From Today in the Past to This Week in Google this is PodcastJunky and I listen to it all. I share the best stuff on my iPod and ask you the question…What are you listening to?

To answer that question, my call in line (714) 855-2639

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to sit down with a character from history and chat?  Each week The host and producer of the show, David Swenson sits down with President Thomas Jefferson to discuss events in the news and answer listener questions. The snow is called The Thomas Jefferson Hour. This is not Sci Fi or time travel. In fact Thomas Jefferson is not even played by an actor. He is played by humanities scholar and award winning first person interpreter Clay Jenkinson. While Mr. Jenkinson does dress in costume for speaking engagements and remains “in Character” he does not consider himself an actor. He doesn’t try to speak with an accent and there is no time traveler,  ghost or reincarnation back story. Mr Jenkinson has thorally studied the works of and about Thomas Jefferson so he can answer questions in the way Jefferson probably would answer them if he were here.

I’m going to play you a clip from a recent episod where Jefferson was asked about the recent Texas decision to remove him from the history text books in that state. This texas decision is more importaint that you might think because text book companies generally don’t make a seperat text book for each state. Texas has a large population and buys a lot of text books. Text book publishers have to comply with Texas standards if they want this lucrative customer. So Texas standards become the standards for the rest of the states.

Lets listen to what Mr. Swenson and President Jefferson have to say on the topic. In this clip President Jefferson gives his reaction to the Texas decision, gives us a lesson in the Constitution, and reacts to how he personally feels about being given “the boot” from the Texas text books.

Audio Clip here

Thank you for the enlightenment Mr. President.

Mr. Jefferson goes on to discuss related issues for about 35 minutes and then the show switches to the second half of the format where Clay Jenkenson comes out to play.

Mr. Jenkenson is a cultural commentator and  humanities scholar.  He has been honored by two presidents. He received one of the first five Charles Frankel Prizes from President George Bush. It is now called the National Humanities Medal and is the National Endowment for the Humanities highest award.  President and Mrs Clinton invited him to be the first public humanities scholar to present a program at a White House-sponsored event. He presented Thomas Jefferson for a gathering hosted by President and Mrs. Clinton. Mr. Jenkenson also served as the major humanities commentator for The Ken Burns documentary on Thomas Jefferson.

In the second part of the show Mr. Jenkenson gives his own comentary on the subjects discussed by Mr. Jefferson. Here are some of Mr. Jenkenson thoughts on the topic of the first amendment and the separation of church and state.

Audio Clip here

As you can see Mr Jenkenson is a bit more animated on this topic than Mr. Jefferson was. That is not always the case. There are shows where President Jefferson is much more animated and pasionat and Mr. Jenkenson takes a more reserved view.

The Thomas Jefferson Hour is first a radio show distributed to affiliate stations by Prairy Public Radio FOR FREE! This highly polished, educational and in my opinion very entertaining and thought provoking show is offered for free. Not all public radio shows are free to affiliates.

The show is in it’s low 800’s. Only the last 200 or so are available and I couldn’t find a date for the first show but doing the math on a weekly show that would take almost 16 years. They have been podcasting the show weekly since at least March 2006. That is impressive consistency.

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This Week in Google is part of Leo Laport’s TWiT network of mostly geek and teck podcasts. A round table style show where the hosts discuss all things google and cloud computing.

Today in the Past- The Thomas Jefferson Hour attempts to accuratly represnt the past. Today in the past makes no such attempt. The host is John Hodgman, you may not know the name but you would know the face. He is PC in the Apple adds. He accounts of what happened today in the past usually does not have even a nugget of truth to ts. But it is fun:-)

Music on this show was

Now then Soon by Third Man

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Below is a partial transcript of the episode.

From Forensic 4cast to Comedy4cast to,this is PodcastJunky and I listen to it all. I share the best stuff on my ipod and ask you the question…What are you listening to?
And to answer that question, my call in line (714) 855-2639

I’m back! Yes, I know, it’s been a while, sorry. But my microphone has not gotten dusty in my absence. I was busy starting a new podcast. Mean Mommies Club. More on that after the main content which is Chasing the Bard.

Here is a taste of this story which is both delightful and dark.

Chasing the Bard Promo

Chasing the Bard is a story of the world of the fairy’s but don’t think Disney, think A Midsummer Night’s Dream . What if William Shakespeare was not writing about a world he created but instead a world he was experiencing. The fairy world, or, the fey as described in Chasing the Bard is a far more rich and deep world than anything Tinker Bell or her fairy friends at Disney Studios could ever imagine.

A malaise is taking over the fey world and it is dieing. Their only hope for survival is The Bard himself William Shakespeare.

But Will is not so eager to leave this world. Time works differently in the fey world and Will knows that it is possible he may never return or return to find his wife and children have grown old and passed away.

When I describe this podcast to friends often the first question is about the language. Is it like Shakespeare? Does it have all the flowery language?

As a side note, Shakespeare’s done right is understandable. See Kenneth Branagh’s versions of Much Ado About Nothing and my favorite Henry V for examples. The story and imagery will draw you in and the language is no longer a hindrance to our modern ears.

Never the less, is not written in the 1500’s it was written by the thoroughly modern Philippa Ballantine. Philippa is a New Zealand author and podcaster. She has published two books. Did I say 2? We’ll add one to that, more about that in a moment. Currently published books are Chasing the Bard and Weaver’s Web which is also available as a PodioBook. She also does the podcast Whispers at the Edge where she talks about life in Wellington, New Zealand and about being a writing.

Phillipa does include a warning at the beginning for Mature themes and situations. The story is not for kids but most of it wouldn’t be a problem for kids to overhear. The l few not so kid friendly parts you will be able to see coming with plenty of time to hit skip and listen to later.

The clips I have chosen are of course as always, kid friendly. So for those of you still worried about the language, here we go. The first clip I am going to play is from Chapter 1. Puck The Trickster has left the fey to investigate the human world. He is following Bess, a midwife who is on her way to a birthing. We later discover this is the birth of Will Shakespeare.

Clip from Ch1

The second section I have for you is from Chapter 3. Will Shakespeare is a child in this scene and Puck has taken the form the family cat so that he can watch over young will.

Clip from CH 3

I promised you more about a third book Philipa is having published. Digital Magic The sequel to Chasing the Bard will be available on Amazon.com on 08-08-08. The promotion for this has been massive. Philipa has gotten together with Tee Morris to promote both of their books coming out that day. The Case of the Pitcher’s Pendant the sequel to Tee Morris’s The Case of the Singing Sword will also be available on 08-08-08. They are calling their double promotion Double Trouble. When you get Tee and Pip together, it’s always trouble.

The promotion for this has been massive.The back seat producers have done 8 reviews of films with 8 in them to honor of 08-08-08. Tee and Pip have done thousands of podcast interviews. Ok that may be an exaggeration but seriously they are all over the podosphere with the interviews. I’ll be interviewing them at the expo later on this month. Best of all they have both put the PDF of their book online for FREE, and if I do the tech part correctly you should be able to find both PDF’s in my feed as well. If not, check the show notes for links.

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Forensic 4cast Each episode the hosts discuss recent news that impacts on computer forensic investigations and those that perform them. This is not the glamorous world of CSI, it’s computer forensics. digging into computers in hopes of extracting the stuff the bag guys thought they had deleted permanently. It’s definitely a niche audience.

Comedy4cast is a short form comedy podcast. Monologues, skits, whatever the host Clinton finds funny. It’s comedy in 4 minutes or less.

Now as for my reason for being gone for so long.

Promo for Mean Mommies Club

Together with two of my closest friends have started a parenting podcast called Mean Mommies Club . We found that all of us had similar parenting philosophies. We wanted to share our loving but no nonsense approach to parenting. It’s nothing new, there have been mean mommies and daddies around ever since the first toddler had a temper tantrum. But we also see lots of misbehaving toddlers who parents give into their demands or worse try to be a friend instead of a parent. So if you are a parent, please check out Mean Mommies Club.

Music on this show was now then soon by 3rd Man from the Podsafe Music Network

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Tue, 1 April 2008

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I Remember Joe: A 2008 Tribute

These are the reflections, the memories, and the considerations of people from across the country and around the world that called Joe Murphy “friend”…

• Chris Lester (Detroit, Michigan)
• Brad Bowyer (Louisville, Ketuckey)
• Valerie Griswold-Ford (Conchord, New Hampshire)
• Kevin Bachelder (Boston, Massachusetts)
• Megan Enloe (Orange County, California)
• Cat a/k/a The SciFi Ranter Girl (Houston, Texas)
• Zac Ricks (Rexburg, Idaho)
• Nathan Lowell (Greeley, Colorado)
• Paul Fischer (Dunn Loring, Virginia)
• Tony Mast (Ofallon, Missouri)
• Just a J0e (Podosphere, The Internet)
• Robin Hudson (Seoul, Korea)
• Philippa Ballantine (Wellington, New Zealand)
• Tee Morris (Manassas, Virginia)
• TD-0013 (Dune Sea, Tattoine)
• Debbie Walker (Mesa, Arizona)
• Jack Mangan (Phoenix, Arizona)
• Sheila Unwin (Chandler, Arizona)
• Evo Terra (Chandler, Arizona)

These are only a few of the lives this one single voice in the podosphere touched. This is a show that may make you laugh, may make you cry, and will give you a look at the soul we all knew for far too brief a time. For those of you contributing to this audio tribute, we at the Joe Murphy Memorial Fund thank you.

Direct download: I_Remember_Joe__A_2008_Tribute.mp3