Saturday Morning with Jack Tame

There was one thing I really loved about the Black Caps victory on Wednesday night. One thing that very few pundits and commentators have focused on.
It was 2am, I had that weird mixture of exhaustion and elation. I knew, with adrenalin pumping through me, that I wouldn’t be sleeping for hours. But I was struck by something when the Black Caps took that final wicket, eliminating India and sealing their place in the World Cup Final. 
I’m not sure if you noticed it too when the final wicket was confirmed, the fireworks and pyrotechnics went off, but the Black Caps didn’t. There was no jumping about or whooping and hollering. They all just smiled contently, patted each other on the back, and calmly shook hands. They’d pulled off a truly extraordinary result, but those eleven players knew well enough the job isn’t done yet.
It reminded me actually of Kane Williamson’s first test hundred. He scored it on debut against India and unlike many of his contemporaries in World Cricket, he didn’t run around or kiss the ground or pump his chest, or hold his bat like a electric guitar or pretend to shoot it like sub machine gun. He just calmly lifted his bat to the crowd, acknowledged the dressing room, and then continued in his work, ever the technician.
I’m a cricket tragic. I grew up with the sport and still remember the day when as a little boy my Australian grandfather walked me a few blocks from his Adelaide home to introduce me to Sir Don Bradman, while cricket’s greatest ever player, then an elderly man, nonchalantly watered his garden. I’ve followed the Black Caps from Lancaster Park to Sabina Park in Kingston, Jamaica. I’ve stood in the stands at Lords to applaud a Kane Williamson century.
Four years ago, having stayed up until daylight in New York to watch the Black Caps defeat South Africa and make the World Cup Final, I flew across the World to Melbourne and the MCG to see us get pumped by the Aussies in the championship game. And here’s the thing. I think our semi final victory over India this week, is maybe the single greatest Black Caps ODI result that I can remember. Greater than Grant Elliott’s mighty six four years ago. Greater than our Knockout Trophy victory or any unlikely Chappell Hadlee win. And yet, and yet.. they were chill.
I’m pleased we’re not playing Australia tomorrow. Not because I think England will be easier than the Aussies, but because the worst case scenario if things don’t go our way, is still so much better than the thought of David Warner cartwheeling around Lords.
That’s not to say I think we’ll lose. I think we’re an excellent chance. Martin Guptill should play. The fields should be super aggressive. The bowling should be full enough to give it a chance to swing and who knows, who knows? Maybe the Black Caps will have reason to really celebrate this time.

The last Beetle has rolled off the assembly line, the end of the road for Volkswagen's car that ran from Nazi Germany through hippie counterculture.
Former broadcaster Kevin Milne joins Jack Tame for a sentimental chat about the end of production for the VW Beetle after some 70-80 years and everything which was great (and awful) about the iconic car.
LISTEN TO THE AUDIO ABOVE

Thai curries are lighter and more soupy than the Indian style.  Cooking times are shorter, the herbs and spices used tend to be fresh not dried and the resulting dish is lively, light and very tasty!
Serves 2-4
100g rice noodles (pad Thai ones are a good thickness)
4 cloves garlic
Thumb-sized piece of ginger
Small handful fresh coriander
1 chilli (or use ½ tsp chilli powder)
1 tbsp sesame oil
250 mls (1 cup) coconut milk
1 ½ cups chicken or vegetable stock
3 star anise
2-3 kaffir limes leave
1 stem lemongrass
1 tbsp fish sauce
2 chicken breasts, sliced
1 tsp palm or brown sugar
½ tsp sea salt or to taste
Handful mung bean sprouts
2-3 limes, quartered
 

Prepare the rice noodles first by pouring over boiling water in a bowl, covering and leaving to stand for 15-20 minutes, by which time they’ll have softened and you’ll have cooked the curry! 
Make a paste by processing garlic, ginger, coriander, chilli and sesame oil in a small food processor until combined. Bring this sauce to a simmer in a saucepan, pan or wok and cook for 5-7 minutes.
Add coconut milk, stock, lemongrass, lime leaves, fish sauce and chicken. Simmer for 7-10 minutes or until chicken is cooked through. Taste and season with sugar, salt and more chilli to taste.
Ladle into small bowls over noodles, squeeze over lime juice and serve.

Do you have a 'poverty mindset' or a 'wealth mindset'?
EnableMe's Hannah McQueen joins Jack Tame to discuss money mindset and how this influences people's financial attitudes.

This week, Catherine Raynes reviews two new exciting books for you to read. 
Chanel's Riviera - Anne de Courcy
Far from worrying about the onset of war, the burning question on the French Riviera in 1938 was whether one should curtsey to the duchess of Windsor. Featuring a sparkling cast of historical figures, writers and artists including Winston Churchill, Daisy Fellowes, Salvador Dalí, the Windsors, Aldous Huxley and Edith Wharton - and the enigmatic Coco Chanel at its heart - CHANEL'S RIVIERA is a sparkling account of a period where such deep extremes of luxury and terror had never before been experienced.
Big Sky - Kate Atkinson
Jackson Brodie, ex-military police, ex-Cambridge Constabulary, currently working as a private investigator, makes a highly anticipated return, nine years after the last Brodie, Started Early, Took My Dog.Jackson Brodie has relocated to a quiet seaside village, in the occasional company of his recalcitrant teenage son and an aging Labrador, both at the discretion of his ex-partner Julia. It’s picturesque, but there’s something darker lurking behind the scenes.

Can't decide what TV shows you should be watching? TV critic Tara Ward joins Jack Tame to gives us her top picks for your viewing pleasure!
Hatton Gardens: The Hatton Garden heist was the most remarkable and lucrative robbery in British history, and this drama series tells the story of an ageing gang of grandads, who so nearly got away with it (Soho, Sundays 8:30pm)
Trust Me: the British thriller series returns with a brand new storyline. Corporal Jamie McCain is recovering from a spinal injury in hospital when patients start to die unexpectedly around him. But is the threat real or imagined? (TVNZ OD)
That’s a Bit Racist: How racist is Aotearoa? Racism is difficult to discuss – and yet we know Kiwis have lots of opinions on the subject. This documentary tests the science and mechanics of how judgement and prejudice work. (TVNZ1, Sunday, 8:30pm)

Insect Life cycles vary from species to species.
There are some general rules, however.
Many decide to “overwinter” as eggs – easy: no eating needed, no movement needed, which is handy as temperatures are low in winter and insect movement can only happen when temps are comfortable.
Remember: they are cold-blooded, so rely on external temps to get energy.
Other species decided a long time ago, that overwintering as pupae or chrysalis is the way to go.
Similar advantages: no movement no eating and slow development into adult life-stage.
Social species, such as Vespid wasps (German wasp/common wasp) and Paper wasps (Polistes species) play a totally different game: they hibernate as adult females, fertilised and all. We call them Queens.
Just before autumn turns into winter, the surviving fertile females from a colony mate with the males (drones) and, after a feed (often of carbo-hydrates, sugars!) they will look for a suitable place to hibernate.
Anything will do, really, as long as it’s out of the severe frost and preferably dark and safe.
Of course, in spring when temperatures become a little more agreeable, the queens will leave the hibernation spot and try locate some sustenance in the form of early-flowering plants with nectar.
This will start the early-season cycle off. Finding a nest site and starting a brand-new nest is the very first priority.
But before it gets that far, we’re stuck with them in winter and often on or near the house. Look for hibernating queens in window cavities, in the grouting of bricks, indeed any nook or cranny will do.
But as I found out a week or so ago: stored and stacked firewood is one of the best places for the queen wasps. As soon as you fill the basket near the Ultra-Low Emissions Burner, the blighters believe that spring has sprung and it’s time to move on the the next phase of the wasp life-cycle.

When photographer Callie Shell first met Barack Obama, he was just a state senator years away from his run for president.
But she was an experienced political photographer and knew there was something special about him. When Obama became a US Senator , she photographed him over his first year while also getting to know his family.
Callie became known as the family’s “semi-official private photographer”  and although she turned down the official job in the White House, she was there for his first 100 days.
She has released a book of her photographs along with some of his most famous quotes called “Hope, Never Fear”.
Callie Shell joined Saturday Mornings with Jack Tame to look back on working with the former President of the United States.
LISTEN TO THE INTERVIEW ABOVE

Every Saturday morning, movie critic Francesca Rudkin joins Jack Tame to take a look at what is playing at the movies this weekend.
Spider-Man Far From Home
Peter Parker returns in Spider-Man: Far From Home, the next chapter of the Spider-Man: Homecoming series! Our friendly neighborhood Super Hero decides to join his best friends Ned, MJ, and the rest of the gang on a European vacation. However, Peter's plan to leave super heroics behind for a few weeks are quickly scrapped when he begrudgingly agrees to help Nick Fury uncover the mystery of several elemental creature attacks, creating havoc across the continent!
Annabell Comes Home
Determined to keep Annabelle from wreaking more havoc, demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren bring the possessed doll to the locked artifacts room in their home, placing her "safely" behind sacred glass and enlisting a priest's holy blessing. But an unholy night of horror awaits as Annabelle awakens the evil spirits in the room, who all set their sights on a new target -- the Warrens' ten-year-old daughter, Judy, and her friends.

I was in the United States last year, in Connecticut for a friend’s wedding. And one of my mates asked to stop off at a local drug store to pickup some chewing gum and a Gatorade. It was the first time I’d been in a CVS store for maybe 18 months, but you know, those expansive American drug stores are all pretty much the same. They sell junk food and greeting cards and every uncture, potion, and tinted moisturiser under the sun.
It was about the same time in New Zealand the supermarkets were finally getting rid of single use plastic bags. I remember walking through the CVS candy aisle and admiring the bags of sweets being pumped out and pushed upon the masses. There were sacks of these things with hundreds of lollies, all of them individually wrapped in plastic. I paused, looked around at the sprawling aisles, and haphazardly tried a few sums. In that store alone, that one store, a bog standard drug store in the middle of Connecticut, there might have been, I don’t know, 20,000 individual pieces of plastic wrapping. Maybe more! More five times that number. But conservatively, I thought 20,000 pieces of plastic wrapping felt a good guess. There you have it, I thought. We are stuffed.
I’ve found the transition into a plastic bag free life relatively painless. Monday meant nothing to me because I’ve been plastic bag free for a year or two now. I used to use plastic bags as bin liners, now I just buy compostable ones that feel as though they’re already beginning to erode by the time I peel a full bag from the inside of my bin. But apart from that, what has this grand transition meant? Nothing really, I just keep a couple of reusable bags in the boot of my car and a couple in my apartment and Bob’s your uncle. 
I do think that as consumers we have a responsibility to be more considered and thoughtful in the way we purchase and consume stuff. But I also reckon this plastic bag ban is misleading. It risks making us feel disproportionately good about our behaviour, when in the scheme of things, it’s going to make next to no difference in saving the planet. Don’t get me wrong, I support not having so called single use plastic bags. I hope it helps to collectively enlighten us and proves to be the spark many of us need in careful considering the rest of our plastic usage. But by itself… it’s nothing. You only need travel to a developing country or indeed walk through a drug store in the U.S to know that whatever plastic we’re cutting here at the Countdown or Fresh Choice checkout is being used and tossed a zillion times over in other parts of the World. 
I also think it shifts the burden of responsibility. Psychologically we’re simple beasts, all it takes are some bright colours, an All Black, and a modest marketing budget and we humans will buy anything. But it’s the producers of plastic that in my eyes hold more of the responsibility in reducing our collective damage.
Just walk through the supermarket. Walk through a department store. Everything comes in plastic packaging. Everything. We’ve been brainwashed into accepting ludicrous quantities of plastic as the norm. As cleaner, as more convenient. Do we need regulation to stop producers from unnecessarily wrapping everything? To prevent them from tapping into our collective psychological weakness? To end the shifting of the burden from producer to consumer? If we really want to improve the World, yeah, we probably do.
But I for one am not gonna pat myself on the back for remembering my reusable bags when my cucumber comes wrapped tip to toe in plastic.