Police in Florida have been dealing with the long-ignored menace of trolls. While we are all taught how to trick trolls in the “Three Billy Goats Gruff,” the victim forgot the “rob-me-when-I’m-fatter” trick when Jimmy Lee Morris (27), Dylan Patrick O’Shea (18), and Christopher L. Johnson (24) demanded that he “pay a toll to the troll.”
The Pasco County Sheriff’s Office says the man was walking from his work at a Toyota dealership (as if he didn’t have enough problems these days) and ran into the three trolls at a vacant gas station. He was on his way back from buying a burger for lunch (the perfect set up for the “wait until I’m fatter” pitch.
The man was told that, “before he could cross the bridge,” he would have to pay a toll. He ran when he said O’Shea began to pry a metal bar from the ground. He left his burger at the scene. (He could have also offered to let the men drive one of those Toyotas without brakes — a modern variation of the Gruff tale).
Florida does not have a trolling law so the men were charged with strong arm robbery.
For those who encounter trolls, here are some of the Nordic translations of common expressions:
Troll kalla mik – They call me Troll;
tungl sjötrungnis – Gnawer of the Moon,
auðsug jötuns – Giant of the Gale-blasts,
élsólar böl – Curse of the rain-hall,
vilsinn völu – Companion of the Sibyl,
vörð náfjarðar – Nightroaming hag,
hvélsvelg himins – Swallower of the loaf of heaven.
hvat’s troll nema þat? – What is a Troll but that?
These three appear to be classic bridge trolls as opposed to haugtrold (mound-trolls) or bergtroll (mountain-trolls). They tend to be the easiest to bribe and rarely take prisoners. Moreover, the Troll Defense Fund will point out that there has long been an anti-troll prejudice that permits any cruelty or trick to be played on trolls, who merely try to scratch out a living under bridges while people drive them crazy by going “trip, trap, trip, trap, trip, trap” over their heads. Consider the original conclusion of the Three Billy Goats Gruff:
“Now I ‘m coming to gobble you up,” roared the troll.
Well, come along! I’ve got two spears,
And I’ll poke your eyeballs out at your ears;
I’ve got besides two curling-stones,
And I’ll crush you to bits, body and bones.That was what the big billy goat said. And then he flew at the troll, and poked his eyes out with his horns, and crushed him to bits, body and bones, and tossed him out into the cascade, and after that he went up to the hillside. There the billy goats got so fat they were scarcely able to walk home again. And if the fat hasn’t fallen off them, why, they’re still fat
Poked his eyes out, crushed his bones, and tossed him into the cascade. Is that nice? At this blog, we have tried to treat our trolls with fairness and a level of disinterest. Despite our desire to poke their eyes out, we let them vent until they go away to feed on other sites.
For the full story, click here.
kinda fucked up that they fail to mention that the one on the right end wasn’t present at the time of the “robbery” but arrived shortly before the cops arrived and only asked to film minus the sound as they were arresting the people he had met earlier that day… yeah he freaked out but fuck I would if some cops were going to pin me with strong armed robbery because I pissed them off by asking to film
Regarding bridges, I find it much easier just to do this:
BRIDGEKEEPER: Stop! Who would cross the Bridge of Death must answer me these questions three, ere the other side he see.
LAUNCELOT: Ask me the questions, bridgekeeper. I am not afraid.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is your name?
LAUNCELOT: My name is Sir Launcelot of Camelot.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is your quest?
LAUNCELOT: To seek the Holy Grail.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is your favorite color?
LAUNCELOT: Blue.
BRIDGEKEEPER: Right. Off you go.
LAUNCELOT: Oh, thank you. Thank you very much.
ROBIN: That’s easy!
BRIDGEKEEPER: Stop! Who approacheth the Bridge of Death must answer me these questions three, ere the other side he see.
ROBIN: Ask me the questions, bridgekeeper. I’m not afraid.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is your name?
ROBIN: Sir Robin of Camelot.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is your quest?
ROBIN: To seek the Holy Grail.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is the capital of Assyria?
ROBIN: I don’t know that! Auuuuuuuugh! [ explodes and dies ]
BRIDGEKEEPER: Stop! What is your name?
GALAHAD: Sir Galahad of Camelot.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is your quest?
GALAHAD: I seek the Grail.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is your favorite color?
GALAHAD: Blue. No yel– auuuuuuuugh! [ explodes and dies ]
BRIDGEKEEPER: Hee hee heh. Stop! What is your name?
ARTHUR: It is Arthur, King of the Britons.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is your quest?
ARTHUR: To seek the Holy Grail.
BRIDGEKEEPER: What is the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow?
ARTHUR: What do you mean? An African or European swallow?
BRIDGEKEEPER: Huh? I– I don’t know that! Auuuuuuuugh! [ explodes and dies ]
BEDEVERE: How do know so much about swallows?
ARTHUR: Well, you have to know these things when you’re a king, you know.
These three guys, while looking every bit the trolls they are accused of being, are a sorry example of trolldom; this now, was some serious trollcraft:
“Police sued over bridge blockade that prevented New Orleans evacuees from entering the West Bank after Katrina
The lawsuit stems from the decision police made the day after Katrina’s landfall on Aug. 29, 2005, to prevent pedestrians from crossing to the West Bank. The police subjected evacuees to “verbal abuse, use of threats and intimidation, the use of excessive force under the circumstances, the use of lethal force, assault and battery, ” the attorneys allege in the 20-page lawsuit. … (Judge) Lemmon granted class certification to about 200 Regional Transit Authority employees and their friends and families who rode out Katrina at the agency’s Canal Street building. They attempted to walk across the bridge on Aug. 30, 2005, but were turned away by police posted on the spans. A trial date has not been set in that case.
But Lemmon denied certification for people who attempted to get onto the bridge Sept. 1, 2005, on the Tchoupitoulas Street onramp, where an estimated 800 to 1,000 people gathered, according to the federal lawsuit. Lemmon also declined to certify as a class a group of people who approached the bridge from the Pontchartrain Expressway on Sept. 2, 2005″
http://www.nola.com/crime/index.ssf/2009/10/new_lawsuit_filed_in_new_orlea.html
Elaine M.,
Excellent poem. I passed it along to my family. I think they’ll enjoy reading it to the “kids” :>)
I’ve had a touch of writer’s block lately–so no new poems. Here’s a children’s poem I wrote many years ago on the subject of the troll who lives under the bridge. It’s a conversation between the Third Billy Goat Gruff and the Troll:
BRIDGE BANTER
I’m Billy Goat Gruff, the third. I’m tough.
I’m muscle-bound and mean.
And I’m the boss so let me cross
To reach the pasture green.
Well, I’m the troll. I’m brave and bold
I’m really getting sick
Of bearded deer trip-trapping here
Around my bailiwick.
You will not pass to reach green grass.
I’ll kill you, Gruff. Now scoot!
I’ll stand my ground—so turn around
And find another route.
You ugly troll, I’ll reach my goal—
It’s written in the story.
Now eat your pride and step aside
And things won’t get too gory.
*************
One good thing this story shows: These three trolls are familiar with at least one folktale. Maybe the trolls should meet the same fate as the evil stepmother in Snow White. She was forced to dance to her death in hot iron slippers that had been heated over a fire of coals.
Buddha:
the American people are awake, I have a feeling both parties are going to be shocked in November. I don’t give a rats ass who the independent is, I am voting for him/her.
I am tired of this bull crappie.
I bet they did!! That would explain their “crappy” appearance! 😉
Sally:
Are you saying that they may have gotten some of this weed?
“Police in Tucson, Arizona stopped a truck with a septic tank filled with human waste . . . and 743 pounds of pot.” 🙂
Wow….these guys actually remind me of trolls!! Well, mostly the first one.
They are probably just a bunch of hippies that had just smoked some weed and they needed money to buy food. I think the weed is to blame, not them!
Some more pertinent than others.
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. –Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
Some words contain many messages.
So Buddha,
Are you saying that members of congress are trolls?
“The source of America’s cynicism is not hard to find. Americans despise the inauthentic. Gregory House, of the eponymous TV medical drama, is a hero not because he is nice (he isn’t) but because he is true. Tiger Woods is a disappointment not because he is evil (he isn’t) but because he proved false. We may want peace and prosperity, but most would settle for simple integrity. Yet the single attribute least attributed to Congress, at least in the minds of the vast majority of Americans, is just that: integrity. And this is because most believe our Congress is a simple pretense. That rather than being, as our framers promised, an institution “dependent on the People,” the institution has developed a pathological dependence on campaign cash. The US Congress has become the Fundraising Congress. And it answers–as Republican and Democratic presidents alike have discovered–not to the People, and not even to the president, but increasingly to the relatively small mix of interests that fund the key races that determine which party will be in power.”
From: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100222/lessig
Your right
Except the important ones.
In every sense of the word.
I’m the one on the right.
And in the story the bonds are only 10K for the robbery. One of em had to be peppered sprayed after kicking the window of a police car so his is 150.00 more. Not sure if the use of a taser would have been more. But why pepper spray em once they are inside a vehicle? Barney? Ya get a job when Sheriff Taylor retired?