Stephanie Foo tells us the story of amateurs who for one night get thrown into a very, very big job — perhaps the biggest: President of the United States of America.

Ira talks about the fact that he never much liked William Burroughs or his writing, just never got why Burroughs was this revered figure for some people. Then Ira heard a recent BBC documentary about Burroughs and finally understood.

Host Ira Glass introduces the story of the New United Motor Manufacturing Inc., aka NUMMI. In 1984, General Motors and Toyota opened NUMMI as a joint venture.

Ira explores the news this week alleging bribery and corruption among officials for international soccer's governing board, FIFA. There have been 14 people arrested, and law enforcement officials have made clear that their investigation is not finished.

Ira finds a ridiculous comment thread on the Internet about an optical illusion.

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.

Julia Lillis talks to Ira about the huge, romantic move she made after a break up, and how it was both crazy and worth doing.

NPR Science reporters Alix Spiegel and Lulu Miller explain to Ira Glass how they smuggled a rat into NPR headquarters in Washington, and ran an unscientific version of a famous experiment first done by Psychology Professor Robert Rosenthal. It showed how people’s thoughts about rats could affect their behavior.

The story of an entire town that gets a status update. Producer Chana Joffe-Walt talked to Paul Kiel of Pro Publica, the man who gave the town its status update.

PJ Vogt’s friend plays a trick on some girl scouts. The trick doesn’t work.

One of the show's producers, Zoe Chace, tells Ira about a joke she made pretty soon after something terrible had happened.And then Ira talks to Amy Silverman about something else being too soon, and how she finally figured out the right moment for it. Amy's blog about her daughter is at girlinapartyhat.com.

Ira speaks with New York Times Magazine Reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones about her years reporting on education and the various kinds of school reforms administrators have tried to close the achievementgap that never seem to work. Nikole says there's one reform that people have pretty much given upon, despite a lot of evidence that it works – school integration.

A mysterious tunnel is found in a forest in Toronto. Public speculation is all over the place and totally wrong.

Michael Leviton was raised in a family who encouraged him and his siblings to tell the truth all the time. They believed it was better to be honest and work things out.

Some of the best improv actors in the country join us for a special Christmas themed performance recorded live at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn. Scott Adsit, Mike Birbiglia, Aidy Bryant, Chris Gethard, Tami Sagher, and Sasheer Zamata dream up a magical world on stage that’s only possible at Christmas.

Miki Meek reports on how bad things got for black residents of Miami Gardens, Florida – and why they got so bad – by telling the story of two men, a convenience store owner and one of his employees.

Three teenage girls explain why they are constantly telling their friends they are beautiful on Instagram.

Lots of people in the lower 9th ward believe that the levees were exploded by the US government, and that’s why their neighborhood ended up under water. This makes a lot of sense when you learn about what happened in that same place in 1927.

Erik Larson has read lots of captain’s logs while researching big historical events. When he found the log of Captain Walther Schwieger, the guy who headed the U-boat that sank the Lusitania, he knew something didn’t sound right.

Producer Ben Calhoun tells Ira about a secret move his friend uses all the time — the "good guy discount" — that gets Ben's friend money off all sorts of items when he's shopping.

This American Life producer Robyn Semien watched the Eric Garner video with a friend who's aNew York cop. Robyn's black.

Ira talks to Joel Gold, a psychologist and author, about a strangely common delusion known as the "Truman Show Delusion," in which patients believe that they are being filmed, 24/7, for a national reality television program.

Harmon Leon is a writer and comedian whose cocktail party story about “the-weirdest-gig-I-ever-did” is more weird—by a lot—than anyone else’s we’ve heard. He answered an ad several years ago that called for a hilarious sidekick to a celebrity on a hidden camera show.