For NPR Junkies

If National Public Radio were television, I'd have a problem. I listen to an average of 50 hours a week of NPR when you factor in the 40 hours that I listen at work and the time I spend listening on weekends. With all that listening, you'd think I'd be getting enough, but I don't. I find myself missing some of my favorite weekend shows like Prairie Home Companion or This American Life.

A solution to this problem came recently from the podcasting world. BlogMatrix Sparks is designed to create and download podcasts, but it also has the ability to record streaming audio which more and more NPR stations are making available over the Internet. Your computer needs to be on when the recording is going to happen, and you have to have a broadband internet connection. Once recorded, you can either listen to your show on your computer, copy it to your mp3 player, or burn it to cd.

If this seems a little too complex for you, most old NPR shows can be listened to for free from the NPR web site or you can pay and download them from Audible.