The Pick 3 Show
Three generations, three choices, one epic argument. A fun podcast, where hosts born in different decades go head to head to rank their Top 3 picks on everything. Perfect for anyone who loves nostalgia, arguments and a lot of laughs!
The Pick 3 Show
Ep 63: Things that ruin your mood
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Some days start out fine and then, unexpectedly, something happens which alters our outlook on the day. These random events/distractions are unforseen, but they change our attitude to how we finish our tasks for the day. In a moment of devilishness the PMG decided to ask the panel to list their top three things that can ruin their mood. In their usual fashion, Martin, Gareth and Andy, took up the challenge and delivered their choices.
Let us know what dampens your mood on any given day by interacting with the podcast via our social portals on X,Instagram & BlueSky or via our e mail address: thepick3show@gmail.com
Three men with three decades of separation debate three tough choices every week. This is the Pick Three Show. Welcome to another episode of the Pick Three Show, which continues to gain momentum with new listeners arriving from a variety of countries around the world. How you have all found us is a mystery to me, but I suspect that the Pickmaster General has many friends in high places putting the word out. Today the PMG has challenged his stroke her panel to select the top three things that instantly ruin their mood. And it is far too easy a gag for me just to say Gareth and Andy Hoving into view. The Pick Three panel with three decades of separation between the panelists. It will be pretty interesting to see if similar things annoy or ruin our day. To get the panel into the proper mood, we have convened in the reception area of HMRC headquarters here in central Belfast, because nothing dampens the mood more effectively than talking tax returns. To be honest, we've already got a few strange looks from Angela on reception, and I'm pretty sure that she has asked security to keep an eye on us. So morning, fellas. How are your tax returns? Are they up to date too? Andy's looking a bit sweaty. It's okay. It's okay, Angela. We're just we're just talking into the mic. No, no, no, it's it's nothing to do with HMRC.
SPEAKER_03Are we uh gonna comment on how happy the workers are as they walk past us every single one of them?
SPEAKER_01Have we seen a single one of them look up and smile?
SPEAKER_03Not yet, no.
SPEAKER_01No. No, I don't think it's allowed in here. No, I think it's part of the job description. No, I mean Andy, I would understand you coming in here must be unnerving for you after that court case. Which one was that? The one you lost. Which one was that?
SPEAKER_03Which one was that?
SPEAKER_01I'd like to point out I'm unaware of Andy ever having lost a court case to HMRC.
SPEAKER_03At this time of recording. At the time of recording.
SPEAKER_01But who knows? What's in the future? So things that can ruin your mood. This is an interesting subject, actually. A lot of people could have gone for ten. Well, I tried to on this occasion to look at things that are very specific mood dampeners for me, rather than just the generality of I'm stuck in traffic, or I woke up this morning and the electricity was off. Yeah, things like that. So I've tried to be a bit more specific. What about you, Andy? You you look perplexed.
SPEAKER_03Oh yeah, that takes a lot to run a good mood for me, Martin.
SPEAKER_01You do, you are endlessly happy.
SPEAKER_03No, I'm saying that my three are very a couple of are very specific. They have to be things that trigger me in certain ways. Bizarrely, most I think mine people will go uh yeah, 100% with that one. Because there's some that have appeared more over the last couple of years and used to. So these aren't things that maybe 20 years ago you would have to worry about. Well, a couple of them aren't. But it'll be interesting to see what you guys have in your three. There might be some overlap. It could be a rant.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I'm going to try and not rant, but I am going to try and explain.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Albeit Gareth, I'm not going to start with you today because I have a feeling Andy is the one who wants to get through things fastest today because he's here again in HMRC.
SPEAKER_03Andy. And this is an ironic one to start with, number three, in our current surroundings. Something that ultimately ruins a mood for me is this new movement of a tipping culture within the UK. And I'm pr primarily saying UK, but it's this expectation of tipping people for stuff that five, ten years ago there would not be any expectation of. Now, I have to put the caveat on this. I quite like tipping people. I actually, whenever I go to places, great service, or or or people like got my haircut this morning, tipped my hairdresser. Things I'm more than happy.
SPEAKER_01Sorry, you tipped your hairdresser for that haircut.
SPEAKER_03It's so predictable.
SPEAKER_01They did the whole bit. What was it? It's like human league on the side.
SPEAKER_04I think it's about flock of seagulls that's morning, isn't it?
SPEAKER_01Is he is he time for a comb over? I don't know.
SPEAKER_03I love this haircut. Well, I've only had it two hours, so I'll let you know in due time.
SPEAKER_01I think Nicole is going to say Sacra bleu, and he but guess que say.
SPEAKER_03But it's for me, this is one of the key things. Uh we tend to have things come from America a couple of years late and a drift in. And we all be the states where you go everywhere you go, you go on someone who holds a door open, they expect a tip. Someone checks in the hotel, they expect a tip, someone cleans your room, they expect a tip. My favorites one favorite one a couple of years ago was we were in Las Vegas, taxi pulled up outside the airport terminal. We got the baggage through. There was a gentleman there in Las Vegas airport uh branded top. Sir, which where's your flight today? Oh, we're flying to New York. No problem, you can put your bags on this. This would be a great help to us. No problem, put the bags on. Had it put his hand out, we had five dollars, whatever, put in. I was like, Oh, that's great. That guy sort of he's told us what we're doing, he checked us in, he got our flight details, typed in the computer. The bags dropped around the other side into the place, and I was like, What's that? It was a random thing just to say whether your flight was on time or delayed or not. And I was like, just paid that guy five dollars, looked out, next guy, handout, another five dollars, five dollars, five dollars. And it was I remember just thinking this is what people are just getting used to. This this tipping culture for things that aren't reliant on money for nothing, yeah, money for not even doing your job, yeah.
SPEAKER_01But you again, that's the thing is nobody ever tipped me for doing my job, they paid the fees, no, but they don't tip you that was exceptional, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03We'll have to, as you said, be careful. This turns into your three old men ranting about society. Yeah, but people want to do it for it. People will be feeling the same about it. But my pet peeve on this at the moment, you go to a terminal, and it could be say McDonald's is a simple one. You go in McDonald's and choose your mail, what tip are you leaving today? And it's literally 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, and then it's small print at the bottom is zero is no tip, you can barely push a button. I didn't even know that. You've done a machine order, a machine order that you actually rely on a tip.
SPEAKER_04Do you know the thing is seeing restaurants now or or even cafes, it's now the option is not there for 10% anymore. Yeah, it's starting at 12.5%.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's 12.5, 15, 20 normally.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yeah. And then there's this other thing where I seen a guy on Twitter last night ranting about this. He was like, a service charge in a lot of restaurants, not a separate tip.
SPEAKER_01So you go into a restaurant, could be they charge you service charge and then you tip them.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's a it's a separate thing.
SPEAKER_01Oh, come on.
SPEAKER_03And this is the world, and this is what I'm saying from a mood ruiner point of view. You have the most fantastic dinner. You get a mail, service charge included underneath it. Tip is not included in this. You go, what is a service charge? So your brain starts kicking in, going, I'm actually confused here, and I don't really want to ask the people because I've had a lovely mail here.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, so sorry, this is my I I want to just pay for the service. If it includes whatever, I just want to pay for it. I don't want to have this decision on do I how much what is, etc. I'm you know, to tell you the truth, the service now compared to any other time is terrible.
SPEAKER_01Interestingly, in Portugal and Spain, there isn't a tipping culture. Yeah, and you can get your meal, pay, they give you the bill, you pay the mail, and you leave. And it's a surprise to them if you leave anything, a genuine surprise.
SPEAKER_03I see I seen a video last night on Facebook about a Domino's delivery driver who I was just capturing a ring doorbell, knocks the door, gives a pizza, reaches for a bag, says, Here's your two litres of Diet Coke. We didn't have any in the store, so I went to the local martin, bought this for you. Hope that's okay. And the guy went, You didn't have to do that. He went, No, I decided. And this guy was 68 years old, and he said, Look, I'm retiring in 25 days. Uh, I just thought I'd do something nice for you. So you don't have to reimburse me for that. That's I covered that. And so this guy shared it from his ring doorbell footage. Someone set up a go fund, the guy said, I haven't got any money to tip you, I tipped you already on the app, six dollars something, so he had no extra money to give the guy. Someone said a GoFundMe page for that guy. It currently stands at 1.2 million. What? For the guy bringing the diet, Coke, to the guy's house.
SPEAKER_01I have the word scam written all over me at the moment where that's that's a coordinated effort between them and they're going to share the 1.2 million. So cynical, why would anybody support? I mean, you can give that in a like, you can give that as well, that's a bit of society and people just doing decent things for each other. But why would you lift 1.2 million for something as simple as that? And by the way, I I'm not against the actual kindness or the service or anything else.
SPEAKER_03But but I think it was something that's ludicrous. But I think that in that American culture is something that's so unique and so over here.
SPEAKER_01But even if that's not fake, how many fake ones are going to appear off the back of the colour? Totally. How many, how much is going to appear off the back of that?
SPEAKER_03Oh, yeah, 100% right, Martin. So no. Number three is the expectation of this tipping culture taking over.
SPEAKER_04I like it. Number three for me, lateness. I'm probably giving a rod to beat with. I was early this morning. Don't even think about that there. I was pretending it's hard to get to our shore as well. And I did it so, but and there is absolutely there is no uh HMRC building our but absolutely no excuse and instantly creates pressure. So it does if you're late because time pressure, because you're typically trying to get somewhere or whatever. And what really annoys me is that there's people who are always lit, and they actually don't care. And sometimes they'll say to you, which sends you up the Richter scale even more, just chill as you're gone. Do you know that's one of those doesn't work well with me? No, no, and then you're left, you know, typically you're trying to get somewhere and you're under pressure, and then you're you know, jumping traffic lights or you're speeding or whatever, and it it's lateness equals disorganization. And I don't like people who are not organized.
SPEAKER_03Well, yeah, you make me think of a story of my dad. We were going to a ferry from it was Dunleary over to France or whatever it was, I can't remember. But we arrived three hours or three and a half hours before we were due to leave. My dad would have to be there, have to be there. And then this other group of cars started getting ahead of us in different things. So my dad's sitting there, you see, he's getting more angry, more angry, more angry. We've been there an hour and a half. When the first car cars pulled up beside us, and these other guns are there, and then the boat opens the doors, and the cars start coming, and dad's eh, beep, beep, beep, beep, cups across the guy said, Whoa, whoa, where are you? What's this? He goes, I've been here three and a half hours. Well, are you going to Spain too? No, we're not going to Spain, we're going to France. So we had to reverse back in the and I still remember how angry he got. But as a kid, we were always and so I've got two, I've got two defaults. I've either really early or late. There's very little in between. I will be usually probably 10 minutes early or something like today, and other times I'll be five minutes late. And the my one banger golf club a few years ago playing golf with you and Johnny Matthews. I'm a five-minute drive in banger golf club. You message the guys in front didn't turn up, so we're going to take the earlier tea time here. It's your go run up the tea. Literally, not enough time for a practice swing. Hit my foot first shot onto the on out of bounds. You use hysterics.
SPEAKER_04But it's the best way to get someone on golf if they are late, going give no time to practice, get on. And you know, I'm one hole up already. Oh, I still remember that.
SPEAKER_03Come on, what's keeping you waving from the car?
SPEAKER_04Not even a practice swing out of bounds.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I've told you before on the podcast that my dad was a time optimist. Always felt he could keep doing everything and was late for nearly everything except airports. Right. Yeah. And he was a great believer that airplanes don't wait for you and tickets are expensive. And it was pre-the-days where you would just book on to something else, and you know, you could easy jet didn't exist. When you'd booked a flight, that was it. You would be at the airport. I have always been an early person. I hate being late for anything, and it really stresses me when I'm running late. So I don't subscribe to lateness at all. And you know, I I'll tolerate it in others briefly, but uh still Martin.
SPEAKER_03Did you ever have any issues with staff in the past being continuously late?
SPEAKER_01Oh, I had one of a couple who seemed to think that the start time was optional.
SPEAKER_04I I have one right guy worked for me, and I'm not joking. I am not joking this year. He now he's a great guy, great worker, but would have been two hours late. Couldn't get out of bed. He says the alarm didn't go off. And would Saunter in at twelve o'clock, now he'd work to seven.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_04But it was just kind of I say, Mark, what was the score here? Why why not? He says the alarm goes off and I just sleep through it. I've tried everything. And I'm telling you, three three and a half hours late, not just late, it was unbelievable. That's right. How long did he work for you? Uh he was still there at the inn. Great guy, great worker, and then like he would tried it, but he would work till seven or eight o'clock at night, he'd be the last one there working really hard. It was unbelievable, Martin.
SPEAKER_01I couldn't have coped that I mean 10 minutes maybe, but no.
SPEAKER_03Oh there's a friend of mine, Michael Barton, he is notoriously late for everything. So if we're going out at 7 o'clock, half six meet, he will still arrive at 7 15.
SPEAKER_04Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_03We're like, you're 45 minutes. Well, I knew you guys were doing it, so we're it's a double buff now, so we'll have to go another half an hour before that.
SPEAKER_01Yes, we're going out tonight. We're meeting at 11am. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03I still and his thing, I always remember a story as a kid, uh, where we've gone up to rugby practicing Sullivan, and he goes, Oh, my my dad will give us a lift up say Saturday morning. I'll meet you at 8 o'clock. Now, for whatever reason, he was like, just walk down your street, the end of your street, and I'll pick you up on the main road. So my dad has to turn off, no problem. All right, 7.59. Looking in the days where it was just watches 8.05, 8.10, 8.20, gale force. I remember this thing was yesterday, 8:30. It's just I can't leave to go back home and ring his parents because I might miss him if he goes. 9.05, he turns up freezing, shivering. He goes, Oh, yeah, I thought it was 9. I was like, No, it was 8 o'clock, distinctly there. And then we turned up and we were late anyway because of that. My word.
SPEAKER_01You see, what I would do with people like that is say you have got basically a one-minute window past the time. And if there's no sight of you, I'm I'm away. Yeah. Because until you do that a few times and go, No, you weren't there.
SPEAKER_03I didn't know you weren't turning up. The positive about this world of technology, which we sometimes moan about, is that world of Uber where you can see exactly where your car is at any time. The old days of well, need a taxi for work or something, or you're going to an airport, you're going, have to be there at this time. Will a taxi turn up in the panic? I'll book it half an hour early. Is half an hour enough continuously, maybe 45 minutes? Love that.
SPEAKER_04Or even good. The Google Maps is so good now, it tells you what time you will arrive at, and it's good.
SPEAKER_01No, look, there are there are pluses and minuses to it, but lightness is certainly No. Yeah. No. Number three for you, Martin. Friends who invite you out to dinner and then proudly say that they have booked a Michelin-starred restaurant. That ruins my mood in a heartbeat.
SPEAKER_03I wonder where you were going there. I thought it was going to be after time.
SPEAKER_01It doesn't have to be Michelin star, it just has to be fancy, and they just go, now I've got to go out and make selections of food. I don't actually want to eat it. Prices I don't want to pay for stuff that I'm actually not going to enjoy. And I've made all of those decisions before I've even walked through the front door of the place. So my mood has dipped. Something like that. Even when people say, Oh, we've done something really, really nice for you. The new Indian restaurant is the best we've ever experienced. You're going to love it. No, I'm not. And if you knew anything about me, you would know I wouldn't enjoy it. So why are we doing it? So things like that where people think that they can convert you to something or that you will suddenly like something. I mean, I don't want to go to any restaurant where emulsified foam is on the mole as an accompaniment to something. I have been in enough of these restaurants over the years to know that it's I was in a restaurant in South Africa at one point. It's one of the best restaurants in uh Tukara, just outside Stellenbusch. And we went there for the seven course taster menu. Oh my word, what a difficult evening. So they're going, the guy's going around the table, getting the selections for the first five courses from everyone. He gets to me and he goes, Well, what would you like? I said, Would you have any breadsticks? And he goes, Yes, but what would you like for dinner? Um, I'll have as a and this is true by the way, I'll have the main course, the kudu, which is a type of antelope. Yes, sir. But what about on the other three courses? Don't require any of them. I haven't found an option. I fancy. Well, shall we just bring you th something we think you might like? Don't waste your time. It is a complete No, but this is this thing is you're out there going, this is, and it wasn't a wildly expensive place because it's South Africa isn't there, but the whole point is I'm not a foodie, never been a foodie, I'm not that interested in it.
SPEAKER_03So say we're going on a golf tour, one of your renegade players tour, Gareth and I are last minute recruits, we come in Latour, and one of the guys goes, Oh, say we're going to New York. There's a great restaurant, I'll try in New York, and you're organizing the tour. Do you overrul them and go? Uh-oh.
SPEAKER_01I've never overruled them. I've said if you want to go there, that is fine. On you go. Do you go do you not go then? I occasionally have stepped out and not gone to things.
SPEAKER_04You got like a burger then?
SPEAKER_01Well, sometimes, yes. I've once or twice, if we've been in a house in um in America somewhere, I've quite once or twice just stayed in the house and cooked something because I I don't see the point. If they want to go and try the new Japanese sushi restaurant, or they want to go and do this, that, or the other, I'm going, no, I don't. I mean, we have we have a You can see his mood go over any country. I can see there's a friend of mine, Scotty, who holds a unique tour record in that he he believes he can eat the hottest food possible without consequence. Trust us, there are consequences. Yeah. But and so he's always keen that we go somewhere spicy. No. No. Is Scotty a listener to this podcast? No, he'll never listen to this. Uh he he's too cool to listen to it. Bad mouth, Scotty.
SPEAKER_04Move on to number two before he goes into bad mood here.
SPEAKER_01No, but I'm just saying, that would be something that is dampens my mood pretty much instantly.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's I can I can see the logic. There's a level of some of the stuff around Belfast now that people tell me I should like, and I look at the menu. Recently, it was like 225 quid taste the menu. Wow. Wine was separate, I was like 125, so I was like 350 quid. And actually, there's two or three things that actually look good. But number two, for me, rude people, people who purposely find a way to ruin your mood based on how they treat other people. Yeah, you see it a lot, and we're restaurants or coffee shops is a perfect example, but in workplaces we see it an awful lot as well. How people sometimes either look down their nose on people based on what their career is and what other people, and we all the way I'm saying this, our listeners are probably going, I've got a person in mind, or else I've been away on trips where I've sat with people who or seen people click their fingers at waitresses and waiters and all. And it tends to be a correlation between rudeness and people thinking they're better than someone. And I it for me, I can be out with a group of friends, or I can be out at a work event or something, and I don't know why, but people still have this element of rudeness about them in this day and age where people record and capture everything and remember and tell everyone. So, number two for me, succinctly, rude people.
SPEAKER_04I I hate rudeness and that and the art of thank you or please is just being lost. It's unbelievable.
SPEAKER_01Well, we've been on this rant before, yeah. But one of the nice compliments I would pay Gareth and Andy, and it's rare that I will pay them a compliment.
SPEAKER_03We've had one before.
SPEAKER_01It is that they regard themselves very much as management, and they regard what I do as the factory element of the. And yet they they speak to me quite nicely. They're quite normal to me. Occasionally they even say thank you and stuff like that. So again, it's not a trait that I've seen in either of you two. You're not rude.
SPEAKER_03Do you ever see it with your role within the Odyssey? And you might have had dealings with some of the acts or some of the groups of people that are around. Do you ever get people going, These guys think they're bigger than they are?
SPEAKER_01There will always be a difference. Some artists will surprise you and some are are way, way nicer than you would. You would think, and uh much more down to earth. I don't directly get involved with that, but I would hear from some of my colleagues there that there are some acts that are just absolutely lovely to work with and some that are very difficult. And I think that's the same the world over.
SPEAKER_04So so say, for example, you're on a tour or whatever, and the person's taking in the tour and making bad jokes. I'm always the one laughing to make them feel okay. And they say, That's not even funny. You're just doing that, you're that over person, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_01I'm good. Maybe he maybe he's just trying to be nice.
SPEAKER_03No, no, no, I think it's important. I remember a friend of mine working in car sales many years ago, and he was comparing some of the Belfast Giants guys come and get cars, some of the Ulster rugby guys come in. I said, Well like he says the easiest way of describing it Belfast Giants guys, just nice guys, down to earth. They they they like chat to people like, oh, this is great, what's a car today? Ulster rugby guys, some of them look down their nose a little bit at Jack Benfricks, Ulster Rugby and all. Can you not do more with this? Can you not do more of that? No, it's like anything, there's some people in all walks of life like that.
SPEAKER_01But I think in the current world, I mean there are stories you hear about various sports people who are go out of their way to be good humans. Yeah, and there are other ones that just assume that the world revolves around them.
SPEAKER_04It's easy to be nice, harder to be rude. Which moves me on to my number two.
SPEAKER_01Because he's finished with your number two.
SPEAKER_04No, no, no, no. Mine is inauthenticity and ego without substance. Oh, yeah, so yeah. Nothing annoys me more. People posturing or pretending they're bigger than they are, which they're effectively telling lies, which you just hate. Flash over substance, you know, whacking out the cash, that type of stuff, to be liked or to pretend to be done it, talking a big game and delivering little. I hate people that talk about doing stuff and then never do it. And I just go, like I always said to myself, why it puts me in a bad mood is I question why they need to do it. I think it's you know, they want to be liked, you know, not having the authentic authenticity of it. I just I find it really hard to believe, and it sends me into a rant. Apparently, yeah, and I it sends me in a bad mood. I go, but I still don't know why they need to do it.
SPEAKER_03So for that example, that story, why do these people think I play a bit of rugby I can come in and yeah, and and do you think in this online world of social media where people have the private jets or I'm gonna manifest one of my favourite stories Why do you have to take a picture of it?
SPEAKER_04You know, yeah.
SPEAKER_03One of my favourite stories, Still is one of the fastest growing companies in LA is a company that lets people hire a facility for the day which looks like it's a private jet interior. So this place is booked out for months in advance because these Instagramers come in and you take the photos and all, and then there's and they go, people buying it. Yeah, it's uh I think there's a lot to be said.
SPEAKER_01I have to say, when we go to LA on the summer tour this year for the pick three show, I think we should hire that place and go and sort of for our Instagram accounts and everything else, suddenly look like we're we're jetting it out there around the world. Um paid for it. But why do people need to do it? Have you ever been in a private jet? No, no, no, have you? No, but I know a couple of people who have, and there there's generally two views of being in a private jet, which is flip me, it's small. Yeah, it feels very, very small, or yes, I I I like that sort of experience, just turning up on the tarmac, walking onto the plane, they go when I tell them to go. Yeah, it wasn't your plane, you didn't tell them to go, they went when they were told to go.
SPEAKER_03I do laugh whenever I see people who get private jets, and it's like oh Belfast to London, and you go, What is the benefit?
SPEAKER_04It's it's not just the private jets, it's the cars, the the restaurants, that type of stuff. So, oh like I did this, or the wines, or that type of stuff.
SPEAKER_01Like you know, my my face It's just not authentic. One of my young and brash colleagues at a point in time turned to me and said, Uh, you're letting the company down by driving a Volvo. And I went, excuse me. He said, No, that's not the image we want for this company. You need to be driving a better car than that. I went, No. I don't think there's a single client of mine who's ever worried about the fact that I've driven up to the premises in a Volvo.
SPEAKER_04No, I know.
SPEAKER_01And he goes, Oh no, but we're trying to prove you know put forward that we're such and such. And I said, No, we're a professional company. Yeah, it doesn't matter what we drive, the service that we deliver is what matters. Yeah, yeah. What do they expect? Good service or me to drive up in a big car.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and they want the authenticity, you know, they want to trust, trust.
SPEAKER_03How do you trust? And we're going this flashness. We're starting to see more, I think, authenticity coming back. We mentioned off air about AI age and stuff coming up a lot. You're getting people now who are living their lives by distance by computers.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_03So the only way to separate anyone now is how authentic and how well mannered they are. Do they turn up on time? So a lot of the stuff we've said is actually things that we're sort of pushing back against these sort of trust technology. All comes back down to trust.
SPEAKER_01Trust is the most important single thing in business. If you trust the people you work with, it makes a huge difference. Yeah. If you don't, then you're second guessing. Even people that you're contracting to do work for you, if you don't trust them, well then you're watching what they do the whole time and you're not getting the best team results.
SPEAKER_04Well, you like you remember in my previous role, obviously the people were getting themselves into quite a lot of debt, whenever I have a lot a lot of them just by you know circumstances, but a lot of them were trying to keep up with the Joneses. Yeah. You know, the Joneses has got a lot to answer for. Yeah, yeah. The cars, holidays.
SPEAKER_01I've argued this before that the biggest mistake in the car industry, not for the car industry who got more cars out there, but for individuals, is leasing. Yeah. And le leasing enables people to rent cars, lease cars they would never be able to buy. True. So suddenly this market is created that is not genuinely sustainable. Yeah, true. Yeah. No, good choice. Number two, Martin. Okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna seem a little bit um what could only be described as lightweight off the back of this one, which is a thing that can ruin my mood enormously is arriving to play a golf course that I've waited years to play, only to be told it's cart path only today, and our greens have just been dressed. In other words, you've they haven't told you that when you've booked, they haven't told you that when you've managed to get there. You've driven frequently this happens to us if we're on tour in the States or somewhere like that, and you've waited years to come and play a certain course, and then suddenly it opens up and you get the opportunity to go and play it, and you think this is great, and you drive maybe an hour and a half from wherever you're staying to go play this world-class golf course, and you get there and they say, Yeah, just to let you know, uh, cart path only today, and uh we've dressed all the greens, so it's not really playing the way you would normally expect. Right, is there a discount then? No, no, no, but we just thought we'd better let you know that it's not going to be quite as you expect. And so you're going, you're out there and you're playing the golf course, but you're not playing it to its full effect. So when you get to the greens and they're Holland Tyne, there's you know, all the rest of it, you're popping, and it isn't as good. You know, you're just going, this isn't the experience I wanted. But the fact is, the minute they told you that in the pro shop, you felt your mood dip. You began to feel annoyed, you begin to go, I've made all of this effort to come here. This has been a course that's been on the bucket list for many, many years, and it's happened to us a couple of times in the States. One of the other things, by the way, uh, is another situation is not where they have done any of that, but where they have huge number of um crew out on the golf course. Okay, and the crew are digging a big hole in front of the T, 75 yards in front of you, but just wave to you to play over the top of them. There is nothing hones a target better than being told to just play over the top of it because you're going, if I hit one low in here, your subconscious is I can see him. Yeah, and I I'm going to hit him. And so the reality is any of those sorts of things where you suddenly realize I've spent all this money to come and do this, and it's not really the way I want it to be.
SPEAKER_04We've just cored the green.
unknownI know.
SPEAKER_03Those are the things. Has it happened more than the other way around where you've gone to a course not expecting it to be good and turned out it's fantastic?
SPEAKER_01One or two of the Arizona golf courses we weren't overly optimistic about when we went to see them, and they were absolutely tremendous. First time we went to a place called Waco Pa, and Waco Pa is on a reservation land. There's a casino there, there's two golf courses, there's the Seguaro and the Choya, and they are two absolutely magnificent golf courses, and they were completely out of left field. We'd put them in there because they were quite cost-effective to go out the tour, and they were absolutely outstanding. Also, it's one of the few places where we've ever chased snakes. We were on the course, and one of my mates stood on a snake in the roof, and the snake goes in one direction. My mate Pete goes in the other direction. My other mate T D yells, I've got the snake, get the camera. So I'm running with the camera to get a picture of the snake. PK goes, it's gone down the hole there. Put your hand down, see if you can get a picture. No. This is where I finished that. And eventually from the rough, further away, all we hear is our other mate Pete going, I'm all right. I'm okay, I'm over here. You know, so but good story. So there have been a few, a few surprises like that, but the reality is that you you want to go when you've taken all this time to get to somewhere special, you want to play it in good condition.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I always remember first time playing hard glass. I was like, Oh, this place looks okay, and I'll came back with it. This is incredible. Yeah, true. Great, great golf course. Number one, and this is in line with probably the last one a little bit, but negative people. Oh, and I think this is more than just rude people, it's people who and the negative people might necessarily be rude, they might be just fine in whatever they do, but they look at everything through a negative lens. Oh what? And the love complaining. What if that happens? Oh, what if this? Oh, I can't believe. Thankfully, and over the years it's sort of pushed most negative people out. But then whenever you say that word, straight away it conjures up images in my head of people I've met or business associates and all go just so negative in everything. Yeah, and actually, it's one of those things that starts to rub off on you as well. If you spend time with a negative person, your brain starts to go, maybe there's a point there. And I think it's one of those things. Whenever I was picking this list, it was number one. I was like, Yeah, negatively for me, I'm very positive in everything I do. And I think a lot of business owners tend to be very positive because you have to be. If you if you opened up, well, this is what that could go wrong over here. Back to your point about subconscious and those guys digging a hole for 75 yards in front of you. This is what could go wrong. If you look at that thing long enough, that's actually what probably will go wrong because you focus on it. So or what's the percentage chance of that happening?
SPEAKER_04You know, and they they complain, yeah, complain about everything, they cannot see the good in anything. A hundred percent.
SPEAKER_01We mentioned in a previous podcast the concept of relentless positivity, yeah. And I firmly believe positive people are a huge benefit to either a company or your social circle. Yes, you want people who come up with positive ideas that drive the narrative forward rather than just always, ah, I don't think so. No, you want people who just go, here's a plan, here's what I think we should do, or yen. And some people go, Oh, actually, yeah, I quite like the sound of that. Yeah, I'll go for it. As opposed to just casting around for vague ideas or anything else, because people go, Oh, that sounds tricky.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that sounds difficult. We we used to say it all the time when we were doing the vista stuff, that growth mindset. Yeah, it's like, do you want your brain to grow? And the best people I meet are the people who just want to keep pushing themselves, they want to do more stuff, the f they want to challenge themselves, they don't sit and go, I'm happy enough where things are. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So it's that sort of I have a few friends, as you know, I'm semi-retired, and I have a few friends who seem to have viewed retirement as you just do as little as possible, and that terrifies me. Yeah, I would terrify the concept of waking up in the morning going, What'll I do today? Whatever I like. Well, what'll I do then? I don't know, just whatever you want. As opposed to I'm still a fairly structured life and wanting to do various things.
SPEAKER_03We'd a mix in the morning, yeah. Lunch at 1 p.m.
SPEAKER_01You know, even even coming down here today and chatting away to Angela on reception to get say, Look, I'm an hour and a bit early for the appointment, but I'm just going to sit in reception and chat to a couple of mates. And she said, That's fine. I think I know one of them. And I said, I don't think so. Um, but uh anyway, so I mean, again, those sorts of things, just the challenges of of even getting the locations that we go to to record, has been very interesting over the last 18 months.
SPEAKER_03I've we've all worked with people that you sort of go, and it could be the Christmas party, or it could be something like an event, and you got the negative people go, oh, we're not doing that, or there's something there. And I think it's one of those things I sort of look at and go, people tend to be negative. It's not just work-related, it's negative in every issue in their life. Of course it is. It's how they look at getting a new car, or or how they look where they go on holiday. It's that negative, I don't want to go there. Or and these people have a propensity to actually, and there's a few people I've met believe in this sort of conspiracy theories or something. There's there is links I've seen before, some of the people I know that are going, I wouldn't believe all the stuff you hear in the press there. That's that's big media pushing that down your neck. You don't want to read that.
SPEAKER_01I think at the moment it's very hard to believe anything on the media. I think that is becoming harder and harder, and that's for another day listeners. We're not going to get through certainly it it ruins your mood when you suddenly realize that half the stuff you're being fed is complete garbage.
SPEAKER_04Oh my number one when it really dips my mood is when things go wrong with my car or my house, and it immediately puts me in a bad mood. And I think the problem is that I slightly feel out of control because I know I can't fix them. I am, and in relation to DIY and cars, I am, I'm brilliant at many other things, so uh but the three even this week we've got my car, maybe the merck cleaned or whatever, and the guy was cleaned, but he left the doors open and all and let the battery drain, right? That was one thing, and then the shower door broke, and then immediately put me in a bad mood, and it is because of that, and even though that that's why I drive a Tesla, because it's just basically um iPhone on the code. Plug and play, plug and play, nothing ever goes wrong, it's fantastic. But then you go, why do I buy well, why do I have a classic car? And I still haven't answered that question.
SPEAKER_01You have a classic car because of the difficulty. The difficulty is part of the attraction, it is the classic car, and those those moments when the season opens and you drive the merc down the road in the sunshine with your grey hair blowing in the wind, you know, that's it, that's a moment that you just love.
SPEAKER_04I do, I do, but you know, I do hate when things go wrong with car or I I heard a phrase the other day I've never heard before.
SPEAKER_03It might be quite an olden phrase. Friends, Mum and Dad were speaking about someone they know, and they were like, he can't even put up a shelf, he's handless. I had never heard that before. It's like does that mean you know? I was I was not my ego, yeah. Sounds handless, no idea what handless means. Is that a phrase, Martin? Handless.
SPEAKER_01Well, I've heard the phrase before. Handless. I just used useless. Yeah, you know, because again, I'm from the generation where you had to do a certain number of things yourself. There weren't necessarily the options available just to get somebody else to come and do it for you.
SPEAKER_04So I I have the best guy.
SPEAKER_01Hanging shelves, hanging pictures, changing plugs, changing light sockets, things like that. Those were things we didn't do that as standard.
SPEAKER_03My favourite, like you boys know I love Frasier, the sitcom. There's one where him and his brother Niles go, we're just we're useless. A car broke down, we don't know what to do, and all so they go to a motor mechanic class at the local college, and the two of them are sitting there in their three-piece suits and they're learning about oil transmissions and all, and it is just comedy goal. They keep correcting the guy's grammar as he said stuff and all. But I sit there going, This is so true. The two of them by the end go, we know more than him, and they look down their nose at that. Right.
SPEAKER_04Reuben Combs does everything in my house, it's superb, and like even curtain poles, and he's so exact, you know, he measures the curtain. It's a real art when you see people doing well.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think it is an underrated skill to be good. And we talked about this in an episode of underrated skills, where you know the the ability to actually do things, trades people who know what they're doing are phenomenally good. They're every bit as valuable in society as people who can move numbers around.
SPEAKER_04You admire those people more. Yeah, you do like a room who comes in and goes, looks around the house, goes, That needs fixed, that needs fixed, that needs fixed, or puts up a curtain pole. But his whole methodology of you know, he measures the curtains to make sure that they'll just the right drop. Yeah, and you go I would not have thought of that.
SPEAKER_01No, yeah, you wouldn't have used the phrase in that the right drop.
SPEAKER_04No, no. But uh you but ever since you did that interior design course, I find that you've been quite good at that.
SPEAKER_03Well it is. I mean, again Lawrence Lowell and McDonald.
SPEAKER_01Some of those colours I chose for your orangerie.
SPEAKER_03I mean very, very nice. But you you you hit the nail on the head with the car stuff as well. You hear a rattle or you hear something, the warning light comes on, and you go, take it to a garage and they go, Oh, it's gonna be a thousand pounds because we've got this, this, this, could be even be more. Complete trust in the unknown.
SPEAKER_01I go back to the days in the early days of owning a car where you could actually do a lot of stuff yourself, and then you only went to the garage once a year for your service, and they would generally tell you what's wrong, what's wrong, or various other things. I remember pulling into the garage at the bottom of Marlborough Park one time, and Michael comes out and he just listens to the car and he goes, Yeah, your tappets are off. And in the old days they could just tell you, whereas now, oh no, we've got to run diagnostics. You know, but it it's a different world. Yeah, no, that's a good one. I can see that. All right, the number one thing that brings my mood down that annoys me beyond anything else, I'm away with a group of my golf mates. We're out for dinner and all the rest of it, and we get to the non-drinker discount calculation.
SPEAKER_03Set the scene more, or are they all? Oh, I'm going to tell a specific story.
SPEAKER_01And this this happened, I can tell you when it happened, I can tell you where it happened. It happened in 2001 in a restaurant in Ponte Vidre, and we went there. Uh, there were eleven of us, and it was a big night, and they went in, and it was one of these restaurants where the waiter saw he got 11 boys in, he played up to them all, something else, he sold them starters, he sold them main course, he sold them wine, all the rest of it, and he was going for it. Now, at the end of all of this, I looked, I had had, and I know to this day what I had, I had a prime rib dinner, which back then was $20, and two glasses of orange juice. That's what I had. So $20 plus two orange is which in Florida ain't the dearest drink on the planet. So my mate Dez did the calculation. They'd had wine, three courses, everything, everybody gone. Somebody'd had a souffle. Oh, yes, the souffle looks nice. Oh, there's somebody lobster, oh a lobster tail with my steak. I'd love that. All the rest of it. So we went through and did the calculation and he turned round and he said, Um that's $95 a head, but Martin, with your non-drinker discount, $75. Oh, that I would love to drink. Now, apparently, the phrase non-drinker discount triggers my Tourette syndrome. Because I told them I put $25 down. I said, that's what I've had, it's probably generous for what I've had. The van leaves in three minutes. You're either in it or you can get a taxi home. I don't care. And I have spent over the years, I have split the bill pretty much everywhere until the odd time where they get completely out of control. Yeah. And so the phrase non-drinker discount instantly makes me rile because you're going, it's not a discount. It just means I'm not paying as much as you guys are for stuff I didn't have.
SPEAKER_03I didn't get the discount part I was doing. Did Dez uh does Dez remind you of this sometimes?
SPEAKER_01Oh, Des will wind me up a few times about such things because that was a night the red mist descended, and we went out and got into the van. And uh with the 11 people in the van, I took it out of the car park and turned the wrong way down a road. And I'm facing the oncoming traffic. And there was there was a little like concrete lip between the two, and I bounced the vehicle over that and on down the road, and not one of the other ten boys said a word because I had lost the plot. Oh and so that had brought my mood right down. The next morning, somebody foolishly said, How are you feeling this morning? And I went off and won all over again. So the phrase non drinker discount will bring my mood down almost instantaneously.
SPEAKER_03Those golf tours are very jovial.
SPEAKER_01They are, they're fantastic and they've been brilliant over the years, but there's always been a couple of incidents. Also on those tours, there's also two types of people on those tours. There's the people who organize and run them and the passengers.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And it's fine if the passengers do what they're meant to do and be where they're meant to be on time. But if they don't, then and it's the passengers who always complain.
SPEAKER_03Oh no, that that's the thing that also. Okay, you can justify if someone's organise and complain, and no.
SPEAKER_01You know, but there you go. Anyway, listeners, what brings your mood down? And um I'm busy watching my two colleagues sit here in HMRC, lift their phones, and look like they're about to make some sort of business proclamation. So, Gareth, what have you got?
SPEAKER_04Oh, the so Ronnie Maxwell, any speech or newsreel with Donald Trump speaking in it? At least he can't. Exactly. The news, just generally right now, finding out we have run out of cranberry juice in the morning. Cranberry juice. And then my daughters, I asked last night, and there was a common theme, and they've shared a room with me and obviously their sister. Uh, and they say someone who clicks whenever they sleep. Not snores. I said, You've got to beautiful the snores. No, this click. He says, or a clock, he says just whenever you can consistently hear something, it does them. Christina says, No, no, uh Alexandra, people being stupid, that's a good one. Complainers, yeah. Negative negative people, and then Christina was having to repeat yourself as someone did not listen. Sorry, I was writing something in what'd you say and saying something in a group and then completely backtracking later on.
SPEAKER_03So yeah, good, yeah, good one. Johnny sent in having to work your day off at the last moment. That is, yeah. Liverpool losing, yeah, and his number one is driving into Belfast City Centre.
SPEAKER_01Which we had to do this morning to get to uh HMRC, and then runs number one is people being late, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Number two, Man United getting beat, and then number three is rain on a Saturda Saturday morning after a good week of weather, just as we're about to play golf, which does tend to happen quite a lot.
SPEAKER_01It does, it does, but it always does. It doesn't matter if you were playing golf on Friday, it would rain on Friday.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01It's it just picks picks on you. Well, here's a voicemail message from uh one of our listeners.
SPEAKER_00Three would be one of my uh favourite sports teams losing. Uh it has been particularly tough to be a Manchester United fan over the last number of years, albeit I was spoilt as a youngster growing up in the 90s. Number two is I absolutely detest being late. So if I am ever late uh for anything, it causes me significant stress. It 100% alters my mood. However, to be more specific, it's if someone else has made me late for sake of argument, my wife, or if I have friends that I'm waiting on, and if they have made me late when I have made the effort to be on time. That is a significant red flag for me and something that I would struggle to look beyond. Number one is undoubtedly people being rude and not showing common manners and decency. People that do not say please and thank you, people that do not consider your personal space, who would walk over the top of you, who would barge past you without saying excuse me, etc. And it would, again, to be more specific, enrage me even further if I felt it was done towards my wife or daughter.
SPEAKER_01Okay, that was from our listener Mark, who again seems to have finished cleaning the kitchen and moved on to walking the dog or something outside. But uh, it's nice to get those sorts of messages. Victoria De Noon listed at number three when something I really wanted on the menu isn't available, and I came to that restaurant for that thing specifically.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Number two, being left hanging. Now I'm not quite sure if that means being left hanging when she goes to give someone a high five and they just leave her hanging is a phrase. I I'm not quite sure. And then asking for help and getting feedback instead, or asking for feedback and getting I don't mind in return. So again, very specific ones there. Uh I'll have to uh look into those. And Johnny Kerr, uh rain in the morning when you wake up. I'm just wondering whether that's here in Grand Canary. Small talk on Teams chat.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's a good one. Oh, yeah, that's a good one.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, where you're trying to chat away to someone when the reality is it's done. You just want to get it done. And his final one is the auto-renewal on app subscriptions that you'd forgotten about.
SPEAKER_03Uh sure he's got a few apps that he subscribes to.
SPEAKER_01Well, I am I'm sure he does, probably like Teams and Zoom and stuff like that. No, that'd be true. That'd be true.
SPEAKER_03Is business a kind of personal?
SPEAKER_01We tried not to rant, but things that bring your mood down, there is is definitely oh, you have another one, Andy.
SPEAKER_03I've got another couple actually have come in as we were speaking. Uh slow drivers in the middle lane.
SPEAKER_04True.
SPEAKER_03Food not being as good as you hoped for. And third one, this is from Lewis, people being unnecessarily stupid. Yeah. I recently had a client ring me on Easter Sunday afternoon thinking, how would I pick up? And then Thomas has also sent in a bad Liverpool performance, which seems to be common amongst these. Yeah, a missing item in a takeaway. Yeah, it's quite annoying, actually. And then hardly ruin your mood.
SPEAKER_01Well, it depends on what's going on. Well, if you do you're ready for it, then well I mean in Andy's case, you know, he's already got the fish and chip, he's got the beans, you know, he's got the extra chip. He's probably he's got the curry sauce. It's just the battered, it's just the battered sausage he's missing.
SPEAKER_03Actually, need one. Um number one of his, which is a really bad one. The worst golf shot you hit after you've hit a great golf shot. Oh. And your mood, oh, I can play this professionally, I'm not good. And then the final one Pete sent in was forgetting to do Wordle every day to solve a straight every day. Getting stuck behind a ladies' four ball.
SPEAKER_04Oh, true.
SPEAKER_03And running out of beers is number one. Well, he has what you will of that.
SPEAKER_04He hasn't Mark's dying to say something about the ladies' four balls. Yes.
SPEAKER_01Well, ladies' four balls have every right to be on the course at the same time. There are some male golfers who seem to think ladies' golf is is of a lesser quality. It isn't, and in fact, most clubs need the revenue.
SPEAKER_04If it's any four ball that's going slow behind it and they're aiming and all that stuff.
SPEAKER_01Oh no, just slow play. Oh that would drive me to the Patrick Amplettes. Oh dear. It's not slow, it's glacial. Yeah. You know, but anyway, listeners, again, we try not to get into rants on some of these topics, but the PMG seems to like to test us to see whether or not we can stay above the line and not descend into rant mode, which I managed. Gareth came close today, and I think Andy, you might have been the one but I think you're probably the most nervous because your meeting with HMRC is in ten minutes.
SPEAKER_03I thought it was your meeting with them.
SPEAKER_01Oh no, mine's already mine was done this morning. Is that that bag of bag of cash? That's why he's smiling as usual. But anyway, we will be back to talk about another subject in the not too distant future. But until then, on behalf of the podcast, my name is Martin.
SPEAKER_04My name is Carl. And my name is Andy.
SPEAKER_01And we'll see you all again very soon.