Off-Beat

Evan Bates has competed in five Olympic Games, won nearly every title ice dancing has to offer and built a life in Montreal with his skating partner and wife Madison Chock. But at his core, he’s still a kid from Ann Arbor and a University of Michigan graduate – the 52nd in his family. In this episode of Off-Beat, Barrett and Emma sit down with Bates days after his gold and silver medal finish at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Olympic Games to talk about what it really means  to come back home.They talk about life with Chock beyond the spotlight, what it actually felt like to come so close to another gold, whether this was his final Olympics and the version of himself he hasn’t had time to become yet.

Most people only think about the fire department when something is already wrong. But what happens the rest of the time? In this episode of Off-Beat, Barrett and Emma spend a Friday shift inside the Ann Arbor Fire Department’s Station One, following firefighters through their typical day –– cooking dinner, swapping stories, trying to sleep between alarms and racing out the door when the radio finally crackles. Along the way, they hear about the calls that stick, the humor that fills the quiet hours and what it means to be ready for a city that’s growing faster than its fire department.

Yemeni coffee shops are popping up all over Ann Arbor — open late and packed full of students and locals. Notes of cardamom and cinnamon accompany their cosmopolitan yet cozy interiors, where patrons aren’t sipping on hot toddies or cocktails, but Adeni chais and pistachio matcha lattes. In our first episode, we ask why?Through café soundscapes, student voices and experts on coffee history, Off-Beat traces Yemeni coffee from its 15th-century roots to its role today as a modern “third place”: not home, not work, just somewhere you’re allowed to stay.Further reading & resources:Read Dr. Nancy Um’s book on Yemeni coffee history: https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvvn0hs Explore a map of Muslim and Arab cafés across North America compiled by Dr. Nancy Khalil: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.8643188,-85.2154144,7.3z/data=!4m2!11m1!2sCGVF_5iHSJat9HzL7_jGng?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDEyNS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D