It must be my face. There is, maybe, something on my ugly mug that says "Come on, you can talk to me...Let me hear whatever insanity it is that's rattling around inside your head. I'll give it a fair hearing, and won't laugh or get hostile, honestly!"
Scene from the Staten Island Ferry, approximately 8:30 P.M., Sunday, December 5th, 2010;
We find our hero (that would be Me) engrossed in his book -- The Peloponnesian War, by Donald Kagan. The story so far: the Spartans have the ball on the Athenian's 35 yard line, down by 6, no time outs, and under two minutes left to play. Sparta's veteran quarterback, King Archidamus, unfortunately died after a vicious blind-side hit (no flag on the play!) in the 2nd quarter, and so the Spartan side must depend upon career bench-warmer, King Pleistoanax. Elsewhere, Cleon and Diodotus are locked in a heart-wrenching custody battle over the renegade Mytileneans, with Cleon believing they only really require a stern, disciplinarian father-figure, while Diodatus believes the poor waifs just haven't been properly nurtured, and are perhaps eating too much sugar. In the meantime, the Athenian Pnyx (sort of like the Glee Club, only slightly less gay, and with the power to make law in Athens) has decided that the Mytileneans are just irredeemable, and despite the fact that they might be cute-as-the-dickens, they should still be slaughtered wholesale.
On the other side of Greece, Thucydides writes about Rainbow Ponies and Purple Unicorns in his frilly and fruit-scented diaries, waiting for the days when his thus-far unrequited love for Pericles oif Athens will finally bloom, and bring forth a New Day in the Ancient World, and so he idles away the time writing "Mr. and Mrs. Pericles...Mr. and Mrs. Thucydides-Pericles, Mrs. T. Pericles of Athens...." and thinking he will just D-I-E if Pericles doesn't call soon.
I can't wait to see how it ends. They should make a Lifetime made-for-TV movie out of it. But I digress...
Anyway, there I am, reading quietly, all by myself in my own little corner of the ferryboat, not bothering a soul, perfectly content to imagine that nothing outside those written pages before me exists, when HE shows up.
"He" is something of a puzzler. At first glance, I can't tell if he's a recovering alcoholic (nah, can't be. Not enough stitches in his face), an ex-drug user (no sign of trackmarks, seems to have most of his original teeth), or just an idiot. Then "He" opens his mouth, and the mystery has been solved. Yep, idiot.
Excuse me, Sir. Have you heard the Good News?
Did the Yankees resign Derek Jeter?
*Chuckle* No, nothing like that. I meant have you heard that He Has Risen?
Oh, that. Listen, I don't mean to be rude, but I'm not really interested in discussing religion with you at the moment. Perhaps there's someone further up the boat that needs saving? Good evening.
There are none so blind as those who will not see.
There are none so bloody as He who won't take a hint and scram.
I'll pray for you, Sir.
Yeah, you do that, Numbnuts.
And there it should have ended. But it was not to be. For having decided that there was at least ONE soul on this ferry that was in dire need of saving, Mr. Have-You-Heard-The-Good-News decided to set up shop not 10 feet away. The Lecture had begun. He began to pour forth a load of rubbish that was so from left field (even for those in this captive audience Washed in the Blood) that even those who DID want to hear what he had to say were like "What page in the Bible was that on, Dude?".
For you see, we had before us the absolute worst of the Godbots; the ones that combine the contradictory gobbledeegook of the Gospel with the absolutely bulletproof stupidity of conspiracy theory. This was too good to ignore.
Because Jesus was an alien being, you see, and he was sent -- in human form, really he looked like something akin to a squid with an erection, I gather, a feat only made possible by the advanced scientific knowledge possessed by the inhabitants of Andromeda -- on a super-secret mission to Save the World, but he was killed before he could truly warn Mankind of it's imminent, galactic danger, and so the secret has been lost.
Except for people like Mr. Have-You-Heard-Good-News, who have had the entire inside story revealed to them in a series of visions, presumably broadcast from another galaxy and picked up on the fillings in his teeth.
You see, the Romans knew who Jesus REALLY was, and there's Scripture written to prove it. So long as you play with definitions and torture meanings.
This douchebag recited that "Scripture that Proves It", word-for-word, and if you listen carefully, the "clues" in all of these passages are evident when one bumps up against a"deliberate mistranslations" (all part of the conspiracy to obscure the Real Truth, you see) of Scripture from Aramaic-to-Greek-to-Latin-to-Vernacular. Jesus was "set up"; the Romans sent spies to see what he was up to, and then they framed him on a fraudulent tax charge (the whole "Render unto Caesar..." routine). Almost like Al Capone. The systematic re-writing, and re-editing of Scripture through the years is all part of the sinister plot (that's why there was a Martin Luther, you know. He was an alien, too, who was sent to finish what Jesus started, but he was easily lead astray and the Truth was further obscured by the Reformation).
Just who is this "They" involved in this conspiracy, and why they should do what "They" have been accused of doing, is never stated, naturally.
Anywho, the Romans had discovered the True Origin of the Extraterrestrial Savior, performed crude medical experiments upon him (related in the Bible, through "deliberate mistranslation" of course, as "scourging"), and then Crucified him, under the mistaken impression they had rid themselves of someone who was capable of destroying the Roman Empire single-handedly. How they discovered this, and how Jesus was supposed to achieve this destruction is covered by at least five verses from both Old and New Testament that must be"re-interpreted", and the"deliberate mistranslations" expunged, in order to make sense in this context.
So, Jesus is crucified, but three days later is "Resurrected"; another deliberate mistranslation, for it was really an impostor who was Crucified, and Jesus was held in the Roman equivalent of Gitmo, only secret-er, for three days, until he escaped by utilizing his amazing alien scientific knowledge to manipulate and transform matter -- powers mistakenly described as "miracles"; the water-to-wine routine, the really neat loaves-and-fishes trick, and let's not forget the perennial favorite, walking on water, just for example. He's "beamed up" by the"Mother Ship" when his Alien Overlords decide this species is too stupid to be told The Truth, never to return.
It gets worse from there, believe me. The story had so many holes in it that it was in danger of taking on water. Ignoring the pleas of the captive audience to "make some fucking sense, Dickwad!" (we New Yorkers are so polite!), our intrepid Alien Acoylete simply plowed onwards.
So, what, exactly is this "imminent" danger that has threatened to wipe out Mankind (so imminent that 2,000 years later it still hasn't occurred)? Fuck if I know! We never got that far, you see. Mr. Have-You-Heard-The-Good-News was too busy explaining all the nuances of the Conspiracy Theory and ran out of time, so that he never got to this Cosmic Truth that only he and his (presumably dumber and crazier) friends apparently know. The ferry had docked, and it was time to leave.
I walked away, quickly, trying to leave before I had to listen to more of this insanity. Mr. Have-You-Heard-The Good-News was following folks down the passage to the gangway, continuing his nonsense.
That's when Mr. Have-You-Heard-The-Good-News did, indeed, finally get his bloody nose; He got it when he walked face-first into a bulkhead, so busy chasing and haranguing the crowd hat as he turned to follow a knot of folks there was no time to avoid that protruding steel flange. I was almost on the gangway when I heard those immortal words:
Jesus Fucking Christ! I think I broke my fucking nose!
I have never laughed so hard at anything in all my life. I saw him talking to the Police inside the Ferry Terminal a few minutes later. It turns out that this idiot is an aspiring actor who does this kind of shit to both to make a few extra dollars, and to polish his mad acting skillz.
Too bad Alien Jesus couldn't use his powers over time, space and matter to save this douchebag...from a broken nose. That's gonna fuck up his glossy head shots, for sure.
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