Episoder
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The first TCD of September (sorry Lucy) and we are starting with what could be loosely called āa planā.
Following some imaginative intervention from the Purples, we have a rich vein of chat suggestions to mine over the coming weeks, starting with a belter from Roger Harvey.
But I aināt going to spoil the surprise, so you will just have to listen for the details - and of course we will also be requiring you all to help provide the clarifications when the timeline gets a little hazy.
Loveānālinen
h
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Itās literally two years since we had an episode quite like this one. And in an unusual foray into accuracy I can give you the exact details, because it was Chapter 122
The reason I know this is because that week Ant was on holiday in Catalonia, and as such he recorded his half of the conversation in a lively cafe in Platja dāAro.
And, literally just for the hell of it, he is back in the same spot - only this time it was a hotel reception. The good news is that the Wi-Fi was considerably better, so actually getting something in the can was a lot easier. The downside is the background hubbub that you get in that particular environment. Meanwhile, I was in Denmark with toddlers.
Tweaks have been made using expensive Spanish digital software, but it is a little nosier than usual so please bear with.
Anyway onto business, because those of you who appreciate a well-run council waste facility, or indeed are unsure about the nutritional make-up of your breakfast bowl, are in for an absolute treat.
Loveānātow-balls
h
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Manglende episoder?
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Big shout out to Roger Harvey, who in a round-about way has filled the middle of the TCD doughnut this week. Confused? Well let me explain..
As you know I read a bit of something in the middle of each week's pod. Since I got through all of The Invisible Man diaries, I have been rooting around the bottom of the digital drawer looking for interesting (and previously unread) stuff to include. And, as most of you are aware I tend to do this a bit 'on the hoof' each week.
Anyway this week I had to message Ant in a panic to see if he had any inspiration, because I had lost all track of what I had (and hadn't) read already. After a few minutes contemplation he recalled that Roger Harvey had been in touch to share pictures of a handwritten excerpt I wrote for the Web Magazine in the way back when, about my 100th show.
So that is what you have got, and it is thanks to another Mr.H that you have that at all.
Cheers Roger...
Loveānāmosi-bashing
h x
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It struck me as I was listening to chapter 215 that one of the quirks of recording TCD (sorry Lucy) is that the process is often interrupted by what has gone before. It isn't exactly a 'ghost in the machine' because it is all very explainable, and indeed predictable.
Let me try and enlighten you. The way I record my half of the conversation involves overdubbing onto a file that contains snippets of previous recordings; you know the kind of thing, old diary readings, the musical idents we use to transition between sections and odd bits of crooncast. Because I am not great at muting these before we start, every so often they spring into life becoming audible to both Ant & myself mid-conversation.
This week it was the jingle for spreadsheet corner that made an appearance, momentarily throwing us both a curve-ball, and resulting in a slight break in the flow as we re-centre.
Of course you, dear listener, are privy to the reaction rather than the cause so I thought it only fair to explain how and why this semi-regular phenomena comes about.
Of course it's entirely possible that you have never ever noticed, in which case 'as you were'.
Love'n'seam sniffing
h
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I was minded on listening back that we spend years fine-tuning our quirks, in fact I am not convinced it's a process we ever actually get to the end of.
But these are the things that define who we are. So to know me is to know both my caffeine routine and how I close an overhead locker when I am on a plane.
So I say 'embrace all quirks without fear or self consciousness' and respect and cherish those of the people that you encounter along the way
Because life for me often involves an imaginary pogo-stick.
Loveānāspecialist-dusting,
h
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This week's TCD (sorry Lucy) reminds me of when you take a drive to somewhere you travel to often. Not a quick-round-the-corner to the shop kind of trip, more a journey that you know well but maybe takes an hour to two.
Sometimes you arrive at such a destination, not really remembering exactly how you got there. You know you have been in the car for a couple of hours, and that you have covered 103 miles but as to the specifics of the journey, well that kind of went by in a blur.
So when I came to edit #213 I couldn't really recall what Ant and I had talked about. I knew we had met at the pre-arranged time and that we had talked for an hour or so, but as to the details, hmm...
So, in short, I may well have had the same experience you are just about to have yourself.
Love'n'Tolstoy
h
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Itās the end of an era, sort of.
Back on the 27th April, 2020 the first episode proper of TCD (sorry, Lucy) was published and we have been chucking them out every week for well over four years.
But with 212 that streak comes to an end, because as of next week we are changing our cadence.
I donāt think either of us expected to still be doing this after 50 episodes, let alone 200, and of course life has moved on bringing more pressure on diaries and the time available to keep the content coming. And because we want to ensure we continue to provide extra stuff for the Purple community we have decided to make TCD a fortnightly release, and produce patron-only bits in the weeks in-inbetween.
So if you have been contemplating Purpleness then maybe now is the time, and if not we now recommend listening to each episode twice, a week apart, because if you are anything like me you will have forgotten it all anyway.
Love'n'Gillian
h
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Apologies for missing last week (though very soon you will know why) This one was a little tough in prospect but alright once we got going.
It sounds a bit different owing to Ant not being able to get his tech to work (post Spanish-holibobs) and having to use the USB mic instead of the flash one he normally uses.
Having said all that, in many ways it is an archetypal episode of TCD - bawdy seaside postcards, eccentric village-folk and me with one leg in a fantasy-world, and the other one standing on a box. She was used to thatā¦
Love'n'oranges
h
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Well it's been a bit of a palaver this week, trying to get TCD (sorry, Lucy) ready for the outside world.
The recording seemed to go well, but when I was putting it together it became apparent that Ant had forgotten his trademark 'and we're back' after the diary reading, so I had to crowbar one in from a previous episode. Actually on that point, the first person who can correctly identify which of the previous 209 episodes it came from can have a bag of Starmix.
So I got around that little faux-pas, only for Ant to message me and break the news that the diary section which I recorded on Tuesday, has actually been used in a previous episode. So not only does that mean I have read and recorded it twice, it also means you will be getting a definite sense of deja vu.
After a high-level executive discussion, we have decided to leave it as is, because it's a good bit of diary and youāve all had several sleeps since you heard it last. Hopefully you will enjoy the refresher.
Oh, and did I mention that Tim Sidwell was in attendance? No, well he was and as usual he was an absolute poppet and not a bit āHollywoodā except for occasionally calling us ādarlingsā. How wonderful!
Love'n'rama
h
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I am properly losing track of what I am reading every week in the diary section.
Even since we finished Volume II of The Invisible Man (1998-2014) I have been scrabbling around on my hands and knees (figuratively speaking of course) under the lid of my MacBook trying to locate odd bits of stuff to read out.
And because I keep stumbling on stuff, we have lost all sense of chronology in terms of what we have included and what can still be used. Which is why I sent Ant an email on Wednesday and asked him to look at a couple of pages to try and ascertain if we had used them already. I couldn't be sure, and as it turned out neither could he, but we both plumped for the 'travelling to Lille' extract as being the safer option - so that is what you are getting.
And as far as the rest of the episode is concerned, well it's just the other Mr.H being brilliant.
Nuff said.
Love'n'railcards
h
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We don't very often about the technical side of producing The Corona Diaries (see what I did there Lucy) mainly because we don't want to be seen to be blowing our collective trumpet, and partly because it isn't that interesting. But it is slightly relevant this week so here we go.
Most weeks, usually on a Tuesday, Ant sets up a Zoom call and we congregate - rarely on time, and never before ten - to ease ourselves into the process. In short order we hit the record button, and away we go, but because the audio quality on Zoom is a little sketchy we choose to capture our individual tracks on separate software at either end. Then either Ant or myself will take those tracks, along with the intro/outro beds and the piano noodles and build what will ultimately be the finished episode.
With me so far? Cracking!
Now one of the little tricks of the trade is that we both have to wear headphones or earphones, because if you monitor via headphones the sound of the zoom call would be rerecorded through the microphone and create a kind of echo. Seems obvious right, but the reason I am telling you is that we have a perfect example of that this week when our guest joined us and did that very thing...
So while you listen to #208 see if you can spot that little moment, because it is a little peek behind the ātech curtainā.
Mind you, itās probably because his volume goes up to eleven.
Love'n'Leonard
h
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It doesnāt really matter which of the many metaphors you choose, win or lose, the ups and the downs, the peaks or the troughs.
The fact is that when we started this run of AHBID themed episodes we kinda hoped by roping in members of the band we would be able to provide a broader collective on the making of that particular record.
Alas it hasnāt really worked out that way, so although we have managed to tease out a few nuggets so far, this particular aspiration is heading for the bucket. (N.B we do still have Rothers to go, but on current form it aināt that promisingā¦)
But with every near miss comes a full-on hit, and the one thing we didnāt expect was how each of these chapters have been imbued with the quirkiness of the particular invited guest.
And so it is with the arrival of The Count, as we delve into clicks, debate marmalade and grill Ant over some frankly bizarre behaviour around eggs.
h
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There is something about being in a room (or indeed on a Zoom call) with Trousers that is one of life's great pleasures.
Let me clarify that, because it is all about the capitalisation. Being in a room with trousers is a fairly mundane occurrence for many of us, but being in a room with Trousers is a joy.
The fact is, he is really funny. Mike Hunter thinks so, Ant thinks so, and I am sure after listening to #206 of TCD (sorry Lucy) you will think so as well. So as much as there are so really insights into the creation of Reprogram The Gene in todays pod, and believe me there are, if you are anything like me they will now be forever intertwined with tales of practical food containers and the purveyors thereof.
Life is better when you take the Pete way.
Love'n'knitwear
h
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Well we have only gone and ruddy well done it...
It might have evolved slowly as an idea, but you can't say that we haven't upped our game a little and actually delivered. Assuming that you are up-to-date with your TCD listening (sorry Lucy) you will know that instead of recoding a load of episodes about FEAR (which as it turns out we have already done...) we are moving onto some chat about AHBID.
And this idea, which in itself is perfectly solid, became turbo-charged when we decided to talk about each of the tracks in turn, and invite a different member of the beat combo to join us and pad out the discussion.
So this week we begin at the beginning, with recollections of the process of writing and recording Be Hard on Yourself in the company of Mad Jack himself, Mark Kelly.
Strap in, get ready, push the button...
Hugs,
h
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It runs out the best way to throw your fellow podcast host off his axis, is to turn up to his house and proclaim āIām hereā with outstretched hands.
After a couple of hundred of these over Zoom, there are consequences in jumping in the car and heading up to Heckmondwike for a face-to-face. Firstly there is no obvious improvement in the depth or quality of the content, and all that happened is that, basically, we buggered off out for lunch.
Secondly in a strange, body-switch-kind-of-moment, I became the sane one as Ant had a bit of a wobble and not only got his albums in the wrong order, but pretty much forgot a whole load of TCD episodes (sorry Lucy) that we had recorded about FEAR.
But being the old pros that we are, we powered on through and managed to start a bit of a chat about An Hour Before Itās Dark. Ant then usefully came up with a plan for the next few weeks which I pondered whilst helpfully locating not 3, but 4 pieces in Ant's unfeasibly difficult jigsaw.
After that I stuck some yellow stars on my face and went home.
Love and Mott the Hoople,
h x
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What can I tell you about this this week's TCD (sorry Lucy)...
Well if it is randomness you are after, then we have it in the kind of quantity that would require a sturdy barrow to transport it about the place. In fact we start in a random place and then we proceed to meander, seemingly unchecked by social convention or common decency.
Which is why we go from football, to snooker, to Warren Close, to the Mr Men to Stephens (and indeed Stevens) and then back to football.
I also found another bit of diary from 2021, just in case you were wondering about the alliterative episode title, and it really is bloody illuminating on the subject of public transport and low-level milk pilfering.
Love'n'the nutter pheromone
h
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The story of TCD this week (sorry Lucy) has an awful lot to do with two questions and one piece of re-direction.
The first question, and let me tell you neither Ant or myself were able to proffer any kind of definitive answer ourselves, is whether or not a number can be classified as a palindrome.
The second question is also a recognition that something Ant said may well be wrong. He asserted that the clock on a mobile phone relies on its GPS location to ensure it always shows the right time but on reflection this may be twaddle. We now think it may be the 'carrier settings' of the service provider that provide this information.
In both instances we throw this out to you dear listener, to offer your insights and set us straight.
Oh and I nearly forgot the re-direction, well if you click here you will not only see my painting from CTTE, but some of the other efforts from my esteemed colleagues and a great pic of Tony Levin.
Love'n'FA cup final replays
h
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There is most definitely a sense of meander about this weekās TCD (sorry Lucy).
After all the excitement of Cruise to the Edge, I needed a little bit of a reset so Ant took pity and let me empty my head of the all things that had made an impression over the course of the trip, without worrying about whether they were in order, were said more than once, or indeed made sense.
The only caveat to that is we did address the elephant in the room, namely the speculation around my seeming ever-present light blue T-Shirt. This is public service podcasting after all.
Oh, and listen out for something special at the end.
Love to the factor of 5!
h
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A little late (to be fair, we did warn you it would be) but we actually made it to the big number.
Three years, 10 months and 12 days ago the first episode proper of TCD (sorry, Lucy) was published and there probably isnāt a one of us that would have thought we would be here, 1414 days later, offering up a bi-centennial chapter whilst aboard a boat.
And in all honesty this one was about as wacky as they come, with the irrepressible Nick Beggs joining in, taking over and introducing us all to jazz origami. Now I know what what it must have been like to interview Rod Hull and Emu.
Anyway thanks to all of you that have come along for the ride, especially those of you who have embraced your inner purpleness. It really has meant a lot to both of us.
Love you allā¦
h
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Believe it or not #199 was actually quite a tricky one to pitch, because it is difficult to focus on the job in hand when you know that an episode with a significant number is just around the corner.
Of course TCD (sorry Lucy) has a secret weapon that can be deployed in just these circumstances, and so we pressed the big red button marked āslipshodā and powered on through.
And even when we are being playful some brevity still seeps through, so amongst the purple gags and seriously reckless tempting of fate, there is a dollop of insight about the Seasons End tour.
Anyway I must fly, darlings, Iām off to pack for CTTE, and I will speak to you from the other sideā¦
LoveānāBlackburn
h
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