As you may have already heard, a fanatical far, far, FAR right wing extremist in California has decreed that tomorrow (or possibly, yesterday or a few days ago, if you don't check your e-mail every day) is supposed to be the end of the world.
For a million little reasons, we're just not buying into the hype today.
For starters, even if you’re Christian and even if you believe in the rapture (or this particular model of the End of Days – there are many ), there are many different Bible verses that - as clearly as any other christian bible verse - lay out that the second coming will occur when pretty much no one is paying attention.
Since you're reading this, and since we put today's Daily Felltoon together, we're pretty sure we're all paying attention - which we think at least gives us all partial credit for saving the world today. So... Mazel Tov and thanks to you! Good job.
There's also the question brought up by a discussion of our staff members earlier this year: exactly WHEN is the end of the world supposed to occur?
Most Western media sources we've looked through seem to say it's supposed to happen on Saturday. But as far as we can tell, the insane maniac/devout fool who began this rumor thinks the rapture will happen at exactly midnight, Jerusalem time.
That puts the rapture square in the middle of the afternoon for basically all of the Western Hemisphere.
On FRIDAY afternoon - not Saturday.
Those of you that have to do end-of-week reports may be rejoicing at that news - but we really think you should hold onto your paperwork and hold off on doing your best Keith Olbermann impersonation. After all, the rapture may be tomorrow, but the end of the world isn't technically until October 21st, according to the California extremist.
Whatever you believe, we hope you live life every day as though there won't be another.
For all of us - like former Nebraska teacher and poet Bill Kloefkorn - that will eventually be the case.
Bill was a teacher, a poet, and a lover of words, all things that we admire and respect. He loved life, and enjoyed humor as much as anyone. We're fairly sure he'd agree with our advice, cliché though it is. He passed away Thursday, and we send our condolences to his friends, family, and all who knew him.
Not a single one of us truly knows when we're going to go, whether we get hit by a bus, or get yanked into the clouds by the rapture. [We're not Baptists, and at least one of us is Catholic, so we're pretty sure the folks who think the world is ending this weekend also think we're all going to Hell.]
We hope that, if nothing else comes from this non-event event, it at least brings to your attention that pithy, if not trite phase, to live life like you were dying. It may be a cliché, but someday that phrase will actually be correct for all of us.
We hope it's not this weekend though, as we have so many more things we'd like to experience in this world.
If we're wrong, and the rapture happens later today - or Saturday, midnight local time if you're in Jerusalem - we may be a bit delayed in getting out Monday's edition. Then again, since there will be fewer people on the internet and most of the internet techies we know are also likely to still be around, we could even get finished with our work early.
Guess we'll have to wait until Monday to see how it all turns out.
We hope you enjoy your weekend. Live a little. Or live a lot, if you get the time.
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