I'm Natalie Moore. I fell in love with soap operas when I was just five years old, and I still

watch them. Their television's longest scripted series and have zero reruns. Now let me tell you,

soap operas aren't just some silly art form. They are significant. In this season of making,

Stories Without End from WBEZ Chicago.

Join me as I share how the genre began, their social impact, and why these stories endure.

Listen wherever you get your podcast.

From WBEZ Chicago, I'm Tricia Bobita here with Greta Johnson, and this is Nerdette. It feels good to be back.

It does feel good to be back, partly because we get to do our most favorite thing, having

conversations with our favorite authors and artists. And astronauts. And astronauts. Sharing our

conversations with nerds of all stripes with you.

To us, it's not really about what you love that makes you a nerd.

It's about how much you love it.

This week, we talk with author Sarah Vowell.

She is a legitimate American history fanatic,

and she writes all sorts of weird stories about the dark, dusty corners of American history.

But first, as some of you may have noticed, we've been gone for quite some time.

And many of you have fairly wondered where we've been during our hiatus.

So we decided to ask some friends of the show to come up with conspiracy theories about why nerd that's hiatus has been so suspiciously long.

Conspiracy number one.

Hi, this is Mike Peska, host of The Gist, and I'm here to explain where Greta and

Trisha have been, and I have the answer.

So, at first I thought, as was widely reported, they were on a swamp in the remote planet

...