750,000 Podcasts (And Nothing On)?

I read an article in my local newspaper that stated that there was something like 750,000 podcasts available to listen to now and I couldn't help thinking of Bruce Springsteen's song '57 Channels (And Nothing On)', where he sings about his frustration of trying to find something on TV that interests him.

Over the holidays I've been trying to find something new in the world of podcasts to interest me to get my mind off doing the boring jobs around the home, like ironing, washing up, cleaning the bathroom and such.
But try as I might I couldn't find a show worth listening to that wasn't as boring as the work that I was doing was.
I'm either up to date with my favourite podcast episodes on my list, or the hosts of said shows are boring me to death by interviewing some guy who has written a grimoire or an astrologer giving a forecast for 2020 to probably match his failed predictions from other years, or I'm listening to an actress telling me how good it is to be married to Chris Hemsworth while living in a $20,000,000 mansion by the ocean in the best spot on the planet (IMO that is;-).
UFOs, Psychic Spies, Consciousness, Lance Mungia and the World (is a Giant Podcast Circle-Jerk) According to Josh Zepps?

I mean no offense Elsa, I like you and Chris ... and I wouldn't say no to an invite to the next Christmas party down in Byron ... or any party (except those EWS parties I've heard about;-), but as far as the podcast goes ... boring to my ears, sorry.
Maybe I'm just all podcasted out at the moment, or have a case of the Christmas humbugs, but I was about to give up and just resort to listening to my music downloads.

Although, I find listening to a conversation that interests me makes the work less boring than just singing along to a tune that I've heard, I don't know how many times before.
Still, listening to music is better than listening to a boring conversation that makes my eyes glaze over.

I tried checking out recommendations of podcasts in the newspaper article's top five lists only to think how boring these people's lives must be.

And why is everyone seemingly into crime podcasts?
To me that's like listening to cricket on the radio ... boring!
So, I hit the browse button in Apple podcasts to see what podcasts were new and supposedly worth listening to and one in particular caught my attention.
It was called 'The Lighthouse' and while it was technically a "crime" podcast, it was about a missing person named Theo Hayez whose last movements before he disappeared were traced to the vicinity of the Cape Byron Lighthouse on May 31st this year.

I've written about that lighthouse many times on this blog, as it would have to be my most favourite spot on the planet, if I was asked such a question.
It was a place I visited on my honeymoon and the place from where I threw my wedding ring into the ocean around 25 years later in 2014, when I was getting divorced - 
Love on the Rocks ... A Fool's Journey?

My launch pad for throwing
 the ring into the Pacific

I had heard about a teenage boy disappearing in Byron Bay in the news around the middle of June, but I didn't really pay that much attention to the story at the time, apart from feeling sorry for his family and thinking that he had probably drowned with his body getting swept out to sea.

But what I hadn't known until I started listening to 'The Lighthouse' podcast was that Theo was kicked out of The Cheeky Monkey's Bar on May 31st this year and then was never seen or heard from again after his walk home from the bar.

And the thing that made my jaw drop was that I had been down in Byron bay that same day watching a movie in the cinema right across the road from The Cheeky Monkey's Bar.
Although our paths probably didn't cross, as I parked in the cinema carpark that day and left for Bangalow straight after the movie finished to have dinner up in Bangalow and to see a play called 'Dreamland', which I wrote about in this old post -
What Will Children's Day Look Like in 2040?

A coming attraction movie poster cut-out I saw
 at the Palace Cinemas on May 31st, 2019

Magic Mushrooms and a Night in 'Dreamland'?

'Dreamland' in Bangalow on May 31st, 2019

The really bizarre thing is that I only have been down to Byron Bay about three times this year and May 31st was the last time I had been down there.

I had planned on going to the Writers Festival down there in August, but later decided to save some money and stay home this year, as the program looked a bit average, and I have enough books to read to last the rest of my life it seems anyway.

Eerily, I had written a post about The Cheeky Monkey's Bar earlier this year when I read Margot Robbie was at a hen's night down there this year -

Starsailor Margot Robbie, Sirens, Surf Gurus and Cheeky Monkeys in the Year of the Pig?

In hindsight with Theo getting kicked out of The Cheeky Monkey's Bar and heading for the beach, that post is very chilling considering the archetypal theme of the siren.

It's even more chilling to me that I wouldn't have been down in Byron Bay on the 31st of May had I not have went down a few weeks before that to hear a talk and see a movie about following your Personal [inner] Guidance System -
Human/Animal Communication and Listening to My Own PiGS? (Part 1)

Unfortunately, Theo was following his phone's GPS on the night he disappeared it seems, and I guess the question is where was his guardian angel that night in May?
I hope by some miracle Theo turns up alive and out of the blue, but I fear he may have either during the night or early that morning gone into the ocean willingly or not and been carried off with the tide.

I doubt very much that Theo was murdered, although it is possible, it is more likely he went in the water and underestimated the current or fell from the cliffs into the ocean unconscious and unable to save himself from the sea. 

Being a father of two boys around Theo's age myself I can only imagine the pain of not knowing ... and eventually maybe knowing ... the fate of a lost son and the heartbreak it would bring.

And I find it synchromystically eerie that if I hadn't have gotten bored listening to Elsa on the 'No Filter' podcast talking about life in Byron Bay I wouldn't have searched for other podcasts to listen to and stumbled across 'The Lighthouse' only to discover while listening to 'The Lighthouse' that I was across the road from The Cheeky Monkey's Bar on the day Theo was kicked out that night.

It's sad to think that The Cheeky Monkey's Bar was literally the turning point in Theo's life ... and he went the wrong way.
This Illusion of Mortality?