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Old (Livejournal) Episodes 20 - 40 are on this page.

Old (Livejournal) Episodes 1-19 are here.

For our first 40 episodes we used Dave's livejournal account as our website.  Now that we have moved to our new site here at Brocasarea.ca we wanted a way to link to the original show notes for the old shows, that said, posting 40 new sets of show notes seemed a tad much.  So, here we are with this old archive page.  Of course you CAN download these using the RSS feed, but these direct links to the original show notes may be helpful to some.

If you would like to give us a little donation to defray some of the costs of this endeavour, please consider hitting the button below and sliding us a couple of bucks, it would be much appreciated.

If you would like to search through the list of show notes, feel free to use the handy dandy Google tool below

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Episode 40 - March 30, 2006 - Swedish Chairs and fancy writing...

Dave had a late class so got home at 10.45, and suggested podcasting, so a podcasting we went.

We started off by talking about Our recent TV interview along with our son for a local TV channel. It was pretty cool, as they were doing a report on autism. We then talked about Jon's new chair from Ikea that is sort of like an egg he can close right up and hide in. Lots of autistic kids need a place like that, so it made a cool fifth birthday present for the boy.

We then talked about calligraphy, which is a hobby of Isabelle's. This lead us into a discussion of letter writing in general and the changing in letters due to email etc.

Hope you like it.

Episode 39 - The Academie Francaise, Convocation and Food

We started out by talking about how we will be in Corner Brook, NL for Isabelle's convocation this spring. She will be receiving a BA in Historical Studies. We are very excited about going. We then did impressions of Olaf and Ellen Janzen...

Isabelle talked a bit about Sea Lampreys as she is working at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans in Sault Ste. Marie teaching a guy that works with these fish how to speak French.

We then got into a rather in depth discussion about the evolution of the French Language and the impact of the Academie Francaise, the regulatory body for French.

We finished up by talking about cooking and food and Dave's assertion that people that can't cook are just afraid of food.

Enjoy.

Episode 38 - Isabelle's guest spot on Podcastra from Germany plus other fun stuff


Isabelle has been busily working on contacting other podcasters. Recently she has been talking to the guys from Podcastra who are from Germany. Isabelle then did a guest spot on their show. They seem like nice guys. You will hear Jonathan in the background as well during Isabelle's Skype appearance on Podcastra.

Episode 37 - Drugs, Mental Disorders, and insane people we have worked with...

We had a nice email from Mark from Electric Sky podcast, and Canadian Podcast Buffet (do check both 'casts out they are very good) in response to our episode 35 about the Indigo Children. Mark has a different view than us, which is cool, but also had a comment about the use of medication in disorders, espescially in kids. So we talked about that some, and our views on it. Dave is more sympathetic to medicating people, while Isabelle is more into therapy. We agree though that both have their place.

Then we talked about people we have worked with that we could not stand. Some of you out there will recognize the people we are talking about. The interesting thing is that it seems academia breeds such goofballs. Why? Well Dave figures it has something to do with academic freedom and the loose set of rules at Universities. Though the sort of nascent insanity at any University should not be discounted....

Episode 36 - listener email from Becca and Parenting in the 50s

We had a nice email exchange with Becca, a listener from Ottawa, about photographing auras. Becca, along with us two, is pretty skeptical.

We shifted gears and talked about a book Isabelle has on parenting from the 1950s, most of the stuff is strikingly similar to today, except for the bit about well, smoke and drink if you want when pregnant, no problem...

Dave had a Vanilla Mintini, here is the recipe:

2 shots of vodka
2 shots of milk
a bunch of crushed up mint leaves
ice
a tablespoon of icing sugar
splash of vanilla extract.

Mix all in a shaker and thank me later....

Episode 35 Indigo children and skype...


We started out episode 35 by reading some of our listener mail, we really appreciate everyone sending us emails to brocasarea@gmail.com.

We talked extensively about a book called Indigo Children. This book claims that kids with ADD, ADHD and ASD are actually sent from Angles to guide us. We came to the conclusion that the 'angel' explanation added nothing new. Indeed, Dave found it harmful.

There is a special bonus at the end, a skype call from some goof and our talk with said goof...


Episode 34, March 9, 2006 - The Regina Monologues.....

We got to talking one night about how Isabelle gets skyped by weirdos all the time. So we decided to set up a skype account for the podcast and see who we could see. One of those people was James Whittingham of www.jameswhittingham.com.

You may recognize James from his movie and TV work, including Just For Laughs. Well James is funny as hell, and we decided to talk to him on our podcast. He has played some of the interview on his show, JamesPod, as well.

Do check out Jamespod, it rocks.

We talked about James dysfunctional family, about blogging, about podcasting, about the oscars and about Regina, where James lives.

Episode 33 - A very special Broca's Area


In this episode we take a look back at the good bad and ugly of our first 32 episodes.

Isabelle as usual likes the dumb guy, and both of us loved the episode with Maddie. Tell us what your faves have been!

Thanks so much James!

Episode 32 - Autism and the MMR vaccine and Isabelle's web designing

In episode 32 Dave started off by apologizing for his 'singing.'

Isabelle talked a bit about the new website she had set up for the Sault Ste. Marie chapter of the Autism Society of Ontario. Here is the URL, check it out:

http://www.asochapters.org/saultstemarie/Welcome%20.html (that's our boy Jon there...)

We then moved into talking about the controversy about the MMR vaccine and it supposedly causing autism. Well, it turns out the authors of the original (poorly done) study have, for the most part, retracted it:

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=6308

The big concern here is that many of the people that are thinking they are protecting their kids from autism may actually be starting, or helping to start, Measles, mumps and Rubella regain a foothold:

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4036

(Oh just to be perfectly clear, we are speaking here as individuals, not as reps of the ASO).

We then talked briefly about losing power, as we did on Friday.

Isabelle ended up by talking about her new fascination with cooking North African food.

Thanks for listening.

Episode 31 - Our Top Five Song of All Time

(Warning, this episode is truly embarrassing for Dave....)

In This episode we decided to list our top 5 songs of all time. Here is the list:

Dave:

5. Sultans of Swing by Dire Straits
4. Summer Winds by Frank Sinatra
3. Storybook Love by Willie DeVille
2. Firewater by Yellowcard
1. Beautiful Day by U2

Isabelle

5. A Perfect Day by Jann Arden
4. Gone Gone by Jack Johnson
3. Angel Eyes by Ella Fitzgerald
2. Miracle of Love by The Eurythmics
1. Somewhere Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World by Israel Kamakawiwo Ole

We both sang little snippets of the songs, rather than being sued by the RIAA. Now, Dave CANNOT sing really at all. Isabelle, on the other hand is pretty darned good, and at least way better than Dave (though that is damning her with faint praise).

We ended by talking about Valentines Day.

Episode 30 - The Tranhemispheric Episode!

This episode features Mark, a listener of Broca's Area joined us from Australia on Gizmo. (Dave did his best with the audio, but had to do a hell of a lot of signal processing to take out some noise on the line). If you want to see where Mark lives, check out http://coastalwatch.com/camera/cameras_large.aspx?cam=1600&mode=windows&state=QLD

We talked about Australians' ideas about Canada, and Canadians' ideas about Australians.

We then switched gear and talked about Darwin, Charles and the city in Australia. We talked about the Australian Wheat Board scandal, and other scams. (Including the scam sent to us by Jen from Florida).

We spoke some of government curruption and business curruption.

Later we talked about mullets... including http://www.ratemymullet.com/

We ended by talkng about the Million Dollar Homepage (http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/)

It was awesome to talk to Mark. It was a real blast, and he is welcome on the show any time. If you would like to be on the show, just let us know and we will see what we can do.


Episode 29 - French Vs. English in a final battle to the death....


OK, actually a discussion of the differences between French and English speaking Canadians.

As a side note, remember these are generalizations.

Isabelle has quite a bit of experience at this as she is a froncophone living in English speaking Canada.

Our observations. There are more babes in Montreal than Toronto.

French speakers are more emotional than English speakers. They also kiss people more, Dave is for this as a rule.

Montreal is not as intense as Toronto.

Toronto has an energy all its own, but it is different than Montreal.

There are lots of babes in Montreal.

Episode 28

Stuff we have around the house, Maps, the Ontario Autism Conference and mystery smells.....

Isabelle just returned from an autism conference in Sudbury ON and gave a report on the goings on in Sudbury at the conference. Seemed to be worthwhile. This lead us into a discussion of labeling and calling people what they want to be called.

We then switched gears and talked about some of our new listeners, including Craig from Seattle. He wanted our take on the election of 2006 here in Canada, wanted to know if we had any maps and finally just wanted to know about old stuff we have lying around. Turns out mostly we have computers and cables... Isabelle does not appreciate the value of the cables, while Dave is pretty sure that one cannot have too much CAT 5E and CAT 6 cable lying around.

Episode 27 - Scams and Marital Infidelity

Scams did not originate on the intrawebs, but, they certainly have proliferated there. We decided to talk about scams, our experience with them, and how to detect them.

One excellent way is to type whatever you are interested in into google and add the word 'scam' to your search, you may be surprised. Another great tool is using the website www.snopes.com. Snopes does a decent job of keeping track of urban legends, scams and the like.

We then switched gears and talked about marital infidelity. An interesting topic. As Dave is a psychologist he gave some interesting (hopefully) insights into why people cheat on their partners, concentrating on an evolutionary explanation.

If you have been scammed email us, we would love to know about it.

Episode 26 - Isabelle's trip to Algeria

The Algerian adventure.

Back in May of 05 Isabelle took a trip to Algeria. She spent two weeks travelling around various towns, spending most of the time with her friends Saadane and Fayza.

In some ways the place was not that different from Canada, in other ways t was tremendously different. To find out how, check out episode 26.

We have set up a map at frappr, http://www.frappr.com/brocasarea please put yourself on the map. We would love to know where you all are and what you think, so please email us, brocasarea@gmail.com.

We were recently mentioned on this site: http://www.canadianpodcastbuffet.ca/ on episode 5. Thunderbird six was also mentioned and they even played an excerpt on episode 6, which is way cool. Hence our circulation is way up. Thanks to everyone for litening.

Oh yeah, hope you enjoy the stereo...

Episode 25 - The film Rainman and the Reality of Autism

As most of you guys know, our son has autism (that is him at the end of each episode saying 'Say Goodbye).

Well most people know about autism from the film Rainman, which is an incredible movie. We both loved it before Jon was born, and it is one we have seen on a number of occasions, well into the double digits. So we thought it would make some sense to talk about autism and the film Rainman.

Some people don't like the movie and how it handles autism, but we both love the film and think that Dustin Hoffman did a really nice job in the movie.

Let us know what you think.

Oh, we are changing our feed to feeds.feedburner.com/brocasarea. This is of no concern to most of you, but it will allow us to track our listenership better. The old one on .mac will still work, but if you are still using that one we would encourage you to shift over to the feedburner one.

Episode 24 hits the web

Happy New Year, and welcome to episode 24!

Our friends Juan and Jessica dropped by (we talked about camping with them back in like episode 3 or something). We sat around and had a few martinis, and talked about all kinds of stuff, including podcasts, about teaching (they are both teachers) about Christmas with family and about the Naked News!

Hope you like it.

Episode 23, recorded while driving on Interstate 75

Travelling on I 75 from Sault Ste. Marie to London.

The weather was horrid for a while, a mixture of rain, snow and freezing rain, which held our speed to below 90 km/h. However once we were clear of that, and the weather improved we decided to do a mobile podcast on I 75.

With special guests Maddie and Jon.

Episode 22, a very special Christmas ep, hits the interwebs

Merry Christmas!

We are both atheists and yet, we celebrate Christmas. We discussed what the season means to us, mostly it is about family and sharing and giving and fun.

We did a little experiment with stereo this time, let us know what you think!

Merry Christmas to everyone, and if you have any interesting family traditions that you do at Christmas, drop us a line, brocasarea@gmail.com.
Merry Christmas to all.

Hot on the heels of episode 20, here comes episode 21!

What will the future hold? Living in a hole in LA doing our podcast with a hobo....

We had a bit of fun last night after the Alouettes lost to the Eskimos in the Grey Cup final. We talked about what the future will be like. We were a little over the top, but hey, it is all in fun!

Dave and Isabelle

Episode 20, wow! What is art?

What is Art? With guests Rob and Lauren.

Dave, Isabelle and their friends Rob and Lauren discussed what they thought art was, and what use it has.

It, of course, degenerated into a discussion about aliens eventually...

Enjoy!