Chapter 1: What prompted the decision to start a daily podcast?
Let's see how we get on with this. I'm working from home. And the last time I worked from home was during COVID. And it was something I was looking forward to, although it didn't work out in the end. We did it for one day and then the technology let us down the second day. If you can hear me now, the technology hasn't let us down. And we're podcasting from home.
Chapter 2: How did working from home impact the podcasting experience?
Yippee! And we're going to be doing it daily. And we were thinking, if this is to be a success, well, then we're going to have to change your listening habits because a lot of people have a weekly arrangement with certain podcasts, but very few people have a daily arrangement.
So we will have to change people's behaviour and encourage them to work us into their routines, their daily routines, and have us as their daily podcast companion. And we were thinking then about what do people want to do daily that they don't? You see, and it was a lovely afternoon in Dublin yesterday. So I grabbed my big black microphone. I have a little red one. I have a black one.
I have loads of microphones, actually. And you would be introduced to them on a regular basis. But anyway, I grabbed my microphone yesterday. I went out and asked people, what would they like to do daily that they don't? You see, what would you like to do daily that you don't? Tara.
What I would like to do daily is go for a walk every day. I'm a bit of a lazy so-and-so, so I think it'd be really good for me.
Fiona?
Go for a run. It's hard to find the time to run every day. Work's too busy. Life's too busy. And I'm supposed to be training for a half marathon, but that's not going very well.
Poor Fiona. She was a bit hard on herself yesterday. She's training for a marathon. Now... When I was doing them, it was a marathon. But now, seemingly, it's changed into a marathon. Now, I don't care. I know what you mean when you say it. But what has happened that a marathon has become a marathon?
And it is T-H-O-N, but then loads of words in English are pronounced differently than they're spelt. And I suppose, strictly speaking... It should be marathon, but we've been saying marathon for years. I did three marathons, not marathons. And it's been said a lot because you know that joke, yes. How do you know somebody has done a marathon? They'll tell you. Of course they will.
Yes, it's a big achievement. It's a big achievement. How do you know somebody's chosen to see? They'll tell you. You see, it's a big achievement. Anyway, that was Fiona. Isabel.
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Chapter 3: What daily activities do people wish they could incorporate into their lives?
What would you like to do daily that you don't? And put top of your list, listen to a daily podcast. Ray Darcy Daily. Ray Darcy Daily. Tom had a basketball game early on Saturday. It was out in Maeve Binchy country, out in South County, Dublin. And they warm up for about a half an hour. So I traditionally...
you know, go to a local cafe and have a coffee and then I'm back in for the end of the second quarter or whatever. So I went down to a local cafe, lovely cafe, and there was a lot going on. A lot of people there, busy on a Saturday morning. And I ordered an espresso with a drop of hot milk and the lady who was at the cash register was confused and she called down one of her colleagues and
And she, because they have some system on the cash register that you have to put in all the codes for various things. Espresso, one shot, hot milk, da da da da da. And by the way, I saw a cafe recently that was charging 65 cent if you wanted oat milk. Anyway, so the lady came down and she seemed to be experienced and she said, oh, that's a cortado coffee.
Now, I thought it was a macchiato, but then sometimes when you ordered a macchiato, you got this thing in a glass. So to be very sure that I was getting what I wanted, I always asked for an espresso with a drop of hot milk, never knowing it was a cortado. But that's what it is. It's a cortado. Anyway, I was up then at the next hatch, because they had a system here, waiting for my cortado.
And there was a man standing beside me. I'll get to him in a moment. And there was another hatch there. off to my right. And from that hatch, you could get your bowls of chai or whatever you call them, brunch sort of things. And for whatever reason, it was quiet in there and the staff were having a chat. And I sort of tuned in because it's, remember, it's Maeve Binchy country.
And didn't she say that that's how she got an inspiration for a lot of her dialogue and a lot of her characters, that she tuned in to conversations. So as I tuned in, one of the staff was saying, what would you be doing having an effing dog in the shower? What would you be doing having an effing dog in the shower? That's what was said.
I don't know what came before it and I don't know what went after it because I was distracted. But it brought me to a place. Who would bring... Now, I suppose it was innocent enough that, you know, that they brought the dog into the shower to wash it. That's fine and that's probably quite common. But...
Just when you get a snippet of a conversation and you don't get context, your brain can go places. Anyway, the man standing beside me, he was there and he was sort of looking at me as if he wanted to start a conversation, which is fine. Talking heads, naive melody was playing on the system song that I love. In fact, I think it would be there in my top five songs of all time.
And I was sort of moving to it knowingly, maybe mouthing the words. And he said to me, you're showing your age. So we started up a conversation about music. He asked me, did I go to many gigs? Obviously, because he wanted me to ask him, did he go to many gigs? And he said he did. He'd been to Simple Minds and he'd been to the Saw Doctors in Fairview Park.
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Chapter 4: What insights are shared about the importance of daily routines?
I looked it up. Anyway, she is passionate about road safety and I am passionate about road safety. She is so passionate that she set up a website, stoproaddebts.ie and she writes a piece about that today and she is giving out about the fact that there is a lack of joined up statistics about road debts in this country. And how can you possibly introduce good policy if you don't have the stats?
And she's saying that the number of people killed on our roads should be a public health crisis. And she does a thing... which they do in public health, in that she calculates the years of life that have been lost. So if you look at the majority of people who die on our roads are between the ages of 16 and 25. They have long lives ahead of them.
So if you die at the age of 16 and the average lifespan is somewhere around 80, well then over 60 years have been lost, you see. So she says, and she's done the calculations, 190 road deaths in the Republic last year destroyed more years of life than prostate cancer, ovarian cancer, liver cancer, pancreatic cancer and cervical cancer combined.
Fewer deaths but with younger victims means more life lost. So you see what she did there. She calculated all those wasted years of young people who die on our roads. And compared to lives lost due to cancer. So it is a public health crisis. Why have we never got it right?
Now, we sort of did back in the day when the Road Safety Authority was first set up and a man called Noel Brett was in charge. He did a really good job. And I think over a number of years, he halved, well not he, but the Road Safety Authority and everybody else involved, halved the number of deaths on Irish roads. And that was a great achievement. And we seem to have slipped.
We seem to have slipped. Back in December, when Sinead wrote a piece about diffused responsibility and road safety, I was moved for the first time to write a letter to the Irish Times. Now, it wasn't published, but I have it here in front of me and I'll read it to you if you don't mind. And So this is from December. I wrote this in December, the 3rd.
I was struck by a disturbing case of dĆ©jĆ vu when I read Wednesday's piece by Sinead O'Sullivan on road safety. She outlined the malaise of institutional diffused responsibility, which continues to hinder efforts to reduce road deaths in Ireland. It was a similar situation over 20 years ago that led to the setting up of the Road Safety Authority in 2006.
At the time, road debts were in the late 300s and there was an air of futility in the commentary surrounding the issue. Noel Brett, the first CEO of the newly formed RSA, oversaw a five-year plan, 2007 to 2012. In that strategy... In many ways, it led to a halving of the number of fatalities in Irish roads, as I've said.
The strategy had 126 actions, and each of those actions was allocated a department or a state agency with a clear deadline. Noel Brett told me about the frenzy of activity in the lead-up to the regular RSA strategy meetings. Everyone got their homework done, he said, from ministers to Garda commissioners, and as a result, lives were saved.
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Chapter 5: How does the conversation shift to road safety and public health?
What about a daily dance?
Is that too, no. No, I don't think so at the moment. That would work on TikTok. So if you want to open up a TikTok account. I don't. No, okay. Other info I have for you is don't post and ghost. So don't put up a post and then just walk away and go for, or run, go for a run.
Why?
You should, when people see it and they're like, oh, great to have you back, Ray. You have to interact with them.
Okay, right. So you're going to have to go. It's a full-time job, isn't it?
thanks, Mary, or is it Marie? You know, that's what you'll have to get back to them and say that. You know, delighted to be back myself. Tune in again tomorrow. You know, listen anytime you want. So don't post and ghost because if you just post something and there's no interaction, again, this is all the algorithm. You know what I mean? We're just slaves to Mark Zuckerberg now.
Okay. And say, is that for everybody now, right across the generations? Yes.
Yeah, yeah. But it's really when you're starting an account.
Okay.
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Chapter 6: What are the statistics regarding road deaths discussed?
Ah, yeah. What shirt? Get ready with me. I would love to see a get ready with me. Okay.
Real. I'll do it with you now, okay? Right. So I'm wearing this Levi's shirt. Yeah, it's lovely. It's really nice. The reason I'm wearing it is because I read an article about it.
Just say because I like it because Levi's are having another moment.
Wait till you hear this. It was in the business section of the Guardian newspaper.
Excuse me.
And it was about the resale value of clothes. Yeah. So it was saying that now people are looking at an item of clothing, not just for themselves, but for somebody else who might buy it down the line in the future.
Like on Vinted. Yes. Yeah, well, I'm on Vinted.
Some of the high street stores wouldn't have any resale value. But something like Levi's, particularly denim, has a resale value.
Yeah.
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Chapter 7: What personal anecdotes are shared about running and fitness?
I love that word. It's a gorgeous word. So you should, you should.
Embrace it. Embrace the dad.
I just brought the mood down, didn't I?
Dad bod, dad bod. Your sister sent you a picture of you and your dad.
Yes. Why was that? Why did she send it to you? I don't know. She must have just found it on her phone or whatever. I was thinking about Paddy there in 104.
Paddy Claffey.
Would you like to live to 104?
No.
What if you were like Paddy and you were mentally alert and physically fit?
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