Intro: Welcome to Counter Programming with Shira & Arielle

Welcome to Counter Programming with Shira & Arielle!

In this intro episode, meet Arielle and Shira, long-time friends who are embarking on a fun project during the time of Corona. The duo are offering Counter Programming to all of the hubbub surrounding COVID-19 in the form of episodes about counters. What kind of counters, you may ask?

Well:

 - Counter tops (marble, granite, steel)

 - Counter culture

 - Counters of calories, time...etc

 - SO. MUCH. MORE

This podcast is sure to be a mix of comedy and useless information shared in a fresh way with a lot of laughs.

Shira and Arielle met in 2015 at their first job post-college in Jackson, Mississippi (at the Institute of Southern Jewish Life). They lived down the street from one another. Now, they're separated by almost 50 states (Arielle in California and Shira in NY), but, in an effort to quell their respective anxiety, they wanted to take on a podcast during Corona.

Counter Programming with Shira & Arielle is a limited-run podcast series meant to bring you some levity in a time of heightened uncertainty.

Episodes will be published weekly and will feature counter programming of all sorts.

Tell us about your favorite counters, won't you please? You can reach us on Twitter:

Shira is at @shishimosk

Arielle at is @arithisandthat

Transcript

Arielle:   0:00
Should we say it together? Hi. And welcome to counter programming?   

Shira:   0:02
Ooh, I love that.  

Arielle:   0:07
Let's try it. Okay. 1, 2, 3...  

Arielle:   0:11
Hi! and welcome, never mind. It doesn't really work. Okay, let's try it. Hi. And welcome to Counter Programming.  

Shira:   0:17
I'm Shira.

Arielle:   0:17
And I'm Arielle.  

Shira:   0:19
We're offering some counter programming to all the Coronavirus hubbub that's going on in the news right now. It seems like every podcast I listen to, every time I open Twitter, I have a mini heart attack.  

Arielle:   0:30
I'm the same way. I kind of I was listening to the news this morning and I was on a walk and I kind of found myself like my heart was palpitating a little bit. And I was like, this can't be good.  

Shira:   0:40
Yeah, I have to, like, turn off episodes halfway through. So I only know half the story, but it's still making me anxious.

Arielle:   0:47
 Then I'm going to a podcast and I'm watching TV That has no basis in reality because it's the only thing that makes it so that I don't have a freakin 27 year old heart attack. You know? It's just a constant barrage of bad news.

Shira:   1:03
Lots of bad news. And that's why we're starting this limited run podcast series, Counter Programming!  

Arielle:   1:09
You do it, Counter Programming. 

Shira:   1:11
Counter Programming.  

Arielle:   1:13
Each week we're coming at you with information about counters of all kinds. Get it, counter programming? 

Shira:   1:18
There's countertops.  

Arielle:   1:20
There's counters that track time  

Shira:   1:21
Counters that keep track of other things.  

Arielle:   1:24
There's word counters

Shira:   1:26
Counter culture

Arielle:   1:27
 Electoral counters  

Shira:   1:30
And so much more.  

Arielle:   1:33
And you're gonna get all of that on Counter Programming with Shira and Arielle. This episode that we're in right now, it's just gonna be a short one. It's our intro so that you can get to know us a little bit better. Then next week we're coming at you with our first series... countertops. You'll learn all about granite, marble, quartz, and everything in between.  

Shira:   1:55
You'll learn why we started using kitchen counters. If certain parts of the U. S. Favor different countertops over others.

Arielle:   2:01
You're in for a real counter programming treat.

Arielle:   2:12
So, Shira. Let's give the people what they want. Who are we?

Shira:   2:16
Well, Arielle, I'm Shira Moskowitz. I grew up on Long Island, not in Long Island, on Long Island.  

Arielle:   2:23
Very important distinction.  

Shira:   2:24
Very important. I went to the University of Michigan. Go blue. Good. I trained you so well. Um, both my parents are rabbis. I feel like that's a fun fact that just describes me a little bit.  

Arielle:   2:36
Yeah, you definitely, you have to say that wherever you can.  

Shira:   2:38
Yeah, I just like to slide it in. So people know that I'm a little off.

Arielle:   2:43
Or why you're a little off.  

Shira:   2:44
Why I'm a little off. And recently I've started doing stand up comedy, which has been fun until I can't do it now because of the thing that cannot be named...Corona. Yes.  

Arielle:   2:57
And who I am I? My name's Arielle Nissenblatt. Love podcasts. I do a bunch of things in the podcast world. I run a podcast newsletter called EarBuds Podcast Collective. I help the Outlier Podcast Festival series, which is a three times yearly podcast festival. In my spare time, I listen to podcasts and I also run another podcast called Feedback with EarBuds. I also love roller blading and playing soccer. But these are things that we can't do anymore. So instead we're offering you Counter Programming. So, Shira, how do how do you and I know each other?  

Shira:   3:33
Well, Arielle and I worked together in Jackson, Mississippi. We worked for a Jewish nonprofit down there. There are Jews in Mississippi. It's called the Institute of Southern Jewish Life. And there we learned how to entertain ourselves. Really well.

Arielle:   3:51
Yeah. We made our own fun. We lived like four houses from each other, So we've been close ever since. And now we live across the country. She lives in New York, and I live in California. You know, we always are good at staying in touch. But, this is happening for me with a lot of friends: Coronavirus has connected me again with so many of the people that I'm close to and this podcast, Counter Programming, is another opportunity for us to teach each other about marble and granite. Aside from all the other times that we were talking about marble and granite.

Shira:   4:21
And just to catch up...

Arielle:   4:22
 About marble and granite. 

Shira:   4:24
About marble and granite, our favorite topic to talk about.

Arielle:   4:26
Obviously. So back to why we wanted to start the show. We wanted to make the show for a few reasons. Number one.

Shira:   4:33
We need counter programming for ourselves instead of listening to all this bad news.

Arielle:   4:39
Number two both of us have extreme anxiety and usually the way this works well, at least when we lived in the same city, we both had undiagnosed anxiety... or was  your's diagnosed?

Shira:   4:50
No, no, no. I started seeing a therapist after Mississippi. It's the best thing I've ever done. Love you, Olivia.

Arielle:   4:55
Yea, mine was definitely not officially diagnosed, but it turns out that you and I were just exacerbating each other's anxiety and we had no idea.  

Shira:   5:04
We thought we were helping each other by listening, but we were actually just fueling the anxieties.

Arielle:   5:10
Just giving each other a little heart attacks once a day.  

Shira:   5:12
Oh, but it's nice to know you're not alone. 

Arielle:   5:15
Yeah. So,  number two: we have anxiety. And yeah, we need something to keep us occupied. And in addition to listening to podcasts halfway through and giving up because we get anxious about it, we thought this would be a fun thing to do a fun project, to keep us occupied.  

Shira:   5:29
And as you heard, Arielle is a podcast expert and I'm just a mere novice, and so I'm gonna learn a lot from her about that too.  

Arielle:   5:37
Number three. We wanted to be able to hang out with each other and work on a project from across the country. So this seems like a great way to do it. So the show is gonna be all about counter programming. So really, the name comes from wanting to listen to anything or wanting to create anything other than the news loop around COVID19, around Coronavirus. And we know we're trying to stay inside as much as possible. We're trying to avoid touching other people as much as possible. So we thought this could be a fun way to keep ourselves occupied, to potentially keep strangers occupied. We hope it's not just our parents and our dogs listening. We want you to learn from this. We want to be able to learn a lot about counters and not just about kitchen counters. Of course, that's gonna be our first series. But we're gonna move on from there and we want to hear from you. And after our series on countertops, we'll move on to another type of counter. What kind of counters do you want us to talk about? If you have any suggestions, please feel free to tweet at us.  

Shira:   6:31
Where can they find you, Arielle?

Arielle:   6:33
They can find me at Ariellethisandthat. That's a r i e l l e this and that. Because it rhymes with my last name, which is... Nissenblatt.  

Shira:   6:42
Love that love that. One of my favorites.  

Arielle:   6:45
Shira, Shira? Where can they find you?  

Shira:   6:46
They can find me at Shishimosk. Shi shi mosk. I'm actually... This is gonna be my big Twitter comeback. So I'm excited.  

Arielle:   6:57
We're gonna be releasing this podcast once a week. This is our intro episode, like we said. So about a week from now, you can expect the next episode to drop in your feed. In the meantime, make sure to subscribe to it. Leave us a comment. If you'd like to leave us a review on Apple, it really helps people find the show. If you like it, let us know if you don't like it.  

Shira:   7:16
Don't tell us.  

Arielle:   7:18
Let Shira know. She's in charge of all the bad things that happen. Right, Shira?  

Shira:   7:21
Yeah.  

Arielle:   7:22
Yeah.

Shira:   7:26
Thanks for tuning in for our intro episode of Counter Programming. We're gonna work on that. It's been a real pleasure. Loved hanging out with you, Arielle.  

Arielle:   7:37
Loved hanging out with you, too.

Shira:   7:37
Awww... We'll be back next week with the start of our countertop series. In the meantime, stay inside, stay safe, wash your hands, and admire your countertops. Send us pictures of your countertops.  

Arielle:   7:51
Oh, that's a great idea.  

Shira:   7:52
I want to see what your countertop looks like. 

Arielle:   7:56
Me too. Yeah, that's a great idea. Better yet, send us a picture of you sitting on your countertops.  

Shira:   8:02
Ooooh, love that.  

Shira:   8:03
I know, spicy.  

Shira:   8:04
You haven't even sent me a picture of your countertop. 

Arielle:   8:06
No. And that's really what we should be doing every day, back and forth.  

Shira:   8:11
Yea, I'm gonna send that to you.

Arielle:   8:11
What color is your countertop?  

Shira:   8:12
I guess it's like a granite. A light granite. 

Arielle:   8:16
Mineis like the dark granite with, like, veins of white running through. There may be a little gold flecks here and there.  

Shira:   8:23
I would say it's a lighter sand color and black. But we should save that for next week.  

Arielle:   8:30
You're right. We don't want to give away too much. Or else why would they tune in?  

Shira:   8:33
Yea, we don't wanna spoil it.  

Arielle:   8:35
You can find this podcast wherever you listen to podcasts. That's on Apple, Spotify, Stitcher, Pocketcasts... any of the podcast apps. There's so many of them. And our fans will be called Counters, right?

Shira:   8:46
Counties

Arielle:   0:00
Counties