Question: What do you do alone, by yourself, on your own?

One may be the loneliest number, and no man is an island, but some things are better, or turn out better, when you do them yourself. The process itself may be more effective or rewarding. Or the product may be better or more enjoyable if it’s yours alone. Perhaps you have learned to do something and there is just nobody else who can do it as well, even though you’re banging your head to find someone to delegate it to or share the job with. So you do it yourself. Let me tell you about the things I find myself doing alone in this week’s podcast. And I’d like to hear from you about what you prefer to do alone.

Question: What’s your happy day?

http://annehodgson.de/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/happyday.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadPerhaps it’s a sign of the times, but several magazines here in Germany (Spiegel and Focus) have featured “happiness” as their title story. Well, it’s clearly a good thing to think about and discuss. The Beatles sang “Happiness is a warm gun”, with more than a touch of irony. […]

Question: Heroes or victims of circumstance?

It’s Memorial Day weekend, a national holiday dedicated to the soldiers who have fallen serving their country. By definition, that makes them heroes. Or are fallen soldiers victims of circumstance? Soldiers have a very important job to do, and we ask them to do their duty for us. Does doing that duty make them heroes? What exactly are we celebrating here? What do you think: Are we right in asking soldiers to do their duty? Are they heroes or victims of circumstance?

Podcasts are better than lectures

Students have been handed another excuse to skip class from an unusual quarter. New psychological research suggests that university students who download a podcast lecture achieve substantially higher exam results than those who attend the lecture in person. Podcasted lectures offer students the chance to replay difficult parts of a lecture and therefore take better […]

Pink flag

http://annehodgson.de/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/pink.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | Downloadred-rag and pink-flag by e e cummings red-rag and pink-flag blackshirt and brown strut-mince and stink-brag have all come to town some like it shot and some like it hung and some like it in the twot nine months young About this poem: e e cummings‘ satirical poem expresses […]

Robert Frost: Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

http://annehodgson.de/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/frost.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadWhose woods these are I think I know. His house is in the village though; He will not see me stopping here To watch his woods fill up with snow. My little horse must think it queer To stop without a farmhouse near Between the woods and frozen lake […]

The Spoken Web

http://annehodgson.de/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/spoken.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadIsn’t he lovely? Photo by Jurec, who found this Buddha “who really listens” in a Tempel in Hangzhou, China.  www.pixelio.de Asia is listening as IBM India Research Laboratory tests the World Wide Telecom Web (WWTW), a network of VoiceSites you access by phone. In this alternative to the WWW, […]