Newfoundland and Labrador - The Codfish That Didn't Get Away

I know.........let's go have a picnic at the lighthouse!

Canadian folk are a happy lot. Patriotic, proud and big-hearted, the latter never better evidenced than during the events and aftermath of 11 September 2001 when the small town of Gander, Newfoundland found itself temporary host to seven thousand stranded airline passengers. The hospitality and friendship exhibited by the townsfolk at that time later came to be celebrated in the hit musical Come from Away, a Newfoundland and Labrador term for an outsider or visitor, someone not from the province. 

Podcasters Nick and Amy Thomson were therefore two such "come from aways" as they embarked on an epic road trip around Atlantic Canada, the easternmost region of the country and closest point between Canada and the UK. Visitors they might have been but they were warmly welcomed and all it cost NIck was a snog with a codfish, part of the Newfoundland Screech-In ceremony.

But what is the Newfoundland Screech-In ceremony?

What is Newfoundland Screech?

Why do you always find the locals in the kitchen at parties? 

And will Nick ever learn how to pronounce Newfoundland?

For answers to these and other questions, click here to listen to Atlantic Canada - Come From Away, part of the Atlantic Canada podcast series.

Incidentally, here's a picture of Nick kissing that codfish. Although with that black bin bag it's wearing it looks more like a turtle. The codfish that is. Not Nick. Either way, I'm not sure who is the more disgusted by this act of animal cruelty. Nick, the lady in the background, or the codfish?

Newfoundland and Labrador - and a beer called Dildo

Canada is big. Very big. In fact it's the second largest country in the world by total area, around seventy times larger than the UK although with a population some 30 million less.

Crowded it is not.

Canada is also named as the Most Loved Country in the World 2025 in the most recent RepTrak report (look it up for yourself) as a model nation for stability, quality of life and social justice. It has stunning landscapes, vibrant and modern cities and a people renowned for their friendliness and politeness. 

It is also home to Dildo Brewing Co. 

The Dildo Brewing Co. & Museum is based in the town of Dildo in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, one of four provinces - the others being New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island - that form Atlantic Canada, the easternmost region of the country and shortest hop between the UK and the Americas.

Humpback whales have no teeth so how do they chew?

Is Atlantic Canada worth visiting?

Newfoundland and Labrador is the starting point for an epic road trip by podcast producers Nick and Amy Thomson, across the four provinces comprising Atlantic Canada, finding out as much as they can about this least well known and visited part of Canada and asking the all-important questions; 

What's with the Irish accents?

Can puffins really sleep on water?

Do humpback whales have the hump because they have no teeth?

Am I pulling your leg about Dildo beer?

This is the first podcast in a new series called Atlantic Canada. 

Click here to listen Atlantic Canada - Part 1

Happy Heavenly 60th Birthday Trevor Beechey

Ten years ago today.

Pictured left to right, myself, Pat, Neil and Trevor enjoying a

beer in Koh Samui, Thailand celebrating Trevor's 50th birthday.

Still miss you mate.

More Berk than Berserker?

I’ve just finished reading Adrian Edmondson’s autobiography titled “Berserker”. It was funny, enlightening and often poignant. It was also ridiculously cheap at just £0.99 for the Kindle version. 

I too have written a book which is similarly funny, enlightening and occasionally poignant. Possibly. It is not ridiculously cheap though and whilst £2.99 for the Kindle version couldn’t sensibly be described as being anywhere near outrageous, it has occurred to me that if someone with the comedic CV of Adrian Edmondson can sell his book for £0.99 then maybe I’m kidding myself trying to sell my own book at three times the price. I may be more berk than berserker but I’m not that much of a berk. 

So that is why own literary masterpiece (literary mantelpiece?) is now available to buy at just £1.99. What? Still more expensive than Adrian Edmondson's book I hear you say? Well, yes. But I have a good excuse for that and it's not my fault because I can only price it at £0.99 if I change the book royalty option from 70% down to 35% and why would I want to do that? And just to complicate matters I have previously made no secret of the fact that my book - the one I'm talking about - is actually an upgraded version of my first book - the one I'm not talking about - which remains available at the now same price of £1.99. Or it did. Because as I want folk to buy the upgraded version, I've had this brilliant wheeze to increase the price on that book to £2.99 because then you'd have to be a real berk to buy the first book instead of the second one .

In the spring of 2022 I walked across northern Spain on the Camino de Santiago with my missus, the indomitable Mrs C. We enjoyed it so much that the following year we walked to Santiago again, although this time from the Portuguese city of Porto, and for good measure we returned to Santiago a few months later to walk from there to Finisterre (once thought to be the end of the earth). And that's what I wrote about. The first book gained a decent amount of traction with some good reviews although the second book hasn't really attracted much attention and is a long way down the Amazon listings. So maybe reducing the price down to the equivalent of only two Adrian Edmondson autobiographies isn't such a dumb move?

More information on both books can be found at A Thirst for Adventure on the Way to Santiago: A Tale of Three Caminos

Adrian Edmondson's autobiography is well worth reading and a Kindle bargain at only £0.99. My book may not be quite the same bargain but if you want to find out more about walking the Camino de Santiago then - trust me - you'll be wasting your money with Adrian's book.

It’s a Classic

As Adrian Gurvitz famously sang;

Got to write a classic

Got to write it in an attic

I’ll stop there. It may have been one of the most played ballads of 1982 but trying to rhyme attic with classic is, well, pretty tragic in my opinion. In fact, he might just as well have sung;

Got to write a classic

Even though my rhyming’s tragic

But his song was a top ten hit so there were obviously plenty of people out there who were prepared to overlook bad rhyme. Which is good news for me because my book is full of it!

Walking the magical Camino de Santiago across Spain and starting each day with a song. What more could any reader want? And all for less than the price of anything that costs £3.00 or more.

Check out this link for details:

https://www.caminodesantiago.uk/home

Searching for the Meaning of Football - At the Birthplace of the fuckin' Hamburger

Episode 8 of Nick Thomson's podcast Around the World in 90 Minutes takes him to Hamburg in northern Germany, birthplace of the hamburger, launch-pad of The Beatles and home to Hamburg SV, one of Germany's largest and most successful football clubs and a previous winner of the European Cup. But that was then. Today, Hamburg SV is not even the top club in Hamburg, having been usurped by a bolshie upstart from one of the city's poorer districts.

From modest beginnings, FC St Pauli has garnered a cult following that spreads way beyond the city's boundaries with its reputation as the world's most foremost left wing football club. The club's present day popularity was borne out of the squats and alternative music scene of Hamburg's seedy port area. FC St Pauli gradually became the cool club to support in the city whilst their once illustrious neighbour "stepped on a lot of rakes" in a gradual decline that eventually saw them relegated from the top division in 2018 for the first time in their history. If it wasn't bad enough having to play their football in the same (second tier) division as their scruffy neighbour (Hamburg fans call St Pauli fans "the fleas"), St Pauli's promotion to the top division in 2024 must have been particularly hard for them to take. But for the fleas, this was the equivalent of social justice, both reward for and justification of their liberal credentials.

Sven Brux - not reminiscing about the 1980's

Sven Brux is Head of matchday organisation and fan affairs at FC St Pauli. He's been a fan since the 1980's, not that he remembers too much about those early days because I was so fuckin' drunk in the 80’s. When asked what the club means to him? It's my fuckin' life! 

But what does the skull and crossbones have to do with FC St Pauli?

What was backpack-gate?

And why do Germans swear so fuckin' much?

For answers to these and other questions, tune in to Around the World in 90 Minutes via the links below.

Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/around-the-world-in-90-minuets/id1772650811

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5HZALrt0Crw6bHfLE0hzVw

Searching for the Meaning of Football - At The World's Most Inspirational Football Club?

Nick Thomson's search for the true meaning of football continues and in Episode 7 of his podcast Around the World in 90 Minutes, he heads south from Manchester to that there London to visit possibly the world's most inspirational football club. A club which once (well, twice actually) provided all eleven players in an England football team, was the inspiration for Real Madrid's iconic all-white kit and took one hundred and one years to complete a tour of Brazil which got interrupted by the First World War although not before providing the inspiration behind the formation of one of the world's biggest and most successful football clubs.

Nick with Corinthian Casuals' chairman Brian Adamson. 

Corinthian-Casuals Football Club was formed in 1939 by the merger of amateur clubs Corinthian FC (founded 1882) and Casuals FC (founded 1883). Whilst it was the Corinthian club that the above narrative refers, both clubs were pioneers of their time in taking football around the country and beyond, at all times championing the ideals of sportsmanship, fair play and amateurism. And Corinthian-Casuals remain an amateur club to this day which, whilst not without its challenges, is nonetheless what makes this club very special. 

Nick with player Marcos Vinicius from Brazil, one of
a number of Brazilian players on the club's books.

What do you get at this ground that you can't get at a Premier League ground? The answer Nick receives to this question is one that will resonate particularly with Manchester City fans right now as they protest against exhorbitant ticket prices.

Also, hear the word juxtaposition used possibly for the first time ever in a football podcast.

How did Corinthian-Casuals become so inspirational?

Why is "pot-hunting" ungentlemanly?

And what does juxtaposition mean?

For answers to these and other questions, tune into the Around the World in 90 Minutes podcast via the links below.

Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/around-the-world-in-90-minuets/id1772650811

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5HZALrt0Crw6bHfLE0hzVw