… to hide our gold!

As usual the Great Depression besmirched everything (the prestige of living in a shantytown, Herbert Hoover,  Tom Joad’s chance in life to own a second pair of underwear). This time it was gold. To prevent further runs on banks FDR decided to set gold at fix price and have Americans trade their gold for paper money. In the present day, this will make leprechaun and perpetual presidential candidate Ron Paul angry. It also inflated the money supply meaning more money for transactions and much less gold for hoarding.

The Guffaw thinks that makes sense. Granted the Guffaw’s financial where-with-it-all is limited, Y2K still sounds like an excellent investment plan. What is Scrooge McDuck supposed to swim in now, FDR? Fast forward six years to 1939, Hitler starts invading stuff and the U.S. economy’s problems are solved. Even women have to work. It wasn’t until the 1970′s and the Gerald Ford presidency that Americans were allowed to own gold bullion.

On June 2, 2012, I am taking part in my first Relay for Life in Falls Church, Virginia. Part of my efforts are to raise money and awareness for everyone still fighting cancer and the scars it leaves. Please feel free to visit my page, http://main.acsevents.org/site/TR/RelayForLife/RFLFY12SA?px=26093367&pg=personal&fr_id=41141, if for anything to see what I look like (basically the love-child of Brett Favre and a Keebler Elf). If you feel persuaded please leave a donation, cool if you do and cool if you don’t. Even better, make a donation to a loved-one, family member or friend who is fighting or has fought a battle against cancer. Give your time or join a team at a local relay event. Feel free to pull up a picture of a cancerous cell and yell at it. Do something, anything to make it less likely that you or anyone you know will have to be told they have cancer. Through the last two-and-half years I have learned that cancer deserves many things, most of all to be beaten.

Apparently, Karl Urban was the only person in his tribe with a gym membership…

To be completely honest, it does not take much to blow the Guffaw’s mind. That is a good thing for the movie, Pathfinder. There was literally nothing “good” about this movie. Historically correct? Not even close. Well-acted and well-choreographed action scenes? Not really. Memorable pieces of dialogue, the Guffaw watched this movie for the first time this morning and can’t remember one piece of dialogue as of writing. Yet, the Guffaw was entertained. Pathfinder was the equivalent of a lava lamp for movies… it was hard to look away.

Any who, Pathfinder tells the story of murderous Vikings who want to kill all Native-Americans so they can settle America and never have to live under the shadow of socialism (the Guffaw conjectured on that last point just in case Glen Beck was reading). They make one mistake. They leave a child. That child grows up to be built like Karl Urban. He has the power of Vikings and Native Americans making him awesome and with the ability to fight most of the time in a loin cloth, in the snow without numbing or frostbite. Game over Vikings. Looks like state provided services for all your ancestors.

What is historically accurate about this movie?

Absolutely nothing. Vikings, while they certainly had their moments of violence were also merchants. They did have a settlement on the coast of North America in present day Newfoundland, Canada called Vinland. They left after not getting along the “skraelings” as they called the Native Americans and Newfoundland is not exactly a vacation spot. Also in the film the Vikings all wear the same uniform with horned helmets. The Vikings were tradesmen and plunderers. They did not have a standard uniform. The Guffaw digresses.

Sorry Vikings, you don’t deserve America if you can’t beat one dude not wearing shirt in late February…

Will I care about any of these questions when I watch this movie?

No, if you turn off your brain you won’t care. If you turn on your brain, then your brain will get angry, make you do some long-division, shut down again to finish watching the movie.

Is this movie kinda racist?

In two words, kinda yes. Vikings are portrayed as bloodthirsty thugs hellbent on inflicting a holocaust on Native Americans. Native Americans are portrayed as a child-like race that can only be saved by a white guy.

Who should watch this movie?

Americans, no one invades this country not Vikings, not Nazis or Commies just god-fearing white pilgrims and some free labor from the continent of Africa. Zach Snyder should also watch, as bad as Pathfinder is the movie moves much faster when every arrow shot or sword swung is not put into slow-motion.

What will I learn from this movie, history wise?

Less than nothing, the makers of this movie went out of their way to divorce it from any historical reality. The Native Americans live in these weird tree-house low-level houses for no reason other than they look different. The Vikings all are all built like Jose Canseco and Mark McGwire on the Oakland A’s, armored like a Sherman tank and yet move with a gracefulness of a Moscow ballerina. Yes, there were Vikings and there were Native Americans, that is all the historical knowledge this movie imparts.

Pathfinder was awful on almost all levels except one, it was so silly and by the numbers action-drama that the Guffaw would have to think twice about turning the channel if it came on.

A Mercator map. Cut into 70 pieces, find some binding and you have the world’s prettiest door jam…

The first Atlas featured over 70 maps. Since this was the 16th century, the Guffaw will wager a guess there were a ton of sea-monster drawings. Mercator and Ortelius called their first book “Theatre of the Round World,” Atlas definitely sounds much better. Mercator first designed a world map to hang on the wall. Merchants were like, I’m not unrolling that thing on a rickety boat. Ortelius was a map dealer and decided to cut the wall map into sections, travel size, and Dutch merchants were like, “We’ll buy that.” So they did. Mercator would print the first map book to be called an Atlas in 1584, he  named his book after the Titan from Greek Mythology who was punished to hold the world on his shoulders for crossing Zeus,  you know that Atlas. Nerds.