What started as a bit of verbal repartee in Lee Hopkins’ report on the “For Immediate Release” podcast has turned into a hilarious post on Lee’s blog. In one of the shows, Lee mentioned that he was suffering from Podcast Solipsism,” which is defined thusly:

Sufferers of this ravaging disease can often be found with earbuds in place during shopping trips, errand running and even Parent Teacher exchanges. This condition affects the higher cognitive processes, so that, for example, listeners to podcasts may actually believe that the people they listen to on podcasts, such as Dawn and Drew, Adam Curry and Hobson and Holtz, are real people, not the superb actors reading the carefully crafted scripts that they really are.

Sufferers of this disease may alternatively believe that only the podcast is real and that everything outside of their earbuds is fantasy.

One of our other listeners, Sallie Goetsch, offered another podcast condition, and we were off to the races. Now, the pair have posted a complete listing as an enticement to visit Podcast Asylum, where such debilitating conditions can be addressed through a variety of treatments, including “repeated sessions of massage therapy by either dusky handmaidens or toned and burly Swedish masseuses named Sven.” Must reading if you need a laugh!