Lent 2: The Reckoning

Tomorrow is Mardi Gras, which means that Wednesday is Ash Wednesday, which means that Lent starts Wednesday, which means that I will be giving something up for 40 days to appease the sky deity "God."

I'm sure many of you are curious as to why I even bother giving something up for Lent, since I don't really do anything else Catholic the rest of the year. You're certainly right to be curious. After all, I am generally at odds with the views and rituals of the Catholic Church. For instance, I don't allow people to put ashen crosses on my forehead, I don't go to church, I can't stand repenting, I go out of my way to hurt people, and I am pro-abortion (and I don't mean pro-choice, I mean pro-abortion). Nonetheless, to keep my options open, every year I give something up for Lent. I can't explain it as anything other than Catholic guilt, which, ironically, I am incapable of feeling.

In years past I've given up drinking during the week and fried food. This year, however, I am going one step further. I am giving up drinking all together (except for the Saturday before St. Patrick's Day and the first Friday of March Madness -- I am human after all). Interestingly, I think the two and a half weeks between Ash Wednesday and March 14 will be the longest I've gone without booze since whenever my previous sip of beer or wine was until sometime my sophomore year of high school. My hope is that my waistline and neck fat will decrease noticeably. Also, this should free up enough money to start a pretty sizeable 40-day coke habit.

As in years past, here are some suggestions for you and yours to give up for Lent, in case you haven't decided on something yet:
-Satanism
-Asking non-rhetorical questions
-Aging
-Answering the question "how's it going" with anything other than "fuck if I know!"
-The will to live
-Making Bible-themed porn (not that "Sermon and The Mount," "The Forty-Second Coming," "Burning Bushes," and "The Four Horsemen of the Anal Apocalypse" weren't amazing)
-Filing frivolous lawsuits and criminal complaints against Freddy Prinze, Jr. for "continuously and repeatedly trying to steal [your] heart"
-Autoerotic asphyxiation
-Using the term "pork" to describe the act of having sex
-Not using the term "queef" at least twice a day
-Keeping chimpanzees as household pets
-Qualifying every answer you give with "but only if rigor mortis has set in"
-Referring to just about everything as "choice"
-Whenever anyone walks into your office, yelling, "Ladies and Gentlemen, Smokey Robinson and The Miracles!"