I might have to substitute “podcasts” for one of those words on my list to the right. I just love podcasts. I used to listen to talk radio [like WWL 870 AM out of New Orleans] and then moved to streaming radio [I still listen to the Dave Ramsey Show online]. But podcasts just make so much more sense.

The idea is simple: subscribe to a show [audio or video] and forget about it — whenever content is posted online, it is automatically detected and downloaded by your podcatcher program where it awaits your listening ear.

Early adopters were of course technology junkies so that’s still the dominant catagory [not complaining, mind you, I love technology] but I’m finding great new podcasts every week.

[FYI]Here are the websites of a few of the non-tech-related podcasts I’m subscribed to:

• the Motivation to Move Show
• the Word Nerds
• Reel Reviews Radio
• the Sound of Young America

By the way, I just bought a used MP3 player online [$30 plus shipping] — it’s modest but it works great. That’s all folks.

Banana spiders have appeared in droves. They have spun their webs [their decietful lies] prolifically and in the general vicinity of our front porch. We host these colorful visitors yearly, sure, but this is ridiculous: they have come on like gangbusters.

The wife and I have been discussing the fate of these eight-leggers, as I like to call them. She thinks we need to take action, and I have taken the high road: “Nah,” I say, “let’s not disturb them — banana spiders are people too.” [I may have overstated things]

For now the spiders remain untouched, un-swept-away- with-a-broom. They are friendly enough, afterall. [I may give them all names.]

The painting above is one I’ve just started; it’s 2 1/2 feet tall and 4 feet wide. It’s not quite finished, but it’s at a point just past the opening — to use chess terminology — and deep into the middlegame. What I’d like is a little feedback — tell me what you think I should add, subtract or change to make this a finished piece. I’d also like your thoughts on a title. Just click comment below — I’d greatly appreciate it!

This website is not a favorite website of mine, but a website I would highly recommend to the first-time computer builder [or even if you want to add additional hardware to your system]. It’s a comprehensive [exhaustive] primer on building computers, start to finish.

Here’s the link: How To Build A Computer - Wikibooks

Thro’ several miles of buffeting wind,
on recent trip to the Norther’lands*,
The sky fell out, a gusher true,
that turned the parchment streets to flowing
Rivers — washed the dust from ‘neath the carraige
and managed to slow our passing through.

*north Louisiana

Digg.com is an ever-changing news headline site where regular websurfers submit and “vote” on various articles online (the news headlines are then automatically sorted according to the number of “diggs”). The result is an interesting collection of cutting edge headline news, geeky trends, novel websites, and weird science. It’s great!

Here’s the link: Digg.com

Some birds fascinate me — woodpecker, wren, wood thrush, and mockingbird — but none so much as the hummingbird, especially when I delve into the amazing trivia behind these little guys [the only bird that can fly backwards, for instance].

I set up my digital camera on a tripod, aimed at the hummingbird feeder, to take a photo once a minute for an hour and a half, resulting in about five good shots of the hummingbirds as they fed. Two of these I combined in Photoshop to create what you see above.

Here’s a website/blog I frequent [two or three times a month]. It features “tantalisingly tasteful, tacky and taut tech trivia.” Actually, “trivia” is misleading: it features tech gadgets. And although I would never have enough money to support such a hobby, it sure is fun to window shop.

Here’s the link: The Red Ferret Journal

Stone. Earth. Fire. A length of twig draws careful circles in the dust. An ancient ritual begun.

Arms outstretched. Eyes closed tight. A torso, smeared with clay and mud, extends, yearning for something greater. Frozen, now, in perfect faith. Rigid. Stoic. Waiting.

The smoke carries familiar smells which sit sourly in the nose, creating headaches and visions. Spirals upward. Upward. To the treetops and beyond. Ambassador to the Great One, able to reach the heavens, beg for mercy.

Whispers the smoke: “Here I am. Here, I wait. A lowly creature bound to this land. Sentenced to find Your beauty here among the thorns and rocks and river currents. Here I am. Here, I wait.”

The smoke summons the courage; tells the long history; fills the eyes with tears.

A sound from within. A low groaning; a pain of the heart. It grows, contorts, takes shape into a cry. Not for help or pain. A cry for knowledge. For reassurance. For answers.

The cry stops. The echoes trail away. Deep and deeper into the woods, progressively fainter, until at last . . . silence. Vast, infinite silence.

The world has stopped its turning. No movement in the trees. No answer from the sky. The crackle and spark of fire have ceased, leaving an immediacy, an intimacy . . . a ribbon of smoke. A golden silence.

The Great One is listening.

We spend our lives questioning and testing and proving ourselves, seeking commendations from other men — our friends and fathers. Testing our mettle in battle, afraid we may not measure up to the ideal; but desperately needing the answer.

Are we here men of quality and good character? Will we yet pass this test? Some of us have survived the fogs of previous war, have taken our scars and given as many in return. Some of us have found our answer; some of us have not.

Until we know we know not. We shake in fear on the inside. We hurry to break our gaze and turn away. We cower but hesitate to run. Until we know we know not.

Our unanswered question keeps us in the battle. We fight on.