A man emerges from the trees of a lush vineyard, grape vines sticking out of his black hair and purple stains covering his once-white clothes. He begins to pull leaves out of his hair one by one, chuckling to himself.

“That never gets old.

I absolutely love messing with the other gods’ minds. What could ever be more fun? Especially Hades, because he never leaves his dungeon to chase me for revenge. Some of the other gods though…I’ve definitely learned not to cross some of them. Once, I sent Aphrodite an exploding bottle of grape juice. Not wine unfortunately, but it was still a divine bottle of wonderful purple juice. I had originally intended to rig it so that when she opened the cap, the delectable purple drink would spray in her face. Harmless, right? Weeeeeellllllll apparently I added a little extra oomph of magic more than I should have, and, well, let’s just say that…she didn’t think it was very funny. She also sent me the bill for having her robes cleaned. And probably purified.

Sheesh.

And of course there’s the time I…actually, I don’t want to talk about it. I’ll just say that Zeus didn’t find my harmless joke, well, funny. And he gave me the WORST punishment ever- no wine for 100 years. 100 YEARS! Do you know how long that is? It’s, like, forever! Ok well maybe not forever, but still. I’m Dionysus, the god of wine and celebration! And not having wine really puts a damper on parties, partying, and just savoring the divine, amazing, delectable, exquisite, heavenly…yeah, wine is the stuff.

What’s wrong with partying? So what if I have responsibilities, they can wait a little longer. All I need is a cup in my hand filled to the brim with wine, and I am allllll set. When Zeus doesn’t let me host my gatherings on Olympus, I like to hunt out secret spots on Earth for me and my friends to congregate and just. Go. Nuts. No party poopers allowed. But ladies…ladies are ALWAYS welcome. The more the merrier. It’s all because I’m a ladies man, of course. (Don’t listen to what Apollo or Hermes say, they’re still going through denial over it. For the past several thousand years.) But me…I certainly know how to charm the ladies. Say something nice, compliment them, let them think they’re the only gal around. Then have a little fun with a bunch of them at one of my famous parties. Later, I see them off and then I forget they ever existed. Apparently I have a couple kids out there. I hope they all take after dear old dad and know how to throw AWESOME parties. Like with lots of dancing and flowing alcohol and knowing that ending before sunrise is unacceptable. Unacceptable.”

Dionysus approaches a row of grape vines, crouching down to inspect a dying plant. He looks at it for a moment, then moves on. In his wake, the plant is slowly coming back to life, turning a lush green and sprouting large bunches of deep purple grapes.

“Well, duty calls I suppose. Gotta do something productive once in a while. But making grapes grow and throwing fantastic parties? Yup, I got it pretty sweet.”