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This segment originally aired February 18, 2017. The electronic data we use isn't as ephemeral as it seems. Our photos, videos, and email take up physical space in the world. Patty Martin knows this. Some of it ends up outside her kitchen window. Martin lives in Quincy, a rural Washington town that happens to house vast chunks of the internet in gigantic data centers. Quincy, a town of about 7,000 people in a bowl of gentle hills, was known for food processing plants that turned potatoes into

This segment originally aired February 18, 2017. For comedians like Seattle’s Scott Losse, sharing lots of information about their flaws and their family members is just a given. He goes on stage in front of a live audiences telling jokes about things like his lifelong issues with anxiety and his deep love for his 16-year-old cat named Kitty. But c omedy often comes from pain, and that's true for Scott. When he was younger, Scott lost his two older brothers — one from suicide, the other, in a

This segment originally aired February 18, 2017. After years of bad experiences with hormonal birth control, at 19, I thought I had found a holy grail: The diaphragm. It was 2006, and nobody used diaphragms anymore, but I knew all about them — because since I was about 10 years old, I knew that my very existence depended on my mother leaving hers in the dresser drawer one cold winter day in January of 1986. I was conceived under the dining room table, on the shag carpet of their Fremont

This segment originally aired February 18, 2017. Alex Ashley, a journalist and musician from Bellingham, Washington, has known his friend, Kit Knowles, for almost five years now. The connected after the loss of a mutual friend. When it comes to their friendship , they trust each other, they communicate — all the boxes are checked. Except one. “There’s an old proverb — you’ve probably heard it — that says ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder,’” Ashley says. “But what if that’s all you have:

This week on Sound Effect, we share stories about our parents, and about being parents. Trick Riders The McMillan family in Soap Lake, Wash. has taken in seven foster children. Most of the kids are now accomplished horseback riders, often performing tricks at rodeos. Lynette McMillan explains why she felt drawn to adopt these kids and how the rodeo lifestyle helps them adjust to a new life. My Mom Back Then What if you could meet your mom or dad at the same age you are now. What would it be like

This story originally aired on December 3, 2017. Lynette McMillan had a small, quiet family, relatively speaking. She and her husband were raising three kids on a ranch in Soap Lake, Wash. They took a trip to a friend's place, a couple that had taken in foster kids and giving them a better life than what they had previously. This was the inspiration for the McMillans to become foster parents themselves. Three kids became four, then five, then six, and now 10. And as you might imagine, it was not

This story originally aired on January 21, 2017. One big way to flip the script is to mess with the traditional parent-child dynamic. For many, it can seem like parents are these older beings with no life before their children were born. In modern parenting especially, parents don't appear to even have a life when you're a kid. But what if you could meet your mom or dad at a younger age? Maybe even the same age you are now? What would it be like? What would that person be like? Sound Effect

This story originally aired on April 29, 2017. Seattle writer Michael Long was a terrible student in grade school. It wasn't that he couldn't do well; it was just that he had no interest in it. Instead of studying or paying attention in class, he would often be caught doodling or staring off into space. Michael's parents had tried just about everything, including doctors and medication. But nothing seemed to work. Then Michael's parents found a doctor who suggested that one of the reasons kids

This story originally aired on June 18, 2016. Nancy Leson, half of knkx's Food for Thought duo, has been in the food industry for a long time. But some of her earliest memories of food come from bars -- not as an employee, but as a patron — a six-year-old patron. Leson grew up in Philadelphia, in a time and place where children were allowed to belly up to bars and eat Slim Jims and pickled eggs, or order a Coke with loads of Maraschino cherries. The reason Leson wound up in those bars was that

This story originally aired on April 15, 2017. When I think back on it now, when I was growing up there’s two things that were really hard for me to tell my parents. The first was: ‘Hey Mum and Dad, so we’re getting sex education at school.’ And the second was, ‘I love you.’