legendary screw-ups
Posted on 13. Aug, 2010 by Nick in entertainment
words > BART WILCOX
Myth—what we have come to know as the mysteries of the universe explained by primitive minds in allegories rich with supernatural beings, or what the ancients knew as “stupid crap pulled off by naked, drunken people a long time ago.” Consider these legendary screw-ups:
Leda, a rich princess and epic partier, had sex with a bird, only to wake up the next morning and discover that the bird was really the god Zeus in disguise. This is how you know it is a myth, because, in the real world, if you got drunk enough to have sex with a bird, you would just have to wake up the next morning and face the fact that you’d had sex with a bird.
Then there was Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods and gave it to Man, which is what people of both sexes were called in those days (and in the 60s). Man immediately set fire to everything, including the Elysian Fields, where the gods grew their weed. They punished Prometheus by chaining him to a rock and having an eagle drop by daily to pluck out his liver. This originated the phrase still commonly heard among drinkers: “Man, that hangover was Promethean.” The gods fixed it so that his liver would immediately grow back, which makes this a hopeful myth for alcoholics, except for the part where the eagle returns the next day and eats it again. But, you know, you can get used to anything.
We owe some of our cherished brand names and traditions to ancient screw-ups. The Trojans were stupid enough to bring a big Greek-stuffed horse inside of the gates of Troy. So as a punishment the gods named a condom after them. Which is fine, because I think going to the 7-Eleven and asking for a Greek to wear on your thing could be highly offensive. Whereas, are you going to worry about whether or not a Trojan is standing in line behind you?
In any case, we should have left myth to the people who knew how to handle it, because we’re about to be up to our Trojans in mythical half-human-half-animal creatures. Before I explain, I must apologize to Sen. Sam Brownback. You see, in 2007 he proposed visionary legislation that would have made it illegal to genetically combine humans and animals. This drew yowls of laughter from both sides of Congress, human and animal. But now the senator has had the last laugh of a man crossed with a hyena. His proposal threatened to crowd out his other entries in the “idiotic” column I had been updating for him, and so it was immediately upgraded to “insane.” But now I find that I have to eat crow and move it again to “inevitable.” And because of the small-minded skepticism of which I have been a part, I may have to eat a crow that looks even more like my Uncle Phil than crows already do. We need to recognize that the senator’s heroic, patriotic waste of taxpayer money could protect us from irresponsible godless science that would almost certainly result in bizarre genetic cross-breeds like centaurs, minotaurs, satyrs, Joe Lieberman, and credit default swaps.
The controversy started about 15 years ago when some geniuses grew a human ear on the back of a mouse. I heard this on NPR, so don’t even argue with me. (Caution: do NOT Google images for “earmouse” or you will gag convulsively several times and then feel compelled to post the earmouse on your Facebook page. This happened to me.) Attention scientists: If you want to get people on your side, and to possibly start dating you, invent something a little more socially acceptable and useful than schlepping a giant ear on the back of a poor little hairless mouse. Come on, it looks like something Microsoft would come up with to counter the iPod. Maybe you should try creating a turtle that can sing all the local movie listings to the tune of Sweet Home Alabama, or a cow with four really firm breasts.
Let’s face it: this human-animal hookup, it’s going to happen. I just saw the movie Splice and it was horrifying. Five bucks for a soda! And then there was the movie—scientists with bad hair join human and animal DNA in a monstrous, unholy union to create a teenager. And that’s really about it. A more terrifying transformation has taken place at my house. Not from genetic splicing, exactly, but from having so lavished human privileges upon my two dogs that they have evolved the characteristics of 30-year-old grad students who still live at home. About the trillionth time the TiVo was mysteriously changed from Law & Order to Animal Planet Investigates, I said, “What, do you guys think you’re humans?” The little one, who is, as best as I can tell, a cross between a mouse and a rhinoceros, finished his omelet, lit a cigarette and said, “You make that sound like a step up.” This is the kind of treatment we can expect a lot more often when animals are further endowed with human physiology. We’re halfway there, anyway. Most men already have no qualms whatsoever about scratching in public or going to the bathroom in the backyard.
Fortunately, human-animal combination will give us the answers that were buried along with the Age of Myth. For example, I have always wondered, what does a centaur do with his hands? He can’t just stand around with his arms crossed all the time. I mean… that would look weird. Not wearing pants must take some getting used to. Of course, centaurs are guys, and they probably figure, “Hey, you’re part horse, people deserve to know which part.” The Kentucky Derby, being raced by centaurs, will be infinitely more interesting. Will the guy part of the centaur wear the little jockey outfit? Will he whip the horse part? (“I knew I had to whip my ass or I’d never catch Zeus-Is-a-Goose in the final turn.”) And, what’s it like to poop standing up? If we had just let Sen. Brownback have his way, we’d never have to find out.
In this brave new world we’ll no longer ponder the timeless question that has troubled philosophers since Acidophilus the Elder: “If you were an animal, what kind of animal would you be?” We’ll finally know what happens when you splice a Republican with a Democrat. (Will we be overrun by self-loathing Libertarians sporting Armed & Liberal bumper stickers?) And at last we’ll have the answer to “What do you get when you splice a hockey mom with a pit bull?” Actually, I think we all know that punch line. Cougar.
