Oedipus and the Sphinx

Once there was a smart aleck Sphinx who sat on top of a giant rock and made weary travelers who wanted to enter the city of Thebes answer a riddle. If they couldn't answer the riddle, she would eat them. She thought she was pretty funny.

The people of Thebes, on the other hand, didn't have much of a sense of humor. Mostly because they were hungry and they were too frightened to leave their city.

One day, a man by the name of Oedipus was traveling the road to the city of Thebes. The guards saw him coming, and although they were highly trained in advanced weaponry and could easily thwart off the Sphinx, they decided to just stand there and watch. Unlike the rest of the townspeople, the guards thought it was funny when people got eaten. Mostly because it wasn't them.

As Oedipus approached the rock, the Sphinx swooped down from the sky. Alighted on her rock, she posed the riddle to Oedipus. "What are three silhouettes you can place in a cloud bubble?"

Oedipus thought about it as she closed in for the kill.

Just as the Sphinx was about to strike, he answered, "A man."

This was the first time the Sphinx had ever heard the punch line to her own joke. Although it wasn't funny, she laughed so hard, it knocked her off her rock and she fell into the sea. The townspeople made Oedipus the new king of Thebes where he did a stand up routine every Saturday night. He was given the bums rush shortly thereafter when they found out where the hack stole his material from.

Dem Apple Pies

Many people don't know this, but the Greeks invented everything. If you think you're original, guess what, you're not, the Greek's beat ya to it. This however, is the story of how some hungry selfish people came together.

This is Atalanta when she was young. She loved to hunt, but she was never any good at it. So her parents encouraged her to hunt apples since they didn't move all that much. Atalanta would only hunt "Dem" apples, because they were the best apples in all the land. Much better than Fuji or Gala apples.

As Atalanta grew, she found that she was much better at baking pies, Dem apple pies to be precise, but there was a problem. There was a shortage of Dem apples since Atalanta was constantly hunting apples, baking pies, and keeping them all for herself. By the way, Greek's came up with apple pie. This made everyone mad that she wouldn't share. Atlanta then told her parents she would race anyone for Dem apples and if she lost, she would bake and share her pies. Atalanta's parents didn't really care at this point. They were sick of her complaining and just wanted her out of the house.

This is Aphrodite, the goddess of love. Love for Dem apple pie that is. There's one problem though, she can't bake "Worth" beans. "Worth" beans were the best beans in all the land, regardless; beans just don't taste good in pies. All she does is sit on top of Mount Olympus and get mad at people who were better than her. She was especially mad at Atalanta since she was winning every race, baking Dem apple pies, and not sharing with anyone. So Aphrodite hired Cupid the bounty hunter to go find someone who could beat Atalanta in a race.

This is Hippomenes. He's tall, smart, and one of the few likely candidates that could win Atalanta in a race. Oh, did I mention he also loves Dem apple pie? There was one problem; he didn't have any of Dem apples to enter the race with. Cupid told Hippomenes that Aphrodite would supply the apples if he ran the race for her. He further told him if he won, she would split the winnings with him fifty fifty. Hippomenes agreed to the proposition, but Cupid doesn't take crap from nobody, and shot him with one of his mind-altering serum tipped arrows.

Hippomenes went to see Aphrodite who gave him three of Dem apples so he could enter the race.

Atalanta's parents started the race since they wanted their daughter out of the house.

At first, Hippomenes couldn't keep up, but then he had an idea. Hippomenes threw one of Dem apples just ahead of Atalanta and, sure enough, she couldn't resist and stopped to pick it up. He then pulled ahead of Atalanta.

She was quickly closing the gap when he threw the second and the third apple. Once again, Atalanta stopped to retrieve them.

She was gaining speed and they were neck and neck up to the finish line, but with the last ounce of strength he could muster, Hippomenes crossed the finish line barely winning the race.

Hippomenes won the race and Atalanta baked him a pie. He also figured he might as well hook up with Atalanta since she was such a good cook. Atalanta's parents were happy to get her out of the house and Aphrodite got half a pie. Cupid got out of the bounty hunter business, because it didn't pay much, and came up with an online dating service. The Greeks came up with that too. How do you like Dem apples?