Card of the Week: Three of Cups

It is said that beauty is only skin deep.  But true inner beauty comes not from the surface, but from deep within, starting with the very soul and spreading its way outward with every action.

The Three of Cups represents grace and congeniality.  It is a card of friendly gatherings and special associations, perhaps to celebrate a formal ritual, a specific joyful occasion, a particular party, an informal gathering, or just a general good time.  Enjoy the mutual support of friends, family and peers, in giving, receiving and sharing lively energies.

Inverted, this card is a caution about taking things to excess.  Perhaps your actions at a party threaten your broader life, or perhaps something in your life is preventing you from enjoying a celebration.

In “Mudd’s Women” the Enterprise pursues a rogue ship that attempts to evade into an asteroid field.  The Enterprise manages to protect the small ship just long enough to beam its occupants aboard to safety before it is destroyed.  The ship’s captain, con artist Harry Mudd, is transporting three beautiful ladies, Eve McHuron, Ruth Bonaventure and Magda Kovacs, supposedly intended as wives for settlers on planet Ophiuchus III.  When the Enterprise diverts to Rigel XII for repairs, Mudd contacts the miners on Rigel and offers the women to them instead, in exchange for valuable crystals.  It is a scam, as the women are enhancing their beauty with an illegal Venus drug whose effects are quite temporary.  And yet, after Kirk secretly replaces Mudd’s drug with a placebo, Eve is surprised to discover that she can be just as alluring on her own.