Finally, I’ve submitted my last degree assignment for this semester. I probably won’t be doing another one until next March. Yippee!

(BTW, for those who still remember by last post regarding my lecturer giving me “hell” for an assignment submission, I just got the grades for that particular assignment. Guess what, I actually got a HD (higher distinction)! Woot!)

So with more time on my hands (at least before the workload for end-of-year processing comes crashing down on my shoulders), I thought I should continue with the rest of my podcast reviews.

I’m sure most of you enjoy a good laugh once in a while (just like me!). Comedy podcasts are a wonderful way to help relieve stress and put a smile back on your face again. Of course, you will need to exercise discreet (maybe even caution) when listening to comedy podcasts on your portable MP3 player, because I’m quite sure you don’t want to invite wierd stares from strangers who’re obviously suspicious of your sanity.

One of my favorite comedy podcasts has got to be Nobody’s Listening hosted by James Kennison, a minister living in Kansas City with his wife and daughter. *stalkers* (sorry, inside joke) James started the show with his step-brother, David, with the purpose of sharing their childhood stories with the rest of the world, or as Jame’s wife so aptly puts it “2 half brothers telling the whole story”. David has now moved to Ireland to be with his fiancée and new-born daughter, and is unable to join in the show most of the time, due to the difference in time-zones. Their sister Aimee took over David’s co-host role for a short while, but was too overwhelmed with the responsibilities of being a full-time wife and mother. Not wanting to do the rest of the shows alone by himself, James cleverly decided to invite listeners and friends to guest host on the show, where they get to share their stories. Genius! The wonderful thing about Nobody’s Listening is since James is a minister, he tries to keep the podcast clean, so that the whole family can enjoy it together. So, proof the name of the podcast wrong and start listening!

The most recent guest hosts on Jame’s show (Episode 40) were Erik Fisher and Rob Swingle from the We’re Both Right podcast. I just started listening to this podcast, but what I’ve listened to so far has been really entertaining. Erik and Rob talk about TV, movies, music, and just about any topic they choose to voice their opinion on. It’s like hanging out with your own friends. Casual and fun. Gonna try to catch up as much as I can over the weekend.

Another podcast that I picked up while listening to another podcast is The Bitterest Pill hosted by Dan Klass. He offers humorous “examinations” of life from his point of view as a stay-at-home dad and a shut-in. Again, it’s a new podcast for me (as at this point, I’ve only listened to less than 5 episodes, so I’m still catching up). Dan is funny and he adds the right amount of sarcasm into the show (I LIKE sarcasm). Dan also produces the Old Wave Radio podcast, which features music from the 80′s.

The recent Podcast Awards has provided an avenue for me to discover new podcasts to flood my iTunes with. One of these is the comedy4cast, hosted by Clinton Alvord. As the name of the podcast tries to suggest, Clinton attempts to present “comedy in 4 minutes… or less”. Very humorous and entertaining, yet work-safe and family-friendly.

Another podcast I discovered through Podcast Awards was the Reduced Shakespeare Company Podcast. The Reduced Shakespeare Company is a three-man comedy troupe known for taking long, serious subjects and reducing them into short, sharp comedies. Their signature theatrical performance is The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged), which is, in their own words, “a high-speed roller-coaster type condensation of all of Shakespeare’s plays”. The podcast, hosted by Reed Martin and Austin Tichenor, lets RSC fans catch up on the latest news, reviews and interviews. Occasionally, they also play a short section of their on-stage performance. I love Shakespeare. I love comedy. I LOVE RSC!

A good place to discover new podcasts is Podshow.com. I found most of my latest comedic additions there. One of them is Traces of Nuts, a sharp, fast-paced collection of sketches and songs from UK-based comedy troupe Traces Of Nuts. If you like British humor, you’ll definitely enjoy this podcast. Warning: this show contains explicit content (profanity and crass language) and is not suitable for kids.

Another one of my favorite comedy podcasts is BUCKET, hosted by Corey and Jen. BUCKET is about Second Life, movies, bathrooms, music, life, Twitter, and monkeys. Yes, monkeys! They actually have a program section called “Primate Updates” with news about monkeys! One of my favorite parts of the program has to be the “Potty-mouth” section by Jen, where she talks about potty etiquette, and shares some of the horrific situations she has encountered in the public bathroom of her office building. The recently added “Dramatic Twitter Readings” section is an instant hit with fans too. Their house pet, the “pod-cat” joins the show occasionally (when he manages to break into the room while they’re recording). Warning: this show contains explicit content (profanity) and is not suitable for kids.

If you’re looking for kid-safe Christian comedy, try out the Sheep Laughs Comedy Show. Sheep Laughs is a weekly 15 minute professionally-produced and family-friendly variety radio show, featuring clean comedy by Christian comedians. They claim to provide stand-up, skits and songs, “all under one hoof!”.

Are you a fan of old time radio? If your answer is yes, I’m sure you’ll enjoy the next few podcasts I’m going to introduce. Who can forget the humor of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis? In fact, they are my mom’s no. 1 favorite comedians of all time! The Comedic Genius of Martin and Lewis brings you back in time to the days of the Martin and Lewis Show, which aired on NBC Radio from 1949 through 1953.

Podshow.com has an entire channel, the Old Time Radio Network, dedicated to old time radio shows. Among these is Old Time Radio Comedy presents some of the best comedians from the 30s, 40s and 50s. Other old time radio shows includes Old Time Radio SciFi, Old Time Radio Adventures, Old Time Radio Detective Stories, Old Time Radio Drama, and much much more. Do visit Podshow’s Program Guide, and check out the the Old Time Radio Network yourself.

Not enough of radio comedies from the good old days? Check out Legacy of Laughs produced by Relic Radio Productions. They also produce 4 other old time radio podcasts, with the purpose of giving old time radio a new audience.

Old time radio fans might also want to browse through the Old Time Radio Podcast Directory to look for more old time radio podcasts.

That’s all for now. I’ve got to get back to working before I get discovered by the boss.

Tags: Humor, Podcasts, Reviews

I’m in a really bad mood this morning, so forgive me if I seem to be ranting.

What happened was this: I was supposed to submit a report for a group assignment to my lecturer and my “employer” (we were working as a virtual group in a “virtual company”, if you get what I mean). The instructions were to combine the various parts of the report into a SINGLE word document, which was exactly what I did. The problem is the university’s webmail portal kicked me out while I was sending the email. I tried a few more times, but I still got an error. I figured that my word document was too huge, so I compressed it into a RAR format, which was significantly smaller, and that managed to go through.

The next day I received a “return receipt” from an unknown address regarding the report. I check with my lecturer if the report has reached both her and my “virtual employer”. She said they have received it, multiple times.

All is well until yesterday, I receive emails from both the “virtual employer” and the lecturer saying that the file received was corrupted. I resend a compressed copy, complete with instructions on how to extract the file.

This morning, my “dear” lecturer sends me an email saying “Instructions are there for a reason. Please submit a SINGLE document containing all the parts of the report”. I’m pissed. I reply her, explaining that the word document has been archived in the RAR file which I submitted. I also tell her that the original word document was too large to be sent across via email. After that, I proceed to send her the original document anyway, just to prove that it will not go through, at the same time I promise to send it to her via my personal gmail if necessary.

As expected, the email went through, but with a corrupted copy of the original document. This somehow pisses off my lecturer who replies asking me to “get my act together”, and that what I did was not professional, etc. She insists on the word document, but I’ll have to figure out how to compress it to a “sendable” size.

Thanks teacher, for helping to “make my day”. Thanks a lot.

Tags: life, rant

Podcasts are a fantastic educational tool. Not only can I learn new things about my faith and pickup useful cooking tips, I can even pickup a couple of new languages at my own pace.

JapanesePod101.com provides a platform to make learning the Japanese easy and fun, while incorporating and current issues into their lessons. Subscribe to their free feeds (audio, video or both) and start learning Japanese. Better yet, sign up as a member and subscribe to their member-only feeds to get pdf transcripts of each lesson. If you sign up as a premium member, you’ll even be able to make use of the learning centre to further enhance your language skills.

KoreanClass101.com is a sister site of JapanesePod101.com. It provides the same ease and fun in learning the Korean language. There’s even a video available on how to read and write Hangul (the Korean writing system). Similar to JapanesePod101.com, you’ll have to sign us as a member to be able to download the extras, though you can always subscribe to the free feed for the audio and video content.

If you just want to pick up some basic phrases to survive in a foreign country, or just to communicate with a new friend, SurvivalPhrases.com has the answers. Evident from the similar layout lesson structure, SurvivalPhrases.com is another sister site of JapanesePod101.com and KoreanClass101.com. While the latter 2 includes more intermediate and advanced contents, SurvivalPhrases.com presents just the basics needed for “survival”. Currently, they offer lessons for 5 different languages, namely Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese and Spanish.

The revival of the traditional Latin mass, now known as the extraordinary rite of the mass, has brought on a sudden interest in the Latin language. LatinCast.org provides an online resource for learning and discussing the Latin language. Sadly, the site has not been updated since May. Perhaps it’s because there has been too many looney people spamming their guestbook with inappropriate material. Urgh!

If the world of nature and science is your cup of tea, you’ll definitely enjoy the various high-quality audio and video podcasts from National Geographic. My personal favorites are the Wild Chronicles and Video Shorts video podcasts.

That’s all for now. Time for me to pack up and prepare for a busy night of editing and formatting my degree assignment.

Tags: education, languages, Podcasts, Reviews

Ah.. food.. everyone’s favorite topic!

For those who love, live and breathe food, you now have an option to “hear” food. There are many podcasts available that revolve around the topic of food, cooking and nutrition. The choice is endless. I’ll just want to introduce some of the “foodcasts” which I enjoy.

As the name suggests, the Culinary Podcast Network is a network of podcasts celebrating the culture of good food and drinks, produced by Chef Mark Tafoya and friends. Chef Mark is a personal chef in New York City who is also a globe-trotter and self-taught gourmand. By subscribing to the feed at the Culinary Podcast Network homepage, you will receive the following podcasts as they are updated, you can also subscribe to the shows individually using the links provided:

• ReMARKable Palate™ by Chef Mark Tafoya
• Food Philosophy™ by Jennifer Iannolo
• Simply Ming by Chef Ming Tsai
• CHIC Podcast by Chef Tom Beckman
• All You Can Eat by Don Genova
• A Guy, A Girl and a Bottle by Joe and Pam Carpenter
• ChefsLine™@5 by Jenn Beisser and the chefs of ChefsLine™
• Culinary Roundtable™ by all foodcasters
• Hungry Mag by Mike Nagrant
• Cuisine Populaire by Bob Borchardt
  

Listeners to Father Roderick Vonhögen’sDaily Breakfast podcast may be familiar to the Scottish celebrity chef. Gordon Ramsay. Gordon Ramsay’s Fast Food is series a video podcast produced by Times Online, Britains most successful newspaper podcaster. By subscribing to this podcast, you will also receive the recipes discussed in pdf format.

If you’re exploring vegetarianism like I am, the Vegetarian Food for Thought podcast by Colleen Patrick-Goudreau from Compassionate Cooks, may be what you are looking for. This podcast aims to inspire a joyful, sustainable and compassionate diet, by debunking myths about vegetarianism and empowering people to make informed food choices.

Watching a cooking video is also a good way to pick up cooking. Apart from the afore-mentioned Gordon Ramsay’s Fast Food, there are many fine video podcasts out there in the “pod-o-sphere”. One such video podcast is Start Cooking, which helps busy people to learn the basics of cooking that’s easy to follow. There are of course lots more out there. So do a search for “cooking” in your iTunes today!

Tags: food, Podcasts, Reviews

Podcasts are great! Not only can I keep up with my faith any time, any place, I can also keep up with my “reading” by listening to podcast novels. The brains behind podcasting belong to a genius, that’s for sure!

Podcast novels are variants of the traditional audiobooks, which used to be available on tape/CD. Now, many audiobooks are available in podcast format, and can be easily downloaded through an aggregator. Some podcast novels are available via podcast only. Such podcast novels are typically read and “performed” by the author themselves, and are released on a weekly basis. Podcast novels are a good way of “testing the waters” for new authors, and as there are lots of author-listener interaction. They’re a good (and economical) way of promoting one’s works too. If you like reading, but simply don’t have the time to keep up with your reading list, podcast novels are a way to bring your favorite books to your MP3 player. For a good selection of available podcast novels check out:

• Podiobooks.com
• LibriVox
• BabbleBooks

Today I’ll like to share with you some of the podcast novels which I’ve listened to or am currently subscribed to. Disclaimer: Some of the novels featured here contain mature situations, language and violence.

I’m recently hooked on the 7th Son written by J.C. Hutchins. It is a trilogy of sci-fi podcast novels exploring the adventures of 7 clones trying to solve the mystery of the assassination of the President of the United States, while desperately trying to stay alive and sane. 7th Son is made up of:

• Book One: Descent
• Book Two: Deceit
• Book Three: Destruction

You can choose to subscribe to individual books of the novel, or better yet, you can subscribe to the “catch-all” feed here, where you will also receive bonus episodes, listener feedback, etc.

One of the most prominent podcast novelists out there has got to be Scott Sigler. Apparently, Scott has a penchant for writing sci-fi/horror stuff, peppered with lots and LOTS of violence. I must say he does have talent for it, though sometimes I feel his stuff tend to get TOO gory for my liking. Among his many works, I’ve listened to and enjoyed the following:

• Earthcore
• Ancestor
• Infection

Scott has his own channel at PodShow.com, which features all the above podcast novels as well his latest work The Rookie and BloodCast, a podcast where Scott discusses latest news on his upcoming works.

Another podcast novel I listened to was Shadowmagic by John Lenahan, a fun fantasy adventure loosely based on a Irish mythological folklore. Quite humorous and the background music is nice, though the cliffhangers can turn out to be quite anti-climax sometimes. Or maybe I’m just picky.

Ok, enough of science-fiction and back to some family-friendly reading. One of my favorite novels from my high-school days is now available as podcast novels. Anne of Green Gables by Canadian author, Lucy Maud Montgomery, tells the adventures of a red-haired orphan girl, Anne Shirley, when she is accidentally adopted by the Cuthberts, a pair of middle-aged siblings who were expecting to adopt a boy to help with chores. Anne’s dreamy and, most times, dramatic personality gets her into lots of trouble throughout the book, but also helps gains the hearts of all around her.

That’s all for now. More podcast adventures next time!

Tags: fiction, literature, Podcasts, podiobooks, Reviews