Summary
We’re tackling everything from funeral insurance frustrations in South Africa to over-engineered foldable beds and Pilates reformers on Kickstarter.
We hear about radioactive pigs in Fukushima, chemtrail bans in the US Congress, and an Irish family’s creative attempt to skip a restaurant bill.
There’s also a disgruntled group of Chinese gold-diggers, fake prescription pills,
and more.
Links
South African Insurance Problem
Youngest person to build a nuclear fusion machine
Bill to Ban chemtrails
Kickstart or Dropkick – Roll
Kickstart or Dropkick – Pavo
Armpit Hair Scam
Disgruntled Gold-diggers
Radioactive Pigs
Drug Empire After Winning Lotto
Show Transcript
This transcript was generated by an AI and is probably not 100% accurate. It pays to listen to the podcast, but if you have questions about any of the information found here, please reach out to us.
Sam [00:00:08]:
Hello and welcome to episode 569 of the Chris and Sam Podcast.
Sam [00:00:25]:
I’m Chris
Sam [00:00:26]:
And I’m Sam, and this is your weekly fix of random technology and life. And you know what, we’ve got our 600 episode coming up real soon. So make sure you stick around and listen to us, the back catalog.
Chris [00:00:38]:
I mean, what else are you going to do? What else could you possibly be doing with your life?
Sam [00:00:42]:
Uh, it’s probably a million things people want to be doing. I dread to think what people are doing while they’re listening to us in the airholes.
Chris [00:00:49]:
But things could be worse. You could be living in South Africa where apparently insurance and banks and things are worse than what we have them over here.
Sam [00:00:58]:
Okay.
Chris [00:00:58]:
Yep. So, so much so that they have a bit of a problem with, what do you call it?
Sam [00:01:05]:
Fraud?
Chris [00:01:06]:
Funeral. Funeral insurance for burial insurance.
Sam [00:01:09]:
Okay.
Chris [00:01:09]:
You know, it’s a real basic thing. A lot of banks will say, oh, you get free burial insurance or whatever. So this one family got really so frustrated, like they did with all the things that it’s trying to get them to fill out.
Sam [00:01:24]:
Oh yeah, yeah.
Chris [00:01:25]:
That they, they’re like, we sent through all the paperwork, we sent through the death certificate, we sent through this. They just went to the mortuary, got the body and took it to the bank and dropped it in the bank.
Sam [00:01:36]:
Oh no.
Chris [00:01:37]:
What?
Sam [00:01:38]:
Oh no.
Chris [00:01:39]:
In a black body bag. You wanted proof of death? Here he is. Can you give us the money so we can bury him? And they had to close the bank and there was a bit of a health scare and stuff because you can’t have that. Shut down for the rest of the day. I think they made their point. Good on them, because I think there’ll be a few other banks that are like, next time somebody’s giving them, jerking them around, they’re like, how much do you want me to prove that this person is dead? Should I bring the whole body or just the head will do?
Sam [00:02:12]:
Well, I can’t imagine too many people getting to that level, but who knows? Who knows? Oh, look, it’s just, hang on, that’s covered with a tarp, eh? I guess.
Chris [00:02:22]:
Yeah. I think they, it said that they Brought a body bag in.
Sam [00:02:25]:
Oh, of course. Well, they probably had one. Who doesn’t have one?
Chris [00:02:27]:
Well, no, because they got it from the mortuary.
Sam [00:02:29]:
Oh, that makes sense.
Chris [00:02:30]:
It’s not like it was sitting around at home. Although, did I ever tell you that story?
Sam [00:02:34]:
I don’t know. Every time you say that sentence over 12 years, a lot of the time it’s like, no.
Chris [00:02:41]:
So when I was doing repossessions, right? So back when I was a private investigator, which is a fancy title because really all I did was repose. Other people did some of the more interesting work, but I did repose. One of the stories that happened, it wasn’t me, it was one of my colleagues. They were chasing this Islander family up for a chest freezer. And they kept going around and they kept getting the runaround and they finally went, nah, this is it. Because it was a crap job doing that because people would always give you the runaround and it’s very depressing. Anyway, they finally got in, they go in, And go, where is it? And the guy goes, oh, it’s in that room there. And they go in and there’s just the chest freezer in the middle of the room.
Chris [00:03:28]:
Oh yeah. There’s flowers all around the room and all the rest of the night. What’s going on here? And, um, yep, sure enough, grandma’s dead in the freezer. So they had bought the freezer on hire purchase so that they could put grandma in it until they could save up enough money to send her back to the islands to be buried.
Sam [00:03:47]:
Oh wow. Crazy. Yeah, not something you—
Chris [00:03:50]:
so he didn’t repossess it at that point.
Sam [00:03:54]:
Well, that’s a good call.
Chris [00:03:55]:
I think he did have to call the cops though.
Sam [00:03:58]:
Yeah, probably, because I think you’re supposed to notify someone.
Chris [00:04:01]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Sam [00:04:02]:
If something happens. You know how we like talking about people with world records, and there’s that dude who seems to be going after all the world records, all of them. And the last one we talked about was, uh, how many people could keep so many balloons aloft for a minute or some stupid thing.
Chris [00:04:19]:
Yeah. And then the time before that was how many t-shirts he could put on in a half marathon.
Sam [00:04:23]:
He was running a half marathon. Anyway, I’ve got a world record here he’s not going to get because he’s too old.
Chris [00:04:28]:
All right.
Sam [00:04:29]:
So some 12-year-old has bait— he wants to get the world record for the youngest person ever to build a nuclear fusion machine because a 13-year-old’s got the record. Okay, so this 12— what exactly?
Chris [00:04:43]:
I mean, talk about burying the lead.
Sam [00:04:46]:
No, no, it’s good. So this 12-year-old from Dallas, his name’s Aiden McMillan, he be a supervillain on his way up. I’m not sure. He developed an interest in fusion after reading about it when he was younger and then decided to make his own. So it’s, it’s based on something called a fuser and it uses electric fields to heat and confine plasma. While such machines do not generate usable energy, successfully operating one is considered a significant engineering challenge.
Chris [00:05:15]:
Yeah. Yeah.
Sam [00:05:16]:
So he’s, yeah, he’s trying to beat out a 13-year-old. Oh no, actually the other guy was 12 as well, but hours before he turned 13. Uh, they haven’t confirmed yet if he is going to get it or not. And I’ll just find a photo of this person. And apparently this is a 12-year-old. Oh yeah, I suppose he is. But anyway, there he is with his little machine.
Chris [00:05:40]:
Yeah, I, I, I know, um, 20-year-olds that look that, that young.
Sam [00:05:44]:
Yeah. So his mum really, really, he had to explain it to his mum to prove that it was going to be safe.
Chris [00:05:51]:
Yeah. It sounds like a Lisa Simpson sort of scenario there.
Sam [00:05:54]:
It does.
Chris [00:05:55]:
Really does. Well, let’s go from smart people in America. I assume that was in America.
Sam [00:06:03]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:06:04]:
Dallas. To less smart people in America.
Sam [00:06:06]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:06:07]:
Probably the least smart people in America.
Sam [00:06:08]:
Okay.
Chris [00:06:09]:
The US Congress.
Sam [00:06:11]:
Good.
Chris [00:06:13]:
Because the House committee has advanced a bill to ban chemtrails. So they voted on it and passed it and moved it forward.
Sam [00:06:22]:
What does that mean in reality?
Chris [00:06:24]:
So it’s going up for the next stage of whatever it is. And there’s a wonderful photo here of chemtrails.
Sam [00:06:30]:
That’s not AI at all.
Chris [00:06:31]:
No, probably totally AI. The reason they got it through is, you remember the fatal flooding of Camp Mystic last summer?
Sam [00:06:40]:
Vaguely. Yeah.
Chris [00:06:41]:
Okay.
Sam [00:06:42]:
Bunch of people, bunch of kids washed away and all that sort of thing. Do they blame it on chemtrails?
Chris [00:06:47]:
Yeah. I have watched the weather cloud seeding in Texas and it happened right before Camp Mystic, said Ted Hawley, a frequent speaker on Republican bills. And yes, it breaks my heart, but yes, that 500-year flood was the result of cloud seeding in Texas. Just so everybody knows, contrails is what normally happens. A contrail is condensation that is caused by the movement, fast movement of the plane through air.
Sam [00:07:17]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:07:17]:
And it’s very similar to you breathing out in a cold, cold day and you see that.
Sam [00:07:22]:
Yeah, yeah, on a larger scale.
Chris [00:07:24]:
But they go, well, no, it can’t be that because contrails just disappear really quickly and chemtrails, which are chemicals in the atmosphere, stay there forever. But Scientists say no because of atmospheric pressure at the certain height and all that and less oxygen molecules and all that. But no, no. Why should we listen to scientists about this sort of thing? Why scientists? No, we should find a 12-year-old that wants to make a fusion reactor and control the world. He probably knows more than these scientists. Anyway, that’s my rant over.
Sam [00:08:00]:
Very good. I’ve got two kickstart or dropkicks for you this week.
Chris [00:08:04]:
Woohoo! Oh God, hopefully I do better than last week because that was terrible.
Sam [00:08:08]:
You love it. Okay. So this crowd, and I think both of these are expensive kickstarters. They’re not cheap. Right. This crowd has somehow made a bed that contracts and rolls up into a thing that’s probably smaller than the table we’re on now. And it’s a full-size bed.
Chris [00:08:26]:
I love those things on Facebook or whatever, or Instagram or wherever, where they go through all those. Space-saving things, you know, tables that fold out and, you know, all that. So it’s one of those beds, right? Cool.
Sam [00:08:39]:
So it says, probably an over-engineered bed that rolls up in a box. We would call it a beautiful furniture piece. Roll is about saving space without compromise, a patent-pending solution with a completely new approach to foldable beds enabling unparalleled comfort in the size of a TV cabinet. So when it’s folded up, it looks like a little TV cabinet, and, uh, it somehow unfolds and you have a bed.
Chris [00:09:00]:
Yeah.
Sam [00:09:01]:
So that’s the gist of it.
Chris [00:09:03]:
So that video that you just showed is 100% AI and not an actual video of an actual product prototype that they’ve made.
Sam [00:09:10]:
I think the people, I think the space in the person’s real, but I’m not sure about the bed.
Chris [00:09:15]:
Right.
Sam [00:09:16]:
Well, that’s, I mean, they do have it.
Chris [00:09:18]:
Oh, okay. Well, yeah. Okay.
Sam [00:09:20]:
They’re jumping on it. So somehow they’ve got a little mattress thing and somehow it squeezes itself into the, little space. So if it did work, pretty cool concept.
Chris [00:09:31]:
Oh, it’s great, you know, it’s fantastic.
Sam [00:09:33]:
So anyway, does the mattress get in there? Oh my God, it must have, I don’t know, like a winder or something, or a memory, uh, yeah, probably memory foam thing, and it just squashes. Yeah. So if you want one of these bad boys, uh, you’re looking at around $1,900 New Zealand dollars, which is not bad. I mean, it’s a lot of money, but then that’s the launch day price. Yeah, but that’s That’s very cool looking.
Chris [00:09:55]:
Yeah, but for an over-engineered thing like that, that’s pretty impressive, I think.
Sam [00:10:01]:
I think so. So here we go. You’ve got 28 days to go as we record this, or 21 days actually, sorry. And you’ve, they only want $134,000. So it’s not like the pocket juice or whatever that thing was from last week.
Chris [00:10:17]:
Tree flavored soda. What was something soda?
Sam [00:10:21]:
Anyway, pocket soda. So they want $134,000 New Zealand dollars. To get this across the line, which is realistic.
Chris [00:10:29]:
Realistic. Even that might be, I would have said a little on the cheap side, but yeah, they’ve already done a lot of work for it, I would say. Okay. I think there’s a definite market for this. Tiny homes are a huge thing. I had an interview with a guy the other, or a meeting with a guy online the other day, and he goes, oh, I’m starting, I’m joining the Skoolie community. I’ve just bought a bus for $240,000.
Sam [00:10:52]:
Oh, wow.
Chris [00:10:53]:
Do you know what the Skoolie community is?
Sam [00:10:55]:
Is that the school bus when they can use school buses?
Chris [00:10:58]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I had to have a look at it afterwards. So this sort of thing would be perfect for that.
Sam [00:11:03]:
And if this guy’s spending $240,000 on a bus, he can afford the $2,000 New Zealand dollars.
Chris [00:11:11]:
Yeah, so I think there’s a market. I absolutely think there’s a market. So I’m going to say they’re at $300,000.
Sam [00:11:17]:
You’re very close. $412,000.
Chris [00:11:19]:
I feel much better with that guess. That’s much closer than I have been for months now.
Sam [00:11:26]:
Yeah, for months actually. So I’ve got another one here. It’s called PAVO. P-A-V-O. It’s intelligent foldable Pilates reformer for any home. Now, do you know much about reformers?
Chris [00:11:39]:
I don’t know what a reformer is. I don’t know.
Sam [00:11:42]:
So Pilates is a thing.
Chris [00:11:44]:
Yeah, lie on your back and flutter your feet. That’s Pilates in my head.
Sam [00:11:49]:
Yeah, okay, close enough. So a lot of them use a machine called a reformer.
Chris [00:11:55]:
Okay.
Sam [00:11:55]:
And it’s got pulleys and things and you can move around.
Chris [00:11:58]:
Like the Total Gym from Chuck Norris.
Sam [00:12:01]:
Maybe, maybe. But a reformer normally is very large, very heavy, and expensive.
Chris [00:12:08]:
Yep.
Sam [00:12:08]:
When I worked at one of my previous workplaces, one of the general managers was right into Pilates. So people that are into it are really into it.
Chris [00:12:15]:
Yeah.
Sam [00:12:15]:
Where I currently work right now, somebody goes off. In the middle of the workday, does a Pilates session at lunchtime, and then he comes back and has a shower in the office and he’s back into work. He comes back as a sweaty mess, seems to like it. But at my old job, a general manager was into it and he brought one of these reformer things and it came in in this huge box and we had to unload it. And then he got the field workers to take their giant truck with a hi-ab to his house and then they hi-abbed it through the window for him into this house because there’s nothing like being a general manager or CEO of a company and using all the resources at your disposal to do your own personal things.
Chris [00:12:57]:
Oh, we— I know all about that. Not looking at you, Dane from Gilmour’s at all. Mind you, I can’t complain because I used his resources too. He was quite happy for me to use the truck to move house here. Yeah. And stuff like that.
Sam [00:13:10]:
So don’t knock it, but not knocking it. So this project, they’ve got about 11 days to go. You can buy one early bird standard for around $1,600 NZD. And I believe that’s quite cheap. I think a normal one’s $4,000 to $5,000.
Chris [00:13:29]:
Yeah.
Sam [00:13:29]:
Don’t quote me on that, but I think it’s around the price, if not more. And this is foldable. It folds in half and you can put it away. Apparently you can do everything with it. It’s got a little app that helps you train.
Chris [00:13:40]:
How much is it again?
Sam [00:13:41]:
$1,600.
Chris [00:13:43]:
Now, yeah, it sounds like a total jumpstart. Okay.
Sam [00:13:46]:
Well, I maybe, I don’t know, but they want about $10,000 New Zealand to reach the Kickstarter goal so they can carry on, you know, how much have they raised?
Chris [00:13:58]:
How long through again?
Sam [00:14:00]:
Uh, we’ve got a, never, we’ve got 11 days left.
Chris [00:14:03]:
Okay. So nearly finished. All right. They would have blown past their, their $10,000. I think they’ll be in the hundreds of thousands. People are keen on this sort of stuff. I wouldn’t spend the money. I’d go to Cash Converters.
Chris [00:14:18]:
I saw a Total Gym there for $150.
Sam [00:14:21]:
I’m worried that you’re lurking out at Cash Converters, but that’s a different story.
Chris [00:14:25]:
Every now and again I do wander through. Yeah, no, I reckon they’re at $400,000.
Sam [00:14:31]:
I love the amount of effort you put into your analysis here, not knowing what I’m going to give you.
Chris [00:14:38]:
I have no idea.
Sam [00:14:39]:
$1.8 million. Holy crap.
Chris [00:14:43]:
Yeah, I’m missing something obviously there. All these guys just don’t watch fricking enough infomercials and they’re just buying these things off Kickstarter. Get a Total Gym. It’s just the same.
Sam [00:14:58]:
Yeah, I’m sure it is. Maybe this is just the fancy version.
Chris [00:15:03]:
What, you don’t like Chuck Norris?
Sam [00:15:05]:
No, Chuck Norris is the man. Do you know how you could save some money though? To save up for your Pilates machine or the Chuck Norris thing?
Chris [00:15:13]:
How’s that?
Sam [00:15:15]:
When you go out to a restaurant, you start plucking hair out of your armpits to throw on your food to try and get out of the $600 bill that you’ve racked up.
Chris [00:15:24]:
Oh God.
Sam [00:15:24]:
And for some reason, I mean, this is allegedly accused.
Chris [00:15:28]:
Allegedly.
Sam [00:15:29]:
This is happening in Sydney just recently. I’ve seen the CCTV footage and the guy is definitely doing something in his armpits. And look who’s pulling them out. And for some reason, it’s some Irish family visiting. Why are they all batshit? Remember those ones that went around New Zealand causing chaos like years and years ago?
Chris [00:15:47]:
Yes.
Sam [00:15:47]:
That was weird. So apparently there’s been similar allegations involving the same family at another venue. They ordered all the expensive stuff on the menu to get to $600 and including a 1.8 kilo tomahawk steak and he’s reaching into his arm and pulling hair out and placing it on his meal after finishing the meal too. That’s crazy. So anyway, yeah, they ate all the food and then raised the issue, and then the man became agitated, raised his voice, and refused to settle any portion of the bill.
Chris [00:16:19]:
No, you—
Sam [00:16:21]:
yeah, um, they did end up waiving the bill because they wanted to end the confrontation.
Chris [00:16:24]:
They just want him out of the restaurant. Yeah, and that is the thing, uh, you want to— you, you are very aware, having managed restaurant in those situations before, yeah, you are very aware of Everybody else in the room.
Sam [00:16:37]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:16:37]:
And you’re like, yeah, let’s get rid of this good dude. And, um, cause I don’t want it, um, doing this. Speaking of ways to make money. So I don’t know if you saw this story. China’s gold diggers are disgruntled after spending big on training. Not a single rich man bites.
Sam [00:16:55]:
So this woman, I am upset that the gold diggers are not getting the results that they would need.
Chris [00:17:01]:
Yeah, Chinese influencer Zhao Yuan built an empire on this promise. The 46-year-old mother of two from Changsha branded herself as China’s foremost expert in what she called sexual intelligence. And with her black and white Sexual Intelligence Academy, she earned over 24 million yuan. I don’t know what that is. In real money, but I think it’s in the millions by teaching women exaggerated poses and suggestive language packed as charm enhancement. And she has this thing like, show them the gaze and form an X with your body. And she goes, yeah, it’s Blue Steel. Basically, she does Blue Steel.
Chris [00:17:48]:
Now, she is quite an attractive woman, I have to say. Like, I’ve seen the video here and we’ll have a link to this in the notes. But then I’ve seen some of those students try to do this. The student said, my professor said, I don’t think your study is good enough. So I just put my shoulder up and gave him the look so that he would mark me as passed. But I don’t think it works. So students practice this gaze in videos that went viral for all the wrong reasons. One clip showed a student joking about using this to a professor.
Chris [00:18:27]:
That’s one I just told you about. Yeah, the business model followed a calculated 3-step process. First, draw customers in with a 9.9 yuan trial course, then provocative short courses. Her follower count jumps to 55,000 in 30 days. Then she has 99 yuan basic courses and an 88,000 yuan mentorship package promising to make women irresistible, and she does upsells to adult products and medical beauty treatments at prices that are 2 to 3 times the market rate. So well done her. But she got arrested for this. So whilst this is sort of what you would do if you wanted to be a politician in America, apparently it’s illegal in China.
Chris [00:19:18]:
So there you go.
Sam [00:19:19]:
25 million yuan is $17,200. Oh, to put things in perspective.
Chris [00:19:25]:
So it’s not that much at all.
Sam [00:19:26]:
It’s not that much.
Chris [00:19:27]:
It probably is a lot for them, but yeah.
Sam [00:19:30]:
Quick update on Pocket Soda, my favorite drink, including tree.
Chris [00:19:33]:
Oh really?
Sam [00:19:34]:
From last week. Uh, I don’t know if they just updated this or if I’ve only just seen it now, but, um, I just did— I’ve been researching it and I can’t find anything about this. I think this guy is just making this up and somehow he’s gonna, I don’t know, make, uh, who knows. There’s 830 people backing this. The very first bit on this Kickstarter says, close but never exceeding FDA allowable limits of mold, insect fragments, rodent hair, and lead. That’s it.
Chris [00:20:00]:
I, that makes me feel ill, to be honest.
Sam [00:20:05]:
One of the comments though says, I was very confused by the description until I noticed the creator’s name and it all makes sense now. I’m so in. Okay, I still don’t know.
Chris [00:20:13]:
It’s a joke. It’s a joke. No, it is a joke, but I don’t know who the person is.
Sam [00:20:17]:
So we’ll find out.
Chris [00:20:18]:
We’ll have to do a—
Sam [00:20:19]:
Next episode, baby.
Chris [00:20:20]:
It’s not just Snopes, it’s, uh, Ask, um, Ask Fred or somebody. It’s an ask. There’s a Reddit called Ask Sam, like Ask Fred or something. When you don’t know what’s going on and you go, what is, why is this funny? Maybe he’s funny at this. Yeah.
Sam [00:20:35]:
Maybe we could do that. Hey, scientists have been busy. They’ve figured out why there’s so many radioactive pigs near Fukushima. They finally explained it. So that’s fun. Basically the radioactive, the wild boars are breeding with regular boars. And they’re making a thriving population of hybrid radioactive pigs. So that’s fun.
Sam [00:20:57]:
Since 2011, the nuclear—
Chris [00:20:59]:
So if we survive the AI, we just got to worry about the radioactive pigs.
Sam [00:21:03]:
I think so.
Chris [00:21:04]:
Mutant pigs.
Sam [00:21:06]:
So domestic pig genes became diluted over generations. The rapid year-round reproductive capacity of them persisted in the hybrid offspring. And it’s turning into a growing concern worldwide, apparently. They are 137 to 300 times higher than they should be above safe levels of cesium. So that’s good. And I don’t know if I’m more worried about the AI robots or these wild boars. I don’t think they’ve got superpowers yet, but that’s coming.
Chris [00:21:39]:
That’s coming. Well, when they can run across the ceiling like a spider pig, then you’re all worried about it. Okay. Spider pig. Spider pig. Anyway, I love this. I love this story from The Hollywood Reporter. Actually, I love the first line because it’s just so, yeah, tongue-in-cheek.
Chris [00:21:58]:
If Donald Trump and Jeff Bezos are known for anything, it’s their ability to take a joke.
Sam [00:22:04]:
Sure, sure, sure.
Chris [00:22:06]:
So the Lake Theater and Cafe in Lake Oswego has touted last— this is a couple of weeks ago— release of Amazon MGM’s controversial documentary of Melania.
Sam [00:22:19]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:22:20]:
And so they were posting things such as, does Melania wear Prada? Find out Friday, because they’re trying to get people into their cinema.
Sam [00:22:28]:
They’ve got— no one wants to watch this. They would rather be eaten by a radioactive boar.
Chris [00:22:33]:
Yeah. To defeat your enemy, you must know them, uh, quoting Sun Tzu. Melania starts Friday, you know, um, which is— that’s pretty cool because they’re a quirky cinema, right?
Sam [00:22:44]:
Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
Chris [00:22:45]:
Um, I’ll give that to Yeah, so like presumably they are told by somebody in their organization, you’re having this film, like, oh God, we gotta, we gotta promote this. And they’re promoting it the best way they know how, which is cool. Uh, the studio was not happy or did not appreciate my take on marketing their film to our own public, um, Perry told The Oregonian. So Amazon called and they said all Mulanee showings are canceled, which I’m I’m thinking they’ll be like, yes, we can put something decent on and fill the cinema. Um, but they just crack me up because it’s like these guys keep going on about being— what is it, what do they call themselves— free speech whatever people.
Sam [00:23:34]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:23:35]:
And then, you know, but you’re not allowed to advertise anything any way that’s funny and amusing because damn it. Anyway, I thought that was funny.
Sam [00:23:44]:
Talking about your buddy Trump, Did you see him waving? Do you see that clip?
Chris [00:23:48]:
No.
Sam [00:23:49]:
It’s, I don’t know where he is. He’s leaving a building. It’s only like 10 seconds. It’s quite short. He goes out the door and he’s waving and it looks like he’s waving at tons of people. And for whatever reason, the camera guy pans to the right. There’s no one there.
Chris [00:24:02]:
I’ve seen this before. Um, and I’ve seen people take photos from different points. He does that all the time. He goes outside of buildings and outside on balconies and he waves and makes sure the camera guy gets him from one angle.
Sam [00:24:16]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:24:17]:
And they put sound effects in.
Sam [00:24:19]:
Oh, cheering people. Yeah. Okay.
Chris [00:24:20]:
But if you take photos from the other side, there’s nobody there. He does it all the time. It’s mental.
Sam [00:24:27]:
He’s mental.
Chris [00:24:28]:
He is mental. Um, cool.
Sam [00:24:30]:
There’s a, I’m sure there’s a doco on this and I looked it up because I’m sure I’ve seen an ad for this on, there’s too many streaming things. I’m sure I’ve seen an ad either. This is either on real TV or streaming or I’m imagining it, I don’t know. But this dude won £288 million and then made a drug empire, started his own drug empire. And he’s an old guy, um, from the UK. And I don’t even know how he got into it, but he started making fake prescription pills and then he started, uh, supplying firearms as well.
Chris [00:25:06]:
So See, most people do those things to make the $288 million.
Sam [00:25:12]:
No, no, sorry. He won $2.4 million and he got up to $288 million. Oh, okay. The headline is very misleading.
Chris [00:25:19]:
Right.
Sam [00:25:19]:
His son got involved. This guy’s 80 years old. So he’s 80 years old and he gets $2.4 million and he’s like—
Chris [00:25:28]:
Pounds.
Sam [00:25:28]:
Oh yeah, pounds. And he’s like, you know what? Let’s just make some fake prescription drugs.
Chris [00:25:34]:
I want to be a gangster.
Sam [00:25:36]:
I don’t know, he got 16 and a half years in prison. So, uh, his son has been arrested and a few other people.
Chris [00:25:42]:
I don’t know, if I was 80, I might be thinking that’s worth it.
Sam [00:25:46]:
But he built— he actually built sophisticated labs. He had one up and running, and then they went and built another one. He had two of them, and they had industrial-scale equipment. They could make tens of thousands of tablets an hour, and they were flooding the street with unregulated and unchecked drugs.
Chris [00:26:03]:
And what sort of drugs are we talking here? Are we talking, uh, totally, um, um, uh, what do you call them?
Sam [00:26:09]:
They seized 2.6 for fun drugs, or are they the like 2.6 million counterfeit diazepam?
Chris [00:26:16]:
What’s diazepam?
Sam [00:26:17]:
Uh, I think it’s a, uh, it’s like a painkiller or something. Uh, it’s either that or it’s for, uh, depression or anxiety. Oh, all right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, someone will correct me.
Chris [00:26:27]:
So yeah, oh, Adam will correct us.
Sam [00:26:31]:
Um, Yeah, he went out and brought like £200,000 worth of machinery to do all of this. Like, he’s going like, no, I don’t even know.
Chris [00:26:40]:
I don’t know. Um, he just— so this would not be what you’d do if you won £2.4 million in the lottery?
Sam [00:26:45]:
I’ve got a million other ideas than setting up a sophisticated bogus drug front.
Chris [00:26:52]:
There’ll be Kickstarters coming out of your ears and art galleries just begging to give you money. What fruit can we nail to the wall here? Oh, $10,000. Thank you.
Sam [00:27:07]:
But he did have a company fronting it to mask his illicit business activity. So they worked all this out. So crazy as.
Chris [00:27:14]:
Yeah, I, I mean, I’m not, I’m not saying it’s a good idea or anything like that, but I will say if I was 80 and I was like, there’s something I wanted to do my whole life I guess there would be morals that I would absolutely not go beyond, but if I thought it was relatively harmless, I’d frickin’ do it. Yeah, no, I get that a lot.
Sam [00:27:39]:
Someone’s walking up or down your stairs, it’s making a noise. That brings us to the end of this episode. Make sure to check it out and share it. We’d love it if you shared it. If you are on any of the podcast apps, whatever, please rate and review us. We don’t normally ask that. And, you know, but it does help.
Chris [00:27:56]:
It gets more people will see us if you rate and review it, and that will be more people downloading it, and we will feel good about that.
Sam [00:28:06]:
I mean, you’re getting 12 years of content for free, which costs us money to make occasionally. And yeah, here we are. So until next time, I’m Sam.
Chris [00:28:17]:
I’m Chris.
Sam [00:28:17]:
See ya.
Chris [00:28:18]:
Bye.
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