As It Happens

Plus: A new study determines exactly where in the UK and Ireland a phoney accent is most likely to be found out.  

Also: Lloyd Axworthy helped lead the push to ban landmines. We reach him now that the US has given the go ahead for their use in Ukraine.

Plus: A Kansas man tells us why he created a page to share terrifying and potentially deadly stairwells, and what makes for a “good” death stair. 

Also: New Brunswick Premier Susan Holt on why the province is now launching a scientific inquiry into the mysterious brain disease plaguing dozens – and possibly many more – in her province. 

Plus: What’s behind the string of cheese heists bubbling up pretty much everywhere. 

Also: The Verge’s David Pierce on Bluesky’s big week.

Plus: LOL hell breaks loose. A new study suggests people who text using abbreviations are perceived as less sincere. 

Also:  Tom Forrestall’s paintings may have a realistic approach, but a friend and curator tells us the late Canadian artist wasn’t afraid of bending the rules -- including using canvases of all shapes and sizes.

Plus: A Scottish town learns a marble head being used as a doorstop in a shed, is actually a bust of their founder that's worth millions.

Also:  Ottawa says a decades-old report about Second World War criminals who came to Canada is still too hot to release, but the founder of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network says we all deserve to see the Nazi secrets of decades past

Plus: An enormous diamond necklace that may have played a role in the downfall of Marie Antoinette sells for a commensurately enormous price. 

Also: Médecins Sans Frontières says a recent attack against an ambulance and patients in Haiti raises serious questions about their ability to provide care in the country.

Plus: Scientists reappraise a 1986 NASA flyby of Uranus…and come up with new theories about possible life there. 

Also: A month after warning Israel to increase aid to Gaza or risk losing military support, US officials say they won’t limit arms transfers because progress is being made. But a former state department official calls that decision shameless.

Plus: Neuroscientist Michael Brecht’s fascinating findings about a Berlin Zoo elephant who loves to shower…and her roommate who has other ideas. 

Also: A high flying doctor from Yukon with a penchant for paragliding narrowly survives a storm in the Himalayas…and lives to tell us the tale. 

Sergeant Tyson Bowen was a frequent guest on Mainstreet over the years.

He gave fourteen years of his life to the Canadian Armed Forces, including two combat tours of Afghanistan. He was a champion and an advocate who fell prey to his inner demons and died on September 3, 2022.

Lest We Forget

Plus: The sole-baring story of Anton Nootenboom, who walked – barefoot – from Los Angeles to New York.

Also: John Bolton -- former advisor to the current U-S President-elect -- tells us what a second Trump administration might mean for Ukraine, NATO, and Canada.