A few updates from my corner of the internet

HELLO!

I hope you're doing well.

A lot has happened since I last sent one of these, including me somehow learning that I've apparently been using Tic Tacs incorrectly for most of my life. More on that shortly.

First though...

BOSTON UPDATE

Boston now has a bit of a dodgy leg, bit of arthritis kicking in unfortunately.

He's absolutely fine, but he's reached that stage where every time he stands up he looks like he's about to tell you a very long story. He falls over a bit now, but we are exploring options to help him!

WHAT I'VE BEEN FILMING

The last few months have been really fun.

One of the biggest changes behind the scenes has been having Hugo helping out more. Quite a few people assume he's a relative, but we actually met through a local college when I was looking at improving my livestreams, and he's become a huge help with the channel.

It's allowed me to start spending more time doing the bits I enjoy most and has also made some slightly ridiculous filming trips possible already. Such as this Burger King breakfast video!

THE NORWICH MISSIONS

We've also been doing a few trips over to see Stuart Ashen recently and, as always, Norwich feels a lot further away than it looks on a map.

I've done the trip a few times over the years and was lucky enough to fly there once, which was brilliant because it took about half an hour. Sadly they don't seem to run those flights anymore, so it's back to the road trip of around 5 Hours each way!

It was actually Hugo's first trip up there. We left late on a Monday evening, arrived in Norwich at around 3am, grabbed a few hours sleep, filmed all day, then drove all the way home again that night. By the time we got back it was around 3am the following morning.

One of the videos we were supposed to film was testing some MRE ration packs.

What's the most important thing when you're filming a video about MREs?

Remembering to bring the MREs.

I got all the way to Norwich before realising I'd left them behind.

Fortunately, a last-minute wander around Norwich Market saved the day. We ended up finding some wonderfully random Asian food items instead and, without giving too much away, some of them were certainly memorable, one in particular, Stuart’s dog Tess enjoyed immensely.

So keep an eye out for those videos soon...

A VERY IMPORTANT TIC TAC DISCOVERY

Apparently there is an official way to serve Tic Tacs.

I've lived on this planet for over four decades and somehow never knew this.

There's a tiny compartment hidden inside the lid which perfectly dispenses one Tic Tac at a time. I'm still trying to process this.

EXCITING THINGS AHEAD

There are quite a few exciting things happening behind the scenes at the moment.

I've learned over the years not to talk about plans too much before they're ready because things can change overnight, but there are a few projects I'm genuinely excited about.

One thing that's been a little surreal is having conversations about some of my videos appearing on other platforms. Amazon Prime, Spotify, Tubi and a few others have all popped up in discussions recently.

It's strange to think that something which started as me filming cooking videos for a bit of a laugh has grown into a library big enough that people want to put it elsewhere. I never really saw that coming. You could genuinely watch a movie, then immediately switch over to me fighting with an air fryer.

The other thing I've been spending a lot of time thinking about is creating something a bit more physical.

Some of you may remember The Doughjo. For anyone who doesn't, it was a project I was incredibly excited about a few years ago before the world suddenly went a bit bonkers. In the end, I refunded the crowdfund because there was just too much uncertainty at the time and it didn't feel right carrying on.

The idea never really went away though.

What I'm exploring now is a lighter, more achievable version of that sort of dream. Somewhere that could potentially be used for filming, teaching, events and maybe even somewhere people can visit from time to time. Something real and tangible rather than just another idea sitting in my Notes app.

At the same time, I'm also working on another project that could be enjoyed wherever you happen to live in the world. That's probably the one that's more likely to involve outside support if and when the time comes, because I know not everyone is planning a day trip to Weston-super-Mare.

The funny thing is that none of these ideas are really new. They've all been floating around in my head for years. The difference now is that I'm finally finding the time each week to properly work on them.

Will they all happen exactly as I'm imagining them today?

Almost certainly not.

But that's part of the fun.

For now I'm enjoying the process, making progress where I can, and trying not to announce things before they're actually ready.

I'll keep you posted.

THE CLUB

One thing I have finally done recently is simplify my Patreon.

Over the years I'd added different tiers, different perks and all sorts of bits and pieces, and it eventually got to the point where it was harder than it needed to be & I couldn’t even explain it either!

So I've stripped it right back and created one membership called The Club.

I personally prefer Patreon as more of the support reaches creators, but the choice is completely yours. The idea is simple: you're either in The Club or you're not.

Inside you'll find loads of behind-the-scenes bits, extended, ad-free Barry Edits and early access to videos, monthly bonus livestreams, Discord access, your name in the video credits, video birthday shoutouts, early access to events and all sorts of updates that don't make it into the regular videos.

What I'm really excited about though is using The Club as a place to test things. New formats, behind-the-scenes experiments, extra content and ideas that might never make it onto the main channel. I'm even considering things like trial podcast episodes with Mrs B just to see what people think to help shape it.

It's become a really lovely little community already and it's nice having somewhere to share the stuff that doesn't quite fit on YouTube, plus getting some support to help when buying an egg or two.

If you'd like to have a look, you can find all the details here:

https://barrylewis.net/join-the-club/

THANK YOU

Whether you're part of The Club, watch the videos, reply to these emails, or simply pop by occasionally to see what weird food experiment I've attempted this week, thank you.

Making videos is still something I genuinely love doing and I'm really excited about some of the things we've got planned for the rest of the year.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go and find out what other everyday objects I've apparently been using incorrectly for the last 40 years.

As always, thanks for reading. I know inboxes are busy places these days, so I genuinely appreciate you taking a few minutes out of your day to catch up with what's going on.

Barry

Links to everything are here if you need them:
https://linktr.ee/barrylewis