Step into the technicolor world of PEZ!

We tour the Connecticut factory where more than 12 million tiny candies are pressed each day, guided by archivist Shawn Peterson, whose personal collection helped shape the Visitor Center.

Meet Brian Trauman, the Guinness World Record holder whose thousands of dispensers trace a lifetime of joyful obsession.

Hear Emily Tracy’s tender, funny, heartbreaking story about the PEZ tattoo she got to honor her mother.

And the hosts of PEZamania, the world’s largest PEZ convention, talk about how nostalgia and candy become community.

Suggested episodes:

• Discovering delight - and despair - in dumpster diving

• We have to talk about cuddle parties

• Take a tour of the John Zaffis Museum of the Paranormal

• Pawn queens: Tales and treasures from women pawn shop owners

• Audacious at sea: Wisdom from strangers on a cruise ship

GUESTS:

• Shawn Peterson: Company archivist and historian at PEZ Candy, Inc. in Orange, CT. He manages the PEZ Visitor Center, where much of the collection on display comes from his own personal archive. He is also the author of PEZ: From Austrian Invention to American Icon and Collector’s Guide to PEZ: Identification and Price Guide

• Brian Trauman: Owns the world's largest Pez collection and holds the Guinness World Record for “largest candy dispenser collection.” He has been collecting since 1999 and owns more than 6,400 dispensers

• Morgan Rhinehart and Landon Proctor: hosts of PEZamania in Ohio – the longest running collector convention in the world, established in 1991

• Emily Tracy: Manchester resident who memorialized her PEZ-collecting mom with a tattoo of her head on top of a PEZ dispenser

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A wise woman once said, “You can tell the ocean anything, but it has to be the truth.“

Chion Wolf boards the MSC Meraviglia expecting a week of small talk and sunscreen. But the farther she gets from land, the more people become willing to hang out in the deep end to talk about love, loss, faith, sobriety and stories they’ve been holding onto for years.

When they speak, the ocean listens. And in this hour, so do you.

Listen to a BONUS track featuring more voices from the ship: Latisha from the Bronx; Vincent Ferrito and Lauren Englemann from Brooklyn, NY; Brittney and Jeana Lockhart from New Bedford, MA; Henry Armbrister, Barbara Williams, Dellie Maycock, and Giovanni Ferguson from Nassau, Bahamas.

Suggested episodes:

• The Big E: What it takes to create 17 days of magic
• Life advice, one Audacious guest at a time
• It's A Brand Nude Day!
• Discovering delight - and despair - in dumpster diving
• Welcome to the Punderdome! We're entering NYC's punniest pun competition
• SOLD! Audacious Auctioneers

Plus, Advice on Amtrak’s Southwest Chief, a project Chion did interviewing passengers on a 48-hour train ride

GUESTS:

• A segment: Keith Miller from Long Island, NY; Kevin Luong from New York, NY; Vin Panday from Ontario, Canada; Jessica Struble from Holly, PA; Ruby Selver from Turks and Caicos; and Marty and Mary Pasternak from Buffalo, NY
• B segment: Mike Turner from Levittown, PA; Brian Martignetti from El Paso, TX; Darrell Floyd from New Haven, CT; and Randy Deveaux and Sylvia Wilson from Nassau, Bahamas
• C segment: Joe and Valerie Leone from Blue Bell, PA; Tommy and Cindy Lazarz from Ware, MA; John and Ada Sue Siler from Richmond, VA; and Javier and Angela Mahon from Brooklyn, NY

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ahoy! Here’s a little bonus treasure from our episode, Audacious at Sea: Wisdom from Strangers on a Cruise Ship.

Chion spends a blissful vacation week aboard the MSC Meraviglia with about 5,000 fellow humans, sailing from Brooklyn to the Bahamas and back. And because we couldn’t fit everyone she talks with into the on-air version, this bonus gives you even more of their voices and stories.

Somewhere in between sunrise coffees and late-night pizza buffets, Chion asks passengers - and a few locals in Nassau, Bahamas - to share their favorite piece of life advice.

That opens the door to conversations that go way beyond advice, and into the values that people have carried with them much of their lives.

GUESTS:

• Latisha from the Bronx

• Vincent Ferrito and Lauren Englemann from Brooklyn, NY

• Brittney and Jeana Lockhart from New Bedford, MA

• Henry Armbrister, Barbara Williams, Dellie Maycock, and Giovanni Ferguson from Nassau, Bahamas

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.