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For years, Amy Borkowsky has been collecting hilarious and embarrassing messages left by her mother on her answering machine. Now she's put them on a CD and wants the world to hear them. On Morning Edition, host Bob Edwards reviews some of the messages with the former ad executive turned standup comedian.

At 17, Jesse Jean was a failing student in danger of falling victim to Washington, D.C.'s, street crime.

Music commentator Marika Partridge reports on singer Pat Humphries and an extraordinary song. Humphries isn't well-known outside folk music circles, but "Swimming to the Other Side" is becoming something of an underground anthem. Listen to three versions of the song online, and hear what Humphries fan Pete Seeger has to say about it. (10:00) The song is on a CD called Hands, and Pat's website is www.pathumphries.com.

Since the 1973 release of his first album, Closing Time, Tom Waits has won fans over with his original songwriting and distinctive, gravelly vocal style. He has two new CDs out this month: Alice and Blood Money.

Turns out Ray Magliozzi of Car Talk has a secret passion for bonsai and magnolias in addition to carburetors and exhaust systems. On Morning Edition Ketzel Levine of Talking Plants takes us on a tour of Ray's Massachusetts garden. Hear excerpts of their rainy-day conversation and view a collection of photos online.

Jacki Lyden is joined by language expert Richard Lederer for our segment on listeners' peeves with language and grammar.

Sitting on the back of an alligator, researcher Daphne Soares noticed a beard of tiny bumps lining its jaws. Turns out, gators on the hunt use those bumps to detect their prey in the water. For All Things Considered, NPR's Christopher Joyce reports.

In the small town of Lititz, Pa., the luxury timepiece company Rolex operates a school for watch repair in partnership with a Swiss watchmakers' organization. As Jack Speer reports for Morning Edition, the opening of the "Watch Technicum" is the latest signal of a rebirth for the high end of the watch industry.

David Newman is a political columnist for The Jerusalem Post. He is also chairman of the department of politics and government at Ben Gurion University of the Negev and editor of The International Journal of Geopolitics. He'll discuss the history of the Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. He's written about the settlements in The New York Times. Newman is also author of the book, Population, Settlement and Conflict: Israel and the West Bank (1991, Cambridge University Press). Read the Transcript

Raha Shehadeh is a Palestinian lawyer and writer whose latest book is Strangers in the House: Coming of Age in Occupied Palestine. (Steer Forth Press) He is a founder of the nonpartisan human rights organization Al-Haq, an affiliate of the International Commission of Jurists, and author of several books about international law, human rights and the Middle East. Shehadeh lives in Ramallah. He was a guest on Fresh Air in February of this year and returns to talk about the latest news from the occupied territories. Read the Transcript