Celebrate Good Times

In this episode, Chris, Russell, David and Vernon try something a little different. Instead of ranting about the state of the industry, the conversation focuses on optimism, momentum, and the things they are genuinely excited about in 2026.

Reasons to be cheerful

The team reflect on what is giving them energy right now, from community and conference season to new projects, new teammates, and rediscovering enthusiasm after a difficult year.

Growth, curiosity, and intentionality

The conversation explores decisive humility, cautious optimism, and the importance of being intentional in how we work, learn, and grow. There is also discussion around revisiting testing fundamentals, pushing beyond comfort zones, and embracing opportunities to learn in unfamiliar spaces.

Community and connection

The group talk about the importance of conferences, shared experiences, and meeting people through the testing community. They also reflect on the continued growth of the Testing Peers podcast, rotating co-hosts, and the excitement around PeersCon.

Looking ahead

The episode closes with personal goals, side projects, travel plans, theme parks, cars, and the simple joy of having things to look forward to.

This episode explores

• Optimism in testing and tech
• Community, conferences, and connection
• New teammates and fresh energy
• Decisive humility and cautious optimism
• Intentionality and testing fundamentals
• Personal goals, projects, and things to look forward to

#PeersCon27 (March 11th, 2027) is now LIVE Tickets for the event are live for the Early Bird Price of £15 until November 30th 2027.

And as always, we are looking for sponsors to make this event the success it has been for the last 3 years, get in touch if interested

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Transcript

0:14: Hello my friends, welcome to another episode of the Testing Piers podcast. 

 0:20: My name is Chris Armstrong and today I am joined by Russell Craxford. 

 0:26: Hello. 

 0:27: David Maynard, I am, and the beautiful Vernon Richards. 

 0:33: Greetings. 

 0:35: Today we're going to be speaking about many wonderful, good, happy things in a flip from last year's testing rants. 

 0:44: We're gonna be talking about good things, things to be optimistic about, things in this world that we need to cling on to so we can move forwards, which I for one need. 

 0:56: Now, today, Vernon has got for us some banter, so take it away, Vernon. 

 1:02: What are the Testing Piers's favorite sweets? 

 1:07: Are we excluding chocolate from sweets, right? 

 1:11: from, from me, yes, I'm excluding chocolates. 

 1:14: I'm excluding chocolates. 

 1:15: Oh, when I say excluding chocolates, chocolate bars excluded, if you're talking about like, you know, chocolate, coffee, like a celebrations, chocolate little thing. 

 1:23: Celebrations is allowed, I will allow that. 

 1:26: Good clarification. 

 1:28: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

 1:29: So just no chocolate bars, OK. 

 1:31: No, no chocolate bars, yeah. 

 1:34: He wants to go first. 

 1:36: It's a lot of deliberation. 

 1:39: I will go first, I think, you know those they're like peach sour sweets, like almost like Haribo peach sort of sweets, they're sort of circular and they're they're half orange and half sort of ready ready pink. 

 1:54: Those things, they are awesome, when my son has them, I try and become his best friend for a short while. 

 2:00: Sometimes they're successful, other times not. 

 2:03: They're delicious. 

 2:05: I could eat a lot of those. 

 2:05: Are they, are they the ones that are, that are quite sugary on top? 

 2:09: Incredibly, incredibly sweet, yeah, if you had a few of them, your, your whole mouth would feel lined with sugar, it wouldn't be very pleasant. 

 2:15: Yep, yep. 

 2:16: I may have demolished a packet or 10 of those, good choice. 

 2:19: I'm gonna be cheeky and have 2, if that's OK. 

 2:22: Have as many sweets as you like, mate. 

 2:23: I would say the, the, the purple one from the Quality Streets, the, the sort of oval one with the caramel and the, the hazelnut in them, so that's one favorite. 

 2:32: And also cola bottles, the, the chewy cola bottles, and it doesn't again talking about whether they, they've got the sugar on. 

 2:39: I don't really care whether they've got the sugar on or not. 

 2:42: Either would be perfect. 

 2:43: So does that count as three options? 

 2:45: I don't know, but anyway, they, they, they, they would be my team. 

 2:48: Just keep on going, list everyone from the penny tubs. 

 2:51: David's answer to the question is yes. 

 2:53: That's basically it. 

 2:56: I see, it's difficult cos so I, I agree with kind of what David's been saying there, but I guess my go to would be, sort of a black bullet that rings any bells. 

 3:05: Does anyone know what they are? 

 3:06: No, I haven't got a clue. 

 3:07: OK, they're sort of anisedi literacy things. 

 3:11: No, they're just mint. 

 3:13: so they're basically just like a boiled mint sweet for want of a better word. 

 3:16: It's like, like an Everton mint, a black and white thing. 

 3:19: That would be an Everton mint. 

 3:20: This is a black bullet, which is basically just a small black, black, sweet. 

 3:25: It's a similar type style. 

 3:28: But yeah, do you buy them as bullet? 

 3:30: Yeah, you buy them in packets. 

 3:31: I'm gonna have to Google and share with you the link. 

 3:35: I googled. 

 3:36: They're, they're spherical, yeah. 

 3:39: I'd never heard of them. 

 3:41: OK, there must be a northern thing. 

 3:43: David, who thought he liked all of the sweets, has just discovered there is a new, just, yeah, it's a boiled sweet type thing of mint, but yeah, it's in a, it's a black circular type thing. 

 3:53: But yeah, they're, they were very common in my childhood, I guess, but yeah, fashioned black bullets. 

 3:59: They're not old fashioned, don't dare you call me old fashioned. 

 4:03: Oh no, that's actually what's on the box, isn't it? 

 4:05: That's literally what Old man who gets angry at a cloud. 

 4:09: Oh, do you know what, one of the links, I just googled it and one of the links has come back to a, a, a YouTube video. 

 4:15: The title of the video is The History of Black Bullets, a Geordie's Favorite suite. 

 4:21: OK, that maybe tells you why I like it. 

 4:24: Well, on brand, that's on brand. 

 4:28: Oddly enough, it's from an area of Newcastle. 

 4:30: I've just Googled this myself now, from Jesmond, and I live round the corner from Jesmond. 

 4:33: It's literally, I was there this evening in Jesmond. 

 4:36: So there you go. 

 4:39: So you are incredibly local then. 

 4:40: No wonder I haven't heard of it, having never really traveled. 

 4:43: I assumed they were an international success. 

 4:46: They're all over the place up north. 

 4:48: Amazing. 

 4:49: There you go. 

 4:50: Pick something that none of our listeners will ever know. 

 4:52: So what's Vernon's favorite sweets? 

 4:53: Oh, my gosh, anyone who's met me in person will look at me and know that I'm partial to sweets in general, I think, what's my favorite sweet? 

 5:04: I think. 

 5:06: So many options. 

 5:08: I like Garden fruits by Bonds. 

 5:12: So garden fruits by bonds, they're like they're boiled but they have a soft center, it's like, it's almost like this, like this chewy, jammy, I don't know what it is, in the middle of it. 

 5:23: They come in different flavors, a packet that you'd have different flavors in it, you'll have a, I guess a lime, a lemon, an orange, I don't know what it would be. 

 5:30: Blackcurrant, I don't know what it is, and it, you know, the, a red one, I don't know what that is, and the white one, I don't know, I don't know what flavor the white one is, but the white one is the best flavor in the whole packet. 

 5:40: I've got no idea what it's supposed to be, but it's absolutely amazing. 

 5:45: So yeah, if you ever see me out and about with a packet of Bonds, garden fruits, and there's only white ones left, don't ask me for any cos I'm not gonna share. 

 5:53: But the other ones I'll share. 

 5:55: Good to know. 

 5:56: That was, that was sweet. 

 5:58: Oh, hey, fantastic. 

 6:01: Reasons to be cheerful friends. 

 6:03: So, look, what have we got to be optimistic about? 

 6:07: What are we enjoying in life? 

 6:08: What are we looking forward to in the coming year? 

 6:11: Summer. 

 6:12: Long days, nice weather. 

 6:14: Spring is here, almost. 

 6:17: Maybe. 

 6:17: You're gonna grow more potatoes, no, no, no, no potatoes this year, probably, I'll be doing chillies though, chillies, tomatoes, probably runner beans. 

 6:27: Yeah, ooh, chili jam, David, yes please. 

 6:30: Chili tomato sounds quite interesting. 

 6:34: But yeah, spring is on its way, so looking forward to that. 

 6:37: So what was the question about what, what do we love? 

 6:40: So let's let's let's just reframe the podcast. 

 6:43: We're testing peers and we like to talk about testing leadership, agility, software development, all the good things around that area. 

 6:49: What are we looking forward to about that space? 

 6:51: There's a lot of doom and gloom. 

 6:53: But what is there to be optimistic about? 

 6:55: Where are the opportunities? 

 6:56: Where are the things that we enjoy that we can spend some more time being enthusiastic about? 

 7:01: I guess community is the thing for me. 

 7:03: we talked already about the Testing Piers conference, but obviously as, as kind of the year starts, I, I did say already about the summer daylight gets here and all the rest of it. 

 7:13: We start thinking about kind of conference season and the events going on, be it the meetups that I start to. 

 7:19: Be a bit more, I don't know, optimistic even, the world just seems to open up a bit more and everything seems to be brighter, so there's conferences that are going on, there's talks that are going on, there's all sorts of those sorts of things, and I think I look forward to kind of what the year will bring in terms of opportunities, myself to speak or otherwise, but to go and learn from peers around the different around the country at different events or even internationally. 

 7:40: I know that many of us probably will be speaking in some form, even if it's just around the corner. 

 7:45: It's. 

 7:46: Certainly, as kind of spring hits, it's kind of makes me think more positively about getting out of the house, I think, for want of a better word. 

 7:52: So for me, I, I look forward to sort of projects. 

 7:56: There's one particular project that I'm working on at the moment that is coming soon and yeah, so I've been working on that and doing really exciting things with it, so I I hopefully the, the buzz will be around and be exciting for that particular thing, but, yeah, so it has great potential, so. 

 8:14: We're really looking forward to to that being launched. 

 8:18: So yes, so we've been enjoying that and looking forward to the launch and the future of what that entails. 

 8:25: See, no one's gonna be able to compete there, are they? 

 8:27: This question, is it about just the work stuff or is it about anything? 

 8:31: You can take it in any direction, Von. 

 8:32: I think on the day job side of things, I've recently got myself two new teammates and they are very, very. 

 8:41: Very awesome. 

 8:42: It is so cool working with, with good people, so, you know, shout out to them should this podcast cross their paths. 

 8:49: They are absolutely amazing. 

 8:50: and that means that I'm spectacularly excited about what we're gonna do next year in 2026. 

 8:57: This year. 

 8:58: Excuse me, this year. 

 8:59: What we're gonna do this year. 

 9:01: It's gonna be, I'm looking forward to it, man. 

 9:03: I'm looking forward to it cause we've got the existing team and adding, well, we've technically added 3 new people, but one of them is kind of not quite new cos she's, she's back from maternity leave, so I don't know if that counts or not. 

 9:14: But she, you know, the lady who was on maternity leave, she's just slotted back into the team like she hasn't even left. 

 9:19: It's amazing. 

 9:20: And then the two actual new, new people, man. 

 9:23: Gonna kick some ass, man, it's gonna be absolutely brilliant. 

 9:25: So there's, there's a lot of things, there's a lot of things we've gotta do, a lot of challenges. 

 9:28: There's a lot of work to do, but I'm excited about it. 

 9:30: I'm gonna echo that. 

 9:31: I think that we have some awesome people working for us as well, you know, we bring in apprentices and, and interns, and their enthusiasm and their work ethic and their, their ability to, you know, in terms of technology. 

 9:46: To absorb it and then, then work is really exciting to watch. 

 9:50: It really is, you know, seeing this new wave of young enthusiastic people is really amazing. 

 9:56: And although they only stay here, stay with us for a year, they, they learn a lot from us, but we also learn a lot from them, and it, it is awesome. 

 10:03: Apprentices obviously stay for a bit longer, but again, their work ethic. 

 10:07: And the way that they're working is, is really amazing and their just their enthusiasm and their, their excitement to work and, and sometimes us older people get caught up in that enthusiasm because questions that are important to them really makes us think about how to phrase things and and what should be important to us. 

 10:24: That's, yeah, same, it's, it's. 

 10:27: You know, I, I mean, I've only been in this company for 1 year, like it's almost exactly 1 year. 

 10:32: I had my 1 year anniversary a few days ago at the time of recording, shall we say. 

 10:36: The existing QA team, it definitely had this new lease of life. 

 10:40: The new joiners have been a catalyst and they've just dropped into the team and then there's been this activity which is good to see. 

 10:46: So now all we need to do in the new year is direct it and just guide it or shape it into the right direction and into the right thing. 

 10:53: And I don't think there'll be any stopping us, to be honest, so. 

 10:56: Should be good, man, it should be good. 

 10:58: I'll, I'll, I'll happily report back at some point in 2026 later in the year, about how it's going. 

 11:04: So you've not put any pressure on them at all, have you, really? 

 11:06: Oh, I've already had this conversation with them. 

 11:08: Good, as long as they know it's fine. 

 11:10: This conversation with him, we're like, yeah, next year, you know, we're gonna, it's gonna be challenging, be fun. 

 11:16: 26 is gonna be awesome. 

 11:17: Yeah, we're gonna, we're going to put our foot down, you know, put a foot on the gas if you like. 

 11:21: It'd be good, man, it'd be good. 

 11:22: That's where the growth happens just outside the comfort zone. 

 11:25: Yeah. 

 11:27: It, it is exciting. 

 11:28: Like I, I decided to start using two turns of phrase last year. 

 11:32: One of them was, was decisive humility, like own the stuff you don't know, but have the confidence to go and find that stuff out. 

 11:39: And then cautious optimism like. 

 11:41: There's been a whole bunch of stuff with AI and other moments in, in our industry recently and if we're at the forefront, if we're helping to shape things, if we're driving that conversation and shaping things, we've got an opportunity to do some amazing things, solve some real problems, help real people, do some really cool stuff. 

 12:01: But sitting on the back foot waiting for stuff to come our way ain't the way it's going to happen. 

 12:05: Like we have to be willing to push ourselves, to put ourselves in positions that we maybe wouldn't have otherwise, and that's not always the easiest thing to do, but I like the idea of pushing myself above and beyond. 

 12:16: This year I'm speaking at a non-testing conference for the first time. 

 12:21: That's putting myself out in a whole new space, and a whole new audience. 

 12:26: People that I wouldn't necessarily consider my people, but maybe they could be, maybe that's a great place to be to really advocate for what we think is the right way to shape our industry going forward, you know, like, it's terrifying putting yourself out there, but you know, if you've got an opportunity to take that shot, like maybe something amazing could happen, new connections, new collaborations, that's what I'm looking forward to having the chance. 

 12:46: Like obviously I'm working in a company that's making a length and breadth of tools for software development and stuff and that's changing and it's challenging and, It's going to force me to look at things in a way that I want a much broader picture than I'd wanted to, and force me to deal with things that I otherwise wouldn't have had to in the previous positions, but do you know, there's a lot of really interesting things to learn, cool people to meet that I just wouldn't have crossed before, and there's a part of me that's quite excited about being the idiot in the room, in not being an idiot, but, Being the one that's got the most opportunity to learn stuff for a while. 

 13:19: I'm quite excited about that and I feel more comfortable asking those stupid questions and and singing and learning and sometimes I can actually be quiet, would you believe? 

 13:30: Really? 

 13:31: It's usually when he's drinking something. 

 13:33: What else am I looking forward to? 

 13:36: I don't know if it's particularly on topic. 

 13:37: Or not, but I'm, I'm definitely, this, this year has been suboptimal in a few ways. 

 13:42: Not all bad, but definitely some challenges that I really, really, really didn't anticipate like really didn't anticipate having to deal with. 

 13:49: So, I'd like to leave those in 2025, and I'm looking forward to achieving some fairly audacious goals in 2026. 

 13:56: So yeah, that's exciting, a little bit terrifying. 

 13:59: I need to be writing more, that's gonna be part of the equation, cos I didn't, I didn't really write as much as I as I hoped consistently in 2025. 

 14:06: I'd like to do, I'm, I'm really looking forward to building that muscle back up again in 2026 cos I love writing and my, it's weird to get cos all these other benefits and upsides to getting, sharing my ideas and getting my thoughts out of my head are not. 

 14:20: Articulating myself on a regular basis, very, very excited about that. 

 14:24: That's gonna be cool. 

 14:25: I think for me, a bit like what you've just said, Vernon, I think 2025, I'm looking forward to seeing the back of it and just starting afresh in 2026. 

 14:35: I felt that I've lost a bit of my mojo, a bit of my excitement in my own life, and I'm actually feeling quite. 

 14:41: Excited by coming up with new ideas again. 

 14:43: I've, I'm an ideas person. 

 14:45: I look at things in very different ways and go down different avenues, and I felt that, for the past few years, that has been knocked out of me. 

 14:52: So having the opportunity to be able to feel that I'm able to start thinking about ideas again and feel excited by that is really a great feeling. 

 15:03: And, and it's nice, it's nice to have that back. 

 15:05: So yeah, I feel, so I feel optimistic and excited by that. 

 15:09: That is beautiful. 

 15:10: That is beautiful, man. 

 15:13: Can't wait to see what you come up with, dude. 

 15:15: We've been doing some cool stuff in testing Piers's land, like Russell touched upon. 

 15:19: Podcast's gonna creep ever closer to 200 episodes, but Sprout's got those two tantalizing ne certificates for us to try and aim for in our little happy world. 

 15:29: It's been a kind of a remarkable achievement, keeping on going and speaking with some amazing folks about some really interesting ideas. 

 15:36: Conference, 3rd conference in person, amazing. 

 15:40: Spending time in person with people that I love, and that's not just gonna be at our own conference, right? 

 15:46: We love. 

 15:46: Conferences, I think that's kind of one of those things that kind of unites so many of us. 

 15:51: I kind of, I do, I view it as a physical manifestation of a testing community coming together at these events, spending quality time with quality people. 

 16:00: I'd sent last year a little image of a pub quiz that Russell and I were winners of, 2 time winners now, of, at Eurostar, we met for the first time. 

 16:10: Russell came over with a pint and asked to join, join my table for a pub quiz. 

 16:15: and we were victorious, you know, like little moments, little chances, like you saw some, saw some people and thought I'll go and talk to them, at a social, you know, sometimes some of those connections you can make can change your life, be enduring. 

 16:28: Yeah. 

 16:29: Wish I'd never walked. 

 16:30: As you mentioned there about the achievements for the podcast, you know, at time of recording we're at 65,000 downloads and the last achievement is for 75,000. 

 16:39: So we've only got 10,000 left. 

 16:40: So that will be an absolute, we'll we'll certainly achieve that hopefully. 

 16:44: Well, I'm assuming we will achieve that this year in 2026. 

 16:48: So we'll have completed the Buzz sprout achievements. 

 16:50: What are we're gonna do then? 

 16:50: They'll create a new one for us because they love us that much. 

 16:54: We'll create our own. 

 16:55: That's the other one, celebrate our best. 

 16:56: And to be honest, this year is also the year that we've had the ability to rotate who's in the podcast a bit more, you know, sad news, obviously Simon leaving us in the end of 2025 as a permanent resident. 

 17:06: Hopefully we get him back a few times, but I, it gives us the opportunity to, have different voices more often, which I think we all look forward to because it brings a bit more, I guess diversity. 

 17:16: it brings a bit more different opinion, it brings a different perspective, and it freshens things up a little bit, which I think I look forward to. 

 17:23: and it's sometimes people I've never met before, so it's fantastic in terms of actually introducing people and meeting people and growing our own horizons as well. 

 17:31: So I think that's something I'm. 

 17:33: Kind of grateful for, I know we have for a while had guest speakers, guest, co-hosts, but I think 2026 is going to be a lot more of it. 

 17:41: So, but that's quite cool. 

 17:42: I totally echo that. 

 17:43: I think that co-hosts add an extra, dimension to it because otherwise if it's the same co-hosts or, or the same people all the time, we know how the rest of us, what we're likely to say and. 

 17:54: Ever and whatever, but having a different co-host, again, it's a bit like the new people in, in the groups. 

 18:00: It brings a different energy, different dynamic, different way of doing it, and, and often we, as we've discussed before, the, the topics often come from the guests themselves. 

 18:08: They bring their own ideas, so it's what's important to them is being brought to the, to the, to the podcast. 

 18:14: Yeah, it's, it's good, I think. 

 18:18: A lot of what, what we talked about also I think is trying to be delivering with a bit more intent. 

 18:23: I was given by a product manager at work that whole line, let's focus on intent. 

 18:28: Why are we doing this? 

 18:30: What's the purpose of this? 

 18:31: What's the problem we're solving? 

 18:33: If we have that secret source, that's great, we can plan with more intent rather than just what's next. 

 18:39: Why is that next? 

 18:40: Two things need to change, there's a bit of agility sprinkled over the top of that sort of stuff. 

 18:45: But I love being more intentional, being more proactive, being more thoughtful and decisive in the way that we work, and leading with a bit more of that confidence that even if it's not gonna work out exactly how we've done it, we can feel like we're a bit less disorganized. 

 19:01: A bit more like we can feel confident that we're at least doing things for the right reasons and I like the feeling that that kind of sense that you have in your culture, wherever you're working in your community or your your actual workplace and where you're, you're about, Uncertainty is crippling, decision fatigue is more than fatiguing, sometimes it's paralyzing, right? 

 19:24: And having a bit more open discourse about, right, this is what we're gonna do, this is why we're going to do it, and feeling like there's a purpose, we're, we're learning stuff, we're changing, we're iterating. 

 19:33: I love that. 

 19:35: Sometimes it means uncomfortable, but with a broader purpose of there's more to achieve if we're open, if we're honest, if we're intentional. 

 19:42: And I think intentional is my word for 2026, and I'm really excited about that. 

 19:47: I think as as you were chatting away there Chris, you, you, you sparked an idea in my head which is I've got this feeling that I've got a feeling that testing is gonna make some kind of comeback. 

 19:56: I don't know if that's the right word. 

 19:57: I don't know if that's the right positioning, but I just feel like for me, one of the things that we're gonna be focusing, one of the things I'm excited about that I'm gonna be doing in the day job is really making sure that the foundations are solid of the work that the team is doing, and that's very much about the fundamentals of testing, interacting with the products and all the, you know, under. 

 20:16: Applying skills and behaviors that make that possible so that we can then do other cool things like say full on quality engineering, I'm doing air quotes, no one can see them. 

 20:25: A quality engineering type stuff. 

 20:28: But I think that foundation of good testing skills and practices needs to be there, and I, I'm really looking forward to to working on that with, with my teammates in the day job. 

 20:37: Like I'm really looking forward to getting back to that, you know, what does it even mean? 

 20:41: I was having a conversation with Emily, one of my new teammates over Slacks, like what even is it? 

 20:45: Even, how do you start to explain to people how to write a test case? 

 20:49: Regardless of the topic, you know, a situation where you kind of, you're trying to explain something that you've been doing for a long time, you start at step one and then you realize your step one is everyone else's step 20 you're like, oh crap. 

 21:00: I've got, I got a, got a few steps back, yeah, that, I need to, in order to do that, I need to do that thing. 

 21:06: So working all that out and and and getting back, you know, becoming more or reacquainted is probably the word, reacquainted with those things. 

 21:14: I'm quite looking forward to that. 

 21:15: That's gonna be good, that's gonna be good fun that is. 

 21:16: I haven't done any of that for such a long time, oh yeah, how do you explain testing notes, taking notes of the, of your work. 

 21:23: That's what even is that? 

 21:24: How do you do that? 

 21:25: That's gonna be good fun. 

 21:26: I'm excited about that because we're being intentional about it, instead of just assuming that we're doing it or or apologizing for it also, like, that's not exactly saying, here's what good looks like, let's see how we can foster that same perspective across the team and then consistently deliver on it. 

 21:43: I think that's going to be good fun. 

 21:44: And I'm, look, I know I'm on the podcast, I get it. 

 21:48: Selfishly, this conference is perfect for me. 

 21:50: It's cheap as chips. 

 21:52: It's around the bloody corner. 

 21:53: I've said this to Chris a million times, man. 

 21:55: I've said, look, quite often I find myself traveling a lot for conferences, but this one, you know, relatively speaking, I just roll out of bed and I'm in Nottingham. 

 22:03: It's like, oh, great, I'm here. 

 22:04: This is easy. 

 22:05: It was done deliberately for you, Vernon, you know, we had you as our like persona that we had to organize a conference for. 

 22:11: You beautiful humans, you. 

 22:12: So yeah, yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm very excited about that. 

 22:15: I can stay as long as I like, and I know I'm gonna be home in about 45 minutes. 

 22:19: Absolutely brilliant for me. 

 22:21: No hotel. 

 22:23: Fantastic. 

 22:24: So are we having the after party at your house in this year? 

 22:26: A good, good looks getting that squared away with my good lady wife. 

 22:31: Well, we, we can pay for her to go to a hotel and we can just use it, it's cheaper than all of us. 

 22:37: My daughter will be down for it though, but yeah, that's, it's gonna be good, man, it's gonna be good. 

 22:40: I'm excited to see what the lineups are, the lineup's very, very cool. 

 22:44: So yeah man, if you don't have your ridiculously well priced ticket yet of 30 quid, I will allow you to pause the podcast. 

 22:52: In fact, no, you don't need to pause, you can just go and buy your ticket while you listen. 

 22:55: Multitask. 

 22:56: Come on man, we can walk and chew gum at the same time. 

 22:59: And if you can't afford the 30 pounds, reach out to us, contact us at testing peers.com, and we'll see what we can do. 

 23:06: Like in all seriousness we're nice people. 

 23:09: Some of our patrons, some of our friends and colleagues have paid for tickets that they, they can't attend themselves anymore, or they've paid for tickets that we can give forward to other people. 

 23:18: So don't let the budget put you off. 

 23:21: even 30 pounds may not be a lot to many, but can be a lot to some. 

 23:25: Appreciate obviously travel can be an option and a problem, but if you're in the Nottingham area and travel less of a problem like Vernon, but certainly we can do things, if you're a student perhaps, you know, God knows why you're spending your time listening to us if you're a student, you should probably be out drinking. 

 23:39: There there are times when the pubs aren't open and the clubs, so they might choose to be listening to us. 

 23:46: Not up north. 

 23:48: The bar's closed. 

 23:50: The supermarket's open. 

 23:52: I to be fair, down south, when, when I went to Ministry of Test, yeah, going for a run at 6 in the morning, having seeing people being turfed out of a club, you're, you're absolutely right. 

 24:03: No rest for the wicked, as they say. 

 24:05: Enjoy life while you've. 

 24:06: Amen. 

 24:07: Amen. 

 24:08: Do you know what I'm looking forward to? 

 24:09: I'm looking forward to a new testing peers logo. 

 24:11: Or I'm look we're enjoying our new testing peers logo, which depending upon when this comes out, etc. 

 24:16: who knows, but I'm we're hoping to see what we can do to reflect more of the current testing peers with our logo, fingers crossed. 

 24:24: But I'm looking forward to hopefully 2026 being the year that something evolves. 

 24:27: If you know any good artists. 

 24:29: Are you saying that you are, Chris, a great artist? 

 24:31: I'm saying I've been in discussion with a great artist. 

 24:34: He has. 

 24:34: I'm covering ourselves just in case, unfortunately, capacity. 

 24:37: But also this this might not be in the podcast, in which case we can just say la la la la chips and cheese. 

 24:43: Edit. 

 24:44: What else, what, what are you, what are, what are you looking forward to that's not necessarily related to, or at least, you know, directly related to work without prying too much into people's personal space? 

 24:55: Well, I'm hoping this year I'll be the year I get my Cobra on the road. 

 24:59: Do you know, I was gonna ask about that. 

 25:00: I, I was half guessing that you might say that or hoping you'd bring it up. 

 25:04: I said it last year. 

 25:05: I'll say it this year and I might say it next year. 

 25:07: Percentage is it done? 

 25:09: Are you talking about? 

 25:11: Yes. 

 25:13: What I'm building a Cobra. 

 25:14: What? 

 25:15: No way. 

 25:15: I Google that, yeah. 

 25:17: is that the corra possibly? 

 25:19: I don't know what you think it is. 

 25:20: You've got one of them. 

 25:21: I've got parts of one. 

 25:22: What? 

 25:23: I'm putting them together at the moment. 

 25:26: it's probably about 40% done. 

 25:29: But it's the main mechanical stuff's done. 

 25:31: It's now the kind of the more the lights, the electronics, that's the bit that needs doing next in the, so yeah. 

 25:37: So once you've done, you do a tour of Britain and visit us all, is that right? 

 25:40: Well, something like that, yes. 

 25:42: Last time I did try to get to Vienna, I didn't get that far, so we'll see. 

 25:46: I'll start small, maybe, but we'll see if we can get on the road in 2026. 

 25:49: What are you saying, David? 

 25:50: What's going on? 

 25:51: I obviously muted myself wrongly. 

 25:57: I was gonna say it may be ready for To PSO 2027. 

 26:00: I hope so though. 

 26:01: March is quite early to drive a soft top car with no roof in the UK. 

 26:05: Does it not have a roof at all? 

 26:06: And you can kind of construct a temporary thing or you can make a hard top shell, but generally speaking, no, it doesn't. 

 26:12: I can't take my eyes off this car. 

 26:13: I need to, I need to get it off the screen, it's way too. 

 26:15: Distracting, bloody hell, man, I'm, I'm, I'm excited. 

 26:18: I'm, I'm gonna be cheering you on now to get that done. 

 26:20: Bloody hell, that is amazing. 

 26:21: It hasn't progressed much in the last 12 months, so we'll see if we can do better. 

 26:25: I mean, let's, let's face it, there's, there's exciting things happening. 

 26:28: There's a World Cup in, in football and, Mrs. 

 26:32: Armstrong, what a trip for us to Orlando to go to the new Super Mario Land Universal Studios, so gonna be living a childhood dream as a as a former games QA Living amongst all the Nintendo stuff, that's gonna be pretty exciting. 

 26:48: And do you know what, like, 2025 surprised me with like the sheer number of amazing new voices and new connections that I made. 

 26:56: I'm just looking forward to being surprised by even more of that sort of amazing stuff as well. 

 27:01: Who, who's more excited about the, the trip to the Super Mario thing, Chris? 

 27:05: Is it, is it you or my youngest is#1. 

 27:10: I might be joint 2nd with my eldest, but let's face it, I mean, a theme park that you don't have to pay for is a pretty exciting theme park regardless. 

 27:17: Especially in that location. 

 27:20: Bloody hell. 

 27:20: Do they have the, like the live action Mario Kart, like a real, so, so you're on a real car, but you wear the headset. 

 27:28: And then you can like as you send like shells and and bananas and stuff, you, you see those on VR or AR I should say, as you're going so, and you get like a little wristband so you can do the proper warm ups on the item boxes and stuff. 

 27:43: I'm gonna be a massive child. 

 27:45: It's gonna be so much fun. 

 27:46: OK, so now I am excited to hear Christopher's report about how amazing that is. 

 27:52: So now I'm excited just to go, oh my God, definitely got a banter for next year, F theme park. 

 27:57: That's a great one. 

 27:57: That's a great one. 

 27:59: That's several banters cos we can do it by region. 

 28:01: Some of us could. 

 28:03: Not all of us. 

 28:04: Chris can do that on his own. 

 28:05: Yeah. 

 28:06: We're, we're collecting European ones now. 

 28:07: We've done a few. 

 28:08: We're gonna, we're doing main, main continental ones as well, so really exciting. 

 28:12: Actually, on that note, we are out of time. 

 28:15: It's been brilliant talking about fantastic things, things that we're looking forward to, things that we have happening in this year, 2026. 

 28:23: we've mentioned it a couple of times, I'm gonna mention it again. 

 28:25: Piers Con in Nottingham, get your tickets. 

 28:28: Testingierscon.com, or you can reach out directly to us and give us your exciting news about what's happening in your lives in 2026. 

 28:37: Contact us at testing peers.com by email or reach out to us on LinkedIn. 

 28:42: Look for Testing Piers. 

 28:43: All it leaves me to do is say goodbye and thank you very much for listening. 

 28:47: See you next time. 

 28:49: Goodbye.