A Few Quick Notes 596

-After a few days in the -35 zone we've moved back into slightly more reasonable temperatures.  Though I don't think we actually made it above zero today, with the help of the sun it was warm enough that we actually had a little slush to contend with as we were making our way home from work.    Hopefully this will be frozen by the time I have to head back to work tomorrow morning.

-You know what's great about this time of year?  It's great that when I drive to work it's not pitch black.  It's strangely comforting to know that you're not arriving at work an hour before sunrise.  And it's not bad that the sun doesn't set until about an hour after the workday ends either.

-After work on Friday (at least I think it was Friday) I received a very strange robocall that seemed to be about electoral redistricting in Saskatchewan.  Just about the only thing that I could make out was that the call supposedly came from 'Chase Research.'

Turns out I wasn't the only one in Saskatchewan to get such a call and that these calls have now been the subject of a number of media reports, including this one.

-Somehow, after years of trying, I've finally managed to get Jeannette to listen to a few of my regular podcasts.  The new This American Life has now become a shared Sunday ritual (instead of one I shamefully engaged in alone whenever I could sneak a listen).  And over the past few weeks I've managed to sneak in RadioLab, 99% Invisible, and the always informative Inside Jobs Podcast.  For whatever reason I haven't quite managed to draw Jeannette into my Jordan, Jesse GO!/Stop Podcasting Yourself web.

-I made eight small raspberry tarts tonight.  Now that they're out of the oven I have no interest in eating them.  Maybe by tomorrow morning I'll rustle up some kind of willingness to sacrifice my health so that these guys don't end up sitting on the counter and spoiling.  

What a tough life I lead.

Cameron - 2

Neil - 0

Get your listen on

A few of my favourite podcasts recently came out with episodes that I quite enjoyed.

This American Life's Switcheroo episode had a particularly engaging story about a new form of outsourced journalism.  Despite the fact that I've listened to the episode and also read a few follow-up stories on the profiled company I still don't know exactly how I should feel about the practice of outsourced context-free reporting.  Anyway, I'm definitely glad to know that this kind of thing is going on and that we're now talking about it a bit more than we were a few days ago.

Radiolab's remix contest episode was also pretty fun (though in a very different way than their content usually is).  The contest's winning entry really worked for me and reminded me of the great Idea's episode by Adam Goddard More About Henry (available here as an episode of Living Out Loud).

I write such posts because I realize I am the internet's #1 source of audio content reviews.  If it weren't for these occasionally posted reviews this place would surely be a ghost town.

Or maybe you're actually coming here for the great Leacockian flourishes?

From This American Life to This is That

For a while I have been interested in creating a graphic representation of development of my podcast listening habits.  In particular, I was interested in looking at the podcasts that I have started listening to either directly because of This American Life or because of podcasts that I started listening to because of other podcasts I had started listening to because of This American Life.

Anyway, last night I got around to sketching out a rough diagram (which I then converted into the image below today). 

I'm sure this image will be as helpful to you as it will be to me.

Note: The Sound of Young America has received credit for referring some podcasts that I actually started listening to because of the Maximumfun.org Podthoughts column.  Also, I know that The Sound of Young America is now called Bullseye, but it was the original incarnation of the show that lead me to these other podcasts, not the one episode of Bullseye that currently exists.

A Bunny Watson moment

This past weekend Jeannette took it upon herself to watch the three Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings movies.  Though I am not a fan of these movies, I did end up catching a few minutes here and there.

After watching the movies Jeannette and I were both quite taken with the similarities between the Lord of the Rings story and the Harry Potter story/books.

Of course, this discussion reminded me of the Radiolab piece from a few years ago about Wagner's Ring Cycle. While this piece is mostly about the Ring Cycle, they do discuss some of the similarities between Wagner's work and Tolkien's.



[Embedded audio]

This piece, like most of Radiolab's output, is easy to access and informative.

A Few Quick Notes 554

-Though we have finally dropped down to sub-zero temperatures in Wolfville, things are still looking quite nice today.  A few recent dustings of snow are making things look particularly festive.  I am even hopeful that we may manage to squeeze out a nice sunset this afternoon evening.

-My Christmas preparations, aside from some gift shopping and thinking about all of the cleaning I will likely need to do, started in earnest today when I made some bread that I eventually intend to use for the turkey stuffing.  As much as I am willing to admit that it does seem a bit weird to intention bake bread to allow it to go stale, it seems even weirder to me to buy bread with the intention of letting it go stale.  Anyway, the deed has been done and the bread is now working its way towards staleness.

-The individuals previously associated with our phone number are still receiving daily calls from creditors.  While I seem to have talked a collection agency into not calling, we are still receiving regular calls for another individual from a major financial institution.  As I have already spoken to the company once I don't really know what my next step is (the calls are automated, making one-on-one interactions with the staff difficult).

(While writing this I had to deal with another such call, though this time from a person.  I suspect I was talking to a collection agency, but as there number was blocked I can't confirm this hunch.)

-I probably listen to too many podcasts.  I consume them while cooking, cleaning, walking, procrastinating, and riding the bus.  They're the best.  And there's little I like more than discovering a great new podcast with an archive I can compulsively listen to over the course of a few days.

Anyway, this is a long way of saying that I have recently found two podcasts that I am in the midst of acquainting myself with.  The first one, HOW TO DO EVERYTHING, which seems to be NPR/WBEZ associated, is pretty light and concerns itself with a Richardson's Rounduppesque assortment of topics.  The second one, 99% Invisible (which I discovered thanks to a recent Radiolab episode), is a little more serious and generally deals with topics relating to architecture and design.

Ethical Question

This morning Jeannette and I were talking about a short 'ethics' she has to discuss in an upcoming assignment. After a few minutes of contemplation I realized that the scenario she was dealing with was somewhat similar to a scenario that had been dealt with by Radiolab in one of podcasts.



[Embedded audio]

Actually, I think that the ethical scenario I remember them dealing with in this episode may have been the first Radiolab segment I ever heard (as it was featured on an episode of This American Life.)

Anyway, if you have the time both This American Life and Radiolab are worth checking out (and would be incredible additions to the daytime CBC Radio One line-up).

A Few Quick Notes 490

-It is currently raining, as it has been for much of my trip. Though we did see some sun this afternoon, today, like every other day since I have been home, has seen at least some rain. This has been one of the worst stretches of weather I have seen in quite some time.

-We went bowling tonight. While my father and I pulled respectable scores together in the last frame or two of play of the first game, we all managed to solidly break 100 in our second game. The only unfortunate part of this, at least as far as I was concerned, is that I managed to score fewer points in the second game than in the first.

While we were bowling the gentlemen in the lane next to us, who arrived just as we were arriving, (who was a good bowler) was seemingly there just to practice. He quickly played two 250+ games and then took off. In total he was probably there for less than 30 minutes. While he was there he seemed to even do things like set up splits and then finish them off. The whole thing was rather odd.

-Jeannette and I will soon be heading back to Halifax. It seems that they have been having similar weather there, so I don't imagine we have missed much.

-For the past day or two I have been engaged in re-listening to the recent Radiolab episode entitled Wild Talk.



[Embedded audio]

This episodes explores communication, or language, that has been found in certain animal species, or across species. Most importantly, it seems to give some credence to my skepticism of the claim that was made by my professor in my intro linguistics class that language is only to be found among humans.