#24 A Continental Romance

0:05Denis:Welcome to this week's episode of Your Internet Boyfriends. Hello, Mark Teacocks. Hello, Denis Lynn. This week we're chatting about big hairy spiders, aliens and Lyme's disease. And I'll be telling Denis all about my celebrity encounter in Portugal. Did you miss me? I did miss you. You're off on your holidays. I missed you, but you know what? How are you feeling? I'm feeling great. Oh. I'm feeling great. I've come onto this podcast in the last couple of weeks. and I'm all problems. Yesterday, I had a double vodka at one o 'clock. Oh. Right? What day is today? Oh. Yeah. Right? We let the listeners work out what day it was.

0:40Denis:I had a double vodka. Yeah. The heat is killing me. Yeah. But I'm flying. What was in the vodka? Just straight? No, it wasn't. It was, you know what it was? I don't, oh, a Hugo Spritz? No. Had one of those before? No. I'm sure the listeners can tell by now that I was not the person who was getting these Hugo Spritz. this is a Lisa invention yeah it's elderflower soda water Posh Mark's grimacing it a little bit you can only get it in Harrods yeah soda water and well in this case vodka I think you're meant to put Prosecco into it though but we only have vodka in a tall glass tall glass yeah yeah the ones that no one else would have lovely lovely time last night right now I want the listeners right to keep the hands above the tables but last night I was roasting yeah roasting and I don't mind saying it because sometimes I keep this stuff to myself but the heat it's driving us mad driving us mad we're up giddy giddy right we can't keep our hands off we are gone mad and the vodka then gets oh shit creates a circus last night right I was so I was in such a state right from the heat and you know all the rest of it I had to get Mr.

1:53Denis:Freezes out of the freezer right technically freeze pops from Lidl or something I had to get them out at about one o 'clock in the morning Where did you put them? Didn't I put them back? The back of the neck The side of the face Down the middle of the back She was applying the Mr. Freeze for me and everything And it was her doing But yeah I'm just leaning into this Behind the knees? On the knees? Behind the knees No I wouldn't go for that No they'd make me quiver And would you re-freeze them then after that? what I did was I refroze them and I mixed them up a little bit so I couldn't find out which ones were the back ones or which ones were the arse ones like externally it's very hot we want to tell people that as well it's very hot today so I'm also a little giddy but Mark you seem I seem very chirpy I think my chirpiness is almost annoying I'm a bit tired now yeah a bit tired actually have you heard that thing going around from Cat and Ken a bit tired I am a bit tired I'm just off the plane I was on a plane back from my holidays I've been and gone and back so I'm fine it was just a long a funny kind of a time to fly the flight was at 12 noon so it's kind of the whole day which you know I left the hotel at half eight, nine and I landed here at five the whole day I think I should have gone a bit earlier but then the thing is where you go earlier and you're like well you're getting up in the middle of the night you're a zombie yeah yeah I checked a flight that I have and it's I don't know where I'm going right but I checked the flight 20 to 7 ah no guess from Luton you're going at 3 o 'clock I'm dead yeah may as well stay up lord but it was lovely I had a great time have you been there Porto I feel I'm ambassador for Porto now but you know I had talked about it so much and I actually didn't know anything about it and I think I had just been told it's a nice place but I had no I had done no research and I didn't have any image I didn't know anything and it's so nice oh my god Did you have any plan when you were going over there?

4:05Denis:No plan or like I've been so scattered and flustered I was like I'll just get there I booked the hotel and I just kind of that was it and then it's absolutely great yeah it's really lovely lovely buildings it's very what would I say it's very it's bigger than I thought it was going to be I was kind of expecting because it's not the capital so I thought it would be you'd kind of run around in a day and you'd see everything but it was pretty huge I appreciate a city where you can walk most of it yeah well now the hills Christ I Google mapped my journey home do you know the way Google map gives you distance and time but over there it also gives you height of the walk so you can like pick your route and it was it was a 90 metre rise where were you staying?

5:03just up the road the top of the church but like within a 15 minute walk it was 90 metres tall like climbing up 30 stories of it I saw the calves bursting out of you there when you came in yeah I'm wrecked now from that so going down was lovely going back up was

5:16Denis:and was it the walking has you tired is it? a lot has me tired yeah it's flat out yeah yeah and so you're solo over there I was solo over there I didn't I actually didn't talk for nearly three days it was so nice like I there's a few people I know there and I'm very sorry I didn't meet them I just didn't want to talk to anybody it's so nice I literally didn't speak and then sure I can't speak the language so I was going around like a gum just pointing and smiling at things yeah it was great no chat and just walked so what did you did you go out like at night did I go out at night no sometimes I would psych myself up and I'd try and go see a drag show or something I couldn't be bothered because then you'd be talking I just couldn't so I kind of just I just skipped that and then sure I was talking to people a bit on my phone the applications, but I kind of wasn't bothered with that either.

6:24Just lovely to have no plan for three days because I'm always making commitments and booking things in and then suddenly your day is like broken up into little sections and obligations.

6:37Denis:Do you know when you're over there, right? Obviously you can probably guarantee something when you're over there through certain applications. Right? Yeah, right. Now that you've come out and said it, right? You can guarantee the ride probably, right? Yeah, but there's a lot of work. But what I'm saying is, you know, you're kind of spoiled for choice a little bit, right? You know, it's at your fingertips. Would you not try and get it in the wild? Like if it happens, it'll be great. I'm not saying that it's not great in the apps, but I'm saying like, you know, like a little, you meet some Porto boy over there or whatever.

7:09I think you have to kind of have a talk with yourself as well of like, what am I doing wasting my time on my phone I literally kind of just gave up on that and it was lovely sure like there's plenty around Dalston you don't need do you know what I mean so but I did I went to I went to a health spa that was nice yeah and that kind of

7:37Denis:gets it all what kind like like a water park like a family water park no kind of like do you know what I mean like a gentleman's a health spa where like on the outside did they have pictures of like buff men in towels no pictures of anything it was very scary it just had the number the address on the door and there was no sign of anything and I'm like I don't know I'm walking into an office or something it just didn't look like it looked like an office walking through an accountant in your house no clothes on sorry you need number five it's next door literally just had a number on the door and it was like an office door.

8:17I think that is really ballsy.

8:21Denis:We've spoken about it before, but I think the social aspect, like that social fear of it. And then, it was only 12 euros. Very impressed. About 30 euros in London. And I was doing very well. And you know you have just that, you just always feel like a nuisance because you can't speak the language. and then you won't just speak English straight out because you're embarrassed about it. So you're like, gomming, like half talking, like a fool. So I was doing that and then he was asking me what number? And I was like, one, me. He was like, what number? And I didn't, I don't know what you want. He was like, what size?

9:02I was like, what? And he was asking me about my shoe size and I was like 10. He was like, no. And he wanted the European shoe size and I don't know I don't know 42 I don't know and then the panic of going through all of that so 43 Ah it's close Yeah close enough So what you get little shoes going in there You get little shoes going in and a little towel and then you walk around and you have a steam and you have a little sauna Is it a big place? A huge two floors You're walking around and there's loads of little bits to go exploring around and there's bits cut out of the walls and you can stick your head in there See what happened But then I met a friend, will I say his name?

9:45Denis:Ah, yeah. His name was Albert and he was from Barcelona and we met friends and that was great. And we were really friendly. He's your guide. Was he on holidays as well? Yeah, yeah. Everyone's kind of, well, there's some people live there, but there's a lot of people on holidays. And then we were very friendly. And then he looked into my eyes and he said, are you, are you in a podcast? I swear to God. and I was like can I just no way finish what I'm doing please were you in the middle of it were you in the middle of it oh dear god and then you have to start being nice and I was like oh Jesus from Barcelona I can't so that's that's it now the fame do you know what I that's 100 % I wanted to cry and then because I had seen him and his friend walking around and they were looking at me and I was like oh it must be gorgeous they kept looking and nudging each other I was like oh it must be beautiful and then I realised they were trying to figure it out and then he went running back to his friend and they were kicked in and chatting Did you tell him I was downstairs?

11:18Denis:Next door Get him running downstairs The office next door So yeah that was that I don't Very nice Well, I could have a great time, but... And why did you say it to him? Well, this keeps happening where people are watching things on TikTok. Do you know what he said, actually, good for the marketing team of the podcast? He thought it was your podcast, and he thought I was your guest. Yeah. Because he was like, you keep asking me questions. Like, you need to ask me more questions. No, he's there too. I think the reason for that in particular is because you, thank God, took on the zombie dong clip, which anyone who's seen has gone completely viral.

11:59Denis:Yeah. Also, it comes... Half a million people. I know, it's insane. In Barcelona. I wanted it to calm down a little bit, to be honest. I know. But I think as well, obviously it's coming from me going, hey Mark, when you're in a gay sauna, what happens? Or whatever, you know. Yeah. You don't have to ask me, hey, when you're in a swimming pool doing lengths, what happens? We just do lengths, Mark. um what did you so yeah can I when you was it hard to get back into it I think for me it probably would have been a little bit well then you're like oh suddenly I'm not this cool anonymous yeah sexy guy now I'm like oh I have to put on the the chat now and be nice and funny again because like for once you don't have to be funny you just go around you know being cool this podcast is getting new I'm sick of it cancel it I'm not getting anything from this you're off fucking riding that's over in Porto I'm here what am I getting do you know what I'm getting honestly do you know what I'm getting you got a top a t-shirt a t-shirt I got a t-shirt tell them about the t-shirt this is like play the violin play the violin for the family at Christmas you're very good at the violin I got a t-shirt I got a t-shirt this is from Crowley's music store in Cork got this off Sheena Crowley thanks Sheena I have to say it pales in comparison to being in in a sauna but this is actually made by an artist in Cork as well we'll tag you underneath it it is very nice Mark we look there's no point in even talking about anything else today I'd say other than this but I just want to get into like how does it feel being like getting that from this do you know what I mean like as a celebrity right because how many celebrities I mean that's one person yeah in little gay Instagram yeah little gay Instagram but you got that as a result of being a celebrity I'd say after a while you have to like I don't know I have a lot of friends who are like they're on TV and they can't really do anything kind of they're a bit conscious of themselves all the time you know well I'd say it'll fade quick enough now but apart from that beautiful city beautiful city I can't believe it do you know what else is lovely the transportation horny very nice say horny like it's very good just works really well and it's all new like 20 years or something they built the metro and just everything just worked you know when you're like floating along and everything is just lovely there's no problems and everything works and contactless to get onto the There's probably a bus over there that says Mark at this stage, is it?

14:49Denis:You just hop onto it, brings you where you need to go. I should be getting paid for this. But yeah, it was great. Over on my side, I had to go to the chemist to get treatment for chlamydia. Oh. Yeah. Yes, I did. You're shocked? Is there... Is there... Someone else? If people remember... You are in a relationship. I am in a relationship. But if people remember last week, and the things that I'm about to say, right, no one should do what I did. No one should do what I did and no one should take this as advice, especially medical advice. But I, on the last episode, if people saw or were listening, I was, there was a little beast had eaten my leg.

15:30Denis:I got bitten by a tick. I think he was an Irish tick. I think he came over on the plane with me and then he was sucking on my leg and I discovered him at the end of the episode. Oh, you think it came from Ireland? Yeah, no, it was definitely an Irish tick. Yeah, he came from Ireland. He came from, he's actually from Cork. Right. He's from West Cork. put a little fucker but yeah I you know we're telling people a funny story about getting bitten by a tick and the alarm in people's voices afterwards and I'll skip back to how I got to the pharmacy in a minute but after this podcast last week right I went home and my roommate was there and her friend was there right I won't name them right they were there let's call them give me two give me two names Grainne Grainne yeah perfect and Marade Grainne and Marade right and they both are Irish, right?

16:17Denis:So Gráinne and Maraid were there. I arrive in, tell them the funny tick story, but I say, I need a tweezers to take out the tick. Mark, this is, if anyone's squeamish, right? Oh. I didn't realise when it, so when you get the tweezers and you're meant to pull them up and out, right? Yeah. But you kind of don't, you don't really see it as a thing that's alive in you, right? You just see it as kind of a spot or something like, you know? That's how you deal with it. When I brought the tweezers near him, it moved. I was scared. I was scared. Yeah, it perceived me. A thing in my leg perceived me. So I went in, bang, got it out, left a piece inside it.

16:53Denis:Oh, a bit of what, his head? Like a bit of his leg or something. Then Gráinne and Marade, in fairness to them, like I would have been lost without them, they started digging into my leg. They loved that. With their tweezers. Yeah, it was something to do, you know. They were lost for something to do. Two hours they were digging that thing out of my leg. Fuck off. Yeah, it was horrendous. I was just I was actually looking at my leg at one point just kind of disassociating that it was my leg finally got it out there was vinegar used all sorts of things there was an there was an Irish dad rang he said there was an Irish dad rang and he said which one was it Maraid Maraid rang her dad and goes dad we're friends here he's after getting bit by a tick he didn't even breed he just goes vinegar vinegar as if he was ready for it got the tick out but as we know how much was like what's the top of it like?

17:43The bit that's in your skin?

17:46Denis:If you can imagine it like an ant's mandible or something. Like a hook. Like it was barbed into my leg and I couldn't get it out. Does it have a face? The tic had a face. Oh my god. Yeah, the tic had a face and he was fat and he exploded when I tweezed him as well. Yeah, it wasn't great. I was just back from holidays as well, which is a lovely thing to be doing for two hours. Anyway, if you're out there, as you know, tics can carry Lyme's disease. I think it's from biting backs of deer and stuff, right? So you got to go and get treatment for it or go to a GP just in case, right? And you have to get it done within, again this is not medical advice, but you have to get it done within 72 hours of removing the tick.

18:25Denis:And in my case, if you have the tick for more than 36 hours or something, it like increases your chances and the chances are not that low. You had it a week nearly. I had it about three days, like two or three days or something. Anywhoos. Had you not looked at your foot for two days? I thought it was a cut. And you know what the worst thing is? You know what the worst thing is? Myself and Lise were lying in bed one day. She's kissing your foot. I was going to lie and follow up what you said there. No, she wasn't kissing my foot. But she said, you've got a cut in your ankle. And she touched it and kind of rubbed it a little bit.

18:59Denis:So when I told her it was a tick afterwards she had collapsed. But yeah, so I thought it was just a cut until I see the lad hanging off it when we're doing the episode. Stop it. Anyway, I go out to get a GP appointment, right? We live in London. Oh, good luck. Not great to get GP appointments. So I couldn't get one. And then I was talking to another friend of mine and he was saying, look, you've got to get this. Like, you've got to get it sorted or you could get Lyme's disease. Very, very bad. So, right, I did a little bit of research. Turns out the same thing that you need to get treated as this preventative antibiotic is, I think it's called, actually, you know what?

19:33Denis:Oh, the doxy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm actually not going to give the name for it. Oh, the gays know that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well. Right. and it's the same thing that treats chlamydia and malaria and stuff it's preventative antibiotics for ticks right to prevent this Lyme disease thing right it's not full it's not like certain but it really helps so I went online said said I have chlamydia here is a report GP asked me like you know a good number of questions I said I've been going mad recently up the walls right and ordered in my my chlamydia medicine which is the same got a 7 day course only had to take a day of it oh yeah but then I had to go to Lisa and say if you see any prescriptions around the place it's for the tick it's for the tick don't worry about it I haven't been up to stuff or whatever it's easy that could go wrong yeah go very very wrong but the tick is gone I want to reassure everyone I also probably know as well don't well I have I've definitely got rid of one seventh of my chlamydia if I have some as well yeah well every nurse in Ireland was messaging me no way about it saying make sure he goes to the doctor very serious they're very nice yeah keep those tablets you never know they're very handy as well you know what the gays do and everybody actually should be aware you can take I can't pronounce the word doxy whatever it's called doxycycine or something yeah whatever it's called you can take that as kind of preventative if you've had a busy night you can actually take that as if you take a double dose it kind of stops the chances of something that's not me making that up that's a big campaign to make that aware.

21:11Oh really? Yeah, it's called Toxipep. So you can take that if you feel like you've been exposed to something.

21:16Denis:And do people use it though? Kind of? Well, you have to, yeah. Do you get what I mean? You can't be using it every day. No, but like do people go like, ah sure, I have that in the back pocket so I'll go mad. I don't know. Like you're probably going mad anyway. Pop it. If you think it's necessary. But obviously you can't just take it every single day because then we'll all become immune to these things. Or no, we'll become not reactive. It won't work. Yeah, it won't work. It won't work. I need it to work. There's a balance. So if people could lay off it there for a week while it gets to work on my life.

21:48It's a great little tool for the busy nights.

21:52Denis:Carrying on from bug talk, right? Yeah. We went down for a little trip there on Friday. I was doing a secret meeting on Saturday, which I won't mention. It was a very secret meeting. It's cool stuff though. I'll announce it there at some point. Oh, yeah. But at Friday, we decided we stayed on. we make a bit of a trip to it we were going down um towards kind of bristol bath and it was 24 hours checking into the airbnb and we were like great you know like we don't have to go down oh yeah just hang out for the day or whatever i was absolutely roasting right as i always am but uh we're having a good little time i went out for dinner and then we went into um uh we said we check into the airbnb right yeah checking into the airbnb mark right spiders everywhere like i mean i mean spiders absolutely everywhere.

22:35Denis:Like when I was coming in through, coming into the little house that's outside, like it's next to their main house, I hit about three spiders like in my hair. And you know... What kind? Oh, you know the kind of fat, the fat brown ones. The fat brown ones with a stripe. They're always out in the garden. Yeah. They're the ones that, you know, you walk around the side of the house and you walk into it and you start screaming. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like those. But there was three of those, but they're okay. Like I could get over them. But I was trying to hold the holiday together again. Yeah. It was the same thing like when I was in the Iron Islands.

23:04Well, you want to be a big man as well.

23:05Denis:Yeah, you do. You want to be a big man. I don't mind spiders, right? But there's definitely a limit. And then we walked up to the door and above the door was like the spider guard. He'd made this... Oh, it was absolutely horrific. He'd made this... And it was boiling hot as well. I think spiders are scarier when it's hotter. But he made this kind of tunnel of webs above the door. And when the sensor light came on, he came out. He didn't... He came out. He goes, who's that? How are you? Who's that? Are you checking in? Had no one opened the door for a while? No, it wasn't really connected to the door.

23:39Denis:It was just over. It's just they decided like they're not going to clean that or whatever. We went in. It was, you know, okay, like cottage or whatever. And then I just start seeing like one spider, two spider, three spider, four, five, six. And I was like, I don't know about you, but I think about six maybe is my limit. And then like all different types of them. And I could see poor Lisa. She was trying to, because it was 11 o 'clock so she was trying to say like oh this is fine like don't worry about it and then she said I'll just have a look behind the bed oh my god spiders all over the place had no one been there for a while I think I don't really know what the story is I think these people might have been like one with the spiders you know but there's also like Lisa was trying to say to me like you know she was trying to be good about it she was saying but you know maybe you know maybe the spiders got in or something and I'm like yeah but if we went to a hotel and there was 35 spiders inside the room you'd complain we'd probably complain yeah what can you do hoover them up well we she was going to start brushing them up and I was like if you brush them up we're going to see all the spiders we can't see yeah you know and they'd come out and get across then yeah did you leave did you stay no we had to leave yeah we had to leave and where oh so we we rang another hotel this is funny actually right we looked on booking.com and like we didn't want to spend loads more money like we fucking broke like so we we uh we looked at booking.com and one of the rooms was like it was nothing right in this hotel and i was like look come on look we just have to do it i'm not staying here having a nightmare for the whole all um for the whole night booked one of the rooms and i said are about to book one of the rooms i said you know what i'm gonna ring the hotel directly and you know give them the money you know ring the hotel and the guy answers the phone and i goes yeah i was just wanting to book through you like you know instead of booking.com and he just goes oh just do it on booking.com oh Jesus I was like great don't you dare give me money we went down to this place boiling yeah absolutely boiling how much but spider free for the night yeah another 90 pounds yeah we got lucky it's like 200 pounds a night but also honestly Mark I stayed awake for half the night just to get my money as worth you'd be picturing oh we're sure I'm checking in there at 12 o 'clock I know no I don't mean you'd be still picturing the spiders yeah you're looking at me as if like we stayed up and made the most of it we didn't she was asleep in about three seconds.

26:01Denis:She was traumatised. I'd have to go as well, I think. I wouldn't deal with it. Because they come out to look at you then, should they be interested. And you know that you swallow spiders. Yeah. So, like, I could really ramp the average up on a night like that. Oh, Jesus. Will we take a break? Yeah. Okay, let's take a break.

26:23Denis:We're back with a lovely break. That was a... God, I don't know how much to be talking about. I feel like the last few weeks I was very nice and mild. And now I'm panicking now about all that story. It's all fiction. It's all fiction. I think you're getting a little apprehensive because one, podcast getting a bit bigger. Yeah. Two, probably a lot of people in Ennis listen to this. Well, I'm going home a lot. I'm going home next week. There's a lot of drama now about flights. I'm actually getting a seven o 'clock flight to Shannon whenever, I don't know, next week. So there's a lot going on about who picks me up and who brings me.

26:59because I still can't drive. But I wanted to ask you a little question because actually from my new friend, Albert, I'm talking all the time and no one's asking you any questions. So I wanted to ask, I have two questions about cars. I want to ask, first of all, about me. What if I had a car?

27:25Denis:This is fantastic. So you're just replacing me. I'm just asking you a question about me. What would it be? I think there's two cars you could potentially be driving. Yeah. I think you'd drive like a BMW 1 Series. Okay. That's like, you know, the smaller BMW? Yeah. Like the kind of city BMW. But you'd have some sort of, you know, racy bumper sticker on it or something. Okay. What color are the seats? The color of the seats, it kind of depends. I think you'd go for... I think you could go like a white, not a white, a cream leather. Yeah, good. A cream leather, I think. Yeah. And then maybe on the outside, we could probably go for, I think you'd probably just go for a black.

28:08Yeah.

28:09Denis:You know? That's what I see as well. That'd be like, you know, I'm an architect man and I'm, you know, driving around to different buildings. Yeah. You know, but I'm going a little fast. And I can afford to get this cleaned often. Yes. Yes. It's spotless inside. Yeah. But you never clean it. No. Yeah. What's your... Wait, wait. Before that, I have another one. I also think you might have, the only thing that might, I suppose, bring down the car a little bit is you would insist on putting up maybe fluffy dice in the front. What do you think? Yeah. I think you'd have something in there. Yeah. You know, I'm a bit mad.

28:42And what would you like?