Introducing: Dave Shuff!

David Shuff’s demands for a little brother were never met, but at least he got an Atari, which was almost as good. When he’s not forcing his friends to try every cooperative game under the 8-bit sun, he edits PBS science shows and makes videos for MoMA. With the help of his father he invented a History Eraser device that either doesn’t work or we just don’t notice the difference when it is working.

Join us as we geek out over the History of Video Games with David on June 5th at SASS Presents: The History of Fun and Games. Plus: lectures on the travesties that have befallen upon the sports world over the years and the history of The Olympics! Aaannnd it’s free!

Victorian Parlor Games Are Amazing

I’ve been looking up Victorian Parlor Games to play at SASS Presents: The History of Fun and Games and I came across this little gem that I thought I’d share with you.

Poor Pussy (taken from Fun Joint)

One player is chosen to be “pussy”, all the other players sit in a circle. Pussy walks around the inside of the circle on hands and knees and then adopts a begging postion at the feet of one chosen person in the circle. Pussy tries to look as pitiful as possible and must cry out a sad sounding “meow” sound. The chosen player in front of pussy must now say out loud without smiling “Poor Pussy” - this must be repeated three times (poor pussy, poor pussy, poor pussy). If the player has even a hint of a smile, he must change places and become new Pussy and the game continues.

Introducing: Tommy Button!

Tommy is a native Texan who has been moonlighting as a New Yorker for the past 8 years. When he isn’t working as an editor cutting TV commercials you can find him galavanting about NYC drinking, eating and drinking more. He has warmed several benches on football, basketball, volleyball and bowling teams (that’s right, bowling.) Writing these types of things are by far his least favorite part about participating in extracurricular activities. 

Come see Tommy be a good sport and recount all the famous debacles that have plagued the sports world at SASS on June 5th!

June Lecture: The History of Fun and Games

What you need to know:

What did people in history do when they weren’t busy killing each other and dying of preventable causes? Well, champ, they were having some good old fashioned fun! So come on an excellent adventure with us back in time as we look at the history of the Olympics (soiler: their uniforms were soooo NSFW), sports, and video games. Plus, we’ll play some Victorian parlor games once we get proper drunk.

• Tuesday, June 5th with doors at 7pm
• Public Assembly
• Facebook Invite

Love reading? Here are the lectures!

A Brief History of Universe of Video Game

Nerds and pop culture fans rejoice! Dave Shuff is coming to town with some awesome facts about the history of America’s real past time, video games.

I Liked The Olympics Before They Were Cool

Chris Hedick gives us the lowdown on naked Greek men performing feats of athleticism to prepare us for some non-athletic TV watching during this summer’s Olympics

It’s All Fun & Games Until Someone Gets Hurt
Let’s be honest- you only like hockey because of the inevitable fights. Well, you’re in luck, because Mr. Tommy Button will be rocking your brain with the famous fights, brawls, and calamities that have made sports worth watching over the years.

Introducing Lauren Ellsworth

We are so lucky to have not only one but TWO fabulous guest speakers at S.A.S.S. this month!

Lauren loves Dinosaurs, Lincoln, running, and the Internet. A California native, she once spent a week digging up dinosaurs in Wyoming with one of People Magazine’s Most Beautiful People 1997, aka Dr. Paul Sereno, super famous paleontologist. These days, she hangs around the museum of natural history and spends the rest of her time building the Internet and eating amazing New York food.

Meet Our May Speaker: Erin Death!

Erin Death is originally from Baltimore, MD (Yes my name is real and I’ve seen The Wire). She wanted to be a singing dancing lawyer as a child. These days she’s tone def, can cut up a dance floor, and doesn’t jay walk.

She can do all these things because her brain has successfully evolved since prehistoric times! Come hear Erin use her brain to teach us about Homo sapiens Tuesday May 1 at SASS, and catch other lectures on cavemen and dinosaurs!

May Lecture: Prehistory!

What you need to know:

S.A.S.S. is going way back B.C., to the land before time to talk about what was going on before our ancestors invented cool things like writing. So grab your nicest club, put on your going-out loincloth, and head over to Public Assembly to hear us grunt unintelligibly about a whole bunch of topics! Grunting will cover how the Homo sapien brain developed us into the lovable idiots we are today, what archaeology can tell us about how the cavemen lived and everyone’s favorite topic, dinosaurs.

• Tuesday, May 1st with doors at 7pm
• Public Assembly
• Facebook Invite

Love reading? Here are more details:

SASS Presents: Prehistory

My Brain is Full

How did the homo sapien brain develop to make humans rulers of them all? Erin Death explains.

Queens (and Kings. and Norms.) of the Stone Age

Anna puts her awesome archeological knowledge to use as she tells us what we know about how prehistoric man rocked out at the famous yet hard to pronounce site of Catalhoyuk.

Dinosaurs: Facts and Fiction

We’re sorry, but Lauren’s going to destroy your childhood beliefs using real live dinosaur facts. It’ll be fine, though, because she’ll make everything okay again with even more dinosaur facts.

Meet Our April Speaker: Andrew Linderman!

Andrew Linderman is a writer, performer, and storyteller.  He teaches storytelling with a number of organizations throughout the city, including The Moth and the Brooklyn Brainery, but his (not so) secret passion is history.   He’s really excited about April’s SASS and promises never to refer to himself in the third person again.

So stoked for Mr. Linderman to share stories of marijuana in the USA with us this month at SASS. We’ll also be covering tales about LSD & the CIA (scary!) and details of Prohibition (scarier!). It’s all going down this SASS on Tuesday, April 3rd at Public Assembly.