We were very lucky this morning, to have Christchurch/Auckland based jazzy soul-pop songstress, L.A. Mitchell come into the studio to pay us a visit and sing a wee song. Lauren’s in town with The Dukes for their album tour as well as promoting her own EP release too. Take a listen to the interview and a cracker of a song:

Next up we spoke with Cornel de Ronde who is the leader of the GNS team currently undertaking the logistically daunting task of mapping the bottom of Lake Rotomahana. This of course is to search for signs of the famous Pink and White Terraces, which vanished after the 1886 eruption of Mt Tarawera. We learnt a little more about the unmanned sub marines they’re sending down and also if there are any colour photos of the terraces, because we sure can’t find any!

This morning we had our medical herbalist Sam McSorley in studio for a chat about those symptoms that effect all of us frequently called PMS. Ah yes, PMS that mysterious condition that befuddles many a man and plagues many a woman. If you or your loved one has been affected in any way by PMS then take a listen to this podcast, Sam explains it a little further and gives some handy tips on how to deal with it a bit better. All natural of course!

This morning on the show we had our ever popular segment: Monday Conundrum with our ethics guru Mr. Mike Grimshaw. Today’s ethical conundrum was “You enter a quiz and the winning team will be awarded $10,000 for a charity of their choice, you find a copy of the asnwers before the quiz - is it OK to cheat for the benefit of the charity?” Oooo that’s a toughy, have a listen to hear what Mike has to say about mine and Spanky’s arguments.

Awesome, we had a real live scientologist on the show this morning as part of our regular feature - Religious Roast. Mr. Mike Ferriss joined us from Auckland with the hope of answering some of those burning questions we’ve been busting to ask for years, and dispell some myths that may or may not have been completely spun by overeager media. OK, so some of the answers were fairly vague but this is a bloody interesting interview and sheds if only a shred of shadowy light on the mysterious scientology.

We had a busy show today, first up we had a chat with Paul Lonsdale who is the manager of the Central City Business Association (we didn’t eve know such an organisation existed until now). He told us of their mission to rid the inner city of thuggery with the awesome power of classical music. It’s called the Mozart Effect and results have shown it is having a very positive effect on the city streets of Christchurch. I don’t know about the effects on learning, but at least the incidents of anti-social behaviour have decreased.

We were also really lucky to have a chat with author and humanitarian Mike Kim over in the States. Mike has recently had his book published called Escaping North Korea which, as the name suggests details the plight of refugees from North Korea seeking a better life in China (sorry for the very vague description). Mike went undercover in China to investigate and help those in need and of course came out with some incredible stories of hope and the strength of the human spirit. Do listen to this:

This morning was jam packed with great stuff, lots o give aways (congrats to all our winners) and some very interesting guests. First up we spoke with a brain doctor by the name of Richard Fraull who is the Director of Centre for Brain Reseach up in Auckland. We wanted to find out how it all worked - where do they get their brains from, how do they study them and what for, do they keep them in big jars? Are brains still the big mystery they've always been and if we wanted to, how do we donate our brains?

NIWA were out and about trawling for deep sea discoveries around the Chatham Rise aboard their research vessel the RV Tangaroa and snagged some very interesting specimens. We had a chat with Peter McMillan from NIWA who told us more on some of their fantastic prizes, including one of those scary looking blighters that emits light and eats other fish that give of radiance too, where does this light come from? WHY??

It’s ‘Science Season’ down in Antarctica, or rather it’s just kicking off, when all the learned folk head down to the Ross Sea and begin studying. Matt Vance is the Communications Advisor from Antarctica New Zealand and he popped into the studio on his way to work to tell us what’s happening down there right now. Christchurch is the gateway to Scott Base - all the planes leave from ChCh Airport - so there are a lot of excited people in town. Matt gave us a fascinating insight as well as told us about the radio station down there - our immediate competition really.