Spoon(RSS)feeding or getting the internet to stalk you

OK, I was so good. I did my homework, got a bunch of feeds going and now I'm waiting, waiting, waiting for someone to post on one to make sure it will come through.

Well, the pot ain't boiling...so little properly "proactive" (read "impatient") me has found a way. I've subscribed to my own gal'dang blog and I'm gonna post to it. Then the eternal question--did I do it right?--will be answered (OK, it will be answered in respect to RSS anyway).

Oh, yeah, homework. So I set up my RSS account in Google Reader, because if I have to memorize one more password I'm going to have to start deleting key words from my cranial hard-drive (if I can't remember your name when we talk, just know that it means I can log-on to something...somewhere). Within G-mail all this took was clicking on "more", then on "Reader". So, yippee I have that.

Then I'm subscribing to krl2pt0, using the magic button, which worked fine but has the amusing side effect (at least for me--the side effect... well, maybe the amusing, too) of being titled "title unknown". Then I move on to subscribe to a couple fellow krlbloggers (we'll need a better name if we want to form a group, but I digress). So I go to their blog, click on the subscribe thing at the bottom, it gives me a window saying it's saving it in "feeds", cool. Do it with another, same deal. Then I go to my reader, where the heck are they?--not there. So I repeat adding them by cut/paste into the reader and all is happy.

What happened, you may ask. Well, sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a big ol' software company that wants to be all things to all people and help you 'til it hurts (you, not them--especially in the wallet region)...Explorer (yes, children, a Microsoft product) was very helpfully intercepting my attempts to save feeds from Google-based (oh my, a major competitor...insert shocked gasps here) blogs and adding them to a "Feeds" button in my favorites, thus making everything happily, conveniently connected to them. Unfortunately, that would nullify the whole web-based thing I was going for.

Luckily, this doesn't happen on the sights that have the magic "add to Google" button, so adding a feed on Outdoor Adventure and Survival books from the Hennepin County Library (that's Minneapolis, MN for those not readily versed in Midwestern counties) went much more smoothly, with no interference from Redmond (Washington, not Minnesota--if there is one, I don't think they care about my RSS feeds).

As for podcasting, I just went to the Splendid Table website and listened to a podcast with a simple push of a button. Boy, that homework was hard (it does make you hungry though...Oh, maybe that's the show). I have also listened to live streaming archived This American Life instead of audiobooks, they have a player on the site that pops up instead of playing through media player...this is also easy. And, yes, I am aware that I have an NPR addiction (mostly filled by KUOW) and I refuse to seek treatment.

I think I've had just about enough of this wacky world for now, out of the web and into the hole.