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Monday, February 11, 2013

Is the End of the World Nigh?


With the current NASA reports that an asteroid will zoom within spitting distance of Earth on Saturday, memories of the beat up revolving around the prediction of Armageddon on December 21, 2012 spring to mind. 

I was on holidays in the lead up to the ill-omened day. 

The Mayans had documented the end of their calendar and certain speculators took this to be a prophecy of world annihilation. 

With spare time on my hands (despite the fact that I had not done an iota of Christmas shopping; I mean what was the point if we were going to be wiped out?), I decided to read a few doomsday books to get myself in the mood. 

Scotto and I feasted on a myriad of movies of the same genre, scaring ourselves silly in the process.

On the actual day my sister Sam, jokingly sent me a text saying,

“Hope the end of the world treats you well today xo”

Ha ha, I laughed to myself nervously. 

I’d begun to psych myself into a lather of uneasy doubt with the huge volume of disaster porn I’d been consuming.

Jumping at every abnormal vibration in the house; thinking it might be the beginning an earthquake, a tsunami or the four horsemen of the Apocalypse galloping down my street, I decided to leg it up to the shopping centre so that I wouldn't have to spend the ‘Day of Reckoning’ alone.

“It must be the apocalypse. There are so many zombies here at Kmart.” I texted my sister.


Sam replied, 

“Omg- big, smelly ones that walk really slowly three abreast and too brain dead to care that someone behind them wants to get past? I know them well.”

(Now I know the pair of us sound condescending and snobby but I assure you the sleepwalkers had really crawled out of their graves on this particular day. I won’t go into detail, but let me just say that inter-family marriages were flourishing in this suburb by the look of the little Anferny and Antwonet trailing behind their rat-tailed Mum and Dad.)

Anyway I got the giggles when I read my sister’s reply. I wandered through the aisles bursting into spontaneous loud cackling. 

This attracted a few suspicious stares as I was by myself and must have looked like a nutty bag lady having a conversation with herself. 

I guess this was fair payback for the mean assessments of my fellow shoppers.

I hate shopping centres but unfortunately I have to frequent these annoying establishments pretty much every day. 

If I did a bulk weekly shop like most mothers the food would disappear in two days. I have secret hiding places for certain non-perishable items such as packets of chips for school lunches. 

My friends are often entertained when I pull out a bottle of coke and chocolate biscuits from the dishwasher. 

That’s one place I know the kids never look.

I’d heard via the telly that the cataclysm was scheduled for about ten o'clock in the morning Australian time. 

By ten thirty I resigned myself to the fact that the end of the world was not going to occur on December 21 after all. 

Crap! I thought. Now I have a sh#tload of Christmas shopping to catch up on.