The Vatican just announced that the Pope will grant you time off in Purgatory if you follow him on Twitter.

No, I’m not kidding.

Apparently, he’s neck and neck with Kim Kardashian and determined to one-up her. So, if you follow him during the week of July 23-28 (World Youth DAY – don’t get me started on that oxymoron), reading his tweets will earn you “indulgences” – an afterlife prize usually granted only for arduous and time-consuming good works, like attending spiritual retreats, feeding the poor and helping the homeless.

But thanks to a suggestion by some intern in the Vatican’s social media department, lazy people like me can now lie on the couch, read the Pope’s tweets, and cut short our stay in the highly unpleasant netherworld. It’s like an insanely good Groupon offer for the hereafter.

But only for a limited time.

For those unfamiliar with how the Catholic religion works, Purgatory is essentially a connecting airport on the flight to Heaven, where your earthly transgressions are burned away with super unpleasant fire, and you are thus “cleansed” and good to go once you hit the Pearly Gates. “Indulgences” (a sort of time off for good behavior) shorten your sentence in Purgatory, which thus means a lot less screaming and gnashing of teeth. I’m not sure why you couldn’t be cleansed of your transgressions with a bubble bath, but hey, I don’t make the rules.

Apparently, however, the Pope does. I mean, he clearly has an “in” with God. After all, this whole “follow my tweets and get a reduced sentence” business is a major revision of the policies for indulgences and Purgatory, so he must have a very cozy relationship with the Almighty, who, one presumes, would have to sign off on such a dramatic rewrite of the rules. Because who’s gonna wanna bother with performing good works if you can read a few tweets on your smartphone and save yourself a whole mess of flesh burning?

I am not Catholic, myself. But I have to admit, I was already a bit intrigued with this religion. After all, these guys know how to throw a costume party. And seeing how buddy-buddy the Pope is with the Lord makes me think that I really should consider converting, since the Catholics obviously have the inside track.

Prior to this, Catholicism had always seemed like a lot of work: all that kneeling, confession every week, the Hail Mary’s. But now, it’s as simple as powering up your phone.

Speaking of which, I think the Pope’s voice should replace Siri on the iPhone. Because clearly, the Pope is somebody who really understands the concept of saving time.

A good friend of mine just put her cat on Prozac.

And frankly, it’s about time.

Vanity has been on an emotional rollercoaster ever since she discovered that Prince, her live-in boyfriend of five years, has been stepping out with a Persian three doors down. Who knows when we would have even found out, had it not been for the telltale kitty litter stuck to his hind paws one afternoon when he returned from his “workout” (chasing pigeons in the backyard).

There are no clay surfaces in the back yard.

I keep trying to tell Vanity that it’s not like Prince can DO anything with this slut. I mean, he lost his scrotum in a savage attack by a crazed, knife-wielding veterinarian (who, tragically, was acquitted on a technicality). So there’s not a lot of “there” there, if you know what I mean.

But Vanity maintains that this kind of cheating – emotional cheating – is far worse than physical. Now, at night, instead of enjoying a few Humans Playing With String videos on MeowTube and maybe a little scratching post yoga, Prince sits at the window and stares at the neighbor’s house. Where that whore lives.

As far as I’m concerned, he’s always been a problem. He was arrested in 2011 for rodent bashing, after a drunken assault on an unsuspecting rat at the Third Street dumpster. Why would you wanna be with someone like that, I ask her? If he’d do that to some poor mouse, what makes you think you’re not next?

“But I love him,” she yowls.

I’m hoping that the Prozac levels her out and makes her see the folly of staying with someone who so blithely cats around. Sure, she’ll probably gain a few pounds from the anti-depressant, but she’ll finally stop playing that Adele album over and over and sobbing into her Friskies.

That gets old real fast.

During the dark days of slavery (or, as it is now more commonly referred to, the Paula Deen Good Times Hour), black people were often considered 3/5 of a human being. (This notion was later scientifically disproven by dividing the number of zeroes in Oprah Winfrey’s bank account by the number in the Klu Klux Klan’s.) Once America finally realized that Black people were a full 5/5 of a human being, it was, perhaps, only a matter of time before they came to the same conclusion about gay folk.

I just didn’t think it would be this soon.

Wednesday, the Supreme Court voted in favor of gay marriage rights, which essentially granted us gay folk that extra 2/5. And I don’t know about you, but I was simply not prepared to deal with having an extra 40% of myself.

I’m a handful as it is – anal, workaholic, a tad materialistic, pushy in a politely passive-aggressive way – you know, kinda crazy around the edges. So another 2/5 just seems like overkill.

Yet, much like when you have a genie wish granted, or Jesus owes you a favor, I feel somehow obligated to make the most of this extra piece of personhood.

I just have no idea where to start.

For guidance, I looked to see what Black people did with theirs. Generally speaking, they seem to have gone to college, redefined basketball, invented hip-hop, popularized junk in the trunk, and taken over running the free world.

That’s fairly impressive. Of course, that took 150 years or so. So maybe I don’t need to wow everyone with my 2/5 right off the bat. Maybe I can just start small.

I’m thinking one fifth should go to self-esteem. I did, after all, spend the better part of a decade trying to pray the gay away. Then another decade trying to drink it away. (Of the two, I’d recommend the latter.) Having the kind of self-esteem that comes from being allowed to participate in the same rituals as straight Americans will definitely be a good use of this 20%. It could even result in some future accomplishments, like a gay hip-hop album (Straight Outta Castro) or a new version of basketball where gay guys drink cocktails and describe the outfits they would wear to play it.

The final fifth could go to forgiveness – of the people who, at this moment, are mourning the loss of traditional marriage and fearing the devastation of the family unit. I may be forced to continue forgiving them for a while, since the evidence of social change doesn’t appear overnight. But what the heck, this is bonus personhood. I can afford it.

And eventually, they’ll see that, like the Suffrage movement, and the Civil Rights movement, when everyone thinks the sky is falling, it’s really just this amazing American land – filled with a rainbow of humanity that glistens with diversity – rising up to meet it.

Maybe it’s just me, but I think those are 2/5 very well spent.

My partner, Sandy, who works from home, was out of town when I texted him with a helpful suggestion.

Just got a postcard from the DWP saying that they’re shutting off the power for God knows what reason. Probably to remind us what having no power is like before they raise our rates. You should consider staying overnight at the condo in Palm Springs and working there on Wednesday. Then you can drive home once the power’s back on.

He was, of course, quite grateful, and I silently checked myself for stigmata as I embraced my Christ-like qualities of compassion and thoughtfulness. Who needs to do an AIDS Ride or volunteer in the Peace Corps, I thought. I just notified my partner that the power was gonna be out.

As Wednesday commenced, I paused periodically to revel in the Smell Me nature of my sensitivity to others’ needs. Until I got a text from Sandy.

YOU ARE A PIECE OF WORK.

A piece of God’s greatest handiwork, I assumed he meant. Tall, and smart, and filled with virtuous qualities like selflessness and humility. I dialed his cell.

“Did you read the card from the DWP?” he said when he answered.

“Of course,” I replied defensively, almost mystically intuiting a shift in tone away from gratitude. “It said 8:00-3:30 on Wednesday. In bold type.”

“That’s right,” he replied. “8:00-3:30 on Wednesday. IN PALM SPRINGS. Where I AM.”

We own a little condo in Palm Springs that we rent out, mostly to delightful Canadian retirees who flee British Columbia in the winter to escape the Santa’s Workshop-like conditions up there. The DWP postcard, which came to our LA address, was for that condo. I had sent him TO the power outage instead of away from it.

“You’re always reminding me,” he barked, “what an amazing combination of creativity and organizational ability you have.”

“That is not true!” I yelled, inadvertently overlooking the advertising awards, book reviews and valuable suggestions on how to live his life more efficiently that I occasionally leave on the kitchen counter.

“You might wanna rethink the organizational part.”

He reminded me of the time that I got lost on the Paris metro and had to wait for him to come find me because I couldn’t decipher the maps. He reminded me of the time that he asked me to pick him up from the airport and I did, dutifully driving to Burbank airport at the appointed time. Except he was at LAX.

“Clearly,” I sniffed, “the scale is just tipping a little more towards creativity these days. I am, after all, a writer.”

“Uh-huh,” he replied. “Well, unless there’s a National Book Award or Emmy statuette on the counter when I get home tomorrow, I’m thinking the scale is tipping a little more towards 72-hour-hold.”

Come visit me. I’ll be the one enjoying three luxurious days off with catered meals and free drugs.

As we sat waiting to board the plane, the most magical thing happened. I began to feel less like someone being chased by torch-wielding villagers. My fever subsided, and the risk of blowing chunks all over any number of Chinese businessmen began to vanish.

Whew, I thought. It must have just been food poisoning. (Mental note: reexamine the value of shopping in the “expiring today” section of Fresh & Easy.) Thank God, I prayed silently, that I’m not exposing scores of unsuspecting passengers to bird flu or malaria or whatever it was I thought I had.

But by the time we arrived in Kuala Lumpur 20 hours later, I was miserable again. Thus began a three day quest for public bathrooms that did not require me to squat over a hole in the floor in order to do my bidness.

By the time we arrived in Singapore, I was finally feeling a little more human.

“I can hardly wait,” I said breathlessly, “to get on the cruise!” I had snagged, for an insanely cheap price, rooms on the back corners of the ship with 250 square foot balconies, and I couldn’t wait to get out there and pose, a drink fairly blowing out of my hand, as others looked on from their inferior balconies with envy and despair.

And then I reached for my wallet.

Now, I have always considered myself a positive person. Someone who does not allow life’s little challenges to upset my emotional apple cart.

This is, unfortunately, a self-image apparently manufactured out of thin air, for on this day, I stood in the Changi airport, behaving markedly like a 12-year-old girl forced to miss the premiere of Twilight.

“I wish I was dead!”

“Really?” Sandy replied. “That’s how you’re gonna play this?”

“I’m sick, I have no wallet, this trip is ruined! Ruined, I tell you!”

Yes, I actually said it like that.

When we arrived at the cruise ship, I phoned the Hilton in Kuala Lumpur. They had found the wallet. But getting it back to me would be something else altogether. DHL clearly thought I was a member of Al Qaeda and informed the Hilton in no uncertain terms that there are rules about overnighting a wallet stuffed with ID, credit cards and cash from one second world country to another.

“This is awful!” I shrieked.

“Why?” Sandy replied. “You’re getting your wallet back.”

“Yeah, after we get home. How am I supposed to pay for stuff on this trip?”

“We’re on a cruise ship. It all gets charged to your onboard account. When we’re touring, I have credit cards. What’s the big deal?”

“The big deal is that I am not in control!”

You may not be surprised to learn that these were not words I meant to say aloud. There was a long and painful (for some of us) silence. But in that moment, as Sandy stood gazing at me with an irritatingly ironic smile, I realized how much of my self-esteem in our relationship is predicated on my being what I perceive as the Big Man. The one who takes charge, the one who makes things happen.

“So maybe,” he said calmly, “you can let go for a few days.”

And I was forced, over the next two weeks, to let him be the one in control. To let him take care of me. Which he did, of course, with aplomb.

And I realized that it’s kind of nice to be taken care of. Sure, I have to be a little more flexible. Sure, when I’m not calling every shot I can’t always get everything my way. But I get to feel loved.

I guess even the best life lessons, the most valuable moments, come at a price.

Of course, that price is much easier to pay when you have your wallet.