FAS & Musicophilia

"Foreign Accent Syndrome (FAS) is a speech disorder that causes a sudden change to speech so that a native speaker is perceived to speak with a foreign accent."

Wha...?! I've never heard of this. It's rather interesting to read about. It makes me think of Oliver Sacks' book, Musicophilia. Lo and behold, there's a website for Musicophilia. There are videos of Sacks talking about some of the cases he discusses in the book. (Sacks is a neurologist; the movie Awakenings was based on his book of the same title, and his book The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat is very much worth reading.) He talks about amusia, the inability to recognize music as music -- instead, music just sounds like noise. And synesthesia, and music therapy.... Lots of interesting things which are much more interesting coming from him.

Some podcast recommendations

Quick and Dirty Tips has several podcasts; the one I've enjoyed is Grammar Girl -- check her page for some grammar tips and links to the podcast. You can also sign up for her e-mail list, which is also fun. Other Quick and Dirty Tips podcasts are listed, from Mighty Mommy to The Digital Marketer. I've not listened to anything but Grammar Girl, but thought I'd let you know there's other stuff there in case you think I'm weird for enjoying grammar.

Another fun word-oriented podcast is Podictionary, "the podcast for word lovers." Each podcast looks at the etymology of one word. The podcast is pretty short but guaranteed to make you say, "I didn't know that!"

Not so interested in this stuff? Give Agatha Christie Radio Mysteries a shot. Search for it in iTunes if you'd like -- that's where I usually get it. Now it appears that this website is the same thing, but I can't swear to it. It's a really cool production some of Christie's mysteries, with great actors involved, not just some dude/chick reading from a book. Although, for a dude who does a great job with that, check out The Classic Tales podcast and extra stuff available on that site.

As long as I'm listing podcasts I listen to regularly....

Anything Ghost -- Lex Wahl reads paranormal stories sent in by listeners. There's some fun creepy stuff, and Lex's voice is really easy for me to listen to.

Dean Koontz -- Unlike his books, his podcast is pretty free of creepy stuff. I enjoy the stories he tells about the publishing world, and he is a big dog lover, so his dog stories are always fun to hear.

Coraline & Knitting

Hmm. Appears there was a contest for knitting patterns related to Neil Gaiman's Coraline? Curious, curious. The gal who did the pattern says she saw Mr. G at a signing where he was reading from The Graveyard Book and there's a photo of it as well. Now, I saw him in Philly on Day 2 of that tour and he had a broken finger on his right hand and couldn't sign. So. Why's he signing in this pic? Curious, curious.

By the way, the aforementioned knitting site also includes free patterns. Now, I can always count on Gaiman's blog/journal to have lots of good links and info, but this is the first time it has led me to cool knitting stuff.

Post-Halloween Halloweeny Shtuff

This made me laugh out loud: The Onion News Network doing a news-program-esque discussion, "Has America Lost Sight of the True Spirit of Halloween?" One of the people says she asked her nephew if he knows why he wears a costume for Halloween. She and the others are appalled that he said he does it for fun and for candy. She says, "He didn't even know that it was to protect his virgin spirit from the wretched dead that roam the earth one night a year to steal souls."

And, uh... since I posted the link for Neil Gaiman's website, you've been checking it daily, right? Riiiight? Well... you could check it now for some fun with a spooky song. And I know I haven't yet done the proper hooting and hollering for having been able to see him (yes, him -- Neil, the Neil Gaiman) in Philly. But I saw him on day 2 of the tour for The Graveyard Book (think of The Jungle Book only... not a jungle), which means he read Chapter Two. At the reading, Neil (can I call you Neil?) had us all say hello to posterity -- his reading of the chapter was filmed and is up for free, there with his readings of the rest of the book. I know day one was in NYC. Folks... these are long videos. But Gaiman always does a great job reading his own stuff.