FROM BAD TO NORSE

The dearth of recent news stories on the subject of Vikings is a troubling trend that we feel obligated to address. Most people consider Vikings to be little more than a bygone race of Scandinavian sea pirates that roamed Western Europe a thousand or so years ago before their reign of sack and pillage was brought to an end by the mass embrace of Christianity in their home region. These people are dangerously deluded, in dire need of being smacked around, shouted at, and quite possibly spat upon.

One of the primary misconceptions of the modern world is that the Viking menace is past. The truth is that there is a direct line of descent between Vikings and modern terrorists. Bereft of their dragon-hulled battleships, many of them migrated inland. Some wound up in Middle East, where they have stoked havoc for nearly a millennium. Others sat around in Central Europe scratching their asses until the circumstances were promising for Fascism. Still others wrote operas about Vikings, in which Viking stories were sung in Viking costume by Viking singers. But despite the fatness and femininity of some of these performers, their singing did not spell the end of the Viking era. In fact, Vikings continue, in their guises of regular, everyday people, to have a profound impact on the workings of recent history.

As such, please study, memorize, and tremble in fear of this list of "Five Events in Recent History That Were Actually Caused By Vikings - Yes, Vikings!"

1. THE BOER WAR - When a group of Edwardian Vikings decided that they wanted to terrorize the Southern Hemisphere for a change, they went straight to South Africa and subjugate the British, who were in turn subjugating the Dutch Boers, who were in turn subjugating the Zulus, who were in turn subjugating the lions, who were in turn subjugating the giraffes, who were in turn subjugating the the mimosa trees, who were in turn pretty much screwed. There were no victors.

2. COMMUNISM - Originally a shiny, happy philosophical system of shared resources and equality devised by the world's first hippie, Carl Marks, Communism could very well have served as a solution to the world's ills were it not for the Vikings who secretly overthrew the Russian Revolution and decided that it would be a lot more fun to kill millions of people and turn the verdant greenlands of Siberia into a crappy prison camp.

3. THE TEAPOT DOME SCANDAL - Vikings have a known propensity to disguise themselves as corrupt politicians and sabotage the system from within. During the reign of President Harden G. Warning, whose cabinet was lousy with them, Vikings accepted millions of dollars in kickbacks from the tea lobby in exchange for the promise to affix a giant handle and spout to the Capitol building in Washington, DC. (In a planned double-cross, these accoutrements would, at the final moment, be replaced with classic Viking horns that would cast their pointy shadows across the Mall for generations to come.) When the scheme was discovered, the Vikings were unceremoniously kicked out of Washington until the next President was sworn in.

4. ISHTAR - Unhappy about their portrayal in such historical films as Erik the Red-Faced, Kill All the Vikings! and Wild Strawberries, the Vikings decided to strike Hollywood in its most tender part: the money. Infiltrating the studio establishment, secret Viking producers created a bizarre proposal for a buddy comedy starring the aging comedy duo of Mike Nichols and Elaine May, who play songwriters at the ancient temple of the Babylonian Goddess of Love and War, Ishtar. Though the film fared poorly at the box office, it failed to destroy the entertainment-industrial complex of the United States, as originally intended.

5. 9/11 - What were those deadly airplanes if not Viking vessels of fearmongering and attempted conquerment? Sure, they didn't have dragons emblazoned on the front, but that was merely practical - the Viking-descended members of Al-Qaeda would have loved nothing more than to paint some scary teeth onto the noses of those jets, only by doing so they would have been caught before liftoff.

And what are they up to right now? It is believed that a group of Vikings has joined the Steampunkerism movement's attempts to revive the corpse of Queen Victoria, in the hopes that a new British Empire would give them something more interesting to conquer than the amateur crap being thrown down by the current United States government. Of course, the Viking scourge has grown so diffuse in the generations since its acme that it is difficult to imagine them banding together and traumatizing the world en masse. Still, Viking sleeper cells are present in every nation of the world, and it is only a matter of time before one of them dons their ceremonial helmets, drinks an assload of grog, and starts swinging a battle-axe at your friends and relations. Look sharp!

MONSTER OUR ASS

One word for the so-called Montauk Monster (okay, a word and a skeptical inflection.) : seriously? (And repeated for good measure: ) Seriously? Of all the different entertaining, amusing, terrifying, serpentine, slime-ridden, scale-infested, befanged, paradoxical, prehistoric, reptilian, cetacean, romantical, eye-popping forms a sea monster could take, you chose this one? Who do you think you’re impressing, Montauk Monster (pictured here as the dork it is)?

We suppose this is what one should expect from a sea monster washing up on the prosaic shores of Long Island. Yes, Montauk may be known for its mansion culture, nautical past and late-night beachside blood rituals, but it represents the dullest America has to offer – it’s only a stone’s throw from Rhode Island, for christ’s sake. And what would a Rhode Island sea monster look like – a fish? With, like, a weird tooth or something?

We encourage the populace to return its attention to the more hellacious sea monsters that still roam our oceans with sinister freedom. We mean, of course, the scyllas, the charibdae, the humpacked hydras, the zombie sirens, the baleened leviathans, the were- turtles, the saltwater Nessies, the great white pleiosaurs, the vampire dolphins, the house-sized electric clams, the seahorses-of-hell, the superintelligent Portuguese Men o’ War, the Moby-Dicks that shoot lasers from their eyes, the flying eels, the maimrays, the krakens – the bloody krakens!!! We must kill them before they kill us – and have a thoroughly awesome maritime adventure in the bargain.

Dear readers, please share with us information about your ideal sea monster. Pull no punches – the grotesquer the better. We want to hear about things that will make us shit our pants the next time we see an oil painting of a lighthouse.

PRO-ANTIKYTHERA

The tabloids are at it again, whapping their porcine tails wildly into the mud so as to splash up a thick brown splatter of lies and mistruths. This time the target of the Old Gray Ho is - no surprise - the Antikythera Mechanism. For those unfamiliar with this remarkable apparatus, it is an ancient Greek contraption discovered in a shipwreck in 1899 by some Mediterranean pearl divers, who used it as a doorstop until a visiting archaeologist stubbed his toe on it during a dirty weekend with one of the divers' wives the following year.

Though it has stymied researchers for more than a century, most agree that the Mechanism is a calculating device, an analog precursor to the modern computer. Supposedly constructed by the great Greek astronomer Archimedes (inventor of the Pythagorean Theorem), it is believed to have been used as a calendar to predict solar eclipses as well as regular outbreaks of Olympic Syndrome, a little-known form of star-influenced mass hysteria originating in classical times, in which entire nations drain their physical strength in displays of athletic bravado and jingoism at four-year intervals.

All of which, of course, is barely two-fifths of the story. We had the rare privilege of handling the mechanism during a surgical midnight research raid on the Mechanism's Cardiff laboratory some few years ago (for which we sported a cute mask and a smart black turtleneck), and are thus, as usual, way ahead of the game. Here are some findings about the device that the researchers DON'T want you to know:

• Its calculating properties were used to create many of the world's most useful inventions, such as the hourglass, the sextant, and the mule.

• It contains primitive clockwork porn, expressed metaphorically as the meshing of gears.

• Despite its avowed status as a proto-computer, it employed not the well-known binary system, but a more primitive "singulary" system.

• It could be used for purposes of identity theft, for instance, by clocking someone on the head with it and stealing their clothes. (Needless to say, this is how the phrase "clocking someone on the head" was inspired.)

• Its original power source was a live cobra.

• Earlier versions of the Antikythera Mechanism were so large that they filled up an entire room!

• A small slot dispensed strips of papyrus containing the latest stock-forum quotes.

• It was capable of communicating with other Antikythera Mechanisms across long distances; unfortunately, no other Antikythera Mechanisms were manufactured.

• Archimedes was civilization's first Dungeon Master.

• It had the capability of solving world hunger and curing all disease, but no, man had to go and fuck it up as usual.

• It has Solitaire.

CONFUSION OF STATE

Last week, notorious Manhattan tabloid The New York Times published a profile of the once- possible state of Absaroka, an unholy amalgam of Wyoming, Montana, and South Dakota that attempted to secede from the Union in the late 1930s in protest over wheelchair-bound president Professor Franklin X. Roosevelt’s abuse of his mutant psychic powers in pre-WWII espionage. Though it represents a colorful chapter of our national history, Absaroka is far from the only state to have made a failed bid for the majors. Here are some of our personal favorites:

PAINE – In 1887, the territorial assembly of the nascent state of Washington batted around a bunch of different names. Though “Washington” won by a nose (setting into motion a fierce rivalry with the District of Columbia, which claimed to own the copyright), the second-runner up was a tribute to influential colonial-era pamphleteer Thomas Paine. It’s true that the radical nature of Paine’s politics fell out of favor post-Revolution, but even more than that, people simply didn’t want to live out the rest of their lives under the auspices of an execrable pun. (A similar state befell Montana, which was originally to be named after Lewis and Clark’s cook Emmet DeNile.)

NEW IOWA – A territory comprising much of what is now eastern Nebraska and northern Kansas was once loosely confederated under the name “New Iowa,” until its founders found the concept too depressing and moved back to Missouri.

SAN FRANCISCONIA – Before there was California, there was San Francisco, a city-state based on the democratic ideals of ancient Athens, populated by gentleman-fortyniners whose love of gold was surpassed only by a lust for classical learning and a fine appreciation for the arts. Of course, their adoption of Greek practices extended to the interpersonal – not too many lady-fortyniners, after all – and the U.S. government cracked down and annexed the area as a state in order to remove this perceived blemish on the continent. Fat lot of good it did.

TEXAS – After its short-lived secession as a sovereign nation, North Mexico was, for a brief period in the 19th Century, a member of the United States of America, under the name “Texas.” It reverted back to the Mexicans when President Zacherley Taylor was debriefed by then-governor Matthew Houston about what a pain in the ass it would eventually become.

NERDOLINA – In 1998, a bunch of computer geeks formed an online “state” and tried to lobby Congress for its recognition. It still exists somewhere, but it’s only had five visitors in the past three years (a 500% increase over the previous three).

Fret not, friends – there are many more where this came from, but since secret knowledge is the 180-proof spirits of the mind, we must hold revelations in abeyance for future tippling.

CRUEL BRITANNIA

It was with great interest that we stumbled upon yesterday’s posting on the Observer of Design web-oriented logging unit: a take-down by one Randy Nakamura of the so-called “steampunkery” movement. As with many commentators on the article, we believe that M. Nakamura seems to have missed the point entirely. We don’t, however, share their reasons for this belief.

For those in the don’t-know, steampunkism is a movement in which people with a fair amount of disposable income and jobs that don’t require excessive overtime create a kind of fantasy world that clings to the skirts of the past, a world that hearkens back to the heady early days of H.G. Vernian discovery, when the strangeness of the world was still new. They are Victoriana obsessives who limn a once-possible post-Tesla present that slipped through the fingers of our ancestors. They are dreamers. They are nerds.

Why, M. Nakamura asks, would anyone in their right mind be interested in turning the clock back to the grimmest days of the Industrious Revolution, during which entire families were forced to live inside toxin-spewing factory smokestacks (utilizing a unique bunking system) and class prejudice made it nearly impossible for anyone lacking a peerage to find decent toilet facilities? What romance can be wrung from a time in which provincialism was stuffed into East India crates and marketed to the world as imperialism?

First of all, the world was newer then, and a much larger place – literally, a few hundred extra miles around the equator. But this doesn’t fully explain the steampunkers’ forward-thinking nostalgia. In fact, all begloved fingers point to the stocky profile that loomed above the entire ill-conceived era, who lent her name to all forms of oppression, unchecked environmental degradation, and all-around haughtiness, the Doyenne of Devilry herself: Queen Victoria.

A little-reported phenomenon is that the majority of steampunkists worship HRH as a goddess – a sort of puffy, potato-like, impeccably mannered incarnation of H. Ryder Haggard’s tropical “She.” And like all goddesses, she refuses to remain dead. The fact is, the original claque of steampunkophytes congregated soon before her death and devised a plan. Knowing they would be unable to prevent her death and, with it, the flow of temporal progress, they plotted an eventual return to the world of their times, a world that would be heralded by the resurrection of Victoria herself. This hideous junta was led by William Jennings Darwin, the inventor of DNA. By injecting this new genetic chemical into the dying Queen’s bloodstream, he was able to extract a few parcels of her life-essence, which would be stored in formaldehyde until the technology was available to build a new Queen from these paltry remains.

As the recent wave of quaint, 19th-centuryesque gadgets and paraphernalia attest, those close to the project feel that the future (in the form of the past) is almost upon us. They want their newly revived Queen to see a world that she would recognize, abetted by progress that would make her proud. Whether their mission will prove, in the end, to be a genuine success, or yet another aborted eschaton, remains to be seen. In the meantime, we can admire the aesthetics of their brass-lined baubles and leathery laptops, but let us not fool ourselves: steampunkophiles are not harmless hobbyists, but the exponents of a dangerous cult, and should be approached with appropriate caution.

PLEASED TO EAT YOU

Imagine the toe-curling, hand-waving, shrill-squeaking glee we experienced upon discovering that one of our favoritest web-based logs, entitled Strange Maps, had posted a “Cannibal Map of the World” in yesterday’s edition. But then imagine our head-dropping, sigh-inducing, shoulder-sloughing disappointment upon discovering that, as always in manners cannibalistic, this 1893 delineation of anthropophagical strongholds throughout the known world was studded with amateur errors.

First, a disclaimer: we do not condone cannibalism as a lifestyle choice. We don’t think people should engage in cannibalistic behavior for any reason (with the possible exception of Uruguayan soccer teams who have crash-landed in the Andes), because it is wrong and weird and gross and probably doesn’t taste nearly as good as you might expect. But that being said, is it possible not to be curious about all of the horrible, grim, bloody details?

A side note: our favorite bit of cannibal hypocrisy is the fact that, after battles, many cannibal tribes would eat their enemies in order to absorb their strength. But what kind of strength can they possibly have had? They lost. By eating the conquered cannibals actually absorbed their weakness, which is why the enterprise was doomed from the start. If the losers were to eat the winners, on the other hand, we’d see much more cannibalism in the modern world.

That being said, onward to the map! We notice at least three cannibalistic groups missing from its roster:

1. The Yipps of the Kamchatkan Peninsula. Members of this rugged Northeast Asian tribe hunted and slayed each other in the wild for centuries, until discovering that most of the people they killed were actually bears. Realizing their mistake, they surrendered their cannibal status and became bear-hunters instead.
2. 19th-century Londoners. After Sir Sweeney Todd was elected to the House of Commons in 1878, it was revealed in the popular press that the pie empire upon which his fortune was based was built upon the bones of the dead. Shrugging with Dickensian callousness, Londoners returned to their suppers.
3. The Antarctic proto-human slaves of the Old Ones. Faced with the option of eating either Cthulhu cuisine or each other, they opted for the latter. Apparently they were all very gentlemanly about it.

And we’d like to defend one group that has obviously received a bad rap: the Aztecs. Sure, they sacrificed humans, and yes, fine, it was bad and they shouldn’t have done it. But when, oh when, will modern science finally come clean and admit the presence in pre-Colombian Mexico of the alien life forms known as Tzitzimimeh? It was this small group of extraterrestrial assholes who did the actual people-eating, and the Mexican government has their freeze-dried DNA to prove it – the only reason it’s remained hidden is because they don’t want to piss off Quetzalcoatl.

But being afraid of Quetzalcoatl is just as absurd as accusing Catholics of cannibalism simply because the doctrine of transubstantiation states that the Holy Communion actually turns into the body and blood of Jesus Christ upon ingestion. And this is because Quetzalcoatl, like Jesus, is a fictional character – in this case, one invented by Tzitzimimeh in order to keep the Aztecs in line. Wake up, Mexico! They can’t eat you anymore!

Still, nice try, anonymous 19th-century mapmaker. You did as well as your provincial, paranoid, imperialistic culture would allow. Better luck next time.

FACING THE BOOK

The very phrase “social networking,” fills us with dread so deep that one cannot see its bottom, and is thus forced to imagine the sort of fanged, eyeless creatures that scrabble about far down in the unprobed abyss. However, just as we struggled for years over the decision to share our riches with the world by producing a web-based log, we have spent long, candle-lit hours debating with ourselves over the decision to join the Facebook, a tool noted for its “social networking” abilities. Our message won the day over our comfort – truth requires exposure, and so we have deemed it necessary to poke another breathing-hole from within the solace of our bushel to let our light shine better on the world outside.

And it’s been a smashing success! We have 86 friends! That’s more people than we’ve spoken to in person for over a decade! And the best part is, we don’t need to speak to them! We’ve also started a group, entitled “Friends and/or Enemies of The Apocryphist,” and this group has garnered 24 committed, enthusiastic readers of this web-based log! Why only about a quarter of our 86 "friends" want to be considered members of our "group" is difficult to understand – we would think the ratio would be removed, since “friend” is such a loaded word/concept, whereas most people hold little stock in the word/concept “group” – we’re all part of the “group” of vertebrates, for instance, but you don’t see anyone lending a komodo dragon twenty dollars simply because of shared membership.

Anywhy, it is our firm belief that the Book of Face and its related applications are destined to revolutionize the dissemination of important crap from here to eternity. This because of the true kernel of genius lying at its core: though it may be “networking,” there is absolutely nothing "social" about it! We can now all be friends without having to lend each other twenty dollars, ever. This is the true evolution of the species!