Where Were You Dec. 21?

Being a seer is a pretty cushy occupation. One of my old college buddies, Jim McCurdy, after trying business courses with moderate success decided to study meteorology. Shortly after his graduation, he landed a weather forecaster job at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport. Jim said it was the best job in the world. He couldn’t fail.

“When our predictions don’t work out quite right, we just say some highly unusual pattern developed at the last minute,” McCurdy said. “Everybody knows the weather is fickle, so nobody puts any blame on us.”

Something like that happened in many places Dec. 21, as we awaited the end of the world or the start of a new Mayan calendar cycle, depending on whose tea leaves you were reading. A convention center near Mayan ruins at Chichen Itza on Mexico’s Yucatan Penninsula was popular.

About a thousand shamans, seers, stargazers, yogis, sufis, and swamis gathered to participate with self-appointed leader Alberto Arribalzaga in experiencing spirals of light entering their heads. This phenomenon was expected to “generate powerful vortexes that cover the planet.” 

We’ve been to Chichen Itza. I was not terribly impressed, so it was easy to resist any impulse to go there to celebrate either the end of the world or the launching of a new one. As it turned out, being there could be dangerous. The guardian of the “sacred flame” burned a finger handling the kindling wood. He later had to scoop up a burning log that was knocked out of the brazier and threatened to start a blaze that might have destroyed the wooden stage.

Many celebrants from distant places raised their arms high toward the sun after it ushered in “cosmic dawn.” Unfortunately, those with fair skin suffered painful sunburns for their trouble, a fate that could have befallen me had I made the pilgrimage to the Yucatan.

These reports made me feel good about my decision to stay home. Seeking to bolster my confidence that the world was not going to end, I spent part of the day performing pelvic muscle contractions, an exercise that can improve one’s bladder control. I believed that would do more good for the world, at least my immediate world, than anything I could have accomplished in Mexico.

Meanwhile the good mystics at Chichen Itza settled down once they realized apocalypse was not going to be now and proclaimed on Dec. 22 the start of a new era. Celebrants said they had witnessed the “birth of a new and better age.”

If that turns out to be true, I promise to hurry off to Chichen Itza and hug every Mayan I can find, but only after applying generous amounts of sun screen. We might have to wait another 5,000 or so years for the Mayan New Age to fully develop, so for now let's just wish each other a Happy New Year.

Hold That Celebration


All sorts of reports appeared over the weekend of people in many places partying and cracking bad jokes because it appeared that the forecast Judgment Day and associated Rapture transporting the worthy to heaven was just another false alarm.


Well, hold on there a minute, folks.


It is true that Judgment Day did not start at 6 p.m. on May 21 in New Zealand with an earthquake as the prophesy said it would. And nothing spectacular happened at 6 p.m. as we progressed through the other time zones. But that is not cause for celebration or ridicule. The preacher who launched the whole idea surely will point this out as soon as he has had a chance to think things through.


A quick check of the status of most of my friends and acquaintances shows all are still with us. But we would have to check the missing person lists worldwide to be sure others were not raptured soon after their clocks struck six. It’s a little embarrassing to admit, but few if any of my contacts have unblemished records. I may have committed a few minor transgressions myself. It is, therefore, not surprising that none of us vanished over the weekend.

If the bar was set very high, it just could be that only a dozen or so humans qualified to rise into the kingdom on the 21st. The rest of humanity, according to the prophesy, will get what’s coming to us between now and October 22. During that time, a series of catastrophes will extinguish many lives throughout the world. On the 21st, presumably at 6 p.m. although the prophet didn’t state the hour for this event, the world will end in a fiery ball.


Looking at things this way explains something that’s been bothering me. Following my generous offer (see May 11 post) to accept excess assets from all who believed they were too wealthy to make it into heaven, I received only two responses. One fellow blogger sent me a bill for $40,010.00, after calculating that his net worth was under water. The other respondent mailed a check for $1.37.


It’s too late now to make yourself more attractive by shedding your cash. You’ll all just have to join me in toughing it out until fall. Then we can party with confidence.

Let Me Save You


We have been assured by Christian fundamentalist Harold Camping and his followers that the long-awaited Judgment Day is May 21. That gives us only ten more days of normal life.


The Geezer was concerned. A quick google of “Judgment Day” turned up all the biblical arguments and associated mathematical formulas that Camping says prove beyond a doubt we all will be brought to judgment on the 21st. Further, after a period of Rapture in which the “elect” will be taken up into heaven, the world will end on October 21. The webpage evidence was overwhelming. It made a believer of me.


Being convinced we now are living in the last few day’s of the history of earth, I did a little more Internet searching for details about just who the “elect” may be. Well, I found precisely who they will not be.


The Christian bible says, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God.” Wow! That’s pretty clear. We can assume that rich women, except for very skinny ones, also are excluded from entering the pearly gates. In the days Matthew allegedly penned the words, men didn’t feel much obligation to give spending money to their ladies, which probably explains the discriminatory language.


Some fundamentalists have tried to wiggle out of the clear biblical meaning by claiming the “eye” really is a narrow street or gate, so only the chubbiest of billionaires would have to be concerned. A majority of religious thinkers, however, say those who put forth this view are full of camel dung. The needle is a needle, and needles don’t have big eyes. And camels have big humps.


Unfortunately, nowhere in the bible is there a concise, or any other, definition of “rich.” So we are left on our own to figure that out. At least in America, almost everyone who is not extremely wealthy took a real kick in the assets during the last two years. So, it seems fair to define as “rich” any person whose net worth at the moment exceeds $10.


After pondering the situation at length, I have decided to sacrifice myself to save vast numbers of my fellow citizens. After all, I have lived a long and satisfying life. It is now time to dedicate what few days remain to others.


If you are nervous about your wealth, you can wrest yourself from among the rich guys who are going to unpleasant places on October 21 by cashing everything in and sending me the difference between your liquified assets and $10. Hurry. This offer definitely expires at midnight May 20. After that, it's a crap shoot.


Should the million-to-one chance that the fundamentalists are wrong actually happen and we are still here on October 22, I will cheerfully return all of your cash (except for a minor administrative fee of 5 percent to cover postage, transportation, and office expenses).


No need to thank me. The joy of giving myself up for a good cause will be reward enough.