Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy iPhone 5 wallpaper

You may recall my previous H2G2 wallpaper for the iPad 2. Here it is, with a different sector of space as background, for the iPhone 5. Share and enjoy.

Podcasts I subscribe to, Oct. 2011 edition

Before I totally blow up my iPhone with the iOS 5 update (said demolition is already underway, as I forgot to take screenshots of all my apps before iTunes decided to start uninstalling a bunch of them, oops), here’s the list of what I’m subscribing to. It’s unlikely that this list will get zapped, but never bet against disaster when patching, I always say.

You can find all of these podcasts in the usual places. A list of obscurities, this is not.

(more…)

Kid-friendly iPad games

My sister-in-law recently got an iPad 2 and asked me what games we have on our various iOS devices that James likes. Here’s what I recommended:

Apps James likes on the iPad, some of which you probably know of via the iPhone or Android phone:

Angry Birds/Angry Birds Seasons/Angry Birds Rio – You know these. Each continually is updated with more content (Easter was just added to Seasons). Note that Seasons is meant for people who’ve beaten the original game and is tough.

Bugsy the Blue Hamster – A cute cartoon hamster educational game, with counting, colors, etc.

Cut the Rope – A simple game like Angry Birds, but with cutting ropes to let candy get to the mouth of a cute frog-like monster. Like Angry Birds, they keep adding more free content all the time.

Fish School HD – An educational game featuring fish in the ocean.

Headspin: Storybook – A cute timed “spot the difference” game. The look and feel is that of a pop-up book of fairy tales.

Itsy Bitsy Spider HD – Another educational game, set to music. Note that, by default, kids can record their voices (it’s meant to be for the parents singing the song instead of the pros), which can make it an annoying noisemaker until you turn that feature off.

Monkey Preschool Lunchbox – An incredibly polished educational game with colors, matching, learning what’s less and what’s more, learning what’s bigger and what’s smaller, etc.

The Monster at the End of this Book – An iPad version of the classic Sesame Street story book (featuring Grover).

Plants vs. Zombies HD – Possibly the best game of 2009. Cartoon plants protect your home from cartoonish zombies. I don’t think anyone, of any age, doesn’t love this game.

Talesworth Adventures – A puzzle game of helping a hero (styled like an early 1980s videogame character) find his way through mazes. I would have thought this was too hard for James, but once he figured out the basics, he fell in love.

Tiki Towers – Incredibly charming physics game where players build structures out of bamboo to let monkeys get bananas and get to the other side of the level. (Note that it’s possible for the monkeys to have cartoon deaths falling into lava.)

World of Goo – One of the greatest games of the last few years. A physics puzzler where one has to create structures to help balls of goo reach their destination. Impossible to overstate how good this is, but note that the tone can be a tiny bit dark.

I would definitely look at at least one Angry Birds game, Cut the Rope, Plants vs Zombies and either Tiki Towers or the superior but darker World of Goo.

(EDIT: Greetings, Wired readers!)

Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy iPad wallpaper

As further confirmation of my hardcore geekdom, I crafted this wallpaper for my new iPad 2, which is more than halfway to a real-life Hitchhikers Guide. If Douglas Adams, a lifelong Apple fan, were alive today, I bet we’d see an official Guide app.

(And since I ordered my iPad through the Apple store, I received free engraving. Naturally, it’s now got “DON’T PANIC” engraved on the back.)

Podcasts I listen to and watch, July 2010 edition

At Liz’s request, here’s what I’m listening to and watching on my iPhone at the moment. Note that some podcasts are daily (or even more frequent), many are weekly, a few are monthly and others are just updated whenever the creator gets around to it. These can all be found via iTunes or your podcasting client of choice.

* APM: Marketplace Morning Report
* APM: The Dinner Party Download
* BlizzCast: The Official Blizzard Entertainment Podcast
* Buzz Out Loud
* Coverville: The Cover Music Podcast
* The Current Song of the Day – Minnesota Public Radio
* Grammar Girl Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing
* IndieFeed: Alternative/Modern Rock Music
* IndieFeed: Blues Music
* IndieFeed: Indie Pop Music
* KCRW’s Film Reviews
* KCRW’s Martini Shot
* KCRW’s Morning Becomes Eclectic
* KCRW’s The Business
* KCRW’s Today’s Top Tune
* KQED’s The California Report Podcast
* Loaded (HD)
* The Loh Down on Science
* The Loh Life
* Loveline
* The Moth Podcast
* The Nerdist
* NPR’s On the Media
* NPR: Hourly News Summary Podcast
* NPR: Pop Culture Podcast
* NPR: Science Friday Podcast
* NPR: Story of the Day Podcast
* NPR: World Story of the Day Podcast
* Official Disneyland Resorts Podcast
* Onion Radio News
* Our Ocean World
* OutDPS! Hunting Party Podcast
* Peter Day Music Podcast
* PRI’s The World – Geo Quiz Podcast
* PRI’s The World – Global Hit
* PRI: The Sound of Young America
* The Roadhouse
* Shark Week 2009
* Shifted Sound
* StarDate
* The Takeaway: Story of the Day
* Tap that App (HD)
* Texas Blues Cafe
* That Sound
* Tiki Bar TV
* Today in the Past
* WNYC’s Radiolab
* The 404

I’m starting to prefer short podcasts of under 10 minutes in length. I recently found myself heading out the door each morning with nine hours of podcasts to listen to in an eight-hour day, and purged a lot of them, or traded full-length shows for highlight podcasts.