On this week's episode I chat to Senator Lynn Ruane about issues around poverty, inequality, and homelessness. I have read Lynn's book about her life and was quite inspired by the hurdles she has overcome to achieve what she had both in education and politics. We discuss teenage pregnancy and the supports necessary to stop that being a barrier to success. We also have a great chat about deciminalisation of drugs of how that can help to stop the poverty cycle.

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In this weeks episode I chat with Stephen Mullan about masculinity. He had told me to listen to a Guardian youtube series about Masculinity which I am half way through. Before we chatted about what came up in the early episodes of that series, we chatted about his experiences on a day out with the Dublin boys club. Its an idea about trying to create a healthy space for men to talk about what is going on for them and bond with men in a healthy way. We also chat about the importance of male friendships and the difficulty of opening up and getting closer to new friends. Finally we get into modern masculinity, the term toxic masculinity and how to be able to chat about the struggles men face without shame and judgement, particularly around how men themselves are victims of what people term toxic masculinity.

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This week I chat to Martin Angolo, a young comic rising in the Dublin comedy scene. We chat a bit about how his mom ended up coming to Ireland from Namibia and raising him as a single mom. We then have a long chat about comedy as a career and how he recently made a decision to take it all more seriously. He struggles with the online content part of how the industry has evolved and we talk about the pros and cons of that. We finish the discussion chatting about the well worn topic of cancel culture arguments about free speech. I also begin the ep with a chat about an incident that happened at the show last night in Portlaoise.

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Today I chat about the argument around the legalisation of drugs. The episode also looks at the stigma around drug use and the overuse of drugs. But first we have a quick chat about the guilt of having a cleaning person and whether you need to clean before the cleaning person comes.

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On today's ep I decided to check in on where I am at since my mother died. The Mia Mamma tour started this week so all of the emotions get stirred up so I thought it would be a good time to check in about all that. I chat about the process of developing a new show and trying to manage the audiences expectation of comedy vs emotion. I also chat about how so many different memories get tied up in grief and how this has been a great opportunity to take inventory on where I am at emotionally in my life in all areas. I chat about resentment and regret and how you navigate that when people are no longer with us. Overall its just me trying to work our where I am with it all and I hope people get something out of it .

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First episode of the New Year and we are chatting about the crazy week in Ireland that resulted in Come out ye Black and Tans getting to number one in the British iTunes Charts. We have a look at how narratives drive our Identity, why we hold on to these stories and why they matter. We also have a look at whether there will ever be a time when Unionists feel like it would suit them to be part of a United Ireland.

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In this episode we delve into the online storm brewed up when a JK Rowling tweet drove twitter crazy. We chat about why this issue is always so heated online and discuss the term TERF and what it means. What is it about trans rights that seems to be so controversial? We finish with a chat about cancel culture which despite being a well worm topic has never been discussed on this podcast.

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It is just Des on his own on today's episode. Originally Des had recorded some thoughts about Donald Trump and the impeachment hearings but then the UK election happened and made him question a lot of things. So in the first part of Des chats about his thoughts on the election results from the UK and how twitter is such a bad reflection of public sentiment. He then chats about how United Ireland started trending on twitter and is it a good idea to start thinking about that. Finally he goes back a day to his wee Trump rant to finish out the ep. Its a fun ep with Des on a solo run.

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I chatted with Comedian Emman Idama at my house recently. He is originally from Nigeria and came to Ireland when he was 7. I had intended to focus on Emman being from that first generation of immigrants that came to Ireland in the 1990's however the chat took a massive turn when Emman opened up about the abuse he endured in his household and how living with his mentally ill mother was a challenge. I am not quite sure how he survived that challenge to be honest with you and I am still a bit shell shocked from hearing about it. It really is an incredible tale of survival but also a sad tale about the toll mental illness takes on a family. A must listen!

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Great Chat with Comedian Emma Doran about getting pregnant while still in school and how she deal with all that. The leaving cert was hard enough without being pregnant, Emma did her leaving a few weeks after having a baby. Its an amazing story. We also chat about how she ended up getting into comedy when she was 29 and how her kids feel about having a comedian for a mum.

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