And now I’m thinking about Cetus. In Greek mythology, Cetus was the sea monster; it’s basically described as being a while with the head of a greyhound (which is actually pretty terrifying when you think about it for more than 5 seconds); Princess Andromeda was going to be sacrificed to it the myth of her rescue by the hero Perseus. Now some of you might have noticed something, I mentioned a scene right out of both of the Clash of the Titans movies, where it was actually a creature called the Kraken that had that role. Well, unsurprisingly enough, Hollywood elected to completely mangle the myth; the Kraken is a sea monster from Scandinavian mythology, basically, the kind of thing Vikings told horror stories about to keep problematic sailors in line, but Hollywood decided to put it in the role Cetus for the movies.

However, Cetus still gets some respect, ironically from sailors. There is a constellation also called Cetus, it’s named for the mythological Greek monster, and the time the constellation is out has a special meaning for sailors; when that constellation is out, and you’re on the open waters, sailors will refer to it as “being in the Belly of the Whale,” and I think some you out there just noticed a particular reference to a story in the Bible.