🍕 Pizza jingle, The Bookdel Test, Snow White, python problems 🐍 Martha Pincoffs💪
💌Podcast The Newsletter is your weekly love letter to podcasts and the people who make them.💌
Bonjour!
This week we’re getting to peek into the podcast app and listening life of Becky Kilimnik, the producer and co-host of Homespun Haints, a podcast where guests are invited to tell their personal, paranormal experiences in a way that celebrates the art of storytelling.
The app I use: I switch between Apple and Spotify pretty frequently, depending on the device I’m listening on. Between work, kids, and family stuff, life is pretty hectic in our house so I just go to whatever is closest.
Listening time per weekL I feel like I always have headphones on! I spend about 20 hours per week listening to podcasts, and at least two thirds of that time is devoted to editing and reviewing my own episodes. I also try to spend time listening to shows that my friends and support network produce so I can stay on top of their content. For example, The Starling Creative by my friend Amy Markham is a small indie podcast on strengthening the creative process that is deep, inspiring, and intelligent. I love Lore and Stories with Sapphire as well. At least once a month, I try to find podcasts in the paranormal or paranormal-adjacent space that are both newer and older than mine. The more established pods help me listen for what I could be doing to improve Homespun Haints, while the newer ones give me an idea of who to watch and connect with.
When I listen: For my day job, I am a freelance designer, so I do a lot of listening to other hosts’ pods when I’m working on client projects in the mornings. I also listen while I make dinner in the evenings (I’m a foodie, so the evening meal is always ridiculously elaborate). I really like working on my show late at night. In the dark. After everyone has gone to sleep. Which is especially fun since I’m editing true ghost stories!
How I discover: Pre-pandemic, I found out about other podcasts through in-person networking and conferences. Now, however, I find great shows through social media. I’m very active on Instagram— @homespunhaints—and have found a lot of great pods and met a lot of great podcast producers on that platform.
Anything else? First of all, thank you so much for giving me a chance to talk to you, and thank you all for reading! If you like spooky stories, or if you just like hearing about how different people process and interpret unexplained experiences, please take a listen to Homespun Haints wherever you like to listen to podcasts. We’ve also just started a YouTube Channel which features stop-motion animated shorts (you read that correctly!) of some of the funny stories we share in addition to the spooky ones. And if you’ve ever seen a ghost and are eager to share your story with the world, please reach out to us!
xoxo lp
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Martha Pincoffs
Martha Pincoffs is a mom, a wife, a chef, a curious human, a story lover, and 1/3 of the podcast team behind Three Righteous Mamas. Follow her on Twitter here. Follow Three Righteous Mamas on Twitter here.
How did you get introduced to the audio space?
I fell in love with the audio stories via The Moth and How I Built This and This American Life. Those shows have gone with me on many a long road trip and walk and life in general. What I love so much about the audio space now is that there is something for everyone out there. The accessibility is pretty open right now and there are some really brilliant creators out there.
How did you get introduced to your cohosts Muna and Cristina?
Muna, Cristina, and I met after the election in 2016. We were all devastated by the results of the election and felt afraid for our families in that time. We also all got to work doing what we could to fight for the world where ALL of our kids have what they need to be successful in life.
Why is Three Righteous Mamas important?
Three Righteous Mamas is important because mom’s are often pandered to and condescended to in political and policy conversations. Subject matter is often limited to perceived “women’s issues” ie choice and childcare, when the reality is that we are affected by all of the issues, by money in politics, by economic policy, and climate policy. With Three Righteous Mamas we are driving the narrative for a “Righteous Mamas Agenda” for the world we intend to build for all of our kids and we believe that Mamas in particular have the moral courage to deliver that world.
How would you ask someone like Elizabeth Warren to be on the show?
She is 100% a dream guest! For Senator Warren in particular, I think we would appeal to her experience as a working mom and how fundamentally that shapes the work that she does in the world. She is vocal about that and is a great example of why we need more mamas in positions of power. In other words, we would go for that place where the heart and the brain connect.
What have you learned about the world making the show?
I have learned that our humanity is our connective tissue and that it is best tended in a very personal, very intimate way. I hear this resonance in Cristina’s stories and experiences from organizing, in Alicia Garza’s belief that “we are better than the worst thing we have ever done”, in Beto O’Rourke’s deep care for the communities in Texas. We are connected and we are only as good as the care we take of each other, our communities, our neighbors.
What's your relationship to your voice, and how would you describe it?
The cadence of my voices always surprises me, I can hear my brother in the rhythm and my sister in the tone. When I was younger (I’m 43 now) I couldn’t stand the way my voice sounded on tape. Now, I kind of like it. I’ve arrived at a place in my life where I really like myself and (finally) I say what I mean. That wasn’t always true, so it is always a relief to hear me speaking my own truth.
🚨If u only have time for 1 thing🚨
At age twelve, Adreanna Rodriguez had to make a bigger decision that most of us have any made in our entire lives. She is part of the Sioux tribe, and spent her childhood in youth shelters and foster homes with her younger brother and sister. One day, as part of the Indian Relocation Act, she was given the choice to be sent back to her reservation that her grandmother left over 60 years ago with her brother and sister, or remain with her foster family. She went with option two, but in Bloodlines, for VICE News and partnered with Snap Judgment, she revisits the reservation to imagine what her life could have been and how her childhood could have been different if she went with option one. It’s not a black and white solution, Adreanna will never know if she made the right decision. Thing things she uncovers are mind-boggling. The story is almost 40 minutes long, I could have listened to her talk for hours. And beginning at 13 minutes, I kept on thinking that the story was over, but it never was. This story is an emotional rollercoaster, incredibly personal, and so well produced. This story will stick with me.
💎BTW💎
🎙️You know how much I love Celebrity Book Club, so imagine the wild dance I was doing when I heard my own voice on it. Awhile ago, Chelsea Devantez asked people to call in and say…anything. And I did. (I suggested she come up with some sort of Bechdel Test-like metric for the celebrity memoirs she reads. I suggested she call it the Chelsea Test, but she had a much better idea—The Bookdel Test. You can listen to a clip here!) That is not why you should listen to this episode. At the end, Chelsea shares her own mini-memoir, parts of it we’ve heard her recall on the show before. But she has an amazing story of building herself up after being in an abusive relationship, like a really crazy one, and she found out that her biological father was a donor, which has given her all these thoughts about identity that I found fascinating. (I am so impressed with the beautiful way she invented her own name.) The story was so well-told. I want to read the book version. All of these celebrity memoirs she reads are compelling, but…I am not fucking with you…her story is the best. So this might just be the best episode yet. (And not because I’m on it.)
🎙️This episode of Endless Thread has all of my favorite things—pizza, mystery, weirdness, Ohio, and Amory Sivertson. (Amory I didn’t know you were from Cleveland! I am, too.) Amory presents a story she found on Reddit of a man so obsessed with a jingle on a local pizza commercial that he a) created two documentaries about it and b) was set to track down the man behind it. He just thinks the guy sounds cool. He is tickled by the fact that the man sings “pizza is my life.” His obsession alone is very interesting. I won’t spoil it for you, trust me that it’s a fantastic journey. (The commercial is so early 2000s Ohio.) Listen to the jingle and tell me you don’t want to know the story behind it.
🎙️I have never heard anything like Cold Case Crime Cuts. It’s a podcast that (fictionally) dives into some of the most horrific crimes of mankind, using the podcast itself to solve the case. Who really killed the radio star? Who shot the sheriff? It’s great to know about these pop-songs, also great if you’re familiar with that style of podcasting that is over-serious, especially when it comes to true crime. But it’s hysterical even if you know absolutely nothing. The “detective” uses real lyrics from the songs to solve the case. The best episode was about the Copacabana. I say this all the time, but I love a show that goes there and is dedicated to the joke. This show has invented a new kind of joke, and it’s endlessly rewarding. I’m dead.
🎙️Chelsey Weber-Smith ended their season of American Hysteria with an episode about urban legends, and if you enjoyed the books Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, you will love it. They end the episode beautifully pulling together what urban legends tell us about us. The writing on this show is fantastic, especially in this last episode. Chelesy’s writing is, what I think, what makes this show shine. I can’t wait to read Chelsey’s book. (That they should definitely write.)
🎙️Ayik Chut Deng was a child soldier in the Sudanese People’s Liberation Army and living in the Dinka tribe in what is now South Sudan, who eventually made his way to Australia as a refugee. You can hear his story on Snap Judgment. He is scarred by his experience, particularly by the memory of one of his tormentors (Glynn Washington keeps on using that word, and while it’s technically accurate, “tormentor” makes me think of a school bully, not someone who is actively trying to kill you, which is what we are talking about, here) who he ends up bumping into at a wedding. In Australia he ends up on a reality TV show called Look Me in the Eye, where contestants have to look someone from their past in the eye for five minutes on air, and he brings his tormentor onto the show. They lock eyes but this is just the beginning of the relationship, which Ayik and his tormentor continue after the show. This story isn’t just how a man heals from years of torture, but it’s about forgiveness and how relationships can blossom in literally the places you would never expect.
🎙️Dave Chappelle has dropped the first single from The Midnight Miracle, a show “that uniquely blends the salon and variety show traditions while providing a glimpse into the inner lives of hosts Talib Kweli, yasiin bey, Dave Chappelle, and friends.” It was recorded during Chappelle's 2020 Summer Camp in Ohio. I was almost a little nervous about this, I have not been a huge fan of some of Chappelle’s recent work. But this is classic storytelling Chappelle. This piece, anyway, takes place in Central Park with his wife. (And set to music from Robert Glasper.) There are so many tiny moments from this short story that feel big. This isn’t Dave trying to be edgy, it’s what he does best—telling intimate, funny, creative stories that make you feel like you’re sitting down in the kitchen with him or something.
🎙️Telling Stories is a podcast about how some of the best storytellers in audio tell stories, and each episode offers an exercise at the end provided by the guest, kind of like a homework assignment. Last week’s guest was Sharon Mashihi, creator of one of my favorite shows this year, Appearances. The way Sharon talks about Appearances made me want to listen to it all over again. Sharon is so deliberate in the choices she makes, there isn’t a second of that podcast that was an accident. She describes telling stories like rock climbing, something she does not do—storytellers are giving people something to grab onto, something to move them along. A lot of her work with Mermaid Palace, like most Mermaid Palace work, lives in uncomfortable places. And Sharon’s assignment has to do with just that: to tell a captivating story, think of something that makes you uncomfortable. You don’t have to tell that exact story, but that feeling you have, that feeling in your stomach, should take you somewhere interesting. Something that will grab your audience’s attention. Sharon was also on a recent episode of The Best Advice Show.
🎙️The voice of Erin Barker always comforts me, I usually get to hear it on Story Collider. But this week she was on an episode of Family Ghosts to tell a story about growing up Christian and finding out what that really means when she finds out she’s technically not. Erin is a beautiful storyteller, and this story has everything. Her mother sort of gaslights her into believing that she is not having an affair, which would go against Erin’s family’s strict Christian beliefs. Erin is able to take us through her childhood and pull out anecdotes that speak to faith, family, truth, and identity. This story stopped me.
🎙️If you enjoyed Jamie Loftus’ Lolita Podcast, you will be interested to hear the most recent episode of Family Secrets, which tells a real-life Lolita story, where a young, handsome teacher actually uses the book Lolita lure 17-year-old Alisson Wood into a sexual relationship Lolita-style. Try to be a little more creative next time, bud! The story is unnerving but as always, Dani Shapiro breaks through to the heart of the story. She always seems to have a greater understanding of the guest than I do, and she helps me get there. Alisson went on to become a teacher who nourishes her students instead of destroying them, and it’s so interesting to hear her reflect on things that happened to her as a child and teen, knowing what she knows now as a teacher and adult.
🎙️I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed Femlore’s episode on Snow White. The guest is Mindy’s mom, which in some cases could seem like, “why?” But she does such a nice job sharing memories of watching Snow White for the first time in a big fancy theater in 1957, which made me miss the magic of the movies. Or even thinking about what grand experiences I have had that compare to a family dressing up to go see a color movie in the movie theaters, something that was novel at the time. Mindy, Mindy’s mom, and Rachael cover all the fucked up things about the story—Snow White is supposed to be seven years old! And all the messages of agency, ableism, and the symbolism of the poisoned apple. This week Snow White also cancelled, so she was on my mind. And Jack O’Brien had such a funny recap of the story on The Daily Zeitgeist I had to clip it for you, here you go.
🎙️Rough Translation reran an old episode, War Poems, that can be experienced in an entirely new way now that Biden has announced the pull-out in Afghanistan on September 11. It tells the story of two soldiers in Afghanistan in 2010, Felisa Hervey and Tim Kirk, who had a different technique in gaining trust from the people there, by talking to them in their language, taking their sunglasses off and interacting with them, listening to them, sitting down for tea. The military didn’t appreciate their approach, and although it was effective, they were punished for doing it. This story goes so many places. You hear from Tim and Felisa at the beginning, you hear about how Felisa used poetry and cooking to build trust with the community, but you are warned that you won’t get to hear from Felisa in the same way at the end of the story. She had a rather mysterious stroke in Afghanistan and developed aphasia, which robbed her of her ability to speak. She had to leave Afghanistan, after many extended tours, but continues to write and read poetry today.
🎙️Florida has a Python problem—The Everglades have been invaded by a million Burmese Pythons, which can grow to be 20 feet long and have telephone-pole-sized girths. They’re completely fucking up the ecosystem, and snakes are even starting to show up in people’s front lawns. Roaring Earth has the story of the brave python hunters who are trying to lower the population so The Everglades can thrive, taking out these Pythons one by one. (It’s as scary as you think it’d be.) You probably won’t like to hear how they do this, but what options do they have? This piece takes you through all the dangers of letting them stay and fighting them in South Florida’s swamps in a kind of hand-to-hand (body?) combat style. Hear a clip here.
🎙️In June we can expect a report about what the government knows about UFOs, which is earth-shattering news if you’ve been following the history of our government not telling us stuff about UFOs. The shift in tone has people scratching their heads taking a close look at the messaging we’ve been getting over the years, and why it’s been so murky. The New Yorker Radio Hour has an amazing story about the history of UFOs and what the government has shared with us about them, and why some people may think they are a National Security Threat. I was on pins and needles, partially because of the story, but partially because of the music that was causing me to break out in goose bumps. Hear a clip here.
🎙️Fryda of teikirisi was on How to Talk to Mamí & Papí About Anything to reflect on how the challenging life of her mother led to the complicated relationship Fryda has with her mom now. Fryda craves independence and freedom, and her mom, still shell-shocked by what she went through, wants to keep Fryda close. Juleyka brings on an expert to help Fryda through the process of understanding where her mom is coming from, and what she can do to maintain peace (and boundaries.) If you’ve listened to teikirisi, and god I hope that if you are a reader of my newsletter you have, you will go in already knowing Fryda and her mom, and this episode will thicken your interest in Fryda (and her mom’s) story.
🎙️Emmy Laybourne (you totally remember her from 1999’s Superstar) is behind Workplace Comedy, a comedy improv podcast set at fiction water bottling company, Sterling Waters, which came under fire when an employee burn book was surfaced which roasted both employees and customers, and the company responded with a podcast, hosted by employees Jen and Valentina. I love how meta and wacky this idea is. There are so many tiny hysterical moments that made me choke on my coffee, and there are some big fun names that comedy podcast fans will recognize, like Carl Tart and Paul F Tompkins. The idea of a fictional podcast created to do company PR is genius—see it inRoss Sutherland’s brilliant series The Golden House.
🎙️Cold Case Crime Cuts and Workplace Comedy had me laughing, but I was snorting with laughter listening to this episode of The Daily Zeitgeist, where Miles, Jack, and guest Greg Edwards walk through a video of Fox News’ Brian Kilmead trying to dunk on a bunch of kids and get them to admit that Biden sucks. I have no words. I assume that if you take my podcast advice, you already heard it because you listen to the Daily Zeitgeist every day along with me. But in case you didn’t, I pulled a clip of the moment that had me cackling like an unhinged person here.
🎙️Wondery has launched its first U.K.-produced podcast, British Scandal. Narrated by co-host of My Dad Wrote a Porno’s Alice Levine, and The Political Party’s Matt Forde, the first series covers the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko, the Russian dissident who challenged the Kremlin and was eventually granted asylum in 2000 before he was eventually poisoned with something called polonium-210. British Scandal tells this story of espionage that was so detailed and exciting, it made me really miss watching The Americans. And the focus is on all of the speculation that surrounded the case, and how it completely fucked up the relationships between the UK and Russia. It’s a solidly listenable adventure, so easy to follow long. The jokes were unexpected and were also my favorite parts. I think this might be my favorite Wondery show yet.
🎙️I love the concept of Laura Cathcart Robbins’s The Only One in the Room…in it she asks guests to talk about when they were…the only one in a room. The stories range from an interview with Geoffrey Owens, a celebrity who was job-shamed for working at Trader Joes, to Matt Cox, who is writing true-crime stories from inside prison. I really enjoyed two recent episodes: a conversation with It’s Nice to Hear You’s Heather Li (I love Heather’s show) and a conversation with Birthful’s Adriana Lozada (I also love her show.)
🎙️My husband texted me a link to Open Mike Eagle’s What Had Happened Was with the following message: my eyeballs fell out when i saw, can we listen to one this weekend? God, I am madly in love with him. We listened together to the first episode of season two, which is dedicated to talking to El-P (season one interviews Prince Paul.) My husband was really into underground hip hop when El-P was in Company Flow, so he enjoyed the deep dive in episode one. This was mostly new to me, and it gave me so much appreciation for El-P, his journey as a very young rapper, his love for word play, and how he grew to fame from an extremely fucking indie rap group. If you’re not into underground hip hop you may not enjoy, but if you are, you will be entranced.
🎙️Foundering is Bloomberg’s serialized podcast that takes you to Silicon Valley to meet the world’s biggest tech CEOS, mining their stories to understand the DNA of their companies. The new season focuses on TikTok and its eccentric founder Alex Zhu, and episode one talks about how Alex built the app by closely following teen behavior (extremely closely.) It seems like an accident, and in fact the entire TikTok experience feels accidental. (That’s one reason I like it.) But this story reveals that everything about TikTok is intentional, and the people who worked on it give new meaning to the idea of a workaholic. The most interesting episode was episode 4, which focuses on how TikTok doesn’t exactly target little baby children but it doesn’t not target them. There is a jaw-dropping story about an 8-year old who downloaded an app at the urging of his teacher, and ended up falling victim to a bunch of creepy criminals. Listen to a clip of that here.
🎙️I love you!