Podcast Ping's Christmas Calendar Day 25

Day 25. Christmas Day!



http://www.archive.org/download/PodcastPingsChristmasCalendarDay25/ppcc25.mp3

For this show I have something special.

Some people might find the song I chose, “Rainbow Christmas” to have a little too much “rainbow” in it. But it's the sort of song that makes for a big production number that closes out a show and I felt it suitable for that. It's been a long run starting back on December 1st of 25 shows, and there was a lot of work that went into making them even before that.

The biggest job was in coming up with enough poetry to fill the shows. And since I only had about five or six Christmas poems, I had to write about twenty. Now writing twenty poems isn't that difficult, but having to make them all tie in with a theme like Christmas--while still keeping them from sounding too much alike--is.

This last poem, “How Jamie MacPherson Saved Christmas” is one I wrote some while back. And to make it extra special I decided to have the cast of the Blue Hot Gossip Comedy show read it. Part of this decision was because I had just come off of doing the Halloween episodes and was sort of in a mood for it, but I also wanted the poem to be a little more than just me reading it.

Some might notice a similarity of approach as with “A Pickle for Christmas,” the poem I wrote for the Podcast Pickle Christmas skit a couple years ago. I likely would have used this poem for that, but there wasn't enough interest. And in some ways it works out a little better since I know the rhythm of the poem which is thrown off when trying to get a number of people reading it.

I've been fortunate that there's not been any major outages with Internet Archive or Blogger. And even though Mininova, where I post the torrentcast, changed over about a week before I was to start, it's turned out to be a big benefit since I'm seeing much higher download numbers than I've seen before. The 24 posted episodes so far have exceeded 42,000 downloads with many individual episodes exceeding 2,500 downloads. It might not be cash, but it helps to make the work worthwhile.

This post finishes Podcast Ping's Christmas Calendar. The next one should be the New Year's episode, provided I can get it done. It won't be a regular episode, but I'll explain that more then.

Podcast Ping is licensed under Creative Commons, Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0.

My online toy shop can be found at http://patrickjmcnamara.webs.com.

Podcast Ping's Christmas Calendar Day 24

Day 24. Christmas Eve. Just one more sleep until Christmas--unless you're Santa Claus.



http://www.archive.org/download/PodcastPingsChristmasCalendarDay24/ppcc24.mp3

Christmas Eve is often a quiet time around our house. Most of the real celebrating--and noise--comes on Christmas. And with Christmas falling on a Friday this year it seems to make for a short week. Nobody works on Christmas Eve, even if they have to.

Next year it hits on a Saturday, so the week will feel more normal. The following year it it falls on a Sunday, which as kids we use to like because it meant only going to mass once in the week.

I'll most likely get to the early mass on Christmas Eve, which typically means arriving up to an hour early just to get a seat. But there's something relaxing about coming home afterward; it feels like I'm starting Christmas early.

Podcast Ping is licensed under Creative Commons, Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0.

My online toy shop can be found at http://patrickjmcnamara.webs.com.

Podcast Ping's Christmas Calendar Day 23

Day 23.



http://www.archive.org/download/PodcastPingsChristmasCalendarDay23/ppcc23.mp3

Another song about toys. Although "The Wonderful World of Toys" wasn't really a Christmas song even though it did talk about toys. But most Christmas songs tend to be more about snow and socializing than the part most really look forward to--the presents.

A couple more posts and the Calendar will be finished. But then I've got to start working on the New Year's show. It's not a lot of work but between Halloween and the Calendar I've been working on the podcast almost every day since August. Of course there were many days I didn't get anything done, but there was still the need to get it done.

Doing the Calendar on it's own wouldn't have been so bad but I started on it before even posting the last Halloween episode. Most episodes just take a few days of occasional work and then I'm done, so between the two it's felt like a marathon.I did fine the Halloween episodes more fun, but I had more time to do them and it took only two weeks to post them. Although because of the scripting I probably did just as much writing, if not more, for the 13 Days than for the Calendar. The Calendar was sort of like running a marathon the day after running one. I just didn't have as much energy.

I could skip the New Year's episode, or just make it a run of music, but I already worked out an idea for it that I want to do. It shouldn't be too difficult, it's just a matter of doing the prep work. And for the idea I have, New Year's seems appropriate.

Podcast Ping is licensed under Creative Commons, Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0.

My online toy shop can be found at http://patrickjmcnamara.webs.com.

Podcast Ping's Christmas Calendar Day 22

Day 22.



http://www.archive.org/download/PodcastPingsChristmasCalendarDay22/ppcc22.mp3

No matter how busy one is, someone else always seems to find more work for one to do.

I'm not in too bad a shape. I've still got a couple gifts to make, but those don't have to be done until after Christmas. The ones for Christmas are already wrapped and under the tree. I planned on getting some baking done early, but I never found the time. However, I expect there will be a fair bit of baking going on over the next couple days.

Although it's not been a real chore, I will be glad to finish the Calendar. It's a bit of a nuisance to have to post every evening. It doesn't take that long, depending upon how long a writeup I do, but it is disruptive.

Podcast Ping is licensed under Creative Commons, Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0.

My online toy shop can be found at http://patrickjmcnamara.webs.com.

Podcast Ping's Christmas Calendar Day 21

Day 21.



http://www.archive.org/download/PodcastPingsChristmasCalendarDay21/ppcc21.mp3

Only three days left (after today/Monday). Although there's four shows left because I'm putting one out on Christmas as well. (Although I'll actually be posting it the night before as I have been with the other episodes.) And I have something somewhat special planned for the Christmas show.

I always listen to episodes of my own show before posting, and often afterwords as well. Usually I wind up listening to each episode at least five or ten times, aside from the time I spend listening while putting the show together. The first few times are to listen for any mistakes, and I've sometimes re-done a show because I didn't like how something sounded. I didn't have time to redo these shows, although if the recording was obviously noisy when I first recorded it I did redo it at the time, so none of them are too severe. However, there's a few I would have rerecorded to get rid of a bit of hiss. Still, I haven't heard any complaints.

Podcast Ping is licensed under Creative Commons, Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0.

My online toy shop can be found at http://patrickjmcnamara.webs.com.