Significant Others: Mary Lincoln
- The Big Idea: President Lincoln’s wife, Mary Lincoln, may have been largely responsible for his political ambitions and trajectory.
- This is a somewhat new podcast from Team Coco and Liza Powel O’Brien (Conan O’Brien’s wife) all about significant others in the lives of famous people from history. It’s not always spouses either.
- This is a quite serious and very well researched history podcast that is also quite good!
- Each episode has a follow up episode that discusses the person in question with a special expert guest. The special guest episode for Mary Lincoln happens to be Conan O’Brien, who is a massive Lincoln nerd.
- I also listened to the episode about Countess Sophia Tolstoy, which was a rollercoaster. Her and her famous husband both kept diaries and the shit they would say about each other was really something. Particularly when she was sick of his BS later in their marriage.
- I went down a YouTube rabbit hole learning more about Liza Powel O’Brien who seems pretty great and talented. Here is a clip of Conan telling Michelle Obama on her podcast how Liza and him met, and here is a longer clip of Liza telling her side of the story on the Inside Conan podcast. And watch how Conan and Liza in a clip on his podcast talking about her new podcast.
The Daily: Cosmic Questions [site w/ transcript]
- The Big Idea: Amanda Aronczyk on Twitter said it best: “Today’s episode of The Daily is all: it’s summertime, come, smoke some weed with us.”
- An offbeat episode I am totally here for. Dennis Overbye, the cosmic affairs correspondent for the NYT, answers some big and existential cosmic questions.
- If you, like me, would like to hear more from Dennis Overbye and wish he had his own podcast, here is a short list on Listen Notes of other shows he has been on.
- Fantastic quote: "Black holes are the cat videos of astronomy."
Clear + Vivid with Alan Alda: Katie Mack — When Time’s Totally Up
- The Big Idea: The universe can end in some dramatic ways, including one we wouldn’t even see coming.
- In this podcast, Alan Alda speaks with folks who are some of the best public communicators out there. He loves talking to scientists and science communicators, and Katie Mack is one of the best in both categories.
- I made a visual about one of my favorite parts of the episode.
The World as You’ll Know It: Solving the Mysteries of Alzheimer’s
- The Big Idea: A clear explanation on what is going on in the brain with Alzheimer’s, what we know, and what we don’t. An acronym for trying to ward off Alzheimer’s is SHIELD. Sleep (get 7-8 hours), Handle stress, Interact with friends, Exercise, Learn new things, Diet (Mediterranean is ideal).
- The newest season for The World as You’ll Know It is all about the advances in the understanding of the brain and neuroscience. From what I’ve heard, it’s a very solid science interview show with great questions and great guests.
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