Contrast In Styles: Witness Prevention Programs

by Knorr the Interpreter

This morning the Jehovah's Witnesses dropped in on my house to save my family's souls. My wife Sally greeted them and pleasantly exhanged ecumenical viewpoints for about three minutes. Assured that our family has indeed heard the word of Jesus and can recount it with some degree of proficiency, the Witnesses left our stoop with a handshake and smiles. I was truly impressed.

You dear readers may be surprised (if not entirely shocked) that the preferred result of each and every encounter I have with other humans is one of such mutual benificence, since I'm a raging smartass by profession. Life has taught me that the more people we can call friends, the easier life becomes to enjoy rather than simply survive. Also, it is infinitely easier to make friends with understanding and a smile than with an insult, no matter how brilliantly creative and insightful or innocent / tough-love bar-buddyish in intent it is. The instant it becomes obvious a new encouter is unwinnable, however, I'll be more than happy to verbally put that goat-porking douchenozzle in his or her place - but until proven otherwise, strangers are just friends I haven't met yet.

In my less wizened days, however, I took a harder-core look at the rest of the race. I firmly held the belief espoused in the Jon Waters classic Pink Flamingoes: "There are two kinds of people in this world... my kind of people and assholes!" My kind of people were few and far between, and the Jehovah's Witnesses fell quite comfortably in the resulting chasms. Below, I will re-enact one particular exchage between myself and some Jehovah's Witnesses who sought to shepherd unto my soul at about 9:30 on a Saturday morning (after I'd gone to bed / passed out around 4:30 am) when I was in my mid-twenties:

Jehovah's Witnesses: Good morning! We've come to share the good news of the return of Jesus with you. May we have a few minutes of your time?

Knorr the Interpreter: Return of who? [Note: This would be a good point to give you the visual - there they stand smartly dressed in collared shirts, ties, pleated pants, and preternaturally shiny shoes against the backdrop of a perfectly mostly sunny 68-degree Saturday morning. I stand before them shirtless in my underpants looking dissheveled to say the least, clutching a five-dollar magnum of Slovenian merlot emptied to its last few ounces. Yeah, I knew it was them...]

JW: Jesus, sir. Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.

KtI: Oh yeah, him. Nice guy. I gotta tell you, this isn't too good a time for me - the Black Mass ran reeeeallly late last night, and I'm flippin' whipped.

JW: Black Ma....

KtI: Yeah - you'd think a group as tight with Satan as we say we are would be able to get its worship-shit together, but last night was a total farce. Dark Lord Drachmar forgot to bring the virgin and he knew it was his turn, so we had to stop and go scrounge one up...

JW: I'm sorry... are you saying that you...

KtI: Yeah, although I may switch temples after worshipping with this group of fumblefucks last night. Come time of the sacrifice, it took Priestess Mordria like ten minutes to tie down the chicken which TOTALLY threw off the chanting groove [wine swig], then to top it all off that thing just would... not... die. I'm sure I don't need to tell you how pissed off His Unholy Darkness gets if he doesn't get his lifeforce offering before the pyre burns out...

JW: Oh. It seems we've caught you at a bad time...

KtI: Yeah, sorry about that - normally I'm glowing with His Demonaic Eminence after a decent mass, but last night sucked. Say, would you guys know the best way to get chicken blood out of a Black Mass robe? [wine swig]

JW: Sorry to have bothered you, Sir. God be with you. [They turn to leave... rather quickly]

KtI: Anytime, guys. [As JW walk away more than briskly] Say Hi to Christ for me... Hail Satan!