Mass hordes in retro clothing run through the streets screaming for answers; computer terminals blow-up; the dead rise from the grave only to realize the solo careers of the “New Kids on the Block” have begun to take off; Baptists dance; warm beer and some hooded guy on a horse throwing locust’s at you.
Apparently the end has come, and I didn’t receive the memo.

During century’s past and certainly present- clergy, futurists and morons of all status have feared the eventual chain of events that lead to the awe-inspiring turn of the century. Only now it happens to be a new millennium we are staring in the eyes.
Though I never have lived through such a turn I have read past accounts. This makes me as much an expert on the subject as anyone else keen enough to claim expert status from reading a book.
The end of every century has seen mass pandemonium, fear and stupidity erupt over the globe. On Dec. 31, 1999, it’s out with the old and in with the new-or maybe it’s Jan. 1, 2001. No one seems to agree or remember which date will usher our fated end. The only thing these doomsayers agree upon is that we are all probably going to die. And that, of course, is bad.
You are probably asking, “How can we avoid this?” I find the bend over and kiss technique works well in these situations. This is when we say good bye to ourselves in a non-flattering way. Other than that, the best advice I can give is, “head west young man, head west.”
There must be some mystic quality about the western United States that will save it from Armageddon. Whenever a century changes, religious nuts emerge and convince other less stable individuals to give up their property and head for the preverbal hills before the end. Oddly enough, this seems to be somewhere in Colorado or Iowa.
Depending on your frame of mind the end of the world is either a multi headed dragon, a consortium of Jewish bankers, the U.S. government, a collective thought that blinks us out of existence or another year filled with crappy high school theme movies. My conclusion: the end of the world will be messy and involve additional taxes on cigarettes.
Advances in technology have made this particular thousand-year change more frightening, and have given our friends in the doomsday department needed ammunition.
Five hundred years ago we were using our feet as transportation, not bathing regularly, killing ourselves in meaningless wars and peeing outside. While we still kill ourselves in meaningless wars, the indoor toilet has revolutionized society.
Still, ours is a technology dependent culture with computers running things. And because society is so dependent on technology, people get fruity when a glitch makes the machines go awry and then claim God is coming because they can’t pulse money or their e-mail won’t work.
Okay, maybe there is a chance that water, mass transit, money, food delivery, national defense and electronic systems of all kinds will fail. And as much as I have tried to prove to the contrary, it will not be Ronald Regan’s fault.
The reason for all the hoopla is simple; computers can’t recognize 2000 as a date to follow 1999. When the calendar changes in January, the computers will see 00 and not know what the hell is going on. It will determine 00 is 1900 and compute that itself hasn’t been invented. The machines will now collectively turn off, and then the fun starts. I guess the geniuses who invented these beauties decades ago figured we wouldn’t live through the Cold War so didn’t bother to program 2000 into their binary codes, or something like that.
The only sane way to face our impending doom is panic. Panic is the one thing humans do well. It is the time we single out everyone who does not fit the white bread, Judeo-Christian image of normal and torch’um. That last phrase is straight from the constitution. I’m sure it is next to the part about us being able to stockpile assault rifles and armor piercing bullets to hunt deer and protect ourselves from Indians and the British.
Or we could follow the dogma of our militia brethren and stock up on freeze-dried potatoes, water and Paul Newman salad dressing. We will hoard all our money and stand on the rooftops with shotguns. Defiantly we will curse the Bilderberg as passenger airplanes and Russian Topol-M2 ballistic missiles start falling. Then we can shoot anyone who might be a looter looking for our stash of radioactive retardant sheets and gasoline. It is good to know we will be ready for the end. I applaud those with the foresight to prepare.
Me, I will probably go out and get drunk like I do every new-year. I’ll wake-up with a hang over, then walk to the market and purchase some beef jerky and Marlboro menthols.
Am I Y2K compliant? Damn straight.
Life is too short to waste worrying about events you can’t change. Have fun while you can.
If the crazies are right and the whole damn thing falls apart, so what.
I’ll be the guy standing next to you in the voucher line. Though with my luck I’ll realize about the same time the missiles are falling that I have been waiting three hours for bread in the toilet-paper line.
But that’s life, be it in the year 2 or 2000.

December 30th, 2001 at 8:59 pm in Our Fault

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