Episode 422 - Potato, Potarto

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HostMelissa Ellis

Guest co-hostDanny Norman

Roving reporterAlison Fraser (King)

Show notes

From the Facebook post

Special guest host Danny Norman from With Me Now pod joins Mel this week on Level Two with a View. Danny adventured to Ben's Yard (opens in a new tab) parkrun, Ely while Mel revisited Berwick Springs (opens in a new tab). Across the ditch Alison was joining the nuptials at Hagley (opens in a new tab), while Reginald has begun a new 'round the world' trip. Join us for loads of laughs, and marvel at our efforts in pronunciation. We did our best and our best is good enough.

- Part time pod host and full time great bloke Simon repped a zoomie in the shirt on the way to a palindrome at Redland Bay (opens in a new tab) parkrun.

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From the podcast feed

Special guest host Danny Norman from With Me Now pod joins Mel this week on Level Two with a View. Danny adventured to Stuntney Estate parkrun while Mel revisited Berwick Springs (opens in a new tab). Across the ditch Alison was joining the nuptials at Hagley (opens in a new tab), while Reginald has begun a new ‘round the world’ trip. Join us for loads of laughs, and marvel at our efforts in pronunciation. We did our best and our best is good enough.

Guest

Roving reports

In this episode

• Welcome starts at 0:24

  Melissa Ellis on Wurundjeri Country with a surprise co-host, Danny Norman, coming from Chessington in southwest London; the lead-in is only the introductions.

• Level 2 with a View starts at 0:44

  The comfy-chair slot, this week filling the whole episode: Danny Norman of the With Me Now podcast joins Mel as guest co-host because regular co-host Simon Mackley is off for his 50th birthday.

• parkrun news bulletin starts at 16:36

  A quiet news week: last week's announcement of parkrun's new interim CEO, Lil Duggan, and what fresh eyes might mean for the organisation; the UK-centric nature of parkrun governance and why the global board must be UK-based; goodr parkrun sunglasses arriving in the post; and rugby union's Johnny Wilkinson park walking at Bracknell as a Vitality ambassador.

• Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew starts at 23:51

  One report this week: Alison Fraser (King) from Hagley parkrun in Christchurch, New Zealand, where a parkrun wedding was held on the shores of the lake. Mel adds context on the hand-back, it was a pretend ceremony with the RD as fake celebrant, the real wedding was that afternoon, and Hagley's "fun director" Lisa organised the confetti.

• Dazza's starts at 31:29

  Dazza's prompt was Wordsmith Day, combined with the listener challenge to feature an adventurers buff. Comments read out from Ingrid Botha (Cooks River, NSW, a rhyme), Simon Mackley (Redland Bay, Qld), Yvette Turner (Gungahlin, ACT, her 250th), Sunil Tamun (Stormont, Northern Ireland), David Messenger (Bibra Lake, WA), Adrian Luscombe (Bracknell, UK), Eric Banner (Yodogawa kasenkoen Hirakata chiku, Japan, a haiku), Andy Paul (Oriam, Edinburgh) and Johan Duvenhage (South Africa).

• the Obi Award — Eric Banner starts at 38:59

  Danny, handed the envelope, could not choose between Eric Banner's Japanese haiku and Ingrid Botha's Wordsmith Day rhyme, so Mel let him split it: "Eric Banner and Ingrid, both of you, please." Ingrid's rhyme won him over partly because it worked both themes at once.

• Emails starts at 39:52

  An email from Mickey Mansell with three photos from a tourist trip to Tauranga parkrun on the North Island of New Zealand, their home event Puarenga having been cancelled for the Rotorua Marathon. Mel follows with an aside on the carved totem beside the course, a pou whenua, or land post, used by Maori to mark boundaries and places.

• Club Corner starts at 41:30

  Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III opens a new series on parkrun countries: how many countries have a parkrun? parkrun's own website lists 22, but depending on how protectorates, jurisdictions and overseas territories are counted the answer could be 31, 34 or 35. He reads the 22 in alphabetical order and promises the rest in coming weeks. (And a straw has one hole.)

• Consolidated Club Report starts at 49:35

  For Saturday 3 May 2025: of 781 members, 541 took part in 10 countries across 280 locations. UK 61 events, South Africa 10, Japan 6, USA 2, one each in the Netherlands, Italy, Norway and Singapore. Locally NSW 54, Queensland 48, Victoria 45, WA 15, SA 11, Tasmania 9, North Island and ACT 6 each, South Island 3, none in the Northern Territory. No adventurers at Bushy, so no pilgrimages.

• the Frond — Bibra Lake parkrun — largest Aussie frond, 9 adventurers; Walvis Bay starts at 50:40

  Largest international frond was five adventurers at Walvis Bay (Stuart Henderson, Denise Evans, Andy and Debbie Airey, Mark Pinney). Largest Aussie frond was nine at Bibra Lake. Special mentions for eight at Gungahlin, where Yvette celebrated her 250th, and eight at South Toowoomba, where Kristine Vergara also celebrated her 250th.

• Launches and anniversaries starts at 53:39"Where is the cake?"

  Six launches: Branch Brook parkrun, Newark NJ (76 finishers, nearest event to Manhattan); Berger Stadion parkrun south of Oslo, Norway (67 finishers); Caroline Bay parkrun, Timaru, New Zealand (130 finishers); Park in the Past parkrun near Wrexham, Wales (156 finishers); Sun City parkrun, South Africa, on the Gary Player Country Club course (199 finishers); and Victoria Park Beach parkrun, Cobourg, Ontario, Canada (48 finishers).

• Watching the numbers starts at 58:22

  Mel's self-declared ongoing segment tracking the new Alice Springs event: 147 parkrunners at event two, 39 fewer than launch week, 73 of them first-timers at the venue, 22 unknowns and 34 people recording their second ever parkrun. No adventurer has reached it yet and she intends to watch for the first one who does.

• parkrun adventure challenge starts at 59:40listener challenge

  Mel had not thought of one, so Danny set it: post #Dorb (capital D, lowercase o-r, capital B), Dolly or Bev, his cat and his landlady, to prove you listened between release and Dazza's going up.

• Sign-off starts at 1:08:02

  Mel said they were coming towards the end and asked guest Danny Norman where he would be on Saturday: Ludlow, a couple of hours west of London toward Wales, though he explained he had mucked up the timing of his 500th different event, which he had wanted at Sheringham on the North Norfolk coast near Cromer where his grandparents holidayed, and which now looks likely to land in Scandinavia during his European extras, with Jem and Tiny Steve there. Mel said she faced a similar dilemma trying to line up her 250th different event with her 500th overall, and the two talked about overthinking, upbringing and neurodiversity before Mel thanked Danny for filling in, trailed her return with TOC next week and gave the Facebook and email contacts.