Cold War Cast

Finally! After years of being without a website, I’ve sat down this morning to claim my space online. To be honest, I probably don’t need a website but it feels good to have a Grand Central Station for the podcasts here. I know contacting me is a little tiresome expecting to go through Instagram message or whatever smoke signals you come up with. It’ll be nice to have a space for everything right here.

I’ve also been thinking about the genesis of this podcast and the timeline over the years. More on that in a bit…

Having an actual website will give me more opportunities to bring you the history and pop culture of the Cold War. I always feel like right after I publish an episode, I might have some important thought, detail, etc. that I forgot to mention. Or sometimes, someone might bring something to my attention that needs addressed. This will be a good place for “saved rounds” from episodes.

I also think that it will give me an outlet to talk about more things related to the Cold War, or enhance episodes. I can do artwork/photography from the Cold War, radio shows (really interested in this), little blurbs on films, etc. Sometimes I’ll have a thought or come across something that wouldn’t fill an episode, but might deserve a few lines of text. I guess social media fits that role pretty well, but I like the idea of the blog (I know, why not both?)

This podcast has really had fits and starts. I remember starting it in maybe 2015 with an episode about the Communist Manifesto. I picked up some steam over the course of a year or two and built some momentum. With small kids, a full time job and a budding small business on the side, it got tricky to make time for the podcast. Eventually it tapered off to where I was putting out an episode every couple of months.

I officially pulled the plug on the show in 2019. I remember feeling a sense of relief that it was one less thing on my agenda. The next day I remember reading a book for pleasure – it seemed like my spare moments went into studying for the podcast and I neglected other interests. I felt behind in life and frustrated that nothing got the attention it needed so the podcast had to go.

A couple years later it felt like life settled down (somewhat) and I needed some sort of creative outlet. Just because I stopped podcasting about the Cold War, doesn’t mean I lost interest or stopped thinking about these things. I decided I’d start it up again.

My philosophy towards these things sometimes is “throw enough shit on the wall and see what sticks”. I figured the fastest, easiest and most “good enough” way to get my words out to the world was recording on my iphone and using Spotify’s podcasting app. It used to be the case you could do everything directly through the app, now I have to use another to actually record and then upload it. Although imperfect, it got me up and going with minimal fuss.

They say that getting started is the hardest part of anything. I agree. That’s why I’ve always been ok falling short of perfection with this podcast. I don’t have the best sound, not the most polished, minimal editing and effects, but I know that if I create more obstacles beyond “sit down, hit record and start talking”, I’m less likely to do it. Thank you for putting up with a few blemishes – especially considering over the course of me doing this the podcasting world at large has gotten more polished and professional.

The other thing this site will allow me to do is keep a good archive of episodes. I lost the files of the 50 or so episodes I did in the first iteration of Cold War Cast and wish I could get them (well, some of them) back. I believe I still have my notes, so it could be possible to redo some bigger and badder than last time.

So here we are. A blank wordpress theme and a few paragraphs of text. I’m ok with this for now but slowly and surely, in the spirit of this podcast, I’ll make little improvements and make this a good place to keep up to date with the podcast and stay in touch.

Ryan