"Ia! Ia! Shug-Niggurath!" I shouted, and

"Ia! Ia! Shug-Niggurath!" I shouted, and within seconds the Elder God appeared in all its gibbering glory. "Could you get me a beer? I'm parched". Winning that bet with Nodens

easy but when the Viking god of Drinking Horns set a great Muskoxen horn of frothy Qvast before me, my drinking mates were truely impressed. But the Elder God expected payment in

a hoard of plundered gold buried in the earth. Odin stood at the gates of Asgard and commanded the valkyries to strike down any that failed to enter without making an offering of

passive aggressive "let me pick up the check." Odin always had to pay, but at least it'd be nice if someone actually pretended that he didn't. That's why the Valkyries were here

, so that we could at least pretend that someone at the table had the money to pick up the check if Odin was short on cash. The Valkyries were foul, but

They made the Iron Chef's competition. Mr. Valkyries was the team leader. His family was mostly vegetarian, due to the cost of meat skyrocketing. Odin watched the Food Channel!

Loki and Krishna snickered as Mr. Valkyries and his team shrank under the harsh gaze of the Iron Chef: Bastet. "Silence!" Zeus boomed. "The secret ingredient is

Pogens!" Mr. Valkyries was crestfallen. "How did you figure that out?" he asked. "Simple," boomed Zeus, "you Germanic types put Pogens in everything. But you win for flavor!"

So here was Reality repeating itself at me but this time it was different. This time I could smell something on the wind that eternity couldn't remember. Yes, I married up.

I wouldn't regret it. I wouldn't let my gold digging effect me after all rich 93 years are hard to find & hard to love. Which at least I did. In a grandparent kind of way. Kudos!