We at the eXile have wasted many years, and many gallons of bile, seething over the crap that makes America's bestseller list. Now we've decided to act. Starting this issue, we're going to rewrite the bestsellers, improving them to the point where they actually make some sense to right-thinking folks like us. Our goal is to try to clean up some of the toxic literary waste out there and beautify the landscape. Our Indian eyes have been squirting dignified tears for too long.
Our first issue, we are rewriting the bestseller, The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible, by A. J. Jacobs
What follows is an excerpt from the improved version: My Day of Killing Biblically: One Man's Insane Quest To Follow The True Unexpurgated Bible, Rather Than The Sanitized PG-Version of The Bible That The Secular-Humanist Fraud Jacobs Followed, by Mark Ames.
* * *
The first thing I did when I decided to spend a day following the Old Testament exactly as it was written was to head out to the Santa Monica pier.
When I came upon a couple of lice-ridden homeless people, I could feel the hand of God was upon them. I could smell it, in fact--the odor of old cheese and shit-crusted underwear. Yahweh is the type of God who leads us by signs, and this shit stench was as clear a sign as any.
Yahweh's favorite bestseller rewrite.
"'Scuse me," I said, "anyone here a certified schizophrenic? Hellooo?!"
"Blrhreh."
"Anyone? Hello? I'm looking for the schizo in the bunch? Anyone hear voices? I'm looking for the guy who's been hearing Yahweh. Which one is it? Is it the one with the piss smell or the shit smell? Come on people, I need answers, don't got all day here!"
I kicked a few of them, but they were all lifeless and could only mumble.
Just then a bearded man with no shirt on, and a face that looked like an old callous, ran up as if to attack me, then backed away when he got close. He started twitching like Joe Cocker, babbling, "Shit two fucker waffle batter batter swing batter batter!"
"A prophet!" I said.
"Two shit shitty fuckerball shit fuckerball!"
"Yea, it is He!"
"Yea he! He he he--who not fuckerball!"
"Fuckerball?" I asked. "What strange angel doth thou speaketh of, that he is named Fuckerb--"
"Fuckerball, ah! The fuckin' cops, man, the fuckin shitball fuckerball George Bush all around!"
"Wait, let me get this down," I said, pulling out my pen and paper. "Okay, keep going. Is this a vision from an angel, or is Yawheh talking direct?"
"Ahh!!!!"
"Ahh? Okay, one 'ahh' means 'angel,' two 'ahh' means 'Yahweh.'"
"AHGGGahhh!" He was suddenly terrified, eyes darting. He kicked the air. I could not understand his strange and holy message.
"What is it?" I asked, looking around, fearful of Yahweh's presence.
"Ahhggahhh!" The Prophet ran away.
After I finished writing down "Ahhggahhh," I realized that our Biblical religion needed to grow and spread. To do this, first we, the Ahhggahhites, needed to claim our Holy Land, as given to us by God in a Covenant. I figured that our land would be the first two blocks between Wilshire and Santa Monica, and 2nd street and Ocean. Pretty good real estate, bound to be several centuries' worth of pointless killing over this holy region.
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