All Things Considered

The Colorado attorney general has asked the state's Supreme Court to stop same-sex marriages. As Colorado Public Radio's Megan Verlee reports, he's trying to have the matter both ways — dropping his opposition to lawsuits against the state's gay marriage ban, while still pushing the courts to continue enforcing it.

After graduation, Mason Kerwick landed a nutty job — quite literally. For the next year, he'll drive the Planters Peanut Nutmobile, marketing the peanut brand. His first assignment? Driving the peanut-shaped truck into New York City for Macy's July Fourth parade.

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This summer, All Things Considered has been taking a look at the changing lives of men in America. And that means talking about how the country educates boys.

In Berkeley, Calif., a private, non-profit middle school called the East Bay School for Boys is trying to reimagine what it means to build confident young men. In some ways, the school's different approach starts with directing, not stifling, boys' frenetic energy.

Artist Willie Baronet is on a 24-city, 31-day trek from Seattle, Wash. to New York City looking for supplies.

He's been buying handmade signs from homeless people for an art project called We Are All Homeless. Those signs are little more than a peripheral blur for many people. Baronet wants us to slow down, read them and understand.

"It really started because of my discomfort, my guilt, the way I felt, whenever I encountered a homeless person on the corner," he tells NPR's Eric Westervelt.

In the new novel Land of Love and Drowning, the Virgin Islands and the ocean around them make for a magical setting.

The book follows three generations of one family living through the modern history of the territory as it passes from Danish to American hands.

It's also laced with magical realism: One main character can sense people's arrival; another family only gives birth to men, generation after generation; and one woman has a hoofed leg instead of one of her feet.

TV viewers have come to expect a certain formula from Lifetime shows — stories of desperate women, sudden teen pregnancy, or sentimental romance — starring women who are, for the most part, white. But on Wednesday, Lifetime added something different to their lineup with the premiere of a new "docu-series" called BAPs. BAPs stands for Black American Prince or Princess. The reality show follows a group of young, wealthy African Americans in St. Louis through dinner parties and shouting matches.

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Transcript

ERIC WESTERVELT, HOST: