About the author:
Descended from old English money, Vidicon was raised by spiny echidnas in the mountainous rainforests of the North American Southeast. Lured back to society by time-traveling gray/reptiloid alien hybrids posing as renegade Jesuits, he has managed to maintain his outsider's perspective and an appetite for crunchy insects. Today, Vidicon is a world-class synchronicity surfer and an unlicensed quantum mechanic. He has a fourth-degree black belt in weird.
About his bi-weekly column:
Tales from the Third Lobe are the unfocused meanderings of the World's Smartest Moron. Topics range widely over the sciences, religion, philosophy, technology, modern culture, mysticism, Vidicon's personal history and viewpoints, and whatever pissed him off in the media last week.
View all articles by Laszlo Q. V. St-J. "Vidicon" Xalieri, 2HC Columnist...
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Vidicon's Cable Guide to the AfterlifeCheck Your Wrappings
The first thing you do when you wake up is to check your wrappings. A couple hundred yards of linen may be the only thing holding your skin on these days. If you're lucky, you got some of that Ultimate Control Body Shaping stuff from Victoria's Secret, because, you know, you've been sagging and drooping for the entire duration of your nap. But linen is industry standard. Make sure the wrappings are good and tight. If anything is loose, check around our bed to see if you have sufficient supplies to cover up those unsightly nipples, at the minimum. Ass hanging out of your trousers is perfectly acceptable these days.
Check Your Head
It's a bit of a problem, isn't it? For some reason, the ancients believed you were supposed to go into your next life empty-headed. They even had a special tool for pulling the brains of the deceased out through their noses.
We just have television. It's unclear whether television is more effective than a hook shoved up through your sinuses at brain-removal, but the theory is the same. I mean, I've even heard people discussing proposed television shows interrogating each other as to whether the show I question has sufficient "hook" to compete.
Head sufficiently empty? Take stock.
If procedure has been followed, you'll at least be able to find your liver, lungs, stomach, and intestines. Your liver is in the jar with Pat Sajack's head on it, the baboon has your lungs, the dog has your stomach, and the falcon has your guts.
Did you sign up for the advanced service? Oh, god. You might need to check the manual. Here are some likely possibilities for anything else you might find missing:
Your teeth are in the glass jar with no lid on it, soaking in Pepsi. Your uvula is in the tiny jar with the chipmunk head. Don't get it confused with the squirrel, because that has your thymus. And, of course, the cat's got your tongue.
The jar with the pit-bull's head has your hyoid bone. (I'll bet you didn't even know you had a hyoid bone.) Nearby is the hippo-headed jar with your thyroid, and your esophagus and bronchial tubing is guarded by Phillip Morris. The label on the jar depends on what you smoked most often. The owl-headed thingy has your eyes in it, and the dolphin-box has both of your cochleas. The porcupine-thingy has your pancreas, the bat has your spleen, and the gecko has your car keys.
Not done by a long stretch.
All of your lymph nodes are in the jar with the bee on the top. They're pretty much mix-and-match, so just stuff them in the sockets until you run out. Islets of Langerhans are in the turtle-headed jar. Bladder is in the sheep-headed jar. Kidneys and associated tubing is the jar with the snake on it. The bunny-headed box has your testicles or ovaries, depending, and possibly your prostate, assuming you ever had one.
Your spinal cord is in the old Orange Crush bottle. The jar with the Atlantic hagfish on it is just full of mucus, so you may want to give it a miss. It's up to you.
Your heart is in San Francisco. Look up the UPS tracking number for details.
Premium Channels
That covers the Basic and Extended deals. If you signed up for the Premium package, you need to keep looking.
Your conscience is in the jar with the oak tree on the lid. Innocence is in the jar with the teddy bear on it. Youthful vigor is in the jar buried in the larger tub of dry ice. It'll have a shark on the top. Filial piety (known to the modern society as Family Values) is wedged between the pages of The Good Book. (Exact title and edition may vary by location and neighborhood.)
All of your remaining money is in the jar with the pig on top, along with any active credit cards. The toad has all your old porn in it. The jar with the clenched fist on top is full of chocolate and a spare handgun. The jar with the penguin-head on it has an assortment of remote controls and a strictly utilitarian cell phone. The can of spam has a spare AOL screen name and a randomly-assigned password. And the cookie jar has your iPod in it.
Wait a minute
Still missing your soul? You lost that when you signed up for the afterlife package. If you wanted to keep a grip on your soul, you should have worried more about what you were doing while you were alive instead of concentrating on making it to 1000-channel heaven and avoiding broadcast-only hell.
Never let them empty your head.
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Vidicon needs some liver and onions and a plate of homemade biscuits. |
