Please Sign Your Name On Hell's Guest Registry

Sure, I have written about heaven and hell fairly recently. But I don't care. You're not the boss of me.

I have been thinking a lot about the devil. Not in a perverted way, necessarily, just pondering his existence. Do you think the devil is fork tongued and carries a pitchfork like he is normally portrayed? Or maybe he is some serpent that slithers throughout the earth and bites people on the ankle, injecting the venom of bad thoughts like: "yellow lights mean go as fast as you can" or "take 2 fortune cookies even though it says to only take one." ? Or maybe he just looks like any other white person (I guess in my mind a white person is the most viable to be the devil, but I guess he could be Asian. or Russian.) and he wanders around creating chaos, and slips into the shadows undetected like Bigfoot or some other fairytale hoax like a narwhal. 

I hope I don't ever have to find out what the devil looks like unless I am mooning him from on high, but when I tally up my life points of good deeds versus evil, my accountant suggests it more likely I will be meeting the devil than God. So maybe that's why I have been thinking about the devil and hell more often, because I am pondering my future there. I hope that there is a system where you could move up the ranks and get into heaven, or at least eventually become an assistant torturer. 

But therein lies the biggest question of all; what is hell like? Is it rivers of poop that flow freely from the mouth of a giant poop waterfall, and there is nothing to eat but stale bread, and all you can smell is poop? So it kind of tastes like eating poop. And anywhere you look there is just pigeons. Everywhere you cast your eyes, there are rats of the skies eating the bread you don't get to first. Do you have a cell there, or can you wander aimlessly through the corridors without purpose, sitting idly by the river of excrement, passing your time in hell?

I would like to imagine that hell is some kind of holding place where I could go, pay off my debts as a sentence in hell for a period of time, then move on to the great beyond where I work at a celestial McDonalds, trying to move up the chain and buy a bigger mansion in a better part of heaven.

Here is what I would suggest that hell should be like, it could be like the American "justice" system where people die, get sentenced, and have the opportunity to move up to a level of hell from the one they are currently on. Similar to Dante's Inferno, there would be levels of lower hell for the more heinous crimes, but the upper levels would offer mild torture, then after a time and, coupled with good behavior, you can get into heaven and do arduous labor for people who were worthy.

The upper levels of hell would be for people who jay walked, skipped class, gave a titty twister to an unexpectant victim, and lied to their mother. This level would basically be spending time in a cell where they served you plain rice cakes and irrigation water for every meal, and you could earn rights to read books like Who Moved My Cheese?, anything by Dave Ramses, or some other dry self-help book, and the especially well behaved could watch 1 episode of Murder, She Wrote on Fridays. You have a toilet but can only flush it once every 3 days. People here would typically only spend 20-50 years time and could move on. 

The middle levels of hell would be for more serious crimes, or sins, if you will. People here might be the ones who leave shopping carts in the middle of the parking lots rather than putting them in the corrals, trampled someone at a Black Friday deal, drew phallic images in their school-owned text books, got several piercings, dyed their hair an unnatural color, watched HBO after midnight when their parents were asleep, went to Burger King on a Sunday, wore a shirt that revealed their midriff in public, called someone a dumbass or dipshit, purchased thong underwear, has worn a toe ring, or read the 50 Shades Of Grey series. (This list is not exhaustive, just examples of crimes in the afterlife)

This level of hell would be slightly more severe. The temperature would always be either too hot or too cold. And you could never manage to get your pants off when it's too hot, or find a jacket when it's too cold. Typically you would be all alone, and wandering some kind of wilderness. You would be thirsty but all that would be available to quench your thirst would be flat 7-Up or Diet Pepsi. When you are hungry all you can find is Boston Baked Beans candy, and someone's leftover plate from thanksgiving, being mostly gravy and fragments of mashed potatoes and turkey that is dry. Occasionally someone will come along and their sole purpose is to hurt you, so that would depend on what kind of person you are. If you are the type of person who liked getting spanked, obviously they wouldn't hit you, they would probably compliment you and make excessive eye contact. I will likely be in this level of hell, so as an example for me, they would send a new person every time and the person would want to make small talk and invite me over for dinner, where they would ask me about my work and hobbies (Of which I have none). Maybe you can work up from this level of hell after wandering for so long, but unlike the first level there isn't a prison system to determine your good or bad behavior. So maybe it's time contingent, and after so long you get sent to the upper level where you could make license plates and move into heaven.

The lower level of hell would be for very serious crimes and sins. Examples: Fornicators, thieves, politicians, people who leave babies in hot cars, auto mechanics (see also: thieves), people who honk immediately when the light turns green, DJ's, murderers, rapists, Keith Urban, anyone who held a Playboy subscription, the person who wrote the 50 Shades Of Grey series, Charles Manson, people with nipple piercings, most newscasters, belly dancers, people who wear cowboy hats in public, Anne Hathaway, the creators of candy corn, people who posed nude for an artist, grifters, anyone who exploited poor people, most, if not all, landlords, the inventors of screamo music, people who have watched Friends, Hitler, the inventor of the bikini, masturbators, drug users, most people who own motorcycles, vegans, Stalin, members of Florida Georgia Line and their fans, people who follow very closely on the freeway, and Miley Cyrus.

This last level of hell would be the full blown torture stage. Women would have to experience blue balls. Men would have to give birth. A steam roller would run over penises. You would be forced to listen to Luke Bryan play for 80 straight hours. You could eat, but all the food is on the floor and most people aren't wearing shoes and walking all over it. Occasionally you could find one of those stale tins of popcorn from Christmas 1995, but all that is left is the cheese popcorn with a little mold on it. Vegans would cry about not being able to eat anything at all. There is always someone with a cowboy hat nearby asking who you voted for, and saying he doesn't want taxes to go up. There is a girl crying constantly. You are allowed to drink but all that is available is peppermint schnapps, skunked Bud Light, and hot water that they filtered from the poop river. You always have an itch on your back that you can't reach. When you lay down to sleep you wake up suddenly thinking you're late for school, even though you are dead. You always have the sensation to pee. Your clothes smell like cigarettes. Your back hurts always. You have to go to the dentist every single day and he gives you a root canal. The floor is made of loose Legos. You cannot work your way out of this level of hell. They have determined you are too bad to move up. 

I don't really think any of this is true, I am just hopeful that it is, as I am likely on a fast track to the underworld. If this does turn out to be true and I have discovered the blue print for the afterlife, mention this blog and I can get you 10% off your mandatory sentence in hell.

I think the best we can hope for is a little grace, because we all kind of suck in our own way. You just have to do your best along the way. Maybe we will all end up in hell. Maybe we will all end up in heaven. Or maybe all of you will end up in hell and I will end up in heaven. Or vice versa.

DIEting

Do you think that God invented food, or the devil? Let's just say for argument's sake that it was God. My follow up question would be this: Does God have a twisted sense of humor? I just can't understand why he would make everything that tastes good, lovely, praiseworthy, or of good report be so bad for you. And everything that tastes like dirt, dog shit, and water be so good for you. 

Maybe he enjoys seeing us all suffer? Or have you ever wondered if God is fat and he wants you to be more like Him? The 600 lb people are closest to God? So in this scenario, skinny people would be like the devil. I enjoy, very much, painting skinny people out to be the bad guys for once. I mean, to be fair, every artist depiction of the devil I have seen, he is usually skinny or has a six pack. Can't think of any time I have seen the devil portrayed as fat. Food for thought. But the other side of that is that fat people die fast and have a lot of health problems. Every medical diagnosis I have ever received they have directly correlated with me being 'morbidly obese'. Which I am pretty sure is the highest level of obese. So at least I am in first at something. Sick burn by doctors though, they're just like "you're not just fat, you are going to DIE because you're so fat. You are morbidly obese bro. Do you want to pick out which piano box you'd like to be buried in tomorrow? You fat loser?"

Have you ever just thought passingly about food and it arouses a feeling in you? That sounds oddly sexual, but it's something I am working through right now. I have been doing a diet for a total of 4 days and just the thought of certain foods evokes a reaction in me that I can't explain. I sometimes think about Raising Cane's, In-N-Out, and Astro Burger the way mothers think of their sons who never returned from the war. Just longingly gazing at pictures of their food for an ineffable amount of time, while tears gently roll down my cheeks, and I help myself to a tall glass of water to curb the appetite, like the dumb ass I am.

I have tried to come up with goals ever since I got my A&P licensing in July, and needed something else to work on. So I have been trying to exercise and lose weight. It's been going well, except I have this problem where, now that I lift weights 4 times a week, I justify eating whatever I want. Cake for breakfast? I'll burn it off at the gym later. 64 oz soda? Gym later baby. So I have been stagnant, for the most part. But I have been doing well otherwise.

I have always been a big proponent of the idea that "fad diets don't work" and in a lot of ways, I think thats true. Most diets aren't that sustainable unless you're Oprah and have the funding to be able to do Weight Watchers for the rest of your life. Most people I know don't have that. Most people say: "you just need to change some eating habits" and I hear that, but when you're someone like me, changing my eating habits would take an act of congress, God, or the British Parliament. You can't just tell me to "Stop eating when I am full" the same way you can't tell a dog to look up. There are some things that aren't possible. Whether in this life or the life to come. So please stop saying that to me, it's hurting my big fat feelings. So yeah, I am trying a fad diet. And it's going okay. I stuffed a donut down my pants just to try and curb the desire to stuff it entirely into my mouth like an anaconda, but otherwise it's been fine.

So yeah, I guess I am an emotional eater. Everybody has problems. Some people don't eat because of their feelings and that's something I don't understand even a little. But that's okay. We all just have to suffer through this thing together. You don't have to understand things to support people who are trying to change and be better, or not. Even if someone is just trying to survive, you can be nice to them. I'm not sure what that has to do with food, but it felt like a bridge.

So good luck to everyone who is trying to make changes, whether it be for the new year or not. I wish you the best of luck. If you see me and I act like a caged animal, it's just because I am hungry. Which could also double as the title of my memoir. Just pound on the glass and keep moving.