“The tale you are about to encounter is a true one, but I must warn you, dear reader, that the facts have been sugared with whimsy, marinated in daydreams, and seasoned with a generous salting of exaggeration. I will leave you and your clever brain to decipher the myths from the realities, but do bear in mind that the truth, as Lord Byron once wrote, is "stranger than fiction," and fantasy is a gilded mirror that reflects the dangers, the oddities, and the marvelous wonders of our own true world.”