Keep checking in!
9:55: It's rather cold outside. Winter has been temperate until this day. I think the sudden onset of bad weather may be a sign of the end.
Also, I found a pair of high-quality Italian brown dress shoes in a thrift store for the strange and unnatural price of two dollars. I may go back there to buy the black monk strap shoes for the same price. But there doesn't seem to be much point to doing so, what with the world ending and all.
12:45 pm: Strangely, the world still exists. Could the ancient Mayans have been wrong? Impossible. They were ancient, and everyone knows that ancient people possessed mysterious wisdom.
3:30: I had a troubling dream in which my dog got lost in an office building. Then I found her. Such a vision must surely presage the Apocalypse.
4:45: My ladyfriend called, wondering what to buy for her twelve year old niece (who, due to some freakish substance being put into our food supply, looks about 23 years old). I told her her choice of Christmas gift matters not since the world is ending. My ladyfriend, unconvinced by this reasoning, thought that maybe she should buy a t-shirt for her niece, something with kind of a punky 80s edge to it. Perhaps she can find one that says: "It's the end of the world as we know it"?
5:00: Still unsure about the monk strap shoes. I've never owned shoes with buckles before -- too flashy; not my style. On the other hand, they are Italian and cost only two dollars. If this is the end of the world, perhaps I should meet it wearing Italian leather with fancy buckles.
5:20: My ladyfriend is still out there, prowling the stores, still unsure as to what to get her niece. I suggested an oversized book about art with lots of pictures in it, purchased at the discount book place. Such a volume will seem like a really expensive present even though it won't cost very much.
And yet -- that choice would be folly. The niece will never get a chance to read said book. Why? Because the world will end today. I know it will. The Mayans said it, I believe it, and that settles it.
5:23: What if we did die, and this is what the afterlife looks like?
6:30: Had some leftover Pizza Hut. Good Doomsday food. Maybe I'll head over to Mickey D's to grab some coffee. If that thrift store is still open, I'll take it as a sign. Omens...omens are everywhere...
7:00: My ladyfriend tells me that she met someone working in a Wal-Mart who knows French. Unreal! Not only that: Earlier today, I crossed a street in Baltimore -- and a driver actually slowed down when he saw a pedestrian in a crosswalk. Repeat: In Baltimore. Can there be any doubt that we have entered upon a time of high paranormality?
7:30: That store was closed, so it looks like I'll be journeying to the hereafter wearing brown shoes and a black belt. If Saint Bernadette sees me like this, I'll be mortified.
10:05: Y'know, I'm starting to think that maybe there won't even be an apocalypse today. Maybe it'll be one of those localized apocalypses, or a symbolic apocalypse, like the ones in Alan Moore comic books.
There have been at least three world-ends in the Moore ouvre -- in Watchmen, Miracleman, and Promethea. Promethea is his masterpiece in the medium (especially the qabala sequence), but it all ends with an apocalypse so lame that it barely even counts as an apocalypse. It's a Grand Anticlimax.
The way I'm feeling right now is similar to the way I felt when I read the end of that series. Look, I don't want to hear any crap about a "new way of thinking" or "a new course for humanity" or any of that other New Agey horse manure. What I want is very simple -- volcanoes and comets and earthquakes and tidal waves and zombies and mass violence and exploding suns, all ending in the TOTAL FUCKING ANNIHILATION OF ALL EXISTENCE EVERYWHERE. Is that too much to ask for?
Goddamn Mayans. They let me down.
12:52 AM: As a reader kindly pointed out, I live on the East Coast and the Mayans lived out west. So, technically, it is still December 21 in Maya-Land. There's still a chance.
I note that Demi Moore has left that big goon from TV. I've always liked her. She's free, and that's the good news. The bad news is that she'd probably never sleep with me -- except, maybe, perhaps, if I were the last man on earth.
Come on, Mayans! Help me out here! I'm beggin' ya!
4:12 AM: Y'know, if this sort of thing keeps up, I'm never going to trust an ancient Mayan again.
17 comments:
Still here. I'll be on the road all day headed for Philly. I'll send a flash on my phone if Rt 81N starts to buckle or shake or do whatever.
My youngest called last night to say good-bye :0). Understand end-of-the-world parties have been in full tilt. The end times! Party on.
Peggysue
I saw signs of the impending doom, just this am.
Obots extraordinaire are saying 'obama is too centrist; too militaristic'
Apocalyptic Apsostasy !
Ben
"keep checking in...'
You were joking, right Joseph?
Ben
Get the monkstraps!
Get the Monkstraps!
I raised two girls pretty much on the idea that giving them anything related to playing strategy games, art supplies, and anything related to nature and science is good.
Anway, I now have a doctor and a stock broker ...
That's not to mention my amazon grlss Brownie/Daisy Troop who are now also in equally scientific successful careers ... one's an anthropologist that does CSI type stuff. So ... here's my suggestion
and it's a board game. Also, I'm well known for dragging children to our family cabins in Colorado for weeks on end with no tv, computer connections, etc.
Board game named Carcassonne. More suggestions as required. If all else fails, go to the nearest art store and just buy all the paints,etc you can afford or go to a music store and buy things that make joyful noises.
I also bought Dr. Daughter a greatbmicroscope in first grade and loaded her up with awesome slides from there on out ... go to stores with European toys ... preferably Scandinavian and german ... avoid anything sold by Mattel
kat, I never heard of Carcassone before. I mean, I've heard of the city -- I've seen pictures -- it looks amazingly gorgeous, and I would love to visit. But I didn't know about the game until just now.
Looks pretty interesting, although it is rather expensive. But there's an app for that...and the app is cheaper.
Joe you are in the Eastern time zone, the Mayans lived in what is now the Mountain Time zone, you got a couple of hours before the end of 12 21
Thank you, Mike. There's still hope!
Joseph, you fool. Many experts actually say the world ends on December 23!
http://www.greatdreams.com/end-world.htm
Remembering a plot conceit from Eco's Foucault's Pendulum, don't forget the calendar got jumped forward a couple weeks with the replacement of the Julian calendar with the Gregorian calendar.
In the story, this caused an ancient prophesized event to occur later than was thought by using the adjusted calendar time.
Not saying the Mayans themselves went with the Gregorian calendar, but, and, that is the point, as we in the west, and not in the Eastern Orthodox Rite, have.
"So, you're telling me there is a chance?!?!?!" (-- Jim Carrey's character Lloyd in .
XI
T-shirt with punky slogan? It's got to be "NO FUTURE!" (Or maybe that's what you were getting at? 'Punk' seems to mean different things - sometimes very different - in different countries.)
Been too sick to worry about it. But I was exactly where was when we the Y2K bug was supposed to end it all. So what's next?
Hey, we had an Apocalypse!! Everyone is a zombie!
The Mayans were clever people. They based their mathematical designs and studies on the numbers 20 and 13. The "end of the world" is the exact same day as the day when the sun is exactly in the center of the universe, a phenomenon that occurs every 26,000 years, which happens to be exactly double 13, aka, half out, half back.
Something brilliant was going on beyond our scope.
feel Better bob. I eat thinly sliced garlic with whole wheat bread, it seems to do the trick.
Should have written, the sun is momentarily positioned at the center of the MIlky Way Galaxy.
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