This American Life

My last post took a dump on iTunes and their dirty "protected files cannot be converted into other formats" deeds. Well, today I'm going to talk about one of my greatest iTunes related pleasures... Yes, folks, I'm talking about the This American Life podcast. This American Life is a radio show on NPR. I'd listened to it several time while journeying up and down the east coast in my driving days. But I don't drive anymore, or really listen to the radio like I used to (with the exception of Opie and Anthony). So now, thanks to iTunes, I can download a free weekly podcast of This American Life for some talk radio when I'm on the go.

There's a theme to each episode, and a variety of stories on that theme. It's mostly true stories of everyday people, though not always. There's lots more to the show, but, like we said, it's sort of hard to describe. [source]

And now it's a television show on Showtime, which I don't have, and I'm reminded of that everytime I see the subway posters for This American Life on Showtime. I hoped I could find full episodes of this quirky, odd show on YouTube, but I guess Showtime is smarter than HBO.

I don't know if you've ever heard the show, but you should check it out sometime (iTunes or otherwise).

Muxtape Madness

I updated my Muxtape. Check it out if you'd like. I got a little tripped up making this mix... Muxtape only accepts mp3s, but iTunes-purchased songs are in some fascist other format that wouldn't let me convert them to mp3s. So after I gave up on those tracks, and picked at least 4 new songs (the rest were easily converted), I finally figured out how to convert the iTunes-purchased songs into mp3s... I burnt them onto a cd, then ripped them onto my harddrive, then converted them into mp3s. That takes effort. Unfortunately most of the new music I buy is bought off iTunes; something I'm beginning to see as a mixed blessing.