318: Comedy, feminism and novel writing with Julia Raeside

0:03Ellie Gibson: Hello, scumbags. This is the Scummy Mummies podcast with your hosts Ellie Gibson and Helen Thorn.

0:16Hello and welcome to the Scummy Mummies podcast. It's me, Helen Thorn. And it's me, Ellie Gibson. Ellie Gibson. I'm very excited. Are you? Yes, yes, because we've got one of our favourite guests, one of our favourite people, and just an all-round excellent woman on the podcast today, Ellie. That's right. It is Julia Rayside. Hello. Oh, hello.

0:34Ellie Gibson: I already feel better just sitting here between you two. Oh, thank you. Thank you for coming to see us. What have you been up to, Julia Rayside? Drinking a delicious cup of tea, which I'm putting down now. Yeah, to explain the noise. No, that's fine. It gives ambiance. It's like people think it's like the archers. cafe sound here comes the horses but mostly i have been as we all have getting through the summer holidays just wishing wishing for them to end and um uh i've done a book you've done a book i have done one but let's row back a little bit let's let's row back julia rayside um so we've had you on the podcast before i mean how would you how would you introduce yourself how okay um is this a trick so I'm a journalist I am a lady um I am old now I am a I'm 50 years old and um yeah so I'm a journalist and mostly an arts journalist I write about telly and love comedy write about comedy and then I started doing investigative stuff because lots of people in comedy were telling me horrible stories about what it's like to work in comedy and then then I had an idea for a book based on the stuff I'd been sort of digging into.

1:44Ellie Gibson: So your book is about, I've read your book, by the way, which is brilliant. And I loved it. And I loved it partly because it is about comedy. And obviously that's, you know, I'm vaguely interested. You hope to work in it one day. So yes, but also I loved it because it is about women and friendship and feminism and all that good stuff, isn't it? Yeah, exactly. I think I knew I wanted to write a book about the problem, the negative thing, the bad thing that's going on in comedy, which is there are lots of predatory men who sort of kind of own the business. It's still quite a boys club, as you probably know.

2:19And so the clubs, agents, promoters, people who kind of have the power in comedy, most of them are men. And it means that a loss of behaviour by other men in comedy goes unchecked because the culture is kind of to just overlook it if people are putting the bums on the seats. So I can't remember what the question was now. This happens a lot when you're flifty. It was something about... No, it's gone. What was it? Oh, got something to do with the book. Oh, no, that's right. The book, and yes, so the thing that I keep hearing myself saying is, I don't want to write an angry book. So I wanted, I did, I am really angry about it.

2:50And obviously it's a lifetime's worth of other female anger that just, you know, informs the anger in the book. But I wanted to write a book, a hopeful book about what happens when women get together, because I keep seeing it everywhere. I keep, I see it in comedy, women in comedy, kind of look after each other, keep lists of men to be careful around, like buddy up with each other so they don't end up on their own with the wrong guys there's a lot of um really positive hopeful stuff coming out of this situation i wanted to write a book that wasn't just negative and saying how bad things are because they are and they have been for ages but i really wanted to talk hopefully about my own experiences of like doing stories about men in comedy when women get together and speak up together things can start to change obviously if we all feel like we're alone that doesn't happen so as opposed yeah the idea was to be positive and encouraging about the power of the power of gossip and the power of female friendship two things I firmly believe in I and I loved I loved the female characters in it

3:45Ellie Gibson: as well and because as well they're not all flawless do you know what I mean like almost almost like real women if you will it's almost like you're quite a good writer it really lifts off the page yeah it's funny though because like some people who've read the book and like one comedian actually I did um I did an interview with uh specifically what kind of went on and on about how the main character, she's called Ali, was, you know, well, she's quite flawed herself, isn't she? And obviously some people don't get past an unlikable female character and they just won't carry on reading the book. So, you know, a couple of that.

4:19I mean, I don't read all my reviews. Of course I don't. I've read every single one. Some of them are like, oh, I just, I couldn't get on with this. Oh, this woman said some awful things about, do you know, I think she might be a bit of a misogynist. Like internally, it's like, it's almost like I put that there as a right, oh, fuck me. It's like, you know, yes, of course. It was really important that she was both kind of on the receiving end of some really toxic behaviour and also not a perfect person with like angel wings and a halo. Because we just in society, this is what we do when a woman says a man did a bad thing.

4:49The first thing that people who don't want to believe about the story do is kind of try and find out what's wrong with her. Why is she lying? How could she be deceiving everybody? It's just like, oh, so depressing. So it was really important to me that the main character was not perfect and kind of had some pretty bad ideas about, you know, women and friendship herself because she kind of needed to go on that journey and find the brilliance and the strength of female friendship. And, you know, it probably took me a long time to kind of realise that. I think when I was younger, I probably didn't see that that was a positive thing.

5:21And it took me fucking ages to kind of get there. So I thought, I'll put that in the book. It's the first novels. There's loads of me in there. Because, yeah, we're not perfect. and the idea that we have to be perfect before we can start telling stories like this is bullshit. Yeah.

5:34Ellie Gibson: And that's such a real phenomenon as well, that thing of as you get older, more and more things happen to you and you see more and more dark sides of different men. Yeah. And you sort of go, oh, no, actually, there's quite a lot of shit. Just because you've never objectively seen in the broad light of day something sexist or terrible happening to you, come to realise that that doesn't mean it's not going on to other women. But it also doesn't mean it's not going on behind your back because they often don't say it in front of you. You know, where I started a long time ago now, like in my early 20s, you know, I forget that I was kind of mulled in the bath of like the 90s, fucking loaded, being told that feminism was like wearing a short skirt and making sure the boys find you acceptable and you can drink as much as they do.

6:21It's like that. None of that is feminism. This is so confusing. What's going on? The specific world I chose to write about comedy is like it's a classic sort of place for this kind of behaviour to happen, because as you were kind of just saying, there's men who kind of are extremely affable, lovely, even feminists, left wing, do a lot of work for charity, really supportive to new comedians coming up. and they would never do anything bad in front of you or someone they thought might call them out on it. But what they do when people aren't looking, when it's just them and a young woman and you comedians say in a car with them, it's quite different.

6:58And it's really, I mean, it's still a real uphill battle to talk about someone who's popular, like someone like Russell Brand, who's obviously being talked about a lot at the moment because he's been charged with some very serious things. Lots of people will go, I didn't like him. He's a wanker. I hate Russell Brand. And that's like, yeah, sure. it's really easy to believe bad things about that guy. But the guy who is nice, a nice guy, a good guy, a softie, seems like a real sweetie. That kind of person, the kind of person I used to fancy, like in my 20s. It's much harder to believe that that person could be a completely different person when they're not in front of their peer group.

7:33But it happens. It happens a lot. And it happens a lot in comedy, I found out.

7:39Ellie Gibson: Yeah. And again, I was going to say, so you've got these brilliant female characters in the book, and then you've got these male characters including yeah there's this one character who seems lovely and you and you sort of especially again at our age you go oh god i know that guy yeah yeah i've had so many messages about him going oh my god i've dated him i've dated him yeah it's like yeah he's not real but yeah you definitely have dated him yeah and then they're almost worse in a way than the blokes who are like oh yeah yes you know what you're dealing with them and you can tell them to fuck off it's this insidious thing of knowing how to manipulate women and use you and push forward and then pull back and it's really oh I really thought you captured it I'm really glad because I think there's you know obviously there's a serious problem with sexual assaults and properly illegal terrible behavior in the comedy industry but the thing I kept hearing that was harder to articulate and we don't quite have we sort of have a vocabulary before but we still don't quite know how to say it like oh he did he didn't touch me he didn't you know assault me or whatever but he over a long period of time um lied manipulated maybe gained consent to do things with me by false you know by some false representations whatever they're not crimes but there's this huge gray area where you will still find a trail of victims and it's like so do those guys just get to do it because it's not gonna get them in prison yeah is that like a thing and obviously with some of them it's a conscious decision to stay that side of the line.

9:07So I did. There's, I mean, some amazing stories, obviously, I will completely anonymize. But there was one guy I heard about who I bumped into a male comedian at a party. And we were talking about another male comedian that he knew. And he said, Yeah, I've heard he sort of stepped back from the industry a bit. He's going to take some time to think about, you know, maybe his behavior with women, he's going to have a think about it. And I was like, All right, that sounds, you know, a bit unlikely. But sure. Okay, interesting interesting that he's got that kind of self self knowledge and then he paused and just said and sort of looked a bit puzzled and said there was one thing that confused me though I was like oh what was that and he just said yeah he said to me um nothing actionable like he'd considered his behavior I thought okay wait wait a minute before I started missing stuff can any of this get me in jail and then he was like no and actually I think probably all his entire career of whatever it was he was doing with women he kind of had that in mind like I don't want to go to prison and I'm not like a bad guy.

10:01I'm just going to push it to the line and then stop. And it's like, I bet that's really common.

10:06Ellie Gibson: And I think there are some people who would say, well, yeah, and that behaviour is not illegal. It's not illegal to lie to someone about whether or not you're in another relationship or what you're going to do with their images that they send you or just manipulate people. That's not illegal. That's just, you know, what grown-ups do. But for me, it's about, well, okay, we're not saying there should be a law against it necessarily. We're not saying these men should be incarcerated. but aren't we ellie aren't we not publicly julia what's the other one castrated that's what i'm thinking yes publicly castrated that's right what you know i'm i'm not calling for a change in the law but i am saying we have to be allowed to highlight this behavior and say it's not cool it's not okay it's not okay to go around causing a lot of emotional and mental damage yeah regardless of that you're not going to get nicked for it exactly it's it's it's still abuse and it's okay and I think the thing in comedy that again I was most fascinated by is as I start you know was starting to put together an idea for a book I was like what book what is this that I'm trying to say why is it comedy why are we focusing on this particular kind of behavior in this world and it was the idea of you know I mean you're sitting between been two comedians now I still find the idea of stand-up comedy I mean maybe that there's two of you like there's you've got somewhere to hide but it's like it's so terrifying it's such a weird thing to want to do to like go on a stage and then it's not just like being a teacher or a lecturer or whatever and just conveying information you kind of live or die in that slot that however long you've got on whether they find you funny or not and that to me that seems like an insane you're both looking at me like yep perfectly normal yeah that's what's what's wrong with that julia you're weird you're so best job in the world the best job in the world i'm saying well if you're a skydiver you live on dial whether you parachute oh well yes yes exactly it's risk involved but there's that kind of dead-eyed acceptance of your possible death at every time like it's it nobody is it to me as someone who finds that whole thing quite frightening in public speech i mean microphone i'm okay with but like a room full of people i kind of go and i don't like it um i find it really fascinating but also the idea of when you i know i've talked for lots of comedians about how in a benign way they love the feeling of controlling the room so you go up there and you love it when you can see you've got them and then you can pretty much you're a conductor they're an orchestra and you can just kind of you can direct them to beat to come up to come back down again if somebody steps out of line there's that social contract with hecklers where you're allowed to destroy them and everyone's with you when you do that if you do it right um it's such a weird controlled interesting environment and then I started to think about all the men I'd heard who behaved in bad ways towards women who are comedians and thought, is there something about needing control of that room and then still needing to control every room they're in?

12:58Like the women they're with, the friends they're with, you know, some of the examples that I was using as kind of inspiration in the book. Nobody real is in the book. Honestly, it's really, it's all made up. You should have called the main character Russell Bland. Can you imagine? Genuinely, when my publishers bought the book, and I love my publishers, they're great. The first thing they said was, well, we're pretty sure we'd like to go ahead with an offer, but we will need to get a legal read first. And I was like, oh yeah, no, of course, absolutely. And I was asking my agent, like, why are they doing that?

13:25And she was like, oh, they think it's Russell Brand. And I was like, oh my God, like, they think there's one, how adorable.

13:35Actually cute. I can't remember what we're talking about now. So this is going going to happen a lot there'll be people shouting at the speakers going get back to the thing you

13:44Ellie Gibson: were saying you were talking about comedians not obviously present government accepted mental medians wanting to control a situation yeah and um so they can be a good version of it the bad version of it so um fern brady wrote that brilliant book about being um get diagnosed with autism and sort of how and i went to see her do a talk about it was so interesting and she talked about how sometimes she wished she could just be on stage all the time because as someone who's autistic as a woman who's autistic the kind of the only way she can check she's okay sort of socially in the in the wherever she is is by kind of you know she picks up a microphone and she says some stuff and then the audience go that was funny or yes we've you've made us feel uncomfortable but she it's like she has this way of checking how she's doing when she's on stage and when she's off stage that it's much harder to read emotional cues and to judge how she's coming across and whether she's fucking up you know an interaction with someone or you know if they if they think she's strange or whatever and I think that's really interesting because it's there's obviously lots of reasons why people do like comedy but having having the mic we call you know we literally say like and I've got the mic now it's like I'm talking um everyone in the room has to listen that control is obviously appealing even if it's not in a mean way it's appealing to feel like you've got control of a brim um and some of the men I was hearing about they were coming off stage they were using the fact that they have status when you've got the microphone you're kind of like the king of the room you come off stage you know that literally you know people are tilting their heads up at a 45 degree angle to admire you those people are most attracted to them and they just know how to spot the vulnerable ones the ones that need the validation and that yeah there's something about the control of the room by stealth they're also having control off stage because they're picking people who will be susceptible to that control and you know it's the stories I've heard like there's well there's one um she's a comedian actually and she wrote she wrote down a couple of things that happened to her in a book I don't want to I mean if you read the book it's in the public domain but I'm not going to say who the comedian is and that it's you know I'm not sort of gonna force her then to answer lots of questions about it and she was talking about being in um a relationship with a man he was obviously married children had kind of just you know told that he was in love with her and then for five years, I think it was, had basically never slept with her, but had emotionally just completely got his claws into her.

16:10And then every time she started to realise maybe this isn't going to become a relationship and perhaps we need to stop now, he would threaten to kill himself. This is what I mean. So it's kind of like, this is not, it sounds so low status, it sounds like he's a victim really, but he's using nasty kind of tactics to keep her in control to keep her in a pattern of trusting him and believing him and and just basically doing whatever he asks her to do it doesn't even have to be about sex it's usually about controlling someone and keeping them there because it makes them feel like they've got the room with them all the time effectively and obviously they don't usually just do it to one woman they do it to loads of women and it's starting to i'm starting to get loads of messages now from people just random people leaving me voice messages on um i didn't know you could do that on Instagram.

16:55It's really unnerving when you kind of go, oh, and someone starts talking out of your screen, just saying, oh my God, you don't know me, but I've just read your book and I've dated that guy and thank you so much. It's like, oh, okay, this is really cool. And it's like, this is what I wanted. I wanted a discussion about this. It's very hidden behaviour. Have you had much feedback from men? Only a bit. And the ones who have been kind of like positive about it have been really positive. Robin Ince has been super supportive and is really keen to talk about this subject in his industry. Nobody else is.

17:29Nobody else with testicles in his industry wants to talk about how bad behaviour is rife. Ed Gamble, that was really sweet. He sort of bigged the book up on his radio show and a few others as well. But there was one male comedian I was booked to do a radio show with and I think his producer went, ah, yeah, you're like this, it's about comedy and hadn't read the book. And then the day of the show, it's really unprofessional, the day of the show, they said, oh, can we bump you to next week? And then the same thing happened the following week. And I was like, oh, okay, fair enough. Yeah, I don't mind.

18:03And then finally the third show we were supposed to be doing came up and the producer was like, I'm so sorry. He just doesn't want to talk about this subject. It's just, it's like, it's not that he thinks you're wrong or anything. It's just like, he has to work in the industry. He doesn't want to. And I was like, fuck off. I mean it's my first reaction but then I was also like but you know that that's the problem right I mean I know you don't want to think about this or look directly at it but the men it's not it's not just the men doing the bad things it's the men and women around the bad things who go don't look at it don't look at it it's fine it's fine we just accept it we don't talk about it the ones who are pretending it's not happening they are the fucking problem so yes it was almost like well thank you for giving me an anecdote to tell when I do my book events you prick and like you know we when we do our comedy show um it is 99 women in the audience and it feels most of the time the audience is fantastic we don't feel like there's a level of aggression yeah and other women say to us i like coming to your show because i don't feel like i'm going to get like picked on or yeah or it's a safe place for women to go collectively as a group yeah because they're they can just celebrate themselves they can feel safe they can let go yeah they can laugh out loud about something that is directly related to them.

19:18And I think we sell out 400, 500, maybe 800 set of theatres that are still as valid as, you know, I think they still pay the same money. But that's women's thing. People are very quick to kind of go, well, you know, you're... Oh, women will laugh at anything. You just have to say period and they all fall about laughing. See? See? No, it's true. It's just anyone who's still trying to perpetuate that idea that like, oh, it's women's comedy. It's like, oh, fuck off. I take great delight now when I do interviews and talking about male comedians. That's divine. It's either a comedian or, you know, a male comedian.

19:57Because bless it, they try it sometimes too and some of them are quite good.

20:01Ellie Gibson: Can we talk a little bit about your process? Mainly because, let's make this about me, I'm trying to write a novel. Oh my God, it's so hard. It's so hard, Julia. It's so hard. Ellie, I wish I had any words of encouragement apart from, yeah, well, nut up, sweetheart. No, it is. It's really fucking difficult, isn't it? Because if you're, I mean, I don't know what your situation is, but mostly if you've got the idea for a novel, no one will buy it until you've finished it. So I didn't have an agent when I started writing it, so I had to write it. Then, oh my God, finding an agent was quite hard. And then when I finally did, it was great because she was super enthusiastic and was like, I totally get it, I totally get it.

20:38And then trying to sell it, that was a whole other hurdle. Because even if she's really passionate about it, oh God, the publishing thing is really hard. But the writing of it, fuck me, I still don't quite believe that I did it. It's like the one time I ran the marathon. Yes, fans, thank you very much. I did ages ago. And it was just like you can't believe you finished. I'm sitting next to someone who's run like 88 marathons. No, no. Book writing is harder. I'd rather run a marathon every day, finish the last 10 % of my fucking book. Oh, I know. It hurts. It hurts. And I think it's like childbirth in that you forget how much it hurts.

21:13and I'm now, I've got an idea for another one and every time I sit down to do it, I think, oh, fuck no, this is going to be awful, isn't it? It's the first draft again. It's getting down the first version of it and all you should really say to someone who's writing their first draft is, oh, no, it will be shit. It will be absolute dog shit. You can't stop. It'll be awful and you mustn't go back and edit it. You must just get it done. And you have to be, you have to have a fucking iron, what's it called? Resilience. you know you eat because i i'm in the stage of the my book where i've had like the second and third edits and and and i'm like it takes me sometimes two or three days to even open the email from the editor kind of going they hate it and they think i'm awful and like it takes so much to go and then you have to really take a deep deep oh my god yeah 500 different comments and things and and then it's like you say very much in i was like this very much feels like this very Why do I say very much?

22:10And everything about you was very exposed. It's really exposing. It makes you feel so self-conscious, doesn't it, about the way you write and the way you express yourself. But I have to say, once the vomit draft was done, I mean, it wasn't like all the other drafts were super easy, but it got better every time. This is just me. I know lots of writers who love that bit and hate the editing. I really loved editing. That was like my favourite bit because I could see it. I don't know. it's like making a sculpture it's just clay it's just a pile of stupid clay for ages

22:43Ellie Gibson: that's what Emily Pink said to me exactly it's a lump of clay you've just got to get the clay on the fucking what's a pot wheel I don't know table the wheel whatever on Demi Moore exactly exactly and then Patrick Swayze's dead spectral figure will come up behind you but it has to be done that way there's literally no other way to do it you do need the dead Patrick Swayze and then you have to rotate the clay and then and eventually you end up with a penis vase yes That's what I want to make. If you work really hard, you could. I heard you on another podcast. It might have been writer's routine.

23:16Ellie Gibson: But you were saying that you like to write in a cafe, but there have been times when you've been in the cafe and it's the wrong kind of cafe ambiance. So you put on a YouTube cafe ambiance. It's just people clattering about, isn't it? What? Because what I realised is, because my husband goes out to write quite a lot. he's really good at just saying no if I sit here I'll start doing house stuff will get distracted yes um so I was like oh no I'm more of a home person I like writing at home so I do sit at home a lot and write but then obviously sometimes I just stare at it and kind of go slack-jawed and then look at the internet and then the day's over so it's not great not not reproductive so sometimes you know to fix something to fix a plot hole or whatever I'll go for a walk and that always helps like it never doesn't help you think oh I feel really stupid why am I going for a walk and then if you stay out for long enough something will kind of shift just let your brain sort of do the work but sitting staring at it will not fix it but then in the latter stages of maybe editing and stuff I was like I could I could go to a cafe maybe just to not be sat in this fucking chair for another day because you spend a lot of time just in the same place so I yeah the cafe would be great until I'd start to hear other people's conversations and I'd be like oh what's that obviously maybe that's great if you're trying to think of a new idea for a book but not so great if you're trying to focus on the words on the page I'm just not very good at concentrating I can even do music.

24:33If it's music with lyrics, forget it. I can do film soundtracks or cafe noise, but nothing else. No, I have classic FM and then just occasionally Alexander-Arne-Shonguk. Mozart. I love it. Oh, that's my go-to. And it'll always be Mozart, never anyone else. No. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll never run out of Mozart to play. I think you're right because my house has never been so tidy as it has been. Oh, my God. Yes. Everything else. Everything else but book. Yes. Also, I'm smoking myself a new lum. Oh, God. Not with cigarettes, just with a triple mango vape. I've got fruity lum. I wondered what that fruity smell was.

25:13It's your lungs. Basically, I've just got two Capri Suns now instead of organs. I mean, yeah. You'll do anything to just not sit there with it. It's just, and it's really weird because it's your, you know, you've written, it's your thing. Oh, I'm the worst critic. I give myself zero out of five for writing all the time. Even though you've professionally done this for quite a while now and gotten paid for it, I believe. Yes, yes. It's crazy, isn't it? You just don't believe it sometimes. Five magic beans, yeah. The most important thing, if you're going to try this, and I don't advise anyone does, but if you're already trying it, you might as well keep going, is having people who've already done it who can tell you, oh, no, no, it's not that you truly understand that your book is now bad and you must stop.

25:57It's that that is how you will feel and you have to push past it and either take a break, come back to it or whatever. But it's, yeah, it takes so long. You'll go through so many emotions, but you must finish. You have to at least finish it.

26:11Ellie Gibson: Congratulations, Julia. Thanks, man. Congratulations on your excellent book, which is called Don't Make Me Laugh. It is. And is available now in paperback for a mere£9.99. That's very reasonable. Where can they get it, Julia? Shops. Also, I have to say this because it's important to, you know, you can get it from anywhere, obviously. But bookshop.org, if you're an online shopper, if you go there, then they kind of give back to independent bookshops. So it's a really good way of buying your books online if you prefer to get them delivered. Well, there we go. Have we reached the end of the podcast, Andy?

26:45It is time for Scummy Mummy Confessions, Ellie. Yes. So I'm going to start off. I recently went on holiday, had a lovely time. went to the Canary Islands with my son and my lovely Canarian partner and we came back. And you know when you're just like, oh, I've had a week away. It's just so nice to be home. And anyway, I went upstairs and unbeknownst to me, my cat had diarrhoea while I was away. And no, no, no. It was on the bed. It was littered throughout the top area.

27:21Ellie Gibson: was can i ask was your partner with you in this moment no he no no because i know he struggles a bit as i would with the cat's ability function yes yes yes he doesn't like he doesn't like the cat in the room okay i mean in in in the bedroom and we so what is wonderful about my relationship with with albero is that he lives 10 minutes away so you know we we have conjugal visits but also like prison yes nice we you know we do it occasionally and then but then he doesn't have to ingest all the cat hair in my house anyway and so we I was like bye we dropped yeah he went home in his Uber and I went home to diarrhoea land no no no it was really not and so did you burn your house down that's what I heard yeah I now live outside fair enough was it the bed or all that On the bed.

28:15Just sort of like, just sort of like, it was like, yeah, like a trail. Like you say, oh, we were really bad tummy that day on the stairs. Then some brown footprints. And if this is like a crime scene and you could age the shit, like how long do you think it had been there? Oh, like three, so did four days. Soaking into your, yeah. So at the beginning of the stairs, up to the stairs. And then, as well, pissed, I pooed on Hugo's bed, my son's bed, and then pissed very deeply into a pile of a open casket of washing oh my god oh and do you know what you you need after a week of relaxing is to come back and feel very stressed into about eight loads of washing and like i so i went down the shops and got all those you know those shaker beads you know then lenoge i'm sure they're very bad for everybody but i just was just i'm pouring everything into that spraying and yeah my partner was just at home going oh gross gross that's disgusting yeah yeah yeah he really values not living with me right now and you're shitty cats yeah yeah no offense but you

29:20Ellie Gibson: know yeah anyway physically anyone else yes we stayed we've just come back from holiday in Italy and we stayed with some friends of ours who live just outside Rome and um they have a beautiful sort of Roman house with a fountain in the in the courtyard they spend quite a lot of time trying to stop the cats eating the fish in the fountain. Oh, no. There used to be about 12 fish. There's now seven fish. Oh, no. That's quite stressful. And then I think I did, was it the last morning? We were up quite early. I'm going to last espresso with Jamila and the cat brought in a dead bird as a sort of... What's wrong with you?

29:58Ellie Gibson: And I was just like, this is why I can't. And now having your story, because my husband loves cats, would have a cat but this is why we can't yeah no i've got a cat but she is polite she doesn't bring in anything dead actually she only did it once we went on holiday and my and my friend came and looked after her for a few days and she brought him two mice and she's never done that to us wow i was like what is going on what are you doing wrong is she flirting with him is that it is this kind of going hey bennett yeah i don't know she's so she's badass she's like a very kind of you know there's lots of floof everywhere and occasionally sure she piques up a hebble but on the whole she's like pretty much keeps all the viscera away from us so i'm fine i'm thrilled for you julia yeah no i've had children who behaved yesterday so that's fine i will i'll give you my confession which happened just today uh and actually i've already told julia this but i'll share it for you and the listener um so since we got back from holiday a few days ago i'm not gonna lie there's been a lot of screen right because you get back and you're like and it's lovely and you're but it's like you need like a holiday for your holiday because you're oh I'm in my house oh yeah oh fuck it I'll let them have another hour to do because I just I've watched this other documentary about the Titanic sub-disaster your list is full Ellie you've got a lot on listen I said I said to you on the WhatsApp I watched K-pop Demon Hunters which is one of the happiest best things I've ever seen and Helen will tell you I don't generally like happy things I'm not that into but it was no I was surprised so joyous absolutely loved it but then I felt like to bring me down I had to watch a documentary about the Titanic sub-disaster.

31:34Ellie Gibson: There's quite a few because Channel 5 hasn't got anything else to do. So I feel like I'm now on this sort of addiction of uppers and downers. Like literally downers. And then rich people exploding. It's like a constant, it's mad. When will the cycle end? I just don't know. I just don't know. So today I was like, right, okay, we're not just going to sit on screens in the morning like we've been doing. It's like 10 o 'clock, we're going off screens and we're going to go on a walk. And obviously the kids are like, we're going to walk down through the down by the canal that goes to catford oh lovely oh lovely so beautiful we'll walk to mcdonald's because that's how i can get my children out of the hat yes it must be a bribe and then we had i ended up having a massive hour with a teenager about screen time generally and wars so that went on for ages it went on for so long and i had you coming around to do it so what i'm sorry your fault i mean i was the one with the putting the time pressure on you so um by the time we'd had the row and then made up after the row we didn't have time to walk of course i promised the little one a mcdonald's and also i needed to go to aldi's so i was like fine just get in the car the whole point in the outing the healthy bit has been completely negative yeah we drive down there and then like we're running low on time so i say right i'm gonna go get a coffee and i give the big kid my debit card i'm like you just take your brother into mcdonald's and just get some lunch and i'll meet you and then okay so he comes out mcdonald's i'm like right how's it going and he goes yeah so you know i'm trying to eat a bit healthier mum and i said oh yeah and he said so i didn't get any chips and i went okay that's a good a good healthy choice and he went yeah i just got 20 chicken nuggets says 20 20 chicken nuggets individually fried morsels and not just that yeah he got spicy chicken nuggets oh well i don't know if he was trying to do your chinese tea trick where he just thought that the daria would pass it maybe the cat ate your chinese laxative tea i mean that's what it is yeah so he was like yeah 20 chicken nuggets it's low carb and i was like is it though and he got spicy chicken nuggets which he'd not tried before and it turns out he doesn't like them it's really actually quite healthy so if anyone wants to buy 18 untouched spicy chicken nuggets, who needs panjara?

33:52Ellie Gibson: Just take them back to Holland and Barrow and get a refund. So that is my scummy holidays. That is my scummy holidays story. It's all going very well. I could give you, so I, you know, obviously, because my kid is 16 now, and the last time I saw you, I probably had a lot of, like, I basically just don't see my child anymore. They live upstairs. They've got like about 18 different screens that they just pay attention to all day. But now I'm at a safe enough distance from it. I've got one from like years ago that, oh God, it's still, I think I'm ready to say it now. But it's one of those times where every time you remember it and you just kind of go, you kind of, you know, you curl up and die.

34:32Feel the, yeah, shudder. So, I mean, obviously this isn't true anymore. But, you know, back in the day when my kid was maybe sort of six or seven, I was, my husband and I still enjoy each other's company. We have a healthy relationship. And so one day there was a little voice from upstairs when we were in the middle of something, having a lovely chat and a cuddle, a special cuddle. And there was like a little voice going, Mom. And I was like, oh, shit, shit, shit. And, you know, you do your best to be so, so quiet, obviously, because that's a situation you just don't even want to consider. and I went up and saw them and they were like, what's wrong?

35:09And I was like, oh, daddy was just helping me. I had cramp. I had cramp. And then a few months later, obviously I was enjoying what happened again. And they were a bit older and I think probably knew that it wasn't cramp. So I was like, okay, look, they always tell you don't lie to your children. So I was just like, oh, look, darling, this is something you won't really understand now, but you know, you've been learning about sort of like sex education at school. so look daddy and I you know really still like each other so sometimes we still have sex and they just looked at me and kind of like you know puzzled it through for a few seconds and then their brow really creased and they just looked at me and went why and I was like yeah I don't have an answer for just like it um yeah and I've done I've just I don't think I've ever said that it's like if anywhere was the place to say it was now my child heard me doing it I could have lied but I thought I was doing the right thing no me and my partner um try to you know keep on the download kissing kissing and you know we you know we'll give each other a kiss on the cheek around the kids but the other day son you know tuned out watching the tv and I walked past my partner in the kitchen he slapped me on the arse and he goes did you just slap my mom on the ball we're like no no no no we were just time piping yeah there I was a fly.

36:31I was getting the fly. Yeah, that's actually really misogynistic. Also, just mums and dads aside, like no one who's a teenager wants to see old people getting frisky. They just don't want to know. It's an ick. It's a real ick. That was a real, like turning 50 has been pretty good. But a couple of times I've just thought, oh, does a 50-year-old do that? Does a 50-year-old do that? So I basically had a word with myself, went straight to a tattoo artist and got another tattoo. Yes, like, yes, a 50-year-old does this because I just have to. You've got to get past that block. I really remember my mum cutting all her hair off when she was 40 because I think her dad had told her that women over 40 shouldn't have long hair.

37:09And she had the most gorgeous long hair. So I'm like, long hair, tattoos, like, got to. Magnificent eyeliner. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Don't pay attention to that. It's terrible.

37:18Ellie Gibson: Enjoy yourself. You're here now. Oh, well, there we go. We've reached the end of the podcast, Helen. Oh, it's been wonderful to have you back. Thank you. I loved being here. Thanks for having me. Huge congratulations on Don't Make Me Love and highly recommended by us and by many. By many. Go out there. Go read it. Yes. And are you on tour or are you doing any talks or anything coming up? What have I got coming up? I'm doing a couple of literary festivals and events here and there. But yeah, we're just booking in some stuff for the autumn. So keep an eye on my social media if you're desperate to see me.

37:51Ellie Gibson: What is your social media? Julia Rayside, writer. We are going to be back on tour. We've had a little break for the summer, but we're back on it, Helen. We are now. I've got to have a metal plate inserted in my knee at the beginning of September. But after that, we're going to do some more shows. Possibly in a wheelchair, possibly not. Let's find out. Oh, yeah. I'm thinking more of a Weekend at Bernie situation. I'll just puppeteer you. Yes. Wow. I think you should bring me in one of those, like the Romans had them sort of, what do you call it? Sedan check. Yes, yes, yes. I think that. Yes. Where are we going?

38:27we're going to Loughborough Loughborough yes and Loughborough the September gigs are selling very very quickly actually thank goodness because back in July it was all looking a bit dicey no no no we've come good we've come good Ellie so we've got Loughborough we've got Tombridge we've got Exeter Redruth in Cornwall which is very far which your knee will love in the car yes yes wait and then we're going on we've got do you know what I'm very excited about we've got three big gigs in Twickenham yeah and coming home to Catford in on the 14th of November

38:56Ellie Gibson: don't forget Basingstoke Bishop Stortford Tembury Wells and Leamington Leamington Spa Oh Leamington Spa I used to live there or near there Tewkesbury Canterbury Wimborne They're wonderful places That's well that's why we're going there to do our comedy show I cannot wait Now do you know what I'm also excited about that Christmas show Are you? Yes because we're doing seven of those Good for us Chipping Norton Wonderful and Guildford Guildford Yes Guildford Have you memorised these? Helen has not got notes in front of us. Oh, I check it every day. I can't get enough of our tour schedule, Julia. Why have I only got five Christmas shows in my diary?

39:35Because we're going to Norwich. We're going to two nights in Norden Farm, which is Maidenhead, Ellie. Oh, is that the Christmas show? Yes, the 26th and 27th. Oh, we're not doing the Christmas show. Yes, that's very early, isn't it?

39:50Ellie Gibson: Is it? It's within the month. Within the month of the Christmas day. Let's have this planning meeting now on the podcast when we've already booked in all the gigs. That's a perfect idea. Can I get those nuggets? Just one thing. I don't know if anyone else is listening to this boy of the podcast. They've all switched off. Anyway, it's my fault. I do the tour booking, so that's entirely on me. I've just forgotten. Well, I've just sent them£120 worth of posters with the Christmas image on it, Ellie. He's hoping I'm right. How big is it? oh my gosh shut up how big are the posters the correct size the correct size that's right because once julia we turn up to helen i i sort of managed the well inger manages the tour schedule but i work with inger on what we're doing when and then helen does like the contracts and she does the posters and the flyers and once we turned up at stockport i think it was and i was like did you get our flyers and they were like uh yeah and then there was this the tiniest like smaller than a postcard, tiny little pocket behind that.

40:52A7. I thought the A's got bigger, but they got smaller. So A4, A5, A6, A7. It's like this very spinal tap there, isn't it? Yeah. They were tiny. They were like, you could fit in your purse.

41:08Ellie Gibson: Thank you so much, Judy. Oh, God. And thank you for listening. Until next time. Bye.

41:22This is such a nice thing. Sorry. Yes. And that's the end of the podcast. Good. Well, this has been so lovely. Didn't I literally just thought then, oh, that might be my iPhone because I've bought a second hand. Oh, no, I don't live here. I don't live here. It's fine.

41:39Ellie Gibson: Sorry, that was my... What the hell was that? That was my son's friend, Gus, who left his scooter in our Skoda and would like it back, not unreasonably. he left his scooter in your scooter yes so he came to knock on the door to say uh can my scooter back and i was like yes and he's like well i can't have it now because i'm on my bike and i was like right okay the logic of that's that's 10 year olds in a matter like placeholder no you can't have it back yeah don't be riding it i'll come back later all right anyway sorry back to feminism