Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hello and welcome to Ian Smith is Stressed, a comedy show all about my stress and my misguided attempts at relaxation. Sit back and relax. Unless you're on a stool, in which case, please do not sit back. If you've already sat back, I apologise. Just wait for the ambulance to arrive, and then when you get in the ambulance, sit back and relax. LAUGHTER
Try not to focus on the fact that you're losing blood and focus on how warm the blood is. Now, this is series two. So obviously I didn't find the secret to relaxation first time round, but I think this series, I'm going to crack it. I've left no stone unturned. In fact, I've unturned all the stones twice, which actually means I've sort of returned the stones to their original positions.
But I've left no stone unreturned. I'm always stressed. I even found writing this show very stressful. I wrote lots of documents on my computer. Ian Smith is stressed, new ideas. Ian Smith is stressed, plans for 2026. But I'd been using the acronym for Ian Smith is stressed. So those documents actually said ISIS, plans for 2026. ISIS, new ideas. ISIS, the final assault.
Long story short, my front door was kicked down by 40 anti-terrorism police officers. And let me tell you, it's hard to relax when that happens. I tried to explain Radio 4 to them, but they were much more of an LBC gang. I've been in my fair share of stressful situations. I once had to buy anusol. You don't need to know why.
And I went into a pharmacy and I asked someone at the counter for Anasol and they walked me over to the shelf where I realised I could have just picked it up myself, used a self-service checkout machine, but instead I looked someone in the eye and I basically said, please help me, I've got a problem with my arse. Stress is everywhere, and you can't escape it by going to Europe.
I once went on a city break to Paris.
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Chapter 2: How does moving house contribute to stress?
I was in a restaurant with my girlfriend. I ordered something on the menu written in French, and when I ordered it, the waitress repeated that order to the room, and everyone in the room went, oh. That is a stressful situation. That is not a good sign. Long story short, I'm pretty sure I ate cow's brain.
I can't be 100% sure because the waiter doesn't let you choose the cow in a tank like you do with a lobster. Partly because of the size of the aquarium and the teaching cows to scuba, it just wouldn't be cost effective. And I'm not condoning eating cow's brain. You know, I don't recommend it, it tastes weird, and also now I seem to have taken in some of the thoughts and memories of the cow.
LAUGHTER
That's a risk with eating brain, I'm afraid. It's given me a craving for grass and an attraction towards bulls that I cannot explain or resist. I've learned everything I know about relaxation by copying and pasting a How to Stop Smoking book into Word, finding all the uses of the word smoking, smoke, or cigarettes, and replaced them with being stressed.
I found this works perfectly fine advice-wise. That's why now, if ever I feel like going outside to have a few being stresseds, I put a pencil in my mouth to replicate the feeling of being stressed. And if anyone offers me a being stressed, I simply say, I don't being stressed anymore.
LAUGHTER
I've also started wearing a nicotine patch and I chew nicotine gum and cards on the table. I am addicted to both of those things. This week, I'll be talking about moving house and my transition into the world of being middle class. And I've always been a working class northerner. That's who I was. I've never been middle class. I remember the first time someone asked me if I had a B day.
I'm like, yeah, 13th of September, every year. We've all got B days. And I think this is a good example of my working class background. And the first line of this story is going to make it sound like I'm about to tell you something far more traumatic than I am. So when I was in primary school, a teacher blindfolded all the kids and made us touch some fruit. No, that is what happened.
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Chapter 3: What humorous experiences does Ian share about moving?
It was fruit. It was only fruit. It wasn't a, oh, banana. Banana every time, sir. It was fruit. We were learning about texture. The only way we know how up north, apparently. Blindfold some children, put an orange in their hand, see if they can tell it's an orange from the feel of the orange. I've got this fruit in my hand and I've got no idea what it is.
And the teacher's getting impatient with me. He's going, come on, Ian. Come on, what fruit is it? And no one has ever shouted that at me since, by the way. Do you know why he's angry? He put the blindfold on me. I haven't caused this situation. LAUGHTER So he whips the blindfold off me. I'm looking at this thing. I've got no idea what this is. It was an avocado.
This is 1995 in the north of England. We don't have avocados. Horrible lesson. One poor kid got bullied for the rest of school because he got kumquat first go.
LAUGHTER
But I'm getting posher now. And I can't deal with it. I don't think I belong. I went skiing for the first time.
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Chapter 4: How does Ian feel about his transition to middle class?
I was just so bad at skiing. I just kept falling over. And at one point, I'd fallen on the floor. And someone who was good at skiing, one of your lot, they like glided past my body. And they pointed at me. And they said out loud, he's got all the gear, no idea.
Yeah.
All the gear, no idea. I'm getting slammed. In rhyme as well, the worst way to get slammed. But that doesn't even make sense as an insult. I guess what they're saying is, he's bought all of the equipment, but he can't do the thing he's got the equipment for. That's embarrassing, isn't it? He's got all the stuff, but he can't do the thing he's got the stuff for.
Do you know what you need to try skiing for the first time? All of the gear. You need all the gear. The gear is a requirement of the slope. They won't let you onto the ski slope if you don't have all of the gear on. And if all the gear, no idea, is the worst you can be, does that mean the best you can be is none of the gear, all of the ideas?
You're going down the slope on your regular shoes like that, like, hey, don't need any of that stuff. This isn't even the thing that annoyed me most. And this shows you how middle class I'm getting. This is how middle class my problems are. I never dreamt I'd be able to have a problem as pathetically middle class as this. This was my big problem in January last year.
I'd come back from skiing to discover that I'd left my AirPods in the chalet. Oh, no. My AirPods in the chalet. Oh, what next?
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Chapter 5: What challenges does Ian face in maintaining friendships?
My cravat still in the villa. Oh, I can't read tonight. My monocle is in the chateau. So I had to get my AirPod sent back to me in a package, but it also come with this postcard. And the postcard said, Dear Ian, Maisie mentioned it was you who left your AirPods. Please find them in the package. We hope you had a good week, despite your lack of ski ability.
LAUGHTER Why am I getting slagged off in a postcard? LAUGHTER Also, a postcard, it's the only completely readable bit of correspondence. Now my postman knows I'm shit at skiing. And that's particularly humiliating because he delivered me all of the gear. Honestly, middle class places are stressful for me. I was actually involved in one of the most chaotic situations I've ever been involved in.
Last year, I was in a very posh pub in Rye. Lovely place, nine tables spaced out. And a couple left their table and a seagull come down to try and grab some scraps of food. But there was nothing for it. But the seagull, it still wanted something. So what it did is it picked up a steak knife.
by the handle and it started to fly off with the steak knife but the steak knife is heavy so it never truly caught flight what it did was a very low figure of eight above the beer garden while precariously dangling a steak knife and people were losing their minds Everyone was up off their seats like, ah, what do we do now?
Because no one knew what to do because, I don't need to tell you this, this is a brand new situation. No one has been through this before. There's one woman about here. She's instinctively picked up her own roast dinner, put it above her head like a shield. There's hot gravy coming down her arms. She's just taking the burn. There's another man quite far on this side. He's dealt with it very well.
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Chapter 6: How does go-karting become a metaphor for adult friendships?
He's just picked up his dinner and he's gone into his car in the car park and he's just eating his roast dinner off the dashboard, watching the entire thing unfold like he's at a drive-through cinema screening of it. The landlord of the pub runs past him. This guy, he looks agitated. He's angry and he says four words which tell you so much about this man's past, his present and his future.
He just goes, Jesus Christ!
Not again!
And we follow this poor man's eyeline to the roof of his own pub where we can see a bird's nest that I would describe as 80% cutlery.
LAUGHTER
Now, as I come towards moving house, one of my big stresses about it is that your friendship groups get spread around. You know, it gets harder to keep in touch with people that make you happy. Or is this just me? Am I bad at maintaining friendships as I get bogged down with the stresses of adult life? What can I do to improve? I decided to tackle these big questions with my friend Stuart Laws.
But I wanted to do something fun. Because as you get older, all you ever do is go for a coffee. Boring! I want to be young again. I want to do fun things. Just because I'm in my late 30s doesn't mean I can't go laser quest or go-karting. So we are going go-karting.
So what you are about to listen to is two friends go-karting while simultaneously attempting to have a serious conversation with each other in a segment that Radio 4 bosses described as an audio recording nightmare. And something that could sound, and this is a quote, truly terrible.
I met Stuart and we got the customary how was your journey chat out of the way right at the start, as is required when two men in their 30s meet each other.
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Chapter 7: What is the purpose of rage rooms in dealing with stress?
I could have gone straight Piccadilly line, because I'm obviously north-west, and so I went central in, and in theory I could have gone Piccadilly, because I'm sort of split halfway between the flats, between the Met Piccadilly and the central line. Come on! Riveting stuff!
Just a couple of guys catching up. First up, like what happens during all good catch-ups with a friend, we had to have a safety briefing.
Right, so stay in the car. Do not get out unless we say so, because we're going on together. No crashing into each other or barriers, otherwise you hurt yourself and you break the car. If we see you hitting each other, ramming each other off a track, anything like that, we're going to chuck you off. Sound fair? Yes. Yeah, cool. It's meant to be fun, not a race. No need to kill each other, okay?
Okay, yeah.
Any questions? Yeah, no questions from me. I was also excited to discover that we'd arrived at a go-karting track for the stars.
The most famous people we've had is, like, We had members from Take That be here for a private event way, way long ago, way before I started working here. And I don't know anything about Take That, but I just know it was the members that aren't Gary Barlow or Robbie Williams. So I don't remember Take That.
It's still good, though.
Oh, yeah.
So after Take That, it was time to put that safety gear on. It was time to put that safety gear on. And this is where I was once again shamed for having a famously small head.
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Chapter 8: How does Ian conclude his thoughts on stress and friendship?
That's nice, it's got Lilo and Stitch on it.
Yep, so with my head, face and brain currently protected by Disney character design... We hit the track to burn some rubber and have a proper catch-up, but I immediately realised the big problem with my plan.
How do you find... How do you keep in touch with people? How do I keep touching people? How do you keep in touch with people? I'm not touching people. In touch with people. Hello? It's loud, isn't it?
Yep, this was perhaps going to be one of the most incoherent interviews the BBC have done since Prince Andrew on Newsnight. We muddled on for a bit, but we were going in circles, both conversationally and in real life, because we were on a track. This was not working out how I'd hoped.
You're not looking each other in the eyes, are you? Because you're side by side, and it's sort of like you do another activity. You don't have to look each other in the eyes. It makes it easier to sort of have that heart-to-heart, because I think, you know, often people talk about that with men. Would you say? Are you talking? Are you talking? Yeah, I'm saying. Are you saying something?
What were you saying?
Yeah, there was no heart-to-heart going on, mid-go-karting, and I should have known that. And the rain only made things worse.
I'm sliding all over the place. Well, the rain's coming. The rain's coming, so be careful here. The rain's coming. How do you know her? How do I know who?
We stopped trying to talk after this and Stuart just started relentlessly lapping me because I was too slow and I was too scared of the slippery conditions. When we got off the track, it was time to go home and I felt like we'd covered no ground at all. It was very loud in there. I couldn't really hear what you were saying.
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