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Hermes, a la Shmoop.

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That's Mercury for you and me.

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Oh, heyyyy. Forgot the shoot was today.

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Anyway, I'm Hermes, herald of Zeus...and, oh...don't mind all these wallets.

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There was a sale at...um...Wallet Mart.

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OK, whatevs, there wasn't any sale. I totally stole all of these. Hey, I'm the god of thieves.

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What do you want from me?

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I figure if people aren't smart enough to hold onto their stuff,

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then they don't deserve to keep it.

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Stealing's just.. kinda in my blood, ya know?

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I've been thieving since I was a kid. I stole Apollo's sacred cattle when I was a toddler.

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It was so funny because I walked the cattle backward,

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making it mega-hard for Apollo to track us down.

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Apollo was so steamed when he finally found us.

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I managed to chill him out, though, by

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playing him the lyre <<LIRE>>, which I'd found the time to invent that day--

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because I'm just that amazing.

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I traded the lyre for the sacred cattle, and Apollo and I were cool.

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The best thing is that, ever since, I've had all the sacred hamburgers I can eat.

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You can't blame me for stealing once in a while. I need a hobby.

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My main job as a messenger of the gods is super stressful.

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My dad, Zeus, is a pretty good boss, but he's majorly demanding.

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At least he gave me these winged sandals to speed things up.

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Sometimes the messages I bring are super important--like back during the Trojan War.

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Though some messages were... more important than others.

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Zeus had me help out some of his favorite heroes back in the day as well--like when

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I leant Perseus my sandals to help him slay that hag, Medusa.

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Between you and me, I kind of regret it, though. Perseus has some funky feet--just sayin'.

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I also helped out Odysseus <<oh-DISS-ee-us>>

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when he was dealing with Circe <<SIR-see>>, the sea witch.

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I gave him a potion so that she couldn't turn him into a pig like the rest of his men.

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Sometimes Zeus makes me do his dirty work, though, like the time he called a hit on

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Argus Panoptes <<ARR-gose puh-NOP-tees>> and made me do the deed.

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See... Zeus had been fooling around with a nymph named Io, and when he heard his wife

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Hera coming, he changed Io into a white cow.

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So Hera would think he was just... milkin' her... or making out with a cow, or somethin'?

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Hera didn't really buy it and put her guy, Argus, in charge of watching over the cow.

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Argus was a giant covered in eyes, so you couldn't really find a better watchman.

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His optometrist bill must've been through the roof...

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Anyway, Zeus wasn't about to let his wife get the better of him, so he sent me in to

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liberate his favorite heifer. I lulled the big guy to sleep with my trusty lyre.

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And then...well... I killed him in his sleep. Brutal? Yeah. But I was just following orders.

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Argus was seriously unhappy about the way he went out, let me tell you. I got an earful

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all the way down to the Land of the Dead.

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Oh, I forgot to tell you. I'm also a psychopomp.

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Ha, no, not a psychopath.

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A psychopomp's job is to guide the souls of the dead down to the underworld.

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Yeah, I do that on top of everything else. I'm a busy fella.

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So, come on guys. Is it really a big deal if I steal a few things every now and then

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just as a way to relieve stress? Everybody needs a hobby, right?

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That's it for today, folks.

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And by the way...that thing you've been missing, I swear I didn't take it...

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