Also known as Dutch courage

OMG, I nearly forgot that today is the 14th World Gin Day, started by Neil Houston and Emma Stokes in 2009, always celebrated on the second Saturday in June, (National Martini Day is coming up on Monnday, June 19, the day after Father's Day - I will just have to pace myself!).

I wait patiently by the phone for confirmation that I have become the new spokesperson for Bombay Sapphire.



Remember - A perfect martini should be made by filling a glass with gin then waving it in the general direction of Italy (or Paris - pick your poison.)



(As always, please celebrate responsibly.)


It's also National Black Cow Day - Everybody grab a root beer float today and run around to celebrate. Especially if you add bourbon to the drink.



According to several websites, the Black Cow was made by Frank J. Wisner, of Cripple Creek, Colo., in 1893. He was already making sodas for the people of his town, but decided to make a sweet treat for kids: root beer combined with vanilla ice cream. According to legend, he was inspired by the sight of the dark Rocky Mountains capped with white snow in the moonlight. And the rest is history. (Except, as I understand, you can substitute Coke for Root Beer and Chocolate ice cream for Vanilla, but I digress ...)



What day isn't a good day to play a Steely Dan song.


June 10, 1939 -
MGM released the first cartoon in the Barney Bear series, The Bear That Couldn't Sleep, on this date.



Barney Bear was a character patterned after actor Wallace Beery, a character actor known for playing gruff but lovable characters, as well as the occasional villain.


June 10, 1953 -
Arguably, one of the worse films ever (save those of auteur Ed Wood), Robot Monster was released upon an unsuspecting public, on this date.



Released to negative critical response and weak box-office, the title was quickly changed to Monster From Mars. The film, however, illustrates clearly that the monster is from the moon.



Close examination of the Ro-Man's helmet reveal it to be very similar to the helmets worn by the moon-men on the lunar surface in Republic Pictures' serial Radar Men from the Moon.


June 10, 1966 -
The Beatles song Paperback Writer was released in UK, on this date.



This claimed the top spot in the US for two non-consecutive weeks; it was interrupted for one week by Frank Sinatra's Strangers in the Night.


June 10, 1983 -
United Artists released the 13th (or the 12th or the 14th, depending on how you count 'em) James Bond film, Octopussy, starring Roger Moore in the US on this date.



During filming, Roger Moore was misdiagnosed with heart problems. When he got home, Maud Adams had her boyfriend, who was a doctor, give him a second opinion. He pronounced him medically fit.


June 10, 1985 -
On May 23, 1985, Francis Albert Sinatra, native son of Hoboken received an honorary degree of engineering from the Stevens Institute of Technology. Garry Trudeau decided to take his life into his own hands when he rudely reminded the American public that Mr. Sinatra was a friend of 'organized crime' in a Doonesbury comic strip on this date.

Over 800 newspapers decided to join him in the foolhardy enterprise and carried the panel. By the next week, lawyers representing Frank Sinatra demanded a list of the names of newspapers that published the Doonesbury cartoon strip satirizing Mr. Sinatra from the distributor of the comic so they can seek retractions.


June 10, 1989 -
De La Soul's debut album, 3 Feet High and Rising, peaks at #24 on the Billboard 200 chart.



On the same day, Me, Myself and I hits #1 on the R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart.


June 10, 1991 -
The last episode of the second season of Twin Peaks: Beyond Life and Death aired on ABC TV on this date.



In the 2014 book Reflections: An Oral History of Twin Peaks by Brad Dukes, Jules Haimovitz (who was the president and COO of Spelling Entertainment while Twin Peaks was on) says that during the show's run, he got a call from the financier Carl Lindler demanding to know who killed Laura Palmer. Lindler told Haimovitz that he was asking not for himself but for then-president of the United States George Bush, who was in turn asking for Mikhail Gorbachev, then the leader of the U.S.S.R.


June 10, 1994 -
Jan de Bont's breezy summer thriller, Speed, starring Keanu Reeves, Sandra Bullock, Jeff Daniels, and Dennis Hopper, premiered in the US on this date.



The bus jump scene was done twice, as the bus landed too smoothly the first time. The bridge was actually there, but erased digitally.


June 10, 2007 -
The final episode of (what could arguably have been the greatest television series ever broadcast) The Sopranos aired on this date.



I'm not even going to comment upon what actual happened in the last few moments of the broadcast.



Coincidence or not, Italian Businessman John Gotti died on this date in 2002.

Make of it what you wish

Don't forget to tune in to The ACME Eagle Hand Soap Radio Hour today


Today in History:
June 10 1190 -
Sometimes, it is not good to be the king ...

While en route to the Holy Land for a jolly vacation of pillaging and sodomy (The Third Crusade) with his fellow sovereigns, Richard (of the Lionheart fame) and Phillip II of France, Emperor Frederick Barbarossa drowned near Silifke Castle in the Saleph river, on this date. Accounts of the event are conflicting. He either:

a.) Drowned while crossing the river via swimming
b.) Thrown from his horse and the weight of his armor dragged him down
c.) Drowned from exhaustion (that's what comes from a day of jolly pillaging and sodomy.)

Some historians believe he may have had a heart attack which complicated matters. Some of Frederick's men put him in a barrel of vinegar to preserve his body (which apparently did not work at all.)



On of many legends that have sprung up around the king is the famous Italian Gesture. When Barbarossa was in the process of seizing Milan in 1158, his wife, the Empress Beatrice, was taken captive by the enraged Milanese and forced to ride through the city on a donkey in a humiliating manner.



Some sources of this legend indicate that Barbarossa implemented his revenge for this insult by forcing the magistrates of the city to remove a fig from the anus of a donkey using only their teeth. Another source states that Barbarossa took his wrath upon every able-bodied man in the city, and that it was not a fig they were forced to hold in their mouth, but excrement from the donkey. To add to this debasement, they were made to announce, "Ecco la fica", (meaning behold the fig), with the feces still in their mouths. It used to be said that the insulting gesture, (called fico), of holding one's fist with the thumb in between the middle and forefinger came by its origin from this event.


June 10, 1692 -
Bridget Bishop, owner of two taverns, was hanged at Gallows Hill near Salem, Massachusetts after having been convicted of "certaine Detestable Arts called Witchcraft and Sorceries" on this date.

Bishop was just the first casualty of what will come to be known as the Salem Witch Trials. (Interestingly enough, a year after her death, her husband married one of the chief witnesses against her.)


June 10, 1840 -
The start of 19th century's favorite show - Shoot the Queen started on this date. Today, during Victoria's first pregnancy, eighteen-year old Edward Oxford attempted to kill the Queen whilst she was riding in a carriage with Prince Albert in London. Oxford fired twice, but both bullets missed.

Many suggested that a Chartist conspiracy was behind the assassination attempt; others attributed the plot to supporters of the heir-presumptive, the King of Hanover. After his trial, Oxford was found to be "not guilty by reason of insanity". He was committed to the State Criminal Lunatic Asylum in Bethlem, Southwark, where he remained as a model patient for the next twenty-four years.


June 10, 1921 -
It's better to get out before you reach the sell-by date.



Today would have been the birthday of everyone's favorite itinerant Greek sailor Philip Mountbatten (Prince Philippos of the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg.)



I believe that celebrations will be muted today in some isolated jungle villages in the South Pacific nation of Vanuatu, who usually celebrate the birthday of Duke of Edinburgh, who was worshipped as a god there.

It must have been nice for him to be worshipped somewhere.


June 10, 1935 -
God, grant me the serenity ...

It's the anniversary of the establishment of A(lcoholics) A(nonymous), in Akron, Ohio. It was founded by a stockbroker named Bill Wilson and a surgeon, Bob Smith, who found that the best way to keep from drinking was to spend time with other people who were trying to keep from drinking. Between the two of them, they developed the main traditions of AA: anonymity, confession and mutual support.



Alcoholics Anonymous grew rapidly in the '40s and '50s, but Bill Wilson refused to appear on the cover of Time, wouldn't accept an honorary degree from Yale, because believed in anonymity, and he stuck with it to the end.


June 10, 1940 -
Italy entered the Second World War on the side of the Axis countries on this date. After initially advancing in British Somaliland and Egypt, the Italians were defeated in East Africa, Greece, Russia and North Africa.



For all his troubles, Benito Mussolini attempted to resign as Head Rat Bastard of Italy but Hitler thought better of it and busted him out of his retirement home (prison). He tried to feign interest in his old job as dictator but his heart just wasn't in it. The partisans of Italy tried to relieve his ennui by machine-gunning him to death, suspended upside down, and urinated on his corpse.

One again bunkie, sometimes, it is not good to be the king (or at least Head Rat Bastard)...


June 10, 1973 -
The 17-year-old grandson of J. Paul Getty was abducted in Rome on this date. When the kidnappers demand a $17 million ransom, the billionaire refuses. "I have 14 other grandchildren, and if I pay one penny now, then I will have 14 kidnapped grandchildren." After the grandson's severed ear arrives in the mail, Getty finally coughs up the money.



Even if he had to pay $17 million dollars for each of his grandchildren, it still would have left him well over $750 million dollars of his estimated $1 billion dollar fortune.

This is the kind of love you can only find in wealthy families.


June 10, 2004 -
Ray Charles Robinson known by his stage name Ray Charles, American pianist and musician who shaped the sound of rhythm and blues, died on this date.



In February 2005, Ray was awarded with the Congressional Gold Medal.



And so it goes.