Manic Bookstore Cafe

Last night I gave a dorm talk at Ohio State to try to explain the Sochi Olympics. My task was made much easier by NBC.com and the opening ceremony alphabet sequence, which took the Cyrillic alphabet and that sweet little Russian girl and laid out a narrative of Russian history and the achievements of Russian science and culture. But as I went through the presentation, I realized that there were a number of odd choices in how to represent Russian culture through its letters. So I've picked a few alternatives that in my mind fill in some of the gaps that the Russian Olympic organizers left out.   А   The first letter of the Russian alphabet is A, which stands for Азбука, or alphabet. Makes sense -- when people think of the Russian language, one thing they fear is those 33 letters that seem so impenetrable -- like the Russian soul or the vast taiga. The video clip  takes us back to Cyril and Methodius who invented the Cyrillic alphabet, and thus to the roo...

This is the week of the year when one should sit and reflect -- what good came of the year just ending? what adventures did we have? what mishaps might have been avoided? what conclusions can be drawn, and how might we proceed more wisely into the year to come? And for what, and whom, do we feel grateful? One of my friends has launched what she calls "The 2013 Gratitude Project" -- twenty-five acts of gratitude in 25 days to mark the year passing. We were excited to receive a "gratitude" package consisting primarily of Christmas cookies, with a lot of love to go with. We made the list in part because I had shared a pot of borscht with her and her family. (I love Darra Goldstein's vegetarian borscht, which includes almost every vegetable you can think of, more even than Molly Katzen's version , and every time I make it I think of how grateful I am to have a Cuisinart, and how useful it would be to have an army of serfs to do the chopping if one didn...