Saturday Morning with Jack Tame

After 34 years of talkback radio, the biggest fear of householders is finding heaps of moths. Any moths! And everyone believes that moths are bad, simply because they have to be clothes moths! Okay. If you find a beautiful, very small moth which has golden wings (held like a roof structure over the body) and with a bright orange hair-do, you might be looking at the webbing clothes moth, Tineola bisselliella. It is no longer than 7 mm. This “webbing” cloths moth is really a recycler of woollen materials: yes, clothes, but especially carpets! It seems to like open spaces with keratin – lots of keratin. Our house is the archetypal “mechanics car”. In my case that means it’s usually full of pests and insects that gnaw away at soft furnishing, clothing garments, carpets and timber. Carpet is removed right to the backing and the woollen yarn ends up in bits and pieces, often sticking up from the remainder of the carpet. They usually end up in the my vacuum cleaner. There is a second species of clothes moth: the Case-making Clothes moth, Tinea pellionella. The caterpillars make tiny cases from silk and their own excrement: a cosy house to live in! I reared some on some old carpet, after I found an infestation in some of my woollen socks. The case-making clothes moths are not as glittery-gold as their relatives, but basically brown with golden scales and some dark spots on the wings. Same size, though! Life-cycle of these moths is similar in length and variable. In warm conditions they go through a life cycle (egg-larva-pupa-moth-egg) in 6 weeks or so. When it’s cold in winter this may take 4 to 7 months. They belong to the Family of Tineidae. Their ecosystem service is to recycle keratin: hair, fur, wool, nails and skin. This is part of the decomposition job that many invertebrates do when an animal dies. Keratin is really hard to digest. Mammals and Birds can’t do that (cat’s fur-balls; owls ejected pellets, etc). These moths are therefore valued members of the RECYCLING SQUAD.I usually leave them to carry out their job (we’re going to change the carpet anyway….). But control can be achieved with some residual insecticides – active ingredients such as permethrin and other synthetic pyrethroids will do the job well (Safeworx aerosol cans). It works well and is residual for 6 to 8 weeks, as long as the substrate treated is not exposed to direct sunlight.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Relationship expert Steven Dromgool has been looking at whether Happily Ever After is possible, or just a fairy tale. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Parents with Lego.. here's an app you need! Stuck for ideas on what to create with your kids? Download the coolest app I've seen in a very long time. You tip your Lego onto the floor, the camera scans the pile, recognizes the pieces adn then suggests things for you to build - step by step! It's called Brickit. It's not made by Lego, but by fans! Lego needs to make it official! It's only for iOS right now, but will be coming to Android soon. Battle of the billionaires Richard Branson is going to beat Jeff Bezos to space! Virgin's rocket-powered plane will now take Branson to space on July 11 — nine days before Bezos's planned July 20th launch. It's a change of plan that I'm sure will annoy Bezos. Bezos will blast off from earth's surface though, where Branson's rocket will be deployed from a plane in the air. Branson says when he gets back he'll announce a plan to open "space for all" so more people can become astronauts. Trump's former aid has launched a social media platform It's called "Gettr" and is basically a Twitter ripoff. It says it exists to fight cancel culture, promote common sense, defend free speech, challenge social media monopolies, and create a true marketplace of ideas. It sounds awful and at the moment just looks to be people doing lots of hashtags trying to get discovered and followed. Apparently this isn't the social media service Trump is still planning to 'solve' some of these same problems. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Eden: In the idyllic coastal town of Eden, Australia, the disappearance of a young woman triggers a devastating chain of events which lays bare the dark, hidden heart of the community. Beneath its beautiful veneer, this faltering Eden can never be the same again. One missing girl. Eight stories. Who do you believe? (Neon) Sweet Tooth: Filmed in New Zealand and based on a comic book, this unique Netflix drama follows a young boy who is half-human and half deer as he survives in a post-apocolyptic world, searching for a new beginning with a gruff protector. Happy Birthday Mr Bean: TVNZ 1 screens this celebratory documentary which looks back at the 30 years since comedy legend Mr. Bean landed on our screens. With classic clips and interviews from key creators, including star of the show Rowan Atkinson, hear how Mr. Bean has gone on to become a global superstar with an animated series, two top grossing feature films and an online phenomenon, with more than 110 million online fans and growing. (Tuesday, 6 July). LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

John Volanthen was at the absolute epicentre of one of the biggest global stories in 2018. Before COVID took over the international news cycle, 12 boys and their soccer coach became stuck in a flooded Thai cave, and the world watched the increasingly desperate rescue effort. The first person to reach the boys was John, a cave diver, who then helped to get them to safety. He’s an IT consultant by day, but also a world record-holding British caver and diver.Jack Tame has been speaking to him, and started with claustrophobia was ever an issue when he was first learning to cave dive. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Perfect Toastie Some of the best combinations:Cheese & onion & kasundi (Indian tomato chutney) Sausage, mustard & edam Tomato, basil & parmesan (my childhood fave was always creamed corn, cheese & onion) Tips for the perfect toastie: The bread; for once I'm not going to advocate for using a quality ingredient because frankly, thick white toast bread will still produce a great toastie! But a sourdough will add a tang and good texture and a rye could offer up a great flavour. Avoid bread that has big holes in it, like ciabatta. Butter or mayo; Mayonnaise is full of oil so will give you a golden crust and it's less likely to burn than if you butter the bread. However butter does have the edge when it comes to flavour in my view. So, both are good. Fillings: anything goes but consider the soggy factor and more is not necessarily better. Try to have a balance of dry (meats, beans, onions) vs wet (chutneys, tomato, cheese, pickles) ingredients The cut; the cooked toastie should always cut on the diagonal in my opinion a. to reveal the filling and b. there's something about tucking the sharp corner into your mouth for that first bite.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Kevin Milne's been looking at a case where he thinks an insurance company has been very generous with a home owner. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What comes next? Isn’t that the gazillion-dollar question for Covid-19?! But now that we’re officially in the second half of 2021, the year in which all adult New Zealanders should be vaccinated for the virus, it is an increasingly appropriate and pressing question.What happens in a few short months when we’re vaccinated? What do we do at the borders? What do we do for vaccinated people arriving in the country? What do we do when there’s an outbreak in the community?Scott Morrison caught a few people by surprise yesterday in announcing the roadmap for Australia’s Covid-19 future. It’s not a plan that has heaps of detail in terms of timings. It’s more of a framework, really. But at the centre of it is one giant shift.Australia will move from a suppression strategy – the Australian version of elimination - to a management strategy. Scott Morrison has basically told Australians that in the years ahead, living in a country with no Covid-19 is not feasible. Even once the population is vaccinated, there is going to be risk. The virus will exist in the community. And unless things get really, really bad... Australia’s state premiers have agreed they will not lock down.The timing of ScoMo’s announcement is pretty interesting given the outbreak in Sydney at the moment, but Singapore came out with a similar plan last week. The U.S and Europe have never even really considered a scenario where they would have zero cases of Covid-19 in the community.From what we know about the virus, I think a change in strategy is inevitable for New Zealand at some stage, and in all likelihood it will probably come pretty soon.At the moment, we’re not shifting. Our government has a specialist group headed up by Dr David Skegg, which is advising it on border and public health settings. Jacinda Ardern has talked a little about establishing other bubbles. But a bigger shift in the coming months will depend on whatever the international data tells us about the various Covid-19 variants and how they are affected by different vaccines. It’s fair that we have as much information as possible before committing to our next steps.That being said.. if the vaccine rollout ramps up in the way our government promises it will, we are going to be confronted with these issues very quickly indeed. If everyone’s had the opportunity to be vaccinated, do we let other vaccinated people into the country without two weeks of quarantine? Like Australia, could we trial at-home quarantine for vaccinated citizens? Can we extend the use of saliva testing? These are really important questions, and my impression is that few Kiwis are really considering what the answers will mean.In a way, we are victims of our own success. Elimination has been incredibly effective so far. We’ve had very few deaths compared to other countries. Our economy has performed extremely well, given the circumstances. Psychologically I think many Kiwis have come to expect that because of that success, zero tolerance for Covid-19 risk is sustainable in the future.Australia says it’s not. Even with vaccines, Covid-19 is here to stay. And as they take the first steps in changing their strategy, it’s only a matter of time before I think we do, too.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Kiwi singer-songwriter Louis Baker has racked up 25 million streams for his brand of soul, and his second record “Love Levitates” was out this week. Our music reviewer Estelle Clifford’s been taking a listen.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Catherine Raynes has been reading US politician Stacey Abrams' new politican thriller “While Justice Sleeps”, and thrilled When They Find Her by debut novelist Lia Middleton.LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Travel editor Mike Yardley has made it out of the country! He's been giving Francesca Rudkin some tips on what's happening in Brisbane.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Until around 1916, making soap at home was commonplace. Using wood or plant ashes and leftover animal fats, families produced their own soap for cleaning their clothes and themselves.During World War I, when animal fats were in limited supply, German scientists developed synthetic detergents — and commercial soap was born. Homemade soap became less of a necessity, and gradually the practice dwindled. In recent years, back-to-the-landers and simple-living adherents have revived the homemade soap-making process. It’s not only in favor with those who leave the big city for rural life or those with an anti-commercialist bent. For anyone interested in living as self-sufficiently as possible, it makes good sense to make your own soap. Homemade soap is good for your wallet: you can make big batches of soap from scratch for less than it costs to buy bar after bar at your local drugstore, and you can reuse leftover bits to make new soap. It's good for your body, without all the potentially harmful chemicals in commercial soap, homemade soap is of superior quality. People with sensitive skin often find relief when they stop using store-bought soap and start making their own. Homemade soap is good for the environment: it lacks the synthetic materials in conventional bar soaps that eventually accumulate in our waterways and put natural resources at risk. There are many recipes on the web and lots of different techniques. Here are some general tips: * Make sure you have all the ingredients and tools assembled before you start. It is quite an exacting process and you don’t want to be running around looking half way through.* Rubber gloves and protective eyewear, such as goggles or glasses.* Two large mixing bowls made of a material that will not react with lye: strong plastic, stainless steel, glass, enamel. Do not use flimsy plastic, aluminum, tin or wood. One bowl with a lip for pouring will be helpful. * Accurate measuring tools and good stirrers. * Sodium hydroxide, which is used to saponify the oils is very caustic. You’ll probably buy stuff normally used to clean toilets or drains. Always add the caustic to the water, not the other way around. This will then start warming up from the reaction with water. * Measure every ingredient accurately. Getting it wrong and you end up with foul smelling or sloppy soap. Once you have done this a few times then you can start experimenting with different techniques including hot mixes. And then you can also invent new shops using different added ingredients and essential oils.LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Bird Feeding stations and Bird Counting We’ve often talked about the food of birds, especially in winter. Many folks have got bird feeders that will attract a range of native and introduced birds: Seeds (on seed dispensers or stuck to solid blocks of dripping) are preferred by sparrows and finches (chaffinch, green finch) Nectar feeders in the form of SUGAR Water attract tui, bellbird, silvereye (and kaka if you’re so lucky to have them around – Yes Wellingtonians, you’re lucky. Fruit feeders love those bits of apple, orange and banana; tui bellbird kaka and Kereru are some of your guests, but I have literally seen wars break out when silvereyes spot a peeled banana! Education and Observation In the school holidays these feeding stations could be great subjects for a little bit of Citizen Science and education. Let’s see who comes to which feeding station and observe their behaviour. Do they travel in flocks, like silvereyes tend to do? Is there any animosity? Can you identify the local “owner” of the territory that is trying to chase away the interlopers? Tui are good at that! See the different types of territorial behaviour, or even hear the different types of territorial behaviour. Primary feathers (flight feathers) of tui and bellbird have oddly-shaped notches that create that whirring sound in flight: “listen, mate! This is MY territory!” Calculate landing rates of certain species – guess how much they eat; How long does it take for a flock of silvereyes to demolish one of those lard balls you can get from your local butcher’s? How many birds of a certain species can you count at one time on your feeding station – it’s all maths and statistics, but it’s also art and joy and creative writing!! What to look out for Of course a lot of birds feed on insects and invertebrates, but at this time of the year they may be hard to find, also for the birds. Here are some ideas of what to look for! With the recent rain you’ll find lots of earthworm holes and casts on lawns and bare soil. This is food for blackbirds, thrushes, starlings, magpies and even owls and harriers. Note how these casts are often found in association with rabbit poo! Starlings have a habit of probing into the soil at this time of the year: they leave heaps of distinct holes, all over the place. I reckon they are looking for the larvae of grass grubs, who are settling just below the surface during raining periods, within easy reach. And then there are the various shrubs and trees that still bear fruits, berries and seeds. Always good for a nibble! While you are at it: count the number of birds you see within an hour and record those for the Annual Garden Bird Survey. Find it on the LandcareResearch website: https://gardenbirdsurvey.landcareresearch.co.nz/ LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Commons: A futuristic Australian drama starring Joanne Froggett (Downton Abbey). In a future beset by environmental crises and dwindling supplies, one woman grapples with the decision to begin a family (TVNZ OnDemand). This is Pop: A new documentary series that takes a deep dive into the nostalgic world of pop music, sharing the untold stories and big moments that shaped our pop culture (Netflix) Talkback: A brand-new local comedy-satire to TVNZ. Talkback is shot in a fly-on-the-wall mockumentary style and follows New Zealand’s leading right-wing radio host Malcolm White and his team as they fight to resurrect his flagship breakfast show, which has fallen to number two in the ratings for the first time in over a decade, and regain his title of King of the Airwaves (TVNZ OnDemand from 30 June). LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Anyone with kids, of almost any age, is likely to be talking the thorny issue of how to teach consent. In fact in the age of #metoo, it's something we’re all talking about more. Enter Doctor Melissa Kang and broadcaster Yumi Stynes, who’ve just written a book called ‘About Consent’. Melissa and Yumi didn’t know when they started writing it 2 years ago that the topic would be so big by now. As one twitter user put it ‘It’s out! Get this book into the paws of kids, teens and federal parliamentarians you know" - of course referencing federal parliamentarians after the recent sexual abuse scandals in the Aussie parliament. Dr Melissa Kang will be known to women of a certain age as the real-life Dolly Doctor, to the rest of you, she’s a doctor and academic who specializes in sexuality and sexual health. She's been speaking to Francesca Rudkin alonside co-author and broadcaster Yumi Stynes. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Microsoft announces Windows 11 The biggest change - the start menu and task bar has been redesigned and centered making it look a lot more like macOS. Microsoft has really leaned into the one operating system for both laptops and tablets and the centered start menu makes it easier to adapt to various screen sizes. It also brings search front and center with results available from your device, your OneDrive and the web. Windows Widgets are just a swipe away with real time information and quick actions. There are changes for power users too: There is now support for multiple desktops - so you could have one for work vs home There are better transitions when you connect a monitor that's a different ratio, or using a second monitor. You can now snap windows to a layout to make it easier to bounce between apps. Microsoft Teams is directly integrated with the operating system replacing Skype for calling and connecting with your friends and family. Android apps can also load on Windows 11 through the Windows App store. That's huge for developers who suddenly got access to a massive market. It's expected current Windows 10 users will get a free upgrade to Windows 11 before the end of the year, and new devices installed with Windows 11 will be available from October. The Tamagotchi is making a return This time, your digital pet will live on your wrist as a smart watch! You'll never need to leave it behind! It's getting some other improvements since it was released 25 years ago - like a color screen, a touch screen so you can pet it, voice recognition so you can interact and wireless connectivity so it can communicate with nearby Tamogotchi! You'll be able to buy addons for it too which you load into your watch via mini keys. They're expecting it to be so popular it'll first go on sale via a lottery system before being opened up to regular sales. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Fresh flounder with caper & horopito butter Horopito is a native shrub, which is also known as the pepper tree and it lends a lovely spicy flavour to flounder in this dish. Serves 6-8 3 fresh flounder 4 tablespoons butter, softened 3 tablespoons finely chopped parsley 2 tablespoons, capers ½ teaspoon horopito 1 teaspoon sea salt 1-2 lemons, sliced thinly Heat the oven grill to high. Lay flounder onto a large shallow baking tray. Make a few cuts in the grey side of each of the flounder. Mix together butter, parsley, capers, horopito and salt and rub this into the cuts and skin. Scatter over lemon slices. Grill on high for 12-15 minutes or until butter is bubbling and fins crisp a bit. Change oven from grill to bake 180 C and cook for a further 7-10 minutes or until flesh is cooked through. Squeeze some of the cooked lemon over and serve at the table! Nici’s note: Horopito is great for relieving stomach aches and toothache and it is available from various specialty or online food stores. I get mine from www.rhayne.co.nz LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This weekend, TVNZ is running at story about former Christchurch mayor Sir Bob Parker and his recovery post-stroke. Kevin Milne wants to take the opportunity to share the love for his mate. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

With Francesca filling in for Jack this weekend, we've brought in Chris Schulz to do this week's movie reviews. He's been watching Lin-Mnuel Miranda's new movie, In the Heights, based on the stage musical of the same name - and Spanish true-crime doco Murder by the Coast. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week Black Ferns Sevens Captain Sarah Hirini and two-time Olympic champion rower Hamish Bond were named New Zealand’s flag bearers for the Tokyo Olympics.Two thoughts spring to mind. Firstly, congratulations. How cool that a change in Games rules means that for the first time we’ll have a male and female athlete jointly carrying the New Zealand flag at an Olympic Games Opening Ceremony. It’s not the first time two athletes have shared flag carrying duties. In 2016, Peter Burling and Blair Tuke were both announced as flagbearers, but only Burling got carry the flag. I’m presuming this year Hirini and Bond will have a flag each?My second thought was, how is it possible these Olympics Games are happening at all? A world full of medical experts and epidemiologists, and the people of Japan, have been asking the same question for months. For good reason. It’s simply absolutely bonkers for thousands of athletes, officials and journalists to travel from all over the world to Japan at this time.The Japanese Prime Minister may have recently lifted the state of emergency in Tokyo, but health officials have seen an increase in COVID-19 cases since. On Friday, the Japanese Emperor announced he’s "extremely worried" about the Tokyo Olympics and the potential spread of COVID-19 it may cause.But in one of the most stoic examples of ‘keep calm and carry on’ the Toyko Olympics are set to open on July 23rd. If you’re wondering why it hasn’t been postponed or cancelled; it comes down to a mix of money, pride and pressure. The IOC can’t afford to lose revenue from broadcasting rights and advertisers.When it comes to pride, the Olympics is a branding exercise for the host country. It would also be hard to justify a controversial $15.4 billion investment in a new stadium which never got its day in the sun.And then there’s the pressure and expectations from the athletes; about 11,100 for the Olympics and another 4,400 for the Paralympics who have already put their lives on hold for a year waiting for these Games. Taken together, it’s all led to common sense being abandoned. Ignored, thrown over the back fence – pick your description.But, given it is going to happen maybe it’s time for an attitude adjustment.Instead of anticipating the worst perhaps we should put our optimist pants on, cross our fingers, and consider this a global study into how the world re-integrates.The questions confronting countries who took an elimination approach are around how we live with a virus which isn’t going away? How do we open up to the rest of the world? When should we feel safe to get on with our lives – make plans, go visit family or friends around the world?The Olympics will be an incredible test for vaccine efficacy. A group of people are volunteering to travel from around the world to spend time together. So let’s watch and learn as they embrace social distancing, mask use, vaccination, and testing.Imagine if the Olympics became more than stories of glory and dreams come true. What if, and I know it’s a big what if, the Covid impact wasn’t what we fear.Could Tokyo 2021 be a much bigger story of hope and progress. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The government's agreed to add debt-to-income lending restrictions to the Reserve Bank's bag of tricks. They haven't been introduced, but the prospect is making property investors AND first-home buyers nervous. Enable.Me's Hannah McQueen has been speaking to Jack Tame about the impact they may have. LISTEN ABOVE government have been discussing debt-to-income ratios. The RBNZ now has a mandate to impose limits on how much people can borrow as a multiple of their income –will they go ahead with it? It would have implications for first home buyers, depending on where they set it, as much as it will have an impact on investors who are leveraging based on the value of their properties. Enable Me now called ‘enable.me – financial strategy & coaching’ (rather than financial personal trainers) Website: www.enabletghg.me See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Maroon 5 has a new album, Jordi, and it’s brought out some brutal reviews.Pitchfork says “The most you can hope for from Maroon 5 is oblivion. The band hummed and strummed their way into perpetual background music, cooing sanded-down soft rock in every Starbucks. It was anaesthesia. Levine became a bland, steady presence in pop culture, preaching banalities and judging TV singing competitions.” Even worse from Paste Magazine “The new Maroon 5 album Jordi makes me fear for the future of civilization.” Estelle Clifford’s been giving her take to Jack Tame.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Catherine Field has been reading Three Weddings and a Proposal by Shelia O'Flanagan, and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Relationship expert Steven Dromgool's been giving Jack Tame some tips for helping a partner with anxiety. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Fruit tree maintenance Here are a few quick-fire ideas to get the best out of your fruit trees in the future… and it all starts by planting (and some pruning) in the winter! 1) Do your home work – select tree varieties you actually like to eat! (or like the look of – blossom?) 2) Buy good stock from good nurseries and check if they need specific pollinators (ie Plums!!) 3) Dig your holes in the garden and prepare the soil with organic material (compost). If your soil is sometimes too wet, perhaps think about raising the planting area a bit. 4) No need to fertilise until spring truly starts (23 Sept) when the soils warm up and trees start to “function” again. 5) When you plant your trees, either from potted specimens or “bare-rooted” trees, a light prune will help the tree survive the planting shock. Think about the fact that the amount of root mass should be more-or-less the same as the branch mass above the ground. 6) If you plant a new tree, think about how you want that tree to grow in a three-dimensional way: create a branch structure that will be the tree’s future “look” – not too high (so you can harvest easily) and think about wind and sun-direction (maybe espalier the tree? If so, does it need support?) 7) Talking about support: any tree that’s planted on an exposed site will need a stake to stop it from wiggling-to-death. Tie it down to the support system. 8) Handy tip for gardens with limited space: either get a multi-grafted tree (with two or three different varieties grafted onto one root-stock) or plant a few varieties (of the same fruit: apple or pear or plum or peach) in the same hole and treat them as “one tree”. 9) if you have planted a tree already, you may need to prune the fruit machine. Pomefruit (apples & pears): Think about the ultimate shape of the tree: an open frame of branches growing outwards – this is going to be a multi-year goal Learn to tell the two types of “buds”. There is a flowering bud that becomes a fruiting spur; they are usually larger and fatter and often covered with a fine, hairy “down”; fruiting spurs provide you with the fruit. The wood buds tend to be smaller and end up much closer to the stem on which they sit; these buds will grow a new branch or twig (and are therefore determining the spatial form of the tree) Remember to cut to a wood bud that faces outward. When your tree is a few years old, remember to leave a few fruiting buds, so you get some fruit! LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Lawmakers want to take away the surprises from subscriptions Everything is a subscription these days and companies have made it very easy (and appealing!) to sign up for a trial, only to then sign you up at full price without a reminder. A group of bi-oartisian US lawmakers want to change that. The Unsubscribe Act does it in a couple of ways: + it would require sellers to allow customers to cancel a subscription in the same way they signed up.. no more phoning a busy call center to cancel if you signed up online. + it would require the company to notify the user the trial or intro price is ending + it would ban automatically moving people from a trial to a contract with a term of more than a month. The Tamagotchi is making a return This time, your digital pet will live on your wrist as a smart watch! You'll never need to leave it behind! It's getting some other improvements since it was released 25 years ago - like a colour screen, a touch screen so you can pet it, voice recognition so you can interact and wireless connectivity so it can communicate with nearby Tamagotchi! You'll be able to buy add ons for it too which you load into your watch via mini keys. They're expecting it to be so popular it'll first go on sale via a lottery system before being opened up to regular sales. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A whole generation of parents have turned to Steve Biddulph for parenting advice. The author of classic books Raising Boys and Raising girls as well as around a dozen other parenting titles. He’s described as one of the world’s best-known parent educators. After a career of helping us raise kids, Steve’s turned his hand to helping the rest of us, with a new book “Fully Human”. It's billed as ‘a new way of using your mind’. Steve has been talking to Jack Tame.LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Pear, blue cheese & walnut tart Pears pair with tangy blue cheese and honeyed walnuts in this gorgeous tart. Makes 26cm tart Pastry 200g wholemeal flour 100g chilled butter ½ teaspoon salt 6 tablespoons ice cold water 2-3 pears 2 tablespoons butter ½ cup brown sugar 3 heaped tablespoons cream cheese 75g crumbled blue cheese (I used Kapiti creamy blue) 3 tbsp walnuts, roughly chopped Make the pastry by combining flour, chilled butter and salt in a food processor until it resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Don’t over work it – lumps of butter are ok. Drizzle in the ice cold water and pulse a few times until it starts to come together in a ball. Turn out and with a light hand press it together into a flat disc, wrap and chill it for 15 minutes. Preheat oven to 180 C and place a tray in to heat up. Line a 26cm tart tin with baking paper. Roll out pastry and line tin with it. Try to get a thin pastry shell and just patch any holes or tears, it’s very forgiving. Prick all over with a fork and return to the fridge. Make the filling by cutting each pear into quarters and each quarter into 3 or 4 slices. Place the pear, butter and half the brown sugar in a pan on medium and until the pear is softened and the pear juice has mixed in with the butter and sugar to form a syrup – about 5-7 minutes. Mix cream cheese and remaining brown sugar to a paste. Spread this over chilled pastry base. Using a slotted spoon pile the pear mixture into the pastry case, drizzling over some of the syrup and reserving some to serve. Bake for 25 minutes on the preheated tray, then toss on the walnuts and bake for another 10 minutes or until the edges are well cooked and the pears are golden. Crumble blue cheese over the tart while still warm and it will melt into the tart. Serve warm or cold with an extra drizzle of the syrup. Nici’s note: This tart keeps well and is still as fantastic on day 3 as it was fresh out of the oven, maybe even better. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

New figures around rental costs released were released this week - and its bad news for renters. Kevin Milne's been talking to Jack Tame about where they leave those who can't afford a house.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Winston Peters has ended his long-running media hiatus by appearing on Australian morning TV and giving the vaccine rollout in New Zealand a bit of a kicking. It’s been too slow, he says.Easy to criticise when you’re out of government of course, but is that fair? I think it’s worth considering a really basic question: What was the primary aim for New Zealand’s vaccine rollout?Was the aim to safely vaccinate New Zealanders as quickly as possible? As a developed country heavily reliant on open borders, it was in the best interests of our collective health and economy to get us all vaccinated as soon as possible. The virus is mutating fast. It’s becoming more infectious. As lucky as we are to be living life free of community transmission, you need only look at Melbourne or Sydney or Taiwan, to know how quickly that can change. With those kinds of risks, there’s a good argument to be made that New Zealand should have done whatever it took to get as high up the vaccine list as possible, even without community transmission. If that meant paying more dosh or negotiating better deals with the big pharma companies, then so be it.But if the goal of the rollout was to safely vaccinate New Zealanders in the fastest possible time, the government and our health ministry have surely failed. We can’t look back at the initial response to Covid-19 and toot our horns, comparing ourselves favourably with almost every other country on Earth, whilst conveniently ignoring the fact that we are making the amongst the slowest progress with vaccinations in the developed World.Perhaps you’d argue that vaccinating Kiwis as quickly as possible wasn’t actually the goal. Call it the moral argument. Because New Zealand is free of community transmission, you might argue, we should ensure that poorer high-density countries vaccinate their populations first. If that was the goal, noble as it might be, no one in the general population would be getting vaccinated this year at all.It seems to me we’re in a funny middle ground. We haven’t done the noble thing. And for whatever reason, we haven’t done the fast thing, either.To be fair, I think we owe the government a few concessions. The decision to stick with one vaccine – Pfizer – is a good one, that has meant supply has been slower than if we’d chosen multiple vaccines. But from the start, the detail on the rollout has been wishy-washy at best. Despite promising a World-leading response, the government refused to publicly release any proper information around its targets and timelines. Confusion and speculation have filled the void. They published a graph showing the rollout plan that had used no real data points. Vast numbers of border workers didn’t get vaccinated when we were told they were. Then it turned out, large numbers of their family members might not have been vaccinated, except the Ministry of Health couldn’t really say, because of issues with data collection. Even though the Ministry of Health is ahead of its nationwide targets, our most vulnerable city, Auckland, and our most vulnerable DHB, Counties Manukau, have been behind their vaccination targets almost from the very start.What has interested me most is how different people’s anecdotal experiences have been. I know of some older people who’ve been proactively contacted and vaccinated and don’t have a complaint in the World. Smooth As! I know of other people who are more vulnerable and presumably higher up the vaccination list who’ve not heard a thing. Everyone’s got a mate who just went and asked for the vaccine, or phoned up the local DHB, and it worked. Others know people who’ve spent hours on the phone without luck.The whole thing has at times felt a bit ramshackle and inconsistent.I’ve heard politicians say it’s not where we start but where we finish. It’s true that we won’t be entirely safe until our full population is vaccinated. Even then, we face a risk. But the speed of the rollout does matter. Every day someone in our community...See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Travel writer Mike Yardley has been checking out three great Wellington neighbourhoods; Thorndon, Newtown and Lyall Bay. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Music reviewer Estelle Clifford has been listen to new music from twin-sister pop group The Veronincas. Their new album is Godzilla, and it's their first since 2014 and follows a whole lot of personal drama.LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Catherie Raynes has been reading Australian thriller Still by Matt Nable; and a true-life account of the rise and fall of media mogul Robert Maxwell, Fall by John Preston. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Busting supermarket myths Most of us believe certain things about the cleaning products we buy, but they’ve actually been planted in our heads by years of advertising. So let’s bust some of those myths. Myth 1: The best shampoos, toothpastes and dish liquids foam well. In many cases scientists figure out how to do something, then make a feature out of it. Lots of research has gone into foam, and making it last as long as possible. It doesn’t make things any cleaner, we have just been taught to think so.Myth 2: My clothes need to smell clean to actually BE clean: No, you are just smelling the persistent synthetic perfume added to the laundry product. And for people with allergies perfumes are one of the worst offenders. Then, these chemicals in your laundry products don’t all rinse out and are up against your skin 24/7. Even if you sleep naked, they are in your sheets and pillow slips. Myth 3: Whiter than white. For many generations there was a competition about who had the whitest clothes. Early twentieth century there was an ingredient called Blueo, that you added to the final rinse to get this affect. Then in the fifties scientists came up with optical whiteners / brightners. These clever chemicals stick to your clothes. When invisible UV light hits these chemicals, they have the ability to change the waves length of the light into the visible spectrum. Suddenly, a lot more light comes off your clothes. Whiter and brighter. Especially new clothes in a store everyone is attracted to the brighter not dull garment. Make sure you wash these when you get hone as these chemicals will also stick to your skin. Myth 4: Super sized and low priced, what a bargain. At one stage, I managed to get the category manager for Woolworths Australia to right one of the these problems. Supersize and cheap is misleading because brands just water down the liquids and fluff up the powders. A one kg of laundry powder used to have only four washes in it when I started. We had 32 washes in one kg but people thought we were the expensive one. So I convinced him to demand the number of washes should be printed on the pack. He did this and it meant that everyone in Australasia changed as they didn’t want to print two different packs. That’s the power of the supermarket....if they do the right thing.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Bob Campbell's wine pick for this week is the Church Road 2020 Chardonnay, Hawke’s Bay $14.99 (on special).LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Apple's new features for 2021 have been announced at their developer conference.Apple is coming after ZoomLots of big changes to the Facetime app, including the ability to schedule FaceTime for meetings. You can share the link with folks using Windows PCs and Android devices too and they can join through their browser - which is a big deal for Apple. They're leaning into make FaceTime more friendly and more personal than Zoom with the ability to watch videos and listen to music with your friends and even text chat along at the same time. Apple is up-ending the Ad Tech industry Emails will no longer tell the sender if they've been read by blocking tracking pixels. The Safari internet browser will block trackers and make your browsing anonymous by running data through two proxy servers. They're also offering burner email addresses so you can keep your real email address private. Ad tech companies are going to find it harder to tie your different data together. You'll be able to add an ID to your digital wallet Apple is partnering with states to offer the ability to store a secure digital copy in the secure chip in your phone. They're working with the TSA to allow it to be used at airport security. You'll soon be able to add your car key, office keycard as well as hotel keys. Siri will no longer need the internet Siri will be able to do many phone functions without sending the data to the cloud for processing. It'll happen on your device which not only makes it super fast, it also is better for privacy. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Time: Sean Bean and Stephen Graham star in this gritty British drama by Jimmy McGovern about a husband, teacher and father who is sentenced to four years in prison after accidentally killing a man. Consumed by guilt, Mark openly accepts his sentence but is quickly confronted with the harsh realities of life inside (Prime, Saturdays at 9.30pm). Domina: a new historical drama. In the wake of Julius Caesar's assassination, Livia Drusilla - the golden girl of the prominent Claudii family - is forced into exile. Ten years later, Livia returns, determined to avenge her father, secure power for her sons, and regain everything that was stolen from her (Neon). The Brokenwood Mysteries: New Zealands’s most successful international series, watched by millions of people around the world, has found a new home on TVNZ 1 (Sunday, TVNZ 1, 8.30pm). LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The latest Marvel installment isn't a mega-budget movie - this time it's a miniseries. If Marvel is your thing, this is charismatic villain Loki played by Tom Hiddleston, getting his very own series, and it's streaming on Disney Plus. The series is being directed by Kate Herron, who’s been one of Forbes’ 30 under 30, and described as a huge comedy voice in the years to come". She describes herself as ‘Your friendly neighbourhood dork’. She’s a relative newcomer to the diecting scene, breaking through for her directing in the first season of Sex Education, and Kate's been speaking to Jack Tame. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Kevin Milne's been pondering what the best fit for Air New Zealand's in-flight snacks might be.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I’m not a fortune teller. I don’t have a five-year plan. I can’t tell you what I’ll eat for dinner tonight, let alone anything I’ll be doing in two years’ time. But I can tell you right now with a very strong degree of confidence I will not be paying $21 to go to They Are Us, the film that apparently focuses on Jacinda Ardern’s response to the Christchurch massacre. I have nothing personal against the filmmaker. Andrew Niccol has actually written or directed two of my all-time favourite films. I think The Truman Show is genius. I love Gattaca. They Are Us, on the other hand, makes me squirm. It’s not that I’m fundamentally opposed to a film about the events in Christchurch. I actually saw it as an inevitability. After all, we have a film about Aramoana. There’s a Hollywood film about the Anders Breivik massacre in Norway. But if the production of this film had actually considered the meaning behind its title, They Are Us, we wouldn’t have seen so many people affected by the massacre respond in disgust. There is a more sensitive and tasteful way to go about these things. The filmmakers say they’ve sought scripting input from a few of those affected, but clearly many of those in what is a pretty small Muslim community here have been caught completely by surprise. It takes a lot of nerve to call a film ‘They Are Us’ when you clearly haven’t consulted sufficiently with the ‘They’ you’re talking about. There’s another thing. They Are Us. If the filmmakers believed those words, there’s no way Jacinda Ardern would be the central character. Here’s a terrible tragedy committed by a white supremacist. Instead of focusing on the authorities’ limited interest in white supremacy in the lead up to the massacre, instead of focusing on those who lost their lives, or the heroics of those in the mosque who tried to stop the gunman, we focus on Jacinda Ardern. She did a good job in the heat of the crisis. But I’m sorry, she isn’t the hero of this story. And as comforting as she might have been to the survivors and victims of the shootings and to the New Zealand public at large, her actions in those days could never have been enough to heal the pain of those who clearly had been let down grievously by the wider government she represents. You can just imagine the scene now: the actress Rose Byrne, standing alone, an exhausted and broken expression on her face, staring into a mirror. The music builds... orchestral strings. She looks down and picks up a simple scarf, wrapping it around her head. ‘What are you doing?’ asks one her advisors. ‘They are us.’ Says Jacinda Ardern. Eurgh. Honestly, that whole ‘They Are Us’ phrase really bothers me. I know many disagree with me and I’m not gonna’ fight the fight again, but if we really meant ‘They Are Us,’ the Crusaders would have changed their name. If we really meant ‘They Are Us,’ then we might not have planned massacre anniversary commemorations, knowing that most Muslims don’t mark anniversaries. If they were us then we wouldn’t us the word ‘They’ at all. But here’s an easy one. An opportunity to live up to those words in a small way. If the Muslim community in Christchurch, the survivors of the attacks and the families of those who died, don’t support this film, then They Are Us. I’ll save my $21. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is new music from Crowded House, from their seventh studio album Dreamers are Waiting. It sees them reuniting with producer Mitchell Froom for the first time since 1991. Estelle Clifford has been taking a listen and have Jack Tame her thoughts on the album.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Before You Knew My Name by Jacqueline BublitzThis is not just another novel about a dead girl. When she arrived in New York on her 18th birthday carrying nothing but $600 cash and a stolen camera, Alice Lee was looking for a fresh start. Now, just one month later, she is the city's latest Jane Doe, an unidentified murder victim. Ruby Jones is also trying to start over; she travelled halfway around the world only to find herself lonelier than ever. Until she finds Alice's body by the Hudson River. From this first, devastating encounter, the two women form an unbreakable bond. Alice is sure that Ruby is the key to solving the mystery of her life - and death. And Ruby - struggling to forget what she saw that morning - finds herself unable to let Alice go. Not until she is given the ending she deserves. Before You Knew My Name doesn't ask whodunnit. Instead, this powerful, hopeful novel asks: Who was she? And what did she leave behind? The answers might surprise you. The Missing Sister by Lucinda Riley The six D’Aplièse sisters have each been on their own incredible journey to discover their heritage, but they still have one question left unanswered: who and where is the seventh sister? They only have one clue – an image of a star-shaped emerald ring. The search to find the missing sister will take them across the globe – from New Zealand to Canada, England, France and Ireland – uniting them all in their mission to complete their family at last. In doing so, they will slowly unearth a story of love, strength and sacrifice that began almost one hundred years ago, as other brave young women risk everything to change the world around them.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Steven Dromgool offers some advice for women on what to look out for when dating men.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Grass grub have always been a “problem” in NZ gardens and lawns. They are c-shaped grubs that live underground, feeding on roots of grasses and other plants/shrubs. There are a number of species in the Beetle Family Scarabeidae (scarab beetles), but the native grass grub, Costelytra zealandica has always been in NZ. It’s traditional habitat and host plants were native grasses, such as tussocks, and they occur at quite high altitudes. There is no doubt that these beetles considered the new, high-nutrient imported grasses as ice-cream, especially when we started planting whole paddocks full of that stuff! Tiny larvae emerge from eggs and slowly grow larger, shedding their skin as they grow. Each growth phase is an “instar”. Larvae creamy coloured and shaped like the letter C. Their damage pattern is grasses losing roots and becoming stunted and leaves yellowing – in bad situations these plants die en masse. If you can literally roll the dead grass mat up (as if it were a carpet), your problem is likely grass grub. The beetles emerge in spring and are attracted to bright lights; the beetles feed on foliage of many plants, shrubs and trees. Even succulents are on the menu. But they do love lawns. Some species (on pastures) are tolerant of grass grub infestations: tall fescue, cocksfoot, yorkshire fog, prairie grass, birdsfoot trefoil, phalaris and chicory. In the old days we used to spray lawns with soil insecticides, such as Diazinon, but apart from the fact this is tricky to obtain for garden use, the grass grubs have shown some resistance to that active ingredient (organo-phosphate). Since the 1990s some biological control mechanisms have been trialled and found to be quite useful: * The bacterium Serratia entomophila, causes amber disease in grass grub. When grubs are infected they stop feeding in a few days and die rapidly; the bacterium stays in the soil for prolonged periods of time (years!) to kill the next generations. * Bioshield is the name of the material https://biostart.co.nz/bioshield-grass-grub-liquid/. Spray this according to label recommendations in February, March and the first two weeks of April. That’s your window of opportunity, because the grassgrub larvae are in late second to mid-third instar and rather susceptible to infection. I realise this information is a bit too late for people’s lawn treatment; this year has been pretty bad in many places in New Zealan.especially Canterbury. The larvae are pretty fat right now (and beyond the third instar) but because of the downpours they have come to the surface of your lawn (to avoid drowning) Here’s a reasonably good idea: get an old, water-filled heavy roller and squash the living daylight out of them while the soil is still soft and squishy. Not recommended for steep Wellington sections on a distinct hill! Your insurance company will not be impressed.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The programme will be rolling out across the country by the end of the year. The idea is to to detect the early signs of changes in the bowel which could indicate bowel cancer. Bryan Betty is a GP and medical director for the College of GPs, he’s also on the Covid-19 advisory committee and he talked Jack Tame through the ins and outs of the initiative. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Twitter's subscription service has launched The $3 a month service is starting in Australia and Canada. It comes with an "undo Tweet" feature (which really just delays the posting of your Tweet for 30 seconds), a more robust bookmarking feature for saving tweets and a "reader mode" to make threads of Tweets easier to read. These features feel more like evolutions of the core product, rather than being unique enough to build a subscription business around. Apple's updating the AirTags to address privacy concerns The tech is great at finding your keys, but it also makes it very easy to track a person without them knowing. At launch, the trackers would only make a sound if they were away from their owner for three days - which Apple has now recognized was too long. It'll now be between 8 & 12 hours. They're also working on an Android app to allow people to detect when an AirTag is traveling with them - something that's currently only available on iPhone. Facebook's u-turn on political speech Facebook is now going to treat world leaders the same way it treats regular citizens when it comes to their posts. They had previously operated under the assumption that their posts were newsworthy and part of the public debate, but that won't be the default. They still have the ability to use the newsworthiness carve out, but when they do, those posts will be clearly labelled. This is really in regards to the incitement or glorification of violence, because they won't be changing their policy when it comes to misinformation - they'll still be able to post whatever lies they choose, especially in campaign ads. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Too Close: Emily Watson stars as a forensic psychiatrist who has to assess a woman accused of a heinous crime, who claims she can't remember a thing (UKTV, Mondays). Bump: From the team behind Love My Way comes Bump. The series centres around Oly, an ambitious and high-achieving teenager who has a surprise baby; and the complications that ensue for two families (Monday on Vibe/Sky Go, Neon 13 June) Why Women Kill: A second season of the darkly humorous American series that details the lives of three women living in three different decades: a housewife in the '60s, a socialite in the '80s, and a lawyer in 2019, each dealing with infidelity in their marriages. The series examines how the roles of women have changed, but how their reaction to betrayal has not (TVNZ OnDemand). LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Kiwi Emma Outteridge was born into a life a million miles away from Uganda. Growing up in an America’s Cup family, she spent her 20s running Louis Vuitton’s international sailing hospitality programme, totally comfortable in a world of celebrity athletes and billionaire sponsors. But a six month trip to Uganda to work at a school has led to a life switching between the glossy world of international sailing, both working there and supporting her sailor-spouse Nathan Outteridge, and time spent growing Kiwi support for the St Paul KAASO primary school for orphans. She’s written a book about her experience, aptly named “Between Two Worlds” and Emma Outteridge joined Jack Tame.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This dessert celebrates mandarins and will make you feel better about the weather getting cool! Instead of the usual biscuit base I use a circle of crisply-baked sweet short pastry – try it, you’ll like it! 1 sheet sweet short pastry 2 tsp caster sugar 500g cream cheese ¾ cup caster sugar 2 tbsps brown sugar 1 heaped tbsp plain flour (gluten free is fine) 3 large eggs ¼ cup cream 2 tbsps brandy Zest from 4 mandarins + juice from 2 ½ cup sultanas Topping 1-2 mandarins, peeled and thinly sliced to garnish Olive oil for brushing 1/3 cup sugar Juice from remaining 2 mandarins Preheat oven to 180 C. Grease and line a 20cm spring form tin. Lightly flour and roll pastry sheet to slightly larger than it comes. Sprinkle with first measure of caster sugar and sandwich between baking paper and 2 oven trays. Bake until crisp – about 15-20 minutes. Set aside to cool then cut into a circle to fit base of tin.Make the filling by beating cream cheese until smooth. Add sugars, flour and eggs and continue mixing until well combined. Pour in cream, brandy and mandarin juice and beat again until combined. Stir in zest and sultanas. Scrape into tin and smooth top. Reduce oven temperature to 150C and bake for 45 minutes or until it has a touch of colourand wobbles only in the very centre. This will firm on cooling. Leave to cool completely in the oven then chill for 2-3 hours or overnight. Make topping: brush mandarin slices with olive oil and brown each in a small pan. Remove and cool. Add sugar and juice to pan and simmer until sugar dissolves and becomes syrupy. Cool.Serve cheese cake with grilled mandarin and syrup. Nici’s note: To get pastry to remain so crispy and flat, cook it sandwiched between two oven trays. Weigh the top one down if you need to.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Dream Horse The true story of Dream Alliance, an unlikely racehorse bred by small-town bartender Jan Vokes. With very little money and no experience, Jan convinces her neighbors to chip in their meager earnings to help raise Dream and compete with the racing elites. Their investment pays off as Dream rises through the ranks and becomes a beacon of hope for their struggling community. (Toni Collette and Damian Lewis) Lapsis In a parallel present, delivery man Ray Tincelli takes a job in the gig economy. He begins pulling cable to link together the new quantum trading market. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.