Category: Uncategorized

idiopathicsmile:

idiopathicsmile:

i just remembered this story my dad told me one time, about abraham lincoln

a guy challenged abe to a duel once. lincoln very much did not want to duel this cat.

so lincoln agreed, on the condition he got to choose the weapon. maybe that was how it generally went in 19th century dueling culture, i have no idea.

the guy said “sure”

lincoln said, “ok. broadswords.”

so that poor would-be opponent shows up on the day of the would-be duel, and abe is outside, doing, like, some quick sword warmups.

now, back in lincoln’s day, he was, as any american schoolchild can tell you, the tallest fucking dude on the entire fucking planet, so please try to even imagine the majestic reach of this stovepiped giant’s condor-like wingspan.

(wingspan plus broadsword.)

abe’s enemy takes one look at this, does some quick mental calculations on his own arm length (mortal, human), turns around and goes home.

the best part is that, as i remember it, lincoln of course had no fucking idea how to swordfight. it was the 1800s. we had guns. he’d just been, like, waving this giant sword around haphazardly, whacking at tree limbs, making his arms look as big as possible because he knew this joker could see him, and he knew that guy didn’t know that lincoln didn’t know what the hell to do with a broadsword.

anyway, i don’t actually know if that story is true or not but i really really hope it is. i would love to know that the president who defeated the confederacy was also fucking hilarious.

UPDATE: a very helpful anon just linked me to an actual account of the actual historical incident. i got a number of crucial details wrong, as it turns out.

PLOT TWIST: the real version is considerably funnier

saxifraga-x-urbium:

paracartography:

Yes, of course I’ve heard what the superstitious locals say: “Stay out of the mountains! There’s no shelter on those harsh peaks, and every last combe and glen is infested with killer spiders!”. They say there’s no way to safely cross that mountain range – anyone trying to rest high up on the peaks will die of exposure, lashed by cruel icy winds. Better that, though, than to risk seeking shelter in the forested vales.

The Crawling Death, they call it. Great glossy black eight-legged fiends, some small enough to creep between the rings of your maille, some large as a splayed hand and quick as a cat, and some – so they say – the size of dogs. Or swine. Or cart-horses. The tales have been exaggerated in the telling, of course, since hardly anyone dares venture far into the gullies and ravines that lace between the majestic peaks (most certainly not at night, when the Crawling Death make their appearance, silent as a shadow).

Even if they’re not quite as large as people say, they’re certainly no less deadly. The king’s physicians, who had the unenviable task of tending to the survivors of the last failed expedition, wrote down in stomach-turning detail the precise symptoms of that merciless venom. Erupting blisters the size of a hen’s egg. Flesh blackening, rotting, and sloughing away from the bone. Sweating, drooling, trembling, nausea, vomiting, ranting and raving and spasming like a creature possessed until death seems like a mercy. Others were gripped with a pain unmatched by any wound of war, paired (curiously) with an erection hard as any standing stone.

And yet, in spite of all this, I’m planning an expedition into the mountains. It’s true, I haven’t the equipment with me to safely shelter from the bitter cold above the tree-line, out of the reach of skittering legs and poison-slick fangs. I have no blessing from the gods, and no miracle of alchemy intended to keep the Crawling Death at bay. What I do have, though, is a map. A map from a past age, a more enlightened age, where the cartographers had a decent understanding of the sciences, rather than the encyclopaedic knowledge of rumour and superstition that seems to be the requirement for a mapmaker these days. And from this map – and the journals that I found with it – I have deduced one particularly salient fact, that I am convinced will allow me to make the journey through the supposedly arachnid-infested ravines in perfect safety.

The superstitious peasants might say every last one of those valleys is crawling with deadly poisonous creatures, but in fact, most of them are utterly empty and safe! However, my map has revealed the source of this rumour: Spiders Gorge, which contains over ten thousand spiders, is an outlier adn should not have been counted.

i feel you deserve some sort of prize for this

islandsurfer13:

thoodleoo:

modern greek mythology stories i am tired of seeing: gritty, “the gods are dying because we don’t believe in them” stories where the greek gods mingle sadly with mortals and lament their lost power

modern greek mythology stories i would like to see: cerberus manages to escape from the underworld and hades has to find him before he can unleash his rage upon the mortal realm, only to find out that cerberus was found by a child who tamed him by sharing her after-school snack with him and giving him pets, and he now has to figure out a way to sneak into the suburbs and avoid getting the cops called on him while he steals his three-headed hell-hound back from a five year old girl

He was a big dog, but not crazy big. And he was so soft! Her hand sunk into his fur like it was a fuzzy pillow when she went to pet him.

The fact that he had three heads and three sets of sharp teeth didn’t bother her. It was silly. One head licked her face while the others nosed at her pockets for treats.

He was way better than the neighbor’s dog. That one was annoying and small and liked to bite little girls who lost their ball. No, this dog was perfect. This dog was hers.

“Come on, it’s time to go home,” she said. “You can sleep in my bed. But Mommy sneezes around dogs, so we’ll have to be careful.”

The dog yipped excitedly, bounding ahead of her. She noticed a splotch of lighter grey near his butt before he turned around to face her again.

“Spot! That’s a good doggy name. You’ll be my Spot.”

And so she took him home. She pushed him into the backyard so she could go say hi to her mommy like she did every day. The bus stop was at the end of the street, so her mommy said as long as she was really careful she could walk home with the boy next door. She was really, really careful. She was in kindergarten. She was a big kid now.

Spot was digging at the edge of the garden when she went back outside.

“No, Spot! Mommy’s flowers will break!” She hurried after him, ready to play with her new best friend.

—

There. At the edge of town, tucked in a nondescript neighborhood.

What was he doing there? Waiting, no doubt. He had to admit, it was a good location to begin his rampage. Women, children, families – he could create a lot of damage.

He should have been paying more attention. His duties to Olympus took up too much time lately. Persephone did what she could, but it wasn’t always enough. She wasn’t there the whole year, so the poor boy got lonely.

Hades was lord of the underworld; he should have sensed that something was amiss. But no.

No, now he was lurking in the mortal realm, trying to corral a three-headed hellhound and keep him from unleashing his excess energy by destroying a fifty-mile radius.

He blamed Zeus. He just liked to listen to himself speak, the old windbag.

So, he needed to figure out a way to get Cerberus back without alerting anyone. Shouldn’t be too difficult.

—

Why did this shit always seem to happen at the end of a double shift? She just wanted to go home and sleep, but they had one last call to respond to.

A neighbor called in that some asshole was trying to steal a dog. Who even did something like that?

So, Officer Marquez geared up, ready to take out her frustration on this douche (seriously, you don’t steal pets – that should get you thrown in the lowest circle of hell) only to find the weirdest thing she’d ever seen.

“What the fuck?” her partner muttered as they got out of the squad car.

A man stood near the road looking very uncomfortable now that they’d garnered an audience. He was tall, pale, and kind of gangly, but he didn’t look like a wackjob. In fact, he looked like a businessman – freshly pressed suit and everything. Just went to show you couldn’t judge a book by its cover.

An adult woman stood in the middle of the yard, clearly not sure what to do.

Then, there was the little girl who had her arms wrapped around a dog. She was about five, but she had the grip of a sumo wrestler on the poor dog. It was about the size of a Great Dane, maybe a little bigger, a deep charcoal grey, almost black.

But it had three heads. And rows upon rows of teeth. And three lolling tongues that occasionally licked the girl’s face.

“Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” Marquez murmured to her partner as they approached.

“Scooby Doo with three heads? Oh yeah.”

“Good. I was starting to wonder if they laced the coffee or something at the station.” She took a breath before approaching the man while her partner sidled up to the woman to calm her down. “Sir, may I ask what you’re doing here? From all accounts, this is not your residence.”

The man sighed, his shoulders sagging. He seemed kind of harmless, but she wasn’t about to let him off easy. She waited him out. “No, officer, you’re correct. I am only here for the day, but my dog escaped. I am simply trying to retrieve him.”

“No!” the girl yelled. “You can’t take him! I found him! He’s mine!”

Marquez tried to take a quick survey of the situation. The dog seemed perfectly content with the girl, but he kept his gaze trained on the guy. The girl was almost in tears, but, really, she’s five. That could be about anything.

The mother was the wild card.

“Sir, can I just have you wait here for one moment?”

“Of course.”

And he did actually stay there while she walked towards the mother. Amazing.

Her partner excused herself from talking to the mother. “She’s in the dark. She’s never seen the guy or the dog.”

Marquez rolled her eyes. “Got it. Kid finds dog, kid claims dog.” She raised her voice slightly as she turned back to the guy. “Sir, will he come if you call him?”

The man nodded. “Κέρβερος, άγέ.”

Suddenly, the dog was across the yard sitting in front of the man, tail wagging and three tongues lolling. Marquez would have sworn – only under oath and only if asked directly – the Great Dane sized dog was now the size of the house with glowing red eyes and smoke billowing around him. The girl broke out in piercing sobs breaking her concentration. She couldn’t be sure anyone else saw.

“Please don’t take my Spot!”

The guy paused in checking over the dog and looked at the girl. He smiled sweetly at her. His whole demeanor changed, he looked lighter, more sure of himself, and kind of… glowy.

“You named him Spot?”

She sniffled, “It’s a good puppy name. And he’s got the spot on his butt.”

“You are absolutely right,” he chuckled. “I named him Spot too. It’s just in a different language.”

“Really?” The girl’s eyes nearly bugged out of her head. But she’d stopped crying.

“Really. Listen, would you maybe like it if he came to visit sometimes? I work a lot, as does my wife, so sometimes he gets really lonely.”

“Please! Mommy, can he visit? Please, please, please!!”

The poor woman just nodded, but it was clear she had no idea how to process what was going on.

The man smiled. “Perfect. He’ll be thrilled to have a new friend.”

Marquez left with her head spinning. Her and her partner sat in the squad car silently for a minute before driving back to the station.

“Let’s just skip the paperwork on this one.”

–

“And that is why we now have a wall covered in drawings of Cerberus from a five year old,” Hades explained to Persephone.

fabbittle:

momnar:

roachpatrol:

one of the nice things about heterosexuals i never see talked about on here is that they haven’t already heard all your gay jokes yet. i just really appreciate having a new audience sometimes for my completely automatic responses to phrases like ‘i’ll be straight with you’. so, shoutout to all the innocent hets out there who have a genuine giggle over lame quips that a fellow queer would groan and hit me for. ilu guys. 

I recently no scoped my coworker when she asked me “What’s in the closet, anyway?” and I automatically said “me”. She lost her mind. Full cackling in the middle of the store. I never thought I’d see the day that joke would work but here I was, blessed with an unexperienced heterosexual. It was transcendent. 

one time i had to go to the utility closet at work to refill my waterbottle and i said “alright im going into the closet…just like high school” and my straight coworker lost it. she started crying she was laughing so hard