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The ending also seems to be awfully tainted of Christianity where a promise of a better world surfaces after the end of the old one, governed by a one true god.

Yup. Prolly the worst part. Made the whole Ragnarock into a bit of a book of revaluations.
The idea that the Vanir are nature focussed gods and the Aesir are more war focussed gods is pretty integral, they're just so different and they don't make too much effort to integrate the two groups. And you can even imagine that before them the Giants were the earlier Proto-gods, like the Greek Titans in that mythology.

But imagining them as actual human representatives of different tribes seems a bit of a stretch… It's possible, but it's like imagining Zeus as a real historical figure. I just can't picture that… It's equally hard with Odin.

Robert E Howard had some entertaining stories taking Snorri's line of reasoning- having the Aesir and Vanir as two actual tribal groups migrating from Northern Asia into Scandinavia and fighting etc. Eventually giving rise to the later peoples… But then that tended to fit in a bit too neatly with ideas of eugenics that were so popular in the 1930s at just the wrong time. :(
Not that Howard was more of a racist than the average 1930's American, certainly not as much of a one as Lovecraft!

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Would it really be so bad to take after a warrior poet? ;þ

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]
Egill Skallagrímsson - . . . his first murder, age 7.

you pretty much answered your own question

I read that saga like some kind of voyeur - just when I didn't think Egil could be any more far removed from being a humane human, there he'd go again.

Like: Egil notes that his band totally looted every single item of value from a village and no one was hurt. There is no honor, he claims. He goes back and creates Egil-style honor (that is, kill every man, woman, and child and burn the village)

Or: Egil notes that his sword does not touch his opponent as the two battle, therefore the opponent is obviously skilled in the magic arts. What's a Viking to do? Egil throws down his sword, charges the opponent, and bites him in the jugular. THAT takes care of that.

There's berserker, and then there's Egil

ayesinback
(Egil doing what Egil does)
There's berserker, and then there's Egil

He'd be proud to hear himself praised as greater than a berserker. Such is the way of things in war and no war is more horrible than that between clans and even worse within them.

The perfect mind of the man born to war and knowing very little else. Egil Skallagrimsson, makes you wonder what was dad like? Skalla the Grim? The Norse were supposedly fatalistic by nature now if they called someone grim he must have been really bad. The local SCA would have me believe these were the Good old Days.

—
My family's lineage is chronicled in a dissertation going back all the way to the Norman Conquest. We were never produced anyone really famous but we were always there in the background. Walk-on roles and scene filling extras while the movers and shakers are in the foreground.
Some members of the family did marry into the Tudors back in the day, another died trying to find the Northeast Passage and one bought land in Virginia that is still named for the family.
The greatest part? In the American Revolution and American Civil War my branch of the family managed both times to pick the losing side and lose everything.
But then the ancestors also chose the wrong sides in the Wars of the Roses and the English Civil War. lol!

Today is a really sucky day. Just found out over the past few days how very human one of my idols is. Hard lesson to learn.

I just hypnotized myself. Then I became unconscious. Best sleep I ever had.

Heh. You think this is a crock of shit. Its true. lol!

Someone
Heh. You think this is a crock of shit. Its true.

it's true that it's a crock of shit?

ayesinback
you pretty much answered your own question

I know. That was the point ;)

A colorful man, my ancestor was.

bravo1102
Egil Skallagrimsson, makes you wonder what was dad like? Skalla the Grim? The Norse were supposedly fatalistic by nature now if they called someone grim he must have been really bad.

While I don't want to knock down the accomplishments of Skallagrímur, I feel obligated to point out that you're thinking in a wrong language now. Skallagrímur's birth name is just “Grímur”, meaning “A masked man”, although older translations of the name might suggest a ghost or a similarly hidden creature. However, he suffered from acute hair loss early in his life and gained the nicknamed Skalla-Grímur, “Skalli” meaning “Baldness”

…

Hey Gullas! Guess what I found out? You're my fifth cousin, twice removed. That means that your great, great, great, great, great, grandmother was my great, great, great grandaunt.

I figured out the proper terms, by checking out this chart:

My mind is going where I never thought it would go before… for instance…

What if that mighty lion compoased robot Voltron was piloted by Australians? What sort of enemies would they face? How would they socialize? For those of you who don't know who that robot is…

Youbube Video: Forming Voltron

From what I can see, an Australian Voltron probably won't be formed by lions. Most likely Kangaroos. And it won't use a “Blazing Sword”. Rather… it'll probably use some form of Mighty Kick which would have the same effect. Not sure if kangaroo use their tails as weapons though…

Why do I think of Australians more than anyone else? They're the next major continent to me, but it's boring to think of Asians piloting giant robots since they do it all the time (they even built one in Japan, with the Chinese following shortly with their knockoff version of it)…

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Ha ha. I expected you'd react to that.

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu…

You… You crafty son of a bitch with your fantastic viking genes!!
D:

Not ONLY are you the reletive of the greatest Medieval poet, you're also descendent from Snorri and Egil!?


MUST… CONTATIN…JEALOUSY… AND… HATRED…


*breathe in breathe out*


And here I am with only a tiny shred of a link with vikings who thought: “Fuck Denmark, let's invade Scotland” With names like “Holm” and “Wardrop”. My lineage is shit! I've got poncey Enlgishmen on one side, who did nothing but make apple cider and partied in Cornwall, and on the other side I've got some bog Irish, some cockney English, some Scots whose adress in the census during the 1800's was “The Old Bailey” in England, and ONE.

DANISH.

SAILOR.

Who drank rum and widdled things on the porch was called Something-a-rather Holm and married something-a-rather Wardrop who was apparently also Danish in some wierd connection and had lots of little kiddies.

@OnlyFools: Those English, Irish and Norse were awfully tight there for awhile — you may well have a drop or two of that Wiking stuff. But from what I've read, you don't want to be sportin your Danish blood in front of some of the Viking clans. Egil in particular had a great fondness for Danish decimation

@bravo: hmph - did not say Egil was greater than a berserker - he was just in a category by himself. And it's not warfare by any description to kill your father's favorite farmhand, at the dinner table, because you're pissed at your Dad for not letting you go on a trip with your big brother. And your Dad wouldn't let you go because you have a bit of a temper, as evidenced by killing someone at age 7 because they wouldn't let you play the big-boy games.

OK - so now I sound like Tim The Enchanter “Well, that's no ordinary rabbit.”

— (bandaged wildebeest)

There's only one good thing about being sick, and that's when the doctor totally validates every little moan and groan that you've been experiencing. So the conjunctivitis has just about cleared, but for four days I've had really bad ear aches and sinus pressure. I saw a new doctor today. We went down the list: allergies? smoking? blah blah blah. Then: “so let's take a look”.

She looked in the good ear. “Well that seems just fine” Then she looked in the bad ear. “Oh MY! Oh, I'm probably hurting you! How long has this been going on?”

And it was wonderful. None of this “oh, you're probably just imagining it” because this time - even though it was “only in my head”, she saw it.

I should be up to par in about a week. Oh, and those ear washings with water? Not always a good thing.

The funniest part:
I told my husband about it and he was genuinely concerned, and was ready to run off and pick up the antibiotics on the spot. I told him to wait for another 2 hours when he had to drop our son off at a meeting (I mean, 2 hours on top of 4 days? who cares).

So he came back from dropping our son off. And he had gone to the pharmacy to pick up a birthday card. But he forgot the prescriptions. he was totally embarrassed - had to laugh.

Ayes
@OnlyFools: Those English, Irish and Norse were awfully tight there for awhile — you may well have a drop or two of that Wiking stuff. But from what I've read, you don't want to be sportin your Danish blood in front of some of the Viking clans. Egil in particular had a great fondness for Danish decimation

We permenatnely suffered from TMS (Tiny Man Syndrome) as the Danish were the shortest people in Europe at the time, but also the most feared, now they're the second tallest on average after those dasterdy Dutch. Odd.

Whereas I, have remained short. Looks like the only thing I inherited from my Danish Rellos was their short height and short temper.


And fondess for invasion.


Also, Its good that your Conjunctivitis is clearing up! But that sucks that you're feeling sick, again, I hope you get better soon!

All this talk of genealogy reminds me, I had some elderly relative somewhere who was pretty creative with her genealogy, and my grandmother believed every word of it, so I was nonironically told we were related to the Jersey Devil as well as being descended from English pirates.

I must admit the resemblance is uncanny, but…

OnlyFoolsAndVikings
Not ONLY are you the reletive of the greatest Medieval poet, you're also descendent from Snorri and Egil!?

Not just a descendant. A direct descendant.

I feel so dissociated. I dont know if thats even the right word to use. hahaha.

everyone has a claim to fame. except me.

On the irish side of me family (my dad's side) We can trace back about 1k years or so. Where we were royalty. Then within 100 years of our earliest date-able lineage, our family was nothing but a bunch of thieves. Apparently our name even became synonymous with people stealing horses specifically.
That explains why i'm always tempted to grab the nearest goods and bolt.

*edit*
I forgot! one of this side of the family assassinated a vice president!…wait.
*end edit*

on my mother's side, i've only been able to trace back about 150 or so years. All living in indiana. (it's such a common name that anything outside of indiana, is pretty much unprovable relationships). However, the furthest back relative i was able to find, shares the same day of birth as I. i always thought that was cool.
——–

I watched desert punk. I was excited. then i saw the end. it was meh.
——

It was 100*f yesterday, today it was 101*f, tomorrow is supposed to be the same. Thursday has a high of 68*F planned. awesome.

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OnlyFoolsAndVikings
Not ONLY are you the reletive of the greatest Medieval poet, you're also descendent from Snorri and Egil!?

Not just a descendant. A direct descendant.

I sincerely hope you didn't inherit the Viking's tendency to expand their territory violently… or at least aren't trying to form raiding parties to invade other countries trying to collect a lot of booty… :)

Oh… and if you do, don't try invading my home, lest you return to your country completely penniless and in “the buff”…

I'm sure there's a reason why the Spanish called this island chain I live in “Islas de los Ladrones”… :evil:

I don't know what my genealogy is…i know my great grandparents were one of the original families who founded this town, and I probably have some badass native american ancestors, but I'm not too interested in it. Plus I'll probably find out i'm a direct descendant of hitler or something

———-

Well I'm buying a new laptop. I'm going with Toshiba since I haven't had their products break on me yet and i can't afford sony. Wish me luck in finding one el cheapo~

Someone
Not just a descendant. A direct descendant.

SHUT UP.

—————

Lonnehart
sincerely hope you didn't inherit the Viking's tendency to expand their territory violently… or at least aren't trying to form raiding parties to invade other countries trying to collect a lot of booty…

Oh… and if you do, don't try invading my home, lest you return to your country completely penniless and in “the buff”…

I'm sure there's a reason why the Spanish called this island chain I live in “Islas de los Ladrones”…

Are you kidding? If I had a big enough crew and an IKEA flat pack viking boat, I'd totally invade my neighbors proerty and steal all his cattle and probably leave his women because I don't do that kind of stuff.

OnlyFoolsAndVikings
Are you kidding? If I had a big enough crew and an IKEA flat pack viking boat, I'd totally invade my neighbors proerty and steal all his cattle and probably leave his women because I don't do that kind of stuff.

You probably could if it were back in the day. Just don't bring any small boats. The locals at the time stole a lot of small boats from the Spanish when they came here. They weren't too happy about that…

———

Oh, brother… my father still wants me married off. Not so easy at my age. Of course, I could've been married long ago if not for my mother scaring every prospect away when she was alive. Sometimes I think she's haunting me, determined to ensure I stay single. At least until I find someone who's rich (I guess she wanted me to marry a rich woman… yech).

I'm pretty sure that one day my marriage will ensue when a woman knocks me out by hitting me behind the head with a blunt object, then drags me off to the Justice of the Peace… or something like that…

Lonnehart
What if that mighty lion compoased robot Voltron was piloted by Australians? What sort of enemies would they face? How would they socialize? For those of you who don't know who that robot is…

Youbube Video: Forming Voltron

From what I can see, an Australian Voltron probably won't be formed by lions. Most likely Kangaroos. And it won't use a “Blazing Sword”. Rather…

If Voltron was Australian it would be composed entirely of giant bear cans and the blazing sword would be an enormous flaming cock that it would beat people about the head with while laughing drunkenly and saying things like “take that you f%#&ing wanker! harharhar! Dickhead” -_-
We all know this to be true, especially my fellow Aussies.

Oh, but the “Black Lion” in the middle would be a giant Vegemite jar.- It's black and a byproduct of beer. This is preordained.
By 2050, Australia WILL have a giant beer-based fighting mecha with automatic cock weaponry and we will proceed to conquer New Zealand and then… THE WORLD!

Hmmmm, My aunt is really into the Genealogy thing, or was at any rate. I have ancestors that fought (for the Confederacy) in the American Civil War, I have European Blue Blood from several lines, including French Royalty. I can even trace my lineage back to about 47 AD. What my family tree lacks in interesting persons, it makes up for in volume (seriously, this thing takes up at least two 4-inch d-ring binders (thats about 10 cm for those of you not stuck with archaic measurements)).

And as they say, quantity has a quality all of its own.

Oh yeah I almost forgot, I am now a (hopefully) 4-time GM of the DD Mafia Games. I am known as the Dark Lord Salsa, and I am looking for Minions to staff my dungeon and vic-I mean security consultants to test my traps and stuff. If this sounds like fun to you then sign right up, No experience necessary.

Lonnehart
(I guess she wanted me to marry a rich woman… yech).

Well that doesn't sound too ‘yech’. Actually before mom knew I was gay she was always saying “I'd rather you marry a rich lesbian than a poor man”. Thanks for encouraging me to become a golddigger mom~

Skullbie

Lonnehart
(I guess she wanted me to marry a rich woman… yech).

Well that doesn't sound too ‘yech’. Actually before mom knew I was gay she was always saying “I'd rather you marry a rich lesbian than a poor man”. Thanks for encouraging me to become a golddigger mom~

I say that from my own experience with such women. Most of them sit on pedastals higher than me… and I'm sitting pretty deep in the sewer to them…

OzoneOcean
By 2050, Australia WILL have a giant beer-based fighting mecha with automatic cock weaponry and we will proceed to conquer New Zealand and then… THE WORLD!

I suggest attacking China's Tsingtao Beerbot as it will probably be another cheap knockoff, complete with a very undersized Phallus Sword. New Zealand will probably be prepared for Australia's Vegemite powered Beerbot with its own Marmitetron… complete with their Marmite Fusion Cannon!

All family trees are enormously massive, when you can trace them, because none of us came from the void, and because the tree is actually inverted: it expands down from YOU, not out from some lone ancestor, which is an utterly illogical way of visualising it.
Since:
- YOU are your own logical end/starting point
- You have no idea how far back you can trace.
- And of course those breeding pairs obviously just double and double as you go further back up the tree, getting into the thousands and millions… The only break on that is interbreeding, which tangles the branches nicely :)
————–

Aussie Voltron will SMASH your silly trees with his flaming cock of destruction.
Then drink a giant beer and vomit.

ozoneocean
Aussie Voltron will SMASH your silly trees with his flaming cock of destruction.
Then drink a giant beer and vomit.

God Bless Australia! :')

The only country where drinking can be worked into all situations.

OnlyFoolsAndVikings

ozoneocean
Aussie Voltron will SMASH your silly trees with his flaming cock of destruction.
Then drink a giant beer and vomit.

God Bless Australia! :')

The only country where drinking can be worked into all situations.

There is no one greater!

————-
Oh Lonne… Marmite is clearly inferior- It doesn't taste beary enough. QED!
Aussie Voltron wees on the Marmitetron.

ozoneocean

OnlyFoolsAndVikings
The only country where drinking can be worked into all situations.

There is no one greater!

————-
Oh Lonne… Marmite is clearly inferior- It doesn't taste beary enough. QED!
Aussie Voltron wees on the Marmitetron.

Heh… and here I thought the U.S. and Germany were the only nations that could work drinking into ANYTHING!!! I guess I'll add Australia to that list…

Um…

*waits for a native New Zealander to answer the Beerbot challenge… assuming DD has any…*

———-

Wow… 4:30 PM and it's hot… all I want to do is lie down and sleep it all off. Oh, well… at least I got my tire fixed. Whoever invented the “donut tire” should be thrown down a bottomless pit. Driving on that tire was harsh. The car pulling hard to one side (the side with tire on it) whenever I tried to slow down, needing more stopping space when raining, etc… Maybe when I can finally get a spare tire that's actually a spare tire I'll use this donut tire as part of a very strange beer drinking table. For my beer drinking guests, that is. I personally don't drink beer. Especially after finding out one of my uncles literally drank himself to death… O_O

Someone
Heh… and here I thought the U.S. and Germany were the only nations that could work drinking into ANYTHING!!! I guess I'll add Australia to that list…

Um…

*waits for a native New Zealander to answer the Beerbot challenge… assuming DD has any…*

You know, I don't think I've run into a New Zealander on the DD forums.

Didn't you know? Part of the citizenship test for Australia you have to drink a litre of proper Aussie beer in under half a minute, as well as eating a packet of Timtams in five minutes along with Pavlovas, Lamingtons and fairybread.

In fact, one of our Prime Ministers, Hawk, actually holds the world record for drinking some rediculous amount of beer (yard glass I think) in under half a minute.

I'm sorry Oz, but I can't take Vegemite seriously any more since I learnt that it was actually bought by America in the 30's and is technically no longer Australian :(

And the fact that Vegemite taste's like Neptune's salty butt hole.

Someone
You know, I don't think I've run into a New Zealander on the DD forums.

Gunwallace I believe is from new zealand.

Vegimit is yummy! Enough of your Neptunian butthollery! -The trick is never to eat it fresh- You must leave it to mature like a good wine. ^_^

OnlyFoolsAndVikings
I'm sorry Oz, but I can't take Vegemite seriously any more since I learnt that it was actually bought by America in the 30's and is technically no longer Australian :(

Not technically true at all really. The companies just had diversified overseas interests… It was more like ohaving a controlling share in a number of businesses in companies that had share iin a number of companies that have share in something else that make food somewhere else.
Even today it's still always just continued as a local product with the same label all these years- Kraft foods back then wasn't the same sort of company it is today. Eeven now Vegemite is WAY more Aussie than something like Holden is or has ever been.

I like Vegemite ^__________^

…All our New Zealanders are gorrrn… prolly the Christchurch earthquake :(