This Ain't No Old Man and the Sea! The DIY Challenge results!

And not one joke about having a small dingy!

I admit, I thought this was a hard one, and with only two submissions, I am guessing that many people were in the thought of, "What the fuck can we do with this?" You cannot deny though that it is quite the interesting photo, and it had definitely drawn me in. What could possibly be the actual story behind the image?

Well, luckily for me, the new system I put into place, with people submitting their stories in the comments of a DIY page, I was able to keep myself from reading what others had written. So finally, this morning, I wrote out what I had in mind when I put the picture into this caption setting months ago and its about as close to what I wanted to do as I think I was able to conjure up what I had wanted it to say when I first found the source photo.

For those who aren't quite following, I based this on Samuel Taylor Coleridge's epic poem, the Rime of the Ancient Mariner, and how instead of a albatross around his neck, the mariner has a more literal 'curse' of having the tragedy of the event right on his head. Pretty much like the saying, "well, if this fails, its on your head." and I liked the implications of people nowadays using "literal" incorrectly in our daily speech. If there is ever a chance for irony, I will certainly try to bend over backwards to accommodate it as best I can!

Looking at it now, I'm not quite sure if its truly an eternal curse, where she is still walking the earth 200 years later like "the Wandering Jew" in the present day, or if she was more of a contemporary of Coleridge himself, who either changed the story to a less fantastical realm, or simply got it wrong and she is trying to set the record straight. Nor do I know if she was physically changed into a woman, or if she was more compelled to look like that while still possessing some male appendages. Not sure if it really affects what the story is about, but whichever way you'd like to flavor it is fine with me.

Ian was the first to get in a submission, and worked up a rousing story of slight ribaldry.I'm sure tales like these have been around for centuries, and its always nice to have some implied lesbian sex in any TG caption. It was much easier to read though once I de-capitalized the entire thing! Next time Sweetie, just type it normally!

Helena went the modern route, so what is great is that we ended up with one from the 1800's and one from the 2010's! She also decided to add Simone and me into the mix, and I thank you for the ridiculous image of Simone trying to make me wear a ship on my head for any sort of contest! I know she's quite persuasive but I can't think of anything other than a shiny rock on my finger or money in my pocketbook that could get me to wear that .. unless she tried to use reverse psychology on me. maybe after the event, you, your girlfriend, Simone and me can all get some dinner and hit the clubs. I just have to make sure I don't rock the boat too much or I'll hit the deck!

Didn't think I was going to post this topic and NOT upload a song by Iron Maiden that covers pretty much the entire poem from beginning to end, did you? Great performance and great adaption!

Wonderful job by both Ian and Helena! Make sure you leave some comments below to let us know how we did on a pretty tough source photo.