Hey, kids! Did you know there are grown ups who are just as obsessed with Disney as you?

There's an adult out there who has full-sleeve tattoos of Disney characters, another who’s spent tens of thousands of dollars on merch, and one guy even set a world record for visiting Disneyland for almost 3,000 days in a row!

Those are just some of the Disney adults you’ll meet on today’s show.

GUESTS: 

• Eric Aasen: Executive editor at Connecticut Public
• Abby Brone: Statewide housing reporter for Connecticut Public
• Jeff Reitz: Set a Guinness World Record for "Most Consecutive Visits To Disneyland", which was between January 1, 2012 to March 13, 2020, totaling 2,995 days
• Erin Dugan & Zach Bakken: Erin Dugan is the President of the Opera House Players in Enfield, where she and Zach met during an audition for Beauty and the Beast. Zach is a voice over actor who voiced characters for Disney World attractions
• Rozy Ambler: A collector of all things Disney, including ears, mugs, and bags. She is followed by 1.2 million people on TikTok where she shares her love of Disney, and advocates for better mental health
• AJ Wolfe: Operates the Disney Food Blog, followed by over three million people on social media
• Katie Charter: Social worker in Leicester, UK, who has a sleeve of Disney characters on her left arm. Her tattoo artist is Clairy Floofs Tattoo

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Ah, Craigslist’s Missed Connections.

Where else can you find that attractive guy you saw at that concert? Or the lady in the laundromat who held your gaze? Or reconnect with your long lost hairstylist? 

Hear those stories, plus what a researcher learned from studying over 10,000 posts.

And what does it sound like when two Tony-nominated songwriters take Missed Connection posts and turn them into songs?

GUESTS: 

• Ilia Blinderman is a Sr. Journalist-Engineer at The Pudding. In 2015, he studied data from over 10,000 Craigslist Missed Connections ads
• Anthony King is a Tony- and Emmy-nominated writer, producer and performer
• Scott Brown is a WGA-award-winning, Emmy-, Tony- and Drama Desk-nominated writer of theater, television and criticism
• Vinz Clortho (a pseudonym) is a Colchester resident who posted on Missed Connections after an encounter at a laundromat 
• Allison Holst-Grubbe is a Manchester resident who found a long-lost beloved hairstylist via Missed Connections
• Alex Ferrante (a pseudonym) lives in the Washington, DC metro area, and posted to Missed Connections after an encounter in an Aldi grocery store
• Erin and Dan Kottke from MN, re-met through missed connections. They are celebrating their 15th wedding anniversary in March, and have two children

This episode originally premiered on February 4, 2022. 

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Olusanya Bey is many things, but he's best known as a “love poet."

But that title comes after much deep, philosophical pondering: What does writing about love do for - and to - him? Must he have a tangible muse? And how does a love of self affect love for others?

Hear Olusanya Bey in Chion’s backyard for this third installment of a series of conversations with poets around a fire.

Listen to the first installment with Zulynette.

Listen to the second installment with Andrew Dean Wright.

GUEST: 

• Olysanya Bey: Poet, community organizer, a mindfulness instructor, and a teaching artist in Hartford

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Imagine you’re at the beach, taking in the scenery, breathing in the fresh ocean air, when the sun hits something floating in the water just right… It’s a bottle! With a message inside that looks totally intact!Meet people who’ve found - and gotten back - their messages in bottles, and hear about one that was thrown from the Titanic.

GUESTS: 

• Stefanie Marco Lantz, Lana & Tommy Simmons: The Simmons family received a message in a bottle as a donation at their thrift store in Statesville, NC. They tracked down its owner, Stefanie, in West Hartford, Connecticut. She had tossed her message in a bottle into the water near Martha’s Vineyard, MA back in 1982 when she was nine years old
• Eric and Melanie Dahl: Parents of Brian Dahl, who sent off a message in a bottle when he was 12 years old in 1989. He died in 2007, and his bottle was found in 2022
• Jack Walsh: General Manager at Cobh Heritage Centre in County Cork, Ireland. In their collection, they have a message in a bottle written by Jeremiah Burke that was thrown from the Titanic on its doomed voyage

Jessica Severin de Martinez and Catie Talarski contributed to this show, with help from our interns, Jacob Gannon and Taylor Doyle. This episode originally aired October 28, 2022.

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When we talk about people getting struck by lightning, we don’t often think, “wait, what does that really do to a person?”

A lightning strike expert talks about the physical and psychological effects of lightning hitting the human body, and tells us exactly what to do when a storm is coming.

Then, meet one woman whose personality and body changed forever, and one man who, after his near-death experience getting hit, became obsessed with the piano.

GUESTS: 

• Dr. Mary Ann Cooper: Emergency physician and international expert in lightning injuries and lightning injury prevention. She is the co-author of Reducing Lightning Injuries Worldwide
• Shana Turner: Lightning strike survivor and special education teacher in Fayetteville, North Carolina
• Tony Cicoria: After getting struck by lightning in 1994, became obsessed with piano music. An original composition had been forming in his head since his near-death experience with the lightning bolt, called “Opus I: Lightning Sonata”. He recorded it in 2008

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In 2000, Sigrid Wade began writing to people on death row to express her solidarity against that kind of punishment; she never thought she’d end up marrying one of them and having a child. But that’s exactly what happened between her and Alan Wade.

Meet a sociologist who studies relationships like theirs, and hear directly from Sigrid and Alan about love, family, worthiness, and trust.

GUESTS: 

• Megan Comfort: Senior research sociologist in Research Triangle Institute’s Transformative Research Unit for Equity. She is also affiliated faculty in the Division of Prevention Science at the University of California, San Francisco, and she works with the non-profit, UnCommon Law
• Sigrid Wade: Originally from France, now living in Florida, she met Alan Wade in 2014 via a pen pal program when he was on death row. They have been married for seven years, and they have a three year-old son. She's the co-founder of Wire of Hope's Prison Pen Pal Program
• Alan Wade: Currently serving life without the possibility of parole in a Florida prison

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When you know you’re months, maybe weeks away from your own death, what do you most want people to know?

As the first in a series of conversations with people near the end of their lives, we get to know David Meyers. He’s a physician who was diagnosed with glioblastoma in 2018. Hear his reflections on life, love, and what really matters.

An extended version of this conversation is available in your podcast feed.

GUEST: 

• Dr. David Meyers: A physician living in the Washington, DC area. He is currently in hospice after being diagnosed with glioblastoma in 2018

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This is a special extended version of my conversation with Dr. David Meyers.

After five years of living with glioblastoma, a brain tumor, he is nearing the end of his life. He talks about what matters most to him, gives advice for those of us who aren't so willing to ponder death deeply, and shares how he wants to be remembered.

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What if, for as long as you can remember, you’ve strongly felt as though one of your healthy limbs just doesn't belong? You’ve always wished it could be amputated.

You aren’t the only person with this feeling, but you would be one of fewer than 400 documented cases of body integrity dysphoria (BID) or body integrity identity disorder (BIID) in the world.

Meet a man with BID, who, after years of struggling with his bodily identity, traveled to Asia to have his left leg under the knee amputated.

Hear how he’s felt since the surgery, and meet a bioethicist and moral philosopher who has pondered the origin and ethics of this rare condition.

GUESTS: 

• Dr. Richard B. Gibson: A bioethicist and moral philosopher currently at the University of Texas Medical Branch. His thesis was about the ethics of elective amputations, specifically for body integrity identity disorder (BIID)
• Dan: A Wyoming man with BIID who had his left leg amputated below the knee in 2009, and started the BIID support group, “Fighting It”

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Beatboxing is so cool! Not only do you have portable access to a full drum set, but also to trumpets, guitars, turntables, and whatever else your body can imitate! It’s a fine art that is fully embodied.

Meet three beatboxers: One of the first on the scene to develop the craft, another who uses it to connect to herself and the rest of the world, and one 12 year-old who is making waves on beatbox competition stages.

GUESTS: 

• Rahzel Manely Brown: Legendary beatboxer, former member of the Roots, and educator
• Gus Mcafoos and his mom, Deaneal: Gus is a 12 year-old beatboxer from Missouri who discovered beatboxing for himself during the pandemic
• Kaila Mullady: Two-time World Beatboxing Champion, worked with Lin Manuel Miranda’s freestyle rap group “Freestyle Love Supreme”, teaches beatboxing workshops, developed a program with the Academy of Noise to use beatboxing as a form of speech therapy

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