Series for your summer queue

Debt debacles, climate activism, the cost of climate change, Amy Adams' bathing, ADHD diagnoses, broken internet.

The days are long and the queues are longer. I might be out of my regular listening routines but there are some series that just keep you tuned in so well. If you need something for a road trip, or just taking advantage of the long summer nights, here are some series that stuck with me.

What are you listening to this summer?

This week’s podstack

Debt Heads - S1.E1 - The Secret Life of Debt Heads

Let’s not pretend that money isn’t an incredibly emotional force in our lives. I might have a fear-based fascination with conversations about money so I was obviously drawn to this new series. Jamie is in debt and now that she’s revealed that truth to her best friend, they’re not only figuring out how to pay off her debt but also investigating how America became such a debt filled place. Did you know that before 1983 the average American family had no consumer debt?! On average, people didn’t have non-mortgage debt and now over half of Americans have consumer debt. What happened! It’s the history of the US banking system (spoiler alert it’s predatory), it’s the sociological and psychological impact of money, and it’s the fact that people aren’t really taught about these things. The style of this show really starts to shine in episode two and they pull in pop culture references, fun scripting, and a great variety of interviews. It makes the episodes so rich and fly by! The consumerism patterns they discuss in episode four have been all I can see around me for weeks. Also file this under shows with a great theme song.

Sabotage - The Splat

Samantha and Alessandra are two journalists who started a media company where climate is the main character. Because just about everything is or is going to be impacted by climate change. They’re longtime friends and decided they needed to take the leap to create this company. Hearing their backstory at the beginning of their first episode sets you up to understand their investment in this work, which I really appreciated. Then they dive into the stories they’re covering this season. It all starts with a climate protest that involved activists throwing tomato soup on a Van Gogh painting. This is obviously a pretty controversial form of activism but it left the painting undamaged and lots of people talking about the story. But there’s a part of that story that Sam and Ali are especially interested in. The organization that those activists are part of is funded by Aileen Getty, who is part of the Getty family which made its millions from the fossil fuel industry. So what lead this great-granddaughter of J. Paul Getty to put her money and support towards climate change initiatives? That’s the surprising story that kicks off this series. By the third episode, we’re hearing about another group involved in some civil disobedience - climate scientists. Ones who got to the point where their cognitive dissonance couldn’t handle it anymore and they needed to take louder action than just discussing all the science that proves how dire the state of our planet is. This series paints such a full picture of the kinds of climate activism going on around the world and across industries. Do these ordinary people, turned extraordinary rebels, have what it takes to save the planet – before it’s too late?

Living Planet - Part 1: How much does a hurricane cost?

Speaking of money and climate… this series from Living Planet looks at the climate crisis from a financial perspective. They’re asking - what is the cost of climate change? Not just the impact it’s going to have on the environment, but how much is it going to cost us, our cities, and the world? The series opens with an episode about the insurance industry and what’s happening to people who live in places that are likely to be impacted by more and more severe climate events. Insurance providers study and know the likelihood of climate related weather events because they need to know how much it’s going to cost them. I don’t know how you can deny that climate change is happening when insurance companies have the policies that prove things are likely coming our way. Each episode of this series looks at a different cost that climate change is bringing. For so much of this, the preventative costs that we should be accepting right now are far less than what the costs will be if we do nothing. (transcript)

Why Is Amy in the Bath? - Episode 1: Why IS Amy in the Bath?

Look, I love a good investigative series! But what I love even more is when it’s about something silly with low stakes, but the same serious dedication to seeking an answer. Have you ever wondered if there’s a correlation between an actress having a scene in a bath and them winning an Oscar? Who hasn’t?! This series investigates that question through the work of Amy Adams and her bathroom related performances. Beyond the big screen, it goes in some very insightful directions that are crucial to understanding the question. Like what’s the history of bath tubs anyways? What has been their social and cultural significance throughout the years? I never thought I could learn so much about humanity through the history of bathrooms, but that’s just the magic of podcasting at work. Fun fact: 10.5% of all best actress nominated movies have the actress in the tub. But a bathing actress has won only 3% of the time. What does it all mean?! This investigation is full of so many delightful rabbit holes, it might be exactly the fun listen you need.

Climbing the Walls - I didn’t want to have ADHD | 1

“This is a story about science, social expectations, stress, and the way we live. It’s about who we trust. Most importantly, it’s a story about women.” This hook in the introduction of the first episode of this series was exactly what made me lock in. It kinda reminded me of what Kate discovered about period pain in CRAMPED. It’s something that I think can be applied to a lot of things in life - frame them around those factors and you’ll uncover a lot and that’s what Danielle is doing in this series about the rise in ADHD diagnoses in women. Why women? Why now? To answer this she’s speaking to women who were diagnosed long before it was common and experts who have changed the way behaviour and gender is perceived as it relates to these kinds of diagnoses.

Understood: Who Broke the Internet? - Don’t Be Evil

Have you heard the term enshittifcation thrown around in the last few years? It’s a pretty ridiculous sounding word if you ask me, but what it stands for is even more ridiculous. It’s basically the changes that have lead to the demise of internet systems that we rely on every day all in the name of profit. Like how Google search became kinda useless because it needed to be more about making money than being helpful. Or how small businesses are completely sabotaged and edged out of platforms like Amazon who basically buy a bunch of their product, sell it for cheaper, and make it impossible for them to survive in the market. This is a frustrating but informative series if you want to understand what’s happening to our technology. We’re becoming more and more dependent on it every day, but it’s becoming less and less helpful. I need to go touch grass now.

More sweet treats

• Shreya shared What Went Wrong’s episode about The Sound of Music and it was the most delightful thing I listened to this week. It has special intro AND outro songs that you need to hear!!!

• Important news flash!!! Hobbies are good for your health! This episode of Ologies changed the way I think about time, activity, and overall health. I might re-listen once a month.

• Andreea introduced me to Unleashed and I finished it in one day!! It’s a fictional series about what can happen as technologies like deepfakes, scams, and heavy reliance on AI assistants become even more powerful than they are now.

Thank you for reading! If you listened to something this week that made your heart sing, your imagination wander, or your brain ponder, I’d love to hear about it!