2011 has been another great year for HoboTrashcan and we sincerely appreciate your support. All of you who read the site – especially those who comment on a regular basis – are what makes it so much fun for us to keep giving you new content week after week.

As we do every year, we will be taking this week off. But please come back on January 2, 2012 for more Hobo goodness.

2012 is going to be our best year yet … up until the world ends in December, of course.

- Joel Murphy
Editor-in-chief

In honor of next Monday’s celebration of International Talk Like A Pirate Day, we are giving away a copy of Pirates of Barbary: Corsairs, Conquests and Captivity in the Seventeenth-Century Mediterranean, a new book by Adrian Tinniswood about the pirates who plundered the Barbary Coast in the 1600s.

For a chance to win, all you have to do is listen to our Talk Like A Pirate Day 2011 podcast and answer the following question: What was the name of the pirate featured in the “Pirates you should know” segment on the show?

The contest is now over. Congratulations to our winner, Yvonne Jefferson.

In honor of the beloved Harry Potter franchise coming to an end, we have released our new “Feeling Weasley” t-shirt, which honors the franchise’s beloved ginger sidekick. Sure, students at Hogwarts may mock the Weasley clan, but no one will mock you in this stylish tee.

The shirt is available in men’s and women’s sizes and as a hoodie. Order yours today through the HoboTrashcan store.

As loyal listeners already know, we’ve been having some problems lately with our Hobo Radio podcast. I sincerely apologize for the inconvenience and am happy to inform you that things have finally been straightened out.

All of the “missing” shows are now available on the site. So to catch up on all of the great shows you’ve missed, make sure to check back through the archive.

- Joel Murphy
Editor-in-chief

Please forgive me while I do a little whoring, both for myself and for former HoboTrashcan writer Brian Murphy’s DC sports website HomerMcFanboy.com.

As you may remember, I am currently going back to college. Well, since my school, VCU, is garnering national attention for making the Sweet 16 for the first time ever (after several “experts” were complaining VCU didn’t belong in the NCAA tournament in the first place), Brian asked me to put together a special guest post for him today.

So, if you aren’t sick of me yet, or if you simply miss the sports coverage on this site, you can check out the “10 reasons to jump on the VCU bandwagon” here.

- Joel Murphy
Editor-in-chief