Sunday, September 23, 2012

Episode #051, 23.09.2012: encumbrance

Please don’t forget to write in for episode 52 with your favorite words!

encumbrance, noun. Burden; annoyance; impediment; without encumbrance: having no children; claim, mortgage, etc., on property. From Old French encumbrance.
In a sentence: “The heavy bag was quite an encumbrance for him.”
I’ve encountered this word in a computer game. In the game, the encumbrance is the amount of weight my hero carries.

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Sunday, September 16, 2012

Episode #050, 16.09.2012: Spotlight: other podcasts

Wow, we finally arrived at episode 50! I can’t believe I am doing this for almost a year. To be exact, I will have done it one year when we arrive at episode 52. That’s why I decided to do a “best of” episode. I will present the Top 10 of the words I have presented to you for one year. Please write in and tell me your favorites.
Today we will talk about other podcast that you might want to listen to. There are many interesting, smart and funny podcasts out there. They are free and they are done by people who really like what they are doing. And no matter which subject you are looking for – there is a podcast about that subject!
So let’s see. Copyright is a complex thing, but you can be sure that if the author has been dead a considerable amount of time, his works are in the public domain. This is true (or partly true) for Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, Emily Brontë, Lewis Carroll, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Brothers Grimm, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Homer (and other writers from Ancient Greece), Jack London, H. P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe, William Shakespeare, Mary Shelley, Robert Louis Stevenson, Bram Stoker, Mark Twain, Jules Verne, H.G. Wells and Oscar Wilde.
This means that everyone can distribute their work, which Wikisource does, which is part of the Wikimedia Foundation. They will also tell you for each work, why it is in the public domain.
Also, everyone can record and distribute himself reading the works. This is what many podcasters do. LibriVox is a project designed to provide as many audio books from the public domain as possible. Listen to the stories of Huckleberry Finn, the Sea-Wolf, Faust, Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Frankenstein, Dracula, Dorian Grey and others.

Then there are modern authors who donate their works to the public domain by choice. I can recommend:

But that’s not all! There are many podcast with wonderful content, including (but not limited to):
  • Existence is Wonderful by Anne Corwin about Transhumanism. It’s unfortunately gone as podcast, but still existent as a blog.
  • Matt's Today in History about historic events. The episodes are not too long and it is always very interesting.
  • Onion Radio News. Parodic news and one of my favorites.
  • peikoff.com Q&A on Ayn Rand about philosophy. Dr. Peikoff invites his listeners to send in philosophic questions. No matter if you agree with him or not, his answers to questions are well thought-out. The questions range from something as stupid as “What should I do about my small penis?” to “What is the meaning of life?” Most of the time Dr. Peikoff has insights which other people might not even consider.
  • SWITCHFOOT Bootlegs. Free legal live recordings from the awesome band.
  • Terror Transmission. If you like horror movies, this is a must.
  • Weird Worm. About weird topics.
  • auboutdufil.com. Free legal podsafe music from France.
  • danielcoffeen's Podcast and Rhetoric 10. An American rhetoric who taught me much about the English language
  • The Devil's Mischief. There, you will hear really funny American comedians.
  • True Capitalist Radio by Ghost. Ghost is nuts. But: He’s entertaining, even though he doesn’t want to be. And in his sane moments, he has some very good advice.
  • HalfCast Podcast. Quirky humor with good background music.
If you find the feed, but don’t find the podcast in the iTunes store, in iTunes simply click on Advanced, then Subscribe to Podcast and then enter the URL.

There are also awesome video podcasts. NASA and ESO have a couple of well-done podcasts, telling you about space and their numerous telescopes, leaving you in awe. Those are:
In addition there are:
  • Beautiful places in HD. Shows you places in the US, where you would like to hike, too.
  • Barely Political - Funny Political Videos
  • Doctor Cockney. A self-proclaimed International Sex Therapist with much charisma asking people in the street personal questions – which they are willing to answer! Very entertaining and also intriguing.
  • Midwest Teen Sex Show. Sex education done in an entertaining, ironic way. Adults can learn from it, too – or at least they can laugh at their many jokes. By the way: Don’t take their jokes seriously. They also do Real American Family about the difficulties of family life
  • Noodle Scar Daily HD. Quirky humor. I still don’t know if the host is putting on an act or not.
  • Onion News Network. Really funny parodic news.
  • spy films. Just amazing clips. The move District 9 is based on one of their short films.
  • A Year at the Wheel. Amazing citizen journalism.
Check out the blog for links! I hope I sparked some interest in you to listen to some of the podcast. If you are not a native speaker, that can only be good for your English. Don’t forget to write in to awordaweek@hotmail.de and tell me which words you liked the most.

This is the script to an episode.
You can listen to this episode at: awordaweek.podomatic.com
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Sunday, September 9, 2012

Episode #049, 09.09.2012: tissue, kleenex, handkerchief

Sound: /ˈtɪsju/
tissue, noun.
  1.  (any kind of) woven fabric
  2.  mass of cells and cell-products in an animal body
  3. tissue paper: thin, soft paper for wrapping things, protecting delicate articles, etc.; toilet tissue: soft paper for use in the W.C. (toilet); face tissues: for use in wiping off lip-stick, face-cream, etc.
  4. (figuratively) web or network; series: a tissue of lies
Sound: /kli.nɛks/
kleenex, noun. (North America) A generic term for any type of disposable tissue.
Sound: /ˈhæŋkətʃɪf/
handkerchief, noun.
  1.  A piece of cloth, usually square and often fine and elegant, carried for wiping the face, eyes, nose or hands.
  2.  A piece of cloth shaped like a handkerchief to be worn about the neck; a neckerchief or neckcloth.

In a sentence: “My nose is running. Could you give me a tissue?”

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Sunday, September 2, 2012

Episode #048, 02.09.2012: quaestor

Sound: /ˈkwiːstə/
quaestor, noun. Ancient-Roman official, state-treasurer, paymaster, etc.; treasurer.
In a sentence: “In 63 BC Caesar served as a quaestor in Spain.”
This word is not only used for Roman treasures, but sometimes even for today’s officials. In the European parliament and at the University of St Andrews, the treasurers are called quaestors.

This is the script to an episode.
You can listen to this episode at: awordaweek.podomatic.com
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