Endless Thread

Chicken patrol. Tiny plates. Purses lined with plastic bags. We peek behind the curtain of the strange world of all-you-can-eat buffets, from the strategies buffet owners use to protect their profits, to the hungry customers who try to game the system.

A Redditor finds a mysterious dice game in his grandparents’ basement. It reads “The Deadly Double: A Game to Play at Your Own Risk.” The Endless Thread team helps him investigate the game and finds surprising connections to Pearl Harbor, the FBI and The New Yorker.

An unidentified man died in a car crash in 1995 with Grateful Dead ticket stubs in his pocket. Twenty years later, Reddit sleuths helped solve the case of the “Grateful Doe.”

The Italian cyclist Gino Bartali could rightfully be called "the GOAT" -- the Greatest of All Time -- for his athletic achievements alone. But in this episode, we tip our hats to him as a humanitarian. During World War II, Bartali was living a double life. It involved the Catholic church, secret missions, Jewish refugees, and what may be the most honorable fake ID operation of all time.

What do Bill Gates, finding your soul mate, and charting a new life path have in common? Reddit Gifts! The world's largest anonymous gift exchange has led to some unexpected outcomes.

Redditor Stephanie Graham started feeling a bit off in the third trimester of her pregnancy. Then, things got weird. Really weird.

One of the bestselling toys of all-time, the Super Soaker, was invented by a rocket scientist nicknamed "The Professor." This is the story of the man, the legend: Lonnie Johnson.

Author Michael Pollan talks about all things magic mushrooms, including their potential for upending the brain's hierarchy and helping people cope with death.

Imagine a fungus that could infiltrate your whole body, turn you into a puppet, and grow right out of the top of your head. Actually, you don't have to imagine it -- IT'S REAL. It's called Cordyceps, and fortunately, it only has this effect on insects... for now.

Paranormal activity has haunted Darcy throughout her life. But it wasn’t until a nighttime ritual with her daughter turned spooky that she wondered what else might be at play.

Australian scientist Jamie Seymour was friends with the famous "Crocodile Hunter," Steve Irwin. He was even there when Irwin was fatally stung by a stingray in 2006. Jamie sat down with Ben to reflect on that experience and Irwin's legacy.

Imagine sitting in a hospital room for 24 consecutive hours in the most agonizing pain you can possibly imagine. You feel a sense of impending doom. You have a feeling this won’t end well. Then, the pain subsides and you walk away. Jamie Seymour has had that experience eleven different times. He’s a leading expert on one of the world’s most frightening creatures and he’s paid the price.

When Alex was in high school, he and his best friend used to break into abandoned houses. Alex was a tough guy, giving people hell. Until one night, in one of those abandoned houses... hell gave him something back.

An elite unit of trolls is engaged in an existential battle against hate speech on the internet. This is their story.

We’re popping into your feed to share a project we think you’ll love. It’s a new podcast called “Last Seen,” about the largest unsolved art heist in history -- the theft of 13 irreplaceable pieces of art from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.

Why are there so many Mattress Firm stores? How did they end up catty-corner across intersections and in the same shopping centers? Are the mattresses full of money? Reddit users start to dig deeper into these Mattress Firm conspiracy theories, and we team up with Business Insider's "Household Name" to conduct an investigation of our own.

Could a unit of Marines destroy the entire Roman Empire if they traveled back in time? That is the question that inspired the now-legendary Reddit thread that turned James Erwin from an anonymous commenter into a Hollywood screenwriter. His once-in-a-lifetime opportunity did not go exactly as planned.

Tim Rose was driving home in February 2015 when he got into a car accident. He was mostly fine, though he went to the hospital just to be safe. That's where things took a turn. He turned to Reddit for help and his life hasn't been the same since.

A 17th century monk using a nom de plume pens what could have been the blockbuster of its time: a teenage boy embarking on an epic voyage to the Americas. But, due to a series of bizarre circumstances, it was never published... until now.

A Reddit comment about a chance encounter on a train inspires Ben to get hypnotized and Amory to face her fears in front of an audience at an open mic.