Pool Noodles, Sunglasses, and Fruit Trees | Soft, Meandering Bedtime Listening

In Pool Noodles, Sunglasses, and Fruit Trees, Marco and Amanda ease into another softly spoken, gently winding conversation that begins with Amanda’s recent Aquafit class. From the buoyant charm of pool noodles — and the playful question of whether they’re the candy of the pool — the discussion drifts naturally into memories of sunglasses, including a beloved lost pair and the curious habit of wearing them at night. Just when the path seems clear, it meanders again, eventually blooming into reflections on fruit trees and the quiet wonder of how conversations grow in unexpected directions.
This calming podcast episode is intentionally unhurried and light, offering relaxing conversation designed to help you fall asleep, ease anxiety, or soften racing thoughts at the end of the day. There’s no need to follow every turn; it works beautifully as background listening while you settle into bed or navigate a middle-of-the-night wake-up. The gentle rhythm of everyday observations and playful tangents creates a peaceful atmosphere where nothing urgent happens. Get comfortable, let your thoughts loosen, and allow this easy exchange to carry you steadily toward rest.

​Pool Noodles, Sunglasses, and Fruit Trees
(Original airdate: April 9, 2025)

Welcome to the Insomnia Project. Sit back, relax and listen as we have a calm conversation meant to help you find your way to sleep.

Amanda: We wow, that really relaxed me.

Marco: Did it?

Amanda: Yeah.

Marco: Good.

Amanda: I was like, good night. My body is very relaxed right now.

Marco: Oh good. I'm glad to hear that because we both had busy days.

Amanda: We did. And I've been Sedentary for far too many days. And so for various reasons. And tonight I went to Aquafoot Fit.

Marco: Aqua Fit. How was that? How was your Aqua Fit foot in Aqua Fit?

Amanda: My feet are good. In aqua feet. Foot fit. That was not intentional. It was good. It was good. There's seven of us. It was all Canadian music tonight.

Marco: Oh, that's interesting.

Amanda: Yeah. And I liked this class better than the last Aqua Fit class I did, which was a few weeks ago. Oh, good. Yeah. And this one I paid for the one a few weeks ago. I didn't realize I was supposed to pay. Nobody stop. I stole a free class.

Marco: Well, the first one's always free, Right? And how was this class? How would you rate this class?

Amanda: Oh, it was good. It wasn't. I'd like a bit more flow. I'd like more of a dance, if you will. But the exercises were good and the music was good, and the teacher was jovial, and that's really all you need from Aquafit. I've learned a trick with Aquafit.

Marco: Oh, share, share.

Amanda: I like to do it right on the line of the pool where the shallow end meets the deep end.

Marco: Okay. And why is that?

Amanda: Because some exercises I'd rather do in the shallow end. Generally speaking, that's easier. But some exercises I want to do and more enjoy doing in the deep end. And it's a better workout with those ones.

Marco: So what exactly is Aqua Fit? Is it like a jazzercise class in the water?

Amanda: Basically, we use dumbbells, like foam dumbbells that offer a lot of resistance. And we use really strong pool noodles that offer a lot of resistance as well.

Marco: So they're different than regular pool noodles?

Amanda: Well, the pool noodles that I always remember are, like, hollow, almost Styrofoamy plasticky tubes.

Marco: Sure, sure.

Amanda: Are they hollow in the middle? When you picture a pool noodle, is it hollow in the middle?

Marco: Yeah, of course it is. Yeah, that's how I picture it.

Amanda: Okay, well, these are not hollow. These are like these. If. If those are licorice, then these are nibs.

Marco: Okay.

Amanda: If you know what a nib is.

Marco: Yeah, yeah. Nib and a licorice are kind of in the same family. It's candy, anyways.

Amanda: Yeah, but nibs are like a strong core.

Marco: Sure.

Amanda: And. And like, Twizzlers would have a hollowed center. Right, right. Gotcha. Actually, you know what it's more like. It's like the normal Twizzlers with the hollowed center and then the peel. The peel and twist or whatever they're called. Twizzlers that are like individual strands.

Marco: Oh, yeah.

Amanda: That make up a thicker, fuller Twizzler.

Marco: Sure. Okay. If you know your candy, you'll know what we're talking about.

Amanda: You know your Twizzlers, Which I do. So anyway, they're like stronger pool noodles. And we like, like, we'll put it between our legs like it's a horse, like a play horse. And then pedal like it's like, put your hands on the top and then pedal around the pool like it's a bike.

Marco: Okay.

Amanda: Which is quite enjoyable, I have to say.

Marco: It sounds silly, but.

Amanda: Oh, they're all ridiculous. Like, everything you're doing in there is. You look ridiculous, but it's you and six other women who look equally ridiculous. So it's fine. And I do appreciate that they put the blinds down in the windows.

Marco: Okay.

Amanda: For the pool. So even though you look ridiculous, no one's watching you. There's nobody gawking, going. Also, I don't think anybody would really care to be like, look at those dumb middle aged women dancing around to Canadian hits of the 80s.

Marco: Amazing.

Amanda: I mean, maybe there's somebody out there that would be that person. But anyway, there wasn't. And the lifeguards are all like 16, so I keep thinking like, do they know Corey Hart? Do they know Gowen? Probably not.

Marco: Right, right, right.

Amanda: I mean, doubtful.

Marco: Anyway, I don't know how many of our listeners know those Canadian artists either.

Amanda: Corey Hart is better known, sure, if you're of a certain age, because of his wonderful hit Sunglasses at Night.

Marco: Right, right.

Amanda: Which has a really, like, dangerous sound to it. Sure.

Marco: Has a dangerous feel to it, if you will, but.

Amanda: And yet a stupid message.

Marco: Right, right.

Amanda: He wears. I don't. What are the lyrics? I wear my sunglasses at night so I can see.

Marco: I don't remember, so I can't be seen. I don't know.

Amanda: It doesn't make any sense. Why would you wear your sunglasses at night?

Marco: Was there any. Was there anything you wore when you went to clubs that was your staple thing that you wore?

Amanda: I mean, I didn't really, unfortunately, have the benefit of getting to go to many clubs.

Marco: I see.

Amanda: I didn't grow up around the club.

Marco: Okay.

Amanda: I grew up around hillbilly bars that wish they were the club.

Marco: I see. I see.

Amanda: And I wished they were the club so I would dress appropriately, but it's not the same. But I did wear thigh highs that was really big in like 1995.

Marco: Thigh highs.

Amanda: Like thigh high black stockings.

Marco: I see. Okay.

Amanda: And like granny boots.

Marco: Okay.

Amanda: I Rocked that look for a long time. I got really into vests also in that era of the 90s, wearing a vest was really cool, but it, like, my mom took it to extremes. She was doing a lot of sewing in those days. She would never tell, say that she was a champion sewer, but she was actually quite crafty. Is quite crafty with a sewing machine. And so she knew there was one vest she made me, and I really liked it. And so then she. I think she made that vest for me. And then she started making me all kinds of vests out of, like, material that she also made pillows and tablecloths out of. So, like, I had to draw the line. When she made me a brocade cat vest, I was like, I'm not gonna wear this. It has cats on. She's like, but you like cats. I'm like, I know.

Marco: A vest with cats you would wore to a club.

Amanda: Well, I didn't wear it to a club, but that was in my closet.

Marco: I see, I see.

Amanda: How about you? What were your signature club clothes?

Marco: I remember. Well, I remember not wanting to wear a jacket to clubs, even in the winter. And sometimes you'd have to stay in a line.

Amanda: Oh, yeah, that was a thing. Yeah.

Marco: Because then you'd have to bring it to a coat check, and that would take forever. And who knows who's running the coat check if you'd ever see your jacket again. So there was that.

Amanda: And if you're going to go to more than one club, that's a lot of coat checks.

Marco: That's a lot of code checks.

Amanda: But you're really cold. I mean, this is Canada. So the. You know, you're cold outside.

Marco: Yeah. And so it wasn't. It wasn't. My favorite thing was to try to figure out where to bring my. Like, where to leave my jacket or bring my jacket. That was never fun. And I think I just had a lot of untucked shirts. So I'd have a T shirt and an untucked shirt. Yeah, that was my. That was my standard shirts, too.

Amanda: This just in the actual lyrics of Sunglasses at Night. Do you know them?

Marco: I wear my sunglasses at night so I can do something.

Amanda: Yeah. What is it that you do? Well, little did I know that what he's saying is so I can watch you weave, then breathe your storylines. No, that's what he's saying.

Marco: Oh, wow.

Amanda: Watch you weave, then breathe your storylines.

Marco: Okay.

Amanda: So I can keep. I knew this one, I think. Keep track of the visions in my eyes.

Marco: Yeah, okay. Okay. So he needed his sunglasses. So that he could keep track of the visions in his eyes.

Amanda: And then the bridges. Don't switch the blade on the guy in shades. Oh, no. Oh, wow.

Marco: Wow.

Amanda: That took a good. Don't masquerade with the guy in shades. Oh, no. I can't believe it. Because you got it made. You've got it made with the guy in shades. Oh, no.

Marco: I guess who wrote this.

Amanda: Oh, here's another reason he wears this. We should have a trivia. What are five reasons that Cory Hart wears a sunglasses night? Here's another one. Number four. So I can. So I can forget my name while you collect your claim.

Marco: Okay.

Amanda: I feel like Duran Duran wrote this because their lyrics are equally awesome, but they make no sense. Oh, here's another one.

Marco: Now, the only reason I could see wearing sunglasses at night is you have a bad eye infection or you have. You have. You know, you're sensitive to light because

Amanda: you have get rid of this infection in my left eye.

Marco: Or like, you've.

Amanda: There's one more. There's six reasons he wears a sunglasses night. The final one is so that I can. So I can see the light that's right before my eyes.

Marco: Okay. Okay. That one makes sense.

Amanda: I mean, does it? Yeah. I mean, what are you walking up to? A lamp? No.

Marco: What if the person's so bright and so lovely that you've got to wear sunglasses to be around them?

Amanda: I mean.

Marco: No, that's not how that. That lyric. That lyric works for me.

Amanda: All right, well. And then he just repeats a lot

Marco: of things I did. Like the sunglasses he wore in the video. And I had a pair of.

Amanda: Yeah, he was cool.

Marco: Those were. Those were like Ray ban aviator glasses. Aviator? No, Ray Ban.

Amanda: No, they're aviators. I think he had a Top Gun kind of look.

Marco: No, it wasn't aviators. They're wear Wayfair glasses, I think is what. They're so.

Amanda: Like the Kelly Clarkson furniture store.

Marco: No. Yeah, I think that.

Amanda: Well, that's way fair. You've got just what I need here. Here he is.

Marco: Yeah. Those are not aviator. Those are. Those are.

Amanda: I think. No, they're not. You're right.

Marco: Yeah. So. So those are the glasses that I had. I had and have a pair of those Ray Ban glasses.

Amanda: Yeah, they were mine. You took them from me and claimed them as your own.

Marco: Well, I had a pair even. Even before I knew.

Amanda: Yeah. But then when I found those in the lost and found in my work and nobody claimed them after like a year, I took them home all excited, and then they became yours. And I never Got to see them again.

Marco: And then I scratched them. And it's so hard to wear scratched sunglasses.

Amanda: It's also hard when someone takes them from you and then scratches them.

Marco: It happens. What can I say? I mean, those glasses look good on me.

Amanda: Well, okay.

Marco: All right. Well, I'll get you a pair of sunglasses.

Amanda: You won't get me that pair.

Marco: I could, because I want the Cory Hart pair.

Amanda: I want to wear a white shirt with my collar up. I want to do a pout and have spiky little brown spike hair.

Marco: I once lost a pair of sunglasses at a monument at a. Remember when I lost those?

Amanda: You want to tell that story?

Marco: I don't know if we've already told it, but we were on the. Was it the Arizona or above the Arizona?

Amanda: Yes. At Pearl Harbor. You might want to lead with that.

Marco: We were at Pearl harbor at this memorial to the sunken ships.

Amanda: The. The Pearl Harbor Memorial in Oahu.

Marco: Right.

Amanda: Which is in Hawaii. Of course, once the ship sunk, they have. They're. They're actually in. And this is something I didn't know. They're in a pretty shallow bay.

Marco: Right.

Amanda: Relatively speaking. So they sunk, but they're right below the water. In fact, parts of them are still sticking out of the water, so they're that close to the surface.

Marco: And it's a great. It's a great museum, memorial type thing. And what happened was I was wearing my sunglasses because it was a bright day, sunny. And I looked down to look at the ship in a better. Because you're kind of the memorials above the ship. So you can look down.

Amanda: Yeah, they've almost made a bridge over these submerged. Over the submerged ship. So that you kind of walk over it. And they're very careful to say it's memorial site.

Marco: Yeah.

Amanda: A war memorial. And so you are meant to be silent and, you know, walk with reverence,

Marco: which we did. And then I looked over and my sunglasses fell off my face into the water and sank down on the ship.

Amanda: Like they're on the Arizona.

Marco: I don't know if. I don't know if they're on the ship.

Amanda: We do know that they're on the. We saw them go down.

Marco: Yeah, but it could have gone because it could have gone to the water, like, beneath. Like.

Amanda: I know, but they went down.

Marco: Down. It went down. We don't know exactly where it went,

Amanda: except that all under the water is the ship.

Marco: Well, they could have floated.

Amanda: I. I dare say you're not the first person who lost your sunglasses that way. It was a moment, and we were Trying not to say anything because we were trying to be silent, but down they went.

Marco: Yeah. So I lost those sunglasses and not at night. Not at night. I wasn't wearing them at night. Perhaps if I was wearing them at night, I wouldn't have.

Amanda: Sunglasses were very loose.

Marco: They were loose.

Amanda: They were extremely loose.

Marco: They needed.

Amanda: They shouldn't have been worn. I remember putting them on and being like, these are so loose. And I have a bigger noggin than you, I think.

Marco: Right.

Amanda: I have a big head. I need to pull my head back in pictures because when we are side by side, it's like, here's Gigantor head and little sweet little Marco.

Marco: What can I say?

Amanda: My. My family has big heads. All of us do.

Marco: It's true. It's true.

Amanda: Yeah. Oh, my sister might not, does she? No.

Marco: Or I think she's the smallest of the.

Amanda: Of the heads.

Marco: Of the heads, she's the smallest.

Amanda: But my parents have big heads. My brother is a big head. I think my little nephew is. Is going to have a sizable and smart brain.

Marco: Oh, he's.

Amanda: I mean, he's definitely smart.

Marco: Definitely smart. Yeah.

Amanda: We are not biased also, but he is extremely smart.

Marco: We just got back from Halifax and we had a lovely time there.

Amanda: Should we mention the thingy, one of his parting words to us?

Marco: Sure.

Amanda: It's so funny and so cute and so sweet. He's just the sweetest thing. He just turned three and I mean, you can. A three year old is just a magical person. They're just amazing. And so it was really fun. We got to spend three whole days with him, which was wonderful. And as we were leaving, I was trying to explain to him, you know, the last time we were there a few months ago, he's that, you know, much younger in development, that it's not. You can't really explain. They're just grabbing some concepts. Right. So there's a likelihood that they might go, oh, these people live here now, or they're in that room now. And so I was sad to think that he might go to our room the next day and we wouldn't be there.

Marco: Sure.

Amanda: And if he remembered, you know, which I thought he might because he seemed to. So. And he was finding always ways to refer to us. And the last day he got up, he looked and he said to his mom, put one of them downstairs. He wanted to play with at least one of us.

Marco: Yeah.

Amanda: Anyway, so I said to him, you know, we're not going to be here tomorrow. Tomorrow we won't be here in the morning. We will not be here. I was sad, very sad saying it. But I wanted him. I wanted to say it, sure, that maybe he had some understanding of that, that this is what was happening. And we showed him where we lived and where he lived on the globe. And we went, we fly over here. And then he was, like, very sweetly doing, like, airplane noises and stuff. He's so cool. Anyway, and so now there's some debate over what he said, but I'm pretty sure what he said was. Because I said, we're very sad. And he said. I don't know if he said our friends or my. I think he said our friends. Our friends are sad. They are making bad choices.

Marco: Listen, he's not the first to tell me that. He probably won't be the last.

Amanda: He's learned that, you know, if you do something, if you're making a choice and it makes you sad, that could be a bad choice. Right. So it's very advanced learning and thinking and applying that learning to our situation. Or there's some debate he might have said, I am sad. They were making bad choices. Either way, we made bad choices.

Marco: What I love with all our nephews and niece is that they all gravitate to something and love something that you have no knowledge of. And so then, as the uncle and aunt, you have to learn about the.

Amanda: Exactly. Luca, our nephew, was for many years, like, obsessed. Am I allowed to say this? I think I am sure. Obsessed with cows. Like, obsessed with cows. Like, he. It's just. It's just a sign that, like, some people are just born in their DNA with certain desires.

Marco: Sure.

Amanda: And he just desired to be in and among the cows.

Marco: Right.

Amanda: And he was very young, I think three. And a cow licked his back. Now, if a cow licked my back at any age, I'm not sure how I'd feel about it. He was so thrilled, he didn't want to wash his back. I mean, he loves cows.

Marco: And the thing about that is I had to do research on different kinds of cows to tell him this was a Jersey cow, this was another cow. And we were going through a whole bunch of different breeds of cows, and he was really enjoying it.

Amanda: And that's progressed into a love of a lot of other things, farming and raising plants.

Marco: That's right.

Amanda: He guarded his tomato plants last year. Brought them up to his bedroom to watch them at night, I mean, and all sorts of other things. But, yeah, it's just amazing, like, how kids are into a thing.

Marco: Did you like to garden when you were a kid?

Amanda: Yeah, actually, I think I have A brother and sister. And I think more than either of them, I was probably the most in the garden with my mom. She worked hard to kind of show us the garden. And she does it with me. Even today she'll be like, let's go out to the garden. I'll show you everything she loves. She's done it ever since I was very small, showing me everything that she's growing and pointing out each flower. And when it comes up, like, I have memories of going out and her showing me the crocuses.

Marco: She's a very good gardener.

Amanda: She is. She would say she's not, but she is.

Marco: I remember in school we had to do this. I don't know if you had to do this. So you'd get a little glass jar and you'd wet paper towel and you'd put it in the jar. And then you'd take little bean, you take beans and you would put the beans in the jar between the paper and the glass so you could see through and you could see the bean. And you'd put it by the windowsill and the bean would start to sprout. And you could watch it every day as a kid in class as the bean sprouted and you could watch it. Right. And that was one of our.

Amanda: That's such a great thing for kids to just any. I worked for a long time. I volunteered actually at a place called the Stop, which is very close to here and its whole mission. It's an after school program to teach kids about farms.

Marco: Sure.

Amanda: Food and plants and growing. Especially kids. You know, we live downtown Toronto, so they may not have access to that in the same way. But it's a beautiful greenhouse, in fact. And so these kids go to this greenhouse and they do after school programs. I think it's once a week. And they learn about all sorts of aspects of growing food. And they just have a really deep understanding and appreciation for the earth and the cycles of food and life and all of that.

Marco: Let me ask you this, have you ever done this, especially as a child, taken the avocado pit, put four toothpicks in it and let the end of it sort of touch water in a glass?

Amanda: I've seen it. Like it, it has roots. Like, does the root up if the end of the pit touches the glass, the water?

Marco: Yeah, we did it. We did it when I was young. I remember. And A, you've got to have sturdy toothpicks because the avocado pit is pretty heavy. B, it's always got to be touching water. So if the water Evaporates, you have to fill it. And so, yeah, it's supposed to start to root and then eventually sprout. We never got to that stage because maybe it would start to root a little bit, then the water would evaporate. I'd forget to fill it.

Amanda: Well, and then the end game is what? That you have an avocado tree eventually, I guess, which in Canada I'm not sure if you could do. Also, isn't avocados one of those fruits? Like male, female, Like.

Marco: Oh, maybe. Yeah.

Amanda: I feel like you. I mean, I don't know. But I don't know if they would just bear fruit on their own, I think.

Marco: I think also growing trees isn't from. From scratch or from seed is not the easiest thing in the world.

Amanda: My brother did it with an orange

Marco: tree or lemon orange.

Amanda: But the oranges, I think he did it at my parents home in Florida, their first home. So that's three homes ago in Florida. And they were oranges, but not oranges the way you think of oranges. They're more like lemony oranges.

Marco: Okay.

Amanda: Just so you know, they were a different kind of orange. I don't know what kind.

Marco: Sure.

Amanda: But yeah, but the thing about that is. So he grew so great. He's got an orange tree, but it's full of thorns. I didn't see it last time we were there. I don't know. Maybe it was in another room and I just didn't see it. Probably.

Marco: I know where it ended up. It's still living and thriving and it's not in the house right now.

Amanda: Oh, really?

Marco: Yeah. So it's doing very well.

Amanda: Where did it end up?

Marco: It's in someone's office right now and it's doing very well.

Amanda: Great.

Marco: I'm trying to think. I grew cherry trees. Like, we've always had cherry trees when I was growing up. And I used to love cherries and I still do.

Amanda: They're great. But they're messy, are they not?

Marco: Yeah, you have to. You have to pick them. And a lot of birds go to them.

Amanda: So.

Marco: Yeah.

Amanda: I mean, any fruit tree. You know, I participated in a program last summer and I didn't go once, so I should do it again this year. Which is a fruit harvesting program in the city where you can sign up ahead of time. It's $10 for the year. For the year, yeah. And you have from the early to the end of the season. So like, I don't know, probably June, maybe May, May, June into, I think October. You go to people's homes and there'll be so many people on a session, so they'll have up to eight people depending on or more depending on the bounty of trees they expect. But your job is to go with all of them. And they bring, I guess the head or whatever, brings a ladder or something. I don't exactly know. And you go and you pick all the fruit for this person. A lot of aged people are just, you know, government offices, people that have these fruit trees. The fruit just nobody's using it. I mean, it's a great. It's sad if you have a tree bearing pears or plums or cherries or whatever it is.

Marco: And the thing about that, because my aunt had a very prolific pear tree, you can only eat so many pears and it. And it fruits more than. Than one family can typically eat. So.

Amanda: Exactly. Like everyone knows if you've got a bushel on your. Like my house in New Brunswick, our first year there, they were raspberries everywhere. I mean, we ate raspberry and everything. Raspberry cobbler and raspberry syrup and raspberry muffins. And like, I love raspberries.

Marco: Sure.

Amanda: Again, you can only eat so much of one thing before you're like, I'm kind of done.

Marco: I'm all raspberry doubt.

Amanda: Exactly. So what's good about this is you can. You could ostensibly go and have a bag of fruit every two weeks or whatever from various things. But I just are scared. The problem with it was, for me, by the time I knew I had an afternoon free or evening or morning or whatever it would be, each one would be filled up.

Marco: Filled up. I see. Okay, so let me ask you this. What is the name of this program for anybody in Toronto? And then what's great is that if you're in a place, maybe they have a similar type program that you can look at if you want to, you know, go and collect fruit and have fruit throughout the spring, summer and fall. I wonder if they do nuts too, because I know there's a lot of nut trees in the city. I remember where was I. Where they were talking about the different nuts. And it was really fascinating because I saw nuts I had never seen before. Like a nut that was in the shape of a heart that you could eat. And it was like, just fascinating. We actually walked by a walnut tree one time when we were walking in the Scarborough Bluffs. And I was like, this is a walnut. These are walnuts. Because they are encased in a prickly, thorny sort of fruit. I guess that falls to the ground and can really stain.

Amanda: Well, the name of the one that I'm part of is called Not Far from the Tree.

Marco: Not Far from the Tree.

Amanda: So you can go to not farfromthetree.org I'm pretty sure this particular one is only in Toronto, but you can have a look and it's, it's pretty incredible when you look at, I mean, 288,000 pounds of picked fruit last year.

Marco: Wow.

Amanda: That's how many pounds.

Marco: Wow.

Amanda: And it says, join our mission. We harness the power of fruit trees to create healthy, resilient, sustainable and connected communities across Toronto. By picking and sharing overlooked fruit, we bring people closer together and create a stronger connection with our neighbors, environment and food system. So it's really. They've existed since 2008 and there's lots of partnerships and yeah, it's, it's all

Marco: of $10 and it's a tasty way to enjoy the summer. I'll say this, if you have a program like that in your area, let us know and we'll mention it here on the podcast. You can always find us on our Instagram or you can email us, go to our website, the insomniaproject.com thank you for joining us. Of course. And going on this journey from Corey Hart to fruit trees. Who would have saw that connection, right, Amanda?

Amanda: Absolutely.

Marco: All right, until next time, thank you for joining us. And we hope you're able to listen and sleep.