Do you feel left out of the millennium madness? Not quite sure how the world is going to end? Well, I’ve compiled all the prophecies you’ll ever need for the year 2000. (But not for you Jews. You had your second millennium 3,760 years ago and you blew it. Same thing for you Imperial Han Chinese.)
Let’s begin with the most famous person ever: Nostradamus. He predicted the end of the world several times, as well as the clock, the calculator, the dog, and sliced bread. Kindergarten teachers across the nation consider his cryptic quatrains to be the most accurate misinterpretations of poetry ever written. For example, he predicted the Crimean War in the famous quatrain:
The bird of prey flies to the window, When old trends become popular anew, Evil before conflict with France makes preparations, Something will happen and it will be bad. In a more obscure quatrain, Nostradamus discusses the 20th century: > The Lion shall lie with the Eagle, The Great Bear walks with four dukes, Up from the ground came a bubbling crude, JFK will be shot in Dallas in 1962. We know this prediction is false because the date is inaccurate. It states that the Soviet Union will collapse after the Gulf War, which any non-American high-school student knows is wrong. Fortunately, Nostradamus wasn’t the only senile white male to see the future.
Affectionately referred to as “the Beast of the Apocalypse” by his mother, the renowned psychic Aleister Crowley wrote several journals full of prophecies using a Ouija Board and some pigeon blood. His most famous collections are Waiting for Godot until September Thirteenth, Nineteen Ninety-Seven, Gray’s Sports Almanac, Green Eggs and Your Imminent Demise and The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Cunnilingus. These chilling excerpts deal with the end of the millennium: “It will be the best of times, it will be the worst of times, but specifically it will be 1998. There is probably going to be a war somewhere. People will be starving and there will possibly be an alliance of nations. Due to cultural changes, comedy will only be funny when it is about sex or it is animated. Ellen will be gay, and the last episode of Seinfeld will suck. So will Star Wars: Episode One. Millions upon millions will prepare to celebrate the end of the millennium one year early, and nobody will give a damn. And that discoloration on your thigh is just a rash, Nathan.”
Respected Berkeley bullshit artist Professor Ken Jowitt has also made some startling revelations about the future: “In the next decade, sociopolitical boundaries will become clouded, unclear and unattenuated resulting in the isolation, consolidation and transformation of various states, regimes and-Sit down! No, just sit down and shut up, got it? I’m talking up here… None of you will ever amount to anything.”
As for me, I’ll continue to follow my personal favorite prognosticator, L. Ron Hubbard. In one of my favorite passages in Dianetics he writes, “Life energy is the center of awareness. The mind is coating a thetan, and the thetan is the person himself. Give all your money to the Church of Scientology, and maybe your computer won’t break in 2000. What, you’re too good for Tom Cruise and John Travolta?” Preach on, L. Ron, preach on.
