I still live an hour from school. (Okay, that's ten hours per week...)

Plus, I've been really good about walking almost every day. (So, that's an hour to an hour and a half each day - let's say six hours per week...)

And on Saturday and Sunday, I try to get out for a REALLY long walk. (Ten miles generally takes me three hours, so let's add another six hours to the total...)

So, by my (admittedly untrustworthy) calculations, I listen to my iPod for twenty-two hours each week, assuming that I don't mow the lawn or anything. (Which, as I look out the window at my lawn, seems to be a safe assumption.)

And that brings me to a somewhat embarrassing confession:


I'm not a music guy.

I mean, it's not as if I dislike music or anything. I've got a pretty good collection of Jazz and Old Guy Rock on my iPod and I do have an abiding loyalty to Tom Waits and Otis Lee Crenshaw, but to just have music on in the background as I walk or drive is to invite an inconvenient mid-highway nap or a pre-dawn moose-stumbling-into.

So I listen to a lot of podcasts and audiobooks.

Mostly podcasts.

Because I'm cheap.

And have a short attention-span.

And um.... uh... something.


Anyway, here are some of the podcasts I've started listening to since I posted last year's list:

About a year ago, I wrote a series of blog posts listing some of the comic strips, blogs and podcasts I read, watch and listen to on a regular basis. Over the past year, I've given up on a few of them and added a few more to my RSS aggregator and my iTunes subscription list.


Here are a few blogs that I've grown to love over the past year or so:

Catalog Living

This is a very silly blog that mercilessly mocks the very silly photographs in upscale catalogs.

Dilbert.com Blog

Scott Adams, the cartoonist behind Dilbert, is also a really interesting blogger. He's got some very odd, very thought-provoking ideas.

I like articulate people who write well.

I'm wacky that way.

Eggbeater


Shuna Fish Lydon is a pastry chef, restaurant-owner and blogger in Brooklyn. I became an instant fan of hers when I read her advice on how to quit a job.

Forgotten Bookmarks

The idea behind this blog is a pretty simple one - the bookmarks that people forget in old books can be fascinating.

Frog Blog

Frog Blog is a series of very odd photos, illustrations and video clips that have nothing in common except their awesomeness. They are posted by cartoonist Teresa Burritt. I suspect that she and I would be friends if we met.

joe's nyc


Joe takes awesome photographs of New York City.

Letterheady
One of the more specialized blogs out there - nothing more or less than the personalized stationery of various historic people and businesses. (My favorite is that of Zella, the Frog Man.)

Lunch Bag Art

This is a blog by an artist dad who designs new bags for his children's lunches. They are awesome.

Matador Network

This isn't exactly a blog, per se; it's a travel website with articles, videos and other items designed to make you feel like you are missing out on something, but you can add it to your RSS aggregator as if it were.

Mila's Daydreams

Mila is a baby. She takes naps.

Her mother is very, very creative.

Oddly Specific


This blog features signs and notices that are, well... oddly specific.

Paleo-Future

You know those predictions from a long time ago about how by now we'd be commuting via jet-pack and we'd all look like June Lockhart or Wallace Beery?

This blog is about those predictions.

Second Rate Snacks

This blog compares mainstream snacks with their cut-rate, dollar-store counterparts. I can't imagine a less important blog; it will not make any kind of difference in anyone's life.

I love it.

Take One Hundred


Another blog I love more than words can articulate.

A fourteen year-old girl is working her way through the American Film Institute's Top 100 movies of all time and reviewing each one.

Three More Food Blogs

I've recently started reading these three blogs by enthusiastic home cooks:

The Tipsy Baker
Smitten Kitchen
Not Eating Out In New York

Sunday Magazine

This is arguably the only blog on this list of any practical use in my classroom. It is a collection of very old, fascinating newspaper articles. I will use some of these during my New York City unit.

Next time - Podcasts you may have missed.