Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Grandpa Ben would be proud
My Aunt Jesus once told me that my Grandpa Ben was rolling over in his grave in consternation about the content of my website. I have always doubted that, considering not even the cabalistic intrigue of the "Unsolved Mysteries" episode he was watching in his girlfriend's Puyallup double-wide on the night his soul journeyed up to Valhalla (or wherever the guys go who happen to die in a La-Z-Boy listening to the soothing gravelly sound of Robert Stack's voice rather than by being slain in glory on the battlefield) was sufficient to revive him. I think, though, that if he were to be resurrected and shown how to use the internet (which didn't exist when he died in 1991, and his ass did NOT use Prodigy) and waited for him to read my website through his one good eye, he'd at least be proud of my reminding the world of this unimpeachable fact:
NORWEGIANS HAVE BEEN KICKING DANISH ASS SINCE THE 11TH CENTURY AND CONTINUE TO DO SO TODAY!
As usual, something's rotten in the state of Denmark, or in this case, on a boat produced in the state of Denmark. Apparently the Sea Stallion, this replica Viking ship sailing from Denmark to Scotland to study "the seamanship of early Norsemen" got stalled in the North Sea due to calm weather conditions. Presumably the seamanship of early Norsemen was superior to the seamanship of extant Norsemen, especially Danish museum curators and history professors on summer break from the University of Copenhagen. They actually quit because of calm seas. I had no idea that Horse Latitudes existed up there, but apparently on either side of the equator isn't the only place you can experience a ship-stopping lack of wind. Since they were a bunch of unseaworthy wimps, the Danes running things decided to call for a tow to Scotland rather than just crack open a seal bladder full of gammeldansk and pass the time reading some Hans Christian Andersen or something while they waited for the breeze to pick up. I mean, jeez, it probably would have only taken a few days. It's not like they were subsisting on weevils and getting scorbutic.
In addition to their intolerance for pleasant, leisurely sailing conditions and their distaste for doing any actual rowing, Captain Carsten Fvid said that supposedly a couple sissy boys on the ship were also cold. Welcome to Scand-rock, bitches! Did you think you were going on a breadfruit mission to Tahiti or something and forget your Helly Hansen parkas? Some Vikings you are! Throw on a damn reindeer skin, nut up, and quit your bitching, you pussies! If the toughness of your modern sailors is any indication, it's no wonder Grendel busted into your Danish mead hall and went bowling with your ancestors' decapitated skulls without breaking a sweat. You all would have been wiped out if Beowulf didn't show up in the nick of time to save you with some clutch Goth barbarian asskickery.
This kind of quitting on a calm sea bullshit never would happen if Sig "The Hotness" Hansen was skippering the Sea Stallion instead of this Carsten Fvid jackass:
Unlike Carsten "The Boy Who Cried Hypothermia" Fvig, Sig wouldn't have allowed a little lack of wind or some nipply temperatures stop him from barking at the crew to man the oars and row that shit all the way to the North Pole. He'd just stoically zip up his Northwestern jacket and fire up a Marlboro with a contemptuous smirk on his face, holler at the crew to put their backs into it, and try to plot a course that would enable him to swing by the Bering Sea and fill the Sea Stallion's tanks with Red Gold. In fact, he probably wouldn't even have to get the crybaby Danish crew to row. Sig's presence probably generates such blistering heat that a hurricane would spontaneously form and provide the much-needed wind to blow him all the way to New York, much less Scotland. That's how Norwegian seamen do it. Leif Erikson (who was also Norwegian in spite of being born in Iceland...his father was Erik the Red, a Norwegian explorer, outlaw, and all around barbarian pimp who is singlehandedly credited with providing the genetic basis for the redheaded phenotype commonly observed in Ireland) did just that when he discovered North America and settled there with his hot wife Thorgunna around the time the original Sea Stallion was sinking to the bottom of the fjord at Roskilde in the mid 10-00's. Why did the Sea Stallion sink, you ask? Because the pussified Danes at the helm couldn't hold off a fierce fleet of bloodthirsty Norwegians, that's why! They didn't have cannons or gunpowder then, but I'm sure the turn-of-the-millenium Norwegian navy managed to find an effective way for bringing the hammer of Thor down upon those pathetic second-class Vikings. When will the History Channel make an hour-long "Viking Tech" show so that I can watch this sublime moment in my cultural history reenacted in low-budget CGI?
My grandfather might not be proud of my many drunken or depraved exploits (although he'd probably understand; when he died we took a stack of nudey mags as tall as the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree out of his house), but he'd be beaming with nationalistic pride at my Norwegian smack talking. Grandpa Ben had a clever bit of verse for belittling all of his Scandinavian rivals, such as "ten thousand Swedes ran through the weeds, chased by one Norwegian." I can't remember what he said about those fruitcakes from Denmark, but I know that he'd like ALL of what I just said. It would almost be enough to mitigate the sting of the Danes' electing a Prime Minister named Rasmussen (a move I'm pretty sure the Danish people conspired as a nation to make solely to besmirch my family name and piss me off). Here's to you, Grandpa Ben! If your surviving heirs hadn't thrown away your (completely rank from ten years of constant wear) Sons of Norway baseball cap after you passed on to the halls of Odin, I'd put it on and tip it to pay honor to our people's mighty history.
SKOAL! Stolt a bli Norsk!
NORWEGIANS HAVE BEEN KICKING DANISH ASS SINCE THE 11TH CENTURY AND CONTINUE TO DO SO TODAY!
As usual, something's rotten in the state of Denmark, or in this case, on a boat produced in the state of Denmark. Apparently the Sea Stallion, this replica Viking ship sailing from Denmark to Scotland to study "the seamanship of early Norsemen" got stalled in the North Sea due to calm weather conditions. Presumably the seamanship of early Norsemen was superior to the seamanship of extant Norsemen, especially Danish museum curators and history professors on summer break from the University of Copenhagen. They actually quit because of calm seas. I had no idea that Horse Latitudes existed up there, but apparently on either side of the equator isn't the only place you can experience a ship-stopping lack of wind. Since they were a bunch of unseaworthy wimps, the Danes running things decided to call for a tow to Scotland rather than just crack open a seal bladder full of gammeldansk and pass the time reading some Hans Christian Andersen or something while they waited for the breeze to pick up. I mean, jeez, it probably would have only taken a few days. It's not like they were subsisting on weevils and getting scorbutic.
In addition to their intolerance for pleasant, leisurely sailing conditions and their distaste for doing any actual rowing, Captain Carsten Fvid said that supposedly a couple sissy boys on the ship were also cold. Welcome to Scand-rock, bitches! Did you think you were going on a breadfruit mission to Tahiti or something and forget your Helly Hansen parkas? Some Vikings you are! Throw on a damn reindeer skin, nut up, and quit your bitching, you pussies! If the toughness of your modern sailors is any indication, it's no wonder Grendel busted into your Danish mead hall and went bowling with your ancestors' decapitated skulls without breaking a sweat. You all would have been wiped out if Beowulf didn't show up in the nick of time to save you with some clutch Goth barbarian asskickery.
This kind of quitting on a calm sea bullshit never would happen if Sig "The Hotness" Hansen was skippering the Sea Stallion instead of this Carsten Fvid jackass:
Unlike Carsten "The Boy Who Cried Hypothermia" Fvig, Sig wouldn't have allowed a little lack of wind or some nipply temperatures stop him from barking at the crew to man the oars and row that shit all the way to the North Pole. He'd just stoically zip up his Northwestern jacket and fire up a Marlboro with a contemptuous smirk on his face, holler at the crew to put their backs into it, and try to plot a course that would enable him to swing by the Bering Sea and fill the Sea Stallion's tanks with Red Gold. In fact, he probably wouldn't even have to get the crybaby Danish crew to row. Sig's presence probably generates such blistering heat that a hurricane would spontaneously form and provide the much-needed wind to blow him all the way to New York, much less Scotland. That's how Norwegian seamen do it. Leif Erikson (who was also Norwegian in spite of being born in Iceland...his father was Erik the Red, a Norwegian explorer, outlaw, and all around barbarian pimp who is singlehandedly credited with providing the genetic basis for the redheaded phenotype commonly observed in Ireland) did just that when he discovered North America and settled there with his hot wife Thorgunna around the time the original Sea Stallion was sinking to the bottom of the fjord at Roskilde in the mid 10-00's. Why did the Sea Stallion sink, you ask? Because the pussified Danes at the helm couldn't hold off a fierce fleet of bloodthirsty Norwegians, that's why! They didn't have cannons or gunpowder then, but I'm sure the turn-of-the-millenium Norwegian navy managed to find an effective way for bringing the hammer of Thor down upon those pathetic second-class Vikings. When will the History Channel make an hour-long "Viking Tech" show so that I can watch this sublime moment in my cultural history reenacted in low-budget CGI?
My grandfather might not be proud of my many drunken or depraved exploits (although he'd probably understand; when he died we took a stack of nudey mags as tall as the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree out of his house), but he'd be beaming with nationalistic pride at my Norwegian smack talking. Grandpa Ben had a clever bit of verse for belittling all of his Scandinavian rivals, such as "ten thousand Swedes ran through the weeds, chased by one Norwegian." I can't remember what he said about those fruitcakes from Denmark, but I know that he'd like ALL of what I just said. It would almost be enough to mitigate the sting of the Danes' electing a Prime Minister named Rasmussen (a move I'm pretty sure the Danish people conspired as a nation to make solely to besmirch my family name and piss me off). Here's to you, Grandpa Ben! If your surviving heirs hadn't thrown away your (completely rank from ten years of constant wear) Sons of Norway baseball cap after you passed on to the halls of Odin, I'd put it on and tip it to pay honor to our people's mighty history.
SKOAL! Stolt a bli Norsk!
Labels: Aunt Jesus, Deadliest Catch, epic geekery, family matters, History Channel, PWT, Razzification, seamen
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