Lash yourself to the mast, dear friends, and keep the knots damn tight.

fropwns · 2020-03-04T11:47:41-08:00

The Odyssey, Book XII "While we were doing all this, Circe (Goddesses, Nymph), who knew that we had got back from the house of Hades, dressed herself and came to us as fast as she could; and her maid servants came with her bringing us bread, meat, and wine. Then she stood in the midst of us and said, 'You have done a bold thing in going down alive to the house of Hades, and you will have died twice, to other people's once; now, then, stay here for the rest of the day, feast your fill, and go on with your voyage at daybreak tomorrow morning. In the meantime, I will tell Ulysses about your course, and will explain everything to him so as to prevent your suffering from misadventure either by land or sea.' "We agreed to do as she had said, and feasted through the livelong day to the going down of the sun, but when the sun had set and it came on dark, the men laid themselves down to sleep by the stern cables of the ship. Then Circe took me by the hand and bade me be seated away from the others, while she reclined by my side and asked me all about our adventures. "'So far so good,' said she, when I had ended my story, 'and now pay attention to what I am about to tell you- heaven itself, indeed, will recall it to your recollection. First you will come to the Sirens who enchant all who come near them. If anyone unwarily draws in too close and hears the singing of the Sirens, his wife and children will never welcome him home again, for they sit in a green field and warble him to death with the sweetness of their song. There is a great heap of dead men's bones lying all around, with the flesh still rotting off them. Therefore pass these Sirens by, and stop your men's ears with wax that none of them may hear; but if you like you can listen yourself, for you may get the men to bind you as you stand upright on a cross-piece half way up the mast, and they must lash the rope's ends to the mast itself, that you may have the pleasure of listening. If you beg and pray the men to unloose you, then they must bind you faster. …"I had hardly finished telling everything to the men before we reached the island of the two Sirens, for the wind had been very favourable. Then all of a sudden it fell dead calm; there was not a breath of wind nor a ripple upon the water, so the men furled the sails and stowed them; then taking to their oars they whitened the water with the foam they raised in rowing. Meanwhile I look a large wheel of wax and cut it up small with my sword. Then I kneaded the wax in my strong hands till it became soft, which it soon did between the kneading and the rays of the sun-god son of Hyperion. Then I stopped the ears of all my men, and they bound me hands and feet to the mast as I stood upright on the crosspiece; but they went on rowing themselves. When we had got within earshot of the land, and the ship was going at a good rate, the Sirens saw that we were getting in shore and began with their singing. "'Come here,' they sang, 'renowned Ulysses, honour to the Achaean name, and listen to our two voices. No one ever sailed past us without staying to hear the enchanting sweetness of our song- and he who listens will go on his way not only charmed, but wiser, for we know all the ills that the gods laid upon the Argives and Trojans before Troy, and can tell you everything that is going to happen over the whole world.' "They sang these words most musically, and as I longed to hear them further I made by frowning to my men that they should set me free; but they quickened their stroke, and Eurylochus and Perimedes bound me with still stronger bonds till we had got out of hearing of the Sirens' voices. Then [and only then] my men took the wax from their ears and unbound me." Friends, there is great wisdom in the passage above. The notion will fall upon you that we should acquire the services of Tom Brady, formerly, it so appears, of New England. I have heard the song of the sirens, Sanders, Smith, PFT, and others. I sought to hear them, and thus, I did! But not before, I bound myself to the reality of the situation. Still, the madness of their song was intoxicating in its beauty and for a moment, yes, for a moment, I, too, was in their grasp. As with all seduction, their song was rife with treachery! I, then, came to a conclusion. Though, I, just as you are, am desperate to win a Super Bowl, sometime in this millennia, the path to it is not with Tom Brady--even if it would be an incredible story of the golden boy coming home--and is instead with young Jim Garoppolo. By all means, listen to the sirens and their sweet, sweet song. But be warned. Lash yourself to the mast, dear friends, and keep the knots damn tight. I am Fropwns.

Mar 4, 2020 at 12:01 PM

pdizo916
Member
Posts: 38,241

Ok?

Mar 4, 2020 at 12:08 PM

Sanfran_chrisco
Veteran
Posts: 33,917

alright

Mar 4, 2020 at 12:09 PM

KittleMeThis
Veteran
Posts: 2,191

IBTL?

Mar 4, 2020 at 12:17 PM

Hoovtrain
Veteran
Posts: 35,012

Huh

Mar 4, 2020 at 12:29 PM

English
Moderator
Posts: 41,410

Yo, Fro. Tell us of the wine-dark sea and the Beli-Chick.

Mar 4, 2020 at 1:09 PM

CatchMaster80
Veteran
Posts: 20,566

The brown acid is not particularly good. Stay away from the brown acid. (quote from Woodstock)

Mar 4, 2020 at 1:15 PM

fropwns
The Last Fronin
Posts: 27,957

Originally posted by CatchMaster80:
The brown acid is not particularly good. Stay away from the brown acid. (quote from Woodstock)

LOL, It was as if World Literature, specifically, the Greek variation was dead.

Mar 4, 2020 at 2:00 PM

RTFirefly
Veteran
Posts: 3,262

Read Odyssey a bunch of times. I absolutely love Greek mythology, am reading some now here and there.

Calypso was my favorite. I would have taken immortality, feasted on meat and mead, with her forever on a beautiful island, and never looked back. Odysseus nearly did. It took being a hero for him to finally leave, to repeatedly risk horrible death to seek to regain his throne and regain his wife. Bah, being a hero is really overrated.

Mar 4, 2020 at 2:02 PM