As you may know, I named my new mac Steve. Unfortunately, Steve is in hospital at the moment. His SuperDrive (yeah, I love the name apple give to their DVD Writers) is pooched. The drive would spin for 20 seconds and then spit the disk back out.

So today I took him to an Apple Repair Centre to get fixed (“fixed” as in why sick people go to the doctor – not as in why you take a healthy dog to the vet).

For the meantime I’m on Woz. Woz is my PC. Woz is unfortunately noisy, crashes a lot and no longer has any music (because Steve’s got it all now). It shouldn’t be long before I can get Woz fixed properly myself, but I just have to be patient until Steve gets back. I’m sure that Woz will miss Steve, but at least little Lisa is over on the other side of the room till Steve gets back.

Unfortunately Steve’s temporary absence also adds another twist. (There’s a plot to this?!? -ed.) Dave and I are both very psyched about the new podcasts that we’ll be doing. (Hehehe @ me pretending to be an editor. Choadtastic!) As a rule of thumb we plan to record them on a thursday with a release either that night, Friday or Saturday (depending). Today’s Thursday (one good thing about Woz is that throughout the numerous crashes he goes through – he never once manages to forget todays date). Today was the day that Dave and I had planned to record the first podcast and I’m sorry guys but you’re going to just have to hold out that little bit longer.

BUT, this gives you a good opportunity to prepare for the podcasts (on the offchance you haven’t already). Now ultimately, we highly recommend iTunes both for its excellent audio quality, ease of use and abundance of features, as well as it being able to support podcast artwork. Whilst you’ll be able to download it and perhaps listen to it in iTunes or on your phone, the podcast experience will be greatly enhanced by iTunes as there’ll also be pictures and written information about the podcast episode included with it. Plus it’s great for anyone who owns an iPod.

The Choad Podcasts will also be listed on the iTunes Music Store as a free download and iTunes will automatically download the latest episodes for you so that it’s there when you’re ready.

If for some reason you’re unable to install iTunes, then there are a selection of various alternatives which I mentioned in a previous post (and for your convenience will do so again now);

• iTunes – For Mac OS X and Windows XP
• Juice – Mac OS X, Windows and Linux
• iPodder – Mac OS X, Windows and Linux
• Cast Podder – Linux only
• Winamp – Windows only (Thank you Fried for the heads up on that one)

So there ya go. No excuses. iPods and most modern mp3 players should be able to play the podcasts and if you’ve bought a mobile phone within the last 12 months then it’s likely that you’ll be able to listen to it on there too.

Last night, Steve was in my room, Woz was in my room, and so was a person (yeah – I have real people in here too at times) called Dom. (For the easily confused, it’s short for Dominic – not Domonolom).

But today, none of them are together. Woz is still here, but Steve’s in hospital, and as for Dom, well he’s about to leave on a huge quest around the globe for 6 months. We all had a good night out last night to wish him all the best for his quest (I can’t help but call it a quest for some reason – and as a result I can’t get the name “Jonny Quest” out of my head. So in my mind Dom isn’t short for Dominic or Domonolom – it’s short for Jonny Quest. Dave reckons that when he comes back in 6 months he’ll be blonde with black clothing.)

Anyway, he’s starting off in Singapore (not Singaporn as was repeatedly mis-quoted last night) and travelling to places such as New Zealand, Australia and America (where Dave will meet up and travel with him). For those who don’t already know, Dave himself is American. Actually, he’s dual-nationality (American & British). It’s complicated.

Basically… Parents are english, moved to America, had 3 kids, then moved back. All 3 kids are born in America but have british parents and now live in England. There. Done.

Back to Dom… He’s created a brand new website to chronicle his journey which promises to be an interesting read, especially as he’s supposed to be meeting someone in a country who apparently has the wrong date for when Dom arrives.

Take it from me, he’s a great guy and his site will no doubt be both highly enjoyable, funny and interesting. He’s even promised me that when he’s in Australia in the outback, that he’ll stand on a cliff and in the style of Crocodile Dundee, spin that rope which makes a bizarre noise over his head. He’s even promised pictures too!

You can visit his site here: recordeddom.blogspot.com/ or by clicking on the “A Travellers Record” link on the Choadroll.

Yeah, I renamed the blogroll to choadroll.