Thing 20

Again, this Thing started easy but I quickly got lost in the rabbit hole.
I was frustrated for longer than I care to admit when I attempted to download Quicktime software. It seemed that I was downloading it successfully and then when I would try to listen to a podcast I'd get a message that I was missing a plugin. Well, somehow finally I got a message to run a repair program and that caused Quicktime software to download correctly.
At any rate, when I tried EPN I went for the science topic podcasts. "This Week in Science" looked entertaining enough due to its annotated title I saw after clicking on it: "Kick--s Science". The podcast was informative at times (I tried their most recent cast), I liked their entertaining delivery - it's more suited for private listening or adult listening due to references to the hosts' alcohol consumption and at times adult language, but overall it seemed too long. Admittedly, I am not accustomed to podcasts but I am disappointed that they don't have the length of the cast listed. As I skimmed through the other podcast themes (science and others) I noticed that the lack of time length listing is de rigeur for the EPN site. Nova's E=mc2 drew my attention when I saw Dr. Neill deGrasse Tyson's name (anything he says, I find interesting and entertaining - watch him on the Jon Stewart and Colbert shows). The Nova podcast is no more than 3 minutes long. I can see subscribing to both of those. I did prefer the organization and look of PodCast Alley. After trying Comedy (disappointing) I went to Environment and liked a few of them, in particular, EnvironMinute would be cool to use in class once a week for a quick science current event discussion. I would recommend More Hip than Hippie for an entertaining listen for outside of the classroom (I gotta buy an Ipod for those road trips to Philly so I can listen to all of this!). Brain Science with Dr. Ginger Campbell is fascinating - check out the first one about Alzhiemer's and an older one about the Teen Brain.
Just to completely veer off the science path I tried the music topic and was happy to find a brass band podcast as well as a cello one (Cello Journey) my favorite parts of the orchestra. I subscribed to both of the those podcasts using Bloglines. I liked the idea of having one location for all of the feeds but I ended up using Itunes for the podcasts I downloaded from the Itune store. I couldn't figure out how to download Itune podcasts to Bloglines. But that's ok. Doing that I discovered the free radio stations on Itunes - the relaxation ones are really nice. The nice feature with the Itune podcasts is that they list the length of the cast. By the way, College Humor podcast is hilarious - had to get that one. The NPR Friday Science is worthwhile as well. Wow, what an evening!