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Alright, PD. In light of the fact it's Christmas, I thought I would share with you an excerpt from a project I'm working on. This is unpolished, and far from the final draft, but I figured some of you mythology spags might get a kick out of it.


Why Odysseus Is A Tool: A Completely Unbiased Analysis Of The Conduct Of The King of Ithaca In The Trojan War

After Alexander Paris, the son of Priam of Troy, abducted Helen, the wife of the Spartan king Menelaos, the son of Atrius went to his brother Agamemnon, and reminded him of the oath the suitors of Helen swore before she had chosen him to be her husband. "We had sworn, great brother, that we would each defend the holy marriage of Helen, to our dying breath. Odysseus, the clever king of Ithaca, suggested it, and we swore that day. Well, now the day has come in which Helen, my Helen, has been spirited away by a barbarian prince, after I showed him the xenia of our people!"

Agamemnon thought on this. "My brother, you are right, I shall gather together all those men who swore, this, and their allies, and their allies' allies! I will command an army he size of which has never before been seen, I will contribute 100 ships, and all shall bend the knee to my will! ...er, all for you, my brother." And so it was. Agamemnon gathered all of the greatest heroes to his... er, Menelaos' cause. Ajax the Greater of Salamis, Ajax the Lesser of Locris, wise old Nestor of Pylos, Diomedes, young king of Argos, Philoctetes,  companion of Heracles, and many others.

Finally, it was time for them to go to Ithaca and fetch the cunning Odysseus. Agamemnon chose Palamedes and Nestor to accompany him to the home of the king of Ithaca. As they made their way up he excessively long drive way, Odysseus saw them and began to panic. "Oh fuck!" he cried with great vehemence. "Those douchebags actually remembered that oath thing! The only reason I proposed it was because I planned on cheating. Damn that bastard Icarius! When, he promised me a wife if I could prevent violence, I thought he meant Helen, not his own daughter!" It was not uncommon for Odysseus to narrate his life like this, which served him quite well when he found himself in the court of the Phaeacians. "Penny! Penny! They've come for me!" he called to his wife Penelope. "Look, stall them, tell them I'm insane. I have a cunning plan to get out of this oath once and for all!" He quickly ran out the back door to make good on his plan. He harnessed his mule to a plow and started plowing the sand of the beach, while singing the score of Meet Me in St. Louis.

By the time he had completed his preparations, Agamemnon and his companions arrived at the door and rang the bell. Rather, Nestor rang the bell gently as Agamemnon pounded violently on the door shouting. "Odysseus, you  craven dog! Come out and make good on your oath!"

Penelope reluctantly answered the door with her newborn son Telemachus in her arms. "Odysseus is not in just n--" she began, but Agamemnon was already thrusting his way in.

"Odysseus! Where are you? You cowardly shrew! Helen has been abducted! You must go rescue her, and bring all your friends! I will win great glory on your back!" Nestor cleared his throat to snap Agamemnon back to the present. He had that look in his eye again. "Oh, hrm. Right. Hello, Mrs. Odysseus. What a beautiful boy, you have. He has his father's shifty eyes, that cowardly sod of a --"
A hard elbow from Nestor. "I mean... is your husband home? We have a bit of a war to get on with. Your cousin Helen's been kidnapped, and I am going to win... I mean, we are going to rescue her."

Penelope just nodded sadly. "Poor Odysseus! Would that he was well! Alas, alas, he is mad, mad, mad. Ever since his goldfish Lieutenant Shiny-sides died, he's done nothing but... umm... one second..." She ran and looked out the back window. " .. he's been plowing the beach and singing showtunes! Oh, woe is me!" She then began to sob melodramatically. Nestor and Palamedes exchanged a knowing glance, but Agamemnon was awestruck.

"How dreadful!" he called. "How am I to gain victory without the cowardly Odysseus to blame defeats on!? Let us go see if we can subdue him and bring him anyway!" Penelope's eyes grew wide as she attempted to redirect Agamemnon out of the house, but he was already storming out the back with Palamedes and Nestor close behind.

Odysseus glanced over and saw them, so he began to sing more fervently and plow faster. He acted as though he did not notice them. Agamemnon addressed him. "Now, you listen here, Odysseus. We are sailing to Troy and you are coming with us."

"With my high starched collar, and my high topped shoes, and my hair piled 'pon my head," was the reply from Odysseus.

Agamemnon grew angrier. "You craven coward! I know that this is just one of your tricks! No one is crazy enough to watch a Judy Garland film enough times to learn all the words to the songs!"

"I went to lose a jolly hour on the Trolley and lost my heart insteaaad!"

Agamemnon was bubbling with rage. He stood directly in front of the plow and started yelling at the top of his lungs. "Odysseus! You are no man! You are some sort of beast, if you have the stomach for musicals of that caliber!"

"With his light brown derby and his bright green tie, he was quite the handsomest of meeeeen!" Odysseus continued to sing, and Agamemnon just managed to avoid being trampled by the mule.

The son of Atreus looked to his companions, crestfallen. "Well, I suppose he really is crazy, if he doesn't even recognize that a man of my stature was in his path! Ah well, maybe we can blame any losses on one of those Ajax fellows..."

Penelope breathed a sigh of relief. Palamedes, however, had had quite enough. "Oh for the love of Zeus!" he cried, as he took young Telemachus from the arms of a shrieking Penelope and cast him into the path of the plow blade.

"Clang, clang, clang went the trolley! Ding, Ding, Ding went the bell! Zing, Zin-- I cannot do it! The chorus is too much!" Odysseus cried, as he diverted the mule from his young son. "Alright, you win! I will go with you to Troy!" When the plow came to a stop, he saw his son lying in sand. "Holy shit! I almost killed my own son! Well, that would have been a very unfortunate accident!"

This is an attempt to collect a number of books that have influenced the way you view Discordia and the world in relation to it. This is NOT a "Best Of", "Discordian Literature", "I'm A Discordian And Kind Of Liked This" Book List. The idea is to share what books are important to you, and WHY they should be important to your fellow Discordians. We aren't shooting for a number.

Criteria for submissions:

Fuck, who needs criteria? If you want a book added to it, write up a brief description of what the book is about and how it shaped your view. It will then be open for discussion, but if one person gives it a thumbs up it's ON THE LIST 4 LIFE.

Have at it.

Fair warning, you fuckers.

I spent all day with my beloved, and we had a great time. She was taking her first Latin final, so she was nervous about it.
We spent the afternoon together, I bought her lunch.
I talked to her about my break up, told her I was starting to slip back towards depression and general debauchery (damn it's been a long time since i was on teh drugs)
She made me promise not to, despite me not seeing a point to fighting it.
I get home, hear a song.
Damn. How close to the truth was that?
It's just a shame, that's all.

Always going round and round. Always sitting, snuggling, cuddling, but never a kiss.
She's still with him, and even though we both know he's a legit sociopath, there isn't a goddamn thing I can do.
She doesn't tell me about him all that much anymore. She went to Kentucky to see him yesterday.
It's just a shame, that's all.

Why does it always seem to be me looking at her, her looking at me?
It's always the same, it's just a shame, that's all.

STOP CHANGING YOUR NAME YOU FUCKER! THAT'S LIKE THE FOURTH TIME TODAY! FEAR MY CAPSLOCK OF DOOM AND DO WHAT I SAY!  

That's right.
Each and everyone of the politically minded folks on PD. We're hipsters.
Especially when we laugh.
And someone wants to punch us all in the face.

My paidika and I were hanging with some of her friends from her speech class a few weeks ago. One was talking about how he's not sure if we will be able to take classes next semester, because he was in a program that paid for wounded veterans to go to school for four years was changing its policy to "trade schools only" or something of the sort. In my head, I felt it bubbling up. That hideous, irrepressible laughter.The conversation continued and my paidika said "I should pay more attention to politics, I have no idea what you are talking about."

One of her friends said, "No, you shouldn't because then you'll start to care, and then you'll realize how everything sucks, but you won't be able to stop watching."

The laughter was shrieking in my brain. I could barely contain it. The horrormirth was winning, and I knew it was going to come out. I said, "And then you start laughing..."

He looked at me and said, "No, hipsters laugh. I punch hipsters in the face. If I start laughing, I'll punch myself in the face."

And I laughed. Hysterically. Uncontrollably. Hideously, horribly, maniacally. The world was going to hell in a hand basket, and I couldn't... stop... laughing.

So, here's to you, PD. Here's to you, My good reverends and doktors. Fellow hipsters, I finally understand. And I'm still laughing.

Phox,
Just became a Doktor

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
Touch me. Touch me. Fucking touch me.
I'm burning. My skin is aflame.
You never would touch me. Why won't you touch me?
I saved your life twice.
Once from him, and once from you.
Who the fuck is left to save my life?
When you left, I held it together. I didn't lose it. I didn't believe it.
I lost it. It's floating away, just out of reach.
Snap.
It's gone.
You're not listening. You're not listening. You are not fucking listening.
Let me talk. Let me fucking talk. Why won't you let me fucking talk?
I'm screaming, but you can't hear me. Because you walked out.
I'm crying, but you won't hear me. Because you didn't want to.
I trusted you. For once, I trusted someone. You knew the real me. How many fucking people can say that? Three, four?
Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you.
Don't touch me. Don't fucking touch me. I don't want you to fucking touch me.
Go away.
Leave me alone.
Kill me. Just fucking kill me. You already took away my will to live, so just fucking kill me.

Phox,
Not Okay

That's right. Blight's thread inspired me to start this. ITT, tell someone how much you appreciate them being here on PD.

To get the ball rolling:

Blight, I admire your dedication to the GASMs that you participate in. I also appreciate the things you said in my OKM, and I think your thread was a brilliant idea, especially since we tend to forget that we are all people, and not just Internet spags. Keep up the great work.  

[I don't fucking know.]

I have a phobia, a fear of the Dark.

But it is not what you would expect. I used to fear the Dark in the literal sense. Dark things in the night. Lovecraftian terrors, ghosts 'n' goblins, demons and spirits, the boogeyman and Freddy Krueger.  But that all changed not so very long ago. I was pulling out of a gas station on my way home for the night, when I looked over at one of the other cars. There was a young man, probably my age or maybe a little older, standing next to the driver's side window. He was talking rapidly, and looking from side to side nervously. Then I noticed he had a gun. He was waving it in the poor driver's face, and she looked afraid for her life.  He looked up, and he saw me looking. So he started waving the gun faster, urging her to get out, I guess, but he kept looking at me. I fumbled for my phone and got it out and then.... I dropped it in the floorboard and drove away. I didn't do a goddamn thing. And I've regretted it ever since. i should have called the police. Gotten out and helped, done anything but walk away... why did I walk away?

I have not gotten a satisfactory answer. I was scared, yes. But that has never stopped me before. So what was it? What stopped me?

Since that day, I have watched the shitty things people do to each other. Every day. The derogatory names people call each other. The violence that is a part of daily interaction. And let's not even start on the news. But I suppose it was Thursday night that this point was driven home for me. My younger brother was supposed to bring me money for gas, because I was not going to make it back home otherwise, but he wanted to go eat with his friends first. Fine and dandy. I was supposed to meet him at the book store, so i got in my car and started it up. I ran out of gas before I got out of the parking garage. There was a speed bump right at the exit that I rolled over before the car stopped completely. So, I called my brother and told him what happened and he said he was on his way with the money, but there was still the problem of where I could get gas. I called a friend who agreed to bring me a gallon, or two. Enough to get me to the gas station down the road. She had offered to bring more, but I said that would be enough.  Truthfully, I didn't know how long it would take my brother to get there, so i had borrowed $5 from another friend to pay for a couple gallons so I could meet him. But none of that is so important. What is important is that for 45 minutes, I was trying to push my car over this speed bump to get it out of the way so other people could get out of the garage. No one helped me. There were people going in and out of the garage, people walking by, people across the way. No one took a second out of their day to give me a hand. My brother arrived and he started helping me, but his jackass friend didn't. We got it half way over, but we couldn't get it over the rest of the way. As luck would have it, at that moment, a car full of frat boys pulled up next to us and asked if we needed any help. I said we did and they piled out and pushed the car out of the way and asked if we needed anything else, and I said no, I had someone bringing me gas. I thanked them and they went on their way, and about 20 minutes later I was back about my business with a full tank of gas.

So,  I came to my answer at last. There are precious few people in the world who actually care enough to do something to help someone in trouble. I thought I was one, but apparently I am not.  I proved that a few months ago. Maybe the situation was different, maybe those guys wouldn't have helped the lady. Bullshit. Would i have tried to help someone whose car was dead if I didn't know who they were? Maybe. I don't know. I don't fucking know.

This is the darkness of humanity. Apathy, lack of empathy. I want to conquer the Dark in myself, but I don't really know if I can. Can I help someone that i've never met before, and probably will never see again, just because they need help? Can I take time out of my day, to help someone, even if I'm busy and I have time constraints? I just don't know.

Phox,
Not Okay

I am not trooling. Nor am I trolling. Also, I'm not from TCC.

And Dok is a horrible cunt for interrupting my conversation, deflating my ego, and kicking me out of his thread! 

I'm embracing my foxy side. Thought you'd appreciate a warning. 

This is still unpolished and unfinished, mostly. It's a little incoherent, but I think it's time to put it out here.


The search for Truth began millennia ago. The world is big and scary, and it doesn't always make sense. But our ancestors tiny minds couldn't comprehend that thought. It had to make sense, they just didn't understand it, yet.

In the ancient world, people knew that your feet touched the ground and that you couldn't walk off the edge of a cliff or you'd fall down to the ground.  It was the way things were. The gods were responsible for earthquakes, volcanoes, weather, and any other phenomena not readily explainable.

In the modern world, we have the laws of physics that tell us that a force called gravity keeps our feet on the ground and makes us fall. Plate tectonics, seismic activity, atmospheric forces, and other factors are responsible for what used to be the handiwork of the gods.

But the fundamental question remains: Why? Why does gravity work? Why do tectonic plates shift? Why did humans end up with the physiological traits they have? We are really no closer to the answer than they were.

The truth is there is no Truth. We're all figments of each others' imaginations, and the world is what we make of it. Things are true only because we believe them to be. If we stopped believing in gravity, we could all float. If we started believing that nuclear weapons did nothing but cause a massive explosion of flower petals, then that's what would happen. But we are trapped in the illusory world society has built for itself. Deep down, we know that gravity works, just as we know mushroom clouds are all we get from atomic bombs. If we could rid ourselves of the socialized knowledge we have, and then we could do anything.

We dream of things that are impossible, but only upon waking do we question them. When we return to reality, the Truth reasserts itself. It was a silly dream, and nothing more. I can't really fly. Butterflies made of fire don't exist. I'll never see her again, because she's dead.

But the things we dream are as true as what we experience in the waking world. Everything is just a fleeting perception, and what we perceive is filtered through our beliefs, our feelings, our memories.

But humans still carry on in the search for Truth.  The gods have been replaced with science, but nothing has really changed.

No joke, I just edited some of the names.