Friendship Bench. We Forget Human Connections Offline. Danny Brown

Hello, this is Catherine, your host of the podcast, your positive imprint, the variety

show, featuring people all over the world whose positive actions are inspiring positive achievements.

Exceptional people are rising to the challenge.

Music by Chris Nole.

ChrisNole.com.

C H R I S N O L E.

My website, yourpositiveimprint.com.

And of course you can follow me on Facebook and Instagram or connect with me on LinkedIn.

Listen to my podcast from any podcast platform, apple podcast, Google podcast, iHeartRadio,

Spotify Podbean, or of course your favorite podcast platform, your positive imprint.

What's your P.I.?

'Do not judge by appearance.

A rich heart may be under a poor coat,' a Scottish proverb..What is it that you

observe when you are on a walk or shopping?

Do you think about the people whom you observe?

What comes to your mind and through your own soul?

Well, Danny Brown of Scotland is inspired by those around him, but not his friends and

colleagues alone, but by those he observes or meets through eye contact or a friendly head nod.

Part of being a proud Scott is to listen to the silence, be still and let your soul catch up.

His work for those in need, non-profits, is globally known and his famous quote resonates worldwide.

And I absolutely love this quote.

'We forget human connections offline'.

His soul was touched by a woman he observed eating ice cream.

Danny Brown.

I'm so anxious to hear your story.

And of course your positive imprints.

Welcome to the show.

Thank you Catherine.

And that's quite the entry you have that down, pat.

Whenever I do a podcast, I have to do like an intro 10 or 20 times, and then maybe get one snippet.

So I was pretty impressed.

Listen to you.

Oh, well, it's, it's about you and, and, , I love, I love featuring people like

you and, and having you share your stories and of course, positive imprints and inspiring

others so that they can go out and do the same.

So how are you today there?

I am good.

Thank you.

I'm in the Muskoka, , area of Canada, Ontario, Canada.

So we get a lot of snow and cold which is one of the reasons we moved here, , to get that proper winter.

Let's hear a little bit more about you.

I was on your podcast and that's how I met you.

And you also unbeknownst to me work for captivate FM, Mark Asquith'scompany, which is a podcast host.

That's correct.

We host the audio file is also help you distribute the show.

Promote, it , et cetera, for that.

Yeah.

Mark speaks highly of you as well.

I told him when you were on my show, I spoke to him about it and he says, oh yeah, Catherine's awesome.

Catherine's great people.

So you've got a big fan there.

Oh, that's so sweet.

Well, he and I have a very good working relationship and I absolutely love his input.

, I so much appreciate him.

And I appreciate you, and that you're on the team.

So, I think that, people would love to hear a little bit about the culture of Scotland.

yeah.

I mean, Scotland is a weird place.

I'm sure like any country in the world, it's it's very much broken down into areas.

So you have the lowlands, which is the, the border area, you know, border on England.

Uh, you have the Midlands, uh, which is where I'm kind of from, from Edinburgh.

And then you have the Highlands.

So you get up into the likes of Inverness sky and all the islands beyond that, uh, Eila where the

make amazing whiskey single-malt whiskey, um, and each, each section has its own little subsections.

So you have in Midlands, you've got Adam Rover.

Inaudible.

It's a big sort of unspoken of rivalry there between which is the true capital of Scotland

official Edinburgh but most people think is Glasgow.

Um, so it's, it's interesting.

And then I lived into borders for about 10 years.

My parents moved down to the, the borders when I was 11, 12 year old.

And I sorta went to high school there and sort of grew, went from my teenage.

Uh, there before I left Scotland about 20, 21 and moved to England to, to work, et cetera.

what are some of the things that you absolutely love about being a Scot?

Um, so, so the funny thing is , I also have a Scottish accent.

But I find it so soft compared to a lot of accents that you can hear.

And I certainly stronger accent when I was younger.

, Edinburgh Edinburghen Glaswegian accent is very similar as you grown up.

, Glaswegian is stronger.

It's more guttural if you like.

But as you've grown up as a kid in Edinburgh, depending on which part of Edinburgh you live in

it can also be pretty strong, but I found it's gotten softer over the years because I've been

around in different countries and different places and, and you, you adapt with people.

People can understand what you're saying.

Um, but I think that's one of the bonuses of being Scottish is it's similar as one

of the most trusted accents globally.

So when you hear people speaking and you hear a Scottish accent and it's trustworthy like

the Irish, uh, I think is trustworthy, , so there's various accents across the world.

And it also helps spark up conversation because people say, oh, where are you from?

So that's a good icebreaker

. Catherine: It is an icebreaker and that's

our countries, our cultures, ourselves that is, is so absolutely wonderful.

, and something to be said for educating others as well in acceptance of each other.

We're going to get started unless you have anything else that you wanted to share about Scotland,

Uh, no, it it's funny.

You mentioned acceptance though, because one of the reasons, , I moved from Scotland to

England at the time was I was finding that the environment around me was becoming very

toxic, , very racist against England of all places.

There was a lot of nationalism coming to the Scottish, or the mindset because of what had been

happened during the Margaret Thatcher years, , and, seventies and eighties, in the UK and how that impacted

Scotland with stuff like the poll tax, et cetera.

So long story short, it was becoming a very toxic place, a toxic environment, and I

couldn't buy into that.

, it didn't feel right.

And so that was one of the reasons I moved up.

I think it's so fitting because I use that Scottish proverb in

the beginning, do not judge by appearance.

A rich heart may be under a poor coat.

Danny brown left Scotland and eventually made his way to his new home in Canada.

While visiting Niagara falls with his wife, Danny noticed a woman eating an ice cream cone in a cafe.

He watched her and even after leaving the cafe.

He could not get her off his mind.

This one observation changed his life.

Forever.

On my, , my 30th birthday my wife took me to Niagara falls, , I moved to Canada when I was 37.

It was an amazing weekend.

We did all the touristy things.

We went under the waterfall, everything was amazing.

Uh, and so it was just on the last day we were having some breakfast.

I think we had gone to a diner for some late breakfast, and preparation for coming back home.

And we just sat there, uh, talking away and diner was pretty busy and I noticed that an older lady to

me, maybe at the time she was older or looked older.

, but she came in and she sat down and got a little coffee and she had an ice cream.

Um, and she just sat there . All by her own.

For whatever reason.

It just, it caught my eye that of all the hustle and bustle there was this

lady, eating an ice cream on her own.

, I I'd like to think of myself as someone that, that you mentioned a little about, you know,

connecting with people and, and sparking up conversations, et cetera, or getting to know people.

But at that time I didn't, I, I didn't go over to say hi, you know, how's life, et cetera.

And it bugged me all the way home.

It bugged me that nothing was said.

And I, I wondered about the story of this lady sitting on her own in a packed dining area.

in a packed restaurant.

So I spoke to my wife about it, and I think, the, the thing that really bugged me about not initiating

any conversation, I'm one of these people like to sit down on a park bench and a wide open park in

the summer and just people watch and watch and go by , and make up, I don't know if you've ever done

it, but make up little stories about their lives.

Complete Balderdash.

And so I was thinking about this lady afterwards and I was thinking, well, maybe she was in there

because possible her husband had just passed or maybe it's a place that has certain memories for her.

Oh a hundred other reasons that she was there on her own.

. , and the more I thought about it, the more I got frustrated, I hadn't got across because at that

time I was really into blogging and my blog was very much about the community, like the online community.

We should all be connected and we should all welcome each other.

But I didn't do that for this, this lady.

, so for whatever reason, I was thinking about that.

, and I was, I'd been giving to various charities at that time.

, I know a lot of people in the nonprofit charity space, um, but it struck me that it was easy for me to do

something like give, but that's a single transaction.

There's no follow on.

There's no tangible effort that you're putting in.

You could automate it from your bank account and never know where the money

is gone or who's benefiting from it.

So I think there was a whole bunch of things came together that just tied in at the right time.

And I thought, you know what I've got at the time, I had a fairly decent presence on social media.

, I was in the fortunate position of having a voice and a platform where I sort of of influence other people,

if you'd like for one of a better word or description.

So speaking to my non-profit friends, I was just curious what their biggest problem

was when it came to the nonprofit world.

And the biggest problem was getting donations because of all the admin side

and how difficult it was to get people

to donate because of the, the red tape and the loops you had to go through and how to reach these

people because traditionally at that time, uh, this was back in the very early days of social media.

Traditionally people would bang on the door or stand on street corners or down in shopping Plaza.

And basically

trying to collect donations.

And that does so much, but I'm with social media and the opportunities that had, there

was a huge opportunity to cut a lot of that and really connect the potential donor with the

organization and really help the organization get their story across in a really human way

that touches more than just 50 people on a shopping Plaza or the odd person walking down the street.

So, so that's where that really came about.

Um, and as I thought more about it, that's where the, the 12 for 12 K project, , came about

The lady eating the ice cream cone will never know the positive

imprint she instilled in Danny that day.

Danny worked hard and became known as the one man who used social media to raise

$91,000 for charities around the world.

That's 12 for 12.

I actually, the journalist that wrote the piece, I actually reached out because the article title I

felt was misleading because it was very much a team.

Yes.

I, I kicked off the project and I was the, the figurehead, if you like, but it was very

much a team that was a core team of us of eight people that were all volunteers and

every single person had their own strengths.

So I had John Hayden who sadly passed from cancer a couple of years back.

He was my go-to for my nonprofit expertise.

He's amazing.

And John Hayden's hugely respected in the nonprofit world.

Amazing guy.

, Susan Murphy, over an Ottawa.

She did all the, the videos with Cheryl Game, and Rachel Key, who she did all the PR and communications.

So it was huge team that does.

And then you had the, the supporters themselves.

And what I liked about the 12 for 12K project is , you could donate as little or as much as you wanted.

There was no minimal effort.

We want the buy-in to be easy.

And if you couldn't donate it because you were under your own hard times, just help be a blogger, a blog

partner, , share the charities on social media, get your social media and online community involved.

so there was a huge team and community behind it, and I felt the, as much as the article really

helped focus attention on the project I thought it was a bit disingenuous to the rest of the team.

So unfortunate that title is still there, but it was very much a team effort.

I love that you explained.

It I so appreciate that you're sharing and that you are inspiring others to also see that view because

positive imprints come from every authentic person.

So could you for listeners explain the 12 for 12 K

yeah, for sure.

The 12 to 12 K project, the idea was to create, an ongoing, uh, non-profit or charitable

initiative, over the course of 12 months.

And we'd pick 12 charities with the goal of raising, $12,000 for each charity.

So you've got your 12 charities, 12 months $12,000.

So that's kind of the 12 for 12 K idea.

And the idea behind it is to purely raise donations and raise awareness using social media.

And having a , a core website so the 12 or 12 K website where everything sort of came into and we, we

shared what the new charities were, how to support, how to get involved on a local level, et cetera.

And then we use a little platform called chippin, which, you know, things that aren't

anymore, but it was really effective at the time.

Chipping as a, like a payment gateway for nonprofits if you like that, you could

essentially embed on your website and people could use that with either credit card orPaypal

to make donations to the charity.

And the great thing with chippin is it allowed you to have a running total of how much you'd raised that

month for that charity, but everything went straight to the charities, financial income, if you like.

So there was no middleman.

There was no admin from our side..

It made it really simple.

And the fact that you could see how much was raised was a, a great visual cue for us to,

to try raise more awareness, to get more, donations or whatever for that particular month.

So it was, it was cool to just use social media and we create a lot of sort of a frame for your

social media avatars that mentioned 12 for 12 K

and that got a lot of buzz online.

People were asking what it was and once they started asking, you could explain, they got real

interested in what it's not how they could help.

So, because social media was so nascent at that time, I think it was done at the right time.

I don't think something like that today with all the different platforms and

all the different ways you can do stuff

I don't think it would have had the same effect as something that was, ah, the early days.

And probably one of the first sort of, nonprofit initiatives the sole use social media.

So I think we were more fortunate in the time and, and the limited platforms that

were available with that time as well.

We learned a lot of mistakes going along.

We'd never done it before.

Like I mentioned, we had John who was our nonprofit expert.

But even John had limitations, as to knowledge for certain areas or certain or

non-profits, so we'll learn by mistakes as well.

And how we approached, fundraising campaigns, how we approached promoting how we approach creating

media, how we approached, , taking donations.

And so there was a lot of things that people learn from.

I know, John heard from, non-profit organizations that had watched the 12 for 12

K project and had adapted some of our stuff.

So for example, for , , the 'no kid hungry'.

I think it's 'no kid hungry' campaign in the U S um, we Tweeted nonstop.

We got a gentleman in Canada called Scott Stratton who tweeted nonstop for 12 hours.

Uh, got a lot of his connections to donate prizes like iPods and, you know, video cameras and stuff.

It was amazing what he did.

And you start to see more 'Tweeter-thons' after that, that event.

That 12 hour event raised about $15,000 for the 'no kid hungry' charity in one day.

So it was, it was crazy.

It was amazing.

So I, I know in speaking to people that it certainly helped pave the way for some, I think some would

already been thinking about it anyway, in the mobile land, from our mistakes and made it, made it

better with their own stuff, but it's cool to see.

And 12 to 12 K was inspired, by a wonderful woman called Stacey in the U S

uh, I forget her sur name unfortunately.

It's been a while since we've connected.

um but she had , an online platfrom

purely using Twitter, that raise awareness for various non-profits and organizations,

but she was more solely dedicated to Africa.

And, uh, the kids growing up in Africa, , that needed schools and libraries, , and

buildings and fresh water, et cetera.

I saw that and I got inspired . So I think everybody gets pulled something from somewhere.

, tweetsgiving.org was the organization that was all Thanksgiving month of November in the U S.

We all have something in our souls that lights a spark to become motivated.

Sometimes that inspiration comes from our experiences.

And those experiences may be positive in nature, but we also learn from our struggles

or even struggles of those around us.

One of Danny's many positive imprints was building a friendship bench for his community.

Yeah.

So the friendship bench came about, through a personal tragedy of a close friend, , Sam Fiorella.

And he lost his son to depression.

. And nobody knew that it was depressed.

He was a bright, bubbly, outgoing person.

, he was getting great grades at college.

Everybody spoke highly of him, , and he seemed very happy.

Like a lot of people that suffer from depression, it was eaten away at him inside

and he didn't publicly acknowledge it.

So unfortunately he, he took his own life.

, so that also had a huge impact on Sam and his family.

, and when at the funeral of Lucas, who was a young, the young kid took his life other kids

that went to university with Lucas went up to Sam and his wife to tell them how Lucas had reached

out, in the corridors of university or whatever.

There was some like almost whether it was an empath or something, you had to sum any (inaudible)

knowledge that something was wrong with this person.

So he would reach out and, just say, 'hello, how are you doing?' You know, and just talk about anything.

And through that, he learned that they're suffering from depression or

thinking about taking their own lives.

And so he'd stay with them.

He'd he talked to them, he'd encourage them to get help and they'd get help.

And so, at Lucas's funeral, a lot of these kids from the university came up and told Sam this.

And this, this was amazing to hear because A.

, nobody knew that Lucas was suffering, but B to know that he'd himself saved a bunch of lives

through the single action of just saying 'hello'.

It was incredible, inspiring to hear.

So we wanted to, to continue that legacy.

So what we did is we, we came up with the idea of the 'Friendship Bench.'And this would be a

bright yellow bench that sits on campus as a focal point to remind you to speak about your

mental health and that it's okay to not be okay.

And that you're not alone.

There are people here that are going through the same things as you or , can help you not

overcome, but, but deal with what you're going through better and understand it's natural.

And this is how you can cope.

And these are the daily things you can do, et cetera.

So the 'Friendship Bench'was born.

And it wasn't meant to be a bench where you sit

to say I'm suffering from mental health issues.

We didn't want to make it a focal point and it could lead to potential bullying or, people being

sarcastic - oh look, somebody's sitting there.

They're not right in the head or whatever.

We don't want to make it like that.

It just needs to be a focal point to say there's people on campus that can help.

All you need to do, come back to Lucas's approach is say 'hello', and that's the whole campaign.

We built a campaign out of it called 'yellow is for hello'.

So if you see a yellow bench, you know it's okay to say hello, and either open up yourself or

just check in on your roommate, check in on your classmates, check in on your friends on other

campuses and just ask them how they're doing.

Let's spark a conversation about mental health and mental health issues amongst the youth.

Because in Canada, teenage suicide is the second leading cause of death amongst, 18 to 25 year olds.

And it's, it's crazy.

It's, it's scared of the numbers.

Um, so this is where we sort of, we built the friendshipbench.org organization,

and the, the impact is as being

amazing.

There's about on average, it's about an 18% increase on- so on campuses that have the

'yellow bench' installed was about an 18% increase in kids coming forward and speaking

to someone, it could be a health counselor.

It could be the teacher, the friend, but there's been that rise.

We've also seen uh, Uh, really cool mental wellness features being installed on these

campuses to compliment what they already have.

And it's just, again, it's a way to continue the conversation and make sure that nobody ever feels

alone, you know, especially college and university, which can be a stressful time as it is without life

that we have to deal with at themoment as well.

And there is a lot of life that we are dealing with.

So has the 'friendship bench' gone global, so are our other universities, or even other organizations

across the world, putting up these yellow benches?

So at the moment, it's just Canada only.

Um, it's, uh, again, it's a purely volunteer driven organization.

There's no funding behind it or anything.

We do it on top of our normal day jobs.

So it's purely Canada based, but we do offer templates.

We've got a couple of people in the U S I've taken a template and they're doing similar

in the U S where they're creating a program around it.

And it may not be the bench.

It may be like, um, one of the things that we saw, which was really cool in some of

the campuses was having a yellow wall.

And on the yellow wall, you would put post-it notes or stickers or whatever of positive messages.

So it could be, you know, you're not alone.

And again, it's just a visual focal point that really lets people know, you know, I'm not alone.

So we're seeing that adapted, uh, some colleges and campuses outside of Canada.

We'd love to be global

. Realistically speaking, we'll probably stick

Right.

We'll probably stick with Canada, but we're more than happy to advise if you like, or,

or help colleges outside of Canada get a similar program set up for their, their campus.

That's one of the positive things about getting messages out via podcasts.

Your message is there.

There's people all over the world who work at universities.

Maybe that is something that will spark their soul, their interest, and

bring about their own friendship bench.

It's providing an outlet and, that's something that has been missing that is still missing because we don't

know how to target these folks because they are so

depressed inside and we don't know it.

Thank you so much for sharing that and for taking the steps with the team to move

forward with the friendship bench and.

You don't have to talk about this, Danny, but I know that you could have been a statistic.

No, that's true.

Yeah.

I, I, um, I attempted to take my own life when I was 19.

So the three co-founders of the 'friendship bench', their son, two lost his son.

There's myself and then Robert, who attempted to take his life at 19.

So yeah, I did that at 19.

Thankfully my sister found me, got me to the hospital and here I am today.

Um, yeah, so, yeah.

It took me a long time to be public about that.

I, I did a blog post, they think 10 years ago, maybe, uh, for a friend of mine

in the U S Sarah Robinson, who's got

I think she's still got the blog.

Um, but at the same should a blog or a website that was about, um, positive stories of redemption.

I'm sure I gave the description wrong.

So Sarah, if you're listening to this, I do apologize.

We got talking and this came out and she asked me to share that and it got such a huge

reception, where people opened up and talked about their own struggles that they

had gone through or were going through.

And I think that's when it, it made me realize that, you know holding it inside it doesn't help anybody.

It doesn't help you because you've got this like guilty, dirty secret, if you like.

Um, and that, again, that's the goal with the 'friendship bench' to show that, you know, there

is absolutely no shame in not feeling okay.

And if you need somebody to talk to.

One of the things I, like, you mentioned podcasts, Catherine.

One of the things I like about today's world is we do have access to various

medias, platforms and technology.

Uh, so one of the cool things that happens when you go to the friendship bench

website, for example, whether you're on your desktop or your smartphone is it'll ping.

It asks you , if we can have your IP, like your address, what location you're at.

Um, uh, so then what we'll do is there's an interactive map on the website

and if you all have access to your IP, we'll ping where you are on the map, and we'll

bring up the nearest, , resources for you.

There could be health clinics, the on-campus support team, et cetera.

So it's a cool way to make it anonymous cause all we're saying is your IP.

We're not seeing your details, your name, your demographic, your gender, or anything, just purely

on IP, but as a quick way to get help without even needing to ask anybody, it just, okay.

I can now go to this clinic again, over to this campus resource.

Just having technology available, but being willing to speak about something that happened to yourself.

Things happen in our lives where we could be having a very good day today and then

tomorrow, a really bad day and our whole body, our chemical balances changes and that changes, you know,

messages to the brain and changes the way we think.

And so those are times when we do need someone to talk to.

But also most definitely people that are going through something really horrific in their life.

You know, and doctors always ask, when you go in and you've had this big change in your, your

blood pressure and, and your anxiety levels are up and they, what is their first question?

Have you had anything stressful take place in your life lately that could cause these changes.

So.

Uh, the friendship branch, obviously something that is needed worldwide and I commend

you and your team for putting it together.

And you might want to mention to Sam that there is an organization Alliance of

Hope, which is for survivors of suicide.

He's a survivor of a family suicide.

I can never understand what that would be like for them.

And to your point, I think it needs people in the same situation that can actually have

true empathy , as opposed to the generic empathy for one of a better word, um,

where you're trying to say your best.

You're trying to say the right things, but it doesn't matter.

I know Sam mentioned it in a blog post that he did, , about the aftermath of losing a child

and, and everybody wants to say the right things.

The organization sounds amazing for sure.

Danny continues, his positive imprints with many different nonprofit organizations.

He cannot even attempt to discuss all of them.

But here is one more.

The second charity, I think that we got involved with, with the 12th, 12 K project,

um, was one that dealt with, uh, child abuse.

And it was about providing support and resources and shelter to kids have been

sexually abused or physically abused.

And sometimes both.

As a human being, any kind of abuses is bad, but I think there's a raw

emotional connection if it's children or animals, because essentially they're helpless, they're

innocent and they don't have a clue what's going on.

Animals, I think have a better clue and they know when they're getting abused . So I really connected.

It happens in our backyard.

It happens at our streets.

Uh, it happens in our countries.

It's an awful horrible thing, obviously.

You've got organizations like a BACA.

BACA, which is bikers against child abuse, amazing organization.

And they're essentially.

For one of a better description, Hell's Angel Bikers.

All the gear, all the dress up, all the bikes, et cetera.

Um, and they go and they help families, help moms get, the kids are getting abused, sexual abuse.

They also form a line of protection when these cases come to court.

So you can imagine being the abuser come into court and you've got 20 or 30 hairy, heavy-set dudes in

leathers looking angry as hell, just staring you down.

And it's a way to provide support and comfort and strength to the victim and show them, you know what?

We've got your back, your dad or your mom.

Cause obviously sometimes it can come from both fronts, but we've got your back.

Your parents can't hurt you anymore.

Not in here.

Not outside.

And now with two kids of my own, obviously I'm very wary of, of stuff that can happen.

I was getting a good visual of those bikers and I certainly commend Baca, ' bikers against child abuse'.

So thank you for sharing that.

So much appreciated.

, so take the time to give us the name of the podcast which is basically sharing the voice of

us podcasters behind the scenes and in our lives.

Podaster stories where I get to meet, you know, amazing folks like yourself, that,

that share your personal stories as well as your podcasts in general, which has been

really eye-opening for me from as a podcast.

Again, to know the stuff that you do is as a podcaster

. But getting to know all your stories.

I'm sure I'll have you back on the show to continue, because there's a lot more, a lot

more to talk about on top of the stuff we already spoke about in the initial episode..

Yeah, and it was fun.

And I do enjoy your, your show because, you know, podcasters, we, we hear their voice and,

but we don't know much about them I'm one of them I'll get emails from my listeners...

What can we learn about you?

, it's nice to be able to share a piece of, of our own lives because it, it provides , more

of a personal aspect for the listeners.

I was on, I think it was season two, episode seven.

And I thank you again for doing that podcast, Podcaster Stories.

And where can listeners find you

? if you want to check out the podcast that

PodcasterStories.com, and I'm online at, uh, Twitter Twitter, like four slash username, Danny brown CA

Well, Danny, is there anything that you are wanting to share that we haven't talked about?

Um, it's like a job interview, right.

Um, is there anything else you want to ask about the company or anything and, you know, I'll

get back to in three or four days, I'm sure.

I'll think of something.

No, it's been really enjoyable.

Good.

what I like about your format it's, it's, it's just really easy goin and like two friends

conversing , um, which, which I real enjoying.

And I feel that's a nice, relaxed way to talk.

Yeah.

You know, share stories and stuff.

Um, I guess the only thing maybe would be if anybody's getting married or has a special event or a birthday

, and you need someone, you, you don't need to lay a whole bunch of money on like a band or a DJ or

whatever, if you want someonewho can play any tune

using a pencil and just their teeth.

Give me a shout and I'll be there.

Whoa.

There you go.

I'll do a zoom call and then I'll do the wedding dance or whatever, using my H two lead pencil.

Oh my gosh.

That is so interesting.

So are you able to play anything for us?

Um, I do have a pen.

I've got a pan, I guess, and this might work.

It has to be something I knew obviously, but, uh, what, what tune , so what are the

copyright laws on this?

I know, well, it's Phil used, there was only 10 seconds.

Um, how about just for like a, a silly thing, like, um, you know, like that music where like

the little cartoon guys chasing someone, right.

Okay.

I'm ready.

Let's try and not bump the microphone.

Okay.

Or something like that or not

so interesting.

I have no idea where I even learned that I've been doing that for years.

I don't know.

Maybe I was just bored one day tapping a pencil class.

Probably right from the one that, Hey, if the podcast doesn't work out, I can always fall back on this.

Ah, that's funny.

So, and, and thank you for your comments about my own podcast.

I do like the, the very raw conversation and nothing's scripted.

So yeah.

Thank you for that.

Yeah.

And again, thank you for, for all that you do with captivate FM and of course, mark Asquith.

So.

Inspiring words do you want to end, as you inspire the listener?

Hmm, I'm going to, I'm going to use a quote.

My grandad said it's not a court as such.

It was just my granddad, who was my pretty much my all-time hero.

Um, and I think granddads get away with a lot of stuff or grandparents get away with

a lot of stuff because they can do things that parents wouldn't allow kids to do.

They're like the little devil on your shoulder cause they know come back to the parent afterwards.

Um, but my granddad was really supportive of a lot of things of what to do as a kid and stuff.

Um, and he used to come up with the weirdest sense.

You just you'd be talking away and he'd say something that would just take your back, but

you think backwards and you think, you know what?

That actually made sense, maybe not at the time, but it made sense, but there was something

he said, and I don't know what the reason was behind it, but he just said that 'this is why

you should always stand up before you flush.

Which I, at the time it was funny.

I just thought that's ridiculous.

And course you should stand up before you're flush, but then you, you suddenly think, I

mean, this, this thing sort of come back to me a lot over the years for different situations.

And it's, I think it's a simple saying it's obviously a very simple saying , but I think it

has a deeper meaning where, you know, you might think you're in control, but unless you take

action a whole bunch of mess is going to happen.

So it's up to you to take that action to either prevent that mess or at least mitigate

some of the fallout.

And I re I realized that fallout , when we're speaking about toilets and flushing, it might

not be the kind of visual you want at the moment.

But, um, yeah, I, I, it's just something that's always stuck with me and I've used it in various

blog posts I've used, I've got a picture somewhere that I printed out and framed and just put that up

. So it's just something that stuck,

multitude of environments and surroundings.

. So I guess that would be always Stand Up Before You Flush.

Danny brown always stand up before you flush.

You have been standing up for organizations and you've been standing up for people who are not online.

Danny brown.

Thank you so much for your positive imprints and what you're doing globally.

Thank you, Catherine.

It's been a pleasure.

Your positive imprint.