The other day I was out clearing a mountain of leaves from my yard, something I'll probably do several more times this fall. It actually was a pleasure to be out of doors even though it was a bit colder than I would have liked. It felt good to be doing some physical work though that night I regretted the resulting stiffness. Moving leaves is not particularly challenging to the mind, however.
Something that made the work a great deal more enjoyable was my little Zen V. There's nothing special about that particular MP3 player except that it works great and was quite cheap. It fits easily in my pocket and it pumps wonderful speeches, interviews and discussions into earphones so that I can listen while I work. I listen to MP-3 files that I've downloaded earlier on the PC in my basement, usually while I am not otherwise using my PC. I seem to recall that it will play some other audio formats, but I've never needed that option since the programs I want to hear are all available in MP-3.
On the day I was moving leaves, I listened to a discussion of the death penalty and its widespread use throughout the U.S. and particularly in Texas. This was part of a broadcast of Progressive Forum. The program is produced by KPFT, a Pacifica station in Houston, Texas and it is, in my opinion, generally a great program, a program I try hard not to miss (though often I listen long after it is broadcast). KPFT keeps an archive of their programs, unfortunately only for a couple weeks, but it does allow you to download what you want for free; you just have to be prompt about it.
I try as much as possible to group my travels and do several things while I'm out; it saves on gas for my car. The morning after clearing leaves, I went to my barber to get my hair cut, I stopped along the way to get seed that I feed to the birds, I went to the bank and I stopped at a hardware shop for some felt weather stripping. While driving, I was able to listen to the second hour of that Progressive Forum program and it was quite a wonderful talk that Robert Reish gave recently at Rice University. Of course he talked about the economy and in doing so gave me some fresh ideas and ways to look at our national quandary. On returning home I sat in my garage for an extra ten minutes so as not to interrupt the end of the program.
The next day, while working around the house, I listened to two different broadcasts of Media Matters. This is a program that is produced and broadcast by WILL, a PBS station in Champaign Illinois. In one broadcast, Robert McChesney talked for an hour about his own book, Death and Life of American Journalism. It was a good program, but even better was his interview of Lewis Hyde about his book, Common as Air. This interview concerned the very nature of property and ownership, the special nature of intellectual property, copyrights and quite a lot of American history regarding these topics.
By now, you probably realize that I listen to these kinds of programs quite a lot. In fact I can't keep up will what I download, but I keep trying and from time to time I hear a program that I especially like such as the interview of Lewis Hyde on Media Matters and the speech by Robert Reich. I've long wanted to find a way to let others know about these programs and it occurred to me that putting up diaries like this might be a way. Let me know if you like the idea.
Robert McChesney, Media Matters. ( RSS URL ): An October 17, 2010 interview with Lewis Hyde about his book, Common as Air concerning property, property ownership and copyrights.
Robert McChesney, Media Matters. ( RSS URL ): An October 2010 Robert McChesney talks about his own book, Death and Life of American Journalism.
Robert Reich on the Economy, Progressive Forum ( RSS URL ) An October 14, 2010 talk with Robert Reich
