People with interesting brains:

Rolf the Red is a friend of mine, what I’d consider to be a close friend. He’s also a sort of character; Many years ago a friend of mine was in a European History course at the undergraduate level, and the professor was talking about the early Scandinavian exploration era (I don’t use the term “The Viking Age” because it’s misleading and rewards some terrible scholarship). The professor, who I guess had some exposure to living history reenactment, mentioned Eric the Red, and muttered, “Not to be confused with Rolf the Red.” My friend laughed. The professor looked at my friend and said, “You know Rolf the Red?”
“Yes sir.”
“How do you know Rolf the Red?”
“”I’d prefer not to say.”
The professor nodded and said, “That proves it, you know Rolf the Red.”
Rolf has an impressive CV, which is not being used like the fad of people with a few jobs trying to appear posh or bougee, as in, until his daughter was born twenty some odd years ago he was at every single major Norse dig in his lifetime. He used to get phone calls in the middle of the night from someone overseas wanting to discuss translation, because he read and spoke Old Norse, Old Icelandic, and what Latin was applicable to studying the eddas and sagas. And in the late seventies he was at the New York Museum of Art helping them put together their exhibit from some recent digs. An interesting piece in the exhibit was an axe bearing the legendary name of “Blood of Odin”, and after several discussions about how effective axes were in combat vs. swords he borrowed it to demonstrate. This required a walk across Central park from the museum to the place on the other side where they held their fighter practice, and then a return trip. He was, of course, wary about the risk to the weapon, so he wore a long coat over his chainmail tunic and kept the axe concealed.
The trip to fighter practice was uneventful, and he made his point, demonstrating that the hook-like nature of an axe can do useful things like pull shields out of the way. Done with the practice, he headed back across the park. It was getting a bit dark.
Okay, folks, here’s the part you’ve been working through my prose to get to – on the way back to return the axe, he got accosted by a pair of muggers. The one behind him tried to stab him in the kidney with a cheap switchblade – the mail tunic made short work of that blade, and it’s former wielder did the smart thing and ran off. The guy in front called “Hey!” and brandished another knife. Rolf went on instinct, yelling, “Blood of Odin!” and pulling out the axe. He swung and nicked the attacker on the earlobe; the attacker screamed like a little girl and ran away as fast as he could. Rolf returned the axe to the museum, making sure there was no blood on it, and if this wasn’t a Rolf the Red story this is where it ends.
But this is a Rolf the Red Story. A week later he was at the New York Port Authority to buy bus tickets to get to his parents’ dome north of Denton, TX (Of course he lived in a dome for a while, this is Rolf the Red we’re talking about). His bladder started whispering to his brain, so he stepped into the men’s restroom. And when he turned to look at the guy in the stall next to him, there he was, still sporting a bandage on his ear, the attacker. In a low voice Rolf said, “Blood of Odin,” and the attacker repeated his prior performance, running from the men’s room where he was grabbed by the police for indecent exposure. Rolf finished his business, then walked by the guy in handcuffs, still sporting an ear bandage, and said, “And the justice of Tir.”
We have a sort of mutual admiration society going – he tells me that my experiences, especially with medical stuff, is close to beyond his comprehension, while my regard is for a lot of stuff he’s done or witnessed and participated in. And yes, there are more stories – let me know if you want to read them