How they organize the chaos of the world, for good and for bad. Prologue: Ira interviews David Wallechinsky, who wrote a wildly popular book in the 1970s called The Book of Lists, full of trivia and research, gathered into lists like "18 Brains" and "What They Weighed." The book sold millions of copies and had four sequels and a brief spin-off TV show. The list books were like the internet, before the internet. (12 minutes)Act One: John Fecile talks to his brother, Pat, about a list their other brother made before he died. They each have different ideas about what the list means and how they feel about it. (14 minutes)Act 2: A brief visit with Bobby, who keeps a list in his phone of all the dogs in his neighborhood and their names to save him from the awkwardness of not knowing the name of someone’s dog – because people get upset if you don’t remember their dog’s name. (3 minutes)Act Two: Reporter M. Gessen talks to Russians living in America and elsewhere about the lists the Russian government has put them on in the last few years. M. Gessen is also on one of these lists. Each list has its own complex rules and potential consequences for the people on the lists and for their family members who live in Russia. (28 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

When the best—and perhaps only—way to say something is to write it down. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Ira goes out with a letter carrier, ‘Grace,’ as she delivers mail on her route. He learns about the people who bring us our mail and also how people treat their mail. (11 minutes)Act One: Writing a letter decades after an event that shaped her life was the only way that Nicole Piasecki could make some sense of it. (18 minutes)Act Two: Yorkshire, 1866. A farmer overcomes his timidity and writes a very important letter to a local beauty. (3 minutes)Act Three: When senior editor David Kestenbaum was still a rookie reporter, he wrote an email to a legend. Then he waited...and waited...for a reply. (6 minutes)Act Four: A woman writes an unusual letter on behalf of her husband. (1 minute)Act Five: Producer Zoe Chace compares the letters a person gets and the letters they wish they got. (12 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

Iowa has three million people and a million come to their State Fair, each with their own goals and dreams for the fair. We hang out with some of them, to see if they get what they hoped for. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: A big bull, a giant slide, and cowboys on horseback shooting balloons are just a few sights you can take in at the Iowa State Fair. Some people come for the spectacle, and some are the spectacle. (8 minutes)Act One: Bailey Leavitt comes from a family of carnies. For her, one of the most thrilling things she looks for at the fair is someone who is really good at luring people into spending money at their stand. She takes Ira on an insider’s search for “an agent.” (16 minutes)Act 2: Motley Crue pledged never to play the fairgrounds. Then they did. We wondered what that had been like for them. They agreed to an interview, but then they flinched. (1 minute)Act Two: What life lessons can kids learn at the 4-H rabbit competition? A lot. (11 minutes)Act Three: The Iowa State Fair awarded coveted slots to just nine new food vendors this year. All of them are run by people who already own restaurants or who’ve done other big fairs. All except for an unlikely newcomer: Biscuit Bar. (19 minutes)Act Four: As the ferris wheel goes dark and the fair is closing down, one game is racing to meet their quota. Ira watches until the end. (3 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

What is it about them, our mean friends? They treat us poorly, they don't call us back, they cancel plans at the last minute, and yet we keep coming back for more. Popular bullies exist in business, politics — everywhere. How do they stay so popular? Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: We hear kids recorded at Chicago's Navy Pier and at a public swimming pool discussing their mean friends. And Ira Glass interviews Lillie Allison, 15, about the pretty, popular girls who were her best friends—until they cast her out. (5 minutes)Act One: Jonathan Goldstein interrogates the girls, now grown up, who terrorized him and his classmates years ago in school—and finds they can be just as scary as ever. (18 minutes)Act Two: We conduct an experiment to test whether being nice actually pays by equipping two waitresses with hidden microphones to record their interactions. Each waitress is instructed to be super friendly with half of their tables while remaining aloof with the other half. We then compare the tips to see which approach was more profitable. (10 minutes)Act Three: A case study in every word from a friend meaning its opposite. (4 minutes)Act Four: An excerpt of Bernard Cooper's story about the bill he got from his own father, for the entire cost of his childhood. Actor Josh Hamilton reads. (19 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

The story of the most commonly performed surgery, and what goes wrong with it – terribly wrong – 100,000 times a year in the United States. We’re excited to bring you the first episode of The Retrievals, Season 2, the new show from longtime This American Life producer and editor Susan Burton. It’s from Serial Productions and The New York Times. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Ira Glass introduces the first episode of an inventive new podcast from longtime This American Life producer and editor Susan Burton.Act One: Susan Burton introduces Mindy, a labor and delivery nurse at UI Health at the University of Illinois at Chicago. (5 minutes)Act Two: Another labor and delivery nurse at UI Health, Clara, gets ready to deliver twins at her own hospital and receives an epidural. (19 minutes)Act Three: Clara’s anesthesia is not working. She is now in the middle of major abdominal surgery, and she can feel that surgery. (21 minutes)Act Four: Heather, the head of obstetric anesthesia at UI Health, gets up onstage and asks a ballroom full of hundreds of anesthesiologists to wrestle with the question of why patients are feeling pain during C-sections, and what they can do to solve it. (8 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

Ira Glass talks with longtime producer Nancy Updike about the most personal stories they have put on the radio. This is a sample of the bonus episodes we regularly release to our This American Life Partners. To gain access to all the bonus episodes AND help us keep making This American Life, join at thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners.

When you’re the only one who can see something, sometimes it feels like you’re in on a special secret. The hard part is getting anyone to believe your secret is real. This week, people trying to show others what they see—including a woman with muscular dystrophy who believes she has the same condition as an Olympic athlete. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Ira asks Jeff Emtman to do the impossible—describe the indescribable color he sees in his left eye. (5 minutes)Act One: Journalist David Epstein tells the story of Jill Viles, who has muscular dystrophy and can’t walk. But she believes that she somehow has the same condition as one of the best hurdlers in the world, Priscilla Lopes-Schliep. (36 minutes)Act Two: Producer Nancy Updike speaks with comedian Tig Notaro about her mother-in-law, Carol. Carol came up with a joke that is only funny to one person—herself. But she loved it so much, Tig had to have her perform it onstage. (9 minutes)Act Three: Actor Alex Karpovsky reads a short story by Etgar Keret, from his book, “The Bus Driver Who Wanted To Be God." (4 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

Summer is a time when change seems more possible than ever. But is that really how it happens? Can people actually reinvent themselves in the warmer months? This week, we present stories — and some comedy — about people and their summer selves. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Host Ira Glass reflects on his feelings about going to the beach. (3 minutes)Act One: Producer Dana Chivvis explores the case of a 66-year-old working lifeguard who is suing New York State for age discrimination after refusing to wear a Speedo on the job. (16 minutes)Act Two: A troupe of comedians tells personal stories about summer experiences and improvises scenes based on them. (23 minutes)Act Three: Producer Neil Drumming tells the story of his dad and his family’s timeshare in Orlando, Florida. (14 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

People on a mission to achieve their goals before their window of opportunity closes. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Guest host Emmanuel Dzotsi goes to a packed sports bar in Brooklyn for his favorite soccer team’s biggest game in years. (6 minutes)Act One: Connie Wang tells the story of a championship window she didn't realize she was in — until it was too late. (14 minutes)Act Two: Seth Lind, our Operations Director, isn’t a crier. But he wants to connect with his emotions, so guest host Emmanuel Dzotsi sets up an unconventional experiment. (14 minutes)Act Three: Two college baseball teams with horrible losing streaks — a combined 141 games — are scheduled to play each other. One of them must finally win. (14 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

On his first day in office, President Trump decided to freeze all U.S. foreign aid. Soon after, his administration effectively dissolved USAID—the federal agency that delivers billions in food, medicine, and other aid worldwide. Many of its programs have been canceled. Now, as USAID officially winds down, we try to assess its impact. What was good? What was not so good? We meet people around the world wrestling with these questions and trying to navigate this chaotic moment. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Just one box of a specially enriched peanut butter paste can save the life of a severely malnourished child. So why have 500,000 of those boxes been stuck in warehouses in Rhode Island? (13 minutes)Act One: USAID was founded in 1961. Since then, it has spent hundreds of billions of dollars all over the world. What did that get us? Producer David Kestenbaum talked with Joshua Craze and John Norris about that. (12 minutes)Act Two: Two Americans moved to Eswatini when that country was the epicenter of the AIDS epidemic. With support from USAID, they built a clinic and started serving HIV+ patients. Now that US support for their clinic has ended, they are wondering if what they did was entirely a good thing. (27 minutes)Act Three: When USAID suddenly stopped all foreign assistance without warning or a transition plan, it sent people all over the world scrambling. Especially those relying on daily medicine provided by USAID. Producer Ike Sriskandarajah spoke to two families in Kenya who were trying to figure it out. (8 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

Conversations across a divide: People who are outside a war zone check in with family, friends, and strangers inside. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: The Hammash family’s group chat unfolds over texts, starting before the war. (8 minutes)Act One: When Yousef Hammash left Gaza a year ago, his sisters decided to stay behind. We hear about the toll that separation has taken on Yousef and the sister he’s closest to, Aseel. (30 minutes)Act Two: Mohammed Mhawish, a reporter who left Gaza a year ago with his family, talks to a young woman in Gaza about how she manages her hunger. Israel blockaded all food from Gaza for more than two months. (15 minutes)Coda: Chana gives a short update about Banias, a 9-year-old girl in Gaza she's been speaking with for months. (4 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

A show about people who are suddenly confronted with who they are. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription. Prologue: Guest host Aviva DeKornfeld tells Ira Glass about breaking into a community pool as a kid, and the split-second decision that has haunted her ever since. (4 minutes)Act One: Some people are great in a crisis. Others, not so much. Does that mean anything about who we really are? Tobin Low investigates. (10 minutes)Act Two: Aviva DeKornfeld has the story of Leisha Hailey, who was certain she had the next million-dollar idea. (11 minutes)Act Three: Comedian Mike Birbiglia talks about the questions his daughter asks him and how trying to answer them showed him surprising reflections of himself.  (15 minutes)Act Four: David Kestenbaum tells the story of the suspicious disappearance of multiple shoes and a woman determined to explain it. (8 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

People immersed in chaos try to solve for what it all adds up to. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: A scientist who is used to organizing data starts tracking scientific meetings that seem to exist only on paper—meetings that might decide the fate of years of research. The NIH website shows one reality; the empty conference rooms tell another story. She graphs the chaos. (9 minutes)Act One: American doctors returning from Gaza compare notes and start to see a pattern. (28 minutes)Act Two: A woman watches her partner get taken in handcuffs with no explanation. Days later, she spots him in the most unexpected place. The coordinates of her life suddenly don't make sense as she navigates the bewildering map of the US immigration system. (23 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

A couple devises a strategy to get their daughter's killer prosecuted and to get attention for other Native families.  Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Mika Westwolf was killed in a hit-and-run on a Montana highway. Her parents thought the driver might get away with it. The driver was white. Mika was a citizen of the Blackfeet Nation. (1 minute)Act One: Mika’s parents, Carissa Heavy Runner and Kevin Howard, share recordings of their interactions with law enforcement. (8 minutes)Act Two: Carissa and Kevin take matters into their own hands. (20 minutes)Act Three: The county prosecutor explains why he let Mika’s killer out of jail. Will Carissa and Kevin's efforts pay off? Sierra follows them to court. (33 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

Artifacts and exhibits of this particular moment we are living through. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Exhibit One: Ira talks to producer Emmanuel Dzotsi, who brings the first exhibit into the studio with him: a chunk of concrete with some yellow paint on it. He got it from the demolition site in Washington, DC, where the giant Black Lives Matter letters are being dug out of the street with heavy equipment. (8 minutes)Exhibit Two: Producer Aviva DeKornfeld talks to Ranjani Srinivasan, who tells the story of how her life was transformed over five days via a series of events that started out confusing and escalated to frightening. (25 minutes)Exhibit Three: Producer Laura Starecheski takes us inside one dramatic court hearing on the Trump administration’s executive order and new policy banning transgender people from serving in the military. (20 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

Sometimes, life’s biggest mysteries require one very specific person to answer them. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: 7-year-old Miles has lots of questions. More specifically, he has questions about the famous car chase from “The Blues Brothers” movie. We arrange for him to talk to stunt coordinator Gary Powell so he can get the answers he so desperately wants. (9 minutes)Act One: Producer Aviva DeKornfeld looks into why comedian Daniel Sloss’s comedy special has been responsible for so many couples breaking up. (17 minutes)Act Two: We hear from Kwaneta Harris, a former nurse incarcerated in Texas, who is constantly asked for medical advice by her neighbors. (17 minutes)Act Three: Producer Diane Wu talks to Juna, a young woman who is getting advice from someone uniquely equipped to guide her to the love life she wants. (12 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

Ira Glass has news to share about some things happening here at This American Life. To sign up as a Life Partner, visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners.

One call to a very unusual hotline and everything that followed. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Ira talks about a priest who set up what may have been the first hotline in the United States. It was just him, answering a phone, trying to help strangers who called. (2 minutes)Act One: The Never Use Alone hotline was set up so that drug users can call if they are say, using heroin by themselves. Someone will stay on the line with them in case they overdose. We hear the recording of one call, from a woman named Kimber. (13 minutes)Act Two: An EMT learns he was connected to the call, in more ways than he realized. (16 minutes)Act Three: Jessie, who took the call, explains how she discovered the hotline. She keeps in touch with Kimber. Until one day, Kimber disappears. (16 minutes)Act Four: We learn what happened to Kimber after she called the line. (10 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

Our most ambitious live show ever! We pulled together a massive team of theater pros at the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Opera House—nearly 50 singers, actors, dancers and musicians. The result? Journalism turned into a Broadway musical, into opera. Mike Birbiglia, Sasheer Zamata, Stephin Merritt, Josh Hamilton, Lindsay Mendez, Lin-Manuel Miranda and others. Carin Gilfry explains how she once accidentally locked herself in a hotel closet, and because today’s show is being broadcast from an opera house stage, Ira is able to take the story to a place he never usually can. (18 minutes)Act One: Lin-Manuel Miranda turns a piece of reporting we broadcast in 2012, into a 14-minute Broadway mini-musical, created by people who normally work on Broadway. (18 minutes)Act Two: Comedian Mike Birbiglia, his wife, and his cat take a trip together and meet some parasitic zombie mice. (10 minutes)Act Three: Joshuah Bearman tells a story that’s a sequel to his memorable episode about his mother and half-brother David. It’s done onstage as a play that’s structured like a radio documentary, with Josh Hamilton playing Joshuah, and James Ransone playing his brother. (17 minutes)Act Four: Comedian Sasheer Zamata stages a radio play, complete with sound effects and comedians Nicole Byer, Chris Gethard, and Frank Garcia Hejl. It’s a true story about a recent bus accident. (9 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.

We spend a month at a Jeep dealership on Long Island as they try to make their monthly sales goal: 129 cars. If they make it, they'll get a huge bonus from the manufacturer, possibly as high as $85,000 — enough to put them in the black for the month. If they don't make it, it'll be the second month in a row. So they pull out all the stops. It’s mid-October, 2013. Freddie Hoyt tries to rally his sales staff to sell 129 cars and trucks by the end of the month. Freddie’s the General Manager at Town and Country Jeep Chrysler Dodge Ram in Levittown, NY, on Long Island. Problem is, the customers are not cooperating. (7 1/2 minutes)Act One: How we found this car dealer. (2 minutes)Act Two: A quick primer of who’s who, and how the place works. (6 minutes)Act Three: Salesman Bob Tantillo has the fewest sales of anyone at Town and Country this month. Robyn Semien spoke to him. (4 minutes)Act Four: Salesman Jason Mascia has the most sales of anyone this month, as usual. Sean Cole spent a week with him watching how he does it. (8 minutes)Act Five: The next-to-last day of the month. Deals fall apart, but not all of them. (10 minutes)Act Six: The last day of the month begins. They have to sell nine cars by the end of the day. "God help us," Freddie says. (2 minutes)Act Seven: Joe Monti’s real name is Joe Montalbano. But when he started in the car business, he didn't want to lose a sale because a customer couldn’t keep his name straight so he simplified it for the job. He's one of the managers of the used cars department at Town and Country. Sarah Koenig reports on what it'll mean if he doesn’t make this month’s goal. (7 minutes)Act Eight: The last day of the month continues and the truism is accurate: some people get great deals because it’s the end of the month and they have to hit their goal. When you look at the numbers, the average car they sell in the last two days actually loses money. (4 minutes)Act Nine: Salesman Manny Rosales keeps to himself in the showroom, with his own sales philosophy. He explained it to Brian Reed. (7 minutes)Act Ten: The last day of the month ends. (8 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.