Yak Shaving

Jono Hey:

I think it's the sort of thing where somebody comes in and goes, what are you doing?

 

Rob Bell:

So I've never physically shaved a yak, but I have oiled the horn of a Highland cow.

 

Jono Hey:

I'm just doing a bit of yak shaving.

 

Tom Pellereau:

It's usually your wife or girlfriend go, what are you doing?

 

Jono Hey:

It's so out there, you never hear anything like it.

 

Rob Bell:

Life is just a series of shaving a whole herd of yaks.

 

Have you ever found yourself doing something that really wasn't part of the original plan?

 

Well, as it turns out, you're not alone.

 

Hello and welcome to Sketchplanations, The Podcast.

 

Now there are two camps to consider here.

 

Those who go, Sketchplanations podcast, oh cool.

 

And there are those who are a bit more, hang on, what?

 

Either way, you're very welcome.

 

But for those in that second group, Sketchplanations is a series of sketches and illustrations you can find online where each sketch attempts to explain something from the world around us.

 

Hence, sketch, explanation, Sketchplanations.

 

But the best way to know what I'm talking about is to simply pop online to sketchplanations.com or just search for Sketchplanations on Instagram or Twitter, you'll find it.

 

And the links to all those places are in the description for this podcast.

 

And in this podcast, we select one of those sketches each episode and dissect it to within a nanometer of its life.

 

I'm Rob Bell, an engineer and broadcaster, and I'm joined by two of my very close friends who I've known from studying engineering at university.

 

That's Jono Hey, the talent behind Sketchplanations, and Tom Pellereau, AKA Inventor Tom, AKA the apprentice winner from the Telly in 2011, AKA Telly Ho Tommy.

 

Gents, hello, you all right?

 

Jono Hey:

Very good, thank you, mate.

 

Yeah, it's been a productive day working on sketches, actually, it's been brilliant.

 

Rob Bell:

Has it?

 

He never stops, he never stops.

 

Right, well, we launched the podcast series last week with the fun scale episode, and we've had loads of great comments and messages from some of our listeners over the week, which we've loved reading through.

 

So thank you all very much for sending stuff, and please do continue.

 

So stay tuned right to the end of this episode, where we've picked out some of our favorites.

 

Otherwise, Tommy, I've been doing a bit more Googling on you since last week.

 

And I found this quote from right after you won The Apprentice.

 

You said, I don't think I'm a nodding dog or an underdog.

 

The dog that comes to mind most is Lassie.

 

He was helpful, clever and caring.

 

That was 12 years ago.

 

Do you still stand by that to these days, Tommy?

 

Tom Pellereau:

Isn't that amazing?

 

I don't remember saying that at all.

 

I do remember the nodding dog thing coming up quite a bit.

 

Somebody made it up.

 

Well, Lassie, I think that's pretty cool.

 

Rob Bell:

I think it's good, yeah.

 

I'd say that's about the same still.

 

Tom Pellereau:

I thought you were going to read a quote from somebody else.

 

So a quote from me is, yeah.

 

Rob Bell:

Yeah, a quote from you, about you.

 

Jono Hey:

How about you?

 

Rob Bell:

Jono, you've been working on Sketchplanations today, have you?

 

A new one that'll, you publish them on Sundays, don't you?

 

Jono Hey:

That's right, that's right.

 

Every Sunday.

 

It's quite nice to be on a Sunday, I think, because not much comes in on a Sunday.

 

So people are generally kicking back.

 

It arrives sometime during the day, and if nothing's on, you've got the time to do it.

 

It arrives during the week, everybody's busy, oh, another thing to read.

 

So yeah, Sundays, every Sunday.

 

Rob Bell:

It's a highlight for me.

 

But I mean, there's so much variety within the back catalog of Sketchplanations.

 

Do you have a load of ideas booked up?

 

Booked up, backed up?

 

Do you have a load of ideas backed up that are ready to go?

 

Or, I mean, where do you get your inspiration, your ideas from?

 

Jono Hey:

Let's say I have a backlog.

 

Yeah, a backlog of ideas.

 

Rob Bell:

Backlog, thank you, that's the word I was looking for.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Jono's not backed up, everyone.

 

It's fine.

 

Jono Hey:

No, but I have a backlog of ideas.

 

No, I'm always on the lookout.

 

You know, I sort of trained myself to be on the lookout for things.

 

I actually had an idea the other day.

 

I was thinking if someone was gonna ask me for some advice, my advice would be to start collecting things.

 

Actually, I think collecting things generally has served me pretty well over the years.

 

And so this is, it's another form of that, collecting these ideas.

 

It's just a little note thing.

 

Oh, that's interesting.

 

I'll put it in there and make sure I don't forget it.

 

Try and write down as much as I can at the time when it's actually clear.

 

Otherwise I come back to it and I have to learn it all again.

 

But there you go.

 

Rob Bell:

It's a nice way of thinking about it.

 

I like that, a way, you know, collecting things.

 

Have you got a collection of anything, Tom?

 

Tom Pellereau:

My son, I've got a nine year old and he has found the Warhammer in the last couple of weeks and he's started really getting into Warhammer 40,000 as it is now.

 

And he's really into collecting things.

 

It was Super Zings and now it's Warhammer.

 

And now, you know, he's got them in his little box and we go along and we paint them and all that sort of stuff.

 

It's a long time since I've collected stuff other than collecting emails.

 

I'm very good at collecting emails.

 

Jono Hey:

I was thinking about collecting stuff.

 

I've collected just a few little physical things, not many.

 

So my job as design, I'm always collecting nice design ideas.

 

I used to collect like nice product design or inventions, right?

 

And I collect quotes.

 

Just as you see them, just take the moment, that little moment, that 10 seconds to like make a note of it.

 

And then all of a sudden, years later, years later, you look back and you've actually got quite something that's, you know, you start to see the patterns between them.

 

I think it's quite interesting anyway.

 

Rob Bell:

And the collection probably doesn't start out to purposefully be a collection, does it?

 

In that sense, in what you're talking about, it just kind of happens.

 

And then you can, there's a point you look back and go, oh, got quite a lot of that now.

 

Jono Hey:

Yeah, you start like, oh, it'd be quite nice to remember that thing.

 

And then you spot another one, and then you add it to that one, and then you spot another one.

 

It's nice to have a little place to add.

 

So I'm always, yeah, I'm collecting ideas for Sketchplanations these days.

 

Rob Bell:

Anyway, this is our podcast.

 

There are a few about.

 

I mean, I was looking at some stats about podcasts generally today, just to understand the kind of field that we're stepping into.

 

Have you got any idea how many podcast series there are out there?

 

Any idea?

 

Tom Pellereau:

It must now be a bit like, is it a billion yet?

 

It's like millions and billions.

 

Jono Hey:

I was going to say thousands, tens of thousands already.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Like tonight, so I didn't have headphones, I'd left them at my work, and I messaged out on a WhatsApp group from my street.

 

Turns out that just on my street, there is someone who writes podcasts, and there's someone who gives podcasts, and there's someone who used to do podcasts.

 

And you're like, this is just on my road.

 

How many, Robbie?

 

Come on, tell me.

 

Rob Bell:

Well, so apparently there are over five million podcast series with over 70 million episodes between them as of February of this year.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Five million running podcasts.

 

Rob Bell:

Yeah.

 

Well, I don't know if they're running or not, but they're kind of out there in the ether.

 

So how on earth are we going to make any kind of dent in that mountain?

 

I don't know.

 

But, you know, we're here.

 

We're doing it anyway.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Are we bothered?

 

Rob Bell:

We're not bothered.

 

Tom Pellereau:

This is wonderful.

 

Just talking to you two.

 

I really hope people do enjoy this eventually, when if they ever hear it, but amazing.

 

Rob Bell:

If not, hey, we'll have a collection of podcasts.

 

Well, listen, I'm delighted as well to be here back again with both of you to wile away the evening with some chat.

 

And I guess we should probably crack on with exactly that.

 

Let's get started.

 

This episode, we're gonna be looking at yak shaving.

 

Sorry, what?

 

Yes, yak shaving.

 

The idea that in order to accomplish a particular task, you might find yourself needing to complete something else first, which in turn requires doing another little thing beforehand, and so on and so on and so on.

 

Now, if you've not already had a look at this sketch, the artwork or the picture for this podcast episode on your screen should be the Sketchplanation of yak shaving.

 

But alternatively, you can find it online or on social media through the links in the description to this podcast.

 

All right then, Jono, this is your bit, over to you.

 

Yak shaving, it's not a phrase you hear every day, is it?

 

Jono Hey:

It's not, it's kind of a ridiculous phrase, but that's the beauty of it, and it's also the point of it, I think.

 

The point is, why would you be doing such a ridiculous activity?

 

And the thing about yak shaving, which is sort of interesting, is that actually it has a purpose, is that you were trying to achieve some goal, and then in order to achieve that goal, you had to do something else, but that something was in the way of that, and then you had to do something else, and all the way to the fact that somebody finds you shaving a yak, and then what on earth are you doing shaving a yak?

 

Well, I'm trying to do this thing here.

 

So that's the genesis of it, and obviously why I drew somebody shaving a yak, but I learned it from a developer that I worked with, and it's very common when you're working with code and developing software.

 

A classic example I was thinking of might be, you go in and somebody says, oh, let's change the color from a light blue to a dark blue.

 

And so you go into the software to change it to a dark blue.

 

So all you have to do is change one little bit of code to the other one, but then you go and you have a look, and then you're like, okay, it's not in the standard format.

 

I'll just change it into the other format.

 

And then you're like, well, actually, it should really be a variable because we're going to use it in other places.

 

So I'll make a variable, and actually we should do a variable file.

 

So I'll add in some of the other colors into that variable file.

 

And then you find that there's a library that will manage your variables, and you're like, brilliant, I'll install that library, and that'll be much quicker.

 

But in order to install that library, you have to upgrade some other libraries.

 

And so you upgrade the other libraries, but then you find there's a bug in the calendar when you upgraded those libraries.

 

And all of a sudden, you're fixing a bug in a calendar when all you wanted to do was change the color of one thing on the homepage, for example.

 

And so that would be yak shaving.

 

So what are you doing?

 

I'm just yak shaving some things, and you're there deep in some other problem in order to make this other thing happen.

 

So that's what yak shaving is.

 

Rob Bell:

So is yak shaving specifically about IT, like software developing then, or code writing, that kind of thing?

 

Or is that just where the, that's just kind of a good example of it?

 

Jono Hey:

I think it's just a place where it comes up again and again.

 

But I think for me, and one of the reasons I thought it made a good topic to share is this, I think it comes up in everyday life all the time.

 

And in my, yes, software is a prime example, but I was thinking the other day of, I set out to tidy my room, or you tidy your room and then-

 

How old are you?

 

Yeah, sorry.

 

Tidy a room.

 

Well, that's a bit of a mess in here.

 

I trained the camera.

 

And then you look in the box and you're like, okay, I'll just get rid of this box.

 

And then you go, oh, there's some nice photos in here.

 

And then you start looking at the photos.

 

But you're like, I don't want to throw away these photos, so I should do something with them.

 

So I should scan them.

 

And then all of a sudden you're like, okay, well, I need to find an app.

 

I'll find an app to scan it.

 

And then you're on some website reading reviews of photoscanning apps when you're supposed to be targeting in real.

 

That for me is quite a common sort of situation in real life, not just in the code world.

 

Rob Bell:

Well, I mean, I'd say it definitely applies to my life as well.

 

Although if you asked my girlfriend, I think she'd probably have a slightly different take on it in that it's not necessarily things that you have to do in order to get to that.

 

The job that you initially set out to do is just that you got distracted by some other things that you go, oh, I could do that quickly before actually getting on with it.

 

Tommy, you're probably quite similar, aren't you?

 

Tom Pellereau:

Yes, there's a lot of times where you're doing stuff.

 

There's so many different examples in this, in the whole time.

 

One of the classic ones is we have a camper van, a VW California camper van.

 

And you put the bed down to sleep in it, and then the kids are upstairs, and then they come down, they want some breakfast, right?

 

And you're like, oh, put some breakfast on, which means getting to the drawer, right?

 

To get to the drawer, you've got to put the bed up, you've got to get up, you've got to put the seat back, put the bed up.

 

Then you've got to like move this to move that, and then that's in the way, so you've got to move that, and then you've got to open the door to put this, and then you've got to get the kettle out of the sink to get the cup that was in the bottom, to open the drawer, to get to the thing, to get to the thing.

 

And you're like, when you're in a van, there's five things you always have to do to do whatever the one thing is that you actually wanted to do.

 

And what is amazing is when you come home, you're like, oh, to get a spoon, I just opened this drawer and I can get a spoon.

 

To boil water, I just turned the kettle on.

 

I didn't have to do the four other things before.

 

So jack shaving in a camper van is hugely classic, but I think you are also very right.

 

I get distracted.

 

Jono Hey:

It reminds me of one of those little puzzles where you have the squares in a square and there's one space and you need to move that one to the right and you have to move them all the way around the thing in order to do it.

 

Rob Bell:

But I guess the significance of the yak and shaving the yak, I love saying that, yak shaving.

 

The significance of yak shaving, I guess, in this context and this sketch is about the fact that what you end up doing is so obscure and so far away from the original job that you set out to do.

 

Is that kind of part of the concept?

 

Jono Hey:

I think it's the sort of thing where somebody comes in and goes, what are you doing?

 

Tom Pellereau:

It's usually your wife or girlfriend, and go, what are you doing?

 

Jono Hey:

Yeah, I'm just doing a bit of yak shaving because it does make sense.

 

There's a reason why I'm doing this ridiculous thing right now.

 

Tom Pellereau:

But it's gonna take you a long time to explain.

 

So I'm thinking my ultimate, ultimate, yeah, and do you remember when I missed a ski holiday because I had to rewrite a business plan by the Monday and I had to rewrite the business plan because Lord Sugar didn't understand what the heck I was talking about in my business plan.

 

And I was writing the business plan for that because I was trying to get through to be one of the winners, to be the winner rather than one of the two.

 

And then I was on The Apprentice because I've done these tasks and I've done these tasks.

 

And the task one was I was making tomato soup because we were supposed to be making orange juice, but we couldn't get enough oranges and the orange juice machine stopped working and we had to make tomato soup instead.

 

And the whole reason I was doing this is because I want to invent products.

 

And I want to invent products, but I've missed a ski holiday and there's 85 other things in the middle and it's just quite deep, isn't it?

 

That's life.

 

Rob Bell:

So in order to be a crackpot inventor of consumer products, you need to make soup instead of making orange juice.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Yes, or miss a skiing holiday.

 

Or sell nudding dogs on the Thames, as I was supposed to do.

 

Jono Hey:

I'd never thought about it quite in that way, but there's a lot of life you could say is somewhat yak shave.

 

And you're like, what would I really like to be doing now?

 

You know, I'd like to be making music or I'd like to be playing with my kids.

 

But right now I'm at work doing this project so that I can earn the money, so I can do this, so I can get the sales to do that, so I can eventually do this, so that, I don't know, so I can retire.

 

It's a long sequence, isn't it?

 

Rob Bell:

Life is just a series of shaving a whole herd of yaks.

 

Jono Hey:

Well, or is the goal, you know, the smaller you can make that sequence, the happier you'll be.

 

Yeah, just enjoy the yak shaving.

 

Rob Bell:

Is there a distinction though?

 

Because is the concept of yak shaving like a critical path that you need to do to get there, or is it more of a haphazard path than the fact that you end up shaving a yak?

 

The fact that you end up shaving a yak, is that kind of a chance thing, or is it that critical path of things that you have to do in order to get there?

 

Is there a level of distinction between those two?

 

Do you know what I mean?

 

Jono Hey:

I do know what you mean.

 

I usually think of it as the critical path, but it's probably not strictly true.

 

Like you can be doing something and it's very interesting to investigate the other ways.

 

And you know, like it might be a very good thing to read the article right now that tells you about this.

 

And it wasn't your intention to be doing that, but actually maybe that's not such a bad use of your time, you know?

 

So yeah, I usually think about it as the critical path, but perhaps it's not.

 

Perhaps all those little deviations are good things.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Well, sometimes it's really not though.

 

Something like that coding example, Jono, and I find it a lot.

 

We work with Amazon a lot to sell stuff on Amazon.

 

And so much of that is, I wanted to do this, but then I realized that the code name was wrong on that.

 

So then I had to go and change the code name.

 

But to change the code name, I had to change it in the master system.

 

But to change the master system, I had to log in to this system.

 

And then my system that my login had expired.

 

So therefore I needed to find a new credit card, because the credit card, but to get a new credit card, I had to get a PO.

 

And to get a PO, I had to find Jon.

 

And Jon wasn't available till Wednesday.

 

So I had to find Karen, and Karen gave me a thing like that.

 

Rob Bell:

Are you comparing Karen to a yak?

 

Tom Pellereau:

I have changed names.

 

Rob Bell:

Or is Jon the yak?

 

Tom Pellereau:

But yeah, that is.

 

And sometimes you're just like, ah, this yak shaving is so frustrating.

 

And sometimes it's like, oh, I've learned about a whole new thing along the way.

 

Rob Bell:

I think you're right, Tommy.

 

That's a really good point.

 

So sometimes the fact that you end up shaving a yak could be really frustrating.

 

But other times it could be this really pleasant, surprising activity that you've ended up doing as part of the journey of whatever the original goal was.

 

Jono Hey:

I find I think it's quite satisfying.

 

You're like making stuff better, right?

 

It's like, actually, actually, that's probably where I run into a bit more is like, you could do it this way, but it would be better if I did it this way.

 

And it would be better if I did it this way.

 

And it'd be better if I learned about this and coded it so I didn't have to do it again, you know?

 

And you actually learn all the way along that journey quite often, and you've made stuff better.

 

It feels quite good if you unravel the yak all the way back to the beginning again, made the world a better place.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Or you found bugs or you found problems that you might not have noticed otherwise.

 

Rob Bell:

But it can be a massive frustration.

 

Especially so for me, I like doing DIY and woodworking and that kind of stuff.

 

And you just want to get this thing done.

 

But sometimes it means you have to go down, you have to get in the car or get on your bike or whatever and go down the DIY store because you haven't got the right bit or you haven't got the right fixing or you haven't got the right tool or I don't know, your chisel's not sharp enough.

 

So you've got to go inside and get a bucket of water so you can put your sharpening stone in the water and then to sharpen this.

 

And you know, it just goes on and on and on.

 

It's really frustrating.

 

And then you've been out there all day and you've, you know, we've not got half as far as you wanted to.

 

Jono Hey:

It's funny that you say it's so frustrating because to hear you say it and to hear you say it, Tom, they're quite funny.

 

Like it's quite funny to hear all these ridiculous things that you're doing in order to get this other thing done.

 

I don't know what it is.

 

There's something deep in those, quite amusing.

 

Watching somebody do ridiculous, annoying things.

 

Rob Bell:

Have you heard the concept of you're trying to assign how long it's gonna take to do this one job.

 

And you might say it's gonna take five minutes.

 

And the, I don't know, theory is that take whatever you've said, go up a unit and multiply it by two.

 

So if I say this is gonna take five minutes, go up a unit from minutes to hours, five hours times it by two, 10 hours.

 

So what I originally set out is gonna think it's a five minute job, it's gonna be a 10 hour job.

 

That's because I ended up in out of Mongolia with a razor.

 

Whereas I wanted to do was redo the silicon around the bottom of the shower.

 

Jono Hey:

Yeah, it's really good.

 

There's a sketch that I quite like, something called a Hofstadter's Law.

 

And Hofstadter's Law is, it always takes longer than you expect, even when you account for Hofstadter's Law.

 

Rob Bell:

Brilliant, love that.

 

Jono Hey:

So even when you sit there and you think, I know that this is gonna be longer than I think, you never allow enough, even that.

 

Yeah, that's a great rule there, the unit times by two.

 

I'll bear that in mind.

 

Rob Bell:

That's very good.

 

I'll include the link to the sketch on Hofstadter's Law as well in the podcast below.

 

Listeners, if you wanna go and check that one out.

 

I think the two probably are quite linked, aren't they?

 

Cause I don't think you ever expect to end up as far away from the original job as sometimes you do.

 

Tom Pellereau:

No, never.

 

Jono Hey:

Somebody once told me if you're gonna go backpacking, like a long travel trip, the rule is take half as many clothes and twice as much money as you think you need.

 

Which is quite good.

 

But the curious thing there is that you have to first make that estimate of what you think you need.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Yeah.

 

Jono Hey:

Oh yeah.

 

And then you're like, right, okay, that's what I think I need.

 

And then you have to sit there and go, no, that's wrong.

 

Rob Bell:

That's hard to do because you've put a bit of brain power into considering what you're gonna need.

 

Jono Hey:

Yeah, you think you're right.

 

Rob Bell:

And you could probably sit there and justify it.

 

Jono Hey:

Absolutely, yeah.

 

So yeah, to think, okay, I think I'm right.

 

I must be wrong.

 

It's quite challenging to do.

 

I've never managed it, yeah.

 

You should take the money out halfway through and throw away the clothes.

 

That's the way you do it.

 

Rob Bell:

Just to meet that particular law.

 

Jono Hey:

Yeah, get another credit card because people can't run or whatever it is.

 

Rob Bell:

Are there any jobs, Tommy, you mentioned one earlier, that when you're home and not in the camper van, you can just get a teaspoon out of the drawer.

 

Are there any jobs or tasks or activities in life generally that you can think of that don't require or end up yak shaving?

 

Simple tasks.

 

But I don't know if that's a valid question because we said about earlier, you could apply it to life generally.

 

So even sitting down and reading a book, how far do you want to take it?

 

I mean, the paper for that book has had to be made somewhere.

 

Jono Hey:

When I sit down and read a book, I want to have the cushions on the chair and I want to have a coffee, but you have to turn the coffee maker on.

 

But you have to fill up the water for the coffee and it's rather coffee.

 

And then you have to heat up the coffee in 10 minutes before I start a book.

 

Tom Pellereau:

So I was trying to work this out earlier about like flow and the sort of link with this and going, is this as an example where we enjoy things where it has the least yak shaving in it?

 

Like sitting down and watching telly where you're kind of absorbed in a movie.

 

Although it does usually take you ages to find what you want to watch.

 

So you sit there like scrolling through or trying to search and then waiting for it to then download or whatever.

 

And all you want to do is just sit down.

 

And by the time you've finished your food, you still haven't even found the movie you were gonna watch while you were eating your food because you're still scrolling through over.

 

Rob Bell:

Then the batteries in the remote run out.

 

Jono Hey:

I think you're probably onto something.

 

The examples, when you said that, that came to mind for me were two things.

 

One was, and they don't really count, but one was sports where, if I'm playing football or tennis, I'm never yak shaving.

 

I'm just playing.

 

You're in the rules of the game in the moment, just playing.

 

I'm never deviating off to do something else.

 

And the other one was like hiking in nature or something.

 

And I could go climb a mountain and I just, okay, that's our goal.

 

I'll go towards it, do what I need to do to get there.

 

And it's all part of the experience.

 

So that, yeah, they don't really count, but those activities are really fun and they've got no yak shaving in for me.

 

Rob Bell:

Once you're doing them, once you've started, once you're doing them, yeah.

 

Tom Pellereau:

So Jono, one of your other brilliant ones is you underestimate, you overestimate how much we can do in a year or a month, whatever it is, but underestimate how much you can get done in a decade.

 

I don't know if you've done a Sketchplanation of that, but I think of that regularly.

 

And I'm just thinking of this dichotomy that if it's clear that whenever we set out to do something, it's gonna take a lot longer to do, then we're therefore, you would imagine, not gonna get nearly as much done in our life, in our year than we thought we would get done, right?

 

But how come that it does also seem to be true that we sort of get more done in a decade than we ever thought we would.

 

Rob Bell:

So what does it say again?

 

Summarize it again.

 

Overestimate what you can do in a day, but you underestimate what you might achieve in a decade.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Is it that, Jono?

 

Jono Hey:

Essentially, yeah.

 

I think it's Bill Gates said something like that, yeah.

 

Rob Bell:

Wise man.

 

Jono Hey:

Yeah, the idea that like next year, you don't think we'll have made great progress on, I don't know, biofuels or whatever, but you look back in a decade and we've made a huge progress, that kind of, yeah, the way it works.

 

Is that technology only thing?

 

I don't know, that's probably where the experience came from, but maybe it's a life thing.

 

All these little things, they build up, right?

 

I mean, it's like collecting, you know?

 

You know, I could get back to that.

 

If you collect a few quotes here and there, and then all of a sudden you've got a book of quotes, you know?

 

The book sounds like a major achievement, but a few quotes added doesn't seem like very much.

 

So yeah, interesting.

 

Rob Bell:

Was there any other business about yak shaving?

 

Anything that you feel you need to get in before we round off this discussion?

 

I have one.

 

So I've never physically shaved a yak, but I have sanded and oiled the horn of a Highland cow.

 

Jono Hey:

I remember watching that and thinking, but this segment will be very popular.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Whilst it was still attached?

 

No.

 

Rob Bell:

Yeah.

 

Yeah, it was attached to the Highland cow.

 

It was being prepared for show, and it needed its horns shining up.

 

So you get sandpaper and you, I mean, there's no other way to do it other than you sand the horn.

 

Yeah, horn on the head.

 

And the cow's there.

 

She enjoyed it.

 

She really enjoys it.

 

She's very happy.

 

And then you oil it up.

 

Jono Hey:

It's not suggested, is it?

 

Tom Pellereau:

With a female cow.

 

Rob Bell:

I mean, she looked beautiful.

 

She looked ready to be shown.

 

And she was a prize winning cow.

 

Jono Hey:

She won prizes.

 

Rob Bell:

Anyway, I digress.

 

That's as close to I've got to physically shaving a yak.

 

Yeah.

 

Tom Pellereau:

That's a good point.

 

Should we, is it possible to shave a yak?

 

Can we like find a website, shaveryak.com?

 

We can actually go and do this.

 

Rob Bell:

I'd shave a yak, I guess.

 

Yeah, for content, for the podcast.

 

Tom Pellereau:

Amazing.

 

I wonder how much we can get you to do.

 

If I booked it and didn't go.

 

Rob Bell:

Why am I doing it all of a sudden?

 

Tom Pellereau:

If we found a place for you to do it.

 

Sheep shearing, that's pretty close.

 

Right, I'll try and book you in.

 

Rob Bell:

All right, maybe for the promo, for the podcast.

 

We'll go and do some sheep shearing somewhere and video it and then that'll be the promo.

 

Tom Pellereau:

We can record the podcast at the same time, amazing.

 

Rob Bell:

I guess to summarize, I think most people probably could think of things in their lives and yak shaving definitely fits the bill.

 

And I'm kind of sad that we're coming to the end of being able to repeatedly say yak shaving is a praise.

 

Jono Hey:

It's just such a great term, is it?

 

Rob Bell:

It just flows really well, yak shaving.

 

Jono Hey:

It's so out there, you never hear anything like it.

 

Rob Bell:

Anyway, it's a great term and it's a great sketch.

 

I love it, because once again, there's another character in there.

 

There's the guy shaving the yak and then there's the other guy kind of looking on.

 

Jono Hey:

Quizzically.

 

Rob Bell:

Which I really love.

 

Do you know what?

 

That is a thing with a lot of your sketches.

 

There's the thing that's going on, but there's always this kind of secondary character who's kind of going, well, what's going on here?

 

Even though they might not have facial expressions, you just know what they're doing.

 

Tom Pellereau:

And you know it's Jono's wife.

 

Jono Hey:

What the hell are you doing?

 

Rob Bell:

Anyway, listeners, feel free to leave comments about your own yak shaving on the social media posts, on Instagram or Twitter for this particular Sketchplanation.

 

Again, the links to this sketch are in the podcast episode description down below.

 

And we'll all enjoy having a good flick through those as they come in.

 

Otherwise, I think we'll probably call it a day on yak shaving.

 

But in order to do that, first, we need to fade up the music.

 

Here it comes.

 

Well, I think, I think we've already decided what the sketch is for our next episode.

 

It's going to be fubbing, which sounds a little bit seedy, but I can assure you it's not.

 

So make sure you're listening to find out more about that, or you could just look up the Sketchplanation for it.

 

But thank you all very much for joining us on our meandering exploration of the world.

 

There are over 70 million podcast episodes out there that you could be listening to.

 

And now there's over 70 million and one.

 

Imagine that.

 

But here we are, you and us, and we're delighted that you're here.

 

Come on in, make yourself at home.

 

If you want to drink, help yourself.

 

Toilets are just through there.

 

And if you want to subscribe to the rest of the series, then click the subscribe button.

 

We'll be back next week, but until then stay well, go well, and just do your best to keep the place tidy, will you?

 

Cheers.

 

Till next week.

 

All music on this podcast series is sourced from the very talented Franc Cinelli.

 

And you can find loads more tracks at franccinelli.com.

 

Well, we put this podcast series out last week, and it's been very fun seeing how people have reacted to it.

 

Needless to say, if you did enjoy last week and this week's episodes, then please tell your friends and family.

 

But I think we're all really pleased with how it's going so far, right boys?

 

Jono Hey:

Yeah, it's been fun.

 

Rob Bell:

We've got listeners.

 

Jono Hey:

Hi listeners.

 

Rob Bell:

Great.

 

But it's been great also hearing our listeners' experiences of the fun scale.

 

And we've had a number of messages pertaining to a fourth type of fun, which I think we kind of brushed over.

 

Jono Hey:

I think Tom suggested it might be death.

 

Rob Bell:

Yeah, death, type four death.

 

So Andre Brown has left us a message on LinkedIn saying, as engineers, how did you not explore type four as being the opposite of type two?

 

Fun to do, but not fun to remember.

 

I think we've got a similar comment as well, Jono, on email from Anne-Marie, was it?

 

Jono Hey:

Yeah, which is I think this is a really good point.

 

It's this idea of things that were really fun when you did them, like type one fun when you did them, like eating ice cream, but you actually really regretted them later.

 

So we've all done binge watching, staying up too late.

 

Rob Bell:

Binge drinking.

 

Jono Hey:

Binge drinking too much, whatever.

 

Yeah, things that are fun in the moment and you severely regret later on.

 

Rob Bell:

It's all the vices really, right?

 

Indulge in the vices.

 

And then a little bit later on, maybe the next day, oh, that wasn't such a great idea.

 

Jono Hey:

We had another one, which I really liked coming from Gretchen, which was about how they might change over time, your experiences of type fun.

 

So the example she gave was about parents taking you on all sorts of outdoor ventures as a teenager, which as a teenager was solidly in the type three fun stage.

 

And then as you get older, you look back on those things and they perhaps moved into more type two as you reflect on them.

 

And so this thought that perhaps as parents, it's your job to put a little type three fun to your kiddos to show them the value of type two fun in the future.

 

Even though they might not be doing type three right there and then.

 

Rob Bell:

I totally agree.

 

You know, you will appreciate this in later years.

 

It reminds me of piano lessons.

 

You'll regret it when you're older if you don't keep practicing now.

 

You'll regret it when you're older if you don't walk up this mountain right now.

 

You know, I just want to sit in the car and smoke and, not smoke, I just want to sit in the car and go on social media.

 

Tom Pellereau:

I know you grew up in France.

 

Jono, I'm sure you've said this to me that you hated doing piano and piano lessons when you were young.

 

Like really, why am I doing this, Mom and Dad, practicing?

 

And now you'd absolutely love it and you're so good.

 

Jono Hey:

Thank you, yeah.

 

And it's hard, it's really hard to persuade people about that future benefit.

 

I don't know if I ever told you, but I was learning piano and clarinet and I decided I just didn't want to do either of them.

 

And so I went to my mom and said, I want to give them up.

 

And last moment, I chickened out and only said, I want to give up clarinet.

 

And here I am, 35 years later, still playing the piano as a result.

 

Funny how things work.

 

Rob Bell:

We have another message from Colby in Texas, suggesting that perhaps a fourth category of fun might be the journeys that don't ultimately have the most thrilling outcome, i.e.

 

injury or rejection or humiliation, but do yield a surprising thrill.

 

you might have lost the race, but you met a dear friend along the way, and thus makes it all totally worthwhile.

 

So it's very much that fourth type of fun that we didn't explore in the podcast.

 

It's true.

 

Jono Hey:

I think maybe something's missing.

 

We should add to the scale.

 

Rob Bell:

But then I think somebody did mention somewhere that lists of three do work better than lists of four or any other number, really.

 

So fair enough.

 

Jono Hey:

It's easier to remember, isn't it?

 

Rob Bell:

But also along the lines of, we were talking about the Gretchen outdoor pursuits, we've had two references to the fun scale outlined on Strava, which is like the fitness outdoors app, right?

 

So Rich Taylor's wet, wet, wet cycle around Berkshire at the weekend, he goes on to label as classic type two fun.

 

Nice.

 

I mean, classic tales.

 

Tom Pellereau:

I like the way it's now called type one, type two, type three in all of our minds.

 

And everyone listen, you can't sort of forget that now.

 

It's type one.

 

Rob Bell:

I know what you mean.

 

Jono Hey:

I had one from an old friend called Joel.

 

It wasn't to me, but he says, it's the muddiest race I've ever done.

 

It was cold, wet, wore latex gloves with thermal gloves.

 

I had one water bottle dedicated to squirting the drive train, type two fun.

 

Rob Bell:

Yeah, brilliant.

 

Tom Pellereau:

It was right there.

 

I love that.

 

Rob Bell:

You really placed a picture of what that was like out there.

 

Tom Pellereau:

That's great creativity.

 

One bottle just purely to clean up.

 

Rob Bell:

I mean, it sounds grim, like grim in the cold and the wet.

 

It's then to go on to describe that as fun.

 

But that's what the fun scale is all about, man.

 

But finally, from the post bag this week, is a retrospective thought from my very own Jono Hey.

 

And it was the quote, Jono, that you thought of after we'd finished the podcast last week from Will Rogers, the early 20th century American political humorist, which I think applies very well to some of the stories we told last week, particularly our friend Ben's ski accidents.

 

Jono Hey:

This is your reaction to anything that happens to anybody else, which is his quote, is that everything is funny as long as it's happening to someone else.

 

Which is fair enough, isn't it?

 

Rob Bell:

Which reminds me, in Faulty Towers, there's a line where the Irish builders come over to the hotel to do some walls, and he's a cheap builder.

 

That's why Basil's got in him.

 

And Sybil, Basil's wife isn't having any of it.

 

She wants the reputable builder.

 

Basil Faulty and the Irish builder are chatting away, and the Irish builder goes to Basil, ah, Mr.

 

Faulty, you know, we should always remember there's always somebody worse off than yourself.

 

And Basil goes, what is there?

 

I'd like to meet him, I could do with a laugh.

 

Well, thank you all very much for all of your comments.

 

We love receiving them.

 

We read them all, and keep spreading the word.