Latest fromPeter Calder
![Is reality TV replacing real life?](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Is reality TV replacing real life?
Reality TV is cheap to make, because the talent works for nothing and the scripts are skeletal, and it follows a wearyingly predictable formula, writes Peter Calder.
![Peter Calder: Cold, harsh truth for so many kids](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Cold, harsh truth for so many kids
You'd be surprised just how hard it is to find a family willing to let a Herald writer snoop around their home and ask all sorts of intrusive questions about their substandard living conditions, writes Peter Calder.
![Blow out Queen's candles](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Blow out Queen's candles
Not for the first time, I found myself wondering why Queen's Birthday is a public holiday here, writes Peter Calder. Much more sensible is to mark Matariki, which begins in late May or early June.
![Peter Calder: Kava club fosters Tongan roots](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Kava club fosters Tongan roots
The only palangi in the room, I had been invited by Tongan community leader Melino Maka, who was keen to speak about the place of kava in the culture here, writes Peter Calder.
![Peter Calder: Golfers out to drive wedge in green plans](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Golfers out to drive wedge in green plans
Regulars at Chamberlain Park Golf Course say there is no public mandate for council ‘carve-up’ of popular public course.
![Peter Calder: Snooker - languid luxury in fast paced age](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Snooker - languid luxury in fast paced age
Snooker got a new world champion last week. Stuart Bingham, at 38 the oldest champion since 1978, became one of those overnight successes who are 20 years in the making.
![Peter Calder: Waiter, these 'parasites' not to my liking](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Waiter, these 'parasites' not to my liking
It would take a hard heart not to feel some degree of sympathy for the restaurant owners who have come out swinging against anonymous reviews and the websites that carry them.
![Give us an ... eh? Kiwi cheerleaders rule](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Give us an ... eh? Kiwi cheerleaders rule
Glory and glamour are made in the drabbest of surroundings.
![Meeting our ethnic neighbours](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Meeting our ethnic neighbours
It bucketed down on Sunday morning, just as they were setting up for the Auckland International Cultural Festival at the sprawling War Memorial Park in Mt Roskill.
![On the trail of fine wine stories](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
On the trail of fine wine stories
Peter Calder revisits the chunk of Auckland's west where immigrant families from Croatia settled to grow fruit - and make wine - for the expanding city.
![Peter Calder: Left is right - but we don't have to be nasty about it](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Left is right - but we don't have to be nasty about it
My first experience of getting behind the wheel of a left-hand-drive car was a thrilling one, writes Peter Calder.
![Peter Calder: Space crisis looming in a place of peace](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Space crisis looming in a place of peace
'Time to get a weedeater through here, I reckon," I said to Roscoe Webb, as I gazed across the expanse of waist-high weeds threatening to choke the old headstones at Waikumete Cemetery.
![Peter Calder: Just no escaping from dead eye Ditch](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Just no escaping from dead eye Ditch
Check Ditch Keeling's voicemail announcement. "I'm in the middle of killing something right now," it says. "Leave a message and I'll get back to you just as soon as it's dead.
![Peter Calder: Coming in off beach to flirt with croquet](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Coming in off beach to flirt with croquet
Had I ever played croquet, he asked. "Maaate!" I thought, though I didn't have the nerve to say it out loud because I knew what he'd say next.
![Peter Calder: A bad man's good idea on voting rights](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: A bad man's good idea on voting rights
Arthur Taylor, whose name never appears in the media without the words "career criminal" shackled to the front of it, has been banged up since 2005 in the maximum security wing of Auckland Prison at Paremoremo.
![Peter Calder: Polo - like playing golf during a quake](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Polo - like playing golf during a quake
The country around Clevedon, southeast of Auckland, is parched and brown. Hawks circle slowly in the blue sky and even at 10am, the sun is like a hammer blow. The occasional "Road May Flood" sign seems like a grim joke.
![Peter Calder: Speeding - a personal view from in front](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Speeding - a personal view from in front
She was just 17. School had just finished. Summer seemed to stretch on forever.
![Peter Calder: Swimming against the developers](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Swimming against the developers
It took longer than it should have before I noticed the name on the letterbox in the middle of Woolleys Bay.
![NZ's first day mystery to most](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
NZ's first day mystery to most
Every American knows about the Mayflower making landfall in 1620 in what is now called Provincetown, Massachusetts...
![Peter Calder: Welcome to movie buff nirvana](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=808)
Peter Calder: Welcome to movie buff nirvana
If you stand at the door of Videon, the DVD and video library in Dominion Rd, you can see the two buildings where their competitors lived and died.