Kitty Felde explores the mystic link between boys and guns when her cousin's husband, a liberal in Berkeley, gives her lessons in his newest toy: a gun that shoots potatoes 450 feet in the air. The "spud gun" has a special property: Any man who sees it instantly wants one.

Scott Carrier took a job in commercial radio working for a network correspondent he refers to as "The Friendly Man." Every story was supposed to be upbeat, a tale of people coming together in the heartwarming spirit of community. And every story they sent him on turned out to be a sham.

Found tape of a conversation about bringing back the dead.

Chicago playwright Beau O'Reilly goes with Ira to the Scottie Pippen Dodge Store.Then, singer/songwriter/playwright Jeff Dorchen on Niketown.

The story of the worst stateside disaster during World War II, at Port Chicago, an ammunition dump for the navy just north of San Francisco. Black workers were assigned to load ammo onto ships under such unsafe conditions that on July 17, 1944, two ships blew up, killing 320 men.

Original fiction by Ira Sher about a group of children who find a man trapped in a well but decide not to get him any help.

We hear campaign diaries from author Michael Lewis, who is on the campaign trail for the New Republic magazine.

Writer David Sedaris's true account of two Christmas seasons he spent working as an elf at Macy's department store in New York.  When a shorter version of this story first aired on NPR's Morning Edition, it generated more tape requests than any story in the show's history to that point.

Scott Carrier's Haiku stories. Scott is the author of Running After Antelope.

Sex advice columnist Dan Savage tells the odd story of how he became a Republican state convention delegate even though he's a Democrat and gay.

Jack Hitt reviews the strange case of William Kane, his mistress, his family, and fifteen vials of frozen sperm.

We give Danny Drennan, the writer behind the website Inquisitor Mediarama, a little assignment.

Chicago writer Cheryl Trykv on her own close encounter with Hollywood, the media, and a famous maid.

Chicago writer and actor Dave Awl, who runs a show called the Pansy King Cotillion, on how he accidentally discovered how not to get picked on as a sissy in high school.

Audio artist Jay Allison and writer Dan Robb present an audio montage on the moment Robb's parents divorced.

The late Ron Brown, the former U.S. Secretary of Commerce, could have had an easy life, but chose instead to take on stressful, difficult tasks.

Producer/sound artist Gregory Whitehead presents his piece "This Mindless Thing." (7 minutes)

Chicago playwright David Isaacson, on hating the Bulls.Then, Nancy Updike presents a sound portrait of a Philadelphia woman and her basketball trophies.

Jack Hitt's quest to find out the truth about the man who lived down the street from him 30 years ago in South Carolina: Gordon Langley Hall, a.k.a. Dawn Langley Hall Simmons.

An excerpt from Spalding Gray's monologue It's a Slippery Slope. Gray has been called "America's premiere storyteller." His monologue Swimming To Cambodia was made into a feature film.

A reading from the zine Motorbooty about the crisis of World Band Overpopulation. Then, This American Life contributor Sarah Vowell on someone who is not part of the world band overpopulation problem: Scott Lee, the world's greatest fan of the Fastbacks, a respected, semi-obscure Seattle alternative band.

Eighteen-year-old Claudia Perez takes Ira on a tour of her Chicago neighborhood and looks at what 1995 was like for her community.

An Orthodox Jew talks about whether Hasidic Judaism is like an obsession.

Alix Spiegel tells the story of her friend Jayna, who made a Faustian bargain at 11 years old.