Top 10 Things I've Learned While Re-Reading The Odyssey

10. I always figured goddesses would be great in bed, but that they would be kind of picky about who they would sleep with. Apparently I was wrong. If a stiff breeze goes by, they open up for it.

9. People in the ancient world were stupid. They weren't pawns of fate or irony, they were just stupid. If a goddess tells you that, whatever you do, do NOT kill and eat the cattle on this one specific island, especially since she just gave you a whole bunch of free food, it's not fated that you'll do it anyway. It's not ironic. It just means you're stupid. It's pretty easy to not do it. It is, in fact, kind of tough to succeed in doing what she tells you not to do. Yet people in the ancient world managed to go right on ahead and do it, along with every other thing that they weren't supposed to do. It's really kind of surprising anyone survived. They were very stupid people.

8. If Homer has Character A tell Character B a story, and then Character C asks Character B what Character A said, Homer is much more likely to retell the entire story word-for-word even though you just read it, rather than just write "Character B told Character C the dealio." Homer is an asshole.

7. Every time Greek people see a bird, they shit their pants and think Zeus is trying to tell them something.

6. Social networking is hardly a recent phenomenon. In the ancient world, everyone knew who everyone else was. And everyone helped sack Troy. In fact, so many people helped sack Troy, I don't think there was anyone in Troy to be sacked.

5. Apparently, all you have to do is tell a king he's a cool guy and he'll feed you for months, offer you his daughters, and send you home at his expense with piles of treasure.

4. The Hulk would've totally made it back to Ithaca in time. He can jump.

3. Everyone in the ancient world had a larder mistress, which sounds gross.

2. I don't think the whole thing about Helen's face launching a thousand ships is true. In the ancient world, everyone had chicks who gave them baths. And if you got tired of your bath chicks, you just went over to your buddy's place and had his bath chicks give you a bath. In other words, considering how many underwater handjobs a guy could get on a daily basis in Ancient Greece, I find it tough to believe that anyone was horny enough to start a war over it.

1. Gods, generally speaking, are assholes.