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What do I need to learn more about…?

Bought myself a pair of bluetooth headphones so I can cordlessly listen to something interesting while I do all this boring housework. I’ve paired them up with my old phone — the one I baptized in the toilet. Helpful hint: old cellphones make perfectly good wifi devices after you take the phone chip out.

I’ve been listening to podcasts and YouTubes, which I find a much better work aid than music. I’ve got a good selection of English history, true crime, ghost stories (I’m as psychic as a potato, but I love me a good ghost story).

I’m kind of deficient in the sciences — I’ve found a few, but I’m not wild about any of them. The one about gut microbes is short and infrequent. The big mainstream science ones are so far all NPR-ish and twee, if you know what I mean.

Any recommendations? Not just science, I mean. Anything talky-talky you like to listen to.

Not working all the time, though. Tomorrow, we have two fetes and a barbecue. Have a good weekend!

p.s. I found my cache of NRA t-shirts. Woot!

Comments


Comment from Monty James
Time: August 10, 2018, 9:50 pm

Maybe PBS Eons on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzR-rom72PHN9Zg7RML9EbA


Comment from Sam Paris
Time: August 10, 2018, 10:08 pm

Stuff you missed in History Class https://www.missedinhistory.com/ is (usually) pretty good.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: August 10, 2018, 10:42 pm

Somebody recommended the British Museum’s channel, but I haven’t watched any yet. https://www.youtube.com/user/britishmuseum


Comment from Ric Fan
Time: August 10, 2018, 10:57 pm

History of Rome: https://goo.gl/A9Rhcv

Audiobook: Talented Mr Ripley: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGSleY3wK4Y


Comment from Ric Fan
Time: August 10, 2018, 11:01 pm

Central Washinton U. Geology lectures are very good and on youtube: https://goo.gl/9jtxnA


Comment from Some Vegetable
Time: August 11, 2018, 12:59 am

I personally like the TuneIn radio app. As I tend to avoid anything intellectual, I listen to old radio serials from the 30’s, 40’s, and 50’s.
I prefer the hard boiled detective stuff, so I like channels like Crimetime, Hank’s Gumshoe Radio, Audio Noir, and Oxford Radio, and – my favorite Suspense 365.

It seems that all the movie stars did radio in the days before TV and so it’s fascinating to see who turns up in these. Bogart and Bacall had a regular show, as did Frank Sinatra (as ‘Rocky Fortune’). Everybody , including Cary Grant and Lucille show up at some point, The weirdest one for me though is Vincent Price who had a series appearing as The Saint. I still can’t get used to him as a leading man- I keep expecting him to act really creepy.

However, TuneIn gives you access to literally every digital radio station in the world, so there are millions of choices.


Comment from Gordon R. Durand
Time: August 11, 2018, 1:19 am

You like genetics; so do I.

My second favorite blogger of all time, Razib Khan, now works with Spencer Wells, and they produce a weekly podcast called The Insight
https://insitome.libsyn.com/

It’s a bit technical a times (this is where your Ashkenazi ancestry comes in handy) but always interesting.


Comment from RimrockR
Time: August 11, 2018, 3:37 am

I like the history of English podcast. Don’t know how to create a link but I think it’s easy to find on the goog.


Comment from EZnSF
Time: August 11, 2018, 3:37 am

Best Kitchen Cleaning Casts:

NPR’s Radio Lab (kinda sciency)
NPR’s All Things Considered
Netflix/etal reruns of Gorden Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares.
(wish they had the old UK versions available)

Barring that, look up your favorite band when you where 25, on youtube. Find the playlist, and crank the volume up as high as it will go.


Comment from hvivian
Time: August 11, 2018, 4:33 am

If you can access it, iTunes U is fantastic. It has a huge collection of university classes – specifically, the course lectures from the entire semester. All the learning, none of the tests, papers, or homework! So far, I’ve gone through the following courses and they were all incredibly good:
– Physics for Future Presidents, Richard Muller, UC Berkeley
– The Civil War and The Reconstruction Era, David Blight, Yale
– Epidemics in Western Society since 1600, Frank Snowden, Yale

All of these professors were excellent at explaining their material in a very understandable and very engaging way. I loved these courses and would recommend them to anyone.

If you use a computer, I believe Apple moved them over to the Podcasts section, but if you have an iPhone or iPad, you can download the iTunes U app.


Comment from p2
Time: August 11, 2018, 5:17 am

try any of the tedx talks… there’s a canadian guy who does a great youtube thing. channel is AvE…. he’s a machinist/weldy metal kinda guy but does all sorts of stuff too. funny as hell..little coarse, but nuthin that’ll make your hair curl.


Comment from Ric Fan
Time: August 11, 2018, 7:48 am

Holy shite! Jeremy Corbyn photographed praying (!) at the graves of the Munich terrorists. The UK is soooooo fooked!


Comment from Uncle Badger
Time: August 11, 2018, 11:24 am

You’re not wrong, Ric Fan.

Under normal circumstances that would be the end of him but the MSM (particularly the BBC) is too much busy crucifying Boris Johnson for daring to criticise the Burka, to pay any attention.

Of course, the real reason they are after Boris is because he is pretending to be a Leaver so as to challenge Mrs Dismay (c. Mrs Proudie).

It is inconceivable that Corbyn will get away with this revelation. But he might well.


Comment from QuasiModo
Time: August 11, 2018, 2:49 pm

I came across this ‘Astonishing Legends’ podcast site, here’s the first one episode about Skinwalker Ranch, an alien abduction zone 🙂

http://www.astonishinglegends.com/al-podcasts/2017/2/6/ep-045-skinwalker-ranch-part-1?rq=skinwalker

…I haven’t listened to it yet, so I can’t vouch for it…sounds like something you might like though 🙂


Comment from Durnedyankee
Time: August 11, 2018, 5:45 pm

I’d recommend things – but then you’d be listening to videos of guys with soundtracks mixing ‘aircrete’ for their shed or making rocket furnaces for cooking or hearing 2 nice little Indonesian guys building a well and water filter system with things you find laying around in your backyard.
I’m not much on the science, but if you can build it without high tech and a lot of math, I can build it.

And…well, you might find out how to make ceramic armor or fiberglass plate that will stop 9mm rounds. Because…you never know when a tree will open fire on you while you’re building your well.


Comment from Deborah HH
Time: August 11, 2018, 8:32 pm

I try, but I just can’t do it anymore—listen to educational things. American history, and war history for DAR research, but that’s about all. Lately I am hooked on fiction audio books though. Michael Connelly’s detective Hieronymus (Harry) Bosch for now.


Comment from Mark Matis
Time: August 12, 2018, 12:38 am

Best not wear those NRA shirts in public, lest you be Tommy Robinsoned, decitizenized, and deported.


Comment from Ric Fan
Time: August 12, 2018, 6:37 am

10 people were shot in Manchester last night. So much for gun free UK.


Comment from JC
Time: August 12, 2018, 8:31 am

Fetes should come in pairs. Good planning, that Weasel!


Comment from Wolfus Aurelius
Time: August 13, 2018, 3:42 pm

Comment from Some Vegetable
Time: August 11, 2018, 12:59 am
I personally like the TuneIn radio app. As I tend to avoid anything intellectual, I listen to old radio serials from the 30’s, 40’s, and 50’s.
I prefer the hard boiled detective stuff, so I like channels like Crimetime, Hank’s Gumshoe Radio, Audio Noir, and Oxford Radio, and – my favorite Suspense 365.

It seems that all the movie stars did radio in the days before TV and so it’s fascinating to see who turns up in these. Bogart and Bacall had a regular show, as did Frank Sinatra (as ‘Rocky Fortune’). Everybody , including Cary Grant and Lucille show up at some point, The weirdest one for me though is Vincent Price who had a series appearing as The Saint. I still can’t get used to him as a leading man- I keep expecting him to act really creepy. . . .
*
*
I didn’t know Vincent Price had ever played the Saint! Price will surprise you, though. You see him in some of his early movies — he’s in Laura with Gene Tierney, playing a normal sort of guy — and yes, you keep expecting him to be creepy, as I always expect Steve Martin to break out in funny in his serious roles, or William Shatner to do Captain Kirk.

But Price was better than just that. He was the original on-stage gaslighting husband in Angel Street (later Gaslight in the movies), and did the voice of the Invisible Man in one of the sequels after Claude Rains. And he played a very Gallic member of Thrush in one episode of The Man from U.N.C.L.E. with his Angel Street co-star, Leo G. Carroll.


Comment from Jon
Time: August 13, 2018, 7:48 pm

Fetes don’t fail you now! #sorrynotsorry

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