Masha Gessen has fled their home country, Russia, twice. First as a teenager, then again as an adult.

How much can you trust whether somebody who you think is close to you really is close to you? Saidu Tejan-Thomas Jr.’s been thinking about that question since a recent visit with some of his childhood friends in Sierra Leone. (37 minutes)

Jane Doe sent some questions for us to ask Chanel Miller. For years, Chanel was known as Emily Doe.

When to leave Twitter is a question lots of executives faced when Elon Musk took over the company — those who weren't immediately fired, anyway. We hear an insider’s account from the man who ran Trust & Safety at the company, until he couldn’t stand it anymore.

Our senior editor David Kestenbaum introduces us to someone who is literally running around the block as a way to solve one of his problems. David tries to figure out why it works.

At the announcement of New York City’s inaugural rat czar, we meet Darneice Foster, who despises the rats outside her apartment.

Miki Meek reports on the situation for pregnant women in Idaho under the state’s new, post-Roe abortion laws, which are some of the most restrictive in the country. OB-GYNs say the state is in a crisis.

Producer Elna Baker’s mom doles out some very harsh feedback for her daughter, which goes unnoticed for ten years. (15 minutes)

Back in 2021, a 19-year-old intern at the Idaho state legislature reported that a state Representative named Aaron von Ehlinger raped her. She went by the name Jane Doe.

Brothers Wes and Jeff spent a winter tagging black bears in Bryce Canyon National Park. One of the bears they needed to tag decided to hibernate at the end of an usually long tunnel.

When Jackie read the obits for the man who had invented the famous Trapper Keeper notebook, she was very surprised. As far as she knew, the inventor was very much alive.

Yet another testimony to the power chickens have over our hearts and minds.  Jack Hitt reports on an opera about Chicken Little.  It's performed with dressed-up styrofoam balls, it's sung in Italian and, no kidding, able to make grown men cry. (14 minutes)The official website for the opera "Love's Fowl" by Susan Vitucci and Henry Krieger is pulcina.org.

Ira has some thoughts about our country’s long history of alien invasion movies.

Etgar's mom invents a business for herself where other women look to her like a queen.

The musicians in the orchestra for Phantom of the Opera tell reporter Jay Caspian Kang about what it’s like to play the exact same music every single night—for decades.

Ira Glass interviews actress Molly Ringwald about what happened when she watched one of her own movies, "The Breakfast Club" with her daughter. Ringwald talks about how for the first time, she saw the movie from the parents' point of view, not the kids'.

Kristina Karamo and her camp defend themselves against Warren’s attacks that they’re bad at fundraising and bad at leading the party. (13 minutes)

Chaunte Vaughn’s mother recently died of Parkinsons. Even though Chaunte doesn't believe in ghosts, she is visited by her mom's ghost multiple times.

We’ve witnessed a revolution in A.I. since the public rollout of ChatGPT.  Our Senior Editor David Kestenbaum thinks that even though there’s been a ton of coverage, there’s one thing people haven’t talked much about: have these machines gotten to the point that they’re starting to have something like human intelligence? Where they actually understand language and concepts, and can reason? He talks with scientists at Microsoft who’ve been trying to figure that out.

A new resident in Berlin is greeted like a minor celebrity wherever she goes.

Writer Marie Phillips believes that magic is not just reserved for the beginning of a relationship.

A middle schooler really wants to trust the adults have her best interests in mind. But some of the most powerful people at her school begin to make that very difficult.

In the months following the court’s decision, two women are stalled getting abortions. Reporter Caroline Kitchener follows Kae and Taylor in those early months, as they try to figure out what to do.

Even people who vehemently disagreed with Heider Garcia wanted him to stay in his job. But then something happened that made staying impossible.