David Rakoff tells the story of a contract between a son and his visiting mother. David Rakoff is the author of several books including Half Empty.

When he was a kid, Josh Martin's mother Nancy told him that if anythingever happened to her, he needed to take care of his brother Ben. This confusedJosh, because Ben was his older brother, and he felt that if anything heshould be the one taken care of.

Wyatt Cenac tells this story about spreading Christmas cheer in Texas. Wyatt is a correspondent on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.

When Dave Hill was in his late 20s and still basically living at home, he hung out with his mom a lot. But once she used particularly sneaky tactics to get him to attend a church fundraiser.

Funny Funerals.

When it comes to predictions, Etgar Keret only trusts one person in his family: His mom. She's amazingly accurate.

David Rakoff tells the story of a contract between a son and his visiting mother. David Rakoff is the author of several books including Don't Get Too Comfortable.

Writer Doug McGray tells the story of a daughter who wanted to be closer to her mom, and went to extremes to do it. Doug McGray is a fellow at the New America Foundation.

Host Ira Glass talks with a high school senior about the lies she tells her mom, and if she'll ever reveal the truth.

When she was in kindergarten, Jennifer, along with her brother and mother,was held hostage by an armed gunman for four days. Their father was a drugdealer and had disappeared with a bunch of cocaine that belonged to someoneelse.

A story about a mother who wants to commit suicide and a son who dutifully helps her do it—even though his mother is a happy, healthy, independent person. How did they manage to pull it off? Practice, practice, practice.

Chaya Lipschutz wanted to donate one of her kidneys to a stranger. But to save a stranger's life, she had to break the commandment against lying.

We play excerpts from the documentary film Troop 1500. In the film, girl scouts from an Austin, Texas, troop visit their mothers, all of whom are in prison.

Karen Sosnoski's one-year-old son, Anton, was born with what's known as Mosaic Down Syndrome, a rare condition where some of his cells have the extra chromosome that causes Down syndrome and other cells don't. So as he grows, he could end up having all the health risks and challenges of Downs syndrome...or just a few of them. Through a website, Karen found a kid with the same diagnosis, named Tim Colvin, who was doing really well...perhaps because his mother, Kristy, invented a surprising and unusual way to raise her son.

When Elspeth was a girl, she wanted nothing more than her father's attention. He was busy, a doctor, and distant.

Nick Hornby's new story about a country so tiny, it's just a field, a few houses, a shop, and a café. There, a boy whose mom happens to be president of this minuscule nation is called upon to show his patriotism by playing on the national soccer team.

David Wilcox tells the story of how his mother, who was dying of lung cancer, made a short videotape for his sister, who is severely developmentally disabled. She hoped the tape would become a daily part of her daughter's life, like the other music and movies she liked to play, that she would watch it and remember her mother.

Writer Beth Lisick decides to try a new strategy to get her infant to sleep better, and buys a baby monitor as part of the deal. Soon, she's hearing her neighbors make drug deals over the monitor's frequency.

When Aimee Phan and her brother were babies, her mother had horoscopes predicting their futures made and put on tape. The tapes were in Vietnamese, which Aimee and her brother didn't understand.

Starlee Kine gets answers about her parents marriage from her dad...after a lifetime of mystery. She and her sister had wanted her parents to divorce since they were little.