Posts Tagged Myth
It’s Christmas Eve, Boys and Girls. Be Good or the Krampus Will Whip You.
Posted by mistergroonk in Art, Artist, History, Holiday on December 24, 2011
Twitterer @RonSalas retweeted an old Christmas card @CalamityJon created a few years ago.
The Krampus is an old myth that the Venture Brothers introduced us to a few years ago. Take a walk through YouTube and you’ll find tons of contemporary parade and Traditional Krampus videos all up in there.
Now imagine our surprise when we learned obscure mythologist writer most extraordinary, Neil Gaiman, did not know of the Krampus.
@neilhimself whaaaa?!Really?!*I* knew about Krampus… how can this be?! #DogsAndCatsLivingTogether #NothingMakesSenseAnymore
— Rantz Hoseley (@RantzHoseley) December 12, 2011
We’re still reeling from this revelation. Reality as we know it may never recover.
via @ronsalas
Art-Out Moment: Betwixt Heaven and Hell
Posted by mistergroonk in Comics, Dinosaurs on August 11, 2010
Dropped below the cut is a comics mural so long that it encompasses Heaven, Hell, and all that lie inbetween.
Including graboids, strangely placed remote control(Neglectful Precursors, maybe?) and a fish wearing a fez.
Pity the artist didn’t sign his/her work.
Read the rest of this entry »
Grave Tweeting: Tweance to Use Twitter to Contact Dead Celebrities
Posted by mistergroonk in Intertube Madness, People Who Died on October 16, 2009
Did we say that a little bit of magic died? One door closes and another opens. In the world of Waves and Twitters, nothing stays constant for long.
Tweance, the online attempt to contact Michael Jackson beyond the grave, is being billed as the world’s first Twitter séance.
What they expect dead celebrities to divulge in death that was not said, recorded, and picked apart in their lives is beyond us.
Science Fact: Vampires Can’t Exist, Zombies Would Destroy Us All
Posted by mistergroonk in Science, Versus on August 19, 2009
You gotta love it when hard science investigates geek conversations to their logical ends. Months ago @joshmull shared an I09 article wherein physicists prove vampires couldn’t exist. It was an entertaining thought. We kept it in drafts until the day was right to expose the dark conspiracy. Then the day came when BBC News informs Canadian scientists have pondered the realities of the “zombie apocalypse.” That’s when it was certain the noted draft had become a publishable thing.
Physicists Prove That Vampires Could Not Exist
Physicists Costas Efthimiou and Sohang Gandhi’s paper “Cinema Fiction vs. Physics Reality” offers a full explanation.
Efthimiou and Gandhi conduct a thought experiment: Assume that the first vampire appeared on January 1, 1600. At that time, according to data available at the U.S. Census website, the global population was 536,870,911. Efthimiou and Gandhi calculate that, once the Nosferatu feeding frenzy began, the entire human race would have been wiped out by June 1602 …
If you like this sort of thoughtless, thought experimentation(as we do) you’ll get a kick out of the entire article.
Then, as there always must be these days, there were zombies.
Found: Birthplace of Zeus.
Posted by mistergroonk in History, Science on February 10, 2009
Ever since I learned of Thunderbolt Iron (fictional and real) back in December, my fascination for the ole Greek gods and their doings on Mt Olympus has been reinvigorated.
Ancient Greeks first worshipped the omnipotent Zeus at a remote altar on Mount Lykaion, a team of Greek and American archaeologists now think. During a recent dig at the site, the researchers found ceremonial goods commonly used in cult activity and dated at over three millennia old, making them the earliest known “appearance” of Zeus in Greece.
The discovery challenges the idea that Zeus worship began on the Greek island of Crete, which at least one classical historian names as the god’s mythic birthplace. The latest finds on Mount Lykaion, in the mainland province of Arcadia, are as old as the idea of Zeus himself, said the project’s senior research scientist David Romano, of the University of Pennsylvania.
“This new evidence strongly suggests that there were drinking (and perhaps feasting) parties taking place on the top of the mountain in the Late Helladic period, around 3,300 or 3,400 years ago,” Romano said.
[…]
Younger, higher levels of the trench have yielded silver coins, a bronze hand holding a lightning bolt and petrified lightning in past dig seasons. All are clear dedications to Zeus, indicating that the use of the god’s altar on Mount Lykaion was likely unbroken for several millennia.
“Petrified lightning”? That’s something you don’t read every day.
Now I know where to send the cake, the wine and the flock of lovely “new” ladies. I know how you are, Zeus.
(via amboy00, livescience)
Unicorn Found in Italy. No, Really. A Fucking Unicorn.
Posted by mistergroonk in Animals on June 12, 2008
The photo is undated but was apparently found in the research center’s park in the Tuscan town of Prato, near Florence, Gilberto Tozzi. His twin had two horns, which makes this little guy here a freak of nature.
Calling it the first time he has seen such a case, Tozzi said such anomalies among deer may have inspired the myth of the unicorn.
The unicorn, a horse-like creature with magical healing powers, has appeared in legends and stories throughout history, from ancient and medieval texts to the adventures of Harry Potter.
“This shows that even in past times, there could have been animals with this anomaly,” he said by telephone. “It’s not like they dreamed it up.”
Other things that happened in Italy:
(via single minded yahoo news)
Gnome terrorizes South American Town. Makes Me Piss Myself with Laughter.
Posted by mistergroonk in Uncategorized on March 11, 2008
Weird day today. This was too hilarious not to share.
The Sun (yeah, I know) claims a town in South America is being plagued by a gnome(yeah, *I know*) and they have video. You must watch the video.
Those kids obviously did not read Harry Potter. The Weasely’s knew exactly how to treat a gnome infesting their garden.
(more stupidity via The Sun)
The Nomadic Aborigine Myth Debunked
Posted by mistergroonk in Admin, History, Science on October 18, 2007
Dwellings were constructed in various styles, depending on the climate. Most common were dome-like structures made of cane reeds with roofs thatched with palm leaves.
Some of the houses were interconnected, allowing native people to interact during long periods spent indoors during the wet season.
The findings, by the anthropologist and architect Dr Paul Memmot, of the University of Queensland, discredits a commonly held view in Australia that Aborigines were completely nomadic before the arrival of Europeans 200 years ago.
The belief was part of the argument used by white settlers to claim that Australia was terra nullius – the Latin term for land that belonged to nobody.
Dr Memmott said the myth that indigenous Australians were constantly on the move had come about because early explorers made their observations in good weather, when indigenous people were more mobile than at other times.
(via warren ellis)
Oh BTW: Huntsville’s Fully Haunted
Posted by mistergroonk in Alabama, History, Holiday on October 16, 2007
The Halloween spirit is finally taking hold of me.
Huntsville – The Carter Mansion – is haunted by the ghost of Sally Carter who died a violent death at 16 year old and is buried on the Carter Estate. She has been sited walking the grounds. Some say she is responsible for toppling her headstone on occasion.
Huntsville – Crybaby Hollow – Ghost of a baby wails through the trees on cold nights and will sometimes scratch on the bottoms of cars that park there. Mysterious breathing sounds sometimes heard as well.
Huntsville – Dead Children’s Playground (next to Maple Hill Cemetery) – The ghosts of children often are seen swinging in swing sets or sometimes the swings are moving as if someone were in them. The children are seen very late at night or early the next day like from 11:00pm to 3:00am, too late for children to be out.
Huntsville – Hell’s Gates (Green Mountain) – There are a set a big black gates that stand about a mile from the bottom of the mountain that guard some huge mansion on this mountain. If you go and sit in front of the gates for a little while a car will come down the mountain and chase you until you get to the bottom and the car will suddenly vanish…its no myth.
Huntsville – Heritage Bible College – WHBC Frat House – Late at night you can hear the Ghost of former youth minister Anthony Stephens walking through the house flushing the toilet. His now deceased brethren Robert Ekisbus and Adam Cooper follow him around making noises that almost sounds like the word “cheese”.
Huntsville – Huntsville High School – People have claimed to here foot steps and laughing of teenagers through the halls at night after late softball or basketball practices.
Huntsville – Kent Robertson park – A young boy died there one summer day. They named the park after him and made a memory stone. He still is heard in the park at night and the hunt club-woods behind it.
Huntsville – Maple Hill Cemetery – An old lady passed away and was put in the family burial house. Her family placed her antique rocking chair in the crypt with her because it was a prized possession to her. Most anytime when you stand outside the burial house, you can hear the rocking chair moving back and forth.
Huntsville – Old Dallas Mill Site – The Dallas Mill was built in 1891 and burned down in 1992. Haunted by a man died while cleaning the smoke stacks shortly after the mill was built, and a homeless person who lived there after the mill burned down. People have reported seeing him wandering around the ruins.
Huntsville – Space Camp – Space camp counselors tell the story there about a man who was working on the sleeping quarters at the facility. One day they were using explosives to make large holes in the ground for the below ground quarters. The explosives went off early and he was buried alive by dirt and rubble. Until this day in the halls and in some rooms there they can still here his cries for help echoing through the halls and large moans late at night.
Cemetery to Kill “Dead Children’s Playground”
Posted by mistergroonk in Alabama, History on October 16, 2007
This is a bit of local(Huntsville, AL) folklore that’s about to make way for more dead people. A place to bury the dead apparently means more money for the city.
An e-mail last week from Huntsville cemetery Director Brenda Webb – who was out of the office Wednesday for medical reasons and could not be reached – to the City Council and other officials addressed a proposition to turn the park into an area for burial spaces and crypts.
“It is hardly ever used for much except vandals, drug deals, lovers and employees hiding out from their employers,” Webb wrote. “It is thought too dangerous for most children to play in.”
Some folks are calling shennanigans.
“For the past 10 or 11 years, we’ve gone to the park regularly on weekends with our dog, and we’ve seen families playing on the playground,” Lattanzi said. “And there was a great baseball field with a backstop.
“Saturday morning, it was all still there. When we went back on Sunday, it was all gone.”
Lattanzi doesn’t approve of voting on the proposal the week of fall break, when he said many of the families who might like to protest the park’s closure are out of town.
“They say illegal activities are going on, but I’ve never felt anything but safe at that park,” he said. “And anything illegal that was going on probably had nothing to do with playground equipment.
“I don’t see how expanding a cemetery is going to fix that.”
Parks and Recreation Director Greg Patterson said he doesn’t love the idea of losing park space, but he said it is an under-utilized area that has security problems.
I’m oddly sad to see it go.
(via huntsville LJ and al.com)
(photo credit to beepboop’s livejournal and flickr)
Update: Looks like the ghosts will live.
“It was poorly handled,” Mayor Loretta Spencer said Tuesday after meeting with department heads involved in the equipment removal decisions.
Spencer said she will yank the cemetery expansion ordinance from the City Council agenda and restore the park. “I am pulling this from the agenda and I have ordered new playground equipment,” she said. Spencer said the equipment will be paid from a $50,000 line item in the budget for recreational equipment. It should be installed within a month, she said.
“That’s wonderful. That’s what we needed in there all along. I think it will be a real benefit for the neighborhood,” reacted Blossomwood resident Nancy Grayson Van Valkenburg, who joined other residents last week in begging the council to protect the park.
City workers on Tuesday began repainting a pavilion and reinstalling picnic tables and benches. Spencer said she has instructed her city landscaping director to remove overgrowth to enhance the park’s safety.
The park resurrection comes on the heels of public outcry at last week’s City Council meeting over the dismantling of the park with no advance notice. Council President Glenn Watson apologized to residents for the way it was handled.








