Category: podcast

barklife on the road: adventurecast parts 1 and 2

we did an experiment this week with the recording—and it was largely successful-ish!

some background: way back in december i (jahnna) won a contest at school by knitting my own ugly holiday sweater, and the prize was a day off from school. it’s not been a good year for being able to get a sub and take a day off from school, nor was there anywhere to go until recently. with jefferson county finally making it to the green for covid levels, the weather finally accepting that it’s probably going to stay spring, and happening to have lunch with one of our regular subs one day and asking her availability for april, we settled on taking a day out in barren county, ky.

why barren county? because i went on a field trip to mammoth cave when i was in fifth grade (thanks again, dad, for chaperoning), and it was really interesting, and josh had never been but also because DINOSAUR WORLD is in barren county. if you’ve ever driven on the stretch of i-65 down around cave city and bowling green, ky, you have seen photosaurus out by the highway. we have been driving this stretch of highway to visit my dad since we moved to chicago, and after 10 years, it was time to take the plunge. 

what does all of this have to do with the podcast? we have some of our most wide-ranging conversations in the car, and we recorded this one for you. we’ll release it as four special edition adventure episodes in the coming weeks. 

the first 2 episodes were from the drive to mammoth cave. we talk about (among other things): 

  • why train travel is great and there should be a train between louisville and nashville
  • our trip to montreal in 2019 and how clean their public transit was
  • wren’s recent surgery and why the surgi-snuggli is great
  • herb alpert & the tijuana brass
  • that our house is a mess, we may need to check in with our mental health professionals about it, and we definitely need the skilled labor of a housekeeper
  • the value in faking it until you make it, saying i’m sorry, and admitting you don’t know things (and also the downside to faking it well)
  • how i’m taxing all of my fifth graders for paper, but they’re actually learning something about american history as well as the value of service to their community in time rather than in treasure
  • how the pandemic killed the development of empathy which was already on its last legs for the age group i teach because of the anonymity of the internet

some links:

josh mentions mammothcaveblueberries.com which, unfortunately, is no longer a valid url, but you can find wild blueberries and blackberries in barren county, and blueberries will grow in kentucky (see this article from the UK extension office on growing highbush blueberries)

stay tuned for adventure episodes 3 & 4 where you can find out how our tour of mammoth cave went and what we thought about dinosaur world as well as listen to us eat crunchy things from sonic.

new barklife episode! “…except for the mongols”

once again, i (josh) intended to put better show notes in here. perhaps, someday, i will. guess you’ll just have to listen if you want to know what we talked about. it definitely involved mongols somehow. kind of. and some general life updates from casa harvey-groft.

jahnna: i’d like to add a special thank you to john green and all the folks at crash course world history for the idea for the episode title.

i’d also like to clarify that i think modern russian history is more helpful than general russian history because russia otherwise follows a similar arc to other european monarchies albeit with a longer-running interest in strongman politics and the cult of personality.

also, in addition to mongols we discuss bowling for soup, and i didn’t mention my enormous love for the song “critically disdained,” and i should have. so now you know.

you also now know that maybe i should write the show notes and not josh.

barklife valentine’s edition

things we don’t like

josh: ah, well… i don’t really have time for show notes today. jahnna is reading Radium Girls and i’m reading Sartre. other show mentions include Tori Amos, Little Women, Ani DiFranco, Liz Phair, Alanis Morisette, and probably some other stuff. you can look it up if you need to, you’re a smart kid.

jahnna: other podcasts for valentine’s day may use as a starting point things they love, but we started with things we don’t like. because that’s how we roll.

a side note: there will be no new pod episode on 2/26. we took a week off from recording for winter break and so otis could enjoy the winter olympics.

otis enjoying some short track speed skating

barklife episode 6 is up!

all we do is dogs and books

as the title suggests, our protagonists discuss both dogs and books, and how we, as a culture, underestimate kids’ reading capabilities and emotional capacities. also, Animal Crossing. beware spoilers for I’m Thinking of Ending Things.
links to other things, mostly books, that are mentioned in this episode:

a further note from jahnna: don’t read the snake book. it really is too disappointing for words.

also, i would never be mean to a living thing like i was to that animal crossing character. you have to lower the friendship score to basically nil before they’ll move away. he finally left. all is well on bark isle now.

barklife episode 5 notes: year in review

jahnna and josh are back to give you a year-end wrap-up. sort of. we sort of ramble, as always, as the words escaping our mouths struggle to keep up with our brains. in episode 5, we find some things that didn’t suck about 2021, as well as desires for 2022 (but not goals, because we don’t do new year’s resolutions). and this episode has been optimized for podcast listening, in terms of loudness, according to Apple. sorry if the previous episodes have been too loud.

as ever, our theme music is Bark-a-Tron 5000 by Bad Ronald.

some media referenced in this episode: