There comes a time in every girl’s life when your demand for This American Life podcasts outpaces a measly one-episode-a-week demand.

It’s understandable. Life throws you a lot of tedious tasks that simply can’t be accomplished without auditory assistance. Like cleaning. Folding laundry. Exercising. Opening boxes of books for hours (just me? huh…).

Or walking.

And sometimes your attention span just can’t handle an audio book, you know?

The last time I tried to listen to Non-This-American-Life podcasts, the whole concept of podcasts was fairly nascent. Which means: the podcasts available were pretty crappy. Luckily for me, there has been a boom in podcast quality during the past years! Yippee!

So here is what I have been listening to with relative obsession for the past few weeks. If you have found yourself in a This American Life drought, then these may fill that massive void in your life.

For a basic primer on quality comedy podcasts, I would recommend my friend Ashley’s post Podcasts for your Ears.

I will admit that I feel a bit of kismet has brought me to the world of podcasts. As soon as I started listening to some of the more popular comedy podcasts, I spotted references to them EVERYWHERE. It was like this bit of counterculture I was never aware of. Anyway, my introduction to these podcasts also began auspicously – as soon as I said “WAH I NEED MORE THIS AMERICAN LIFE WHAT SHOULD I DO??” I swear, the next day, Ashley made this post. MAGIC!

Ashley covers the big ones: Nerdist. WTF with Marc Maron. The Pod F. Tompkast. I’m not hooked on any of these yet, but they are certainly entertaining, and feature some quality guest stars. Head on over to Ashley’s blog for a more thorough recommendations – she’s been at it for much longer than I have!

Additional moments of kismet:

• Marc Maron’s podcast was the answer to a question at Pub Trivia last week
• About 5 days after I started listening, a college classmate’s new book – So You Created a Wormhole: The Time Traveler’s Guide to Time Travel – got a shout-out on an episode of the Nerdist

If you aren’t in the mood for comedy and you have two working ovaries, I would heartily recommend Hilary Frank’s The Longest Shortest Time. On this podcast, Frank interviews new moms and dads about the bizarre experience that is raising Very Tiny Babies. Think of this as a well-produced mommy blog for your ears. I was so sad when I listened all the way through this series.

Moment of kismet:

• Hilary Frank also wrote one of my favorite YA books that I read as an actual teen – Better Than Running At Night

If you ARE in the mood for comedy, allow me to reveal my biggest obsession – You Had to Be There. I saw this article about the podcast in the NYTimes last week and was so intrigued. While I like comedy podcasts, what drew me to this one was the strange premise. The two hosts, comedians Nikki Glaser and Sara Schaefer met at a party and hit it off. They wanted to be friends. Instead of doing awkward lady-dates – or however it is you make friends when you aren’t in school I have no idea – the decided to start a podcast. So it’s part funny podcast, part two new friends getting to know each other. I am a big-time voyeur, so this was intriguing. And I was SO instantly hooked. In fact, I have not listened to anything else since discovering this one because GUESS WHAT! It’s a year old so there are 700 million episodes to listen to.

 

Moment of kismet:

• I am about 10 episodes in and for some reason these episodes have been disproportionately MICHIGAN and KANSAS heavy! I believe my readership here is about 90% people from Michigan or Kansas, so this might excite you.

I will also add these notes:

• The musical guests are all… strangely awesome.
• It’s pretty raunchy. Actually, a lot of these podcasts are pretty raunchy. If you are adverse to the raunch, listen with care.
• I love that this is two ladies. Lady humor ftw!

And in a final moment of kismet, just as I entered this Let’s Hunt for Podcasts stage of my life, another college friend of mine was like SO YEAH I STARTED A PODCAST!

 

And it is funny. Very funny. Recommend! J.D.’s Cocktail Lounge is available on my friend’s tumblr or on iTunes.

This last one has made me miss my college friends something fierce – I need more hilarious discourse in my life.

Additionally, this whole experience has made me want to start a podcast. Every time a funny exchange occurs between me and a friend in real life, I start to wonder “Hmmm… what kind of podcast could we make?” I feel like it may be a sickness, but it also makes for a fun conversation starter at parties.

But seriously. Anyone down?

 

 

These are the Ways You Love Yourself

“forgive yourself for not handling it all better, for feeling like you let others down. the path is not done, the road is not finished, why are you trying so hard to rush the whole thing? celebrate the fact that your story has some major departures.”

I love Meg’s posts. I bookmarked this weeks ago, but after writing yesterday’s post, it seems relevant yet again.

 

13 Practical Ways to Face Your Fear, Take Control, and Conquer Anxiety and Phobia

Just remember, fear is natural. It’s normal. It’s there to protect you. It’s your friend. Don’t beat yourself up for being afraid, try instead to be kind and thankful for it. Face it. And love it.

Respect it. Play with it. Make yourself comfortable with it.

Speaking of self-care, I thought this article from The Freedom Experiment about conquering legit phobias offered a lot of small, practical tactics for just calming yourself down when you’re feeling a bit too keyed up. “Breath in squares” feels much more tangible to me than “just breath.” Worth a read if you are a high-anxiety type.

 

15 Fights to Have Before You Get Engaged

Honey, I was watching this Oprah show about a beautiful family with forty foster children…

I found this exceedingly old article the other night and it was probably the funniest piece of relationship advice I’ve read. I like reading about how to effectively navigate major romantic relationships, but every article is the same, you know? This one hits all the obvious points, but the humor hits the points home a bit harder.

 

25 Things I Want To Say to So-Called “Aspiring Writers”

Agents, editors, reviewers, readers, trolls on the Internet, they’re going to say things you don’t want to hear. A thick skin isn’t enough. You need a leathery carapace. A chitinous exoskeleton. Writing is a hard-knock career where you invite a bevy of slings and arrows into your face and heart. It is what it is.

Repeat what I said above, but replace “relationships” with “writing.” I’m trying to keep this particular quote in mind this week because I am feeling too much like a delicate flower.

 

 

When We Fail To Do Our Part

These hard-working committees can miss something simply because of how overwhelming their tasks are. They can miss something because they miss something. Human error happens. But anyone who reads can pitch in and do their part, too, so books like Imaginary Girls don’t unfairly slip between the cracks.

Even though the 2011 book award frenzy is dying down, the process for handing out Newberys and National Book Awards and such is really going on all year. Kelly’s article on Stacked talks about YALSA awards and a little known way that everyday readers can “lobby” for a favorite YA underdog.

 

Advocating for Contemporary YA Lit

Contemporary ya lit doesn’t get the marketing or publicity bucks behind it that so many other genres do. Pay attention to the advertisements you see around for books — do many of them look familiar? Do they target the same few books over and over?

Another Stacked article! This one is a bit old, but I am taking this YA Lit class that has me thinking all about how to keep up with what’s new in YA without getting buried/discouraged – believe you me, there are SO MANY BOOKS! This article, though, presents the task as more of a professional responsibility than the simple act of “keeping up with those kiddies” – it’s important to support quality lit so that publishers will continue to support quality lit, rather than publishing Twilight knock-off after Twilight knock-off.

 

Sendak on Colbert

I’m sure everyone and their 90-year-old grandmother have already seen these videos, but they are SO hilarious, SO amazing, that I’m just going make extra-double-sure that EVERYONE possible has seen it.

Did you see it?

Good. Aren’t you glad?