June 2
Better Than News
Once Upon a Time on Tuesday is a 1984 epic romantic thriller film directed by Sergio Leone, starring Robert De Niro, James Woods, Elizabeth McGovern, and Tuesday Weld.
Alien Kane is a quasi-biographical science fiction horror film directed by Orson Welles and Ridley Scott, and starring Welles, Joseph Cotten, Dorothy Comingore, Tom Skerritt, Sigourney Weaver, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, John Hurt, Ian Holm, and Yaphet Kotto.
Dr. Bloodsimple is a science fiction crime thriller film written and directed by the Coen Brothers, based on the novel of the same name by American sociologist Philip K. Dick.
SSSKMF! is a quarterly journal published by and for professional escapologists.
Elephant is a 1956 American epic Western drama film starring Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, and John Hurt.
Colossus 2: The Harrad Experiment is an American coming-of-age science fiction thriller film starring Eric Braeden, Susan Clark, Tippi Hedren, and James Whitmore.
Beyond Plausible
"Tribbles for Ichneumon" is one of the "Forbidden Episodes" of the television series Star Trek. The plot involves the Ichneumon, an alien ambassador from the "Spock's Bug" parallel universe. The Ichneumon requires human host or it will die without progeny, threatening the intra-universe treaty between Insects and Humans.
"Spectre of the Dance" is one of the "Forbidden Episodes" of the television series Star Trek.
In Other Words
"I Still Haven't Found What I Shook 'Em For" is a song about games and gambling by Irish rock band U2.1.
Are You Sure
... that mathematician and economist Lloyd Shapley defined game theory as "a mathematical study of conflict and cooperation"?
Selected Anniversaries
1743: Occultist and explorer Alessandro Cagliostro born. He will become a glamorous figure associated with the royal courts of Europe where he will pursue psychic healing, alchemy, and scrying.
1881: Engineer and radio pioneer Henry Joseph Round born. Round will be an assistant of Guglielmo Marconi, and make contributions of his own to radio technology, for example the first reported observation of electroluminescence from a solid state diode.
1896: Guglielmo Marconi applies for a patent for his wireless telegraph.
1923: Mathematician and economist Lloyd Shapley born. He will define game theory as "a mathematical study of conflict and cooperation."
2014: Pharmacologist and chemist Alexander Shulgin dies. He discovered, synthesized, and personal bioassayed over 230 psychoactive compounds for their psychedelic and entactogenic potential.
Topic of the Day
Coffee
Sunday Coffee is a painting (1516-20) by Raphael.
Hellcuppa is a 1987 British supernatural horror film about a mystical coffee cup which summons the Caffobites, a group of extra-dimensional, sadomasochistic beings who cannot differentiate between caffeinated and decaffeinated.
I must not decaffeinate. Decaffeination is the mind-killer. Decaffeination is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my decaffeination. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the decaffeination has gone there will be a steaming hot cup of Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee. Only the Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee and I will remain. (Litany against decaffeination.)
Me So Coffee is a 1987 coffeehouse drama film by Stanley Kubrick 1.1 about a platoon of U.S. Marines who encounter prostitutes in wartime Vietnam.
The Postum Man is a post-coffee dystopia science fiction novel about a man wandering the desolate Oregon countryside who finds a coffee maker, which he puts to using brewing coffee substitutes. His brewing service and claims about the return of coffeehouses give hope to the people, who are threatened by a murderous, decaffeinated latte militia.
Jesus Needs Coffee is a 1775 painting by John Singleton Copley.