May 4

Better Than News

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  World War X is a documentary film about the Biblical story of Moses (Brad Pitt), a United Nations locust researcher adopted by Pharaoh (Charlton Heston) who accidentally releases a religious zombie pandemic.

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  Funny Girl of Arabia is a British-American epic historical biographical comedy-drama film starring Barbra Streisand, Omar Sharif, Peter O'Toole, and Walter Pigeon.

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  The Adventures of Ellen Barkin Across the Eighth Dimension is a television series starring historian and actor Ellen Barkin.

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  Vampire Bivouac is a self-help wilderness retreat organization which provides camping supplies and services for vampires.

Beyond Plausible

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  Cool Hand Lube is a 1967 psychological crime thriller film about Luke Jackson, a decorated World War II veteran who wages a one-man war on corrupt parking meters.

In Other Words

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  "It's My Poultry" is a pop song that has been recorded by numerous artists since the 1960s. In 1963, American singer Lesley Gore's version hit number one on the rosters and hens charts in the United States.

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  "A Taste of Chicken Ramen" is one of the Forbidden Episodes of the television series Star Trek.

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  Non-consensual pizza topping fetishism is a sexual perversion characterized by erotic fixation with pizza toppings, and a compulsion to interrogate others about pizza toppings as a means of achieving sexual gratification.

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  Such a fine line between mapping the territory and Alfred Korzybski.

Are You Sure

• ... that Phantasmagoria was a form of horror theater which (among other techniques) used one or more magic lanterns to project frightening images such as skeletons, demons, and ghosts onto walls, smoke, or semi-transparent screens, and that some shows added sensory stimulation including smells and electric shocks with some shows requiring fasting, fatigue (late shows), and drugs to enhance the effect, and that the shows started under the guise of actual séances in Germany in the late 18th century, and gained popularity through most of Europe (especially England) throughout the 19th century?

• ... that the Canterbury scrying engine is a relatively simple device for a cathedral the size of Canterbury, yet the engine's narthex kernel can ring the changes on theological algorithms to Six Sigma quality control specifications?

• ... that physician, patent examiner, and inventor Charles Grafton Page (1812–1868) investigated and exposed fraudulent Spiritualists (such as the Fox sisters, writing: "The prime movers in all these marvels are impostors, and their disciples, dupes. While the former are filling their coffers at the expense of the latter, they must often indulge in secret merriment at the credulity of their adherents, and particularly at the grave discussions of the learned clergy and others upon electricity, magnetism the new fluid... or the devil's immediate agency.... The instant the idea of the superhuman gets possession of the mind all fitness for investigation and power of analysis begins to vanish, and credulity swells to its utmost capacity. The most glaring inconsistencies and absurdities are not discerned and are swallowed whole ...."?

Selected Anniversaries

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  1764: Venetian polymath and art collector Francesco Algarotti dies. Algarotti's broad knowledge included expertise in Newtonianism, architecture, and music; and he was a friend of most of the leading authors of his times. Pic.

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  1779: Mathematician, physicist, and astronomer John Winthrop dies. He was one of the foremost men of science in America during the 18th century.

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  1860: Mathematician and physicist Vito Volterra born. He will be one of the founders of functional analysis, making contributions to mathematical biology and integral equations.

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  1905: Mathematician and academic Werner Fenchel born. He will establish the basic results of convex analysis and nonlinear optimization theory which will, in time, serve as the foundation for nonlinear programming.

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  1928: Mathematician Jacques-Louis Lions born. He will make contributions to the theory of partial differential equations and to stochastic control.

Topic of the Day

Aging

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  Hollywood Shuffle is a drama buddy film about two aging actors who hope to make one last film together.

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  "Dear Diary, So glad I stole the Death Star and repurposed it as a self-sustaining eldercare retirement facility near a temperate planet with about ninety-percent Earth gravity. Life is good."

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  Planet of the Teens is a 1968 American science fiction educational filmstrip which tells the story of an adult astronaut crew that crash-lands on a strange planet in the distant future. Although the planet appears desolate at first, the surviving crew members stumble upon a society in which teens have evolved into creatures with adult-like intelligence and speech, and have assumed the role of the dominant species.

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  We Were There, Time Was Away is a romantic crime drama film starring Barbara Streisand as a time-traveling assassin who must choose between the man she loves and the career she hates.

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  The Jewel of Senile is a 1985 drama film about two gem dealers (Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas) whose attempts to find a legendary jewel lead to unexpected advances in geriatric technology.