Millenium Revisited

I wrote this back in 1999. Thankfully I was wrong...funny... but wrong.. Or was I? The latest prediction I found when doing a search in 1999 was that the world would end in 2006, so there is time yet....Not much mind, but George Bush is eager to make sure we meet the deadline isn't he?


MILLENIUM

Whenever Robbie Williams sings, “we’ve got stars directing our fate,” I come over all homicidal. My skin starts to crawl. I get a sudden urge to grab that microphone and shove it somewhere unprintable. That would give the little fresh-faced, scallywag, pop-meister something to really cry to the angels about.

But perhaps I should be more charitable, because after all, there isn’t much time left. The millennium Bug is gonna wipe us all off the face of the earth real soon. No, really, ...it will.

I’m not joking; it’s really coming. The four horsemen are adjusting their stirrups and oiling their saddles as I speak. End times my friends, doom, destruction, the final curtain. Aufwiedersehen pet. There is no use the IT department sending reassuring memos round the office. At midnight on December 31st the clock isn’t just going to tick over, it is going to stop ticking altogether. Kaboom and arrividerchi.

How do I know? Well, it stands to reason doesn’t it.

Can it really be a coincidence that the ancient Mayans, St John the Divine, Pope Leo IV, Mother Shipton, Nostradamus and my Auntie Nellie[1] have all pinpointed the end of the world to within the next seven years. Call me hysterical, but I saw all four Omen movies and little Damien Van Horne looked a lot like a young Bill Gates. They call it a ‘bug’ and give it a logo and nobody seems to worry any more. “Don’t get worked up”, they say, “its not a big problem.” Well forgive my cynicism, but isn’t Ebola just a bug too. You get a bit of that in your fridge and people start to worry all right.

You could try to take precautions against the Millennium bug. No, no, don’t try to fix all the millions of computer chips that control every aspect of your existence. That would be a futile waste of time. You have to invest your time wisely. A government official has gone on record as saying it might be wise to stock up on some tinned goods, just in case there are some short-term disruptions to deliveries as a result of the millennium bug. Now I don’t know about you, but when I hear a junior minister recommend a spot of panic buying, its time to get the brown trousers out. We need survival tactics. Firstly, the biggest problem come midnight on New Year’s Eve will be the planes and satellites dropping from the skies in their thousands. I recommend a really hard hat and a thick coat to protect you from unforeseen debris such as fragments of red-hot engine casing. Staying indoors might be a good idea, although people who currently live in Windsor[2] might want to consider visiting family and friends elsewhere.

Even the guys in the office are at it. Have you heard of the ‘Business Recovery Plan’? The big guys in sharp suits are auditing everyone to find out what steps we could take to keep the business running in the event of an undefined catastrophe (forgive my cynical italics). Innocent questions like, “Could you work from home?” “Would you need a phone?” “Do you have access to a supply of bandages and Geiger counters?” The boys and girls at head office are sitting around in life rafts drawing lots for who gets to eat whom first. I say we should join them. Lets forget all this stiff upper lip stuff and endulge ourselves in a health bout of blind panic and terror.
I was having a quiet panic attack about all this the other day, so I went to see a friend called Graham who is involved with a Church group.[3] He explained it all clearly. Apparently, we are in for about eight months of real unpleasantness as the Satanic Beast flexes his powers of destruction. About 10,000 people will get ‘The Rapture’ which is where they get sucked up to heaven by a giant hoover for ringside seats to watch the rest of us get medieval on each other until the whole planet is engulfed in a wave of pestilence, bestiality, evil, sickness and horror. To quote Graham directly, “There will be great wailing and gnashing of teeth and terrible noises which chill the soul ...”, which kind of brings me back to Robbie Williams doesn’t it …

Chris
[1] My Grandad’s sister who famously predicted the Belgian invasion of the Isle of Man in 1942.
[2] Heathrow Airport, Runway 2b Approach Run Alpha…need I say more?
[3] I say Church group, but they do get a listing in a book called “ Secret Cults and Societies in the United Kingdom.” For some bizarre reason, Graham is proud of this.

Ego tripping

Have you checked out http://www.morepopularthanjesus.com/ where you can find out whether you are more popular than jesus or not?

Try it, then, as the site puts it, go find a god botherer and tell em all about it.

Farewell Crocodile Botherer

Too too easy to laugh at the tradgic loss of Steve Irwin. He leaves a family in mourning... and a hell of a lot of reptiles and sharks feeling pretty smug.