It's true that it does not work for any task that you need to pay attention to. Folding laundry, cooking a known meal, cleaning anything and driving the standard commute, however? No problem at all. Maybe I need to rewind 15 seconds a few times (which is purposefully made easy) if something unexpected happens in the menial task, but most of the time those menial tasks leave more than enough attention for a podcast.

I'm roughly the same way. When driving the choice is that I either miss something on the road or miss something on what I'm listening to.

I usually take public transit to work, but the buses are too noisy for me to actually get anything out of a podcast. I could use noise canceling headphones, but I find those just make the bus sound weird instead of getting rid of the noise.

Just get IEMs with properly fitting tips.

I have this problem too. The other nice thing about music for me is that it regularly inspires emotions in me that are useful for writing fiction.