Suffering from debilitating anxiety and depression, as a young man Jock Hume could have fallen through the cracks. Instead, he bought himself a studded shirt and tan boots and carved out a place for himself in the world.  For more unforgettable true stories from The Lip go to www.thelippodcast.kiwi

Episode 3: The Singing Cowboy

A podcast of unforgettable true stories. Each story is 100 percent lived by the person telling it. Be prepared to laugh, cry or forget to breathe!

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Rohan Stace was a Kiwi cop who never shied away from the dangers of frontline policing. But behind the macho image he was a cross-dresser who lived in terror that his secret would be discovered. Three years ago, Rohan ceased to exist. She is now Rhona – New Zealand’s first openly transgender police prosecutor. This is her story.

Episode 18: The Wall

Averill Richardson was 18 years old when she gave birth to her daughter Angie. Before Angie was born, Averill had been faced with a choice: give her baby away to strangers, or keep the baby – but never, ever tell her who her real father was. Averill made her choice. Sixteen years later, the secret was out.

Episode 17: The Choice

He was a Southern Man. She was a sausage dog. They went together like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny Devito. Harriet Bremner tells the story of her life with such unlikely companions... and what happened when everything went wrong.

Episode 16: Hot Dog

Police dog handler Bruce Howat and his canine partner Cara were a crack crime-fighting duo – one of the finest man-dog teams on the force. It all came to an end one night when Bruce found himself on the wrong end of a 33cm-long hunting knife wielded by the most unlikely of criminals. A story of the immense bond between a policeman and his dog – and the lengths they went to to save each other.

Episode 15: The Premonition

Book lover Dennis Gallagher could accept losing his apartment in the devastating 2011 Christchurch earthquake. But he could not accept losing his books. Instead, he found his inner James Bond and launched a secret operation to steal his own books from his own apartment within the military-patrolled red zone.

Episode 3: The Singing Cowboy

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