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Chapter 1: What are the parenting challenges discussed in this episode?
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It's a tasty way to reclaim those family moments. That's kind on the wallet too. Ah, Rob, also. You get the after-school meltdowns, don't you? They're hungry, they're tired, one wants to sit in the front, one wants to choose the music. Or you've brought the wrong snack, or you get home and they want to watch different things on TV.
Josh, when the kids come out of school and they just throw their bags at you, say I'm hungry, arguing with each other about who sits where in the car. Oh, my word.
It's full of... Couldn't agree more, Rob. And do you know what? When you find yourself in that situation, in my experience, there's no 330 meltdown that can't be calmed with a £5 serving of dough balls.
Chapter 2: How do Rob and Josh handle after-school meltdowns?
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Hello, you're listening to Parenting Hell with... Imogen, can you say Josh Wendicombe?
Can you say Rob Beckett?
Stop. Just sign. Rob Beckett. And Josh Whittakin. Josh Whittakin.
Brilliant.
I'll come to us one day. She got your name wrong at the start, but I think she was stressed because she was obviously asking a teenager.
So, this is my 16-year-old daughter, OG listeners and originally from Kent. I also qualify for your long-time school runners. Kent, Dubai, Singapore and currently Johannesburg, or as I call it, Joburg, with daughters aged 16, 23 and 30 and a grandchild on the way.
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Chapter 3: What experiences do Rob and Josh share about their recent travels?
She's nowhere near the longest school run.
No, I know. I mean, it's a long stint, but this is what's awful about that. That it's a horrendously long school run. But what we've discovered is it's unremarkable. It is remarkable. But it is insane and it's dominated a life of 20 years. But the sad thing is there's people out there doing it for 40. Well, I was at the school sports day. Well, not school sports day, school cross country.
Was you there as the sort of, you know, the patron of the cross country due to your running? I was just offering tips. Right. What was your tip?
Just keep going.
Chapter 4: How do they cope with busy schedules and parenting responsibilities?
Just keep going. Okay, cool. Keep going. Stop if you want. Not judging by your lifestyle, Rob. No. It's fucking back to back.
You need to listen to your own advice, mate. The king of the hypocritical. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Hypocritical buffer, man. No buffer for me today.
Never give up. I absolutely love listening to your podcast.
Chapter 5: What humorous anecdotes do they share about school events?
I want to say it gets easier, but it doesn't. Every stage brings a new challenge, more expense, but amazing memories. Lovely. Rob. Yeah. I was at school sports day and one of my friends. Cross country. Cross country, sorry. Her daughter's in my daughter's year, but her sister was also running in a higher year. What?
Not the daughter's sister, the mum's sister. The mum's sister was also running in the kids' cross country. What age? It must be a few years above. Let me get straight.
Chapter 6: How do Rob and Josh discuss the impact of their careers on family life?
Your daughter's class, she's got a friend, and that friend's mum was talking to you, and she said that her daughter's running in your daughter's class, but also her sister was running in the school as well. Yeah. That is a long one. My older brother's in his 60s. So that's a 20-year gap.
Well, there you go. There you go.
There you go. It's a classic remarried older dad second time round scenario.
Exactly. Exactly. Now, we haven't spoken in a while, and we are both in the middle of something mental. Yeah, we both do. In terms of diary. Yeah.
Chapter 7: What unexpected issues arise during home repairs?
Let's just go head to head on who's living the least buffer lifestyle.
From, well, no, my week wasn't that no buffer, but I was in China for the whole week. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, fine. But no, today's been no buffer. I went to China for a week with Romesh. Hong Kong, then China. So Lou's been at home with the kids, obviously, and she said... She's not had a... So she's had a very busy week with work.
So my diary calms down a lot from July, August time to the point where I've got nothing in. So like, if anything, too much buffer. It's all buffer. It's basically just buffer.
I'm buffering for months. My second half of the year is very different from my first.
But my first is insane.
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Chapter 8: What lessons do they learn from their parenting experiences?
Yeah, and so it'll calm down again and we'll do more parenting and stuff like that. But Lou's obviously gone back to work. Her book's been a big success. So she's doing lots more other work. She's been invited to be a judge for the Book Awards. So she was doing that this week. So that was quite big and a lot for her to do. She had to read all these books. So it's a lot of time consuming.
Then she had to go in and do all this stuff, which is fine. Obviously, it's just part of her job. But obviously, she was solo parenting. And then... Also, within this week, our lights kept flickering. Electric's kept flickering in the house. So I'm in China, not being able to sleep at like 3 a.m. And then she said, I don't know what's going on. So she was going to be stressed and worried.
So I messaged the electrician, big up Ryan. Ryan, I said, can you speak to Lou? Lou didn't have his number. So she rung him and he said, it should be fine, blah, blah, blah. It's not going to be dangerous because of the way it's been wired. I can come tomorrow if they're still flickering. So... He came around the next day and then he said, all of your stuff's fine.
It's from the main power station or whatever. So there's a problem on the cable that comes from the power. I don't understand these words, but I'm saying someone said substation. I don't know if that's what they're talking about, but I've clung onto that. In my head, the cable from the substation to the house is damaged, needs replacing. They've come around to replace it.
They don't know where it is. No one, apparently, again, allegedly, this is what I've heard through Lou on WhatsApp, apparently no one filed where they put the cable in the office. Right. So they've just been digging holes trying to find a cable that's not working whilst we've got a poltergeist in the house. So that's been going on.
So at the moment, the entire house is covered by holes and they're having to dig into, like, the neighbours' gardens. What? I know it's not our fault, but, you know, you feel a bit like, oh, God. What? Just for one wire? Yeah, I don't know. But anyway, so I think they found it now.
How can't they just follow the wire? Josh, I don't... I mean, obviously they've thought of that. I'm fully aware I can't come up with the ideas that they're going to go, wait a minute, that's a better idea than we've come up with.
Josh, this has been happening with me in China and I landed at 6am this morning. I was going home, but then there was a drama at home because we can't open a certain door because it's full of builders digging holes. Lou let the dogs out of another door. One of the dogs jumped about three fences and ended up in a field full of horses. Oh my God. Oh my God.
Country living.
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