Fasting Is Just Esperanto For Eating Fast

Oy fucking vey (OFV), it's almost that time of year again: Atonement Day.

Atoning. Why is this necessary? Isn't it enough that I feel bad about all the shitty things I've done?  As I told my kids all their lives, the important thing is that you feel bad. 

And then you overeat afterwards so you feel shame. 

Hey, instead of having to fast on Yom Kippur, we should overeat. THAT would totally make us feel remorseful.

The problem with fasting is that I feel so virtuous. Like I could go out and commit a transgression against humanity because, you know, I'm fasting and therefore beyond reproach. When my clothes aren't tight I am king of the world. I am superior to everyone else. I don't care about war or pollution or the working class poor. (Note to self: this might be where Trump's hubris comes from. Loose clothes.)

Check out the pony-tailed, baseball-capped Lululemoned chicks at Whole Foods loading up their carts with wheatgrass juice, extolling the virtues of a fast. First of all, if it's a JUICE fast, it's not really a fast, is it? I mean, I have gone twenty-four hours eating only Wheat Thins, Laughing Cow cheese and rum Cokes. Can I call that a fast?

Oh I can? Sweet.

Those wheatgrass bitches are looking into my cart, making me feel bad about myself, while telling me how their poops just float to the top of the toilet bowl (which, evidently, is a good thing. For me, it's a sign that my toilet is about to overflow.) There is nothing about fasting that appears to make them want to atone for their sins and repair the world. They look positively satisfied.

Too bad they're not Jewish. They would totally look forward to Yom Kippur. Imagine the airborne poops they could produce.

When I OVEReat, getting back to my point, I feel as though I should wash the feet of the poor and detail their cars because I am fat and unworthy. Everyone is better than I am when I overeat.

What is it about fasting that makes people feel so virtuous? Truly, this is a ruling class phenomenon. I mean, I doubt if actual starving peoples boast about not having eaten to other actual starving peoples. And high-five each other about it. And walk away thinking, "Man, that guy is amazing. I wish I had the willpower to not eat for twenty-four hours."

Holy shit, my fellow Jews. We have been doing Yom Kippur wrong for seven thousand years. Get me a pen and some Wite-Out. I am going to rewrite the Bible.

"And this shall be a statute for ever unto you: that in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, ye shall afflict your souls BY SECRETLY FINISHING OFF TWO PERSONAL SIZED PIZZAS WHILE DRIVING HOME WITH A LARGE FAMILY SIZE PIZZA FOR DINNER, and do no work at all WHICH MEANS GOING TO GREAT HARVEST BREAD COMPANY INSTEAD OF GOING TO WATER AEROBICS, AND DRIVING RIGHT TO THE DOOR OF THE STORE TO ROLL DOWN YOUR WINDOW AND HAVE THEM PITCH THREE LOAVES OF JALAPENO CHEDDAR CORN BREAD INTO YOUR CAR WHILE YOU CRUISE BY, whether it be one of your own country OR WHETHER YOU BE ON THE BEACH IN CABO WHEN YOM KIPPUR FALLS ON LABOR DAY WEEKEND or a stranger that sojourns among you (THE LAST TIME I LET A STRANGER SOJOURN AMONG ME I GOT AN STD, SO NO THANKS) ... It shall be a sabbath of rest unto you BECAUSE NAPS, and ye shall afflict your souls AND YOUR ARTERIES, AND RAISE YOUR CHOLESTEROL, by a statute for ever OR WHEN THE WAISTBAND ON YOUR UNDERPANTS CAUSES A WELT ON YOUR STOMACH, WHICHEVER COMES FIRST." (Leviticus 16:29, 31)"

There.

See you in Hell. Dinner's at 6.