Sam and girlfriend in Singapore.
Category: friends
Blifford The Drug Mule
Don’t ask. 🙂
AUDIO books and PODCASTS 2015
Seems everyone I know is now listening to audio books and podcasts. 🙂
In the fall of 2014, the medium of podcasting achieved a milestone moment. The podcast Serial – which reinvestigated the 1999 murder of Maryland high school student Hae Min Lee – became the fastest podcast to reach 5 million streams or downloads in iTunes history. Although the success of Serial – a spinoff of WBEZ’s This American Life – clearly represented a new peak in the popularity of podcasts, Pew Research Center data show that the medium has, in fact, been steadily growing its audience …
I’m currently subscribed to about 70 podcasts. But truly only listen to about a dozen of those. They are all free via iTunes.
I have about 20 audio books lined up into the future. I pay an average of about $10 for those.
I buy from Amazon – Audible.com.
The advantages of audio over reading are many. But progress in the switch over has been slower than I would have expected.
Sadly, Apple has mostly bungled podcasts. Their apps have been lousy. Yet the competitors have not dented the importance of iTunes in distribution.
Audible is too dominant in the audio book market. They don’t innovate. They charge too much / title. Yet competitors have not dented the market leader, Amazon.
related – Against all odds, print books are on the rise again in the US
snow FUN north Idaho
Farragut State Park.
Dave, Jeni and I did some virgin powder off-trail snowshoeing. 🙂
New Years 10km run
Good turn out at Adlard’s party the last night of 2015 – about 32 people and 2 dogs.
New Years day 10am tradition. The hung over first run of the year.
For the first time I actually trained for this. It did me no good. I ran about the same as usual – 1 hour.
stop logging the Ghost watershed
I signed a Change.org page:
Petitioning Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, Honourable and 2 others
Call for an immediate moratorium on logging in the Ghost Watershed.
Anna Glaser’s family has a vacation home in the Ghost. Spray Lake Sawmills wants to cut down as many trees as possible. Spray Lake Sawmills is the bad guy. 😦
Here’s Anna’s take on the situation – Ghost Stories
Here are Anna’s family and friends of the Ghost protesting.
John & Laura in Doha
After decades of threatening to come visit John & Laura in one of their exotic postings, I finally got to one.
John works for Shell Oil and has travelled the world for work. He, Laura and their kids have lived in a number of oil rich nations.
For the past few years they’ve been living in Qatar. I stayed one night at their home in the Shell Quipco Compound.
They drove me out into the desert to see one of the few tourist attractions I’d not yet visited, the Zubarah Fort. It’s a new world heritage site.
On the way home we tried a new Persian restaurant for lunch. Mixed tasty kabobs. Bread with dipping sauces. Fresh vegies.
Another night Laura made coconut shrimp.
I wish I could describe it … but all I remember was how much wine we drank. I passed out instantly after falling on the bed.
Oddly, it briefly rained in Doha. It had rained twice on my in Saudi. Seems I’m a rain maker.
John, Laura and I talked of the future. Hoping to meet up one day for a travel adventure.
Mike Sissons sculpture
