In The NoCo

Every December, Santa Claus literally does the impossible – delivering presents all over the world with a team of flying reindeer. So when someone becomes a stand-in for Santa at your local mall, or work party, those are big boots to fill.  

But as it turns out, being Santa is a teachable skill. 

Susen Mesco founded Professional Santa Claus School in Denver in 1983. She says more than 5,000 Santas have attended over the years. And that means she has decades of expertise in getting your local Santa acting and looking his best.  

Susen got started when her event planning business got an offer to train and manage some Santas at local malls. And she saw a lot of room for improvement.  

"I went around spying on my competitor, and what I actually found was everything not to do,” she said. "So I went to work, writing kind of a manual.”  

Susen joined Erin O’Toole last December to talk about what makes a great Santa, the extensive training her school offers, and how she trains Santas to answer particularly tough questions from kids. We’re listening back to that conversation today. 

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Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
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Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.

Imagine traveling from Denver to Pueblo in just 20 minutes. And instead of sitting in traffic on Interstate 25, you'd make the journey through a sealed tube moving almost at the speed of sound.   

That’s the vision behind Hyperloop – an innovative transportation technology that’s being tested right here in Colorado.  

The Hyperloop works like this: You fill a specialized pod with people, or stuff you want to transport from one place to another. Then you shoot those pods at very high speeds through miles of giant metal tubes. 

A Switzerland-based company called Swisspod is operating in Pueblo to make this form of travel commercially viable. Last month, they performed a successful trial run that generated a lot of buzz, using a pod the size of a mini car. 

Reporter Sue McMillin wrote about it for The Colorado Sun. She joined Erin O'Toole to talk about the technology and how this work could reshape the economy in southern Colorado. 

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Sign up for the In The NoCo newsletter: Visit KUNC.org
Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
Like what you're hearing? Help more people discover In The NoCo by rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks!
 
Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.

Scromiting  refers to an intense form of illness – a mix of screaming and vomiting – brought on by overindulging in cannabis. 
 
CNN recently reported that scromiting is on the rise and quoted one female patient who described the pain as “worse than childbirth.” The New York Post noted that misdiagnosis is common because many doctors don’t know about the condition.  

The CDC and World Health Organization recently gave official diagnostic codes for cannabis hyperemesis syndrome, which is the official term for scromiting. 
 
It turns out that emergency room doctors in Colorado have seen their share of this condition in patients since the state became one of the first to legalize recreational marijuana in 2012.  

Dr. Sam Wang is one of those physicians who has seen and treated cases of scromiting. Wang practices pediatric emergency medicine and specializes in medical toxicology at Children's Hospital Colorado. He joined Erin O’Toole to share more about this unusual illness.  

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Sign up for the In The NoCo newsletter: Visit KUNC.org
Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
Like what you're hearing? Help more people discover In The NoCo by rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks!
 
Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.

A unique retelling of the holiday classic The Nutcracker explores the history and cultural importance of Denver's Five Points neighborhood.   

The Five Points Nutcracker replaces the story’s traditional characters with significant figures from Denver’s African American community. Five Points was once known as the “Harlem of the West.”  

Duke Ellington’s jazz version of the music is the backbone of the production, and was the inspiration for the show’s director, Larea Edwards.  

The production, which is now in its third year, features actors and dancers from the performing arts group LuneASeas. Musicians from Denver jazz artist Tenia Nelson’s band will perform the Ellington score.  

Larea Edwards spoke with Erin O’Toole last December about the production. We’re listening back to that conversation today.  

Performances take place Dec. 26 – 28 at the Savoy Denver. 

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Sign up for the In The NoCo newsletter: Visit KUNC.org
Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
Like what you're hearing? Help more people discover In The NoCo by rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks!
 
Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.

A diagnosis of chronic depression or bipolar disorder can be scary. These conditions can come with feelings of sadness or despair, or intense mood swings.  
  
But a researcher at the University of Colorado says we might be thinking too simplistically about these disorders.   

June Gruber is a professor of psychology and neuroscience who runs the Positive Emotion and Psychopathology Lab at CU Boulder. She specializes in research around happiness.  

She recently looked into silver linings — or side benefits — of some common mood disorders. And what she found is encouraging — both for folks with these conditions, and those close to them.  

June and her research team found those potential advantages can include a greater ability to cope with life's stresses, a tendency toward creativity and a richer social life.  

June joined Erin O’Toole to talk about her research, which was partly inspired by watching her father deal with life with bipolar disorder.  

If you enjoyed this conversation, check out this previous interview with June on her tips for living a happier life.

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Sign up for the In The NoCo newsletter: Visit KUNC.org
Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
Like what you're hearing? Help more people discover In The NoCo by rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks!
 
Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.

The CU-Anschutz medical campus in Aurora recently agreed to pay $10.3 million to settle a lawsuit over vaccine mandates during the pandemic. 
 
A group of 18 students and faculty claimed that the school violated their religious liberties by requiring them to receive COVID vaccinations to be on campus in person. CU ultimately settled the case through mediation. 

The Thomas More Society, which specializes in religious liberty cases, represented the students and staff. The organization says this is one of the only cases in the country so far in which a defendant paid out money in a lawsuit over COVID vaccinations.   
 
So, why did CU settle? And what does the case say about vaccination policies in Colorado going forward?  

Reporter John Ingold covers public health and wrote about this settlement for The Colorado Sun. He joined Erin O’Toole to unpack those questions.  

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Sign up for the In The NoCo newsletter: Visit KUNC.org
Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
Like what you're hearing? Help more people discover In The NoCo by rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks!
 
Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.

Writer Cassondra Windwalker’s new horror novel uses fiction to highlight a real-life crisis that often goes ignored.  

Ghost Girls and Rabbits touches on the thousands of unsolved cases of Indigenous American and Alaska Native women who were missing or murdered. More than 4,000 cases fit that description, according to the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. 

The novel tells the story of two Indigenous American women: one who has lost her daughter, and the other who has herself been kidnapped. Windwalker is originally from Oklahoma, spent time in Alaska and now lives in Berthoud.  

Ghost Girls and Rabbits was released on May 5, which is also a day of awareness to call attention to the issue.  

Windwalker spoke with Erin O'Toole earlier this year about her influences, and how she hopes the book raises awareness about an urgent problem. We’re listening back to that conversation as part of In The NoCo’s Holiday Book Club – our annual look back at some of the year’s most fascinating titles by Colorado authors.   

Find more information and links to the 2025 collection of author interviews here. 

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Sign up for the In The NoCo newsletter: Visit KUNC.org
Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
Like what you're hearing? Help more people discover In The NoCo by rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks!
 
Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.

When Colorado writer X. Ho Yen was a kid, he loved to read science fiction.   

X. Ho Yen is autistic. He liked how some sci-fi stories, like the Star Trek series, depicted a more enlightened future society where neurodivergent people were treated equally.   

Eventually he began writing his own science fiction novels. His newest release is titled Space Autistic Author’s Puzzling Innerverse. It’s different from his other books: It’s a series of puzzles that reveal the plot of a story as you solve them.   

X. Ho Yen spoke with ITN’s Erin O’Toole earlier this year about the new book, and how science fiction resonated deeply with him as a child.

We’re listening back to that conversation as part of In The NoCo’s Holiday Book Club – our annual look back at some of the year’s most fascinating titles by Colorado authors.   

Find more information and links to the 2025 collection of author interviews here. 

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Sign up for the In The NoCo newsletter: Visit KUNC.org
Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
Like what you're hearing? Help more people discover In The NoCo by rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks!
 
Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.

Kindergarten teacher Ellen Javernick has published over twenty illustrated children’s books. The Loveland resident’s first book, What If Everybody Did That? has sold more than a million copies.  

She just published her newest book titled Awesome of the Day. It tells the story of a boy named Andrew who has one bad day after the next – until he learns to change his outlook. 

Ellen teaches at Garfield Elementary School in Loveland. She says she wants her books to inspire positive behavior in kids without getting overly sappy. 

She joined Erin O’Toole earlier this year to talk about what inspired her newest book and how – at age 87 – she continues to find energy that matches that of her young students.  

We’re listening back to that conversation today as part of In The NoCo’s Holiday Book Club – our annual look back at some of the year’s most fascinating titles by Colorado authors.  

Find more information and links to our 2025 list of books here. 

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Sign up for the In The NoCo newsletter: Visit KUNC.org
Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
Like what you're hearing? Help more people discover In The NoCo by rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks!
 
Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.

In February of 1942, not long after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the U.S. military removed thousands of Americans of Japanese descent from their homes. Most of them were full citizens who had been born and raised in the United States.   

Families had only a few days to get their affairs in order before reporting to relocation centers, mostly in Western states. Roosevelt’s order affected about 120,000 Japanese Americans, including 17,000 children.  

Writer and poet Brandon Shimoda, who is fourth-generation Japanese American, says the impact of incarceration didn’t end with the war.   

Shimoda, who lives in Colorado Springs and teaches at Colorado College, is a descendant of several family members who were incarcerated in internment camps. He says his family’s stories helped inspire his newest book, The Afterlife Is Letting Go.  

He spoke with Erin O’Toole in February about the legacy of Japanese American incarceration, and why the impacts still resonate today. We’re listening back to that conversation as part of the In The NoCo holiday book club – our annual look back at some of the year’s most fascinating titles by Colorado authors.   

Find more information and links to the 2025 collection of author interviews here. 

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Sign up for the In The NoCo newsletter: Visit KUNC.org
Questions? Feedback? Story ideas? Email us: [email protected]
Like what you're hearing? Help more people discover In The NoCo by rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks!
 
Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
 
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.