An Eclectic Mind

Yes, but which one?

That’s easy. The funny one.

This afternoon, I searched the iTunes Music Store for a podcast I’d listened to a few times but had somehow lost my subscription to. (I’m a bit quick on the delete key some days and often delete subscriptions rather than episodes. Oops.) The podcast is called “The President’s Weekly Radio Address.”

Imagine my surprise when I came up with two matches for the phrase president’s radio address:

• The President’s Weekly Radio Address authored by Official Parody from WeeklyRadioAddress.com is the comedy podcast I was looking for.
• President’s Weekly Radio Address authored by George W. Bush is the national broadcast I didn’t want to hear.

I wish there were a way to see which of the two podcasts were more popular — in other words, had more subscribers.

I also found podcasts by Bill Maher and Penn Jillette of Penn & Teller fame. (Okay, so I’m a liberal. But we all knew that.) And video podcasts from Comedy Central.

Why am I filling my iPod again? Got some long drives and flights ahead of me. May as well feed my head while I’m behind the wheel or at the stick.

I hear a new sound that I like on an NPR podcast.

I have a problem. I don’t seem to like much of the new music that’s coming out. I’m becoming my parents, who didn’t like the music I listened to in the 70s and 80s. Now it’s the 00s and I’m stuck in a sound that’s 20 to 30 years old.

Don’t get me wrong: I’ve tried listening to the new stuff. Really. I like the rhythms of hip-hop and rap, but I cannot tolerate the lyrics and instrumentals. Half the new “rock” groups sound to me as if they’re singing off key, or just making a lot of noise. None of the new stuff sounds very good to me at all.

But when a new Steely Dan or Pink Floyd or Eric Clapton album comes out, I buy it immediately. It’s what I like. And my iPod is full of the same stuff, along with some “smooth jazz” and a touch of Mozart. And podcasts, of course.

It’s the podcasts that often introduce me to new things. I listen to NPR’s Story of the Day podcast. I enjoy about half the stories. But the ones that I enjoy I really enjoy. Like a recent All Things Considered piece about the Ditty Bops.

The story was kind of weird. It appears that this female duo is touring the country by bicycle, from California to New York. They should be in New York as I write this. But what hooked me was their music. The podcast included bits and pieces from some of their songs. The music was folksy, with good rhythms, interesting instrumentals, and wonderful harmonies. Something new for my iPod, I realized. Something other than more classic rock.

If you’re in the over 30 crowd and are interested in listening to something new, give this podcast a listen. Then go out and get some of The Ditty Bops’ music. You’ll find it in the iTunes music store and on Amazon.com, as well as in the NPR shop.

And if you’re already a Ditty Bops fan, use the Comments link to share your thoughts. I’d like to think that I’m not the only one who likes this kind of music.

An interesting podcast that describes me as a blogger.

There has been a lot — probably too much — said about blogging and bloggers. This Future Tense podcast, which can be found in the Future Tense: July 2006 Archives gets to the heart of the matter. (On that page, search for “Profile of Bloggers.”)

If you’re looking for a good podcast with short episodes about technology issues, I highly recommend Future Tense.

blogging, blogs, podcast

A book about crossword puzzles?

I used to be a crossword puzzle lover. It wasn’t because I loved words as much as because I had an assignment at my job that gave me lots of free time in the middle of the day. Every day, I’d do the crossword puzzles in Newsday (Long Island’s paper), the Daily News, and the New York Times. When you do three newspaper puzzles a day, five days a week, you start getting good at it. And it starts getting boring. So before that assignment was done — it only lasted about three months — actually started making crossword puzzles. That’s when you know you’ve got it bad.

(A side note here. Around the same time, I used to play Scrabble with a friend of mine’s mother and her friend. They were incredible Scrabble players and I learned a lot from them. I also made a list of and practically memorized all of the acceptable 2- and 3-letter words in the The Official Scrabble Player’s Dictionary. This is the key to winning at Scrabble, as I learned (to their surprise one day). That and having a decent vocabulary, of course.)

Anyway, that assignment ended and I didn’t have time to do crossword puzzles every day. I’d occasionally do them when trapped on an airliner flying across the country, but that was about it.

Time passed. I started listening to Podcasts, including NPR’s Sunday Puzzle, with the New York Times puzzle master, Will Shortz. Will, of course, began plugging an independent film called Wordplay that had just been made about the American Crossword Puzzle Championship. It sounded interesting. Not interesting enough to trek down to an independent theather in Phoenix, mind you, but certainly interesting enough to add to my Netflix queue.

Will also started giving away copies of the companion book, Wordplay, as prizes for the Sunday Puzzle winners. The other day, while in a Barnes & Noble bookstore in Flagstaff, I saw the book on the shelf and, on a whim, bought it.

It was a quick read. I learned a lot of things.

First of all, there are a lot of people that are seriously into crossword puzzles. In my crossword puzzle heydays, I was just starting to approach the fringe of how these people live. I’m kind of glad that assignment ended; I don’t think I’d want my life to revolve around crossword puzzles, as the lives of some of these folks do.

Second, did you know that the New York Times crossword puzzle is easiest on Monday, progressing to a higher level of difficulty as the days of the week pass? Saturday’s is the toughest and Sunday’s, although largest, is only about as tough as one from a Wednesday or Thursday.

How does the toughness get established? Not by the fill — that’s the letters and black boxes in the grid. By the clues. Straightforward, “dictionary definition” clues are easiest. Clues that rely on puns or wordplay are the toughest. That’s Will Shortz’s job — he doesn’t create the puzzles, but he edits them for difficulty.

Good puzzles have themes that are carried out throughout the puzzle. The more theme words or phrases throughout the puzzle, the better that puzzle is. And if theme words and phrases are puns or wordplays on the theme, all the better.

I also learned that crossword puzzles are often created by computer (a sad state of affairs) but that some expert puzzle makers can create a good crossword in a few hours. One puzzle maker actually created an entire puzzle in less than an hour during the competition, based on a theme provided by the audience.

The book includes about 50 puzzles. Some are the contestants’ favorites — you know a person is serious when he can tell you his favorite puzzle by name or date — and others are puzzles used in the competition. I left the book at my place at Howard Mesa so I could fiddle with the puzzles in the evening before I go to bed.

If you like crossword puzzles and are interested in the creation and completion processes, I highly recommend the book. My rating (for puzzle lovers, not the general public):
[rate 4.5]

Now I can’t wait for the movie to come out on DVD so I can watch it.

book, review, wordplay, crossword