TomFlannery.com

I’m told the world will begin to end on Saturday. Or something like that. The swell people will slip out of their clothes and float up into the clouds. The rest of us are doomed I guess……left to pick up the pieces and to await eternal damnation. This will take approximately 5 months. No idea why so long, unless it’s just a lot of paperwork and stuff. The actual end of the world is set for October 21st, 2011, which messes up Halloween for my kids….but I hate Halloween so the date is fine with me. Plus, at least I can watch half a season of college football. The Pros will be on strike. Great timing guys.

I imagine they’ll be lots of real estate available all of a sudden. There’s some nice houses I’ve got my eye on. With pools and killer landscaping and lots of privacy trees. I hope the owners don’t disappoint me by being craven sinners. My friend and frequent writing partner Mike Stevens says he wants a tractor and some root beer. Mike’s always been a modest guy.

I looked into this rapture thing and found that if you’re one of the chosen and you just happen to be driving 80 miles and hour on route 81 you’ll be lifted and your car is pretty much on its own. How much of a suck-fest would it be to get run over by a riderless car? You’ll need a helluva lawyer. At least we know they’ll be lots of them still around when it’s over.

This was supposed to happen a while back but the rapture people admitted that they miscalculated the date. A simple mathematical error. You’d think with something as important as the end of the world they’d get the formula right.

But this time they’ve nailed it. They promise. 1844. 1914. 1981. 1988. 1989. 1992. 1993. 1994. All mistakes. Sorry about the inconvenience.

It’s all supposed to start with an earthquake in New Zealand. I’m writing from memory now but I’m pretty sure it’s New Zealand. This will happen early Saturday morning (New Zealand time or EST I do not know), and trigger a chain of cataclysmic events that promise to be quite nasty. I checked Saturday’s weather and they’re calling for sun and temps in the 70s….hardly an armageddon-like forecast. But they’ve been wrong before.

My daughter has a softball game on Sunday but the coach says he’ll cancel if he doesn’t have enough players. He did say he’s got no worries about the unavailability of umpires.

Most of us I expect will sleep through this. I don’t think people floating off into the sky will make a lot of noise, unless they’re scared of heights and start screaming. I’m certainly not going to set my alarm, in any event. I don’t want to hear insufferable Bible-freaks taunting me from above on my only day to sleep in.

Sunday mass will be interesting….since anybody there by default is doomed no matter how much repenting they do. Day late and a dollar short you might say….the ultimate in wishful thinking. And lots of dirty looks for the priest. I expect a lot of looting and mayhem and fornication and boozing and people going off their diets. I’ve decided I’m not going to cut my grass anymore. One good thing is no more Fox News, since they’ll obviously all be gone to the good place. We’ll be stuck with Dan Rather to narrate it all. I’m guessing the Home Shopping Network will have t-shirts and hats to sell by the evening. They’re pretty fast off the mark.

I just hope we don’t lose our internet connection.

In a bit…

–tf