Episode 143 - With Us Now

Welcome

00:00:17Scott Trickett: Don't listen to the naysayers and the grinchers of this world. This is the best time of the year. It's the happiest time of the year. It's our Christmas episode.

00:00:26Melissa Erbacher: Is it the happiest time, Scotty?

00:00:28Scott Trickett: Well, it is for me. I like it, Mel.

00:00:31Melissa Erbacher: Okay. I like to try and be happy all year round.

00:00:35Scott Trickett: Yeah, I do, I do. But this is our Christmas episode again.

00:00:38Melissa Erbacher: Okay, well, no, it's not the Christmas episode. It's the last episode of the year. We already had a Christmas episode.

00:00:45Scott Trickett: This is take two, or the remake. I'm determined to keep this the Christmas episode. Yeah, the sequel. So welcome to episode one, or in other circles as episode 143 of the parkrun adventurers. I still to this day, Mel, curse that time when we had a break and we got our episode numbers all out of whack. What do you mean, out of whack as in? Yeah, if we kept doing it, we could have, like year one, we finished on episode 50. Last year, we could have done episode 100. It's a minor thing.

00:01:18Melissa Erbacher: Mental health breaks are important.

00:01:20Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:01:21Scott Trickett: So this is our last episode for 2018, which means there's going to be a little bit of a break. But down here in Australia, that's a good thing because we're all in party mode. We're in holiday mode. And so we want to give all our listeners around the world and in Australia a chance to catch up as well. So nobody misses out on ordering a Christmas singlet again, which we know has happened. Or people miss out on voting in the Perlustration because they didn't know it was happening.

00:01:48Melissa Erbacher: And I'm sure they were gutted.

Bad Christmas Jokes

00:01:50Scott Trickett: One of the best things about the Christmas episode, the sequel, is that we get to do our Christmas jokes.

00:01:57Melissa Erbacher: You know what? I think this is probably why we have to have a sequel because did we even have any dodgy Christmas bonbons? We didn't. No, see, so there you go.

00:02:06Scott Trickett: We were all about just pushing the merchandise.

00:02:12Melissa Erbacher: Okay, well, Scotty, I think it's time to start ripping them out.

00:02:17Scott Trickett: Okay, well, I want to set the tone with mine. Can I go first? Please do. So what's the difference between snowmen and snowwomen?

00:02:27Melissa Erbacher: Snow idea.

00:02:29Scott Trickett: Snowballs.

00:02:33Melissa Erbacher: Oh, dear. Oh, dear. You're setting the tone. That's where I'm going. That's the tone you want. Yeah. Right there. Okay.

00:02:41Scott Trickett: Can you lift it?

00:02:43Melissa Erbacher: I actually also have a snowman themed thing because despite the fact that there is nary a snowman to be had in Australia, it's still very Christmassy for some reason. I guess it's all the snow, the European and Northern Hemisphere winter Christmas movies I've been watching lately, but I've got a snowman one. So what do snowmen call their kids? Nothing. Children. Children. See, mine was at least a little bit, well, you can't really say cleaner, but yeah.

00:03:27Scott Trickett: Yeah.

00:03:28Melissa Erbacher: All right, well.

00:03:28Scott Trickett: Well, we'll let the audience decide which one was funnier. We won't do a poll on it this time, but we know the answer already. But there's more to come. There's more to come, not only from you and me, but we've got our regulars joining us. This is another fun part of our last podcast, episode for the year is that the Channel 5 News crew have stepped up to the plate.

00:03:47Melissa Erbacher: They do. We love having them all involved in our final episode every year.

00:03:53Scott Trickett: So you'll hear them throughout the episode. We've got roving reports from two new reporters and that's exciting in itself.

00:04:02Melissa Erbacher: And we have some special guests.

00:04:04Scott Trickett: which we'll get to. So it's another bumper episode, but it's going to finish with another gift to our listeners at the very end of the episode. So I know it's a long one, people.

00:04:13Melissa Erbacher: Stay with us. It'll be worth it.

00:04:15Scott Trickett: But I trust you. It'll be worth it. It'll be worth it.

Year in reviewhost top-three highlights

00:04:17Scott Trickett: Stay to the end. What I wanted to do, Mel... is look back on 2018 and I want to hear, just share some of your highlights from the year. I think we're going to, let's put aside palm18, our listener meetup, because that's a good one.

00:04:32Melissa Erbacher: That's a great highlight from the both of us.

00:04:35Scott Trickett: And it was a highlight for the podcast. So I'm just curious to know what stood out for you during the year. parkrun.

00:04:41Melissa Erbacher: parkrun-wise. Well, earlier on in 2018, I started the year off in the best possible way. Obviously, New Year's Day doubles and lots of new events in January. And one of those new events was skipping across to Western Australia to visit Margaret River parkrun, which, no, you know what? I didn't even do that in January, but it was February, so it was still the start of the year. It was a birthday gift, a belated birthday gift from my husband. I mean, I received the card to say that that's what we were doing on my birthday, which is early January, but we didn't get across until February. And that was an awesome parkrun weekend for me. I got to catch up with Manny Trent and Cassie Hughes, who are just fabulous, fabulous parkrunners from that side of the country. And yeah, had a really wonderful morning on the trail parkrun that is Margaret River parkrun. So that was a definite highlight for me.

00:05:39Scott Trickett: Awesome. We do good things about Margaret River. So was it the people? Was it the course? Or was it just everything?

00:05:44Melissa Erbacher: It was everything. It was the combination of all the things. You know, even the post-parkrun breakfast was astounding. It was just, yeah, ticked all the boxes for the whole weekend.

00:05:54Scott Trickett: Awesome. And because we work in threes, give us another.

00:05:58Melissa Erbacher: And the other one, as well as Margaret River and palmating, would have had to be I got to tick off my first international event. And I did that in Malaysia at Taman Pudu Ulu, which was the inaugural event for that country as well, run by a fabulous bunch of volunteers, made to feel so welcome the entire weekend. And just... I mean, I know there's an awesome vibe often at inaugural events anyway, or even just new events that are building their communities. But to be at an inaugural event in a new country, I'm not sure too many people get that opportunity. So I felt very privileged to be there. And they did a fabulous job. And the community aspect was already there. Like these guys had been basically trialling the event every weekend for months beforehand. So they had already built their community and it was a great, great morning all together.

00:06:55Scott Trickett: Awesome. A bit fancy. A bit fancy. How far down the list would we have to go before your visit to Westerfolds, Scotty? Probably just fourth, yeah? If we did top fours.

00:07:06Melissa Erbacher: Oh, Scotty.

00:07:10Scott Trickett: Top five?

00:07:11Melissa Erbacher: Six. Well, see, the thing is, whenever we ask people for top threes, we always tell them to rule out their home events. And for me, Westerfolds is like my other home. So it's just not – it's my spiritual home in Victoria and it's really not appropriate.

00:07:31Scott Trickett: Good.

00:07:31Melissa Erbacher: Mark, the rest of them. Is it?

00:07:33Scott Trickett: No, it's not. You're right. That's a fair comment. That's a fair comment. So great. Do you want to know my highlights?

00:07:38Melissa Erbacher: Who wants to know your highlights? It is. Please, you're not allowed to talk about Westerfolds, okay? I'm ruling that out.

00:07:43Scott Trickett: Okay. Oh, shit, I've got to cross that. Hang on, I'll just go through my list. There's one, two, three. Studley, can I cross out Studley? Okay. My highlights, here's one I don't reckon you would have picked. We go back into earlier in the year when, one, I was a bit fitter. I was feeling really good. But we visited Bright for a couple of weeks. And so the first week there, I just got to run Bright parkrun. And then the second week, Yvonne, Kasia and myself took over the volunteering duties. So I got to be a Run Director on tour. Okay, which is something that I haven't really done before. I've been to other parkruns, like when we took over Jells and run directed, we didn't really know the event and the community, but this was really different going up to bright miles away from where I live. Didn't know anybody there, but it was a great morning. It was a great morning. Just starting completely from scratch. Trying to help build and getting to know everybody who visited that morning. It's such a beautiful part of this country too. That sort of stands out.

00:08:44Unidentified speaker: Very cool.

00:08:45Scott Trickett: When I just quickly track back and think what was some of the highlights of the year. The two weeks that we spent in Bright was a real highlight. And that includes the week that I ran there, I got a 59.59. My only 59.59. And it didn't deter. It didn't detract from the experience at all. 59 should never.

00:09:05Melissa Erbacher: They're an enhancement, definitely.

00:09:07Scott Trickett: Yeah. It's just a guarantee that I've got to go back there and get a 21 or a 22 or a 37-minute time on my profile. Another highlight happened recently is that when Tim and I visited the Ponds, an event that I know I've talked about a lot. It's been on our radar a lot, but it lived up to all expectations that morning. The night before, the morning of, just meeting real parkrunners who love parkrun. The community there were just awesome.

00:09:39Melissa Erbacher: It was just the vibe of it.

00:09:41Scott Trickett: It was just the vibe. Yeah, I even enjoyed the run. I had a good run there. And it was happy days. So there are a couple that stand out for me amongst many. It's been a good year. We've run together a few times or we've been in the same parkrun location together a few times. That's been a highlight for me.

00:10:00Melissa Erbacher: Well, yeah, you can't count it on one hand how many times we've been in the same parkrun location.

00:10:05Scott Trickett: Yeah, and that's a real privilege. And we're going to do it again next year. I reckon we should try to up the ante.

00:10:11Melissa Erbacher: I don't know how we're going to physically be able to do that. But yes, definitely.

00:10:17Scott Trickett: So there's some highlights. So obviously where you went on the weekend didn't crack your top three, but I hope you still had a good time.

00:10:23Melissa Erbacher: I did. I had a wonderful morning actually. And let me just touch on it briefly. It is going to be a bumper issue this episode, so I won't keep it too long. But I ventured back to Lota, which I've been to before and I've talked about on the podcast before, great event really friendly uh volunteer crew there um but it was actually so this is where my brother and sister-in-law it's their home parkrun and they don't spend a lot of time there because they've caught the adventuring bug also along with their kids Rowan and Lani and um They're all over the shop a lot of the time. But it was actually Michelle's 100th parkrun. And Rowan and Lani were both doing their 50th as well. So, it was a big morning. Plus, happy birthday. It was Michelle's birthday. So, you just can't line up that many things to celebrate all on one morning. There was not an ounce of arbitrary about it. And, yeah, fabulous morning. Just amazing. Once again, it's a vibe. It's a vibe. There's nothing like celebrating with a close family or friends when they have these big milestones. And I was so proud, especially, you know, Rowan and Lani, 50 events that 35 of those are different, you know, so they're big adventurers with their parents. It's something they've adopted as a family and it's a way for them to make memories with their kids, you know, travelling around and doing this. So I love how much it's involved in their life now. And it means there's a lot more opportunities for us to catch up with them as well when they either travel to an event that we're going to or vice versa. Yeah. And yeah, so big shout out to those guys. And also just quietly, future, working on the future of my Wilson Index, I grabbed a 57. I know I'm only on three at the moment, but I was thinking about the future and eventually I'm just lining all those ducks up. Where were you, Scotty?

00:12:24Scott Trickett: Well, you were working on your Wilson Index and bonding with your family, celebrating milestones. I was working on my P Index and also visiting Mullum Mullum for their anniversary. And I love Mullum Mullum, Mel. I've said it before on the podcast. I really, really enjoy running there. And we've had a lot of rain, as a lot of the country has had. And so Mullum Mullum runs beside a creek and the water was flowing. The trees were green. It was really beautiful, start to the morning and I got but it was still humid so we don't get a lot of humidity down here in Melbourne so it was a bit different there was a lot of carry-on from a lot of people that what's this nonsense but um my Thai blood yeah my Thai blood can handle humidity okay and I was running with Kasia we dropped a mum again so we we all started running together mum couldn't keep up Push Kasia got close to her PB, which she was pretty chuffed with in the humid conditions. And they're my favourite kind of mornings, I've got to say, Mel. I'm completely over running fast by myself with nobody else. I much prefer running 37 minutes with my daughter in ridiculous humidity. That's one of my favourite courses. There, I've said it. It's one of my favourite courses, Mullum Mullum parkrun.

00:13:43Melissa Erbacher: I'm glad to hear you had such a good weekend, Scotty.

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

00:13:56Tony O'Connell: Howdy parkrunners, it's Toc reporting in for the Channel 5 News crew. I'd like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a very festive New Year. For all those people that I've met, it's been great meeting you all and I look forward to meeting all those people that haven't yet. I look forward to getting out around your courses next year. For those people that have volunteered, thank you for making parkrun the great thing that it is. And now a special one for Mel. Mel, what do you get if you cross a Christmas tree with an apple? A pineapple. Cheers, everyone. Have a great Chrissy.

00:14:28Melissa Ellis: Merry Christmas, parkrun adventurers. It's Melissa here. I wanted to say Merry Christmas. I hope you have a fabulous Christmas with your loved ones. I hope you drag them along to parkrun and I hope I get to meet you next year at parkrun. So if I'm somewhere where you are, please come say hello and have a fabulous time and I'll see you next year. Bye.

00:14:49[music]

00:14:49Scott Trickett: Music

Interview Danny Norman and Nicola Forwood — Co-presenter, With Me Now (formerly The parkrun Show); former parkrun staff member;…

00:14:55Scott Trickett: There are only a handful of people in the world who produce a parkrun podcast. So when Mel and I got together and we wanted our own Christmas party this year that we discussed on our Christmas episode about three or four weeks ago, the list wasn't very long. So we just thought we had to get Danny and Nicola back on the podcast together so we could all celebrate our office Christmas party. Welcome back to the parkrun adventurers.

00:15:19Nicola Forwood: Yay. Happy Christmas.

00:15:21Danny Norman: Hello. Hi, guys.

00:15:22Scott Trickett: I haven't got a party blower.

00:15:24Nicola Forwood: I know. I want one of the party poppers. Bang. Yay.

00:15:27Scott Trickett: Okay. Well, this is it. We're making up the rules for our own office Christmas party because we've never done it before. I hope you've all got a glass. I have. I've got a couple. So join in. Join in the merriment. I've got a plastic bottle full of water.

00:15:41Nicola Forwood: Me too. Danny. And actually, it's 9am here and these guys, they're drinking and it's like, what is it there? 7am? It's called a champagne breakfast, Nicola. Putting us to shame.

00:15:54Danny Norman: It's called an Australian breakfast is what that is. Are you wearing a Santa hat, may I ask? Have you got any Christmas paraphernalia on?

00:16:03Melissa Erbacher: I have got a hat that looks like a Christmas tree and it's got red baubles on it and they're all flashing.

00:16:09Nicola Forwood: Oh my goodness, Mel, please tell me, please tell me that you have paired it with one of your singlets.

00:16:15Melissa Erbacher: Well, my singlet's not here yet, but I am wearing a gold singlet to match just to be a little bit festive. But you know what? It's not going to match my singlet because my singlet is the ugly... podcast colours of purple and sort of orange hues. So I've actually got plans before parkrun happens at the festive time to make a hat that matches my singlet as well.

00:16:38Nicola Forwood: No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I don't think you can do that. It was my understanding that the whole point of the singlet is to clash with everything and be as ugly as possible. You can't be matching it.

00:16:50Danny Norman: Scotty, Scotty, do I need to push the hand thing to put my hand up to speak now? Because these two are just going to gab on for ages if you don't stop them.

00:16:58Scott Trickett: Well, let's try it. No, just jump in whenever you can. But I think Nicola's got a point, Mel. She's called you on it. Yeah, but – You can't be accentuizing the singlet. The singlet needs to stand out proud and loud.

00:17:09Melissa Erbacher: Well, but it will if – I'll be accentuating it and it will be like amplifying it.

00:17:14Nicola Forwood: the singlet by having purple and orange no you'll be doing the thing where you end up looking like a pair of curtains that's what you'll be doing like really old lady curtains you can't do it you can't do it Mel like it won't go with red it won't everyone has to be wearing red so I'll be clashing with other people but you do make a good point Christmas fashion podcast

00:17:39Melissa Erbacher: You'll have to consider all options. I do have more than one Christmas hat. I've got reindeer antlers. You know, there's quite a lot stashed in the costume cupboard. So we'll see what we come up with.

00:17:51Nicola Forwood: To be fair, it's an important parkrun consideration at this time of year because the last two parkruns I've been at, there have been loads of people in fancy dress and I feel like I'm missing the boat. I mean, I'm pulling it out for next week, obviously, but...

00:18:05Melissa Erbacher: Why are you pulling out your costume for next week? You're not pulling out of fancy dressed.

00:18:12Nicola Forwood: Yeah. No, no, no. I'm pulling out all the stops. I'm going to, you know, come dressed as a Christmas tree or something.

00:18:19Danny Norman: It's got to get down to the pub for a drink together.

00:18:24Melissa Erbacher: Well, you boys don't usually have too much trouble interjecting and talking over us. I'm surprised it's been this quiet.

00:18:32Scott Trickett: Well, let's move on from fashion. But actually, I want to stay on fashion because I want to ask about the tops. And the fact that we didn't sort of get together and decide that we're both going to do tops, it was just coincidence that we both put them out at the same time. But yours are out and about. Have you actually seen anything live in the wild yet?

00:18:51Danny Norman: Well, yeah. Yeah. It depends on what you consider wild because Bev, surrogate mum Bev, was the first to purchase. She was demanding and that turned up. Other people, in terms of going to another parkrun on tour and seeing them out in the wild, no. Not just yet.

00:19:12Nicola Forwood: That's going to be a thrill when it happens. I can't wait. It's going to be exciting, isn't it?

00:19:17Danny Norman: Yeah, absolutely.

00:19:19Nicola Forwood: I'm just wondering, if my singlet arrives after Christmas... Do I wear it anyway? Oh, yeah. And get those covers.

00:19:29Melissa Erbacher: Do you think? That's even more important, I think, if it arrives late and people still wear it. I just think that's a... Perfect, in fact. In fact, if it comes before Christmas, don't wear it. Wait until after Christmas.

00:19:45Nicola Forwood: Hey, it was the second of our cross-country races today. Vest and shorts. We're hardy over here. We can do it. Vest and shorts.

00:19:52Melissa Erbacher: That's insane. Well, there you go. Okay. Scotty and I kind of thought, eh, nobody in the UK is going to want a singlet, but we desperately need them in Australia, so...

00:20:02Danny Norman: But you're forgetting that Nicola's blood in her veins is coursing with alcohol from the night before, so she's not feeling anything.

00:20:08Nicola Forwood: Behave yourself, Danny Norman.

00:20:12Danny Norman: It's not untrue, though, is it? It's not untrue, is it, Nicola?

00:20:16Nicola Forwood: I mean, you know, I'm not saying that.

00:20:18Melissa Erbacher: It is the season to be jolly and merry in all sorts of ways. And, yeah, it's kind of difficult to avoid the parties at the moment. You know what's really good for doing that? Working from home. You don't get invited to parties when you work from home.

00:20:32Danny Norman: I have a party every day on my own at home with Dolly. That's it. That's my party. It's good enough for me. It keeps me happy. Moving on from parties and fashion and booze, are we going to talk about parkrun at all?

00:20:45Scott Trickett: We are. We are because I want to get you on because I want to find out how relaunching – are you relaunching or is it just launching the podcast has been? So you did it before. The parkrun Show existed. That was the parkrun Show. Now it's with me now. How has it been different? Have you enjoyed it up to this point? Have you underestimated the workload? Have you overestimated it?

00:21:08Melissa Erbacher: Scott, you're asking too many questions.

00:21:11Danny Norman: I need to note that's four questions in one, and they're all really good.

00:21:14Scott Trickett: I didn't get many opportunities to talk, so I wanted to get them all in at once.

00:21:20Melissa Erbacher: Small violin, small violin.

00:21:22Danny Norman: So run that by me again. So in terms of is it different to TPS? So that's a good question. Workload, okay, a good one as well. And how does it be different? So addressing the is it different thing. Really good, interesting one. It depends on what aspect you look at it. So we are the same presenters. I don't know if you're familiar with Top Gear and Jeremy Clarkson over there. I know Top Gear is a global thing, the car review show. Would you know those?

00:21:52Melissa Erbacher: We're familiar with them, yep.

00:21:54Danny Norman: Didn't want to assume in that case. But when they moved from BBC and they're doing the new thing on Amazon now, I guess it's the same but repackaged. And it feels a little bit like that. Obviously, we bring a core audience over. There's a lot of references that we make. We make sure that we're trying to refer back and people are understanding what we refer to. But also the rebirth of it was caused by a few things, really. And... Yeah, and then we'll come back to that in a minute. But then the workload side of things, actually, I can intertwine this into two things. So in September last year, when Nick Pearson and I had a chat in Richmond upon Thames, discussing the potential for me to bring back a parkrun podcast. The concern was regarding the workload and how much it would affect me. And I tried to make clear that the podcast wasn't what overloaded me enough to make me step down and resign from working for parkrun. The podcast was a light in my week and that I really enjoyed that. That wasn't what stressed me. It was everything else on top, the 24-7 nature of the job. So the concern of bringing it back, I guess, for some people would be, would this be too much for me? And do you know what? No. If anything, it's the thing that I really hang on at present each week. It's the one thing that I need in my week. So the workload, not at all. I'm learning to delegate better now. We've just got somebody to look after our Twitter feed. Mark Brocklehurst is now mentioning. So Mark's looking after the Twitter feed. And he's doing a great job. He's driving it forward. But I'm... growing tired of twitter at the moment and also being able to having to tour all over the place spending sometimes four hour round trips coming back and then park faffing and then having to go through everything comms emails and twitter on top it's the one thing that I can forego and so I've handed it over uh

00:23:44Nicola Forwood: You don't have to tour around. Well, if I don't, you won't. If I said, I have to.

00:23:48Danny Norman: Somebody's got to produce some variety in the podcast each week. They want to hear about Leeds every time, Nicola Forwood. So...

00:23:55Nicola Forwood: I mean, there's lots of parkruns in Leeds now.

00:23:57Danny Norman: Circumstantial and fortuitous, that is. But...

00:24:01Nicola Forwood: You love it. You love touring.

00:24:03Danny Norman: So is it different? Somebody made a point, one of my favourite world poisoners made a point that they like to think that we're not as independent as you think you are because of how we were born at the parkrun show. And I think, to be honest with you, yes, we are independent. And that it's always interesting to know what the thoughts and feelings are of HQ because I didn't inform them. I'll be open and honest about this, that I was bringing it back. Surrogate Mum Bev was a driving force in... bringing me bringing it back there's other things I won't go into in the background regarding it but um that we have a voice now and which I feel that we can be a bit more I wouldn't say adult that's the wrong way to say it is that we can address things so egg gate when we addressed egg gate there's no way we could have done that during the parkrun show time I don't feel I really don't feel oh will you know will you guys know your listeners might not know what egg gate they will most of them will So the controversy regarding a sponsorship choice. So could we have done that before? I don't think so. I think one thing I'd love to refer back to as to how we can be quite frank, and this is, I think we're going to refer, actually, Nicola, you'll remember this quite clearly, is that Nicola went to Sewerby parkrun. And she made a comment how, remind me if I get this wrong, Nicola, but you were, you got lost or there wasn't, this is before Tail Walkers.

00:25:24Nicola Forwood: I was pregnant and I got lost.

00:25:27Danny Norman: Before Tail Walkers, right?

00:25:28Nicola Forwood: Is that right?

00:25:29Danny Norman: Yeah.

00:25:30Nicola Forwood: Yeah, this was long before the days of Tail Walkers and I got lost. I did inform a Marshal that I'd gone wrong because it's a bit of a figure of eight, but nothing happened. And they closed down the whole course, pulled in all the Marshals. So then I only became more lost because then when I was back on course, but all the signs had gone, all the Marshals had gone. Yeah, but it was still a great parkrun day. I still did it. They added me in at the end. But I made a comment, just something about... Because I think I might have been crying in the woods at one point because I didn't know where I was and I didn't have my phone on me because I was running. So I think I just made a comment on it and the team got upset. And then obviously I was... It wasn't my intention to upset them, but... Obviously, when you're an official parkrun podcast, you feel the weight of that more. Whereas I think now I would discuss it more openly and be like, there's loads to learn from it. And yeah, my my discussion of it now would probably be different to my discussion of it.

00:26:29Danny Norman: It was never a criticism. And that's the thing. So what happened was that Nicola didn't criticise. We're very good and balanced about it. Nicola said, I don't want to upset or offend the team. She literally, matter of fact, said this is what occurred and what happened. Of course, now we know that Tail Walker is a completely core, essential part of it. And had it been nowadays, it wouldn't have happened. But Nicola said, look, this is what happened. I got a bit lost. And she answered, I don't think she even used the term upset. But Sewerby took a slight to that. And we weren't criticising. We were just stating what had happened. And then so Sewerby spoke to HQ, made a complaint. And then I had to front the complaint, direct from HQ saying, look, well, you can't say this about teams. Even these bad things do happen because we're official voice, comms channel. Then you can't say this. You just have to let it go. And we weren't picking a fight. So you have to... I guess.

00:27:19Nicola Forwood: And it's a stunning, stunning parkrun. So I said loads of lovely things because it's right. It's on the cliff tops overlooking the sea. It's absolutely like it's a wonderful parkrun. And I said all that too.

00:27:29Danny Norman: It's just a matter of fact. It was the thing. This is what happened. Nicola wasn't lying. She wasn't accusing, wasn't criticising. She just stated what happened, of course. And then, like we said, in hindsight, Tail Walkers is now a thing now. Just coincidentally, not because of that, but it's so there's a reason, a purpose for it to make sure no one gets lost at the back. And so we had to kind of suppress in a way that it wasn't again.

00:27:51Nicola Forwood: Oh, yeah, I definitely played it down.

00:27:53Danny Norman: And so now we wouldn't have to do that. We don't do that. And we don't want to go out and criticise teams. We definitely don't do that.

00:27:59Nicola Forwood: I think now I'd be like, I was walking in the woods crying. Whereas I definitely wasn't saying that.

00:28:07Danny Norman: And it's a fantastic parkrun from what I've heard.

00:28:09Nicola Forwood: Danny and I have, we've got over a thousand parkruns between us. We, we are, we're parkrun, aren't we Danny? Through and through, cuts in half, it'll say parkrun. So neither of us want to ever upset event teams or, so I think the whole time our approach will be similar, but yeah, we just got a bit more free reign now and, to not toe the official line although most of the time we're on board anyway because we're such avid partners.

00:28:38Danny Norman: This is what I mean by adult is the fact is that we don't have to pretend we don't have to pretend that everything is awesome and perfect and at the same point if things do go slightly wrong then we can say so and I think a lot of people respond to the fact that it's an adult conversation that the people are treated in a different way that they don't know what actually people are going to be honest and true. And also that there was a concern about me being controversial, I should say. But if you listen back, I don't think we've ever been controversial with me now. And also, as Nicola says, we are just in love with the parkrun idea. There's no reason or purpose as to us being controversial, denigrating or derogatory toward parkrun having invested so many years into it that we're only in support of it we love it and if we have a concern we have a concern for a reason so having that ability to speak freely I think is a massive benefit and a big shift away and also less time constraints there was also time constraints in the the length of the podcast parkrun show originally because of it being my official employ So there are lots of different nuances. I think having a bit of freedom is better. But at the same point, we use this blueprint and template of the parkrun show, tweak things here or there. But it's been well received and people have missed it. People have missed a UK based link of information that was going on. And I have been in vehicles and I've been around PSH, Jo Sinton-Hewitt, and they would always repeatedly say, when we go on tour, we miss a parkrun show. And they'd always make comments to them to bring it back. And we fulfilled that. So, yeah. And there's a lot to think about in terms of why it's back. And is it here to stay? That depends on my personal circumstances, I'll be honest with you.

00:30:19Nicola Forwood: Let's hope so. We've all got our T-shirts now, Danny.

00:30:23Danny Norman: Start it. Get everybody to buy a T-shirt and then sack it off in January. So, yeah. So very, very good questions in depth. I mean, I've omitted and left out quite a few bits and pieces there as to the really intricacies of it going on. Obviously, Free Weekly Timed came around. And that didn't happen for multiple reasons.

00:30:42Nicola Forwood: I'm so confused about Free Weekly Timed. Is it official or not official?

00:30:45Danny Norman: Yes, it is. And they keep getting referred to as official. I've said this in the podcast before. It gets all the official comms. It's the same thing as Contra.

00:30:52Nicola Forwood: I mean, if you ask them, I think they say they're not.

00:30:54Danny Norman: It's the same as Contra not being parkrun. Yeah. And I've had this discussion with said parties before. Contra is not parkrun. No, it's not. But its two directors are the founder and the CEO of parkrun. It's registered under Companies House as being that. And then you also have... PSH is the face of it and people are always going to interpret it as being a parkrun thing. So whilst you can say it's not official, it's not tied in or it has this carte blanche or freedom, it's not strictly true. It's still perceived by the general parkrun populace and public as being official because it's in all the official comms. It gets retweeted and shared by the CEO, COO, PSH do that. We, of course, don't have any of that comms, word of mouthing. Oh, Mel and Scotty.

00:31:38Nicola Forwood: Does the parkrun adventurers get shared in your official comms?

00:31:41Scott Trickett: That's a good question. It did in its previous life, but it hasn't this year.

00:31:47Nicola Forwood: Did it have a previous life?

00:31:48Scott Trickett: It did. So in years one and two, it did appear in the Australian newsletter as a banner ad, but it has been absent in this year. And I think what it does is parkrun adventurers free weekly timed with me now three different All about parkrun. And I get what you're saying, Danny. And the reason why you guys are on our podcast this week is I think we're probably a bit more aligned with you guys. But we get it that the UK audience didn't quite get the Australian sense of humour, the Australian lexicon, our accents, and just the fact that we're talking about...

00:32:25Nicola Forwood: Swearing. Swearing, yeah. You're not a family show over here.

00:32:28Scott Trickett: Well, the fact that we're talking about an event called Westerfolds, and there's not enough Westerfolds in the UK, so we get all that. But I'm not sure where I was going with this, but I think just the difference between the three.

00:32:41Danny Norman: Well, I need to ask you, Scotty, what are you thinking of that? Do you think that people haven't taken to it because of culture? I would suggest that... And please say if you disagree with me here is the fact is that they didn't know about you and the fact is it wasn't advertised about your existence. Now, when I watch stuff on YouTube and I have interest matters, if the person who shares my interest is reporting about it localized in America, the fact is in America is irrelevant. So the fact that you're in Australia, but you still principally and fundamentally do the same thing, which is parkrunning, just happens to be geographically different. I still have a massive vested interest. I want to hear what you and Mel have to say, and I'd like to hear from different Event Directors all around. I would perhaps suggest that maybe they weren't massively made aware of you. Were they made aware of you? If you were lent and given the size of comms that, for example, parkrun UK has now with 100,000 Facebook followers and Twitter followers and the newsletter going out to a million people, it would be a different story. But of course, because you didn't have any of that reach, that's perhaps why they were not aware and perhaps not listen to you as much. But I'd like to think you're having people sent your way a bit more now as the awareness of parkrun podcasts are going up. I don't know this. I can't prove this. There's no evidence. It's all anecdotal. But I think levels of awareness are a big factor and promotion here. And so we rely on word of mouth enormously. We'd have a much bigger audience if we were having the reach that Free Weekly Timed had in terms of the official parkrun UK comms. And that's why it's hard for people to understand about it being different because do you know what? Well, it is. Because...

00:34:11Nicola Forwood: it's promoted throughout all the UK channels so yeah I yeah I agree with you it doesn't matter to me at all that Mel and Scotty are in Australia not at all it's a big parkrun family isn't it anyway

00:34:25Danny Norman: Well, like Mel's story, the one that really hit me, and sorry to bring this up again, but the fact that when you were emotional when you hit the kangaroo, Mel, it doesn't matter where you were, I felt so much for you because I have an affiliation with you. And I also, I... I empathise with you, but I also understand where you're coming from because you're so well-versed in experience in parkrun. The fact that you know the inner workings, you know behind the scenes, you understand the culture and the communities that you go around to. You are a tourist. You understand the volunteering side of things. And you have a passion and a love. And your Saturday mornings are about getting up and going to wherever you can do. In fact, you'll tour with so much passion and enthusiasm with your family. So it means more to you than just that run. And that, I think, is core and key. And it doesn't matter where you are in the world. That's what we can relate to.

00:35:10Melissa Erbacher: Well, I like this answer, Scotty. This works for me. And it makes sense that people just didn't know. But because as I just briefly mentioned before, we are kind of a grassroots. We've grown the way a local parkrun event would grow. You know, we... word of mouth. And I think possibly we have a listenership that is very, very hardcore and very devoted as a result because they, you know, it's that word of mouth community that we've built, I suppose, which is interesting. But not that we don't love when people listen from overseas and everything as well because you guys are all part of that parkrun family as well.

00:35:58Scott Trickett: I can add, there's no doubt. So our numbers, our UK downloads have grown significantly this year from about halfway through the year. There was a noticeable bump in UK downloads, which is good. But I know, so when I've gone over there the previous two years and attended the parkrun conference, a lot of people in that room who are hardcore parkrun tragics knew who I was, particularly once I started speaking as well. Some people sort of made the connection. Others would come up to me, guests who we've had on the podcast, who work for parkrun, start telling me all about the parkrun adventurers podcast without knowing that I was actually the presenter.

00:36:38Nicola Forwood: That's brilliant. Did you tell them?

00:36:42Scott Trickett: Well, yes, because it was pretty obvious once they... Once you started speaking, they must have known. So cheers again, Rowan.

00:36:57Unidentified speaker: Brilliant.

00:36:58Danny Norman: What we're fulfilling, what we do now, with me now, I think the biggest key thing is that the... the thing that Nick Pearson wanted was that he wanted parkrun to not live in a bubble. And he is extremely objective and amazingly objective person who really thinks deeply about all sides of things and makes effective change. And he wanted something to come back that had a voice that would challenge and, uh, almost kept parkrun in line to a point where that they felt that they couldn't just do things without being challenged you didn't want to have this evangelical mob mentality that if anybody said anything against parkrun as a slight no matter how well meaning it may be no matter how well informed it may be as a concern or even a valid criticism that people would jump on it and shut you down and which can often be the case and so it's best to have a voice and also parkrun be proud of having that voice to keep them as a balance and that's what nick wanted So when we've come back with now, the thing that I always struggled with is having that separation of church and state with that you could end up being objective and unbiased if you're under the banner of parkrun that you're going to have someone to answer to fundamentally. And we don't have anybody to answer to. Obviously, that can sometimes be a dangerous thing. But I think we're well versed enough and smart enough to know when we're doing the wrong thing. If alarm bell rings and we don't speak about it, we don't put it in, I cut it out and edit it. And I think that we have this position now that we are truly that voice of potential objective reason, born of vested interest, passion and experience. And that lends us some gravitas. And I think a lot of people who take to us and people who do take to us are Event Directors, ambassadors. And you call them parkrun tragics, but I mean, you have your tourists and you have people. I mean, I'm a parkrun tragic.

00:38:46Nicola Forwood: I wondered if he said parkrun tragic. So I was like, oh.

00:38:50Scott Trickett: I mean it in an affectionate way. In a nice way, yeah. Yeah, like I refer to myself as a tragic all the time.

00:38:56Danny Norman: When you're a nerd and you're proud of being a nerd, that sort of thing. Yeah, I'm a parkrun tragic, absolutely. I'm massively passionate. And so the amount of ambassadors and now regional ambassadors in the UK, I mean, like second tier just beneath staff, they are so enthused. And I've had people thank me for bringing this back. And that's who we appeal to. And also being aware of our audience. And that is our audience as well. We always say it's preaching to the converted. And we're not having to reiterate the same information over and over again. We know that people are hooked in. We don't have to tell them about inspiring stories all the time. They already buy into the concept. So sometimes you can have this pyramid of things where people are going, do you know what? I've heard this inspirational story a thousand times. And yes, it's amazing, but you don't need to sell it to me. You don't need to sell parkrun to me. I got hooked years ago. So can we talk about the other things that I now focus on in my life? And they're the things I'm also interested in. I think we cater for that audience like you guys do with your guys in Australia, that you're not having to continuously tell them or convince them to go to parkrun. They're going to go anyway. And they want you to talk about that subject. And I think we cover those bases.

00:40:06Scott Trickett: So what are your plans for next year? Is the weekly thing sustainable for you guys? Have you thought beyond January? Nicola?

00:40:18Nicola Forwood: Well, I mean, Danny, I've got the time. Being a full-time athlete. Are you joking? Yes, I mean, I'd love to. I really enjoy it. And, I mean, Danny always teases me. Obviously, Danny does the lion's share of the work. I do just rock up.

00:40:38Danny Norman: A pride of lion's share. Thank you very much.

00:40:40Nicola Forwood: I do just rock up and... Chat about my parkrun day. Well, I don't know if that's fair. I do keep an eye on all of the social media with me now, stuff that's going on and parkrun World. But Danny just does a lot more than me. So, Danny.

00:40:56Danny Norman: Nicola's an even keel. She's my even keel. There are times throughout the past... How many shows have we done now, Nicola? 22, 23? Where things have gone in. And Nicola, she knows when to say or speak up and suggest. She has that editorial input and the fact that she goes, oh, actually, you may want to phrase this differently or take this out or not do this. And she's certainly well-versed and smart enough to do that. And I trust her and rely on her. And she knows as well. And she's not frightened to pick up. While she does say, look, it's your baby, but she knows how to help me parent it. So credit to Nicola in that case. Oh, that really hurts me having to praise her publicly. Ouch.

00:41:31Nicola Forwood: Oh, Danny.

00:41:34Danny Norman: I love her really.

00:41:35Nicola Forwood: Oh, God.

00:41:35Danny Norman: That really hurt again. So the plans of 2019. It's a personal tricky time for me. You guys know this. You see my feed publicly. So it depends on how I get my life together. So the podcast, as I said, it's the thing that really spurs me on, drives me, gets me out of a bed early Saturday morning and gives me motivation. And obviously I pour a lot of time and effort into it, but it has to be made worthwhile that I can spend so much time throwing myself into it that sometimes it may not be worthwhile throwing so much into it because I'm not getting enough out of it that will sustain me. And I mean in terms of a professional level, I need to... I need to buy food, pay bills. So the podcast isn't going to do that. So I just need to make sure there's a fine balance between doing this on the side as a big passion and hobby and at the same point sorting my personal life out. And there's a long way to go just yet. I have every intention... of making this run for as long as possible, each week wherever I can. If I need to take a break, I know who to delegate to. Obviously Mel, when she stood in for the two weeks when Nicola was away, was fantastic. And Scotty, I'm sure if I was ever away, I would call on you within a heartbeat. And I'm sure, I'd like to think you'd take us up on the offer and filling in for us in that case too. But yeah, yeah so I just need to sort myself out personally I know this is a bit oversharing but also people but at the same point people have often they do they really continually message me and say look thank you for being so frank and honest because it's I'm learning not to fear um speaking of being open and honest about my uh difficulties at the moment uh with tackling uh severe depression and that's what it is and um so as long as I can get over that then the podcast is going to be around because like I say it helps me uh deal with it all there you go

00:43:30Nicola Forwood: I mean, and hopefully, Danny, as you go through your journey with that, you may... come to a point where you can let things go a bit because you have such high standards so I think people would be surprised how much time you put into the podcast and the edit and it it takes you a long time doesn't it because you you listen to something and if you're not sure you'll listen again and again and again um you'll say I need to delegate yeah well not only delegating but let it nothing has to be perfect it does though I'm a perfectionist I know you are. I know you are. But maybe you'll learn to be a bit kinder to yourself. And yeah.

00:44:08Danny Norman: Yeah, but Nicola, you wouldn't say to an artist, oh, make your painting a bit more slapdash, would you? If you could not be so good at football.

00:44:17Nicola Forwood: I mean, I get that. But when it's a hobby...

00:44:21Melissa Erbacher: What you need to do, Danny, is just, I mean, I know you're a perfectionist, but if you lowered the standards of perfection, what you just need to do is not give a rat's ass a couple of times and then you'll see that people still love the podcast and you go, oh, okay, wow, I didn't put as much effort in and they were all still downloading it and loving it and listening to it and boom.

00:44:44Danny Norman: If you knew how much I had to edit Nicola's audio all the time, then I don't think I could do that.

00:44:49Nicola Forwood: Oh, no. I deny this false allegation.

00:44:53Danny Norman: Anyway, Merry Christmas, everybody. Sorry to divert off in this direction, but as long as it's interesting topic matter for you. But yeah, now I'm going to overthink everything I've said and spin it out of my head for the rest of the night, yeah I know you're right you're absolutely right Mel I agree with you the fact is that if you let things go and you worry about them and eventually when you go through it and go actually I didn't need to worry about that then you can be a bit more settled regarding that and but I do concern and worry about how I'm perceived and seen and the problem is worry is such a useless emotion but that doesn't stop us from having it you know it still gets in and permeates everything and

00:45:33Melissa Erbacher: Yes. I mean, I only know about the lowering expectations from personal experience. Scotty and I have had a few off weeks and, you know, have just slapped something together. And it's, you know, the world hasn't ended.

00:45:47Nicola Forwood: And nobody even noticed. They just thought it was great still.

00:45:53Danny Norman: But the world keeps turning and the podcast is out the week later. And you're right. You're absolutely right, Mel, in that case. You're absolutely right. I just think that sometimes, do you know what it is? It's because, again, because I oversee the majority of the comms, if one email comes in that just is a bit denigrating, that is a little bit critical, that just, it can get under my skin really badly.

00:46:15Nicola Forwood: Yeah, that's what you need to work on, Mr Norman. Yes, Nicola, I know you offered to take over the comms. I'm like, well, never mind.

00:46:23Danny Norman: Yeah, Nicola would, she would shrug it off and she said, let me take over the comms. But, yeah, we'll see. We'll see. 2019 is going to be an interesting year if we make it.

00:46:33Scott Trickett: Let's go back to 2018. Now, I know, Danny, you hate us talking about top threes. So can you just give us some highlights, maybe some of your top highlights from parkrun this year? Maybe three of them? Yeah, if you want to pick an arbitrary number. Give us your top three highlights. Now, you know, you've probably had 52 wonderful weeks at parkrun as we all have. But maybe can you just pick out a couple?

00:46:58Danny Norman: I will yeah I will pick it out on the fact that I'll try and think of the first things that spring to mind and you know what what's really quite tough is that because I do parkrun every week continually I could say something right now I can't remember if it was the last year or this year I'm actually I'm not sure um so I did mention before because we had this discussion about Fountains Abbey, this world heritage site being the most beautiful parkrun in the world and I don't disagree with people's subjective opinion on the aesthetics of that place um um but something that really ticked my box that when I was there that I wanted to go back to was aesthetically was Rutland Water and it's um had a lot of Norman history and obviously you have that link with my surname but uh it's just something about the day it just wasn't the weather wasn't perfect it was just the location and I like being by water and it was a quick course and um and The cafe is great, but of course, it's not the best parkrun by any means, and it wasn't perfect, but something about that day just made me feel quite happy and wanting to return back to the location outside of parkrun. So that's one, I guess, in terms of that gave me a bit of a holistic feeling. um highlights in terms of a really good question do you know what and this makes me sound really twee but even over the past few weeks that going around to parkrun locations that are engaged with the podcast that they are so equitable in terms of how I've been received, how warm they've been, the time that I spent in the cafe afterwards, and even the past few weeks where I've been to Gloucester City and I went to Bedworth and there was Brooklands with the over-familiar people over the years, is that... That has been fantastic and much needed right now. And just, I can't say that better. I'm not going to get into that. But the fact that I think the highlight has been going around to the parkrun locations, events, then being excited by the fact that they're going to get profiled by the podcast, which was missing, obviously, when we stopped, and then being excited about my attendance and Nicola's attendance, and then having that little bit of time, the name in lights, as it were, in the podcast. But being able to sit there and just chat and shoot the proverbial, in the cafe for a couple of hours and it could go on for hours and hours. And these are with strangers. These are people that, okay, may have met briefly at another parkrun location or that I know of them because they've communicated with us via the podcast. But it's been amazing for me to go to these parkrun locations and just have this warmth and this empathy and this emotive feeling towards this community that exists and being so welcomed in. And like I say, strangers become friends very quickly and that has been my highlight the fact that we brought the podcast back and now we're on this role and going around to these parkrun locations and feeling that we are providing these communities with a pedestal that they've desired for a while so hopefully that's a conclusive answer wasn't a top three though was it no I'm not going to do that I can't do it. I can't. My highlight as a whole, one big package of highlight has been that re-ignition of the podcast and each event being just so warm and welcoming in the aspect that we are doing the podcast. I'll be honest with you, I enjoyed not doing the podcast, going there and having anonymity and it being quiet and muted. At the same point, I do like being busy and having a sense of urgency and purpose about what I do at these events.

00:50:31Melissa Erbacher: Yes, Nicola, we would like to know how a professional athlete deems things to be the highlights. What are your highlights?

00:50:40Nicola Forwood: Well, I mean, first and foremost, I'm a parent, aren't I? So the highlight of my year has to have been Poppy's 50th parkrun. Just, I don't think it'll take a long time in parkrun World for something to trump that for me. It was the build-up. She made herself a countdown of the last 10 from 40 to 50. So we counted down every week and every week it got bigger. So first she needed to run with a balloon. That's fine. And by the time we got to 50, she wanted party bags for her friends. Well, I mean, she'd invited friends. So we had to do invitations, party bags for her friends that were coming, cakes for loads of people at the finish. So it cost a small fortune, but in the end it was brilliant. And the pictures on the trees of her running journey and everything. Just really, really, really special day. I then completely ruined parkrun for ages for her because she was like, well, this is boring. Where's the party? I don't want to do 51, 52. Why aren't we celebrating every week? So that was a bit tricky. But then one of my real highlights has to be a couple of weeks ago going to Cliffe Castle, which people had said was going to be really, really tough. They've got a huge hill there. And Poppy just loved it. And I think when you're a parent, what your child gets out of it, you get out double. So if they're having a bad day, you have a terrible day. And if they're having a great day, you're just over the moon. So Poppy really getting her love for it back. So I think it took several months, but she's back there now and it's just a delight to see her absolutely engaged and super proud of herself again and really, really loving parkrun again. So, yeah, I think mine's been Poppy's journey. I mean, also maybe... It's a bit of a funny one because I had a really difficult parkrun experience at Sizewell parkrun because Poppy decided halfway through she didn't want to do it and it took us an hour and 23 minutes and that was a parenting challenge. But my dad had passed away not that long before and it's a couple of miles from his house and he would have been there and it was right next to the site that he used to build on and it Yeah, there was something really, really, really special.

00:52:58Melissa Erbacher: Danny sort of covered a lot about how he finds things differently now from the parkrun show and everything. But what has been, has there been a major difference between then and now for you? Or what have you loved most about picking the mic back up?

00:53:17Nicola Forwood: Ooh, it is a good question. I suppose I'm in a really different place in my life now. So when we were recording the parkrun show, and especially towards the last year or so of it, I had quite a lot going on. So my husband, Ben, was really poorly. I think in the end, he passed away maybe three months after we stopped the show, maybe six months after we stopped the show, but quite soon after we stopped it. So I think at the end, it become difficult to juggle everything. And so what I'm really enjoying at the moment is kind of freedom again that I found in my life. But it started, I was really scared because I have a boyfriend now. Ben passed away over three years ago, and it's been a long journey. And I'm in a place I never thought I would be. I spent a long time in that place thinking I would not never be happy again. But just I couldn't see it, you know. It just wasn't in my vision. And then when we started the podcast again, I was really scared to say I had a boyfriend. So that was weird to juggle.

00:54:32Danny Norman: I was laughing. Talking about it. Because you sound like a little teenage girl. I've got a boyfriend. I've got a boyfriend.

00:54:38Nicola Forwood: thing is, and I'm a bit like you, Danny, in this respect, that you worry about what people will think. And I mean, I worry way less than you do. But there's still that

00:54:48Danny Norman: But you had these concerns about how you were seen within your community regarding having that.

00:54:52Nicola Forwood: And I don't know, I think you just do that thing that people think, oh, you've moved on and you never move on. Never. Ben is still ever present to me. You move forward, you know, but you just think, oh, I don't know what you worry. But now, yeah, I suppose I've got a lot more freedom now as well. Poppy was quite young. When we were doing the parkrun show, well, she was born during the parkrun show, but now she's older and parkrunning. It's just brilliant to be able to share that journey. So, yeah, and in terms of whether I feel like it's different or not, it's less different for me because obviously at the time Danny worked for parkrun and I didn't. And there's only that kind of aspect that we've already covered that maybe I didn't talk quite as frankly, but I don't think we ever... We still addressed points, but just maybe now I'm enjoying the freedom that we don't need to answer to anybody or worry about what people will think. It's just really nice. And I love chatting with Danny. I've missed him.

00:55:57Danny Norman: I've missed you too, Nick. We don't really quash very much in terms of information. We certainly know how to pick and choose regarding our content, but... Um, it's, it was like, uh, speaking of Nickelodeon or expensive bikes, it was like getting back on a bike again, that it felt like it hadn't, we hadn't been away and, and having people listening back to our back catalogue. And then they're listening to that in between listening to the, with me now and end up going, well, I've just heard about this name, this reference and this person. And, um, and that moniker and so on. And then, so it's like an echo from the past. And so those three and a bit years, those three and a third years that we didn't do the podcast feels like nothing really. It feels like there has been like a, a kind of, we've gone to sleep and we've jumped forward again and we've carried on peddling away. And,

00:56:42Nicola Forwood: scary isn't it how quickly that time passed and I'll tell you what we've both done things Danny in that time that we wish we were podding for we've done some amazing things like Danny joining the 500 club and obviously I came down your neck of the woods Mel met you park did parkrun Australia, New Zealand, Singapore not podcast that's a regret that is definitely regret they all say regret nothing but no it does play in my mind a little bit is thinking that

00:57:08Danny Norman: like when Nicola has travelled around and myself to San Francisco as well, is that had we been podcasting, then yeah, it would have been fantastic content to have created, uh,

00:57:19Nicola Forwood: Yeah, more adventures. Perfect excuse. We'll just have to do it again, Danny.

00:57:24Danny Norman: Yeah, maybe.

00:57:25Scott Trickett: One thing Mel and I noticed is that, so we park-runned together a couple of weeks ago, and we seem to see each other a lot throughout the year. But that's something we noticed that you guys don't do. You guys don't park-run together, and you haven't been in the same place very often. Is that planned? Yeah.

00:57:42Danny Norman: You don't want to double up on each other. That particular question. So apart from the fact I don't want to see Nicola in the flesh anyway. No, I'm joking. To be honest with you, people ask me, they go, well, when's the last time you saw Nicola? And Nicola, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it may have been the Ambassadors Conference about four years ago. Four and a half?

00:58:02Nicola Forwood: No way.

00:58:02Danny Norman: Yeah, that may have been the last time.

00:58:03Nicola Forwood: I mean, your memory's better than mine, Danny. So, yeah, maybe.

00:58:05Danny Norman: Last time I was in, it was at Cannon Hill. We ran. Chrissie Wellington had just come on board. And around that, I was definitely there with you.

00:58:13Nicola Forwood: Oh, yeah, we did a brilliant cool-down after parkrun. I ran with Danny and Chrissie Wellington and ran a cool-down a couple of kilometres faster than my parkrun.

00:58:22Danny Norman: And now the roles have reversed in terms of speed ability. You'd be able to run quite happily and I would be... lugging around at the back but the um yeah so not having seen Nicola and of course the the 500 Nicola couldn't come over to Bradford so when I have gone up into nicola's vicinity um things have been against us and also good question when you say about content so when Nicola went to go and do Sizewell I deliberately won't do that just yet now because of the content. So if I go to Sizewell, Nicola's already touched upon it in the podcast, and it's relatively within my vicinity to do in terms of a new event that I could then go take off, as it were. But Nicola's already done it. So it does. It does have a site block in my head. So Nicola covering the northern part of England does me a service. I mean, geographically, it does help if you split the UK into two. Obviously, we're aware that we don't – potentially do Scotland enough and Northern Ireland and Republic and obviously other places but we geographically have like a I guess a kind of circumference that we cover and but being in the vicinity of each other deliberately not aligning I think well answering another question from earlier what are our plans for 2019 I really really want to make a live with me now happen it's easily done there's lots of people willing to help us and arrange us and we'd meet in the middle somewhere and we'd We'd obviously be in the vicinity and do it there. So I think it lends a bit of specialness to it that if we haven't seen each other for a while to then go and do something for that particular reason and purpose. But it also feels very much like with the power of social media and the fact that we talk to each other for... What time do we – I mean, Nicola are online at 9.30.

01:00:07Nicola Forwood: I see Danny's face every week.

01:00:09Danny Norman: Yeah, she doesn't have a camera on her computer. But we will be three hours online. Whilst we may record for an hour, there's three hours. So we're having two hours of talk every week again now. So it very much feels like whilst we don't see each other in the flesh, we very much communicate. And obviously social media enables us to keep up on types of people's lives, just like we see you guys when you post up.

01:00:32Nicola Forwood: It's modern day family, isn't it? FaceTime and chatting and messaging and yeah.

01:00:38Melissa Erbacher: You know, it's going to be huge if you do a live and because seeing the two of you together in the flesh is like the unicorn for most of your listeners. So it will be massive. We loved getting together for our first live meet-up this year, and we can't wait until April next year when we're going to do the next one. Is there any chance you would time it with, Nicola, are you up to 450? That would be too long away, wouldn't it? That's like another year away of parkrunning.

01:01:06Danny Norman: It's very arbitrary as well.

01:01:08Melissa Erbacher: Well, my 500, yeah, it's 450 next week.

01:01:10Danny Norman: That's arbitrary. That's irrelevant. It doesn't matter.

01:01:12Nicola Forwood: Yeah, but Mel means my 500, Danny.

01:01:17Danny Norman: Oh, no, she doesn't. That's a year away.

01:01:22Nicola Forwood: It'll be too close to Christmas.

01:01:25Danny Norman: We don't want her to turn up with a party hat and blowers and balloons making a big spectacle and deal out of it.

01:01:29Melissa Erbacher: Well, arbitrary is pretty huge, so you should make it the most arbitrary possible time that you can for everybody involved.

01:01:38Danny Norman: Can I... Can I subvert what you supposed there was the fact that it would be huge? And do you know what? I wouldn't want it to be huge. I would like it to be small and insular and special.

01:01:52Nicola Forwood: Not insular. Don't say insular. Say intimate.

01:01:54Danny Norman: Sorry, wrong word. Thank you very much. So this is why I like Nicola, because she corrects me when I'm wrong.

01:01:59Nicola Forwood: We don't want to be...

01:01:59Danny Norman: Sorry, wrong word. All right, on the fly. We've been talking for an hour. Sometimes my vocabulary isn't perfect. All right, there you go. So intimate, sorry, intimate. And in my head, I see it as nothing more than perhaps a... 30 50 people um obviously there's many factors at play but then you see what we have the UK parkrun tourist group and we have our cow cow buffs and beanies that I'd like to think you're aware of that when they do a meetup they turn out in force and so sometimes I think about potentially trying to line it up when when they have one of their meat sources to cover that base but also I realise that you have a lot of podcast listeners who aren't part of that who would also want to be here. No, no, no, no.

01:02:45Melissa Erbacher: You don't want to align yourself with any other group. If you build it, they will come, and they will come just for you guys.

01:02:50Danny Norman: Intimately. I've had it in my head to be intimate and make it a special occasion, certainly for the first one. But we'll see. We'll see how things pan out and play out and obviously where we locate ourselves.

01:03:02Scott Trickett: Okay, now it's come to the time of the interview where you get to share your bad Christmas jokes with us, guys. Who wants to go first?

01:03:09Nicola Forwood: Hang on, why bad?

01:03:10Melissa Erbacher: What do you mean bad?

01:03:12Scott Trickett: Well, bad and good.

01:03:13Melissa Erbacher: Bad in the Ugly Christmas Singlet kind of bad. Oh, the best.

01:03:19Nicola Forwood: As in so bad, it's good.

01:03:20Danny Norman: Can I just praise you, actually? When I saw your vest and single it, I loved the fact it was so bad, it was good. I absolutely adored it. I mean, it threw me for a curveball. It wasn't what I was expecting at all, and it came out of it, and I thought, this is, sorry to blow smoke, but I thought it was a genius stroke, the fact it was so sort of looking aesthetically trashy, that it was fantastic and superb. The fact that you've managed to weave a Christmas jumper into a vest is just... Yeah, Masterstroke.

01:03:46Melissa Erbacher: All Scotty's idea. He can take full credit for that one.

01:03:49Scott Trickett: It was a team effort because Mel did all the artwork, which is quite weird because usually I'm doing all the artwork, but we reversed roles in this instance and it created something beautiful, we hope.

01:04:01Danny Norman: Great jokes, Nicola. Have you got a decent one? You said that they're not rubbish. You better be good. I better be laughing when you say your one, by the way.

01:04:07Nicola Forwood: Well, I mean, it's all subjective, isn't it? I've got loads. I've got so many. Seeing as it's a Christmas party sort of thing, what kind of music do elves listen to?

01:04:23Danny Norman: Elfish Presley.

01:04:28Nicola Forwood: It's good, but it's not right. Rap.

01:04:34[laughter]

01:04:34Melissa Erbacher: I mean, you don't have to laugh, but I love it.

01:04:39Scott Trickett: My laugh was genuine.

01:04:41Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, Scotty loves his rap. Well, no, is that what Kanye West does? I don't know.

01:04:47Scott Trickett: I love my bad Christmas jokes. He loves his bad Christmas jokes. I think I laugh at all of them. So, Danny, pressure's on you. Hit us.

01:04:56Danny Norman: Blimey, right. Okay. Who hides in a bakery at Christmas? A gingerbread man? What's your thinking behind that, Mel?

01:05:08Melissa Erbacher: Well, because it's ginger, and gingerbread is a Christmas thing, isn't it?

01:05:12Danny Norman: Hiding in a bakery? Where's the pun?

01:05:16Melissa Erbacher: Well, he doesn't want to get eaten?

01:05:18Danny Norman: I don't know.

01:05:19Melissa Erbacher: These things don't make sense.

01:05:21Danny Norman: Okay. He's a mince spy. Thank you, Scotty. I can't control it.

01:05:29[laughter]

01:05:30Scott Trickett: It's funny.

01:05:35Melissa Erbacher: Well, I don't think it is a mint spy. Like, why are spies hiding in bakeries?

01:05:41Danny Norman: You're thinking too literally now.

01:05:45Melissa Erbacher: Why is he minty? Mince. Mince. I know, but mince pies aren't a big thing in my household, you know. We have pavlova at Christmas time. Oh, they're disgusting, aren't they? Yeah. It's just like Christmas pudding. I've turned a lot of people off Christmas pudding because my dog ate sultanas last week and then when she vomited them up, it smelled like Christmas pudding. It smelled like it.

01:06:14Nicola Forwood: Yeah, I enjoyed that reference.

01:06:16Melissa Erbacher: Thanks for that.

01:06:16Scott Trickett: You're welcome. On the theme of vomit, let's wrap up this chat, this Christmas party, as all good Christmas parties tend to end.

01:06:29Melissa Erbacher: Before it gets too messy.

01:06:32Scott Trickett: nice nice nice okay but uh honestly guys we've loved having you back this year we've loved sharing the spotlight the parkrun podcast spotlight with yourselves with Free Weekly Timed and let's not forget about stay frosty parkrun um and let's hope uh the office Christmas party next year is twice as big absolutely yeah thank you very much for having us on and it's been a delight to

01:06:56Danny Norman: have been on the podcast and obviously correlating with you over a lot of things. And yeah, and it's nice that we, I guess, cover either side of the globe, but yeah, thank you very much to you too.

01:07:06Nicola Forwood: Yeah. Big parkrun hug. And I'm going to leave you guys with a parkrun Christmas joke. Cause that's how good I am. What does Santa say at the start of parkrun? Ready, set, ho, ho, ho, ho. And I think all Run Directors should start next week's parkrun like that. Did Nicola make that joke? No, did Poppy make that joke up, Nicola? No, but she's got some good ones too, but then we'll be here all night.

01:07:40[16 seconds of audio that could not be transcribed]

01:07:56Paul Kitching: G'day there, Mel and Scott. It's Paul Kitching here, or PK to many of you, just checking in, not for a roving report, but for my Christmas message, my Christmas greetings. Thank you so much. This time around, I'm full of thanks. Many thanks to you both, Mel and Scott, for your dedication to this wonderful podcast. I'm sure I speak for many when I say thank you for creating it and for both being equally funny and just, yeah, for the dedication that you have to churn it out every week with great content and always interesting stuff to keep us entertained and wanting to do parkrun every week. I would also like to thank all the parkrunners, people that do parkrun and obviously give us content, us roving reporters. So it's great to be able to get out there and chat to people and to all the different, visit different parkruns that are popping up everywhere. And to my fellow parkrun roving reporters, members of the Channel 5 news team, I love you all. You're all legends. Thank you for your stories, for your travels, for your questions, for your inspiration, and for just being yourselves. I love it. Don't go changing. Just keep doing what you're doing. You all do a marvellous, brilliant job. And finally, to my family, I want to thank them for putting up with me yabbering away at random times and listening in and putting up with me staying back at parkruns and chatting to people. Anyway, I know they secretly love it. Anyway, and my dodgy Christmas joke is, what's Santa's favourite pop star? Well, it used to be, of course, Elvish Presley. But these days, I reckon it's Beyond Slay. So bad. Anyway, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, have a wonderful festive season, and may 2019 bring you everything that you deserve. Thanks, Legends. PK, over.

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

Roving report Caroline Southwell — Penrith Lakes parkrun

01:10:03Caroline Southwell: So it's Caroline Southwell here with Sam, the Run Director here at Penrith Lakes parkrun. How are you doing this morning, Sam? I'm doing really well. Hi, guys. So we have a very hot, muggy, humid day out here after like, what, 48 hours of pretty solid rain?

01:10:21Sam: That's right. And we're on a cross-country course, which means we've got lots of... Puddles to splash in.

01:10:27Caroline Southwell: And so for anybody who hasn't been out to Western Sydney to Penrith Lakes parkrun, it's a bit of a unique course out here in that you have actually three courses, is that right?

01:10:37Sam: That's right. So we are based out here at the Sydney International Regatta Centre. So at various times, the Regatta Centre may have events on. And when that's the case, sometimes we use our cross-country course. Cool.

01:10:51Caroline Southwell: And do you have a preference?

01:10:52Sam: My personal favourite is cross-country because I'm a trail runner. So I prefer to run on grass. But definitely for people that like a flat, fast course, our full lake and our southern bank course are a hot favourite for everyone.

01:11:06Caroline Southwell: Good job. So I would highly recommend for any of the parkrun tourists listening in, and of course if you're on the parkrun adventurers, you are a parkrun tourist, definitely keep your eye on the Facebook page to be able to see which course is up and whether or not there's any last minute changes like there was today, right?

01:11:23Sam: That's right. We found out yesterday afternoon that there'd been an oversight where the Regatta Centre did have an event on, so we quickly had to change that. To the cross-country course, normally we have more notice, but it's always a good idea to be checking the night before a parkrun on the Facebook page to see where we're at.

01:11:40Caroline Southwell: Good job. And I think that's a good rule for any parkrun tourists to be able to keep an eye on wherever they're travelling to. And we had a bit of a special event today. Chad Russell had his 100th parkrun.

01:11:53Sam: That's right. Chad is one of our most enthusiastic parkrun volunteers. He's been here for a number of years and he's so enthusiastic about parkrun.

01:12:04Caroline Southwell: And we're just welcoming in a couple more of the deaf community here who have just finished. Over there.

01:12:13Sam: Yeah, Chad is a really enthusiastic parkrunner and he volunteers regularly and Chad is part of a large deaf social group so he encourages all the people in his social group to come along and participate as well.

01:12:28Caroline Southwell: Awesome. So what I have noticed as I've travelled to Western Sydney is here at Penrith Lakes and at Rooty Hill and your neighbour here, Nepean River, that this whole deaf community in Western Sydney seem to take really good advantage of those three courses. Do you have any idea of what has...

01:12:50Sam: what do you think has helped facilitated the integration of more of the deaf community into parkrun why are we seeing it so well taken up here at these parkruns do you think Sam well I think I mean obviously parkrun is a very welcoming environment and it is inclusive of everyone in the community we have we've had participants from the deaf community for a number of years and we've been very fortunate over that time to have the assistance of Auslan interpreters. We've had people who work as interpreters who volunteer and we've also got our family members who are happy to assist as Auslan interpreters and that means that when we're doing our first-timers briefing and our full briefing that everyone participating on the day has an opportunity to understand what information we're sharing. So I think that definitely helps. With Chad today, he had the assistance of an Auslan interpreter, which was fantastic because it meant that I really knew that... I was attempting to make sure everyone could recognise Chad's achievements and I wanted to know that that was communicated clearly to him and to all of his friends and family that were participating today. And with the Auslan interpreter, we were able to do that.

01:14:09Caroline Southwell: And Sam, do you think that there's... If you were going to give any sort of advice to other maybe Event Directors in other parkruns in other parts of Sydney or Australia, do you have any ideas, and maybe you don't know, but do you have any ideas about what... If there is an Event Director or even an enthusiastic Run Director at another parkrun who thinks, well, hang on, we want to be able to include, there must be deaf people in our community, how do we make space for them in our parkrun? Have you got any suggestions or words of advice?

01:14:41Sam: I think most communities have a very active deaf social group and these are people that regularly get together to participate in various social functions. So perhaps promoting parkrun, making sure that people within the deaf community are aware that parkrun is on and letting them know that they are welcome. And then probably just checking in and consulting with people directly as to what they think they might need in order to be able to participate fully. And that could mean, you know, they might have ideas about, you know, if they've got family members that would come along regularly and volunteer as Auslan interpreter, that might make it easier for everyone to participate freely.

01:15:21Caroline Southwell: Good. Thanks, Sam. And Sam, a bit about you. How long have you been parkrunning?

01:15:27Sam: I came, I've been parkrunning since Penrith Lakes parkrun first started which was back in May 2014. So I came on the first day and have loved it. I feel so lucky to have a parkrun where everyone is welcoming, where everyone takes the time to make sure everyone's okay. We've recently had an engagement here, a proposal at Penrith Lake. So it is a wonderful community. I feel really proud to be a part of it.

01:16:00Caroline Southwell: I do have to say, for any other, especially in Sydney, for any of the parkruns that I've been to, I think that the event team, you guys who are the core Run Directors and Event Director here, there's so much extra stuff that goes into Penrith Lakes. And I think that if any Run Director or Event Director wants to get a sense of how involved a job can be, they need to come and take a look at the stellar job you guys are doing because there seems to be

01:16:30Sam: so much more involved in making Penrith Lakes work and I just felt like you were totally on top of it this morning so thank you thank you and I want to give a shout out to our Event Director Shelley Coote she um her leadership is amazing she just uh very quietly and calmly um takes control um of situations when she needs to and and really I mean she's been the Event Director from the start and and I wouldn't have the confidence to be a Run Director um without the assistance of someone like Shelley and all of the other Run Directors in the Penrith Lakes team.

01:17:05Caroline Southwell: Good, good job. Thanks, Sam. Thanks for chatting to us on the parkrun adventurers. Thank you for coming to Penrith Lakes. So I'm back in the car now and we're all finished up. It was a pretty eventful event number 200 for Penrith Lakes. So I think that's enough for me for my first and maybe only roving report representing New South Wales. And may everyone have a fantastic Christmas, New Year's, parkrun holiday season. Bye for now.

Roving report Steve Marston — Portobello parkrun

01:17:41Steve Marston: Good morning parkrun adventurers, it's Steve Marston here. You may remember a couple of weeks ago, if you tuned into the podcast, I did a roving report from Weeper parkrun. Well this week I've gone a wee bit further north and I'm here at Portobello parkrun in Scotland, Edinburgh. It's a little bit different the weather conditions. It's about minus one or zero degrees with an apparent temperature of about... minus two or three. We've had sleet during the run, just a little bit of light sleet. Here with Ethan, my son. Ethan, what did you think of the course out there today, mate?

01:18:17Ethan: Oh, it's really nice. It's sort of, for any Brisbane locals, it's very much like North Lakes and it's got three laps. But it's just, it's a really nice run through some woodland and park and, yeah.

01:18:28Steve Marston: Around a lake? Yep. A little bit of ice on the course this morning that we got warned about in the briefing.

01:18:34Ethan: Yeah, it was a bit... They did manage to step on that once, and it was very slippery.

01:18:43Steve Marston: How did your run go today? Were you happy with your time? Yeah, just over 20 minutes, so for me that's pretty good. Happy with that in the cold. Quite a few good turnout here today, probably well over 200 runners, which is pretty impressive for a morning, sleeting it's turned to drizzle now actually I think just a very light misty drizzle but um it's freezing cold so we're gonna be uh short sharp and um we're gonna leave you with it have hope everyone has a great Christmas in parkrun world and see talk to you in the New Year bye

01:19:24Melissa Erbacher: Thanks to Caroline and Steve for your reports. It's lovely to have Aussies reporting in from overseas. It's always good. And thanks also to PK. I got a few chuckles there, Scotty. I don't know about you. I thought he, in his joke, he was asking Santa what his favourite pasta was. So I was a little bit confused when he said it used to be Elfish Presley. And I was like, wait a minute, is Santa some kind of a, cannibal or I don't know but then it made more sense that yeah it must have been music or pop star makes more sense have you got another one for us oh oh do I have another one for you I do did you hear the joke about the wall I can't get over it that's funny it is isn't it Christmas though. Well, it's a bonbon joke. They're not all Christmas related.

01:20:19Scott Trickett: This is true. This is true. I've kept it on theme this year.

01:20:23Melissa Erbacher: Oh, have you? Okay. See, my other two ones, they're kind of more, well, one of them's more Christmassy and then the other one's more like running related bonbon joke. But crack out what you've got next.

01:20:36Scott Trickett: What goes oh, oh, oh?

01:20:41Melissa Erbacher: Santa Claus walking backwards.

01:20:44Scott Trickett: You got it. It's not as funny when you guess the punchline, Mel.

01:20:51Melissa Erbacher: Well, you know, sometimes they're a bit too obvious.

01:20:55Scott Trickett: Okay. Well, then give me a second chance because this is pretty obvious too.

01:20:59Melissa Erbacher: Okay.

01:21:00Scott Trickett: What did Adam say the day before Christmas? It's Christmas, Eve.

01:21:07Melissa Erbacher: Oh, no.

01:21:10Scott Trickett: See, I'm going down my list. They're getting worse. They're getting worse. So let's wait for – yeah, let's – yeah.

01:21:17Melissa Erbacher: Scotty, I still have two more bonbon jokes to give you.

01:21:19Scott Trickett: Okay, I'm waiting. Let's hear them.

01:21:22Melissa Erbacher: Okay. This one, I think you're going to love this first one because it's parkrun related sort of. So why wasn't Cinderella good at running?

01:21:34Scott Trickett: The heels? Wasn't she good at running in heels?

01:21:38Melissa Erbacher: No, because her coach was a pumpkin.

01:21:44Scott Trickett: Oh, jeez. I can't control my laughter, Mel, but got nothing there. I'm not sure if I even get it. Oh, her coach. Her running coach. Her running coach. Hey, Mel, I'd ask you for another one, but I think I finished on a flat note as a team. We should both finish there, the 2018 edition of Bad Christmas Jokes.

01:21:45[laughter]

01:22:12Melissa Erbacher: I think other people will have laughed, but yeah, I'm okay with that, Scotty. Thank you for letting me share so many Christmas bonbon jokes. I couldn't just stop at one.

Launches and anniversaries"Where is the cake?"

01:22:22Scott Trickett: Let's go to anniversaries because it's going to be really short. We've only got one.

01:22:26Melissa Erbacher: Well, we should start with launches, Scotty.

01:22:28Scott Trickett: There aren't any.

01:22:29Melissa Erbacher: Well, there aren't any for December, but we're having a couple of weeks off and I don't want to miss anything. So I think it's only best that we do the 5th of January just in case because we're probably not back till the 7th, I'm guessing.

01:22:42Scott Trickett: Okay. So we're launching in Mansfield at Mansfield Botanic, which is in the greater state. I'm going to be there.

01:22:50Melissa Erbacher: Are you? That's a nice way to start off. Yeah.

01:22:53Scott Trickett: Mansfield is a beautiful part of our state, the great estate, and it's a favourite of Yvonne's, my beautiful wife. So we're going to hit up there for their launch. And anniversaries, now can I get to anniversaries this week? Because there's only one.

01:23:05Melissa Erbacher: Well, no, but we still have an anniversary in December.

01:23:08Scott Trickett: Yeah, that's what I'm going to go to.

01:23:09Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, but we've also got the 5th of January anniversaries, but you can go to this week's one first.

01:23:17Scott Trickett: I'm following the sheet that you got.

01:23:19Melissa Erbacher: That's good. I'm glad you're reading. Because often you're just looking at a calendar and you're a bit of a wild card, Scotty. I never know what you're doing.

01:23:28Scott Trickett: Well, look, I've built this up. There's only one anniversary. It's at Underwood Park this week. Head along. Get your U. We're going to go there one day. It's in Brisbane, isn't it?

01:23:38Melissa Erbacher: It is in Brisbane, yes.

01:23:40Scott Trickett: So if we could just do a fly-in, fly-out visit to Brisbane, I could get my U there.

01:23:45Melissa Erbacher: You could, absolutely. Do you not have any U's in Victoria, the greater state?

01:23:49Scott Trickett: No, we don't. We only have two U's. Only two U's in Australia.

01:23:53Melissa Erbacher: No U's, no Z's. Call yourselves the Great Estate. Okay, well, but there are a whole bunch of anniversaries on the 5th of January as well. So for Lawson in New South Wales and Margaret River in WA.

01:24:11Scott Trickett: Quinns Rocks in WA.

01:24:14Melissa Erbacher: Rocks Riverside in Queensland.

01:24:17Scott Trickett: And Tannum Sands in Queensland. Queensland. But that's not this week. That's next week or the week after.

01:24:23Melissa Erbacher: It's the 5th of January. It'll be the first weekend after all the New Year Day double fun.

01:24:29Scott Trickett: There we go. Imagine, Mel, imagine welcoming Christmas with a new baby.

01:24:35Melissa Erbacher: Wouldn't that be a great gift? Like Mary did on Christmas Day.

01:24:38Scott Trickett: Yeah. Do you know anyone who's done that?

01:24:41Melissa Erbacher: This is Scotty's nice little segue for us to give a shout out to our regular Kelly Hodges who welcomed baby Charles to the family. So congratulations, Kelly and Christian. He's a gorgeous little man, looks like perfection. I'm hoping they're getting some sleep right about now.

01:25:02Scott Trickett: Well, you know they're not.

01:25:05Melissa Erbacher: But I can still hope, Scotty. You can.

01:25:08Scott Trickett: I say, Chucky, we're welcoming Chucky.

01:25:11Melissa Erbacher: Well, I don't know if he's going to be called Chucky.

01:25:13Scott Trickett: He is on this podcast.

01:25:16Melissa Erbacher: Oh, dear. Kelly might not come back.

01:25:19Scott Trickett: So this could go two ways. We could be hearing a lot more from Kelly as she's got more time on her hands because that happens when you have a baby. You give up work. You don't have much to do. Or she could just be too busy and we don't hear from Kelly for a while.

01:25:32Melissa Erbacher: Well, see, you know, I think this whole funny thing that you keep going on about might be because you make jokes like that that are, you know, borderline offensive to a large group of people.

01:25:43Scott Trickett: Not offensive.

01:25:46Melissa Erbacher: No time on her hands. I mean, all the time in the world on her hands because she's had a baby and doesn't have to go to work. Yeah, borderline Scott Trickett. I think you're, yeah, right there.

01:25:59Scott Trickett: Okay, okay. I take it on board and I'm writing that down. I've got a big book of ways that I can improve next year. You've got a big book of it. Stop the offensive jokes. It's not at the top, but it's on there now.

Sign-off

01:26:14Melissa Erbacher: I should mention at this point that we have not thanked enough our Channel 5 news crew for the contributions they've made all year. They're incredible. We love them. I'm not going to rattle off the names because there's seven of them and I'm bound to forget one and then that's going to be really awkward and then they'll be like, oh, why did you forget me? But know that we love you all and we think you're amazing and we We can't wait to hear where you adventure to and report from next year.

01:26:46Scott Trickett: There are openings in the Channel 5 News team for people to submit applications. It does come with a caveat, though. We had a new member join the team this year in Melissa Ellis.

01:26:58Melissa Erbacher: Who had to jump through a lot of hoops to get there.

01:27:00Unidentified speaker: And I think this week maybe she's questioning whether that was worth it.

01:27:04Scott Trickett: Because of what we've asked them to do. But I think you'll enjoy it. I'm not going to say any more about it, but I hope you all enjoy our send-off for the year. That's it. I'm done.

01:27:14Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, me too. Look forward to chatting to everyone in 2019. Have a safe and merry festive season. Enjoy your Christmas Day parkruns, your New Year's Day doubles if you get to them. But if you don't get to any of those, it's okay. They're going to happen all again next year. And there's always parkrun next Saturday.

01:27:33Scott Trickett: We'll be back next year. Won't give you a definite date. Just keep clicking refresh on our Facebook page and in your podcast app. Just do it every couple of hours until a post appears. You'll know we're back. Once a day. Once a day. Let's not.

01:27:49Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, it is the holidays in Australia. So once a day should do it.

01:28:02[music]

Channel 5 News Crew Christmas singalong

01:28:02[the recording continues here — the words are not reproduced]

01:30:43[music]