Episode 6 - Northern Territory

Episode details · 279 speaker turns · sound cues from context

00:00:08Scott Trickett: time for episode six of the parkrun adventurers my name is scott i'm joined by my co-host mel hey guys hey mel it's chinese new year or as it's it's called lunar new year and i know number six is um sentimental very sentimental in the chinese culture so should we reminisce let's reminisce about our previous five episodes which was your favorite

00:00:34Melissa Erbacher: Oh, I think they just get better and better. So I'm going to go with number five at this stage.

00:00:41Scott Trickett: Lucky number five.

00:00:43Melissa Erbacher: Yeah. By the end of the podcast, though, it's likely to be number six.

00:00:47Scott Trickett: This is going to be massive. This is going to be our best podcast. And this is going to be a good week for both of us. A film's coming out this week.

00:00:56Melissa Erbacher: Yes, and we get to go see it with our running clubs.

00:00:59Scott Trickett: Yeah. How cool is that? We've married the two things we love the most, our running people and a really funny movie. So you're in a running club called the Derek Zoolander, what is it?

00:01:14Melissa Erbacher: Derek Zoolander Centre for Kids Who Can't Run Good.

00:01:17Scott Trickett: Born out of the movie Zoolander.

00:01:19Melissa Erbacher: The original Zoolander, which came out 15 years ago. Yep. What I think is actually pretty interesting is that we've created a running club from a 15-year-old movie. Obviously, it wasn't 15 years old at the time but it was still, you know, over a decade old when the running club was created and there's so much love for this film and so much love for the characters and the quotes that, you know, it's brought a whole bunch of like-minded people together who love running, can't run good, don't care, going to do it anyway.

00:01:54Scott Trickett: Do you come across many people that actually have no idea of the connection?

00:01:57Melissa Erbacher: Yes, actually we often confuse some people about whether or not it's a running club for either underprivileged kids or kids that have actual problems with running very well. So we've had to explain that a couple of times. Obviously, people who aren't familiar with the film gets a bit awkward.

00:02:20Scott Trickett: I'm doing a similar thing. So my running club, the Westerfoldians, who aren't based on a movie at all, They're based on a geographic location. Not as funny, but still a very cool running club. So we're having a Zoolander night as well. And I was surprised that I'd say half the people going had never seen the first film.

00:02:41Melissa Erbacher: Oh, well, I mean, it is.

00:02:43Scott Trickett: They've corrected that now.

00:02:45Melissa Erbacher: Oh, you made them all watch it or did you have a group viewing of the original?

00:02:49Scott Trickett: I think there was just general judgment and that forced them to watch the first one.

00:02:56Melissa Erbacher: Nothing like a little bit of gentle judgment.

00:03:00Scott Trickett: Yes.

00:03:02Melissa Erbacher: Well, obviously they thought it was good enough to come along and see the sequel with you.

00:03:05Scott Trickett: No, see, that's the thing. If there's a Westerfoldian social night, you just want to be there regardless of what it is. So I said, yeah, we'll go. What? We're going to see a movie that I've never seen or heard of?

00:03:18Unidentified speaker: Sounds fun.

00:03:19Scott Trickett: So I really like movies. So we're going to get into give us some of your top movies. But with me, there's been all these iconic movies that I've never seen. Never seen a Star Trek, never seen a Terminator, never seen a James Bond film.

00:03:35Melissa Erbacher: Oh my gosh, Scotty, there's going to be so much judgment.

00:03:39Scott Trickett: So much judgment. So to continue on the judgment, should I give you my top three? Please do.

00:03:44Melissa Erbacher: Or should we break it up? No, I want to hear your top three movies because this is going to be fairly fascinating if you haven't seen half the classics.

00:03:52Scott Trickett: And if you've joined us on Facebook, so we've had a theme, so we've had a movie theme up to this point. So we thought we'd tie it all up here.

00:04:01Melissa Erbacher: It's been a little bit subtle.

00:04:03Scott Trickett: It has. I wonder how many people have picked up on it. I think episode five was a real give away. Fairly obvious.

00:04:09Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:04:12Scott Trickett: If you still don't know what we're talking about, go back and have a look at all our posts and see if you can make a connection.

00:04:18Melissa Erbacher: But come on, Scotty, I think you're delaying now.

00:04:21Scott Trickett: I want to hear it. Don't judge me. I can be quite a shallow person when it comes to things like this. I like sport. Probably my all-time favorite movie would be Jerry Maguire.

00:04:36Melissa Erbacher: Really?

00:04:36Scott Trickett: For no other reason than it's about sport.

00:04:41Melissa Erbacher: Okay.

00:04:42Scott Trickett: It's funny. It's an Academy Award winning film.

00:04:46Melissa Erbacher: It's very mainstream.

00:04:48Scott Trickett: Yes.

00:04:49Melissa Erbacher: But that's your all-time favourite movie.

00:04:52Scott Trickett: I'm big on top three, so I'll go top three.

00:04:54Melissa Erbacher: In no particular order.

00:04:55Scott Trickett: But I'll throw that in there with Mo' Better Blues. Ever seen that?

00:04:59Melissa Erbacher: No, I have not seen that one.

00:05:02Scott Trickett: Spike Lee movie from the 90s. Denzel Washington, a really young Denzel Washington, plays in a jazz band.

00:05:11Melissa Erbacher: Doesn't sound very sporty, this one. No.

00:05:13Scott Trickett: No. Maybe a couple of references to sport, but no. Okay. Wildcats. Wildcats. Goldie Hawn.

00:05:23Melissa Erbacher: Goldie Hawn. See, now football, Wildcats. That I can understand. Okay. I'm on the page, the same page as you now.

00:05:33Scott Trickett: Okay. So my definition of greatest movie of all time is if it came on TV now or if it was on Netflix or whatever, I would watch it. I'd sit down and I probably couldn't get up.

00:05:45Melissa Erbacher: And it doesn't matter if it's got ads.

00:05:48Scott Trickett: No, you push through.

00:05:50Melissa Erbacher: Even though you've got it on DVD in the cupboard, you're just still going to sit down and watch it on the TV anyway.

00:05:54Scott Trickett: Yeah. So if any movie can do that. So like a movie like Inception.

00:05:59Melissa Erbacher: Yes.

00:06:00Scott Trickett: Great movie, but I wouldn't sit down and watch it again now. So I couldn't classify it as an all-time great. Better Off Dead, classic.

00:06:08Melissa Erbacher: Okay. I like how you figure out. See, and this is where I fall down because I've got about 10. I don't have a top three. I've got like 10 that are all fairly equal. If they came on television, then yes, you don't get back up from the couch and you just sit there and you wait until it's finished. And then you might get the DVD out and watch it again without the ads this time.

00:06:32Scott Trickett: So give us yours.

00:06:35Melissa Erbacher: I won't give you 10 because that's just a lot, but I might try to get it down to five. So, in no particular order, just like you, The Princess Bride. Have you seen The Princess Bride? I have. Okay, good. Because that's a classic and if you hadn't seen it, I'm not sure if we could still be friends.

00:06:55Scott Trickett: Yeah.

00:06:56Melissa Erbacher: All right.

00:06:57Scott Trickett: I struggle with The Princess Bride, but I know a lot of people love it, so...

00:07:02Melissa Erbacher: You struggle with it. Where's the struggle?

00:07:04Scott Trickett: Is it supposed to be funny?

00:07:06Melissa Erbacher: It is. It's supposed to be hilarious. Oh, my God. How a rodent of unusual size is not funny.

00:07:16Scott Trickett: Yeah, see. I'm not going to judge. If you didn't judge me on Jerry Maguire, move on to the next one.

00:07:22Melissa Erbacher: Okay. Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

00:07:25Scott Trickett: Absolute classic.

00:07:26Melissa Erbacher: Yes, you cannot refute me on Ferris.

00:07:29Scott Trickett: I started a movie education night with my daughter and that's the movie we started with, Ferris.

00:07:35Melissa Erbacher: As well as Ferris and Princess Bride. I have to say Clueless because who doesn't love a modern retake on a Jane Austen classic?

00:07:45Scott Trickett: Alicia Silverstone, whatever happened to her?

00:07:49Melissa Erbacher: whatever happened to her she became Batgirl that's what happened there's no coming back after that and I'm gonna well Star Wars trilogy has to just be in there as a one-er it has to count as a one-er and it's the same with Back to the Future trilogy and on the general theme of that I also have to say no it's not really the general theme Aliens the sequel to Alien specifically Have you seen Aliens?

00:08:21Scott Trickett: I've seen one of them.

00:08:22Melissa Erbacher: You've seen one of them. Have you seen the one with Bill Paxton? The first one is Alien.

00:08:28Scott Trickett: Okay, that's the one I've seen.

00:08:31Melissa Erbacher: Okay.

00:08:34Scott Trickett: Didn't do it for me, so I didn't watch the second one.

00:08:36Melissa Erbacher: The second one. See, the second one is the strongest in the trilogy. And it's got Bill Paxton in it. And he's hilarious.

00:08:44Scott Trickett: Is he meant to be funny?

00:08:46Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, absolutely. Or at least that's my take on it. So is that too many movies for you, Scotty?

00:08:52Scott Trickett: No, no, give me one more.

00:08:54Melissa Erbacher: One more. I won't give you another sci-fi one. I haven't given you any musicals.

00:08:59Scott Trickett: Please don't.

00:09:04Melissa Erbacher: There are two musicals on that list. But I didn't give you one more movie. I have to say that Zoolander is also in my top ten, obviously. It's my club.

00:09:18Scott Trickett: And we started the conversation with Zoolander.

00:09:20Melissa Erbacher: We did.

00:09:21Scott Trickett: And so are expectations of the sequel pretty high?

00:09:26Melissa Erbacher: Yeah. I hate having high expectations going into a movie because that's when things go badly, but I can't help it. Very high expectations to Zoolander 2.

00:09:36Scott Trickett: It does have Kristen Wiig.

00:09:38Melissa Erbacher: It does. And bridesmaids. Yes. And she's one of my favourite Saturday Night Live actresses.

00:09:45Scott Trickett: Same here.

00:09:46Melissa Erbacher: Yeah.

00:09:47Scott Trickett: We're back on the same path. We got there eventually.

00:09:52Melissa Erbacher: We did.

00:09:52Scott Trickett: Six degrees of Kristen Wiig. Can you do that? It is our sixth episode.

00:09:59Melissa Erbacher: She hasn't been in as many movies as Keanu Reeves.

00:10:03Scott Trickett: Well, give me Keanu then.

00:10:05Melissa Erbacher: All right, give me an actor or an actress and I will give you six degrees of Keanu Reeves.

00:10:10Scott Trickett: Have you seen the movie Prefontaine?

00:10:13Melissa Erbacher: No, I haven't. But who's in it?

00:10:15Scott Trickett: So Steve Prefontaine was played by Jared Leto.

00:10:18Melissa Erbacher: Okay. And you would like me to connect Jared Leto.

00:10:24Scott Trickett: Leto or Leto?

00:10:27Melissa Erbacher: Leto or Leto. All right, so Jared, you can pronounce his last name however you like, was in Fight Club with Brad Pitt. Brad Pitt was in Oceans 11 with Julia Roberts. Julia Roberts was in Notting Hill with Hugh Grant. Hugh Grant was in Miss Congeniality, no, not Miss Congeniality, that other one. Two Weeks Notice with Sandra Bullock, who was in Speed with Keanu Reeves.

00:10:59Scott Trickett: Well, I am impressed. Well done.

00:11:02Melissa Erbacher: Do you have a favourite movie line, Scotty?

00:11:05Scott Trickett: Mo' Better makes it Mo' Better. From Mo' Better Blues.

00:11:11Melissa Erbacher: Can you do that in a Denzel voice?

00:11:14Scott Trickett: That was my Denzel voice.

00:11:16Melissa Erbacher: Okay. My bad.

00:11:19Scott Trickett: Mo' Better makes it... No, I can't. If Denzel was part Irish...

00:11:31Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, a lot of my accents come out Irish too.

00:11:34Scott Trickett: Have you got a favourite line?

00:11:38Melissa Erbacher: I would have to say probably, life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop to look around once in a while, you might miss it.

00:11:46Scott Trickett: And do you live life by that?

00:11:49Melissa Erbacher: When I remember, I try to, yes.

00:11:53Scott Trickett: I look forward to seeing what my daughter's generation of classic films will be. I've also never seen a Harry Potter film, so I know that's a classic film for a lot of people of a younger generation.

00:12:07Melissa Erbacher: Have you read the books?

00:12:09Scott Trickett: Have they got sport in them?

00:12:11Melissa Erbacher: They do. It's called Quidditch.

00:12:13Scott Trickett: Yeah, I mean real sport.

00:12:15Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, it's a real sport. I actually saw people playing Quidditch on the beach a couple of weeks ago.

00:12:20Scott Trickett: Okay, that's sad. But there's also a Hogwarts running club, which I love. And I'm assuming that's Harry Potter.

00:12:31Melissa Erbacher: Well, there's no running club in the books or the movie, but okay.

00:12:35Scott Trickett: No, I've seen. There's the Hogwarts running club. There's a few girls running around in Melbourne with their singlet on.

00:12:41Melissa Erbacher: Okay.

00:12:42Scott Trickett: You haven't seen it?

00:12:43Melissa Erbacher: No. Well, I live on the Sunshine Coast.

00:12:46Scott Trickett: Well, they'll spread. Just as soon as that generation starts running, you'll see more and more.

00:12:53Melissa Erbacher: Well, we've got to get them out there. We need to get them registered at parkrun so we can have a new. Oh, see, but that would create a lot of dilemmas. I think if you started a Hogwarts running club or a Gryffindor or Slytherin or Ravenclaw running club, yeah, all the other running clubs would suffer massive losses. There are a lot of fantasy geeks out there.

00:13:14Scott Trickett: All those names didn't make any sense to me at all. Are they all Harry Potter names?

00:13:18Melissa Erbacher: They are. They're Harry Potter house names. So the school has four houses.

00:13:24Scott Trickett: I think it would be great to see running clubs. Some original, you know, forget the Harriers and forget the Striders. Let's go for, you know, the Hogwarts, the Zoolanders. Let's see more of that. I'd like to see where it goes from here.

00:13:40Melissa Erbacher: Well, I think you're putting the challenge out there now, Scotty.

This Week's Challenge

00:13:43Scott Trickett: This week's challenge, create your own running club based on your favorite movie.

Roving Reporter / Roving Adventurer vox pop

00:13:49Melissa Erbacher: Following on from our movie theme, we had a roving adventurer out there who asked some of our parkrunners what their favorite movie or movie line was.

00:13:56Adam: Hey, everyone. This is Adam, your roving reporter. This week, I'm coming to you from town of Seaside parkrun, and I'm with Jerry Taylor. Jerry, what's your favorite movie?

00:14:06Jerry Taylor: I'd have to say Star Wars. I know everyone's probably going to say that, but yeah, it's Star Wars.

00:14:11Adam: Oh, that's all right. Star Wars is a good movie. It's very topical at the moment. And what's your favorite movie quote?

00:14:17Jerry Taylor: You don't know the power of the dark side.

00:14:21Adam: Thanks, Jerry. Happy running. I'm now joined with Mark. Mark, what's your favorite movie? Shaun of the Dead. And what would be your favorite movie quote?

00:14:31Mark: Oh, there's so many. There's so many. I suppose it has to be Arnold Schwarzenegger. I'll be back. That's a good one.

00:14:38Adam: Thanks a lot, Mark. Okay, everyone. I'm now with one of the cutest parkrunners in Australia, Mackenzie, who's three. Mackenzie, what's your favorite movie? Peppa Pig. And what does Peppa Pig say? What's her favorite quote?

00:14:53Mackenzie: Jumping up and down in muddy puddles.

00:14:56Adam: Thanks, Mackenzie. Happy running.

00:14:58Scott Trickett: Back to you guys. Awesome job there from Adam. And the award for our cutest parkrun adventurer so far goes to Mackenzie. Technically, I'm not sure Peppa Pig has made a movie yet.

00:15:11Melissa Erbacher: She has made a movie. Has she? Yeah.

00:15:14Scott Trickett: A full-length feature film?

00:15:15Melissa Erbacher: Well, as full-length as feature films go for children.

00:15:18Scott Trickett: Okay. Good job, Mackenzie. And we continue to work our way around the country. This week we're joined by our Darwin event director, the only event in the Northern Territory. Welcome to the parkrun Adventurers, Mark Connolly. Thanks, Scott. Thanks, Mark, for having me.

00:15:19[music]

Event Director interview (working around the country)

00:15:42Melissa Erbacher: I recall that Russ and Robbo, when they went up for your launch, they actually described it as like running with a wet towel around your shoulders. Would that be fairly accurate?

00:15:55Mark Connolly: Definitely the time of the year of our birthday. The build-up is definitely the worst time of year for running up here. It gets a little bit nicer towards the June area, June, July, but September, October, November, yes, definitely. Running in a swimming pool, maybe.

00:16:13Melissa Erbacher: Do you find your numbers dwindle off at that time of the year or you just have the really hardcore ones coming out?

00:16:19Mark Connolly: Yes, all our regulars are still there. Yeah, it does be quite astounding about that time of year, November, December, picks back up in January, picks about... This time of year, Valentine's Day weekend is our record last year, and we're going for another record this weekend coming.

00:16:35Scott Trickett: Excellent. Is it something that you can acclimatise to?

00:16:39Mark Connolly: I'm not sure you acclimatise to it. I think you just accept it. That's what's going to happen when you go for a run, and you just accept it and move on.

00:16:46Scott Trickett: Lots of washing.

00:16:48Mark Connolly: Lots of washing. There's a lot of shirtless men running around up here.

00:16:51Melissa Erbacher: You could probably just run in your togs, couldn't you?

00:16:56Mark Connolly: Might as well. Might as well. And have a little swim afterwards to cool off.

00:17:00Melissa Erbacher: Because you're right along the water, aren't you?

00:17:02Mark Connolly: We are beside the harbour, but I'm not sure you'd like swimming in the harbour around here. A few little snappies around.

00:17:10Melissa Erbacher: Okay. Are we talking sharks or are we talking crocodiles that eat the sharks? See, Scotty, I told you there was crocodiles in Darwin.

00:17:21Mark Connolly: No one wants to know if you've got them on your risk assessment. They are on the risk assessment. They are? They are on the risk assessment.

00:17:29Melissa Erbacher: And so what does that look like? Do you say crocodile on the course or...?

00:17:36Mark Connolly: It's very unlikely where we are to get them up there. We are raised a bit up away from the harbour. We're right beside it, but it's like a little cliff there beside us. If anything's likely to be on the course, it's more likely to be a crocodile. But no snakes. But, yes, we still haven't seen one yet, so we're lucky.

00:17:53Melissa Erbacher: And what happens if one of your runners falls into the harbour? Whose volunteer position is it to retrieve them?

00:18:00Mark Connolly: No, there is a nice fence around our park. We're pretty safe there.

00:18:04Melissa Erbacher: That's a relief. I'm coming to visit you in June. Excellent. These are the important things to establish. I don't like being snapped either in the water or on land, so...

00:18:16Scott Trickett: I want to bring it back to the weather because I know you guys like to talk about the weather. Is there the same excitement about getting the Milestone shirts in Darwin simply because they are technical t-shirts? I would imagine you're all in singlets or topless up there.

00:18:31Mark Connolly: Yeah, the shirts are very good. I wear my little 25 volunteer shirt around everywhere and it handles it quite well actually. They are definitely a popular item as they're coming in, the shirts.

00:18:43Scott Trickett: There's a big tip for Tribe Sports.

00:18:45Mark Connolly: Yes, yeah, they do a good job up here. They do a good job.

00:18:49Melissa Erbacher: Also, Mark, you were talking about you're hoping to have course record attendance on Valentine's Day this coming weekend. What is your course record attendance currently?

00:19:01Mark Connolly: We're at 222, which was last year's Valentine's Day.

00:19:05Melissa Erbacher: Wow, and do you do something special for Valentine's Day? Do you do one of those traffic light runs or anything like that?

00:19:12Mark Connolly: Yes, that's what we did last year. It worked quite well. We'll be doing it again this year, this weekend.

00:19:18Melissa Erbacher: Okay. And for anyone who doesn't know what a traffic light run is, can you explain that for us?

00:19:24Mark Connolly: Basically, like the traffic lights, the red, orange and green. Red if you're an unavailable person, green if you are available and orange if you're not quite sure what's going on.

00:19:36Melissa Erbacher: And so that's just basically a visual for people to understand where everyone's at without having to make the awkward questions to a married person.

00:19:45Mark Connolly: Yeah, maybe if it's a green one, if you're looking for a new running person to run with or et cetera, or you're happy with your running crew if you've got a red shirt on.

00:19:53Scott Trickett: What colour is a pineapple? Pineapple's yellow. A yellow, not orange.

00:20:00Melissa Erbacher: Well, it's also green.

00:20:01Scott Trickett: Yeah, yeah.

00:20:04Melissa Erbacher: Pineapple's on the cusp between available and not sure.

00:20:07Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:20:08Scott Trickett: Do you know where we're going with this, Mark? I do know I have heard of Mel's pineapple outfit.

00:20:14Melissa Erbacher: Oh, well, we've got some inside knowledge.

00:20:16Mark Connolly: I have some pineapple shorts. We've seen some photos. Do you want to explain yourself? We have a nice pair of running duds with some pineapples on them that are actually very good to run in, very comfortable.

00:20:28Scott Trickett: Are they running shorts, Mark?

00:20:30Mark Connolly: They are running shorts. The running duds crew... I have a lot of shorts like that. My pineapples, I think they're some ice creams and a few other bright colours.

00:20:40Melissa Erbacher: I actually own a few pair of running duds.

00:20:44Mark Connolly: There we go.

00:20:44Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, they are awesome shorts, absolutely.

00:20:48Mark Connolly: They're really good running shorts for running and I try very quickly.

00:20:52Melissa Erbacher: We've been talking on the show today a little bit about movies or maybe a lot about movies and we were just wondering, do you have – a favourite movie of all time or a top three?

00:21:06Mark Connolly: Not a real favourite movie of all time. There are quite a few I do like. Things along the lines of The Big Lebowski, Hercules Returns, those sort of comedies, maybe even more reactions like A Top Gun, Days of Thunder, those sort of things.

00:21:21Melissa Erbacher: See, I was thinking Top Gun. I almost put it in my top ten, but then I thought, no, no, no, no, that's just, that's, no.

00:21:29Mark Connolly: What was the other one you said there, Mark? Days of Thunder? Maybe that sort of style of movie, Top Gun or Days of Thunder.

00:21:37Melissa Erbacher: Days of Thunder is almost a sport movie, Scott. You might like that.

00:21:40Scott Trickett: It is. Yeah, that's what I'm interested. It's not one you often hear talked about as a top three movie or whatever, but I'll pay that.

00:21:48Melissa Erbacher: It does have the whole Nicole Kidman's hair was amazing going for it.

00:21:53Mark Connolly: Yes, that's what I remember about the movie.

00:21:58Melissa Erbacher: Yep.

00:22:00Scott Trickett: There weren't any tanks in that movie, were there? But it's a great segue to the time when there was a tank on your course.

00:22:11Mark Connolly: There was a tank on my course. The Army up here and Defence in general is the major source of thing up here. Lots of training and people living up here from the Defence Force and they were doing some sort of a training session down there or something where they happened to lock our volunteers car in who were setting up the course. And we were parked on the course and we said, go and ask them to move the tank so we can move our car before we start the day.

00:22:37Melissa Erbacher: Oh, see, so they hadn't parked it there until after you arrived in the morning.

00:22:41Mark Connolly: Yeah, we'd already arrived, started setting up. Then they came along and set up a tank and a few other things, a few cannons and things. And they happened to park our volunteers car in.

00:22:50Melissa Erbacher: So the training exercise excuse was probably legitimate and less likely to be that somebody just got a little bit drunk on Friday night and forgot where they parked their tank.

00:23:01Mark Connolly: Yeah, it's got to be around here somewhere. It's a very interesting question. Excuse me, sir, can you move your tank for me, please?

00:23:10Melissa Erbacher: And how do you know which one is the tank driver? Like, do they look different from the others?

00:23:16Mark Connolly: Maybe a lucky guess. The one that was leaning on the tank.

00:23:18Melissa Erbacher: The one who had the keys.

00:23:19Scott Trickett: Yeah, swinging the keys around.

00:23:20Melissa Erbacher: Yeah.

00:23:22Scott Trickett: How did you end up in Darwin, Mark?

00:23:25Mark Connolly: Yeah, I'm a Queenslander from central Queensland. And I was actually travelling in England at the time, living in England. And I met my wife, who's from Darwin, when I was in England, in London. And after moving back to Australia, we moved up here. And I've been up here for about five years now. And you're loving it? I'm loving it. It is a great lifestyle. There isn't much cold weather to worry about and lots of things to do, lots of outdoorsy things to do up here.

00:23:54Melissa Erbacher: Okay, but the outdoorsy things... How careful are you about crocodiles? I have to come back to this because it just seems like – and I should probably know better because I'm an Australian and I live here and I know that we don't have snakes and spiders in all of our houses and that sharks aren't going to kill everyone. But I'm pretty sure crocodiles will. So – you've got small children. When they were crawling and stuff, what do you do about outdoorsy type activities when there are crocodiles in your general area?

00:24:30Mark Connolly: In Darwin, they do actually trap all the crocodiles around the harbour and just around the city itself. So they try and keep them to a minimum. They do trap quite a few hundred every year from around there and move them on to farms and stuff like that. But you don't see too many of them around the area. They sort of They keep them away from the city quite well. They do a good job. But when you start to get a bit further, just outside of the island where they don't do the trapping, you definitely stay out of the water and out of the boat. Stay in the boat, out of the water. That's the best way to go. Near boat ramps, stay, you know, get in the boat as quick as possible. Just stay out of the way and don't harm them. They don't harm us, mostly.

00:25:09Melissa Erbacher: Did you just say get in the boat as quick as possible? Like as in you're in the water where the crocodiles are?

00:25:17Mark Connolly: Don't they have gangplanks? Some places, but most of the areas, no, not really.

00:25:24Melissa Erbacher: Far out. And I understand Litchfield National Park has a pretty awesome-looking trail run. Are there crocodiles out there?

00:25:34Mark Connolly: No, there has been known to be a few little freshwaters in the waterfalls there. No, I've never heard of any real dangerous ones out there yet.

00:25:42Melissa Erbacher: Little freshwaters?

00:25:44Mark Connolly: Yes, little freshwaters.

00:25:46Melissa Erbacher: Not dangerous? No.

00:25:48Mark Connolly: Not too dangerous anyway. So we're not planning a parkrun out there? They did start an ultra marathon there last year in the Litchfield National Park and they're doing it again this year, an ultra and a half as well.

00:26:02Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, and I think I'm going to have to come back for that next year as long as the crocodiles don't grow too big.

00:26:07Scott Trickett: No, they'll be all right in there. Are there any plans for more parkruns up in the NT?

00:26:13Mark Connolly: Yes, there are lots of plans. We're looking at one right now in Palmerston. Just trying to finalise a few things now, some funding in the course, basically. Palmerston is a small satellite city, I guess. About 30,000 people just near Darwin, right beside Darwin. And that'll be up and running hopefully in the next couple of months. We've had quite a few inquiries around and it seems like a nice serious one coming out of Katherine right now. Katherine's about three hours south of Darwin, three or four hours.

00:26:39Scott Trickett: Yeah, and someone from Nullarbor just asked me on the weekend actually So this is how parkruns grow and you being the only event there at the moment, how did you initially find out about parkrun?

00:26:50Mark Connolly: I initially found out about it from podcast Marathon Talk from England with Tom Williams and Martin Yelling. He made it sound that good that I thought I'd better have a look at this and I went on holidays to Perth for a wedding and had to go down and try this parkrun and I think down there they made it look so easy for me and so good and so easy that we might have to give it a go up here.

00:27:12Scott Trickett: And you did, October 2013. Yes, 2013. The reason I know this is because Westerfolds launched on the same weekend. It was a big weekend for parkrun.

00:27:22Melissa Erbacher: It was Kawana parkrun's first anniversary that weekend also. It was. So we share birthdays, the three of us.

00:27:30Scott Trickett: There you go. Oh, wow. I've always had a second eye on Darwin and it's always looked like a great event. Lots of fun. So one day, hopefully I'll get it.

00:27:40Mark Connolly: So when are you coming up in school?

00:27:42Scott Trickett: It's a long way away.

00:27:42Mark Connolly: Probably only one fly.

00:27:47Melissa Erbacher: I'm hoping to get there before you've got four events and make it a lot more difficult to become a statesman.

00:27:53Mark Connolly: Yes.

00:27:54Melissa Erbacher: Mark, thank you so much for joining us this week and thank you for asking the important questions of Mr Tim Oberg when he comes on the show. We hope you can continue to interact with us and share the podcast love. I can't wait to come up to visit you at your event. It's going to be a highlight of my year. I know it already. So thanks again.

00:28:14Mark Connolly: No worries. Thanks for having me, guys. See you soon.

00:28:16[music]

The Social Adventurer Scene

00:28:28Melissa Erbacher: This week on the social adventurer scene, we've had heaps of stuff on Instagram and Twitter and Facebook. Loving the interactions with you guys. Keep them coming. Make sure you don't forget to hashtag parkrunadventurers on everything you put on Facebook that's got to do with parkrun over the week. And you know what? Even if it's just got to do with movies, we want to hear about it. This week in particular, I really loved a post done by positivism number one, which was a picture of two junior parkrunners. They're holding hands. They've got big smiles on their faces as they run. And the caption is, this week's hashtag parkrun adventure involved two friends working together to beat their PB and get 51 minutes. Love it.

00:29:14Scott Trickett: Yeah, very cute. Positivism has been on fire because he also posted a picture of Kurt Fearnley. Photo bombing or was Penny photo bombing Kurt Fearnley?

00:29:26Melissa Erbacher: We're not entirely sure.

00:29:27Scott Trickett: Yeah. but it's topical because you may be following along in the parkrun newsletter that parkrun has done a partnership with the australian paralympic foundation to help fund our para athletes and get them over to the rio olympic games so all through the month of february there is a link in your results email where you can contribute a donation So the idea is that you will nominate an amount and you will donate for every parkrun kilometre. And we know that that's five, so if you donate $5 per kilometre, your total donation is $25. How's my math?

00:30:10Melissa Erbacher: How's your math?

00:30:12Scott Trickett: Maths.

00:30:13Melissa Erbacher: How's my English? I thought you were talking about Matt Fullerton there for a second. Who? You mathed good. You mathed good, Scotty. It's worth mentioning that the donations are 100% voluntary, but you will be helping the Paralympic athletes get to Rio, which is awesome. They do an amazing job and they're very inspirational. So any help we can give them would be great.

00:30:42Scott Trickett: Indeed. A couple of other highlights from Instagram. So Instagram is our social media platform of choice at the moment. I think it works really well for what we're trying to do. Our good mate underscore PK had another cracking shot. He's all in pink. Not sure what's going on, but he looks fabulous.

00:31:01Melissa Erbacher: Who doesn't look fabulous in pink war paint? Me. Well, maybe you just need to grow a good beard like he's got and you'd be able to pull it off, Scotty.

00:31:11Scott Trickett: Okay, I might try that next week because there was another horrific photo of me. There's no need to look that up. But you could look up Nod Lightyear's pic, very pretty pic at Coburg parkrun.

00:31:24Melissa Erbacher: There's another great one from Running Guy Ryan. A lot of our listeners will have seen Running Guy out at various parkruns or parkrun event, organized events across the country. He often dresses as Where's Wally or occasionally Spider-Man. He was Spider-Man at the Sandgate Sunset Run last year. He's a great character and we love that he's hashtagging parkrunadventures. This week he was out there running with Rockstar. This is his parkrun adventure. He ran to parkrun, did 9K on the way there and did a 1K cool down. So he did 15 kilometers for the whole morning.

00:31:59Scott Trickett: That sounds like a real adventure.

00:32:04Melissa Erbacher: It is an adventure.

Launches and birthdays / "where is the cake this week?"

00:32:06Scott Trickett: There are no launches this week.

00:32:08Melissa Erbacher: There was supposed to be a launch.

00:32:09Scott Trickett: There was. A little bit sad. Studly was going to launch this weekend, but we've just got two more weeks to wait for that. But where is the cake this week?

00:32:19Melissa Erbacher: Oh, there's going to be so much cake around the country this week. I'm pretty excited. I'm going to be... at one of the cake places this weekend, Golden Beach parkrun in Queensland, having their second anniversary, and it's going to be a carnival fiesta. I haven't decided what costume to wear for that yet, but the options are pretty fun, so I'm looking forward to that.

00:32:41Scott Trickett: You've got a wide selection of options.

00:32:45Melissa Erbacher: Oh, you can't wear a costume you've already worn, Scotty. That's against the rules.

00:32:48Scott Trickett: No, I'm talking about the theme.

00:32:51Melissa Erbacher: Ah, yes.

00:32:51Scott Trickett: Carnival fiesta is open to interpretation.

00:32:55Melissa Erbacher: It is, but I think both words pretty much say party to me. So it's going to be bright and colourful and fun for sure.

00:33:04Scott Trickett: That's what I'd go with. In Ipswich, they're having their second anniversary, Tackiest Formal Wear. And we like the Facebook description.

00:33:13Melissa Erbacher: We do. If you're not, and this is it, verbatim, if you're not sure what Tacky Formal is, well, it's like Melbourne Cup dress, but at the end of the day, not the start. And I think we've all seen those photos on Facebook. So I'm looking forward to seeing what costumes come out at Ipswich this weekend, especially if it's as warm as it has been. It could be some pretty interesting stuff.

00:33:39Scott Trickett: I've lived some of those experiences. Whereabouts is Ipswich?

00:33:46Melissa Erbacher: Ipswich is in the Southern Cross Circuit, actually. So it's, well, relatively southeast Queensland but it's further south of Brisbane and west also so it's a nice country town they do have runners occasionally participating in their steel cap boots instead of running shoes so it's a good farming country I haven't actually been to the event yet but it's as many of them are on my list. And the final birthday anniversary parkrun event this week is going to be at Lake Mac in New South Wales and they're celebrating their third anniversary. Big number three with big love and Valentine's Day theme. I reckon there'll be a lot of red shirts, pink shirts, love hearts. What do you think, Scotty?

00:34:34Scott Trickett: Yeah, I think so. There could be a few Valentine's themed parkruns going on this weekend. I've never participated in one. Have you?

00:34:45Melissa Erbacher: We had – participated is a loose term, I think. We had one of the stoplight parkruns at Kawana the first year. So we had the red, the green, the orange, as Mark mentioned earlier on. And I'm pretty sure – I participated in that. I wore a red shirt because I'm married, and I think I made my husband wear a red shirt. He was oblivious. He probably would have shown up in green. I do recall.

00:35:12Scott Trickett: Well, that's the danger, isn't it?

00:35:14Melissa Erbacher: That is the danger. See, there were a couple of runners that didn't know, and one was a seven-year-old boy who got quite embarrassed when he got called up by the run director who said, oh, you're wearing green today, we noticed, so you're looking for a girlfriend, and he was mortified. Because he just was wearing a green shirt. He didn't know anything about it. So that is the risk you take.

00:35:38Scott Trickett: That's what I'd always be worried about. Because we know that just some of our runners aren't engaged in Facebook or don't follow the newsletter or wherever they get their news. And so sometimes they turn up and they think, what the hell's going on? If you were in green one week.

00:35:54Melissa Erbacher: It's all part of the parkrun adventure. And if anything, I'm sure it will just mean you meet more people and you have a bit of a laugh and make some new friends.

00:36:03Scott Trickett: Yeah, good point.

00:36:04Melissa Erbacher: All righty. Well, I'm off to watch Mo Better Blues. I'll talk to you later, Scotty. See you later, parkrun adventurers.

00:36:11Scott Trickett: I hope you enjoy it. I might catch up on Clueless and we will chat to you all again next Wednesday.

00:36:12[music]

00:36:58Unidentified speaker: So I can call you, convince him, come on