When Caroline Garry first noticed she had a problem with perfection, she was in her bedroom closet scrubbing down a pair of white leather Nikes. Caroline was in seventh grade, and like a lot of kids she had gotten attached to a new pair of school shoes. But unlike a lot of kids, Caroline would come home from school every single day and clean them. In hiding. Whether they were dirty or not. "I just felt this compulsion. I needed to." After she got her first car, Caroline began to realize her

A violinist with the Seattle Symphony talks about having perfect pitch , and offers a demonstration. A University of Washington gymnastics coach discusses the constant pressure for elite gymnasts to be perfect . A Seattle photographer takes us out to try and find the perfect shot . A glass chemist talks about her secret recipe for creating perfect colors. Sound Effect is stories inspired by the place we live. The show is hosted by KNKX's Gabriel Spitzer . The full broadcast version of this week

Bulgarian-born Momka Peeva knows a thing or two about glass. In fact, she probably knows everything there is to know about all kinds of glass. She even wrote a book about it, which is still the go-to text on glass composition and manufacturing used in Bulgaria today. Momka grew up in Soviet Bulgaria during a time when all people, including women, were encouraged to become engineers. So that’s what Momka did: She became a chemical engineer specializing in glass technology . She worked for years

The expectations for Elise Ray Statz were enormous. These days she is the head coach of the University of Washington women's gymnastics team. But back in 2000, she was captain of the USA Olympic team, and that team’s job was to win gold in Sydney, Australia. “So ‘96 was the first women’s gymnastics team to ever win a gold medal for team [competition]. And it was just a massive accomplishment for gymnastics,” Elise said. “I think we were expected in 2000 to win gold, and that anything less wasn’t

If you are a musician in the Seattle Symphony, you already have a certain mastery of your craft. Andy Liang is in the second violin section with the Symphony, and despite being an incredible talent, he would probably be the first to tell you that he is not perfect. But he does possess at least one type of perfection: perfect pitch. Perfect pitch, sometimes called absolute pitch, is defined as a rare auditory phenomenon characterized by the ability of a person to identify or re-create a given

Seattle photographer Tim Durkan is known for his photos that document the lives of men and women who are homeless. But Tim also spends quite a bit of time chasing down the moon. A photo he’s taken many times is of a full moon sitting atop the Space Needle like a celestial flag. “A moon rising above the space needle isn’t signifying political allegiance. It doesn’t have party affiliation, it’s just something that everybody can admire,” Durkan says. Durkan’s images capture the beautiful symmetry

Kimberly Clark Sharp lives in Seattle but she grew up in Kansas. And when she was 22, she had an experience with her father at the DMV that would change her life. It was not something she was prepared for. “We were leaving the building. I collapsed into and through his arms, and hit the sidewalk,” Kim said. A nearby nurse, a good samaritan and the fire department all worked to resuscitate her. Nothing was working. Kim describes hearing someone say, “I’m not getting a pulse!” “I said, ‘of course

As a kid, Agnes Bodor had a few unusual interests. “I was really crazy about books about illnesses, you know, images of skin rashes and things like that,” Agnes said. One day she spotted a small microscope in a store window, and longed to have it. That was unrealistic, considering that her family was poor and living under the Communist government in Hungary. But one day, a family friend with no children of his own stopped by Agnes’s house, and presented her with a small box. “So I got it for

Nightmares happen to us all. For people with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, nightmares can be debilitating, nightly experiences. “Trauma nightmares are almost [like playing] a video tape of a traumatic event,” says Dr. Murray Raskind. He’s a psychiatrist at the VA Puget Sound hospital in Seattle and a professor in the University of Washington School of Medicine, who’s been researching PTSD treatment since he started working with a support group for African American veterans of the Vietnam War,

Growing up in Taiwan, Dean Huang always knew he wanted to study abroad, especially after visiting cousins that had immigrated to Boston. “It’s just that Taiwan is really small, and I feel like I can maximize my potential and challenge myself to receive a different education.” When he turned 18, Dean was accepted to University of Washington in Seattle, and shortly after that became an American citizen. He was active in a group of fellow Taiwanese immigrants, and also made lots of friends with