Tag: Helen of Troy

In the Star and Garter: reflect, ponder, excogitate, reply.

March 5th • Aeolus

Kyrie eleison 12:26 pm

Virgin Mary: (On the God mic) Welcome everybody, thank you all so much for coming today to the Star and Garter ballroom here in the Empyrean building. We’ll get started in a few moments and as you can see we don’t have an equal number of men and women, so if you find yourself waiting, please form an orderly cue here near the front and we will direct you where to go next. Please write your names clearly on your name tags and make sure they are visible. You will only have eight minutes for each date so please make your time count. No time to be shy folks, really put yourselves out there. So. Right. We’d like to ask the women to choose a table, whichever one you want, it doesn’t matter, and the men will rotate from table to table when you hear the bell. Please do not linger as there will be time during the mixer for follow-up conversations and you will not want to take time away from your next date. Are you ready? (off mic) Joseph, did you prep Helen?

Joseph: As well as I could boss, but she doesn’t seem cooperative.

Virgin Mary: Stuck up bitch. Nothing but problems since we took her on. Well, we need to find her a man she won’t want to run away from, even if she didn’t actually run in the first place. And that blind date with Adam Kadmon went nowhere.

Joseph: Not each other’s type.

Virgin Mary: No. He wants more of a viper. Ok here we go. (On the God mic). All right everybody, relax, have a good time, and remember with only eight minutes there is no reason to have anything but a fun conversation. Stay on neutral subjects, in other words don’t talk about sex, and remember that our policy is no sex before monogamy. Ok, Bell!

Bell: Heigho! Heigho!

Garrett Deasy: Hello pretty lady.

Helen: Hi. So, what should we?

Garret Deasy: I brought a writing sample in case you.

Helen: You want me to read this?

Garret Deasy: Maybe later.

Helen: There’s a bit torn off.

Garret Deasy: Metaphor for my life, I’ve been a bit short taken.

Helen: So have you ever been married?

Garret Deasy: Still am. The bloodiest old tartar God ever made. She once threw soup in a waiter’s face.

Helen: Great. What’s that on your face?

Garret Deasy: Foot and mouth disease.

Bell: Heigho! Heigho!

Helen: Thank God. Hi.

Vampire: Hello. You are a creature beautiful. Want to put your mouth to my mouth?

Helen: Not really. Sheesh, age preceeds creepy. Let’s not talk.

Vampire: Yes, yes. Your foot, allow me to put it in my mouth. You look like the sort who could bring sin into the world, ships to the seas. Um. I don’t want to be rude or anything, but aren’t you going to say anything?

Helen: Nope.

Bell: Heigho! Heigho!

Helen: This is already looking like a lost cause. Hello, I’m Helen.

Napoleon: Napoleon.

Helen: Well, when you sit down you pretty much disappear, don’t you. So what do you do?

Napoleon: I am an Emperor, undefeated. You?

Helen: Kyrios! Lord! That is impressive at least. I think the last guy was a cloacamaker, woof he stank!

Napoleon: Nature has endowed me with a virile and decisive character.

Helen: And your other, endowments? Judging from your stature I think it fair of me to wonder.

Napoleon: Hasn’t it been eight minutes yet?

Bell: Heigho! Heigho!

Helen: Oh lord what now. Hi I’m Helen. What’s wrong with your head?

Pyrrhus: (sniffing, wearing a bandage wrapped around his head with dried blood showing through the gauze) Got brained with a brick. Saw it coming too.

Helen: You ok?

Pyrrhus: Yes. No. I’m sorry, I’m not very good at this. I’m just feeling so, I don’t know, so overwhelmed. I think it is some sort of existential crisis.

Helen: Oh honey, please don’t worry about it. You’ll be ok.

Pyrrhus: You are so sweet. I guess I was a bit misled in the past and now I feel like everything is a battle and I always fall.

Helen: Oh poor, poor, poor Pyrrhus!

Pyrrhus: My analyst says I shouldn’t just dump this all out when I first meet somebody, I should highlight the radiance of my intellect, the language of my mind. But I don’t know. I think I’m a lost cause.

Helen: Poor, poor, poor Pyrrhus, I am loyal to lost causes! I’ve never been loyal to the successful. Success for me is the death of the intellect and the imagination.

Pyrrhus: You mean it?

Helen: I do.

Pyrrhus: You are a rose! A rose of Castile!

Helen: Of where?

Bell: Liliata rutilantium. Turma circumdet, Iubilantium te virginum.

Virgin Mary: [On the God mic] Ok, nice speed dating people! We’ll take a short break, have a brief mixer, then do another round. That was great everybody! I feel so optimistic for all of you!

Joseph: You do?

Virgin Mary: Oh lord no. This was supposed to help Helen’s image and who does she like? Boohoo Pyrrhus. Well, time is money. Let’s get on with this travesty and have done with it. These are disappointed people, but we mustn’t make a mockery of their disappointment. And Joseph?

Joseph: Yes Holy Mother?

Virgin Mary: I am not your mother; I wish you wouldn’t call me that. Joseph, find Jesus. We’ll be needing lots more wine.

We have committed many errors

February 6th • Nestor

To course across more kindly waters now my talent's little vessel lifts her sails, leaving behind itself a sea so cruel; and what I sing will be that second kingdom, in which the human soul is cleansed of sin, becoming worthy of ascent to Heaven.

Holy Mother Public Relations, Inc.

10th Heaven

Empyrean

Meeting Minutes

Date: February 6

Time: 10:53 am

Location: 10th Heaven conference room C, Empyrean building

Purpose: Initial branding meeting with Eve, Helen of Troy, and continuation of Mary Magdalene campaign.

Attendees:

The Virgin Mary, Meeting Host

Eve, New client

Helen of Troy, New client

Mary Magdalene, Client

Agenda:

1. Brainstorm joint PR campaign for Eve and Helen

2. Develop action plans for Eve and Helen of Troy

3. Mary Magdalene continuation of action plan

4. Develop possibilities for negative PR, maybe something new this time.

Discussion:

1. Mary discussed success re: her own case. Talking points were her unexplained pregnancy and potential social disaster. PR push. Damage control. Result: everybody thinks she’s a virgin and the daughter of her own son. She is now widely esteemed with stellar poll numbers particularly in Latin America and parts of Europe.

2. Discussed efficacy of article placement in cross-platform media outlets except billboards; speaking engagements (appearances in dreams, visions, usual platforms), charity functions, direct marketing, and crisis management. Possible planting of artifacts in archeological sites. Problem, Eden: fictional.

3. Eve. Primary problem — blamed for fall of humanity. Expulsion from garden. Also, labor pains. Discussed fault of serpent and Adam complicity.

4. Helen of Troy. Blamed for Trojan war / fall of Troy, labeled a runaway wife but was kidnapped. Fault: Aphrodite. Also, Menelaus not most ideal husband. And Helen from Sparta not Troy.

5. Mary Magdalene. Reputation as notorious prostitute. Victim of slander, possibly at the hands of Martha (sister). In later stages of PR campaign. Discussed her campaign as example for new clients Eve and Helen. Success of Da Vinci Code campaign.

Action Items:

1. Contact apple growers associations in top ten apple producing countries for possible promotional opportunities, or photo ops with focus on developing a more positive association between the apple and Eve (tree of knowledge) & Helen (apple of discord.)

2. Brainstorm negative PR campaigns for Adam, Serpent, Menelaus, Aphrodite, and Martha (litigious). Send intern to look through garbage of each. Have paparazzi follow.

3. Possible ad campaign promoting benefits of epidural anesthesia. (Eve)

4. Helen, face of international shipping? Research availability of 1000 ships for possible televison commercial, print media, and viral you tube video.

5. Mary Magdalene, The Da Vinci Code part 2? Check availability of Dan Brown, Tom Hanks.

6. Develop app for Da Vinci Code part 1.

Minutes typed by: Joseph

Approved by: Mary, Virgin and CEO

Pluterperfect Imperturbability

February 3rd • Nestor

Emptiness is everywhere and it can be calculated, which gives us a great opportunity. 10:43 am

May I trespass on your valuable space? I’m Cassandra. I was just invoked. You know, think about me a little and poof, here I am! Most of the time you don’t know it, or if you do you don’t want to, but that’s what happens. Doesn’t bother me in the slightest that you don’t believe me. Believe me, nobody listens to me. You know, I’ve grown enough to admit that never being believed used to upset me a little bit. Just a little. Ok, enormously. It was everything. Frankly, it made me crazy. But I’ve had a little therapy with what’s his name. That Swiss Tweedledum (not to be confused with the Viennese Tweedledee) and now I am more than perfectly unaffected by the reactions of others to my truth. A transcendent level of perfectly unaffected. Except I do have some guy issues. Got pretty screwed over by a boyfriend once. His name was Apollo, you might have heard of him. There’s also Ajax but I can’t talk about that yet. Anyway, Apollo was a lot like that chick who was no better than she should be. You know the one. No, not that one. Not Helen who caused that whole mess back in Troy, no. I mean Torralba. Is that how you spell it? Torralva. Same difference. Sounds the same. Anyway, she’s no Helen of Troy. Torralba’s face launched a thousand ships too, but those were getting away! Sorry. Sweet kid really. Stout, kind of a wild child. Has a moustache that she pretends isn’t there. Somebody ought to tell her to take care of it, but how? Awkward. I told her keeping that thing on her lip was not going to work out for her but she didn’t listen. So frustrating! I could just! Ok, breathe. Om Mani Padme Hum. Om Mani Padme Hum. Total awareness. Got it, I’m cool. Have to keep centered or I’ll end up in crazytown again. So what was I saying? Oh yeah, Torralba. She met a decent, good looking guy with a steady job. Ok it was a job herding goats but still. He loved Torralba and since nothing is less attractive to a woman than a guy who adores her, she didn’t want anything to do with him. Creepy. Came on way too strong too fast. On the first date he said his mother would love her, how many kids do you want, and I’ve always seen myself getting married on the beach. Yikes. She changed her digits, all of them. And as one must, the nice goat-herd turned into a complete jackass who hated her for rejecting him. Then of course, as is customary, once the goat-herd started treating Torralba like complete shit she decided that she loved him. Happens every time. A loves B, B doesn’t love A. Then A hates B which makes A suddenly irresistible. If A+B=B-A then A-B=A*∞. And around it goes. Of course we all would rather end up with ((A+B)=(B-A))/((A-B)=(A*∞)) = ∏/4 but not everybody finds their soul mate. Apollo loved me but faster than I rejected him he totally screwed me over. So here’s the bottom line. You are going to fall into this same trap. Don’t be like Torrabla or her goat-herd! Or Apollo. Or me. Beware. Believe me. Come on, I can tell when somebody is blowing me off, mark my words, there is danger ahead. Listen to me! Oh crap. Calm blue ocean. Calm blue ocean. Breathe in through the nose. And out. Good. Ok. So you seem to be eavesdropping on Stephen a bit. He has father issues, you know. And he’s been spending too much time around the English department lately. I told him it would be no good for him but did he listen? Acted like he couldn’t even see me. Deasy wants his help getting an article published. Lots of paranoia there, thinks somebody might get there first, this is my idea not your idea. Same old bullshit. I told him to strike while the iron is relevant but will he listen to me? He won’t, nobody does. You know, you might look into what you’ve been doing to that body of yours. You know what I mean, don’t pretend you don’t. Your doom is coming. Don’t say I didn’t tell you. Believe me if you will. What will it matter if you wont? It comes when it comes, and soon you’ll see it face to face and say that the seer was all too true. You will be moved with pity.