Podcast Roundup Week #18

I listened to 40 episodes this week. I would have predicted more because spring has sprung, but it's also been stupidly busy here with the semester finishing up, my second job both picking up and falling into absolute chaos, and our house collapsing around us as we sleep (update on this later after the trauma has lessened - this weekend we'll be getting visits from a roofer, plumber, and some guys who were always supposed to come to install windows in the basement, but now it's just one more stupid thing), so I guess it all makes sense. 

30 for 30 is a podcast based on ESPN's award winning documentary series of the same name. I did not know this existed until quite recently and I haven't listened to a bad episode yet. My relationship with sports is heavily influenced by reading Sports Illustrated (which has just switched from weekly to twice a month and I'm hearing its death rattles and it makes me sad), which is to say that I fully and completely understand how sports relates to every social phenomenon in the country.  Poverty, housing, abortion, gender, race, religion - there's always a tie to sports.  I'm working my way through the back catalog and have only listened to six episodes, but they're ALL good. Even the one called "On The Ice" about women going on an expedition to the North Pole, which is something I would normally be completely uninterested in (adventures = zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz in my world), had me captivated.

Even if you're not a sports person, these are just well told stories with maybe a tie to sports.

The BBC has a new podcast out called Death in Ice Valley about an unidentified body and the search for her identity and how she died. I spent the first twenty minutes of the first episode with my finger on the "Unsubscribe" button because that was a really slow, convoluted start.  But things pick up in the first episode and by the end of the second, I was all in.  I moved the third right up to the top of my playlist.

My last recommendation is just to simply listen to Doughboys. It's definitely best if you can listen to the back catalog because it's filled with callbacks and in-jokes, but you can just jump in and go for a ride. The concept of the show is that these two frenemies go to chain restaurants and then review them. They have guests on the show who sometimes are in on the jokes and sometimes aren't. That's part of the joy. They are simply WRONG about so many things, but then I remind myself that tastes are personal and I stop screaming at my podcast player (I think I have to state that my preference for Five Guys Burgers WILL NEVER BE COMPROMISED and screw disgusting Steak and Shake).  Anyway, they seriously carefully consider their ratings and then the next week undo it all. It consistently makes me laugh and this week I needed that laugh.