The latest Radio Diaries is featured on today’s NPR: Story of the Day podcast. It’s a multi-p.o.v. sound-portrait of twins separated at birth, “Identical Strangers” (13:10 mp3):

The Nature Conservancy’s Nature Stories podcast features a bike-mic collage, produced by Emily Botein, of my two-wheeled self-propelled roadtrips. From Stories from the Heart of the Land, “Biking the Back Roads” (10:05 mp3):

KPBS-FM has made a Google Map for wildfire updates in the San Diego area. And here’s Los Angeles wildfire updates from the LA Times. Both are linked from the maps.google front.

Saw Joe Frank a couple weeks ago perform “The Blue Room” at Largo’s in LA, along with a live groovin’ Frank-en-jazz band. Quite the show. Don’t have audio from that night, but here’s another taste of JF live— his acceptance speech for the Third Coast International Audio Festival Audio Luminary Award:

The Nature Conservancy’s Nature Stories podcast has Scott Carrier’s piece, from Stories from the Heart of the Land, on circling the sacred Tibetan “Mount Kailash” (20:26 mp3):

Today’s most pressing news is not from Iraq, Wall Street, or the Presidential campaign; rather it can best be expressed as music, specifically some ancient hippie crap from the 60s Boston band Earth Opera (w/ Peter Rowan and David Grisman) whose song-title sez it all— “The Red Sox Are Winning” (3:32 mp3):

This week’s HV cast is from the NEA book project, Operation Homecoming, writings of troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. We end our series with editor Andrew Carroll and project creator Dana Gioia (Chairman of the NEA) discussing the book and its contributors; and we hear troops reading their works. Music: Jess Atkins. A story by Barrett Golding, “Operation Homecoming- NEA” (5:47 mp3):

NPR reporter Tom Bullock had a nice music-laden commentary this Morning Edition about leaving Baghdad for the last time, “Journalist’s Assignment in Iraq Ends” (5:47 mp3):