Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes: A No-Bullshit Guide to World Mythology

by Cory O'Brien

  and then they tear off his skin

  and rape his corpse

  and rip his head off

  and chuck it into a river

  along with his lyre which he is inexplicably still able to play

  and he just floats off down the river making awesome music forever.

  So the moral of the story is

  Unless you can play your instrument with your head ripped off

  and your arms and skin missing

  You Are Not a Real Musician.

  FRIENDS DON’T LET FRIENDS BANG COWS

  So this dude Minos is having all kinds of problems being king of Crete

  because his brothers all want to be the king of Crete instead

  so they are all murdering each other like nonstop

  until Minos is like “Hey, Poseidon you should make me win.”

  And Poseidon is all “Okay I am going to send you a bitchin’ white bull.

  It means you will win

  but you have to kill it later in my honor.”

  And Minos says “Sure, okay, just make me king already.”

  So Poseidon sends this bull

  and Minos becomes king

  but then he REALLY likes this bull.

  I don’t think you guys understand what hot shit bulls were in ancient Greece

  you have to remember Minos didn’t have the Internet

  so bulls were like THE HEIGHT OF TECHNOLOGY

  and this was like the APPLE IPAD OF BULLS

  so he decides “How ’bout I don’t kill this bull?

  What’s the worst that could happen?

  I’m already king, right?”

  WRONG.

  Well, I mean, he is already king

  but something bad definitely happens

  because Minos has a wife

  and Poseidon goes and hits up Aphrodite like “You know what you should do?

  You should make Minos’s wife

  fall in love with MY BULL.”

  and Aphrodite looks up from giving Ares a blow job and she’s like “Okay, lemme just finish this.”

  So all of a sudden Minos’s wife is like mad attracted to this cow

  but the problem is that the cow is not at all into chicks.

  Human chicks, I mean.

  It’s not a gay cow.

  Not that that would have been a problem.

  Some of my best friends are gay cows.

  But anyway Minos’s wife has this brilliant idea so she calls up this dude Daedalus

  and she is like “I need someone to build me a giant wooden cow suit

  so I can fuck cows”

  and Daedalus

  who is a fantastic genius inventor with no concept of right and wrong

  is like “Sure, no problem.”

  And he makes her the suit

  and she puts it on

  and she goes out and makes hot animal love to that bull

  simultaneously inventing furries

  and getting totally preggers

  and Minos is none the wiser until she gives birth to a HIDEOUS COWBABY

  aka THE MINOTAUR.

  So Minos does the smart thing and calls up the Oracle at Delphi

  because that never leads to bad decisions

  and the Oracle says “Dude, just build a maze around it. No harm no foul.”

  So Minos calls up Daedalus

  (the same Daedalus who caused all these problems with his excellent cow suit)

  and he hires him to build this awesome maze

  and then instead of paying him with money

  he pays him with years in prison

  locked in a tower over the ocean with his son Icarus.

  Minos is a dumbass though

  because he has locked a master craftsman and his son in a tower

  along with an apparently unlimited supply of feathers and wax.

  So they make wings with that stuff

  and jump out the window.

  But you know who else is a dumbass?

  ICARUS

  because he does not understand that the sun is made of heat

  whereas his wings are only made of wax and bird hair

  so he flies way the hell up toward the sun

  and the sun says “Aw hell no”

  and Icarus’s wings melt and he drowns

  and his genius dad lives happily ever after no longer hampered by his dumbass son

  or else he flees all over the country for years trying to avoid Minos

  before finally convincing someone to murder Minos in a bathtub

  or maybe both

  and then it turns out Daedalus even fucked up the labyrinth

  because a few weeks later some dick named Theseus just rolls in and kills the minotaur

  and then escapes and gets laid a whole bunch and then falls off a cliff and dies

  but that’s a whole other story and I just told you all the good parts anyway.

  So the moral of the story

  is don’t count your chickens before they hatch

  because the chickens might be minotaurs.

  NORSE

  Holy shit, my friends

  this mythos we are coming up on right now

  is the cosmological equivalent of French-kissing a battle-ax.

  These myths are rude, crude, and probably radioactive

  they play music too loud and draw disapproving looks from the elderly

  they will wake your mother up in the middle of the night by driving a Humvee through the armoire.

  Seriously

  any mythology in which the principal characters are a suicidal pirate-wizard

  and what essentially amounts to a beard with a hammer sticking out of it

  is the mythology for me

  and for you too

  once the Norse get through with you.

  THE NORSE ARE METAL

  So you might already know the way the Greeks thought the world got made

  and also the Romans because the Romans are goddamn copycatters

  and maybe you have listened to some scientists or some creation scientists

  and you know one or two other ways.

  Listen

  I want you to forget everything you know about creation myths

  because this myth

  is going to BLOW YOUR DICK OFF FROM PURE WONDERMENT

  and if you do not have a dick it is going to SEW ONE ON

  and then IMMEDIATELY BLOW IT OFF.

  Wanna know why?

  because it’s NORSE MYTHOLOGY TIME.

  SHIT YEAH.

  So to start out, the world is already pretty badass.

  It is just two things:

  One is a sea of pure all-devouring fire called Muspell

  guarded by a dude named Surt who is just WAITING

  to ride out and murder all the gods and then set the world on fire.

  By comparison, the other half of the world is pretty lame.

  It is just a whole bunch of ice called Niflheim.

  But the best part is that in between Muspell and Niflheim

  there is a big-ass trench called Ginnungagap

  which is empirically proven to be the number one funnest thing to say.

  Go ahead and say it. I’ll wait.

  So Ginnungagap is where shit starts to get real

  because the cold from Niflheim

  bumps up against the heat from Muspell

  and causes a bunch of vapor to condense

  in Ginnungagap

  to create a frost giant

  in Ginnungagap

  named Ymir

  (not Ginnungagap)

  Actually, Ymir is more of an ogre than a giant

  and he is actually more of a wuss than an ogre

  because what is the first thing this guy does?

  He goes to sleep

  right there

  in Ginnungagap.

  Sleeping and sweating like a motherfucker.

  He sweats so hard

  that a man and a woman
grow out of his armpit

  and then he sweats EVEN HARDER

  causing his legs to fuck each other

  and have a baby

  so then this cow shows up and starts shooting milk everywhere

  and Ymir drinks all of it

  ’cause there’s pretty much no one else to drink it

  other than his legbaby and the armpit people.

  Then the cow gets bored and starts licking ice

  and all of this licking melts away enough ice to form the shape of a dude

  or maybe it is just the same dude who appeared in Ymir’s armpit.

  (Ymir has mastered the fine art of being a neglectful father.)

  Anyway, this guy’s name is Bor.

  He marries Bestla, the daughter of some giant.

  Maybe the daughter of Ymir, who knows?

  Bor is quite a catch because he is the only man in existence.

  So Bor and Bestla have three kids

  Odin, Vili, and Vé.

  Really the only one anyone gives a shit about is Odin.

  He is the ruler of all things, essentially

  and he gets his brothers to help him kill Ymir

  who is probably still asleep

  and has definitely not done anything to deserve being murdered

  but Odin seems to think that he has become TOO EVIL

  which probably just means that he was snoring REALLY LOUD.

  Whatever the reason, they kill Ymir.

  Nice patricide, Odin.

  What are you going to do next

  further desecrate your grandfather’s body by tearing him apart

  and using his limbs as decoration for a universe you and your brothers are making?

  Yes.

  This is exactly what Odin and his brothers do.

  I mean you gotta give them credit

  they use pretty much every part of this dude.

  Like, not only do they make his blood into lakes and oceans

  and his bones into mountains

  and skin into earth

  and his teeth into tiny rocks

  but they use his skull to make the sky

  which is such a dumb idea that they have to get some cheap slave labor to make it work.

  So they go over to Ymir’s corpse

  which is crawling with maggots at this point

  and they are like “Hey, maggots

  wanna be a sentient humanoid species?”

  And the maggots are like “DO WE?”

  So they turn into dwarves

  and Odin is like “Great, awesome

  how about you repay us by holding up this skull we found.

  We wanted to make it into the sky but skulls are not really meant for that.

  We’ll even name the guys who do it North, South, East, and West.

  It will be awesome.”

  And the dwarves are like “Okay, fine.”

  But listen, guys

  just because they have already used Ymir’s skull and skin and bones and teeth and blood

  does not mean they are finished defiling his corpse

  because the next thing they do

  is they chuck his brains into the air

  and they become CLOUDS.

  Did you think clouds were beautiful fluffy collections of water vapor?

  WRONG, ASSHOLE.

  BRAAAAINS.

  Then they make the stars out of all the sparks coming out of Muspell

  and give all the land along the coast to the giants

  I guess to say sorry for murdering Ymir and building a world out of his corpse.

  But the giants are still pissed

  and Odin is like “I need a fort to protect myself from all these giants.

  What will I build it out of?

  Oh, I know

  EYEBROWS.”

  The fort he builds becomes a safe haven for all the humans, called Midgard.

  Also, they drag Ymir’s corpse over Ginnungagap

  And Odin makes a place called Asgard

  using surprisingly few of Ymir’s body parts

  and he lives there with his wife, Frigga

  and is startlingly faithful to her

  and fathers all the other gods, who are called the Aesir.

  So the moral of THIS story

  is that we need to invent space travel with a quickness

  because all of Ymir’s body parts are about to get REAL ripe, REAL fast.

  THOR GETS HAMMERED

  When Odin finally gets done making the world

  and settles down to get busy with his wife, Frigga

  the first radical dude to get born is named Thor.

  Thor is pretty much the baddest motherfucker you will ever lay eyes on.

  In fact, if you ever laid eyes on him

  he would probably walk up to you and DESTROY YOUR EYES WITH HIS HAMMER.

  Thor’s hammer is called Mjolnir and it was made like so:

  So Loki (the god of being a needless prick all the time)

  sneaks up on Thor’s wife, Sif, one day

  and shaves off all of her hair like he’s one of the guys on Jackass or something

  and Thor really loves hair, I guess

  so he gets SUPER ANGRY and he chases down Loki and is like “Hey

  how about I cut off all your FACE?!”

  and Loki is like “But I need my face for making infuriating smirks with!”

  And Thor is like “Well, how about . . . I just break every bone in your body?”

  and Loki is like “No, I need those too.

  How ’bout instead I have the dwarves make your wife some new hair?

  it will be made of GOLD and it will grow like NORMAL HAIR.”

  and Thor is like “AWESOME.”

  So Loki goes to these dwarves

  like “Guys, I sorta promised Thor that you would make his wife the ultimate toupee.”

  And the dwarves are like “Sure, no problem.

  Do you want us to make it out of gold

  or DOUBLE GOLD?

  We REALLY FUCKING LIKE GOLD because we are DWARVES.”

  Hey, by the way I’m sorry if I’m being racist against dwarves

  but that is just how dwarves are, okay?

  Some of my best friends are dwarves.

  Anyway, Loki is like “Regular gold is fine”

  and the dwarves are like “Okay, okay

  well, how about we also make you a boat called Skidbladnir

  which can fit all your friends and all your treasure

  and always has wind in the sails

  and can be folded up and put in your pocket when not in use

  and how about we also make Odin a spear

  scratch that, an UNSTOPPABLE spear.”

  and Loki’s like “Damn.

  All WE ever did for YOU GUYS was make you hold up the sky for forever.”

  So Loki brings all this sweet loot back to the gods

  and then he gets this great idea

  which is to bet the dwarves that they can’t make three more EVEN BETTER treasures

  FOR FREE.

  But he doesn’t have much cash on him, so instead he just bets them his HEAD.

  And these dwarves named Brokk and Eiti take the deal

  because it’s not like they have to bet anything themselves

  and they go to the forge

  and Brokk pulls out this big-ass boar skin and he is like “Okay, Eiti.

  It is completely crucial that you crank the bellows constantly.”

  so Eiti starts doin’ it

  and pretty soon a big-ass fly lands on his hand and stings the shit out of it

  but Eiti does not care. He is going crazy with that bellows.

  and Brokk makes what he was trying to make.

  He brings it to Loki and is like “Okay so we all love boars, right?

  But you know what would make a boar even better?

  GOLD.

  GOLD MAKES EVERYTHING BETTER.

  I AM A DWARF AND I COVERED THIS FU
CKING BOAR IN GOLD.”

  Okay, look, guys, I am just telling the story.

  It is not fair to apply our modern conception of racism to a bygone past, okay?

  I forget what the term for that is, but don’t do it.

  Anyway the filthy dwarves still need to make two more things

  so Brokk decides to cut out the middleman and just put some gold directly on his forge

  and he’s like “Hey, Eiti remember what you did with the boar?

  Just do exactly that, because it is totally crucial.”

  so Eiti starts working the bellows and lo and behold

  the same fucking fly shows up and bites him on his NECK

  but Eiti just toughs it out and keeps on pumpin’

  and Brokk finishes the thing he was making and brings it out to Loki

  like “Check this gold ring I made.

  I call it Draupnir.

  But see the thing is, this is just one gold ring.

  Do you think that is enough gold? I don’t think that is enough gold

  so what I made it do, is every ninth night

  it shits out EIGHT IDENTICAL RINGS.

  There will be SO MANY RINGS.

  I can melt them down for their gold

  and use them to make more rings

  that drop out MORE RINGS.

  I HAVE CREATED INFINITE GOLD.

  This is the dream of every dwarf, because we love gold so much.

  Did you know we invented rings so we could have sex with gold?”

  Okay, okay, hold on, guys.

  If you have any dwarf friends

  maybe you should just have them not read this myth

  if they have read this far it is already too late

  we’re pretty much done with the gold part and you have lost a friend.

  Anyway, then Brokk puts a big-ass chunk of iron on the forge

  And Eiti starts pumping that bellows

  and then this SAME FUCKING FLY comes back and bites his eyelids. His EYELIDS.

  But Eiti still just keeps on pumping

  until blood from the gaping wounds this fly has inflicted trickles down into his eye

  and he takes one hand off the bellows to wipe away all the blood

  and the bellows stops and everything is RUINED.

  It was supposed to be a hammer called Mjolnir

  but now it is a hammer called Mjolnir WITH A KINDA SHORT HANDLE

  and Brokk is like “Dang maybe I won’t get Loki’s head after all.”

  But he still bundles up all the shit and takes it to Asgard because quitting is for pussies.

  And in Asgard all the gods are like “HOLY DAMN

  YOU MADE A RING THAT SHITS OUT MORE RINGS.