-to-1991-attack-1500751.html https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2008/dec/20/robert-napper-rachel-nickell https://www.mylondon.news/news/west-london-news/murder-successful-businesswoman-stabbed-8-24414130 https://www.newspapers.com/image/260260709/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/260259630/ “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Austin, Texas on August 25-27, 2023. To get a 15 % discount on the purchase of tickets, please our specialized promo code, “TRAIL”, by visiting https://truecrimepodcastfestival.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.
June 20, 2016. Penn Hills, Pennsylvania. The Allegheny County Office of Children, Youth and Families order the Penn Hills Police Department to remove multiple children from the home of a woman named Patricia Fowler. The authorities soon realize that two of Patricia's children, 17-year old twins Ivon and Inisha Fowler, are no longer in her custody and an investigation reveals that they have not been seen for around 10-15 years. Patricia provides conflicting stories about what happened to the twins, but even though she faces legal trouble for her deception, there is no evidence to prove that she harmed her children and investigators are unable to pin down how and when Ivon and Inisha went missing. On this week's episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we chronicle the unusual disappearance of the Fowler twins, which somehow managed to go unnoticed for several years. Special thanks to listener Kim Fritz for narrating the opening of this episode. If you have any information about this case, please contact the Penn Hills Police Department at (412) 798-2035. Additional Reading: https://charleyproject.org/case/ivon-d-fowler https://charleyproject.org/case/inisha-v-fowler https://www.wtae.com/article/penn-hills-mom-accused-of-hiding-information-on-missing-twins-tells-her-side-of-story/7481623 https://observer-reporter.com/news/regional/mother-of-missing-twins-back-in-jail-over-welfare-charges/article_fd20a0ad-6449-5e36-98a7-9679f21bfaa9.html https://www.wpxi.com/news/top-stories/investigators-still-searching-2-years-after-penn-hills-twins-reported-missing/788057168/ https://www.khou.com/article/news/investigators-release-photo-of-twins-missing-pennsylvania-for-a-decade/285-301530446 https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/08/17/mother-charged-after-telling-police-among-other-things-that-she-sold-her-twins-10-years-ago-for-2000/ https://apnews.com/article/1c801e797e25443eb8fab93b2be186ab https://www.post-gazette.com/local/east/2016/12/30/Missing-Braddock-twins-Ivon-and-Inisha-Fowler-leave-mystery-behind-as-mother-Patricia-Fowler-charged/stories/201612160215 https://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/mother-of-twins-whove-been-missing-10-years-gets-probation/ https://www.sharonherald.com/news/state/one-things-for-sure-twins-arent-with-mom/article_2b6ecbd0-ad12-5e2a-9641-95359d7bf766.html https://www.tribdem.com/news/police-stymied-in-search-for-pittsburgh-twins-missing-10-years/article_44435cd6-e69e-11e6-a0bd-bb05fd152d4f.html https://www.newspapers.com/image/839288048/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/839288115/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/839288205/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/839288068/ “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Austin, Texas on August 25-27, 2023. To get a 15 % discount on the purchase of tickets, please our specialized promo code, “TRAIL”, by visiting https://truecrimepodcastfestival.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.
February 23, 1946. Grandview Heights, Ohio. 24-year old Lola Celli leaves her parents' residence in order to walk to the bus stop, but she soon vanishes without a trace. An eyewitness later reports seeing a woman struggling with a man inside a moving vehicle before a red shoe is thrown out the window. Since Lola was wearing shoes like that when she went missing, it is suspected that she was the victim of an abduction. Ten years later, the Grandview Heights police chief announces that the case has been closed because Lola was found alive in another town, but he never produces any evidence to confirm this and it eventually comes out that he may have been mistaken. Did Lola Celli disappear voluntarily or was she the victim of foul play? On this week's episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore an older missing persons case known as “The Red Shoe Mystery”. Special thanks to Miranda Merrick of “The Midnight Library” podcast (https://www.midnightlibrarypod.com/) for narrating the opening of this episode. If you have any information about this case, please contact the Grandview Heights Police Department at (614) 488-7901. Additional Reading: https://charleyproject.org/case/lola-ada-celli https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/local/grandview-heights/2021/02/19/grandview-heights-moment-time-missing-lola-celli/4509663001/ “Murder & Mayhem in Columbus, Ohio” by Nellie Kampmann https://www.newspapers.com/image/295841035/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/324768888/ “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Austin, Texas on August 25-27, 2023. To get a 15 % discount on the purchase of tickets, please our specialized promo code, “TRAIL”, by visiting https://truecrimepodcastfestival.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.
November 6, 2001. Florence, Montana. A customer enters a salon called the Hair Gallery and discovers the bodies of three murdered women: the salon's 62-year old owner, Dorothy Harris, a 44-year old employee named Brenda Patch, and a 71-year old customer named Cynthia Paulus. The victims have each had their throats cut and the customer reports that an oddly dressed individual wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a long black coat was exiting the salon when they arrived. Six-and-a-half years later, a pair of drug dealers named Brian Weber and Lincoln Benavides are indicted for their alleged roles in the crime, but since the evidence against them is not particularly strong, the murder charges against them are eventually dropped. Were Weber and Benavides responsible for killing these three women? If not, who was the perpetrator and what could their motive have been? On this week's episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore the horrific and perplexing crime known as “The Florence Salon Murders”. If you have any information about this case, please contact the Ravalli County Sheriff's Office at (406) 375-4060. Additional Reading: https://billingsgazette.com/news/local/town-shocked-by-beauty-salon-murders-killer-still-on-loose/article_60ccaede-de9d-59f9-96a5-c6aa89f2fea7.html https://missoulian.com/a-tale-of-five-murders/article_67794684-3696-5da1-8006-5d44963d0f47.html https://missoulian.com/florence-murder-case-stands-alone-in-fbi-records/article_101cb5b5-ec16-5cf5-98e9-4d902e80cbf1.html https://mtstandard.com/news/state-and-regional/illinois-murders-share-similarities-with-unresolved-florence-killings/article_ace8066c-29a2-5fbd-a2a4-e9544178cb25.html https://missoulian.com/news/local/article_b2a3d5f8-c28d-11de-b1cb-001cc4c03286.html https://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/montana/federal-judge-dismisses-charges-in-florence-triple-murder-case/article_e1a46c3c-0a7c-11df-9268-001cc4c002e0.html https://www.kpax.com/news/mtn-original-productions/the-florence-murders-20-years-later https://greatbendpost.com/posts/b71f6fd9-f340-4839-bd6a-9eb7b0f92322 https://www.kwch.com/2022/09/06/kbi-announce-new-evidence-2002-dolly-madison-bakery-murders/ “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Austin, Texas on August 25-27, 2023. To get a 15 % discount on the purchase of tickets, please our specialized promo code, “TRAIL”, by visiting https://truecrimepodcastfestival.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.
August 15, 1982. Boston, Massachusetts. The body of 16-year old Lucia Kai Roberts is found in Franklin Park and her cause of death is ruled to be strangulation. Over one year later, allegations emerge about a black girl who was sexually assaulted by multiple police officers at a private club and since this incident supposedly took place six weeks before Lucia was killed, there is speculation that she was the victim of the assault. The Boston Police Department is accused of being complicit in Lucia's murder and orchestrating a major cover-up, but multiple investigations fail to generate any conclusive evidence to support this theory. On this week's episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore one of the controversial unsolved murders in the history of Boston. Additional Reading: https://www.newspapers.com/image/444291924/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/444291953/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/438805326/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/440679800/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/440679818/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/440256522/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/440256581/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/437505989/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/428536151/ Boston TV News Digital Library – Segments on the “Silver Shield Rape” https://www.necn.com/news/local/roberts_-1982-murder-remains-unsolved_necn/72223/ https://deafinprison.com/2012/09/02/my-misspent-youth-a-memoir/ “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Austin, Texas on August 25-27, 2023. To get a 15 % discount on the purchase of tickets, please our specialized promo code, “TRAIL”, by visiting https://truecrimepodcastfestival.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.
December 2, 1993. Memphis, Tennessee. John Cheek, the 28-year old financial officer of a real estate firm, spends the evening having a dinner at a restaurant and is last seen heading towards his parked car. John's abandoned vehicle is soon discovered near the Memphis & Arkansas Bridge and there is fear that he took his own life by jumping into the Mississippi River. Months later, a drifter matching John's description is seen at a truck stop in Virginia, leading to speculation that he may be suffering from amnesia and forgotten who he was, but all attempts to find him are unsuccessful. April 19, 1991. Punta Chivato, Mexico. While on vacation from California, 34-year old Gordon Collins sets out in a fishing boat alongside his girlfriend, Anastasia Seals, and another couple, Wayne Shwatz and Arlean Burlington. A storm soon hits the area and the overturned boat, as well as Anastasia and Wayne's bodies, are found floating in the Sea of Cortez the following day. Gordon and Arlean's bodies cannot be found, but reports start circulating about a disoriented white male matching Gordon's description wandering through Mexico. This leads Gordon's family to believe that he survived the boating accident and is suffering from amnesia, but they are unable to track him down. On this week's episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore two unsolved missing persons cases in which each victim was believed to have lost their memory before they became a transient. Special thanks to listener Marcos Sainz for narrating the opening of this episode. If you have any information on the disappearance of John Cheek, please contact the Memphis Police Department at (901) 545-5700. Additional Reading: https://unsolved.com/gallery/john-cheek/ https://charleyproject.org/case/john-andrews-cheek https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1994/02/25/an-executive-hits-the-vanishing-point/30dddee8-d4d6-442e-b310-8c13bcf593e2/?utm_term=.ce4551e324b8 http://people.com/archive/vanished-with-a-trace-vol-41-no-11/ https://memphismagazine.com/features/unsolved-mysteries/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/774400146/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/774544772/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/774544793/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/774378109/ https://unsolved.com/gallery/gordon-collins/ https://unsolvedmysteries.fandom.com/wiki/Gordon_Collins https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-04-26-mn-756-story.html https://www.newspapers.com/image/571519189/ “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Austin, Texas on August 25-27, 2023. To get a 15 % discount on the purchase of tickets, please our specialized promo code, “TRAIL”, by visiting https://truecrimepodcastfestival.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.
February 7, 1999. Westminster, Colorado. 38-year old Paul Skiba, his nine-year old daughter Sarah Skiba, and 36-year old Lorenzo Chivers spend the day performing moving jobs for a company Paul owns before they all vanish without a trace. When the company's parking lot is searched, Paul's moving truck is found, but there is ample physical evidence, including blood and bullet holes, to indicate that foul play took place. There are numerous theories surrounding the case, such as the disappearances being connected to a dispute between Paul and his estranged girlfriend, but none of the three victims are ever found. On this week's episode of the “Trail Went Cold”, we explore a tragic missing persons case involving a father, a daughter and an employee who all vanished together. If you have any information about this case, please contact the Westminster Police Department at (303) 658-6430 or Metro Denver Crime Stoppers at (720) 913-7867. Additional Reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearances_of_Paul_and_Sarah_Skiba_and_Lorenzo_Chivers https://charleyproject.org/case/paul-carroll-skiba https://charleyproject.org/case/sarah-arielle-skiba https://charleyproject.org/case/lorenzo-deshawn-chivers https://www.westword.com/news/a-cold-case-frozen-in-time-5097544 http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/08/06/cold.case.sarah.skiba/index.html https://www.denver7.com/news/local-news/westminster-police-asking-for-information-in-20-year-old-cold-case https://www.9news.com/article/news/cold-case-20-years-later-murders-of-3-in-westminster-remains-unsolved/73-513348d8-705e-48c4-a8fa-ac1a18ce2f4a https://www.9news.com/article/news/local/arvada-man-gets-28-years-for-stabbing-mom/73-249897793 “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Austin, Texas on August 25-27, 2023. To get a 15 % discount on the purchase of tickets, please our specialized promo code, “TRAIL”, by visiting https://truecrimepodcastfestival.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.
January 24, 1987. Martinez, California. Nine-year old Eric Coy leaves his home on his bicycle in order to visit his aunt's residence. Fifteen minutes later, Eric's body and bicycle are discovered in a nearby wooded area and he has been stabbed several times. Four weeks after Eric is killed, six-year old Jeremy Stoner goes missing from nearby Vallejo before he is also found murdered and even though a suspect named Shawn Melton is charged with the crime, both of his trials end with hung juries and the charges against Melton are dropped. While investigators explore potential connections between the two cases, there are unable to find conclusive answers. Were Eric Coy and Jeremy Stoner both killed by the same perpetrator? Was Shawn Melton actually guilty of murder? On this week's episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore a pair of cold cases from the Bay Area of California that are still unsolved after 36 years. Special thanks to listener Hope Grimsley for narrating the opening of the episode. If you have any information about the murder of Eric Coy, please contact the Martinez Police Department at (925) 372-3440 Additional Reading: https://www.newspapers.com/image/461391269/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/758716985/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/758717596/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/461434154/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/758717407/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/461437953/ https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-02-04-mn-535-story.html https://martineztribune.com/2016/01/21/cold-case-still-under-investigation/ https://www.upi.com/Archives/1987/03/05/Guard-arrested-in-child-slaying/7547541918800/ https://www.upi.com/Archives/1988/10/04/Second-jury-deadlocks-over-accused-child-killer/5028591940800/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/461517007/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/461455421/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/461240895/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/624223222/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/808781792/ “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Austin, Texas on August 25-27, 2023. To get a 15 % discount on the purchase of tickets, please our specialized promo code, “TRAIL”, by visiting https://truecrimepodcastfestival.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.
September 8, 1999. Horry County, South Carolina. 22-year old Lisa Myers Neugent phones her mother to let her know that she is staying at a resort with her estranged spouse, Frank Isley, but is planning to end the relationship and return home to North Carolina. After not hearing from her for nearly two weeks, Lisa's parents travel to her residence and discover that it has been ransacked and Lisa and Frank have disappeared. A warrant is issued for Frank's arrest on unrelated charges and he remains a wanted fugitive for four years until he is found. However, Lisa is no longer with Frank and he fails to provide any information on her whereabouts. This week's episode of “The Trail Went Cold” covers the unsolved disappearance of Lisa Myers Neugent, who vanished while attempting to remove herself from a toxic relationship. If you have any information about this case, please contact the Horry County Police Department at (843) 915-5350. Additional Reading: https://charleyproject.org/case/lisa-ann-myers-neugent https://unsolvedmysteries.fandom.com/wiki/Lisa_Myers https://greensboro.com/a-family-s-somber-holiday-woman-s-disappearance-haunts-parents/article_6fc2d17f-7f5d-5622-adc5-8585d7f672ec.html https://greensboro.com/family-turns-to-web-in-search-for-woman-lisa-myers-neugent-24-disappeared-on-labor/article_bd34d1e9-4e05-502b-9cb1-22da9e0dc951.html https://greensboro.com/show-to-feature-missing-woman-unsolved-mysteries-plans-a-segment/article_9407c009-c381-5d23-9ca1-a9bc3271dc52.html https://web.archive.org/web/20040816040458/http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld/sunnews/news/local/7563267.htm https://www.timesenterprise.com/news/local_news/fugitive-pursuit-leads-to-arrest-in-new-mexico/article_0a6b17d0-3600-5718-8349-ab18bfd7e0cd.html https://www.myhorrynews.com/news/crime/clues-point-to-horry-county-home-in-case-of-conway/article_746f9984-c0d0-11e3-b689-001a4bcf6878.html “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Austin, Texas on August 25-27, 2023. To get a 15 % discount on the purchase of tickets, please our specialized promo code, “TRAIL”, by visiting https://truecrimepodcastfestival.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.
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