Can this be? Is it even remotely possible that the end of yet
another year has rolled around?
Can this be? Is it even remotely possible that the end of yet another year has rolled around? Are you telling me that just when I’ve gotten handy at scrawling a decent “3” in the date when I write a check I’m going to have to start practicing a legible “4”? Once upon a time, a year was a substantial unit; now one slides by while I’m waiting in the express line at Safeway behind the woman who forgot her checkbook and can’t remember the PIN on her ATM card. This didn’t happen when I was young, and damn it, I want an investigation.
Nonetheless, 2003 is undeniably all but over, and among other things that means it is time for me to don my oversized robe with the really big sleeves and my conical hat with the moon and stars on it, all part of Mickey Mouse’s wardrobe in “Fantasia” which I was able to purchase on e-bay, and assume my annual role as this newspaper’s resident Top Psychic. As always, my first prediction is that I will be by at least one prediction more accurate than any tabloid Top Psychic, and as always merely making that prediction guarantees that I will be correct; we Top Psychics work in devious ways our wonders to perform. So here they go – put ’em up on your refrigerator and watch ’em come true.
I predict that in 2004 the tabloids, having grown tired of having to hallucinate story after story claiming to have discovered the Shocking Truth about Kobe Bryant’s various affairs and Scott Peterson’s various affairs, will arrive at the inevitable bombshell: “Kobe and Scott Announce Engagement, Plan Double Wedding With Ben and J.Lo! Peterson to Change His Name to S.Pet.”
I predict that in 2004 a woman will come forward and be interviewed by all the network news shows and every major newspaper, and will be featured on a special episode of Oprah because she will claim to have served with Jessica Lynch, been groped by Arnold Schwarzenegger, allowed her child to sleep with Michael Jackson and sold drugs to Rush Limbaugh. She will be sued by the Tabloid Celebrities Union for allegation-hogging, and will be sentenced by Judge Judy to a life of reasonable normality without possibility of victimization.
I predict that in 2004 Donald Rumsfeld will declare that the stumbling block to peace and democracy in Iraq is the existence of Iraq, and therefore the President has issued an Executive Order that henceforth the nation formerly known by that name shall be designated East Kansas. Baghdad shall be officially renamed Wichita, Sunnis shall be called Democrats, Shiites shall be called Republicans and the Kurds shall be called Ralph Nader. Within a month, repetitive use of the new terminology (e.g., “Cheney Reports Saddam Hiding North of Wichita Among Fundamentalist Democrats”) will have so successfully befogged the American public that the regular diet of Administration whoppers about the war will become as easy to swallow as a fine single-malt Scotch.
I predict that in 2004 Weta Workshop, the special effects studio which developed the incredibly lifelike character Gollum for the Lord of the Rings movies, will reveal that Gollum is not it’s first creation, and that for years it has been pumping out top-quality CGI characters, including major movie stars, professional athletes and national political leaders. While they refuse to say which of our most well-known public figures are actually computer-generated, employees in private conversations were overheard saying such things as, “What steroids? You have no idea how easy it is to add muscles to Barry Bonds,” and “Wasn’t that 2000 Presidential election amazing? Who would have thought we could we beat the real guy?”
They’re all true, or should be.
