It was dumb, I’ll admit it. Kids these days don’t know they’re born, with their camera phones and fancy music player thingies. In my day you had to really stamp your authority to get even the merest kudos, the slightest sniff of wealth or power. All the lads were doing it, all over the Aegean. You couldn’t move for long-haired, loinclothed Greeks in sandals attempting to win glory by dubious and often ill-conceived means.

I’m not ashamed to say I was one of them. I was a boy of my time after all. Oh yes, I swanned about with the best of them, trying to slay this or that, just for the favour of a girl, or the attention of a god, and that didn’t always end well. I mean, most of the gods were alright, but some went barmy when you killed their favourite creatures. I got a stern talking to from Athena herself on one occasion, and that was just an owl. Perhaps that’s where I should have stopped. The owl and no more. One thing’s for sure, divine adulation or not, I should not have taken on that bloody basilisk.