Jumping Monkeys (Audio)

Jumping Monkeys is a TWiT show built on conversation between Megan Morrone and Leo Laporte, and its subject is family life with technology running all through it. Production has stopped. The archive remains. Heard now, the 2008 episodes are a record of how parents at that moment were thinking through the web, work and school. The openings set the tone. One introduces it as 'the show that jumps and has monkeys', another as 'the continuing saga of parenting in the digital age', and one bills it as something far racier before a host steers back to parenting. Banter spills into the business segments too. Sponsor reads are loose: one pauses so a host can admit the answer is not in the talking points, and another turns an audiobook plug into a suggestion for a family evening with a fire, popcorn and The Wizard of Oz. The real weight sits with the guests. Wikipedia and homework get practical treatment, with a host describing telling the kids at home to use the site as a starting point and never to assume anything on it is true, and the guest agreeing that schoolwork calls for other sources. In a conversation about equally shared parenting, a guest explains how both parents in the household negotiated reduced hours once their children arrived, including asking for reduced hours when walking into a new job after a layoff. The talk turns to the economy, with a half-remembered story about an auto plant that cut hours rather than people, told with an open admission that the facts behind it are thin. The owner of Cubs and Crayons, a shared workspace with child care, takes direct questions about rent, furnishing, equipment and how full the place has to be to break even, and says the investment is the owner's alone. Lighter moments sit between those exchanges. Before an interview with a guest named Andy Williams, the hosts joke about the crooner of the same name, and about running into other Megan Morrones and fake Leo Laportes on Facebook. The episode titles show how wide the range runs. Each puts a lead subject ahead of a list of smaller items, and those items run from 'Thrifty Green Baby Guide' and '$5 Dinners' to 'Manga statistics', 'Girls on the Run' and 'Ze Frank's Flickr memory game'. One closing points listeners to a call-me button online and an email address for messages. For a first listen, 'Using Wikipedia - How Wikipedia Works, The Boon Squirt, Book Closeout's Kids Section, Tiny Revolutionary, and more.' shows the practical side. 'Coworking - Freelancers get together, Manga statistics, Gagas is going going, Metal for Monsters, and more.' centers on a small-business story about shared workspace and child care.