Must See: Don’t-Stop-Non-Stop Gogol Bordello

Sergei Dovlatov, and why you should care

It’s been a little while since I felt the compulsive need to write/talk/read about Sergei Dovlatov, the unsung Soviet storyteller whose raw wit and uncomfortable humor trancends national borders, economic philosophies, and continents, even if it never trancended Russian. He is also my favorite author, and the subject of this week’s New Yorker Fiction Podcast.
Dovlatov [...]

OMFG, Heatwave in Oymyakon!!!

As some of you may know, New York winter turned me into a quasi-religious checker of weather.  And if you check the weather as frequently as I do, and especially if you’re checking it in New York, in the winter, you’re likely to get a little down. That’s why I also got into the habit [...]

Daily Oddities: Monday World Edition

There’s a lot to talk about in the World today, so lets jump right into it. You know about Tehran and you know about Binyamin Netanyahu’s speech, so we’re skipping that and getting straight down into the stuff you didn’t hear.

GLOBE:
More than a billion people go hungry, says the World  Food Program. That’s about as [...]

Yes We Can (embrace Russian kawaii racism)

You may have seen this weird, yet weirdly cute image on Gawker and wondered, Hey Russia, WTF. If you are sitting in your cubicle wondering, are Russians racist against black people, you can stop holding your breath. The answer is yes. And yes. And yes. Whether or not this advertisement is an expression of angry [...]