Episode 5 John Bishop's Britain


Episode 5

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Transcript


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APPLAUSE

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Thank you. Thank you, thank you.

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Good evening and welcome to John Bishop's Britain.

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CROWD CHEERS

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The subject I'll be looking at tonight is parenthood and family.

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They say that the family that plays together stays together.

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In our house, we like to play a game called,

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"Let's sit in separate rooms and argue via text messaging."

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LAUGHTER

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To help me get to grips with what parenthood and family means to Great Britain,

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I've spoken to loads of people about it.

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I know, it looks like a really shit version of Celebrity Squares.

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They've given us their opinions and here's a few of the highlights.

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My number-one grandson.

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-All right, girl?

-Breastfeed me.

-He just yakked in my mouth.

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-And I can see it!

-Which is handy.

-I HATE you.

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We'll be hearing what they think throughout the show.

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Plus, there'll be the odd sketch to explain what's going on.

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So, parenthood and family.

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Now, before I proceed, I've stood here just by chance and I have to ask,

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you're nearly there.

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-How pregnant are you?

-31 weeks.

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Is this your first child?

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-It is.

-Anyone in the room got kids, give me a cheer.

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CHEERING

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OK, anyone in the room without kids, give me a cheer.

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LIVELY CHEERING

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Hear that?

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At the moment you're in that second group. You know the happy group?

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That's where you are now.

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-Do you know if it's a boy or a girl?

-No, keeping it a surprise.

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What about names?

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-Um, we've got a shortlist.

-I tell you what will happen now,

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I tell you exactly what will happen,

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YOU will have the baby, YOU will start crying,

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YOU will pick the name.

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That is what happens,

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that's why my kids are called Shannon, Tracey and Becky,

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which for three boys is a bit...

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-LAUGHTER

-We all had our kids quite early, to be honest,

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we got married and then had them quite early,

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mainly because... Well, I'm a good shot.

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But they grow up and they stop being a lovely baby

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and they start walking and making noise,

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and then that noise becomes words,

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and then words become arguments.

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That's how it works. I mean,

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I've got three teenage boys,

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I had to look at a picture of them the other day when they were babies

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just to remind myself that I used to love them.

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We did that thing because we got together quite early and decided to have kids quite early.

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Somehow, Melanie, my wife, had told her dad,

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she told her mum and her mum told her dad.

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I remember being in our kitchen, making a cup of tea,

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and my wife's dad come into the kitchen and said,

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"I believe you're trying for a baby."

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I went, "Yes."

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-He said, "How's it going?"

-LAUGHTER

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I said, "I'm doing my best, like."

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"It'd be better if she put a bit more effort in, to be honest with you.

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"The boots would help a bit more often."

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When do you ever talk to your wife's dad about how often you're shagging your wife?

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This is ridiculous, unless you live in Norwich, no-one does that.

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Then there's that thing as well you must've had,

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and other people in this room would've had it,

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that moment when you realise that you've made your partner pregnant.

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That wonderful moment where you realise that you've created

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a new life. When you've created the union of your DNA with her DNA.

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That moment she comes out of the bathroom and says, "I'm definitely pregnant."

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I remember when one of my mates said it happened to his wife.

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I said, "What did you do? When it happened to me, I was overjoyed."

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He said, "I was overjoyed and I really wanted to kiss her,

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"I was full of emotion, but as she was stood there,

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"I couldn't help thinking, she's got piss on a stick."

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Instead, I just went, "well done"!

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And what happens when that happens, you get in that first phase

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where you go, "We are pregnant."

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"We are pregnant." This is a wonderful thing. "WE are pregnant."

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And then you see what happens and you think,

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"Thank God it's just her."

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Cos I don't...I don't relish it at all, honest to God,

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I don't relish the pregnancy thing for a girl,

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I think youse bloom and you do well, men wouldn't do it.

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We would never ever have babies, we would just give up.

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I mean, the idea that women become obsessed with... Or like IVF.

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IVF treatment is a massive thing and it brings joy to a lot of people,

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it's one of the things that the Government is suggesting might be cut,

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major cutbacks, cos apparently, it costs £7,500 for a treatment.

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Let's just look at that for a moment,

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£7,500 to have kids.

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You could get on a plane, fly business class to Malawi

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and you can come back with a couple of twins.

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But then it happens. That's what happens with us.

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We've got three and they're never always the same,

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but for me, the best one was the middle one when the waters broke.

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It was one of those moments you wish for all your life, as a bloke.

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It was a waters-break moment at half one in the morning.

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So it was downstairs, in the car,

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which meant I've got a girl in the car, having a baby,

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for the first time in my life, I could drive like a lunatic.

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And I drove through every red light I could find.

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EVERY red light. I must've done 110 in the 30mph zones,

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I drove mentally.

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I drove everywhere like a mad man. Not one policeman stopped me.

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That is not fair.

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I even took a 15-mile diversion

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cos I was hoping for that moment

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for a copper to come up with blue lights and go, "Where do you think you're you going?"

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"She's having a baby, piss off, nobhead!"

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LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

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But not everyone has the same experience.

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When a woman is in labour,

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it is quite tiring for the husband, isn't it?

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It's quite hard work, you know?

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Well, it wasn't too painful for ME.

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Let me tell you, it was like hell. It was..."David!"

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And there she is, screaming. Shouting, she's in pain.

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It's all your fault! And of course, it IS always my fault.

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"Georgie Major, I HATE you."

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When my wife was in labour, I thought she made too much noise,

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but I think she'd been watching EastEnders for far too long.

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Watching my girlfriend give birth was like watching my favourite pub

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burn down in front of my eyes.

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It was vile. Blood, poo, water.

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I just ran out. Shit myself.

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She said, "Do you want to cut the umbilical cord?"

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I was overrun with emotion and said, "Yes, I'll do it".

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She was screaming and shouting for a few hours, like they do.

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I was given these massive scissors, it's like a big rubber belt -

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I just couldn't cut it. Every cut I made, blood was going in my face.

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After some time, I got bored of this and thought,

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"I'm quite hungry now, so I'll get a McDonald's."

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As I snapped it, the midwives, four of them in the room,

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all cheered and gave me a round of applause.

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They were all patting me. She's just given birth, but I took full credit.

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By the time I got back, she had a baby, which was handy,

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so we had burger and chips. My wife didn't, of course,

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she was still being sick and other unpleasant things.

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It was an amazing feeling cutting the umbilical cord, the best moment of my life.

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And Lana daughter being born, of course. A close runner-up.

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APPLAUSE

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Can I just ask, is there any blokes in here who's ever cut the umbilical cord?

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No. You just don't...

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You have? YOU have?

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Yeah. Was it your baby?

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LAUGHTER It was, yeah.

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And what made that happen, if you don't mind me asking.

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Was it a midwife's idea, your idea?

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It was a midwife's idea, yeah, hers.

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Oh, rea...

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-You're a midwife? You're the midwife?

-Yeah.

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Are you actually with him?

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I mean, let's get this straight, is your job being a midwife?

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Yeah, and I was having the baby.

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You were the... Oh! Oh, I just thought it was one of those days

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where you bring your partner to work.

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"This is my husband. Go on, have a go, son. go on."

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And you...you cut the cord?

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Chewed through it.

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Chewed through it?

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Because it was said to me, "Do you want to do it?"

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And on the three occasions, I went, "No chance!"

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I just thought, "No chance." I've got a mate who's a builder,

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and his wife said, "Do you want to cut the cord?" He was halfway through

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and he said, "I've got another cord I started...

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"I'll be back next week."

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Now, having a baby's completely different.

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A mate of mine wanted to have a baby in a birth pool.

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They said to him, apparently, it was booked. Booked?!

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It's a birth pool! A birth pool, it's not a swimming baths! But it was booked.

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He was told that you could rent one. You can RENT a birth pool.

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You can rent something to put in your living room.

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It's probably going to be a paddling pool and sit in front of the telly,

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so that your wife can have a baby in front of the telly.

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You'd be sat there watching EastEnders, "Do us a favour, can you just move?"

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Why d'you want a birth pool anyway? Why d'you want a baby in water?

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Unless you're having a mermaid, it makes no sense.

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Advice for any prospective father,

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my only words of advice is that if you're going to be there before the birth,

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do not watch Alien the night before.

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That definitely changes your view of things,

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cos to be honest, it's becoming mysterious, we've got all these different ways of doing it,

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which are wonderful, but mammals have been giving birth

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for thousands of years and they've never made such a fuss of it.

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I'm not saying it's not hard, but women do go on and on and on.

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I know it hurts, I know what pain is, I stood on a plug once. I know.

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It is an amazing occasion.

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And you must have, again... You've seen it loads of times,

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you must have seen loads of blokes cry and you will cry,

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I guarantee you will cry,

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cos that's what happens, cos all of a sudden this flood of emotion comes out,

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and it's an amazing, joyous occasion.

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What happens on every single occasion, the midwife always says, "Do you want a photograph?"

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I remember the first time, the baby come out, I'm holding this beautiful baby

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and I'm looking with the love that you can't possibly imagine,

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and my wife had been in labour for over 12 hours.

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I look and she said, "Do you want a photograph?"

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I looked at my wife and thought, "God, you look a frigging mess!"

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I said, "Just me and the baby.

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"I can't let her see herself like that!"

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She looks... No, just me and him.

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And then afterwards as well, every dad who has a baby, you get the dad,

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you know, the proud dad pictures,

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"Look, we just had a baby, look, we just had a baby."

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You'll be wetting the baby's head.

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-HE MUMBLES

-"That's my son, that's MY son Steven."

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You think, "Yeah, maybe you should have come all the way out before you took the picture."

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But what happens as well, the other healthcare professional that gets involved,

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after the midwife, you get passed on to a thing called a health visitor

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who's someone who's done an NVQ in papier-mache.

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Honest to God, the most useless person...

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I'm not having a go at health visitors, I know you do a good job.

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But if you're going to be a health visitor for new parents,

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come at two o'clock in the morning,

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come when they want to stab each other in the eye.

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Come when they've had no sleep for four days,

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not at half ten for a cup of tea and a piece of cake.

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Because all the paraphernalia you have to buy as well,

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it's all built around this theory of all this fear

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that we need to have...

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You're paranoid about it, so you buy all this paraphernalia,

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and anyone here who's had a baby's had that moment

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when a baby gets really congested and there's nothing you can do,

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you can't put a tissue on it and say "blow".

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They don't know what you're saying.

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So...so...there's this device in France

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and it's a tube, right?

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-And you put it in your mouth.

-GROANING

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And there's a tube at the end like that,

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and it comes down to, like, a little vessel.

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And then there's a tube coming out, and you put it in the baby's nose

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-and you suck the snot out the nose.

-GROANING

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And it collects in the vessel, it is,

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-it's like siphoning petrol, it is.

-LAUGHTER

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It's the same effect if it goes too far, you go, "Unh!"

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But no, it's genuine! It's a genuine thing and any parent in this room,

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when your child's congested,

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will do that, you go, "Mh-nh, we got any?"

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It works, it works.

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It also explains why every time you look at a French person,

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they've got little heads.

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And we've gone crazy with the paraphernalia that you get.

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I was at a friend's the other day

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and they had a barbecue, and his son who's about that age,

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about two and a half, three, he's at that potty training age.

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We're having a barbecue and he has a dump in the garden.

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I said, "That's ridiculous," he goes, "No, it's OK."

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"We've learnt that when he does that, what we do then

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"is we put the dump in this potty and he sits on the potty."

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"And then he gets up and goes, ' "My poo's in the potty,

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' "I put poo in potty,' ",

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and I said, "How do you make him sit on the potty?"

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This is an actual invention, this.

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He said, "It's a musical potty."

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So when he sat on the potty, it went...

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# Ding, de-ding, de-ding, de-ding. #

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He said, "That will encourage him to sit on the potty,"

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I said, "No, it won't!"

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I said, "That will go into his subconscious.

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"When he's 18, first goes to a nightclub,

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"he hears music, he's going to shit himself!"

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It's ridiculous. He takes him to baby yoga. Baby yoga!?

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I said, "why are you taking him to baby yoga?"

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He said, "He loves it, he bends..."

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I said, "He bends cos he can't stand up!"

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He hasn't got a choice!

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But anyway, after you've dealt with the baby years,

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you realise that you're sentenced to life with children.

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I don't think anybody likes anyone else's kids.

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I really like kids, but I don't want to hear about them on Facebook.

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Not many people say that, but I hate anyone else's kids.

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The worst is when they put pictures of their children on their profiles.

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-It's disturbing.

-When you first take your baby home,

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I know myself and a friend, you just look at it and think,

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"What do we do now?"

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The whole process of having kids and being a parent is fascinating.

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I've had some disgusting moments with my baby.

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Once, I was lying in bed in the morning,

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happy to be alive, smiling, holding her above my head, she was going "Aah..."

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And if it isn't, then something's going wrong, really.

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Wrong time to do it after a bottle, she yakked in my mouth.

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It was milky and lumpy. It was so thick.

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The best thing about my children is they dress up for me

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in my Star Wars costumes.

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And they manage to just make an appearance, do whatever they want.

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I have Joshua, who's 18, and he plays my Darth Vader.

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And I can see it, and it doesn't work on me.

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Shannon is my next one down. She makes a great mother Ewok.

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They are very, very intelligent, even if they're miniature.

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I don't think they enjoy it!

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I think we now know that Social Services are going to go around

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and find out what's going on with their mother Ewok.

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Also, you have this thing with kids,

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we have a relationship with them that you never used to have.

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You spend time with them in a different way.

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I remember when my one of my youngest lads, he would've been about five

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and his mum said, "look, he's five now,

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"it's time that you took him to go and get a pair of shoes."

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So I took him to Clarks to get his feet measured -

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before going somewhere cheaper.

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I said, "you don't want them, they've got lights on, they catch fire."

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We're in the Trafford Centre, he's just under five

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and he turned round to me and said, "Dad, I need a poo."

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Everyone knows if you've got a toddler,

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and the toddler turns to you and says, "I need a poo" -

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that means he could have a poo now,

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or he could have a poo next Tuesday.

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You've basically got a poo bomb in your hands.

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You don't know what to do, you don't know whether to take the risk and walk,

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or just run in a panic to the nearest place, to get rid of this potential poo.

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I picked him up in the Trafford Centre and run through the shops.

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There's a place that I never knew existed in the Trafford Centre.

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I come to this place, they must have them in shopping centres all over the country.

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It said on the door, "family toilet."

0:18:120:18:15

I walked into the family toilet. It WAS a family toilet.

0:18:150:18:19

It had the little toilet and the daddy toilet.

0:18:190:18:22

I thought, "This is wonderful." I sit him on the little toilet.

0:18:240:18:27

He's there, sat on the little toilet.

0:18:270:18:29

SMALL FART

0:18:290:18:31

Has anyone in this room ever been in the presence of someone doing their business?

0:18:310:18:36

It's like watching someone yawn. All of a sudden you go...

0:18:360:18:42

"I think I'll have one of them myself."

0:18:420:18:44

BIG FART

0:18:480:18:50

That's a wonderful thing. It's bonding, the modern way.

0:18:500:18:53

The family who shits together stays together.

0:18:530:18:55

What happens, you have a baby, it changes your life.

0:18:570:19:01

It changes your social life, you stop going out.

0:19:010:19:04

You reach the point when you think it's time to go out

0:19:040:19:07

and that's when you realise you can't, cos you can't afford it.

0:19:070:19:10

When we first had kids, we had them close together,

0:19:100:19:16

we got a babysitter to come and baby-sit for the first two.

0:19:160:19:20

£8 an hour.

0:19:200:19:23

She wanted £8 an hour to baby-sit.

0:19:230:19:27

I said, "I tell you what, "I'll give you a fiver an hour to go out with her, I'll stay in."

0:19:270:19:31

And we ended up with this babysitter,

0:19:350:19:37

and I wasn't quite sure, because you do get paranoid with kids -

0:19:370:19:40

I wasn't quite sure that she was looking after the kids OK -

0:19:400:19:43

she was a young girl, 21, she was, a young graduate, so what I did is

0:19:430:19:48

I got a nanny cam in the room, just to see what was going on.

0:19:480:19:51

And one day, one of her friends came home from hockey,

0:19:510:19:54

one of her friends who played hockey with her,

0:19:540:19:57

and they started making mad, passionate love on the couch

0:19:570:20:02

while she was babysitting my kids. She was making mad, passionate love

0:20:020:20:06

with one of her friends that she plays hockey with.

0:20:060:20:09

On the couch.

0:20:090:20:11

She's been doing that now for ten months.

0:20:110:20:13

I'm keeping an eye on her, I didn't want to mention it.

0:20:150:20:17

I didn't want to mention it to my missus

0:20:170:20:20

just in case she got worried about the kids.

0:20:200:20:22

Thing is, when you have kids, things change,

0:20:240:20:28

because before you have kids, if you're in that group who cheered before,

0:20:280:20:31

you see kids in an entirely different way, cos you'll see people

0:20:310:20:35

in shopping centres with kids and the kid will be having a tantrum.

0:20:350:20:39

You know kids under five having a tantrum, they're like that.

0:20:390:20:41

You always see the parent holding them like that.

0:20:410:20:45

And they're looking at you and they always give you that look...

0:20:460:20:50

Before you've got kids, you think that that is a look of embarrassment, cos you think,

0:20:540:21:01

before you've got kids, "My kid will never do that,

0:21:010:21:03

"my kid won't have a tantrum like that, my kid will poo pot pourri.

0:21:030:21:07

"My kid won't be doing that in a shopping centre.

0:21:090:21:12

"My kid will be a lovely kid.

0:21:120:21:15

"My kid will be at home, practising the piano or the violin."

0:21:150:21:19

It's only when you've got kids a few years later that you're there in a shopping centre

0:21:190:21:23

and you've got your kid... and people look at you and you go...

0:21:230:21:26

It's not until that moment that you realise that look

0:21:280:21:30

isn't a look of embarrassment, that look -

0:21:300:21:34

is an adult-to-adult message saying,

0:21:340:21:36

"Do us a favour, mate, look away, one dead leg will sort this."

0:21:360:21:39

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

0:21:390:21:42

It's true! Cos kids know you can't hit them, that's why they go mad. You think, "No, I can't hit,

0:21:480:21:52

"but I can hold your hand and break your bleeding fingers!"

0:21:520:21:56

What happened was, we ended up with three. Our hands were always full.

0:21:560:22:01

That's what happens when you have kids close together.

0:22:010:22:04

You've always got one kid having a tantrum.

0:22:040:22:07

We had this health visitor come round and I had one of my lads,

0:22:070:22:10

who's always running round the house, screaming his head off.

0:22:100:22:14

I said, "I don't know what to do, he's forever screaming."

0:22:140:22:17

She said, "If a child under the age of five is having a tantrum,

0:22:170:22:20

"don't hit him, that's a bad thing to do, don't hit him.

0:22:200:22:24

"Whatever you do, don't shout at them, because they don't understand what's going on.

0:22:240:22:29

"If they're under five, they've just lost control of their emotions.

0:22:290:22:32

"The best thing you can do..." -

0:22:320:22:34

and this is genuine NHS advice for everyone -

0:22:340:22:37

"The best thing that you can do in that situation

0:22:370:22:39

"is throw some water on them."

0:22:390:22:41

Apparently, the shock of the water will stop the tantrum

0:22:460:22:51

and the child will come to you for love.

0:22:510:22:54

That's bollocks.

0:23:000:23:01

I tried it, two weeks later, he's running round the house screaming his head off.

0:23:020:23:06

I said to his mum, "I'm going to try the water."

0:23:060:23:08

I tried the water, he just screamed more.

0:23:080:23:11

His mum said maybe I shouldn't have used the kettle.

0:23:110:23:14

I love telling that joke.

0:23:220:23:24

There's always some people in the room thinking, "That's a bit harsh."

0:23:240:23:27

Then there's all these young parents in the room going, "Well, did it work?"

0:23:270:23:32

The real problem is no-one ever gives you a guide to parenting.

0:23:330:23:38

I think good parenting

0:23:430:23:44

consists of lots of factors

0:23:440:23:46

and I think everybody's different.

0:23:460:23:48

As soon as I heard my baby cry in the middle of the night,

0:23:490:23:53

I'd run downstairs, jump in my cab, put the meter on and go to work.

0:23:530:23:56

That's one of the advantages

0:23:560:23:58

I had with driving a taxi at the time my first baby was born.

0:23:580:24:01

It's good to be honest with them and not treat them like children,

0:24:030:24:07

even though they are children.

0:24:070:24:08

So I swear at them. My sister's going to kill me,

0:24:080:24:11

but what I do is, when they leave me, I give them a fiver each,

0:24:110:24:15

and I say, "Don't tell your mother."

0:24:150:24:17

My son, Barney, and I were at Alton Towers and we were having tea

0:24:190:24:23

and there was a wasp flying around.

0:24:230:24:25

I said, "Just leave it alone. Leave the wasp alone."

0:24:250:24:28

"It won't do you any harm if you just ignore it."

0:24:280:24:32

At which point, the wasp flew up Barney's fairly baggy shorts

0:24:320:24:36

and stung him four times around the groin area.

0:24:360:24:41

And he's never believed a word I've said to him ever since.

0:24:410:24:45

LAUGHTER

0:24:450:24:47

The thing is, when you become a dad as well, things change.

0:24:520:24:56

Things do change. It's probably the same for women, but I think particularly for men.

0:24:560:25:00

Because when you're a little boy growing up, you want to impress your dad.

0:25:000:25:04

And then you become a dad, and the only thing you want to do

0:25:040:25:07

when you become a dad is to impress your kids,

0:25:070:25:10

that's all any dad wants to do.

0:25:100:25:12

That's why every time you go on holiday

0:25:120:25:14

you always see a fat bloke stood at the top of a diving board

0:25:140:25:17

shitting himself while his kids are shouting,

0:25:170:25:20

"Come on, Dad, do a somersault like the German boys' dad."

0:25:200:25:24

And you don't want to let them down, but things have moved on now.

0:25:240:25:28

Kids live in an entirely different world now.

0:25:280:25:30

There's a lot of pressure.

0:25:300:25:32

My oldest son was the first in our house to get a mobile phone.

0:25:320:25:36

The first one in our house to get a mobile phone amongst the kids.

0:25:360:25:39

He got a mobile phone when he was 11.

0:25:390:25:42

His mum said, "He needs a phone because he's starting high school."

0:25:420:25:45

I said, "So what?" She said, "He's got to get a bus."

0:25:450:25:49

I said, "Is he going to phone the driver?"

0:25:510:25:53

She said, "No, he's the oldest of your three sons.

0:25:550:25:58

"He's got to get a bus to school. He needs a mobile phone."

0:25:580:26:01

I said, "What for?"

0:26:010:26:03

She said, "What if he misses the bus?"

0:26:030:26:06

I said, "He can friggin' walk!"

0:26:060:26:08

Then she said what only a mother in this day and age would say.

0:26:090:26:13

She said, "He is the oldest of your three sons.

0:26:130:26:16

"What if he misses the bus?" Has to walk home?

0:26:170:26:23

"And when he's walking home,

0:26:230:26:25

"someone grabs him and snatches him?!

0:26:250:26:27

"What'll happen then?" Bleeding hell!

0:26:270:26:31

I said, "I'll tell you what'll happen then."

0:26:310:26:33

"Them two'll never miss a bus!"

0:26:330:26:36

Sometimes you've got to play the long game.

0:26:430:26:46

He was 11, which meant the youngest was seven, and HE wanted a phone!

0:26:460:26:51

Seven! He said, "He's getting a phone! I want a phone!"

0:26:510:26:54

I said, "You're seven! Seven! You've got nothing to say.

0:26:540:27:00

"You don't know enough words to have a phone."

0:27:020:27:06

He said, "I don't want a phone to speak to my mates".

0:27:060:27:09

"I just want to text people."

0:27:090:27:12

I said, "But you're seven!

0:27:120:27:13

"Are you going to be sat watching Scooby Doo going,

0:27:130:27:16

"I think it's the caretaker?"

0:27:160:27:18

When I was seven, I'd never used a phone. I hadn't.

0:27:220:27:25

Not cos I was stupid, cos it had a lock on the number one.

0:27:250:27:29

If you wanted to make a phone call, you had to say,

0:27:310:27:33

"Dad, can I make a phone call?"

0:27:330:27:35

And he said, "I'll just get the key out".

0:27:350:27:38

And what happens, you had the phone for the house.

0:27:380:27:41

In fact, it wasn't for the house, it was for about four doors.

0:27:410:27:44

People knock at your door and say, "Can I use your phone?"

0:27:440:27:48

You think, "No chance! Piss off!"

0:27:480:27:50

And what we used to do, we used to have the phone,

0:27:520:27:54

and are soon as you got the phone,

0:27:540:27:56

the next thing you got after you got the phone was the telephone table.

0:27:560:28:00

A table for the phone. A place for the phone to live.

0:28:000:28:03

And you could stand the phone on in the hall, under the stairs,

0:28:030:28:08

so everyone who came into your house would go, "Oh, there's a phone."

0:28:080:28:12

Did anyone remember the telephone table?

0:28:140:28:17

It was ergonomically the worst piece of furniture ever designed.

0:28:170:28:22

The only way you could make a phone call was to sit like that.

0:28:220:28:25

That's how you had to sit, you had to sit like that.

0:28:280:28:30

That's why now when you see old people, they all walk like that.

0:28:300:28:33

But the problem is now, things stayed the way they were then,

0:28:410:28:45

and as a parent you understood the rules.

0:28:450:28:48

Now things just change too quickly.

0:28:480:28:50

There's things that I just don't understand.

0:28:500:28:53

We have too many inventions.

0:28:530:28:54

We need to have a year off, don't you think?

0:28:540:28:57

We need a year off where no-one's allowed to invent anything,

0:28:570:29:00

like that whats-his-name, that Steve Jobs,

0:29:000:29:02

that fellow, someone needs to say, "Stevie, do us a favour,

0:29:020:29:04

"take your Apple and piss off."

0:29:040:29:06

Give us a year off, Steve.

0:29:060:29:09

Just give us a chance to catch up with everything that we've got.

0:29:090:29:12

Cos when you were a parent in the old days, a game was a game.

0:29:120:29:15

Now, you get your kids a game and it gets upgraded.

0:29:150:29:18

Monopoly when I was 10 was still Monopoly when I was 12,

0:29:180:29:22

was still Monopoly when I was 16, was Monopoly.

0:29:220:29:26

It never went Monopoly to Super Monopoly

0:29:260:29:29

to Monopoly with graphics to Interface Monopoly

0:29:290:29:33

to Monopoly with zombies and aliens. It was freaking Monopoly!

0:29:330:29:37

Now, now, everything gets upgraded and I just can't keep up with it.

0:29:370:29:41

I got an iPod for Christmas. It holds 160,000 songs.

0:29:410:29:47

I've got six CDs.

0:29:470:29:48

I've started buying new CDs cos I feel sorry for the iPod.

0:29:510:29:54

You want to try and keep some traditions together,

0:29:560:30:00

like when my son was five, I wanted to do the father-son moment

0:30:000:30:03

when the oldest one was five.

0:30:030:30:06

That main moment. I don't think it's just a Scouse thing,

0:30:060:30:08

I think a lot of people have that moment where you say,

0:30:080:30:12

"My son's five now. He's going to be a man one day,

0:30:120:30:14

"so I'm taking him for his first football kit."

0:30:140:30:17

As a Scouser it's like a Bar Mitzvah.

0:30:170:30:19

It's our rite of passage. I remember taking my son to the shop.

0:30:190:30:24

There was an array of football kits. I said, "Pick a kit, son".

0:30:240:30:28

Remember, I'm from Liverpool.

0:30:280:30:31

My wife's from Manchester, so my kids are mixed race.

0:30:310:30:35

And that creates a lot of problems.

0:30:370:30:39

At times, you assume certain things get passed on in your DNA,

0:30:390:30:43

stuff you never think you need to talk about.

0:30:430:30:46

I said, "It's going to be your first kit. It's me and you, son".

0:30:460:30:51

"Which kit do you want"?

0:30:510:30:54

I basically meant, "Home or away"?

0:30:540:30:56

He looked at me, a five-year-old boy, with eyes full of innocence.

0:30:590:31:03

He said, "Dad, can I have a Man United kit"?

0:31:030:31:07

At that moment, I'd rather he said,

0:31:100:31:13

"Honestly, I don't like football. I'd rather be a girl with a pony".

0:31:130:31:17

It's a different religion. It may be your religion,

0:31:200:31:23

but it's like one of your kids saying, "I want to join the Moonies."

0:31:230:31:27

You'll never get them back.

0:31:270:31:29

"No, I can't do that. I can't let it happen."

0:31:290:31:32

It's a difficult thing to happen in a shop. All those cameras - you can't just hit 'im.

0:31:320:31:37

I said, "Let's go home and have a chat."

0:31:380:31:41

The truth is I took him out

0:31:410:31:43

and bought him an ice-cream and said... It was hard to say.

0:31:430:31:48

I thought if I say the word, I'll get a rash.

0:31:480:31:51

I said, "Why do you want a M-M-M... Why do you want a Mmmm...."

0:31:520:31:56

"Why do Mmmm... Why do you want a Mmmm-United kit?!"

0:31:560:32:00

I said, "Why do you want a Man United kit?"

0:32:000:32:03

He said, "Cos all the other kids in school like Man United".

0:32:030:32:06

I said, "All right, son". I said, "Which Man United kit do you want?".

0:32:080:32:12

He said, "Honestly, Dad, I'm not sure what they play in".

0:32:120:32:15

So we went home with an AC Milan kit.

0:32:190:32:22

I told him that's what United play in when they play in Europe.

0:32:240:32:28

Then I took him to Anfield two weeks later. Changed him, saved him. It's what you've got to do.

0:32:280:32:33

It's so difficult, because we live in an environment where everybody's

0:32:390:32:43

trying to do the best for their kids.

0:32:430:32:45

You try and be nice to them and make sure everybody feels loved,

0:32:450:32:50

particularly if you've got multiple children.

0:32:500:32:53

You're not supposed to have a favourite.

0:32:530:32:55

You do.

0:32:550:32:58

Everyone has a favourite.

0:32:580:32:59

You're not supposed to say it, but life is a tough thing,

0:32:590:33:03

so kids need to know what's going on.

0:33:030:33:05

We sat ours down and said, "See him? He's the favourite".

0:33:050:33:08

"You two come second, but at the moment, he's the favourite".

0:33:100:33:13

Before you know it, you have turned into an embarrassing parent.

0:33:150:33:19

There is a name for someone like my dad. Social hand grenade.

0:33:210:33:26

I embarrass my daughter by doing silly walks or dances.

0:33:260:33:30

He'll get bikini tops and put them on his man boobs while doing a jig.

0:33:300:33:34

It's not nice.

0:33:340:33:35

He was dancing past the shop once, and didn't clock a toddler

0:33:370:33:40

walking towards him, and kneed him in the face.

0:33:400:33:43

Now we've got a bleeding child and he's still bopping.

0:33:430:33:47

-Still having a good time.

-Which, as you can imagine, does embarrass her.

0:33:480:33:51

I fart in front of her friends

0:33:510:33:53

and she gets embarrassed. She's like, "Dad!"

0:33:530:33:55

"No, Dad. Dad, no, no, no!"

0:33:550:33:57

The other night I come home from football

0:33:570:34:00

and I was quite hot and sweaty.

0:34:000:34:01

I said, "Have a smell of that, Hayden!"

0:34:010:34:04

I hope to embarrass my children!

0:34:060:34:09

As my mum likes to be a teenager,

0:34:090:34:11

she tries to follow my style and wear what I wear.

0:34:110:34:14

"Dad, if you're wearing that shirt, I'm not going out with you".

0:34:140:34:17

If I've got a nice wee floaty top, she'll get one,

0:34:170:34:20

but it'll be all flowers. It's like, "No, Mum, this is hideous."

0:34:200:34:24

I think it's more of a joke than being serious.

0:34:240:34:27

APPLAUSE

0:34:270:34:29

The thing is, once you become a dad, it's forever.

0:34:330:34:36

You can't change it, you've crossed the line. It's something that will never change.

0:34:360:34:41

And things about you change. Stuff that you never expected.

0:34:410:34:44

You find yourself going to B&Q for no reason whatsoever.

0:34:440:34:48

Just to walk around.

0:34:480:34:50

Past other men who look like they're dads,

0:34:500:34:52

and look them in the eye and go, "All right, mate?"

0:34:520:34:55

And they're looking at you and go, "All right, mate, yeah, yeah.

0:34:550:34:58

"I've knocked out a couple of kids and I've come for some tools."

0:34:580:35:01

"To build stuff cos I'm a man."

0:35:030:35:05

That's what you do.

0:35:050:35:06

But then the other thing happens - summer comes,

0:35:060:35:09

you get your sandals out, you put them on for the first time

0:35:090:35:11

and in your mind, you're thinking, "Could chafe a little bit.

0:35:110:35:15

"Maybe socks would be a good idea."

0:35:150:35:17

And you're now supposed to talk to your kids,

0:35:200:35:22

get involved with them in a way our dads didn't get involved with us.

0:35:220:35:27

You go to Wacky Warehouses and ball pools and fun places in pubs.

0:35:270:35:33

We didn't have that. When I was a kid,

0:35:330:35:35

if my dad said, "D'you want to come the pub",

0:35:350:35:38

that meant he'd drive there, go into the pub,

0:35:380:35:40

come out with a bottle of pop, a bag of crisps,

0:35:400:35:43

and piss off for four hours.

0:35:430:35:45

If I was lucky, he'd wind the window down.

0:35:450:35:48

When you reach adulthood, you still think your parents are a nightmare.

0:35:500:35:55

My mum's quite funny. She's quite ditzy.

0:35:570:36:00

She gets muddled up with the easiest stuff.

0:36:000:36:03

My mum struggles with technology.

0:36:030:36:05

Mobile phones are a no-go.

0:36:050:36:07

With computers, if something goes wrong, she buys a new one.

0:36:070:36:11

My mum just says the greatest things.

0:36:110:36:14

My mum was very eccentric.

0:36:140:36:17

My mum came in the kitchen and went, "Oh, God, I buy all this food,

0:36:170:36:20

"and all you lot do is eat it."

0:36:200:36:23

We used to go up to Chapel Market in Islington

0:36:230:36:26

and my mum used to bring a pram,

0:36:260:36:27

which was empty, to put all her potatoes in.

0:36:270:36:31

"They are frying eggs on the streets of London."

0:36:310:36:34

I used to try and have an argument with my ma,

0:36:370:36:39

but she just gives you this look, which is "the look."

0:36:390:36:42

Whenever my dad's mad, he doesn't say anything at the time.

0:36:430:36:46

Which is when you know he is mad, when he's silent.

0:36:460:36:49

And you know it's like a volcano that's about to erupt.

0:36:510:36:53

My father was an amazing father

0:36:550:36:57

in a time when men weren't supposed to be like that.

0:36:570:37:01

He couldn't quite breastfeed me, but he got as near as he could.

0:37:010:37:05

My dad gave me some good advice.

0:37:050:37:08

It's not really advice. It's a saying.

0:37:080:37:10

"You're an idiot. Luke, you are an idiot."

0:37:100:37:15

APPLAUSE

0:37:150:37:16

I'm from the generation where your dad thought a day out

0:37:210:37:25

was a trip to the tip. That's what he thought.

0:37:250:37:27

And it was. Your dad would say, "You want to come to the tip?"

0:37:270:37:31

You'd go, "Great! We're going to the tip!"

0:37:310:37:34

"We're going to throw some shit on other shit. It's great!"

0:37:340:37:38

That was a day out.

0:37:380:37:40

We didn't have slides or big things like that.

0:37:400:37:42

We went to the tip and pushed fridges over. That was a day out.

0:37:420:37:45

Even now, my dad can still go to the tip

0:37:450:37:48

and come back with more than he went with.

0:37:480:37:51

Four years ago, my dad went to the tip

0:37:520:37:55

and saw an oak front door in the tip.

0:37:550:37:59

He thought, that's too good to throw away.

0:37:590:38:01

He got it out, took it home and built his shed around it.

0:38:010:38:05

My mum is the only person in Britain

0:38:070:38:09

who's got a shed with a brass knocker.

0:38:090:38:13

Mums also know everything. They know stuff they shouldn't know.

0:38:140:38:18

They know the answer to everything.

0:38:180:38:20

Even now, I haven't lived with my mum for 26 years,

0:38:200:38:25

but I'm sure if I phoned her up

0:38:250:38:27

and asked her where my socks were in my house, she would know.

0:38:270:38:30

Cos they know everything.

0:38:300:38:32

They know a cure for everything.

0:38:320:38:34

They tell you lies about it. They do tell you lies about it.

0:38:340:38:37

My mum used to say, "You've got a headache

0:38:370:38:40

"because you've been telling lies." I used to believe her.

0:38:400:38:43

She came to our house

0:38:430:38:44

and I had this terrible gripping pain in the stomach.

0:38:440:38:49

You know what it's like, you think it could be something serious.

0:38:490:38:53

That could be really bad.

0:38:530:38:55

I'm not going to the doctor.

0:38:550:38:57

I'm not going to go to the doctor cos I don't want him to tell me it's bad.

0:38:570:39:01

I just want to know it's bad so that I can be bad

0:39:010:39:05

and have this thing inside and it's terrible and painful

0:39:050:39:08

She said, "It's trapped wind".

0:39:080:39:11

I thought, "You're not an MRI scan. How do you know?"

0:39:130:39:16

She said, "You need some bicarbonate of soda."

0:39:160:39:20

I thought, "Well, my mum's here, I'll do it."

0:39:200:39:22

And she happened to have bicarbonate of soda in her bag, along with everything else.

0:39:220:39:27

She got the bicarbonate of soda out.

0:39:270:39:29

I drank the bicarbonate of soda.

0:39:290:39:31

I had the biggest burp I've ever had in my life as this wind left me.

0:39:310:39:37

She said, "You've got trapped wind cos you've been telling lies."

0:39:370:39:40

Finally, the most important person in any family is your nan.

0:39:430:39:49

My dad's and mum's families are from Liverpool. They have Scouse accents.

0:39:500:39:54

But my nan always answers the phone like, "Hello?"

0:39:540:39:57

And then she'll go, "All right, girl!"

0:39:570:40:00

My nan and grandma are different.

0:40:000:40:02

My grandma was a grandma-grandma.

0:40:020:40:03

All soft and cuddly, typical grandma who collects thimbles.

0:40:030:40:07

My nan, who's the same age, is very young, hip and sexy,

0:40:070:40:12

if you can say your nan's sexy.

0:40:120:40:15

I don't know who she's expecting to ring, probably the Pope.

0:40:150:40:18

That would be her dream, the Pope to call. "Hello?"

0:40:180:40:21

If she didn't answer like that to the Pope, she'd be very distressed.

0:40:210:40:25

At Christmas, I came home and found that my brother and dad

0:40:250:40:28

thought it would be funny to tell everyone on Facebook

0:40:280:40:32

that I was masturbating.

0:40:320:40:34

I screamed at my brother. My grandma was hovering.

0:40:340:40:37

She didn't hear what was going on. She summoned me over and said,

0:40:370:40:41

"Sam, my number one grandson, what's wrong, darling?"

0:40:410:40:44

I said, "Gran, it's very embarrassing,

0:40:440:40:47

"but Leo told my friends that I'm masturbating".

0:40:470:40:51

She took a moment and went, "Sam, everyone masturbates!"

0:40:510:40:56

"I masturbate, your father masturbates.

0:40:560:40:58

"There's nothing wrong with it."

0:40:580:41:00

I've got to be honest.

0:41:080:41:09

I don't know what was most disturbing about that.

0:41:090:41:12

The idea of your nan...

0:41:120:41:15

LAUGHTER

0:41:150:41:16

..doing stuff you can't imagine,

0:41:160:41:18

or the fact that she sounds like Frank Butcher while she does it.

0:41:180:41:22

But we all had nans that are a bit on the edge.

0:41:230:41:28

Just a little bit racist without knowing it.

0:41:280:41:32

It's a generational thing.

0:41:320:41:34

I remember when my nan went into hospital. I went to see her when she came out.

0:41:340:41:38

I said, "How are you getting treated?" She said, "It's OK, cos the sultan is looking after me.

0:41:380:41:43

I said, "Who?" She said, "The boss, the sultan."

0:41:460:41:49

I said, "You mean the consultant?" She said, "Yeah, but he looks like a sultan."

0:41:490:41:54

And I actually took my... And maybe this is only a Scouse thing as well

0:41:560:42:00

cos you do get colloquialisms.

0:42:000:42:02

I remember taking Melanie, as a Manchester girl,

0:42:020:42:06

to meet my nan for the first time.

0:42:060:42:07

It's a nerve-racking thing.

0:42:070:42:09

Going to the matriarch of the family.

0:42:090:42:12

We walked in to my nan's house...

0:42:120:42:14

There was a massive pile of sandwiches before we'd got there.

0:42:140:42:18

Loads of cups of tea. We walked in and I said, "Nan, this is Melanie".

0:42:180:42:23

She went, "So are you his tart?"

0:42:230:42:27

LAUGHTER

0:42:270:42:29

Her face dropped.

0:42:290:42:30

I said, "No, that's a good thing!" She didn't call you a slag.

0:42:300:42:34

That's parenthood and family.

0:42:360:42:38

Tonight, Britain has taught me that you never really know

0:42:380:42:41

what your nan's up to, that there's only one thing worse than

0:42:410:42:44

a dancing dad, and that's a dad who makes his kids dress up as an Ewok.

0:42:440:42:49

Luke, you are an idiot.

0:42:520:42:55

Good night.

0:42:550:42:56

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

0:43:220:43:25

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