This American Life, Season 2

In the second season debut, people escape from home without going very far. In Philadelphia, teenage boys find ways to impress girls using a mode of transport obsolete since the 19th century; a young man's fight for independence from his mother would be normal for most kids, except for some special circumstances.

Two foreigners in the U.S., in the aftermath of two very different wars, try to make sense of life here. A young Iraqi arrives in America after fleeing his war-torn homeland and embarks on a road trip to let Americans ask him anything they want, with hilarious and poignant results; a Bulgarian man in Rhode Island realizes that an ongoing argument with his American wife about lawn maintenance has to do with the life he left 20 years ago, on the other side of the Iron Curtain.

Stories of people making (or trying to remake) history. A pair of Wisconsin convicts gain local fame for almost escaping prison using dental floss; high school students pose for smiley yearbook snapshots, which capture nothing of the drama in their lives; a man with a 30-year obsession with one particular bird unveils the grainy, Big Foot-style video evidence that he actually saw it.

There's a whole world of boxing way down the food chain from championship fights, and the stakes are high even without media hype and massive cash prizes. Two boxers in Tennessee who've known each other all their lives face off in a match that neither can afford to lose; a group of kids in New York learns to fight bullies the old-fashioned way: by being funny.

Cartoonist Chris Ware animates a true story which demonstrates that every marriage, even the happiest, is a courtroom battle; a husband's obsession with a legal battle forces the most basic marital questions into the open: What do I need? And, what can I put up with?

In this episode, we learn the true life stories of several people named John Smith: the parents of 11-week-old John Smith of South Carolina reel from revelation that he's a boy, when their sonogram predicted a girl; 23-year-old John Smith of Laramie, Wyoming, has made some mistakes and is appearing in front of a judge; and 46-year-old John Smith of Texas welcomes his son back from Iraq.

Three pieces about comedy…COMEDY KIDS: Kids of varying ages attend a comedy camp to mixed results. A NIGHT AT THE BIG FISH: What is it like to do stand-up comedy at a venue where you are not welcome, where the audience isn't just disinterested but they are downright hostile? Does it make you a better performer? Or is it an experience you'd never want to repeat? TRAGEDY MINUS COMEDY EQUALS TIME: Shot at a theater on 16mm film in front of a live audience, comedian Mike Birbiglia tells the story of the time he ruined a cancer charity event by giving the worst performance of his life. (Here's a hint: he improvised.)