State of the Podcast and a Resources Roundup
State of the podcast:
4 episodes are published; I’m editing the next three episodes over this Easter weekend break; I need to record #8 and #9, and then edit them along with #10 which was recorded before Christmas (long story, once upon a time I was sticking to a carefully planned episode topic outline…those were also the days when I thought it was completely reasonable to record, edit and release two episodes per week.)
State of the Podcast(er):
Not great. School, while worthwhile, is incredibly demanding and really there’s no time for enjoyable things when a person has committed to lecture/lab time on top of full-time work. Most days I feel like my schedule isn’t in my control and I hate that feeling. But I just keep checking my planner upwards of 100 times a day to be sure all the plates keep spinning, and so far the only casualties have been personal relationships. To my friends and family who put up with my self-centered mishaps, bless you all.
Resources Roundup:
Some things I’ve come across in the past few months that really don’t merit a blog post all on their own:
This recording of Mendelssohn’s Octet in E-flat Major
Pablo Ferrandez (cellist) keeps releasing awesome practice tips and his Instagram is also worth following
Nicholas Yee (cellist) is doing lots of interesting covers on his YouTube. I really enjoy his Slow Dancing in the Dark
Jack Spirko recently interviewed Prof CJ of the Dangerous History podcast, about CJ’s epic look at the US Civil War. Strictly from a conventional “what you missed in grade school” perspective, if you listened to the DH podcast’s coverage of the Revolutionary War, American chattel slavery, the Civil War, and then followed it up with Dan Carlin’s episodes on WW 1, you’d be light years ahead of the average citizen’s understanding of these critical events in our country’s history. I made the initial disclaimer because in order to cover so much material, other important stories can get left out, and giving women’s history a voice is one of the reasons I wanted to start my own podcast. I give CJ high praise for many things, one of which is his inclusion of topics like the Seminole Wars, Florida’s disastrous experiment with the Everglades, and its destructive ties to Big Sugar among his many other great episodes. Prof CJ is truly building a tremendous body of work, mostly available for free to the online public.
Jack also has a series of YouTube videos on permaculture design principles, which I hope to watch next week after my class ends for the spring semester. I’m taking a big biology class for credit at my university over the summer, but I’d also like to take Brianne Barker’s Immunology lectures or Vincent Racaniello’s Virology lectures this summer. If there’s time…. I’m linking all of these resources but YMMV because I haven’t vetted any of them personally:
And last but not least, allow me to take you back many many years ago to fifth-grade me: devouring Karen Cushman’s “Midwife’s Apprentice” and wanting SO BADLY to become an herbalist. So much so, in fact, that I spent a Saturday at the library patiently hand-copying the text of a book on herbal medicine into a spiral notebook. Which of course I promptly forgot about. I mostly forgot about my herbalist desire as well, until a few weeks ago when I learned about the podcast “Alba Salix, Royal Physician” and guys………..my herbalism interest is back in a major way. I don’t really know what to do about it though, see above with the absolutely no time problem. Luckily I’m studying pre-med and organic chemistry right now, so I can pretend that a side interest in herbal apothecary studies is completely fine and won’t distract from the classes I’m currently paying to take. Sigh.