I admire Meghan Markle. I really do. She is genuinely the most admirable and wonderful person, or so I believe. I imagine she and her lovely clothes and her lovely hair and her lovely husband and her lovely children are living their best lives in their monstrous but lovely Montecito house full of freshly cut flowers and sunlight and the smell of newly toasted organic muesli. Just thinking about it brings a tear to my eye.
If I have one tiny criticism of Meghan – I feel we are on first name terms – it is that she’s a bit shit at podcasting. Actually, it might be more than just a bit.
In the first episode of her latest one called, somewhat promisingly, I thought, Confessions of a Female Founder, she interviews someone called Whitney Wolfe Herd. Surely a made-up name, I thought, but apparently not.
What would Whitney – I feel we are also on first name terms – confess to, I wondered. Greed? A murder? Forgetting to recycle? Sadly, at least for the prurient, it was that she and Meghan love and admire each other.
According to Meghan, Whitney is not only the “kinda friend who always knows the exact right thing to say”, but was an “undeniable visionary”. This, it turned out, was because Whitney had started a dating app company which has made her a shed load of money.
Meghan’s first probing question for Whitney was about where they first met, which seemed strange given they both knew the answer. Whitney said, “I came to your house in a disco cowboy outfit for New Year’s Eve.” This was apparently still hilarious even though it was ages ago.
“To this day,” Meghan shared, “Archie says, ‘When am I going to see the cowboys again?’”
Later, after much talk of personal growth, not sweating the small stuff and bad boyfriends, Meghan explained to Whitney that “loving yourself is a revolutionary act”. I confess it was at this moment, about 20 minutes in, that I silently screamed, “Enough!” And stopped listening to Meghan’s podcast.
It was while silently screaming “Enough!” that I conceived my own revolutionary act. Perhaps, I thought, Michele and I should make our own motivational podcast, even though neither of us are at all motivated. We also have no idea how to make a compelling podcast, though this has been no barrier for Meghan.
What is important, I thought, was that the podcast, should be, as Meghan’s businesses are to her, “an extension of my essence”. It would also be essential, too, I reckoned, that Michele and I were our authentic selves.
After considering various ideas for a Lush Places podcast – should it be about mowing lawns, seasoning firewood or chasing sheep back through fences? – we have settled on one of the world’s most relatable subjects, and one which, as far as we can tell, no one is covering.
It will be called Michele and Greg try to decide what to have for dinner: A Lush Places mystery. It will be available daily, in 5 to 120-minute episodes, depending on how long it takes to decide what to have for dinner. I have recorded the first one already, though we have yet to find a way to distribute it. In the meantime, here’s a transcript of episode 1:
Michele: What do you feel like for dinner?
Greg: I don’t know.
Michele: [Sigh].
Greg: Well, it was egg and bacon pie last night and the night before that. Sunday was Chinese orange beef, I think. What was it on Saturday? The claypot?
Michele: [Sigh], yes.
Greg: Sausages?
Michele: You always say sausages.
Greg: Because I like sausages.
Michele: We’re not having sausages.
Greg: Something with chicken, then.
Michele: Okay. What?
Greg: I don’t know.
Michele: [Sigh]. Okay, we’ll have sausages.
Stay tuned for another exciting meal decision tomorrow. In the meantime, bon appétit!
