Russia’s Excess Death Toll Hits 422K

Russia recorded almost 30,000 excess deaths during February, the country’s statistics agency announced Friday — a figure which takes Russia’s total excess fatality count since the start of the coronavirus pandemic above 422,000. Excess deaths are calculated by comparing fatalities during the pandemic with mortality rates in the same months of previous years. It is…

My Favorite Things: Chicken Schnitzel and Slaw

Years before I ever tasted it, I was pre-conditioned to adore schnitzel. Maria in “The Sound of Music” listed it along with “cream-colored ponies” and “crisp apfelstrudel” as one of her “Favorite Things” during the famous thunderstorm scene with the pajama-clad Von Trapp children. This inspired the first order of business on my first trip…