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255: This American's Life's Holiday Gift-Giving Guide 12.19.03
The vexing difficulty of finding the perfect gift, illustrated in three acts.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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254: Teenage Embed, Part Two 12.12.03
In early 2003, we brought you a special show about a California teenager, Hyder Akbar, who traveled to Afghanistan, his family's homeland, for the first time.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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253: The Middle of Nowhere 12.5.03
Stories from faraway, hard-to-get-to places, where all rules are off, nefarious things happen because no one's looking, and there's no one to appeal to.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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252: Poultry Slam 2003 11.28.03
During the period of the year with the highest turkey consumption, we bring you an annual This American Life tradition: Stories of turkeys, chickens, geese, ducks, fowl of all kinds, real and...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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251: Brother's Keeper 11.21.03
Biblical fables ripped from today's headlines. In his ongoing effort to write his own version of the Bible, Jonathan Goldstein retells the story of Cain and Abel. Finally we hear Cain's side of the...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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250: The Annoying Gap Between Theory...and Practice 11.7.03
Why is it always harder than you think it'll be? We explore several case examples of the annoying gap between theory and practice.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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249: Garbage 10.31.03
We make what's usually invisible, visible: the world of trash. We follow the trash from the sanitation men on the street, to the mob guys who controlled the hauling business, to the people who...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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248: Like It or Not 10.24.03
Some stories we make happen, others happen to us. Extremes from the latter category, where people let things happen to them and don't act, even when maybe they should. David Rakoff guest hosts.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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247: What Is This Thing? 9.19.03
What is this thing? This thing called love, that is. For answers, we explore the romance novel industry, a $1.5 billion empire run almost entirely by and for women. Plus, relearning the rules of...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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246: My Pen Pal 9.12.03
Stories of very unusual pen pals, people whose relationship could not exist without the help of the postal service.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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245: Allure of the Mean Friend 9.5.03
What is it about them, our mean friends? They treat us badly, they don't call us back, they cancel plans at the last minute, and yet we come back for more. Popular bullies exist in business, politics...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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244: MacGyver 8.15.03
In real life, we usually never get to invent ingenious solutions, like the guy in the old TV series MacGyver. Today, four real stories in which real people invent amazingly clever solutions to their...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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243: Later That Same Day 7.25.03
Stories about what the passage of time can do to someone. When each story starts, the world's aligned one way. Years pass—or sometimes just months—and everything's different.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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242: Enemy Camp 7.18.03
Living behind enemy lines among the enemy, it's sometimes hard to remember why you're fighting in the first place.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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241: 20 Acts in 60 Minutes 7.11.03
Instead of the usual "each week we choose a theme, and bring you 3 or 4 stories on that theme" business, we throw all that away and bring you 20 stories—yes, 20—in 60 minutes.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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240: I'm In Charge Now 6.20.03
Stories of people putting themselves in charge in very unlikely, unpromising circumstances.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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239: Lost in America 6.6.03
Stories of people who are lost, histories that are lost, and things that are lost. This show was recorded onstage in front of audiences on a five-city tour in May 2003. The cities: Boston, Washington...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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238: Lost in Translation 5.30.03
Stories of what can and cannot be translated. A short, non-athletic, bespectacled East Asian studies major who couldn't make his high school basketball team finds himself in the NBA as the personal...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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237: Regime Change 4.18.03
Sure, John Kerry got in trouble for using the phrase, but we have no fear. Because we know that regime change, like charity, begins at home. This week: Stories of regime change in everyday life—...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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236: My Two Cents 4.11.03
Stories from a contradictory recession. (Audio is from the updated 2004 broadcast)- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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235: The Balloon Goes Up 3.21.03
Stories from the beginnings of the war in Iraq, and how it compares with wars in our country's past.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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234: Say Anything 3.14.03
Does talking about it really help? Stories where it does, and stories where it doesn't, including Michael Bernard Loggins, who tried to battle his fears by listing them. He ended up with a list 183...- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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233: Starting from Scratch 3.7.03
Stories of people starting over, sometimes because they want to, other times because they have to.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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232: The Real Story 2.14.03
It's been said that truth is the first casualty of war. In this week's show, we try to get the real stories from three very different wars.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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231: Time to Save the World 2.7.03
Stories of people trying to save the world one person at a time, and stories of sudden truths delivered by complete strangers.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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230: Come Back to Afghanistan 1.31.03
In January 2002, the President of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, spoke at Georgetown University. There he urged Afghan-Americans, especially young ones, to move back to Afghanistan.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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229: Secret Government 1.10.03
Stories of some of the secrets our government keeps: of imprisonment, deportation, and spying, and how those secrets affect us.- You must be logged in to access these features. Login / Register
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228: You Are So Beautiful…To Me 1.3.03
Two stories about love, and what people mean when they use the word love. Or, looked at differently, two modern-day reinterpretations of the Frog Prince story. One concerns a pretty man falling in...
