Boys and girls, you only get one chance to die in this life:
Most people are familiar with the “bucket list”, which are all those things that advertisers want you do/spend money on before you expire, but this concept is really unfair. A lot of people who die don’t really plan for it to happen. What if you ran out of time? Bucket lists just make dead people feel guilty for not finishing them.
On the other hand, there is plenty of time to accomplish things AFTER you’re dead. In fact, one might say time ceases to be an issue at all. That also means you have no excuses. So here are some activities I’d recommend once you pass on to a less corporeal realm.
1. Rigor Mortis
Do you guys remember the song “Baby Get Shaky” by the Ian Carey Project? I do because it was no. 2 on the charts in Australia the year I was there. Anyway, the song encourages you to get shaky “after school”, which is probably just an extended metaphor on the afterlife. Rigor mortis is best done in the company of unsuspecting family members who do not know what rigor mortis is. It’s really your last chance to get some exercise out of your cold, decaying, now-lifeless body before you transcend this plane of existence and become a blob of ectoplasm.
2. Read Dante’s “The Inferno”
One of the classic works on the geography of the afterlife, it was questionable at the time whether or not Dante had firsthand travelling experience at the sites he claimed to visit. Still, it’s a good primer for what you MAY expect once you arrive at your post-retirement retirement home. And even if it turns out to be a load of bullshit, it’s still cleverly written and an important addition to the western literary canon, and even among the dead, I imagine it pays to be knowledgeable.
3. Ghost Group Sex
I would like to introduce a new word into the vocabulary:
ECTOGASM: the act of supernatural arousal within ghostly bodies, and the resulting ejaculate matter, which still maintains a surprisingly sweet, nutty, taste
4. Visit the Eiffel Tower
y5. Photo-bomb Pictures of the LivingSo what if you’re dead? The Eiffel Tower is one of the greatest landmarks of the 19th century, still the tallest structure in France and an impressive example of good crowd management (much more so than the Empire State Building). As a ghost, you should be able to avoid the cramped elevator by simple floating up the stairs to the observation levels. The restaurant is expensive, but tickets for visiting dead tourists are probably discounted from the original price. It really is a must see experience, one that promises to stay with you for the rest of your afterlife existence.
5. Photo-bomb Pictures of the Living
As far as haunting goes, nothing beats see the look on living faces when they realize their visit to the cemetery, or the grocery store, was joined by spirits previously unseen. Be careful, however, to make sure that your pose and presentation appear plausibly ghost-like, or else you’ll be mistaken for a photoshopped hoax. Don’t try to mimic any magazine pictures or old photographs of yourself from when you were still alive. Don’t play around with false perspective and don’t joke around and appear as an abstract shiny blob of light, because the idiots will just mistake it for a camera malfunction.
6. Party It Up in Purgatory
Reaching hell is a pretty tough accomplishment for the goodies, and even then, it’s just too hot to have a really good time. But purgatory is a great place where you can “bend the rules”, be discreet, maybe do a little gambling or sexy time with a dead Marilyn Monroe look-a-like (there are literally about 100 million fake celebrity ghosts). If the whole thing seems a little tacky to you, well, yeah, that’s the idea. It’s purgatory. If you wanted paradise, you should have tried harder.
7. Haunt Your Living Relatives…On Twitter
Thus far, ghosts and other supernatural beings have seemingly avoided social media. Sure, there are plenty of dead people on twitter-Abraham Lincoln, Mozart, etc-but unfortunately the authentic accounts of dead people are crowded out by fake ones. In fact, it’s possible that dead people have fake twitter accounts of living people, which just makes it even more confusing!
For a truly ghostly experience, try starting up an account on myspace.
8. Float Out of An Airplane
No parachute necessary! Just bring the camera, shout something hilarious, and exit out of the emergency windows (without opening them, of course).
9. Call Someone Up Just to Say You Love Them (and listen to them freak out because you’re dead)
10. Look in the Mirror…And See Nothing
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