The anniversary of the Loma Prieta earthquake just passed and Halloween is right around the corner. So, today’s show is about all things ominous. We’re looking at everything from disasters to ghosts to Oakland turf wars. We’ll hear from a reporter about his own morbid interest in earthquakes; and then meet a ghost channeler who tries to conjure up a dead professor. In Oakland, a city known for its high murder rate, 2009 has been a somewhat calmer year; we’ll learn about the anatomy of one of its turf wars. And we’ll hear how one burned down chicken farm struggles to survive through social networking.

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Outsiders are not the norm–they often live and recreate outside of mainstream society. For today’s show, we meet people who are outsiders in the communities where they live, places where they work and in the sports that they play.

We’ll visit students at the California School for the Blind who are being trained for work in the service sector. And we’ll hear from a woman who was born outside the US, but forced to move here during World War II. We’ll speak to people participating in a variation of soccer. They hope to raise America’s underdog profile on the international soccer stage. And we’ll hangout with another group of Bay Area athletes. Only these wheelchair rugby players have redefined expectations for people with physical disabilities.

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It was just over a year ago that U.S. financial markets melted down.  These days, more than one in ten Californians is without a job. Today we’ll take a stroll down economy lane and speak to a Berkeley resident who collects cans for extra cash.  We’ll also speak to Bay Area porn producers.  Turns out, their sales have gone soft during the recession.  And we’ll trek north and spend a day with an 81-year-old man who shoes horses in picturesque Humboldt County.

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