Mythology rewritten...

Yesterday was a long day for me. It was order day at the store, and also one of my days to close. I started on my way home about 7:30, and I called my friend Rachel to chat for a few minutes. As per my usual luck, I got stuck behind a slow moving vehicle in a no passing zone. I vented this frustration to Rachel, who was probably cursing the fact that she had ever answered the phone.

I am not usually a road-ragey person, but sometimes those slow moving vehicles bring out a psychotic rage in me. I am reminded of the old Goofy cartoon where he is the mild mannered guy who turns into the psycho scary red-eyed mean driver. That was basically me. I was driving along, raging at the person in front of me, and then I realized I was totally the Jeckyll and Hyde Goofy cartoon. I passed them, and then got back in my lane, drove the actual speed limit (what a concept!!!) and was much happier.

I was also feeling kind of crummy last night, I was so tired, and my tummy was not super happy with me. I knew I had a house full of family out to watch the football game (stupid Broncos!!) and my wonderful sister-in-law came with supplies to make dinner for us. (Hallelujah!!) As I pulled into my driveway I still wasn't sure if I was going to be able to manage much of anything except for maybe some eggs and toast.

As I walked into my house, Arlene was just finishing dinner. She made Jerk Chicken Nachos… ironic, no? Since I was being such a jerk on the way home? hahahaha… Anyway I decided to give the nachos a try, and not only did they not make my stomach worse, they (paired with a glass of wine) also soothed the savage beast inside of me. I watched the freakin' Raiders beat my pathetic Broncos (except for Champ Bailey, he's always amazing, and NEVER pathetic!!) After everyone left, I tucked myself into bed with a season of Friends on DVD and Lucie and I had a little marathon of Friends until we fell asleep.

I did not sleep well last night. I didn't wake up a lot, but I was very restless and when I woke up this morning, I didn't feel rested at all. I started out running late this morning, I wasn't really paying attention to my alarm clock, which apparently I had been snoozing, because Matt wasn't home yet, and since he's off at 7:00 am, that meant it wasn't time to get up yet. Well, I was wrong. I didn't know he had a meeting this morning after work and so he didn't get home until 8:15. OOPS!! I leaped out of bed and grabbed a few things and headed for the bathroom.

The sight that met me in the mirror was beyond horrifying. I quickly averted my eyes because I was reasonably certain that it was Medusa staring back at me from the mirror and I was afraid of being turned to stone. I have no idea how my hair managed to do the things it did this morning, but I wouldn't have been surprised to see that it had actually turned to snakes. It was wild and crazy, curling in all different directions and sticking straight up in the air.

I did what I could to tame my hair and make myself somewhat presentable so I could go to work. I made myself coffee, which I promptly spilled all over my shirt, went back upstairs and changed, and then was finally on my way to work.

As I drove across the county this morning it occurred to me that maybe, just maybe Medusa got a bum rap. I went back and re-read the myth (Ok, I skimmed the Wikipedia page briefly because I wanted to see how accurately I remembered which hero had killed her. I was wrong, which actually stole a pretty great punchline from my intended blog. Dangit!!)

First of all, it is pretty obvious that these myths were written by men, because really?? Medusa was assaulted and abused by Poseidon in Athena's temple, and Athena punished Medusa instead of Poseidon??? What gives with that??? Anyway, that's when she was turned into a Gorgon and her hair was turned into serpents. So Medusa started turning people to stone when they looked into her eyes. I think that's perfectly justified. Sometimes I wish I could turn people to stone… but I digress. So Medusa goes along her merry turning men to stone way, until Perseus comes along with his mirrored shield and cuts her head off, and then uses her head as a weapon. What a jerk!

Speaking of jerks… I got to thinking, did anyone ever consider taking another approach with Medusa? Maybe if Perseus had brought Medusa a glass of wine and put that mirrored shield to better use as a platter full of jerk chicken nachos, she would have been happier, and just let him pass by without turning him to stone. I'll bet that if he'd thrown in some Cheetos and Swedish Fish, she'd have given up her stone-turning ways and been a lot nicer.

Ok, alternate ending… In my hazy mythology memory I thought that Medusa was the one guarding the Golden Fleece and that Jason had killed her so I was going to work in something about not only did he not even try the wine/nachos route, but in addition to cutting off her head he also stole her fur coat. What's up with that?!?

If you want to watch the Goofy video, you can use this link to watch it on YouTube. You'll have to copy and paste, because I don't know how to make it a clickable link. http://youtu.be/mZAZ_xu0DCg

How do it know?

When I was little, my father taught me a joke about the greatest invention in the world. The gist of the joke is a guy trying to discover the greatest invention, and he asks all sorts of people and gets all different answers, and then one day on the street he runs into an old man and asks him, and the old man says, "The greatest invention is the Thermos." The guy is a little baffled by this answer, and says, "A Thermos? Like in my lunchbox?" And the old man replies, "Yes, a thermos. It keep hot things hot, it keep cold things cold. How do it know?"

For most of my life I have used that punchline, "How do it know?" in various situations. The other day I was re-stocking something that had been put away wrong. (GASP!!! Shocker I know) When I was hanging it up I saw something on the back of the package and I stopped for a closer look, and it had the warning about this product being known to the State of California to cause cancer. So, my mind working the way it does, I decided to run with it.

Who manufactures these smart chemicals that only cause cancer in California? How do it know? Does this chemical somehow know that it is California bound, so it morphs into a terrible cancer causing chemical? Why doesn't it cause cancer in any other state? Is it something to do with the air quality in California?

I'd pay good money to find a product that is "Known to cause hiccups in the State of Massachusetts." Or how about "Known to cause excessive knuckle cracking in Kansas?" Why is California so special?

Just wondering... How do it know?