Book Club Meets: Namaste Motherf*ckers! How to nail midlife, with Cally Beaton

Cally Beaton spent much of her career in male-dominated board rooms. She, in her own words, was a ‘boring businessperson’. Now? She’s a stand up comedian! Namaste Motherfuckers was the Happy Place Book Club pick for August. It’s Cally’s manifesto for embracing the radical change that comes with midlife and menopause, proving it’s never too late to reinvent your life. In this chat with Fearne, Cally explains that she’s particularly passionate about better understanding perimenopause after being misdiagnosed with bipolar disorder, and is candid about being a single mum to an autistic child. Thank you to Headline Home for the use of Namaste Motherf*ckers audiobook, narrated by Cally Beaton. If you liked this episode of Happy Place, you might also like: Book Club Meets: Emily Henry https://pod.fo/e/2e0585 Book Club Meets: Lorna Tucker https://pod.fo/e/2cf8fc Book Club Meets: Lisa Jewell https://pod.fo/e/30f6cd Child on the line is a three-part documentary podcast series celebrating the Volunteer Counsellors of Childline, and the brave children & young people who contact the helpline service. Listen here: https://www.childonthelinepodcast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Hi, I'm Natalie Dormer and I'm proud to be an ambassador for Childline. This year, Childline turns 40. To mark it, I've made Child on the Line, a three-part documentary podcast. We hear why children needed a helpline in 1986, how it was built against the odds and the challenges children face today, from abuse and mental health to social media and AI. Search Child on the Line and listen wherever you get your podcasts.

• 0:28Speaker 00

  After a recent gig where I'd done a bit of menopause material...

• 0:32Fearne Cotton?

  Welcome to the Happy Place Book Club with me, Fern Cotton.

• 0:35Speaker 00

  We were having a rollicking good chat, until he said...

• 0:38Fearne Cotton?

  Today, Namaste Motherfuckers by Calli Beaton.

• 0:41Speaker 00

  Not that he's got anything against female comics talking about periods or menopause or sex or whatever, or indeed against female comics full stop, but how did I think his mother and grandmother coped with menopause without needing to talk about it all the time? Having briefly toyed with slapping an oestrogen patch over his still-open mouth, but they're very hard to come by, so why waste one, I responded by explaining that we'd all coped with lots of things in the past, like dentistry without anaesthetic or passive smoking in public spaces or dying in car accidents without seatbelts. And how did he know they'd coped when women were routinely being locked in institutions

• 1:21Speaker 00

  and given everything from Valium to hysterectomies when all they actually needed was HRT? And if for generations, men had been having their willies removed because of anxiety, depression and an inability to regulate their own body temperature, then I think we'd all feel able to agree that it's a pretty good thing, it's finally on the agenda now. Yes, right. Are we going for a drink then, or what? No idea why I'm single.

• 1:48Fearne Cotton?

  Okay, let me give this book the respect of its full brilliant title, Namaste Motherfuckers, a modern manifesto for keeping cool when you're a hot mess. This book is so great because not only does it weave in some of Cally's own personal story and her views on life and aging and being a woman, it's also incredibly funny because Cally is a stand-up comedian and you hear about her life pivot within her own memoir parts of the book. But also, it's highly practical. Cally not only talks about her own life, but gives little examples and bits of advice on how she's navigated some tough stuff, whether that's being a single parent, whether that's raising a

• 2:29Fearne Cotton?

  son with autism, whether that's being a female in a very male-dominated industry. There's so much in there and there's some very funny jokes to end each chapter, too. Comedian Cally and I had this chat live at the Happy Place Festival in Tatten Park just a few weeks ago. Maybe you were there, you lovely lot. I hope you had a good time. I really do. I did. I loved it. There's a lot of love for Cally in the TalkTent, a lot of love, and on Instagram. If you're not in our book club, why? If you love books, you've got to join our book club. We chat about brilliant books that are out. We have a chosen pick for each month, which we dive into deeply. That's what we've done with Cally's book. And we suggest books. We hear what you think of them. Oh, it's so

• 3:12Fearne Cotton?

  fun. Go to our Instagram account, @happyplacebookclub. You lot have been sending me your thoughts on this book. Nahal says, "I'm about to turn 40 and feel I'm on the cusp of radical change that hasn't materialised yet. Hearing Cally's words is really reassuring." Oh, thank you so much for that message. We talk about radical change a lot in this convo, actually. This is from Bunny. Bunny says, "I used to be trapped by the too-old cage, but I busted that lock and I'm now frolicking in beautiful fields of endless colour and creativity." Oh my god, I feel ramped up from reading that message. And Alice wrote a similar message. "I've passed the old, broad, past-sixty border. I've just started to write, sing, make dance

• 3:54Fearne Cotton?

  music, yes! And I've picked up photography, too. The good news behind all this, dear girls, you can start and keep going as long as you bloody well want. Let's kick those limitations society has put on us to the curb." Oh my god, Alice, I've got goosebumps. So, as I said, coming up in this chat, why you're never too old to change the path you think your life is on, loving your imperfections, looking up to older female elders and mentors, bloody important, and a big'un perimenopause.

• 4:26Speaker 02

  Standard-sized rugs shouldn't be the standard. Get a custom-sized rug that actually fits with Ernesta. In as little as two weeks, Ernesta cuts, finishes, and delivers your rug straight to your door. No more awkward sizing, just a designer-quality rug made to work within your space perfectly the first time. Visit ernesta.com to explore Ernesta's full range of custom-sized rugs and get $50 towards any style when you order five samples for only $10.

• 4:55Speaker 03

  Hi, everyone. It's Katie Couric, and on my podcast, Next Question, we love stories about how women are taking control of their lives. They are increasingly leading financial decisions in their households, yet many say they don't feel fully prepared for the long-term financial choices ahead. Real confidence comes from knowing your financial future is protected, whatever happens. Pacific Life has helped generations protect what matters today and prepare for tomorrow with life insurance and lifetime income solutions. It's a promise Pacific Life has kept for nearly 160 years, so its customers can keep theirs. Ask a financial professional about how Pacific Life

• 5:40Speaker 03

  can help you create a more confident financial future. Pacific Life Insurance Company, Omaha, Nebraska, and in New York, Pacific Life and Annuity, Phoenix, Arizona.

• 5:53Speaker 04

  I'm Jake Stauk, co-founder and CEO of Serval. We built Serval to automate the IT work that slows companies down: onboarding, password resets, access to applications, my laptop stopped working. While employees wait for help, their real work is put on hold. IT desperately wants to automate this work, and that's why they need Serval. You just tell Serval what you want to automate in plain English, and it's built. No drag-and-drop workflows, no expensive consultants. Employees get unblocked, and IT teams go from drowning in tickets to building what actually matters. With Serval, IT becomes the AI engine powering the entire company. This is a new way to run IT. We guarantee you'll automate 50% of all tickets,

• 6:38Speaker 04

  and we'll prove it to you in a free four-week pilot. Go to serval.com/tickets. That's S-E-R-V-A-L dot com slash tickets.

• 6:52Fearne Cotton?

  Right, here's the show.

• 7:16Fearne Cotton?

  Let's do it. Come on, book nerds. Please welcome my guest, Callie Beaton.

• 7:21Speaker 00

  Hello.

• 7:24Fearne Cotton?

  Hello, Callie.

• 7:25Speaker 00

  We're awake, we're here.

• 7:27Fearne Cotton?

  We were just chatting backstage because Callie was saying, you know, obviously you do a lot of your stand-up is in the evenings.

• 7:33Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 7:33Fearne Cotton?

  This is like, you've got jet lag for this one.

• 7:35Speaker 00

  If they give you the 9.15 slot at most of the festivals, I do 9.15am, you'd be like, "None taken." But here, prime time.

• 7:42Fearne Cotton?

  Prime time. And also, for any of you book lovers out there, the Happy Place Book Club is where we have big, deep chats about books that we love. So, this is our book club pick for August. Cally's book, Namaste Motherfuckers. I'm trying not to whisper because it's nine in the morning. It feels like kind of sinful saying it.

• 8:02Speaker 00

  Too early to swear.

• 8:03Fearne Cotton?

  Too early to swear. But this book has brought me so much joy. I know lots of you have been following us on social media, reading along with us. So, look, I love this book. It's a modern manifesto for keeping cool when you're a hot mess.

• 8:15Speaker 00

  Yes, indeed.

• 8:17Fearne Cotton?

  What initially inspired you to write this book, Cally?

• 8:20Speaker 00

  I'd been thinking for about five years about writing a book. And I didn't quite know what book it was I wanted to write. But I kept thinking, you know, I used to sit in boardrooms, now I'm a comedian, my life's kind of messy. There's lots of stuff I put out on social media people seem to sort of relate to. And I was thinking, I need to write this glossy, gorgeous, perfect book. And then I realised, no, actually, the book I want to write is about imperfection and not having to know how to do things. So, I kind of... I spent my life fitting the wheels while I fly the plane and that was sort of how I decided to write the book. So what I finally hit upon was writing the book that I would like to read.

• 9:03Speaker 00

  And I had some brilliant advice from someone in the literary world who said that. She said, just don't worry about who's going to read it. Just write from the heart and write what you want to write. So yeah, I embarked upon the journey of getting someone to pay me to write a book because I'm not very good without deadlines or incentive. And then I had nine months in which to write the book. So it was like a sort of, like a pregnancy.

• 9:23Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 9:24Speaker 00

  Quack through my nine months. Yes, the nearest I'll get to a pregnancy these days.

• 9:27Fearne Cotton?

  It really is. It's like, writing a book is no mean feat. It's a, it's a wild process to go through and any other writers that I speak to, I think, you go through this cycle of you're so excited, you're fired up, you're writing it, you're loving it, get to the next bit. This is a pile of shit, what am I doing? I don't want anyone to see this. Then you come out the other side of that again. It's so undulating.

• 9:48Speaker 00

  Yeah. I think I had really good advice, loathe as I am, to give a big word to a, to a man at the Happy Place Festival, but Richard Osman's a mate from the telly days. And he's obviously written a few quite successful books and he said, get it down, then get it good. And every time I just asked, I sort of manifested the willingness to sit and write, not the capacity to write something amazing. So I just kept trying to sit with it. Lots of the book got written, dictated into my phone on dog walks. So I would think of things and I'd be like, oh, that's a good idea, I'll do that. And I would dictate stuff and then when I got home, I would look at it and put it together. So I don't, when I read the book back in its entirety, when the manuscript was finished, I was like, gosh, it's sort of, it did just kind of come into the world. It was a bit like a birth.

• 10:33Speaker 00

  I don't know where it did come from, but I enjoyed reading it and I hope other people enjoy reading it too.

• 10:38Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, my god, I love it. I love it. It's such a good mix of real practical advice, but also loads of personal anecdotes in there and stories. You know, you had, your own whole kind of life pivot is featured in this book heavily.

• 10:50Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 10:51Fearne Cotton?

  As you say, you worked in TV. That was your career and you were thriving. And then you had this seminal chat with Joan Rivers, which is not something many people can say, but tell us about that and, and why that sparked something in you.

• 11:05Speaker 00

  It's never too early in the day for an epic name drop, is it? So here we go.

• 11:09Fearne Cotton?

  Quang!

• 11:10Speaker 00

  She's in the tent. So yeah, I was, in fact, it's funny, our paths never crossed, because I worked at MTV for many years, and I ended up sitting in boardrooms at quite a young age. I ran a production company that was acquired by ITV. And I sat in these really male domi-, I was the youngest and only female member of the ITV board back then. This is going back 25 years. It was really fun. David Cameron was on the board at the time. Yes, that, David Cameron. Some of you thinking, why didn't he just stay there?

• 11:41Speaker 00

  So I was in these very sort of male-dominated boardrooms, and then began this life in, as a sort of board-level person in media, which wasn't ever what I set out to do. You know, you watch your life going down a path that you never quite intended. And it's really easy to think, well, I'm on this path now, I'm committed. What am I supposed to do? And along the way, I'd become a single mum of two young kids, and one of my kids has special needs. So I felt like I'm trying to have a grown-up career and support my family and just kind of crack on, really, not make a fuss. And I ended up being on the board of Comedy Central in the US. And we would meet the sort of A-list talent at industry events. So I was the boring business person, but we would host events for drunken, jaded TV executives. So fun.

• 12:26Speaker 00

  Around the world, such fun. And I was like the least sexy fluffer ever. I would be the one who'd have to bring on the sort of acts. And I soon realised you've just got to sort of keep the room awake at the wheel before you bring them on. And I worked with Joan Rivers a few times on those occasions. And she and I kind of hit it off from the start. I hadn't really thought of her as a feminist icon until I met her the first time. I was like, oh, wow, you really were busting through the glass ceilings Yeah. of Hollywood when no women were doing what you were doing. It was because of women like Joan Rivers that I'd grown up as a little girl, knowing women could be funny. And I introduced her at several events. And we had dinner together, just the two of us, not long before she died, not connected, not long before she died.

• 13:11Speaker 00

  And she, and she said to me, you should have a go at stand-up. I think you've got what it takes. And I was 45 at the time. And I said, you know, I'm a 45-year-old, single mum of two kids. I sit in a boardroom. That's way too late for me. And she just looked me in the eye and she said, Cally, I'm 81. What's stopping you? And she died two weeks after that dinner unexpectedly from complications to surgery. And two weeks after that, I did my first ever stand-up gig, an open mic gig. That's how tough it is for older women in comedy.

• 13:44Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 13:45Speaker 00

  We operate a one-in-one-out policy.

• 13:51Speaker 00

  And in honour of Joan Rivers, I died. So, but I was doing it, so that was my first gig. And I still had my boardroom job and I was, so I was doing the open mic circuit like everyone has to. I was hustling my way through, you know, trying to get good. You have to do a lot of gigs to become remotely good as a stand-up. So I put my hours in, you know, on the circuit by night and by day I was in boardrooms.

• 14:17Fearne Cotton?

  But what's so remarkable, and I really felt this reading the book was, yes, that's an extraordinary moment to have someone like Joan Rivers look you dead in the eye and give you that advice. You know, I'm sure most of us would go, oh, I should probably take this a bit more seriously than I am. But it's really something to go from, that was a funny little moment, to you're on a stage doing it. You know, how do you get from, god, that does feel quite exciting, maybe I could, to actually doing it? Because I think the thing that stops most of us is just going, oh, no, you just sort of, I can't be bothered, it's not for me, or I couldn't do that. You know, we don't even give ourselves the chance to try. I think it's remarkable that you even got on the stage to try that first gig.

• 15:00Speaker 00

  Well, I think a couple of things. One is, it's really nice for the purposes of the book and our chat that this conversation has Joan Rivers in it. But what's relevant about that conversation is that it was an 81-year-old. It was a wise female elder who I revered, who told me that. It's nice she was famous for the story, but actually it doesn't matter. It was someone who, so that person, you know, today is as young as we're ever going to be. And I never felt that more clearly than in that moment with her. Her dying then obviously anchored the sort of mortality of things because she was so vibrant and, you know, and it was out of the blue, her death. And so there was that, there was this kind of like, you know, real Carpe Diem sort of thing to the whole thing.

• 15:43Speaker 00

  But there was also an increasing, um, looming perimenopausal desperation within me. Something in me was screaming and was thinking about saying what I thought. So I was like in board meetings thinking, I'm this close to saying what I'm actually thinking.

• 15:58Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 15:59Speaker 00

  So I kinda needed somewhere to go and do that, that was not in the boardroom. So this, the reason the book is Namaste and Motherfuckers is because on the one hand, I was very namaste, you know, juice cleanses, you know, doing my meditation, being a real grown up. And on the other side, I had this rage in me that women my age and women full stop are told not to feel. I had this motherfucking rage and I was like, well, that needs to go somewhere. So I, my life became very split into the namasteing in the boardroom and the motherfucking at night.

• 16:29Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 16:30Speaker 00

  And, um, but it was very, I would say, as someone now at fifty six, I would say, for anyone in the forties, in the trenches, that, those were the hard yards. Those are the hard yards, much, yeah, those are the hard yards.

• 16:43Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, it's a funny old time. I mean, I'm sort of, I talked about this a fair bit yesterday in various talks that I was doing. I'm in sort of like peri denial. I'm just like, no, I'm not even, I can't be bothered to do menopause. I know I'm in it. All the things are there, all the signs, but I'm like, la, la, la. And I'm like, at some point I will call Davina McCall, but I haven't got there yet.

• 17:02Speaker 00

  Yeah, or Cally Beaton.

• 17:04Fearne Cotton?

  Or Cally Beaton.

• 17:05Speaker 00

  What I would say is, I, I feel really strongly about, um, the perimenopausal phase and how little is talked about that.

• 17:12Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 17:12Speaker 00

  I think it's brilliant that we talk much more about menopause. But I do think, so I, I, I properly had a kind of a full on meltdown at forty seven. And that's when it was, that was part of what led to me actually making the full pivot. So it looks like a radical, powerless reinvention and it, it was and it wasn't. But it also came from the fact that my coping strategies, what I was doing and how I was doing it, perimenopause made them reach their sell by date and I had nothing much left to give.

• 17:45Fearne Cotton?

  I mean, you were misdiagnosed at one point as well with bipolar.

• 17:49Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 17:50Fearne Cotton?

  Which I think, you know, that's a whole other conversation about the disparity between sort of. Men's healthcare and women's, a lot of these symptoms are not taken seriously, or we're meant to just push through and crack on with it. But a misdiagnosis, that's major.

• 18:04Speaker 00

  I did some research about it for the tour show I'm doing at the moment, and it's because I talk about the diagnosis and the period of psychiatric support I had at 47. And it was, actually what was going on at 47 was a Venn diagram of looming empty nest, perimenopause and burnout, that's what was going on. And I will be by no means unique as a 47-year-old woman going through those things. It was misdiagnosed as bipolar disorder. And I found out that if you're perimenopausal or menopausal, you're more than twice as likely to be diagnosed with bipolar disorder, oftentimes erroneously. I was given medication for it, and I took that medication for nearly 10 years,

• 18:46Speaker 00

  until I found out it was not bipolar disorder. Along the way, luckily, I also started taking HRT. But that bit of medical misogyny cost me a decade, and it's serious. And I don't know a single one of my mates, my hugely scientific focus group of menopausal and perimenopausal mates, but not one of us went through our 40s without some kind of massive wheels coming off the bus. If it's any consolation to anyone in their 40s, things have been much better in my 50s. Menopause has been a dream compared to perimenopause. It's not been easy all the time, but the peri-years were the trenches for me.

• 19:25Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, but I think, again, what I love about this book is, yes, you talk about the trenches, you talk about the rock bottoms, but also the potential for reinvention. And I don't want to sort of say that in a reductive way, like, oh, and then you can reinvent and be someone new, but I think, you know, I've been sort of ground zero before, not necessarily to do with hormones, but, you know, maybe like early 30s. And it was a chance for me to reassess my whole life and go, this doesn't make sense. I'm not loving this. Why do I think like this? And unless you are forced to have those big, big reframing moments, you probably won't. You just carry on because, oh, this is just how life is, this is what I do. So there is a glimmer of light, I think, in those moments that feel like absolute shit.

• 20:09Speaker 00

  I think it literally, when you realise, when you think about what holds you back from doing anything, it's a fear of failure. And we're thinking, well, I'd better not do it in case I'm not good at it. If I'd been saying as a comic, I'm not gonna do a gig until I'm a good comic, I'd never have done a gig. You get good from doing the gigs and you never learn as much from a good gig as you do from a bad gig. So stand-up will bring you hard up against failure, like it or not, and it's really a massive relief. Because so what? You go home and cry into your pillow, no one there gives a shit, that's happened now. They saw someone else who was good, you weren't, doesn't matter to them. And I think reali- and also realising, what I do now seems very different. So I'm now a broadcaster, podcaster, writer, comic.

• 20:52Speaker 00

  But everything I learnt in the boardroom, everything I was all those years before, I took it all with me. And that has really been able to help me in what I do now. So everything you've worked so hard to be, every single thing you are, in your work, at home, whatever you decide to do next, it's all in the toolkit. And there's enough that gets in the way of midlife women without us getting in our own way.

• 21:16Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 21:16Speaker 00

  So doing it our way, messily, and knowing that the aim is not how well we do it, it's just letting the wind be in our hair and having a go.

• 21:26Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 21:26Speaker 00

  That was such a relief to me. I was like, oh yeah, you're allowed to just try stuff and do stuff. And the only person who really cares is me.

• 21:33Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 21:34Speaker 00

  It's fine. So it's, it just is a big sort of relief really, and I just, I think far better my imperfect story than some perfect story that I've been told is the one I should be living.

• 21:46Fearne Cotton?

  Oh my god, I mean, no one is. It's just a whole fallacy when we see these stories on social media or whatever. It's just, it's a load of old nonsense.

• 21:53Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 21:53Fearne Cotton?

  I mean, you tell one story in the book that sort of merges everything you've talked about there, which is the notion of feeling invisible in midlife, but also being a stand-up comic, but like you say, you're facing potential failure, there's risk every time. But also it's a real male-dominated scene. We've had on the podcast, Joanne McNally. Um, we also had Harriet Kemsley at the Last Happy Place Festival, and both have talked about that. And you, you tell a story of turning up to support Mickey Flanagan and not being allowed in.

• 22:22Speaker 00

  Yeah. I turned up, I was doing some tour support for Mickey, and I turned up at the London Theatre. And the stage door had scaffolding, so you couldn't go in the stage door. So I just whizzed to the front of this massive queue. People get a bit twitchy if you're walking to the front of the queue anyway. So I was a bit like, sorry, sorry. And then I got to the front and I just said, oh, you know, I'm Mickey's tour support. And the security said, oh, there is only Mickey on stage tonight. I said, well, Andy's tour support. And she went, no, there is no tour support. It's just Mickey on stage if you just want to get in the queue with everybody else. And I literally was like, oh, God. So I then had to walk past 600 people, all of whom were about to see me on the stage, calling Mickey's agent, going, oh, Christian, could you get me into the venue? But I've never heard of a male comedian be turned.

• 23:06Speaker 00

  And I get turned away from, I think particularly as an older female comedian. I don't look like what people at the venue think a comedian should look like. I repeatedly have to negotiate to be allowed into venues. I do after dinner speeches and get told I'm not the speaker. I've, you know, I mean, it happens so often. I said, I'm here with Lou from my publishers today. And I was saying, it's really nice. I reckon this one, they'll actually let us in and

• 23:34Speaker 00

  we'll be fine.

• 23:35Fearne Cotton?

  All women welcome. Come on in.

• 23:37Speaker 00

  I've never had more swagger. I was like, yeah.

• 23:39Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, this is just a community of middle aged women hanging out, chatting about hormones.

• 23:43Speaker 00

  Their red carpet for all menopausal.

• 23:46Fearne Cotton?

  We love it.

• 23:47Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 23:47Fearne Cotton?

  But it is a harsh environment. You know, I always, whenever I get to interview stand up comics or I'm chatting informally, I'm like, I don't know how you do it. I, I wonder if you do have to have a certain personality type. Because I love what you just said a moment ago, that you might have a bad gig, go home, have a cry, but no one else thinks about it. I don't think I could put myself through that. You know, I've obviously done shit podcast episodes or I've done a talk at an event and I've thought, God, I just wasn't on point that day. I hate that feeling. But I could drive myself mad for weeks, sometimes months. It could wake me up in the middle of the night. And again, like you say, no one else is worrying about it. But I think stand up. Is the most sort of brutal environment to test that theory out in because you're the

• 24:31Fearne Cotton?

  reaction is a must. You know, we could do a talk today and it doesn't have to be funny. People might walk away and think, oh, that was interesting. I like that. But with comedy, you know how it works. There has to be laughter. That is like a must. Otherwise, why have you turned up? So how do you, again, sort of put yourself in the face of that risk, but also go home and pick yourself back up to get back out on stage and do it again?

• 24:54Speaker 00

  Well, I always think, first of all, with stand-up, I mean, all we are doing is mucking about on stage, telling jokes. There'll be loads of people in here whose jobs are actually really hard and challenging and brave. So I always think to keep it in context. But I do think, they say that, um, they say that stand-ups are egomaniacs with intense self-loathing.

• 25:13Fearne Cotton?

  What a combo!

• 25:14Speaker 00

  And I think that probably sums us up really well. Because on the one hand, we're like, look at me. And on the other hand, we're like, I hate myself. And it's this weird push-me-pull-me thing that we have. Um, there's usually a re, there's some, something's gone a bit awry or we wouldn't do stand-up. Most of us have had something in our childhood or something. It's rare you meet a stand-up whose life has just gone in a linear sorted way. So we're all doing it for some kind of a weird reason that we can't explain. It's a kind of band of rogues. I've never felt I belong as much as I do in stand-up sort of circles. But it's also really empowering. So if I'm on stage, I like doing, I used to do loads of emceeing. That's when I got, kind of got my craft. Because you have to be live. You've

• 25:57Speaker 00

  got to work the room, turn up, can't hide behind your script. And I love nothing more than if a bloke gives me a heckle, a big loud heckle near the start. Because I'm the one with the microphone. And none of the room want the heckler to win. They want you to win. And as soon as you can adequately put the man or men, and it often is men or, yeah, often it's males who will give me the biggest heckles. Once you've put them in their box, you've got the room. When do you get that chance in life? Imagine if you're on the tube and some dickhead says to me, and you've got a mic and you're like, well, darling.

• 26:28Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I love that. Might take one next time.

• 26:30Speaker 00

  Yeah. So you've got the mic. And when you remember, you've got that, you've actually got a lot of power when you've got the mic. And, um, and most of the room have come because they want you to succeed.

• 26:39Fearne Cotton?

  Can you take that attitude into your real life? Because I think that is a lovely skill. Not to literally shout someone down, but to realise you do, or you could, but to have that level of autonomy, like, I'm not going to be put down by you. I'm not going to be told what to do by you.

• 26:53Speaker 00

  I've realised as I've, as I've gone through life that I think we put, I don't know how it is for you. Um, but I, I've often been the one to put myself down the most.

• 27:01Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 27:02Speaker 00

  So I'm only too willing to be thinking, well, I'm less than you because I don't look as good in my yoga clothes. Or I don't do this, or I, I'll, I'll have a pop at myself before anyone else has. And now I realise that we all are allowed to occupy our, our space. And the reason I have such a positive relationship with social media, which I know has its massive downsides. But the stuff I put out on social media and the incredible community of Amazonian women who engage. And it's a similar community to the one that you guys have across the Happy Place platforms. And you realise that these outliers who want to bring women down, who just hate women, they are outliers.

• 27:46Speaker 00

  Common sense can prevail and they don't diminish us for a second. You know, the biggest thing I get levelled at me on stage or on social media, one of the biggest insults is, oh, you know, you're so ugly. I wouldn't want to have sex with you, that kind of stuff. And I'm like.

• 27:59Fearne Cotton?

  Wow, are you 12?

• 28:00Speaker 00

  By way of an insult, that is like you telling me you're not going to burgle me and expecting me to be really upset. So, so thank you. So, but I think those things, I think that's not, that's not about me. That's about that person. So I feel much more able to see it for what it is. And you do get a lot of, you know, on stage and on social media, you know, I, I'm, I get a lot of hate thrown my way. And I think it's actually helped me realise that it's, it's a sort of bubble of hatred that has nothing to do with the recipient.

• 28:33Fearne Cotton?

  That's the, that is the one huge lessons I think, I mean, I'm still learning it and I know it. And, you know, I've had to learn that one pretty early on in life. And it is so powerful if you can really, really lean into that one. You know, not just on social media, but like in our lives, whether it's a friend saying something shitty to you or a relative or someone at work. It's so rarely, if ever, about you. It's someone else's projection onto you, their own self-loathing, you know. We all know really happy, grounded, content people and then they're good eggs. They don't feel the need to bring other people down or to, you know, throw their weight around with other people. It's totally different transactions.

• 29:18Fearne Cotton?

  So I think when you can really believe that one, because we all kind of know it's true, that is such a weight off our shoulders because we waste so much time constantly worrying what other people think about us.

• 29:29Speaker 00

  And it really doesn't, one of the things I was thinking about, because they say as a female stand-up, everyone's got to be funny within the first thirty seconds. That's about as much grace as you've got, get a bangin' joke out within thirty seconds. And for women, you've got to be liked as well. So you've got two things you've got to do. And if you're not liked, you don't see many female comedians who come in with an objectionable persona as their persona. Because no one would go with us long enough to keep it going. It's pretty hard. You've got to be kind of, oh, you know, I'm your friend, you know, let's all hang out together. But I do think that when you're looking at kind of how you do these things and how we get out of our own way. When I do kind of stuff on the corporate speaking circuit, I do loads of like TED Talk-y type stuff.

• 30:12Speaker 00

  And I realised actually what people also want is stuff they can actually take away, that they can do stuff with. So I thought it's one thing me saying, oh, I've got all these revelations and isn't it helpful? But the other thing I really did want to write down in the book was takeouts. As you know, that every chapter has stuff that you could actually try. And you don't have to, you can read the whole book and do none of them. Or you can just step in and out of them if you want something for a certain occasion. But I thought all the stuff I've tried to learn with fifty, sixty years at the wheel of life, or sometimes not feeling much like I'm driving, but being in the car. I've sort of thought, yeah, I wanted to try and share those as well and also just write them down for myself. What helps and how can I try and catch it and keep it and use it if I need it?

• 30:54Fearne Cotton?

  I think, you know, certainly that stuff around caring less about what people think is, I think that's one big lesson we all need to learn. And that's one of the big takeaways that we need to have from your book, from listening today is, you know, it's never about us. And you're so right, like, I was having this chat the other day about. Wasn't necessarily about female comedians, but just females in general and this, this, this sort of must that we should be likeable. And I was thinking, have we ever seen a sort of character on TV like Simon Cowell, who everyone sort of loves, but, but he's, you know, he's the mean guy, he's the bad guy. If there was a female equivalent, you'd go, what a bitch, don't like her. She'd last one season of a show and then be booted

• 31:36Fearne Cotton?

  off. And it's such a, that's such a tricky one, sort of for you to cross. Because comedy, you know, it's meant to be, it's meant to be pushing boundaries and saying the unsayable. But you've got to also tread the line of, please, you know, please also like me so that I can stay in this job.

• 31:51Speaker 00

  I always loved doing longer sets. So if you're doing even a 20 minute set, which is the normal amount of time you do on a club, on a club stage, within 20 minutes, by about minute 12, 13, if they're in, and you've given them enough laughs and you're likeable, you can start putting in what it is you want to say and how you want to say it. So I've got much darker, funny dark, but I've got much darker in what I'll dare to say on a stage. But I'll only be able to do it when I've properly got everybody really with me. Yeah. And the nice thing about doing longer shows, obviously, is you really do get a chance to sort of tell your story. But I also think we're, when we're heckling ourselves, people say to me, how do you deal with hecklers? It's my own heckles to myself that are the biggest problem. And it's, if somebody, you could have 100

• 32:35Speaker 00

  good gigs and one bad gig, and that'll be the one you remember, the bad gig. And all of us have an equivalent of that. And if someone says something lovely to us, we dismiss it. Someone says, you look great, or I love that thing you did at work, or we'll be like, oh, yeah, oh, you know, we've moved on. But we need to bank that stuff, you know, all that lovely stuff, all the lovely people, the energy of places like this. This exists outside of here. There's so much more of this than there is of the toxic stuff. And if we can just relax into that, life's so much more pleasant. And also, we might be able to give ourselves permission to fail and try something we always thought we could try.

• 33:13Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, we need to let ourselves off the hook big time.

• 33:19Speaker 03

  Hi everyone, it's Katie Couric. And on my podcast, Next Question, we love stories about how women are taking control of their lives. They are increasingly leading financial decisions in their households. Yet, many say they don't feel fully prepared for the long-term financial choices ahead. Real confidence comes from knowing your financial future is protected, whatever happens. Pacific Life has helped generations protect what matters today and prepare for tomorrow with life insurance and lifetime income solutions. It's a promise Pacific Life has kept for nearly 160 years, so its customers can keep

• 33:59Speaker 03

  theirs. Ask a financial professional about how Pacific Life can help you create a more confident financial future. Pacific Life Insurance Company, Omaha, Nebraska, and in New York, Pacific Life and Annuity, Phoenix, Arizona.

• 34:17Speaker 02

  A rug shouldn't just fit your room. It should make your home feel finished. Ernesta creates designer-quality rugs, custom-fit to the exact size of your space, so every room feels beautifully pulled together. Explore Ernesta's range of options, all ready to be custom-cut, finished, and delivered to your door in as little as two weeks. Start with five samples for just $10, and get $50 toward your rug when you order. Visit ernesta.com today. That's E-R-N-E-S-T-A dot com.

• 34:48Speaker 05

  Business is booming. Is your fulfillment ready for peak season? Switch to ShipStation now and handle more volume with confidence when it counts. ShipStation connects Shopify, Amazon, TikTok Shop, and over 200 more integrations with one platform that does it all. You can manage orders, sync inventory, track returns, all automatically. Everything your operation needs, all in one place. Right now, qualified shippers get a real, dedicated person to get you set up and switched over for free. So when peak season hits, you're ready to go. Switch today at shipstation.com code AUDIO.

• 35:18Speaker 06

  Hi, it's Danny Pellegrino from Everything Iconic. Twelve celebrities, one Don, and cold, hard cash. From the producers of The Traitors comes The A new Hulu original series. The iconic Parker Posey hosts this unique reality competition show where 12 celebrity contestants shake down in an Italian villa to win a share of up to $250,000. Watch The Mob, now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney+ for bundle subscribers. Terms apply.

• 35:52Fearne Cotton?

  I mean, you say that your 50s has been the happiest decade so far. What do you think has made it such a great decade for you so far?

• 36:00Speaker 00

  Well, the kids fucked off.

• 36:03Fearne Cotton?

  See ya.

• 36:07Speaker 00

  No, and I got a dog.

• 36:12Speaker 00

  So, yeah, I think, well, I gave up the day job. The year I turned 50, there was a B-list French celebrity that year, a guy called Jan Moi, who went viral. You may remember it. He said that women at 50 are invisible. And there was this big backlash. And I did a show that year called Invisible and I gave up my boardroom job. It was also the year that the global pandemic shut down all live venues. So don't take business advice from me. But I did give up the day job. I don't regret it, even though it was tough timing with the pandemic. I have become an empty nester, which is a mixed blessing. But I couldn't have written this book when I was as busy as I was with my kids.

• 36:54Speaker 00

  I have got the dog Jeff, who I love and is a great joy to me.

• 37:00Fearne Cotton?

  I'm a big one for pets with human names. I've got two cats and they're called Frank and Simon.

• 37:05Speaker 00

  There you go. Well, they probably, they should meet Jeff.

• 37:06Fearne Cotton?

  They should. What a gang.

• 37:08Speaker 00

  Yeah. And we've got a cat called Crystal, not named by me. So Jeff and Crystal, I always think they should have a lot of Cortina with their.

• 37:16Fearne Cotton?

  Fluffy dice.

• 37:17Speaker 00

  Fluffy dice with their names on it. But the other thing that is a real revelation to me at the moment is I've been a real serial data. So from 14 to 54, I always had a boyfriend, always, always. And I finally realized after one disastrous kind of car crash relationship after another, that it would be really nice to just, I know it sounds really cliched, but to actually worry about my relationship with myself and my friends and doing things that have nothing to do with that. So I've not hung up my hat forever. I've not joined the convent, but I'm really loving having a life that is just open and free. I'm full of possibility and there is something very liberating about no longer being fertile.

• 38:02Speaker 00

  There is no clock ticking on anything. I still have the period pants, but for we, not periods.

• 38:08Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, same. Yeah, I wear them for we.

• 38:10Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 38:10Fearne Cotton?

  I have no pelvic floor.

• 38:12Speaker 00

  Yeah, no, the period pants are great.

• 38:14Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I love them. I live in them.

• 38:16Speaker 00

  I'm peeing right now. It's really nice.

• 38:18Fearne Cotton?

  Fantastic.

• 38:19Speaker 00

  But I do think the, but being able to just walk free in our period pants, what a joy.

• 38:25Fearne Cotton?

  Dreamy. But you know what, this is all the stuff no one talks about. You know, we are fed this narrative that, you know, oh, menopause and kids leaving and like your 50s, oh my god. And all I've ever heard is sort of, not from women that I know, but the sort of societal piece on being in your 50s, what a terrible time for women and everything's going tits up. And actually, everything you've just said excites the hell out of me.

• 38:49Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 38:50Fearne Cotton?

  Like, what an amazing period of freedom and liberation. And I know it's not always that simple, you know, a lot of my friends who are a decade or two decades older than me and maybe got like parents that they're now caring for and that's sort of all tips as well. But I think we're not looking at any of the positives at the moment of midlife.

• 39:05Speaker 00

  It's, it's all, what I wanted to say in the book and the reason it is about what to do when life, when you're a hot mess, is it's all of that. It is sleepless nights, anxiety, upset, tears about weird things, non-stop crying, non-stop pissing. But it's also, but it's also free and joyous and I've only just found my voice. It's taken me 10 years as a comic to find my, find my voice. Writing this book helped me find my voice. The tour show I'm doing right now is the first show I've ever done where I'm like, oh, right, this is my show. I've found myself. All of that is happening. And when people say, it's amazing, you reinvented at 50, it's like, well, I'm, this isn't my last reinvention. Why would it be?

• 39:46Speaker 00

  My dad's 81 and he still plays the drums and he still cycles and plays tennis and he's still living his life and having new adventures. When he heard he had his third type of cancer, he went out and bought a crappy old kit car and went driving. And I was like, yeah, we can live like that. So it's all of that. So even on the messiest days, I think H.G. Wells said, when, if you fell down yesterday, stand up today. And I fall down and stand up many times every day. And we were saying before we came on, weren't we, that we were, you know, just to break the fourth wall, we were both a bit like, oh, we're not quite awake, what's gonna happen? And we both said, it's always when you feel like that, you have a lovely time. And just knowing, we might be slightly bleary eyed and what, and

• 40:29Speaker 00

  then we come on and it's just lovely in the moment. And that's all part of a normal day.

• 40:33Fearne Cotton?

  Completely. I mean, that's certainly one of the main things that I try and talk about either at the festival or in the podcast or whatever. And it's kind of why Happy Place exists, is that it is a place for, like, anything goes, like, absolute imperfection. You don't have to come here and be good at yoga or meditate every day. I haven't meditated for years. I just, I haven't had the time. That's a crap excuse. I meant apparently meditate more when you say things like that. But none of it is about perfection or like this regimented lifestyle. So everything's perfect. It's like, we're all trying our best. We're all getting out of bed every day, giving it a good shot. Some days it's gonna be great, other times not so much. But we've got to give ourselves a break. Stop being so hard on ourselves.

• 41:15Speaker 00

  Well, it's also when I talk about, I completely agree with everything you've said. And one of the things that people often ask me about imposter syndrome, when I do the corporate speaking, and I speak to that theme a lot of. And when you think about whether it's imposter syndrome or what holds us back, we're always comparing our insides to other people's outsides. Because that's all we can see of the other. So we're the only one who knows about the mess, and it's our mess. But everybody is, I think the latest research says that over 90% of people suffer from imposter syndrome. And the ones who don't are narcissists and psychopaths. So, good, good, if that's how we're feeling. So when people say to me, well, how do you counter imposter syndrome? And every single thing I ever do, I, a bit of me is thinking, this will

• 41:58Speaker 00

  be the one I get found out. Or it's been a bit of a mistake that they booked me for this.

• 42:02Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, everyone's thinking that. Do you think I'm walking around here going, yes, I deserve my own festival. Everybody, follow me around and take pictures. No, I'm going, what the fuck is this about? Like, it's completely insane. Do you know, we've got, as a little exclusive, tomorrow on our sort of regular Happy Place episode that goes out, we've got Prue Leith on, Dame Prue Leith, who's amazing. I'm such a big Bake Off fan. Her story is incredible. And she talks about Start in a restaurant, uh, she's never done it before. Also, opening a cookery school. She'd never taught anyone to cook in her life. She was sort of, was a great cook, but had never taught it. And she's like, none of those things should stop you. Like, give it a go. And imposter syndrome is a, is a new term. So she went, obviously, everyone's always been feeling that. We just didn't have language for it.

• 42:44Fearne Cotton?

  And you kind of assume, yeah, everyone's winging it, flying by the seat of their pants, giving things a go. But it should never, ever stop you from trying, you know. We can all look at other people. It could be someone on the talk stage today, or the person next to you doing yoga. And you think, oh, man, they've got, they've got it all sorted. They've cracked life. They're nailing it. Everything's going brilliantly. We haven't got a clue.

• 43:04Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 43:05Fearne Cotton?

  I don't have a clue what's going on for other people, ever. No idea.

• 43:08Speaker 00

  And I find the, the bit that brings people in is that vulnerability. So I realised as a, as a corporate speaker, I, I, it's a very male circuit and I occasionally get to see the other speakers on it. Normally, we're booked simultaneously, you know, at different events. We don't see each other. But whenever I see people, often their whole vibe is this amazing thing they did. And they're going to help you try and be as good as they are. And personally, I think, well, I'm never going to climb up Everest in a tweed suit. So good luck to you, but that's not my, whereas I always will go on with how I'm feeling, what's actually going on. And I will kind of, um, break down the, what's actually, what it actually takes to be doing, including public speaking. I used to hate public speaking. I think Jerry Seinfeld said, most people would sooner be in the coffin than give the eulogy.

• 43:51Speaker 00

  Because people are so scared of public speaking. But I just, um, yeah, so I think actually vulnerability and people giving their true sort of sense of what's going on invites people in. And that's much more inspirational to me.

• 44:03Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 44:04Speaker 00

  Than someone who really has got their shit together. Then I'm like, oh, that's, yeah, that's just unattainable.

• 44:08Fearne Cotton?

  I completely agree. And also, that, that's the sort of stuff that's relatable. You go, oh, God, I've, I've felt like that. I understand that. You know, it's a shared human experience rather than, yeah, like you say, these sort of unattainable stories that just feel completely out of reach. That makes me want to give up from the get go. I'd much rather hear about someone's struggles, but they still kept on going and gave things a try. The other thing I love about this book is that I laughed out loud throughout it, not only from your own personal stories and the brilliant way that you write, but you also include jokes that people have told you over the years at the end of each chapter. And there are some absolute caucuses in there. This is my least favourite question when people ask me, because I can't remember any jokes ever. But do you have a favourite joke?

• 44:52Speaker 00

  My actual favourite joke, I think you'd have to bleep out. So I will give you, yeah, so here's, this isn't my joke. This is, there's a massive hornet or something up there, anyway.

• 45:03Fearne Cotton?

  Crikey, there sure is. He's a big northern hornet just wandering around the tent.

• 45:08Speaker 00

  Don't get there like that in Camden. So this is not my joke, this is Dimitri Martin, the American comedian's joke, but I like it. So I checked into a hotel and they said, would you like a wake-up call in the morning? And I said I would. Next morning, phone goes, voice at the other end of the line says, "What the hell are you doing with your life?"

• 45:29Fearne Cotton?

  That's so good.

• 45:32Fearne Cotton?

  That's a good one. The other thing that I adored about this book is how you weave in lessons that you've learned from your son. Your son is mega obsessed with wildlife, always has been, has got a really interesting take on lots of different species and how we can learn from their habits and what they do. What would you say your favourite thing is that you've learned from your son?

• 45:56Speaker 00

  Yeah, my son is an autistic zookeeper. I mean, he's autistic, he's not looking after gorillas with Rubik's cubes. But he's, so yeah, so he was always obsessed with animals from really, really young. And so I spent my life chronicling particularly primates with my son in further and further flung locations as he got older. And I think the thing I most learnt from my son was, well, first of all, that different is not less. He was so different from everything I ever thought I would have in my family. He's probably the sort of kid I would have taken the piss out of at school, I'm ashamed to say. And then I'm his mum and I'm having to come hard up against all my preconceptions and really rethink what it is to be neurodivergent or neurotypical.

• 46:38Speaker 00

  But the other thing I learnt, my son has taught me so much about feminism from the animal kingdom, because the animal kingdom is full of feminist role models. And there's a brilliant book, Bitch by Lucy Cook, that demystifies and debunks all this erroneous information from centuries of evolutionary biology, where we disregarded anything that might give the power to females of the species as inconvenient anomalies, and gave it all to a sort of patriarchal narrative. And she writes this brilliant book that debunks all of that. But my son has kind of been debunking that for me along the way. So yeah, we've, particularly like bonobos, he's obsessed with bonobos, and they're matriarchal, they're bisexual, and they have these revered older female, you

• 47:20Speaker 00

  know, role models, orcas. It's the orca grandmothers, the post-menopausal's, who have all the power, because they know where the food sources are. And it's with those post-menopausal grandmas that the young orca bucks have their first sexual experiences.

• 47:35Fearne Cotton?

  Wow.

• 47:36Speaker 00

  Be more orca, guys.

• 47:37Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 47:39Speaker 00

  So yeah, I've learned a lot about feminism from my son through feminist role models, yeah, in the natural world. And I've learnt that, yeah, when I was told of his diagnosis, it was given to me like a sort of like I'd won the wrong prize at the raffle. It was like, oh, sorry, seems you've got a kid like this. And I've realised that, yeah, it's been the richest gift I've ever had, watching my son navigate the world, and what I've learnt from watching that. And there would be swathes of the world that wouldn't function without neurodivergent people. So thank goodness we celebrate that now.

• 48:14Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 48:15Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 48:15Fearne Cotton?

  The best. I loved every one of those stories. It was all so fascinating. And yeah, on that note from your son, we need to respect our elders way more than we are. Female elders, where it's at, you look at so many other countries, you're like, one of my friends does a lot of work in Mexico. She'll stay out there for 10 months, she'll work with all of the Mexican grandmas, and they teach her everything, all of the rituals and the ways and their wisdom. And they see older women in a completely different light. They are revered, they are. You know, they they want to constantly get that wisdom from them and apply it to their lives and over here we're just like, mm, cute little grandma.

• 48:55Speaker 00

  Well, it's funny how people often make assumptions as well about what people want to hear and who they want to hear from. I sometimes find there's definitely ageism in the world that we work in, lots of it.

• 49:07Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, yeah.

• 49:07Speaker 00

  And I, we've had it before, my agent has been told, oh, we'd love to book Cally for that panel show, but our audience is like eighteen to thirty four year olds, so probably she's not the right booking. And it's like, well, who do you think's in the comedy clubs? It's mainly under thirties. And I would tell you this, the people who come up to me after the club gigs, it's very often women, a generation younger than me.

• 49:29Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 49:29Speaker 00

  Coming up to me saying, I loved hearing what you would, and they want to see what might be next.

• 49:34Fearne Cotton?

  Of course.

• 49:34Speaker 00

  And they want to hear that. So, and I, we may be traditionally told that we should go gentle into that good night and become invisible as we get older. There is no one more visible to me in the world than women midlife and older. I see those women, I love those women. I have yet to ever sit next to a woman forty or above without a fascinating story to tell.

• 49:59Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 49:59Speaker 00

  And indeed, women younger than that. But I love midlife women and I love older women and I see you and I hear you and I want to hear more from you.

• 50:06Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, you've come to the right place.

• 50:07Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah.

• 50:08Fearne Cotton?

  Very much here for all of it. Um, where would you say your happy place is, Cally?

• 50:15Speaker 00

  I think a lot of it does come down to the dog. I'm pathetically happy with, I'm so happy with Geoff. I'm so happy. So, he's the best husband I never had. I love him. So, yeah, when I'm with Geoff and in nature, I'm really, really happy. And I'm also just really noticing, I am very much at the sandwich point. My dad's very unwell. Um, you know, we're in the trenches with dad and my kids live very far away from me and I am relishing any moment I get in the orbit of any of my family and also relishing the moments I get of connection with them, even when I'm not actually with them, but however we connect

• 50:56Speaker 00

  when we're remote as well. So, right now, it's, it's Geoff and then my dad and my kids.

• 51:04Fearne Cotton?

  Let's just get your priorities straight here.

• 51:05Speaker 00

  Yeah, exactly.

• 51:06Fearne Cotton?

  It's all about Geoff.

• 51:07Speaker 00

  I've told Geoff and I have a pact that he has to live forever. He said he's going to be the first-

• 51:11Fearne Cotton?

  That is great news.

• 51:12Speaker 00

  First sausage dog that's never gonna die. And it was really nice of him to agree that.

• 51:16Fearne Cotton?

  Yes. Cats are the best. I said this yesterday, but I, one day, will quit everything and open a cat sanctuary. Like, that's the plan.

• 51:24Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 51:24Fearne Cotton?

  The first thing I do when I get out of bed is I go downstairs. Simon, you don't pick Simon up. Absolutely not. He will scratch your eyes out, but Baby Frank-

• 51:32Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 51:33Fearne Cotton?

  I pick up Baby Frank. He's not even a baby, he's two now, but he's my baby.

• 51:36Speaker 00

  He is a baby.

• 51:36Fearne Cotton?

  And I pick him up and he's got, they put a squirrel's tail on him rather than a cat's tail. He's got a big fluffy tail. He's got the wrong tail altogether.

• 51:43Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 51:44Fearne Cotton?

  And I hold Baby Frank and I rock him like a baby and I talk in a stupid voice.

• 51:48Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 51:49Fearne Cotton?

  And he's looking at me going, "Shut the fuck up."

• 51:50Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 51:51Fearne Cotton?

  And I just rock it and I'm, that's my happiest bit of the day. Just rocking Baby Frank.

• 51:55Speaker 00

  I know. I go around talking to Geoff on the, I will talk, I'll sometimes think there's no one around and I'll be like, "Are you such a good book?" Are you my, and then there'll be someone, I'll be like, "Oh, so..." I do talk, yeah, I do, oh, yeah.

• 52:06Fearne Cotton?

  The best.

• 52:07Speaker 00

  I love talking. And I have a cat who I absolutely adore as well. She's a really furious tortoiseshell midlife female cat.

• 52:13Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 52:14Speaker 00

  We are very-

• 52:15Fearne Cotton?

  Hard relate.

• 52:16Speaker 00

  Very, very attuned, so. But yeah, actually, it's the times when I'm just still and I also need to try and remember that I didn't expect to write a book, I did not expect the book to hit the Sunday Times Bestseller list. I didn't expect any of this. I didn't expect to be sitting here with you and to notice right here how I'm feeling. This is a pretty happy place.

• 52:36Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 52:36Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 52:37Fearne Cotton?

  Yes to that. I love it. I love it. Well, look, I, I love this book and I know a load of our Happy Place Book Club followers did. And as I said, if you haven't got the book, do go to the book area for a book signing and also you're gonna do a book reading as well today.

• 52:50Speaker 00

  I'm doing a reading in about half an hour.

• 52:52Fearne Cotton?

  Yes, amazing. So, look, all of you gorgeous people, thanks so much for listening to this live Happy Place Book Club chat with the wonderful Cally Beaton.

• 53:01Speaker 00

  Thank you.

• 53:02Fearne Cotton?

  Thank you.

• 53:05Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, Cally, I love that. That's fucking funny, but also deeply seeped in wisdom that I shall hold on to dearly as I canter through my mid 40s. That Prue Leith episode that I mentioned, by the way, is obviously out now. That was last week's episode, so do listen to that if you want more on just bloody starting that thing, whether you think you're going to be good at it or not, because Prue has, and she's absolutely nailed life. So, it's a new month, which means a new book to read in the Happy Place Book Club. September's book is the debut novel by Ayesha Mohara. It's called Loved One. It tells the story of Julia, whose first love, Gabe, dies aged 29, launching her into a

• 53:46Fearne Cotton?

  worldwide quest to recover the possessions he left with friends and acquaintances across the world. It also brings her into contact with that last woman that Gabe loved. It's set between LA and London, deeply evocative places that she talks about and how she describes them. Oh, and Barcelona's included too. It's completely gorgeous, and I know you're going to love it. You'll be able to hear my chat with Ayesha in a few weeks' time, so do join the Book Club discussion on Instagram if you want to send us a little comment to be featured in that episode. We're at Happy Place Book Club on Instagram. All right, until next time, you beauties. A massive thanks again to Cally, to the producers of this episode, Anushka Tate and Basil Oxtoby, and to you, you bloody book nerd legends.

• 54:57Speaker 03

  Hi, everyone. It's Katie Couric, and on my podcast, Next Question, we love stories about how women are taking control of their lives. They are increasingly leading financial decisions in their households. Yet, many say they don't feel fully prepared for the long-term financial choices ahead. Real confidence comes from knowing your financial future is protected, whatever happens. Pacific Life has helped generations protect what matters today and prepare for tomorrow with life insurance and lifetime income solutions. It's a promise Pacific Life has kept for nearly 160 years, so its customers can keep theirs.

• 55:39Speaker 03

  Ask a financial professional about how Pacific Life can help you create a more confident financial future. Pacific Life Insurance Company, Omaha, Nebraska, and in New York, Pacific Life and Annuity, Phoenix, Arizona.

• 55:55Speaker 04

  I'm Jake Stauk, co-founder and CEO of Serval. We built Serval to automate the IT work that slows companies down. Onboarding, password resets, access to applications, my laptop stopped working. While employees wait for help, their real work is put on hold. IT desperately wants to automate this work, and that's why they need Serval. You just tell Serval what you want to automate in plain English, and it's built. No drag-and-drop workflows, no expensive consultants. Employees get unblocked, and IT teams go from drowning in tickets to building what actually matters. With Serval, IT becomes the AI engine powering the entire company. This is a new way to run IT.

• 56:37Speaker 04

  We guarantee you'll automate 50% of all tickets, and we'll prove it to you in a free four-week pilot. Go to serval.com/tickets. That's S-E-R-V-A-L dot com slash tickets.

• 56:51Speaker 05

  Business is booming. Is your fulfillment ready for peak season? Switch to ShipStation now and handle more volume with confidence when it counts. ShipStation connects Shopify, Amazon, TikTok Shop, and over 200 more integrations with one platform that does it all. You can manage orders, sync inventory, track returns, all automatically. Everything your operation needs, all in one place. Right now, qualified shippers get a real dedicated person to get you set up and switched over for free. So when peak season hits, you're ready to go. Switch today at shipstation.com code AUDIO.

• 57:22Speaker 06

  Hi, it's Danny Pellegrino from Everything Iconic. 12 celebrities, one Don, and cold, hard cash. From the producers of The Traitors comes The Mob, a new Hulu original series. The iconic Parker Posey hosts this unique reality competition show where 12 celebrity contestants shake down in an Italian villa to win a share of up to $250,000. Watch The Mob, now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus for bundle subscribers. Terms apply.