I’ve found that I’m more okay with that flavor of podcast when I’m doing a particular type of not quite mindless but not quite focused task, like driving for a while or doing yardwork. My attention is on what I’m doing, but it’s not really using much mental capacity. I’ve found that the more conversational podcast keeps my mind a little more active without distracting me from what I’m doing. Like a watered down version of chatting with the driver to keep them awake, or having a dumb conversation while cleaning to make the time go faster.

“While There’s Your Problem” is my go-to. They’re a podcast about engineering disasters, and they stay on topic enough, so their tangents tend to be related to the topic at least, and there’s not really a focus on them as characters beyond a couple recurring jokes or things that make one of them get ranty. It helps that about once a month I make a drive that’s roughly the length of one of their episodes, so it lines up pretty nice.