On your plate
This is the week when lots of local folks will be ringing in the New Year by eating a traditional sauerkraut dinner.
If a steaming pot of sauerkraut with pork roast and sausages doesn’t do it for you, remember, this is Akron, where you can enjoy your sauerkraut in the form of the sauerkraut ball, Akron’s official food.
You can order them from restaurants, or look for the Bunny B brand at local grocery stores, made by Akron’s own Or Derv Foods Inc.
Celebrate nature
You can still catch the spirit of the season at Glow, the holiday celebration at Cleveland Botanical Garden.
The event, which ends New Year’s Eve, features all sorts of holiday plants and decorations, as well as entertainment and a gingerbread house display that’s always a crowd favorite. New this year is a Garden Express train that ferries riders through the decorated gardens.
Glow is open from noon to 5 p.m. today and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. New Year’s Eve. Admission is $12, or $6.50 for children 3 to 12. Members and younger children are admitted free.
Cleveland Botanical Garden is at 11030 East Blvd. in Cleveland’s University Circle.
‘Space Odyssey’ returns
Select Cinemark theaters, including Valley View and Macedonia, will show the Stanley Kubrick classic 2001: A Space Odyssey at 2 and 7 p.m. Wednesday. One of the films that defined mind-bending cinema, it topped the American Film Institute’s list of the best science-fiction films and was in the AFI top 20 for films of all genres. Fans like Video Hound’s Irv Slifkin have maintained that it has to be seen on a big screen to be properly appreciated.
Time in a bottle
If you live in a close-knit neighborhood, have everyone write down a prediction or put something special into a capsule. Bury it on New Year’s Eve and plan to open it in 10 years.
Make sure someone writes down exactly where it’s buried or it could be lost forever.
New in your paper
Look in the Beacon Journal every Monday starting Jan. 7 for American Profile, a magazine focusing on hometown life in the Midwest.
Stories will focus on people, places, lifestyles and food of the region, health trends, current issues and celebrity news.