Jesse had been waiting his whole life to fall in love—and then he started getting these letters from the perfect woman, Pamala. She seemed vulnerable.

Lulu tells the story of Daniel Kish, who’s blind, but can navigate the world by clicking with his tongue. This gives him so much information about what’s around him, he does all sorts of things most blind people don’t.

Ira speaks with Mike Pesca, host of the sports podcast Hang Up and Listen and Slate's daily podcast The Gist about the whole concept of the game face in sports. What is it exactly? And who might be the best examples of athletes with incredible game faces? Then Ira speaks with writer David Dupuis about the athlete who may have the game face-iest game face in sports history – hockey goalie Terry Sawchuk.

Larry speaks English. His dad speaks Chinese.

While it’s hard to explain to kids how babies come into the world, it might be harder to explain that people leave the world too — especially to a kid whose mom or dad or brother or sister has died. There are grief counseling centers all over the U.S. that cater specifically to children.

It turns out winning the lottery is only the first step in trying to come to America. More than half of the people who win each year never make it.

Before Sinatra died, Sarah Vowell appeared on this radio program and made a prediction about how network news would cover Sinatra's death ... and she made a simple plea. We hear whether her prediction came true.

This story, produced by the podcast Reply All (website, iTunes), asks the question — can internet bile ever be helpful? PJ Vogt interviews Paul Ford, a man who programmed a website to deal with his anxiety. The website sends him abusive comments all day long.

Reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones, who has investigated integration in schools for years, joins ChanaJoffe-Walt to interview the Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan. The Obama Administration saysit’s in favor of integrating the schools, but doesn’t seem to do so much to promote it.

It turns out that one of the members of the This American Life staff, Elna Baker, has a kind of anti-game face. She's what's called a chronic blusher.

There are things lots of us think we might fix about ourselves, you know, someday. When we get around to it.

Comedian Aziz Ansari has been touring the country collecting people’s text messages from when they first say hi, and ask each other out. Sociologist Eric Klinenberg wanted to study this raw data of the initial approach a man makes to a woman over text.

Julia DeWitt tells the story of someone who goes to incredible lengths to do a favor for another guy, even though the guy won't ever be able to know about it. Julia's story originally aired on Snap Judgment.

Ira Glass introduces producer Chana Joffe-Walt, who reports this week's story.

When Jordan was going into his senior year of high school in small town Utah, he and his buddies all lived together in a house, daring each other into Jackass-style pranks and stunts. There's one particular thing Jordan did that he did not want to talk to Ira about.

Lots of people in America share actual beds – but almost never see each other. Flight attendants have crash pads near airports, oil rig workers carry their own sheets and sleep in shifts in an RV – and Stephanie Foo has a profile of Mexican immigrants who share a few beds in a tiny trailer in upstate New York.

Fort Bragg Army base was suffering a number of unnecessary deaths — so they decided to attempt to save soldiers’ lives through the art of musical theater. Jack Hitt investigates, and tells the story of how this strange phenomenon began.

Lots of people don’t remember the storm: like people who are just becoming adolescents today. But they think about it a lot.