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Interview with Paul Dorin, Cartoonist, Ilustrator and NSW Fire + Rescue Station Commander.
11 Plays1 month ago
Paul Dorin is a station commander with Fire and Rescue NSW and in 2024 received the Australian Fire Service Medal in the King’s Birthday Honours for more than 30 years of service as a senior NSW firefighter. Based at Corrimal Fire Station in NSW Paul has a passion for helping others and has become a role model for his peers and local community which has seen Paul develop many safety initiatives. Firstly, the Home Care Disability Fire Safety Program in which he promoted fire safety efforts involving clients and their carers, and secondly the winter’s Smoke Alarm Action Day project, known as SAAD which takes place on June 1st every year. When not at the Fire Station, Paul is an incredible cartoonist, and we are proud to say he is the Illustrator behind all of our books which bring the stories to life in a spectacular way. Paul began drawing cartoons when he was very young at school, but before drawing l had a passion for modelling things out of plasticine. His late brother Steven was his inspiration to swap the plasticine to pen and ink and the family Louvre kitchen gallery eventually led to Paul getting his first published cartoon in The Bulletin magazine back in 1984. Today his cartoons appear in suburban & regional newspapers all around Australia and different parts of the world, and of course in our books, for which we could not be more grateful. Over the years Paul has supported the Jean 4 genes charity raising money for the Children’s Medical Research Institute by painting on the jeans of celebrities such as Mike Tyson, actors Robin Williams, Jonah Hill, Jim Belushi, Keven Kline, Frances Mc Dormand, David Hasselhoff to name but a few.
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Transcript
Introduction and Mission
00:00:09
Speaker
G'day, I'm Trent Maxwell.
00:00:10
Speaker
And I'm Lee Mason.
00:00:11
Speaker
And we want to welcome you to our Live, Learn, Survive podcast.
00:00:13
Speaker
Since 2018, Lee and I travel the globe and met face-to-face over 36,500 children in six countries across three continents.
00:00:19
Speaker
We've created a series of award-winning children's books, a global online education program, and are founders of the Live, Learn, Survive charity, all focused on teaching children and young adults life skills that will not only help themselves, but help others too.
00:00:30
Speaker
We're on a mission to spread awareness about fire, water, and first aid education to inspire the next generation of first responders.
00:00:36
Speaker
So join us for the next half an hour with some fun, inspiration and kindness and we'll try and learn something too.
Personal Catch-up and Guest Introduction
00:00:42
Speaker
How are you this week, Lee?
00:00:43
Speaker
Welcome aboard.
00:00:44
Speaker
Maxie, I am good.
00:00:46
Speaker
How are you?
00:00:47
Speaker
I'm good.
00:00:48
Speaker
I'm good.
00:00:49
Speaker
It's been a crazy couple of weeks, but I'm sure we can catch up on that soon.
00:00:55
Speaker
But yeah, how are you going?
00:00:57
Speaker
No, no, it's been good.
00:00:58
Speaker
It's been an interesting few days up here in South East Queensland, but...
00:01:03
Speaker
think we're all okay so um back on back on the uh what do they say back on the bike back on the and um back on the wagon and getting on with it and um getting busy so um but we've got a special guest today maxi one of our very very special guests a very special guest someone that's actually a part of the live and survive family absolutely i can't believe it's taken this long to actually interview this person but in hindsight um
00:01:32
Speaker
You know, the longer we leave it, the more and more great things the great person is doing.
00:01:36
Speaker
He's looking very nervous now.
00:01:38
Speaker
We've put him under pressure.
00:01:39
Speaker
So we better introduce him, hey, for the people that are not on YouTube and can't see
Meet Paul Doran
00:01:44
Speaker
him yet.
00:01:44
Speaker
So Maxie, today we are joined by our very, very special friend, Mr. Paul Doran.
00:01:52
Speaker
So Paul is Station Commander with Fire and Rescue New South Wales and in 2024 received
00:01:59
Speaker
the Australian Fire Service Medal in the King's Birthday Honours List for more than 30 years service as a senior New South Wales firefighter.
00:02:08
Speaker
Based at Colomal Fire Station, which is in regional New South Wales, Paul has a passion for helping others and has become a role model for his peers and local community.
00:02:18
Speaker
And they've seen him develop many safety initiatives.
Safety Initiatives Discussion
00:02:22
Speaker
Firstly, the Home Care Disability Fire Safety Programme in which he promoted fire safety efforts
00:02:29
Speaker
involving clients and their carers.
00:02:32
Speaker
And secondly, the Winter's Smoke Alarm Action Day project, known as SAD.
00:02:38
Speaker
I hope I said that right.
00:02:39
Speaker
Paul, we're going to talk about this anyway.
00:02:41
Speaker
It takes place on the June 1st every year.
00:02:43
Speaker
And as I said, we're going to talk about it.
00:02:46
Speaker
When not at the fire station, Paul is an incredible cartoonist and illustrator.
00:02:51
Speaker
And we are really proud to say
00:02:53
Speaker
He is the illustrator behind all of our books, which has brought the stories to life in such a spectacular way.
00:03:00
Speaker
Paul began drawing cartoons when he was very young, back at school, but before drawing, had a passion for modelling things out of plasticine, which I didn't know.
00:03:11
Speaker
Paul's late brother Stephen was his inspiration, and he eventually swapped the plasticine for pen and ink,
00:03:17
Speaker
and the family Louvre Kitchen Gallery eventually led Paul to getting his first published cartoon in the Bulletin magazine back in 1984.
00:03:26
Speaker
Today's cartoons appear in suburban and regional newspapers all around Australia and different parts of the world, and of course, in our books, for which we could not be more grateful.
Artistic Contributions and Inspirations
00:03:39
Speaker
Over the years, Paul has supported the Jeans for Jeans charity, raising money for the Children's Medical Research Institute,
00:03:46
Speaker
by painting on the genes of celebrities, such as Mike Tyson, actor Robin Williams, Jonah Hill, Jim Belushi, Kevin Kline, Francis McDormand, David Hasselhoff, the Hoff Maxi, to name a few.
00:04:00
Speaker
So let's give an incredible welcome to our very special friend of Live and Survive, Paul, we are thrilled to have you here.
00:04:08
Speaker
Welcome, Paul.
00:04:09
Speaker
Thanks, Maxie.
00:04:10
Speaker
How are we going?
00:04:11
Speaker
Good, mate.
00:04:12
Speaker
Good.
00:04:12
Speaker
How are you, Max?
00:04:13
Speaker
Just for people on YouTube, explain the scene.
00:04:16
Speaker
Where are you, Paul?
00:04:18
Speaker
I'm actually in my office at the fire station, so I'm ready to go in case we get a fire call.
00:04:23
Speaker
So it's a little quiet room and the guys aren't around, so that's the main thing.
00:04:28
Speaker
That's good.
00:04:30
Speaker
It's good to see you, mate.
00:04:31
Speaker
Obviously, we both work in the same organisation as well as doing parts for Live, Learn, Survive.
00:04:38
Speaker
I've had the chance to work alongside you at a couple of big jobs over time.
00:04:44
Speaker
But yeah, within the fire world, mate, you're very well respected.
00:04:49
Speaker
And again, I'll say to you before this podcast, they don't hand out AFSMs, Australian Fire Service Medals, out of cereal boxes.
00:04:57
Speaker
So you should be very proud of that medal, mate.
00:04:58
Speaker
It's something that a lot of firefighters do aspire to hopefully achieve and to get that is so prestigious.
00:05:05
Speaker
So you should be very proud of that.
00:05:07
Speaker
No, thanks, Maxie.
00:05:08
Speaker
Like yourself, you know, we don't do this job for awards or medals.
00:05:14
Speaker
But, no, it was a lovely honour to receive it.
00:05:17
Speaker
And it's the king's birthday, so it wasn't the queen.
00:05:20
Speaker
The funny thing is, on the medal, they've still got the queen's face.
00:05:23
Speaker
So it might be old stock medals, I don't know.
00:05:26
Speaker
There you go.
00:05:28
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:29
Speaker
Do you know what?
00:05:29
Speaker
It's a lovely year.
00:05:32
Speaker
That's going to make it very, very rare in years to come because it will be the one where there was probably the transition.
00:05:41
Speaker
Transition, exactly.
00:05:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:44
Speaker
So it was a lovely experience.
00:05:47
Speaker
Going up to Government House to receive it was, I was a nervous little boy, but yeah, the royal kind of sort of communal of it all was spectacular and the Commissioner was there as well in the day.
00:06:01
Speaker
Awesome.
00:06:02
Speaker
And it was lovely too, sitting amongst other people receiving awards for things they've done in the community and
00:06:10
Speaker
There are some amazing people out there doing some amazing things for the community.
00:06:14
Speaker
It's just amazing.
00:06:17
Speaker
Awesome, mate.
00:06:17
Speaker
Congratulations.
00:06:19
Speaker
So we've got about 15 questions here.
00:06:21
Speaker
Lee, we'll start it off and then we'll just go through and learn more about you.
00:06:25
Speaker
Yes.
00:06:25
Speaker
So let's start
Becoming a Firefighter and Volunteering
00:06:27
Speaker
it off.
00:06:27
Speaker
Firefighter, how long?
00:06:28
Speaker
How did that start?
00:06:30
Speaker
How did you get into it, Paul?
00:06:35
Speaker
Well, as a little kid, you always want to be a firefighter.
00:06:40
Speaker
And when I was about 15, I was going to Sydney with my mum and we drove through a bushfire and we saw all the fire trucks there.
00:06:50
Speaker
And I thought, oh, this sounds exciting.
00:06:53
Speaker
And when I was at school, a friend's dad was in the bushfire brigade, now the rural fire service.
00:07:00
Speaker
And when I was over at his place, we got talking about the fire brigade and about... And I just sounded really interested and excited.
00:07:09
Speaker
And he invited me to come down to one of their Saturday drill days.
00:07:14
Speaker
And I did that.
00:07:16
Speaker
And so before I joined Fire and Rescue New South Wales,
00:07:20
Speaker
I was with the Rural Fire Service for about eight years.
00:07:23
Speaker
And I always say it's probably one of the best things I ever did.
00:07:29
Speaker
The people that were at the fire station I was at were fantastic role models.
00:07:35
Speaker
And I attribute who I am today
00:07:38
Speaker
partly because of the time I spent around them and grew up with them as great mentors.
00:07:45
Speaker
Yeah.
00:07:45
Speaker
It's funny you say that, you know, with the professional lifeguarding that I've done for firefighting, I was part of the volunteer organisation of Surf Lifeslam Australia.
00:07:55
Speaker
So the RFS is very similar.
00:07:57
Speaker
that's a volunteer aspect to firefighting.
00:07:59
Speaker
So it does pave so many paths for people to aspire to become permanent firefighters, the skills, the community, the charity stuff that you guys do.
00:08:10
Speaker
It's all about giving back.
00:08:11
Speaker
And when we do our talks and we talk to a lot of people, volunteering is such a good thing to have on your resume.
00:08:17
Speaker
It's a good thing to do for the community.
00:08:18
Speaker
And you always reminisce and think about those good times because you did have, because you know that people are in that room or in the engine bay or,
00:08:27
Speaker
in the in the hall they're all there off their own bat and they're there because they care and they want to learn so and i totally agree it's um the main word there is community just the uh the community aspect of it is is just remarkable and it's like having just a big group of friends and uh and it becomes a family and it doesn't matter what i i think um
00:08:48
Speaker
involuntary capacity that you do in the community.
00:08:51
Speaker
There's always a family community connection to it, which is brilliant.
00:08:55
Speaker
And I recommend anybody to join a volunteer organisation, whether it's SES, it's the Royal Fire Service, if it's Mills on Wheels.
00:09:05
Speaker
But there's so many volunteering organisations that we can get involved with.
00:09:09
Speaker
You've just got to pick one that suits you and suits your life balance as well.
00:09:15
Speaker
And those organisations are crying out for volunteers as well.
00:09:18
Speaker
You know, it's not, it's like, it's a win-win.
00:09:22
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:09:22
Speaker
Well, I remember when my mum was in hospital when she broke her wrist, the amount of volunteers that were in there, even retired nurses, that were just helping out along the moors was just fantastic.
00:09:34
Speaker
It was just uplifting to know that people are volunteering their service to actually be there.
00:09:40
Speaker
Yeah, having a purpose, absolutely.
00:09:43
Speaker
Exactly.
00:09:45
Speaker
Mate, you touched on how you became a firefighter, but what is your role currently as a firefighter?
00:09:50
Speaker
Can you explain that?
00:09:52
Speaker
Yeah, I'm a captain, also known as a station commander.
00:09:56
Speaker
So, again, a little bit different to you, Maxie.
00:09:59
Speaker
I'm a retained station, not a permanent station.
00:10:01
Speaker
So our station is not...
00:10:03
Speaker
Not me and 24-7, but we are available 24-7.
00:10:07
Speaker
And I've got a crew of about 16 firefighters that I look after.
00:10:11
Speaker
And out of that 16, we've always got to have four available.
00:10:16
Speaker
So we've got ship workers.
00:10:17
Speaker
We've got people that work for themselves.
00:10:21
Speaker
Actually, we've got a whole variety of people with their...
00:10:24
Speaker
their careers that at certain times that make themselves available.
00:10:30
Speaker
If they're at work, they can't be available.
00:10:32
Speaker
But some of those might be on ship work, they might be doing nicely, but they become available through the day.
00:10:38
Speaker
So they're available through the day.
00:10:40
Speaker
Someone like myself who sits at the desk drawing all day, I'm always available.
00:10:45
Speaker
So, you know, someone that's got the daytime availability is extra handy because it's the toughest time of the day to get people to be available.
00:10:54
Speaker
Yeah, and how far away do you live from the station?
00:10:57
Speaker
Give a context for people.
00:10:58
Speaker
If the page or the phone was to go off, how quick can you get to the station and what's the turnout like?
00:11:05
Speaker
Yeah, our turnout time is pretty good.
00:11:07
Speaker
We've got to be at the door in six minutes and we try and beat that.
00:11:10
Speaker
It's a bit of a challenge for us every call.
00:11:12
Speaker
We get to try and beat that six-minute turnout.
00:11:16
Speaker
So we've got to live in a reasonable distance to the station and you can be shopping, you can be down at the park with the kids, you can be doing anything in the page that goes off.
00:11:26
Speaker
But you've got to do things within a reasonable distance to the station to get there.
00:11:30
Speaker
So, again, we like to be at the door in six minutes with the bells going off.
00:11:33
Speaker
So that's the truck out of the fire station door within six minutes.
00:11:37
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:38
Speaker
So we're going to come to our home, get unchanged, get dressed, jump in the fire truck, go back here, jump in the fire truck and out the door within six minutes.
00:11:46
Speaker
So you're probably no one is more than three or four minutes away?
00:11:51
Speaker
About three to four kilometres.
00:11:54
Speaker
I probably live the second furthest away from the station and I've got a pretty good run with traffic lights.
00:12:01
Speaker
So, yeah, in reasonable distance, but, yeah, you wouldn't launch only 15, 20 kilometres away and take the station.
00:12:09
Speaker
Awesome, mate.
00:12:10
Speaker
Wow.
00:12:10
Speaker
Awesome.
00:12:12
Speaker
I've got a fantastic crew.
00:12:14
Speaker
I've got a mixture of people and they've got quite a range of jobs.
00:12:20
Speaker
We've got bus drivers, we've got sign riders, we've got people that work for BHP Steel, a couple of miners, we've got electricians.
00:12:30
Speaker
So there's a whole variety.
00:12:31
Speaker
But the best thing is it's definitely a family and a family.
00:12:36
Speaker
I think the most important thing that I sort of, I've got myself at the station is our camaraderie.
00:12:42
Speaker
And it's just, yeah, it's a real bonding sort of a group.
00:12:47
Speaker
And it's funny because we might get a fire call that might only be about five minutes, but we spend an hour chatting away afterwards before we head home.
00:12:57
Speaker
Yeah, so important.
00:12:59
Speaker
Brilliant, brilliant.
00:13:01
Speaker
So one of the things that we just talked about as we intro'd you, Paul, and we know how passionate you are about this, so we want to make sure you really get every opportunity to talk about it.
Smoke Alarm Action Day
00:13:13
Speaker
The SAD initiative, which is the Smoke Alarm Action Day project.
00:13:18
Speaker
Tell us about it and, you know, how it came about.
00:13:23
Speaker
Yeah, that's something I'm really, really proud of, Smoke on Action Day.
00:13:28
Speaker
This is our second year.
00:13:29
Speaker
This will be in June, first of June, this will be our second year.
00:13:32
Speaker
It was an idea that came about with regards to, I suppose, well, one program led to another program.
00:13:40
Speaker
My Home Care and Disability Support Program kicked off as I was a full-time carer for my mother and my association with the carers that came in and helped myself and my mother out.
00:13:52
Speaker
And from that, it just sort of made me aware of the amount of vulnerable members of our community out there that don't have a smoke alarm.
00:14:00
Speaker
Or we say now a working smoke alarm.
00:14:02
Speaker
They might have an old smoke alarm that's not working and surprising the amount of people that don't have a smoke alarm at all.
00:14:08
Speaker
So change your clocks, change your batteries is something that was kind of, I suppose, it's lost its impact.
00:14:18
Speaker
And we need something new, something fresh.
00:14:21
Speaker
And these days smoke alarms are 10-year-old smoke alarms.
00:14:24
Speaker
So they come as a computer.
00:14:25
Speaker
So you're not... Sorry, that's my phone.
00:14:27
Speaker
So... I don't know if it's a call.
00:14:30
Speaker
We're on.
00:14:31
Speaker
I was going to say, are we on?
00:14:32
Speaker
No.
00:14:32
Speaker
It's off.
00:14:33
Speaker
No.
00:14:35
Speaker
So, so smoke alarms now come as a complete unit, a 10 year, sort of 10 year battery.
00:14:42
Speaker
And once it's had its 10 year lifespan, well, we just changed the whole unit.
00:14:47
Speaker
So we needed something a bit more fresher and came along smoke alarm action day last year.
00:14:53
Speaker
It was something that was sort of just going to develop in New South Wales.
00:14:57
Speaker
But because through my connections with the Home Care and Disability Program, we were in touch with Canberra Fire Service because there's a lot of home care providers that have got clients on the outskirts of Canberra.
00:15:09
Speaker
So they wanted to get involved as well.
00:15:11
Speaker
And from there, I thought I'd sort of introduce Canberra to it.
00:15:14
Speaker
And then we introduced Melbourne to the idea of Smegelomax on Day.
00:15:18
Speaker
And from there, it just sort of grew and grew.
00:15:22
Speaker
And knowing me and how I get passionate about it, if I get something passionate about,
00:15:27
Speaker
something I'm involved with, I just go sort of 100%, and it led to contacting the other states.
00:15:34
Speaker
That was the hardest thing is getting everybody involved.
00:15:38
Speaker
So we started to get a few of the other states and territories involved in the fire services.
00:15:44
Speaker
And I'm really glad to say that this year we've got, I think, every state and territory fire service in Australia involved.
00:15:50
Speaker
That's amazing, mate.
00:15:51
Speaker
It's a huge effort within two years of operating.
00:15:54
Speaker
Amazing.
00:15:56
Speaker
We're all different fire services.
00:15:58
Speaker
We've all got different protocols and different things that we do.
00:16:01
Speaker
But the fact that we could all come together on common ground
00:16:05
Speaker
and get this great initiative out there to have working smoke alarms in homes.
00:16:10
Speaker
You've been a firefighter for a long time, been a firefighter for nearly 10 years, and we've had a number of jobs, fatalities where people haven't had working smoke alarms and they've died during their sleep from not having a working smoke alarm.
00:16:23
Speaker
So you are saving lives and it's something you should be very proud of.
00:16:28
Speaker
And adding on to that, talking about different fire services, how can people at home listening or watching this podcast right now, how can they get involved with the SAD Fire Safety Initiative?
00:16:41
Speaker
Well, Smoke Alarm Action Day, it's one day.
00:16:44
Speaker
It's a day that we want residents to take action and be responsible for their own safety and their family's safety.
00:16:52
Speaker
So all we're asking on June the 1st is just to test the smoke alarm.
00:16:57
Speaker
I think we've become a little bit complacent because there's this little device that sits on our ceiling and we can walk past it every day but forget it's there.
00:17:06
Speaker
And unless you're a bad cook and burn the toast or you burn dinner, the smoke alarm, you know, you may never hear the smoke alarm going off.
00:17:15
Speaker
So it's, and some people, you know, you'll think that little lights
00:17:20
Speaker
showing that there's power going to it, but does it actually work?
00:17:25
Speaker
So on June 1st, we just want everybody, it takes a couple of minutes just to test their smoke alarm.
00:17:32
Speaker
We don't want people climbing ladders.
00:17:33
Speaker
They can use a broom handle, turn it upside down, and just test to make sure it's working.
00:17:38
Speaker
Because you're surprised the amount of homes that we go into that we test the smoke alarms and they're not working.
00:17:44
Speaker
They don't work or they're in the wrong spot.
00:17:47
Speaker
And then adding onto that, they need to make sure they're in your hallway, outside your bedroom on all levels.
00:17:53
Speaker
A lot of the time people put them in their kitchens.
00:17:56
Speaker
And yeah, if you have multiple detectors, you could have one near the kitchen or in the kitchen.
00:18:01
Speaker
However, a lot of people just have the one in the kitchen.
00:18:04
Speaker
If you're a bad cook, like you were saying before, set some off.
00:18:07
Speaker
you've got to find yourself in a situation where they get annoying, you've got to take them down, you forget about them, they become complacent.
00:18:14
Speaker
But not having them outside your bedroom or in your hallways, they're designed to alert you when you sound asleep.
00:18:19
Speaker
As you know, Paul and Lee, when that smoke creeps into that bedroom, that early detection is going to save your life.
00:18:27
Speaker
Yeah, and I always say, if you haven't got a smoke alarm, especially at night time, you should be sleeping with one eye open.
00:18:32
Speaker
because you're pushing more to sleep a lot of people don't realize smoke and fire or you know the fire but the smoke puts you more to sleep and you won't wake up um in the movies where people get burnt from the fire it's the smoke that actually kills you yeah yeah i love that tip that you just said paul about the broom handle because you know like people think oh can't reach not got a ladder elderly people you just said you know don't
00:19:02
Speaker
necessarily want them climbing ladders.
00:19:04
Speaker
That's a really good tip, just the broom handle.
00:19:07
Speaker
Just, you know, yeah, that's, you know, brilliant.
00:19:12
Speaker
Well, it's interesting because we went into a gentleman's home a couple of months ago and, well, we're across the road doing someone's putting some smoke alarms in the early lady's house and he was out the front and he said, oh, what are you doing?
00:19:27
Speaker
I said, oh, we're here just changing the lady's smoke alarms for her.
00:19:30
Speaker
She had old sort of smoke alarms.
00:19:33
Speaker
And I said, would you like us to do yours?
00:19:35
Speaker
He said, no, I'm okay.
00:19:36
Speaker
I said, well, we're here.
00:19:37
Speaker
We can do smoke alarms for you.
00:19:38
Speaker
He said, no, I've got my smoke alarm.
00:19:40
Speaker
It went off the other day.
00:19:41
Speaker
I know it's working.
00:19:42
Speaker
It's all fine.
00:19:42
Speaker
And I said, well, this is an opportunity.
00:19:45
Speaker
We can drop in.
00:19:46
Speaker
So he allowed us to come in and we went to check his smoke alarms.
00:19:51
Speaker
And I said, okay, yes, sir.
00:19:53
Speaker
So where's your smoke alarm?
00:19:54
Speaker
He said, there it is, up there.
00:19:56
Speaker
And I said to him, well, that's not a smoke alarm.
00:19:58
Speaker
That's a burglar one.
00:19:59
Speaker
It's not a stag alarm.
00:20:01
Speaker
Yeah, and I said, well, if it went off, I said, the other night you had a burglar in your house.
00:20:05
Speaker
Oh, wow.
00:20:09
Speaker
There's two lately in Maxie, and it's camper vans, it's caravans.
00:20:15
Speaker
You know, you can do a smoke alarm in them as well.
00:20:18
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:18
Speaker
Oh, definitely.
00:20:19
Speaker
And the other thing, too, that more people die in house fires than the natural disasters put together in Australia.
00:20:25
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:25
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:26
Speaker
Again, and adding on to that, I know we're talking about fire safety here, but more people drown inland in waterways than they do on the coast here in Australia.
00:20:33
Speaker
Yet the media and, you know, a lot of the initiatives are around the coastal areas, which is great, but, you know, a lot of people do drown inland and same sort of thing, what they say, you just said, more people die in house fires.
00:20:46
Speaker
And natural disasters.
00:20:48
Speaker
I'm just writing that down.
00:20:49
Speaker
I'm going to put that as one of our, we do a statistic,
00:20:52
Speaker
every Monday that goes with our quote.
00:20:55
Speaker
So I just jotted that one down.
00:20:57
Speaker
And Paul, I'm going to use that in one of our statistics.
00:21:01
Speaker
Because, you know, yeah, absolutely.
00:21:07
Speaker
Is this me?
00:21:09
Speaker
Yes.
00:21:10
Speaker
Sorry.
00:21:11
Speaker
Had to think then.
00:21:12
Speaker
Brain's a bit slow.
00:21:13
Speaker
So you kind of alluded to that in that last answer, Paul, but have you got another story where you know, and I'm sure you've got multiple as Maxie, how like having a working smoke alarm saves a life?
00:21:28
Speaker
Yeah, well, we're very fortunate in New South Wales that we will install smoke alarms free of charge.
00:21:35
Speaker
We used to have a program for Sabre, which is smoke replacement, battery replacement for the Aldi, which doesn't exist now.
00:21:42
Speaker
We sort of will install a smoke alarm in anyone's home free of charge.
00:21:49
Speaker
And we've had an incident, and it's happened quite a few times.
00:21:54
Speaker
You've heard the stories where someone's worn
00:21:56
Speaker
A firefighter had gone in, changed the smoke alarms for all installed smoke alarms into someone's home.
00:22:03
Speaker
And we had this where we did probably a couple of years ago now.
00:22:08
Speaker
And a week later, we had a fire call at their place.
00:22:11
Speaker
And had it not been the smoke alarm that we installed, they wouldn't have been alerted to it.
00:22:18
Speaker
Wow.
00:22:19
Speaker
Yeah, it just goes to show.
00:22:21
Speaker
Wow.
00:22:23
Speaker
It's like we out in Western Maranoa, we won't say the town, out in Western Maranoa when the kids in the school put their hand up and said, no, we don't have a smoke alarm.
00:22:35
Speaker
The fire keeps setting off.
00:22:37
Speaker
Yeah, we don't need one.
00:22:39
Speaker
You saw the teacher just suddenly looked her eyes as if to say, what?
00:22:44
Speaker
So the teacher said, well, I know what's going in the newsletter this week.
00:22:48
Speaker
You know, just people don't realise and don't sleep with one eye open.
00:22:52
Speaker
Even something recent, Paul, last Friday I went and visited the Air Force cadets out at Naui, which is in southwest Sydney.
00:23:03
Speaker
And it's kind of like scouts, you know, they've got the hall and they catch up every Friday and they do their drills and their marching and stuff like that.
00:23:12
Speaker
And I did a bit of a talk.
00:23:14
Speaker
They did a donation to the charity, which was awesome.
00:23:17
Speaker
And I mentioned about smoke alarms.
00:23:19
Speaker
I finished on fire safety and smoke alarms.
00:23:21
Speaker
And I'm looking around and I usually do this a lot.
00:23:23
Speaker
I look around the rooms or I kind of like to point out, you know, and they actually didn't have one.
00:23:29
Speaker
And I know, you know, maybe a public place, they're probably thinking, you know, it's just a kind of one big room.
00:23:34
Speaker
They probably don't need it.
00:23:35
Speaker
But one of the secretaries come up to me and she's like,
00:23:40
Speaker
I have to, after hearing how they work and what they do, I had no idea.
00:23:45
Speaker
We're gonna put one in the hall.
00:23:50
Speaker
And then they said, yeah, we spent a lot of time in this hall.
00:23:52
Speaker
And, you know, so it just goes to show you, you just don't know who you impact or who you're thinking.
00:23:58
Speaker
And we're talking about a hall that's been there for 60 plus years.
00:24:03
Speaker
You've got members from eight years old up to 80 years old, and they've never been a smoke alarm.
00:24:08
Speaker
You've got retired police inspectors, retired ambulance inspectors.
00:24:13
Speaker
You've got people from all walks of life, bankers that have their kids in there and they didn't have smoke alarms.
00:24:17
Speaker
So you just never know.
00:24:21
Speaker
what impact you have.
00:24:23
Speaker
I know, absolutely.
00:24:24
Speaker
And we're sort of connecting with a lot of politicians at the moment and their newsletters or their e-newsletters, they've been putting out the smoke alarm or the fire safety message in their mail outs.
00:24:39
Speaker
And we're getting quite a lot of feedback from that.
00:24:41
Speaker
And I'm just absolutely surprised at the home fire safety visits we're doing lately.
00:24:46
Speaker
The amount of people that have never had a smoke alarm
00:24:50
Speaker
in store, never.
00:24:52
Speaker
And it's just amazing.
00:24:53
Speaker
And it's been in legislation since 2006, May 2006, that I'm surprised it's not yet.
00:25:01
Speaker
It's just something that I think people easily forget about.
00:25:04
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:06
Speaker
It's like the, you hear it, oh, yeah, you know, maybe, oh, I'm going to, you know, next week, next week becomes next month, next month becomes, you know, and so on.
00:25:18
Speaker
And it's like,
00:25:20
Speaker
where it falls on the priority list, but really it kind of needs to be top.
00:25:25
Speaker
Yeah, and there's nothing worse than, and Max would know this, Lee, that there's nothing worse for a firefighter jumping on the fire truck and knowing it's a person's reported fire or the house fire.
00:25:39
Speaker
It's just a horrible feeling in your chest.
00:25:42
Speaker
when that comes up and you get a notice that that's the case.
00:25:47
Speaker
So when you're getting a fire call and it comes across that everyone's out of the house, it's just such a relief for a firefighter knowing that's the case.
00:25:57
Speaker
And this is what a smoke alarm will do.
00:25:59
Speaker
It will...
00:26:00
Speaker
The thing is, too, we've just not got to sort of think that smoke alarms are there to protect us during the night.
00:26:07
Speaker
They're there to protect us 24-7.
00:26:08
Speaker
So seven days, 24 hours a day, they're there to alert us.
00:26:13
Speaker
Exactly.
00:26:13
Speaker
At that time of call.
00:26:16
Speaker
Mate, that's amazing about all the fire safety and the SAAD initiative you've
Paul's Artistic Process
00:26:20
Speaker
done.
00:26:20
Speaker
We're going to kind of change a few of the questions up now and talk about your illustrating career.
00:26:26
Speaker
Tell us how you became a talented illustrator.
00:26:30
Speaker
Well, that's, like I said, I think I was very fortunate to be in a creative family.
00:26:37
Speaker
growing up in a creative family.
00:26:39
Speaker
Our home was definitely a gallery.
00:26:41
Speaker
It was like, it was just littered with artwork.
00:26:46
Speaker
And the kitchen at home was from, there was one particular wall that was just plastered with all my brother's artwork.
00:26:54
Speaker
It was just.
00:26:55
Speaker
The Louvre, as you called it, the Louvre, the gallery.
00:26:59
Speaker
It was, and it was pretty like, I wish I took photos of it back then.
00:27:03
Speaker
As you're a kid, you don't need to take photos of it.
00:27:05
Speaker
And I was creative, but I was creative in the plasticine, you know, modelling and making things.
00:27:11
Speaker
And I'd always be sitting in my room with my plasticine board modelling.
00:27:15
Speaker
And everyone that would come into the house would just focus on the kitchen wall with all the artwork.
00:27:22
Speaker
And I'd be sitting in my room and listen to all these great accolades that my brother were getting, like, oh, look what Stephen's done today or this week or what Stephen's done, look at his work.
00:27:32
Speaker
And I'd be in there playing my plasticine and Paul Scott is getting nothing.
00:27:35
Speaker
Paul's are sitting there playing plasticine, no accolades.
00:27:38
Speaker
So one day I thought, yeah, I want a taste of this.
00:27:40
Speaker
I wouldn't mind getting a few accolades myself.
00:27:42
Speaker
So I started to draw a couple of characters and I went to the kitchen and took one of the pride places on that kitchen.
00:27:52
Speaker
Remember, my brother had his artwork and I stuck one of mine.
00:27:55
Speaker
As brothers would, yeah.
00:27:59
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:27:59
Speaker
I wasn't in the corner.
00:28:01
Speaker
I wasn't in an empty spot.
00:28:02
Speaker
It was right speck in the middle of the
00:28:04
Speaker
where are you going get it on there yes i started from one and then the second one came and then the third one until i practiced half the kitchen wall myself by that time and um and then i suppose i just anyway again it was everyone was so excited that with the kitchen wall and um and and then i started to draw for um obviously that led to drawing to the school newspaper so i started with the school newspapers doing a few more drawings here and there and
00:28:33
Speaker
And had I not, I sort of destined at that age, I was about probably 13.
00:28:39
Speaker
I was sort of 14.
00:28:41
Speaker
I was kind of under the impression on myself I was going to be a bricklayer because my dad was a bricklayer.
00:28:48
Speaker
And when I was younger, I just followed him around with a trowel.
00:28:52
Speaker
picking up bricks and laying, you know, it always had, being a bricklayer, it always had bricks laying there in the house and big tins of mortar and that.
00:29:00
Speaker
So I'd always be playing with bricks.
00:29:02
Speaker
So it was something, I picked the right career.
00:29:05
Speaker
I've still got some nice soft equipment, but not being a bricklayer.
00:29:09
Speaker
And so from,
00:29:11
Speaker
From school doing the school newspapers, I then thought, yeah, I wouldn't mind doing this as a career.
00:29:17
Speaker
And so I sort of started to, I wanted to go down the editorial path of political stuff.
00:29:25
Speaker
My brother was at that stage friends with the Cnetti family, Paul Cnetti, who was an editorial cartoonist for many, many years and one of Australia's best editorial cartoonists.
00:29:37
Speaker
We knew the family and,
00:29:39
Speaker
And obviously that association with Paul Cennetti, I would sort of admire of his work as well.
00:29:46
Speaker
And I thought, yeah, that's the track I want to go down doing the editorial stuff.
00:29:51
Speaker
And so then I thought, I did a couple of cartoons and at that stage I thought I was the best.
00:29:56
Speaker
I thought my cartoons were, I was going to make it, I was going to make it in the world of being a cartoonist.
00:30:03
Speaker
And I look back now and I go, oh, gosh, how naive was this kid?
00:30:07
Speaker
You know, like this kid had big dreams, but my work was terrible back then.
00:30:12
Speaker
I look at it now.
00:30:13
Speaker
But...
00:30:14
Speaker
It was about probably a year after I left school, I started to submit cartoons because I had to sort of make a decision what I wanted to do with my life.
00:30:25
Speaker
And I started to syndicate a couple of cartoons to the Bulletin magazine and then from the Bulletin magazine that led to Australasian Post magazine and Women's Weekly and Women's Days.
00:30:36
Speaker
And it sort of grew and grew and grew.
00:30:39
Speaker
Did you have any training, Paul?
00:30:42
Speaker
No, no, that's the thing.
00:30:44
Speaker
Pure from yourself?
00:30:46
Speaker
There's always been a little bit of the family, obviously, a little bit of a gift in the genes of the family.
00:30:53
Speaker
But it's just something I had to teach myself.
00:30:58
Speaker
I think if I went to art school, I'd be a lot better than I am today, surely.
00:31:03
Speaker
But I would just watch other cartoonists.
00:31:06
Speaker
I'd go and visit other cartoonists.
00:31:08
Speaker
Roger Fletcher, who used to draw a comic strip's Tolkien and Staria, again, was a fantastic role model for me growing up as a young kid.
00:31:18
Speaker
wanting to get into the field of cartooning.
00:31:20
Speaker
He taught me so many things just by watching and going to visit Paul Sonetti when he was working at The Telegraph.
00:31:27
Speaker
Ellen Moyer was another cartoonist.
00:31:29
Speaker
And Bill Leake, who I thought was a real role model for myself.
00:31:36
Speaker
And I was very fond of...
00:31:38
Speaker
of Bill Leak and he taught me so much again as a young kid just just just chatting with him and just talking to him just watching him just spending half an hour and just just seeing how they did things and I'd go home and I'd definitely go home and sort of put that into my own work.
00:31:54
Speaker
So before we talk about the books I've just got where does the inspiration come from because I see your work and I was like what comes first is it the
00:32:05
Speaker
idea or do you kind of get a visual and then you put the, just tell me with some of your, you know, the editorial.
00:32:14
Speaker
How does it come together?
00:32:16
Speaker
It's interesting because sometimes you'll have the eye, the caption, a lot of the time the caption comes first, but then it can reverse the other way.
00:32:26
Speaker
I always say that if I, a picture says a thousand words, and if you can do a cartoon without a caption, that's, you know, that's the best cartoon.
00:32:38
Speaker
But I always try and do my artwork that it needs the caption for the artwork to be funny and vice versa, that the artwork needs to be there to make the caption funny.
00:32:49
Speaker
So they work in tandem.
00:32:52
Speaker
You just don't get a joke and you can do a picture to a joke.
00:32:55
Speaker
I like them to sort of marry up and...
00:32:58
Speaker
work together yeah no you've done some great great stuff that you've sent to us over time um even the last couple of days with uh with the the illustrations um you know you're very talented mate very talented no thank you and the thing is uh um actually you're a bit like a movie a movie uh you're making a movie because you've got auditioned people in your head um
00:33:21
Speaker
You've got to then, what's my background going to be?
00:33:24
Speaker
You've got to then sort of, am I going to do it in the outside?
00:33:28
Speaker
Am I going to do it inside?
00:33:30
Speaker
And then you've got to colour it up and then you've got to do the caption.
00:33:32
Speaker
Like, if you look at my early stuff, like, yeah, you would have thought, oh, this kid's going nowhere.
00:33:38
Speaker
But, yeah.
00:33:40
Speaker
You've always got to start somewhere.
00:33:43
Speaker
You've got to start somewhere, and the fact that you stuck with it and you chipped away and there was that passion there and that drive, you know, look how far you've come.
00:33:52
Speaker
And, you know, you don't get all the eggs in the basket off the bat.
00:33:56
Speaker
So the fact that you started and you chipped away, yeah, you should be very proud.
00:34:02
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:34:03
Speaker
Yeah, it's amazing my passion can get you, that's for sure.
00:34:06
Speaker
Yeah, 100%.
00:34:10
Speaker
So do the magazines and things, do they give you a brief or do you submit what you've got?
00:34:18
Speaker
Do they say we need X, Y, and Z?
00:34:21
Speaker
Or do you get a brief or do you just submit...
00:34:25
Speaker
No, my editors are really good.
00:34:27
Speaker
Sometimes that will happen.
00:34:28
Speaker
Sometimes an editor will say, oh, we've got this particular issue happening in our area.
00:34:34
Speaker
Could you do a specific cartoon relating to that issue?
00:34:38
Speaker
But mostly, because I syndicate right around the country, what I try and do is that a cartoon that's going to be topical in Queensland will be topical in Canberra, will be topical in Victoria, will be topical in New South Wales.
00:34:53
Speaker
So I try and I might do about four or five cartoons a week and then be on editorial base, which is obviously the recent storm in Queensland and top of New South Wales, that everyone knows that's going on.
00:35:08
Speaker
So that's quite topical.
00:35:10
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:11
Speaker
But with regards to, I guess, the politicians write my material for me.
00:35:21
Speaker
I think Australia over the years have had, we've had, cartoonists have been very fortunate that we've had.
00:35:26
Speaker
So,
00:35:29
Speaker
They do the things that make my cartoons funny.
00:35:32
Speaker
So a lot of the time I go straight away, they'll just get on and they'll start talking.
00:35:37
Speaker
I go, okay, I bet that's crazy.
00:35:38
Speaker
That's going to make a great cartoon.
00:35:40
Speaker
And, you know, look at Trump's, I guess, what he's provided for cartoonists as well and over the years.
00:35:47
Speaker
But Australia, ever since I can remember, and you'll hear a lot of cartoonists, editorial cartoonists say this, that
00:35:55
Speaker
Australia's been very fortunate to have the politicians we have to write out, to give us material.
00:36:02
Speaker
Comedians sometimes say that, don't they?
00:36:04
Speaker
Comedians have got a tour coming up.
00:36:07
Speaker
And I remember, I think I heard Billy Connolly saying this once, I've got a tour and he didn't know what he would talk about.
00:36:12
Speaker
And then there was suddenly a election and a royal wedding.
00:36:16
Speaker
And he was like, thank you.
00:36:17
Speaker
You know, it was like he was away.
00:36:19
Speaker
He'd got his stuff.
00:36:20
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:36:21
Speaker
And that's the thing too.
00:36:23
Speaker
With my cartoons, I don't like to be too heavy handed.
00:36:26
Speaker
I
00:36:30
Speaker
I'm a little bit, I'm not a confrontational person in my nature anyway, but I, as long as they're funny, so long as they, I'll be serious.
00:36:39
Speaker
The cartoons that need to be serious, I'll be serious.
00:36:42
Speaker
Most of my cartoons will be kind of light humour.
00:36:46
Speaker
So long as it gets a giggle, a little laugh, that's important to me.
00:36:52
Speaker
And as I say, if you're offending one side and you're offending the other side at the same time, well, you're doing your job.
00:36:57
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:57
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:59
Speaker
Exactly, exactly.
00:37:00
Speaker
Sorry, I snuck a couple of extra questions in there.
00:37:04
Speaker
I was just intrigued with the process of it, Paul.
00:37:07
Speaker
So talking about illustrating the books.
00:37:11
Speaker
So first one that you did with us was Max's Beach Rescued, the picture book.
00:37:16
Speaker
And then you're, as we're going through the process,
00:37:20
Speaker
bring in the Maxie the Life God series back to life for second editions.
00:37:24
Speaker
How was the process of that for you?
00:37:27
Speaker
How did you go about that?
00:37:30
Speaker
Yeah, well, the picture book's definitely different to the chapter book.
00:37:34
Speaker
The chapter book, again, I was quite fortunate that I could follow what was in the previous edition, so I was just following that.
00:37:44
Speaker
It's just that I guess I put my style towards it and the way I do my, I guess, my style, I guess.
00:37:53
Speaker
Yeah, and we changed kind of, we changed all the illustrations so that it made it, you know,
00:37:59
Speaker
you know, new for the reader as well.
00:38:01
Speaker
So our story stayed the same.
00:38:03
Speaker
The actual pictures were completely different.
00:38:07
Speaker
So I understand that there was a bit of a guide there.
00:38:11
Speaker
So with the picture book.
00:38:13
Speaker
The picture book was a completely different story.
00:38:16
Speaker
The picture book, I had to sort of, again, audition the characters and put them to you and Maxie to sort of go, yeah, we like this character.
00:38:23
Speaker
Like I think Maxie, there might have been two versions or three versions of Maxie before you picked
00:38:29
Speaker
the one that you liked.
00:38:30
Speaker
Yep.
00:38:31
Speaker
And Felix and the other characters, I think, again, I think I did a couple of different how I would have envisioned that they would have looked at that age.
00:38:41
Speaker
And so I had to create every page.
00:38:48
Speaker
And so obviously I've got the brief from you.
00:38:50
Speaker
Then I had to interpret your brief to be into, I suppose, a visual picture.
00:38:56
Speaker
Some were more detailed and more difficult than others, but that's a challenge, I guess, an artist always enjoys.
00:39:06
Speaker
Trying to get me to interpret the vision of someone else into a picture.
00:39:12
Speaker
They were just incredible.
00:39:13
Speaker
They were, and the fact that you didn't really mention, but until after the fact, once you did the illustrations in the picture book,
00:39:23
Speaker
you put secret fish on each page.
00:39:26
Speaker
And I must say the kids, especially the litterlies that have the picture books, they love trying to locate the fish.
00:39:32
Speaker
And then you've carried that over into the illustrations in books one and two, the second edition.
00:39:38
Speaker
We're yet to get three, but we have done the brief for three, but we'll get two first and then we'll reassess that.
00:39:47
Speaker
But yeah, when it comes to the little fish, just that little add-on was such a great thing to do.
00:39:53
Speaker
It's amazing because I don't do the little hidden character.
00:39:59
Speaker
I used to have a little dog.
00:40:01
Speaker
And ever since I did the book Maxi, it turned from a little dog to a fish because the fish obviously was more relevant to the beach scene.
00:40:11
Speaker
So in all my very detailed artworks, whether it's from newspapers or
00:40:17
Speaker
or magazines or whatever the case I might be using it for.
00:40:22
Speaker
The ones that I've got in really detail, I'll hide the little fish.
00:40:26
Speaker
Because you can hide it.
00:40:27
Speaker
If I was to do it in a lot of my editorials, because they're done fairly quickly and I don't put as much detail in my editorials, it can be easily found.
00:40:36
Speaker
So it's not so much of a challenge for people to look for.
00:40:39
Speaker
But it's funny.
00:40:42
Speaker
amazing uh like if i was to do it if i've done calendars before and i've had the little character in there it becomes the highlight of the uh of that month or that week absolutely something so small but it's something that has a big impact and gets people excited so if we have we got a little fish in here paul it's like where's wally i guess
00:41:03
Speaker
I'd have to go back to the original, but can I tell you a story just quickly?
00:41:09
Speaker
Please.
00:41:10
Speaker
With one of my calendars where I used to, I hid the dog.
00:41:14
Speaker
Growing up, I had a kelpie foxy, a little black and white kelpie foxy.
00:41:18
Speaker
That looked like foot rock flats, the dog.
00:41:20
Speaker
And I had him in a lot of my artworks.
00:41:23
Speaker
And I had this calendar.
00:41:25
Speaker
And I had the dogs in all of them and the calendar was printed and up it went and got sold.
00:41:33
Speaker
And then the publishing company were getting a lot of letters saying they could not find the dog in one of the months.
00:41:39
Speaker
And they said, could you please ask the artist?
00:41:41
Speaker
We can't find it.
00:41:42
Speaker
We really need to find it where the dog is.
00:41:46
Speaker
And I sent you and I come back to all my, and I looked and I looked and I looked and I could not find the dog myself.
00:41:54
Speaker
And when I'm doing air, because I airbrush a lot of my backgrounds and I have like, it's called crisp feel, but it's like contact that I put over areas where I don't want to protect the area where I'm spraying.
00:42:08
Speaker
And when I was doing that particular page, I'd forgotten to remove the little bit of contact to reveal the dog hiding.
00:42:16
Speaker
Okay.
00:42:17
Speaker
I only found that out later and I finally got back to the publishing company and I said, look, I cannot tell you where it is because I'll be giving up.
00:42:28
Speaker
I can't tell you where it is.
00:42:29
Speaker
They've got to just look for it.
00:42:31
Speaker
So...
00:42:35
Speaker
If someone has that calendar, I think it was back in 98 or 2001, I can't remember which month, which one of you, that if you still got that artwork, obviously you wouldn't have been hanging it up, but you've got it in your cupboard, you've kept it or framed it.
00:42:50
Speaker
Yeah, there was no job to be found in that month.
00:42:53
Speaker
I'm in the middle of going crazy trying to find... Isn't it in the picture book, Maxie, one of the fish ended up in the... Oh, it's very close to the binding.
00:43:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:43:04
Speaker
And we've had several times in the crease of the book, you know, several times the kids, and it's like, yeah, it is there.
00:43:13
Speaker
We know it's there.
00:43:14
Speaker
So I think for people to know that...
00:43:18
Speaker
The illustrations and the work you do, Paul, is like hand-drawn.
00:43:22
Speaker
These are not computer, you know, they're not like digital.
00:43:27
Speaker
It's not, you know, this is your hand-drawn artwork makes it so, so unique, so special in this day where everything's just computer generated.
00:43:39
Speaker
And I think people...
00:43:40
Speaker
forget that there is somebody actually drawing this and colouring it all in and bringing it to life and the hours that that takes you.
00:43:51
Speaker
I'm old school.
00:43:51
Speaker
I'm still very old school.
00:43:53
Speaker
I still get the paper out and draw and colour and airbrush and ink and paint.
00:43:58
Speaker
So, yeah, so I'm still very old school with my style.
00:44:01
Speaker
And I like it like that.
00:44:02
Speaker
Look, it's amazing.
00:44:05
Speaker
some of the creative people out there with the new technology doing it on laptops and computers is just brilliant work and i get jealous mate when i see some of the how talented some of these people are um but again i'm still old school uh yeah the way i've been there you go right yeah it's awesome um and now more of the serious side of the chat um best piece of advice you've been given
00:44:32
Speaker
Do you know what?
00:44:33
Speaker
It's funny.
00:44:34
Speaker
I give advice to myself all the time.
00:44:36
Speaker
I'm always encouraging myself.
00:44:39
Speaker
If I've got a challenge, I'll say, come on, Paul, you can do this.
00:44:43
Speaker
Come on, let's just get stuck and let's just do it.
00:44:45
Speaker
I'm always talking to myself if I have a challenge when guys are getting...
00:44:50
Speaker
to getting something done or to build my motivation up.
00:44:54
Speaker
So I would say I've always myself, a lot of doing myself, but something I did receive a long time ago was, you know, nothing's awkward until you convince yourself it is.
00:45:04
Speaker
And I find that with regards to, like, if I get, especially with my drawing side, if I get a challenging artwork and I know I'm going to struggle with it,
00:45:13
Speaker
I've just got to get in and get it done because once I get started and I get into it, it'll just be easier and easier and easier.
00:45:19
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:45:21
Speaker
And it's, yeah, it's interesting that, isn't it?
00:45:25
Speaker
You've just got to get started and things like that.
00:45:28
Speaker
So two parallels.
00:45:31
Speaker
So you've got two careers, firefighting, high, you know, stress, and then you've got this lovely idealistic, I've got this image of, you know, calmly drawing away.
00:45:43
Speaker
How do you deal with this?
00:45:45
Speaker
Is there a message in there?
00:45:46
Speaker
Because how do you deal with the stress that you have?
00:45:51
Speaker
I think I strive on stress.
00:45:54
Speaker
I think I like stress to a certain degree.
00:45:59
Speaker
The balance, like my work-life balance is pretty bad.
00:46:03
Speaker
So, you know, if anything, I need to get that better.
00:46:07
Speaker
But the firefighting and the car training works so well together.
00:46:11
Speaker
Like, it can be quite lonely sitting at a desk drawing all day by yourself.
00:46:15
Speaker
You're sitting there, you're not getting exercise.
00:46:16
Speaker
And once the bells go off and I get a fire call, you know, I'm using energy.
00:46:21
Speaker
I'm sort of moving my lens and my body and then... Yeah, you can't, aren't there?
00:46:27
Speaker
I'm talking to the crew, I'm telling you the crew, I'm laughing with the crew.
00:46:31
Speaker
And so I can, so I can chase, you go from zero to a hundred and it can be at any time of the day.
00:46:38
Speaker
And I think that's just, that's a great balance for me.
00:46:42
Speaker
fire call in a couple of days, which we don't like fire calls because fire calls means someone's not having a great day.
00:46:49
Speaker
But when you do get the fire call, it's definitely a great time for me to sort of get in and talk to people and, you know, just have that person sort of
00:47:01
Speaker
connection yeah definitely so important and for the community as well you know having um that familiar face someone that's keen and and ready to have a chat and to comfort and to look after it's a skill in itself you know people are suffering the worst possible day at a fire or a car accident or any sort of incident and um you know that reassurance is so important and having that passion it goes a long way yeah exactly and i'm terrible you know i always say you know
00:47:31
Speaker
to help them stress and get up and go for a walk, sleep better, diet better.
Balancing Firefighting and Art
00:47:36
Speaker
And that's advice I would give, but I'm terrible because I don't take my own advice, so to speak.
00:47:43
Speaker
As many of us are the same, Paul.
00:47:46
Speaker
Maxie, I stole your question there.
00:47:47
Speaker
Do you want to pinch mine's back?
00:47:49
Speaker
No, it's all good.
00:47:51
Speaker
You answered both of those anyway, but the stress, it's all good.
00:47:55
Speaker
You know, it's good that you thrive a little bit on stress and you obviously have your good and bad days, but, you know, you have ways of dealing with that, which is so important in this day and age.
00:48:03
Speaker
It's so important to know and be aware of it and do things about it.
00:48:07
Speaker
So kudos to you, Paul.
00:48:10
Speaker
Yeah, I'm someone that suffers from anxiety, you know, and, um,
00:48:14
Speaker
And I always say, if I'm going for a bit of a trot myself, laughter is the best medicine I find.
00:48:22
Speaker
And I'm lucky I'm in that kind of career as well where, you know, I love making other people laugh.
00:48:28
Speaker
And I love when someone can make me laugh as well because I know...
00:48:32
Speaker
yeah you can get so much out of no definitely yeah a good laugh definitely helps lots of situations for sure and I was just gonna say so the next next one here we have next career goal I know you got your hands full with the the sad and the initiatives and stuff like that but have you got a next career goal
00:48:54
Speaker
Look, I think the things I'm doing now, I'd like to just make sure I keep doing them better as a goal.
00:49:01
Speaker
I think a career goal would be also to, again, improve my work-life balance.
00:49:07
Speaker
I think I need to do that.
00:49:08
Speaker
And I don't know how much longer I've got even with the Fire Brigade and, you know,
00:49:13
Speaker
I just want to enjoy every day or every opportunity I have been with Fire and Rescue New South Wales because I've really got to start really enjoying what time I have left because I know when the time comes that I've got to hang up my helmet, it'll be a sad day for me.
00:49:30
Speaker
And I just want to make sure I can just enjoy the things I'm really enjoying now.
00:49:36
Speaker
And look, if Smoke Alarm Action Day goes worldwide, well, you know, that would be a great goal, that's for sure.
00:49:44
Speaker
Oh, definitely.
00:49:45
Speaker
That could be the future, Paul.
00:49:49
Speaker
Yeah, I can see you doing firefighter conferences and getting that initiative out there, you know, especially those lower socioeconomic countries or third world countries where they don't even know probably what fire safety is, you know.
00:50:02
Speaker
There's so much opportunity there.
00:50:04
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
00:50:07
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:50:08
Speaker
So important.
00:50:08
Speaker
So, so important.
00:50:10
Speaker
so important and you know what paul you know it's like you say there may be the day that you're not on the truck but still having the passion and the purpose like that it could be that that is um absolutely you know where your next steps are so um i can see that for sure so if you weren't a firefighter and a cartoonist illustrator
00:50:32
Speaker
What do you think you would have been?
00:50:34
Speaker
Maybe not Bricklayer?
00:50:35
Speaker
We're crossing.
00:50:37
Speaker
You've both got Bricky Dads, so maybe not Bricklayer.
00:50:41
Speaker
So what would you have done?
00:50:46
Speaker
I definitely think I probably would have been a bricklayer.
00:50:49
Speaker
Again, I don't know, Maxie, if you were out playing with bricks when you were younger.
00:50:54
Speaker
Yeah, I was definitely playing with bricks.
00:50:56
Speaker
And that was actually my option when I finished school.
00:51:00
Speaker
If I didn't get the traineeship as a lifeguard, I was going to do a bricklaying apprenticeship with my dad.
00:51:05
Speaker
And as soon as I turned 18, I was going to use the apprenticeship to be able to apply for the fireys.
00:51:09
Speaker
So I had a bit of a backup plan.
00:51:11
Speaker
Yeah, that's absolutely fantastic.
00:51:14
Speaker
Well, unfortunately, my father passed away when I was five turning six.
00:51:19
Speaker
So I never got that opportunity.
00:51:21
Speaker
But had he been still around at that time, I would have definitely become a bit of bricklayer.
00:51:27
Speaker
And I think my brother would have been a bricklayer as well.
00:51:31
Speaker
But he ended up being a sign writer, so he used his creative talents as a sign writer and I went more to the cartooning.
00:51:41
Speaker
Again, I'm glad I did the cartooning because I know now being creative that if I'm not creating for a week, I start to get withdrawal symptoms.
00:51:50
Speaker
So not only do drawing, like I love writing poems.
00:51:52
Speaker
I love writing stories.
00:51:53
Speaker
That's one of my hobbies.
00:51:55
Speaker
I enjoy writing books.
00:51:56
Speaker
opinion pieces.
00:51:58
Speaker
And again, it's just using another part of just being creative.
00:52:01
Speaker
So I think it really shows that I love being creative.
00:52:05
Speaker
And again, yeah.
00:52:07
Speaker
So if it wasn't bricklaying, it would be definitely something creative.
00:52:11
Speaker
I love that the fact we've been able to showcase a creative career because I think so often creatives are not given, you know, we're all pushed down this academic road and whatever.
00:52:26
Speaker
And to be able to showcase a creative career, I think is just, you know, fantastic because there'll be so many kids that will connect with that and see that there is a different path.
00:52:39
Speaker
There's more than one opportunity.
00:52:41
Speaker
So absolutely.
00:52:43
Speaker
There's so many creative people out there, Lee, that, you know, that might only be a hobby or they mightn't realise they're creative.
00:52:52
Speaker
But I think everyone, every one of us has got something we can do, something creative, whether it's cooking, you know, maybe plate food.
00:52:59
Speaker
I've seen some family, friends where they create fruit platters.
00:53:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:53:04
Speaker
It's amazing some of the stuff they can do.
00:53:07
Speaker
Incredible.
00:53:07
Speaker
Very creative.
00:53:09
Speaker
Mates, we're towards the back end of the podcast.
00:53:12
Speaker
There's three more to go, but we did touch about the Encore Retain Fireies.
00:53:19
Speaker
Can you tell us how someone in the community can join the Retain Fire Service and learn more about what you do in the community?
Joining the Retained Fire Service
00:53:26
Speaker
Yeah, well, we do a lot within the community.
00:53:30
Speaker
I think we're very community engaged kind of a service.
00:53:36
Speaker
But to become a real on-call firefighter, you kind of need to live within a reasonable distance to a retained fire station in the first place.
00:53:43
Speaker
And you've just got to be very community-minded person.
00:53:48
Speaker
And I think most of us are anyway.
00:53:52
Speaker
A retained station loves someone who has daytime availability.
00:53:55
Speaker
So if you're a stay-at-home mum and the kids are at school, if you're a ship worker, fire and rescue, love those kind of people.
00:54:06
Speaker
Even people starting university that have the time to put in to be available.
00:54:13
Speaker
And also too, that the station needs to have those vacancies available.
00:54:17
Speaker
So a lot of stations might be station of 14, 16, 18, 20, depends on, you know, if there's two appliances to that station.
00:54:28
Speaker
So as long as there's a position available, I suggest anyone who leaves near a retaining station to go.
00:54:35
Speaker
Because once you get the bug, once you're in and you get the bug and it comes in, it gets to your blood, you just love it.
00:54:43
Speaker
It's just the best thing.
00:54:44
Speaker
Being a firefighter and especially being, and I'm biased, Fire and Rescue New South Wales, it's just an absolute joy.
00:54:53
Speaker
It's an absolute fantastic organisation.
00:54:56
Speaker
And the comrade, I just sort of, I just thrive on the comrade you get from Fire and Rescue.
00:55:03
Speaker
So, but a lot of people don't have that luxury of living near a Fire and Rescue retained station in New South Wales.
00:55:11
Speaker
So I suggest even joining the Rural Fire Service, again, like we mentioned before, you know, the SES.
00:55:18
Speaker
It's a great start to where it can lead you.
00:55:22
Speaker
And the networking connections you have,
00:55:24
Speaker
within these organisations is fantastic as well.
00:55:28
Speaker
Yeah, and I think while this is on, this will go up this Friday, but on Monday the 17th is when the application is closed for this year's fire recruitment for Fire Rescue NSW.
00:55:39
Speaker
So if anyone's listened to this over the weekend and you do want to become a firefighter, you can jump on to Fire Rescue NSW website and follow the prompts and get your application in.
00:55:52
Speaker
Yeah, it's a great job.
00:55:54
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:55:56
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:55:56
Speaker
Fantastic job.
00:55:57
Speaker
Fantastic organisation.
00:55:59
Speaker
So you're just saying about people getting involved and joining up.
00:56:02
Speaker
What advice would you have given to your 16-year-old self, Paul?
Advice and Inspirations
00:56:08
Speaker
I think, I think, like,
00:56:11
Speaker
Don't let the world intimidate you.
00:56:14
Speaker
Again, like I said, I think I've always had a little bit of anxiety and I haven't let that sort of get in the way.
00:56:20
Speaker
I've pushed through and I've always been so, like some of the things I get myself into, I go, why did I ask for that?
00:56:29
Speaker
Or why did I suggest to do this?
00:56:32
Speaker
Or why did I say yes?
00:56:34
Speaker
But once you've done it, it's just such a joy and relief.
00:56:37
Speaker
Yeah.
00:56:38
Speaker
It's a big wide world out there.
00:56:39
Speaker
It can be scary, but just don't let it intimidate you.
00:56:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:56:43
Speaker
Good advice, Paul.
00:56:44
Speaker
You probably thought that after we came knocking on your door.
00:56:52
Speaker
I'm like, what was I thinking?
00:56:55
Speaker
So, yeah.
00:56:57
Speaker
So we thank you that you said yes, even if, you know, in the midst of it you thought, what was I thinking?
00:57:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:05
Speaker
And it's because someone mentioned to me, oh, Maxie's kind of looking for an illustrator.
00:57:11
Speaker
And I forget who mentioned it to me.
00:57:15
Speaker
And I said, oh, yeah, well, get him to give me a call if you ever cross paths with him.
00:57:20
Speaker
So I don't know how that came about.
00:57:22
Speaker
But, yeah.
00:57:24
Speaker
I think we had a conversation, didn't we?
00:57:27
Speaker
I think I saw one of your...
00:57:30
Speaker
illustrations on fire and rescue.
00:57:35
Speaker
And then I said to Maxie, do you know this guy?
00:57:41
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:42
Speaker
And then there was the ship fire.
00:57:45
Speaker
And I think that, yeah.
00:57:47
Speaker
So I think that's how they, absolutely.
00:57:51
Speaker
Brilliant.
00:57:52
Speaker
I'll always remember that ship fire and when we saw Maxie and his crew come down because Maxie was just, when he came over and said hello to us, he was just the perfect person, the perfect gentleman.
00:58:04
Speaker
And he's so accommodating and such a well-spoken person that we just thought, yeah, what a fantastic guy this person was.
00:58:24
Speaker
Yes, indeed.
00:58:56
Speaker
It's interesting.
00:58:58
Speaker
It's so funny because I've always said to the crew, like, let's get something.
00:59:02
Speaker
Like, if we're going on a strike team, let's get something pumping and let's motivate ourselves up.
00:59:07
Speaker
Let's get ourselves ready to go to fight this beast.
00:59:11
Speaker
But, like, I do love anything Queen.
00:59:15
Speaker
Queen's probably my number one.
00:59:17
Speaker
I love Queen.
00:59:21
Speaker
Well, can I tell you a song that I'm about to paint at home and my favourite Queen song is Under Pressure.
00:59:29
Speaker
Yes.
00:59:29
Speaker
Yes.
00:59:32
Speaker
Yes, but the song I sometimes play when I, because I also paint as well as cartoon.
00:59:37
Speaker
I paint Australianist themed kind of paintings.
00:59:41
Speaker
One that I love to do, I paint, I have, sorry, I put on just before I go to paint, is funny enough, it's from the greatest showman, Never Enough.
00:59:56
Speaker
Yes.
00:59:57
Speaker
What was the girl's name?
01:00:00
Speaker
Somebody's... Yes, I know exactly.
01:00:03
Speaker
Oh, no, no.
01:00:06
Speaker
Yes, love that song.
01:00:08
Speaker
Lauren Aldred.
01:00:09
Speaker
That's it.
01:00:11
Speaker
Lauren Alfred.
01:00:12
Speaker
Oh, don't say Alfred this weekend.
01:00:17
Speaker
Yes.
01:00:18
Speaker
Beautiful song, Paul.
01:00:20
Speaker
I put that on and I'll go and put the jug on and make a cup of tea and I'll sort of limber myself up because I paint on the knees or if I'm doing my paintings.
01:00:29
Speaker
It's just to inspire me.
01:00:31
Speaker
It's amazing what music does.
01:00:32
Speaker
It can inspire you so much.
01:00:35
Speaker
Isn't it the ultimate mood changer music?
01:00:38
Speaker
You can, you know, put the right tune on in the car and you can...
01:00:43
Speaker
It literally is the ultimate, yeah, so important.
01:00:47
Speaker
Absolutely.
01:00:48
Speaker
Yeah, so important.
01:00:49
Speaker
Music, yeah.
01:00:51
Speaker
As much as, you know, we need to laugh, I think music's the same thing.
01:00:54
Speaker
It's a lovely thing.
01:00:55
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
01:01:06
Speaker
Yay.
01:01:23
Speaker
Brilliant.
01:01:24
Speaker
Thank you so much, Paul.
01:01:25
Speaker
And thank you for what you've done for us because, you know, you coming on board gave these books a second lease of life meant that the picture book came to fruition and, you know, we are so, so happy.
01:01:41
Speaker
very grateful and um your energy and enthusiasm you are the ultimate um team player and um you know i can imagine there is incredible energy in your room station because of um all that you bring to it so um that thank you from from me and magazine live and survive no thanks guys and it's so funny because like i live in a beach suburb um down on the south coast and um
01:02:09
Speaker
When I do go down to the beach, it's so funny.
01:02:13
Speaker
I think of really Maxie every time I go when I'm down the beach.
01:02:16
Speaker
I get this inspiration of this little Maxie running around my head.
01:02:19
Speaker
It's amazing.
01:02:22
Speaker
It's funny.
01:02:52
Speaker
Absolutely.
01:02:53
Speaker
Live, learn, survive, guys.
01:02:55
Speaker
Absolutely.
01:02:56
Speaker
And remember, June the 1st, Smoke Alarm Action Day.
01:02:59
Speaker
We're going to get behind that and we'll see if we can, you know, wrangle in to get on board to support your campaign.
01:03:10
Speaker
Okay.
01:03:11
Speaker
It's my working smoke alarm saves lives and it's got the QR code and on the back I've got the QR code.
01:03:17
Speaker
So if I'm shopping, out shopping, people can scan me.
01:03:21
Speaker
And it has happened.
01:03:23
Speaker
People have, we've turned up, we've rocked up to someone's home and I said, I had you find out about us.
01:03:27
Speaker
They said, oh, I scanned you when you were shopping at Woolies the other day.
01:03:32
Speaker
Yeah.
01:03:36
Speaker
Exactly.
01:03:37
Speaker
Legend.
01:03:39
Speaker
Brilliant.
01:03:41
Speaker
And the thing is, working smoke alarms definitely save lives.
01:03:45
Speaker
100%.
01:03:45
Speaker
And the bells were kind to us, Paul, because we just got through an hour and almost four minutes and you didn't get called away from the desk.
01:03:53
Speaker
Well, we didn't jinx it, so that's great.
01:03:55
Speaker
Didn't jinx it.
01:03:56
Speaker
So I think it's time now.
01:03:58
Speaker
Go and get the jug on.
01:03:59
Speaker
Cup of tea time.
01:04:01
Speaker
And we hope your shift is a nice, peaceful, quiet one.
01:04:06
Speaker
Thank you, guys.
01:04:07
Speaker
Thank you.
01:04:08
Speaker
I'm off to Melbourne tomorrow for the F1.
01:04:12
Speaker
That's my annual holiday.
01:04:15
Speaker
Yeah, it's my only, yeah.
01:04:18
Speaker
All my travelling overseas, all just been for Formula One.
01:04:22
Speaker
So this is my little annual.
01:04:24
Speaker
I don't really do a lot for holidays, but this is where I get to go away for a couple of days and just get away from home.
01:04:30
Speaker
Play.
01:04:30
Speaker
Brilliant.
01:04:31
Speaker
Brilliant, brilliant.
01:04:34
Speaker
All right.
01:04:35
Speaker
So we'll wave goodbye to the people and then we'll just make sure we've got your audio.
01:04:41
Speaker
So don't go anywhere.
01:04:42
Speaker
No, no, we're still recording.
01:04:43
Speaker
We're just say goodbye to the people and then we'll come back and we'll talk about Formula One.
01:04:49
Speaker
Thanks, everyone.
01:04:50
Speaker
Have a great week and we'll see you all next week.
01:04:53
Speaker
Bye.