We Sold Everything And Bought A Mountain

David: EPISODE 1 TRANSCRIBE David Stanley (00:00) We're just carrying on with the recording. My little girl interrupted. This is part of living in a van. ⁓ I thought I'd have like ten minutes available where I can record. But obviously not. ⁓ Banging on the window. Yeah, look, she's collecting flowers because we're doing natural dyes and t shirts and shit. We do do some silly stuff. Have to keep educated and we have to do stuff. So I I miss chatting.

David Stanley (00:28) ⁓ people have said they miss hearing my voice and they look to us for recording and like our messages on Facebook and everything else. So what we're doing is we're hosting this on either YouTube or Vidik or something like that, and then we'll embed it into Facebook and pass it through and run it through there and it'll be available as a podcast. So you can listen to us while we're talking. Again, if you have any questions, send them into our email address which will somehow be below. I'll have it sorted out. It's probably hello at ⁓ the van table.

David Stanley (00:58) or questions at the van table. ⁓ Uh.me. So what else is there? What was this for? It's not for van lifers, it's not for entrepreneurs, it's not crafters, it's for anybody. It's curious about anything. I go through everything. ⁓ I'm currently reading all about ⁓ natural dyes ⁓ and getting the kids

David Stanley (01:24) A little business going, they're gonna be making their own t shirts and doing stuff that they wanna do. ⁓ they want to earn some money. So this is Wolfie's five, he's into it. He got up this morning. T shirts haven't arrived from Amazon and bought twenty. ⁓ so they're practicing on one of my t shirts. Baylor's just currently been up picking some flowers. I did say you need a lot, so she's taking about five. ⁓ They don't listen, but kids don't. Well my kids don't. Yours yours might do.

David Stanley (01:57) Bit of a gap here. I've forgotten what I'm gonna bloody say, so I'll just look at my notes. ⁓ we cover everything. We're currently in Scotland. ⁓ we go back to Portugal at the end of end of September, early October. So we'll be heading back over there. We're going to finalise our visa this time. I keep saying this every year, but we started the process last November ⁓ and nothing happened. The company or the government office they notified us to say that we hadn't started.

David Stanley (02:25) Would you like to carry on? The guy that was dealing with it, he's left the company and it's been on his desk for four months. And I was like, Well, that's just great. Yeah, we do want to carry on. And then I said, Right, well, we'll have something sorted out the next two weeks. Went on a bit longer, nothing happened. So I said, I'll have a refund. So they're waiting for a refund. And that has taken another three months. So from November to now, we're still no further forward, but we are gonna move ahead. ⁓ We've had a bit of a tricky time with it.

David Stanley (02:56) Say the least. But everything we own, apart from the van and our clothes in it and the other small bits and pieces, is in Portugal. Everything we have is there. Our whole life is over there. We're gonna be olive farming and orange farming and everything else that goes with the natural lifestyle. We just want to slow down and become self-sustainable and live. ⁓ and that's it. What's been happening? Mention the t-shirts, I've done that. This is I'm impromptu. ⁓

David Stanley (03:25) ⁓ Kids, ⁓ with four kids. I have ⁓ Ryjin, who's the youngest, she's one. Then we have Zionna, who is three. You might see I've got a midge in the van. Scotland is famous for midges. I might swear it. Scotland is fucking famous for midges. Look, I've got bites all over me. Everywhere, look, bites! ⁓

David Stanley (03:51) I think I've got one here as well. ⁓ there, that is itching like mad. I'm dying to scratch it, but can't. And I've got them here. Down here. That was a mosquito, right? Alison burnt it with a spoon. Look, see that? You can hot spoon and burn Stop the itching. I haven't done that since. ⁓ It did work. Just burnt like hell. So that's that's us. What surprised me?

Davi Stanley (04:20) I don't know what on that note is. that's about T shirts. It's our latest thing. We're doing T shirts. ⁓ I'm learning all about data centers and security and everything else. Cause I need to I don't want to be working physically in the physical world. You know, I want to be able to work from anywhere. So what I'm doing is I'm people have asked how I'm generating money. ⁓ currently working as a chef and front of house for a company.

David Stanley (04:49) They're really nice guys. Had a bit of a spat during the World Cup because they wouldn't let me watch the England game. The only game that I had to work in they wouldn't let watch it, so I fell out with one of them. ⁓ we patched up at the end. ⁓ I quit.

David Stanley (05:06) ⁓ Quit my job over the football. I'm not a football hooligan, but I just thought yeah, you know, I came in two hours early to work to help him out because one of the chefs couldn't work, so I said, Yeah, I'll come in two hours early. So I went in two hours early to help out, and then at five o'clock, you know, the the it was when the England game were at five o'clock. It wasn't a problem every other game, it was just this one that was at five o'clock. I don't mind missing the first half, but not the old game. So ⁓ basically John said I I said to John, it says, ⁓

David Stanley (05:36) We've got some tables in at five o'clock. I said, bang on Then he went, Yeah. I said, they'll be getting served as plastic chuffed he wants that I Well the football's on and he said, You're not watching the football in here. I said, Well, I'm in the kitchen, nobody can see. So, no, you're not watching the football in here And then he said, ⁓

David Stanley (05:54) It was along the lines of you're not watching that episode in here, we pay you a good wage. ⁓ And you know, I think you're taking the piss by watching football in our work time. And I was like, okay, I take your point. You're absolutely 100% right. I'll not watch it, I'll turn it off. I sort of respect you for that. So that was it. I was annoyed. I mean, the first game I've been since 1982. So I thought, yeah, that's fine, not a problem.

David Stanley (06:24) You know, and I just said to everybody, you know, this was after this was after, but anyway, so it escalated a bit from there and he laboured the point a bit, and then he says, I think you're taking the piss. And I said, I've already said I'm not gonna watch it, and that was it then. I said, I tell you what, I've already got a fucking interview for another job because I wanted more hours. I said, I'll go and fucking work for them, you know. You twat. I didn't swear to him. I was very polite, I was very calm and custom, but this is football. This is an England game.

David Stanley (06:53) I know ⁓ I've I don't go to football games, I just can't be asked, you know, with all the people that they I don't like people very much.

David Stanley (07:02) ⁓ Well I work in customer services. Customer service, business hospitality, you know, ⁓ everyone at customers I just don't like people. Well what what are you doing this for? Well I need to earn a living, so this is what I've done. So ⁓ that was it. I'd got a job interview at the Claque. 'Cause basically they w what I thought I could do was we don't hope until five ⁓ and I've got two months to kill during the day and then I work in the evening. So I thought, well I could go and work during the day.

David Stanley (07:32) Go and do breakfast, finish there at like three o'clock, and then come straight here and work, you know, and still have my two days off, but earn double money. You know, because the idea is we'll be earning enough money here that I can buy a digger. I want to buy a digger. A three and a half ton thing. So if any of you got a three and a half ton digger that you don't want, lying around sparing your gun, ⁓ I'll have it. Send us a message with where it is and I'll pick it up on the way back. I've got a tow hook on the back of my van, you know, and I'll mention you. If anyone's got one. ⁓ Ollie. ⁓

David Stanley (08:01) Like he's gonna be listening to this. Anyway. ⁓ the bigger picture. I'm not an influencer. Don't listen to me. I'm not interested in, you know, is a product. You know, buy this, it's really good. I use lots of products and we are switching out using certain things and looking I look at the ingredients on everything. ⁓ food and we avoid a lot of stuff. We try and cook from scratch and do everything from scratch. We have a we have a whole

David Stanley (08:30) site with all the recipes and everything else that we do that's traditional. So you can look at that. That's you'll find that it's called the ancient kitchen table. ⁓ A lot of things about tables here. Ancient kitchen table, that's on there. ⁓

David Stanley (08:44) That's you can find that through ⁓ the po what is it the vantable dot me. Yeah, the vantable.me you can find that through everything we do is on there. There's also a magazine, so everything we do. ⁓ the Facebook posts we do, articles, and it's just guff that I do. We put links up of what we use and some of them I earn five pounds, some of them I don't, some of them I earn a bit of commission. I think Amazon links that we use for stuff like we might do a review on. I get two percent.

David Stanley (09:13) Something like that. So it anything you click, it's great. You know, help yourself click on things and then ⁓ I might actually earn something. And it's all we're trying to generate money without I don't want to sell out. I don't want to advertise stuff. I'm not one of them people. ⁓ I'm not interested. I'm not gonna have loads of products enter. Look at this. You know, ⁓ yeah, look it's this is a good mug. ⁓ I bought this in Tesco as it were a tenner. It doesn't spill. Well, hang on a minute.

David Stanley (09:43) Ha ha ha it's spill look you know but it's great and it does actually do its job and I fucking love it. It's massive, it's about a pint, sixteen ounce. And it's got a little hole there that you suck it through. Look, I had to make sure that one on because it does spill if you've got this. Because my little girl like tipped half me drinking out of it. So if you lock it like that, you can throw it and I have it the kitchen so no liquids go anywhere. We have to have a sealed vessel in the kitchen because our edge chef, it's very professional, not like me. ⁓

David Stanley (10:13) That's definitely not all like me. Fucking lunatic in the kitchen. So er I I I'm the saute chef, I cook everything, bang it to him and then he plates it all up. And he's really good. He's an American fella. He's lovely.

David Stanley (10:28) It's not. It's not. It's a miserable cunt. He missed and sinister we're like, fucking call him me a miserable cunt. He is. ⁓ It's great when he's great when he's finished. He's alright when he's building up to it, but an hour and a half before we start to open up, the pressure kicks in and he goes And he's got a bad back at the minute, so he's on a lot of painkillers, so he's a bit of a moody animal. But he's he's alright. You know, he he he

David Stanley (10:56) He was quite happy for me to set the football up in the kitchen. Fucking hell, we were talking about that about 10 minutes ago. So, yeah, so we were doing that. The football. And anyway, I I qu I quit. You know, and basically I said, that's it. You know, ⁓ I'll I'll give him a notice. I'll do two weeks, then I'll leave. Well then John's like, ⁓ I don't want you to leave. ⁓ I went holding him to ransom, I went out. I didn't ask for more money, didn't ask anything like that. You know, I d I I could have put a gun to the red and said, Look, I'll I'll stop for X amount.

David Stanley (11:25) pounds an hour. But I'm not like that. I'm not a total twat. But I thought you're taking the piss telling me I'll take the piss out out of you. But anyway, we kissed the made up. He said, I don't need to leave. You know, ⁓ you know ⁓ it was it was the little bits in there like if you have an accident in the kitchen and he said to Heather and he brought Heather into it you know he said to Heather he said ⁓ you're my witness I've told him if he falls in the fryer while watching the football like I'm ever falling in a fryer. You know so I thought that were it

David Stanley (11:54) So that was the football random army notes, one random thing. Always include something unrelated. ⁓ the mountain in Portugal. my mountain in Portugal is magical. It's probably on fire. Well, I don't think it is at the minute. As you're probably aware, I'm recording this in August 20 ⁓ begin end of July, early August. ⁓ What day is it? it'll probably go out in early August. There's a massive fire in Bordeaux ⁓ and a lot of fires starting in Portugal, and it is.

David Stanley (12:25) Really scary. You know, ⁓ I don't scare much. But I got four young kids. If it was just me and Alison, I wouldn't be so bothered, but I've got four kids. So I have to clear off part of the land, ⁓ so we can get out. So we can get to water and we can get out. So there's three routes I cleared. ⁓ one was about two hundred and fifty metres through twelve foot rock rows, which is horrifically hard. It's very hard wooden, it splinters like knives. So I had to clear roots out to that. So

David Stanley (12:55) To make it safe. We also had to clear queer. Clear I'm mumbling. Clear fifty yards ⁓ round or fifty metres around the house. ⁓ take it all down to about that far, so we're allowed that much. ⁓ to keep it safe so that we have a fire break because it reduces it, doesn't stop the smoke, but ⁓

David Stanley (13:18) It's just one of the gambles of what we've done. So ⁓ be alright. ⁓ So why we've why we start fucking I've knocked microphone over. Microphone. My teleprompter. Teleprompter, it's not rolling up or anything, it's just notes I've got one thing. ⁓ yeah, Instagram had just sent me a message, Cristiano Ronaldo. Game day blast recipe. ⁓ He needs his other two hundred and sixty squillion followers.

David Stanley (13:46) I follow Erling Harland. I think Erling Harland is ace. When he puts his head like that. ⁓ And all the memes, it's just the memes. He said there's just so much. I I think he's top dude. So if you haven't followed him, followed him. He's so funny. And all the memes and he's there. There's someone doing a spring onion. No spring onion with the roots and they're bent them back and they're going like that across the screen. ⁓ mate, and he said, The green onion. There's people that look like him that are doing really well off it.

David Stanley (14:14) You know, ⁓ I th I find him so funny. I I follow a lot of funny people. So Tushi Mango where they're doing ⁓ reviews of someone doing like spaghetti bolognese where they're ⁓ my boiling the the boiling the meat, I mean the onions and I just think ⁓ and they're like having a f a lippy flip they're having a fit. I don't know whether you can say that. Sorry, I might be might say something a bit shit, but sorry. I could always edit out I'd ⁓

David Stanley (14:43) One random thing. yeah, I was talking Portugal High Mountain. It's beautiful. We've got a river that runs alongside it. We've got one and a half kilometres of frontage, that's how big a land is. And we've got lots of olive trees around the outside of it. ⁓ our plan is to have people come and stop, relax, reset, and get away from it. And of course, things don't always go according to plan. You know, ⁓ I tend to go by the seat of my pants. Portugal has different ideas.

David Stanley (15:10) ⁓ It's absolutely scorchio ⁓ and you can't use metal blades and you can't cut anything. So from like the end of April, you can't do anything. Unless you've got a pair of scissors. And you can only do that till nine o'clock in case you create a spark because everything goes as you know, everything's tinder dry and can catch fire. So we have that against us. ⁓ what else? Water. We've got to put a borehole in to get water. But there is a fabulous spring where everybody comes over. If you want to buy a bottle of spring water and you're deadly serious,

David Stanley (15:40) It's the best spring water ever. Don't know what shipping costs are. Don't know whether we can do it. But if you want some spring water and we can do it, send you some. It's ice. It's best water ever. So smooth. That's another thing. We bought a tap today from Pure ⁓ No Link. Look for it. PW U. P W double U. Not W. U U. ⁓ P U U R E. It's the thing that goes on the end of your tap and they're doing a an offer at the minute. I'm getting nothing for this, but I've I've bought it because

David Stanley (16:10) I miss clean tasting water that we get in Portugal. I have to spoil it with coffee and dirty water as my friend ⁓ Gonzalo is lovely in Portugal. He said, Don't do Airbnb because there's no corporate round here. Only 'cause he's doing his big house.

David Stanley (16:31) ⁓ so yeah. ⁓

David Stanley (16:36) What else? ⁓ we're doing pizzas as well. We've got a pizza, man. We've we've got a thing. Ask people. It seems like and subscribe. Have you ever made something that completely surprised you? Have you ever done anything that's totally out of the ordinary? Did you sell everything you own to go and live on a mountain in Portugal with no visa? Can only do 90 days. Brexit. That would have good result, wouldn't it? I didn't I didn't vote, so it's not my fault. Can you see it with my nose?

David Stanley (17:06) Get my head! Cut all them! See that? See all them? That's where I've switched my head on different things. And it hurts. Don't hurt my brain. I don't think there's much in there. Look. I've gone bald. I could do with that. I've put a fo ⁓ a picture of me with like my little lad's cut his hair and I've put some on the top of my head just to you. And it's like perched on the top of me. I look a bit like Donald Trump, someone said. But anyway, comments went wild on it on my personal podcast. I a white hair coming at me out.

David Stanley (17:34) Another thing that's totally random is ⁓ I used to have long long hair and I've always loved long hair. ⁓ when I was twenty-seven I started to cut it short because obviously I went bald, but when I was younger than that, I used to have long hair, shoulder length all below. And I loved it, I used to have it swept back. ⁓ hairdresser. My old business partner, he's his wife said, ⁓ you've got a bit thinny, and I'll be off. So I had it down there just a bit longer than this. I think it was down to about that sort of length, dead short.

David Stanley (18:03) And then just fluffed front it here, like twisted it to cover this this gap here. And then my mate was a comedian, Silky. You know, ⁓ he I had like I've got two tuft tufty bits here. There's nearly nearly got bold. I don't got bold properly either. Two tufty bits here. And he says, just pencil over them, so we put some Vaseline on these here. And then I went like that. ⁓ Looked like I was the most startled man on the planet.

David Stanley (18:31) Look like a right lunatic. if you haven't seen ⁓ Stilkies, my mate comedian, Paul White, he's up at the Eddin Refringe in August and he's trying to sell tickets. Buy one. Buy one. I tried to get him to do podcasts and all he talked about was his diary dates and it wasn't really good material. But he's so funny. Paul White, I'll put a link for that below f if I remember. He's he's really good. So f I'm gonna talk to other people on here as well, me and Alison. They'll do some solo episodes of me, because Alison's quite shy.

David Stanley (18:58) Getting into talk, but when she does talk, she's so funny and she rips me to bits, you know. ⁓ She's really good. ⁓ love her to bits, superb, fantastic mother of my kids. You know, sh th my kids are awesome. There is nothing better th than coming home at night when you finish work and my little one year old, you hear her little feet going across the floor, and then she just wants to cuddle and she wants to sit with me. And then all the other kids have noticed the other three, they've noticed.

David Stanley (19:27) Baylor hasn't 'cause she's cold as ice. She didn't want to come and sit with me. So Wolfie came and sat with me and Zayana comes and sits with me. And they're ace. And the best thing ever. So if you haven't done that, get some kids, you know. You want some kids? Comment below. ⁓ I can't do that. ⁓ I was once I was once in ⁓ doing a shop fit in ⁓ Italy. We were in where were we? Verona.

David Stanley (19:57) And I was setting up a shop, a Yankee candle part in a in coin department store in Italy. ⁓ me and my mate Steve, we were doing it. It was his his missus that organized it all for us, and we were doing it out there. ⁓ and we were fitting up this place and ⁓ the smelling the fragrances and the this woman, beautiful Italian lady, beauti stunning, beautiful, in the 30s, easily yeah, I this were fifteen years ago for me as well.

David Stanley (20:26) I was single, you know, ⁓ and we were doing it. And she says, ⁓ the smell of baby powder is beautiful. And she said and I said, and it reminds her of her children. She two children. She said, yeah, I'm being awful. It reminds me of my my baby, you know, it Italian like. ⁓ And I said to her, Do you want another one? And she couldn't stop laughing. My mate Steve's face fell through the floor. Because you can't see that ⁓

David Stanley (20:56) I if he hadn't been there, she'd said, yeah, come on, we'll get at it, you know, behind the till. ⁓ wishful thinking. But anyway, that was it. So that's another load of rubbish. ⁓ so tomorrow we'll have I don't know. I'm gonna try and put out a couple of episodes a week. You know, and link it in and cut bits of information out for various things. So podcast, this is it. First one, I'm not editing it.

David Stanley (21:24) I'm just gonna do it raw like this. Cut it, put it all in, and I've got no notes. I'll show you, look here, I'll show you my notes. My iPad things falling off. Look at this. Hang on a minute. ⁓ still recording. Just a minute. What's happening here? I don't know. Ha ha. So there's my notes. Look there. There, that's it. That's my van. There, look, there's Alison's plants. ⁓ this is where we are currently. This is where on a building plot.

David Stanley (21:55) They're not gonna build anything here. So ⁓ I I can't hold I can't put it back now, so I'll have to just hold it. But look at that, there's my solar panel, I've got to fit that. That's five hundred and fifteen watts. It's been raining ever since, so I know a lot of you're on fire, but it's really hard, you know, to get on the roof and do it when it's raining. We had three days of sunshine, but I was at work at eleven o'clock in the morning and I ain't got time to get up there and get the glue to dry and glue and bolt it on. So it's going on me I've got a pop top in this van, so we have

David Stanley (22:23) Three double beds. We have some beds behind here. A pull-down bed, and we have a fixed bed. You know, so we have a work counter where the bed folds down over the top of it. It takes up about ⁓ width of a mattress and a bit of oar, so it's about that thick. It was meant for the kids, but ⁓ got different ideas. So it's me, me that's on that. ⁓ Anyway, if you like the episode, thank you. Like, subscribe, don't forget to subscribe and ⁓ follow us, give us a mention, you know, send us any emails you want, ask questions.

David Stanley (22:52) ⁓ Post comments, do what you want. I'll try and reply to them all. I'll do it on Facebook, mention everything. I'm on Facebook. ⁓ I'm gonna sort out my name out 'cause I took Alison's name. One of the older kids had the same surname, we didn't want to be hang on, why's he got a different name? So we're all the same name. So my family are gonna be upset. Told my sister, she went, What do you mean you dropped your name? Anyway, thank you for that. That's the end of the recording. See you later bye. Jingle music now. We ain't got any Ha ha ⁓

David Stanley (23:21) I'll get Alice until record it. ⁓