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

by Cory O'Brien

So she shows up at Odin’s place, all angry and shit

  and Odin is like “WELL, WELL, WELL

  IF IT ISN’T SLUT CITY.

  HEY, I HAVE SOME BRASS PLATES AND A SHINY ROCK.

  WANNA GIVE ME A RIMJOB OR SOMETHING? THEY’RE ALL YOURS.”

  And Freyja is like “VERY FUNNY ASSHOLE.”

  and Odin is like “I BET YOU WON’T THINK MY ASSHOLE IS VERY FUNNY

  WHEN YOU ARE GIVING ME A RIMJOB.

  But seriously, it’s because of shit like this that we keep trying to sell you to giants.

  So I’m going to punish you.”

  and Freyja is like “Aw Frigg.

  What’s it gonna be?”

  And Odin is like “Well, I’ll let you have the necklace back

  but only if you make all the races of men in Midgard fight wars forever.

  Oh wait, that’s not really a puni—”

  AND FREYJA IS LIKE “YES, DONE, THANK YOU.”

  Then there is war forever

  but at least Freyja looks pretty.

  So the moral of the story

  is that apparently women ARE currency

  but the exchange rate of women to gold isn’t actually that great.

  THOR GETS JACKED

  So Thor’s sleeping one night

  prolly dreaming about lightning and murder

  and he wakes up like “Man, that was a good dream.

  ’Bout to go make it a reality with the help of my trusty OH SHIT

  WHERE IS MY HAMMER??

  LOOOOKIIII”

  and Loki shows up like “I didn’t do it.

  I mean . . . Hey, Thor, what’s good?”

  And Thor’s like “SOMEONE STOLE MY HAMMER.”

  And Loki is like “Wow. I actually seriously am not responsible for once.

  Here, dude, let me help you find it.”

  So they go see Freyja

  and Freyja is like “Hey, Thor, what’s good?”

  And Thor is like “SOMEONE STOLE MY HAMMER.

  WAAAAHHHH.”

  and Freya is like “Shut the fuck up, man.

  We can solve this mystery.

  Loki, did you steal the hammer?”

  And Loki is like “Nope.”

  And Freyja is like “Well, I’m out of ideas.”

  and Loki is like “I know, right?

  But how about this:

  how about you lend me your cloak of feathers that lets you fly

  so I can fly over to the land of the giants

  and ask them where they hid Thor’s hammer

  because as you know

  if it wasn’t me, it was definitely the giants.”

  And Freyja is like “Sure, man

  take my super valuable cloak.”

  So Loki takes it

  and COMPLETELY FAILS TO STEAL IT all the way to Jotunheim.

  and he glides right up to some really rich giant named Thrym

  who is just sitting up on a mountain with some hounds on gold leashes

  and he is like “Yo, Loki, my man, what’s good?”

  and Loki is like “You didn’t happen to steal Mjolnir, did you?”

  and Thrym is like “HAHA, YOU GOT ME

  I STOLE IT AND THEN I BURIED IT

  AND I’LL NEVER GIVE IT BACK UNLESS I GET TO MARRY FREYJA

  HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.”

  So Loki flies back to Freyja and Thor

  who are both like “HOLY SHIT, LOKI

  Did you forget to steal that cloak or something?

  It’s like you’re suddenly respecting people’s possessions. It’s creepy.”

  And Loki is like “I KNOW, RIGHT?

  Look, I can get Mjolnir back super easy.

  Here, Freyja, just put on this wedding dress

  and Freyja is just like “HELLLLLLLL

  NO.

  What do you think I am some kind of slut who trades sex for treasure?

  Make Thor do it.”

  And Thor is like “NOOOOOOOO WAY, JOSÉ.

  What do I look like some kind of cross-dressing motherfucker?

  Bitch you could not find a vagina on me if you CUT ONE INTO MY FLESH.

  SHIT WOULD GROW BACK.

  I AM A VIRILE DYNAMO WITH THE HEALING POWERS OF WOLVERINE.”

  and Freyja is like “Yes, Thor, we all understand.

  But if you don’t get that hammer back who is going to kill all the giants?

  Those giants are going to remain woefully unkilled.”

  And Thor is like “Fine, I’ll put on the dress.”

  So they pull out ALL the fucking stops

  this is like Pimp My Ride for drag queens right here.

  They give him a veil and a dress

  and Freyja’s pretty necklace and some house keys

  ’cause apparently there is some Norse wedding tradition

  where they lock you out of a house and you have to get inside or else you’re divorced

  and Thor just feels SOOOO PRETTY

  but he won’t let anyone know

  ’cause he’s Thor, all right?

  And then Loki gets jealous of how pretty Thor is

  and is like “I wanna dress up too.”

  And Freyja is like “All right.

  You can be her—I mean HIS wingman or whatever.”

  Hey, is there a female version of wingman?

  Wingwoman sounds awkward.

  I’m coining a new phrase:

  Titcaptain.

  Tell your friends.

  So Loki and Thor show up at Thrym’s place

  and Thrym makes the colossal mistake of inviting Thor to have dinner with him

  so Thor eats an entire ox, and then eight salmon

  and all the little cakes and shit they can bring him

  and chugs a ton of mead

  until Thrym is like “Whoa, baby.

  Might wanna slow down there.”

  And Loki is like “No, man, it’s totally cool.

  She hasn’t eaten in EIGHT DAYS

  ’cause she was SO EXCITED ABOUT YOUR DICK.”

  So Thrym is like “Oh okay.”

  But then he’s like “Man I really wanna kiss my bride right now”

  so he lifts up her delicate veil and WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?

  Here come Thor’s furious eyeballs, flaming with pure black hatred

  and that is NOT what Thrym was looking for

  and he is like “MY, WHAT BIG EYES YOU HAVE”

  and Loki is like “No, man, it’s fine.

  She just hasn’t slept for the last eight days

  ’cause she was so excited about your dick, like I said.

  Honestly I don’t know how she’s even alive

  except for the whole immortality thing, I guess.”

  So then this random chick busts into the room

  one of Thrym’s daughters or something

  and is like “FREYJA, GIVE ME A WEDDING GIFT

  EVEN THOUGH I AM NOT GETTING MARRIED.

  GIVE ME RINGS OF RED GOLD.”

  and Thor is like “Fuck your red gold.

  What do I look like, some kind of red dwarf?

  Hey, Thrym, I want a wedding gift actually. I want Mjolnir.”

  and Thrym is like “ANYTHING YOU SAY, HONEY.”

  and goes and digs up Mjolnir and gives it to Thor

  and Thor is like “OH, IT IS PARTY TIME NOW, MOTHERFUCKERS.”

  So he kills Thrym

  and then all of Thrym’s dudes

  and then that chick who asked him for gold, just for good measure

  and then he’s like “WHO’S THE MAN?

  WHO’S THE MAN?

  ME RIGHT?

  ’CAUSE THIS WHOLE THING KINDA MADE ME QUESTION MY SEXUALITY.”

  So the moral of the story is

  if at first you don’t succeed

  try cross-dressing.

  ALL’S WELL THAT MIMIR’S WELL

  Odin is constantly doing weird shit for secrets.

  Like every morning, he sends out his two ravens—Hugin a
nd Munin—to go fly around

  and then in the evening they come back and tell him what’s up.

  But DISASTER STRIKES

  because one day

  instead of telling him all the shit they saw

  all the birds will say is “OHH SHIT. GOT SOME FOREBODING SHADOWS UP IN THIS BITCH.”

  And Odin is like “FOREBODING SHADOWS?

  THOSE ARE THE WORST KIND OF SHADOWS!”

  At which point his wife, Frigga, busts in like “HUSBAND, STOP YELLING”

  and Odin is like “HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO STOP YELLING

  WHEN THERE ARE FOREBODING SHADOWS GOING ON ALL OVER THE PLACE??”

  And Frigga is like “Okay, tell you what

  how about we go hit up these chicks called the Norns

  who live at the bottom of Yggdrassil—

  THE TREE OF LIFE—

  and look into their eyes for a bit and see the future?”

  And Odin is like “Okay, I GUESS.”

  So Odin gets all his buddies together

  them being Tyr, the one-armed badass murder convention

  Baldur the prettiest and best loved of all the gods

  and Thor, who has a hammer.

  They all walk over to this fabulous rainbow bridge

  that connects Asgard to the base of Yggdrassil

  and Odin goes up to Heimdall who is the keeper of the gate of Asgard

  and also has a sweet gold grill

  and Heimdall opens up the gate

  and Odin walks through, and Tyr walks through, and Baldur walks through

  and Thor tries to walk through and Heimdall is like “NOPE, NO THORS ALLOWED.”

  and Thor who is the god of getting real pissed real fast

  is all “DON’T MAKE ME COME OVER TO YOUR HOUSE AND BEAT YOUR WIFE.

  OH WAIT, YOU DON’T HAVE A WIFE

  SO I GUESS I AM GOING TO HAVE TO WAIT

  UNTIL SOME POOR SKANK FINDS YOUR WEAK-ASS GOLD GRILL ALLURING

  AND THEN WHEN YOU ARE CUTTING THE CAKE AT YOUR WEDDING

  I WILL BUST OUT OF THE CAKE

  AND CLOCK YOUR NEW WIFE IN THE JAW WITH MY HAMMER

  BECAUSE IF THERE IS ONE THING THAT DEFINES ME AS A PERSON

  IT IS MY MASSIVE FUCKING HAMMER.”

  And Heimdall is like “Actually your hammer is kind of the problem

  the weight of your hammer combined with the weight of your fat, fat ass

  would break the rainbow bridge.

  So I’m sorry, dude but you’re going to have to stay home.

  UNLESS you want to wade across these two smothering miserable cloud rivers

  and meet your bros on the other side.”

  and Thor is like “SOUNDS AWESOME.”

  So nine hours later, Thor finally catches up to everyone at the base of Yggdrassil

  and then Odin goes over to stare at the Norns for a bit.

  There are three Norns:

  Urda, the old one

  Verdandi, the hot one

  and Skulda, the emo one

  and in their eyes Odin can see the future

  and I dunno exactly what it is

  but it’s apparently pretty depressing

  and then Frigga shows up

  with Sif (Thor’s wife)

  and Nanna (Baldur’s wife. Lucky bitch)

  and she looks at the Norns for a bit

  and then looks real sad at Baldur, who is her son

  presumably because she saw him die in the future or some shit.

  Who knows?

  (Spoiler alert: He totally dies.)

  So Odin turns around like “Hey, guys I need to go to Midgard for a bit.

  I need to drink from the well of Mimir

  because it is fortified with wisdom and shit

  and all these foreboding shadows are going wayyy over my head.”

  And then Thor has to figure out how to get back home.

  So Odin trades in his spear, and all his armor and his eight-legged horse, and his name

  for a blue cloak and a staff and a big floppy hat

  and the name VEGTAM THE WANDERER

  and he starts walking through Jotunheim looking for giants.

  Pretty soon he sees him a giant

  So he walks up to this giant like “Hey, bro, what’s your name?”

  and the giant is like “I AM VAFTHRUDNIR WISEST GIANT EVER.”

  Odin has heard about this dude

  and he knows that he is not bullshitting

  so he is like “Oh damn, I am in luck.

  Wanna hook me up with some wisdom?”

  and Vafthrudnir is like “OKAY, BUT FIRST ANSWER SOME RANDOM TRIVIA

  AND IF YOU ANSWER WRONG I GET TO CUT OFF YOUR HEAD.”

  This may seem strange

  but actually this is just how they play trivial pursuit in Sweden.

  So Vafthrudnir tosses out a bunch of questions

  but his quiz is actually super weak sauce

  because like 100 percent of the answers can be readily found on Wikipedia

  so Odin proceeds to hand him his ass

  and Vafthrudnir is like “Aww dang.

  Now you gotta ask ME a question.”

  and Odin is like “How about this one:

  WHAT ARE THE LAST WORDS THAT ODIN WILL SAY TO HIS SON BALDUR?”

  And Vafthrudnir is like “COME ON, THAT IS ENTIRELY UNFAIR

  ONLY ODIN WOULD KNOW THE ANSWER TO—Waaait a second.

  You’re Odin, aren’t you?

  You motherfucker.

  Okay, what kind of wisdom did you want to get hooked up with?”

  And Odin is like “I just wanna know how much it costs to drink from Mimir’s well.”

  and Vafthrudnir is like “Oh damn, is that all? You probably could have just asked Mimir.

  He generally just charges people THEIR RIGHT EYE.”

  And Odin is like “Really?”

  And Vafthrudnir is like “Yup.”

  And Odin is like “Does he ever charge . . . anything else?”

  And Vafthrudnir is like “Nope.”

  So Odin is like “Fuuuuck, man

  I need my right eye

  for like, depth perception

  and keeping bacteria out of my bleeding eye socket.

  Maybe I shouldn’t go through with this.”

  But then he remembers that he’s not a huge wuss

  so he goes to Mimir’s well

  and he’s like “Hey, Mimir

  hook it up.”

  And Mimir looks at him and is like “You know how much it costs, right?

  ’Cause a lot of people show up here like ‘GIMME SOME WISDOM’

  and I’m always like ‘Sure. One eyeball, please.’

  And they are like ‘NOOOO WAYYYY.’

  I mean, I know you’re not gonna pussy out

  because I drink from this wisdom well all the time and I’m wise as shit

  but I still gotta ask for legal reasons: You down to give me your right eye?”

  and Odin is like “OH HELLS YES.”

  So Mimir gives him the water of knowledge right away

  which strikes me as an incredibly unwise move

  because Odin could have just drunk all the water

  and then left without giving away any of his eyeballs

  and in fact if that water had really given him ultimate wisdom

  that’s probably exactly what he would have done.

  But no, he drinks the water

  and he sees what he has to do to mitigate the horrible foreboding shadow

  not that it can be stopped or anything because Norse mythology is pretty gloomy

  and then he puts down the drinking horn and he plucks out his eye

  and he puts his still-warm bleeding eyeball in Mimir’s well

  proving once and for all

  that the Norse may not have been a very smart people

  or a very happy people

  but no matter what

  THEY WERE ALWAYS METAL.

  THE END
OF THE NORSE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT

  Bad news, guys. In this myth all the Norse gods die.

  Yeah, this is the big one:

  RAGNAROK

  THE END OF THE GODDAMN WORLD.

  So basically the first thing that’s gonna tip everyone off that the world is ending

  is this thing called Fimbulvetr

  which just means THE WINTER OF WINTERS

  and that is exactly what it is.

  It is a winter

  MADE OF MULTIPLE WINTERS

  like, there is going to be a winter

  and then once that winter is finished there will be ANOTHER WINTER.

  And then after that maybe it will be spring?

  Think again, son.

  MORE WINTER.

  The whole point of this endless winter is just to put everyone in a really bad mood

  to prepare them for the next stage of the apocalypse

  which is CEASELESS WARS.

  Which is funny because that is also the Norse idea of heaven.

  Like, that is seriously what everyone is doing in Valhalla all the time.

  But then finally after that goes on for a while

  this wolf Skoll

  who is one of the sons of Fenrir

  is gonna eat the sun.

  Then Fenrir’s other kid, Hati, will eat the moon, because he’s a fucking copydog.

  Then the cock Fjalar will crow to the giants

  all like “TIME FOR WAR, MOTHERFUCKERS”

  and the golden cock Gullinkambi will yell the same thing at the gods

  and then a third cock will raise the dead.

  Hehe, cock.

  THEN

  there’s gonna be A WHOLE BUNCH OF EARTHQUAKES

  and this is going to have the effect

  of finally releasing that evil wolf bastard Fenrir

  and his bottom jaw is gonna touch the earth

  and his top jaw is gonna touch the sky

  and his eyes are going to be on FIRE

  and there’s gonna be a whole bunch of tsunamis and shit too

  because the Midgard serpent, who holds up the world

  (and is also another one of Loki’s horrible children)

  is going to start having seizures all over the ocean

  on its way to fuck up the land.

  And not only that

  but he’s going to breathe poison all over everything constantly

  completely destroying all the air

  and all the land.

  And all the waves caused by the serpent

  are gonna set free this ship called Naglfar

  full of giants who are ready to romp and stomp everyone

  and another ship is gonna set sail from hell

  with all the dead people on it

  and Loki is gonna be driving it