Anyone for a bedtime story?

I like to entertain my closest family and friends. Usually, this happens just by opening my mouth and telling them whatever idiotic thing I have been thinking about lately. (Sometimes they laugh and inch away from me, worried about my insanity level that day). These are the people who know me best and are least likely to be offended by what I say or do, offense being something I seem to be able to inspire in the rest of the world a little too easily.

I have what could politely be called an irreverent sense of humor – to me most things in life have an ironic side and should be laughed at. (This of course does not apply to anything that causes only suffering, of which tragedies there are far too many to list here.) Often, what makes me laugh is something I sort of glimpsed or overheard a snatch of while on the bus, walking down the street, spacing out on a park bench, or whatever and then my crazy little pea brain made up its own story, randomly filling in the blanks. Just like the Mad Libs I used to play with my sisters on long car rides in my parents’ horrible mustard yellow Ford Pinto.

The usual response I get when I tell my friends and family some of my crazy ideas is that I should write them down. Why would I do that? Writing things down fixes them in a permanent state and my brain functions in a more fluid way. It also provides a lot of concrete proof that I am a little kookoo and might benefit from some mind altering medication. I also have a serious problem with fleshing ideas out – I can usually come up with the initial premise, but the details are beyond me. If I tried to write them down, it would just be a list of things, what-ifs, thoughts that go nowhere.

However, I do sometimes like a challenge. I am up trying to note down my favorite loco thoughts and see what happens. The attic in my noggin is getting a little full and perhaps if I write them down, I can let them go and make room for new thoughts. So please enjoy the craziness with one caveat – take everything with a ginormous grain of salt. I mean no disrespect to anyone, any belief system, any gender, orientation, identity of self, etc, etc.

“In the beginning…Irreverent Bible Stories for Lapsed Catholics”

**WARNING** Any devout Christians are likely to want to burn me at the stake after this, including some of my own family members…I am seriously not joking. I just want to make it clear that these ideas are not meant to insult anyone or debase any faith they may have. For the few of you who have heard these ideas before and found them hilarious, I hope you enjoy them again.

*What if Jesus was a vampire? No seriously, I am not the only person in the world to think of this. I mean, if you are not a believer in God, don’t see Jesus as the Messiah, and think it is extremely odd for an institution to condone and promote transubstantiation (the magical turning of bread and wine into flesh and blood), how else do you explain the miracle of Christ? The rite of communion is all about ingesting the flesh and blood of a human being – surely this is cannibalism at the very least but there is definitely a vampire connection there too. Jesus was a man who was dead and yet rose again, not-dead (undead)? Vampire lore is also full of all kinds of interesting items that can be attributed to Jesus – the ability to walk on water is one. What if instead of walking on water, he was just floating above it? At the marriage celebration in Cana, he supposedly turned water into wine. Vampires are famous for being able to hypnotize prey – what if all he did was plant the suggestion in the guests’ minds that the water had become wine and they all believed it? I could go on, but I think you get my point. I think it is outrageously funny to contemplate the idea that a religious figure who supposedly preached peace but inspired so much bloodshed is actually a blood drinker himself.

*Peter, Peter, woman hater. To me, Peter is the biggest misogynist in the last 2000 years. He helped turn the only other important female character (Mary Magdalene) in the New Testament (Mary, Jesus’ mother being the first) into an anathema, a social pariah, a whore. The man obviously had a vagina problem – why else would he help create an institution that has completely denigrated women? Wouldn’t it be funny, though, if every night when holy man St. Peter went home, he had a few dominatrix women waiting for him? What if the rock of the church was spanked like a little boy by his mommy every night before bed and he LIKED it? I laugh just thinking about it.

*Judas Iscariot – poster child for a broken heart. Sometimes, I can’t understand why Christianity is so against homosexuality. I mean, why does anyone care so much about how another person finds happiness in a relationship? Why is there only one missionary-style road to happiness? One day in a flash of truly inspired depravity, the answer came to me. Christians hate Judas Iscariot as much as they hate homosexuals, right? I mean, Judas IS the man who betrayed Jesus to the Romans, which led to his scourging, painful trudge through the streets of Jerusalem, and finally the agonizing execution by crucifixion. I mean, who WOULDN’T hate such a rat? So where am I going with this? Well, what if the true story is that Judas was a gay man who was madly in love with Jesus and actually had a romantic relationship with him? And then, Jesus dumped him? And Judas felt immense anger and shame when his heart was broken? I don’t know anyone who hasn’t felt that way when told by the object of their desire that they ‘just don’t think of you that way anymore”. I have experienced it myself and can easily understand why in a moment of pure anger Judas would want to make Jesus’ life a little uncomfortable, to teach him a lesson. I have always thought Judas was a tragic figure who regretted what he had done – he hung himself eventually, committing suicide, yet another strike against him. The guy just could not win for losing. The true history behind Christianity’s obsession with the evils of homosexuality has just been revealed by a love affair between Jesus and Judas.

*Dona Maria, Holy Mary Mother of God – the poor preggers girl. Seriously, think about it. Some teenage girl has a glowing alien/angel stalking her, telling her crazy things like she is destined to become the mother of God. God?!? How is that logically even possible? It hurts my head thinking about it. The Thing from Outer Space finally talks her into having the kid, she becomes pregnant (the Bible skips a few details when explaining exactly how THAT happened. But Mom, Dad, it was only one time…) and suddenly for social reasons she needs a husband. So she marries the most famous cuckold in history, Joseph, who by all accounts was a good husband and father, one bright star in this story. From now on, Mary’s life is not her own, if it ever was. She has to give birth in a barn with a bunch of animals and strangers from afar looking on as she is sweating and screaming her way through contractions and delivery. She has to raise this uber-holy child, not having any resources for something like this. I imagine it would be like trying to raise a genius but not being able to read, write, or do basic math yourself – where do you even begin? Then her crazy kid decides to start his own hippy commune, preaching revolution and a serious lack of respect for established authority, an early pre-cursor to the Summer of Love. Eventually, this kid, this man, who changed whatever course her life might have taken, has the gall to get arrested and die a messy, public death, all the while praising God and saying ‘thy will be done.’ What about HER will? This person who was carried in her body, who she cared for and raised to manhood didn’t consider her at all when he ran off to foment revolution. I bet deep inside, Mary wanted nothing more than to just be left alone, in a nice little cottage somewhere with her cats and a rose garden. That’s how I picture her now – a plump little lady with dyed, permed hair wearing a too-small sweatshirt covered in kittens and living in a house with plastic covers on the furniture and velvet paintings of Elvis on the walls, smoking cigarettes like a chimney. When you visit her, she gives you stale store-brand Oreo wannabe cookies and Kool-aid lemonade. It makes me laugh a naughty, disrespectful laugh to think she could have been so normal.

Ok, if you are still reading this blog and want more, the rest is pretty benign in comparison. Boring, even. I promise to try to make you laugh..

*What if you were some drugged out asshole wandering the streets of a bad neighborhood one night and saw a beautiful woman inexplicably sitting in a convertible at a stop light? And what if you jumped into her convertible, stuck a knife to her throat, and told her to drive off, all the while salivating over what you were going to do to her before you stole her jewelry and car and left her for dead? And what if the woman just laughed at you, grabbed you and pulled you in close for a kiss – but wait, she is actually biting your neck and sucking all the blood out of you, down to your toes? And what if she tossed your pathetic, dead body out of the car and drove off licking her lips? That would really suck, right? Get it – suck? I crack myself up. So then the beautiful woman drives back to her high class condo, racing the rising sun, completely satisfied with her midnight snack. Yum. Better than a glass of warm milk to help you sleep.

*One day I was walking down Market Street, enjoying the mixture of sunshine and San Francisco weirdos and listening to Marilyn Manson scream in my ear, “I don’t care if you don’t want me, ‘cause I’m yours, yours, yours, anyhow..” About ten feet in front of me, a cab pulled up in front of the Regis Hotel and just as the passenger opened the door, a bike messenger came zooming down the sidewalk, swerving around pedestrians, and got nailed by the cab door. The messenger, a girl, went flying then skidding down the sidewalk until she finally slid to a stop. She must have been one giant body-sized mass of bruises and road rash – I cringe just thinking about it now. Yowza. So I turned off my headphones and ran over to her with my cell phone out, ready to call 911 because I was positive this chick was seriously hurt, if not actually semi-burnt toast. The guy who hit her with the door got to her first and was talking to her. The girl sat up, took off her helmet, and it was a total sexy-librarian moment. With her helmet on and wearing the usual messenger gear of trashed Carhart jeans, black concert t-shirt and a big bag, she had a total tomboy appearance. But the moment that helmet came off and all this pretty blond hair came tumbling down, it was a totally different story. I am an appreciator of beauty everywhere and even though I was very frightened that this girl was seriously hurt, I admit to staring in awe – she was honestly a very beautiful woman. I noticed that the cab door guy was staring too, but who could blame him? It only took a few seconds to figure out that not only was the girl really ok, but that I wasn’t needed and I could boogie on down Market Street. So I did, listening to the rest of Marilyn Manson’s “I Put A Spell On You”. The song started me thinking – this is a classic stalker ballad. And what happened between those two people had the makings of a perfect stalker story. What if Ms. Messenger decides it was fate that she was nailed by Mr. Cab Door at that very moment? She would be foolish to try and thwart fate and she ain’t no dummy. Mr. Cab Door is a very polite man who truly felt sorry for nailing her, even though she shouldn’t have been riding her bike on the sidewalk. As a way to feel better about it, he gives her his business card and tells her to contact him if she needs anything at all, then continues on his way into the Regis. For him, it is over, although he does enjoy thinking about how beautiful she was. For Ms. Messenger, though, a completely different concept was received. He told her to contact him. He gave her the means to do it. Fate, again, is telling her he is THE ONE. You can probably fill in the blanks – think Single White Female. Although, who knows – maybe they could have a happy ending. After an appropriate amount of bloodshed, creepy behavior, and any other Hollywood-isms you want to throw in, of course.

Is anyone still awake? I hope I haven’t insulted you / bored you to tears / convinced you I need to be legally committed to the nuthouse. I could give you more, but this blog is already getting too long as it is. If you are interested in telling me what you think, I believe this site allows you to comment. I would love it if you did. Ciao