People & Life
People & Life on Weekend America
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Open Letter to Carpet
Usually when you write a letter, the recipient writes back. But sometimes, they just can't. From time to time we air open letters to people and entities who are unlikely to respond. It's part of our ongoing series with McSweeney's online magazine. Writer Colin Joyce took some time out of ripping carpets out of his new home to send along this correspondence.
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Fragile Heart
On Valentine's Day producer Julia Barton thinks about the heart as more than just a romantic symbol. She thinks of the human organ and one that can be especially frail. Her son was diagnosed with a rare heart problem. Barton brings us the story of the surgeon who gave her son a chance at life.
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An Open Letter to Lifetime Television
Lucy Baker has whiled away way too much time--not reading or taking photographs--but watching Lifetime Television. She blames a lot of time wasted on the TV channel. We hear a letter she has written about it.
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Lincoln Highway
Last summer, Weekend America started a trip across the Lincoln Highway, America's first coast-to-coast road. The road opened in 1913 and started the venerable American tradition of the cross-country car trip. So now we are starting the New Year by wrapping up the trip at the highway's end, in California. We sent Weekend America's Pat Loeb to drive the final stretch, which for her, was like a dream come true.
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A Return to 29 Palms
In this hour of Weekend America, we will be revisiting some of our favorite stories that we had on the show this past year. We start with one of the first stories we brought to you in 2006. Weekend America's Pat Loeb reported from Twenty Nine Palms, Calif., the largest marine base in the world. Alex Cohen catches up with Felicia Erikson, one of the women she met there. Erikson's husband Jay is deployed in Iraq and is expected home in January.
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Open Letter
Is Rudolph suffering from an esteem problem? How else can you explain how easily he gave in to Santa's request to guide the sleigh after being slighted for so many years? Santa was nice on that one foggy Christmas Eve, but Rudolph, is he really your friend? In an "Open Letter to People and Entities Unlikely to Respond," A.F. Passafiume pleads with Rudolph to reconsider his unhealthy relationship with Mr. Claus.
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Food Fears
This week, Federal health officials said that lettuce was the most likely source for the E. coli outbreak that has made 70-plus people sick in the Northeast. This scare really hits home for Dennis Krause. Last September, his family got sick from eating contaminated spinach. His son was hit the hardest, and after being put on dialysis and having several blood transfusions, is still recovering. We talk to Krause about how his relationship to food has changed since his family's illness and what the latest scare means to him.
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Open Letter
You know the drill. You order something from a catalog to give as a gift, the present comes in the mail, and you move on. But the thing is, it's hard to move on, because for years afterward the catalog keeps on coming. This is what happened between Erik Bowie, and the mail order meat company, Omaha Steaks.
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Protest in a Military Town
Along with memorial services, this Veterans Day will feature war protests. Sentiment against the war in Iraq has increased and Tuesday's election spurred defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld's resignation. But one place you won't see any open opposition to the war is the town of 29 Palms, California. It's right outside the biggest marine base in the world and home to hundreds of retired military officers.
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Coming Home
This weekend, about 700 marines are returning to their home base in 29 Palms, California. Twenty-Nine Palms is a small, desert town and the influx of marines has a big impact on the community. Weekend America's Pat Loeb has been following the military town during wartime. Her last story was about deployments. Now we see what happens when the marines come home.
