O Magazine

Hugh Nibley, a Mormon scholar, historian and gadfly who defended his faith yet openly criticized what he saw as many members' conformity and materialism, has died. He was 94. Nibley died Thursday in Provo, Utah, in the small, green house where he lived for 50 years. He had been in steadily declining health and died of natural causes.

Art Thiel of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on last Sunday's game between the Baltimore Orioles and the Cuban All-Stars: "Sitting side by side at the game in Havana were Fidel Castro, who hijacked a nation in 1959, and baseball Commissioner Bud Selig, the used-car salesman who hijacked the Seattle Pilots in 1970. "Have there ever been two men who have ascended so dubiously, accomplished so little and stayed in power so long?" (Note: the Pilots are now the Milwaukee Brewers.

The Atlanta Falcons will be wearing their black uniforms today in the Super Bowl. It was an easy decision, considering the Falcons were 8-0 while attired in black this season. Samuelle Easton, president of a New York color psychology firm, said the Falcons may have made a mistake. "While the black may make them appear more formidable, rough and tough, it'll also make them top heavy," Easton said. The Broncos will be attired in white jerseys and were 6-2 while wearing them.

The chief financial officer of Gruner & Jahr USA, publisher of Rosie O'Donnell's magazine, admitted Monday that his company reported false circulation figures to hide the magazine's losses. Lawrence Diamond said executives at Gruner & Jahr decided to "manage the financials" of the magazine, Rosie, so they could keep publishing. If the magazine lost more than $4.2 million in a fiscal year, O'Donnell would have been permitted to end her arrangement with Gruner & Jahr.

A lot of siblings use the weekend to call each other and catch up. Few, though, have strangers across the country eavesdropping, or joining the conversation. The five Dolan sisters will be doing just that on Saturday, when their radio program "Satellite Sisters" debuts on KABC-AM (790) and other ABC network stations. The show, which originated with a two-year run on public radio in 2000, features the five women, ranging in age from 37 to 47, chatting about subjects from momentous to minuscule.

A decade ago, novelist and poet Kate Braverman chose 25 students from her UCLA Extension classes to participate in a private writing workshop. The writers met twice a month and were initially hesitant to be exposed to Braverman's sometimes ruthless critiques.

The current take on writer ZZ Packer as hip, as a fresh voice of the disenfranchised, began edging toward critical mass when the chroniclers of style -- Vogue, Oprah Winfrey's O magazine, Entertainment Weekly -- all played her up recently in photo spreads. That kind of stardust is cool, acknowledges Packer, whose debut collection of short stories, "Drinking Coffee Elsewhere," was released in March. It's not that she expected the attention, but she wasn't taken aback either.

Every Thursday, history students file into a stately old building here at the University of Illinois for classes about Alexander the Great, the Federalist period and . . . Oprah. Oprah? Yes, Oprah; specifically, "History 298: Oprah Winfrey, the Tycoon." Tenured professor Juliet E.K. Walker, a specialist in the history of African American business, introduced the course this semester.

Lance Armstrong will face millions of Oprah Winfrey fans Thursday night in a play to restore his tarnished image. But Winfrey has as much to gain as the disgraced Tour de France champion cyclist. Since conceiving the Los Angeles-based Oprah Winfrey Network five years ago, the former talk show empress has burned through $300 million and almost a dozen top managers trying to reengage the 10 million fans who long ago flocked to her daily daytime open house. Viewers have had trouble finding OWN on their TV and cable systems.

New York-based designer Tory Burch has brought her Palm Springs-meets-Morocco brand of tunic-wearing chic to Robertson Boulevard with a new Tory by TRB store. Construction workers were still fiddling with the air conditioning in the boutique inspired by designer Arthur Elrod and artist David Hicks an hour before the opening party began last week. But Burch, 38, an Upper East Side socialite and former fashion editor, stayed cool among the driftwood lamps and leopard stools.