Mythic Mania

Zeus! Apollo!One of the saddest lessons I ever learned was that Santa Claus wasn't real, a lesson that coincidentally came hand in hand with a murder I witnessed in the parking lot of the Fairview Mall. As that hobo bled out under the flickering sodium lights his ragged breaths marked the end of his life as well as that of my childhood. The first of my myths was destroyed thanks to an act of what the police called "public lewdness gone wrong", but it was by no means the last myth to suffer such a fate. By the tender age of seventeen all of my myths of childhood had been crushed by the harsh reality in which all but the most devoted Everquest players live. The Easter Bunny was lost to a casual comment from my parents, the tooth fairy was banished during a home invasion, and Paul Bunyon was buried by a Discovery Channel show about Blue Oxen. Piece by piece the magic was stripped from the world around me.

I would like to blame science for taking away the magic, mostly because of all these retarded anime movies I've seen where science robs the world of magic. Oh no the forest spirit is dying because of boron! Motherfucking boron, slayer of dreams! Alas boron was innocent of all crimes save for a few thousands deaths at a chemical factory in India, instead it was just simple cynicism that chased away my dreams of wish-granting fat guys and alien butlers.

This may be starting to seem like a dreary life history of the day the music died, but hang in there, I haven't got to the best part yet. It involves a magical dragon! Okay, it doesn't, but it would be pretty cool if it did, don't you think? Fuck it, it does involve a magical dragon, I'll just add one in there.

It wasn't college and a class on legends that reawakened me to mythology throughout history, it was actually a magical dragon named Lucktor. He was great and shaggy and coincidentally he had this really hot grad student working as a TA in one of his classes and I just happened to be in her study group. Goddamn Lucktor knew how to pick 'em! His magical dragon class was one of the most interesting things I've ever had the honor of being a part of. Mythology 101 was a lesson in love too, and as Caela, the uh, warrior princess who was my study group leader taught me well about the ins and outs of mythology until I really cared. I mean to imply that we had hot sex constantly and this was her unconventional method for inculcating an appreciation of classic mythology in me. It would be cool if it were true but when you're fortunate enough to have a class taught by a magical dragon named Lucktor not everything can be blessed.

If the flame that burns twice as bright burns only half as long then my college career must have burned approximately sixteen times brighter than normal. It was a magnesium fire of beer, drunk girls, and the cruelest mistress of all; Daggerfall. But what my college career lacked in academic achievement it made up for with a rekindled interest in mythology. This spark of fascination has gradually grown into a raging inferno of obsession with mythology. My shelves are lined with tomes so musty that I can legitimately call them tomes without sounding like a pretentious fag. These ancient texts have fueled this interest in dead civilizations and their gods so that I feel compelled to share some of these amazing myths with you.

You may think you know a lot about mythology. You may even own a T-shirt that says "MYTHOLOGY" or "SCA" but all you really know about is making PVC swords buddy. You think Zeus is that dude who would appear and give advice to Kevin Sorbo? Fuck that thing, you've got learning to do. Zeus would mop the floor with your sorry ass and then track down your friends and family and mop your sorry ass with their sorry asses.

The MinotaurThe MinotaurIt's a common misconception that the Minotaur was created from clay to protect a Jewish ghetto from the Romans or whatever team they were against in the great cosmic paintball game. This myth couldn't be farther from the truth. The Minotaur was an ancient average Joe, which is pretty much like a modern average Joe only instead of working in a factory he worked in a volcano and instead of being named Joe he was named Minos. One day while mining lava Minos was crushed beneath a rockslide in one of the volcano tunnels. Rather than dying as was the hip thing to do when crushed beneath a rockslide Minos survived, mostly because the rocks that had crushed him were radioactive. He found himself changing, growing stronger and stronger, but other parts of him were changing as well. Crushed beneath the rock with him was one of the bulls used to haul carts of lava out of the volcano and this massive beast was slowly combining his genetics and what have you with Minos thanks to the radiation. Minos's head transformed into the likeness of the bull, and other parts below the waist that I won't mention further because a lot of furries read this site and I don't want to provide any inspiration for their next fan art piece.

When Minos grew strong enough he burst forth from the fallen rocks. For a time he tried to fit in working at the lava mine, but his coworkers shunned him because of his bestial visage and tendency to eat children. Dejected, Minos constructed a labyrinth of epic proportions and retreated inside. Seeing the opportunity to dispose of some unwanted virginal maidens, King Snorlax began to offer sacrifices to Minos to "appease him". Minos was cool with that, and was fine when Snorlax dumped prisoners into the labyrinth for him to eat too. One of those prisoners happened to be heroic hero of Greek mythology Pete, who eventually answered the Minotaur's riddle and killed Minos with the power of love. The myth is a little hazy as to what killing him with "the power of love" entailed, but I made sure not to ever research that topic.

Medusa

MedusaA hair of live snakes, a gaze that paralyzes, throw all that you know about Medusa away, because it isn't true. Medusa was actually an early Roman experiment in Artificial Intelligence. Ancient Rome was sort of like Ancient Atlantis in that it had all sorts of futuristic technology that we don't have now. Who knows why, I'm willing to blame boron for this one and this one only. Romans enjoyed a culture so free of hard labor that most of them spent their entire lives inside brothels. They were born and as an infant were immediately placed astride a prostitute. But, a lot of people seemed to have a problem with newborn babies having intercourse, however consensual, with adults. To sanitize the operation and save all of the whores the trouble the Romans developed love droids. Medusa was the most advanced love droid chassis with her simple positronic brain replaced with a neural network or something like that, my primitive mind has difficulty comprehending their incredible feats of technology. Her body was perfect in every way and her mind was thought to be much more intelligent than a human and capable of actual thought.

Like all metaphors for mankind's hubris Medusa was bound to go crazy and turn on her creators, which is exactly what she did in 420 BC. While having sex with a 3 year old named Cassius Medusa inexplicably became self-aware. She immediately hacked into Rome's defense grid and launched all of their nuclear weapons at Sparta. With no choice but retaliation a nuclear Armageddon ensued. Rome and Sparta were reduced to radioactive ash, but Medusa survived and began to produce robotic kill-drones to cleanse the world of the taint of humanity. Eventually she was stopped by resistance leader Jesus Christ who wielded the legendary flaming sword "Indomitable Will" to smite her in her cybermatrix throne. In a shower of sparks and hellfire Jesus rent her asunder with one stroke of the two-handed blade and put an end to the reign of thinking machines.

Puff the Magic Dragon

Puff the Magic DragonSo fucking sue me, I have an affinity for magical dragons. I'd like to think it's my mercurial nature but more than likely it's my months spent as a child recovering from the bubonic plague with only books on tape to keep me company.

Puff, the Magic Dragon, lived by the sea. The screams of his victims carried through the autumn mist in a land called Honalee. Little Jackie Paper loathed that rascal Puff and fled from him constantly with the dying cries of his entire family still ringing in his ears. A dragon lives forever, but not so little boys, they're easily smashed to pieces against rocks or incinerated with magical fires billowing forth from the mouth of a dragon. One grey night it happened, Jackie Paper ran no more. And Puff that mighty dragon, he gave a blood-curdling roar. His victory sealed at last over his nemesis Jackie Paper, Puff set out to ravage the entire land of Honalee. No flesh was spared in his orgy of violence through the autumn mist and horror begat horror until all that Puff remembered was killing.

He had become feral, the slaughter of the innocents had rendered him incapable of reasoning beyond predator-prey instincts. Yet still he seemed to delight in the torment of those weaker than him. He cackled as he dropped townsfolk from a great height or herded them into caves and then roasted them alive with searing gouts of his fiery breath. Nothing could ever stop Puff and his domination of Honalee remained uncontested for centuries, the pitiful villagers living only to prostrate themselves at his mercy and almost always be butchered. Eventually Puff grew tired of his playthings and left this world through unknown magic, but the land of Honalee will never recover and all those who remember the tales of the vile dragon live in fear that one day he might return.

Zeus and the Hippo Caper

The Mysterious Primordial GodIn Greek mythology Zeus is the creator of the heavens and earth, very similar to The God of Christian mythology, only Zeus is a rapist known to forcibly sire children with human women while having a number of female gods as wives or lovers. Which is sort of like Christianity's original sin when you think about it. After millennia of ruling over the earth Zeus made contact with an ancient primordial god known as The Black Pharaoh. This god appeared as an ebony-skinned human clad in golden robes and he prophecied the coming of another to the world, a god more powerful than all of the pantheons of mankind combined. Zeus was never one to back down from a challenge, but the minute he caught sight of this newcomer he and the other gods packed up and skipped town for parts unknown.

This mysterious eldritch god subjugated man, making meals and slaves of the entire world's population. Unspeakable horrors accompanied this being from the stars, ravenous plastic-fleshed creatures that prowled the cities and lands of humanity. They hungered and so did their god and mankind was a feast to be enjoyed for centuries to come. After centuries of domination another great race of space-farers arrived on earth and unlike mankind they did not cower in the face of its monstrous overlord. They destroyed his minions and banished him to the depths of the sea where he waits in his great sunken city, dreaming until the stars are right and he will rise again to claim his place on this earth.

That's the story of Zeus and the Hippo Caper.

I take great pleasure in sharing my wealth of knowledge on the subject of mythology. I also take great pleasure in updating Something Awful in place of Greasnin so that once a year Sundays can actually be not quite as bad as they usually are! Haha, I kid folks, Greasy is great. At least he tells us in advance when he's going to disappear. I can only assume Frolixo was abducted by a Japanese rape video crew and is currently enjoying the scalding bukkake offerings of "the biggest gangbang ever told".

State Og 1, John Steinbeck 0

Speaking of scalding bukkake, this is Dennis "Corin Tucker's Stalker" Farrell reporting in once again. As your State Og representative, you'd think I'd be a little biased in favor of our fine company, but I assure you this isn't the case. With that said, you'll be surprised to hear me say that State Og is the most significant series of literary works in the 21st century. In fact, our closest competition is the work of John Steinbeck, who somehow managed to completely miss the 21st century altogether, revealing how much of an oafish twat he really was.

No other organization is as eager to help the police solve crimes. In fact, it’s not uncommon for the first police officers to show up at a crime scene to find State Og agents already there, handling evidence and preparing preliminary reports to help the officers begin their investigation. [Note: Let me tell you, these guys aren’t afraid to get their hands dirty doing forensic work. When we find them at murder scenes, they’re often covered in blood, head-to-toe.] Ever since State Og started providing this special assistance a year ago, I can’t express how thankful those of us in law enforcement are. It really helped decrease our workload, especially after the crime rate started to skyrocket last year.

If you read this week's State Og, you might get to see the word "twat" again! Actually, I just checked for you, and it's not in the update at all. Still, that Steinbeck certainly was a putz. I mean, come on.

– Zack "Geist Editor" Parsons (@sexyfacts4u)